DISCLAIMER: I own nothing from the Naruto universe but I do have an imagination of my own. PLEASE REVIEW! I will take advice on any relationships you'd like to eventually see, as well as suggestions from my readers on anything else while continuing the story. (I've found that people get really excited and passionate about their ships!)

Thinking

Emphasis

Biju, etc. speaking

Biju, etc. thinking

Meanwhile, in the Clan district…

The man-turned-boy was pretty sure that his new mother was talking about him not understanding them or speaking well, but what could he do? He was sure he was in Japan, though, although the people he'd come to know looked a little bit like… Nah, that's impossible.

But I didn't believe reincarnation was possible, either.

Still, he'd lose his shit if he really was in the Naruto world.

He was outside of the compound for the very first time, riding on top of his father's - his now father's - shoulders as he accompanied him to work for a bit until his mother would be available to pick him up later.

He could say honestly that he had come to really care about and even love his new parents. "Different" as they were, they focused so much of their available time and attention on him and were really serious in helping him develop his mind and body. After assisting and interacting with him so much, how could he not appreciate them?

And they were proud of him! That was something he never really felt from his previous parents' actions, and they certainly never said it - as much as he could recall now, anyway. Just like in his first life, he told himself that his natural - first life's - parents probably simply showed their love "differently" from most others, but there were still parts of his mind that strongly doubted that. He'd never really felt the same love from his original parents that he was now getting in spades, especially from his new mom. Kaa-chan, he smirked. Yeah, he could definitely live in this new reality, even though it sucked being three years old, going on four, he reminded himself sarcastically before rolling his eyes.

The language was coming to him more easily now, and the now-boy was confident that absolutely everyone around him was speaking Japanese. Immersion really does make a difference. It's not that he had been bad at languages in his first life per se, it's just that translating English to Japanese on the spot had been a real doozy. First life: glad I didn't reincarnate as a cow. Well, maybe that would've been somewhat alright in India. Was it India that saw cows as blessed or whatever? Geez, I'm a horrible person: I shoulda learned that shit a long time ago. Maybe I did and just can't remember now.

He blew that thought off, but still felt guilty about it.

Having taken Norwegian as a foreign language definitely didn't help him with Japanese.

"Look, son," His father pointed up, drawing the boy's attention as they came out of the trees. "That's the Hokage monument. The Hokage is our village leader. They…"

The man was interrupted when his son started yelling angrily, ranting about something in the nonsensical words he sometimes muttered and tried to jump off his shoulders. He nearly laughed as he quickly caught him. Gods, his little boy was losing his shit! The words coming out of his mouth made no sense to him, but it was hilarious how much it sounded like his son was on an expletive-filled rant! His child finally sagged in his arms, all tuckered out.

Rachel woke up in the hospital for what had to be at least the half-dozenth time. She once again had no idea what had happened to her. Surely she hadn't been attacked like that first time? No, why would anyone attack a mere child? She twisted her lips, remembering first-hand that there were definitely reasons for kidnapping and even torturing a child no matter who it was, or how young he or she was. Thank goodness she had no scars now to prove that: she had checked her skin many times.

In her first life, her mother had been in the FBI when she was young, and her father had been some kind of liaison as a then Captain in the Air Force. She didn't remember what the two had been working on together, as she was too young to understand it all back then. Her parents refused to speak about it later: it was obviously too painful for them, not to mention, probably classified.

She had been kidnapped and nearly taken out of the country by someone who had previously seemed so nice. Considering it, she scoffed out loud. The man had made her think that he had rescued her from the first group that held and starved her for days.

Her mother had entered the plane that she and the new "so nice" kidnapper were on, (he had told her that he was taking her back home.) It was the scariest thing she could remember in either of her lifetimes. Her mother had eventually been shot in the shoulder as others made themselves known, killing what she later learned was a terrorist. One of the agents spirited her away as she screamed for her mother.

Rachel remembered visiting her mother with her father at the hospital and had to be held back from clutching onto her like a lifeline. Her father had told her that things were going to change and they - well, they certainly did.

Mom retired from law enforcement to stay with her full-time and found Jesus, while Dad continued to rise in the ranks. Sadly, the war the U.S. was waging was not only in the Gulf, but nearly everywhere, so Rachel saw her father only intermittently after that. At least when she did see him, they had a good amount of time to themselves. They went fishing, hunted, and even spent time doing regular stuff like playing frisbee or bowling. His father thought his mother's views on religion were too extreme, and as Rachel grew, she completely agreed.

Dismissing her memories as best she could, Rachel wondered if once again, the old man in the hat who was like a mayor she guessed - the senior citizen now carrying her away from the hospital would take her to that ramen stand again. It never failed: leaving the hospital = ramen trip, or at least an effort to go to it. Also, "Hokage" = ramen. Idly, she wondered if in this life there were equations specifically dedicated to ramen. Snickering quietly, she was poked in the ribs.

"What are you thinking about Ru-chan?" the old monkey man asked, mirth in his eyes.

"I was just wondering if you were taking me to the stand today," Rachel responded. Ah, yes: "Ru-chan." What a weird name! Every time she heard it, she remembered delicious Cajun recipes. Bummer: I haven't had cajun or even cajun-fusion yet in this lifetime!

Oh, and by the way: straight out fuck everyone else in this hick-town! What was their problem with her?! Honestly, she was more than glad she lived in various houses, each of them in different places, but all somewhere in the middle of a deep forest, with a bunch of crazy masked people instead of them! Thank God she only saw these asshats when she was either in the hospital or with the village leader. They still sucked, even when she was with him.

She had much better hearing in this lifetime, so she heard the horrible words directed at her, a woman who was now a child... Even if the assholes were apparently whispering too low for the elderly "Hokage" to hear.

Rachel really didn't like ramen at first thought: she'd had a lifetime supply, thank you very much, of the instant variety. She'd been basically forced to eat it way too much in college because it was so cheap back when she tried to distance herself from her mother. That ended just before the end of her second year when her student loans were forgiven and she received a boatload of scholarships or whatever the hell they were when her dad's overseas status was finally taken into account by the financial aid department. She remembered being so relieved that she didn't need to keep working a full-time job in addition to being a full-time student.

"Ru-chan" had noticed that her memories were fading away as she grew, but she refused to let go of what she'd learned in college and as a business manager. More than anything, though, she didn't want to forget her parents. She'd totally made up with her super-religious, (but fortunately a little saner about it as time went by,) mother long ago, after all. Her dad? Well, he was awesome!

She'd already forgotten so much and felt horrible about it. Even Sean and her brother, Evan, were slipping away no matter how hard she tried, especially at night, to focus on her memories of them. Feeling the stress of it all, she inadvertently laid her head on the old man's shoulder, trying to not think too much about how she couldn't even remember her beloved, funny sister-in-law's name or face anymore.

The elderly man sat her on the stool she knew so well. The ramen stand owners were absolutely lovely, but today she'd try a different dish than the one the old man always ordered for her. "Do you have Wagyu, Teuchi-san?"

The middle-aged man's eyes brightened. "You can bet your orange on that, Ru-chan!"

Ah, yes, orange: fuck my life.

"Ichiraku's uses only the finest Wagyu found in the Elemental Countries!" He praised his beef, before moving on to the vegetables his family grew nearby as he winked at her. He was really too much and just delightful. His cute little daughter moved from what she supposed was a prep area.

"Ru-chan! So glad to see you!"

"Incredibly nice to see you, Ayame-san," Rachel beamed. Ayame reminded her a bit of her nephew, Sean, in some ways. Aside from the age and gender difference, the main bright and gregarious personality difference she had noticed thus far was that Ayame was actually polite without needing to be reminded to be.

"Just call me Ayame, Ru-chan. I don't really get into all those formalities," she said shyly.

"Are you sure?" the girl nodded, and Rachel smiled at her gratefully, before getting off her stool as gracefully as she could: it was awfully high compared to her currently short stature. She wiggled her fingers toward Ayame, silently asking her to follow her to a back booth. Ayame saw her father and Hokage-sama smile genuinely and nod at her as they quietly chatted, and all but skipped to the little blonde currently moving to sit in the last booth. She sat down and felt a little uncomfortable at the glint in the young girl's amazingly blue eyes.

"You know: you're so pretty Ayame-chan, but that's not what's most important," Ru began, not knowing that maybe even a fifth of her Japanese words were either mangled or wrong. The look on Ayame's face told her that she was definitely not expecting what she'd said. It was hard to stifle either a sigh at the young pre-teen or teen's reaction to a simple compliment. Still, the girl needed to hear this: she'd seen Ayame's frustration and kowtowing to rude and plainly sexist customers when she'd been here last. "I'm sure your father's already told you that, but you really are!"

"Ru-chaaan," Ayame whined, making the blonde smile even more while remembering a tad of her own past life. Ayame's reaction was just so similar to the friends she had as a preteen, no matter how sketchily she remembered them now.

"I'm SERIOUS, Ayame-chan! You're a lovely, kind person," she saw the girl blush and look down in embarrassment. "Don't deny it Ayame-chan: you have so many wonderful qualities that can take you so far in this life: you really have to live it to the fullest, just the way you want to! Own it. Be the wonderful person you are. NEVER let anyone disrespect you in any way, no matter what you do in life!"

Ayame's eyes widened: she'd never seen the little girl so passionate before, even if she could only guess the meaning of some of what she'd misstated. The little girl's vocabulary was just kawaii!

Rachel did not mean what she'd said as a diss at Ayame's profession at all, and Rachel hoped that she was voicing her feelings correctly, even though she didn't quite yet possess the Japanese vocabulary to say all she wanted to in the manner she deeply felt. Rachel had worked in the restaurant industry, in fact, for years before and during college. Restaurant workers, she felt, were an incredibly important part of the backbone of society.

As the small blonde continued, Ayame was a little shocked at what was obviously her encouragement, tearing up. "Hai! You, too, Ru-nee."

Rachel's eyebrows rose. She nodded sincerely and grinned so hard, her eyes nearly closed. "Hai - umm, nee-chan?" The blonde realized that it now felt more good than painful to be called someone's sister again. She sometimes felt like a few of the masked young women she lived with were something like really big sisters to her, but she'd never even seen their faces! She bit her lip and eventually winked a bit at the adolescent across from her. "So, Ayame-NEE!" The other girl giggled, so "Ru" continued. "Got your eyes on any boys?" Too fun!

Ayame's eyes went wide and a blush covered the top of her cheeks. Rachel smiled at her gently, watching as the older girl came to sit on her side of the booth.

"Well," Ayame whispered. Rachel learned about a boy a little older than Ayame that was "so sweet ..and I don't even mind his green jumpsuits!"

Rachel was actually pleased about that, considering what she was wearing. She had no idea why Hokage-sama forced her to wear the absolutely unconscionably blinding orange jumpsuits he presented her with every time she left the hospital. She could only be glad that the rest of her masked companions, er- her family of sorts, allowed her to wear dark clothes. There was always a cute red spiraling circle on all of her clothes, orange or not, but for some reason the design was comforting.

She also more than appreciated that her oddly assembled family of sorts enjoyed bonfires, where she and some of the others danced around the burning preposterous jumpsuits whenever she came home in the orange nightmare.

Rachel put her finger against her lip, shushing Ayame as she felt the Hokage approaching. She was still unsure how she always knew where people were, despite how silently many people like the old monkey mayor moved. The man said something silly and childish before picking Rachel up from the booth after Ayame exited toward the kitchen. He should really know better than to treat me like a toddler at this point. Rachel preferred independence, she always had.

Sitting on the barstool again, she ate the delicious noodles and vegetables - especially as it now had such tender beef in it. It was nothing like the instant ramen she'd had in college. "This is wonderful."

Hiruzen looked fondly at the little Uzumaki as she chatted eloquently, albeit a little oddly, with Teuchi, one of his very best non-shinobi inner-village intelligence sources. She'd obviously inherited not only her father's looks but also his intelligence. Yes, she'll make an amazing kunoichi. He really needed to update her godfather and get his "permission" on paper to enter her into the Academy early.