THIS STORY IS REVISED! I almost can't believe I ever published the horrible thing that came before this. I say almost because well... Let's just say that drinking and writing might be okay, but drinking and PUBLISHING? Never again!

DISCLAIMER: I own nothing from the Naruto universe but do have an imagination of my own. PLEASE REVIEW! I will take advice and suggestions from my readers while continuing the story.

Thinking

Biju, etc. speaking

Biju, etc. thinking

Emphasis

Oh. My. Gods… People are totally losing their minds!

Naruto inwardly snickered and averted her eyes from some of her fellow Konohans as well as their excited visitors as she walked toward the Memorial Stones. She observed many who were looking around in awe at their mostly rebuilt village. Some of those folks were obviously from podunk towns within Hi No Kuni, although certainly not from their nation's capital. Remarkably, the Fire Nation capital was the only one of the Elemental capitals that stood completely intact after the recent Fourth Shinobi War.

Oh, gods... Naruto tried to look away, although she was more than amused by the naked people running around, many with flags for who knows what reason. Some of those nudists were obviously from the other nations, considering they were only wearing their hitae-ates. Naruto shook her head and knew that her best friend, the Kazekage himself, was somewhere close by and grinned at the mere thought of him being in her crazy village right now. Her thoughts of him, along with a grinning, naked, and terribly obese man's wave in her direction stopped her cold. Dear Kami: please don't let Gaara-kun be naked. There was only so much nonsense she could handle!

There was a very good reason that their national capital and village, in general, had remained as intact as it was now: Senju Tsunade had once again proven that despite her initially improbable worth as Hokage, not to mention just how much she'd done her heritage proud... The Godaime Hokage had ordered all her Genin to stay out of the war beforehand, outside of the now newly-promoted, (from-Genin-to-Jounin,) Uzumaki Naruto; and there were a lot of them! She was the only Kage to do so.

The Genin that were either part of teams, like Ebisu-perv's troupe of absolute darlings, (according to only Naruto, because everyone else felt that those kids, in particular, were damned brats,) Konohamaru-kun, Moegi-chan, and Udon-kun… Or even those in the Genin Corps, like the reformed and now quiet and completely converted Ami-chan, had definitely seen the horrors of war. Perhaps they hadn't seen it to the extent the rest of the now PTSD-ridden higher-ranking shinobi, but they had defended their assigned territories incredibly well. Naruto was ever-so-proud to have them in the ranks.

The blonde retrieved the memories of one of her dozens of clones who had been carrying cases of sake and had dropped it on the way to… The Tower? Oh, no: what are those idiots doing?! Everyone had been at her apartment earlier, partying throughout the night as the entire populace was finally home after six years of war. It seemed that now, however, some of her more moronic most precious people had gone off to bother the new Hokage or at least those in his office. Rokudaime-sama… Naruto smiled a bit at the thought of the man who was horrified at being forced into the role. He couldn't wait for her to take over his duties.

Naruto sat down in a seiza position in front of the stones that she frequented even more often than Kakashi these days. Lighting candles in front of each of them, she tried not to grumble.

"Hey, Neji-kun. Let's once again get the pleasantries over with, shall we?" She could just imagine his face at that: dignified as always, with an expression of disbelief that she was capable of said "pleasantries." Meanie. "I miss you, ya know?" Naruto said to her deceased friend softly. His name was placed toward the top of the recently placed stone that honored shinobi lost in battle from all nations. There are too many names on it and they still haven't finished adding to it.

"You wouldn't believe what's happening now, although maybe you would?" She paused for at least a minute before continuing. "Hina-chan…" Naruto's vision blurred as her eyes teared up in grief once again. "What the hell am I supposed to do without you, ya know? And not to mention you, Itachi-kun… Ya total idiot."

Naruto let out an ugly snort and rubbed her face harshly. "People are partying like there's no tomorrow, ya know? I can't quite get into it." She paused but laughed bitterly once again as she rubbed her hands against the names of Hyuuga Neji and Hyuuga Hinata. "Forget it." Naruto exhaled deeply before putting her hands on her hips to stretch back a bit. "Ne, Hyuuga Ultimate Duo-san, what would you have me do going forward?" Naruto paused for a moment before unintentionally snorting again. She steadied herself to give her best gal pal, Hinata-chan, some gossip…

"Well, Hina, the bastard... Yeah, yeah, Hina-chan, I know you'd say I shouldn't call him that, but let's face it: Uchiha's a dick." She realized she was smiling a bit. "Gomen, Itachi-kun. Honestly, though: I know you talked to your brother when you got on the other side of Snake-san's technique, so you HAVE to know what a dumbass your brother is. Gomen, gomen." She knew that the two Uchihas each had incredibly extreme brother complexes, so for a moment she looked up to the sky and waited to see if lightning would strike her down.

"You all wouldn't believe it, or maybe you would. Uchiha-san has taken off on a journey of self-awakening or something. The Rokudaime even allowed it!" She laughed bitterly. "Don't even go there, Neji!" Naruto could just imagine him wanting to Juken her Genin teammate. He never did get over the fact that he'd stuck a Chidori through her chest. Neither have I, if I'm being honest about it...

Naruto held back angry tears, keeping her mask up in front of her dead friends.

"Fuck. Oi, I'll cuss when I want," Naruto paused as that ever-prescient pain continued to burn within her. "Not like you can stop me," she muttered. "Gomen." She took a minute to settle down a bit, not allowing herself to once again consider Itachi's enormous sacrifices again as she looked past his name for the moment.

"Anyway, everyone, Mom and Dad..." Naruto did her best to smile at them. "You wouldn't believe it." She once again let out a pained choke. "Not even you, Omoi-kun: ya 'worst-of-all-case-scenarios' goofball." He was so fun, and he shoulda made it out alive; he almost did. Naruto let her fingers run slowly from her parents' names on the first stone to another one there that had saved her before she breathed in deeply. "The newly appointed Rokudaime-sama:" she not-really joked, "he's doing pretty okay, Obito-bastard. What's the deal with you Uchihas anyway? If only your cousin, or whatever relation he is to you, had your personality..."

She really wasn't happy that Sasuke had left the village. Kakashi had spoken to her for a long time about what he was thinking in allowing his travels, but Sasuke had nearly killed her and was definitely still disturbed. Not to mention, he'd taken her arm off. He was always his favorite student. What might the Bastard do out there while he's walking around finding himself, though? What might people do to him? The Leaf might have formerly exonerated him, but other nations hadn't.

Crap. Is that what Kakashi's thinking?! Naruto took in a deep breath as she scowled before once again calming herself: that couldn't be true, could it? Surely not! She determinedly brushed off her thoughts revolving around Sasuke. Outside of his three immediate family members, no one here probably even wanted to hear her talk about him, let alone rant.

Staring at a particular name on the first stone, she considered the aforementioned Uchiha once again. Naruto might detest Obito's actions: there were so many horrible things he'd done, but she could never bring herself to hate the man himself. As always, she internally even praised Obito a bit for helping them end the Fourth Shinobi War that the idiot basically started along with that Ultimate Bastard: Madara.

Naruto had told Obito that she had forgiven him, plus promised the man that she wouldn't speak publicly of him favorably the same day he was turned to ash. Whether or not he was the man who had caused her to grow up parentless, Naruto would forever remember him most as the man who had saved them from that rabbit-eared alien-princess… Bitch. Naruto and her still-alive teammates, thanks to his sacrifice, would never have had a chance without him. That was a fact!

She once again breezed over Nohara Rin's name on the stone, and couldn't help but glare at it a bit, especially as she could sense that Rokudaime-sama was not nearby. She shook her head, knowing that Kakashi would be angry at her conclusions when she considered the girl that had thrown herself into his Chidori all those years ago...

"If it were me, I'd have killed myself, or would've somehow figured out a some other way than hurting him so badly, bitch…" Naruto muttered before shrinking into herself. "That wasn't fair to you - not even a little. Gomen." She took a deep breath and re-centered herself, aggravated that she was having a hard time with anger issues, no matter how normal Ino said it was. What do I know about their pain - about her fear - or what happened? The girl was barely even a teenager, she reminded herself guiltily.

Once again, she was disgusted with herself - just another lovely thing that Ino said was normal as she/pretty much everyone processed the hell they'd been through.

She knew that Kakashi adored Rin after her death! Maybe even before then. Rokudaime-sama, she reminded herself: if he knew, he would definitely not be happy with her mean thoughts regarding his Genin teammate. The last thing she ever wanted was to add to the Rokudaime's often-overwhelming grief.

No matter how many people told her that she was too paranoid, even for a shinobi, Naruto had never been one to apply their logic. There was a reason that she was known as the "Heroine of the Shinobi World," no matter how much that title embarrassed her. That paranoia was how she'd stayed alive.

One of Naru's clones dispelled within the main office of the Hokage Tower, of all places. Naruto's eyes widened in fear at what she saw. Taking on the senjutsu of one of the four clones that she always had on the mountain, Naruto pushed off in a fiery flash of gold before she had a chance to apologize for leaving her deceased comrades so quickly. She realized Kakashi had been on his way to the stones, too, as she flashed by him. In a final push, she made her way up and through the Hokage's office window.

She'd already seen through her clone's memories that her friends and fellow fools had covered the seal that she and the Rokudaime had been trying to decipher on and off for weeks. Someone had stupidly put a rug made of scrunched-up, rather ugly black leather carpet strips that the fashion-inept Kakashi had purchased on a mission a decade or two ago. Why did he even keep it?! It had been rolled up behind his couch in the office. Why the hell had her drunken friends grabbed it, then moronically chucked it on top of that seal?

Naruto arrived in the room and saw the modified Twister game she often played with her friends at her place. It was right on top of the carpet - which was on top of that infuriatingly complex seal - in front of the Hokage's desk, her friends giggling and in various positions on the enlarged Twister mat. Just before her drunken buddies fell at a bad turn of the game's wheel, Naruto threw herself under them, arms splayed wide. Feeling pain, both she and Kurama suddenly pushed out their chakra to lessen the blow to everyone.

Everything in front of her eyes turned from a whirling white with colors to just black. Her last thoughts were that at least she'd protected those precious to her. But the…

Naruto passed out cold after unintentionally dispelling an unbelievable amount of chakra.