The results for the pairing so far are:
Yakumo: 1
Karin: 2
OC: 1
Hinata: 1
Ino: 1
Tayuya: 1
I do not own Naruto.
Naruto smiled as he watched the bustle of the village from the top of the Hokage monument. Lying in the late afternoon sun, he sighed and watched the clouds go by. He had been able to pay off another 2 months worth of payments for his house. He was relieved to have two months off from the stress, even though he could pay more of it if he wanted. Sitting up again, he noticed someone sitting on the head next to him. Walking over, he saw it to be a boy around his own age, with long brown hair and almost white lavender eyes. As he got nearer, the boy's head snapped towards him. "Who are you?" He demanded, staring at Naruto warily.
"My name is Saisei. You looked lonely, so I decided to talk to you." The boy turned away.
"I don't need to talk to someone."
"Everyone needs to talk to someone sometimes. Bottling up your emotions is never good. I have a tendency to do it myself, but at least I have someone to talk to. You don't look like you have anyone. Eventually they all come out, and then you feel so weak and vulnerable. Talking to someone helps you get rid of whatever's piled up inside." He smiled, watching the boy.
"And who would I talk to? You? I don't even know you. How do I know you won't tell the first person who asks about me?"
"I'm a civilian, and I don't even know your name. How am I supposed to expose you? How could I hurt you? Showing emotion isn't weakness. Being controlled by them is. There's a difference." He studied the boy's face as he said this, seeing a small frown taking form.
They sat in silence for a while, before the boy finally said,
"My father died when I was young. Someone tried to kidnap the heiress to my family, and my uncle, the clan leader, killed him. But the village that sent the kidnapper was angry, and demanded appeasement in the form of the killer's head. My father, the leader's identical twin brother, was sent in the place of his brother. If my stupid, weak, pathetic cousin hadn't been so useless, my father would still be alive."
Naruto hummed. "How is that her fault? She probably was young, so why do you expect her to know how to fight off a kidnapper at however old she was. You're speaking like this happened a long time ago, and as if you're older, so she was probably very young. Would you have been able to fight what was most likely a highly trained shinobi at her age?"
"My family has been bound to hers in servitude for generations. It is our fate to die for them, no matter how useless they are. We are destined to die for a foolish cause. My cousin was not worth my father's life."
"Then fate must be a sad thing, if you have no free will to think for yourself. If fate is behind everything, it must also be fate for her to survive. Maybe she'll be stronger or more important in the future. Have you ever asked your uncle what happened? Maybe he knows something you don't. I know that if I had a sibling I would gladly die for them. Maybe something similar happened with them?"
He kept talking. "And fate is a lie anyway. What is the point of living if everything is already planned out for us? We must seize fate in our own hands. I want to control my own destiny." He had slowly started raising his voice as he talked, and when he stopped he was almost shouting.
He scoffed. "You know nothing of me. You probably have both parents, friends, a life outside of servitude and prejudice. It is fate's will for me to die in servitude."
Naruto jumped up. "At least you had known your father. I have no parents. The village hated me, ignored me, and treated me as less than dirt. If I had submitted to fate, I'd be dead. Our future is not concrete. At least try to control it! What's the point of existing if we have no free will?!"
The boy sat there thinking. "You… are very wise for a civilian. I have not talked to either my uncle or my cousin since that day. You have given me much to think on." He stood up, walking down the trail back to the village. "And by the way, my name is Neji. Neji Hyuga. I hope we meet again." He looked away and faded into the distance, disappearing down the path.
Naruto froze, thanking Kami he had not given Neji reason to activate his bloodline. Of all his luck, the boy had to be a Hyuga! Sighing in relief at not being discovered, he lay back down and went back to watching the sky, wondering about Neji's past. He pitied him. No one should be alone with that much misery. An hour later, he packed up and headed back to the village, carrying a freshly painted landscape of the sunset on the village.
Bonus: Iruka's reaction
"He was WHAT!?"
Iruka was furious, storming around the Hokage's office before banging his fist on the table.
Hiruzen sighed. "The council overwhelmed me with a majority vote to deny Naruto's promotion. They were technically correct saying you did not have the authority to promote him, but i had been willing to overlook it as I had been planning to promote him afterwards anyway. It appears I have both become too complacent since retaking this position, and placed too much trust in my old friends. For them to betray me in such a manner is… indescribably excruciating. I had thought that they would be able to look past the Kyubi, but it appears I was mistaken." Iruka's face softened.
"Speaking of Naruto, where is he? He hasn't come to see me yet, and he normally would have shown up by now."
"...I honestly don't know. He hasn't been by here either."
"I'm going to look for him. I'll come back in three days if I still haven't found him. He could just be hiding somewhere."
"I'll expect you to report to me when you find him. You are dismissed, chunin Umino." With a nod, Iruka left to search for Naruto. Sighing, Hiruzen pulled out a blank piece of paper. Scribbling a message on it hastily, he addressed it to its intended recipient, and sent it out the window on a messenger hawk. He only prayed it got to him before he found out another way. Otherwise all hell would break loose, and the civilian and elder councils would be doomed, politically important or not. Nothing would protect them from the wrath of an angry spymaster hellbent on revenge for his godson.
Two days later…
A man was walking on a beaten path in a forest when a messenger hawk swooped down and landed on a nearby branch. Extending its leg to him, he untied the letter and shooed the hawk away. As he read it, his face grew darker and darker. Crumpling it up and stuffing it in his pocket, he immediately began heading back towards Konoha. The council would pay. Oh, they would pay. His revenge would be slow and painful. He would ruin their reputation by bringing even the smallest facts to light, and when they were left ruined, he would swoop in and end them. Jiraiya was PISSED, and he had his next mission: Protecting his godson. This Sannin was out for blood and he would get it, consequences be damned.
Back in Konoha, all the members of the civilian and elder councils felt a chill run down their spines simultaneously. They shook it off as nothing, unaware of how much they would regret that action later.
