Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto. I make no claims to anything but the original parts of the storyline I write, and frankly even that is probably owed to the government because of my student loans.
Edit: A couple of people have posted guest reviews asking me questions. While I am always grateful for reviews, I can't PM a guest, so please don't take a lack of response personally, if it's not something too specific to future story points i'll answer in the next chapter in an AN. Thanks for the reviews!
Chapter 2
Hiruzen stared at the boy in front of him, his mind still caught in a daze. It seemed the day did, in fact, have one more sucker punch to throw at him. The fallout from Itachi's massacre would bury him in paperwork and meetings for a month, but the recovery of the Kyuubi jinchuriki would send the balance of power in the council, already precarious with the loss of the Uchiha clan, into complete disarray as they fought over who would be put in charge of Naruto's training, not to mention preventing him from fleeing again. He could already hear the screeching of the civilian council in his head, and he could swear the headache already pressing on his temples was a conditioned response by now.
"You know, of all the ways I could have imagined us meeting again, Naruto, this has to be the least likely of them all." He said, a wry smile tugging the corners of his mouth up. "Nearly three years those two have been looking for you" he motioned with his hand to Inu and Neko, the former of which looked as if he wanted to grab Naruto and shake him until he understood just how frustrating the last two years had been "and you just walk into my office the day after one of the worst incidents in our village's history. Forgive an old man his curiosity, but why now?"
Hiruzen had always been a good judge of people. Decades of holding the highest office in the village and dealing with the political machinations of the council had left him able to decipher most people's general motivations at a glance. He'd known Naruto for most of his life before his disappearance, and before today would have bet most people nearly anything that he could tell Naruto's state of mind at a glance. After all, he'd never been the most…subtle of children. Now, however, all Hiruzen could tell of Naruto's state of mind was that he was guarded, and his body language was subtly telling him that Naruto considered everyone in the room except for possible Hitomi and Hinata as threats. More than surprise, Hiruzen felt a wave of sadness pass over him.
"What happened to him over the last 3 years Naruto? Where did the happy child go?" Hiruzen wondered to himself. He knew Naruto had participated in at least 2 fairly horrendous situations, at least one of which he felt somewhat responsible for, but he had hoped that something of Naruto's happy-go-lucky against all comers attitude had survived.
Naruto looked at him, his gaze unwavering, and Hiruzen saw something there. Purpose maybe, or resolve. Whatever had driven Naruto from hiding, it was important to him.
"I made a promise to someone to help protect the village, Hokage-sama. The Uchiha are gone, and that means that the village will need help, and I want to do what I can. The forest is my home….will always be my home. But if I stay out there I would be going back on my word, and betraying the only person who has ever shown complete faith in me. I….I can't do that." For a second, Hiruzen saw the same four year old he'd known before, the one who would do anything in his limited power to keep a promise, even at such a young age. His relief at seeing something, anything, of the old Naruto rushed through him, almost negating the pain he felt at the knowledge that Naruto felt he'd lost faith in him at some point. Hiruzen looked at the two people that had accompanied Naruto, acknowledging their presence for the first time.
"And what of you and your daughter, Lady Hyuuga? How is it that you came to be escorting young Naruto today?" He almost winced as he saw Hinata curl further behind her mother.
"Hiashi really needs to tone it down. At this rate she'll have a nervous breakdown before she's fifteen. A fake clan heir going off the reservation is bad enough, we don't need a REAL one…" He thought critically, but he knew he had little say in clan matters. Hiashi's pride was pushing him down this path, and much as Hiruzen wished he could do something to change it the law was firmly on the Hyuuga clan head's side.
Glancing down at her daughter briefly, Hitomi squeezed Hinata's hand reassuringly once, then turned back to the Hokage.
"Naruto approached my daughter and I this morning in our garden and requested an escort to see you, Hokage-sama." Hitomi said easily. Her smile said there was something more to the story, and Hiruzen quickly caught the disparate element.
"An unknown child dressed in worn clothing was allowed into the inner gardens of the Hyuuga compound at…"he glanced at the clock on his wall and did some quick math. "Eight fifteen in the morning, roughly?" He asked skeptically.
Hitomi's smile just widened a fraction of an inch, and Hiruzen noticed a small amount of red in Naruto's cheeks.
"Naruto correctly assumed that, in light of the debt the Hyuuga clan owes him, he would be permitted in the clan estates. That he chose to….forgo all of the normal pleasantries normally associated with entry into the inner gardens was simply a reflection of how important he felt meeting with you in a timely manner was." Hiruzen felt his eyes widen as he worked out the implications of her response. Obviously Naruto had not been approved to enter the inner gardens, which meant he'd snuck in. And if he'd managed to avoid the guards of a clan with a doujutsu that allowed them to see 360 degrees… That much stealth potential at such a young age was rare enough to merit interest all on its own.
"How?" He asked her. Before she could answer, two transparent chains burst from Naruto, wrapping around his body until only the pointed tips were free, poised over his shoulders. Their manifestation had been so fast that Hiruzen had barely registered their presence before the boy was covered from thigh to neck in solidified chakra. He noticed that the two ANBU had moved to defensive positions, but subtly motioned for them to stand down when he saw that Naruto was making no moves beyond the initial manifestation.
"Amazing." Hiruzen murmured. He stepped toward Naruto to get a closer look at the chains, and noticed the tips following him as he did so. "I haven't seen anything like this since…" His voice trailed off, but he never expected what he heard next.
"Since my mother, I assume." Naruto's voice was even, but Hiruzen caught the undertone of anger as he spoke. Naruto's eyes caught his own and held them; the betrayal burning in them left no doubt that he had discovered Hiruzen's deception regarding his parents. Hiruzen's hand came down almost reflexively, activating the security and privacy seals built into the walls of the office before anyone could say anything.
"How long?" Hiruzen asked, ignoring the confused looks on the faces of the two Hyuuga.
"The night I killed Akihiro." Naruto's voice didn't change at all when he answered, but Hiruzen winced inwardly as he remembered the night. More, he saw Hitomi's face whip toward Naruto, and he could read he expression well enough to know she was putting the pieces about the chunin's death together. Hiruzen sighed again. This day just kept getting worse and worse. He took a deep breath and turned to Naruto.
"What would you have me do?" He asked warily. Naruto only took a breath, seeming to steady himself before he spoke.
"Nothing, Hokage-sama. I'm not back because of my parents. Harping on their memory at this point would be dishonorable, and they've suffered enough betrayals." Hiruzen was unable to keep himself from flinching as he heard the blunt statement, but couldn't find it in himself to argue. "I'm here to fulfill a promise to protect the village to the best of my abilities. All I ask is that you help me do that." Naruto finished.
Hiruzen sat for a minute, pulling on his pipe as he thought. Reintroducing Naruto to the village would be difficult, to say the least. Even if he disregarded the standard power-plays that had always surrounded him, deflecting the accusations of the council over Akihiro's death or the attack on the Kumo ambassador would be problematic. Technically the Hokage was the supreme authority in Konoha, but the council could make his life extremely difficult if they chose. When he finally turned to Naruto, he knew that his answer would not make the boy happy.
"As much as I would love to help you, Naruto, you have to realize there are certain….issues that some on the council would have with you rejoining the village. It's highly likely they would try to prevent you from becoming a normal shinobi." Naruto nodded as he heard that, only the slight tightening at the corners of his eyes giving away his irritation.
"Because of this, right?" Naruto said, placing his hand over his stomach.
Hiruzen gasped in shock as he heard Naruto casually refer to the Kyuubi sealed inside him, and as a consequence pulled in a lungful of smoke. Coughing heavily to try and expel some of the smoke from his lungs, he looked at Naruto in shock.
"How..cough..how did you?" his question tapered off as Naruto shook his head, his face harder than any child's had a right to be. Hiruzen nodded slightly, willing to wait for an explanation at a later time. Finally expelling the last of the smoke, he looked at Naruto's stomach briefly before returning to his face.
"Yes, that is the main reason. They will try to hold you in reserve as a last resort or deterrent, and frankly you're too well known around the village. If we tried to pass you off as someone else they would find out right away." Hiruzen said, his face drawn. He hated the thought of condemning the boy to a life like that, hated for his burden but unable to escape it because of the potential power. He was about to suggest that Naruto possibly try for another path, maybe T & I, when Inu cut in.
"I'm sorry Hokage-sama, but that might not..strictly be true." He said slowly. Hiruzen looked at him sharply, along with every other person in the room, then motioned for him to continue.
"You're looking at this from the perspective of someone who has known Naruto for most of his life, spent a large amount of time checking up on a covert search for him. For someone who wasn't familiar with him …..the boy looks nothing like he did before." Hiruzen frowned, and looked at Naruto critically before shaking his head.
"His hair may be different, and his face thinner, but there's no way anyone will mistake the marks on his face or his eyes. He'd never make it past the first class at the academy before someone outed him." To his surprise, Inu chuckled and shook his head.
"With all due respect, Hokage-sama, those are small problems. The marks on his face can be covered up with cosmetics or a mask" He pulled up his dog mask slightly to show the mask covering the lower part of his face. "And as for his eyes, a pair of sunglasses will hide those well enough." The Hokage snorted.
"And what, wear the glasses 24/7? That would draw too much attention, it'd be obvious he's trying to hide." He said sarcastically. Inu only shrugged.
"Have you even seen an Aburame without their glasses? I've been guarding you at council meetings for years, and I still don't know Shibi Aburame's eye color. Make his true identity an S-class secret and lock it in the Hokage vaults, and unless he tells someone they'll never connect him with a runaway. In two or three years he'll have grown up enough that even without a disguise he'll be unrecognizable from his four year old self, and it won't matter by then." Hiruzen frowned as Inu finished, then slowly nodded. He'd become so accustomed to the backstabbing politics of the council over the years that he sometimes forgot what tools he had at his disposal as Hokage.
"Yes….that might just work." He looked sharply at Hitomi.
"You understand that everything being discussed here is now sealed under my edict, yes?" Hitomi nodded, a serious look on her face. The Hokage's edict was absolute, and she knew that if he suspected she'd divulged Naruto's identity it was possible she could be arrested at best, or simply vanished at worst. Hiruzen stared at her for a second before nodding and turning to Naruto.
"Is that acceptable Naruto? It would mean hiding who you are from everyone around you, but it would also prevent the council from making your life unnecessarily difficult, at least for the immediate future. Naruto nodded without hesitation before answering.
"As long as I can participate as an active part of Konoha's forces, I don't care. If a little deception is what I need to keep some fools from holding me back, I'll do it." Hiruzen nodded. Naruto's true birth certificate and records were already sealed in the Hokage's vault so it would only take a notation linking Naruto's new identity to those files and the same secrecy measures would apply to both.
"If we're going to protect your identity, you'll need a new name. It would do no good to hide your appearance if we don't change that. Any preferences?" Hiruzen asked. Naruto thought for a moment, then answered.
"Kodama. I can shorten Naruto to Ruto, and Kodama is….fitting as a last name." Hiruzen could only nod.
"Naming himself after a forest spirit….I guess it IS fitting when you look at his life for the past few years. He certainly managed to imitate one well enough to avoid us for that long." He made the notation to create the false identity, then passed it off to Neko. By the end of the day, Konoha's records would show one Ruto Kodama had been a citizen of Konoha for seven years, and only access to the Hokage's archive could tell any differently. He stood, and offered his hand to Naruto.
"Then let me be the first to welcome you to Konoha, Ruto Kodama. May the will of fire burn strongly in you." Naruto hesitated, then shook the proffered hand.
"Thank you, Hokage-sama." He said quietly.
When Naruto walked away from the Hokage's office, he was moderately confidant that even Itachi would have had a hard time recognizing him. Inu had gone above and beyond his initial suggestions, providing not only a foundation that completely erased Naruto's whisker marks when applied but also contacts that changed the color of his eyes from blue to a light green and a pair of sunglasses similar to those used by the Aburame clan. A long-sleeved black and red jacket filled out the ensemble, and "Ruto Kodama" was complete.
Being back in the village was something of a culture shock for Naruto, not only due to his long stay in the forest but also the change in the villager's attitudes towards him. Now that he wasn't the "demon brat", shop keepers called friendly greetings and more than one vendor offered him small samples of their wares. Proprietors that had physically ejected him from their establishments three years ago now smiled at him as he passed. It shook him to the core to think of how easy it was to changer their attitudes. A jacket and a pair of sunglasses, apply a little makeup and bam! Instant acceptance. Naruto knew deep down that it was an illusion, but he also remembered what Itachi had said.
"The best illusions are no different from the truth." He repeated to himself. He took a deep breath and let it go explosively. There was no use thinking of how they used to treat Naruto Uzumaki, because from now on there WAS no Naruto Uzumaki. He was Ruto Kodama, and forgetting that for even an instant could be disastrous.
His walk ended at a large apartment building just off of the main commercial district. Konoha was roughly divided into 3 main sections, Residential, Commercial, and Ninja. The clan compounds were mostly around the Ninja sector with the exception of a few clans like the Nara whose clan compound was in the woods off of the Commercial District. The Hokage had assigned him an apartment that was at the border between the Ninja and Commercial Districts, citing ease of access to both, and the building was obviously quietly prosperous. He walked up to the second floor and found his room number, the key turning easily in the lock. He knew that Inu lived somewhere in this building from what the Hokage had said, but beyond that he had no idea who any of his neighbors were.
The apartment was furnished in a modern but aesthetic style, only two chairs at the single table, and a small couch the only other seating in the kitchen and living room. There was a full bathroom, the size of which surprised him, and the bedroom was easily half a dozen times the size of his cubby. Still, he was unused to so much space and the close proximity of other humans.
"If I hadn't promised Itachi…." He thought as he pictured sleeping so close to other humans. He missed the forest more with every passing minute, but he would never go back on his oath to Itachi.
Sighing, he fell back on the bed and sunk in slightly. "Well at least there's something good about this place" He murmured as the soft mattress caused his lids to close slowly.
"Maybe..*yawn* maybe I could get used to this.." His words trailed off, and snoring filled the apartment. He never noticed the door open as a head topped by a shock of white hair peered in, then pulled back and closed the door.
Life in Konoha was something Naruto found to be simultaneously endlessly frustrating and endlessly fascinating. Compared to his life in the forest, everything was incredibly fast-paced. Naruto had almost missed more than one appointment simply because he was unfamiliar with any time increment besides sunset, sunrise, noon or midnight. Adjusting to a life measured in seconds and minutes instead of hours and days was frustrating, and Naruto soon began to feel as if every second was something he was losing, slipping through his fingers despite his every attempt to slow them down.
Despite his new awareness time, there were several things that he enjoyed in Konoha. Hitomi made a point to visit with him at least once every week or two, and she brought Hinata with her. For Naruto, Hinata's presence was a godsend. While he liked Hitomi, she had a very strong personality, constantly trying to tweak or improve things in Naruto's apartment or suggest new places to visit and activities to try. While Naruto enjoyed new experiences, Hitomi seemed to want to experience a little of everything at the exclusion of deeper enjoyment, while Naruto had long ago learned to appreciate the complexities of the little things. After all, there're only so many opportunities for entertainment in a forest, and being easily bored wasn't really an option if he wanted to stay sane. Hinata was farm more timid than her mother, but when Naruto was around she seemed to come out of her shell to some degree. At these times she agreed with Naruto more often than not when it came to choosing what place to eat or activity to try, and as a result they managed to slow down Hitomi's rampage through every new experience to something Naruto could handle without needing to keep a journal just to remember what they'd done in a single afternoon.
One thing Naruto had noticed about Hinata was that, if pushed beyond her comfort zone too far or forced out of her timid habits, she showed a determination and force of presence that was truly impressive to the red haired boy. From his observations while in the forest and the hints Hitomi and Hinata had let slip, he knew that Hinata's relationship with her father was strained due to her kind nature and difficulty with the traditional martial art of her clan. He also knew from his observations that she would practice every day without fail, and rarely if ever complained about any of the treatment heaped upon her. She bore it with a grace that struck a chord in Naruto, reminding him of Itachi's attitude toward his own sacrifice. What Naruto couldn't understand was her lack of skill with an art she worked so hard at. He'd seen her prowess in other areas of the ninja arts, and outside of the Jyuuken she excelled. It was almost as if the art itself was fighting her.
He had considered asking Hitomi more than once, but he wasn't sure if it was a taboo subject, nor was he eager to reveal that he had been spying on the compound even after leaving the woods. For now he was keeping his questions to himself, waiting to see if their enrollment into the academy in two months would do something to help with her problems with the Jyuuken. Naruto wasn't sure what was taught at the academy as Itachi's training had focused on immediately applicable things, not theory, but he assumed that someone there would have an idea about how to approach the situation. In all honesty Naruto was looking forward to the academy. It was the first step on his path to becoming a strong shinobi like his parents and Itachi, and if he was to ever figure out what had prompted Itachi's actions that night he would need to hone his skills. Sneaking into a place like the Hokage's archives wasn't an activity for an amateur, and despite his growing prowess Naruto knew he was nowhere near good enough. He could be patient, however.
The one thing about the academy that Naruto disliked was the necessity of hiding his heritage. He knew the ruse was necessary to insulate him from the council, but his name was one of the only connections he had to his parents, and it irritated him to have to act as if it didn't exist. His conversation with the Hokage when he'd done the paperwork to enroll in the academy had been heated, to say the least, and not all of it Naruto's fault.
-X-X-X-X-X-X-
2 days after Naruto's return
-X-X-X-X-X-X-
Naruto stared at the Hokage over a small pile of forms, his hand aching slightly from all the writing he'd had to do. He'd managed to become somewhat skilled at reading from his stolen scrolls while in the forest, but without any way to practice writing he'd been unable to progress his abilities beyond what he'd had at four years old, and even those had atrophied from disuse. The office was once again empty except for the two of them and the ANBU guards Inu and Neko, both of them edging away slowly from the growing confrontation.
"I'm sorry, Naruto, but there is no way I can release your inheritance and still maintain your cover" Hiruzen said. "I realize this is difficult, but there's just no way it would go unnoticed." Naruto's stare didn't waver.
"I'm not asking for money, or recognition. You told me my parents' house is still the same as they left it. Just give me the key." Naruto's voice was even, but internally he was raging at the old man.
"I can't Naruto. If you were seen entering the house" Naruto cut him off swiftly.
"The house is on the edge of the village, close to the Uchiha compound! There's never anyone there, how could they see me go into a house they think is abandoned!?" He exclaimed angrily. Hiruzen had simply taken a pull on his pipe and exhaled a cloud of smoke.
"There are always people around Naruto, this is a ninja village. It would only take a single mistake and everything would be ruined. I'm sorry, but I cannot risk it." Naruto had stormed out of his office angrily at that, and it had taken him several hours in the forest to calm down. When he finally had a firm hold on his temper, he noticed that he'd unconsciously circled around the village until he was close to the wall that separated the forest from the clan section, not far from his parents' house. Noting the patrolling guards on the walls, he quickly pulled himself over the wall with a quick chain movement, and dropped to the ground. He froze, looking for any sign that he'd been seen, but he didn't see or hear anyone. Cautiously making his way over to the front gate, he looked forlornly up at the house. He was less than fifteen feet from a tangible relic of his parents, but the ornate gate blocked his way. He could see seals lining the top of the surrounding wall, and recognized a few as variants of explosive seals from Itachi's training. If he tried to jump the wall he'd be luck to come down on the other side in less than a dozen pieces.
He sighed heavily and leaned his head against the gate. So close but so far…. his hand rose to touch the handle of the gate lightly, and he nearly jumped out of his sandals as blue light began to climb around the gate. He could see a line of seals radiating out from the lock of the gate, for a brief moment, and then the whole array blinked out as suddenly as it appeared. A loud *click* came from the lock, and the gate swung inward a few inches. Naruto looked around furtively for a second, but the lure of the house was too much and he pushed his way quickly inside. As the gate closed, Naruto once again saw the array pop up and disappear, another *click* signaling the gate was locked again. Naruto walked forward slowly, looking around him. The grounds were unkempt but wide, and he could see a series of posts similar to the ones at the training fields in one corner. The house itself was in good shape, only a little peeling paint betraying the long time it had sat unused. It was not particularly large, only two stories. The kind of home a family could grow in without feeling stifled, but not what Naruto would have expected for a Hokage.
The front door opened easily at his touch, and he moved into the front hall before closing the door behind him. He could see a hallway stretched out before him, but what caught his attention was the closet next to the door. Several pairs of sandals stood in a small cubby next to the door, and a several white coats with flames at the bottom stood in the closet next to a flak jacket. Naruto could feel tears tracking down his cheeks as he looked at the first tangible reminders of his parents that he'd ever seen. He ran a hand slowly over the flak jacket, noting several nicks and a holster for a katana on the back, then took a deep breath. He couldn't stay here forever, and there was more to see.
The hallway had several rooms leading off of it that Naruto could see, and a staircase at the other end. He passed a kitchen on his left, dishes still in the sink, but only looked in briefly. The first door on the right side led to a living room with a large fireplace in one wall, a large sheathed katana hanging over the mantle. There were several pictures there as well, and Naruto spent several minutes simply drinking in the sight of his parents. For the first time he had faces to go with the names, and it filled something inside him that he'd never realized was missing. He picked up one picture, a shot of his parents standing arm-in-arm and a hand each on his mother's pregnant stomach, and took it with him as he moved to explore more. The only other room on the first floor was a bathroom, but the staircase was a spiral that led both upwards and downwards. Deciding to leave the lower level for last, Naruto went up the stairs. The first room was a somewhat bland room that was set up for guests, but the second room was set up as a workshop and armory. Stacks of shuriken and kunai lay on a rack in one corner, and he could see at least 2 katana leaning against the wall. A desk with a long shelf took up one half of the room, sealing supplies laid out with methodical precision over most of its surface. He could see several tri-pronged kunai sitting on the end of the shelf, and a cursory inspection of the cabinets above the desk showed both more sealing supplies and a large number of the same strange kunai.
He left the room as it was and moved back to the hallway towards the last room on the floor. The door opened to a large bedroom with a west-facing floor-to-ceiling window. The window afforded a beautiful view of the village, and in the waning sunlight Naruto could easily imagine that sunset would look spectacular. The room itself was somewhat messy, showing the hasty nature of its inhabitant's last departure, but it was the corner that made Naruto pause. A large crib stood against the wall, a shuriken and katana mobile hanging over it. Naruto walked slowly over to the crib and stood over it, looking down. A small blanket that looked hand-stitched lay over the bedding, its surface adorned with swirls and leaf symbols. Naruto picked it up with shaking hands and hugged it to his chest. This was where he was supposed to be, happy and safe with his family. Memories of the hatred the villagers had shown him for the first four years of his life flashed through his mind, and a deep feeling of loss caused sobs to rack his body. He didn't know how long he sat sobbing next to the crib, but when he finally wiped his eyes and looked up it was dark out. Saying a silent prayer for his parents, he took the slightly tearstained blanket and wrapped it around the picture he'd grabbed from the living room and headed down the staircase. There was still one part of the house he'd left unexplored, and he didn't know when he would be able to sneak back here again. The Hokage had a point, coming back here too often would increase the chance that he would be found out, and he couldn't afford that right now.
The staircase ended at a metal door with the same style lock as the one on the front gate. Naruto tentatively touched the handle and was grateful to see the same seals spread across the door after a second, followed by the *click* noise of the lock disengaging. He pushed the door open slowly, and moved into the room. Either his presence or the door opening had caused lights to come on automatically, and Naruto looked around him in amazement. Row upon row of scrolls sat in neat racks, filling every corner of the room. He could see several labels from where he stood in the doorway, and they seemed to be elemental labeling. He reached out to the closest rack, one labeled "Earth", and took a random scroll. Opening it, he found a series of pictures and instructions that seemed to describe a jutsu for moving underground quickly, complete with hand-written annotations that seemed to be advice on how to make the most of the technique. He put the scroll back on the rack and pulled another from the rack labeled "Fire", this time showing a technique for creating a concentrated stream of fire that was breathed out in a straight line. As Naruto looked around he marveled at the concept of such a large collection of ninja techniques. He could stay in here for the next ten years and barely learn a tenth of the things he could see here. As he marveled at the wealth of information in the room, one scroll caught his eye. The scroll was labeled "Shadow Clone Corollaries", and Naruto picked it up eagerly. The shadow clone technique was one of his best, and although Itachi had given him another technique that worked off of it the more options he had the better. A quick glance at the scroll showed four techniques, all based off the same theory as the shadow clone, starting with the Shadow Shuriken technique. Naruto put the scroll in the same bundle as the picture he'd grabbed, and looked longingly at the room around him. He would love to take more of the scrolls with him, but he knew that there was a limit to how much he could bring with him without being caught. Finally he decided to take only two other scrolls, the earth move technique and a beginner's guide to sealing, in the hope that he might be able to decode what the seals on the gate were.
Naruto resolutely kept his gaze forward as he moved back to the front door, avoiding any more emotional breakdowns like the one upstairs. He stopped only momentarily to glance at the jackets hung in the hall closet before stepping outside, almost running to the front gate. A quick check to make sure that no one was watching, and Naruto opened the gate. Retracing his steps back over the wall was relatively easy, as the village patrols were not very thorough in this peaceful time, and he gained the forest only a few minutes later. He made his way back to the cubby that had been his home before returning to the village. That night he stayed in the forest, staring at the picture of his family. The image followed him into his dreams, and finally the faceless parents that he'd dreamed about so often were fleshed out. That night he'd slept better than he ever had before, protected by the mementos he'd taken.
-X-X-X-X-X-X-
Kakashi stood at the edge of the village walls, looking out over the woods in the direction that Naruto had disappeared. When the Hokage had asked him to follow Naruto after he'd stormed out of the office, Kakashi had reluctantly agreed. Even though he thought it distasteful to keep Naruto away from whatever mementos of his parents still existed, he had agreed with the Hokage that it was too much of a risk for Naruto's cover. He'd been intending to let Naruto run off some of his anger, and then step in and talk to the boy before he did something that would get him into trouble with the old man.
His shock when Naruto had walked up to the gates of the Yondaime's house had almost made him blow his cover when Naruto checked for followers, but it was nothing compared to what he felt when the gates opened at Naruto's touch. Kakashi had been to the house a few times when the Yondaime was his sensei, and he knew the gates would never open to anyone that didn't possess a blood link to the man. The pieces he hadn't noticed before began to click into place, and when he realized the truth it astonished him that he hadn't seen it before.
"Sensei's son survived….and we never knew!" He thought, his eye widening behind the dog mask. He'd always thought that the child had died the same night the Kyuubi had attacked. That even he, who'd been so close to the previous Hokage, hadn't known about Naruto's parentage was amazing, but the implications for the village as a whole were enormous. The loss of the Fourth had been more than a psychological blow for the village, it had signaled the loss of several key techniques that had been unique to the beloved leader. Presumable the scrolls for those techniques existed inside the sealed compound, but even the best seal masters in Konoha had pronounced the seals unbreakable, and cautioned that anyone attempting to tamper with them or cross over the gates would set off a chain reaction that would, at best, obliterate the compound. It was a visible reminder of what Konoha had lost in the Kyuubi attack, sitting here at the edge of the village, taunting them with how close the knowledge was while simultaneously being impossibly far away. With Naruto now having access to the house, it was entirely possible that he would one day return some of the most powerful techniques the world had ever seen to Konoha.
Kakashi had stayed hidden outside the house as night began to fall, somewhat worried that one of the security features had caused him some harm, but just when he'd begun toying with the idea of going to the Hokage for help Naruto stepped back out of the front door and made his way to the gate. Kakashi's eye focused on the bundle in his arms, and he picked out what seemed to be two scrolls and something square inside of a hand-made blanket. As Naruto ran past his hiding spot, the blanket shifted slightly and he recognized one of the pictures that had been on the mantle the last time he'd been in the house. He knew it was dangerous to have something like that out of the house, much less in Naruto's possession when he was trying to stay incognito, but Kakashi couldn't bring himself to keep Naruto from having at least that much of his parents, not now that Kakashi knew who they were and the magnitude of sacrifice they'd made, leaving their child behind while saving the village.
Naruto had moved quickly over the wall and out into the forest, but Kakashi had stayed on the wall watching him disappear between the trees. He had suspected Naruto still had a hideaway somewhere out there and as much as he wanted to see where it was, even if only to assuage his curiosity after looking for it for so long, he knew it would be a breach of Naruto's privacy. Plus, with Naruto's familiarity with the woods in that area it would be difficult to hide from the boy, especially in the dark. Kakashi stood on the wall for nearly half an hour before he decided to go back to the Hokage's office. He would tell the old man nothing of this, not until he worked through what he'd learned today, and not unless something Naruto did put him at risk for discovery. He owed his sensei's child that and much more, but it was a start.
-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X
Free time was something that Naruto had had quite a bit of over the last several years, and would until he started the academy, but he'd learned to fill it with worthwhile things. He'd continued the exercises Itachi had left for him in secret along with the scrolls he'd taken from his parent's house, but recently Inu had taken to training with him in his free time. He'd just shown up one day in the training field Naruto used when he wasn't hanging out with Hitomi and Hinata and begun to critique Naruto on his taijutsu forms. He'd never offered an explanation as to why he would sacrifice his spare time to help Naruto, but every so often Naruto would catch the masked ANBU staring at him intently as he did his exercises. Initially he was wary of Inu, but as several weeks went by without anything bad happening he began to relax around the nearly silent man.
When Naruto wasn't training with Inu, he retreated deep into the forest and worked on the scrolls he'd taken from the house. The earth move technique was relatively easy to start, but had taken him several days to perfect to a usable level. His first few tries had been somewhat memorable, with one particularly bad attempt causing him to bang into the roots of several trees when he failed to sink deep enough into the ground, and another attempt nearly causing him to panic when he overpowered the technique and sunk deeper into the ground than he meant to. It took him nearly five minutes to claw his way up out of the earth, and he hadn't tried the technique again for nearly a week after that.
The scroll with the shadow clone techniques was by far the most interesting to him. The first technique was the Shadow Shuriken technique, something very similar to how he made shadow clones but targeted toward a thrown kunai or shuriken, and he'd managed to get that down passably. The other three techniques, however, were a disaster. The shadow barrier technique wouldn't stay up for more than a fraction of a second, and he still couldn't figure out how to get the other two to work at all. The last technique on the scroll had a warning against inexperienced users that Naruto didn't see until he read through it a second time, and his single attempt at the technique had left him gasping on the ground, vision graying out for more than an hour. When he'd finally been able to sit up, he vowed not to work on the technique again until he had more experience and could either figure out the principles behind it or talk to someone who already knew it.
The text on sealing was surprisingly complex, even as a beginner text, but Naruto had been slowly working on it in his spare time. Because there was no visible aspect to it yet, just theory, he could read it in between workouts at his normal training ground, and he'd taken to carrying it with him whenever he went out in the mornings.
Naruto had been in the middle of a break five weeks after his foray into the house, working through the theory behind basic storage seals when he heard someone coming into the training grounds. As it wasn't one of the normal times for Inu to show up, Naruto looked up warily and quickly put away the sealing text. His expression quickly shifted from wary to surprised as the sobbing figure of Hinata launched itself at him. He caught her reflexively, unsure what to do about the sobbing girl.
"Hinata, what's wrong?" He asked frantically. It took her a second to speak, and Naruto could barely understand her words through the sobs.
"Father h-he..the jyuuken…f-failed" Her disjointed words continued for a minute before tapering off into more sobbing. From what little Naruto had pieced together, her father had been particularly harsh on her as she failed to grasp a basic Jyuuken technique, and it had finally pushed the gentle girl over the edge. She'd fled the compound, and apparently come out here to find him.
Naruto held Hinata awkwardly as she clung to him and sobbed, not knowing what to do. After nearly half an hour her sobs slowly died away and her grip loosened on him, but when he looked down to see if she was done crying he noticed her eyes were closed and her breathing was more even. He frowned slightly at the sight, wondering how he was going to explain this to her family, when two more figures came into the clearing. At first he thought the man was Hiashi, and he felt a surge of irritation at the Hyuuga patriarch for his treatment of Hinata, but the soft expression on the man's face and the forehead protector identified him as Hizashi, and his anger abated slowly. Behind him came Hitomi, and for the first time since Naruto had met her she wasn't smiling at all. She had a grim look on her face, and Naruto almost reflexively shrunk back from her slightly. She noticed his reaction, and her face softened slightly as she took in the sight of her daughter sleeping in Naruto's arms.
"Thank you for taking care of her Naruto" She said softly as she came forward to take Hinata from him. "It's been a very hard day for her."
Naruto could only nod slightly, and he knew his expression was hard.
"It's all right. I just hope she's alright" He said softly. Hitomi didn't respond beyond a sad nod, and she turned to leave the clearing. As Hizashi turned to walk away with her Naruto called out to him.
"Sir" Naruto called. "Can I talk to you?"
Hizashi hesitated for a moment, looking at Hitomi, but she motioned him towards Naruto and continued to walk out of the clearing. Hizashi walked back to the boy, and looked at him questioningly.
Naruto took a deep breath to center himself. He'd made the decision not to pry into Hinata's training when he'd first began hanging out with her and Hitomi, but after today he'd reconsidered. Something was wrong there, and it was hurting his friend severely.
"Sir, why does your brother try to force her to do things that don't work?" Naruto asked bluntly. Hizashi's eyes widened fractionally before he responded.
"My niece does not….does not grasp the intricacies of the Jyuuken with the ease my brother would prefer." Hizashi said carefully. Naruto only snorted slightly.
"She knows how they work for him, sir. They just don't work for her." Naruto said. It seemed obvious to him after watching Hinata with her father so many times, but apparently it wasn't so clear for others. Hizashi's confused look caused him to sigh.
"Watch" He said. A chain extended from his hand to a series of wooden posts lying on the ground at the edge of the clearing and snaked around three of them, pulling them towards the boy. Hizashi watched intently as Naruto used his bloodline, and Naruto noticed he'd activated his bloodline at some point.
"What is it with doujutsu users and my chains?" He thought, amused. He planted the posts in a line about three feet in front of him, and turned to Hizashi.
"This is what you do" He said, and thrust his hand forward. A chain leapt in a straight line from his hand and struck the first post. The spear-tipped chain punched straight through the first post, then the second, and finally struck deeply into the third. Naruto allowed the chain to dissipate, looking intently at Hizashi to see what his reaction was. The older man had furrowed his brows slightly, but still seemed to be giving him the benefit of the doubt. Naruto turned back to the posts.
"This is what Hinata does" He said, and thrust his had forward again. This time, instead of striking through the posts with brute force the chain began to turn. It was very slight, but the movement was enough to cause the chain to avoid the first post, and then curl around the second before implanting itself in the exact same place as the first.
Hizashi's brows came up in surprise as he looked at the posts, and he looked at Naruto.
"You're saying she's not strong enough to do the Jyuuken?" He asked skeptically, but Naruto just shook his head.
"No. She's….she's not stiff. When you do the Jyuuken, you're stiff, rigid. She's…flexible?" He said slowly, trying to find the right words. Hizashi's eyes widened to match his brows for a second, and he looked at Naruto as if seeing him for the first time.
"How do you know what I look like when I use Jyuuken?" He asked. Naruto blushed slightly and looked down.
"The walls are shorter than the trees" He mumbled, expecting Hizashi to yell at him. Instead, the white-eyed man just laughed loudly.
"Some 'all-seeing' eyes we have" He said depreciatingly. The corner of Naruto's mouth came up in a small smile, glad that Hizashi didn't seem mad that he'd been watching the compound.
Hizashi's laughter seemed to die as quickly as it came, and he heaved a large sigh.
"I'll look into it, Naruto. I don't know what we'll do if you're right, but if Hinata is truly unsuited to the Jyuuken….well, we'll figure something out." He said, his voice troubled.
Naruto simply nodded to him gratefully. He had worried that Hizashi would simply discard what he was saying because he was younger, but the man seemed to be genuinely considering what Naruto had said.
Hizashi nodded back to Naruto, then turned and left the clearing. Naruto stared at the posts for a moment, then down at his tearstained shirt.
-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-
Naruto stood outside of the front doors of the academy building where he would be spending much of his time for the next four years, and looked at Hinata nervously. She was holding onto Hitomi's hand tightly, and her mother was looking at them both with an amused smile on her face.
"It's nothing to be afraid of, you two" She said. "I'm sure you'll learn a lot and make tons of new friends! After all, your future teammates will come from this class." She said brightly, motioning to the other students milling around them. Naruto was feeling nervous about being so close to so many people, but Hitomi and Hinata's presence kept him from bolting.
Naruto heard a loud whistle, and looked over to see a man with brown hair and a scar over his nose waving his hand.
"Students over here, please! We'll be going through orientation in a minute, so please say your goodbyes and come inside!" He yelled out.
Hinata looked at her mother, panicking slightly, but Hitomi gave her a hug and a light push towards the door.
"You'll be fine" She said "Besides, you've got N.. Ruto here with you." She said, almost slipping over his cover name. Naruto gave Hinata a nervous smile which she returned, and squared his shoulders. Hitomi surprised him with a quick hug and a murmured "good luck" before she stepped back, and the two of them moved forward with the rest of the class. The man, who introduced himself as Iruka, led them into the second classroom on the left of the first floor, and they filed in and began to sit down.
Naruto was walking towards the far wall, Hinata right behind him, when he stumbled over the foot of one of the students who had just taken their seat. As he stumbled he turned slightly and his shoulder banged into the desk, pushing it backwards into the chest of the person he'd tripped over.
He stood up quickly, and apologized to the boy, who looked at him as if he were something disgusting. Naruto just raised an eyebrow in response, and began walking back toward his intended seats in the upper corner before he heard a muttered "freak" from the boy. His eyebrows narrowed in anger at the insult, but Hinata's presence behind him kept him moving forward, but not from glaring at the back of the boy's head when he finally sat down. Iruka began to take roll call, and Naruto heard the boy call out "here" when the name "Uchiha Sasuke" was called. Naruto's eyes widened slightly as he realized that this was Itachi's brother.
"I said I'd protect the village for him. Doesn't mean I have to like everybody in it" he told himself internally. As he tried to pay attention to the orientation, he was constantly distracted by the whispers of several of the girls around them. They all seemed to be about the dark-haired jerk from what he could tell, and every time he heard them his mood grew steadily worse. These were the people he was supposed to trust with his life in four years?
"This is going to be a long four years"
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