Hey guys, I love you all and hope you enjoy reading this chapter. We're rapidly approaching some much more emotional chapters that had to happen, and I gotta say I felt so sorry for certain characters when I wrote some scenes that will come up over the next few chapters.

Tsunade was glaring fiercely at Naruto but after a moment she groaned and crossed her arms over her chest, "Eh, fine I won't strangle the brat."

"I'm not gonna stop calling you Baa-chan." Tsunade's eye twitched at Naruto's words.

"I hate you."

"Nah, you love me." Naruto stepped out from behind Hiruzen, who's expression almost screamed, 'I'm too old for this crap.'.

"Right. So Tsunade, will you be staying here."

Tsunade's expression shifted, turning hesitant before she nodded, "Yeah, I think I will. It'll do Shizune good and from the sound of it the Hospital needs some work-"

"Rin-san will appreciate it." Hiruzen nodded, "She's been stepping up since Orochimaru's failed invasion but she's already said she'd need help."

"Good thing I'm here then." Tsunade nodded, "It'll be nice to see the brat again too-last time I saw her she was like twelve. She was talented."

Tsunade paused before her gaze swung to Sakura, and she pointed at the pink haired girl, "You, meet me at the hospital in the morning, six. If you're late I'll pummel you."

"Wait-what-"

"I saw you during the fight, you have spirit and you've got a talent with medical ninjustsu. Don't make me regret this."

"I won't Tsunade-sama." Sakura was suddenly beaming, "I promise."

"You better make me proud."

"I will I swear." Sakura was almost glowing with excitement. "Thank you so much."

"You won't be thanking me when I've beaten some skill into you." Tsunade said firmly."

"What fight?" Hiruzen's eyes narrowed, "I assume that you're referring to a fight other than the run in with the Akatsuki."

"I am." Tsunade nodded, "Guess they haven't told you about that part yet. We had a run in with Orochimaru. I'm over my fear of blood."

"That-what happened?"

"He wanted me to heal him. I tried to trick him, failed, ended up having to fight him and his little minion after Naruto-chan got hurt."

"I got poisoned." Naruto remarked, "And Kurama couldn't heal me because they used a seal to cut me off from Kurama-I was not impressed." Naruto remarked, shaking her head.

"Not impressed?" Tsunade snorted, "You went damn near feral. You kept moving far longer than you should have been able to with the snake venom in your system."

"They cut me off from Kurama." Naruto snarled the words, "They're lucky I was poisoned or they'd be dead for it."

Hiruzen's brows furrowed, "I see. But the poison was dealt with yes?"

"When I arrived I removed the seal and she was healed." Jiraiya confirmed.

"Why weren't you there-"

"That would be my fault." to her credit Tsunade did look somewhat sheepish as she said that. "I drugged him, I didn't want him interfering-didn't realize Naruto-chan would sense me leaving but when she did I figured it'd be better to bring her along."

"Like I'd have given you a choice." Naruto shrugged, "Besides I totally saved your ass."

"I appreciated that." Tsunade admitted, "If it wasn't for you I wouldn't have gotten over my fear of blood." she admitted, "But I have."

"That's very good." Hiruzen sighed, "I do believe you'll be wanted to heal Kakashi-san. Rin-san spends most of her time in the hospital at the moment
with him unless she's at home sleeping."

"I'll go there now." Tsunade nodded, "Sakura-chan you can come with me and watch." her voice was firm. "If you're going to be my apprentice you might as well."

"Of course Tsunade-sama." Sakura was bouncing excitedly.

"Go on then, go heal him, I wish to speak to Naruto-chan and Jiraiya-kun about the Akatsuki's attack in any case." Hiruzen waved a hand, and Tsunade grabbed Sakura's arm, half dragging the excited pink haired girl out of the room, the door getting kicked shut behind them.

Then the old man focused his gaze on Naruto and Jiraiya. "Right. The Akatsuki's attack-"

"Can I go and get Sasuke-kun?" Naruto asked quickly, "Since we'll be going over stuff he was there for."

"If you wish." the old man nodded, and Naruto quickly Hirashined to Sasuke, who raised an eyebrow.

"Time to speak to the Hokage?"

"Yep." Naruto grabbed his arm and they were back in the Hokage's office.

"Hokage-sama." Sasuke bowed his head respectfully and the old man nodded.

"Thank you for coming Sasuke-kun. Now, I need to know what happened-Jiraiya I was told you weren't there."

"I was... lured away and tricked. "Jiraiya looked sheepish, "Uchiha Itachi used a Genjutsu on a woman to get her to distract me, I admit I allowed myself to be distracted until Sakura-chan came and got me, by the time I reached them Naruto-chan and Sasuke-kun were on their way back."

"Right. Now Naruto-chan." the old mans gaze focused on her fully, "What happened? The whole story please."

"Okay. So." Naruto let out a breath, "Sakura-chan and I were relaxing since we were taking a break from traveling and I was getting tired so we went back to the hotel... I'd sorta felt like something was off but I couldn't tell what so we just decided to be careful." she explained slowly, "We got back to the hotel room and relaxed... we weren't there long before there was a knock on the door. I decided to check the peephole and I saw a shark faced guy-"

"Hoshigaki Kisame." Jiraiya spoke up.

"Kisame then." Naruto nodded, "And I couldn't really see Itachi at first so I didn't know it was him. I heard them talking-they mentioned someone they called Madara-" that made Hiruzen pale slightly but Naruto shrugged, "I don't think he was Madara though-just so you don't panic. Anyway, we obviously didn't open the door so they smashed the door down. It was clear pretty quick that they were there because they were interested in me-they asked about me and they said that I was of interest to them because-well they heard I kinda saved your life and because they heard that I had connections to Gaara-kun and I'd kinda caused a lot of changes- like the whole Kiri thing and all. I uh... happened to realize who Itachi was." Naruto blushed slightly, "And I explained to him exactly what I thought of him... I may have told him to shut up a few times, he was very surprised."

"I'll bet." Sasuke snorted, "Not many people would get away with telling him to shut up-"

"It was weird. I can sense negative emotions-perk of being Kurama's Jinchuriki and he felt..." she hesitated, "He felt all angry and there was a lot of hate but usually that's projected outwards whereas he was projecting it inwards. He hated himself." she watched the Hokage carefully-and was that regret she could feel from him.

Hm. Odd.

"Anyway, after that I made it clear that if they wanted to go after Gaara-kun they'd have to go through me and Kisame said I'd be dead anyway... then Sasuke-kun showed up."

"I did." Sasuke nodded, "I'd pretty much ran there after Rin-san got Kakashi-sensei stabilized."

"Yes." Hiruzen nodded, "You told me your side of the story when you returned with Gai-san-and I must say I was extremely impressed by your courage in standing up to your older brother to defend your teammate-"

"Sister." Sasuke's voice was stubborn, "My sister."

"Of course." Hiruzen smiled almost fondly, "My mistake. In any case I know that you used your Mangekyou Sharingan for the first time to defend yourselves, and that Itachi-san for some reason blocked Kisame's attack and then the man they called Madara arrived-and for simplicity sake we'll call him Madara for now until we learn more."

"Right." Naruto nodded, "So he arrived after Itachi decided it was time to leave-he just sorta appeared there, some sort of teleportation jutsu, he called it the Kamui I think. He recognized me instantly-he knew who I was-"

"That's odd." Hiruzen frowned, " Few people here have figured it out but they knew your parents personally." he tilted his head, "Naruto-chan is there some information we're missing."

"I.." Naruto looked down, "We'll get to that.

"Hm." Hiruzen clearly not entirely happy with that. "Continue."

"Right so..." Naruto hesitated, "He was angry-like, really angry, rage just pouring off of him. I've never felt anything like it-and I routinely hang out with Kurama-and he might not have that much rage any more but back when I was little he was filled with it, at the entire world other than me pretty much."

Sasuke reached out, laying a hand on her arm, reassuring her, and Naruto took a deep breath, "Anyway... he uh.." She closed her eyes, "He knew who I was, and he was pretty shocked-he felt it anyway, and he sounded really angry at me and he said that they gave me 'her name-'"

"Actually." Sasuke frowned, "He said something like that to Kakashi-sensei. I think it was 'You let someone use her name.'"

"That is odd." Hiruzen frowned. "Very odd-was he referring to the name Naruto-"

"No." Naruto shook her head, "I asked what the hell his issue was and that my parents gave me my name and-" she was shaking slightly. "He said he knew." she looked down and she could feel the two adults gazes on her as Sasuke wrapped an arm around her shoulder, "He said he remembered them screaming for me when he ripped me from my moms arms." that made Hiruzen and Jiraiya both go deathly pale.

"What?" Jiraiya's voice was a whisper, hoarse and horrified, "You didn't mention that to me."

"I..."

"That could have only been the day you were born." Hiruzen's voice was only just steady, "The day-"

"The day he set Kurama free and tried to use his Sharingan to force him to attack the village." Naruto whispered the words and Hiruzen closed his eyes.

"So. Danzo was right, Kurama didn't just break free he was released."

"Yes." Naruto looked down, "Dad distracted Madara for long enough that Kurama broke free and attacked on his own but it was a planned attack." she stared at the ground. "I... I realized then that he was the Uchiha Kurama warned me about-"

"You knew there was a Uchiha that night?" Hiruzen's voice was sharp "You never told us that."

"I don't talk about it much." Naruto shook her head, "All Kurama knew was that there was a Uchiha there after he was freed who tried to control him, and that the Uchiha was wearing a mask he didn't know much more than that and... I just didn't... it's not like there was much to go on." her voice was soft, helpless. "And I was scared to bring it up-scared of him."

"I see." Hiruzen sighed heavily, "Continue the story Naruto-chan. We need to know everything." despite his words his voice betrayed the fact that he wasn't going to forget that she'd withheld the information.

"He uh... he told me it was the name Nohara he was angry at-kept demanding to know who gave it to me.

He used his Kamui on both of us and then we were in the forest outside of the village and he-I don't know how but he can use Mokuton... he's not on the same level as the Shodaime though-he failed at suppressing Kurama's Chakra when I broke free and fought back." Naruto shook her head, "We fought, I used my Hirashin and he used his Kamui but.. he could turn intangible which made it real hard to land a hit... he's strong, scarily strong and with his Kamui and his intangibility..." Naruto shook her head, "I'm lucky that Sasuke-kun and Itachi-san showed up when they did because I was getting my ass handed me."

"I see."

"I freaked out when Naruto disappeared." Sasuke said, "But I already told you how I started screaming and yelling and freaking out and Itachi just said 'Perhaps Naruto-san was right' and just picked me up and took off."

"You did. You also told me how when you reached the fight yourself and Itachi worked together and you used the Chidori to injure Madara-"

"It was weird." Naruto frowned, "He froze up when he heard it."

"That is odd." Hiruzen sighed, "So we know that this man is responsible for the Kyubi attack and that for some reason he was angry over your use of the Nohara name-I believe your mother is the only one in Konoha with the family name. I'll call her in after you three have left to ask if she has any ideas as to who this mystery Madara could be."

"Of course Sandaime-sama." Naruto nodded, "I uh... I didn't mention her at all, just so you know."

"We'll see what we can find out-and I'll make sure that there's an Anbu guard assigned to her at all times." Hiruzen stated firmly, "After all she is a Jinchuriki even if no one should be aware of the fact. And she's the mother of Konoha's newest hero."

"Thank you."

"Is there anything else I'd need to know? After he was injured-"

"Itachi threw Sasuke at me. I guess he knew Madara would Kamui away and he didn't want Sasuke to be sucked away with him."

"That would certainly make sense." Hiruzen nodded.

"He threw me to the side." Sasuke scowled slightly, "Itachi I mean, after the asshole disappeared he threw me to the side and healed Naruto... I tried to get him to tell me what the hell was going on but he said I didn't need to understand and that I wasn't the foolish one. I don't... I always thought he was evil so why did he help me?"

"He felt like he was filled up with grief." Naruto spoke softly, "I... there was so much pain." and there was guilt rolling off of the Sandaime now and Naruto focused her gaze on him. "What do you know Sandaime-sama?"