Take me out to the Ballgame,
Take me out to the game!
Buy me some kunai and ninja tools,
So I can slice up some fools! (ya fool)

(Btw here's a YouTube video:

https/m./watch?v=h232bilq8eQ.

Copy that link into your browser. If it doesn't work, The video is called Best comeback ever by Brian David Gilbert. It's the laugh of a certain new character introduced in this chapter. You'll know when you meet him.)

-

It had been 1 year since the beginning of the academy. Naruto and Lee had the same routine since the beginning of the year.

Naruto would get up at 5:30 everyday and get dressed as quickly as possible. The first person to the training ground would choose the first and second exercise.

The two had slowly been increasing the amount of each exercise and were able to do: 2500 push-ups, 650 sprints around the yard, 2000 punches and kicks (each limb), 350 laps around the school on their hands, etc.

Naruto was actually enjoying his time at the academy. He had forgotten a lot of the little details about the villages history. So unlike his fellow classmates, Naruto listened intently to each history lesson.

All of the math, however, was incredibly boring, so Naruto just slept on Hinata's shoulder during the lessons.

Little did he know, every time he leaned on his friend's shoulder, her heart exploded into several tiny pieces. She too would lose consciousness a lot, although not for the same reasons.

Iruka had tried initially to call out the sleeping blonde. It went the same every time: "Naruto! Wake up!" And the class would giggle at the boy getting in trouble. Naruto would yawn, then groan as he walked up to solve the equation. It turns out that Naruto is one hell of a teacher. He would walk through each step of the problem and answer any questions. He could practically teach the class, and one time; in fact, he did.

Iruka was fascinated with this boy. He kicked himself over how narrow-minded he was before meeting the boy.

As he got older, became a genin and so-forth, rumors started to spread. There was a child the contained the nine-tails. Some said that he even befriended it. It was assumed that he was banished in a sense. The main rumor was that Danzō had taken him into custody to prevent any violent outbursts. Iruka could be spotted as one of the many who actively avoided the boy, and gave dirty looks and such.

He shouldn't be confused with the most radical in their hatred towards Naruto. Hell, that subset of people vanished after a certain, rather poignant incident.

The people involved in the only physical violence against the boy slowly dwindled off after the death of Naruto. A sudden uptick in suicides, from the people who investigated the orphanage after Orochimaru's attack, worried the public. Without a reason for the odd events, the village once again placed the blame on Naruto, the only survivor of the orphanage.

All it took was one person to show hate: the one spark that lights the flame. The flame of anger spread from house to house, until the whole village was razed to the ground.

Those who were either smart or just rebellious ignored their parents' warnings. Iruka could tell plenty of students still steered clear of him purposely, however, following their parents instruction.

The fire still seemed to be spreading.

It wasn't the children's idea to hate Naruto. Hell, he just seemed like a normal kid. Not being able to communicate with someone so cheerful probably sucked. It sickened Iruka, seeing ignorant ideals forced on children.

Who was he to judge though? He held those same ignorant beliefs about the wonderful kid that sat not even twenty feet from him. Sure, it was before he had met him, and he did lose his family to the kyuubi, but that didn't excuse the prejudice. Iruka had seen people who barely lost anything to the attack still loathe Naruto more than anybody else.

Why did they feel threatened by him?

The short answer was that they were afraid the kyuubi would consume the boy, and attack once again.

What Iruka believed to be the actual answer, was that, in the case of those who didn't lose much, they were compensating for that fact. They had to show support for their neighbors by going out of their way to be disgusted by the boy. They have to hate the nine-tailed fox. They are right to do so.

But what are they to hate if the fox isn't there? Well it's container of course.

By not hating Naruto, they feel that they are undermining their neighbors. People now feel judged if they don't show hate as well. If they don't actively shun the "thing who destroyed the village", they lose face amongst their friends.

Mob mentality. Maybe they felt like they had to overpower the hate inside the fox using their own hate. Fight fire with fire. It was stupid to use Naruto as a target for all that hate, however. To show disdain without saying anything about why. Make him torture himself as he searched for reasons of their contempt. He didn't know what was inside of him.

What did the great leaders of the past fight for, if not this? For every person to be treated as such. A person.

Nobody ever sat down to learn about the boy. Maybe they were afraid that they would actually like him. It was a scary thought, the person who harboured an actual demon being a very kind individual.

At least Iruka had changed. He took solace in that fact. It gave him hope. Hope that others could follow in his path.

But, humanity is very odd in her methods. Iruka at least understood that.

Naruto had settled into the academy quite nicely, despite Iruka's inner monologue. Not only was he friends with Sasuke and Hinata, he had made friends with plenty of his more progressive classmates. Kids who couldn't care less about what they were supposed to do. Kids like Ino and Choji (and Shikamaru via proximity).

The shy Sakura, with heavy pestering from Ino, eventually gave in and disobeyed her parents' wishes. It was a tough sell, however. It helped that Naruto and Sasuke were almost attached at the hip.

Naruto, because he was so close to Sasuke, was the resident Uchiha expert. He convinced Sakura and Ino to be less hyper towards their crush. They were more laid-back and less clingy around him. Naruto discovered that, sometime during the year, they had destroyed their friendship over their competition for Sasuke. Naruto convinced them that the only thing Sasuke found less attractive than annoying people, were people who abandoned their friends.

They were easy to manipul- convince to change their ways of thinking... If you knew which buttons to press.

There wasn't much he could do to change Shikamaru or Choji. Him and Choji were so set in their ways that nothing anybody would do could change them. Shika was always snoozing, Choji was always snacking. The Naruto they had seen wasn't exactly a leader when it came to energy and YOUTHFULNESS.

The only real reason Shikamaru was Naruto's friend was because he was too lazy to give him dirty looks or walk away. It took too much effort to think about who he should or shouldn't be around.

Today, excitement could be felt all around, even in the lazy Nara boy. Barely, but it was still present.

Today was a special day at the academy.

Today was a field trip to the land of fire's own leaf stadium. They were going to watch the Konoha Krush play the Cloud Crushers in an all-out, tit-for-tat, baseball brawl.

Although not very diverse when it came to naming schemes, the two teams' skills were unparalleled. Konoha was 1st in the league, and Kumo was 2nd. Konoha only had one more win than the Crushers. This game was crucial for both sides.

Naruto was trembling in excitement. He had his Konoha Krush jersey on, unbuttoned all the way down, with a black undershirt underneath (you pervs!).

He was wearing the jersey of his favorite player, Konoha legend, number 51, Ichiro Suzuki! He was an absolute monster. It was like the game was played in slow motion for him. Naruto had only caught a couple of games via tv, but in his limited viewing, he fell in love with the Krush star player.

Because tickets were so expensive, the school only had enough funds to send one class, so a quiz competition was held between each class.

One representative would answer a question, then the next student, then the next, and so on.

Naruto was DESPERATE to see this game.

He convinced the rest of the class, save Sasuke and Sakura (who both refused to believe Naruto was smarter than them) to let him transform into each and every one of them to answer each question. The questions were easy, and the year 1 students got 98%! Sasuke blamed both Sakura and Naruto for them not getting 100% (One question wrong=2% off of the score. You do the math).

The day before the field trip, Naruto watched as the last people turned in the permission slips. The only person to not turn one in was Hinata.

This worried Naruto. He wanted all of his friends to see Ichiro snuff their opponent's dreams on the spot. That included his "tied for bestest friend in the class and world", Hinata. When Naruto found out about the absence of a slip from Hinata, Naruto made sure to thoroughly interrogate her.

An unexpected consequence of the interrogation was that Naruto was required to get very close to Hinata. This did not bode well for the Hyūga, her nose, or her consciousness.

Her father, still paranoid of a kidnapping, didn't want her to leave so close to the stone village. Upon hearing this, Naruto grabbed an extra permission slip and bolted to the Hyūga compound 5 minutes before class started.

He was on his knees begging Hiashi. He was only able to convince him with an under-the-table deal, which would land the Hyūga clan head the icha icha deluxe ultimate compendium, signed by Jiraiya himself, as well as Naruto promising on his own life that Hinata would be returned safely. It was worth the risk.

With his dignity restored and his excitement at its peak, Naruto was rearing and ready to go.

There was only one drawback to the trip.
'Jeremy,'
'Jeremy,'
'Jeremy.'

Jeremy was the feudal lords nephew, and the class shithead. He was constantly annoying the entire class, and even Nuibari and Kurama.

'That boy is more inelegant than a rusty spoon,' Nuibari smirked, getting a nod from Kurama.

'Remember kit, money can't buy you everything.'

'I like rusty spoons,' Naruto remarked, 'The feeling of a rusty spoon on my fingers is almost-'

'Please. Stop with that. I do not wish to think of that... that thing,' Nuibari shivered.

'Yeah... to be honest, That dude was really disgusting. What was he called again?'

'I'm pretty sure it was a girl. Think his name was-'

'Don't say it's name! You'll summon it that way.'

They were interrupted by Jeremy sauntering his putrid, horrendous body into the room. Said douche threw his permission slip at Iruka's desk, which was ten feet away. The paper fluttered down to his feet, "Someone pick that up. Now!" Nobody gave the boy anything but a grimace.

'Jeremy,'
'Jeremy,'
'

Jeremy.'

Jeremy walked up to his desk right in front of Naruto and glared at him, "Oh hey FART-uto,"

'That's not even a funny nickname,' Naruto thought. Nuibari and Kurama looked at Naruto and nodded sternly, 'I know how to take a joke, but fart-uto just isn't funny, nobody thinks it-

Naruto's train of defensive thought was interrupted by the snot filled, vomit inducing voice of Jeremy, "Would you like some gum?" And he spat his chewing gum directly at Naruto's forehead.

"No," Out of reflex, Naruto quickly batted the gum out of the air and directly into Jeremy's throat, "I don't like that flavor."

Naruto looked boredly out the window as Jeremy slowly twirled to the floor letting out an, "Oh dear." Naruto acted nonchalant, hiding the fact that the trio in his head were having a "high five party".

Jeremy 'hmphed' into his seat, after a couple minutes of hyperventilating, and crossed his arms, glaring over his shoulder at the still bored (still high fiving) Naruto.

Iruka was just as excited for this day as anyone else.

He had been the biggest Krush fan for 15 years! 7 years ago was the first time he watched in awe as Ichiro Suzuki, his favorite person and celebrity crush, hammered 5 home runs in his debut game. His talents were out of this world- nay- out of this universe!

Iruka burst the door open and faced the class, the biggest grin stretching his face. Naruto noticed Iruka also wearing an Ichiro jersey. He began pointing frantically at both himself and his teacher in order to notify him of their shared fanship. Jeremy also attempted to speak, opening his wretched, terrible mouth, and raising a finger. Iruka interrupted the two, "Jeremy, Naruto- shut up!"

"I wasn't even talking!" Both shouted, getting a screeching Iruka in return:

"I SAID SHUT UP!" Everyone went dead silent. Iruka was shaking and panting. The class had never seen him so worked up. He regained his composure, cleared his throat, and instructed the class to follow him.

Sitting outside was a flock of massive hawks with a row of cushions on their backs. Iruka briefed the awestruck class on how they would be flying. Each hawk could carry four people and each person would be held in place by a special seal. Sasuke, Hinata, and Naruto all jumped onto the same falcon. Sakura stepped towards the falcon that her friends were on, only to be pushed away by Jeremy, who stole her spot, "Careful SACKura WHORuno, I almost tripped on your forehead." He laughed his god-forsaken, and extremely gross laugh.

'I'm gonna flatten that damn Jeremy! CHA!'

-

The flight was smooth for everyone, save a certain boy and his two inner voices.

There had been a constant stream of gum falling down Naruto's shirt for the entirety of the journey. It only took about 15 minutes to reach the stadium, but 15 minutes felt a lot longer with qwfive pounds of gum piled up in your shirt.

How does Jeremy have this much gum? Why does he keep putting it down Naruto's shirt, even though he was getting nothing out of it? Naruto had not responded to the gum assault once. What kind of satisfaction could Jeremy be getting out of this? Naruto had traveled the world, dispatched disastrously dubious, dangerous delinquents, but his kill count paled in comparison to:

1.) The amount of gum in his shirt

2.) The amount of questions he had

3.) The amount of questions that he would be unable to answer about this situation.

Per-capita, Naruto had touched more gum in the last 15 minutes than the rest of his class minus Jeremy. He had enough gum in the back of his shirt to replace his large intestine... if he really wanted to. He looked like a two-humped, gum camel. The list goes on and on and on and on and-

This was truly a nightmare. A gum-filled nightmare.

Naruto was about to turn to Jeremy and launch an onslaught of fists and "kind" words before he realized two things.

First, if he turned around, there was a good chance he would fall off.

Second, maybe Jeremy was neglected or something. That would clear up a lot of things. He was antagonizing everyone just so he could get the attention that he had always wanted from his noble father. Maybe that was why he was in the academy. Maybe he wanted to make a name for himself as a ninja. Naruto could relate to that in some way. 'Maybe he isn't so bad, awful, sucky, terrible...' Naruto continued to list for a solid half-minute.

He was broken from his thought when he felt something sticky on his neck. Something sticky all over his neck. A tick mark grew across Naruto's face as he reached a hand back to feel the wall of gum Jeremy had placed on his neck.

He glanced back over his shoulder at the boy, who was alternating between loud snorts and even louder lip smacking. Naruto briefly activated then deactivated his fūinnome.

A lot like Itachi's mangekyō, Naruto's fūinnome had a different ability for each eye. His right allowed him to copy and paste any abilities his opponent had. However, depending on the ability, Naruto might experience crippling pain for weeks. His left eye was a mixture of the Tsukuyomi and the Yamanaka clan's psycho mind transmission technique. Instead of going through countless scrolls in real time and only being able to skim for important memories, Naruto could search unlimited memories in a second, absorbing each and every one.

He kept this ability mostly secret, as he did not want to defund the entire intelligence division.

Naruto was shocked to find out that this boy was an asshole for no reason. No neglect, nothing that could justify his shittiness. He wasn't even doing this because he didn't know people hated it. He enjoyed seeing people be upset by his hand.

Naruto shivered at the thought before ejecting the gum from his neck using his skeletal control. Jeremy was surprised at the sudden gum projectiles and instinctively jerked backwards, falling off the bird. Naruto heard the boy cry out and turned to see him losing balance off of the hawk.

'Maybe this'll keep him from being so moronic.'

'Near death experiences often do change a person.'

'I would know,' Kurama and Nuibari gave a nod.

Naruto marked the bird with his sealing formula and leapt off in suit of Jeremy. Naruto grabbed onto the gum gunslinger, retreating back to his mark, firmly holding onto the boy.

"Thanks Poozumaki, you really came through there," Jeremy said before promptly spitting a piece of gum at Naruto, "Ewwoops," the snot-bucket said as the piece of gum was caught in the wind. Everyone stared in shock as the gum floated, seemingly bouncing in the wind, before landing with a splat on one of the bird pilots faces, causing him to jerk upwards in reaction. The passengers, Ino, Shika, Choji, and Sakura all screamed and began to plummet to the ground. Naruto had to act fast. He only really had two options.

His first option was to hiraishin all four of the passengers. Because there were so many people and he only had a mark on the bird he was on, this option was looking far less viable. Meaning...

"Kamui!" Naruto whispered. He had to be incredibly precise. If he missed even in the slightest bit, he might take an arm off, or worse. Besides the chakra he was using in his feet, Naruto sent as much as possible to his eyes, making the Kamui as big as possible. He was able to get them all as they were at the same angle. Because they were so far away, making them small to Naruto, it was actually a lot easier than he thought. He sighed in relief as he fell to his knees, bleeding from his left eye.

He would have to think of a pretty good excuse for this one.

Hinata watched as a swirl began to form around her falling friends. She squinted and watched in mixed shock and horror as her friends disappeared. She looked around, trying to see if anyone else saw it. Naruto seemed rather unphased, and wiped some blood from his eye.

'Bleeding? From his eye?' Something was definitely up. But it seemed that Hinata was the only one to notice the bleeding eye, and she wasn't one to raise a fuss. After all, if she was the only one noticing, was it really that big of a deal?

-

The class arrived and Iruka was fuming at Jeremy. It was the first time that the boy had ever shut up. He hung his head and sat down on a nearby bench, seemingly pondering his life choices after each person in the class had their turn yelling at him.

After the gangbang on Jeremy's psyche, Naruto explained that they were all most likely under some genjutsu from the "genjutu flowers" blooming below. The class seemed to accept this, other than Sasuke, Sakura, and Iruka. If he had to, he could probably trust them. None of that mattered now, as he remembered that the whole back of his body was sticky.

Naruto failed to recognize that Hinata didn't believe the genjutsu flower lie.

'I can't believe that monster would do such a thing,' Nuibari was appalled at not only the gum shenanigans, but Naruto ignoring said shenanigans.

'Yeah, he hit me with a couple of gum- gum rockets.'

'Did you just... stutter in your mind?'

'I'm reaaally tired.'

-

The game was about to start, but more than anything, Naruto just needed a bath.

Instead of actually going to the bathroom, like he said he was doing, Naruto found a secluded spot off to the side of the stadium where he took a wet rag and wiped off the gum residue. No matter how hard he tried, there was just one spot he couldn't reach. 'Damn that wretched gum criminal.'

"N-Naruto-kun," a soft voice spoke from behind him.

Naruto jumped a little bit, "Oh, hehe, you scared me. What's up, Hinata."

"Is your eye okay?" A panicked look spanned Naruto's face. Luckily, he was looking away from Hinata, "It's just... ano... you were bleeding and-"

"Oh yeah," Naruto inwardly sighed, "Just got hit by a pebble near my eye. Everything's okay, dattebayo!"

"Oh well... ano... would you like some of this?" He turned to see her holding a small tin.

"Oh! What is this?"

"It's... ano... KyYYAAaAaA," she sprung a nosebleed and plummeted towards the ground. Naruto grabbed her by the shoulders.

"Hinata?" A wide smile and blank eyes made up the girl's face. She was stammering, blood still trickling from her nose, "What's up with that? She's like Danzō when he sees my sexy jutsu," he scratched his head. He set her down and put his shirt back on. The tin caught his eye. He picked it up and analyzed it.

"Ano... It's- it's a healing ointment. I-I just... ano-"

"Ohhhh. For my eye," he stuffed it in his pocket, "Well, trust me, it's perfectly fine," Hinata looked down and rubbed her arm, "But thank you. I'll definitely need it in the future," she smiled at that, but continued to rub her arm. "Come on," she looked up, "Let's go back to the others."

"Right!"

Naruto and Hinata returned to their friends. They saw their class standing behind a nervous looking Iruka. Their teacher was waving his hands around frantically, talking extremely fast.

He forgot the tickets.

Naruto was initially disappointed, no, depressed at the thought of coming this far and not being able to see the game. Then his head perked up.

He remembered something. He saw the tickets lying on Iruka-sensei's desk and had placed them in a storage seal on his arm. 'That was a close one.'

"Here," Naruto spoke before undoing the seal. He was shocked to find that, instead of 28 tickets to see the Konoha Krush, was a wad of chewed up gum.

"DAMN IT JEREMY!"

-

Although they didn't have their tickets, Naruto would get into this game. He had been looking forward to it for the whole year! He wouldn't give up that easily. "Iruka-sensei, do you have a kunai?"

Iruka looked at the boy with obvious confusion, "Yeah bu-"

Naruto cut him off, "I need it. So we can get into the game."

Naruto was too vague and everyone looked at him in horror, "I'm not going to kill the guards. Who do you think you are, I am?" Everyone sighed in relief, then looked at him, confused with his weird wording.

'Reaaal elegant.'

'Kurama is the one who does sarcasm. I guess you two are basically the same now,' Nuibari gasped.

Iruka hesitantly handed the boy his kunai. Naruto turned away and did something out of view. He then chucked the kunai up onto the roof.

Everyone was confused, albeit, very curious as to what the boy was doing.

He motioned for everyone to come closer, "Alright everyone, grab onto me," he paused as several people placed a hand on him, "Jeremy I swear to all kami that if there's a piece of gum on your hand, you are not going to wake up tomorrow," There was a pause, a muffled mumble, and a shuffle before Jeremy eventually placed his hand on Naruto.

Once everyone had placed their hands on their blonde classmate, Naruto hiraishin-ed to the kunai atop the roof. The entire class' jaw dropped to the floor in awe. Everyone began to bombard the blonde with question after question before Iruka put a stop to it all, noticing the boy slowly crawling from exhaustion.

"I must... see... Ichiro," the boy mumbled as he scaled the roof.

The game had begun and Ichiro stepped into the batters box, performing his signature shirt tug and settling in.

The opposing teams had taken a habit of basically throwing the ball to the moon, in order to avoid letting Ichiro hit. He was a slight man, but every time his bat touched the ball, he smashed it out of the stadium.

A pitch barreled towards the stands, five feet away from Ichiro. He leapt forward, flying parallel to the ground, swinging the bat at the same time. Bat met ball, then ball met ocean outside of the stadium.

As Ichiro was rounding the bases, he squinted at a group of familiar figures sitting atop the stadium. He saw a boy with duck-butt like hair, a pink-haired billboard brow, and most prominently, a blonde knucklehead jumping with joy, screaming "ICHIRO!ICHIRO!" Before promptly passing out into an older mans arms.

He had finally figured out where he was.

After the game (the Krush won 5-4) Ichiro was set to give a post game interview. He knew that there was time to convince the broody Uchiha, while he was still young, a lesson that could save thousands.

"Ichiro, you hit four homers today and were instrumental in the win. What pushes you to stay strong and keep providing for the team?" It was the perfect question. A meatball right down the middle for him to knock right out of the park.

"Well Jim it's actually pretty simple," Ichiro stated on the big screen for all to see, "the people around me, my friends, have pushed me day in and day out to support not only them, but the people of the village. I know they trust and love me, so I would just feel horrible if I let them down after they do so much for me."

At that last part, he seemed to stare directly at the Uchiha, piercing through his soul. Sasuke looked at Naruto. That was what would drive him. Same thing with Itachi, Shisui, and even Sakura and Hinata. Sakura could be annoying, but he could tell she cared about him. Hinata was... weird, but she was always pleasant and kind to him. Friends.

'Could that be how to gain true strength? Is that why Itachi and Shisui are so great?' The boy pondered for a while, even as they left the stadium, Naruto slung over Iruka's shoulder

-

The journey home was peaceful. Although it was only midday, Naruto had already clocked out. Hinata offered to take the boy to her home to sleep, and Sasuke carried the boy to the Hyūga compound.

'Hinata's house is farther from the gate anyway- I'll get stronger if I take him there! Plus, maybe Hinata will want to be more of my friend, and I'll get stronger that way too!'

"Hey Hinata, what's your favorite food? Your favorite color? Your favorite season? Your favorite animal?"

"Ano... Sasuke-kun... you're being, ano, rather talkative."

Sasuke nodded and took a mental note: 'Don't ask too many questions.'

Hinata realized how her words may have been misunderstood, "I- ano- I didn't mean... I like cinnamon buns."

Sasuke violently winced, "I don't like sweets."

Hinata looked down, "Yeah... you're right, they're stupid," they walked in silence for a while. Hinata spoke up, "What's your favorite food?"

"I like tomatoes. Especially in rice balls," he smiled at the thought of the delectable treat.

"Oh... well... those are g-good." She hated tomatoes.

'Yes! Bonding! Friendship! TRIUMPH!' Sasuke cheered in his mind.

-

Hey all! I'm a big baseball and Ichiro fan so I wanted to include it somehow. If you didn't know, Ichiro is actually a real person! Fun fact: he was the first Japanese born person to ever play American Major League Baseball. Also I found it weird how there's like no occupations besides shopkeeper or ninja in the Naruto universe.
Anyway~
Have a good day/night (or else!)
Jerry out!

And curse that horrible Jeremy!