A/N: Please read the chapter to the end before jumping to conclusions. Thanks ^o^


Chapter 6: The Solution

Naruto watched as his kaa-chan and godfather fought against a man, who the blonde thought he could trust. His neck hurt, but he just pressed his hand onto the wound. TonTon sat next to him tearing on his shirt, before she gave up and run away.

But Naruto was too stunned to do anything. From one moment to another, there were huge animals fighting each other. A gigantic slug landed next to him and stopped the even bigger snake that headed for him. While a toad which was as big as a frigging mountain tried to behead it.

He watched the fight in horror, his eye catching his kaa-chan's jacket or his godfather's hair time and again, but never long enough, to make out anything more out. It just looked like colors flying around and crashing into the floor…

All of the sudden he felt in pain. His left shoulder and arm hurt like somebody emptied a container with acid over him. He wanted to scream, but he couldn't. The little blonde tried to stay conscious, but he knew he was failing. Blackness caught his eyes, before it slowly faded again.

Naruto blinked. He wasn't sure, if he was dreaming. But that couldn't be real, could it? In front of him was a huge gate and he felt so tiny in comparison to the cold metal. Around the metal grew some small trees. They looked ready to bloom and Naruto felt like he just had to reach out to them and they would grow however he wanted them to. As he looked up, he saw two small pieces of papers on it. They were right in the middle of the gate, where you would expect to find a keyhole.

But that wasn't the weirdest thing, it seemed pretty normal in comparison with what laid behind the gate… a gigantic fox, which could easily eat the snake, slug, and toad from earlier and still be hungry.

Scared, the kid looked around, but other than the green looking walls of a sewer, he couldn't make much out. Just then he noticed the water on the floor. It was just there, without being felt. He searched for an exit, but there was none. However, it looked like there had been one behind him which was now covered in branches of various plants…

Deciding, he hadn't anything better to do, he stepped towards the gate. He looked up at the papers, trying to make out what the kanji on them said.

"First Cloud Seal," he read slowly, "Bond"

Naruto blinked. What? That didn't make any sense at all, did it?

"Naru-chan!"

His head flew around. Had somebody called his name? The fox was still sleeping, so it couldn't be the huge animal. It didn't even move a muscle, even thought it looked like it was bleeding. What else could the red liquid be, that crept at him through the weird water.

"Naruto!"

He threw his head around again. It was his kaa-chan! But where was she? He couldn't see her anywhere! The blonde knew he always talked big in front of his onee-chan. He wanted to be a great shinobi. But truth to be told, Naruto was still a small four year old kid! And he was scared.

"Kaa-chan! Where are you?"

The blonde felt a force pulling him away from the creepy place and as he opened his eyes again, he saw his mother looking at him with a worried face. His godfather stood next to her, but Naruto could only see his back. The older man watched their surroundings.

"Kaa-chan," before he could continue the medic-nin had grabbed him and gave him a choking hug. He wanted to flee from it, but stopped as he felt something wet against his shoulder. He wanted to ask her, what was wrong, but he felt too weak. Something was absolutely not right…

"Kaa-chan…"

"Tsunade!"


Jiraiya eyed the forest around them. As much as he wanted to take care of his godson, he knew that even if Orochimaru vanished in the middle of their fight, he could still be in the area. So, he left it to Hime-chan to make sure he was alright.

But the more he watched them from the corner of his eye, the more he knew that she was too shocked to think straight. And as his godson's eyes flickered, he did the best thing he could think of.

"Tsunade!"

Reluctantly, the blonde let go of her kid. Horror filled her face as she saw Naruto unconscious in her arms and black markings move from the left side of his neck over his shoulder and red arm. They looked like broken leaves, each one missed something.

Carefully, to avoid Tsunade's furry, Jiraiya shoved her out of the way and inspected the markings. He bit his lip in thought and tried to track the dark lines. The seal-master searched for the true meaning behind all these curves, but a failed seal contained a lot of mistakes from the original. One wrong line in a storage seal could change it into an explosive tag. He didn't want to think about what a complex seal like this one would do if it missed only one dot! Not to mention that he stopped Orochimaru to applying the whole seal. It would have been a lot easier to work with a completed one…

"What's wrong with him, Ero? Jiraiya?" The Slug Princess was panicking, but Jiraiya tried to ignore her. It would annoy her, yes, but he needed to focus.

Shaking his head, the Toad Sennin decided it was best to stop its doing and remove it later. He bit his thumb and drew a small circle around the original seal. Focusing his chakra into it, he created a barrier, before connecting his chakra on Naruto with his own system. Without another real seal it would only hold for a year at most if he stayed close to his outer chakra network, but another seal could also trigger something different in the one it was supposed to keep at bay…

"It won't hold long, but he should be out of pain for now," he tried to assure the blonde woman. It was in exactly this moment that Shizune appeared with TonTon through the forest. She stared a moment at the destroyed area behind them, before snapping out of it and heading towards the two Sannin.

"Sensei?" She asked, before noticing her otouto on the floor and running towards them, "Naru-chan! What happened?"

Tsunade stayed quiet and didn't seem to be ready to say anything for a while. She just stared at her son, too scared for him to die…

"Orochimaru committed treason to Konoha some weeks ago," Jiraiya started slowly, knowing full well that Tsunade was listening and needed an explanation, "He… His apprentice, Gai Tsuyoku was found and some of their secrets were revealed. Orochimaru… he tried to…" Jiraiya bit his tongue. He knew the blonde would find out the moment the bingo books were to be updated in a week. But he also knew that it could hurt her, knowing she was one of the last Senju… and remembering Naruto's little secret… That she looked up, straight into his eyes made the matter even worse.

"He tried to recreate the Mokuton. About 60 infants were kidnapped and died, only one survived"

Before anybody could blink, Tsunade had created another crater in their current environment. She looked furious and ready to kill anyone that looked at her the wrong way. She turned back at Jiraiya and her angry eyes become soft and filled with sorrow.

"But why did he attack my Naru-chan? Only grandfather Hashirama could use the Mokuton. I was never able to and Naruto wouldn't be either!"

Her eyes seemed to water again and Jiraiya was sure of three things. That now was the third time he actually saw her cry, the Slug Princess lost control of herself, and Naruto hadn't told anybody else about his ability, because neither Tsunade nor Shizune seemed to look surprised…


It had been a week later, when Naruto finally woke up again. He felt good and didn't even notice the mark on his neck, but his kaa-chan still didn't let him out of her sight for longer than three minutes, stopping Shizune teachings and anything similar in the process. And as annoying as it seemed, it stopped her from going out and drinking or gambling.

Jiraiya had stayed with them and they started to change locations every three days. It just felt safer to leave a place as soon as somebody could remember their faces. And even thought Jiraiya had to run his network of spies, he tried to never be gone for more than some hours maximal, keeping his additional chakra network stable. He also tried to study the seal every time his godson was asleep. He didn't want the little kid to worry.

It also had been the Toad Sennin, who told Naruto to keep his powers a secret. He wasn't sure if Tsunade was ready for it and adult or not, he wouldn't let her get more hurt, because of a power that was believed dead…

Shizune kept healing some of the civilians, they passed. So, Tsunade decided to cook again… Only for everybody to vomit the weird looking… things? Everybody but Naruto, who was totally fine with the pink bread, yellow-violet soups, and a mixture of a red cheese-pickle-soya sandwich could not get the food down their throats without running for the next toilet…

The young medic-nin was the first to suspect something, right before Jiraiya refused to finish his meal and was slapped out of the room, tearing down two walls in the process… It had been in exact that moment that she was sure of her theory.

"Sensei? You look a little pale. May I check you over?"

Naruto looked up from his meal and watched his kaa-chan with his big blue eyes. He hadn't noticed his kaa-chan looking pale, but onee-chan's shooing hand told him to go along with it.

"Shizune, don't you think I would notice it if something were wrong?" She went back to eat, dismissing the subject.

But her kohai wouldn't let her. Hearing a groan from the hole in the wall, or probably walls, she tried it again: "But you always told me, that sometimes we don't notice the changes our bodies go through, because we are just too used to them, just a quick check-up, please?"

Tsunade nodded slowly and pushed her chair away from the table to give Shizune more room, as the younger medic-nin approached her. Naruto close behind, watching every move his onee-chan made with even bigger eyes.

Biting her lip, Shizune first checked her sensei's body temperature and pulse with her in green chakra covered hands, before she moved towards her abdomen and feeling what she had expected, another live.

She stopped her chakra and looked straight into Tsunade's eyes.

"What is it? Is kaa-chan sick?" Naruto looked uneasy from one woman to the other, ready to tear up any second.

"No, not like that, nothing like that," Shizune tried to assure him. Before she could say anything else, her sensei spoke.

"I am pregnant?" Tsunade never watched Naruto study their books, so she didn't know that he already understood the word, which made his little blue eyes shine. Had she known, she maybe would have asked a totally different question, something metaphorical… not something direct.

"I am gonna be a big brother!" Said little blonde jumped up and down, before running towards his godfather, while the other blonde's eyes just widened in shock. Shizune looked scared at her sensei, silently praying not to be asked about her otouto's studies.

"I should just…" she wanted to say abandon it, get rid of it, don't bear a child of a traitor. But the moment she didn't say it, she knew, she couldn't do it. She didn't want to be the one that destroyed her son's happy shining eyes…

"Sensei?" Shizune eyed her carefully. But the woman just shook her head she didn't want to think about it. She just didn't.

Just in this moment Jiraiya run into the room, back on his legs with an overjoyed smile on his face making the red printed hand on his check seem a little out of place... The Slug Princess just wanted to hit him again, when his voice stopped her.

"That's the solution!"

Everybody just blinked in confusion. What? Had he just gone senile?

"Shizune, here take little Naruto and TonTon out to a little walk, there's a beautiful park close to that flower shop. I need to speak with Tsunade about something," he picked the little pig up from the floor and put it into his godson's arms, before gently shoving them out of the room, "Have a nice day!", with that he slammed the door shut.

"What do you think you are doing?" A half-deadly, half-furious voice asked him quietly.

"Calm down. Give me one minute and you can run after them and glare at everybody coming to close to your son again, deal?"

She raised an eyebrow.

"And if you're still angry, you can beat me up again."

Reluctantly, Tsunade nodded and silently started to count to sixty in the back of her head. After what happened she would kill everybody who stood between herself and her son. Old teammate or not, even Jiraiya wouldn't be save from a punishment...

"I told you about the seal placed on Naruto to keep the Kyuubi at bay, didn't I?" She nodded raising her other eyebrow, "Well, with the used seal, we need a second container to stabilize the first and grant them the power to use Kyuubi's chakra, which would help him to get rid of Orochimaru's failed seal. The chakra of a bijuu could just overpower it! But because Naruto was a newborn baby as Kyuubi was sealed, we need a newborn baby again. We need a kid that is compatible with the blonde tornado. In the first thoughts about the Ni-Kumo Seal, Minato and I thought about somebody blood-related…" Tsunade stopped the countdown at twenty-seven and looked straight into the Toad Sennin eyes.

"So, you want to use his soon to be born sibling as second container?"

Jiraiya sighed again. He knew, would he say something wrong, his body would be found in Konoha, dead and not next door in Ishi no Kuni, still breathing…

"Haven't you noticed how Naruto had never been sick? And I can assure you, it's not because of your cooking abilities. Where do his whisker marks come from? As we fought with Orochimaru, I saw one of Manda's venom attacks hit Naruto, but it was gone, as we got to him. His arm looked just a little bit red afterwards. Kyuubi grants him healing abilities, but it's not able to do much more. It's still unconscious. If I am right, you wouldn't have to worry about your other child as well. The child would have the same healing abilities. With some experience they could both heal instantly. I am not saying that they should train to become shinobis. I know about Minato's promise. But they should be prepared, because Orochimaru is out there," he pointed towards the whole in the wall "and he isn't giving up on the Mokuton any time soon."

Tsunade looked at him. She wasn't angry. She knew her friend was right. But she felt fear. She wasn't able to love the fetus in her any time soon, she knew, she was sure of it. It made the medic-nin feel disgusted by herself. But she knew she couldn't change it… And loving her child or not, she didn't want to put a huge burden on a little baby…

"Are you sure? Could it work out?" The Slug Princess was more asking herself than the silver-haired shinobi in front of her.

He knelt down and carefully laid his hands onto hers: "I can transfer the seal from the scroll onto the baby. Kyuubi wouldn't want to be in pain, so it will not interfere with my work. It also will destroy the failed seal on Naruto with rare power and it will protect them. Just believe in us, Hime"

The blonde nodded. Her baby might hate her, but she would just have to deal with it…


"Onee-chan, if I'm gonna be an onii-san, am I still your otouto?"

"Sure, that's not going to change, o-tou-to," Shizune said stretching every syllable of the last word, emphasizing it.

They just went through the little park and Naruto seemed to enjoy not being watched by his mother. Together with TonTon he jumped around and sometimes even ran ahead, just to stop, when the medic-nin was ready to call out to him. As he waited for her to catch up with him, he asked her about the plants name's around them.

The boy had already run towards the next couple of trees, when he stopped and came back to Shizune, TonTon hot on his heels.

"Onee-chan, the girl in the house over there, watches us," he pointed to his left side, worry in his face.

"You shouldn't point at other people," the medic-nin scowled him, as she watched how the girl pulled the curtains in front of the window. She hadn't been able to get a good look of the girl, but name it a medic-nin's sixth sense or not, she already knew that the kid had been sick.

"Should we visit her? I don't think she is doing well…"

Now the little blonde looked from his onee-chan, to the house, and into the direction they came from. His kaa-chan could get really angry, but if Shizune suggested it… It couldn't be that bad, could it? He was just going to watch some medical ninjutsu, see how the girl would be healed and feel happy for her…

"What's taking you so long, onee-chan?" Laughing, he ran towards the house, an oinking TonTon and giggling medic-nin behind him, just to come to a sudden halt in front of a wooden door.

Naruto looked back at his onee-chan, before he knocked. As nobody answered, he put his ear on the door. At first, there was only silence, then he heard somebody inhaling, a coughing, followed by a quiet thud.

"Have you knocked?" Shizune asked him, her eyes watching a sign on the door in wonder, which was up too high for Naruto to read.

The blonde nodded and before the medic-nin could stop him, he already went inside. If she wanted to lecture him at first, she forgot it the moment she saw the body of a young, blonde girl laying on the floor. Even from the other end of the hallway, she could see the sweat running down her forehead.

Without taking her shoes of, she ran towards the kid and let her chakra cool her body temperature. Her experienced hands flew over her body searching the roots of her illness.

"Hello? Can you hear me?"

She noticed Naruto behind her. He looked from the probably eight or nine year old girl to his onee-chan and back at her.

"Damn it," Shizune felt the pulse of the girl vanish from under her, while Naruto jerked away. Shizune and cursing meant trouble, real trouble. "I need powder of a wisteria sinensis branch. Can you bring me my bag in-"

"Can you keep a secret?" the boy interrupted her, while he chew on his lip.

"Naruto, that's not-"

"Can you?"

Shizune looked away from her patient. What was so important for him that he didn't even hurried and got her supplies?

"Yes and now-" This time she wasn't interrupted. She stopped speaking, when she saw what her little otouto did… He had put a hand onto the wooden floor and let a little wisteria sinensis tree grew out of it.

To say the medic-nin was stunned speechless, was like saying Jiraiya was the finest gentleman in the Elemental Countries. She blinked and stared at the little tree that seemed to bend to Naruto's will and suddenly stopped spreading towards the ceiling.

It was then that she noticed she had been too stunned to keep the healing chakra in her palms. She shook her head, before continuing to heal the girl. Looking around, she found the stove and nodded in its direction.

"Heat up some water," she watched him stand up and heading for some pans and bowls "I will do the rest… and Naruto?" he turned around again, chewing his lip again, "We are going to have a long talk about this as soon as she's better, got that?"

The blonde boy nodded, before continuing his task. That was the first time, she asked him for help while dealing with a patient. He wouldn't disappoint his onee-chan.

While he put a bowl with water onto the stove, Shizune took care of the little girl. She kept her fever down and thought about her condition. The hot temperature in the kid's body wouldn't ever be a big problem for her. It was a little cold, nothing more and nothing less.

But she'd found something different in her body. Something, which was destroying the kid from the inside and a nagging feeling told her, that it wouldn't be a normal disease…

It was just a moment later, that the girl regained conscious. Her eyes couldn't focus, but the medic-nin was sure, that this would change soon.

"Good morning, honey. How do you feel?" She asked the kid softly. From the corner of her own eyes she noticed her otouto watching them.

"Leave," the girl's hoarse voice said, while she regained some of her strength, "I will just make you sick too."

"Nopes, not going to happen, honey," Shizune replied as softly as before.

Naruto poured some of the hot water into a cup and brought it to them. Curious, the small girl watched him, as he handed it to his onee-chan.

"Hi," Naruto smiled at her and she hid behind Shizune, "What's your name?"

She slowly looked back at him, watching him closely. Shizune knew right then, that the girl wasn't treated well by the villagers. She was way too fearful of her little brother. And as the kid noticed, that she'd hid behind another stranger, she - tremblingly - tried to stand up and run behind a chair.

…only to trip over one of the wisteria sinensis' branches…

"Are you alright?" Naruto went up to her and helped her to sit onto the chair she'd tried to reach. Reluctantly, she accepted his help staring at the small plant in wonder. The medic-nin watched them as she cut some of its branches off and dropped them into the still boiling water. The mixture would take a while to be done…

"Anko, Aoi Anko"

Shizune looked up, puzzled, before she noticed – it was an answer to Naruto's earlier question. It was her name.

"That's an awesome name! I am Naruto. And that's Shizune, my onee-chan, she can heal you, she's a great medic-nin" he pointed at her and the young woman gave Anko a warm smile, "And that's TonTon," he said pointing at the oinking pig "She's a good friend, but not really talkative…" He looked at the floor in wonder "Wanna be friends?"

The sick girl looked at him scared, before nodding with the hugest smile Shizune had ever seen. They continued to talk and both became happier. Naruto, because he met a playmate, that didn't seem weird to him and Anko, because she had hope again. Hope to live a normal life with the help of these three travelers.

Shizune watched them a while, before handing the cup towards the girl, who took it and drank it without complaining about the bitter taste. Anko seemed to be used to bad tasting medicine… Leaving Shizune to wonder, how the civilian in this village dealt with her sickness…

"Can I check you over, Anko?" The medic-nin asked carefully. But the girl just nodded in excitement, letting her long blonde hair fly around. It looked like she was never before treated by a medic-nin and that she was overjoyed with the thought. Normally a medic-nin took a lot of money and it wasn't something a normal person could afford…

While Naruto told the blonde girl stories about his godfather, Shizune let her chakra flow through Anko's body. It didn't took her long to find the root of her sickness and discover that the cold had made her real sickness take slowly over the little body… It took all of her training as kunoichi to not show any signs of sadness.

Anko Aoi had cancer and would probably die in the next couple of days…


So... What you think? I hope the chapter turned out alright, but all the exams are coming up... so I might have missed some mistakes... *sigh*

Well, a big THANK YOU to tstoldt, god of all, and ForeverFallen76! I was really happy reading your reviews!

I think it's kind of oblivious now, who Anko is going to be...

Please review! ^o^