Yugito frowned, ink brush in hand, as she delicately redrew the Nine Halls Seal on Utakata's belly.
The red chakra gradually faded back into black ink with her expert brushwork. Utakata's ashen face slowly regained color. The energy circulating through his body had returned to normal.
Except for…
"Naruto, are you sure about this?" Yugito asked. "Replenishing a bijuu's chakra is an unearthly task. To be honest, I don't think most jinchuuriki are even capable of it."
Naruto took a firm step forward. "I'll do it, ya know," he said. "I mean...the more that people tell me that I can't do something, the more I push myself to do it! And besides, Saiken is in trouble and needs help. Like Octopops said when I met him, we all gotta help each other, ya know?"
He placed his hand on Utakata's repaired seal, closed his eyes, and concentrated hard. And then in a gloomy mind space much like the one he shared with the Kyuubi, the Rokubi appeared.
A giant white slug, dripping with thick slimy goop, was gasping in pain and exhaustion. Most people would have found normal slugs – much less giant ones – gross – but as the tears dripping from Saiken's eyes fell onto Naruto's head, a pang of sadness washed over him.
He used to cry like that a lot too, when he was a kid.
Human or bijuu, it didn't matter. Everyone cried when they got hurt. Naruto ran forwards.
"Hi, Saiken!" he yelled up at the slug. "Don't worry a bit! I'm gonna fix you and you'll feel better!"
Saiken momentarily ceased his crying and blinked at Naruto curiously.
"Who are you?" he asked in a surprisingly high-pitched voice.
"I'm Naruto, and I'm here to help," Naruto said, shooting Saiken a big thumbs-up. "I'm giving you some of my chakra so that you won't be tired and hurting anymore."
"Huh? But no human has enough chakra to replace a bijuu's." Saiken's eyes narrowed. "Wait a moment, you're a – " He stopped, speechless.
Naruto placed his hand on Saiken's torso, flowing his chakra into the demon slug.
It wasn't the Kyuubi's crimson red; it was Naruto's very own buttery yellow chakra that was flowing into the Rokubi.
Human and bijuu stared at the yellow thread linking them together.
An odd voice – old and tired, but still brimming with wisdom – flowed through Naruto's mind.
"Chakra is a force meant to connect everyone..."
Naruto blinked, looking around for the owner of the voice, his confusion mounting when no such person could be found. Was he hallucinating now?
He snapped back to the present. His chakra was being absorbed by Saiken rapidly. The slug was growing fuller and fuller, and a mounting wave of tiredness was slowly crashing over Naruto with every drop of chakra he gave.
And within no time, Saiken's face was glowing with the picture of health.
"I – thank you," Saiken began to say. "You're a very strange human..."
Then Naruto collapsed, but not before uttering a string of words totally incomprehensible to the Rokubi: "Need...ramen...now..."
Saiken stared at the bizarrely foolish and kind jinchuuriki.
What the hell?
A warm, crackling campfire.
Yummy fish caught from a nearby stream.
Irritated muttering, scowling, and a general burned-out aura.
It was one of the many camping trips of the Naruto search party.
Akamaru's white fur was matted with dirt thanks to many days of running. Kiba wasn't much better. Shino's long overcoat was in tatters, and everyone's mission gear was practically shredded into pieces.
Despite all this, Lee was humming cheerfully as he munched on his fried fish.
"Neji, Tenten, the Land of Water is really beautiful, isn't it?" asked the much too youthful ninja.
Tenten grumbled noncommittally and Neji simply stared gloomily into the distance.
"We've been on this wild goose chase for almost a month now," Tenten muttered, poking at the fire with a stick. "Why can't that idiot Naruto stay still? So many times we've been on the verge of catching him, and he goes and runs away again."
"Just think of it as a challenge to prove our youthful – " Lee began, but clammed up immediately when his teammates fixed him with furious stares.
"There are only two more jinchuuriki he could possibly find, and both of them are Kiri ninja," said Neji. "Although I must say, I'm not at all surprised that so far, Naruto seems to have befriended every single jinchuuriki he's met."
"I think Naruto will make friends with every single person he meets," Tenten agreed. "You know, I bet that he's become friends with those other bijuu too, not just the jinchuuriki..."
"He must be talking to them all about the wonders of ramen or something." Neji's tone had thawed slightly, a hint of a smile in his voice. "Those poor bijuu must be so confused. They won't know what hit them."
"When we see Naruto-kun again, we can all have a joint youthful ramen eating contest together!" Lee yelled enthusiastically. "Just like we had a few years – "
"NO!" Neji and Tenten bellowed as one.
They did not want to witness Lee puking after eating ten bowls of ramen too many.
Both of them shuddered.
No. Absolutely not.
Naruto had caused all of Konoha, Iwa, Kumo, and Taki to have a massive conniption. Between Tsunade-sama's binge-drinking, the mass destruction of the Earth's countryside, the battle in the bathhouse, and straight-up dropping out of the sky and escaping with a rogue Takigakure jinchuuriki, the migraines he'd caused were of gigantic proportions.
And the Sugoi Ramen chopsticks incident. Naruto would pay for that. The stains still hadn't come out of Neji's clothes and Tenten's tongue was still void of all sensation.
No ramen eating contest with Naruto, ever again.
They couldn't let him off that easily. If Tenten and Neji had their way, Naruto would be forced to endure a million of Guy-sensei's "Dynamic Entries" as punishment.
As it happened, it was Neji on guard duty that night.
And what he saw with his Byakugan made his jaw drop.
Bijuu chakra leaking like a drippy faucet, all over the countryside, destroying everything in its path. Except that it stopped leaking somewhere in a lonely field, and Neji could clearly see eight people running off into the distance. And one of them was most certainly...
Naruto.
It seemed as though there would be no rest for the Konoha 11 tonight.
A/N: As usual, thanks for all the reviews. Shion, I'm glad to see you come back. I was wondering where you went. :)
And thanks for the kind words, ThisIsStorm101, Jac Frust, UltimateGenius, Kage ongami, and Princess Hinashi. :)
BadReader, I have fixed the grammar mistakes in the previous chapter. However, I'm sorry, but no one except Naruto will learn Sage Mode in this story (I'm not sure exactly how it would be possible for them all to sign a contract without asking the toads for permission, when they obviously need the toads to agree to give them the contract in the first place).
Phoenixknight19, thank you for showing interest in my silly little story. But Naruto and Fuu won't get together (romance isn't a big part of this fic at all). Sorry, but I hope you'll keep reading and enjoying.
Slight spoilers: The next jinchuuriki they'll save is Yagura, and the Konoha 11 (and everyone else searching for them) will all cross paths at last. :)