Kakashi was worried sick when Naruto disappeared for over a day after his strange exit from Tazuna's house, he sent shadow clones and summoned his ninken to look of the blonde and the only reason he didn't go looking himself was because he couldn't leave the rest of his team and Tazuna unprotected with the likes of Zabuza around.

He was nearly panicking when he could find no trace of the boy no matter how much he looked, none of the clones found traces of him, none of the ninken could get his scent and nobody seemed to have seen the boy.

"Naruto where are you? Could Zabuza had gotten to him? I never should have continued this mission"

It didn't help that the night after Naruto disappeared he felt spikes of chakra so massive that even he who wasn't a sensor could feel them, tracking them down he was met with a red barrier that he could not get past, not even his raikiri could pierce it.

By the time the barrier was put down all he saw was a devastated piece of forest, trees burned and uprooted, massive areas torn apart by what was clearly an extremely powerful wind jutsu, there was even an area that was completely glassed, like an explosion powerfull enough to incinerate everything in its blast radius with ease, it all pointed to a very high level ninja battle.

He returned to Tazuna's house and was preparing to contact Konoha to have a team of tracking focused ninja come to try and find Naruto when the very same blonde walked through the door. He ignored Kakashi's demands to know where he was, walked up to Inari and unsealed a head from a scroll he was carrying.

"Looks like you were wrong, Gatou didn't kill me, though his men certainly tried"

He tossed Gatou's decapitated head to the boy, ignored everyone's shocked questions and hit the couch, falling asleep immediately.

After the shock Tazuna took the head and ran off the house, claiming he had to let everyone know. Kakashi looked at the sleeping blonde and felt glad he was okay.

A Week Latter

Without Gatou and his thugs the bridge was completed without trouble, the workers were in a good mood and the town was celebrating their freedom from the tyrant.

Kakashi had questioned Naruto on his actions and he didn't like the answers he had been given.

Flashback: The day Naruto woke up

Naruto had woken up a few hours earlier and Kakashi let the blonde take a much needed bath and have a meal before he questioned him, he was wondering why did the blond go after Gatou alone and how he hid from him despite Kakashi's best attempts to find him.

Naruto sat down at the table, knowing what was to come, Kakashi begun, seeing the boy had no intention of starting himself.

"Naruto what happend?"

"I went after Gatou"

"But why?"

"He was the main threat to Tazuna, without him here Tazuna is safe and our job is done"

"That was not your call to make" Kakashi said sternly.

Naruto scowled and spat out bitterly "Contrary to what you might believe Hatake, I'm not a slave, you don't own me and I don't need your permission to make my own choices"

Kakashi was taken aback and asked "Naruto what made you think I thought of you as my slave?"

"Why wouldn't you? You're Konoha and that's all I am to them, a weapon that should be glad it's being used, a slave that should obey without question or die"

Kakashi saw the look of bitter resentment and said "Naruto you're not a slave"

"Of course I am! I have been ever since those bastards decided that they didn't care about me enough not to make me a fucking human sacrifice"

"Naruto your parents-" Kakashi started but was interrupted.

"They are not my parents, those bastards lost that right when they made me a monster, less than human!"

Kakashi, seeing that this wasn't going anywhere decided to change the subject.

"Where were you? I went looking for you but couldn't find you"

"I was scouting Gatou's compound to make sure there weren't any traps or enemies that I wasn't ready for"

Kakashi shook his head and said "Naruto I'm a jonin and I checked Gatou's compound, I think I would have found you"

"I have lot of pratice hiding from people"

"Even so my ninken couldn't track you"

Naruto sighed before he erupted in a plume of smoke, when it cleared there was a small fly where Naruto stood, the fly went around the room a few times before going back to the chair and turning back to Naruto.

"Naruto that was amazing" Kakashi said, wide eyed. "The amount of uses that could have would make espionage much easier, you have to teach people this technique"

"No" Naruto said curtly.

"But Naruto the amount of lives you could save with it-" "Would not compare to the amount of lives you would use this to take, not that I care. I figured it out on my own, either they figure it out by themselves or they make do without with, I'm not helping them"

"But Naruto they are your comrades"

"They are only my comrades as much as you are your kunai's comrade" Naruto said.

Kakashi sighed sadly, feeling worried the blond saw himself as a tool and not a person.

"But why didn't you tell me you were going after Gatou? We could have gone together" He asked.

"I didn't need your help"

"Naruto you didn't know what Gatou had inside his compound and even scouting you couldn't have picked up everything, we could have watched your back"

Naruto glared at him and spat "Hatake I don't trust you to watch my back, how can I know you won't decide your trauma is more important and abandon me when I need you again?"

Kakashi visibly flinched at this, he looked at the blonde in shame and said.

"Naruto I know what I did was wrong but-"

"Enough with the excuses Hatake, I'm sick and tired of people screwing me over and expecting some bullshit apology to undo all the shit I was put through because of them, you had your chance and you blew it and now you come crawling back to me and expect all to be forgiven after one miserable fucking apology!?"

"Naruto please-" "No! I don't believe in second chances Hatake, I will never forgive you or any of the others so just leave me the fuck alone!"

Kakashi took a shaky breath to calm himself down and said with the most even tone he could muster.

"What about Sasuke? You two are friends and you could have asked for his help"

"If I wasn't strong enough to take on Gatou's thugs by myself I would never be strong enough to achieve my goal"

"Is this goal that important to you?"

"My goal is the only reason I have left to live, if I can't achieve it, I might as well just die already"

Kakashi was shocked and said " Naruto...do you want to die?"

"If I did I would finally be free, it would be my choice and you wouldn't be able to hold me prisoner any longer"

Kakashi was speechless and afraid, thinking that the boy he saw as a little brother saw death as an escape, but what really hurt him was what Naruto said next.

"I want to die, if only so I can be free from the people who betrayed me, so I can be free from people like you"

Flashback End

Kakashi had been visibly shaken after that and spent most of his time watching Naruto from far away, not wanting to aggravate the blond by trying to talk to him but afraid he could do something drastic if Kakashi wasn't around to stop him.

They guarded the bridge until it was finished but had no more problems with attackers, even Zabuza, who as far as most of team 7 knew was still alive, didn't show up anymore. They thought that after Gatou's death he had left since he no longer had an employer.

The day they left everyone but team 7 had been in a celebratory mood, with the bridge being named The Great Naruto Bridge after the boy who slew the tyrant Gatou.

Sasuke and Sakura, who had grown somewhat closer with Sakura's slight change of attitude and their shared interest in Naruto's apparent personality shifts, were confused and concerned at what was going on with their teammate and sensei.

Kakashi was still sneaking glances at Naruto, worry clear in his gaze, while he tried in vain to concentrate in his book, while the blond himself seemed to be deep in thought, face marred with a frown.

"Hey Kurama, do you think you could take over for a little while?" Naruto thought.

"Why?"

Naruto let out a sigh, drawing his teammates' attention, but he didn't notice.

"You know I'm not good at prolonged exposure to people and we've been surrounded by them since the beginning of this mission"

"You know, I never thought one of my containers would ask me to swap and take my place on the cage" Kurama said with dry humor.

"To you the cage keeps you in, to me it keeps others out"

"Sure, I'll take over"

Naruto stopped for a moment, his head slumping before he started walking again without saying a word, worried about him Kakashi asked.

"Is everything alright Naruto?"

Kurama ignored him for a while but when it was clear he wasn't going to drop it they said.

"The brat is a bit out of reach at the moment"

Kakashi was instantly on edge, he looked at "Naruto" and said.

"What did you do to him?"

Kurama, who hadn't stopped walking turned to him, revealing his red eyes, and said.

"I took over his body, he wanted some time with his thoughts and asked me to take over"

Kakashi relaxed somewhat and kept walking, though still clearly wary.

"Relax human, the brat asked me to take over, not fight you"

Sakura and Sasuke were both intrigued by this apparent second personality of Naruto's. Kurama, feeling the girl's curiosity decided to humor her.

"What is it little girl?"

"H-How? I didn't even-"

"I can feel people's emotions, I felt your curiosity"

"Can Naruto do that too?" Sasuke asked.

"He can, we're parthers and all I can do he can and vice versa"

"Could it be? Is that how he learned of his parents" Kakashi thought.

"It is not, though that is how he learned you were lying to him" Kurama said.

"You can read thoughts?" Kakashi asked, shocked.

"No, but I can feel your suspicion and it wasn't hard to guess"

"Are you another part of Naruto?" Sakura asked.

"Hah, not really though given how compatible we are I might as well be"

"What are you then" Sasuke asked.

"I am the Kyuubi no Kitsune"

"What?" Sakura asked, scared. "But the Fourth killed the Kyuubi"

"You can't kill tailed beasts little girl, we merely reform if you do, what that blonde bastard did was seal me inside a baby so my power could be used as a weapon for Konoha"

Kakashi explained to his team about tailed beasts and jinchuriki so he could make sure they would not see Naruto as the beast but as his container, though he wished Naruto could be there to talk to his teammates about it.

"Jokes on him though, the brat hates him even more than I do"

"Naruto is just confused, he will understand" Kakashi said.

"I doubt that, one of the reasons we bonded so easily despite me hating both my previous containers was our shared hatred for Namikaze and his wife"

Kakashi was about to retort when Naruto slumped again before he got up and growled.

"When I told you to take over, it was not for you to fucking chat with them about those bastards"

The rest of the trip was made in silence, Naruto with a permanent scowl on his face giving away that he didn't want to talk.

Hokage's Office

They made it to Konoha around noon, Kakashi dismissed his team, taking note that Sasuke and Sakura went together somewhere and Naruto was on his way to his apartment before he even finished.

He went straight to the Hokage's Office, where he currently was, finishing his report.

"-we didn't encounter any enemy ninja after that, the bridge was finished and we returned"

"I see. You should have known better than continuing in a false mission while with a group of genin Kakashi" Hiruzen said sternly.

"I know sir, it was my mistake"

"Now how is your team?"

"Sakura is improving, she still has some of her fangirl habits but overall she has grown from when we first met. Sasuke's ability has increased by leaps and bounds, he is determined and disciplined and now that he has awoken his sharingan he will continue improving faster and faster."

"Very good, you've done well"

Kakashi looked away embarrassed and said.

"Actually Hokage-sama, that's mostly Naruto's doing, he took to helping their training, said it was because he refused to let them slow him down, I've been teaching them teamwork and practice but most of their growth is Naruto's doing"

"Is that so?" Hiruzen wondered "You'll make a good leader Naruto-kun, you just have to work on motivating your comrades better" He thought proudly.

"How is he doing?" Hiruzen asked and saw Kakashi's face instantly fall. "What is it Kakashi?"

"Naruto's...as far as skills go he is very good, he is proficient in taijutsu, managed to mimic Tsunade-sama's super strength, even though at a much lower level, has ninjutsu of all elements and seems to favor countering his oponent's attacks and use combination attacks, I never seen him use genjutsu but I wouldn't be surprised if he was proficient with it too, he seems to enjoy using the shadow clone's memory transfer function to become a generalist instead of using only one type of jutsu or element, honestly his combat style is very similar to yours"

Hiruzen listened to the report and couldn't help from feeling pride at the boy's choice to become a generalist who exploits weaknesses like him instead of a specialist in a single element or jutsu, still he couldn't help but feel there was a but incoming.

"But... his personality is a problem, he seems to have sudden mood swings, he goes from angry to excited in the span of a few seconds and with no apparent reason, he seems to not enjoy being near people, I saw his discomfort rise through the mission and he would take any excuse to be alone"

Kakashi sighed before continuing "And due to our shared history he doesn't respect me as team captain, mostly forcing himself to do my orders and sometimes talking back and refusing to follow them, at worst he went behind my back and put his life on the line to do something without my help."

"What do you mean Kakashi?" Hiruzen asked worriedly.

"During the mission he had one of his mood swings, he had been angry for some time before he was suddenly eager for something, he left the house and I thought he just went into town or for a walk in the woods, he did that a lot during the mission but my clones only saw him walking when they watched him, by morning when he didn't return I searched for him, neither my clones nor my ninken could find any trace of him and he only appeared the day after"

"Where was he?"

"He told me was scouting Gatou's compound, showed me this jutsu that turned him into a fly and let him sneak in undetected"

"That's amazing, where did he learn it?"

"He said he created himself, when I asked him to share it he said he figured it out himself and would not share it with anyone"

Hiruzen noticed Kakashi's depressed expression and waited for him to continue.

"He sees himself as a weapon, or rather, he thinks that Konoha sees him as a weapon, he told me he felt less than human"

"But why would he think that?"

"I don't know but he seemed convinced that he was a slave to the village" Kakashi looked down and said.

"He went after Gatou by himself, said that he didn't trust me to watch his back, to not abandon him when he needed me, I asked why he didn't ask Sasuke or Sakura and you know what he said? That if he wasn't strong enough to do it alone he wouldn't be able to achieve his goal and that if he couldn't do it he might as well die"

"He wants to die?" Hiuzen asked, worried and shocked beyond belief. He knew his upbringing would have affected the boy but since Naruto didn't show any sings of being affected he just assumed the boy was tougher than he looked, it seemed that wasn't the case.

"He said he would rather die than live without achieving his goal, that he would chose death to be free from the people who abandoned him, people like me"

Hiruzen was deeply troubled by this and asked.

"Do you know what this goal is?"

"No, that he never mentioned and whenever directly asked about it he said it was personal" Kakashi, recomposing himself and glad for the change in subject.

"I wonder, do you think he would be open to therapy?"

"I don't know, he doesn't seem the type but with the Kyuubi making it impossible to have an Yamanaka this seems like the only choice"

"I just hope he lets us help him" Hiruzen said.

Yamanaka Flower Shop

Sasuke and Sakura were walking together through the village, something he hadn't expected to ever happen. The girl was still head over heels for him but after they became a team he saw her slowly improving both as a ninja and as a person, and she was almost tolerable now.

He would still rather spend time training than with her but since they had a common goal he would manage, they were curious about Naruto's clear dislike towards the Fourth Hokage, after that conversation with the Kyuubi on the road they had a better understanding of what caused Naruto to hate him so much, even if finding out Naruto had a tailed beast inside him was a shock.

The Kyuubi had said that Naruto hated the Fourth for making Naruto a jinchuriki but they felt there was more about it, they couldn't forget how Naruto indirectly said that the Fourth was his father and they were going to the one person who might have been closer to Naruto than them to see if she knew anything.

They walked into the flower shop and saw Ino on the counter looking bored.

"Hey Sasuke, forehead, what are you guys doing here?"

"Ino could we talk to you for a moment? It's about Naruto"

Ino was surprised by Sakura seemingly shrugging off the nickname and even calling her by her name, she motioned them to follow her and took them to one of the rooms in the back.

"What's up? Did something happen to Naruto?"

"No its not that,its...did Naruto ever tell you anything about his family?" Sakura asked.

"Sakura you know Naruto's an orphan" Ino said sternly.

"I know, but did he say anything about his parents? Who they were or what happend to them?"

"No, he doesn't. I once asked him about it but he didn't want to talk about it, I gathered that his parents either died or abandoned him but he never wants to talk about it"

"So you don't know either"

"What do you mean?" Ino asked.

"We're not sure but we think Naruto's dad might be the Fourth Hokage"

"What? That's ridiculous"

"He once told us our sensei was a student of the Fourth, and now in our latest mission he said his dad was Kakashi-sensei's teacher"

"Could it be? But he hates the Fourth!"

"We're not sure but we think we might know why, or at least part of it"

They explained to Ino about the Kyuubi and what they told Sasuke and Sakura, Ino was shocked but could understand why Naruto would keep this a secret, suddenly all those times he would refuse to talk about his family made sense, she looked at the pair and asked.

"Could Naruto really be the Fourth's son?"

"We don't know, we were hoping you would know something"

Ino shook her head and said.

"I don't, I could see why he would hate him if that was the case but I don't know for sure"

"Maybe we should leave it be, Naruto clearly hates the man and I think its a bad idea to push him on the why" Sasuke said.

"But Sasuke, the Fourth's a hero, Naruto can't hate him" Ino said.

He turned to her and said. "He's very quick to anger when the subject is his family, do you really want to risk your relationship with Naruto for the sake of curiosity?"

"Well no but-"

"Then drop it, if he wants to keep his secrets then its not our place to pry, he'll tell us when he wants to"

A Few Months Latter

Contrary to what they thought Naruto wasn't willing to do therapy, in fact he was furious they even brought it up, claiming they just wanted to get into his head to control him and that they thought he needed help only because he refused to bow his head and gladly be their slave.

Kakashi tried to talk to the boy but he wasn't listening and after that day Naruto would glare at him constantly whenever they were together and call him a traitor under his breath, he knew he was just trying to help the blonde but Naruto didn't see it as such and went from being closed and cold to outright antagonistic most of the time.

It didn't help that Ino had confronted him about his status as a jinchuriki and while she didn't hold it against him he was less than pleased at his secret being exposed without his permission, it took months for him to treat his teammates the same again.

Outside of his ninja duties and the occasional date with Ino Naruto retreated into his training, spending his time doing exaustively harsh training for as long as he could before he stumbled onto bed, everyone could see it was not healthy but he refused to listen and by Kakashi's and Inoichi's, who was the go to mental health councilor for ninja, advice they decided to let the blonde be, reasoning his training was being a way for him relieve stress and that given his apparent suicidal tendencies it was better to not risk it, even so Kakashi watched him whenever he could to make sure he wasn't doing anything drastic.

As the months went on team 7 kept getting better and better. Sakura had become a decent genjutsu user and started to learn medical ninjutsu, she had even started to learn Naruto's super strength technique, though she could barely crush a boulder with her current skill.

Sasuke had managed to mature his sharingan completely and had improved tremendously because of it, he still favored his fire and lightning jutsu but had acquired a few others from Kakashi and Naruto, who let him copy them, he also became much better at taijutsu thanks to Naruto's suggestion of copying other people's taijutsu to both gain unpredictability and be better able to counter them.

After much asking he finally got a pair of gravity seals from Naruto, nowhere near the ones he used of course, and that had helped his speed and strength tremendously, making him be able to force Kakashi to store his book when they fought, he also improved his lightning nature vastly since he finally managed to get the shadow clone jutsu form Naruto, though not without a severe warning about not using more than 2 clones at once so as to not suffer from chakra exhaustion.

Naruto had been to one who had improved the most, expanding his arsenal of jutsu thanks to being given access to the Uchiha clan library by Sasuke on the condition that anything he learned there he would have to let Sasuke copy with his sharingan. Thanks to his new obsession with training he had also gotten much stronger and faster, being able to match Kakashi in speed and shatter large boulders without his super strength.

They had gained a reputation of being Konoha's strongest genin team, with their weakest being Sakura at high genin, and both Naruto and Sasuke at high chunin in terms of strength and skill, it was assumed that both of them would make jonin very soon after they make chunin in the upcoming exams.

Naruto was trying to ignore the square shaped brush with eyes in the middle of the street that was following him, after an incident where he was turning in a mission Konohamaru had started following him in hopes of learning from him, much to Naruto's annoyance.

"Konohamaru I don't know what kind of brush has eyewholes but you're not fooling anyone"

Konohamaru jumped out of the disguise and said.

"Of course you would figure me out boss"

Naruto sighed and was about to retort when he saw Sakura coming.

"Hey Naruto, Kakashi-sensei asked me to tell you we have a meeting today?"

"All of the sudden? Wasn't today our day off?"

Sudenly he felt a very bloodthirsty presence nearby and Kurama gave name to the feeling.

"Shukaku"

"So they're finally here"

"Are you sure about this?"

"I'm surprised you are, I thought you would be less than trilled at the idea of reforming into the ten tails"

"If we do everything correctly I will still be in control, and despite what the old man said I don't actually care about peace or any of that"

"But your siblings, don't you care about them?"

"You rubbed of on me, I guess. I don't hate them but you're my parther, I'm with you and if that means going against them then I will do it"

"Thanks Kurama, you're the best"

"Of course I am, and besides, its not like I can't manifest into a clone whenever I want so I can have my freedom while still having the safety net of not worrying about being sealed again"

At this point Konohamaru had said something that made Sakura chase after him and straight into the Suna team. Naruto saw him hidding behind Sakura who was wary of them, when she saw him she was relieved and said.

"Naruto! There you are"

Naruto walked past her with a smirk and up to Kankuro.

"And what have we here?"

"Great, another weakling, do I have to beat you too?"

Naruto let out a laugh as he looked Kankuro in the eye.

"Oh I would like to see you try, Kankuro of the Desert, middle child of the Kazekage"

Kankuro was confused, both at the blonde's aparent knowledge of him and at the alarm bells ringing in his head.

"You know us?" Temari asked from behind her brother.

"I do, Temari of the Desert, oldest child of the Kazekage"

"Who are you?" She asked.

"You can call me Naruto, Konoha genin"

"You'll be in the chunin exams too then, good, I look forward to taking you apart" Kankuro said, annoyed at being ignored.

"You'll be disappointed then, you're no match for me"

Kankuro growled and prepared to punch Naruto only to be stopped by a voice.

"Kankuro stop, you're embarrassing us and I'll kill you if you continue"

A red haired boy appeared in a burst of sand, Kankuro froze instantly before retreating in fear, the boy then turned to Naruto and said.

"Mother wants your blood"

Naruto surprised everyone by letting out a mocking "Is that so?' before walking up to the redhead, getting mere inches from his face and hissing in his ear "Come and take it then"

The entire Suna team was shocked at the blonde, people in Suna all knew to fear Gaara and directly provoking him was tantamount to suicide, yet here was this blonde actively taunting him. Sakura was also wary, she knew Naruto was strong but the redhead gave her a strange vibe and she wasn't liking it.

Sand quickly shot towards Naruto encasing him in a cocoon, he blasted it apart form the inside out with a punch and answered another one. Gaara moved his sand to block but it was blasted apart, barely able to block it, he shot sand at Naruto's chest but Naruto jumped and used the sand as support to kick downwards at Gaara while upside down, The redhead blocked and tried to use the sand to grab Naruto's leg but received a punch from Naruto's other arm that he was forced to block instead.

Gaara sent sand spikes at the blonde who dodged and moved to punch him, Gaara's instincts told him the punch was dangerous and he sent a wave of sand to push the blond back, Naruto blasted the wave back but had to retreat when the sand on the floor tried to impale his legs, he was already moving when Gaara shot a sand spear, not at him but at Sakura nearby, she prepared to dodge but remembered Konohamaru behind her and put up a hasty block, that proved unnecessary when Sasuke came out of the trees and blasted the sand apart with a kick.

Naruto growled at this and moved towards Garaa, suddenly much faster than before and drew his fist back for a punch, Gaara moved his sand to block but it proved inefective when Naruto's fist punched through all his sand like it was nothing, the blow connected to Gaara's hasty block and pushed him back, leaving his arms numb and the sand armour around it cracked.

Before Naruto could make another move Kakashi appeared and stopped the fight.

"Save it for the exams you two"

"You mean?" Sakura asked

"Yes, I nominated you"

Naruto glared at Gaara and said.

"Watch yourself, or your tailed beast wont save you from me"