FR: hey everyone! Right now I'm hiding from Ino since she is still mad at me for all the things I'm putting her through so …

Ino: FANREADER! Where the hell are you!?

FR: *wimpers behind desk*

Ino: why does Hinata get happier moments?!

FR: *whispers* it kinda just comes out this way

Ino: there you are! *pulls out a mallet*

FR: *runs away* anyway guys hope you enjoy the chapter bye

"Normal speech"

'Normal thoughts'

"Demon/Summon speech"

'Demon/Inner Sakura/Summon thoughts'

Jutsu name

(author comment) - not a lot of them

flashback/memory

~locations and transitions~

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto, it's owned by one wiser than me

Chapter 25: 2 out of 5 isn't bad

Naruto was eating with his friends trying to stop the burning he was feeling but no matter how much he ate it would still hurt. He could only assume that whatever the snake creep did to him must be the problem. He still had one hand over his exposed stomach, since he didn't have a change of clothes so he had stayed in his torn clothes

"Hey Naruto? You ok man?"

Naruto looked up to see that Kiba was looking at him with a bit of concern in his eyes. Looking around him he saw that team 8 and Sakura were looking at him with a look of worry. Sasuke had left the second the group went to the cafeteria. Naruto gave a small smile to the group "I'm not sure guys. I feel like my body is being weighed down and my all muscles burn"

Hinata didn't like the idea that Naruto was in pain. She got up and walked around the table to place a hand on his shoulder "Naruto-kun. Lets go to the medical wing so they can check on you"

Naruto tensed a bit when he heard this as he rarely ever went to the hospital and when he did, it was usually with specific people such as Hana. he hated when he was told she was a veterinarian and Anko was in the room. She had been laughing for the entire visit and even when they left. Naruto looked to Hinata and shook his head "it's alright Hinata-chan. I'll feel better after I get some rest". He would have gone back to eating his meal but he felt a sudden chill go down his spine

"Naruto-kun. You should go get yourself checked out to make sure that you are actually fine"

Naruto turned back to look at Hinata and could swear there was a dark aura surrounding her. He couldn't even tell what the feeling she was emitting was but he knew that he shouldn't argue against her. Nodding his head he allowed Hinata to drag him away from the cafeteria.

Kiba was laughing hard as Akamaru wagged his tail.

Shino externally show no reaction but internally he was amused.

Sakura just smiled at the concern Hinata gave 'she is a lot more confident now. Especially when Naruto is around'

~Medical wing~

Hinata and Naruto walked into the nurses office, looking around to see if anyone would be here to help. "Hello? Is there anyone here that can help us?"

Naruto sat on one of the beds and looked at Hinata who was looking around the room "Hinata-chan, all I really need is to sleep a bit" Naruto began to lay down on the bed but shot back into a sitting position and winced when sharp pains were felt on his back

Hinata noticed this and walked up to Nartuo "Naruto-kun are you ok?!"

Naruto had one of his eyes closed from the wince and shook his head. He never liked lying and even less to Hinata "no ...something stings on my back"

Hinata grew more concerned. She had noticed that Naruto never removed his hand from his stomach but now he feels pain on his back. She acted out of sheer worry "Naruto-kun! Take off your jacket and shirt!"

Naruto began to blush at being told to go topless "um Hinata-chan… I don't think that's a good….."

"Now Naruto-kun!"

Naruto felt a bit of fear from how stern Hinata seemed to be. He slowly slipped out of his jacket and shirt, exposing his torso to her.

Hinata now realized what she had just said and grew several shades redder at not only demanding Naruto to strip but the fact that Naruto was so close to her and without a shirt on. She was close to fainting but she caught a glimpse of Naruto's back. 'Oh Naruto-kun' on Naruto's back were several splinters that had embedded themselves into his back and a few were bleeding. Hinata went into nursing mode and walked away to the medical cabinet "Naruto-kun please lay on your stomach please"

Naruto looked up at Hinata and tilted his head "why?"

Hinata pulled out a medical box and placed in on a table next to the cabinet before she opened it and began looking for something "you have some wood fragments in your back. I have to remove them so they don't get infected"

Naruto knew that he wouldn't get an infection since his body would destroy any infection or bacteria. In fact his body should have already pushed the wood out of his body and heal but it hasn't. He then chose to let Hinata do what she was going to do, so he slowly lowered himself so he would be laying on his stomach.

Hinata had found a pair of tweavers, disinfectant and a bandage for his whole back before she made her way to the bed Naruto was on and sat down next to him. "Ok Naruto-kun, just try and relax. I'm about to start removing them"

Naruto nodded his head and tried to relax his body. He felt her start removing the wood chunks from his back and winced a bit every time they were removed

"Sorry Naruto-kun" she said as she placed another piece in a small metal tray

Naruto just smiled at how kind Hinata was "it's fine Hinata-chan. They just sting a bit. I can handle it"

Hinata smiled 'I know you can Naruto-kun' and continued

After 25 minutes she had removed all of the splinters that she could and began to rub the disinfectant on Naruto's back. He would have said that he didn't need it but didn't want to anger Hinata again, besides he enjoyed the small touches she was doing.

Once Hinata finished putting the disinfectant, she placed the bandage on his back "ok Naruto-kun. You should be fine now"

Naruto slowly sat up as Hinata put away the disinfectant placed the tray in the sink to be cleansed and threw away the disposable plastic tweezers. Naruto looked towards Hinata "thanks a lot Hinata-chan. It's amazing how you seem use to this"

Hinata walked back to stand in front of Naruto "I'm use to helping heal wounds for my teammates and my mother always tells me to help out your friends."

Naruto's smile grew wider as he started to get up from the bed but the movement caused him to wince again from the pain in his stomach. "grr"

This caused Hinata to begin to worry again "Naruto-kun! What's wrong?!"

Naruto was wincing from the pain "I got hit on the stomach during the exam and it still hurts like hell"

Hinata knelt down to be level with his stomach. Placing her hands over his she slowly moved them out of the way "let me see"

Naruto moved his hands and let her examine him

Hinata noticed that there were five kanjis on his stomach and she felt worried about this "Naruto-kun….I think someone placed some sort of seal on you". Hinata wasn't a master at seals but she has seen a fair amount of them, so she knew what a seal placed on the body would look like. She unfortunately didn't know anything about what this seal might do or how to remove it but she examined it as best she could, sliding her fingers from one kanji to the next.

Naruto felt a chill as he felt Hinata examine the seal. He could feel her soft delicate fingers run across his skin in a slow motion. This gesture caused his instincts to rise in him. He could feel the soft skin of her fingers touch him, he could smell her unique scent coming off her. He looked down and thought how beautiful she was. His instincts told him that she was important to him, that he needed to protect her, to stay with her. He had only felt this feeling before in a smaller amount and it was for two people. Right now it was strong, compelling, and he could tell that it was still for the same two people as the other person flashed in his mind. The girl right in front of him and the girl he wishes to be friends with again. "...Hinata"

Hinata looked up and immediately blushed hard as she not only realize what she was doing but also how close Naruto's face was to hers. He was inches away from her, she could see he was breathing slightly heavier as she looked into his eyes. His beautiful azure blue eyes that seemed to shine as they looked at her. "Naruto…"

Hinata's hand was no longer just pressing fingers on the seal. It slowly grew closer until her palm was slowly rubbing Naruto's abs causing Naruto's hand to go over hers. She aimlessly thought that his hands were larger than hers, and that they were smooth and soft yet strong and firm.

Both didn't realize that they were slowly growing closer to each other. That they could feel each other's breath on them, that their lips were almost touching. That their eyes were slowly closing

The door to the room suddenly opened snapping Hinata out of what she was doing. With a small "eep" she stood straight up with a massive blush on her face and turned to see who it was

The nurse was looking at a clipboard as she walked in. she looked up to see two people looking at her "hello. Is there something I can help you with something?" she said with a smile

Hinata shook her head rapidly "no no no no w-we a-are fine!"

Naruto shook his head as if he was in a trance and looked around until his eyes landed on the nurse who was standing by the doorway "uh ...no we're fine" Naruto stood up from the bed, still in pain but with a little more energy "She just finished helping me out"

When Hinata heard this, the last few minutes flowed into her mind. Her blush grew to new levels and she did what she normally would have done, she fainted

Naruto was quick enough to catch her before she landed on the floor "hey Hinata-chan! Are you ok? Hinata-chan?". Naruto turned to the nurse and gave a nervous chuckle "I think she needs to rest a bit".

He placed her in the opposite bed so she could sleep, grabbed his shirt and jacket before he looked at them, realizing that his shirt was now useless. The shirt was missing it's lower half and what was left was filled with rips and holes. His jacket was almost as bad, it was missing a sleeve, half the collar was gone and there was a tear on the back of it. Putting on the jacket, he tossed the shirt over his shoulder so he could throw it away later. He made his way out into the hallway and walked towards the bathroom. Once he made it he made sure he was alone, walked into a stall, sat down on the toilet and immediately changed color as he gripped his head in panic "what the hell did I almost do!?" he thought back to his interaction with Hinata "it was like I was on autopilot and I almost ki ...ki ...ki! I almost kissed her!". Naruto was going crazy as he began pulling his hair so hard, he almost ripped it out. Naruto chose that he needed to calm down so he started to take a deep breath to try and get his nerves to calm down and the blush to lower. "Ok think. What happened? She helped me with the splinters, put on the disinfectant, placed a bandage, I got up but had to sit back down because my stomach still hurt and she checked it before she said…..". Naruto jumped up and moved out of the stall to look into the mirror. There he saw the five kanji marks on his stomach "what the hell?! Is that what that snake-teme did to me?" he then realized something "is this why my body hurts? Why I can't hear Rama-tou-chan anymore?! I need to get rid of this thing!" he pulled his shirt off his shoulder before tearing it and wrapping it around his stomach to hide the seal

Naruto began to walk fast around the building trying to find Iruka or any other chunin or jonin so he could go see the hokage. He felt that the hokage would be his best bet in removing the seal so he needed to talk to him immediately.

~20 minutes Chunin/Jonin break room~

Iruka was in the middle of having a conversation with the Kuranai and Kakashi, since their teams have made it through this part of the exam, discussing the progress of his former students "so Kiba still has settled down in his overconfidence? How so?"

Kuranai put down her cup of tea and looked at Iruka "from what I know about his academy days, he was one of the best taijutsu users in his graduating year so it would make sense that he would consider himself one of the best but Hinata has been improving in her fighting and confidence so she has been giving Kiba a harder time in the spars. In this he was slowly realizing that he wasn't unbeatable when Hinata had beaten him in a spar once. After that he toned down his small superiority attitude he had"

Iruka nodded his head in understanding "so Hinata has been improving just as much"

Kuranai couldn't help the smile from appearing on her face "she has been gaining confidence from her extra training sessions"

Iruka quirked a brow "you've been giving her extra training sessions?"

Kuranai gently shook her head in amusement "no. she has been training with your student Kakashi-senpai: Naruto-san"

Kakashi looked over his book with a small look of interest "oh really? I didn't know he was training with the hyuga girl. It would explain how he seems to keep coming up with new ways in fighting. Fighting a user of the gentle fist would force someone to become creative" Kakashi closed his book and fully entered to conversation

Kuranai was happy to see Kakashi put away his little smut book. She already tried getting him to get rid of it but to no avail "I think that it was more for her benefit than his own. Kiba and Shino had told me that she would always say something about what they did during training. He would do some sort of move that she has never seen before and she would have to learn to react differently than she normally would. She started to change to hyuga style little by little."

Kakashi chuckled when he heard this "he has that sort of effect on people. I am not entirely sure how he did it but after having an argument with Sakura-chan, she started to take her physical training more seriously. She started training not only with the team but also with Haku-san, in fact she seems to be spending more time with Haku-san now. She no longer fawns over Sasuke-kun"

Iruka's eyes widened at this as he still remembered how much Sakura would go crazy for anything that had to do with Sasuke but now he was hearing that she had gotten out of it "well how far has he….."

"Iruka-sensei!"

The three senseis looked towards the door to see the very boy they were talking. "Naruto?!"

Naruto turned to look at the three and felt some relief after looking fro Iruka for all that time "Iruka-sensei! Kakashi-sensei! I need your help!"

Both Iruka and Kakashi got up from the couch and went to the boy. Iruka asked the question while kakashi lazily stood behind him "what is it Naruto-kun?"

Naruto took a breath as he pulled off the shirt that was wrapped around his stomach. Both senseis looked at the kanji on the stomach with a critical eye "I need help removing this and I want to ask Hokage-jiji if he could do it"

Kakashi gained a serious look as he saw this "Naruto who gave you this"

Naruto then explained what had happened in the forest of death. Iruka, Kakashi and Kuranai who had joined the group midway were shocked to hear one of the traitorous Sanin. Kakashi grew concerned when he heard that Sasuke had gained something from the snake "Naruto! Where is Sasuke right now?!"

Naruto shrugged his shoulders "I dunno. Maybe in our room since he left right after we arrived"

Kakashi nodded and turned to Kuranai "Kuranai, go get the hokage and bring him here. Once he helps Naruto come find me. I'm going to go find Sasuke. For obvious reasons, I don't trust whatever it was that Orochimaru gave him" he then turned to Iruka "Iruka stay with Naruto. Make sure nothing happens and find an area they can use for some privacy" both nodded agreeing with how this should be handled

Iruka nodded as the others shunsined away. He looked at Naruto and sighed in exasperation "why can't anything be simple when it involves you?"

Naruto looked at Iruka and smiled sheepishly "I wish I knew"

~30 minutes later~

Hiruzen and Naruto were standing in the middle of an empty guestroom as Hiruzen was looking at the seal on Naruto's stomach with a critical eye. He was surprised to see Kuranai appear in his office without any previous appointment but after being told a summary on what had happened he let it slide due to the urgency of the situation. "Hmm this is an interesting seal"

Naruto felt nervous at the way the Hokage said this "does that mean you can't remove it?!" he began to panic a bit when he said this. "What does it do and how can we remove it!?"

Hiruzen stood back up and lifted his hand to stop Naruto from panicking so much "calm yourself Naruto. This seal is meant to be a crude addition to the 8 Trigram seal that was placed on you to seal up the kyuubi. From what I can tell it should have rebounded any of the kyuubi's chakra back into the yondaime's seal by using your own chakra. Without the yondaime's seal there anymore, it is mainly a blocker which could be a bad thing."

Naruto was really starting to panic at this "why jiji?"

Hiruzen placed his hand on his chin in thought "the yondaime's seal was designed to convert the kyuubi chakra into your own chakra. This would have used your own chakra to bounce the kyuubi's chakra back to him instead of converting it but without the original seal there all this is doing is not only pulling it in it is stockpiling it. Once it is released a good burst of chakra could happen"

"So what can we do?"

"It would be best to remove the seal as soon as possible so the burst would be as small as possible. Unfortunately I cannot remove it entirely ..." Hiruzen saw the distraught look on the boy's face and placed a hand on his shoulder "I said 'entirely'. I can remove two of the five but I am unable to it entirely"

Naruto looked up in hope "do it Jiji!"

Hiruzen could only shake his head "why the rush Naruto-kun?"

Naruto looked at his stomach in sadness "I can't hear him anymore"

Hiruzen gave a deep sigh "alright Naruto" he then pulled up his sleeve and two kanji appeared. One on his index finger and another on his ring finger "Ok Naruto brace yourself. This will hurt a bit"

Naruto nodded and braced his legs and muscles "do it"

Hiruzen thrusted his hand onto Naruto's stomach, hitting the mark on two of the five kanjis.

Naruto was lifted off his feet from the blow and felt the air leave his body. Once the hokage removed his hand Naruto fell to his knees clutching his stomach "*cough damn *cough* you weren't kidding * cough cough*"

Hiruzen felt a big burst of chakra come out from the boy and was glad he had set up seals in the room to prevent anyone from noticing anything. He knelt down and placed a hand on the boys shoulder "well Naruto? Any difference?"

Naruto took a minute to catch his breath before he focused on how his body felt. He felt better, his body didn't burn as much anymore, he felt some strength come back and he felt that his wounds start to heal faster. He prayed as he did one last thing, he closed his eyes 'Rama-tou-chan?...Are you there?'

"...hey kit"

Naruto grew a smile that could split his face. He could hear Kurama again. Although it came in a little muffled and quieter but he could hear him 'thank kami your there'

"You can't get rid of me that easily kit. But let's not have anymore seals slapped on us, got it?"

Naruto closed his eyes in contentment 'got it'. He got back to his feet and looked at the hokage "thanks for do that Hokage-jiji" he then looked at his stomach to see that three of the kanjis were still there "how do we get rid of the other ones"

Hiruzen was glad to see the boy feeling better "well I know someone that would be able to remove the rest of the seal and fortunately for you, I have already summoned him back to the village. He should be here by the end of the second exam, so when he arrives I will send him to you"

Naruto smiled as he bowed to Hiruzen "thank you Hokage-sama"

Hiruzen wished he had a camera right now as this was the only time he has gotten full honorable respect from the boy and he wanted to have something to remind him that it happened. The last time he received it from Naruto was when the boy wanted something but this was out of gratitude "your welcome Naruto. Now you should get some rest, I have to check on Sasuke-kun now about that little event that had happened"

"Oh hey can I get someone to pick up another set of clothes for me from my place?" he asked as he lifted up his sash to show that it was also shredded.

Hiruzen sighed in exasperation "very well I will ask Iruka to go pick one up fro you. You really should learn to have a storage scroll with another set of clothing"

Naruto chuckled sheepishly and nodded "yeah, I really should". Both made their way out of the room and towards their destination.

Naruto went to the room meant for team 7 and Hiruzen went to find Kakashi and Sasuke as thoughts ran through his mind 'I need to recall Anko and her team immediately. We now know that Orochimaru is here and that he has an interest in Sasuke so we will need a guard team for him. There is more going on here but I am not sure what it is. Lets hope our hand is better than his this time'

~team 7 guestroom~

Naruto walked into the room and was glad to see that it was empty. He didn't know where Sakura or Sasuke was but right now he didn't really care. He made his way to one of the three beds and plopped down. He wanted to enter his mindscape but as hard as he tried he was unable to enter. He grumbled at this and gave a mental promise that he would hurt the snake-teme someday for doing this to him

'Hey Rama-tou-chan?'

"...yeah kit"

'Isn't there a way for you to remove the stupid seal yourself? Didn't you do it for the yondaime's seal?'

"... I wasn't the one that removed it"

'Huh? Then who did?'

"...when this seal is removed, I will show you who."

Naruto quirked an eyebrow at this but just let it go. Right now he was just glad that Kurama was still here. He chose now to get some sleep.

~unknown location~

Danzo stood in front of a team of his Root agents with a smile on his face "are you all prepared to do your part in this and give your lives to achieve our goals?"

All agents stood straight and gave their answer

"Yes sir Danzo-sama"

Danzo smiled as he walked away with the agents following him diligently

End of chapter

Where did this come from? Oh right from my head.

That moment with Hinata and Naruto was added because I feel like Hinata hasn't had much screen time as Ino and as I was writing it, that scene just came

This chapter is shorter since not much else can happen. Next chapter will be the start of the prelims. I feel like I should switch some of the fights around but if I do I will be keeping a few the same since the fights were epic and can't really improve on them. Spoiler though one fight will still happen like canon but I plan on changing a few things about it.

Poll results

Prowling fox - 16 votes

Feral fox - 12 votes

Hunting Fox - 11 votes

Hunters claw - 7 votes

Fox claw - 6 votes

Based on how the voting is going I think I might just pull the poll off by next week or the weekend either way it seems that the winner is becoming clear

Please read and review