The Beginning

Let me take this moment to tell you all about my favorite Anime. You see, I am a manga reader. I do not like many Anime's. My favorite Manga could fill an entire list, with heated debates between me, myself, and I for each position. But my favorite Anime is a very easy thing to explain. Knights and Magic. The only anime with a main character who is an 'Otaku' which isn't unspeakably cringe-worthy. I'm looking at you GATE, you worthless piece of fan-service garbage. Your manga was good dammit!

Ahem. But I have always loved Mechs. I find them to be the single most interesting trope to ever come out of Japanese culture, and as far as Sci-Fi goes, they rank of similar importance to masterpieces like "Childhood's End" by Arthur C. Clarke.

Naruto gets a lot of shit. Both the Anime, and the fans themselves. If I'm being honest, a lot of that shit is probably deserved. Masashi Kishimoto and George Lucas share a lot of similarities, and that is not a good thing. But who cares! Naruto was my intro to the world of Anime! I saw it at a friend's house for the first time at 12-ish, and as Curse-Marked Sasuke tore Zaku's arms from their sockets, I fell in love. That scene was beautiful, it was brilliant, and it drew me into the devilish web of anime/manga.

So, this is my attempt at repaying all of you! Kishimoto and the other major contributors to the Naruto-verse! You who write fanfics! You who read them! You guys have made this into a sprawling, expansive world, and I have long sought to continue that tradition with my myriad of incredibly odd stories. Yes, most of them fell by the wayside, torn apart by my many failings as a self-proclaimed writer.

I make no promises. As a writer I can only extend my hand to you and ask the simple question-

"Will you take this journey with me?"

For centuries, warfare was a stagnant art. Two armies gathered, each with a general hidden carefully at the rear. Both then pushed their soldiers together, like a child smashing dolls, until the ground was soaked in blood and the enemy general was slain. It had been dressed up in pretty words, each generation brought new tricks, new tactics. But war was always the same.

That is, until a man came along name Kishimoto. A man who's legendary eyes could see the magic within the ground, and the shape within the metal. His hands could craft priceless treasures from tattered rags. Though the true value came from his clockwork mind. A mind that unearthed more secrets in a single night than a team of engineers working for a decade. It was these three traits that made him the first "Great Creator". From his mind came designs. From his eyes came the ore. From his hands, the shape. From the heavens, the power.

Thus the first Kinzoku was born. Standing 15 meters tall and shaped like the knights of old, this machine would revolutionize not only warfare, but the world as well. Legions of troops became impossible sights, armies were reduced to a handful of Kinzoku pilots. Thirty warriors on one battlefield could represent the total military might of a small country. Kishimoto had brought something beautiful to the world. He was a man who's talents seemed limitless, as if he was a gift from the land of gods. But the years wore on, and his gifts soured. He went mad as age addled the brain that had revolutionized the world. His hands crafted nine circuits, mighty objects capable of untold powers. The point of fusion between pilot and Kinzoku. He unleashed these upon the world, and the warring states would never be the same.

A single circuit could turn a rookie pilot into a demonic foe, and the power would only grow exponentially alongside the pilot's skill. A single small country with only 2-3 pilots could find one of the circuits by luck, and overnight become a regional superpower. In fact, this is exactly what would lead to the founding of Kirigakure, the village of mists.

So Kishimoto had gifted the world with his twin hands, and from those would spring both heaven and hell. In the land of Konohagakure, an event was unfolding that would alter the world in much the same way as Kishimoto had. For the pilot of the "Blood-drenched Murderess" and possessor of the 9th circuit had lost herself to the power contained within. Now her blade was turned on her own village, and only the "Thundering Storm" could stop her. A Kinzoku piloted by her husband.

…

Konohagakure boasted a dozen fully fledged master pilots. The "Blood-drenched Murderess" was a weapon of death and destruction. Each hand carried a single large swinging axe. Six flowing red tendrils hung across her back, capable of flinging objects or entangling enemies. She was a mid-power type, strong in arm and leg, but not to the extent that her mobility suffered. Every inch of her armor was painted bright red, as if the entire machine had just stepped out of a bloody bathtub. Once she had been Konoha's staunchest defender.

Now she stood in the ruined Tatogami District, surrounded by the broken machines of Elite-tier ANBU pilots. Across from her, her husband was waiting in his "Thundering Storm". The weapon he had always been so damned proud of.

It was a light Kinzoku, designed for the highest tier of speed and agility. Its arms and legs were slender and flexible, allowing it to literally leap from perch to perch, darting about like a startled finch. Its weapon was a thick spear which burned with barely restrained current. This was held in its right hand, and the tip twirled like a corkscrew. But it's left hand held the real trick. Each finger formed a wicked point, and the palm itself was a circular node which could instantly transfer a massive surge of power into anything it touched. On the left hip, a clip of slender silver knives lay in wait for the hand to retrieve them.

"Don't do this Kushina. You can fight this!" Minato ground his teeth. Around her feet lay the dead and dying members of ANBU. She had to be stopped. But he had fought by her side for too many years to turn his weapons to her. Behind her, another ANBU team thought they were clever, and sticking to their years of elite training, they struck with long-range combat tactics. She tore through them with ease, having been the one to teach those lessons. Slowly her eyes turned back to him and his mech.

"I'd rather fight you!" She roared, her axes a blur as she rushed him. "I always wondered which of us was the strongest. Come honey, let us learn the truth!" Twirling axes were knocked away by his spear, and Minato danced back to keep his range.

She was power, and he was grace, the two lovers danced together in the city ruins. Scrapped metal and ruined bodies covered the street. As he parried her axe and narrowly dodged a swirling grapple attack from the flowing red tendrils, he remembered their first date. As she slapped aside the spear tip and kicked him through a building, she remembered their first kiss. Together they danced the last dance, knowing equally that when the climax came, one of them would be single.

For Kushina had carried the 9th circuit for 30 years, and though she remembered all of the good times they had shared, her blood-soaked Kinzoku was currently running the show. Her brain was no longer the pilot of a grand and magnificent machine. It was now just an accessory, a combat guide for a mass of unstoppable metal given conscious thought. She was the machine, and it was her. When Minato's thundering spear pierced her forearm, her physical body began to bleed.

This was the power of the 9th circuit. Complete and total integration. Pilot and machine became indistinct concepts. The flowing red tendrils on the back of her Kinzoku moved like snakes because they were a part of her. No pilot could ever control such a precise bit of machinery with buttons and control sticks. But controlled by her mind, they could attack, twirl, grab, and dodge as if they themselves were living beings.

Minato skipped back, leaping onto the rooftop of a shopping complex. She followed, as he knew she would. Kushina was a woman afraid of nothing, she would fight on anyone's terms, and no matter where he went, she would chase him down. But her Kinzoku weighed twice what his did. Its body was thick and powerful, and the roof could not support it. Her foot sank through three stories and she tumbled forward, as his electric spear tore through the air like a bolt of heavenly thunder.

Her face turned at the last second, the cloak of red already rushing forward to grab him. If even one of those caught his Kinzoku, he would not survive hand to hand combat against the famed fighter Kushina. His spear danced across the faceplate of her head, skipping across an ocular circuit. Kushina went blind in one eye, and a thunder-driven scar etched itself across the Blood-Drenched Murderess. Her tendrils caught the speartip before it could retreat, yanking it from Minato's hand. The weapon was snapped in an instant, caught beneath constricting red snakes. The Thundering Storm could only retreat, and as it did, a flurry of electrified knives soared towards the immobilized Kushina.

Her tendrils caught each knife, and the explosive current sent six of her nine tendrils offline until they could be forcibly rebooted. But the 9th circuit would not allow permanent damage to the electronical centerpiece of its host body. Kushina screamed within the confines of her machine as the current was instead redirected into the pilot's body. Something that the circuit had analyzed as "Irrelevant". In seconds, the six downed assets were up and running, carving through the building that trapped her foot to free the incensed Kinzoku.

Minato swore. He knew that the knives would not defeat this feral warrior, but he had hoped for a few extra seconds to clear the field. He clicked his microphone from "Communicate", to "Record" and began a final message to his son. "Naruto, know that your father loves you. I wish I had time to tell you more, but mommy and daddy have a fight to finish. Bye son." In a flash, the Thundering Storm switched from running to full combat mode. Minato charged the Blood-Drenched Murderess, who's red tendrils met his approach head on.

Nine snakes of steel and power caught him easily, crushing the slender lightweight frame of his Kinzoku with laughable ease. Two burrowed through the steel exterior, digging into the cockpit to fish out the pilot like a scrap of marrow in the center of a broken bone. Minato felt them coming, and smiled a wry smile as he flipped the kill switch.

Thee "Thundering Storm" was the lightest Kinzoku found outside of Sunagakure. It was a mass of power storage and high-mobility structures, designed to harness the full power of a thunder storm. In the cockpit, a small red switch lay on the console, a switch that was never meant to be flipped.

Kushina watched with a mad gleam in her one remaining eye, as the Kinzoku trapped in her hands was violently torn apart. The pieces of it were scattered, and even trapped in the haze of madness, she recognized that each of the scraps looked slightly melted. The 9th circuit could think at a rate that no human could ever replicate, but even it was a second too slow as it tried to drop the defeated enemy. A power surge tore through it, and as the Blood-Drenched Murderess was slowly reduced to a pile of molten steel and burnt out wires, Kushina felt a tear slide down her burning face.

Then the full might of the storm struck, and her body was reduced to blackened bone and scattered ash. The 9th circuit receded, reforming into a simple metal chip, etched with the sigil of a ferocious howling fox. The chip fell to the ground and was lost as the Blood-Drenched Murderess's reactor exploded. But such fires could never destroy one of the great Kishimoto's creations. They could merely bury the powerful artifact, until the grasping, greedy hands of mankind unearthed it once again.

…

Far away from the battlefield, an old man looked towards the thunderous explosion and felt tears streak down his face for the first time in 20 years. The room he sat in was a regal establishment, with but a single out of place item. A blond-haired baby boy lay in a simple hand-carved wooden crib. The wood was rough, and poorly cut. The nails were misshapen from haphazard hammering. But on the front board two people were carved, hugging as they cradled a bundle of blankets between them. The artwork was rough, and clearly not the result of someone who knew what they were doing. In the crib, the newly orphaned boy began to stir.

Next to him, the soon to be 3rd Hokage buried his face in his hands and felt a world of weight settle back upon his shoulders.