Disclaimer: This is a Naruto fanfiction Naruto is the original work of the author Masashi Kishimoto.

Chapter Four

Iruka stood before Memorial Stone and clapped his hands twice. The offering of incense that he'd left before the stone smoked lightly. As he finished the monthly ritual and turned to go he said, "I've got to get to work Mom; I'll be off early today before noon so tell Dad I'll swing by before he leaves for Tea Country."

The fortyish woman beside Iruka smiled gently, "I'll let your father know, and have something ready for lunch, you don't eat nearly well enough since you moved out. I don't know why you don't just stay with us; you come over every day anyway…"

Blushing, Iruka rubbed the back of his head as he looked away, not noticing his mother's knowing look.

The two ninja thought simultaneously:

'I can't possibly tell her I'm dating Anko!'/ 'I wonder when he'll introduce us to that Mitarashi girl?'

"Anyway I'll see you later!" The chunin said as he headed in the direction of Konoha's shinobi academy.

"Be seeing you son!" The older woman replied. Then she turned toward the memorial stone and bowed.

As the retired kunoichi walked away from the forested glade with a slight limp but steady pace, she thought.

"Hiroshi-sama, thank you"'

Tree!

-SWISH-

"Oh…"

Okay, so jumping off of a cliff wasn't one of his brightest ideas, even it wasn't really that steep of a cliff… initially.

Naruto's first thought upon clearing the edge of the cliff proper was how small everything looked from up high. That train of thought led him to the realization of just how high up he truly was and of course, inevitably, the fact that the he was currently plummeting down toward a steadily expanding pavement.

Rock!

-SWIP-

The pupils of blue eyes shrunk to pinpricks as a new set of obstacles were revealed.

Tree! Thorn bush! Boulder! Monkey!

-SWISH-

-SWOOSH-

-SWIP-

"Eek! Damned hooligan!" The startled monkey railed at the screaming blur that was Naruto.

Having been a victim of his mother's various health kicks at one time or another, Naruto had been exposed to nearly every vaccine and health supplement that his mother found beneficial. These treatments helped during his bad periods even if they usually tasted horrible. In the end he'd begged Shizune-nee to teach him her iron belly technique at the age of five just to handle his O-kaa-san's weekly health drink. The technique had the side effect of dulling his sense of taste temporarily whenever he used it and was only partially successful for dealing with the nausea caused by imbibing whatever potion he'd be fed for the week.

Bird!

-SWQUARK-

On the plus side his proficiency with the Tetsu no Hara had encouraged Shizune to teach him other delightful skills, like how to spit poisoned senbon from his mout-

"Tree! Tree!"

-SWISHSWOOSH-

His heart hammered wildly as he tried again to focus just the right amount of chakra to his feet and hands to allow him to grip the rock face of behind and below and failed, continuing his half-controlled slide down the steep rocky surface.

-Oh sh-

Naruto was a naturally effusive child, given to expressing himself in an unrestrained manner. This was partially due to his nature and in part due to a deep desire to step out of his family, the Senju-Uzumaki Gouzoku, deep and long shadow.

-ite!-

Unfortunately his chakra control wasn't up to the tasks of might and skill that he was often witness to from his own clansmen and women. Add that he had too much energy to patiently sit through lessons at home; and, as Hisao had correctly pointed out, given to reckless acts, 'like jumping off a cliff!' Naruto was often his own worst enemy, point in case being that he was currently skidding down the side of the Hokage Mountain because it was something that he'd once seen someone do... in a manga.

And so he skated along, periodically unleashing frantic bursts of energy from his legs in order to avoid splattering on the side of the odd, enterprising plant growing out of the shadow of the Shodaime's chin. As rambunctious as he was Naruto quite often found himself being chased down by some family retainer or another and had become proficient at escape and evasion, even from his mother. Combined with his lessons with Yamato-nii he should have been well ahead of his peers.

Unfortunately; for a long time, it had only been in fuinjutsu that he truly surpassed others, even his fellow junior Uzumaki disciples. Too bored to learn history beyond what dealt with the his family, and even then too frustrated at being compared to his honored ancestors, he had rarely applied himself to his fullest capabilities. He eagerly struggled to prove himself physically capable of learning how to fight from his mother but it usually took mere weeks before the positive effects of whatever chakra control technique he mastered began to fade. To make matters worse, Naruto's health regularly careened from superhuman to pathetically ill, costing him time at the academy and even briefly placing his future as a ninja in question.

Through it all Naruto still persevered. Mentally, his family retainers were determined that the Senju Heir not be a dunce even if they resorted to tying him down (this also provided several impromptu lessons on shibari). Physically, Naruto was taught a series of exercises in dynamic movement that Yamato-nii had eventually come up with for him. After seeing Naruto's predicament, his tutor decided on a form of training that combined basic shinobi gymnastics with basic tree-walking training. It was brutally effective at helping him to recover from his bouts of illness, so much so that his class standing had improved from dead last to fourteenth place in taijutsu within a week of beginning the training. His mother even took part, designing a series of ever-shifting obstacle courses that he was to run through at high speed; using his chakra to grip and grab fleeting handholds that shifted and tried to clutch at him.

Compared to that, bounding down the hill should have been easy, which was why he had done so in the first place. But it seemed like his chakra control was on the fritz again, with it in such a state he just couldn't dealt with the speed that he'd gained travelling down such a steep surface, not with such weak traction, barely enough to avoid sending him screaming into the air at the first misstep.

Still years of training paid off as his body instinctively made do with what little it had to work with. Gloved hands, glowing with a haze of blue chakra gripped to a sturdier tree trunk along the way. He bled off momentum as he spun around, leaving groves in the bark. It also shot him out over the village and now he bounded then soared over a pair of houses in an orange flash so fleeting that the only proof that he'd even been there was a four foot wide patch of cracked tiles and a trailing,

"SOOOOOOOORREEEeeeeee!"

He winced as he felt even more tiles crack under his feet and waved sheepishly at the house's owner, evidently a retired kunoichi of some skill, who shook her fist at him with half-hearted annoyance. He could already tell that he'd be going back there later to fix the damage. He was beginning to really regret jumping off that cliff in spite of the massive adrenaline surge brought about by his impromptu shortcut and the sheer awesomeness of his recovery. He briefly wondered what his grandfather must be thinking, seeing him do something so reckless after having complimented him on his progress as a ninja.

-Wire! Wire!-

And he decided that he didn't want to know as a telephone line flashed by so fast and invisible that he'd almost missed it, just barely ducking under before the line lopped off his head. This dangerous exercise was the price that he gladly paid in his desperate attempt to tame his monstrously large, even by the standards of his clan, chakra.

He'd always had chakra control problems and during the summer holiday it had again been the focus of Yamato-nii's training. The week after he had successfully completed one of his nii-san's harder obstacle courses had been a blast with his irrepressible energy causing him to indulge his impulses and run around, climbing roof-tops, exploring and generally making a nuisance of himself as he desperately tried to refine the skill in his spare time while having fun.

Although he hadn't lacked much in the way of childhood companions, not with the many families and apprentices living at the Senju compound, Naruto was rarely ever allowed off the premises without adult supervision for long. So when the neighbors started to… well not complain, but talk about his wild antics. Word had quickly gotten to his mother that he was sneaking out on his own and who then decided that all that extra energy was better spent doing something constructive.

At first he had been excited to be training with a real ninja, Yamato-nii didn't count, and he'd practically been raised on stories of his mother's prowess so initially the evasion training had seemed like fun; up until one of those leather-bound cork balls had actually hit him. He'd bruised a rib and the force of the impact had flipped him through the air. To make matters worse, later a completely unsympathetic Shizune had explained that the real exercise was conducted with medicine balls and while the first part of his training was dodging attacks, eventually his mother fully expected him to catch them.

It was a strange thing that Naruto had then discovered about his mother Tsunade. In spite of her almost obsessive efforts to keep him from harm, she was completely willing to risk crippling him if it meant that he would be strong enough to survive whatever the world threw at him. Given that was her philosophy, it meant that from then on, Naruto's evasion training had incorporated not just medicine balls, but eventually boulders of various sizes; ranging from flint shards thrown with enough force to imbed into flesh, to man sized slate rocks.

Trees were tossed at him, weapons of every description; all while Tsunade had off-duty clansmen tossing caltrops like popcorn. After he learned Kawarimi no Jutsu in school they'd graduated to avoiding being dosed by the mild teargas from sairuidan traps and yes, playing catch. Although fortunately his mother had back pedaled after the third time he'd broken his arm and gone back to simply dosing him with various types of poisons from traps.

The intensity of that three month long training exercise had waned with the beginning of the new school term. Still, Naruto continued with his own training and it would have been an understatement to say that Naruto's rise from the bottom of the pack in taijutsu was anything less than meteoric. For the rest of his time at the academy, he had held the top spot in hand to hand combat even with contenders like Uchiha Sasuke, Inuzuka Kiba and Akimichi Chouji.

Unfortunately it looked like no amount of training could help him in improving his skill with genjutsu. In spite of his family's best efforts it seemed to Naruto as though his chakra control took two steps back for every step forward that he made in training. It was a situation that had hounded him through his academy years and was the reason why he flunked genjutsu casting and detection; and why his bunshin, when they were created at all, looked like Hisao and Shizune after eating a Tsunade brand dinner.

It was only the rigorous training he kept up and exercises like his current helter-skelter run through the village that had allowed him to graduate in his first try. Now though, he had other concerns, the roof of the Academy was in sight and he was still going too fast!

"Hmm, how to stop myself from becoming a bloody smear on the side of the academy wall…"

He was drawing a blank. Finally, in a fit of desperation as he cleared the wall still moving at a, for him, insane speed. He spread is arms and legs out wide in an attempt to increase wind resistance, willingly trading the unstable form for a chance to slow his body down. The wind billowed through his hair and filled in his jacket. Actually the force of the wind nearly pulled the garment right off of him, forcing it open and causing Naruto to hook his arms into the sleeves of his impromptu parachute.

His body acting out of instinct, he pivoted his legs about his hips, jerking himself parallel to the ground. With instinct alone he adjusted his somewhat uncontrolled flight to take him through the third floor academy window. He tucked himself into a ball, counted two rotations, then sensing himself about to hit the ground his hand blurred out. Using his chakra, he stuck to the ground briefly enough to flip himself onto his feet but not risk snapping his wrist. Now upright, he gathered chakra to his feet, brute forcing a grip to eliminate the last of his momentum in a sideways slide across the floor coming to a stop close to the door of the classroom with the smell of burning rubber left in his wake.

He knelt there for a second, leaving his fellow ninja graduates gaping at him. Some of his female classmates were blushing at his open jacket, flushed face and heaving chest. Not all of those blushing at the sight were girls though but still he couldn't help feel a little smug…

Then a heavy fist smacked down on the crown of his skull.

"Use the door next time! They're there for a reason, you idiot! Now settle down!" Iruka roared.

Naruto just twitched on the floor; as it would so happen, a few days travel away from Konoha, a white-haired ninja was pouting morosely from much the same position as a hostess club manager tried to fish him out the garden koi-pond, "Why do people keep ruining my entrances!"

Tsunade

We, do terrible things to the people we love.

We can do terrible, terrible things to the people we love.

If only to protect them…

For Tsunade it was not a happy revelation when ten months after his birth, she learned of the 50,000 ryo bounty on her newborn son's head. It enraged her even more when she considered the usual suspects that may have placed it. A foreign village, Kumo or Kiri? Perhaps the mysterious assailant identified by the survivors of the Kyuubi's initial attacks, lives bought at the cost of her husband. Did Chiyo of the Sand dare? Or was it her fallen teammate Orochimaru, so recently driven out of the village after having experimented on fellow Konoha nin, even her kin; and if the proof left behind was to be believed the man had held a more than passing interest in her son's medical records.

If she could, Tsunade would have taken on the world to keep her son safe. Over protests from Hisao she had tried just that, keeping her Naruto-chan all but imprisoned at the clan compound. She would not hear of ninja training, despite carefully phrased demands that such potential should be better managed. Tsunade stubbornly held onto the belief that she could keep her son safe, up until the moment when all such illusions fled her.

Naruto as a toddler was walking with his nanny near the Clan's reflection pool when a Kiri missing-nin, tried to carry out an assassination of her child.

Her sweet, sweet child…

The boy's survival was merely a result of the vagaries of fate, and in the aftermath of the revelation that someone had penetrated the clan's barriers Tsunade found herself with yet another secret about her son, one she believed she had cursed him with, that would hound him for as long as he lived if others were to learn of it.

Hopelessly she came to the conclusion that Hisao, Jiraiya and the Sandaime had all been trying to convince her of.

She couldn't protect Naruto forever.

If her son was to live, he needed to be a ninja.

If her son was to survive the life of a ninja he needed every shred of power that she could give him.

So Tsunade, out of love, did a very terrible thing.

Chapter Five

Iruka huffed as he stood before the graduating class, inwardly suppressing a smile. He'd known enough of the young Senju's antics to make an educated guess of what he'd been doing before class began when he'd seen Naruto come in through the window. He couldn't condone showboating though and it was for the best if he did what little he could to nip the problem in the bud. Even if from today onward his former students were no longer his responsibility and were now proud shinobi of the leaf. He'd give his all to help his fellow ninja and protect them to the best of his ability to the very end, if need be. That was the nindo he'd inadvertently inherited on that day.

Even though Iruka taught his students without bias, it was inevitable that there would be some children whose progress he noted. Obviously the first to come to mind was the most accomplished of the graduating year, Uchiha Sasuke. Talented in all areas of the ninja arts taught in the academy, the dark-haired boy sitting at the window seat of the third row was a model student. Iruka had no complaints with Sasuke's work, both during his final year and in the exams. Sasuke was placed first among his peers in ninjutsu, genjutsu and practical fieldwork.

He tied for second place overall in the infiltration/information gathering/shinobi knowledge portion of the exam and second in taijutsu. Combined with his exemplary grades throughout the he well deserved the title: 'Rookie of the Year'

As with any teacher the next person to garner Iruka's attention was the one who gave him the most trouble, which in this case was also the student to make the biggest improvement, Senju Naruto. The boy wasn't exactly a delinquent per se, though he did at times sleep through his afternoon classes, Naruto's grades in applied math, tactics and shinobi history were always the highest in the class and he had even managed to tie with Haruno Sakura in attaining a perfect score in the final paper exam.

His skills in all other areas save for trap-making were atrocious though and for a while it Iruka had worried about the boy's eyesight because he couldn't seem to hit even the closest of targets. The fact that the child couldn't even perform a simple bunshin had left Iruka convinced that the boy's mother would hold him back from taking the exam for a third year running.

That had been one year ago.

Somewhere along the lines someone, most likely at the behest of the afore-mentioned parent, had taken Naruto aside over the summer and helped him to polish his skills. The most obvious improvement was the child's taijutsu. While it was still the same academy fare, Naruto's Konoha-ryu had been purged of every sloppy habit and incorrect technique.

Actually there were several elements to the style that the boy seemed to grasp instinctively at a level that even some chunin that Iruka knew would be hard pressed to match. The boy's movement in hand to hand combat now exemplified efficiency of motion, speed and power, with a heavy emphasis in evasion and maintaining and advantageous position. It was more than enough to overmatch stronger and faster fighters like Akimichi Chouji and Inuzuka Kiba in skill; and efficient enough to outlast skilled and technically correct fighters like Aburame Shino; and for the final exam the former dead last had even managed to maneuver Uchiha Sasuke into a ring-out.

Iruka kept note of Naruto's steady improvement in the class ranking, watching with pride as he placed first in taijutsu and infiltration/information gathering and shinobi knowledge, tying for first place with Haruno Sakura in the last during the exams. The boy scraped though the genjutsu requirement in last place and placed sixth overall in field work. In the end Iruka had proudly handed the Naruto his forehead protector after the ninjutsu requirement was cleared, watching in amusement as the three clones the boy had wasted an obscene amount of chakra creating danced soundlessly across the classroom floor.

For Iruka, Naruto's rate of improvement was nothing short of phenomenal. He couldn't help but wonder how far the boy's development would take him.

And now it was time to let them go…

"Sakura quiet down!" Mizuki quieted the cheering girl as Iruka continued to call out the roster of team assignments, "Team Eight, Aburame Shino, Hyuuga Hinata, Inuzuka Kiba… Team Nine…"

A mousy little girl, in the back fourth row near the door sagged in disappointment.

Iruka continued oblivious, "Team Ten, Nara Shikamaru, Uzumaki Naruto…"

"Mendoukusai…" Shikamaru grumbled, holding his chin in his hand.

"Yamanaka Ino. " The chunin carried on.

"Yes!" The blond girl in question cheered, before returning to her seat blushing, sending furtive glances at the clueless Senju.

Shikamaru slumped against his desk bonelessly. The rest of the announcement too tiresome to even listen to.

Nara Shikamaru found a lot of things about his life to be tiresome. Getting up in the morning; taking out the trash; cleaning his room; listening to his mother lecture him a about his hair; dealing with the jerks that kept taunting his friend Chouji, INO... It's not like he couldn't do anything about it -he just didn't feel like it, it was just too… troublesome most of the time to deal with and he usually found much easier ways to get things done without any fuss and just a minimum of effort. The answers to most of life's problems came easily to him when he bothered to think of such tiresome things. They more or less amounted to people are troublesome, go to sleep and maybe they'll lose interest and go away.

There were only two people that tack didn't work on as far as he could tell. One was his mother, the other…

-Smack-

"Wake up you lazy ass! Oh I swear!"

…was Ino…

Shikamaru blearily opened his eyes, he gave a faint look of betrayal to Chouji who was supposed to be blocking the end of the aisle and preventing Ino from approaching him. His gaze turned sympathetic however when his friend turned to look at Ino's self-proclaimed rival in love, Haruno Sakura, hurrying out of the classroom, most likely in search of her crush, the 'Rookie of the Year' Uchiha Sasuke. Shikamaru sighed and nodded his understanding. He and Chouji had talked about what the other boy would do if by some irritating course of events, their parents' not so secret; secret request for their children to be teamed up somehow fell through.

For a time it had seemed like a done deal, Chouji wasn't the best at class but he excelled in taijutsu and there were others below him. It only took a minimum of effort on Shikamaru's part to keep his friend from being in danger of flunking out. For a time it seemed that last place was reserved for Senju Naruto who held first place in the theoretical work like code breaking, math and shinobi history, but that was hardly surprising for someone who'd been as rumor said, an early entrant to the academy and likely had a full three years on his peers.

Out of the classroom Shikamaru noted that the other boy's shinobi skills had been laughable aside from wilderness survival. Sakura beat him in taijutsu, he couldn't hit a practice target with a kunai to save his life and his bunshin technique was, to be blunt, abysmal. Most of the adults looked on with barely restrained pity with an undertone of disappointment. Shikamaru could understand, having seen the skills of the class rank leader, just how far below the expected threshold of talent the scion of two illustrious clans fell. The other kids were also downright mean, especially after the day they learned about Naruto's mother and the Uzumaki clan in class. The boy seemed to press himself deeper and deeper in his seat, trying to avoid the prying gazes that seemed to say, 'Huh? That's you?'

But Naruto secluded himself not long after that, heading straight home and not leaving unless he had to. Shikamaru wasn't willing do something so troublesome as seek the other boy out when it was none of his business and Chouji needed his help more, so the Nara forgot about the whole tiresome mess; at least until the beginning of the final year.

If Shikamaru had to put it into words, he'd say that Naruto became sharper after he returned from holidays, sharper and crisper. In the taijutsu spars he now excelled even against the likes of Uchiha Sasuke with increasing frequency. It wasn't like he learnt new moves or skills. He still practiced the same Konoha-ryū that everybody else learnt. Only now there was a lot less wasted movement, a lot more thought was put into his fights and his ability to sense attacks even from a blind spot bordered on the supernatural. From the moment he'd seen the writing on the wall, he'd tried altering his plans to suit, but there was nothing he could do. Naruto shot past the bottom rankers and firmly established himself in the top ten by the time final examinations came about.

Troublesome…

Tsunade

Medical Report:

Given subject's baseline results, the likely-hood of surviving initial procedures without complications is greater than ninety-six percent, influxes from secondary chakra source noted. [Name Redacted] has been reluctant to proceed in this endeavor but I have prevailed upon the old bastard just what his choices are. [Name Redacted] agreed on the condition that all procedures be as thoroughly and rigorously vetted as possible. Damned right they will be!

Administered initial treatment to subject… Na-chan… I haven't left his side all day. We knew it would be painful, but he can't even sleep. I've overridden my own medical protocols to keep knowledge of what we're doing from getting out. We estimate that our research into the persistent beneficial effects of Raiton no Yoroi (Lightning Armor) on the nervous system has not only enhanced Na-chan's reflexes, but the mutation to the medullary, myelin and neurilemma sheaths have had the effect of improving his conscious reaction times and speed of thought.

This… hurts more than I thought it would.

Orochimaru, you disgust me, but what does it say about I who willingly use your research. The information retrieved with the blessing of the council has drastically improved our ability to treat a wide range of degenerative illnesses and even enhance a shinobi's abilities without the need for invasive surgery.

The real gems I've saved for my darling child. Thankfully the reaction was much milder that the last treatment. He was only bedridden for a week as the nodules formed in marrow and muscle. The stem cell clusters worked perfectly in harmony with the aid of [Name Redacted]'s seals. We had a scare as the mineral supplements proved insufficient, by the end of it we were literally force-feeding him chalk. Need to account for the Fox's effects on his body, reactions not detrimental so far and controllable due to the seals but initially unnerving, the deposits are added to his bones almost instantaneously!

A Hyuuga may have noted the changes.

Silencing her did not prove necessary.

Second stage guided by seals, improved durability of arterial tissue, increased level of blood clotting enzymes, elevated levels of red and white blood cells. Linked a modified Yin-seal in preparation for the full implantation of Souzu Saisei no jutsu. Secondary benefit is that the seal seems to be working to help purify previously noted influxes of the Fox's chakra and storing certain amounts of the potent energy.

Noted side effect is a significant improvement of chakra control, disruption seal to be applied at a later date so as to avoid drawing undue attention.

Third stage initiated. Muscle and bone growth accelerated, as predicted, enhanced blood vessels proved capable of taking the increased strain. Nodules forming at unanticipated organ sites, initial study indicates that the deviation from planned alteration is beneficial. Oxygen retention increased, lactase recovery time shortened, Na-chan led us on a wild chase around the village, no eight year old should have such stamina. Yin-seal attached to extra stem cell nodules, redundancy has resulted in a passive healing ability, noted in previous Kyuubi Jinchuuriki, but enhanced well beyond previously observed phenomena. Investigating alterations due to this may necessitate changes in future medical protocols.

Noted enhanced blood flow through eyes in addition to the effects of the previous stages of treatment has resulted in grossly enhanced visual acuity, and capacity for fast tracking and smooth continous eye movements. Increased blood pressure resulted in migraines and temporary loss of vision until his body adapted.

Noted increase in chakra potency due to augmented state of body, resistance seal added to disguised disruption seal. His healing ability compensated by increasing lung capacity after a few weeks of apparent lethargy. Shizune is growing concerned, I've arranged for an extended mission, something safe but further away. Hopefully I'll have a more convenient distraction for her when she returns; she needs the experience any way.

Slowly releasing restrictions on nervous system and musculature, I've arranged for a suitable trainer to ease him into adapting to new levels of strength and reflexes, [Yamato] keeps gushing over potential, gushed too much in the wrong direction. A meeting with the Third and assorted councilors ensued. A pointed discussion over how far I'm prepared to go to ensure my son gets a full education at the academy followed. Rejected offer of training Na-chan in ROOT, rejected offer of moving Na-chan to accelerated stream, rejected proposal to betroth Na-chan to suitable female, shelved all further discussion until a later date.

Paid for property damage caused by the discussion...

[Name Redacted] informs me that Na-chan may be idiot savant when it comes to fuinjutsu, emphasis on idiot.

[Name Redacted]informs me that his leg doesn't bend that way.

Matter with Hyuuga Yui resolved when medical advancements utilized in Na-chan helped cure wasting disease and haemophilia due to inbreeding, symptoms onset after second childbirth, barely survived first, I have to say it, the Hyuuga are fucking retarded. Na-chan introduced to eldest daughter, cute kid but a likely genetic dead end. I am reconsidering stance on marriage proposal though, Na-chan's that is.

Temporarily released disruption seal, chakra control advanced from abysmal to proficient genin level in less than twenty-four hours. Seal re-applied, instructing him in kage-bunshin, tsuchi-bunshin to make up for deficiency.

AN: This chapter was two thirds completed long ago, time constraints and personal commitments mean that I'm presenting two chapters instead of three as planned. If the text is odd it's because the FF .net window editor is messing with me. If Tsunade seems a little mean or unbalanced that's intentional. She's pretty much locked onto Naruto and these are her private thoughts that she's writing down, her unvarnished opinions.