Family

It was roughly early afternoon when they finally arrived to a hotel. At this point Itachi and Mikoto were exhausted from all the traveling throughout the night into the morning without rest. While not physically tired, Naruto was mentally exhausted from what was revealed to him, and thus needed rest as well. Unknown to Naruto, when Mikoto would start his teaching, this was to ensure to set him up as fast as possible to be a shinobi. Life with a missing nin is hard, especially as a child. They each got into their respective beds and two of the party blissfully fell asleep. However Naruto was deep in his thoughts. If he were to be told that he would be leaving what he had known as his 'home' his entire life, the venture with his family, he would most certainly think they were lying, but here he was, with his new family. While he was slightly nervous around Itachi, solely because of how he was able to kill his friends despite the reasons, he felt at peace with Mikoto. Unknown to him, it was simply because she has a motherly atmosphere around her that comforts Naruto, especially since he had never really experienced that before. Collecting his thoughts, Naruto fell asleep, however this night would prove rather restless for the young Jinchuriki.

He could hear loud howling, mixed with a menacing feeling in the air. Once the howling somewhat died down for a moment, he could hear low cries and screams, followed by the sound of an inferno blazing near him. The smell of soot and burnt flesh blocking any other scents in the air. When what he was hearing came into view, he could see what was causing it. He noticed a raging beast, no a fox, with multiple tails raging. The most noticeable thing was the destruction around him, he could see buildings burning and bodies burnt to crisps or impaled by debris. He had never had this nightmare before, he had never felt more afraid in his life. Not realizing he was dreaming of course, made him wonder how could this be. It looked like Konoha. It mattered not however as another inferno came racing towards him, where he quickly ran away and barely made it out with minor burns. His restless night seemed to only be beginning.

Outside his dream world, he was tossing and turning, it seemed as if he was silienting whimpering as well, this seemed to go on for about ten minutes before it was noticed however. Noticing Naruto in this state, motherly instincts kicking in, Mikoto swiftly picked up the child and rocked him slightly hoping to make whatever was causing his state to settle. After a few moments, she lucked out, and his sleep became stable. They both fell asleep, to wake in the morning.

Unknown to the duo, this state was caused by the Kyuubi, since Naruto awakened his sharingan. The unquenched hatred towards those eyes blinded him and his container felt the repercussions. This was an unforeseen circumstance towards his rage, only time will tell if this type of dream will occur again.

The sun was glistening through the windows, lighting up the hotel room in the early morning. This of course caused Naruto to stir, however he felt different then he did when he feel asleep. He then noticed the calming presence he was in and realized he was not in his bed. Slightly worried, he jumped out of bed before realizing he was with Mikoto. Slowly beginning to remember his dream, he realized he must've gone to her afraid, not knowing what actually happened. His jumping out of bed woke up Mikoto, as well as Itachi, both being trained shinobi, only to realize it was only Naruto. Realizing this Naruto was embarrassed.

"Sorry, it was an accident" Naruto said sheepishly

"It's alright, we can get started on your teachings earlier" responded Itachi. He was already awake but merely enjoying the comforting sunlight entering the room.

"Itachi is right" Mikoto said groggily "What had you troubled last night Naruto" she followed up remembering the events

"Uh" Was all Naruto could say, there was a pregnant pause before he felt comfortable continuing.

"There was this massive fox attacking a village, there was lots of broken buildings and dead people, it was scary." Naruto stated somewhat downcast with what he recalled.

He did not have the vocabulary to describe everything he saw, but this just mentioning the fox was enough for both Itachi and Mikoto to draw conclusions. They both had the same thing running through their minds. "Why would the fox be messing with his dreams" was what they were currently in deep thought about. They both drew the conclusion they would find out eventually.

"Well don't worry about it Naruto, we will be here for you" replied Itachi and Mikoto, they were on the same mindset of not wanting Naruto to dwell on the dream to much.

"Naruto why don't you sit down and I will start teaching you in a minute" Mikoto asked of Naruto, she needed a second opinion of Itachi.

"Do you think we should unlock his chakra correctly before we teach him, doing so would allow him to use his sharingan to learn, which would greatly speed the process up of him reading and perhaps writing. As using the sharingan is near equivalent of a photographic memory." Mikoto directed her thoughts towards Itachi.

"I do think it would be advantageous, however should we do that, we would need to start drilling into his head that the sharingan is a mere tool so he is not clouded with judgment." Itachi responded calmly towards his mother, already agreeing with what the possibility of learning that way would do. "Anyways, I'm going to run to town and get supplies, such as food, water, and some shinobi gear." Itachi said as he was walking out the door, Mikoto simply responded with a nod and went to talk to Naruto.

"Naruto, before we start you on your teaching, I want to unlock your chakra. This will allow you to use your sharingan much easier, ultimately letting you memorize things faster. However I want you to remember that the sharingan is a mere tool, nothing more, ok." Mikoto told Naruto, wondering what his response would be.

He could barely keep the excitement off his face, he was going to unlock his chakra and learn faster. He could barely fathom what was happening. Up until today, he was always going to have to wait until the academy to learn those things, he was certainly excited for what was about to happen.

"Miko, how am I going to unlock my chakra" he questioned towards Mikoto.

"I want you to copy the position I'm sitting in" Mikoto stated and she got into the lotus position. Naruto quickly copied the position, in which she fixed any mistakes he had. "Now I want to focus within, try to find a warm feeling inside your tummy, once you do just pull on it, and keep pulling on it" she answered, trying to keep it simple for the child's sake.

Naruto was completely focused on completely his task, looking for something warm and happy inside him. After a few moments, he started to get frustrated and opened his eyes, frustration clearly present.

"Listen Naruto, most people can take over a day to do this, it even took Itachi a few tries and he is extremely gifted. Don't give up, I am sure you can do it." Mikoto advised

Listening to her advice he tried to unlock his chakra again. However even after calming down he still could not do it after roughly an hour of trying. He was trying to give up when he remembered something he was told yesterday. He recalled how his parents would want him to be a good shinobi, coupled with the fact that his new family wanted him to be as well, he would not give up. With a small flare of determination, he was able to find his chakra and pull. He kept pulling on the sensation until he could no longer.

Mikoto was quick to observe the copious amounts of chakra the boy had, however quickly noted he was a jinchuriki and that made sense. She then realized he wasn't going to stop pulling chakra until he couldn't and quickly get him to stop. She didn't need him passing out from lack of chakra so soon.

"Enough Naruto, now that you have successfully unlocked your chakra, can you feel it in your body" questioned Mikoto, hoping that she wouldn't need to explain how to feel it now.

"Yes, I can feel it everywhere, it is amazing" Naruto claimed with excitement.

"Now I want you to try to move the chakra towards your eyes" she ordered

Naruto did as he was asked, the first attempt he did not succeed, he was able to move his chakra but not accurately. He tried again and this time he was able to move the chaka to his eyes, immediately noticing the difference. He was rather astonished by the difference in what he saw. While he didn't know what he was looking at, he was intrigued by the blue coloring given off from Mikoto.

"Miko what is the blue stuff around you" Naruto asked Mikoto, his voice full of curiosity.

"That is chakra, every living thing has it" she responded scholarly. "Now Naruto, these eyes of yours are nothing more than tools, they will help you learn and eventually help you in combat, however as I said, they are nothing more than tools. You should not rely on them. Anyways, those eyes are good for learning and memorizing information, now that you can activate them, we will begin teaching. We will start by going through words and phrases, when Itachi returns we will eat and go into history. After dinner we will review. Does that sound good to you Naruto." Mikoto asked, she knew that this was going to be a lot of effort for him, but she also knew that it was for what's best, it will difficult to get a lot of time while traveling between regions, so they needed to learn whenever they could.

Naruto only nodded, which began his lessons. The rest of the morning was uneventful, with Naruto learning various kanji and how to string them together. It was a difficult task, especially with his sharingan activated non stop. He was feeling quite tired by the time Itachi returned.

"How is the learning going" Itachi directed towards Naruto as he returned with food among other things.

"It's going good, but I am rather hungry" Naruto asked, sharingan still ablaze.

"That's good, however I think you can deactivate your sharingan for now, you don't want to continue to tire yourself out." Itachi explained to Naruto, he knew that having your sharingan active all the time can be extremely tiring, especially when you are using more than enough chakra to keep your eyes activated.

"So what have you learned so far" he asked, curious to if the morning was eventful or not.

Naruto then proceeded to explain how he had unlocked his charkha, and learned multiple kanji and how to string sentences together. He had advanced rather quickly, even with the sharingan. This had shown both Mikoto and Itachi that if he was given the proper environment, Naruto would be quite the prodigy. After explaining how his morning went, the family began to eat some onigiri and once they were finished, pochi. Mikoto noted Itachi's weird craving of pochi, but said nothing.

"Naruto, what would you like to eat for dinner" Mikoto asked her surrogate son. The response was an instantaneous uproar of "ramen!" which left the other occupants in the room silent for a moment. They both remembered Kushina's lust for the noodle meal, and only feared those who had to appease the appetite of the ramen beasts.

The night continued as Mikoto said it would, with Itachi stepping in as well to teach the young raven haired boy. He learned about the warring clan states, and how eventually Madara Uchiha and Hashirama Senju both shook hands and eventually formed what was Konohagakure no Sato. This is how their night finished, however there would be much other history to cover, such as the shinobi wars and how each elemental nation came to be, and what they view as important. This would seem rather redundant for now, but learning the histories of each nation would be extremely important for the future.

The the next two weeks went without much of a hiccup, each morning started with learning the alphabet while the afternoon was dedicated to history, however after the first week some shinobi tactics were discreetly thrown into the mix. In this time, Itachi had stepped up quite a bit, he loved teaching history to his brother, and was in large responsible for the shinobi tactics. Itachi always made a point on how many shinobi want to learn jutsu that are 'eye candy' but that is not what is needed for a shinobi.

The morning was relatively quiet for the most part. Itachi had just left to go to an old Uchiha hideout to claim some scrolls that would prove useful in the future. He figured since the were moving away from Hi no Kuni it would be better to grab those things now than in the future. Since Itachi was away, Mikoto decided she would take Naruto into town to get some lunch. It was a nice afternoon, it wasn't to hot, but the sun was shining making things rather comfortable. They finally arrived at the ramen stand, both browsing the menu.

"What are you going to get Naruto-kun" Mikoto questioned her surrogate son.

"Miso ramen!" he hastily responded, it was clear he had already known what he wanted before they even sat down.

"So Naruto, what do you think of all the teachings so far, I know it has been a lot for you to undergo" she asked, wondering what his response would be.

"Although it has been hard learning so many things, It's nice to be able to learn like this, especially on how all the shinobi villages are connected and how they view each other. Most of history is sad though" Naruto responded, while he did enjoy history, he had to admit that a large part of it was rather depressing, with nothing but bloodshed. He favorite part about history would be the founding of the shinobi villages, where different people were able to band together to attempt to stop fighting.

As they finished eating, Mikoto paid for the food and they started to return to the hotel. The sun was starting to set when Mikoto noticed that something was wrong. Had it not been for her shinobi instincts, she would not have been able to dodge the kunai that was headed straight towards her.

"Ah, so the lady does have some training after all" a bandit responded coming out of the trees, followed by two of his comrades.

"That she does., but she could never take on three of us, I wonder what kind of things she could do once we capture her, she is quite the looker" another one responded, however this man was not a bandit, but a missing nin. Based on his headband, he was from Kirigakure. This would make sense as the land of waves was closest to that elemental nation aside Konohagakure.

Hearing this Mikoto quickly activated her sharingan and prepared for combat. She then looked over at Naruto "Stay behind me, and do not get in the way. Naruto simply complied he was not one to argue given the situation.

Mikoto then didn't give any time for the trio of enemies to asses the situation. She quickly went through a series of hand signs Fire Style : Fireball Jutsu, quickly launching a large fireball towards the assailants. Unfortunately, none of them were incapacitated, with only one receiving minor burns. Quickly jumping away from their previous positions, one of the bandits then cried out Water Style : Water Bullet Jutsu launching a medium sized water ball towards Mikoto. She immediately realized she couldn't dodge with Naruto behind her. In her predicament she cried out Earth Style : Earth Wall , a rock wall emerged from the ground just in time to shield her and Naruto from any injury. Quickly flipping through hand seals, she tried to catch one of the bandits out Fire Style : Phoenix Flower Jutsu, seven fireballs quickly came out of her mouth, she was able to catch one bandit with her fireball, effectively killing him. The bandits realizing that they were losing, they needed to change their tactics. Mikoto, keeping on the defensive, was awaiting what was to come next. Water Style : Hidden Mist Jutsu the missing nin from Kiri called out. He was trying to seperate Mikoto and the child to force her into cooperating, a dirty tactic, but they were shinobi after all. Mikoto quickly realized what they were doing, but it was to late, the missing nin was able to grab her surrogate son, however she noticed the second bandit behind her, quickly readying a kunai, she threw it at him. He was not prepared and caught off guard. This error would cost him his life, the kunai quickly imbedded into his chest and he hit the ground with a loud thud.

The missing-nin knew that he was alone now, but it mattered not, he had the child. He could easily force the women to do what he wants now. Unfortunately he forgot the one rule in his situation. A women defending her child is something one does not want to willingly fight, especially when she is stronger than you. Mikoto kept her cool, unfortunately Naruto was not, he was quiet however she could see the despair and helplessness in his eyes. She hated seeing him like that and quickly flew through some hand signs Genjutsu : Bringer of Darkness, this technique took a lot out of her, so she wasted to time. Once the genjutsu was active she rushed the missing nin and ended his life, however not before getting some minor cuts from the blindly swinging kunai of the missing nin. Once the fight was over she quickly picked up Naruto making sure he was okay. The second she picked up him he started crying and hugged her.

"Kaa-san" was all he was able to say through his sobs. He didn't even realize what he said, but it would have lasting effects. "I'm sorry" was the next thing he said. Mikoto was definitely caught off guard at this point, not only did he call her kaa-san, but he was also apologizing.

"Sochi it's okay, you're safe" she didn't know what came over her, but it sounded right at the moment "Why are you sorry, there is nothing you could have done"

WIth his sobs quieting, he was able to respond. " I was useless, I couldn't help you and make things harder for you" he said still somewhat distraught from what happened. "If I was stronger I wouldn't be a burden to you" he added, in a sullen tone. He hated feeling helpless, especially to someone he holds dear.

"It's okay Naruto-kun, you are still young, you can't expect to fight shinobi, especially since you aren't even trained in the shinobi arts." Mikoto responded, trying to lighten his spirits.

"Then please, teach me to be a shinobi, I never want to be a burden to you or Itachi-Nii-chan." Naruto responded with fierce determination. If you could say anything about his personality, his loyalty to family was uncanny.

"We will start when Itachi returns, however It will be difficult, more than likely one of the hardest things you will ever do, are you sure you want to be a shinobi"

Naruto quickly nodded, however after his sobbing session he fell asleep still clutching his surrogate mother. She of course smiled at the boy, despite the situation, something great had come from it, they had officially started seeing other as family. This is something that made her fill with happiness. This was something she could not wait for Itachi's return.

After destroying the bodies, she returned to the hotel and put Naruto in bed and sent a crow summon to deliver a message to Itachi, explaining what happened and that he should hurry. With the message sent, she blissfully fell asleep.

It was the middle of the night when Itachi returned. When he received his mother's message he knew she was fine, but he couldn't help it. He needed to go back to her as soon as he could, moving as fast as he could he got the scrolls from the Uchiha hideout and made his way back home as fast as he could. Walking into the hotel, his presence had woken Mikoto. She didn't mind, she wanted to tell him things and now was as good of time as any. She gestured for him to sit down when Itachi finally decided to break the silence.

"Are you okay kaa-san, how is Naruto taking it, is he alright" Itachi fired off rapidly, he was worried about the two.

"Yes Itachi-kun we are fine, I would even say better than fine, despite what happened I feel as if something great." she blissfully stated, however she felt that Itachi needed some elaborating and continued "After what happened, Naruto was worried that he was a burden, and wanted to train as a shinobi so that his kaa-san and nii-chat wouldn't be burdened trying to always protect him" she finished happily.

If Itachi was expecting anything, that was surely not it. He could only respond with a nod and a bright smile, knowing that his surrogate brother finally viewed him as family. With that they both said their good nights and went to bed. Tomorrow they would move on to Ocha no Kuni. (Land of Tea)

-END Chapter-

Notes:

So that was my first ever fight scene, I know it wasn't that expanded but I felt that the fight wasn't really the focal point, but what the fight resulted in. Any feedback on how to improve future fights if appreciated,

As for the timeskip, I generally don't like time skips, however for the story to progress I feel some are required, for instance he is still a small child at this point. While it is fulfilling to write his entire childhood, it would prove repetitive, in my opinion, to continue with him learning the shinobi ways. That being said, you will see him training and learning the shinobi arts, just not every minute detail.

As for honorifics, if you guys want me to keep using honorifics let me know. I am not perfect with them, so keep that in mind. With that being said I do think that honorifics do point characters in better lights that without, but what do you guys think. Thanks :D