DISCLAIMER: I don't own anything from the Naruto universe.
Thinking (+ flashbacks, "Naruto speaking to Kurama in her mindscape," etc.)
Emphasis
Bijuu, etc. speaking
Bijuu, etc. thinking
A/N: Sorry it's been a while.
Now, what do you get when you repetitively Mind Walk someone, genjutsu her on top of it, then realize that you can't even drug her to get the answers you're looking for? Well, let's see!
.
Naruto frowned at Young Inoichi, Old Inoichi-but-not-Inoichi, and tried to smile at the younger Third Hokage. She wished that Jiraiya was here but at least Danzo wasn't. The old lady who let her in the office shut the door behind her. "Hokage-sama?" Naru asked, figuring that being polite was probably the best (and new) way to go here. "I was told you wanted to see me?"
"Yes, I did, Naruto-chan. Won't you have a seat? Would you like a piece of candy?"
Naruto didn't think the little discs on the plate he held out looked particularly appetizing but she did like to fill her stomach as often and as much as possible. –Her stomach was really hurting! Now that she thought about it, she didn't remember the last time she'd eaten at all. "Is it poisoned?"
Hiruzen held back a surprised snort. "No, my child, it is not." He smiled more genuinely at the girl when her eyebrows raised and she looked at him so fondly. And then sadly. He gestured for her to sit down at the third chair in front of his desk. "Do you remember Yamanaka Inojin and Yamanaka Inoichi?"
Naruto frowned at the two blondes. "I don't think we've been properly introduced." Each man corrected that, acting all appropriately affectionate to a child, she supposed, and Naruto twisted her lips, trying to figure out what their game was even as she nodded at them in acknowledgment and respect.
"What's up?" she asked. The oldest blonde of the three of them leaned forward. Naruto leaned away from him even more than he had moved - with big, wary eyes.
"Naruto-chan, do you remember what my son and I visited within your memories?"
Naruto popped one of those discs in her mouth, wishing that she hadn't. She'd been right: these were old people candies - or ones designed for smokers to counteract the tar and tobacco stuff. Something like that. "No." She looked back and forth between all three of them because that seemed to make the Yamanakas excited which probably wasn't a good thing. "Rude. –Is that bad?"
Shit, she had a LOT to hide: of course, it was bad!
"Tell me Naruto, have you ever heard of visions? –And would you like to spit that out?"
Naruto nodded at the Hokage's question and seeing that he had that spitoon of his, used a little wind chakra to shoot the disgusting piece right into it. Just like the Jiji she used to know, Sarutobi Hiruzen tried not to laugh. Both of the Yamanakas looked a little disgusted. Naruto only half-shrugged. "Did you say visions? Like ones those fake fortune tellers talk about?"
"Something like that," the older Yamanaka said with too large a smile.
Hiruzen walked around to sit on his desk. "Do you have visions, Naruto-chan?"
Naruto blinked at him several times before obviously (and repeatedly) trying to dispel a genjutsu. She did not appreciate the way that the Hokage chuckled at that. "No."
Her chakra didn't feel right. Huh. She blinked several times and found herself relaxing. Her stomach had been hurting with the stress of everything that had happened so it wasn't unappreciated.
The older Yamanaka cleared his throat. "Perhaps you have dreams?" He saw the girl very slightly stiffen.
"Everyone has dreams," she said in a quieter voice.
"What are your dreams about, Naruto-chan?"
You have got to be shitting me. She looked into her mindscape for a second, noticing the way that Kurama was just curled up but with his head tilted almost cutely - clearly paying attention - and sagged. "I dream about bad stuff." The way they all looked at one another made her twist up her lips. "Happy?" They seemed happy about that - or even eager. How uncool was that?!
- Very uncool is what they were being.
"Of course not," real Inoichi exclaimed before nonverbally signaling something to his father. "Hey, Naruto-chan. Did you know that I'm friends with your big brother, Minato-kun?"
Naruto crossed her leg and began slowly bouncing her foot at first, unknowingly glaring something fierce. "You're trying to manipulate me." And sucks for you, because if you're one of my father's friends, where the hell were you when I was being abused for something beyond my control when your daughter was my longtime classmate?! She let out a sad whine as Inoichi tried to explain that he didn't mean to manipulate her. That was a lie, and they both knew it.
But because she was a jinchuuriki and the world had been a madhouse, she'd gotten this future man killed. And he was Ino's father. And Shikamaru's uncle! She whimpered, hating she was a little kid, dealing with little kid emotions when she was already an emotional person as an adult. - Or she used to be, as close to being a real adult as she had ever been. She rubbed her eyes furiously and tried to remain strong and not sniffle. "Sorry."
"That's alright," Inoichi said kindly. "Anyway, Minato-kun and I were classmates at the Academy - but he graduated early. Your clansman, Kushina-chan, was also my classmate!"
Naru gave him a deadpan look. "Dude, you are making things so much worse on yourself." My mother was also your friend? And you admit it?!
You son of a bitch!
She cleared her throat and tried to smile a little, admitting defeat when she figured that she probably, instead, looked terribly constipated or frightening. –That's what she usually looked like when she tried so hard to fake it, anyway.
She was seriously stressed out here!
She took a deep breath and blew it out quickly to calm herself.
Her stomach still felt queasy. In fact, she was unusually jittery.
"Why is Inoichi-kun making things worse for himself, Naru-chan?" Hiruzen asked. Naruto shrugged and wiped her eyes with her little fists again. "It would be better for all of us if you told us the truth about your dreams, Naruto-chan."
Naruto pulled her knees up and hugged them since they were making her so uncomfortable and her stomach hurt so badly. Her voice was soft. "I don't know about that." She found it hard to look at any of them. You're all dead - along with everyone else because I didn't fight my way out of that sealing circle powered by ghosts. How the heck could I fight ghosts, though?
How does one fight a group of foreign Kages' leftover chakra imprints?
"Please, Naruto," Hiruzen said, blowing off formality and even taking his almost ever-present hat off. "We've already seen some of what you've been experiencing, my child."
"My child, huh?" Naruto muttered to herself. He used to call her that back in the day. Maybe he'd attached a weird technique to those words this time because Naruto's mouth started moving on its own. "I dream almost every night of unimaginable destruction. –A war to end all wars, one which was fought in a grand alliance between shinobi nations and won - only to be lost because the shinobi I thought was my best friend or RIVAL, at least, couldn't stand being wrong - or being alone after he wasn't." Her heart started to pound; her blood was racing in her ears.
Kurama, she bet, smacked himself in the face because Naruto could HEAR it without looking at him.
"Is this… one of your friends from the Academy?"
"No," Naruto cried, a little outraged. "Oh, there is this one guy that… Never mind." Yeah, Obito hadn't done anything YET. Nor would she allow him to act as he had in her past.
Child of Prophecy and bringer of worldwide peace or not, Naruto would kill him before he did. She shuddered at that thought and looked down at the fingers she was tugging on: her own. It was hard to reconcile the Obito she knew from the Academy with the maniac known either as Tobi, Madara, or eventually Obito - depending on his mood.
She huffed as she recalled the way Kakashi had just… broken when Obito's mask came off. He didn't deserve that.
None of us deserved what Obito did to us.
"What were you going to say, Naruto-chan?" Ino's teenage future father asked quietly.
Inside her head, an even chibier-version of Naruto snapped her fingers: I know! She felt STRANGELY giddy! Her heart was even racing! Naru sat up on the end of the chair her short legs were kicking and became still as she began to whisper. "I see a man with a scar on his chin - like an X. He'll lead to the destruction of much that we hold dear."
The silence following that statement lasted an awfully long time. Kurama might have said something but Naru was paying more attention to those with her. She was feeling so emboldened, it was as if she were in her own world.
"I… think that might be enough," Hiruzen began to say but Naruto was just getting started. Especially since Jiraiya was now downstairs. She'd better make this quick!
She spoke as fast as she could. "He's wrapped in bandages and has red eyes like some of the KMP have: they fill his fake arm. He stole his arm from the First, I think, or he took DNA from him via a snake. His disgusting arm was filled with Sharingans! He steals children from orphanages and then pits them against each other, forcing them to kill one another. He seals their tongues so no one will know but EVERYBODY knows, just no one fucking does anything about it!"
All three men looked horrified. But Jiji also looks nervous.
There had also been some KI thrown out there - and it wasn't being directed at her.
Naruto began to shudder in her chair as she realized, once again, that she was alone. "Madara Uchiha is still alive and I'm not strong enough to fight him again yet. He's hooked into some kind of statue. He's gonna take a bunch of the tailed beasts, combine them, and use them against us all." Realizing that she was clutching her seal, she rubbed it as if she had a stomach ache: which she did, and it was back with a vengeance. –She hoped that she'd played the gesture off well enough.
Wait: wasn't she alone just a second ago?
"What the fuck is going on in here?" Jiraiya bellowed as he threw open the door.
Naruto blinked up in a start, looking way too innocent. She tried not to wince but felt really funny. Fuck! What had she done?
Naruto was also wondering at that moment why people didn't seal their rooms effectively.
Goddamn, she'd fucked up.
"Hokage-Jiji was asking what I dreamt about." She did dream about that shit. Every goddamn night.
Like she guessed Kurama had before, Jiraiya slapped himself in his "oil" hitai-ate before going off on the three men for taking/requesting her presence. –Not that he had much say in that, considering that she was a Genin. Naruto ran behind the back couch and hid, also hiding her almost manic laughter. Yep: she'd definitely lost her mind. She heard Danzo come in as plain as day and waited, crouched near the floor until he eventually left.
She tried not to vomit or make a sound.
As always, he was arguing with the Hokage, demanding information about something she didn't understand and sneering at everyone. –She could hear it in his disgusting voice. She popped her head out again above her hiding place.
"See. Nobody does nothing about him," she said succinctly.
"Let's go, Naruto."
"Okay. See ya, Jiji. See ya, blonde dudes!" Throwing a wave behind her, she studied the huge bite mark on her hand that still hadn't healed, although it didn't really hurt anymore. It was numb, oddly enough. She felt numb. The teeth prints were still red. She began fisting that hand, once Jiraiya had slung her on his back. It throbbed, just like her head. "I hope I didn't just fuck everything up."
"As soon as we're home, you're going to EXplAiN, Naruto!"
"Are you going to listen now?"
Naruto jumped with the surge of his chakra: the jig was up. Kurama would've done it before but the old monkey had seen it when the brat had channeled her own/THEIR own chakra. Sarutobi Hiruzen's extremely low-level but eventually multi-layered genjutsus combined with the Yamanaka techniques, Kurama figured, had fooled even him earlier.
Normally, there was ill intent associated with illusions; in this one, there was no KI or anything close to it. It was only when something shifted that he'd looked up to see what was going on. Yeah. Try to tell Naruto that.
The Hokage and she were still alone in his office, and he'd raised her top up. She pulled it back down and jumped away from him, snarling like a little animal. "How long?! How long was I in a genjutsu?!"
"For only a few minutes," Hiruzen said, going back to sit down behind his desk. "Let's talk about who you really are - and how you became a jinchuuriki, hm?" If you are who I think you are, you must be a very important person to what?
To have been sent back to the past, Naruto-chan? You must have been someone very important. He laughed at himself: what a ludicrous idea.
Or was it?
Or are you really so mentally unstable, Naruto, that you believe you once fought Uchiha Madara?
Madara's dead.
The girl looked so much like Minato and Kushina that The Ludicrous was, in fact, his first thought when Sakumo brought him his opinion: that Jiraiya had brought another jinchuuriki into Konoha and called her his daughter. –A girl that for a moment, he thought might be two of his other, YOUNG Jonins' child.
- Jiraiya would not have done something like bring an unknown jinchuuriki to Konoha
- If ANY of his students were loyal to Konoha and absolutely steady, no matter what, it was Jiraiya
- Wasn't that something to finally realize?
- I need to look into Orochimaru's "studies"
Hiruzen had also been around more than one tailed beast. He KNEW that their enormous, malevolent chakra signatures were different. So if Sakumo sensed the Kyuubi's chakra, and I was there, watching as Mito-sama transferred the Kyuubi's chakra into Uzumaki Kushina, it only made sense, didn't it?
Naruto sat back down, knowing that they were alone, and sighed, trying not to cry. She looked up and saw Jiraiya who was looking at her oddly. "Eh- Ero-sennin. What? - Goddammit. I think those Yamanakas fucked up my head!"
They were at their new house! She wasn't in the Tower at all!
"Language, Naruto. Now what are you talking about?" he asked. Jiraiya pushed chakra into her but Naruto didn't feel any different, although the bite mark on her hand REALLY started to hurt. And her stomach was killing her again!
"I think Jiji - er, Hokage-sama knows, Ero-otou. I think he knows… Maybe the Yamanakas do, too. I - I believe I got Mind Walked: yeah, I'm pretty sure I did. And I think Hokage-sama genjutsu-ed me." Jiraiya only seemed irritated, maybe. God knows that he was up to his eyeballs or past them to protect everyone. "I'm sorry."
I… I need to find sensei.
.
Kakashi finished reading the storybook his father had given him, more concerned with what in the world was on his father's mind than he was with the two fairy tales he'd just read.
"You finished?" Sakumo asked. Kakashi nodded, his slim, little eyebrows pinched. "What did you think of it?"
"Maa, what did YOU think?" He didn't appreciate it when his father snorted and leaned back so lazily against the couch. "Why did you have me read a baby book?"
Sakumo arched a brow at him as he got up to make them dinner. "Just because it's written for children doesn't mean it's not real," he said easily enough.
Kakashi thought about that. He'd heard of the tailed beasts, of course, and had a strong feeling that Kushina-nee had one or was associated with one somehow. "Jin- Jinchuurikis."
Sakumo's silver eyebrows climbed under his shaggy hair before pinching. "You've heard of them, huh?" Why am I not surprised?
"Maa, I thought human sacrifices were people that were sacrificed to gods or fake gods in some kind of ceremony or something. I'm pretty sure you're not planning to sacrifice Kushina-nee, right?"
Sakumo wiped his hand over his mouth and jaw. His son was very smart but, thankfully, still a child at the end of the day. "You're getting into the territory of S-ranked secrets there, Kashi-chan." His lips twitched at the way his son scowled at him. "Kakashi-kun."
"Better."
"Mhm."
"So why have me read it if you're unwilling to discuss it?"
Sakumo groaned. God, when did Kakashi get so grown up and WHY does he have to be so smart? Oh, right: Kakashi wasn't even two, but going on 16, when he finally began speaking in full, complete sentences.
And Sakumo was being a manipulative shinobi bastard by giving Kashi something to consider if he was still forced to deal with his temporary teammate.
Surely Hokage-sama will find a solution to this.
.
Naruto approached the barbecue joint reluctantly, hiding behind it and hoping that after everything that happened earlier today, this was real. Yakiniku-Q looked different from how Naruto remembered it and it smelled… weird. Again, after everything that happened today - or in my life, for fuck's sake…
"Kurama, are we okay?" She jumped when she saw her target materialize out of a shadow, not having expected that at all!
Shikaku leaned back his head, groaning, as h stared into the sky. When he looked at her again, Naruto thought he looked even more like Shikamaru somehow. Like Shikamaru when he knows I need him. "Shikaku-sensei," she begged moments later.
"What's going on, kid?"
"Can we go somewhere safe?"
Shikaku sighed and raised a single eyebrow at her, observing the student he pawned off as much as possible, and felt his future stress-level shoot through the roof. "Sure."
Once back at his house, Naruto - his little student (the one he never wanted) dipped into a deep bow and stayed in that position as she began to speak. "Shikaku-sama. I need your discretion and advice. The entire future depends on it."
"Naruto, we have a problem."
Her head now pressed to a concrete floor, Naruto squinted her eyes shut, furious with whatever the fuck they'd done to her.
"You're being drugged."
Naruto collapsed at feeling foreign chakra and fingers shoved into her gut. She started to panic: she couldn't feel or sense Kurama. Naru jumped and felt a hand on her shoulder. She began hyperventilating, seeing trees over her and… "Shikamaru?"
"Bad dream?" he asked while carting his fingers through her hair.
Naruto knew that she couldn't really be resting her head on Shikamaru's lap, in what was obviously his clan compound - the one she'd thought she'd been in with his dead, teenage father. She began chuckling a little hysterically. "Gosh, do I wish this was real."
"What do you mean?"
Naruto didn't respond, knowing this wasn't real. It was too good to be real!
"Troublesome blonde. This is real and you're not alone. You're certainly not the only one who's experiencing nightmares after the Infinite Tsukiyomi."
Naruto couldn't help but softly smile at him, taking in his handsome features. –And just everything about him, really. "I'm so sorry, Shika. I left you there!" Her eyes welled up with tears that she didn't bother to hide from him. "I didn't mean to! You were right about Sasuke! And… And… Shika?"
He was gone! –Fuck! She was finally coming out of it?
"Naruto."
"Mom?"
"C'mon, Naruto," Jiraiya hissed. "Don't you dare give up! …Tsunade, please."
"Her chakra," Tsunade gritted out between clenched teeth as she did chest compressions on the little girl. "How am I supposed to do ANYTHING after all the damage you've done to her?!"
Kushina, unable to stand it any longer, channeled chakra to her fingertips behind her back and sunshinned next to her cousins. "Kaifū suru," she shouted as she unsealed the shitty damage her village leader or one of these morons had done to Naruto's seal.
Kushina had no idea how Naruto had been made into a jinchuuriki but she was not letting her die because of it! Now she knew how Naruto knew that she had an "other chakra" as the little blonde put it. Mito-sama said that jinchuurikis were drawn together - or that perhaps their tailed beasts were.
"Suck it, 'ttebane!' She smiled a very feral grin as she was tackled by the Hokage's guards because Naruto had finally taken a ragged breath and for a split-second, was on her feet before collapsing.
Naruto might be back in the living but she thought she was having a Chidori pushed through her chest - the lightning passing through all of her coils. She felt like she was on fire!
And as she fell, Tsunade caught her as Jiraiya broke out of his binds.
Jiraiya was in Sage mode. His kid had been right; he needed to work at becoming a perfect sage because it had taken him entirely too long to break free.
"Wh-at. Di'. You. Do. To me?" Naruto tried to ask in a pained whisper before spewing vomit. She had no strength and was in so much fucking pain! If she'd had any strength, she would've aimed it at these T&I fuckers! She shivered and tried to move with purpose as she continued to violently shudder.
Tsunade quickly laid the girl back down and wiped off her face, feeling no humor at the way the brat tried to swat at her as she applied suction (or something: Naruto wasn't sure what it was) into her mouth. "I broke your sternum, kid. You need to stay still!"
WHY? Naruto wondered as everything got darker and darker.
"You've been drugged." The kid's eyes went wide as Kushina's chains flew out, hurling those who had subdued her nearly into them. "Shut up, kid; let me work."
Naruto couldn't do anything to help her mother and thankfully, her mother didn't look worried about those that had been on top of her(?) in the slightest - even as they scolded her. The little blonde passed out again, wondering what had happened: what had been real - if anything - and what hadn't. "Kurama?"
Kurama let out a sigh of relief. "Baka. Welcome back to the world of the living, Naruto." To think that I have Kushina of all people for saving your life.
Having realized something frightening after touching Naru's seal, Kushina stilled in her movements as she stared with teary lavender eyes - her red eyebrows furrowed in enormous concern - at her little student who'd almost DIED.
Why is Minato-baka's chakra in her seal?!
What did he do?!