In the Shadow of a Perfect Life

Chapter 2

Well, that surgery was horrible. But hey, it would have been far worse if they actually took out my bottom ones. I wanted to at first but this they are now fused to my jawbone…I don't want to imagine the pain. So yeah, that is finally out of the way and I kind do shit now….well most things. Still can't eat solid foods.

XXXX

Minato sighed as Kakashi left the room. That was one child down. Now he needed to make sure that his other child had passed. However, with this new information about his son, he could safely say that his children had an uphill battle in their lives. One who had the power to eventually control all of Time and Space and other?

The door was quickly opened, interrupting his inner monologue. Minato smiled to see his other still alive student in Rin. Strong in her own right, but there had been a reason for him choosing her to led the team of his other child.

"Report." He stated flatly.

Rin smiled. "I am happy and exhausted to announce that Team 8 has passed. They all seem to work really well together and your daughter is exhausting to deal with in a fight, even for me. But I feel that Hitome will grow into a powerful warrior with the help of Hinata Hyuuga and Shikamaru Nara by her side."

"I am glad you think that. Hitome and Hinata already work well together as they are great friends, even with Hinata treating my daughter like a hero and a child at the same time." Minato said aloud with a smile of his own.

"Very true, sensei." Rin replied calmly. "Plus, it seems with Shikamaru's immense intellect, common among the Nara, he has become the strategist and leader of their little group. Too bad he has that Nara laziness as well."

"I am not surprised." Minato replied with a chuckle before he got serious. "Will you be able to help Hitome with her statues as a Jinchuriki."

Rin smiled sadly as she unconsciously put a hand to her stomach. "With the beginning stages I believe I can, but it will be hard since she had Kushina's quick to anger personality. Even IF I am the Jinchuriki of the 3 tails."

It was true, she was still a Jinchuriki. Even after getting pierced by Kakashi's lightning blade and having Obito find them that way and kill the people who did that to Rin. Obito never buried her. She was only alive because of one reason and it was pretty odd. The three tails, felt safer inside of Rin than it did outside. It saw the girl's predicament and proceeded to help slow down the effects of her poorly made seal and heal her grievous wound to the chest. That was when Minato came to the scene and helped the best he could in making a better seal.

Now, are Rin and the tailed beast on good terms? Yes, but they were far from it at first. She hated the beast when she found she was still alive. It was thanks to Minato and Kakashi that she learned to accept her fate and the being inside of her. Ironically, it treated her like an older sister and even gave her its name, Isobu. It made her think what the other Tailed Beasts were like.

But at the current moment, that did not matter because her mind drift to the other potential teachers. "Oh! Did Kakashi and Yahiko pass their teams?"

Minato smiled. Asuma was going to teach team 10 but since the team he wanted wasn't going to be around, he declined the teaching position. So Minato gave the job to the eager Yahiko. He was good guy despite the events sounding his arrival to the village. "Yes, Yahiko's Team 10 passed along with Kakashi's Team 7. I have faith Yahiko will do well leading Shino, Kiba, and Choji. As for Kakashi, he will have his hands full with my son, Ino, and Sasuke. Just like you."

"Oh, why is that?"

"They seem to have more skill then they let on." Minato replied, explaining what he learned to the woman since she was close to the family as well.

"I see." Rin replied, feeling bad for the blond son for the Hokage. "But maybe he can fulfill his ambition now that he has those powers."

"Maybe." Minato replied. "I use a bit of time/space seals myself but I am limited in my knowledge and being Hokage doesn't give me a lot of free time to practice all that much."

"Oh? Are you wanting to be able to challenge your son with time and space?" Rin asked with a smirk.

"Some day. I think it would be fun." Minato replied before he continued. "Still, back on track. Since you passed your team, that makes up the actual three teams that passed the exams. I was hoping for that. You are dismissed."

"Thank you sensei. I must get home to think up lesson plans along with Kakashi." Rin replied with a soft smile.

Minato smiled as he watched the woman he still saw as that little girl he taught go home. Once she was gone, he whispered, "Thank you Rin, for deciding that life was still worth it for you."

XXXX

Naruto walked in the front door of his home to see the smiling form of his sister, Hitome, standing there with a triumphant smile on her face. He knew what that meant as soon as he looked up to see a paint bucket coming down on his in slow motion. He smirked at that and slowed down time even more to calmly walk past sister.

As soon as he was behind her, he let go of his hold on time and heard the telltale clang of the container hitting the floor. "I am not cleaning that up." He said to her shocked form.

"Oh come on! How do you keep doing that?" Hitome groaned. She had long red hair that flowed freely like her mom's, a blue short sleeved shirt with two red stripes on the front, along with fishnet underneath that connected with her blue shorts, and navy blue ninja sandals. And of course she had three whisker like marks on each of her cheeks.

The blond just shook his head at the girl, "Maybe in time I'll tell you." He then walked further in the house, closely followed by his sister who had an annoyed look on her face at the roundabout answer he had once again given her. "I thought you were going to clean your mess up."

"Oh I left a Shadow Clone to do that." She said dismissively. Naruto smiled at that. The girl could make a small army of them since their mother taught that jutsu to them. Since he was an Uzumaki, he had larger than normal chakra reserves, so he too was able to do that jutsu. Just not in great number like her. "So I passed my sensei's test, what about you?"

"Of course my team passed. Sasuke and I work pretty well with each other and Ino was willing to do the same." The blond replied simply. "What about you?"

"Oh yeah, getting Shikamaru's butt to do anything was a bit of a pain to work around, but Hinata and I got the job done, so yes, we are a team as well."

"I am glad, now let's eat dinner, I am starving….even though I had a small snack of ramen." Naruto replied as they went into the kitchen.

"So unfair!" Hitome cried.

XXX

Minato smiled as he made it home in time for dinner. Well, almost. He had to leave a shadow clone to do his paper work that he didn't get done during the day. Sure he was the fastest man alive, but even he could be late.

As he sat at the table with his wife and twin children, he smiled even though every time he looked at his children, he was reminded of that night where he almost lot them. Or a better go at it would be that they almost lost him. Sarutobi had been the one to do the deed of putting the Kyuubi into Hitome.

But, he was able to kill the masked man who dared to even try to kill his son. Imagine his shock when the man turned out to be his long lost student in Obito Uchiha. Before the man died, he relayed to Minato why he had done what he did. The information shed some light on the goings on in the world and he had Jiriaya look into it. What he found was not pleasant.

With Obito so disillusioned with the world and wanting to get rid of it, Minato found out why that was. He thought that Rin was dead. So Minato did the only thing he could for the boy. He told him the truth, that Rin was actually alive. And so with tears streaming down his face as he drew his last breaths, he smiled, bequeathing his last remaining eye to Kakashi, and then cursed one name. Madara Uchiha.

Jiriaya had taken all that info and indeed found where Madara was hiding, only to find an army of strange white men, whom he quickly destroyed with as much fire as he could. In the ashes, Jiriaya said he did find the body of Madara Uchiha without either of his eyes. Eerie.

They still didn't know much about that situation, but that was fine. They had other things to deal with, like this Akatsuki.

Shaking his head, Minato decided now was not the time to dwell on that. He was supposed to be enjoying his dinner with his family. Something he should be doing more often and prepping for this Akatsuki. He needed a successor and he already had one person in mind.

Kushina smiled at her kids as they bantered between each other as they normally did. She was proud of them. However, without having to be told, she snuck a look at the extent of the scar like seals on her son when he was in the hospital that night. This was something not made by her son, just applied. It seemed that his grandmother still played a part in his life even if she was no longer among them.

She did not know what he would do with them, or what all they did themselves, but she was hoping he would make the correct decisions.

Turning to Hitome, she said, "Dear, I hope you will put as much effort into your training with the Kyuubi as you can."

"Mom, you still haven't told me why I have to train with it. You and Grandma never did. You two just kept it hidden." Hitome replied, not happy that she would have to use the Kyuubi's chakra for some reason.

"Because I fear things will be more complicated then we know them to be in the future." Minato stated with a sigh.

"Oh, like what?" asked a bored Naruto on the outside, but on the inside, he was curious.

"When I have more information, I will let you know." Minato replied, "Maybe near the Chunin Exams this year."

"Alright." Hitome replied with a shake of her head. Why did she expect an answer in the first place. They always had their reasons, but they always liked to be vague. It was annoying.

Throughout all this talk, Naruto's mind and went back to his grandmother. She had always been nice to him, but at this moment, he was having trouble remembering. Remembering something she said. It was important since it was a promise that was supposed to be kept when he became a genin. But he was drawing a blank.

And it was eating at him.

Minato and Kushina saw Naruto look of concentration and were worried. Especially when he suddenly held his head in pain. Not only that, but they saw the glow of chakra around the arm that controlled time and a subtle glow near his chest. What could that mean?

"Ugh, I think I need to see Aunt Tsunade again." Naruto growled. Even now, his accident was giving him issues. Or at least, that is what he thought.

Hitome just smirked. "Oh, more like going to see your civilian girlfriend, Sakura? Gunna find out what else is pink?"

"No." Naruto replied flatly, not rising to his sister's taunt. He kept it hidden, but when he looked at her, an image of a girl with red hair in buns was superimposed over her figure for a moment. Odd.

"Aw, you're no fun!" the red head groaned while Kushina stared at her daughter. Sometimes, it was hard dealing with her daughter. She also needed to keep her away from Jiriaya.

XXX

After dinner, Naruto made his way to Tsunade's office, he ran into the pink haired girl Sakura. She was a civilian girl that wanted to help people, but not be a real ninja. Tsunade took an interest in the girl and began to teacher with Minato's permission seeing that the woman had to take her out of the academy. Her other student, Shizune, tended to keep everyone in line when Tsuande went overboard with Sakura's training.

Said girl stared at him with a deadpanned expression and asked, "Sasuke with you?"

"Nope." The blond stated simply, smiling when the girl gave a sigh of relief.

"Thank God. I am not in the mood for him today." It was true, Sakura did not like Sasuke all that much. She could deal with Hitome's perverted nature, but add that with Sasuke and things did not go well for her when the two of them were in the same room. "So what is up?"

"I need to see Aunt Tsuande. The usual issue."

"Ah, I thought that might be it, but she is asleep. You know how she gets when you wake her up." Sakura replied with a shiver.

"I can deal with it."

"Your funeral." She replied as she lead her mutual friend to her master.

Now, Sakura would admit that that she had a crush once upon a time for the blond due to clan status alone. He was the Hokage's son after all, but after spending time with him, she found that he was like a brother that she wanted. She cared for him but mostly as family.

Once in Tsuande's office, the saw the 'strongest' woman in Konoha, asleep on her desk, a pool of drool no doubt ruining her documents. Naruto just smirked at the sight and proceeded to poke at the air repeatedly.

In reality, he was manipulating Space to poke her from a safe distance seeing as he was not dumb enough to get close to her to wake her.

And it worked. Tsunade roared in annoyance, trying to punch whoever dared wake her up. Upon seeing Naruto, she just felt stupid since she had an idea how his powers worked.

"Tch, and what can I do for you brat?"

"Well my significantly older Aunt, I need a checkup." Naruto quipped, playing his game with Tsuande. They liked to insult each other.

"Well you little shit, you better prepare yourself." Tsunade replied, cracking her knuckles before turning to Sakura. "You may go now Sakura."

"R-right." The girl shakily replied, quickly running out of the office and closing the door

XXX

Naruto found himself in place he had not been to since his little accident. His grandmother's old home. It was empty now but still held everything from her life. And it was there that he found the seal that was now literally etched into his skin.

But to Naruto, this place had sentimental value. This is where his grandmother had taken care of him and Hitome when their parents needed a break, were busy or they just wanted to visit.

And before she died, she made him promise something. However, for the life of him, he still could not remember the promise his eight year old self accepted.

Just what could it have been?

Then, a sudden noise caught his attention. "Who's there!" he shouted.

"Please don't hurt me, I just wanted a place to stay for bit." A girl's voiced said as she came into view. To Naruto's shock, another Uzumaki came onto the scene. She was around his age, maybe a bit older, with a strange red and white battle kimono, and the signature red hair done up in a two familiar buns.

"W-who are you?" Naruto asked, not used to seeing anyone in this place. Not since his grandmother's death.

"Just call me Mito." The girl replied somewhat cheerfully. "Who are you?"

"I am Naruto Uzumaki Namikaze" he replied.

"A blond Uzumaki? That is odd."

"I know, that is why I usually skip the Uzumaki in my name." the blond replied with something in the back of his mind registering an odd fog clouding it but he paid it no mind for some reason.

"Oh. Well I didn't know anyone else knew about my hide away." Mito replied sheepishly. "Things aren't great at home right now."

"Oh, I didn't know. I usually come here because…because it was the home of someone close to me." Naruto replied, slipping further into the fog his mind was in. "There was a promise I made to them and I can't remember it."

"I see." The girl replied sadly. "Well, maybe I can help. In a way, we would be helping each other."

"I…I would like that." Naruto said as he smiled back at the girl, not seeing the chakra glow on his arm nor on his chest.

XXX

Kakashi was concerned and that was not an emotion he often held. It had been a few months since he started teaching his students. On occasion, Rin's team would join them for training and then Tenzo and Anko would join in on his request as well.

However, the part that had him concerned as was Naruto, something he informed Minato about. Naruto would interact with the team like normal but when it was his turn to rest, he would disappear. No, not go to some place, he would literally fade away for a few moments. It was getting strange and the boy's increasing frustration was not helping things.

Even Kakashi knew that Naruto was trying to remember something but it was affecting his mood and not in a good way. Well, he also knew that the team didn't like the D ranks, so maybe a C rank was in order. They had earned it with all the D ranks they had done.

XXX

Naruto sighed as he rested against a tree while he watched the joint team training between his own team and his sister's. They had gotten really good, and he had even learned to control his powers a bit more. His current ones were good for now, but he still couldn't figure out some of the others.

Due to that and his memory issues, his mood wasn't always the best. That was why he usually rested by himself.

"Hey Naruto, how are you doing?'

The blond looked to his side to see Mito again. Since meeting her in his grandmother's old place, he had seen her many, many times. Sometimes he would see her in the house, but for some reason that he didn't feel like getting into, the house had other people in it and it somehow looked…..more preserved. Younger would be another word for it. Then he would randomly see her in town for weird experiences with her telling him about her life, like she was getting in an arranged marriage or some other weird things. He could have sworn he only saw two heads on the Hokage Monument at one point. Other times it was like this, them just talking out of the blue as he rested from training.

"Oh, it is you." He said, not at all surprised. "You know, just popping up like that is getting weird."

"Oh? You usually disappear on me, so I thought I could come to you once in a while." She said with a shrug.

Him disappear? Now that was really weird. Just what was really going on? Was she also a bit older as well?

Interrupting his thoughts, she asked, "Have you remembered yet?"

"No…I don't know why either." The blond replied irritably.

"I see…" She said sadly, like the secret was about her. Changing subjects, she handed him a small locked book. "Here you go. I found this in that old house you said was your grandmother's. I left the key there for you to find."

"Thanks, but what book is it? Who wrote it?" Naruto asked, eying the book.

"The Second Hokage." She replied and when Naruto looked to her, he saw nothing once again.

"Naruto, we are going to have a joint C Rank Mission! Come on!" Hitome yelled to him with a strained smile. She noticed his disappearance act many times, however, this time was longer.

"Right." Naruto replied as he stared at the spot Mito had been and then pocketed the book to follow after his sister, not even noticing it was already late in the day.

XXX

Minato stared at the two teams in front of him, each with one of his kids. He wanted to take this moment in as a father, but it didn't last long since he was the Hokage and he needed to get things done.

"Since this will be your first C Rank Mission, I believe a joint mission is in order. For this, I have chosen an escort mission entailing you all to protect a band of researchers looking into the ruins near the edge of the Land of Fire and the Land of Stone. I don't have to remind you all of the potential severity of that."

The kids all nodded, knowing of their Hokage's history with Iwa. It was not pleasant and Minato was not happy with the potential problems that Jiriaya was sending him.

"Your mission begins in the morning, be at the gates at eight. You are dismissed." He finished as all the kids left the room, leaving Kakashi and Rin in the room with him. Once he was sure they were all gone, he said, "Report Kakashi."

The silver haired man sighed. "Naruto's issue seems to be getting worse. He completely disappeared today and I had Hitome say in the area to inform naruto when he reappeared to report here. I am wondering if his seal had something else in it that is causing all this."

Minato had a contemplative look on before his eyes lit up. "I think it is possible to add a part of one's self to a seal. Since Mito made the seal and she knew Naruto was going to get it, she did that to have him remember something. He mentioned he couldn't remember something."

"Foresight like that…how do you think Mito could have predicted something like that?" Rin asked, shocked that something like that would happen. "Wait, how did you think of that?"

"Because I did that to the original seal for Hitome, just in case something happened to the seal. If I am not there, that part of me could fix the seal." Minato said with a smile. "As for Mito knowing all of this before had, maybe something happened that we don't know of yet."

"I am not fond of that." Kakashi replied with a narrowed eye.

"Me neither, but considering that his seals are based around Time and Space and Mito made them, I say we wait. Hopefully this will all end soon and Naruto can go back to how he was before….Mito died."

"I see. Well this mission will be good for everyone. We all might learn something." Rin replied before they began their exit.

"Correct. Mr. and Mrs. Hatake, you are dismissed." Minato said with a smile. Once they were going, he said aloud, "And what do you think of all this…Itachi?"

"It is concerning about Naruto's mental state because even I can see that his mind is foggy when these events happen. But I do miss the old him."

"I agree. Hitomi has her quirks, but Naruto was able to play her game. Now he just tolerates her. That shows how much he changed." Minato said sadly. "The pain of losing a close loved one and then dealing with all that pain from the seal. I fear that is what is driving him to overtake me. He won't find his answer that way."

"Only time will tell." Itachi replied, not commenting on what Sasuke had to do to save his best friend. "Sir, why me? I am sure there is someone better than I to take this job."

"Itachi, I know you don't feel ready or even worthy to take the Hat, but I do. I have seen the good in you, and despite what happened to Shisui, I still believe in you….God of the Uchiha."

"I really wish you won't call me that." Itachi said uncomfortably, making the blond man to chuckle.

"I am serious." Minato said in all seriousness. "I need a successor and you are one of my top ninja who had known loss and sacrifice. I am sorry for your experiences, but you are the man for the job and I will help you be ready…every step of the way."

"Thank you." Itachi replied with his eyes closed, still not feeling ready.

XXXX

And that's it folks. I am sure some noticed elements from a movie call When Marnie Was There...that is going to be wrapped up in the next chapter.

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