A small paled army of ninja, a hopelessly emotional Hokage, and the most feared man on the face of the world. It was turning out to be an interesting night for one who had killed thousands and thousands across country after country.
"Well then," Naruto stated as he 'oh so unceremoniously' tossed his mask into the hands of a petrified Sakura, who dropped her clipboard and pen just to catch it.
"I do appreciate the recognition finally, but we do need to discuss a few things…such as where I will be staying for the rest of my days here, what rank I will be assigned, etcetera." Naruto said stoicly as he made his way through the crowded ninja who were making a very large path for him.
"N-N-Naruto…Youv'e come back to us…" Tsunade stated, still staring ahead of her at empty space (Naruto was already halfway through the crowd at this point) with misty eyes.
Sakura had almost the same reaction, but she did not have the courage to even mutter it. She had long since learned of Uzumaki Naruto's secret life that he led in the village, the one filled with suffering, cold stares, and colder hearts.
Yes, after he was banished, Tsunade had dropped the Sandaime's law about Naruto's secret. All of the younger generation of Konoha now knew of it. Sakura had taken it the hardest. After she was told, she nearly broke down. It had explained so much about Naruto, like an intricate puzzle that lacked a corner piece that seemed to put every other in its place. Like the last drop of water that will declare a cup full enough to spill an excess amount.
That had explained all the stares, the mob lynchings….everything. Everyone her age had thought it was because Naruto had deserved it for doing something horrible or stupid, like the time he painted the faces of the Hokage monument.
"Anytime your ready, Tsunade-sama." Naruto said impatiently as he turned around at the end of the man-made path.
As soon as he turned around, Tsunade had gone out into a full out sprint.
'Well…this is an interesting night indeed.'
Uzumaki Naruto, the Demon Blood King…..was being embraced by the Fifth Hokage of Konoha.
"Youv'e finally come back."
"Yes well, I do want to make amends. Hopefully the council will not banish me a second time. Seeing as my tenant has been fully absorbed by myself."
She had figured as much. After all, no one could really deny that he definitely no longer looked human.
"Its fine, as long as I know your in control we will never have a reason to fear you."
"Thats refreshing…don't get me wrong, I like the fear…but from my enemies."
Sakura stood, listening to the conversation, both happy that her long lost teammate had returned, and frightened at what he had become.
"Will the council have any 'problems' with this new development?" Naruto asked Tsunade, interrupting Sakura's train of thought.
"I doubt it. It was their idea in the first place and only went through because I had consented to it. Besides, if I know the council, and I do, they will NEVER try to banish someone as…valuable…as you." Tsunade half said, half whispered, and broke the embrace.
"You do however need to tell me what happened in detail later on."
"Sure thing, Tsunade-obachan." Naruto said, noticing Tsunades happy grin at the old and familiar nickname.
"As I was planning on doing once we learned about you more and established a more trusting and loyal relationship, we were planning on promoting you t…"
"Ah yes, Jounin of Konoha. I had expected as much. However, I don't very much like the idea of teachi…" Interuppted Naruto, to be followed by another interruption.
"Actually, we were going to promote you to the newly created position of Yonnin of Konoha." (San 3, ninninja, the legendary 3 ninja. Yon4, ninninja, the legendary four ninja…I thought this was fitting)Said Tsunade with a big grin. "You didn't think that the only AP class nin in all existence would be a mere Jounin did you?" She added as a rhetorical question.
"Heh, well…" Naruto began to ask, "When do we start missions?"
They had begun to walk to Naruto's lodgings while Tsunade explained Konoha's current situation. Wind and Fire countries were fairing poorly, each having lost a very large number of their forces. Sand having lost about 30 of their shinobi and Leaf taking a loss of over 35. It seemed that the only one not involved in the war, eerily enough, was the Village hidden in Sound. They had yet to take a side, though it is widely known that they would never side with the Leaf or the Sand. She went on the explain the details of the battlefront. She also managed to squeeze in tidbits of information on Naruto's old gang. It appeared as though the entire rookie nine and Gai's team…plus the sensei's themselves…were leading an attack on the northern border towards rock, rain, and mist.
"When do I set out towards the northern front?" Naruto inquired, as though all the other battlefronts seemed pointless to even participate in.
"Tommorow at dawn, your are to assist in the northern battlefront." Tsunade replied.
"Objectives?"
"Search and destroy all enemy ninja. Give them no quarter, they have deemed it unnecessary to offer it to us anyway."
"I see…mission accepted. Give me about 4 days."
Four days…Tsunade knew the reputation of the Blood King was to be feared and respected. But four days seemed an impossible feet to destroy three armies…even for an AP class nin.
"One day for every army, and one for travel and rest."
"Ok…" Tsunade said, better off having left the conversation drop instead of questioning his power. "Well, we have arrived at your lodging. I believe you'll recognize it quite well as your old apartment."
"Ah the memories…right Sakura-chan?"
'Eeep!' Sakura screamed inwardly.
"Well then, I'll leave you two to reminisce about old times. You are to set out at 0400 hours to the northern front. Goodluck naruto…I'll see you in four days time."
"See you then."
As Tsunade parted ways with her long lost—now reunited—surrogate son, a smile spread to her lips. She was finally at peace after so long a struggle, worrying about him.
Naruto opened the door to his apartment. 'Heh…still unlocked I see…even after allt his time.'
His thoughts were interrupted as Sakura charged at him. Tears blazing and arms extended, she caught the 'mighty Demon Blood King' in a full on embrace sibling embrace. She didn't speak, only letting the muffled sobs against his cloak do all the talking.
They stayed like that for what seemed like a few minuets.
"It's ok…I won't be leaving again….not for good anyway." Naruto said, as he almost hesitantly broke the pleasant embrace and ensuing silence.
"You…you didn't even say goodbye to us." She said, now visibly and mentally calmer then moments ago. "We thought we had lost you for good."
"Well, I did say goodbye to one very special person, but that didn't go as I planned. I meant to tell her, but the moment was just not there."
Flashback (the night before Naruto left)
Naruto and Hinata arrived at his the apartment door, he holding on to her, and she accepting the affection and returning it to him, knowing that she would be breaking two hearts tonight, his and her own.
He had never seen it coming. Naruto couldn't be blamed for his ignorance of course, since he was about to break news to her that would change her life forever, and he didn't know what would happen.
Naruto now had known about his impending exile. He was scheduled to leave in just two days, and he had been struggling with an unasked question.
Naruto and Hinata had been going out for almost a year now. It was something like a perfect relationship. He gave her courage and love, and she gave him support and happiness. Not the regular, fake happy of his smiling mask, but a true sincere smile that tingled on euphoria whenever she was around.
So it was, that Naruto was trying to ask Hinata to come with him. He wanted her to live happily with him, traveling all around the world and finding true happiness together, although for him, it didn't matter where but with her.
"Naruto-kun…" she started, as she hesitantly broke their own embrace.
He could see a few tears start to form in those lavender eyes he dared say he loved.
'Oh no! Could she have found out! Shit, this is not happening, I can't let it end like this. I love her, enough to risk my life for her! Please Kami-sama, let her say yes to the question I'm about to ask.' He decided, better to blurt out the question than to have Hinata call her out on it and say no off the bat.
A took in an enourmous breath, and opened his mouth to speak, but was cut off.
"We…can't be together anymore." Said Hinata, tears streaming down her cheeks now.
"W…What…why?" Said Naruto, now oozing trepidation.
"Father…he…arranged it to bring the two houses, the branch and family, together as one."
"I don't understand, isn't that good news?" asked Naruto with a solemn expression, fearful of the outcome of this night.
She was really hating herself now. She hated herself for letting this all happen under her nose. She hated that she had no say in it, because to go against it would mean her exile from the clan and Konoha as a whole. She hated it, mostly, because it wasn't fair to her feelings of love for Naruto, because it wasn't fair to him…to them.
"Neji-kun and I…we are to be married in two months time for the branch house and main house to become one whole house again." She said, stuttering and sobbing like a broken woman.
If there ever was a straw to break the camels back, this had to be three metric tons of dead weight on a mouse's nose.
Resigned to exile, lost to love, and shrouded in sorrow was the only way to describe Naruto's face as he, without a warning, started walking away into the streets.
Few know the pain of losing their most precious people from right under them. Naruto was one now. He felt the longing for his love, for something that wasn't his anymore…in a way, it never was. In the end, it was never meant to be, and wouldn't even keep a single shred of her things that she left for him. Not the pictures of them together, not her blanket that they had slept under for the first time they were truly together one night, not even the insignificant of items. He would throw away the engagement ring that was fashioned from the Godaime's necklace that he had won in a bet with her long ago. He was saving it for her, to propose, if she excepted going into exile with him. She was no longer his, and it would do him good to not think about her anymore, and those things would constantly remind him. Some may call this petty, throwing away things that once meant so much, but to Naruto, to a man that had nothing left BUT those things to remind him of her, he had to do so. Whoever said that to love and lose is better than to not love at all, surely hadn't lost anything ever, because Naruto's was a pain no man can ever recover from.
He is head back to her as he was disappearing into the night, already on his way out of the village for good. 'If she is gone…than what is the point of delaying the enibitable?'
"Goodbye…Hinata-chan. I may forget about your quirks, your actions…even your things…" He said, now shedding a tear of his own "I may even one day, forget you. But…I'll never forget that I loved you, the girl who met me as a boy, and the boy who gave to you freely because he received it."
He said, as he disappeared into the dimly lit streets of Konoha, never to be seen again for a very long time, and never as the same person he once was. He didn't even wait for Hinata to utter her goodbye's. She would find out later the next day, that he had gone for good, and she would probably never see her Naruto-kun again. Then a letter addressed to her carrying a box and a single word written inside the envelope had arrived.
It read "Sorry". When she opened the box, she saw the engagement ring that was meant for her, now having lost its shine, much like her once brilliant lavender eyes seemed to dull. She cried for days and sulked for months later. They even had to push back her own wedding date because she was too depressed.
Flashback End
"In a way, the moment was never meant to exist in the first place." Naruto said, as he let Sakura sit down on the couch in his apartment so he could recant the tale of his last night in Konoha. She deserved to know anyway, she was, after-all, his team-mate.
Scene Change
Wind and Fire against Grass, Rain, Mist, Earth, and Lightning.
Kakashi sat back in his tent at the Northern Front. Tsunade had appointed him acting commander of the combined Leaf and Sand forces. The battlefield in front of them lay in ruins, smoldering heaps everywhere which were once called humans. The Grass, Earth, and Rain had dug themselves in opposite the Leaf and Sand forces. It was a veritable 'no man's land' in between them. Every time a ninja of any side would so much as peek his head out from the trenches, dozens of Kunai and shuriken would target the head and let loose. To make matters worse, moral was extremely poor. The artillery that the enemy had brought up was also slowly killing them through attrition.
Tremors rocked the tent Kakashi sat in, letting loose dirt and soil from the top of the tent and scattering them on his intelligence papers. Kakashi was beginning to lose hope. Many had died int his battle alone, and Rain, Mist, and Lightning were still unnacounted for on the battlefield. 'Probubly trying to circumnavigate our position and flank us….but there is little we can do but sit back and wait'.
Waiting for death, as it seemed, was the only option left. Kakashi had survived one great ninja war already, and through that experience he knew when a battle was going to be won or lost. He knew when efforts were fruitless. The least he could do now was to encourage the ninja on his side and go down fighting.
So he stepped out from the tent into the muddy, sooty, and much hated trenches to check on the moral of his troops.
Some good reviews, and I thank you for that. If it keeps on coming, I might make this into a fairly large story instead of a two-shot or three-shot like I had planned without a crap load of reviews.
Oh and to answer a few questions, yes, the entirety of the rookie nine (minus Sakura) are on the Northern front.
Also, I decided to make the ninja battles into somewhat of trench warfare and small flanking skirmishes. After-all, the last romantic battle ever fought was WWI.