Chapter 12

Secrets Worth Telling

Half an hour on the streets of Nami is all it takes to find a lucky break. One of Naruto's clones is disguised as one your average street thugs, slightly darker skin suggesting he's used to equatorial living and a lot of travel. His messy brown afro and barely grown mustache blow about in the ocean breeze, as does his open crimson overshirt, white button-up beneath it, and dark gray shorts. He decided to enhance his disguise by stealing a pair of Geta sandals, clacking away with every step to support the authenticity of the illusion, and a quick 'spar' with another thug earned him a cheap-ass katana to carry about.

His visage didn't go unnoticed for long. He could tell a good number of thugs were eying him, wondering where this wannabe samurai came from and what to do about him… until he approached a gaggle of them gathered out front of a restaurant. He keeps his back arched into a profound slouch and his hands deep in his pockets. "So, I heard there's good work in these parts. Who's payin, and what's the gig?"

The two eldest mercs share a quick glance. In an instant, Naruto knows they must share a history either under Gato's employ or on other job. He decides to keep an eye on these two. Disguising himself as either one at any time would be too risky, for now at least. They deliberate in silence in a matter of two seconds before looking back to the walking bomb they're about to invite into their midst. "Gato needs this place underfoot for his… secondary businesses. He's got a lot of property here, and lot to take yet. Might need to get your hands dirty, if ya know what I mean."

Naruto scoffs and shakes his head. "Good money, and a town to have the run of? Yeah, I'm in. What perks come with it? We get any of his stock?"

The youngest of the crew grins wide enough to almost split his face. "Boy, we got the best shit in the world! Part of the job is to keep em from farming here. The boss needs all that land for his products. I've been flyin half the time I've been here, man!" He reaches into his back pocket and pulls out a bag full of pre-rolled joints, clearly handmade. "Want a sample to celebrate the new job?"

Naruto raises an eyebrow as he debates how to handle this. Denying it would seem a bit too obstinate for this crowd. If he uses it, his regenerative properties from the fox won't allow him to get anything out of it. He has no experience with this kinda stuff to work off of to act like he's high, so that's out of the question too. Thankfully, his prankster's mind has already devised a dozen ways to take advantage of this by the time half a second has passed. "Eh, I'll take a sample," He reaches out to take a blunt and stuffs it in his pocket. "but I'll wait to have this later with a good drink and a girl on my arm, ya know? Why waste a good thing like this in these dreary parts?"

The eldest of the group chuckles and gives Naruto a quick fistbump. "Now that's a real man's way. You'll fit in here just fine, boy. What's your name?"

"Oh yeah, always been poor at introductions." He chuckles and shoves both hands back in his pockets. "Call me Genma."

"Well, Genma..." He waves for the clone to follow as they turn and leave. "Lemme show ya to some of the best cargo. You need a girl? We've got plenty."

Two blocks away, with right eye glowing and right ear tingling, Jiraiya chuckles to himself and turns to walk away, his transparency jutsu in full swing and nobody the wiser. "Not bad, kid. You've got a real future in infiltration. My spy network could use more men like you…" He sighs and marches off towards the bridge builder's abode. "Now, I believe the real you is…"

Back in the same clearing Naruto had made all of his clones in, he sits in a near meditative state, occasionally placing a few brush strokes on the schematics at work in front of him. He had gone into the field to double check for any specific scenarios he'd need to make new clones on the fly for, but returned soon after to record his findings and work on more designs. Each calculation is careful and deliberate, collected by clones elsewhere, preparing his greatest trap yet. He'd need a lot of help with this one. Yoko remains seated in his lap through it all, half asleep and just enjoying her best friend's company. Naruto jolts as another clone pops and he jots down a few notes on a separate scroll, beneath a series of them detailing intel from his disguised clones. "That's a pretty huge pot farm… Now what to do with it? Could probably get away with stealing some to use in traps… Maybe give some to Sakura for medical research? I know Jiji would want some…" He chuckles and shakes his head. "Illegal in a lot of Sui no Kuni territory, where Gato does most of his trading, but perfectly legal back home, thanks to Tsunade's research and Jiji's insistence. Kakashi sensei, didn't the Nara have a hand in that too?"

"Yep." Kakashi looks up from his book and glances over the scrolls. "Impeccable work so far. I discovered some of that well before you, but your clones and the range of your search improves your results by quite a lot. Figuring out what warehouses he's using isn't difficult, the pot farm's pretty huge and hard to miss, but getting both of those and the whereabouts of his human trafficking cells in such a short time is incredible for someone your age."

Naruto chuckles as he writes down a few more bits of intel. "How's adding the ship Gato's living on and the total roster of his missing nin hires sound?"

Kakashi perks up and stashes his book back in his back pocket before stepping up to read. "No names, but decent descriptions. We already knew about Zabuza and the demon brothers, though. His Hyoton using friends seems to be quite a lot of trouble, but-" Kakashi pauses and glares at the one name Naruto was able to get. "… That idiot is actually throwing his name around?" Kakashi rubs at the bridge of his nose. "Ugh…"

"Guessing you recognize the name somehow." Naruto pinches his chin- Kakashi once again marvels at how unknowingly similar he is to his father. "So who's this Aoi Rokushō, anyway?"

"A dumbass who thinks he's tough shit just because he got his hands on a powerful tool. That sword your intel says he's bragging about was one of the Nidaime's creations." Kakashi pulls his right hand from his pocket and channels a bit of lightning into it. "It was one of my inspirations for my original jutsu, actually. My sensei, the Yondaime, was a big fan of his as well. You've taken up one of his jutsu, too." He smirks at the realization that Naruto's completely enrapt by this knowledge. "The Kage Bunshin was one of the Nidaime's creations. Seems that's a habit that's gone through three generations of students now."

Naruto returns his gaze to his notes, but smiles gently at the thought of already being so mentally and emotionally close to his idols. Without even realizing it, he'd made a piece of their legacy his own. His spirit refreshed and more empowered than ever, he returns to work, inspired to develop a plethora of new traps and techniques.

Off to the side of the clearing, a toad watches in silence, but struggles not to break into a smile and ruin the illusion.

That is, until Yoko starts eyeing him up and he bails as hurriedly as possible.

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Dinner was relatively uneventful. Inari was still absent, which Sasuke seemed a bit distracted by, but said nothing of it. He knows how the boy's feeling after the speech he'd given. Sakura was completely drained of chakra, digging into her meal like her life depends on it. Thankfully, this was a bit of advice from Anko that she took to heart: stop dieting. Shinobi don't diet, they binge and train to the point that not a single calorie is excessive. Naruto on the other hand is oddly quiet at this meal. Kakashi explained it away as the results of the headache induced by expelling too many clones at once, but he knew all too well that Naruto was really thinking off the conundrum he'd proposed to him earlier.

Naruto's deliberation becomes so deep as to nearly enter his mindscape. For a moment, he ceases to see his meal and instead sees the Kyuubi's face, lazily smirking at him in his own half-slumbering state. Seeing the fox laying there on the titanic pillow he had conjured months ago, shockingly peaceful for such a reportedly destructive beast, once again turned his thoughts to how their conversation a few months ago had gone. Since then, he's had a lot of time to think about the 'interrogation' he promised the cocky kitsune, but one thing stayed at the forefront of his mind; Why isn't the Kyuubi the mindless and destructive beast that the village assumes him to be?

For him to act as he did in that first meeting proves a wealth of intelligence beyond those reports, and having seen it with his own eyes, he knows it must be the truth. Therefore, logic states the 'mass-destructive wild animal' reports are false. So why? He'd have to ask later, if he can ever find his way back into his mindscape to do so. It's proven difficult so far.

Regardless, that leaves him with one more inquiry: How should he tell the others of his tenant and said tenant's intelligence? By now, it wasn't a question of whether he should or shouldn't, but how to break it to them smoothly enough to prevent any panic.

Eventually, Naruto's finishes his meal and washes up for the night, making his way upstairs to the guest room offered to himself and his teammates. He'd been the last to bathe that night, and it gave him just the time he needed to figure out the final details of his plan.

He opens the sliding door into his team's room, and the moment it's shut behind him, he clears his throat. "So, guys… there's a few things I really need to talk to you both about."

Sasuke raises his head from the scroll he'd been reading on chakra applications to taijutsu, tucked into the corner opposite the door, beside his cot. "What's this about, then?"

Sakura barely realizes anything's going on until Naruto walks past her field of vision, just above the medical textbook she'd been reading. "O-Oh, hey Naruto! Is something wrong?"

Yoko remains napping in the middle of the floor, paying no attention whatsoever. She already knows what's coming.

Once he reaches the window and stares out of it, he sighs deeply, takes a moment to run his towel over his head to dry his hair off more, and speaks with his back turned. "We make a great team, but I don't feel like we really know each other that well. That needs to change. Honestly, I… I have some really big things to tell you two, but I'd like if all of us could get something off our chests tonight."

Sakura tilts her head as she weighs her options on this. "… Alright. I'll bite." She marks her place in her book and sets it aside before laying back in her bed. "Guess I'll start. I probably have the least to say. So… You should know Naruto… I have you to thanks for becoming half as competent as I am now." She returns her gaze to him from the ceiling. "That prank you pulled on the fanclub got me to resign from it and start taking things seriously. I… I know I was really hard on you for years. I know I wasn't the best person…" She looks back to the ceiling and runs her fingers through her hair, getting a bit stressed just bringing this up. "Sasuke, I was way too obsessed with you. That set me back a lot. And I'm not letting that hold me back anymore. Naruto's the one who showed me just how much that obsession crippled my progress as a kunoichi, and even then it took a lot of struggling with everything my grandmother always told me about 'marrying a rich clan boy like Sasuke' to finally snap out of it. She was always on about 'that Naruto boy's a demon' and 'Sasuke's the best thing you can have in life'." She half-heartedly mimics a gag. "So sick of her shit. It's not to say you're not… still on my mind, Sasuke. I'm just focusing more on me now. And Naruto…." She finally looks back to him with a gentle smile. "I'm sorry for everything over the years. Just know you can count on me to not cause you any more trouble moving forward. I've got your back, just as much as Sasuke's."

That one confession, no matter how comparatively small it is compared to the one he had coming, leaves Naruto's choice to tell them sealed. All that remained was Sasuke's own confession. After lingering on Sakura with a teary smile, he turns to face Sasuke, and finds him stunned still for a few seconds yet.

Once Sasuke finally moves, he crosses his arms and tucks himself deeper into the corner. "…Thank you, Sakura. It's… nice to hear that without your fangirling in the way." He sighs and closes his eyes to calm himself for what's to come. "… You heard what I said in introductions. I have a goal to track and kill someone for the sake of my clan and village. That would be my brother, Itachi."

Naruto nods and pinches his chin. "The bastard who slaughtered your clan. Anyone with an ear to the ground and without their head up their ass knows about that."

Sasuke nods and returns to his tale. "When he did it, I couldn't understand why he left me alive. I honestly still can't, but I've obsessed over that all my life. It wasn't until you two started changing that I started… rethinking it."

Naruto perks up and raises a brow. "Why's that?"

"… I saw how you two changed by dropping your obsessions. Naruto, your mindless obsession with being Hokage without having a real plan for how was something I found both ridiculous and admirable. It was a big goal, like mine, and neither of us had a clue how to get there. I just wanted to get stronger, and didn't care how, or know how." He looks to Sakura, whose been staring intently through every word, enrapt and clearly inspired. "And… Sakura. When you abandoned your obsession of me and started taking things more seriously, I realized my obsession with killing Itachi was clouding my judgement and making me miss a bigger picture too." He sighs deeply as sparks fly between his fingers. "Yes, he most certainly needs to die still. I still plan to do so. But I'm not going to rush in blind for the sake of vengeance anymore…" He looks up from his sparking hand with a smirk. "I still wasn't sure what new motivation I needed until that homeless kid in town yesterday. I knew at that moment it was for kids like him. Like… me. To protect people from monsters like Itachi who would leave more kids like me in the world."

Sakura's left blushing a bit by the end of his speech, once again floored by him, but for reasons far from those her previous, fangirl self would have been. She gently shakes herself from her lovestruck stupor and steps over to take his hand, which conveniently stops sparking as she reaches out. "You know you don't have to handle all of that alone." She peeks up to Naruto for a moment. "Just like you don't have to suffer your climb to Hokage alone."

Sasuke nods and sighs in relief. "That's why I'm telling you. Because I know you'll have my back. When the time comes for me to deal with him, I do want to fight him alone… but we'll help each other grow stronger, to be sure we can all handle monsters like Itachi."

Naruto nods solemnly and takes a deep breath to prep for his reveal. "Speaking of monsters… do either of you know what a jinchuuriki is?"

Sakura stares blankly for a moment, but Sasuke wracks his brain and finds an answer from within his clan's texts. "Wait, are you fucking serious?"

Sakura peeks down to her crush. "W-What's wrong? What's a jinchuuriki?"

Sasuke sighs. "Naruto, explain it, cuz I have an idea what's going on, but I need holes filled in."

Naruto nods and starts to pace around the room. "Basically… a Biju, like the Kyuubi, can't be killed. But it can be sealed, and all of them have been before, as best I know. But it takes a strong seal to do it, a really strong one. The Kyuubi's the strongest of them, so it takes a seal great enough to kill the user…" He sighs deeply and scratches the back of his head. "and a newborn baby with undeveloped but flexible chakra coils to seal him in."

Sakura quickly puts 2 and 2 together to get the 5 million on this reveal's WTF scale. "Wait, you're telling me to Yondaime died sealing that thing in you?"

Naruto chuckles grimly and nods. "Yeah. My hero died leaving me trapped with the thing everyone in the village treats me like shit for."

Sasuke grumbles and glares out the window, to the south. "That explains a lot. The hate, the glares, the insults, your ridiculous chakra capacity…"

"U-Um…" Sakura giggles nervously. "Do you, um… hear him, at all?"

Naruto snorts. "That's the best part. I've had a few conversations with him in the last eight months, and lemme tell ya, the guy's a lot more intelligent than the reports from that night let on. So much so that I'd have to guess there was something going on that night that only he knows, and he's refusing to tell me. Says I'm 'not ready'."

Sakura pauses and furrows her brow, focusing on all the imperceptible details she's already collected. "But if he's intelligent, then why has nobody reported him speaking at all that night? Why the drastic difference?"

Sasuke groans and rubs the bridge of his nose. "Genjutsu… Naruto, can you pass my apologies to him for whatever jackass in my family was responsible for that?"

Naruto's mouth falls agape for just a moment, but then snaps back shut as he considers Sasuke's implication. "That explain a lot… and he's too prideful to admit it happened. But why are you so sure it was someone in your clan?"

He grumbles and leans back against the wall, staring up at the ceiling. "… The night my brother slaughtered our clan, he used the strongest genjutsu in the world on me. Something I discovered more details about my looking into ancient family records. It's called Tsukuyomi, and only someone with an especially advanced and powerful Sharingan, a stage known as the Mangekyou, can use it. It was the worst experience of my life… and if the Sharingan is capable of horrors like that, then I have no doubt that the clan records suggesting it's been used to command Biju before are correct too." He drops his gaze to Naruto and narrows his eyes. "… I believe you, Naruto. And if you ever find a way for anyone else to hold a conversation with him, I have a few questions of my own."

Sakura nods in agreement and shifts off her knees to sit beside Sasuke against the wall. "It's… a bit much to take in, but he's right, Naruto. We believe you, and we've got your back. And even the Kyuubi's, if he's as smart and potentially innocent as you're suggesting." She sighs and leans back to relax a bit, almost slumping against Sasuke, who seems uncomfortable, but doesn't object. "I trust your judgement. Besides the pranks you pull on us, you haven't steered us wrong before…"

A few moments of heavy silence pass before Naruto manages to step over and sit on Sakura's other side. Yoko leaps into his lap a moment later. "Thanks, guys…" He keeps his head turned away to hide the few tears of joy he can't hold back. "… for believing me… and in me, when so few have before."

Sasuke snorts slightly. "You may be a good liar, but you're a shitty storyteller. The story you just told us makes too much sense for you to have written it."

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Just outside the window, with the salty ocean breeze blowing his minimized scent away so Yoko can't detect him through his transparency jutsu, Jiraiya sits on the wall of the second floor with a smile plastered on his face. This kid's ready. As soon as he's asleep for the night…

.

.

Naruto jolts awake as water splashes across his face, leaping into a defensive stance and frantically peeking around to the sight of empty woods. He already recognizes the divot his ass left in the dirt when he was recording all his intel here earlier that day, so he knows he hasn't gone far… but how did he get here?

"Naruto, up here." He quickly follows that familiar voice to find Kakashi lounging in a tree, reading his usual Icha Icha. "We all brought you out here because we need to have a very important and confidential chat with you."

Naruto stares for a moment as he registers the 'we' in his statement, before whirling around to see the three other men perches in nearby trees. The first to stand out is his adoptive father Iruka, kneeling on a lower branch and still holding the last handsign for the water jutsu that woke him up. Second is Hiruzen Sarutobi himself, the Sandaime, in his combat gear including a black jumpsuit and helmet. The last figure confuses him for a moment, another old man standing cross-armed in a red vest with shaggy white hair past his hips and a giant scroll strapped on his back. The custom headband with the kanji for oil gives him away though, and Naruto's left wide-eyed and stunned. "… J.. J-Jiji? A-And Jiraiya?" He wheels back to Kakashi and his dad. "What's going on here?"

"What's happening, Naruto…" He's cut off as Jiraiya leaps down from his perch and crouches slightly to be at eye level with the orange-clad genin. "Is there's more secrets to you than just the Kyuubi, and we've decided you're ready to hear it."

Naruto stumbles back from Jiraiya and glances at Hiruzen. "… What secrets?"

He sighs and slowly walks down the tree to meet with everyone on the ground. "I told you that you weren't ready to know your heritage. Well, that's changed. But you must know that this too is an S rank secret, just as the Kyuubi is, but unlike that one, you will not have permission to speak of this openly for some time yet. Not until you're a Chuunin, at the very least."

Naruto audibly gulps as that fact sinks in. How could the secret to his parentage be so important? Unless-

At that moment, the pieces come together. The Sandaime as the ruling force and officiator. Kakashi as the student, Jiraiya as the teacher, his adoptive father there for support. It all comes together in an instant, and he draws his textbook on sealing, scrawled with notes on every page, from a seal on the inside of his hoodie. He turns to the inside of the front cover and finds the signature of the man who marked it up to hell and back for the sake of improving the art of sealing.

That signature was none other than the Yondaime Hokage himself, Minato Namikaze.

"… You've gotta be shitting me." He nearly drops the book. "You've been setting me up for this reveal for months. My sensei, this book, getting me on a mission close to Jiraiya…" He slumps against a tree. "… Of course he chose me. How could the Yondaime have chosen anyone but his own son to be a jinchuuriki?"

Kakashi nods and looks up to the stars through the sparse leaves above. "He couldn't make someone else make a sacrifice he wasn't willing to himself. But, there was more to it…"

Iruka sighs deeply as he takes a seat beside his adoptive son. "I knew them both well enough. Minato was an idol to me. Uzumaki Kushina was beautiful and terrifying, but had so much life to her." He peeks down to Naruto with a smile. "You take after her a lot more than you do your dad, honestly."

Jiraiya snorts. "Minato's mind and Kushina's hyperactivity and penchant for pranks? I swear, it's the most terrifying thing I've ever seen." Naruto chuckles half-heartedly at that, but the sage's next comment shuts him up fast. "But, you also inherited her status as a jinchuuriki from her."

Silence falls as Naruto registers that fact. "… So something caused the seal to break on the night I was born, releasing the fox with me, and… she must have been dying as a result."

Hiruzen grunts and nods in confirmation. "As you suspect. She was in a heavily guarded base far off from the village to deliver you, in case the seal broke, with your father maintaining it. Something happened that night to break the seal, and when a jinchuuriki loses their tenant, they are certain to die in short order. Your mother lasted long enough so aid your father in resealing the fox into you. Not only were you the only candidate as their son, but the best candidate, as an Uzumaki. The third Uzumaki to contain the Kyuubi."

Naruto raises his head with a jump and stares the Hokage in the eyes. "Third? Who was the first?"

"Ah…" Hiruzen strokes his fingers through his beard. "That would be your great great aunt, Uzimaki Mito, the Shodaime's wife. Mito was a wonderful woman, I know you would have loved her. She aided her husband in sealing the Kyuubi the first time after Uchiha Madara chose to summon and hypnotize the Kyuubi to his will in their final battle at what is now the Valley of End. It was discovered afterwards that the Uzumaki bloodline is especially potent as jinchuuriki, and most capable of containing the fox. Any other child may have died in the process."

Naruto falls silent once more and lets all these facts mingle and interlock, and the moment the Madara fact links back to his conversation earlier that night, he jolts to his feet. "The night I was born, another Uchiha attacked and put the Kyuubi under another genjutsu."

All shinobi present look to one another as they consider this information. Although things like this are normally high above Iruka's pay grade, he's always been good at gathering intel, and he's had similar suspicions for a long time. Jiraiya is the first to speak up. "I heard you and your team talking about all this earlier, and already filled the other three here in." He gestures to his sensei with a tilt of his head. "He'd already suspected that a long time ago but didn't want to believe it. Knowing what we do now, it seems undeniable."

Hiruzen sighs and hangs his head. "Yet another failure in my duties as Kage. Still… I doubt there were any Uchiha alive at the time with that sort of talent. I'm still not certain what to think."

"Either way…" Kakashi buts in and places a hand on Naruto's shoulder. "I'm sure you see exactly why we had to wait so long to tell you…"

Jiraiya grumbles. "And keep our distance…" He shakes his head and tightly grips his crossed arms. "I wanted to be there for you from the start, but my job and the beacon it would put on you couldn't allow it. I couldn't stay in the village with you because my spy network would have collapsed and leaked intel everywhere, and me being seen with you would have told every foreign spy exactly who you are. I couldn't bring you with because my work requires a specific skill set that no child can meet even with my guidance." He finally looks Naruto in the eyes again, his own aged and sagging as though this one confession was aging him another decade. "I've failed you as a godfather."

Naruto stares into his freshly-met family's eyes for several tense moments. That tension grows deeper for just a moment as Naruto rushes him with a jab to the sage's gut. He doesn't bother to dodge or block, taking it directly and hunching over, only to then find the boy's face buried into him and his other arm around his back. "… B-But I know you had to do it… and I know you can make it up to me…"

Jiraiya sputters silently for a moment but lets just a few tears free as he kneels down and pulls the overwhelmed blonde boy into his arms. "I promise I will. You can count on it, kid. You'll see a lot more of me soon, and eventually, I'll personally train you. Ya got that, gaki?"

Naruto chuckles and grins through tears as he pulls back. "I-I got it! I'll be waiting for you, Ero-Sennin."

"Hey, where the hell did that name come from?!"

"Dad called you a perv all over his notes in this textbook, I'm making that a family tradition."

"Iruka, please, tell your son to cut it out."

"I dunno, I think it's pretty accurate."