Author's Note: So I just read Naruto manga 428, and I must say, Go Konohamaru! Hot damn. I knew I liked that kid.

Disclaimer: Naruto and etc. aren't mine, but there is a growing collection of original characters that will undoubtedly make their appearances.

oooOoooOoooOooo

Namikaze Brothers Arc One : Magirekomu Bettenchi(to be lost in another world)

By Renatus

Chapter 03 – Tanshin (away from home)

oooOoooOoooOooo

Three and a half weeks after arrival…

Naruto was in his apartment, hunched over his kitchen table with scrolls and slips of parchment laid out before him when his stomach's growling interrupted his task. He ignored his stomach as his hand painted the last of the characters for the explosive tag, the thin brush scratching across the surface of the thin slip of paper. He finished the seal and leaned back, tracing the characters with his eyes carefully to make sure he hadn't made a mistake. Even with the simple seal characters of an explosive tag a careless mistake could cause a world of hurt. He had learned that lesson the hard way.

Naruto laid the brush down by the inkwells and placed the newly created tag on the pile of complete tags nearby. It was a good start for a collection, and if he had the time, he could create enough of them to sell a few bundles, since he was yet to be cleared for active missions. While the Fourth was willing to put him on active duty, the council members apparently were being the same stick-up-the-ass bastards that they always were. They hadn't liked him much on the one, brief occasion that he had the displeasure of meeting them all again. His appearance from out of nowhere did not help his case, and his blunt way of speaking just ticked them off, and he had happily done so. The scarf around his face didn't help his case either.

Their continued stubbornness had put off his planned mission with Jiraiya by two weeks already, so the toad hermit had left three days ago without him. Information on Akatsuki's movements and his spy network was more important than getting Naruto out of the village. Naruto knew and fully accepted it, but it didn't make him any happier about being left behind.

He scowled and got to his feet, leaving his seal materials scattered across the table, and plotting through a variety of humiliating pranks that he could play on the council. He hated being grounded to inactive status. It had happened on more than one occasion since he made Genin, and it chaffed every time. The council never did trust him – or like him.

'The only thing worse is being trailed by an ANBU squad that doesn't think I know they're there.' He thought darkly.

His stomach rumbled again and Naruto moved towards the door, deciding that he wanted Ichiraku's ramen, and it had been far too long since he had been to the miracle of a food stand. He hadn't yet visited it since his impromptu arrival in the past and his mouth was watering at the mere thought. He strapped on his sandals and pushed his scarf over his nose and left the apartment, locking his door behind him.

With thoughts of a good meal of ramen soothing his irritation at being caged within the village, Naruto made his way down the hallway, bypassing a neighbor and her daughter who looked vaguely familiar. Neither of them gave him more than a glance as they passed, engrossed in their own conversation.

Naruto paused after he had passed them and looked back, recognizing the older woman, but not the teenage daughter. They had stopped outside of a door two down from his own, their conversation floating down the hallway. He watched them for a minute, trying to figure out where he had seen the woman before. The daughter – perhaps fourteen or fifteen – was dressed in a new Chunin vest, talking excitedly about a C-ranked mission she had just returned from. Her story alternated between barely contained pride at a job well done, and complaining darkly about one of her teammates. Her mother smiled at her story and scowled at her complaints and Naruto suddenly recognized her.

He sucked in a breath and turned away, walking down the stairs and out of the apartment building as his mind swirled with old memories. He remembered the woman as being one of the villagers who had always greeted him with nothing more than a distant scowl, darkness in their eyes and hatred lacing their scents. He didn't know her name and she had never spoken to him nor come close to touching him, but he knew her face, and he knew that she had lost a daughter during the attack of the Kyubi – a newly crowned Chunin who had been one of the many teams and ninjas to attempt to battle against the destruction that was the nine-tailed fox. He didn't know if the girl had died while trying to directly fight the fox or if she had been one of the many victims of the destruction that waved over the forest and edges of the village from the fox's long-range attacks. He thought the latter, but it wasn't like the woman would have told him anyways.

Naruto paused on the street outside the apartment and glanced back up at the four-story building. He was somewhat torn with his feelings. On one hand he resented the woman for her dark looks and severe indifference to him as a child, but another part of him was glad for her, happy that her daughter was still alive and well. He wondered how many others were still alive who had died the first time and he wondered how much those lives would change the future.

He sighed and turned away, making his way down the street towards the general direction of his favorite ramen stand.

The young, new Chunin was not the only change and difference that he had noticed. It was the little things that got to him, really. The village was Konoha, yet not. There were things that he would suddenly notice that just seemed off or wrong to what he expected and they threw him off every time. The different location for the Ninja Academy, the absence of Iruka-sensei within the Academy once he found it. He hadn't realized how much he had expected to see Iruka-sensai in his classroom until he wasn't there. The plethora of Uchiha, which was one of the odder things, seeing so many of the clan wandering the streets with a range of scowls and severe looks on their faces. Then there was the semi-recognizable faces that just looked too young, too different; people he had met and knew somehow before, but they no longer knew him, or looked at him in different ways.

Naruto stopped in front of Ichiraku's, absently taking in the sight of the place before blinking rapidly and staring at the stall in front of him. A wrinkled, frail looking old woman sat hunched over in the back of the stall, a needle in her hand as she slowly but surly stitched at the material in her lap. Naruto looked around him, wondering if he had somehow managed to go to the wrong location, but the establishments on either side of him were what they were supposed to be. He looked back at the seamstress and her little stall filled with cloth and thread and needles and stared.

'Where's Ichiraku's?'

He watched the old lady, not really seeing her as his mind floundered. This was the right location, it was the right street, the dango shop was to the left and the old man's convenient store was behind him, and he could just make out the top of the Hokage Tower over the corner of the stall's roof and the angle was just right as to block out the lower half of the Third's face carved into the mountain from view – just as it was supposed to – but there was no Ichiraku's Ramen.

Naruto sucked in a deep breath and looked down the length of the street, still not really seeing anything in front of him. His emotions swirled and his chakra spiked for a moment and he heard the seamstress gasp. He glanced back at her and saw that she had poked her finger with her needle. Naruto stared at her from his increasingly slouched posture, barely blinking, and trying to will his favorite place to eat back into existence.

'How can there not be Ichiraku's?' He thought, 'Where'd it go?'

He let out a low keening noise in his throat and with one last look at the confused and slightly nervous seamstress he wandered off back down the road listlessly. His eyes jumped back and forth, wondering if the missing ramen stand had set itself up somewhere else, but he didn't find the familiar red flags and enticing smells of Ichiraku's. Not along that street, nor any of the others he paced down throughout the following two hours. Finally giving it up he let his feet carry him where they wanted, bemoaning the loss of ramen and thinking that of all the things that he had found to be different, the missing Ichiraku's Ramen Stand was by far the worst.

oooOoooOoooOooo

The Third found him slouched in his favorite thinking space, hidden among the spikes of the Fourth's hair atop the Hokage Mountain. It was one of the few of his spots that were still around, and arguably the best of the lot. It was quiet save for the birds in the trees behind him, and rarely did another person pass nearby. He was hidden from view, and left alone to think without interruption. The best part, Naruto found, was that the village stretched out below him looked like he thought it should.

Naruto sighed and slouched lower among the rocky spikes of hair, fighting off depression and righteous indignation. He had wandered the streets for most of the afternoon, backtracking and pacing as he looked for the familiar ramen stand that he had visited at least three times a week, usually seven – sometimes more than once a day since he had been five.

Konoha just wasn't Konoha as it should be without Ichiraku's. His stomach rumbled at the thought of the missing ramen stand and he scowled, caught up somewhere between annoyance, depression and homesickness. And he had barely been in the past for three weeks yet.

"That's quite a face."

Naruto's scowl deepened as he turned his head to look at the other man, disgruntled at being found. The Third stood just off the carved part of the monument, lined up to about the only space that could see Naruto's position among the spikes from the backside of the mountain. Naruto gave him a small smile.

"Hey old man, what do you want?" Naruto said, his voice neutral and slightly teasing.

The Third frowned but made his way forward anyways. Naruto watched him, thinking that it was strange to see the man without the Hokage's robes and hat. It was the only outfit that Naruto ever really remembered seeing him in growing up. Sarutobi wore clothing that resembled that of the elder council members, but he stood strong and was clearly a well-trained Shinobi. Naruto could see the solid footing, the easy glide of his movements, the way his eyes took in everything around him, cataloging. There was no doubt that the old man, despite his age and dress, was every bit the incredible ninja of his reputation. Naruto thought it a little odd that he didn't seem quite as old or frail as Naruto remembered him to be. By the time he had made Genin the Third had simply appeared to be a strong shinobi clearly past his prime; old strength had lingered beneath the surface, but it had felt almost stale in comparison to other active ninja. The Sarutobi in front of him now did not have that stale feeling of strength. The man was still clearly a dangerously strong man. Naruto wondered if the change had been gradual or sudden in the first timeline.

"Not many have the audacity sit on top of the heads of the Hokage's." the Third commented with some amusement.

Naruto looked up at him and snorted, turning back to look out over the village. "That's why it's such a good spot. Nobody would think to come to look here. Besides, there's no law that says I can't be up here."

"No, there isn't." Sarutobi said, crouching down to sit next to him. "It is one of those unspoken rules, I suppose."

Naruto made a disgruntled noise in his throat but didn't voice his thoughts on the matter. He had never cared for many of the laws and rules that had been flung at him. He listened to them only long enough to know that they existed for him to break them. It was always more fun to break a rule when he knew he was doing it, however he had learned about most of the village's many unspoken rules by breaking them unknowingly.

"How are you doing, Kinatsu?" the Third asked. Naruto glanced over at him, taking in the benign look of concern on the man's face. He remembered the many times that he had found comfort in the old man's presence as a child, happy and content to have some attention that wasn't hateful or full of scorn. The Third had always been around to give him a kind word or touch, usually just when Naruto needed it the most.

"I'm alright." Naruto said, looking back to the village. He sighed, "It's different. Harder than I thought it'd be I guess, not that I really thought about it."

"Ah." Sarutobi pulled out his pipe and lit it. Naruto watched absently, comforted by the familiar scent of the tobacco and smoke that wafted around their heads and slowly faded into the wind. Naruto leaned back against one of the rocky spikes of hair and pulled the scarf from his face, letting it pool around his neck. He was more used to its presence, but it still somewhat bothered him. He was very much not used to hiding his face. He had never done so before, even though he knew the whisker scars on his cheeks marked him for what he was to so many. He flaunted them, even when he didn't know what they meant, because he craved the attention – no matter what sort it was and because it was one of the few ways he could show the village that he wasn't scared of them.

"What bothers you, Kinatsu-kun?" the Third asked, his voice soft next to him. Naruto sighed, being reminded of how observant the old man was of people's moods.

"You always knew when I was down." Naruto said, a small smile playing on his lips.

"Oh?"

Naruto nodded. "Even though I smiled and laughed and joked, you still knew."

"Hmm." Sarutobi puffed a thick ring of smoke over them. "And did I usually figure out the reasons?"

"No." Naruto smirked at him. "Not always. At least I didn't always voice it, but I think you figured things out on your own just fine most of the time."

The Third gave him a pointed, if comforting look before turning his eyes to gaze out over the village. Naruto smiled and followed his gaze, settled into the silence and comfort of the man's presence. They were quiet for a while, both watching the comings and goings of the villagers below them. Shinobi leapt from rooftop to rooftop, civilians wandered the streets. Naruto spotted a youth attempt to wall climb with chakra, only to crash down to the alley, much to his companion's clear amusement. A normal day in Konoha. Yet Naruto still felt the subtle, barely-there differences that marked this Konoha as not his Konoha.

"It's just not the same." Naruto said.

"What isn't?"

"Konoha."

"Ah. No, I suppose it wouldn't be."

Naruto scowled down at the village, sorting through his emotions and feelings, trying to pinpoint why he felt so lost and confused. Part of it was the village, he knew, but the rest of it was something else and he had no idea how to address it.

"It's…" Naruto started, paused and sighed heavily. "It's Kushina." He said, pulling one knee up to rest his chin on. He scowled, "It's not that I don't… I mean she… ah hell. I don't know." Naruto sucked in a deep breath and buried the lower half of his face in the crook of his elbow over his knee.

"She's your mother." Sarutobi said.

Naruto nodded. "Yeah. But she doesn't even know."

"Yes, but she has just recently lost her first born to a violent attack. She's a ninja, a very good one, yet even shinobi struggle with the loss of a loved one, especially of a child."

Naruto nodded again. "But it's not just that the baby – that I – agh. It's not just that he died, it's – I don't even know!"

The Third puffed on his pipe in silence, looking at the blonde next to him with an unreadable expression. Naruto scowled down at the village, trying to sort out exactly what he was feeling so depressed and confused about. It wasn't just homesickness. It wasn't just the differences, the whole being in the past fiasco – though it certainly didn't help his turbulent moods. Whatever his discomfort was it stemmed around Kushina and to a slightly lesser extent, Minato. Naruto stubbornly ignored whatever feelings he had about his missing Kyubi, stuffing them down deep below his emotions about his parents and the timetravel and being stuck in his situation. He didn't want to address the hole that the Kyubi's absence left in him just yet.

"I think it's because they're my parents." Naruto said softly. He let out a long, low breath. "I've never had them before."

"Ah." Sarutobi shifted next to him. "I see."

Naruto glanced at him, a little exasperated. "Well could you clue me in? Cause I'm not seeing anything. I don't get it."

Sarutobi chukled. "Tell me, Kinatsu, was there one who filled the roll of a parent for you when you were a child?"

Naruto blinked. "Uh, I guess… Iruka-sensei maybe. But he was more like an older brother, really. I would say Jiraiya but that's just a little wrong. He's too perverted to be a father."

Sarutobi laughed, and Naruto smiled at the sound. A minute later Naruto sobered. "I guess the answer would be 'no' then."

"Minato and Kushina do not have children."

Naruto blinked, a bit confused at the statement. He felt a momentary flash of irritation considering that they would have a child if not for Madara, but forced it aside. He knew that the old man wasn't trying to be mean, and was only trying to get Naruto to think along some other line of reasoning. Naruto, however, didn't have a clue as to what that was.

"What's that supposed to mean?" he asked, squinting at the man beside him.

Sarutobi smiled a bit. "They do not know how to be parents, Kinatsu, just as you do not know how to be a son."

Naruto blinked, blinked again and sat up straighter as his words sunk in. 'Well that might explain it.' Naruto and Minato both knew of their real relationship to each other, and despite the joy of that, neither of them really knew how to act when together. Naruto found it easier to ignore the fact that the man was his father and just concentrate on him being the Yondaime Hokage, his superior, village leader and occasional sparring partner. During the few times that Naruto couldn't shake the 'father' aspect of their relationship out of his head he found himself feeling a bit awkward and nervous – rare emotions if he ever had any – and falling behind one of his many masks while he edged away from the other blonde, looking for distance in order to settle his emotions. Naruto wasn't usually one to avoid an issue, but he was simply at a complete loss for how to handle his relationship with Namikaze Minato. He didn't even want to get started on his turbulent reactions to Kushina. It was easier to avoid her.

Naruto let out a breath and rested his head back against the rock. "So – now what?"

Sarutobi made a noncommittal noise and sucked at his pipe. "That is up to you."

"How do I act around them?" And that was the real question. Naruto could handle the subtle differences of the village. He could handle the strangely young familiar faces that no longer recognized him, he could even handle – with much work and disgruntled swearing – the lack of Ichiraku's Ramen, but he had no idea how to handle having parents. He had never had anyone to serve as anything even similar to him. The closest anyone had ever come was Iruka who was more of a brother, or Jiraiya who was by far more like a perverted old godfather more interested in peeping than fathering. Naruto supposed that Kakashi as his sensei could count as someone close, but Kakashi was – well that just didn't fit either.

Sarutobi laid a hand on his arm and Naruto looked over at him.

"Just be yourself, Naruto." The Third said, "The rest will fall into place on its own."

Naruto stared at him for a minute and smiled. "Yeah." He said, turning back to look at the village. "Thanks, old man."

"Any time, any time."

Naruto grinned, finding endless amusement in the turn of phrase. Sarutobi chuckled next to him as they lapsed into a comfortable companionship. Naruto felt better, even though he was still craving ramen, and he was pretty sure that he would still crane his neck around corners looking for old friends every time he thought he heard an almost familiar voice. He would always miss his Konoha, but he also knew that the Konoha below him was still Konoha, even if it was different in minute ways that he couldn't always pinpoint. But for all the differences and the loss and the surreal feelings, Naruto recognized the potential that his situation gave to him. He could make things better for his future friends, and give them lives that were better than they had been the first time around.

oooOoooOoooOooo

Naruto was wandering towards the training fields, intent on working on figuring out the limits of his endurance without the Kyubi when he was waylaid. He smelled them first, a vaguely recognizable scent that told him they were of Konoha, but before he could identify them further a kunai shot out of the trees to his feet. He jumped backwards as the kunai struck the ground, sinking deep into the earth. Naruto eyed it for a moment and followed its trajectory back into the trees.

Three ninja stood across from him and he recognized two of them – Genma, who was leaning against a tree and Tetsu who stood in the branches above him. He didn't know the third, a young boy with dark hair and eyes and a cool face who stood half in the shadows of the woods. He was dressed in the usual Chunin uniform minus the vest, which had been replaced with a short-sleeved, wide collared navy shirt. He couldn't have been older than eleven or twelve. He looked a lot like Sasuke had as a child. Naruto rather thought that the three of them made for an odd team. There was a wide range of ages and seemingly personalities between them. He wondered who the kid was.

"Hey, shithead!" Tetsu called, twirling a second kunai around her finger.

"Ah, Tetsu-chan!" Naruto said with a wide grin, which could be seen despite the scarf wrapped over his face. "Did you miss me?"

"You little twerp. Quite calling me that!" she growled.

Naruto just smiled wider and waved at them, not bothering to tell her again that he was actually older and bigger than she was. It didn't seem to matter to her.

"Ossu (1), Genma." Naruto said.

"Kinatsu," Genma smiled, "If you aren't careful, she's going to gut you or something."

Naruto shrugged, ignoring the slight roll of malice coming off the younger girl, and nodded towards the boy standing in the speckled shade of the trees. "Who's the gaki (2)?"

Genma glanced behind him at the Uchiha-look-alike. The kid frowned at being called a brat, but didn't respond otherwise.

"He's our new teammate." Genma said. "Uchiha Shisui."

"An Uchiha, huh?" Naruto said, studying the boy. He could definitely see the resemblance to both of the Uchihas he had known, but Shisui also looked a bit different. His hair wasn't as dark a black, having lighter almost reddish highlights in the sunlight, and he was taller than Sasuke had been. Shisui had longer limbs and it looked like he would be a gangly teen. Naruto guessed that he would be taller than both Sasuke or Itachi had ever been.

"Heard of them have you?" Tetsu said.

Naruto nodded and pulled his eyes away from the boy to wink at the girl in the tree. "Who hasn't?"

Tetsu snarled silently at him and gripped the kunai she had been twirling in her hand. Naruto only kept half an eye on her. She was quick, but his reflexes were quicker. She was still just a Chunin, and the Ninja war had ended before she fought in it. She probably hadn't seen much of real combat yet and Naruto knew that he had a huge edge on her. He was more interested in what the Uchiha boy could do. He had heard the stories. The Uchiha clan was one of the best of Konoha. They called themselves elite. Naruto had heard the term more than once from Sasuke and Itachi both, though the two said it in different ways. Sasuke still bore pride for his clan, Itachi only held scorn for its reputation. Naruto figured that either way there was something to all the rumors. If an eleven-year-old Uchiha was already a Chunin, than he had some talent to get him there.

"Is the gaki any good?" Naruto asked, looking back at the Uchiha to watch the boy's reaction. Shisui's frown deepened and his eyes flashed slightly – not with the Sharingan, but with angry indignation. Naruto would recognize anger anywhere in any form. The Kyubi was a roiling mass of anger and fury and madness. Naruto knew it well.

"Probably better than you, shithead." Tetsu ground out.

"Better than you, Tetsu-chan?" Naruto asked, flashing a grin at her again. Tetsu crouched lower on her branch, her knuckles a bit white around her kunai at the reminder of their past spar and her loss.

"You got lucky." Tetsu said. "You're not that good."

Naruto bit his tongue to prevent himself from saying something that would make her try to kill him. He didn't mind a good fight every once in a while, but he didn't want some Chunin trying to lop off his head because he goaded her too far.

"I didn't want to hurt you, Tetsu-chan." Naruto said, grinning behind his scarf at her.

Then again, he was terribly bored and highly frustrated with his grounded status. Maybe a pissed off Chunin with a bad attitude and the urge to kill him was just what he needed to blow off some steam.

Tetsu made a sound between a snarl and a shout and chucked her kunai at him. Naruto side-stepped it easily and jumped back from her launched attack. Tetsu flew past him, rolling over the ground and coming to her feet in a mostly fluid movement. Naruto turned sideways to watch her and keep an eye on her two teammates. He wasn't sure that they wouldn't join in to help her out or not.

"You're so angry, Tetsu-chan." Naruto commented.

"You're pigheaded, twerp."

"I'll remind you that I'm bigger than you are."

"Your ego maybe." Tetsu said as she came at him. "And that doesn't change that you're a shithead."

Naruto dodged her punch to his face and moved around her, pushing on her shoulder to move her off balance in the process. She caught herself before she stumbled and growled lowly as she spun low and swiped her foot at his legs. Naruto jumped over her leg and backwards out of her immediate range, tossing a shuriken in front of her to make her redirect whatever attack she had planned. Tetsu paused, crouched in a ready position with one side facing forward towards him.

"You barely know me and already you don't like me." Naruto said, "I'm impressed."

"That should tell you something about yourself, how quickly people dislike you."

Naruto shrugged. "I'm used to it, I'm afraid."

"Come on, Tetsu." Genma called, "As much fun as it is watching you two bicker, we've got to get a move on."

Tetsu straightened and frowned at her teammates. Naruto just stood aside and watched them, curious about what they had to be doing, and a little disappointed at their thwarted fight.

"Going on a mission?" he asked.

Genma nodded. "A quick one to the border. Delivery and message mission."

"Heard you were grounded." Tetsu said, turning back to him with a smirk. Naruto shrugged again, scowling.

"The council didn't like me much." He said.

"They don't trust you, you mean." Tetsu said.

"Is there a difference with them?"

Tetsu barked out a laugh and she moved to leave, waving at her teammates to follow her. Genma moved from his lean against the tree, his senbon shifting from one side of his mouth to the other. Naruto could see Shisui out of the corner of his eye. The boy was watching him closely, in a way that reminded Naruto of how Itachi used to watch him – interested, reluctant, aloof, as if trying to see if Naruto had the possibility of potential for some plan or power. It had made Naruto uncomfortable with Itachi, and it was equally uncomfortable with the young Shisui.

"You hear about the Jonin Trials, Kinatsu?" Genma asked.

Naruto shook his head. "Are they like the Chunin Exams?"

"Nope." Genma said, his smirk showing around the needle between his lips.

"They're worse!" Tetsu called back to him. Naruto turned to look at her as she walked away, leaving her teammates behind. Naruto looked back at Genma, trying to ignore Shisui's stare.

"What are they?"

"They're not an exam." Genma said. "More like a chance for the Chunins to beat the hell out of each other and then have the chance to go up against some of the Jonin."

"The Jonin participate?" Naruto asked.

"They always do."

"So it's what, a competition?"

"Something like that." Genma said, rocking his hand side to side. "Except no Chunin ever wins it. The Jonin always beat the best to a pulp by the end."

"Sounds like fun."

Genma gave him a strange look but then grinned. "Yea, it does, ne?"

"It's coming up then?" Naruto asked.

Genma nodded. "Yup. At the end of the week I think."

"You're not sure?"

"No Chunin ever is. It's a surprise tournament. We haven't had one in a few years because of the war, but there has been rumors for a couple months now that we'll be having one. It'll be soon."

Naruto stuffed his hands into his pant pockets and rocked back on his heals. A tournament style fight amongst the Chunin and Jonin sounded like a better way to work out his frustrations than baiting Tetsu. It would also give him a chance to see what the current crop of Chunin and Jonin were capable of. He knew a lot of them from his future, but they weren't quite the same yet. He knew that from the spar with Tetsu, Genma and Kakashi. Kakashi could have taken them all on when Naruto had known him, and the young, masked Jonin had struggled a bit – not much, but it was enough for Naruto to notice.

"How do you get in?" Naruto asked, causing Genma to smirk.

"You're sponsored." Genma said. "A jonin submits your name if they think you're worth the effort. I don't think you'll have to worry about it. It's supposed to be a surprise, being sponsored by some Jonin, but I'd bet that you'll be in it."

"I don't know many Jonin." Naruto said. He actually knew a lot of them, they just didn't know him at all. He had mostly kept to himself in the weeks he had been in Konoha, training alone or occasionally with the Fourth.

"You know the Hokage." Genma said, slapping him on the shoulder. Naruto felt himself stiffen slightly at the contact, but Genma just smiled and walked away. Naruto watched him for a moment. Genma joined Shisui at the edge of the training grounds and the two disappeared form his view. Tetsu was already gone. Naruto turned back to the training fields and thought about the Jonin Trials. It would be a good way to see what his new limits were. Without the Kyubi as back up, Naruto really didn't know what he was truly capable of any more. He could still create a hundred shadow clones without breaking a sweat. He was pretty sure he could do it more than once in succession, but he just wasn't sure. Working in the training fields alone was different for him than facing an opponent. He always did better when the pressure was on.

Naruto grinned beneath his scarf and headed deeper into the training fields.

oooOoooOoooOooo

Naruto panted as he stood hunched over, his hands on his knees. Before him was a stretch of downed trees and shrubs and upturned earth that made the area look as if a tornado had gouged out a part of the forest. It stretched before him in a twisted, deadened manner, the trees not just knocked down or uprooted, but broken and twisted around themselves. The only sound was his deep breathing as he tried to catch his breath. The local wildlife had long ago fled the area, leaving him alone in the training field.

"Damnit. That hurt." He grumbled.

"Ne, boss, we almost had it that time." Naruto looked up at his clones and nodded. Three of his clones stood near him, looking a little worse for wear.

"We didn't quite get it, did we?" Naruto asked. All three of his clones shook their heads, their eyes flickering over the downed trees nearby. Naruto ran a hand through his bangs and tugged the scarf around his face off, letting it pool around his neck.

"Alright!" he said, standing straight. "One more time!"

One of his clones held its right hand out palm up and he and another clone circled around him. The Rasengan (3) formed over the upturned palm easily, the blue chakra spinning above the clone's hand with a whisper of wind. His clones flanked him, as they reaching out to manipulate the chakra. The sphere changed under their direction, first growing in size and then spinning faster as elemental reconstruction was added. White wind spun sharply around it, chased by streams of red fire as the Rasengan grew and changed.

"Got it!" his clone yelled just before a silent boom echoed off of the trees.

Naruto's hair was pushed off his face, and his clothing whipped around him as a force of unseen chakra rippled out from the sphere in the clone's hand, pulsing through his body and rattling the trees. Naruto looked down at the jutsu, the blue, white and red colors of it racing around the sphere. Blue was at its center in a tightly condensed sphere of chakra with razor blades of white wind twirling in a steady circle around its middle. Chasing the blades of wind was the fire, licking around and through the sphere in a wild, untamed manner. It was a deadly looking technique, and it lived up to its look. At least he thought it would.

"Alright!" Naruto said, watching the sphere carefully. "Try to hold it!"

The clone began to run, his hand holding the Rasengan arched at his side, aiming for the already devastated stretch of forest in front of them. The chakra in his hand whistled at the motion, the wind whipping behind the sphere like a comet as the clone charged forward. The Naruto clone reached forward, pushing the sphere in front of him and the whistling sound grew louder.

"Hurricane Rasengan!" the clone called out. The chakra connected, whistling loudly, and for a moment everything seemed to still. Then the Rasengan exploded.

Naruto staggered and threw up his arms to block the blast of air and dust, lowering his head to ride out the after shock of the explosion. Wind howled before him, blocking out the sounds of cracking trees and burning foliage. He cracked an eye open, watching as his technique ripped through the forest again, rising high above the trees and spreading out in a wild spiraling pattern of destruction. Blue, white and red chakra laced through the area, feeding off each other and fighting for dominance. Fire trailing wind, wind gusting and blowing out fire, both fed by the whirlpool of blue chakra as the tightly knit center of the Hurricane Rasengan expanded out and forward. The destruction raged and blew forward, dieing slowly with a trailing sound of wind and crackling flames.

Naruto lowered his arms, taking in the additional damage with wide-eyed shock. The trees were gone. Not just cracked and broken and shredded, but gone. A triangle gouge of earth and stone stood where once there had been a stretch of tall forest trees. It stretched before him like a gaping canyon, as if some great beast had tracked its claws deep into the earth and uprooted it all. Along the edges were shredded bits of trees, roots and branches reaching desperately into the hole left behind by his attack.

His clone stood at the head of the swath of destruction. Naruto walked over to it, taking in the worn state of it, clutching its arm close to its chest. The clone's clothing was worn and its sleeve tattered, revealing the raw skin of its arm. Blood tried to leak out of the pores, collecting and streaming down the arm to drip slowly to the ground.

Naruto heaved a sigh. "That's going to hurt, isn't it?" he asked, thinking of the memories he'd get once the clone poofed into smoke.

The clone winced and nodded, holding its arm carefully. Naruto glanced between the destroyed, downed forest and the clone. His clones usually didn't survive the attack, dissipating before the full power of the Hurricane Rasengan was unleashed, unable to survive long enough to hold it to completion. He wasn't yet desperate enough to hold the attack himself. It was adding two elemental reconstructions instead of the one of the Rasen-shurikan. His Rasen-shurikan was self-damaging, and he had known from his clones' continued dissipation that his attempt at this new attack would be just as destructive to his own body, if not more so. He had been right. The clone's arm was trembling in its grasp, seeping blood out of pores and the skin looked raw and thin.

He had never seen the full power of that attack before.

"Damn." Naruto mumbled, still shocked at the sheer destruction that his technique carried. He was quite sure that nothing would have survived it had anything been in its way. He felt a flicker of pride and directly after that a deep satisfaction. He had completed another variation of the Rasengan, one that would rearrange the landscape if he needed it to. He smirked. It also let him work out a good deal of his frustrations and wild emotions from his situation and being in the past. 'Nothing like beating the hell out of something to make you feel better.'

"We did it, boss." His clone said, its voice strained a bit as it continued to hold its injured arm. The blood was increasing, and the clone's arm was an angry red mixed with pale white skin. Its face was looking a little paler than it should, too.

"Yeah." Naruto nodded, "And I'm not sure if I'll ever want to actually use the thing. Damn! It's destructive."

"Hurts too." The clone grumbled.

Naruto nodded again and then stilled, squeezing his eyes shut as a wave of dizziness swept over him.

"Woah. Eats chakra like a bitch, too." Naruto said and let his body slip to the ground, holding his head with one hand as he fought off the dizzy feeling. He moaned and hung his head between his knees, ignoring the chuckles from his injured clone above him. He hadn't felt such a level of chakra exhaustion in a long time. The Kyubi's absence made his pool of chakra no longer so deep. It was a strange, empty feeling that yawned open in his gut in a way he wasn't sure he could ever fill short of putting the fox back in it.

"Company, boss." His clone said suddenly.

"Leave me alone." Naruto said, pulling the scarf from his neck and pulling it over his head in an effort to drown out the dim light coming through the trees above him. It was hurting his head.

"Fine, boss. I'll take this one, then."

Naruto ignored his clone, but froze when he heard a girl's voice call out across the small clearing.

"Kinatsu!"

He knew that voice.

"Kushina-san!" His clone greeted. Naruto heard the clone's feet shuffle across the ground, rounding a downed tree to meet the woman. Naruto peeked out from under his scarf, spotting his clone, its scarf wrapped around its face, and Kushina through the brush and trees. He was largely out of sight from them, sitting behind the downed tree and in the semi-shadow of the forest – or what was left standing of it near the edge of the clearing and the cleared gully he had just created.

"Kinatsu, training?" Kushina asked. The clone replied with an affirmative and was about to say something else when the woman spotted his injured arm.

"You're hurt!" Kushina said, reaching out to the clone. The Naruto clone reacted with unfeigned nervousness and avoidance, stating that it wasn't something to worry about – which it would have been had the injury been on the real Naruto. Kushina didn't seem happy with the situation, looking equally concerned, annoyed and protective. Naruto was touched by her concern, even though she didn't need to be – but she didn't know that she was talking to a clone with more endurance than was usually healthy for the thing.

Naruto watched them interact for a minute, drinking in the sight of her. She had donned personal ninja-dress, her slacks tucked into the wraps around her calves and her feet bare in her sandals with her hitai-ate tied around her neck. An orange tank over a slim, navy shirt draped her shoulders and fell to her mid thighs, decorated with white patterns of some leaf or flower down one side, interrupted only by the belt of her tool pouch. Her long red hair had been pulled back into two loose braids that trailed down her back and shifted every time she moved.

"What have you been doing?" Kushina said, reaching for the injured clone, "Did you do this training?"

"Heh, sorta." The clone said.

"Sorta? What do you mean sort of? Were you sparring? Did someone else do this?"

"No, well not really." The clone tried to take a step back, but Kushina wrapped a hand around its upper arm, keeping the masked blonde in place.

"What happened, Kinatsu?" Kushina said, her eyes narrowed in determination.

Naruto grimaced slightly before standing and sliding further into the shadows away from the two. He moved silently, letting his scarf fall back around his shoulders as he picked up his red coat from near his feet, and moved deeper into the trees. His clone could handle this. He was too tired to do it himself. 'Besides,' he thought, 'I'm not really injured anyways.'

He was just out of hearing distance of the two when his clone's memories filtered into his mind, telling him that the clone had dissipated itself. Naruto paused in his slinking through the shadows as the memory of the pain of the jutsu rippled through him, and then grimaced as the end of the clone's conversation with Kushina came to him – her grip on his shoulder, the healing chakra laced through her fingers as she reached for his injured arm and the streak of panic the clone had right before dissipating away, Kushina's shocked face the last thread of memory.

"Damn it." He mumbled, glancing back the way he had come. She wasn't going to be very happy with him for the panicked ditching in getting away from her healing, nor for tricking her with a clone.

"Kinatsu!" her voice echoed angrily through the trees, reminding him very strongly of Sakura when he had done something stupid to piss her off. He vaguely heard her move through the forest, no doubt looking for the real him.

Naruto grimaced again and jumped up into the trees. Maybe he'd avoid her for a while.

oooOoooOoooOooo

Author's Note: And the Japanese…

1)Ossu – a greeting used between male peers.

2)Gaki – brat; also kids, or ghoul. Used in the context of 'brat', or 'kid' here.

3)Rasengan – means "spiraling sphere". It is the attack that the Fourth created and didn't get the chance to finish. Jiraiya taught it to Naruto, who learned it in a week with the help of his clones, and won Tsunade's necklace for his trouble.

The Hurricane Rasengan is my own spin on an advanced form of the Rasengan.