~A/N: Well, here's chapter 2 to my first fanfic on the site. I always thought people exaggerated when they said reviews keep an authors mind going but... now I know how they feel :P Also, I like to write ahead, and I'm not going to make any major changes to the chapters I already have written unless it's VITAL that it changes, or I really want to change it. If you don't like how the story goes, then don't read it.

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto… If I did, it probably wouldn't have played out the way it did…

~Fallen Angel~

~A Naruto Fanfiction~

Have not the strongest
and closest ties been bound so long
I've called upon them
they remind me where I'm from
With deep conviction
I am connected cross the miles
with out them nothing worth relying on

Chiron - All That Remains

~Chapter 2: New Ties~

Drip. Drip. Drip. Drip.

The sound of water gradually brought Naruto back into consciousness. He slowly flickered his eyes open. He became aware of an intense pain in the majority of the right side of his body, but for some reason it didn't bother him much, like it was numbed.

Naruto sat up and looked around, dazed. He was sitting in some kind of sewer, judging by the pipes and steel walls around him and the murky water (at least he hoped it was water) underneath him. There was a dull light illuminating the tunnel he was in, but he couldn't find anyplace the light could be coming from. It was as if the place was built to look creepy.

'Wha… Where am I?'

He stood up and realized his pants were completely dry. Yeah this definately wasn't normal water... didn't smell like a sewer though, so what could it be? He dismissed the mystery as unimportant at the moment.

"Ugh, what happened?" He question to no one in particular, holding his hand to his head, which wouldn't stop pounding. He suddenly felt a strong urge… like he needed to go somewhere, deeper into the tunnel system. He followed the urge, automatically walking through the twisting tunnels, quickly losing his sense of direction in the dark surroundings. Yet he never felt lost, and the urge never dulled, it only grew stronger.

Eventually, after a few minutes (or was it hours?) of walking through the complex tunnel system, he came across a large room, with what appeared to be an equally large cage on the other side of it, with the kanji for 'seal' on it. There was something on the other side of those bars, Naruto could feel it in his bones. As he cautiously approached the cage, a blanket of malicious power washed over him and he felt like he weighed a ton, but he still remained standing.

A pair of massive crimson eyes with slitted pupils revealed themselves, but Naruto showed no reaction. The sound of a very large creature taking rough breaths echoed throughout the room. Naruto stood waiting for something to happen.

Eventually, after several minutes of waiting, something did.

"WHAT THE HELL WERE YOU THINKING?" The creature suddenly roared. Naruto looked up like he had just realized something was angrily shouting at him.

"Hm? What are you talking about?" Naruto questioned with a confused look on his face.

"YOU KNOW EXACTLY WHAT I'M TALKING ABOUT YOU GAKI! NOW ANSWER MY QUESTION! WHAT IN THE NAME OF KAMI WERE YOU THINKING, JUMPING LIKE THAT?" The creature roared again in anger and irritation.

It didn't faze Naruto. "What? What do you mean…? Jumping…" A look of realization dawned on his face as his latest memories returned to him. "I was… Jumping off of the Hokage Monument…" He said dazedly.

He then grabbed his head with a crazed look on his face. "What the hell was I thinking?" He shouted. "W-wait, does that mean that I'm… dead…?"

The large being before him sighed with enough force to blow Naruto back a few inches. "No, you aren't dead, Gaki. You're in your mindscape,"

A bewildered look adorned Naruto's face. "And that means…?"

"OK, I'll say it in simple terms so even you can understand it," The creature replied, recieving an offended "Hey!"

"You aren't dead, but you're not quite alive, either, so you're in you own mind to figure out where you want to go from here."

"… What? How can I not be dead, but not be alive, either?" Naruto questioned, scratching his head in confusion. "And what do you mean, where I want to go from here?"

"When you started heading towards the cliff, I knew what you were going to do, and I was trying to tell you not to… but of course you didn't listen, and you jumped anyway. When I realized nothing I said was getting through to you, and saw how close you were to the ground, I abandoned all precautions and tried to take control so I could stop you. It didn't quite work as planned, obviously." The creature explained, seeming to calm down a little.

"Oh, so you must have been that voice in the back of my head…" Naruto seemed mumbled to himself.

"You mean you heard me and you ignored me?" The creature said, quickly growing angry again.

"Well, I couldn't really understand what you were saying… what were you saying, anyway?"

The Creature was glad it was dark, so Naruto couldn't see it turn crimson. Well, more crimson than usual. Some of the things it had said to get him to stop were… Well it'd probably never say them ever again, unless it REALLY needed to get his attention...

"T-that's beside the point! Anyway, when I tried taking control, I couldn't get full control, this seal stopped me, but my power gave you enough protection that you didn't die on impact. You're currently lying in your room in Konoha's Ninja Hospital."

"That still doesn't answer my question." Naruto pouted. Things were getting confusing! The creature sighed again.

"I'm getting there, I'm getting there! My power was strong enough to stop you from dying, but too weak to save you from extensive injury. Right now, you're balancing on the line between life and death. Because of this, you've been inserted into your mind to make the decision."

"So, what do I do then?" He asked with a determined look on his face.

"It's actually quite simple. Just decide if you want to live or die, and leave the room the way you came. If you decide to live, you'll wake up in the hospital. If not… you'll die. Simple as that."

"So I just decide and then leave, huh?" Naruto pondered the decision. He wasn't sure what he was thinking when he jumped that cliff… He remembered all the hateful glares and words. The blatant disrespect that even the academy teacher's gave him. And then he remembered Iruka. The only teacher who actually bothered to help him. The man he looked up to. He remembered the Sandaime, and the Teuchi's, and the occasional kind person who saw past the demon he contained. He made his decision.

"Just who are you anyway?" Naruto questioned the Creature, who sweat-dropped comically.

"You mean you really haven't figured that out? Wow, you really are as stupid as your academy grades say."

"HEY!"

"Think about it. We're in your mind, and I'm sealed inside a cage. What do you contain that's sealed inside you?"

At this, Naruto managed to put two and two together. His eyes grew to the size of dinner plates, and he stood gaping at the Creature. "You mean you're the…Kyūbi? But…you're not anything like I thought you'd be, you're actually kind. Well, maybe not kind, but you don't seem to hate me, and that's fine in my book." He said, ranting and nodding to himself.

"You of all people should know by now that people aren't always how others make them out to be."

Naruto sat down cross-legged and thought for a few minutes before voicing his thoughts. "If you're the Kyūbi, and you're sealed inside of me… Then why wouldn't you just let me die?" He thought with a gloomy look on his face.

"Because, as much as it pains me to say it…I care about you, kit. And not just because when you die, I die – after all, I'll just be reborn again in the future – but because I've seen your life, the hell you've lived through year after year, and I have to say that most, if not all other people would have snapped and tried what you just did years ago. But you didn't. I may be one of the nine mighty bijū, but that doesn't mean I don't have feelings just like a human. I have to say, Naruto, that I am truly sorry for the hell I've caused you to live your entire life. If it weren't for me, you'd have a family, and the village wouldn't shun you. I am sorry for what I've caused…"

With that they both sat in silence for what seemed like forever until finally Naruto spoke up.

"What's in the past is done. You can't change it, so it's no use getting hung up on it now." He paused and looked up at the large kitsune, a genuine smile on his face. "I guess it's just nice to know you care about what happened."

With that he got up and started walking towards the exit with a mischievous smirk on his face. "You know, for one the most feared beings in the world, you really sound like a girl."

He failed to notice the Kyūbi's smirk as well. "Who said I was a male, kit?"

The utterly shocked look on Naruto's face before he was ejected from his mind was priceless.

~~)(|)(~~)(|)(~~)(|)(~~

Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.

An all too familiar beeping noise awaited Naruto when he awoke from his mindscape. It was the beeping of the medical equipment in his hospital room. How many times had he heard that in the past year? He had lost track after the first few dozen. Suddenly the pain hit him, and this time he felt every bit of it. The beeping increased dramatically in rate, eliciting a surprised shout from the occupant of the room. He grunted and arched his back from the pain.

Jumping off a cliff hurt!

A nurse quickly rushed up to him and gazed at him, shocked, when he turned his head to look at her. He slowly moved to sit upright in the hospital bed, trying to ignore the painful protests of his body.

The action startled the nurse out of her daze. "W-wait!" She rushed forward and pushed Naruto back to the bed, being surprisingly gentle. "You shouldn't be trying to sit up yet! You shouldn't even be awake, let alone able to move!" She said wide-eyed as she checked his clip-board at the end of his bed. She scribbled down some things.

Naruto laid back down on the bed in a daze. He... he had just met and had a conversation with the Kyūbi. It seemed so surreal, to hold a (somewhat) civilized conversation with the being that had practically destroyed your life so far.

To think that he had tried to commit suicide... he didn't know what the hell he was thinking then. The events of the past few days must have just built up... and that was the result.

He shuddered and finally got to observe his surroundings. He was in what appeared to be a generic hospital room, but he knew this was his special room, reserved for him by the Hokage's orders, incase something happened to cause Naruto injury, which was often the case.

The nurse attending to him was young – probably not even twenty yet – and frankly very beautiful. She had flowing brown hair that was pulled back into a ponytail. Her eyes were a deep ocean blue just like Naruto's own, and she had a pretty face with flawless skin. Her chest was… developed. He wasn't going to go any farther than that, he wasn't a pervert! She was of average height; around 5'10" would be his guess.

Naruto always got new nurses assigned to his room, ones straight out of medical training, since they could sabotage his healing process and pass it off as 'inexperienced mistakes'. The 'Head Doctor' or whatever the guy that ran this place was called seemed to have a larger than usual grudge against Naruto.

A voice startled him out of his thoughts.

"Are you finding everything to your liking?" The nurse questioned with what seemed to be a playful smirk. It took Naruto several seconds to realize he was still staring at her chest.

Naruto quickly raised his hands in protest. "N-no! I-I mean yes! I-I mean I wasn't checking you out, I swear!"

She giggled in response. It was actually very cute in Naruto's opinion. Too bad she would likely beat him for staring.

"Please don't beat the tar out of me!" He flinched back and shielded his face comically.

'Ah, crap. She'll never believe me!'

"What? Why would I hurt you? I already know you weren't being a perv." She said with a confused look adorning her face.

"W-what? How do you know?" He responded, surprised. "Not that I'm complaining! I'm glad you're not going to hurt me!" He quickly stammered out.

"When you were staring at me, it wasn't a lustful look. It was more like you were… analyzing me, I guess," She responded curiously. "The look on your face was actually pretty cute." She smiled and tried to replicate the look on his face. It really was cute. At least, it was on her… he wasn't so sure about himself. Sakura had told him what she thought of him often enough that he had started believing her at one point.

"You thought I was cute?" She nodded with a small blush, not that Naruto noticed; he was still clueless in the category of women. "Well then I guess you haven't seen 'The Great Uchiha' yet." He sulked.

"You mean Sasuke Uchiha?" She quesioned, raising an eyebrow. He nodded in response. "Of course I've seen him, who hasn't?"

'Oh, great. Now she'll just go on about how handsome the Uchiha is compared to me, and how awesome the Uchiha is compared to me, and blah, blah, blah…'

"They keep parading him around town like he's the best thing to walk this planet! He used to be a good kid, but because of the councils pampering he's become a stuck up ass!" She growled out.

This earned a very surprised stare from Naruto.

"He isn't even that handsome, but he has hordes of fangirls following him wherever he goes! There are plenty of people who deserve their attention more than him!" She continued. "You're a perfect example of that. In fact you're pretty handsome yourself." She giggled at Naruto's now red face and Naruto felt like he was going into shock.

The Hokage took that moment to stride through the door.

The nurse quickly muttered a surprised "Hokage-sama!" and bowed. Naruto of course ignored the formalities and yelled "Jiji-san!" with a huge grin on his face.

The now surprised and slightly fearful nurse glanced at Naruto. Nobody disrespected the Hokage like that!

The Hokage sighed. "How many times have I told you not to call me that, Naruto-kun?"

"Too many times to actually expect me to listen, Jiji-san." Naruto said, with a sly grin.

The wide-eyed nurse looked between Naruto and the Hokage in shock.

The Hokage shifted his eyes to the now standing nurse and she suddenly felt very afraid.

"I trust his healing is going according to plan, Miss Hisagi?" He questioned – well more like interrogated – while narrowing his eyes in suspicion.

"Y-yes, Hokage-sama, his healing is going perfectly. He's healing at a phenomenal rate; I've never seen anything like it!" She said, glancing at Naruto.

This earned a surprised look form Naruto, and even an eyebrow-raising from the Hokage. Didn't she know about the Kyūbi? Well, even if she didn't, it wasn't the Hokage's place to tell her, that was Naruto's decision.

"Well then, I guess I've accomplished what I came here for. I'll be getting back to my... work now."

"Ok, see you later Jiji-san!" Naruto smiled another rather large beaming smile. Gotta keep the mask up, you know?

"Naruto, after your team assessment is over, we are going to have a little talk about just how you came to be in the hospital in the first place," The Hokage replied grimly, exiting the room and heading to the Hokage Tower.. The nurse had a questioning look on her face.

"What was all that about? Why did it feel like the Hokage was interrogating me?" She looked to Naruto for the answers.

"The nurses that are assigned to my hospital room tend to… sabotage my healing process." He stated reluctantly.

"What? Sabotage… you mean they purposefully work against your healing? Why would they do that?" She asked incredulously.

"Do you know who I am?" He asked solemnly.

"Well, I know your name is Naruto, but that's pretty much it. What does that have to do with this?"

Naruto looked at her like she was crazy.

"You're old enough to know how the Kyūbi was defeated, right?"

"Yes, I am... It was killed by the Yondaime Hokage," She said, narrowing her eyes ever so slightly. It was obvious she knew that the Kyūbi had not been killed. At this point there was pretty much no turning back.

"No, it wasn't," He started, his voice sounding emotionless. Her eyes widened as he continued. "It was sealed..."

"...Into a child… but how do you know that?" She questioned suspicously.

"Do you know the name of the Kyūbi's Jinchuriki?" He asked, reluctant to say it outright.

"Of course, he's just as famous as the Uchiha, he's… Naruto… Uzumaki…" A look of realization dawned on her face. It was hard to tell what she was thinking, but Naruto was pretty sure it wouldn't be good. She had only acted kindly towards him because she hadn't known who he was, but now she would yell and rant or hopefully just leave without a word.

What he did not expect was a pair of feminine arms to sweep him off of his hospital bed, wrap around him and press his face into her well developed chest, effectively suffocating him.

"Oh, you poor boy! You don't deserve anything those idiotic villagers do to you!" She squealed as she squeezed the life out of Naruto.

"Mmmmph mmrrmm!" Naruto's strangled cries alerted her to his plight. She quickly released him from her hold and he gasped for breath for several seconds. Luckily for Naruto she didn't notice how red his face was, or if she did, she must have passed it off as a reaction to the lack of oxygen.

"Couldn't… Breathe…!" He wheezed. He recovered after several moments of rest.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean hurt you, Naruto!" She squealed. She was acting rather fangirlish in Naruto's eyes.

"Don't worry about it, it's fine," Naruto replied, causing her to breathe a sigh of relief. "So… you really don't care that I have the Kyūbi inside of me?" He asked with pleading eyes.

"Of course not! There's no way you could be a monster like almost everyone claims, you're too kind!"

This time it was her turn to be surprised as Naruto buried his face into her chest and hugged her. She soon returned his embrace, albeit gentler than the last time. "Thank you…" He said queitly.

"There's no need to thank me, Naruto." She murmured softly. "You deserve much better than what I've given you, but I can only do so much," She chuckled a little.

"Well, I'm sorry for ruining the mood, but I need to do the rest of my rounds or my boss will fire me." She said sadly. She turned to leave.

"Can I at least know your name?" Naruto pleaded. She stopped, turned and stuck out her hand.

"My name is Akari Hisagi. It's a pleasure to meet you!"

Naruto took her hand and shook it. "Naruto Uzumaki." He said with a grin.

And with that she left. Naruto couldn't help but feel saddened by her absence. He'd most likely have a different nurse assigned to his room the next time he stayed here. She was the first nurse that hadn't treated him like shit since the Hokage had assigned him the room. It felt nice to be cared about, instead of being seen as a waste of space.

His thoughts were again interrupted by the door opening and another presence in the room. He looked up to find the single eye of Kakashi staring back at him. His face looked solemn, even though you could only see his eye.

Yeah, he definitely knew how Naruto had gotten there…

"Kakashi-sensei? What are you doing here?"

"I was just checking up on you, seeing if you were alright. I was the one to bring you here after all."

Naruto's eyes widened upon hearing this. Come to think of it, he hadn't really thought of how he had gotten to the hospital in the first place. "How did you know where I was?" He questioned.

"When you… jumped, you released a small amount of the Kyūbi's chakra, whether you intended to or not. Any ninja close enough to the Monument or any ninja with high sensory skills felt the outburst and I happened to be the closest to the scene. So I transported you here and alerted the Hokage," He eye-smiled.

"Oh. I guess that makes sense," Naruto said to himself.

"Well since you're up I guess I'm not needed here anymore. I'll see you at the team assessment at Training Ground 7 tomorrow. Don't be late," he said, and then poofed away before Naruto could protest.

Something Kakashi had said nagged at the back of Naruto's head. 'I'll see you at the team assessment at Training Ground 7 tomorrow… Team assessment… Training Ground 7… Tomorrow…'

Tomorrow! What time was it? He frantically looked for a clock, and eventually found the one above the door. It was 10:47 P.M.

He only had around 7 hours until team assignments! That was nowhere near enough time to train! Now he was certain his sensei was sadistic! He decided to make the best of the time he had and grabbed his clothes that Akari had laid out before heading out the door. He would spend an hour training and then sleep the rest of the time. He had to be ready for Kakashi-sensei! Maybe he could find Iruka-sensei if he was still at the academy and get some pointers…

With those thoughts in mind he bolted out the door for the exit, earning rude comments from all the nurses walking down the hall. All but one.

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~A/N: So, how was it? Good, bad, absolutely horrible? Need to know how my first attempt at fluff went :D Also, for those wondering why Akari couldn't just read his last name off of his medical papers, info, etc... It's because the hokage ordered his last name not to be revealed to any nurses or doctors, in the hopes that they wouldn't realize who they were tending to. For those that like action, the next chapter will have some!

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