A/N: So, before starting the chapter and responding to reviews, I'd first like to cover what role I plan for the ANBU to serve in my story. I want to make sure they are very distinct, but not more or less important, than the other ranks of shinobi. The ANBU are basically going to have two purposes. First is to investigate and eliminate threats from within Konoha that have NOT been declared as missing-nin officially by the Council/the Hokage. Both ordinary ninja and ANBU will deal with official missing-nin like Orochimaru, but only ANBU will deal with the less publicly known problems (like Itachi does with the Uchiha coup d'etat). The second thing they will do is be a fast acting response team to immediate threats. The reason their identity is hidden is so that when they are investigating or "dealing with" internal threats, it won't cause any hard feelings towards the ninja who is actually behind the mask from people living in the village.

ANBU are comprised of ninja of chūnin and above. They are chosen based on their ability to be discreet and their extreme loyalty to the village. Many ANBU members also perform duties as regular ninja outside of ANBU. For example, Anko is Hebi when she is dealing with internal traitors as an ANBU, but just Anko when dealing with foreign nin or those officially declared missing-nin. Most characters within the story will not realize that it is her, but you, my lovely readers, will. ANBU would disguise themselves sufficiently to hide their identities, but I, as a writer, want my readers to be able to keep track of what character is doing what.

Well, that's enough rambling before the story. I'll respond to reviews after the chapter!

I don't own Naruto. I'd have a lot more money if I did.

Chapter 3

2 weeks later, Hokage office

Sarutobi Hiruzen sighed, feeling troubled. It had already been two weeks since they had recovered Naruko, but the girl still hadn't spoken a word; at least that he had heard. He had visited her in the abandoned apartment he had set up for her in one of the less populated areas of Konohagakure no Sato, after somehow convincing the young kitsune to not run back into the forest at the first opportunity she had. He had wanted to have her stay with him, for her own protection, but the problem was that he lived in the most populated area of the village. He was sure that the poor girl's nerves were not ready for that, seeing as how skittish she seemed. He couldn't blame her, after all she had gone through at the hands of the demon-hating villagers. He thought back to the night she had been recovered.

Flashback

Hiruzen carried the young, tired girl, who was finally full after emptying his wallet, towards the apartment he had arranged for her, should she ever be found. He was NOT putting her back in the orphanage after he had discovered what they had done. His ANBU had investigated and found the culprit, and she had been arrested, but the other workers there surely held some ill will towards Naruko. Plus, she had already proven that she could fend for herself to some degree, having survived that long in the forest. He hoped that having an apartment in a lower population area of the village would at least make it easier for her to do that, however. At least it would serve as a shelter from bad weather for her, if nothing else.

The girl he was carrying stirred, looking up at him from his arms with bleary eyes. "Ah, I see you are awake, Naruko-chan," the Sandaime told the girl. Her ears perked a bit in recognition of her name, and she didn't struggle to escape like he had been told she had done previously. 'A good sign,' the Hokage thought to himself, 'maybe there is hope she can trust humans again.' Hiruzen decided to try more conversation with the girl. "Are you feeling better after getting some food in you?" he asked her. She perked up at that, with a small smile, shining eyes, and a tail moving back and forth rather quickly in excitement at the memory. She nodded quickly, clearly very pleased at the memories of the feast she had devoured. Hiruzen chuckled at her excited response and smiled. 'It is good to see her like this. I'm sure Kurama and Kushina would have loved to see her smile like that,' the man thought to himself.

At about this time, the pair had reached the empty apartment building that Hiruzen had arranged. Naruko stared at the building in curiosity as the Hokage took her inside and set her down, allowing her to stand for herself in the room he had furnished for her. She examined her surroundings curiously, looking at everything carefully, even going so far as sniffing every peice of furniture for a few seconds before moving onto the next one.

"I want you to stay here, and not in the forest. Can you do that for me?" Hiruzen asked. The girl stiffened at the suggestion, clearly nervous at the idea. This old man didn't *seem* to want to hurt her, but the idea sounded crazy. Live in the village with all the people who kept trying to hurt her? Was he crazy? She looked out the window towards the forest, then back at the old man. She kept looking back and forth between the two nervously. Hiruzen sighed. He had expected her to react this way. "There aren't many people in this area of the village, and you'll have shelter from bad weather. Plus, this way, I can make sure you get the food that you need," he told her. That did it. At the mention of guaranteed food, her eyes lit up again and she nodded in agreement.

"Good. I'll come visit you every day, then. I'll see you tomorrow," he told her as he left her and headed home for the night.

Flashback end

'Well, even if she hasn't spoken a single word yet, at least she seems to understand what other people say. I guess it will just take some time for her to open up enough to speak. She did go a long time without talking to anyone, after all,' Hiruzen thought to himself. He was pleased that she seemed to be rather curious. The girl always seemed to enjoy listening to him talk about various things, but she always seemed especially interested when he told her about what the ninjas of the village did. 'Maybe that would be good for her? She IS the daughter of Kushina as well, who was one of the greatest kunoichi this village has ever seen, after all. I can already tell her chakra levels are going to be immense... no, already ARE immense, considering both of her parents. Not to mention the fact she somehow evaded some of the top ninja in the village for months. I still have no idea how she managed that...' the elderly Hokage thought. He sighed in relief as he finished the last peice of paperwork for the day. He finally could go visit Naruko and see how she was doing.

Meanwhile, in an alleyway near the market

Naruko was starting to get a little more comfortable staying in the village. She still wasn't completely at ease, but she had gotten to the point where she was willing to explore a little rather than just sit in her apartment all day. The nice old man, who was apparently called "the Sandaime Hokage" or "Sarutobi Hiruzen," had given her a little bit of money so she could go to that ramen stand she had fallen in love with, Ichiraku Ramen. And, as much as ramen would now and forever be her favorite food after that feast she had eaten, she did want to eat other things from time to time, like the apple that nice girl had given her a while back. This led Naruko to decide to try going to the market and seeing if any of the shopkeepers would be as nice as Teuchi-san and his daughter.

Unfortunately, that was not the case. As she entered the market cautiously and approached one of the stalls, the owner took one look at her and yelled "AAHHHH! IT'S THE DEMON!" and immediately started trying to hit her with a broom that he had pulled from behind the counter. Having heard this, everyone turned to see her, and glared with icy cold eyes at her. Naruko, realizing that this was a bad sign, immediately took off running. A mob soon formed chasing after her, carrying various objects to hit her with, such as brooms, sticks, or anything else that they could grab.

She ran and ran, finally shaking off the angry mob that was chasing her by ducking quickly into an alleyway. Breathing heavily, she hadn't noticed the group of scruffy-looking men sitting there already. She leaned against a wall, breathing heavily from all the running.

"Oi, oi, isn't that the demon bitch that has been seen around town lately?" One of the men asked. "Yeah, I think it is," another replied. Naruko stiffened at the unexpected and hostile-sounding voices. She looked up to see a group of men circling around her, glaring at her with cold eyes.

One of the men grabbed her neck and squeezed, making it hard for her to breathe. She pulled at his hand but was unable to get him to let go. "Oi, let's have a little 'fun' with her before we kill the bitch," one of the men suggested. The man choking her smirked and responded, "Way ahead of you," as he reached to undo his pants.

Naruko was panicking. She knew what these men were intending to do to her. She saw the look in their eyes and smelled their 'excitement' with the keen sense of smell she had inherited as a fox demon. She didn't notice the angry red chakra forming on her hand. She didn't notice that a second tail grew next to her first one. All she wanted to do was get this man away from her, NOW. She didn't want any part of what they were planning for her. She raised her chakra-covered hand to his chest and pushed, trying to push him off of her. However, instead of her hand pushing him back, it instead went through the man's chest. His eyes opened wide in pain and shock, as he dropped to the ground, lifeless.

"OH SHIT!" one of the men yelled in shock and fear, backing away from the redheaded kitsune girl. "She just put her FUCKING ARM through the boss! Fuck, fuck!" another yelled as the group turned to run away. "THE MONSTER KILLED KENCHI, DAMN IT, GET AWAY FROM ME YOU MONSTER," the final one yelled as they all ran away.

Naruko just stood there, staring at her arm, and the body, in shock.

Back with the Hokage, en route to Naruko's apartment

Sarutobi Hiruzen heard the shouts and commotion of men running out of a back alley. It would have been hard to miss with how loud they were, even if he had not been a top class shinobi. 'Oh no... something must have happened involving Naruko!' the old man thought in a panic. Quickly, he dashed into the alleyway the men had just run out of. When he saw Naruko, leaning against the wall, arm covered in blood, and the man, a hole through his chest and his pants open and around his waist, he felt a sense of disgust and dread. Quickly, he moved forward to check on his surrogate granddaughter.

"Naruko, are you okay?" Hiruzen asked, voice laced with worry and urgency.

Looking up at the elderly man, Naruko cringed and refused to make eye contact. She knew his job was to protect the village. He probably would hate her now that she killed someone in the very village he was meant to protect.

"I d-didn't mean to... he was going to... and I panicked.. I just w-was going to push him away a-and..." she looked down at her arm again, trembling. She just knew that she had lost the trust of one of the few people who had ever been nice to her. She just knew he was going to throw her out of the village, or worse, have her killed for being such a danger. So it was to her great surprise when, instead, the old man pulled her into a hug.

"I'm glad he wasn't able to do anything to you," Hiruzen said. Naruko looked up at the Hokage in shock.

"...You don't hate me? I k-killed ..." she started.

"No, I don't. You did the right thing, Naruko. I'm not going to do anything bad to you and I don't want you feeling guilty, either," the Hokage told the girl sternly. Her eyes flew wide open in shock and confusion. "What he was doing was wrong, Naruko. No one should force themselves on anyone else in that way. If you hadn't killed him, he would have likely done that to someone else. Not only did you protect yourself, but you protected who knows how many others by disposing of a dangerous threat to innocent people," Hiruzen explained, seeing her confusion. "B-but aren't I a d-danger to people, too? I j-just..." she started, before the Hokage stopped her again by raising his hand in the 'stop' gesture.

"I suppose, in a way, you are. But so am I, if that's the case. In fact, most people can be a danger if they want to be," the Sandaime started to explain before Naruko interrupted him in confusion. "I don't understand..?" The Hokage sighed, and said, "Let me finish. As I was saying, it isn't about whether you are dangerous or not. It is about what decisions a person makes. Their character, if you will. Do you want to cause harm to people, other than to protect yourself and those you care about? Regardless of whether they did anything bad or not?"

Naruko thought on this for a brief moment, then shook her head, finally realizing what the Hokage meant. "No, I just want people to accept me for me," she replied.

Sarutobi Hiruzen smiled at her and nodded, "I want that for you, too. But I must apologize, Naruko. I should have assigned an ANBU to protect you. I know the villagers don't understand you yet, and treat you badly because of it," he said. Her tails and ears drooped at this. She didn't understand why the villagers treated her like this. "Jiji, why DO the villagers treat me like that? I'm guessing it has something to do with my ears and tail, but..." she asked, hoping he could explain it to her.

"I think you mean tails, Naruko-chan," the Hokage said with a bit of amusement in his voice. "Eh? But I only have one - oh. WAIT WHAT? WHEN AND WHY DID I GET ANOTHER TAIL?" Naruko started to say in confusion, which quickly turned to surprise as she looked behind herself and saw not one, but two tails. The old man chuckled at her reaction and said, "Well, I think I can answer all your questions, but I'd rather save that for tomorrow. For now, why don't you get cleaned up and we can grab some ramen at Ichiraku's."

"WOOHOO! YEAH!" the girl cheered excitedly, much to the amusement of Hiruzen.

A/N: So I almost combined this chapter with the start or all of the next one, but I'm still not sure where exactly I'm going with it past a certain point. I still have ideas to write, but this seemed like a good break in the action. So another update may be coming either later today or tomorrow, assuming I don't get stuck on ideas. Either way, I'm going to be writing some more right after posting this one.

Responses to Reviews:

ThunderClaw03: Yeah, I know I've been giving Naruko a tough time as is. Chapter 2 AND chapter 3 are really rough on her. I definitely don't plan to make it ALL bad for her; she will still make some friends and such. But I honestly cannot imagine that the villagers wouldn't give her even worse treatment than in the original series with her fox ears and tails. Her troubles are definitely not over, but this is Naruko we're talking about. She's tenacious and will fight hard to not only survive, but to thrive.

PinkiePieParty122894: I'm glad you have enjoyed the story so far! I'll do my best to keep the updates as often and as good as I can. Honestly, my ideas I used in chapter 2 were the ones that motivated me to, instead of just keeping the ideas in my head, actually write them out and share my story here. Especially the whole "Chōji and Shikamaru encounter a feral Naruko" idea. I figured that would be "troublesome" enough for Shikamaru, haha.