Disclaimer •• Unfortunately, I dont own Naruto. Though, I think I should gather some dandelions and blow a few wishes. Maybe one will be granted, and then I will be the owner of that *amazing* story!

Warning •• Rated T for mild swearing, blood and violence, and a lot of mental trauma.

No Beta•••

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Chapter 3: Really, Old Man?

•••

My body was stuck, coldcoldcold ice froze the blood in my veins and my head pounded, that same ice cold blood feeling hothothot, burning, burning, BURNING--

He stood there, just within arms reach. His yellow spiked hair reflected the low sun's rays like strands of pure spun gold, oceanic eyes sparkling with confusion and...worry?

It was almost taunting, how close he was-- as if I could reach out and touch him--

But I couldn't touch him, couldn't feel him-- because... because he's dead. My father is dead. Dead. dead. DEAD--but... but, he's not dead, right? Because I went back-- everything was gone, so I went back to-- to when? When was I? Where was I? I wasn't home. This wasn't my Konoha. This... this wasn't my home. I didn't belong in this time-- this Konoha.

The panic thrashed within me, darkness creeping from the depths of my chest because- because--

"I...I-I dont belong here... I don't-- I dont belong here. I shouldn't-- I shouldn't be here--I SHOULDN'T BE--"

"KIT!"

I jolted, Kurama's cry booming painfully in my head, "Kit, calm down. You can't panic here. Not now."

"Mirai-san?," Rin's soft, worried voice broke through the coldcold fear, and I realized that I couldn't. I couldn't. Not there. Not then. This-- these emotions could be pushed back, shoved away, because I couldn't handle them. Not now.

•••

He'd seen a lot of things in his life. Good things, bad things, beautiful and ugly things, evil and... more evil. He wasn't old and wise and experienced in many ways, but... he wasn't naive either, and he most definitely wasn't innocent.

Minato was... he liked to think he was a relatively good person. Of course, he'd done many things that most would consider to be unthinkable, but he was a shinobi. It was his job to do what nobody else would so that he could protect his village and his loved ones. It was his job as a shinobi to do the unthinkable, so that others didn't have to. He fought and killed for them, every breath of exhaustion, every bead of sweat that formed on his brow, every drop of blood spilt-- it was all selfless.

He tried, of course, to be merciful, even on the battlefield. He'd hope that maybe that one Iwa child he'd spared would someday grow to protect the gift of life to the best of their ability - to return that same mercy to another poor soul that would have otherwise died by his or her hand.

The world was truly a horrid place in many, many ways. Evil lurked in every dark corner, writhed in every shadowed crack, thrived in too many people. Shinobi and kunoichi alike fought and bled and suffered, pushing stubbornly through their pain on both sides of every equation-- whether it be for the right reason or the wrong reason.

Endurance. Every shinobi must endure. Through every tragedy and every misfortune. Every death of a loved one, every kill-- through everything, they endure.

At least, they try.

But shinobi are human, no matter how beastly they can be, they are above all human. And a person can only handle so much before they crack, then break, then collapse to the ground in a million tiny pieces-- until they pick up every single piece, one by one as their hands bleed, and build themselves back up again.

To restart the cycle.

Minato had seen many different eyes in many different people. He'd seen the eyes of a child, brimming with innocence and curiosity and wonder, sheltered and unexposed to the horrors of the world. He'd seen love and naivety in the eyes of a civilian girl, as she held the hand of her childhood friend, laughing and smiling as if the world around them did not exist. He'd seen anger and hatred and bloodlust in the eyes of some shinobi, hardened, uncaring, cruel.

Then, there was experience and knowledge, hardened by war and the dark side of the world, yet still holding on to their humanity despite that.

--those were eyes he'd only ever seen in very specific people. Shikaku, Inoichi, Hiruzen, himself, and many of his friends.

He never thought that he would see that in the eyes of a child.

And she was small - exceedingly so, her meager height barely reaching the edge of the Hokage's desk. She stood with a certain tense posture that seemed to make her impossibly thin limbs seem that much thinner. Her fingers trembled at her sides, the tips of her limp golden hair brushing the shaking digits as it tumbled down her back and shoulders. Blue eyes peeked from underneath long bangs, impossibly wide as they shook with curiosity and anxiety and terror - and absentmindedly, he felt he'd seen those eyes before.

Her deep eyes locked onto his, holding a faint flash of recognition. Her eyes seemed to be stuck in place even as she tried to rip them away, only for them to find their way back, and cold worry dropped like a dead weight in his chest as her breathing picked up, choppy and shallow with panic as she silently attempted to it control it.

His brow furrowed and he quickly dropped to his knees, gently grasping her shoulder in what was supposed to be a comforting way, but she flinched violently back at the action, as if his touch burned her skin. The panic in her eyes seemed to flare, all sense of awareness and coherency being stripped from her blue eyes with the rush of emotion, making her body tremble ever more.

Rin, who had been standing quietly in the corner, emerged from her spot to place her own hand on the girl's shoulder, brows furrowed with worry over the blonde's rampantly panicked state, "Mirai-san?"

And just like that, the barely five-year-old girl's oceanic eyes snapped with clarity and a forcefully calm facade slipped over her soft features with disturbingly practiced ease. A certain blankness that is only achieved in the most war torn shinobi settled in the depths of her sapphire eyes, every sort of pain writhing beneath the porcelain facade, the kind that was riddled with scars and torn with fear and horror and he couldn't help but wonder why.

Minato paused.

Was the girl afraid of him? The thought didn't really occur to him until now, of course, he was a well-known and respected shinobi, in Konohagakure at least, but in other places he was someone to be avoided. A Flee on Sight order was tagged next to his name in the Bingo Books, one of only a few to have that warning, which of course sparked some essence of fear in the hearts of much of the Elemental Nations.

He'd found her in the middle of nowhere. She was alone, injured and dying, completely and utterly helpless. What was left of her clothing, having been torn and ripped from her in her desperate situation - which they also didn't have any information about - was in Konoha's color and style, but her hitai-ate was practically unheard of, and her overall identity matched no records found in the Archives, at least not in her age group.

She was a shinobi, though, which posed as a problem and a threat. They'd zero knowledge of her abilities, origin, or blood. They were frankly in the dark, as far as he knew, and since he had no information on the subject of her upbringing, it wasn't at all a preposterous thought to assume that she had heard of him - or had at least been warned to stay away from him.

The majority of shinobi did not spare anyone, after all. Even children.

Her fear, in Minato's eyes, could only be explained away with simply assuming she had gained knowledge of his identity.

But did that warrant a near panic attack?

He didn't know, but it did worry him. He and his team had saved the girl, yanking her away from the cliff where she teetered on the brink of death, so it only made sense for him - and his team - to care for her, in a distant sort of way. Despite himself, he also acknowledged that fact that she was also a child, and that in itself made him much more adverse to her being in danger of any sort. She was young. Too young, younger than even Kakashi was when he began active duty, and she was already fighting out in the open - completely alone, with nobody to back her up, keep her safe.

Potential enemy or not, it infuriated Minato. Desperate country or not, putting a child so young directly into warfare to fend for herself was preposterous and made him livid. They had no right to send her out so that she could be hunted down and fed to the wolves that were her enemies.

There are so many enemies, and not all of them are interested in simply killing their target - no, some are sick in their ways, torturing and prolonging the deaths of those that oppose them...

A child should never be subject to that.

The girl straightened her tiny shoulders, almost defiant in her disposition, and set her gaze straight. She locked her endless eyes stubbornly to his, as if she was resisting her fear.

--And he could see it, he could see the fear and uncertainty and sadness within her, but her gaze stood strong and her body stood in full attention, no tremor or shaking to be seen.

And despite her lack of words, Minato nodded, out of respect for the integrity in her eyes, or acknowledgement for her bravery, he didn't know, but he nodded at her nonetheless before standing to his full height and turning once again to his Hokage.

If she was at all intimidated by him now, she didn't show it.

The dark eyes of the Sandaime met his own, a brief and silent conversation passing between them before Sarutobi cleared his throat. "Minato-kun will be removing his cancelling seals, Mirai-chan," he said quietly, "The process itself should be relatively short, so sit still for as long as you are able, alright?"

The Namikaze stifled an amused chuckle when Mirai bristled, seemingly irritated at the childish tone he used, but she sat nonetheless, huffing as she rolled her left sleeve up to her shoulder.

Minato knelt in front of her slowly, inwardly humming in interest as her eyes darted around his form, eyeing each of his movements with apprehension.

'She sees me as a threat,' he thought sullenly. He still didn't understand why she was so afraid of him. His reputation was something to consider, of course, but just didn't warrant this much distrust, especially from a kid.

With a sigh, he retrieved a brush and ink from his pouch. Dipping his brush in the ink, he brought it to her wrist, starting just above the heel of her palm, each stroke deliberately slow and gentle as it danced with practiced ease.

"Mirai-chan," Hiruzen's rough voice prompted the child to rip her eyes from Minato's brush-- from his movements, the action seeming to take every bit of her willpower, "As for your skills as a shinobi, you have...," he paused, shuffling through a thin stack of paperwork, "...a few different options. If you so wish, you could begin in the academy, and move your way up from there, or I could simply reinstate you with a chunin rank directly."

Mirai stiffened, her body coiling defensively, and at the sudden jerk of her body, Minato's brush streaked a line of cold ink across her forearm. Her head snapped back to him, eyes widened dangerously at the icy feeling of the ink, and she flinched violently as he wiped the smear of ink with a tender thumb.

The little blonde's blue orbs pierced his own, a feral, defensive, and desperate sort of terror swimming beneath the ocean of sapphire and cobalt, the black of her pupils almost seeming to narrow and sharpen animalisticly.

Then, suddenly that menacing fire that burned red behind the sea of blue snapped away, as if it was never there to begin with, and she breathed a deep, steadying breath.

A wave of sorrow flooded Minato's chest.

This child...was so broken.

A small, wobbly, and painfully plastic smile stretched cross her face as she turned back to the Sandaime, clearing her throat tightly, "I would like to continue with my shinobi career as soon as possible, Hokage-sama. Being reinstated as a chunin would be preferable, please."

Minato paused. The way the girl had addressed the Sandaime was ill-mannered at best, bordering on insolent and disdainful. Interestingly enough, Sarutobi didn't seem to bat an eye at her stark disrespect, a certain glint in his dark orbs as he leveled his gaze with Mirai. It seemed as if he was testing the waters, testing Mirai, in a way that hinted that he wasn't speaking to a child - more as if he was gazing at an... equal?

Confusion flooded Konoha's Yellow Flash, his orbs switching between the child and his Hokage as they stared challengingly at eachother, a silent and subtle battle apparently passing between the two.

And through it, all Minato could think was, "What the hell?"

••••••

"Damn it," Kurama cursed, his fury shifting uncomfortably in the recesses of my mind, "He backed you into a corner."

And the damned old man Sarutobi had. By asking me about my preferences relating to my shinobi career and rank - in the presence of both Minato and the majority of his team - he avoided direct negotiation with me, while simultaneously giving Minato an idea of my level of ability.

"I wasn't able to negotiate with him. I had to make a choice in the heat of the moment without being given time to even think about what would be the best option," I seethed, gritting my teeth furiously, "this just reaffirms that this is not the same old man. He's playing with us. Testing his limits. He might be the Hokage, and my age is regressed, but he doesn't know what my abilities are-- he's attempting to see just how far he can get me wrapped around his finger."

"Precisely. I like this Old Man a lot less than the one from Before, and I hated that one."

"I know,"

I sighed, "this just got a whole lot harder."

Annnnnnd, there we have it! Short chapter, I know, I'm sorry. It's not the best written either, but, I hope it wasn't too disappointing!

Mirai is... struggling. And really, she has a right to! Minato is her dad, but he's not her dad... You get me? He's also supposed to be dead, but since she's in a different time, he's not, and it's just weird.

But don't worry, she'll make it through!

(Kami, I'm all over the place today. I hope I'm at least coherent to y'all!)

Ciao~!