Blonding - A Time Travel Fic

Chapter 12


"Well, well, well."

The voice was like a gravelly syrup, sweetening the air to an almost sickening degree. It hung amidst the dust for a moment, before the door slammed shut behind them.

Boruto and Hoheto both spun on their heels. Naruto just turned and watched, observing their faces.

Would it truly be who he thought it would be?

At the short, narrow intake of breath his son took, his fears were calcified.

When he first thought of travelling to the Hidden Mist, his thoughts gravitated towards Zabuza. His mind was still trapped in the past, living his life through his eyes and his experiences alone. The famed swordsman was most likely barely older than Boruto in this time – if that.

He had, however, neglected to remember Kisame.

"Pleasure of you to join us," Tobi said placidly, moving to the window again as Naruto began to turn, eyes wide at the possibility of seeing another one of the Akatsuki's long-gone members for the first time in over twenty years.

Kisame Hoshigaki. Swordsman of the Mist. Legendary "Tailed Beast Without a Tail". The widowed companion of Itachi Uchiha. Died by none other than his own hands – prideful even at the end.

And there he was.

He looked nothing like he had in the days of the Akatsuki. His arms were wrapped in loose arm warmers, and his body was covered in a simple black vest of some kind which helped prevent the wide, tan strap of his massive sword from cutting into his flesh.

One thing that hadn't changed, however, was that he was grinning like an animal.

"Oh, but the pleasure is all mine," Kisame smiled, his beady little eyes piercing Naruto's with startling conviction. "I take it these are the guests you informed me of, Madara?"

"They're the ones that… incapacitated our Mizukage, yes," Tobi said in an almost exaggerated way, as if speaking to a child. "It truly is a shame. Lord Yagura was such a wonderful shinobi."

"And what of the Three-Tails?" Kisame smirked, eyes having yet to leave Naruto's.

Tobi stepped forward.

"That is what I intend to find out."

The tension that had been building since the beginning - almost tangibly dangling before their eyes in the hazy air like a strand of string – it all snapped, giving way to the feeling of freefall, of surprise, of gut-lurching terror

A flicker of movement was all the warning Naruto had.

Then, the entire building exploded.

Naruto leapt into action, eyes golden and piercing. He jumped forward and grabbed each of the two Hyuuga men, then his own son, before executing a rough-yet-effective shunshin out of the office as it came tumbling down around them.


"What on earth—" Hiashi began to blurt, his mind struggling to process the events in the office. Dust and debris plumed into the air as secondary explosions near the base of the tower rocked the village, shockwaves reverberating off of the shuttered windows and barricaded doors that lined the city streets below.

They tumbled apart, Boruto and Hiashi and Hoheto slipping off of the rooftop and rolling to the ground beside a boarded-up storefront, Naruto stumbling on his feet above them.

Naruto shot around to check on his son when he felt like the coast was clear; the boy's chest was heaving, his eyes wide and mouth agape in total shock.

"You alright?" he quickly called out from above, looking down on the others as they rose to their feet.

"Y-"

Boruto didn't get the chance to answer; Naruto turned away and had just enough time to squint as a massive blur slammed forward into him. He felt the air in his lungs force its way out of his chest as Kisame's body connected with his. Naruto's feet slipping back ever so slightly, the cement rooftop they were standing upon cracking and popping under the strain. Kisame's black eyes burrowed into Naruto's, sneer deepening. "You're stronger than you look."

"He's a jinchuuriki; what else would you expect?" The low, almost bored voice of Tobi stated behind the shark-man.

Naruto just narrowed his eyes. Well, that was a surprise. How Tobi knew that was beyond him... perhaps it was an educated guess?

Samehada began to shake and hiss on Kisame's back. "Is that so?"

"Look," Naruto pressed, ignoring Kisame and looking at Tobi from over the shark-man's shoulder. "I'm not here to fight. None of us are." He gestured to the others down below him. "I'm just here to talk."

He narrowed his eyes. "To you, Tobi."

The masked man said nothing. Several seconds passed, the flames from the Mizukage's Tower lapping at the sky behind them.

He spoke.

"Talk is of no importance to me. What is…" He took a step forward, "…is action."

Naruto's eyes widened, and he moved to leap off of the rooftop and back down to street level… back to his son.

Kisame jumped in his way.

"Oh no you don't," the man grinned. "Lord Madara doesn't want you to go anywhere."

Hiashi looked up at the rooftop, noting the two ninja in their standoff. Naruto watched as he gathered up the children and began to push them away, moving towards the other side of the courtyard.

"Kisame," Tobi drawled, "You take the jinchuuriki. I'll go retrieve his… precious cargo."

"Don't you touch them!" Naruto snarled, eyes biting and fierce as he turned to face the masked ninja, whose feet were already beginning to sink into the ground. "Come back here! I need to talk to you!"

But he was gone.

Naruto hissed, turning back to Kisame. "Get out of my way."

"Certainly," the ninja said, teeth shining in the sunlight. "You'll just have to make me. Or I'll turn around and kill them all. I've got clones everywhere."

Naruto frowned, narrowing his eyes.

Fine. He'd play their game.

The two broke apart, one flying across the street, the other to the building adjacent.

Kisame leapt back into action before Naruto had a chance to get a decent footing, a simple streak on the foggy skyline, the blur colliding with Naruto just as he moved his lone arm up to protect himself. A rippling shockwave shot through the air, the sound of windows shattering on the streets below, Naruto's body smashing through a row of buildings on the other side of the village.

A bright orange light sparked to life from within the crater, and not a moment later Kisame was flying through the air himself, his sword taking the brunt of the blow from a massive Rasenshuriken. It detonated, a flash of white in the sky expanding into a bubble, then vanishing in a whisper of ozone. Naruto shot into the ground, his body connecting with the gravel street with a sickening thud, Kisame jettisoning off in the opposite direction, making short work of another building.

But then Kisame was there again. He swatted the man's arm away as he moved in for a rough uppercut, swiveling on the heel of his foot to allow the Mist nin to slip past him. As Kisame realized he had been duped, Naruto dealt a swift elbow to the man's ribs, before leaping into the air with a massive burst of energy.

'Is my chakra normal enough to use… that again?' Naruto quickly asked inside of his mind, as he reached the cusp of his jump, and began to descend towards the ground again. He had a plan… but whether or not it would work was… debatable. 'It was shaky when I tried it earlier. I still have a few clones that are en route, maybe I can stall—'

"Do you really want to chance it, brat?" Kurama interrupted. "Do it! Now!"

Naruto opted not to argue, and reached deep down inside of himself for the strand of chakra that was not his, and pulled, the string giving no resistance. Immediately, he felt the warm rush of Kurama's chakra wash through his system, his skin flashing to life with a bright white fire that exploded from him like a miniature sun. It was shaky at first; the light flickered like a firefly before it fully ignited, the power palpable on his skin.

He disappeared.

Kisame had enough time to blink before he felt it – the feeling of his ribs, all of them, fracturing into two. He could vaguely sense the wind whipping past his face before he realized he was flying upwards, and was able to acknowledge that he was, in fact, airborne, just before he nearly blacked out when Naruto's shin smashed into the top of his head.

In the fraction of a second it took for Naruto's kick to connect, Kisame's body changed directions so quickly the air crackled in protest. The sound of the shark-nin smacking into the concrete below was deafening, sending a plume of smoke into the air, the sound reverberating for miles.

By the time Kisame came to – again - a split second later, Naruto was waiting for him, laying blow after blow onto the man's chest, arms, legs – anything and everything that was exposed.

Were it not for Kurama, he may have never noticed the strange tickle at his leg – one that was draining his chakra like a child hungrily drinking a milkshake.

"BELOW YOU!" The fox bellowed inside of his mind, and Naruto was moving again a split second later, glaring at the scaled sword as it writhed around on the ground in ecstasy.

Naruto twitched his muscles and flew downwards again, but it was too late – Samehada leapt in between the two shinobi in a flash of movement, and began to suckle on Naruto's chakra the instant his fist made contact with the blade instead of flesh.

"Augh!" Naruto called out in anger, leaping away again – this time, a decent distance. He needed a strategy – as frequently as going in guns-blazing seemed to work, Naruto had to admit that this time would be different… would need to be different.

He needed to stop and think – back on the time he and Gai fought Kisame off on Turtle Island at the precipice of the Fourth Shinobi War. What went wrong? What went right? What—

Then, Kisame was up again, his wounds healed, his sword in his hands, a sharp smile on his face. He perched himself triumphantly atop the rubble of where the Mizukage Tower used to be, glaring across the street to where Naruto stood. He watched as his opponent's eggshell-white cloak flapped in the wind, golden chakra spitting off of him like a fire throwing flame.

"Well, well, well," Kisame panted, "You are certainly a tricky one."

Naruto narrowed his eyes.

Kisame laughed. "I've learned my lesson. Taijutsu was never particularly my strength anyways, as… fun as it can be."

He tossed his blade up in the air for a split second, giving his hands just enough time to weave through a series of hand seals.

"WATER STYLE: THOUSAND HUNGRY SHARKS!"

For a moment, nothing happened.

Then, everything happened.

The ground began to vibrate, the few window panes lining the streets around them still intact rattling so much that they, too, began to shatter, one by one. The sky darkened, the mountains behind the village blending into the shadows as the wind picked up speed, growing faster and faster –

Two walls of water the size of city blocks rose from the ocean surrounding the village, swirling through the air at Kisame's beck and call, before coalescing in a gargantuan orb of swirling, tumultuous, chakra-infused seawater.

As if someone flicked a switch, the orb froze, compartmentalizing, each segment changing, morphing, shifting –

An instant later, true to the technique's name, a wall of bloodthirsty sharks descended down upon him. Their sharp, all-too-real teeth glistened in what little sunlight that had managed to work its way through the storm, eying their prey with a look that showed no mercy, no acknowledgement that defeat was even an option, only vying to kill, kill, kill

Naruto froze, eyes wide and calculating, dozens of rapid-fire solutions flickering through his mind as he watched the beasts approach him, moment by moment, inch by inch, tooth by tooth –

He snarled.

Half a dozen arms of golden chakra shot from his shoulder blades, wrapping around the front of his body and reaching into the swarm of writhing sharks. The beasts began to vanish in flashes of heat and smoke as the fists passed through their bodies, blitzes of golden chakra poking through the gaps from moment to moment, as sharks disappeared, only to be replaced a split second later by the next in line.

'Kurama…' Naruto winced, when he felt his control starting to slip. One of the chakra arms vanished in a whisper of golden smoke, disappearing into the twisting swarm of beasts.

"I know, brat," the beast hissed from within his mind, and Naruto could tell he was concentrating just as hard.

With a determined roar, Naruto clenched his teeth shut and powered through the pain, forcing the lost chakra arm out from his body and into the swarm once again with sheer willpower. 'Almost… there…'

Like the eye of the storm, the sharks were finished off, a cloud of steam billowing into the sky, Naruto's golden-lapped body breathing a quiet sigh of relief.

And then it was Kisame again, trying to capitalize on his distraction. He fired off fist after fist, Naruto parrying each time with determined ease, the two shinobi blurring across the Hidden Mist skyline as the scent of vaporized shark hung in the air. Kisame came forward and struck out again, but Naruto stuck his hand out in front of him, the fist connecting with his forearm with a nauseating crack.

Kisame flinched when he realized that it'd been his hand that had broken, not Naruto's, as he pulled away from the sheet of golden chakra that burned his skin with a hiss.

He leapt back several yards, chest heaving from the exertion. "That… was impressive," he heaved out between breaths, as he used Samehada to prop himself back up onto his feet again, the blade feeding back into his chakra supply.

"Nothing I haven't seen before," Naruto said, narrowing his eyes.

"Is that so?" Kisame grinned. "No… actually, I don't believe you've seen anything yet."

And then he was weaving through hand-seals again – a slight variation from before. He snarled in glee when the final hand-seal was performed, the water on the floor beginning to pulse and throb on the village streets below.

"You see," Kisame smirked, cracking his neck. "Sharks are much more cunning than most people realize. They are impulsive creatures, sure, and they revel in bloodshed. They give in to their most primal desires, and they kill mercilessly."

The water began to blitz into the air, soaring high above the village, wisps of the fluid spiraling into the sky like miniature tornadoes, roaring like a steam engine.

"That may be true… but sharks are quite clever. They plan, they scheme, they devise."

Kisame's eyes lit up like the dead of night.

"And sometimes, they deceive."

Naruto blinked, looking to the sky as the last of the water from Kisame's defeated sharks amassed into a massive orb of spiraling water, more still rushing in from the surrounding oceans like a hurricane. The sky was blackening at a rapid pace, the clouds thundering and crackling with lightning, winds rocking the village from side to side.

The sharks were just a distraction, Naruto realized… too little, too late. Kisame wasn't going for Naruto or the others…

…he was aiming for the village.

Naruto's heart leapt into his throat. 'Obito… you wouldn't…'

"That brat killed your parents in cold blood! His own sensei!" Kurama snarled. "Yes! He would!"

The water wave now stretched from horizon to horizon, fifty… one hundred feet tall. The black abyss that stretched beyond the tsunami was impalpable.

Naruto's eyes widened when he realized just what Obito was planning.

With Yagura gone…

"Oh, yes, how devious of me," Kisame grinned, shouting across the rooftops. "I suppose I'm more a shark than just in looks."

He clasped his hands together.

"WATER STYLE: TSUNAMI DEVASTATION!"

Time froze.

A golden fox, taller than the tallest thing for miles, burst forth from Naruto's body, stretching high into the clouds, white-hot eyes burning in fury.

The beast roared into the blackened sky, as he leaped into the air, stretching his arms and tails out in a frantic attempt to stave off the incoming disaster.

Naruto winced from within the skull of the fox avatar, eyes wide as he watched the water slam into him, barreling towards the city below. 'I need ideas!'

"Clones! NOW!"

Naruto obliged. A dozen more Nine-Tails burst into life like crackles of lightning, each taking up position in a line, surrounding the feeble Hidden Mist village like a system of tailed beast levies.

Naruto watched in vain as the water continued to march onward, fear creeping into his gut. This was no longer just about the village. His son and father-in-law were down there, fighting in the village center – Naruto could see them darting around one another from high above the ground.

The crushing weight of the tsunami pressed further forward, and Naruto shouted in rage.

They were losing. It was slow, and it was methodical, but they were losing.

Then, Naruto had an idea, his eyes widening in realization. 'Kurama…'

The fox's mouth stretched open wide, and Naruto could feel Kurama's concentration slip for a moment when he, too, realized what his jinchuuriki was doing. "Naruto-!"

'I've got to try something!' He shouted inside of his mind, eyes wide and daring.

The fox avatar's mouth opened wide, the power of tailed beast chakra fluctuating through the air like a lightning storm. Orbs, red and blue, manifested out of thin air, orbiting around Naruto's jaw, shrinking, condensing…

The fox avatar leapt forward and swallowed the Bijuudama in one gulp.

A heartbeat.

The bomb exploded.

A bolt of pure power blasted forward from the beast's mouth like a laser beam, the heat and power intense beyond comprehension. Water vaporized, hissing like a snake, the discharge burning a hole straight through before vanishing into the horizon.

Naruto heard his clones elsewhere doing the same, beam after beam of condensed Tailed Beast Bombs firing off into the tsunami, the water held at bay for just a moment's breath.

But still the water came.

Naruto's heart dropped. 'This isn't working, Kurama!' He winced when he felt his control over his Nine-Tails body waver – a consequence of using the Tailed Beast Balls in his condition, he no doubt assumed.

But still he held on.

"SON GOKUU!" Kurama roared from within Naruto's mind. "We need a barrier!"

For once, the Monkey King said nothing, opting instead to heed his brother's request. "Where?"

'EVERYWHERE!' Naruto hissed inside of his mind, his feet slipping along the rough coastline as the water wave forced him into the ground.

But still he pushed forward.

He strained again, and two additional sets of limbs stretched forth from the fox's chest, joining the others against the water's ever-pressing advance. "Give me some clones, boy," the Four-Tails rumbled.

Naruto nodded, hissing as he brought his hand to his chest in a seal, the golden chakra fox around him roaring to the sky.

Two dozen more Naruto clones, glowing bright white from the heat of the Nine-Tails' cloak, popped into existence at the base of the avatar, each leaping into action the moment their feet touched the ground. Naruto watched out of the corner of his eye as they fanned out, placing themselves all across the village, like golden blips on a map.

Naruto nodded, gritting his teeth together again. 'Whenever you're ready, Son G—"

A heartbeat.

Everything froze.

Eyes wide, Naruto watched in slow-motion as his chakra cloak began to flicker and die out, the white-hot fox beast that surrounded him beginning to dim, his control over the beast's form slipping...

The Eight-Tails. His clones had made it to the Hidden Cloud.

'K-Kurama…' He hissed, feeling as his chakra writhed out of his grasp. The fox was curled in a meditative state, nature energy swirling through the air as he collected it, his eyes slammed shut as he struggled to keep focus.

"I know! I'm… working… on it!" The Nine-Tails hissed out from within Naruto's mind.

Naruto's heart leapt into his chest when the ethereal form of his Tailed Beast dissolved into the atmosphere completely, and he began to topple to the ground, the water rushing in like a hurricane—

The ground rumbled down underneath him, getting closer… closer… closer…

Naruto suddenly found himself airborne again.

Kisame barreled into him as he fell, flying in from out of the scene, his massive sword somehow much smaller (curiously) than Naruto had ever seen it…

SMASH!

The ground rose up and ensnared him in its sickening embrace, clouds of dust billowing as he bounced across the surface of the village street like a stone on water. He skid to a halt against the side of a small shop on the corner of the market square, his lone hand coming up to brace himself against the wall.

Kisame walked out of the dust like a ghost in the night, smirking wildly, holding his arm to his chest, sword strapped to his back.

Naruto began to rise to his feet, the form of his clones' avatars glowing like suns all around him, the wall of water looking like the blackness of death as the beasts struggled against it, slowly losing ground, the village shrinking beneath the sheer enormity that Naruto simply couldn't wrap his head around—

It took a split second, his body reassuring his mind, but Naruto realized that the ground was still vibrating, shaking, quaking. The buildings swayed like flowers in the breeze all around him, china and valuables crashing to the ground, terrified villagers moaning in fear from within their hiding places.

Then, it stopped.

"Earth Style: Stone Barrier!" he heard Son Gokuu call out from a corner of his mind as Kisame leapt forward in a blur and struck him in the jaw.

Naruto saw specks of white cloud his vision as the fist connected, his body screaming at him to move. He stretched his senses, eyes flickering across the battlefield wildly, the rest of him moving on its own accord, the instinct of battle forcing him to stay upright and attentive.

They scuttled around one another for a moment, Naruto doing nothing more than humoring Kisame, ducking under punches and sliding out of the way at the last moment. He was acting on the defensive – the longer he kept Kisame out of the fray, kept him distracted, the sooner still he could save the village.

Over Kisame's shoulder, Naruto watched in mild fascination, mild relief washing over him as massive stone walls rose from the ground in front of the clone foxes, the water vanishing behind giant spires of bedrock. He ducked another punch, watching as the massive wave began to disappear.

At first glance, the village seemed to sink into the ground, like a marble sinking down, down, down a drain, the walls rising up and clawing away at the sky. It was slow – painfully slow. Naruto vaguely realized somewhere in the catacombs of his mind that even for a tailed beast, such a jutsu must require astronomical amounts of chakra… the speed was most likely a consequence of that.

No matter. He was winning – at least, winning by waging a war of attrition.

"You're… more powerful than you look," Kisame grimaced, clutching at his side again, taking a step back. "So you're the Nine-Tails jinchuuriki. Interesting. I was under…" he coughed, wincing as blood dribbled down his lip, smile still as disturbing as ever, "…under the impression that the Leaf had the Fox."

"You don't look so good," Naruto smirked, hoping that his exhaustion wasn't readable on his face. "Use up too much chakra for that fancy water trick of yours?"

Kisame just chuckled. "Something like that."

Naruto frowned, simply watching as Kisame smiled at him, chest heaving, eyes twinkling.

CRASH!

Naruto blinked, mouth falling open as a massive section of the wall collapsed across the village, water rushing past it like a broken dam.

'What? I don't understand, I thought I…'

Naruto's eyes widened when he realized what had just happened.

With a snarl, he rushed forward and shoved a golden fist into Kisame's chest—

–the clone's watery form vaporizing on contact.

"DAMN IT!" he roared, leaping to the sky in one massive surge.

He was being played. Naruto wasn't distracting Kisame… Kisame was distracting him.

"You haven't made a mistake that bad in years," Kurama grumbled from within his mind. It wasn't teasing, or in bad taste – the fox was just being blunt.

And he was right.

The wall continued to crumble, sections of rock tumbling down the surface of the barrier. The force of the water swept up the chunks of stone and hurled them like projectiles, sweeping into the city, buildings collapsing from the force as the segments pummeled into them.

To his right, on the far side of the Mist, another segment disintegrated, the rushing water behind it exploding through the massive gap.

Naruto watched in anxious fear as the water level began to rise within the village.

'I've got to use it,' he stated inside his mind, although his tone betrayed his conviction. 'Kurama… I'm going to need your help. All of your help.'

Naruto could feel the tailed beasts within his mind all freeze, their faces pocked with surprise. "Surely you don't mean…" the Hachibi whispered, eyes wide.

"Brat, you promised that you wouldn't. Not unless you had no other choice."

'I've fucked this up enough,' Naruto said. 'I doubt I have much more of a choice at this point. Either I use the Sage's chakra, or people die.' He narrowed his eyes, watching as more chunks of wall tore off and barreled into the village. 'I'm a Kage. I cannot let that happen.'

"This isn't even your village."

Naruto blinked, moving for a moment into his mindscape, his body moving forwards of its own volition.

When he quickly appeared in the seal room, he approached the ring of tailed beasts and looked up at the third from the left with a shocked expression on his face. "Isobu?"

The great turtle beast took a deep breath, already regretting speaking up. "Do… do you really care so much for a place that is not your own?"

"We're shinobi," Naruto said bluntly. "As far as I'm concerned, there are no Hidden Villages anymore."

The Three-Tails paused for a moment, before nodding from within Naruto's mind. "Alright then. As much as it pains me to admit it, the Hidden Mist has been good to me the past few years. I suppose… I suppose returning the favor is only appropriate." Naruto felt the beast's chakra flow into his system, the warm tickle of power feeding into his veins. "You have my support."

"And mine," Son Gokuu muttered reluctantly. "Don't mess this up, kid."

"Oh, alright," Shukaku said, rolling his eyes and shaking his head. "Fine. Just make the evil shark man pay! I hate water!"

"You don't need to ask me," Kurama said with a smirk, exhaustion evident on his face. "And it'll be nice for these freeloaders to help out for once, I'd say."

"I'm going to choose to ignore that," the Hachibi said, bending down to look the Hokage in the eye. "I do, however, agree that you don't even need to ask, Naruto."

The rest of the beasts nodded.

"Yes, Naruto," Matatabi purred. "You are Father's legacy. If you must, you must."

Naruto gave a timid smile, shocked at the fervent support. "I have to say I'm… well, surprised," he said sheepishly, rubbing at the back of his neck.

"When we said you shouldn't use the Sage's powers unless the situation was dire, we meant it," Gyuuki reiterated. "But as far as I am concerned, this is a dire situation."

Naruto simply nodded his thanks. "Alright then."

He vanished from his mindscape, refocusing his attention to the shark-shaped blur that was headed right for him.

'Let's take care of business.'


Minato froze, his pen hovering above a sheet of parchment. He turned and looked out the wide, stretching windows of his office towards the horizon, staring off at what seemed to be nothing at all.

It was subtle.

But he felt it.

It was like the beam from earlier that week – only much more muffled, more suppressed.

And more… pure?

Minato watched in abject fascination as a thin fissure, the width of a spider's thread, wove its way down the window's frame, tracing from one corner to the other like a droplet of water.

Then, with an explosive crack, the entire window exploded into a kaleidoscope of fragments, the village behind it morphing into a strange segmented pattern, the horizon gone from view.

Minato flinched. Without realizing it, his hand drifted to his kunai pouch and pulled a single blade from within its contents. He twirled the blade around his finger as he stared, the window looking back… mocking him.

Things were about to go bad.

Very bad.


Hiashi skid to a halt, the two boys' wrists firmly held between his hands, the rooftop underneath them kicking up shingles and spitting dust into the air as they landed.

"Are you both alright?" he asked, looking back and forth from Hoheto to Boruto.

Boruto nodded, looking to the other boy expectantly.

"I… think so," Hoheto mumbled, blinking in surprise, teetering on his feet once Hiashi let them go. "Actually, I don't feel so good…"

"Oh, now that's a shame," a voice hummed from all around them.

Hiashi spun around, eyes erupting with veins as his Byakugan flared to life. "What do you want with us, Madara? We wish you no ill will. We simply want to talk to you."

Boruto gulped when the masked man neglected to reply, his hands gripping the pair of shuriken they held until his knuckles were white and the tips pricked blood from his skin.

"I can't see him," Hoheto said, his own Byakugan active. "Hiashi-sama, what's going—"

The village began to shake and tremble, people within the buildings around them screaming as if in pain. Boruto gaped as he watched his one-armed father blitz from one side of the village to the other, dancing a delicate, powerful dance around the strange shark man - Kisame Hoshigaki, if he remembered anything from his history courses at the Academy – as they parried, buildings crumbling beneath their feet.

Naruto paused on the rooftop, eyes narrowed.

Then, he burst into flames.

Boruto yelped in surprise. "Dad?!"

"Your father is a jinchuuriki, is he not?" Hiashi asked emotionlessly at his side, form locked in that of the Gentle Fist's. "Surely you've seen this before."

"N-no, I haven't…" he said, watching with wide eyes as Naruto vanished in what could have only been pure speed, Kisame blasting backwards as the two collided again.

"Tell me what I need to know," Haishi said, interrupting Boruto's inner monologue as it began to marvel at the opponent his father was on the battlefield.

Boruto took a shuriken in each hand, moving so that he was back-to-back with Hoheto. "He can make himself intangible. He's probably hiding in the floor right now, watching us."

A dark chuckle vibrated through the rooftop, almost as if to confirm Boruto's assertion.

"What else?" Hiashi asked, eyes narrowed, hands outstretched as he moved around the two boys slowly and professionally.

"He can make more than just himself intangible— Look out!"

Boruto leapt backward and smashed Hoheto out of the way, Kamui morphing to life around where the boy's chest used to be. He made to move out of Tobi's line of sight as well, but stumbled when he realized his arm was caught in the vortex.

"Shit," he whispered to himself, eyes wide.

The dimensional portal began to expand, the gravitational forces crushing him forward, the blackness pulling him in

The next moment, he was gone.

"Boruto?!" Hiashi said, eyes wide with shock. He immediately turned to Hoheto, who was just as surprised. "Hoheto!"

"Oh, how charming," Tobi said. "Having a moment, are we?"

Hiashi spun around again, eyes wide when he realized that the masked man was now standing directly behind him.

He hadn't seen him approaching at all.

With a snarl, the Hyuuga struck out, the man's fingertips practically glowing blue, dripping with rage.

Tobi didn't move an inch.

When he felt his fingertips reach their intended destinations, Hiashi almost smiled.

When his hands continued forwards, falling through the man's black-cloaked body as if he wasn't even there, he felt his heart sink to the bottom of his chest. Off balance, he tipped forward and allowed himself to roll through Tobi's body, Shunshining back to Hoheto's side the moment his hands were free once again.

Tobi turned and looked behind himself lazily, pretending to suppress a yawn. "Really? Is that the best you can—"

Hiashi turned and pressed Hoheto into his chest, leaping down to the village square beneath them just as the rooftop detonated, the explosive tag he had placed during his failed attack exploding in a flash of white-hot chakra.

The moment the flash dissipated, Hiashi turned back to where the strange Mist man had just been standing, his eyes searching the smoke for signs of his chakra flow.

"Do you think that did it, Sensei?" Hoheto asked by his side, a kunai pressed hard between his fingers, his Byakugan searching just as desperately as he looked at the rows of buildings around him.

"No," Hiashi stated evenly, eyes narrowing. "That was too easy."

"The explosion passed right through him," a voice said beside them. Hoheto jumped.

Hiashi actually let a smirk flicker across his face. "A clone. I figured as much."

Boruto simply nodded, still staring at the cloud of smoke before them. "Yeah."

"You know, I don't have all day," Tobi sighed from within, his black cloak strolling back into the open air. "I intend to find out what happened to the Three-Tails one way or another, and I don't necessarily need a two Hyuuga and a blond nuisance to do so."

The ground rumbled again as Naruto continued to fight. Far off towards the coastline, a building collapsed to the ground, debris billowing into the air.

"Your village." Hiashi took a step forward. "It's crumbling beneath your feet."

Tobi huffed in amusement. "My village? You're sorely mistaken."

He drifted back into the ground again, his voice carrying across the courtyard. "I could not care less about this pathetic village." Hiashi blinked in confusion as Tobi continued. "What I do care about, however, is the Three-Tails. Tell me, what did you do with it?"

Boruto yelped when he felt the tips of Tobi's fingers begin to wrap around his ankle, leaping to the sky just before his grip snatched shut.

"We can do this the easy way, or the hard way," Tobi said simply, hand returning to the earth once more. "All it takes is one moment… one split second when you aren't paying the utmost attention…"

Hoheto stumbled backwards as he felt Tobi's hand ghost through his own leg.

"Knock it off!" Boruto called out with a snarl, taking a step forward. "Come out and fight like a real ninja!"

"'A real ninja'?" Tobi laughed, the voice gravelly and sharp. "You sound as if you've never seen a shinobi before, let alone fought like one, brat."

All of a sudden, he was there again, a chain twisted around his hands, his posture glaring. "Shinobi aren't valiant. They aren't honorable." He moved forward, marching towards Boruto like the Reaper, until he was just out of arm's reach. "They find shortcuts… cheat."

Boruto pocketed his Shuriken and replaced them with kunai, glaring as he gripped them against his palms.

He smirked. "I know." Boruto stepped forward and plunged the kunai forwards toward Tobi's chest.

Tobi almost laughed. He simply watched as the boy attempted to stab him, confident that the blade would simply pass him through.

His eye opened wide, and he let out a hacking cough as blood twisted its way up his throat.

Boruto let go of the blades, allowing them to hang from within Tobi's chest of their own volition.

Tobi took a stumbled step forwards, grasping at his chest as blood began to seep out from between his fingertips. "H-how…"

Boruto didn't hear him finish. The skies above them darkened, the sea around the village growing choppy and agitated.

Then, there was water.

Everywhere.

Boruto vaguely noted that Tobi had disappeared again, as he regrouped with Hiashi and Hoheto in the village center.

The water flew over their heads, twisting in the air like giant dragons writhing, dancing around one another. He could just barely make out similar spires of water rising from the ocean and uniting above the crumbling remains of the Mizukage's Tower, amassing into a ball the size of the Hokage Monument in the Leaf Village alone.

Boruto watched in amazement as a swarm of sharks burst from the bubble like a popped balloon, and jerked in surprise when he saw his father leap forward, into the swarm, destroying them as quickly as they were formed with what looked to be golden threads of pure chakra.

"Stay alert," Hiashi advised beside him. "We do not know what 'Madara' wants."

"His name's not Madara," Boruto said, sensing the Hyuuga's doubt. "And it's not Tobi, either."

"Then what is it?"

Boruto narrowed his eyes, watching the skyline, trying to ignore the way his heart was thundering inside his chest. He knew that Tobi was listening – there was no other reason they were being left alone. His father had told him of Tobi's real identity the previous day, as well as about the way he fought and acted on the battlefield. Just in case, Naruto had said.

Now Boruto knew why.

"I don't remember," Boruto lied, not caring if his grandfather could tell or not. And chances were, he could. Hiashi always could see right through him. It almost gave him a creepy air about him… despite knowing how much the man loved his only grandchildren. Whenever his parents would drop him and his sister off for the evening on date nights, Hiashi's stoic demeanor would crack ever so slightly, and Boruto, even as a child, could see the way life would flicker back into his opaque eyes.

This Hiashi – this younger Hiashi – still had life to him in spades. It was refreshing.

The village shook once more, the water from the sharks steaming into the air and rushing down the streets as it drained out of the village.

At least, it would have drained, had Kisame not done… something.

Now, the entire village looked like it was being hammered with a hurricane, sunlight dwindling to pinpricks between the looming clouds, before disappearing completely. The trees that dotted the streets every few yards swayed so hard in the surging wind that branches began to rip off and disappear into the distance; the rain in the air – it was raining now – slamming into Boruto's face at an uncomfortable rate. Mist, spat into the air by the rain as it connected with the ground beneath them, bit into his skin as he strained his eyes, trying to look for any sign of the strange Uchiha that had them cornered like rabbits.

They sat.

And waited.

Boruto blinked when he realized that the horizon had gotten… darker.

Considerably darker. So dark, in fact, that it clashed dangerously with the already blackened sky around them.

He frowned, straining to look into the distance. It wasn't night time already… was it?

His heart nearly burst when he realized that the horizon was moving towards them.

"What… is that?" he murmured to himself, eyes wide.

Like a crack of lightning, chakra rushed across the market square. His father's chakra. It coated the village in its warm embrace, spreading out like roots from a tree, grounding him… reassuring him. A moment later, the bright white light enveloping the Seventh Hokage grew, the warmth increasing, its power growing with each passing moment.

Boruto knew that barely a moment had passed. And his hunch was proven true when he blinked; as his eyes opened once more, a massive golden fox, taller than any building even in the Leaf Village's Financial District, was now standing in place of his father.

The Nine-Tails. Kurama.

"The power of a jinchuuriki…" he heard Hiashi whisper from beside him. Boruto gulped, transfixed. His hand moved to his kunai pouch of its own volition and blindly fished out another kunai, his fingers gripping around the handle as he brought it up to his chest.

Boruto watched as the massive beast stepped forward and attacked the wave head-on, without any hesitation. The Nine-Tails strained against the force of the water, arms stretching out from its torso and forcing as much of it back as it could. But Boruto could tell – even something as massive as the Nine-Tails couldn't hold back a wall of liquid water.

A moment later, a half dozen dots of golden light shot out of the beast – clones, it would seem – and fanned out across the perimeter of the village.

Now there was an entire army of fox avatars, each taking up point across the village, trying as a unit to fight the waves.

Suddenly, each beast began to amass energy, pure and palpable, into spheres of dark light. They grew and grew and grew, each the size of a house, until…

…they ate them?

Boruto blinked in confusion, then in terrified surprise as literal bolts of white-hot light shot from their jaws, blasting into the tsunami like the weapon of some sort of character in one of his video games.

He was starting to wish he hadn't cheated so much in them now.

He was broken out of his reverie by a burst of information rattling around his mind, and he winced as it came flowing back to him unexpectedly.

"Damn," he muttered, loud enough so that Hiashi could hear it over the roar of the storm, "he got my clone. And chances are, he's not gonna fall for that one again."

"We need a plan," Hiashi stated coolly, eyes still scanning the mist.

"We just need to stall," Boruto said. "My dad can take care of him… he's done it before. He's barely older than I am anyways. He's just got the stupid Sharingan and that makes things annoying."

Hiashi blinked. "I thought that's what I had seen…"

"Yeah," Boruto replied. "It's… it's a long story."

The ground began to rattle and shake, Boruto instantly on guard again, his blue eyes darting everywhere he saw movement. The wave continued to march onwards, the quiet hiss from afar of the water surging towards them growing louder, harsher every passing second, the chakra beasts still standing at their positions…

And then, suddenly, one of them was gone – vanished in a whisper of golden mist.

Boruto blinked as he saw a cloaked figure drop from the beast's head, toppling towards the ground…

…just before a streak of blue and black blitzed across the village, sideswiping the figure as he fell.

His father!

"Stay focused," Hiashi reiterated, no doubt watching Naruto's fight and Boruto's reactions simultaneously with his Byakugan active. "Your father is very clearly a capable ninja. I trust in him, and so should you."

Boruto stood up straighter, surprised. "R-really?"

"Of course." He couldn't see the man directly, but Boruto could tell his grandfather was smiling – if only just. "He saved myself and Hoheto's life on more than one occasion this journey, and yours countless more, I'm certain."

"Yeah…"

As if to prove the Hyuuga's point, the rumbling roared even louder, the village buildings around them straining under the stress. Then, massive spires of solid bedrock rose from the earth, growing by the moment, the second, blocking the water more and more with each rumble of the ground…

Explosions rocked the newly-constructed dam, the tsunami cascading through the holes like a massive waterfall.

The water level within the village began to rise.

"What do we do now?" Hoheto mumbled beside Boruto from a few paces to his left, his voice wavering ever so slightly.

"I dunno." He turned to give the boy a smile and a thumbs up in reassurance – he could tell he needed it - but felt his heart drop from his chest when he noticed Tobi's head reemerging from the earth, a kunai propped in his outstretched hand, the blade zipping forwards faster than he could move, how did he get there so quickly—

"Hoheto!"

Boruto acted faster than he thought he could, doing the only thing he could think of.

He aimed his kunai directly in front of Hoheto, and prayed that the blades would intersect.

Tobi was on the move now, suddenly much closer, his hands reaching outwards towards Hoheto's neck even as his weapon hung in the air, the fingers stretching closer and closer…

CLANG!

The two kunai connected just millimeters from Hoheto's heart, the blades falling to the ground in one heap as Tobi leaned in, hand closing around the boy's throat—

Just before he disappeared in a flash of gold and a crack of ozone.

Tobi recoiled in surprise – or was it disgust? – when he realized what had just happened, his feet sinking into the earth in one moment, gone the next.

Then Hiashi was there, pale-faced and sickened, as he stared at the lone kunai – Tobi's kunai – that sat where Hoheto used to be, arriving just after… whatever it was that had just happened.

"What happened?" Hiashi and Boruto said at the same moment, Hiashi's question more urgent and worried than Boruto's.

The blond blinked, looking down at his palms, when realization struck.

"He gave it to us for a reason," Boruto said, repeating something his father had told them just that morning. "He… he saved him."

"Who? Who saved him? Where is Hoheto?"

"The Fourth Hokage," Boruto said, a smile beginning to grow across his face. "He… he must have reverse Hiraishined Hoheto back to the Leaf."

He let out a sharp laugh in relief, before the knot in his stomach began to ease just a little.

Hoheto. He would be alright.

And now the Fourth knew they were in trouble.

They would be alright.

It was only later that Boruto realized just how wrong he was.


It only took a moment for the walls to be fortified once Naruto held the Sage of the Six Paths' chakra in his hands.

"Okay, guys, are you ready?" Naruto said out loud, eyes narrowed at the wall as it crumbled underneath the pressure of the water and Kisame's repeated attacks. As he said it, the shark-nin struck again, and the north section of the levy burst like a balloon, water spraying inwards at an alarming rate.

"Do it, brat," his resident tailed beast called from within his mind, and he nodded.

When he reached inside of himself this time, he found nine strands of foreign chakra dancing about within his body. He reached forward with a single hand and gathered them together like a bushel of straw, pulling them all to the surface with one mighty tug.

Instantly, he felt his senses expand outward in all directions. The world sharpened around him, as if he had taken off the blinders of everyday life, and everything became more understandable… more focused.

He watched as the south side of the wall began to crumble to dust as well, and knew he had to act – and quickly.

Using his lone hand, Naruto gathered every chakra type he could get his metaphorical hands on into a tight orb, the power manifesting itself in small ball of multiple colors as it swirled through the air, condensing into a perfectly round, impossibly black sphere.

He did this four more times, each time the mental energy required to complete the Truth-Seeking ball growing more and more taxing as his concentration began to waver.

He still had too much chakra. But at least now he could manage it better.

Three clones appeared behind him at mental summons, and each clone took a sphere and headed for the edges of the village. Naruto himself moved forward towards the north – he could sense that was where Kisame was returning to, if the streak of chakra was anything to go by. He leapt from building to building, hovering slightly from time to time to adjust his course, before landing gently beside a large willow tree, the ocean's rapidly rising water lapping at the roots like a cancer.

Naruto looked up at the wall – it stretched at least fifteen stories tall, if he had any sense of scale whatsoever – and frowned at the pockmarks that lined the exterior.

With a snap of his fingers, the Truth-Seeking ball that had taken up residence just over his shoulder shot forward, expanding outwards into a small disk, growing thinner and thinner and wider and wider every centimeter it travelled. When it connected with the levy, it began to stretch across the surface, layering the barrier in a solid-black coating, the holes disappearing one by one.

He could see his clones mirroring his actions across the village from him, black painting the interior of the village wall, the water finally stopping its relentless barrage.

Kisame was suddenly there again, his chakra-infused blade lashing out at the now nearly impenetrable barrier. Naruto flinched at first, worried that it wouldn't hold – it couldn't have been more than a millimeter thick at its heaviest – but the material refused to budge, much to his relief.

Kisame snarled as Samehada bounced off of the Truth-Seeking ball harmlessly, and he attempted to correct himself midair before landing awkwardly across a battered road (that looked more like a river now) from Naruto. They both turned to stare at one another, the sky still black and imposing above them, the quiet hiss of water lapping at the buildings below them barely audible over the dying roar of the winds.

"Why?" Naruto said, eyes shocked… sad. "Why are you doing this?"

"Because…" Kisame panted, heaving in lungfuls of air, "Because Lord Madara promised me power. Influence. A way to make my mark on the world."

"But do you have to destroy the Mist village to accomplish that? Can't you grow and become who you want to be on your own?"

Kisame grinned. "Oh, sure. But Madara's way is easier. And faster."

His eyes flashed an unnatural silver for a moment, the light catching them ever so slightly. "And fun, of course. Let's not forget that."

Naruto sighed, shaking his head. "Kisame… you could have been so much more. You were a genius… a once in a lifetime swordsman, and the only person just short of the Second Hokage I'd call a master of the water element." He blinked in reminiscence, looking at Kisame's (shaking) feet. "You… you have morals. Respect for those you fight. Respect for yourself, and for those that are above you… as few in number as they are."

He took a step forward, his chakra 'cloak' glowing an unnatural white.

"You can still become the person you want to be. Just not this way."

He extended his arm, offering a handshake. Naruto's eyes looked up into Kisame's and dug themselves in, their fierce gaze holding him captive.

Kisame blinked, looking down at the blond's hand, before back in his face.

Resilience. Rugged determination.

Hope.

Kisame saw it all in Naruto's eyes. He saw himself, a younger Kisame, sitting in the ninja academy at the tender age of ten, watching the jounin spar in the fields below from high up in his window seat. He saw himself, standing before the Mizukage, the day he graduated, a brand new katana held shakily in his arms. He saw the way the man looked him in the eye with a smile – that trusting, disarming smile …

The same smile. Naruto had the same one.

"You're a Kage, aren't you?" Kisame wheezed, gripping at his chest, eyes wide in realization. "Yes… you have to be. No other man I have ever met has had quite the same… look as the Third Mizukage." He blinked. "You… you're Minato Namikaze."

"No," Naruto said, a small grin growing on his face. "Although I appreciate the compliment. My father was one of the greatest Kage ever to walk the Earth."

Kisame raised a hairless eyebrow, whispering Naruto's words back to him. "Your father?" He blinked. "'Was'?"

Naruto gave a sad smile. "Kisame, you are a good person. Maybe clouded by the world you were born into, but I truly believe that." He sighed, eyes glazing over. "I truly believe we could have been comrades had our lives been just a bit different."

Kisame frowned at him – the first time Naruto had ever seen the man do so. "You realize that can never happen, right? I've already accepted who and what I am." He looked up, taking a step back – away from Naruto's still outstretched hand. "You should probably do the same."

The jinchuuriki watched as Kisame stumbled away from him, before realization struck him across the face. "You're… you're dying."

"Hmph," Kisame grunted, his telltale smile surfacing across his face once again. "Figured that out… all on your own?"

"That tsunami jutsu…" Naruto turned to look at the walls surrounding the village, amazed at just how much chakra Kisame had most likely used to create a threat as threatening and mind-numbingly powerful as he had. He looked at Kisame's side, at the once mighty shark-toothed blade that rested there between the man's trembling fingers. It was barely thicker than a broadsword now, the scales looking frail and brittle even from as far away as Naruto stood.

"You know… were we anywhere else, that jutsu wouldn't've worked," Kisame smirked, eyes glassy and unfocused. "And were I fighting anyone but a jinchuuriki…" He coughed, the sound wet and sickening. "I got a bit carried away. Lord Madara wanted the village gone, and I wanted to… to try it… I was certain it would… work…"

Naruto blinked. "Why? Why did Tobi want to destroy the Mist?"

Kisame's shoulders slouched forwards, blood gurgling up from his throat and dribbling down his front, his smile still unmoved. "Yagura… Yagura dead... village crumbling anyways… worthless excuse…"

The man's eyes rolled back into his head, and he fell forwards onto the rough concrete of the rooftop below them in a crumpled heap.

For a moment, Naruto just looked down at the man's body with wide eyes, lingering shock running through his veins like a thick slurry.

Kisame. The man who was barely seventeen, dead from his own hubris.

His mind screamed at him… raged from behind his stupefied surprise, chastising him. This was a major change. All of this was a major change. The village being destroyed, the Tailed Beasts being separated from their rightful places in the timeline… Yagura's death.

He hadn't meant to, but the entire time he had been travelling to the Hidden Mist, Boruto by his side, his mind had been compiling a wish list of sorts – things he wanted to go back and change from his past… from his world's past.

Prevent casualties. Save lives, and reduce the bloodshed.

But with each crushing bout of sudden realization, Naruto could feel as each one was crossed off, either by fault of his own actions since arriving, or simply due to the fact that he knew he shouldn't… couldn't.

Meddling with the past was not an option.

Kisame may have died, but it hadn't been in vain after all.

He made up his mind, just as Kisame's body erupted in a brilliant blue flame, the fire licking desperately at the sky. It roared into a seemingly uncontrollable inferno, the force pushing Naruto back on his feet, his lone arm rising up to block the light from his eyes.

Then, just as suddenly as it had appeared, it whispering away – leaving nothing behind but a charred husk and the shards of Samehada that had somehow survived the intense heat.

Naruto's eyes steeled. He watched raindrops hiss as they landed on the rooftop, their numbers increasing by the second until the entire village was suddenly doused in even more water - natural water this time, but water nonetheless. He could feel the imposing wave around the village begin to dissipate back into the ocean, and breathed a sigh of relief.

Then, he heard a whisper from across the village – a battle.

His heart nearly stopped when he remembered the others.

He took the sky, feeling for the warm blur of chakra that could only have been his son's.

They still had a plan to follow.


Boruto winced as he leaped backwards, landing hastily in the courtyard center before jumping forwards again, dodging Tobi's chains just as they slashed across where he had just been standing not a nanosecond before.

Then Hiashi was suddenly there, lashing out at the masked man's chakra points as he himself recovered from his failed attack on Boruto. But Tobi was already transparent, body dipping downwards into the earth as Hiashi spun on his heel.

They were being worked to death, it seemed – but Boruto felt slightly better now than he did before. Hoheto was no longer a liability; as much as Boruto had grown to actually enjoy the other boy's presence, even he had to admit that he simply wasn't skilled enough. Not in a battle where one's attention had to be focused on one thing and one thing only.

Boruto swiveled in place as he felt the whisper of a kunai jetting through the air prickle at the hairs on the back of his neck. Sure enough, the blade passed through the air just above his head as he ducked, falling forwards onto his stomach only to push himself into the air with one massive burst of chakra.

He was not, however, prepared for the explosive blast when the kunai detonated, sending shards of rock and sand towards him faster than he could have ever hoped to dodge.

"Augh!" he hissed as he felt his back rip open, a few sharp husks of stone slicing across his skin underneath his clothing.

He stumbled to his feet, moving back toward Hiashi as quickly as he could, the man turning and raising an eyebrow at his bloodied back.

"Are you alright?"

Boruto just nodded, moving beside Hiashi and pulling his last kunai from his pouch.

"Madara is playing with us," Hiashi said coolly, as he looked out over the suddenly deathly quiet courtyard with his Byakugan active.

"Yeah," Boruto said, wincing as he rolled his shoulders and returned to his previous stance. "Dad should be here soon, I don't know what's taking him so long…"

"The rumbling has stopped," Hiashi noted quietly, and Boruto suddenly realized that he was right. The ground was quiet, and the water that had been rushing past the crumbling barrier was now being held back by a strange black substance that coated the wall like some sort of omnipresent shadow.

The sun was beginning to peek its way through the black clouds, and the low hum of the ocean returning to homeostasis behind the levy began to overpower the wailing of the dying wind.

A fog began to creep in.

"We are, after all, in the Hidden Mist village," Boruto heard Tobi chuckle from nowhere in particular, as the mist grew denser and denser – like a thick soup. "It is only fitting that this be the way that I kill you."

"Kill us?!" Boruto blurted, his heart accelerating to unmanageable speeds. "I-I thought you were going to take us hostage or something, y'know! What happened to wanting information?"

"I grow tired of playing with my toys," Tobi said simply. "Besides… if the Nine-Tails truly believes he can stop me, then let him try."

Silence.

Boruto could feel something moving behind him, but when he swiveled around in terror to defend himself, he saw nothing.

That's when he heard what sounded like a mild explosion go off behind him, only to find his father standing inside of Tobi, who had his hand outstretched towards him – dangerously close.

"You alright?" Naruto said quietly, before narrowing his eyes at the ground where Tobi had returned. "Am I too late?"

His eyes widened when he spotted Hiashi, but no one else. "Oh… oh no…"

"Grandpa Minato took him," Boruto quickly blurted out when he realized what – or, rather, who his father was talking about. "Hoheto's back in the Leaf."

Boruto watched his father's black-cloaked shoulders sag forward slightly in relief. It wasn't hard for him to tell that his father was fatigued – whether it was physically or mentally, Boruto was unsure.

Naruto looked up and into the fog, his eyes morphed into a strange four pointed star pattern. "Come out, Tobi. We just want to talk."

No response.

"He's been doing this to us since you left," Boruto murmured to his father, as he moved to Naruto's side. "I don't know what—"

"ROTATION!"

Boruto jumped when he spotted Tobi's masked form attempt to grab Hiashi's arm, just before the man erupted into a sphere of swirling blue chakra. The fog within their field of view began to churn and spin along with Hiashi's jutsu, the air clearing up once more.

Once the fog disappeared, Boruto blinked when he saw Tobi sitting amicably atop an overturned stone in the center of the courtyard, watching them with a bored demeanor about him.

"You wanted to talk?" he asked simply, not bothering to move.

Naruto took a step forward, his chakra-infused cloak billowing behind him as he walked. "Tobi…"

"My plans didn't originally call for any of this, you know," he said evenly, his arm dangling over his raised knee. "I was simply going to manipulate the Three-Tails, and subsequently this village, until they had outgrown their usefulness. The fact it happened so quickly is a shame, of course, but it couldn't be avoided."

Naruto sighed, taking another step forward, his chakra cloak slipping from his body in a whisper of light. The black coating on the walls around the village evaporated into the air like they were never there, leaving behind the battered and pitted stone surface underneath. The setting sun peaked through one hole in particular, casting dark shadows across the town square, and sunlight everywhere else.

"I take it Kisame is dead, then?" Tobi began again. "Shame. Although I can't say he outlived his usefulness."

"Why are you so quick to destroy this place?" Naruto hissed, eyes fiery. "Thousands of people are undoubtedly injured now, all because you wanted to put on a show and get me to play my hand. So tell me – why? What do you want?"

"What do I want?" Boruto couldn't see it, but he was certain that the man was grinning underneath that mask of his.

He leapt up from the rock. "I want you, Nine-Tails jinchuuriki."

He chuckled. Boruto heard a rustling of movement from behind him, and tore himself away from Tobi's ominous showdown with his father to see what was happening.

"And the easiest way to do that is to go through the hearts of your friends." He laughed, then – an outright, evil, maniacal laugh.

Then, he disappeared in a puff of smoke…

…just as a sickening squelch echoed through the courtyard.