Chapter One: Catalyst
And you'd be inclined to be mine for the taking
and part of this terrible mess that I'm making
but you… You're the catalyst.
Anna N.
There was a catalyst.
To be exact, it started when Naruto was five, and though the story is called Naruto, it did not start with him. It started with a tired merchant named Aiwa Maura, who was delayed in his trip to Konoha for exactly 24 minutes due to a last-minute deal. More importantly, this last-minute deal involved some silks exclusive to Iwa.
These silks would be seen by the Haruno and Yamanaka matriarchs during their motherly-bonding shopping trip. They would then delay their progress to the main playground and this, in turn, would give little Ino and Sakura exactly 22 more minutes to play with their newfound friend, Naruto.
Ino and Sakura had met each other three weeks ago at this very playground. Sakura's mother had, once seeing the relationship forming, quickly latched onto the prosperous Yamanaka family, who were well-known to be shinobi of high society. So it was that three weeks after their first meeting, the mothers were shopping and the girls were perched on a low tree branch just out of the view of the other parents, making daisy chains.
"I wanna play hide-and-seek," Ino whined for the fifth time that hour. She threw down her daisies impatiently. "Daisy chains are no fun!"
Sakura, who, unlike Ino, could make a passable daisy chain, pouted again. "Ino-chan, we can't play hide-and-seek with two people," she pointed out reasonably. Plus, Sakura wasn't very good at hide-and-seek and her dress was new and her mommy would just kill her if she got it dirty.
Ino sighed for the fifth time and returned to poking at the ants climbing around on the tree branch. She was startled and nearly squished one when a voice sounded from just behind them.
"What's hide-and-seek?"
The two girls squeaked but relaxed when they saw a young boy with a dirty mop of blonde hair. "Don't sneak up on us!" Sakura swung a foot petulantly at him and it connected with his chest. To her surprise, he didn't fall over. Even when she kicked her daddy, who was at least three times taller than him, he fell over (though usually he was laughing when he did – anyway, the fact is that he did, so Sakura knew that she was a strong girl).
"What's hide-and-seek?" He persisted.
Ino saw her chance. "It's a game, you wanna play?" She nudged Sakura. "Ne, with three people we can play hide-and-seek!" Naruto beamed at her, the brightest smile she'd ever seen, and Sakura sighed and put down her daisies.
"Fine, but I'm not it!"
Ino grinned victoriously. "I'll be it." Remembering the boy and her mother's insistent warnings to 'use good manners', she turned to him and asked, "What's your name?"
Naruto smiled, showing all his teeth and the gap where he'd lost one a week ago. "I'm Naruto," he offered proudly. "How do you play hide and seek?" Sakura scoffed and did a little-girl frown at him, her little pink eyebrows crinkling.
"Are you an idiot? How do you not know how to play hide-and-seek?"
Ino cut her off. "See, when you're not it, you go hide from the kid who's it an' it tries to find everybody! So you wanna play?" Without waiting for an answer, she barreled on, "Let's play, I'm it!" Ino covered her eyes and counted quickly, "One and two and three and four…"
Sakura leapt behind the trees. She turned back to see Naruto standing there, still dumbstruck by Ino's fast talking and easy acceptance. "Come on," she hissed, "hide!"
It took a second, but by the time Ino uncovered her eyes and screamed "Ready or not, here I come!" Naruto and Sakura were well-hidden. Sakura, not wanting to ruin her dress, had hidden just out of sight behind a tall oak tree. Naruto, with his experience of hiding with his life in the bargain, had sequestered himself into a small crevice between two rocks, hidden on all sides with his back to the stone.
Ino stumbled a little, but walking around she immediately saw Sakura's pink hair and red dress in the corner of her eye. It took her all of ten seconds, and Naruto found himself sitting in the damp darkness listening to the two girls giggle.
"You're an awful hider!" Ino accused. Their footsteps neared his (in his mind, woefully inadequate) hiding place. "Anyway, help me find Naruto?"
"He went this way," Sakura said. They drew ever closer. "Come out, Naruto!"
In a whirlwind of thoughts, in that damp and dark place that smelled of mold, Naruto had an epiphany. So the game, this hide-and-seek, it was about being found, wasn't it? He wanted to be found. He didn't want to be alone.
Time: 22 minutes before the mothers arrived, at the exact point in time when they would have if not for a turn of events in Iwa.
"Where are you?" Ino asked in a sing-song voice.
In one swift movement, Naruto stood up and moved out of his wedge behind the rocks. "You found me!" He shouted happily. Sakura shrieked. They turned around to face him. There was a brief moment of silence.
"You're not supposed to come out," Ino complained.
Confused, Naruto asked, "I thought I wanted to be found?"
Sakura stomped her foot, unhappy that she'd been found so quickly and that her newest friend hadn't understood the simplest of games. "No! You don't wanna be found! The last person found wins the game!"
As Naruto pondered on that and Sakura neared a temper tantrum, Ino decided to break the tension. "Here, let's play again. I'll be it again, 'cause Naruto didn't get it."
She positioned herself by the tree again and started counting. "One and two and three and four…" Sakura dashed off, intent on winning, and Naruto ran off in the opposite direction. His mind was whirling. So everybody had been playing a game with him?
Why had they hit him, then, if it was a game?
His young mind tried to reason with it. Finally, in the middle of squeezing himself between two leafy branches of a tree, twenty feet above the ground, he understood. The orphanage directors and the bad-smelling people on the street had been playing adult hide-and-seek with him. He felt a swell of pride that they thought he was old enough to play with them.
I'll win, he thought. It was taking Ino an awfully long time to find him. His muscles cramped, and he settled more comfortably in the tree and went to sleep.
It was hours later when a worried Sandaime finally found his wayward jinchuuriki. As he carried the shivering, sleeping child to his room, he heard the most inane things spilling from Naruto's dreaming mouth. "Don't get found," the child muttered. "I'll win. I'll win."
Then, as he tucked the boy in and turned off the light, "Let's play again tomorrow."
For some reason, it sent a shiver down his spine.
"Naruto, this is the last time I will tolerate such behavior." Sarutobi found himself caught between laughing at the shinobi corps, despairing for the future of Konoha, and murdering the little brat that caused all this trouble.
"We were playing hide and seek, Jiji," Naruto said for the two-hundred and twenty seventh time.
He knew. He'd counted.
And that excuse? It was getting so old.
Sarutobi did not have to force severity into his voice. "Naruto, you're wasting precious time and resources by leading the ninja of Konoha on hours-long chases. Furthermore, you are desecrating the reputation of the ninjas of Konoha, which the Hokages have built in the village. I thought you wanted to be Hokage, Naruto. Hokages command respect and pulling pranks is not the way to do that!"
Honestly, it was getting hard to find trustworthy people to chase after Naruto who wouldn't bring him back maimed or dead. Even his most patient, kind, Naruto-loving ninja (the numbers of which he could count on the fingers of one hand) had lately started getting a murderous look in their eyes after lugging the blonde back to his office.
If anything, they must have been ashamed. One would think that the shinobi would learn and maybe shorten the (at this point, 5 hour 27 minute long) time needed to catch the prankster, but it was actually getting longer.
Someday, Naruto would make a very good ninja. For now, he was being a very bad hindrance to Sarutobi's plans and the Third's peace of mind.
"Is that all, old man?"
Sarutobi's anger flew away. The endearment, often applied to fathers, always reminded him of the sacrifices the child had to make. Sometimes he wondered what Konohamaru would turn out to be without a father, without a family – then he wondered what he would be. Today he was called the Professor, but long ago he was just a brat being taught by his father.
"Naruto," he said, very seriously. "Tomorrow, the daimyo is coming to Konoha. I need you to promise me not to make any trouble. Then, on Friday, I'll be there for your graduation, okay?"
A very slow smile grew on Naruto's face. And Sarutobi remembered that Naruto wasn't like Konohamaru at all. He was a brat who knew how to bargain, and too much like his father when Sarutobi least wanted him to be.
"That doesn't sound like a fair trade to me, old man." Over the years, Naruto had weaseled the "cool wall-sticking thing", the "walking on water thing", several small elemental jutsu, and at least two times his weight in gold in ramen out of Sarutobi.
But money wasn't tight for the leader of a military village. "How about I treat you out to ramen?" Sarutobi suggested.
"How about I start a paintball fight?"
There was little chance Naruto would actually mess up the plans for tomorrow. There were many ninjas on duty, after all, and Naruto knew his place and had loyalty (or some twisted form of it) to Sarutobi. But the boy could make it very, very hard for the venerable leader later.
But he didn't have any time today to find a non-threatening something to teach the boy. He had to plan the security tomorrow and look over the graduates and call together the Jounin-sensei and…
Sarutobi had a brilliant idea. (He always knew there was a reason they called him a genius. Thank goodness it showed up at the most opportune moments.) "How about I loan you a Jounin-sensei, Naruto?"
"Are those the ones that catch me?" No doubt Naruto still remembered the time Sarutobi sent two Jounin out to catch him and they did (12 minutes). These days he just set up an endless 'genin and chuunin training mission' to catch the kid.
"Yes, they're the ones that catch you."
Naruto stood there, at the edge of his desk, looking for all the world like some shrunken statue of the Yondaime. (Sarutobi really didn't want to think about Minato. He still cried sometimes about it.)
"Okay, it's a promise, old man."
Suddenly tired, the acting Hokage smiled and waved his surrogate grandson off. "I'll send one to you at Training Ground 11 in an hour." He watched the blonde bounce through the doors, smile and wave at some ninja outside. Then he let his weary, whitened head sink into his arms.
What he wouldn't give for another chance.
An hour later, Sarutobi found himself at a curious loss of Jounin.
He had originally planned to send Asuma, who could be trusted to sleep or laze the time away (maybe he'd teach Naruto shogi, and that might get the hyperactive brat to sit down for a while). But Asuma was out escorting the daimyo to Konoha. With him was a good tenth of the Jounin force.
Several, of course, were Jounin-sensei. (And he really didn't want to see Naruto in a green leotard, in any case.) Many were on missions, out in other places or part of the everyday inner security.
Jounin did a lot, Sarutobi realized. He knew there was a reason he'd been paying them.
His second choice, of the remaining, was Kakashi. But he rethought that. He didn't want Minato's son to become a perverted little boy, or at least any more than he already was. And he'd already planned to put Naruto on Kakashi's genin team, which would make this Jounin-lending escapade seem like favoritism.
Well, he'd already picked out three Jounin-sensei for the teams likely to pass into genin-ship. As he recalled it, he remembered his reasoning for picking Kurenai, that pretty and young girl, for the scouting team.
Surely the girl could put up with Naruto for a day. For her sake as well as for his sanity.
Babysitting.
That was what she'd been demoted to.
When Kurenai was called to the Hokage's office, she'd been excited. Tomorrow was the genin test, after all, and she'd wanted to be a Jounin-sensei since forever. And, word around the admin office was, she was going to be one this year.
She'd heard rumors about how Jounin-sensei got a huge say in the teams and she had hers all planned out.
Obviously, she wanted Hinata, who was a sweet child and needed more confidence. Kurenai was fairly sure that she, once a shy girl herself, could help Hinata with that. She'd taken to looking in on Academy lessons (stalking the kids) and decided on Shino, a similarly quiet boy. He was skilled, and quiet in a calm way, which might help Hinata.
Then, to balance out the team, she needed a charger, a front-attack kind of kid, and she'd picked Kiba. He was loud, but had sensibilities and an animal companion. He and Shino might understand each other. She also picked him because she knew she couldn't get any of the Ino-Shika-Chou group or the Uchiha, who was no doubt going to Kakashi.
(There was also Uzumaki, but she didn't want him. It had nothing to do with the Kyuubi, really. He was just, frankly, the most singularly annoying brat she'd ever set eyes on. Apart from being nearly impossible to catch, according to the rumor mill, he was loud and brazen and had no tact. Plus, Hinata had a crush on him and she knew that crushes were bad for genin teams.)
And it just figures – she was in the middle of hashing out a reason the Sandaime would accept not, ever, in any case to give her Naruto (even if the whole ninja force knew he was weak when it came to the boy) when she was given Naruto. "Kurenai-sensei," he'd said, elevating her spirits and practically confirming that she'd be a Jounin-sensei, "Can you do me a favor?"
Anything, she thought. Thank you, Sandaime. I love you. I would do practically anything. Oh, and I want Hinata and Shino and Kiba. This is going to be great. We'll be the best team ever.
Still in his indulgent, I'm-granting-you-a-grandfatherly-favor kind of way, he said, "Please, head out to Training Ground 11 for me. I have a student there for you."
He thinks I'm good enough to mentor somebody? Mentor somebody directly under the Hokage's attention?
"His name is Uzumaki Naruto…"
It sunk in. She didn't hear the rest of his statement. She kind of numbly walked out the door.
Babysitting.
Naruto had a feeling he was being ripped off when, half an hour late, a woman stumbled out of a Body Flicker and sat down heavily next to a tree. "Is this a test?" She muttered, "Does this mean I'm not going to be a Jounin-sensei? What about Hinata? She needs a positive female guidance." She looked up at him. "Is this a test? Please tell me it's a test."
Naruto was getting impatient. "Oi, lady," he shouted. "You're late." And crazy, he added in his head.
The pretty lady buried her head in her hands. "It's just like a D-Rank," she moaned.
Naruto scoffed. "This is the best Jounin the Old Man could come up with?" Sometimes the best way to get people moving was to rile them up a little. Naruto had learned that people paid more attention to him after a big prank than when he did something inoffensive.
"I earned my Jounin rank," Kurenai responded heatedly, automatically. "I am Konoha's leading Genjutsu Mistress." She stood up and dusted off her clothes. It was time to stop wallowing in the Sandaime's reasoning behind this babysitting mission. A mission was a mission, after all.
"The Old Man probably just liked your face," Naruto taunted. Genjutsu – Illusions? Sounds fun. "I bet you can't even catch me." And before she could react, he was off, using a chakra-enhanced jump to fling himself into the tree line.
There was a soft curse behind him, and after a moment's hesitation, the Jounin followed.
Step two complete, Naruto thought victoriously. After getting their attention, usually with a prank, he led them on chases that demonstrated the few skills he had. He didn't know many techniques but the ones he knew he'd perfected. Now, some of the more frequent chuunin would even greet him in the village, mentioning something about the last chase and how they'd beat him next time.
He had to show her something to get her to respect him, respect that he knew something. After that, he'd see what she could teach him. Illusions, after all, could do quite a lot for his pranks.
He was in the middle of feeling the floating of victory when she caught up to him, abruptly. He'd underestimated her speed. "Look, kid," she said, "I don't have the patience to deal with-"
He didn't let her finish, performing a perfect Kawarimi with a nearby log.
He led her on a chase, trying to throw her off at a river. It didn't work. He'd headed higher and lower into the trees and made a brief escapade into the village, but the crowd had hindered his speed and she was too close to lose in the people. He ran back to the forest.
Naruto began bringing out the traps. The Jounin was right behind him with a Body Flicker, and he had to slow her down somehow.
A fairly long time ago, the Hokage had made one of the greatest mistakes in his life.
He had taught Naruto how to make a Containment Seal.
Apart from getting the brat interested in seals, Naruto had quickly figured out how to turn the innocuous Containment Seal to devious purposes. He had learned how to overload the seal with things and almost fill the Release configuration so the slightest brush of chakra (such as the passing of an emotionally aggravated shinobi) would trigger it.
Sarutobi was half proud and half dismayed at this ingenious misuse of sealing.
She was, at first, very surprised. He had actually managed to outpace her for a while, and suppress his chakra to an extent that if she had not been a chakra-sensitive Genjutsu Mistress actively seeking him, she might have missed him. Anybody under Jounin level would definitely have difficulties tracking him, and with enough of a head start she would have lost him, too.
He obviously knew tree climbing. Somewhere along the way he'd run along a river (to throw off scent and hearing, she assumed, but she didn't rely on scent or hearing, so it was no issue) so he knew water walking as well. He had figured out some way of erasing his tracks when on the ground – probably the B-Rank wind technique for 'naturally' disturbing tracks. Some wind chakra lingered in the area. He was good with Kawarimi.
Kurenai found herself being impressed.
After the first seal went off and coated her with some mixture of mud, bugs, and leaves, Kurenai began to get angry. She was a pretty laid-back person, but bugs were among her least favorite things and cleanliness was important to her.
Then the next seal went off, covering her with dirty candy wrappers and trash. She was infuriated.
Even the other Jounin knew to stay out of her way when the Genjutsu Mistress was mad.
The kick came out of nowhere.
Naruto knew, sometime after the third seal had completely failed to affect her, that she had reined in her chakra and temper. She was calmer now, and it showed, because though the kick connected and threw him back, it didn't cause any lasting damage.
Naruto could barely hold his own, even with the Jounin visibly holding back on him. His taijutsu was weak, and he knew it, so he generally relied on more long-range tactics. The greatest thing that could be said for him close range was that he was strong and had endurance.
But he wanted to see where the lady could take this, and besides his traps had almost completely failed to slow her down – she was even almost clean now – so he'd have to wait and see. If she started to get vicious, he could always use his newly perfected Body Flicker to hightail it out of there.
That was his last thought before the world went dark.
Kurenai was almost dismayed at Naruto's lack of taijutsu proficiency. And as soon as the genjutsu hit him, he went stock still. It was a genjutsu that only affected sight and sound, effectively blacking out the world, but his nose twitched and he turned to her.
What happened next was, perhaps, the most surprising event of the day.
Naruto bowed to her. Low, with knees and hands on the ground, forehead brushing the grass. Then he said, "Please teach me. I'm in your hands."
The stiffness in Kurenai's posture faded. Naruto's sincerity touched her – though Kurenai had been raised to be polite and respectful, times had changed in the past two decades, after the Kyuubi attack, and many children were no longer raised with manners.
Almost against her will, Kurenai smiled and removed the genjutsu. "I'd like to teach you a better foundation of taijutsu, Naruto-kun, but I have a better idea in mind. How would you like to learn the basics of genjutsu?"
Naruto walked out of the clearing that day with a head full of dreams. Illusions, it seemed, could do everything, with the right amount of concentration. Kurenai told him that Genjutsu wasn't really all about chakra control. If you had the chakra to waste, she said, you could always use it to add more things to the illusion.
She'd left him with the basic structure of visual-effect genjutsu and told him she'd drop off books on affecting the other senses later.
All he had to do was surround the victim with chakra and then imagine. It sounded too easy to be true.
Naruto took to the rooftops, settling on a rooftop opposite his apartment. He looked down at the street and selected a random person. Casting his chakra down over that range was hard, but it wasn't any harder than maintaining a steady flow to his feet. "There is a bird flying straight at your head," he chanted. He closed his eyes and imagined it. The bird would be coming – there, right at his face.
But he got distracted. He began to notice tingles in his foot. He wondered what the sun would look like if it was a giant bowl of ramen. He'd like to have a pet dragon. He would name it Dracula.
A blue haze lingered around the woman as she began to scream. Oops. Naruto ducked down under the side of the roof and almost stopped breathing.
He was using too much chakra. Kurenai-sensei had said that when chakra was visibly still hanging around, there was too much in use. It was bad because ninjas could sense chakra, especially the experienced ones, so using less chakra was always good. He also wasn't keeping his focus. He hoped that woman hadn't seen the dragon. That would probably be scary.
After a couple minutes, Naruto peeked over the roof edge again. The woman had been led away, but it was too close to his home and too soon for another try. He leapt in search of a different street and another person to try his newest toy out on.
Author's Notes:
Basically, Naruto is good, but only good at hiding.
A short something to tide you over until I can update BtS or Failure again. If continued, don't expect it to be long or soon.
Liffae ^-~