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When the news breaks.

A/N: AAHHHH! HOLY SHIT ONE HUNDRED REVIEWS! YES! PRAISE JASHIN-SAMA! THANK YOU ALL! EVERYONE WHO REVIEWED, I DON'T KNOW YOU BUT I PLATONICALLY FUCKING LOVE YOU!

On a less energetic side note I have started a new story. It's called When One Jinchuuriki Raises Another and it is a Utakata/Naruto mentor fic. The first chapter is up so do me a favor and give that a look-see.

Here's the summary:
After his master's betrayal Utakata fled to Konoha, hoping to hide in plain sight as a civilian. He had no idea how he ended up working in a ramen shop and rooming with a hyper-active blonde boy.

"Sarutobi-sensei what did you bring me back here for?" Jiraiya, super pervert and Toad Sage, walked into the Hokage's office grinning widely. He flopped down into the chair across from the Hokage. "And what's with sending Kakashi to find me? I mean, I'm flattered that he understands the awesomeness that is my Icha Icha series but he spent the whole trip trying to get an advance copy of my next book."

"Jiraiya, something serious has happened." Sarutobi punctuated his grave statement with a single puff of smoke from his pipe.

Jiraiya grinned easily, "What? Finally decide that you're too old to wear the fancy hat? Well sorry to tell you that I can't be the next Hokage, I've got far too much research to do."

"This is serious Jiraiya."

"That's your business voice, oh no, what happened? Did Guy stop wearing spandex?" Jiraiya chuckled at his own joke, obviously not taking the situation seriously.

Sarutobi sighed at his student's antics, "Jiraiya, please take this seriously. It is incredibly important."

The Toad Sage examined the Hokage's face, taking in the deep lines of worry around his mouth and eyes. The man looked like he had aged a decade, and he hadn't stopped puffing on his pipe since Jiraiya entered the room. Jiraiya hadn't seen Sarutobi-sensei looked this worn out since Orochimaru's defection. The seriousness of the situation finally sank in and the self-proclaimed super pervert straightened up in his chair, watching the Hokage intently.

"What's wrong Sarutobi-sensei?"

Sarutobi took a deep, steadying breath, "Naruto-kun is missing."

It took a moment for Jiraiya to process what his sensei had said. His first thought was that this was all some elaborate prank, but another look at Sarutobi's tired face dissuaded him of that idea. Momentary shock was replaced by anger.

"What! Missing? How can he be missing? You were supposed to be looking out for him! He's Minato's kid for God's sake! What, did you just let him wander out of the village? You were supposed to have people guarding him, dammit! What if Iwa took him to get retribution for all the shinobi they lost to the Yellow Flash?"

Jiraiya didn't realize that he had stood up and began pacing until he accidently knocked over the chair he had been sitting in. Slightly startled at his own outburst, he set the chair upright and sat down again.

"Jiraiya, calm down, take a deep breath. It wasn't Iwa, the Inuzuka trackers confirmed it. Naruto was alone when he left the village; his was the only scent that could be found."

Jiraiya took a deep breath and ran a calloused hand over his face, "If the Inuzuka found his scent why do you need my help?"

"His scent completely disappeared about two miles into the forest, not even Tsume-san can find it."

"What!" he rocketed to his feet once more. This was bad, very bad. The Inuzuka clan was notorious for being some of the best trackers in the world and Tsume Inuzuka was the best of the best. It was rumored that not even a powerful concealment jutsu could hide a scent from her. If she completely lost Naruto's scent then something was incredibly, undeniably wrong.

Sarutobi tamped more tobacco into his pipe and relit it. "Jiraiya, your spy network is legendary; I need you to get everyone you have to start looking for Naruto."

Recap:

"Hey brat if you're done checking yourself out we need to talk about something."

Naruto turned around, "talk about what?"

Hidan held up the thick book from the conversion chamber, "How did you get this?"

"That? Oh the Spirit gave it to me. What is it anyway? The Spirit didn't really say, it just kinda babbled cryptic bullshit at me."

"This," Hidan tapped the cover of the fabric wrapped book with one finger, "is the Book of Forbidden Knowledge, every Jashinist has one."

"So then why is this one such a big deal?" Slightly disappointed, Naruto turned back to the mirror and resumed examining himself, tilting his head so that the light hit different parts of his face. His newly aged body was probably in its late teens, possibly early twenties. If he had to guess he would say twenty. His body was now twenty. How fucking awesome was that? Naruto saw Hidan scowling at him in the mirror and grinned sheepishly. He turned to face his sensei, giving the silver haired man his full attention.

Satisfied that the brat was actually paying attention Hidan continued, "It's a big fucking deal because all the Books that Jashinists have now are fucking copies of the Books from the time of the Empire. Some of the words or instructions have changed during years of translation and copying. Some passages can't be fucking translated at all. They're incomplete. But this book," he tapped the cover again, "is complete; it's directly from Jashin-sama."

"How can you tell?"

Hidan held out the book and Naruto took it. To his surprise the book gave off the same strange simultaneous electrical buzzing and skin crawling sensation that the ritual Spirit did.

"That's fucking awesome." Naruto opened the book at random and whooped in joy as his eyes fell on a diagram of a jutsu. "Hidan-sensei we're gonna learn so many new jutsu with this!"

"You might learn some kid, but I won't."

Naruto looked up in surprise, "What? Why not?"

Hidan's scowl morphed into an ugly frown, "My chakra coils got fucked up as a kid; I've got enough for the basic stuff like water and tree walking but not much else."

"Oh…"

"Wipe that look off your face. You're immortal now so if I think for a minute that you're pitying me I'll cut your Jashin-damned head off."

Naruto held up his hands in surrender as best he could (he was still clutching a foot thick book after all), "Whoa, Hidan-sensei calm down. Hostile much?"

"No shit Sherlock."

Naruto chuckled and handed the Book of Forbidden Knowledge back to Hidan. Then he stood and walked slowly around the room, getting a feel for his new, elongated limbs.

"Hey brat I almost forgot to give you this."

Naruto stopped in the middle of his third circuit of the room and turned toward his teacher just in time to have a Jashinist rosary bounce off his forehead.

"Wake up brat."

Hidan nudged Naruto in the side with his foot. The boy grumbled something and snuggled deeper into his nest of blankets.

Hidan nudged him again, harder this time. Absently he wondered how Naruto could even stand sleeping under blankets in the nearly unbearable temperatures of the Swamp Temple.

Again, the boy didn't react. In fact if Hidan didn't know better he would have thought the sleeping boy had snuggled even deeper into the blankets after the last nudge just to fuck with him.

Hidan growled under his breath, "Brat, I know you can fucking hear me. Do not make me get the motherfucking water bucket."

Naruto shot to his feet as if someone had poked him with a cattle prod. Hidan got his answer to the blanket question but he sincerely wished he hadn't. For the love of Jashin-sama there were some things he just didn't want to know. The fact his apprentice had decided to sleep in the nude was one of those things.

"I'm up! I'm up!" Naruto shouted. He waved his arms around frantically, as if to emphasize the point.

Hidan scowled, "For fuck's sake there's no need to yell. And put some damn pants on, seriously."

"Oh quit bitching sensei." Naruto casually waved off his sensei's quote unquote bitching and pulled a pair pants up over his legs.

Hidan's scowl deepened, "I'm gonna make you pay for that during training," he growled.

Naruto stopped in the process of zipping his pants and looked up, "Training?"

"Yeah, I'm gonna start teaching you how to use a scythe you ungrateful little fucker."

Naruto laughed, "So I'm gonna have a badass scythe like you? That is so fucking awesome!"

Hidan shook his head in faux disappointment, "Your mouth has turned into a fucking sewer kid." He tried to sound disapproving but really fucking doubted that he had pulled it off.

"It's your fault! Don't you know you're not supposed to say 'fuck' around kids?"

"…fuck you."

"Alright brat, this is a three bladed scythe."

Hidan held out the weapon, gesturing to the different parts of it as he spoke, "Now the blades are designed to get blood for the Curse Technique. That means they're designed to wound, not kill. Now that's not saying they won't kill someone, jam this through some poor fuck's chest or take his head off with it and they're gonna die, obviously. Each blade is removable but I prefer to leave all three on because it increases the odds of drawing blood. I'm gonna start you off with just one blade though," He elaborated at Naruto's confused look, "less fucking stitches if you fuck up and hack off a limb or put it through your chest or some shit."

Hidan pressed the scythe into Naruto's shaking hands (later the mostly-blonde would say he was shaking in anticipation and deny to his last breath that he was shaking from the fear that he might chop off a limb) and walked several feet away.

The moment Hidan let go of the scythe it dropped almost a foot as a surprised Naruto struggled to hold it, "Damn, this thing is heavy." He struggled to lift it back to its previous height, internally grumbling 'what the hell? I thought this peak condition body shit would have made me strong enough to lift a Jashin-damned scythe. The fuck! What the actual fuck? This fucking blows!'

"Fuckin-a-right it's heavy brat." Hidan sounded incredibly smug as he watched Naruto struggle with the scythe. Obviously the ridiculously heavy scythe was his doing. Naruto would have given him the finger if he thought he could spare a hand, "You're gonna have a hard time using it for a while. Do you know how we're gonna fucking fix that?"

Naruto tensed at Hidan's tone. He knew that tone; it was the same one that Hidan had used right before he started throwing sharp objects at him. Naruto took a step back, fearing the worst, "Um…you're gonna give me a training regimen that doesn't involve mass amounts of kunai and stab wounds?" he asked without much hope.

"Nope," The psychotic nin practically sung the word, "I'm gonna teach you the same way I was taught."

"You know what?" Naruto practically threw the scythe away from him, "I'd rather learn how to use a sword."

"Oh no, pick up the scythe kid."

"No, it's alright really sensei. I'll just uh, study some of the jutsu in the Book an-shit!"

He barely managed to leap out of the way of a barrage of kunai.

The news that Naruto was no longer in the village did not stay under wraps as long as the Hokage would have liked. In an ideal situation no one would have realized that the boy was gone until after he had been returned to the village. Unfortunately the arrival of a Sannin in the village raised a lot of questions. In hindsight, Sarutobi realized that he should have expected that. Having Jiraiya brought to the village when it would have been just as easy, if not easier, to talk to him outside the village walls was not the Hokage's brightest idea.

It wasn't soon after Jiraiya's arrival and subsequent departure that the news leaked out. (The Inuzuka, in addition to be renowned trackers, were also infamously gossipy drunks.) The fact that Naruto, or the demon brat as he was commonly called, had disappeared from the village spread through the shinobi ranks like a wildfire fed by gasoline. Within a day the entirety of the village knew and people had taken to the streets, rejoicing that the monster was finally gone.

This was an unmitigated disaster. Sarutobi sighed and tamped more tobacco into his pipe. He knew he shouldn't be smoking so much, (his pipe was lit constantly now, from the moment he left bed to the moment he returned) but the entire situation made him feel ill in a way that only tobacco or finding Naruto could help. He glanced out his window and felt a pang of sadness so poignant that he had to sit down again. Revelers, still partying hard even though they had started two days ago, had backed up the streets, making normal travel impossible. Normally Sarutobi would have used Konoha nin to, if not break up the celebration, at least make sure it kept from obstructing the normal functions of the village but even the ninja had taken to the streets. Not only did Sarutobi have to face how much the villagers had hated Naruto he had to face that his village's shinobi, some of whom had been good friends of his, hated the boy as well.

It was, as previously stated, and unmitigated disaster.

And to top it off, to make the entire situation that much worse, he had to deal with the very real and probable possibility that the spies the other Great Nations had undoubtedly had posed as civilians around Konoha had already reported in. At this moment the other Kages were probable rejoicing and laughing their asses off as they found out that Konoha was bereft of its jinchuuriki. All the work he had done relieving the tensions between Konoha and Iwagakure was probably going to go out the window the moment the Tsuchikage learned that he had two jinchuuriki at his disposal and Konoha had none.

"Shit."

Yep, in Sarutobi's eyes that word pretty much summed up the entire situation.

Surprisingly (or perhaps not so surprisingly if you knew the girl at all) Hinata Hyuuga knew that Naruto was missing before the news had made its way out of the mouth of a drunken Tsume. Of course she was the only one in the Academy that realized that Naruto was, in fact, not even in the village. The general consensus of her classmates was that the 'dead last' had finally dropped out or was simply skipping class in a bid for attention. In fact the only person who seemed even remotely concerned about Naruto's disappearance was Iruka-sensei (who had, incidentally, known of Naruto's status as missing before Jiraiya). So one day Hinata spent all of class steeling her nerves and stayed behind to ask Iruka-sensei if he knew anything about Naruto's whereabouts. Now, Iruka had always harbored a fondness for the soft-spoken Hyuuga girl and, after asking her to keep the information to herself, told her that Naruto was currently missing. Before he could reassure the girl (and himself) that Naruto would be found and brought home soon she had burst into tears, apologized, and ran from the room.

As Hinata ran through the Academy's front doors she collided with Shino. The normally stoic and reserved Aburame had stayed behind because he felt that they had a special bond as outcasts (she was an outcast because she was soft-spoken and not infected with Sasuke rabies and he was an outcast because…well, kids weren't exactly crazy about his Kikaichu) and thought that she may have needed someone to talk to. Hinata broke down almost completely at the Aburame's completely surprising, unexpected, and kind gesture.

Shino allowed Hinata to cry on his shoulder (metaphorically of course, he had no desire for anyone to get close enough to actually touch him). He listened in polite silence to Hinata hiccupped, sobbed, and gasped her way through her story. He hadn't been particularly fond of Naruto (he held onto grudges easily and the blonde had once called him 'the creepy crawly kid') but he did feel slightly sad when he heard that the boy had vanished without a trace. In his opinion (which he regarded as fact) the only time anyone went missing without a trace was when they were killed by an expert.

For obvious reasons he didn't tell Hinata this.

Miles away, deep within a swamp in the aptly named Land of Swamps, Naruto dodged kunai for his life (not literally, of course, seeing as the mostly-blond was immortal) unaware of the hoopla his disappearance had created.

A/N: and there it is. Chapter ten. Reviews would be super awesome and super welcome.

Self promo moment ahead (feel free to skip over it if you want).

I'm going to be posting another story soon (I've been having a bunch of new ideas for stories, no idea where half of them are coming from). I had a rough draft of the first chapter up on the site for a couple of days but decided to take it down to edit it. I haven't decided on a final name for the story but here's the beginning of the first chapter as like a teaser or something.

'Whirlpool, just another little town nestled away in the heartland of the country. It's a perfectly normal little town, with a normal name, in a normal patch of woods, right? Not according to Konohamaru Sarutobi, a teenage resident of the town. Sarutobi gained publicity after he began posting on conspiracy and scary-story forums earlier this year. He talked on his blog about the frequent disappearance of teenagers, TV shows that appeared to be only static and white noise to everyone except the young kids watching them, and creatures that moved around in the woods. He also claimed that the military was using locals as test subjects for some sort of experiment. Just the paranoid ramblings of some stoned teenager with too much time on his hands, right? That's what I thought at first, until Konohamaru's blog and the forums he had posted on were shut down without warning or explanation. THAT is fishy ladies and gentleman, it practically reeks of cover up. This reporter smells a story and he is going to Whirlpool to get the sc— oh what the hell?"

Self promo moment: OVER.

Later,

Pathetic-really