Really Grey

9.

"Minato!" Kushina gasped from the hokage's tower, sitting on the hokage's chair, her elbows on the hokage's desk, watching the hokage's crystal ball atop it's cushion. "Minato!"

She had seen his figure suddenly hurled from one place, a house, and then hurled to a different place entirely—Rin was there. Then, the scene flopped to a suna child getting candy from a dispenser at a fair. "Come ON, COME ON!" Kushina wailed, hoping the image would return to her husband. "Minato…!"

His image returned for a brief moment. But she could not hear what he was saying. Like a low, indiscernible hum, she pressed her ears and eyes to it, but she could not make out the words he was speaking to her—a terrible sobbing form of Rin. Kushina frowned when she saw Kakashi, too, lying broken on the branch. "…Obito," Kushina thought aloud, "Where's Obito?"

"Ma'am…?" spoke a young aide from around the corner.

"AW DARNIT!" The image was interrupted again. A dark laughing face. A sailboat. A fresh bun out of the oven. Shodaime Hokage passing out a medal at a ceremony—"WHAT THE HELL?"

The young man rushed forward, "Ma'am…?"

"Has it ever done that before?" She pointed incredulously.

"Done what?" asked the teenager Shiranui Genma.

"That! The—The past! Has it ever shown the past!"

The boy had no ready answer.

"Oh fuck, and I just told Sarutobi-sama to go out into the village and tell people not to worry."

Young Genma blushed. For her sake.

"God dangit. Stay here. No wait. Come with me. We gotta go tell him."

"Yes ma'am."

.

"Tell me what?" Sarutobi and Danzou were looking at an odd version on Maito Gai, "She's here! Just outside Konohagakure!"

"Maito Gai, there's something I must explain to you about what is…going on…" said Sarutobi.

Gai looked up at him strangely.

"Time…has been…ripped."

"…Ripped?"

Sarutobi nodded, and explained, all the while noticing the same young man in a purple jumpsuit crossing a walk only two streets away…

.

Yondaime looked at the message again.

After taking care of the iwa shinobi, he was on his way back to his students, wondering if he'd run into Jiraiya along the way. "Jiraiya-sensei? In prison clothes?" Yondaime asked himself over and over. And why in the heck did Danzou think he had been asking about Sakumo? Without no further word—from anyone? But the iwa shinobi had taken precedence. And who knows. Jiraiya-sensei was always a practical joker. Minato didn't exactly put it past him to pull some crazy stunt like that…but for what?

Yondaime was catching the smell of blood on the wind. It was very faint, but he was coming toward it. Jounin Kakashi and the others should have been done by now, barring anything unforeseen. As it goes, a sick feeling, lodged into Minato's chest about the whole thing. Was Kakashi truly ready? Worse: had something gone wrong…?

.

…Minato was just setting Kakashi down on a raised surface near a large tree, shading the plateau when Yondaime came through the brush and gasped holy hell:

Minato looked up, "Oh my God."

Minato looked at Minato. "What the hell…?"

Minato froze, despite his efforts to assume an unassuming demeanor. Ha ha. He was failing miserably. "Um…Hi…"

"GET AWAY FROM MY STUDENTS!"

Rin backed away—Minato lunged at Minato.

"I can explain!" Minato said. "Wait!"

"Who are you, and what have you DONE to my students?"

"I'm you! I—" Minato thought fast, backing away from his own self holding a kunai. "I am you! I know that's difficult to believe," Minato had been hoping not to break his cover in front of Rin, but unfortunately, time was begin screwed so bad, he could not withhold it. "Something has happened to the time—the timeline. I was summoned here by Hiraishin, on a kunai. By accident. Not you-me, but me-me…Oh that doesn't make sense, but it has too, please believe me!" Me!

Yondaime stared.

And then all of sudden—

Flash.

.

Minato stood in Trippy's presence.

"Oh my gosh…" the formerly masked ninja sighed a great sigh of relief. "It worked!"

Minato looked down.

"Are you all right? Where did you go? Who summoned you?"

Minato, at first, did not say anything.

Minato sat down, near Trippy and looked his arch-nemesis, tied up with a grin. "You're a dirty bastard." Minato did not use the crude phrase often.

Trippy looked back at him. The older man shrugged, smiling.

"How did you bring me back?"

"You had placed a seal on my ankle earlier. I added some of these symbols to it, and I was able to activate it."

"Really?" Minato looked at him with some eager surprise.

The Trippy Ninja nodded. "I think I'm getting closer to figuring this out."

"Careful…you may not have enough tii-me…" The old man murmured.

"What?" Both ninja looked at him.

"Oh my God Trippy, the explosive seal," said Minato all of sudden. "Is it…"

"Is it on a TIME-DELAY?" the both reacted.

The older man chuckled.

"YOU BASTARD!"

"I bet I activated it when the ceiling fan came down—it was all apart of his plan…"

"When A and B and C fail…in case X…you merry cheap bastard," said Trippy. "How DARE YOU DO THIS."

"I suggest you get a move on young man."

Trippy stood, his fist raised in the air about to strike hard when Minato stopped him, "This is all my fault," Minato atoned. "Please. Stay calm. There's still time."

"But how much time?" asked Trippy.

The two men looked at the old man.

"Well, seeings-how you wasted about a half an hour already…I'd say thirty more minutes yet till…ka-plooey!" His blue smile showed.

"…"

.