Hark the herald muses sing, waiting for nothing, not rain, not sleet and sure as hell not trig homework.

I'm posting this chapter in honor of the American debut of Naruto. Here's to the hope that it doesn't suck.

BTW: I need the fallowing phrases translated (since I can't find a reliable translator online) Fire's Shadow (title), and Duel Fist (taijutsu style).

Disclaimer No Jutsu: I really shouldn't have to repeat this any more. I don't own it, never have, never will.

Awakenings and Explanations

1-2-3

Tsunade, 5th Hokage of Konoha was having a very bad day. No, make that a very bad week. "No," Tsunade thought ruefully, "It's worse than that." Ever since she had let Naruto talk her into returning and taking the position of Hokage, her life had been a living hell, and the events of the last 72 hours were just the tip of the iceberg.

As Tsunade mused over just how horrible her job was, the door opened and her assistant Shizune stepped through carrying a tray. Tsunade let a huge sigh escape her lips as she viewed the tea set atop the tray. Three days ago, upon seeing the unconscious form of Hinata Hyuga, Shizune had made the decision that until Tsunade got the full story from Naruto, Tsunade would be denied all manner of alcohol. This came from the fact that Tsunade went through three stages when drunk - talkative, violent, and asleep - and since Tsunade didn't want Hiashi Hyuga to find out about his daughter yet, the talkative part was very bad.

Looking pleadingly into Shizune's smiling face, Tsunade asked the same question she had asked since Shizune had put a stopper on Tsunade's drinking, "Please, Shizune-sama, just one bottle of sake?"

To this Shizune replied simply, "Soon Hokage-sama." Setting down the tray she elaborated, "Naruto Uzumaki and Hinata Hyuga woke up a few minutes ago."

A moment passed as Tsunade processed what she had just been told, then she was up and at the door in the blink of an eye. She turned briefly to Shizune as she opened the door, "I going to see them now." Closing the door, behind her she sprinted across Konoha with every intention of murdering the young shinobi who had made her life hell.

1-2-3

Naruto was the first to awaken. Feeling the sun on his face, he stirred slowly, blinking as he sat up. Looking around he recognized the cold sterile walls of a hospital bedroom. After a second, the memories of his fight with Sasuke and Hinata's injury came rushing back to him. As his thoughts drifted over his decision to save Hinata he wondered were she was. Suddenly he felt a tugging sensation in the back of his mind. Turning, he saw Hinata lying in the bed next to him. After a moment he felt another faint tugging, different then the first. This one seemed to originate from the seal on his stomach.

Naruto stared as a small patch of air shimmered over Hinata's chest. The shimmer quickly took on a red hue and folded into the shape of a fox. A few seconds later the fox shaped aura became solid and Naruto found himself facing a small fox sitting protectively atop Hinata. For nearly a minute they stared at each other before Naruto noticed the fox's unusually bushy tail. Upon closer inspection, Naruto saw that it was not one, but nine distinct tails. Looking the fox straight in its familiar eyes, he asked aloud, "Kyuubi?"

Naruto watched a smile touch Kyuubi's eyes briefly before he answered. "Yes Kit, it's me."

Naruto fought back laughter as he looked at the chibi demon. "That's your body?"

Kyuubi scowled at Naruto as he replied, "This is the best I could manage under the circumstances." Naruto continued to chuckle under his breath as Kyuubi went on, unruffled. "We have more important matters to deal with, Kit." He said gesturing to Hinata's sleeping form with his tails. "You have to explain to her what happened, before you let anyone else know. She has to understand what she's gotten herself into."

"But she's asleep." Naruto countered, not wanting to have to tell Hinata that, because of him, she now bore a curse. Standing up he moved further from Hinata's bed, and Kyuubi's scrutinizing gaze.

"I understand your feelings Kit." Kyuubi said sounding as if he really did understand, "but she has to find out sooner or later, and better it came from you than anyone else." With that he channeled a small bit of chakra into Hinata's mind, drawing her from the dream that she was in. Then he disappeared back into Naruto.

Slowly Hinata's eyes opened and she sat up. Glancing around the room her eyes settled on Naruto standing, shirtless, nearby. Quickly she dropped her eyes to the ground as crimson crept into her cheeks. Then something flitted across her mind, a shadow of a shadow of a memory. She reached out for it and quickly found herself buried under a torrent of memories. The Valley of the End came rushing back to her; Sasuke and Naruto looking like demons as they fought, their clashing attacks, Sasuke preparing to finish it, and then…then Naruto's face as he watched her take a fatal strike for him.

She looked up, fear filling her eyes and fright turning her face white. Finding his eyes, she found the truth written clearly in those no longer sparkling blue pools. "N-naruto-kun, what happened?" she asked in hardly a whisper.

Pain greater than anything Hinata had ever seen filled his eyes as he let his gaze drop to the floor as he moved to sit on his bed. "I'm so sorry Hinata." He whispered to himself before answering. "Hinata, what do you remember from the Valley of the End?"

"I remember you fighting Sasuke, then you passed out and he went to finish you. I remember running to you, then pain, and then nothing."

Looking up from the floor, Naruto couldn't help but look to where her belly was exposed because he had cut that part of her shirt off to get to her wound. "To where the seal lies." he thought bitterly. "Where do I start Kyuubi?"

"The beginning would be best Kit."

And so with a heavy heart Naruto began, "Do you remember the story of the Fourth Hokage and the Nine Tailed Demon Fox?" When she nodded Naruto continued. "Unfortunately the story you know is only half the truth. The demon really did attack, but the Fourth didn't kill the demon. Instead he was forced to seal it inside a newborn baby boy, at the cost of his own life."

For a moment Hinata thought about that story and when it had taken place. "But, N-naruto-kun, if that w-were true then the boy would, be our age." When she said this Naruto flashed her one of his very foxy grins. Although it didn't touch his eyes it was enough for her to remember the aura he had had during the fight in the Valley of the End. An aura shaped like a great fox, she realized. Suddenly it all made sense. The hate she had always seen fill the eyes of the adults, her parents telling her to stay away from him, the pain that always filled his eyes. When the shock filled her eyes Naruto knew she had put all the pieces together. "It, it was…y-you wasn't it…"

He looked into her eyes and smiled sadly as he nodded his head. "For 13 years I've lived with the Kyuubi inside me. I first tapped into his power one year ago during a mission that nearly cost my team their lives. The next time I used the power was during the chuunin exam, when I fought your cousin Neji. When I trained with Jiraiya he showed me how to draw on Kyuubi's power at will. That power is how I defeated Sasuke." Now Naruto stood and still looking at Hinata he reached out to Kyuubi's power. Naruto closed his eyes for a moment as Kyuubi's chakra rushed through him. When he opened them again he heard Hinata gasp, his eyes where now blood red and had had slits for pupils like Kyuubi's. On his stomach the seal glowed red.

He let the power fade from him before sitting again. When he met her eyes again he almost smiled, in those silver orbs he saw not the hate that filled the eyes of others, but sadness for one who had survived a living hell. "Naruto-kun, how did you survive all the hate?" She whispered after a moment, then confusion filled her eyes and she brought Naruto back to the matter at hand. "What does this have to do with the valley?" The smile died on his lips as he remembered what he still had to tell her.

For almost a minute Naruto sat in silence trying to decide how to tell her the last part of their story. Just as the silence began to grow uncomfortable the door was thrown open revealing a very irate Tsunade and a slightly scared Kakashi and Jiraiya. As the jounin entered he closed the door and joined the others surveying the room much the way they would survey the site of a horrendous disaster.

Tsunade spoke first, "How much have you told her Naruto?"

Naruto shot Tsunade his first earnest smile since waking up, "She knows all about me and Kyuubi now, Tsunade-baba."

Tsunade wanted to strangle him but the deed was done and what she needed now was to find out what had happened at the valley. "Naruto, what happened after you fought Sasuke? I need to know the truth Naruto, the whole truth."

Naruto dropped his gaze to the ground once more as he nodded, he was out of time once again. When next Naruto spoke he spoke more to himself then anyone in the room. "I remember clashing with Sasuke then blacking out. When I came to, Hinata was already between us. I watched as Sasuke stabbed her with the Chidori," At this information Kakashi cursed under his breath. "Then he came for me. Somehow, somewhere I found the strength to beat him then. I would have killed him if I had had the time." Despite his startling statement Naruto's voice was dead.

"I gathered them up and went to where Hinata had been hiding. I was hoping against hope that someone had come with her. We were lucky that Sakura was there too. I gave Sasuke to her and told her to get help, but I already knew that the only help would have to come from within me. I told Kyuubi to heal Hinata, but he said he couldn't. She was beyond the seal and so beyond his protection. He told me there was only one thing that I could do…he told me the only way he could help her was if I split the seal." Naruto paused but there was no reaction, none of them yet understood the magnitude of what that meant, so he continued. "I didn't have time…Hinata didn't have enough time for me to dwell on the decision…so I agreed."

Naruto looked around at the faces in the room. Each one wore an almost identical look of confusion, Hinata looked simply confused and maybe grateful that Naruto had done everything he could to save her, Tsunade looked more angry than confused, Jiraiya and Kakashi looked as if they were trying to see something hidden inside Naruto.

This time Jiraiya broke the silence, "What does the Kyuubi get out of saving Hinata?"

Naruto didn't answer, instead he waited as a crimson aura appeared and slowly folded into a human form. This time Kyuubi's form looked to be a man of about 20; he had compact build, like that of a well-trained runner. He wore a long rust red coat over black pants and a black shirt. On the back of the coat was the symbol for fox in gold surrounded by a golden circle, a second circle surrounded the first with a small band between them. Inside this small space were nine blood red flames. His hair was the same color as his coat and hung down to his waist. It was pulled up into a braid that split into nine separate braids. When Kyuubi turned to the Sennin and Jounin they could see the same whisker marks as Naruto decorating his cheeks, but it was his eyes that drew all of their gazes. For his eyes were understandably the eyes of a demon.

All three of the senior ninjas tensed, not aware that this was Kyuubi. Since most of his power was still sealed inside Naruto and Hinata his chakra felt like that of a high end Jounin. Hinata already being tense tried to tense further and shrink in on herself. She had felt something before this mysterious man had appeared. After a moment of surveying the room, much like a lord would survey his holdings, Kyuubi spoke. "So these are two of the great Sennin. Really Kit, I wonder what it is you see in them."

Tsunade drew herself up and faced the intruder. "And who are you to intrude on this meeting? Naruto is this one of your tricks?"

Kyuubi laughed a deep mirthless laugh. "Not at all, Tsunade-hokage-sama." He spat her title with every bit of sarcasm he could manage. "I am just the benefactor of these young shinobi." He smiled a wide foxy smile. "I am the lord of my kind, the Guardian of the Sacred Flame, and the terror of Konoha. I am the Great Nine Tailed Fox, Kyuubi."

The whole room was silent for an agonizingly long minute before Tsunade drew herself up again. She put on her best "I am the Hokage" face and tried to stare Kyuubi down. "I don't care what you think you are but if you ever intrude on the business of the Hokage again I will personally see to it that you never walk the same way again!" She started forward towards the intruder who had insulted her, intent on physically removing him.

In the blink of an eye he stood behind her with a kunai pressed gently against her throat. "I would very much like to avoid bloodshed at this point. I have no qualms about killing you but Kit seems to favor your guidance and staying on good terms with him is high on my priority list." He whispered harshly to Tsunade. Letting the kunai disappear beneath his coat he turned to face the rest of the room. "Now since you're all obviously clueless about what it is Kit has done, I shall inform you so that I can finish my business here and leave."

Before Kyuubi could continue Jiraiya turned on Naruto, horror and shock filling his eyes. "YOU LET IT OUT! You let the Great Demon Fox free! What the hell were you thinking? Kakashi alert the ANBU I'll hold it off."

It was now Jiriaya's turn to have Kyuubi press a kunai against his exposed throat. "Do try to think before you open your mouth. If Kit had let me out completely both of them would be dead by know." Kyuubi said dangerously. He was really starting to dislike these Sennin. "And I've taken the liberty of shielding this room so there will be no leaving until we're done here." He added seeing Kakashi struggling with the door after failing to teleport. Once more replacing his kunai and moving to the window, he continued. "Now I trust there will be no further interruptions." He gave each of the three senior Nin a glare that assured they would stay quiet, at least while he was still here. "I showed Kit how to split the seal that contains me. Thus making it so that he was no longer the only vessel for my power. I am able to manifest this physical form by manipulating the thread of my chakra that connects my power stored inside Kit and the other half stored in the aforementioned other vessel." Ending his speech he looked around at the occupants of the room. For some time they sat in silence, Hinata and the three senior ninjas digesting the explanation that had just been handed to them.

"So, you're saying that Hinata has a seal on her, just like Naruto, and that's why you could heal her. But in return for that healing this new split seal allows you partial freedom?" Kakashi finally supplied, breaking the silence that infected the room. He had managed to recover from the initial shock and fright of finding Kyuubi free, and could see clearly enough that Kyuubi wasn't actually free, and wasn't going to hurt anyone.

Kyuubi smiled and replied. "Exactly. Now, if there are no more questions, I have matters far more important than educating shinobi to attend to." Turning one final time to Naruto, he nodded once. "Kit." He turned to Hinata and nodding again. "Kitten." As he spoke, Hinata heard his voice inside her mind. "You need not fear me, Kitten. I protect my own." With this final message he was gone. One moment he was there and the next all that remained of Kyuubi was a lingering crimson aura, and soon even that was gone.

With Kyuubi gone the room once more fell into silence. This silence dragged on as the stunned occupants struggled to come to terms with Kyuubi's declaration. The oppressive silence continued until the last person expected spoke.

"N-Naruto-kun…is, is it true? What he said...?" Although Hinata whispered, the utter silence that filled the room carried her voice clearly to every ear. After she spoke all eyes in the room turned to look at the person who had just broken the lovely quiet. Hinata felt their eyes on her and began to blush, but she kept her eyes fixed on Naruto until everyone turned to him waiting for his answer. Hinata knew somewhere deep inside her that it was all true, but a small part of her wouldn't believe it until Naruto told her.

Naruto refused to meet their eyes. Instead he stared at the floor. He didn't want to answer, they already knew the truth, but he still didn't want to tell them. He had never wanted this curse, and he had never wanted any one else to have to live with it. He hadn't wanted the decision. Why did he have to hurt the person who had saved his miserable little life? But he didn't have any more of a choice now than he did then. She deserved to hear the truth from him, and if she hated him for it then it was no more than he deserved for what he had done…but somehow if Hinata hated him, it would mean something more than all the hate of all the others in Konoha.

Finally Naruto lifted his eyes and met Hinata's. For a long time he simply stared into those pearly white eyes. Once more he was surprised by what he found there, it was not the unfounded hate he had know for so many years, it was something different; something Naruto had never seen directed at him before. "Hai Hinata, it's true."

As if his words had flipped a switch, Tsunade leapt into action. Rounding on Naruto, she prepared to take out her humiliation on the responsible party. "NARUTO YOU IDIOT! THINK ABOUT THE CONSEQUENSES OF HAVING THAT MONSTER FREE, EVEN A LITTLE! I'M GOING TO BEAT SOME SENSE INTO YOU, YOU LITTLE BRAT!" As she started towards him, Naruto could feel the murderous intent rolling off her. Jiraiya seemed to share her feelings and started after her, a sickening little smile on his face. Fortunately for Naruto, Kakashi decided to intervene.

Stepping in between the Sennin and Naruto Kakashi spoke in what he hoped was a calm voice of reason. "Hokage-sama, Jiraiya-sama, perhaps we should find out Kyuubi's intent before we jump to conclusions and assume the worst." For a moment the Sennin struggled with Kakashi's logic, trying to find a loophole they could exploit, they really did want revenge for the whole escapade, but in the end, logic won out and Naruto was spared the beating of his life.

Turning to Naruto Tsunade spoke in a commanding voice that left no room for argument. "Stay here." Naruto only nodded, but Tsunade decided he looked sincere enough. Satisfied that he would stay put, she gathered Kakashi and Jiraiya up and led them outside.

As soon as she was gone an oppressive silence descended, once more, on the room. Naruto tried to place the look he had seen in Hinata's eyes. He was sure now, that he had seen it somewhere before. Meanwhile, Hinata found herself doing what she always did when she was with Naruto.

"Come on Hinata, its just four words. Four simple words. Naruto. I. Like. You." In the end she couldn't work up the courage and settled for something less. "Naruto-kun, thank you."

At the same moment Naruto spoke up as well. "Hinata, I'm sorry." For the third time that day their eyes met and they lapsed into a collective silence. "There's that look again." Naruto thought. "Where have I seen that look before?"

Once more Hinata was the one who broke the silence in the room. Acting on an impulse - much like the one that started this whole mess - she rose from her bed and crossed the short distance to where Naruto sat. Sitting down beside him she wrapped her arms around him. For a long moment Naruto sat stunned, then he found himself returning Hinata's hug. As he sat, content for the first time that day a single thought floated across his mind. "She has forgiven me."

In her mind Hinata once more told herself that next time she would tell him, but for now she was happy to remain in the embrace of the shinobi she admired most.

1-2-3

Crying in corner, rocking back and forth Oh, god. It could be so much worse, it could be so much worse, it could be so much worse. Oh DEAR LORD, IF ONLY HIS VOICE DIDN'T SUCK!

IMPORTANT NOTE: I need some translation help, if anyone could supply me with the proper translations for; Fire's Shadow and Duel Fist, I would be eternally grateful.