I do not own anything about Naruto except a pack of trading cards, and even then, I only own those cards not the designs or characters on them.
Chapter2
Naruto woke up on October the 11th and had to take a few moments to remember where he was and why exactly he was there. The Sarutobi compound hadn't had a chance to be rebuilt in the previous timeline. Though at least one Sarutobi had survived the war, and Konohamaru would certainly do his family proud, though Asuma's daughter Mirai wasn't really at an age to really know the significance of her last name being only over a month old and such when they had left.
Naruto missed some of the people he lost while going back, but to leave them all with their grief was such a terrible thing. The one thing more terrible to have lost then their loved ones was to lose their hope. When they had finally won against Madara, Zetsu, and his resurrected minions they didn't celebrate the simply cried. It was not joy but simply relief that it was finally over.
Naruto was dropped off at the orphanage shortly after breakfast and decided to start the day in the mess hall anyway. After all, just because he'd already eaten didn't mean he couldn't still just sit and talk. In many ways it was better, he had things to discuss with his friends, and comrades after all.
Naruto decided that he wanted to talk to lee, about anything that may have happened while he was gone. Naruto dressed in his new outfit, of orange shorts and a white and orange shirt. He stepped into the cafeteria or mess hall to meet a pleasant surprise, Tenten was there. He grinned "hey Lee who's this she looks sharp." It was his way to give anyone watching proof that they just met but he couldn't resist a vague reference to the affinity to weapons.
Naruto caught the smallest hints of an eye roll, as she looked towards him. "Hi, I'm Tenten I'm going to be adopted soon." Which was true she mentioned it a few times that she was adopted a short time after turning four. "I'm Naruto nice to meet you." Speaking lower the three of them subtly discussed what has been happening. Though Lee didn't go to the park but Tenten did she met Ino who assured her that Choji and Shikamaru had arrived safe. Sasuke was fine. Neji was there as well with news of Hinata.
That was confirmation of at least nine of the group which was more than half if the jutsu had malfunction it would have done it at the halfway mark. They should be all there. Relieve with the news Naruto sighed and he felt a huge weight fall from his shoulders. "…they all probably made it back." The jutsu could only after all be done once if they failed again there would be not redo this was a wonderful start though. Before Naruto could leave the table, Lee perked up. "Oh, by the way happy birthday from me and Tenten." The each pulled a tiny box out.
Naruto looked at the packages they were plain and obviously something they found, he smiled and opened the clumsily resealed soap packages there were two practice kunai and five practice shuriken's. Naruto grinned. "we don't have allowance at this time, but we found some that the older students discarded now we can get back in shape skill wise." Tenten stated nervously before Naruto interrupted.
"This is perfect you guys it's just what we need I hope you kept some for yourself." They nodded and noticed others were coming in. Naruto having finished hi glass of water and stood up. See you later guys. 'though I don't think people would like to know a toddler has even practice weapons we do need to start practicing. We need to find a place to start practicing as well as a few excuses for doing so.' Naruto rubbed his chin thoughtfully.
Naruto turned back to Tenten and Lee. "hey guys I think we should head to the park today I want to talk to some of the others if we can find them." They agreed immediately, since it was Saturday; and the park was being consistently supervised by an ANBU or two. They would be fine, and it was loud enough most of the time to ignore a few toddlers talking; The other two finished eating and left soon afterwards.
The park was sandy, and dusty as ever; Naruto immediately headed to the tower to see if he could see anyone, he climbed up the steps that led to the slide. He let the other kids go past as he looked out, He didn't recognize the kids on the swings except maybe a purple haired girl he thinks he went to school with. 'What was her name? Ami? Ameki? Something like that.'
He turned his attention to the merry go round, and saw a small boy playing not on it but near it. That caught his attention, he didn't recognize Shino immediately because so much more of his face was visible but there were still the glasses. The brown hair was as spiky as ever but quite a bit shorter. Shino however didn't look like he intended to move soon so he decided to see if he could spot anyone else.
The slide and sandpit where empty, he was about to step down before he saw two shapes approaching. Naruto almost jumped out of his skin, was that an adult Shikamaru? The face came closer and he relaxed it was just Shikaku. He forgot sometimes how much like his dad Shikamaru was if it weren't for the scars he would still be confused. though older Shikamaru had a few scars of his own; they were however in different places. Naruto saw Tenten coming closer having found Kiba.
Naruto sighed 'well I guess now's as good as time as any.' He saw Lee approach Shino. 'I guess that's taken care of.' and he moved somewhere he thought Shikamaru might see him before going to the sandbox, the others met him there.
They made a few gestures referencing old wounds the would now never gain. After all identities were confirmed, Naruto spoke first. "hi how are you guys doing?" Shikamaru laid down "troublesome." Shino took over. "I am doing as well as can be expected though I must enquire as to how the others are as I've yet to see them." Kiba practically jumped into the conversation. "so yeah Akamaru isn't even weaned yet so he can't be here but what going down?" Naruto explained the situation so far.
"We've seemed to have all, including Konohamaru, made it back from what we know; but we haven't been able to contact Sakura yet, does anyone have any information on her at this point?" Most of the group shook their head. Kiba spoke up, "I saw her at the festival briefly though we didn't talk, I'm pretty sure it's the old Sakura." He finished talking while swirling some sand around his fingers. Naruto tilted his head." Do you know it was her?" Kiba grinned. "Yeah I'm pretty sure when she saw me made a motion with her hand of pulling one half of her face back. I'm pretty that she was trying to reference her old injury."
Naruto nodded and at least one of the others winced, I see that would make sense; Did you signal back so she would know that you also made it back?"" Of course, I did I made two slashing motions across my stomach from the stomach wound Madara inflicted right before he was killed by the rabbit goddess chick." Kiba shrugged. "she was the one that healed it after all." Naruto grinned and smiled. "That's great. The only ones whom we are not entirely sure of are the sand siblings who don't happen to live here."
Naruto decided to get back onto a more important subject, I had hoped we would arrive later, so we could at least have an excuse of reading about something to explain knowledge. Unfortunately, life its seems is still not fair, we have ended up at an age where kids our age should be happy that they don't wet the bed regularly. We aren't supposed to do some of the simplest things people learn. If we start immediately doing things. There will be chaos and, we won't be able to explain it away.
"So, basically, we aren't even supposed to be able to read yet, but I can't stand the thought of waiting around for us to get bigger we need to be progressive, now who here is actually supposed to be able to be learning how to read?" Tenten and Lee responded that they were learning that now in pre-school, they said as they pushed around lumps of sand. The others just shook their heads and answered for the ones who weren't there. Naruto spoke again. "well we each need to find some excuse to explain either how we know or get someone to teach us, and we also need some way of explaining any other training methods; they cannot be personalized."
Naruto interrupted lee as he tried to protest. "I know Iron Fist style is great but only Gai as supposed to know that certain style. Weapon are limited so we need a way to either get more and distribute them or rotate them. We can't use chakra yet, but we can hone everything else. Oh, and before I forget." Naruto explained his theory about sensing chakra. which they discussed for a time. Before they knew it was time for lunch.
Tenten spoke next. "Honestly I'm happy enough that I don't constantly spill when I try to drink from one of the larger drinking glasses. I think we should spend most of this time just figuring out how to use our bodies. We are still toddlers with no real chance of true coordination but if I can help it we will be the most coordinated group of toddlers there is." Naruto laughed but agreed. "we should all be pretty well coordinated by the time we are five or so, that's the age when Kakashi became a gennin. Though I'm pretty sure that we won't be allowed to graduate that fast we should still keep an eye on things." That got a general murmur of agreement before Naruto remembered. "oh and Konohamaru is back too."
Naruto and the others made their goodbyes before departing. They after all couldn't spend all day at the park, though the active childish part of him really wanted to. After all, inheriting his memories meant he had his personality as well. Naruto continues trudging back, being a kid was great but being a jinchurriki still sucked sometimes. Another villager glared as they saw him.
Naruto returned to his room after lunch and decided to do some more coloring, he tried to draw Gama Chan and then he drew Inu. The drawings weren't the best, but you could at least tell what they were he had drawn a few letters before, but he didn't want people to know he knew things he shouldn't. Considering he was in the body of a toddler that was almost everything, so he just drew.
Naruto planned to fix his nonexistent reading problem as soon as possible, since Lee and Tenten were learning maybe he could ask him to pretend to tutor him. He could also as the Hokage when someone could teach him how to read, usually if it's easy to grant Hiruzen will let you try. That ways if you fail you at least learn a valuable lesson, after all these years he was still a teacher at heart. Naruto Laid down that night with one major thought on his mind. 'we actually did it were going to save them. We are going to save everyone and anyone we can. He drifted off to sleep with a soft smile on his face.
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The next day Naruto headed to the mess hall as usual Lee however must have been up doing something last night, because by the time he finally got their breakfast was already halfway over. What caught Naruto's attention however were the few glares Lee received. The other kids were now mentally associating Lee with Naruto, he decides that this might not be a good thing. Lee was an outcast already but the more he became an outcast the harder his life would be. Mostly because the supposed grownups might sabotage either Lee for associating with himself, or Naruto for influencing some of the other children to the dark side.
Naruto mentally snorted 'They think I'm the dark side now, but in a few years, I will be saving your butts; it doesn't matter how smart you are, the more people in a hoard the less brain cells are invited to join.' Naruto stopped to think about that as he made small talk with Lee, and discreetly found out that Lee spent the night before trying to relearn how to juggle. Surprisingly juggling was actually very useful skill, after all it made your hand eye coordination skyrocket; plus, a surprising amount of missions involved dressing as some type of entertainer. Naruto made a mental reminder to learn how to juggle as well that as well. Though by the bruise on Lees head he should probably start with something fairly harmless, maybe a few handkerchiefs or something.
Naruto said his goodbyes to Lee, as Tenten was in her usual spot watching what was going on; she was good at scouting and keeping watch. This was mostly because Tenten liked people watching and trying to predict what people were going to do next. She also probably knew that, being associated with Naruto too much would be bad for her reputation as a good girl; the matron might interfere with her adoption. Though as far as anyone knew Tenten's parents didn't give a darn about what Naruto had in his stomach. The same couldn't be said about the matrons of the orphanage.
Granted they weren't actually bad people on the contrary they loved children but most of them were there when the Kyuubi was manipulated to attack and the orphanage had sustained heavy damage. One of the matrons had died and another crippled. They were all terrified and fear doesn't die easily. In the end Naruto was able to do what he did best, which was to empathize with people in sad situations. Though they tended to avoid him as much as they could they still did their job and took care of him.
Naruto spends the rest of his afternoon watching the academy students, they're not very good to say the least but he must find some way to explain how he seems to know some of these things. After all no matter how much of a prodigy he is going to pretend to be even the prodigies need to get their information of how to do things from somewhere. Naruto sighs in relief as he feels the ANBU, they apparently don't find anything wrong with watching.
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Later that afternoon Naruto decided to play with the building blocks in his room, and tried to place each block on the next with one move it went horribly. They were all crooked, and he was happy enough if he got eight high; without either having to straighten out the blocks, or having them fall over. Naruto giggled this was ridiculous no wonder kids found this so funny. They were probably laughing at themselves. Naruto changed tactics and began making a pyramid maybe then he could actually get it to bet taller than he was though looking at himself taller than him wasn't that much of an accomplishment.
Eventually the toddler tiredness kicked in Naruto frowned as he tried to place the Next block on top of the rather sizeable pyramid of blocks that was shoulder high before sitting down he was not done but he didn't want to continue. Naruto blinked tiredly what was he doing again. Naruto tried to stand up and was surprised by how the world tilted before her felt something grab him. Naruto blinked up looks like it's Kakashi's shift again Naruto stayed awake long enough to feel the blankets of his bed being brought up to his chin before going dead to the world.