Chapter 12: Close Encounters of the Ninth Kind

Gryffindor Common Room- Night Time

It was around night time when Naruto and his friends went back to the common room. They had just celebrated Harry's victory in his first Quidditch match. "Man that was awesome Harry! Seeing you do all those tricks on the broom!" Naruto said. Harry chuckles, "well it was nothing compared to how you took down that troll," Harry states. "Yeah, but you guys helped so there's that" Naruto retorts. "Well as much as I would like to compare both your feats, I believe we have to discuss the more important issue such as why Snape was jinxing your broom" Hermione states. "Right, I think we should talk with Hagrid about this tomorrow," Harry replied. The group nodded in affirmation. Soon they all wished each other good night as they went to their respective dorms to sleep.

Naruto's Mindscape

Naruto wakes up only to find himself in a rather strange location. "Where the heck am I?" he asked himself, as he looked around the area to see himself in a sewer-like labyrinth. He trudges through the knee-deep water for a while until he stops in front of some hall with a giant cage. "Lumos," Naruto said as he uses his wand for a light only to see something that will shock him. The boy looks up to see a giant orange fox behind the cage, and the boy backs up slowly as the giant fox wakes up and looks at the boy with its two large red slitted eyes. The fox grinned, and as Naruto was about to get close to the cage, the fox stabbed its claws at the gate making the boy fall. "So… we finally meet. I've been trying to reach you" the giant fox said as the boy got up. "Y-Y-You're t-t-the-" Naruto stuttered. The fox grinned showing its fangs, "the Nine Tailed Fox" the fox finished for the boy. "How are you still alive, you're supposed to be dead?!" Naruto said as he pointed at the fox accusingly. The tailed beast scoffed, "Idiot! I cannot die; my body is nothing more than a large mass of chakra-" the tailed beast explained to the boy.

"Then how are you here then?" Naruto asked. "How else, brat! I'm sealed inside you!" the fox said as he pointed to the blond wizard. Naruto looks at the fox in shock, and that was when he realized why he was hated by everyone back home, why they would always beat and try to kill him, why he was an orphan… it was all because of the fox. "It's your fault… you're the reason why my life was a living hell back home!" Naruto yells at the fox, sounding angry. "You think I wanted this?! Why don't you blame the third hokage as he's the one to announce your status as a jinchuuriki!" the fox retorted. Naruto winced, but he remembered that whenever he asked the old man about why he was hated, the old man would brush off that subject and always arrived after the boy had gotten beat up by the villagers. "So you finally get it now!" the fox asked. The blond looks down, "maybe if you hadn't attacked the village, then I would've had a chance-," "At what? Becoming a tool for the village?! A puppet?! Face it kid, that's what a shinobi is, a tool whose only purpose is to live and die for the village!" the nine tails snarled. "At least I would've had a normal life!" Naruto screamed. The Fox laughed at that response, "A normal life! Pfft, yeah right, when has anything been normal for you… besides if it weren't for me, you wouldn't have discovered your magical abilities and made friends with the people of this world, so if anything you should be grateful brat!" the fox retorts sounding annoyed.

Naruto wanted to deny those claims, but he knew the fox was right. Looking back, if he had still chosen to be a shinobi instead of a wizard, he wouldn't have met his friends here and wouldn't have seen the new world. "Do you finally realize it?" the fox asked as it lay down. Naruto nods sadly, "you're right… the villagers hated me for something we didn't ask for, if anything I'm sorry for yelling at you for telling the truth" Naruto said to the fox. The fox looks at the boy, "It's fine kid, you suffered enough so I figured you needed to vent out your issues" the fox said. Naruto looked at the fox in surprise and responded, "well, since we're in the new world, this is a perfect chance to start off fresh for the both of us, now that we don't have to worry about being targeted for being alive. So what do you say, do you want to be allies in this new world?" The fox looks at the blond in shock. For as long as he can remember, from being used by Madara to being sealed by the Uzumaki clan, never in his life had he ever been offered friendship by a human… not since his friendship with the Sage of Six Paths himself. "Whatever kid… so long as you don't annoy me like my previous jailer, then I don't see a problem with being allies. Now I believe you stayed here long enough… so get out already!" the fox said. Naruto looked at his tenant and smiled, before he was being pulled back to the real world. The fox thinks back to his meeting with Naruto and smirks, "Looks like the boy is beginning to interest me," the fox said to himself.