Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto
Chapter IV: On the road
Sealing Chamber, ANBU Headquarters
Naruto was currently unconscious, laying inside a large sealing area in a special section of ANBU Headquarters. The Sandaime was just finishing putting all of the seals on Naruto's body before he would be escorted to prison. A four elements seal was placed over the seal holding the Kyuubi to make sure that Naruto cannot knowingly access the fox's chakra and the fox cannot send chakra into Naruto's body. The reason that this seal had not been placed on Naruto earlier was because the Sandaime wanted to see if Naruto would have another episode of being possessed or influenced by the fox, which did not occur in the nearly three weeks he stayed in the ANBU holding cell. He was constantly monitored the whole time.
The Sandaime was also placing several chakra seals to repress Naruto's chakra and stop him from molding it. These seals were placed on both of the shoulders of his back. While only one seal was needed, a second was placed as a contingency. All seals fail eventually. The weaker the seal, the faster it could fail. Even with Naruto's higher than average reserves, these two seals would hold until several years after the time that he would be released.
He wished that Jiraiya had been able to make it back to Konoha but his messengers had been unable to find his student before the trial. He had spread word with several of Jiraiya's contacts that he knew of in Fire Country and hoped the Toad Sage would eventually get word. The Sandaime sighed heavily as he looked down at the unconscious blonde haired boy laying on the floor. He really wished he could do more for the boy, but even the Hokage had limits which most shinobi in Konoha didn't understand. They seemed to believe that he could do anything, and he wished that were true.
It was obvious to the Sandaime that the boy had been crying on and off after he heard about the outcome of the trial and the sentencing. Naruto had been looking forward to joining the academy the following year with other students his age. With the recent events this was not meant to be and the Hokage was not going to tell the boy about his extremely limited chances of ever being a shinobi due to his chakra being sealed up. Something like that, after going through such an ordeal, might cause the boy to suffer some kind of breakdown. Naruto was already near the breaking point when the Sandaime sadly informed him that their was no ramen in prison. That had really hit the boy hard.
The Hokage had spent the entire week since the sentencing going over information on the prison facility and getting help from Ibiki. They had already replaced nearly every guard with ones that they knew could be trusted to treat the boy fairly and created a room just for Naruto. It wasn't like the regular prison cells there and he was also tucked away from the main population of the prison.
Scheduling changes also had to be made to make sure that Naruto wasn't around many of the more infamous inmates at any point in time. Especially the ones incarcerated for the more heinous of crimes. Ibiki had an interesting idea of bribing several of the prisoners in order to watch out for the boy, which the Sandaime was in agreement to. Unfortunately only two inmates fit this criteria but no one in the prison messed with those two.
The Legendary Stupid Brothers were in prison for killing several fellow members of a group of criminal ninja over food dispute. Afterward they settled down immediately upon getting the food. They were apprehended in Fire Country and placed in the ninja correctional facility. They were both exceedingly strong and their bodies had extremely hard skin. Both had monstrous chakra reserves and were among the stupidest people the Sandaime had ever met.
No one in the prison messed with them, or their food. They really only ate, slept, and performed manual labor. If you fed them regularly they weren't a problem. The guards didn't even bother locking their cell door. They wouldn't run away from the free food that they were provided. With a little bribe of extra rations if the watched out for Naruto during his stay at the prison, they readily accepted. Their cells were also moved so that they were close to Naruto's cell.
The Sandaime sighed once again. He wished he could do more for the boy. Kakashi had already volunteered to secretly smuggle Naruto outside of the village and not into the prison despite the fact that he would be committing treason but the Sandaime told him it would not be a good idea nor could let Kakashi suffer such disgrace should someone find out.
The new laws that he had placed in the village went over as he had expected, everyone hated them and would only follow them in public. Eventually though he knew that people would start to forget about Naruto and what he had been found guilty of, which was what he hoped for. In ten years they might not see the boy as they do now and maybe life in the village would not be so terrible for Naruto by that point, but that was wishful thinking at best. Both councils had demanded that they be given regular updates on the boy, at the very least once a month. The Sandaime guessed that the Ninja Council members just wanted verification that the boy was where he was supposed to be and the Civilian Council members wanted to feel assured that the boy was locked away.
In any case, the Hokage had done all that he could. If Jiraiya was here that may have been different. Had his wayward student arrived before the trial he could have possibly convinced the arbitrator to have Jiraiya watch the boy and take him on his trips instead of jail time. That way someone who was knowledgeable in seals was always near the boy and Naruto would be away from Konoha. The Sandaime had nearly suggested it at the meeting after the trial but because Jiraiya was not there and there was no guarantee when or if he would arrive he could not put forth that suggestion with any hope of success.
For years the Sandaime had believed that Orichimaru and his fall into madness was his greatest failure but recent events had changed his mind. The boy in front of him that was being carried back to his cell by two ANBU was now his greatest failure. With the seal and the fox's chakra getting added to the boys own chakra, it was possible that he would still be able to become a ninja after being release but even 'The Professor' wasn't sure about that. He only hoped and prayed that things would get better for the boy.
On the road to the Konoha Strict Correctional Facility
This was the first time in his five years that Naruto had been outside the walls of the village. He had expected something interesting but so far it was just a dirt road and a bunch of trees. Once he had woken up from the sealing, Naruto had been introduced to three shinobi who would be taking him to his final destination. He wished the Old Man had chosen three other ninja.
"YOSH! Kakashi my Eternal Rival, the score is currently 15 to 14 with my youthful self being in the lead! That means it is your turn to pick the challenge!" the shinobi on the right side of Naruto said to the shinobi on the left side. The man was very hard to describe. He wore green skin-tight clothing and had an odd bowl-shaped haircut. When they were first introduced Naruto had an extremely hard time concentrated on what the man was saying because he could not stop staring at the mans eyebrows, if they were indeed eyebrows. They could have been caterpillars and he swore he thought they were moving. The only words that he managed to catch of the man's introduction was that his name was 'Gai', he was 'Youthful', and for some reason he wanted Naruto to 'admire his manly features'.
"Hm...sorry did you say something Gai?" said the second shinobi lazily. That guy was nearly as strange as the first one in Naruto's opinion. Despite seeming to be rather young, the man had gray hair that stood nearly straight up. He wore a mask that covered nearly his entire face and wore his hit'ate so that it covered his left eye. He never seemed to put down the orange colored book that he was reading and once in a while he would...giggle. When they first met he also gave him a really creepy eye-smile.
"Darn you Kakashi and your hip and cool attitude!" stated guy in a scolding voice. Gai had been trying to challenge Kakashi since they started their journey but with no success. He looked over to the boy they were escorting and barely held back a sigh. So young and he was going to jail for unyouthful crimes that he did not knowingly commit. His fires of youth were terribly low. 'They just need to be fanned to return to a youthful burn, but how?' thought Gai.
Kakashi once again wondered why Hokage-sama, in is infinite wisdom, had decided to team him up with Maito Gai again. Kakashi was still in ANBU and it would have made more sense to just let his ANBU team escort the boy but perhaps Naruto had enough exposure to the silent and faceless masked force. 'But seriously, Gai?! That man should never be allowed near young impressionable children.' he thought.
The third member of the group was currently walking slightly ahead of them and constantly scanning the terrain for any sign of danger with his Sharingan. The eleven year-old had already been a chunin for over a year and was the most gifted shinobi of his generation. Of course he also had the emotional capabilities of a rock from years of training by his clan to become the perfect shinobi. Itachi was chosen for a specific task during this mission which wouldn't start until they were in the prison. Until then, he was keeping watch for any possible threats and aimed to complete the assigned this mission without any problems. He was personally chosen by the Hokage for this escort mission and he would not let down the village or his kage.
For all of Itachi's genius though, he still had trouble understanding the blonde child behind him. He understood the boy was the Kyuubi container but from Itachi's perspective the boy was clearly no threat to anyone. Itachi also had trouble believing that the boy could have committed those crimes. Yet the rest of the village thought completely different. To them he was a monster that should have been destroyed years ago and now their thoughts had been proven corrects. Their irrational fears and anger towards the boy did not make any sense. The damage and casualties due to the Kyuubi attack had been moderate at best. Itachi had been called in during the rioting to 'defend' the Konoha Military Police Station along with nearly every active ninja member of his clan.
Until then Itachi believed that war was the thing that brought out the worst in people. But on that day, a good portion of the village had been driven into some kind of hysteria. When he first responded to the Hokage's orders he had assumed that it was some terror attack by another village through mass genjutsu or some kind of drug but he had been very surprised to learn that it started with the deaths of three civilians seemingly by a five-year old boy.
They weren't even influential civilians such council members or nobles from the capitol. Two failing merchants and a weapons store owner. Yet the village had experienced a small uprising. He had felt the Kyuubi's power on the day that it attacked an while it was frightening and the most malicious he had ever felt, it didn't make sense that it could cause such panic and irrational behavior.
Ten minutes later later, same road
Maito Gai had been silent now for nearly ten minutes. It was really starting to scare Kakashi. The Green Beast seemed to be thinking hard about something. This only made Kakashi worry more. At some point the man would either have his answer or get fed up with thinking. In either case he would explode into action and shouts or do something very odd. Kakashi put away his orange book and contemplated moving his head band up to use his Sharingan should he need it.
"YOSH NARUTO-KUN! I HAVE FINALLY HAVE AN IDEA! YOU..." began Gai as he expectantly shouted while he pointed at Naruto in a very odd stance. "..ARE LACKING PASSION! BUT I HAVE COME UP WITH A WAY TO FAN YOUR FIRES OF YOUTH!" finished a very exuberant Gai. Everyone stopped walking at the outburst and Itachi turned around to determine what was happening. Naruto just blinked and looked around for instruction from the other shinobi as to what he should be doing. Kakashi looked worried. Itachi had pulled out a kunai and was intent on defending the young boy from these 'fires of youth' as he believed them to be in some way harmful to the boy. He had not been exposed much to the insanity of Maito Gai.
"YOSH! WITH THIS..." Gai quickly reached around his back to his ninja pouch. Itachi tensed and brought out some shuriken ready to spring into action while Kakashi mentally prepared himself for the worst. Gai continued with his motion and whipped out a green one-piece suit. "...GORGEOUS SUIT!" finished Gai. Itachi accidentally dropped his shuriken, Kakashi sweat-dropped, and Naruto just stared.
"This is one of my specially made suits. It's durable, it breaths, and fits perfectly no matter what!" Proudly shouted Gai. Kakashi coughed slightly as he was having trouble keeping the bile down. Naruto stared for a few seconds and then said, "Awesome! What else does it do, what else does it do...ttebayo!." Naruto's response made Itachi accidentally cut himself why he was picking up his dropped shuriken.
"I'm glad you asked! This highly sought after item is specially lined to prevent minor cuts and abrasions while taking some impact from hits! It also does not restrict movement in the slightest and is waterproof. It is guaranteed to increase your training abilities. As you can see.." he pointed at himself with his thumb. "..I wear one as well and it has made me the Green Beast that I am today!." Gai said while finishing with his 'good guy pose' complete with thumbs up and 'tinging' smile.
'This is by far the worst infomercial I have ever seen. It's going to haunt me in my nightmares for years to come.' thought Kakashi while wearing a slightly horrified expression on little of his face that could be seen. Itachi was actually thinking the same thing since he had his Sharingan activated and he accidentally memorized the whole thing. Naruto on the other hand was thinking very differently. 'I have got to get one of those suits. But with all the features they have, its gotta be pretty expensive and I don't have any money. And you have to pay extra for the shear awesomeness. Things that have awesomeness like that are always so expensive.' thought Naruto.
"Here, this is yours!" Gai said while handing Naruto the suit. "For free? Really?!" Naruto said and Gai just nodded with a blindingly bright smile of his whiter than white teeth. "Of course! Once the other prisoners see you in this, you'll be the envy of everyone there!" Gai assured Naruto.
Of course Kakashi and Itachi had considerably different ideas about Naruto wearing that suit in front of prisoners, and they were very the complete opposite from Gai's thoughts. "Maaa...Gai-kun can I have a word with you...over there...privately!" Kakashi said to Gai while pointing to an area several paces away. Naruto didn't even notice as he was thoroughly inspecting his new suit. "Of course my Eternal Rival! We will be right back Itachi-kun." Gai said as Itachi nodded and moved closer to Naruto. He too began examining the suit to determine if it actually may have the qualities that Gai described.
"Umm...Gai. It might not be a very good idea to give that skin-tight body suit to Naruto so that he can wear it while he stays in prison, if you get my meaning." Kakashi said, hoping that Gai would comprehend.
"Hmmmmn...ohhh I see, I should give Naruto more than one so he can give one to the friends that he makes." replied Gai. Kakashi face-palmed thinking 'He keeps more than one of those on him during missions?!"
"No, Gai. That's not what I mean at all. The boy is going to prison, you can't give him something like that to wear in there!" Kakashi said in as hushed a voice as he possibly could muster considering his current frustration.
"Hmmmmn...ahhh, I understand perfectly.." Kakashi sighed, 'finally' he though. "...that color wouldn't be suitable at all for a prisoner." With that said Gai reached back and started digging through his ninja pouch. Kakashi nearly face-faulted and though, 'he keeps multiply colors with him too!?'. "I think I might have an orange one in here somewhere." Naruto, who was not standing too far away, heard this and shouted in a very exited voice, "YOU HAVE ORANGE?!"
Before Gai could respond, Kakashi grabbed his jonin vest and looked him directly in the eye. "Gai, I want you to focus on what I'm saying." Gai, who was rather worried at how his rival was acting at that moment nodded slowly. "Naruto is going to prison, a ninja prison, with terrible people inside." Gai nodded and continued to follow Kakashi's train of thought. "These are very bad people, murderers, felons, and perhaps rapists and pedophiles. And you want to give him a skin-tight suit to wear in front of these people?" Kakashi finished.
Gai suddenly caught on to what his genius rival had been trying to tell him all along and developed a horrified look on his face. He glanced over at Naruto and then back at Kakashi. "This is bad." Gai said. Kakashi could only nod his head with a sigh. "I can't just take back the suit, look how much it means to him." They both looked over and saw Naruto hugging the suit while Itachi watched on with mild disgust. "Unfortunately yes." acknowledged Kakashi with much reluctance.
Gai got in his thinking pose once again and thought of something quite quickly. "We could just tell him to wear it underneath the other clothes that they give him when he gets there." Gai said. Kakashi for once looked at Gai and wondered exactly why he himself hadn't thought of that solution. "OK Gai, you'll have to make this clear to him before we reach the prison tomorrow." said Kakashi. "You can count on me, my Eternal Rival!" Gai replied while giving Kakashi that creepy shining smile of his.
'Whew, dodged a fire jutsu on that one.' Kakashi thought and sweat-dropped as Gai went back over to Naruto and started to explain the suit to him, how he should wear it, and started outlining an exercise regime and schedule for him. He also explained that he did not have a bright orange suit with him but he could mail him one later, much to Kakashi and Itachi's ire.
Deep in Root Headquarters, underneath Konoha
Danzo was currently siting at his desk inside of his office in Root and filing out paperwork. Yes, unfortunately even he had to fill out paperwork and then have his Root ANBU burn it at a later date. On the outside Danzo seemed calm but on the inside he was still seething. His plans for acquiring the Kyuubi container had fallen through.
The three men that were murdered were done so on his orders by his Root forces. They kidnapped the container right under his ANBU guard's nose and placed him near the scene. Evidence was also planted. One of his Root ANBU even stayed at the scene and made sure he was seen by a civilian while under a henge. Danzo had come to this plan after a need to eliminate the three civilians. Most of his Root ANBU were either thought as being MIA by normal Konoha forces or were not even listed as being citizens or ninja of Fire Country. They couldn't just walk into a weapons store and purchase items.
He therefore had been using the two merchants and the weapons store owner to smuggle and acquire weapons for his Root forces. He had also used his Root forces to help the merchants smuggle other goods to other cities and countries for a price. Eventually though, the merchants businesses started to fail. A day before they were murdered, the weapons store owner had wanted him to come down to meet in person. The outcome of the short meeting was to set up another meeting between the store owner and his two suppliers at a later time. Before the Danzo entered the shop he saw the Kyuubi container being thrown out right after walking in and filed the information away. During the late night meeting, the three businessmen had threatened to tell the Hokage all that they knew if Danzo did not pay them more money.
Before the meeting, Danzo had already decided to kill them, even before they threatened to tell the Hokage. They were marked for death and just didn't know it and so he arranged another meeting the following night. Danzo remembered thinking that their disappearances or murders might start an investigation so he needed someone to blame it one. It was then that Danzo remembered the Kyuubi container and he made a plan to not only take care of the three civilians but acquire the container to be his personal weapon as he had wanted to do for years. Until that point, he had never able to acquire his weapon because Sarutobi was always protecting the container.
The reason why Danzo had never outright kidnapped the container was because he was sure the boy had several tracking seals on him and Sarutobi would track down the child. Of course he had never seen or had any verification that the seals existed but he theorized that they had been placed by the Sandaime or maybe even the ANBU. Its what he would due if the situation was reversed. One seal may even be tied into the world barrier that surrounded and protected Konoha from unauthorized entry but he had no way of knowing for sure.
Imagine his fury when the Root ANBU who kidnapped him and placed him near the scene, reported that the boy didn't have any tracking seals on him. Danzo was livid upon hearing that, and by that time the boy had already been snatched by Kakashi and he had lost his chance to kidnap him again. The only way that Sarutobi had to find the boy would have been to use his crystal ball, which could be easily fooled with the correct application of fuinjutsu to one's body, which Danzo had been using for years to escape Sarutobi's gaze.
He remembered thinking about wow stupid Hiruzen was to have not put any tracking seals on the boy. 'What if someone else had tried to kidnap him during the five years that he had been alive.' Of course Danzo couldn't say anything about it to Sarutobi because the Hokage would become suspicious as to how Danzo knew such information. He was completely fooled into thinking that the boy had more than one tracking seal when none existed in the first place. That had been his first failure and it was never even part of his original plan.
Originally he had thought that a civilian judge and jury would preside over the trial and did not plan on the villagers rioting which forced Sarutobi bringing in an Arbitrator. He was positive that it was within his power to convince a civilian judge and jury to turn the boy into his weapon but an Arbitrator was a different story. During the meeting to discuss options for the fate of the container, he had not counted on the Arbitrator making the vote for his suggestion a Ninja Council-only vote. He had planned on getting the support of the civilian council and had set about bribing and blackmailing them to vote for his suggestion. This was the second failure in the execution of his plan.
After that, he had tried to get the boy placed into a civilian prison as it would be very easy for his Root forces to extract the boy and bring him back to Root Headquarters. This went south when boys prison was chosen as the shinobi prison. It would be much harder to infiltrate there then a civilian prison. This had been the third failure in his plans and salt in the wound.
Shortly after the Arbitrators decisions, Danzo had begun making plans to possible ambush the boys escorts before they made it to the prison but Sarutobi refused to tell anyone on the council when the boy would be leaving for the prison. His sources told him that the boy had not left any of the village gates, but Sarutobi had probably sent the boy out of the village through the secret ANBU entrance which was behind the Hokage mountain. What he did learn was that Sarutobi had possibly used an entire ANBU squad as well as three of the strongest shinobi in Konoha to escort the boy and that they had already left. This had been the fourth failure in his plans.
Sarutobi had also managed to get upgraded security and switch out all of the guards at the shinobi prison. This made it nearly impossible to get one of his Root ANBU inside the prison to extricate the container. Also there was no way he was going to risk attacking the prison. The attack could release the prisoners that did belong in the prison. This had been the fifth failure in his plans.
The only thing that had worked out that he was in the least bit pleased with were the laws that Sarutobi had passed concerning the container. The Sandaime made it illegal to talk about the boy or the incident which Danzo was pleased with. Danzo didn't wanted any information to get out about the boy and after the Kyuubi attack he had wanted everyone to think that the Kyuubi was gone and had been defeated by the Yondaime. Sarutobi had stupidly told the entire village about the boy. Unfortunately now because of both of their blunders the boy was in prison and had his chakra completely sealed. By the time the container was released from prison his effectiveness at a shinobi would be slim to none, and his effectiveness as a weapon would be almost zero due to his chakra pathways not being used until after he went through puberty. This had been his sixth and ultimate failure with the plan.