X||.


"O - Old Man? What's going on?" Naruto Uzumaki questioned, sitting on the chair opposite the hokage. Hiruzen sighed, smoking his pipe and exhaling. And his grandson was watching with wide eyes at what they were doing.

"Yeah? What the heck happened?" Konohamaru asked, looking back and forth between Naruto and his grandfather.

"Ahem." Sarutobi cleared his throat, and looked up at the brat; bored. "This is about the villagers, Naruto. And your house. Not to mention that landlady of yours." He shuffles through his pile of paperwork and finds a file; showing it to the blonde. "You forgot to pay your rent last month, and now she's mad at the fact that all the money she saved up for that apartment is burned down to the ground."

"I didn't have enough, then! That's why I've been tryin' to do my missions overtime. But...!" He says; shaking his head."I didn't even earn my fair share, Old Man! Sakura-chan and the teme got it all instead. None for me." He says, looking down at his lap. "D-rank missions get me jack squat, can't you see? And B-rank missions almost never happen, either. I WANT to be a ninja. How can I do that if I'm doin' boring stuff like paintin' fences and catching cats, HUH?" His chest is constricting, but he can't stop now. He has to show the leader of the village what it's like from his point of view. Dealing with the villagers, forcing a smile day in day out...all of that for them to destroy his place he used to call "home". And now it was nothing...just like him.

"I'm sorry, boy, but rules are rules," Sarutobi says gravely, "The village won't want to fund for someone they hate. I do not have the time or money myself to simply buy you a new house and, unless you know someone who can take you in, then there's nothing we can do for you. And my grandson alone can't even make a ryo or two for your sake! Since you are still a minor, I'm afraid I have no choice but to send you to the village orphanage."

Not the orphanage! The last time he'd been there had been horrible. He had vaguely remembered as a child what it had been like and the experience wasn't "pleasant", to say the least. It was dark and secluding, not an ounce of a welcoming atmosphere about it. The administers from the Sound there sent creepy vibes and it was only a moment too late when he realized that they had abused the children there and would sometimes beat them until they were emotionally or physically broken like mindslaves. It was at that point that he had had enough.

He hated it there and always had been. If he had stayed any longer, he probably would've had let Kurama loose and destroy the village once again, so thank goodness he was free from all of that. The day he had left the place was heaven.

That's why he kept to the streets. If not that, then staying with the hokage's until the Old Man had supplied him an apartment. But, this.

This was utterly hopeless.

"But, gramps!" Konohamaru whined. "What's boss got to do with it? It's not his fault he lives like this!" He counters, trying to back up the one who was a lot like him. Aspiring to be at the tip of the top; even at rock bottom. If it weren't for him...Konohamaru honestly wouldn't know what to do with himself. "He's never had parents. He said so himself. And wherever I go, they always hate on him! How has he lived like that for so long; it's so unfair!" He choked out, gritting his teeth.

"I thought I had it bad, when they only saw me as a Sarutobi. They always saw right through me; as if my last name was all that I was worth. 'The hokage's grandson this,' 'the hokage's grandson that'! Why can't they just see ME? Why can't they acknowledge me and Boss for who we are? Why can't we just be accepted for once? But...but!" His head is bowed low, and he's clenching his fists. Tears trickle down his face, and he looks away from his grandfather; ashamed.

The door opens, and the landlady herself walks in without so much a "hello" and slams Naruto against the wall from his chair. It falls; unnoticed. And so she grabs him by the collar.

"Do you know how much damn ryo that cost me, you brat!" The old lady shrieked, shaking him back and forth. "Enough to buy me the whole lot of Konoha, I reckon. And all of that gone! Because of you, you demon!" Naruto winced at the nickname and really wished that at that moment he wasn't born as an Uzumaki; as a jinchuuriki of the Kyuubi.

"I'm sorry!" He plead, eyes shining with tears. " I swear, I'll do anything for you! I'll pay you back, build you a new one, ANYTHING! I just..." his eyes softened, "...need a home."

"I'm done with you." She promptly drops him down and slams the door behind her; leaving the three in total silence. Naruto sobs to himself; his whole body shaking. His once bright, blue eyes dulled into a gray color. There was just no hope in them anymore.

"I...see." He says, faking a smile. "Ha aha aha." He laughs, weakly. His throat was dry and rough; cutting the the quiet of the room. It suited how he felt right now; a real mess of who he used to be; of who he aspired to become someday.

'This is all just a bad dream...isn't it? It's almost unbearable...When I wake up, I'll just see myself alone in my apartment...' He thinks to himself, feeling numb to the dull pain. And slouches down against the wall limply.

Konohamaru looked at him sadly, and Hiruzen was still serious; sitting on his chair.

"I'm leaving, then. If I can't even live in the village," he sniffles, "then, how can I become hokage?" He stands up from his fallen position with a look of defeat. It's enough to break Konohamaru's heart in two; seeing someone so strong become a broken shell of who he once was.

"B - boss!" He sputtered; before he could stop himself. The door was already shut behind him.


Living on his own with nothing, but himself. Was this was what it was like to be homeless? Naruto didn't like this feeling of being all alone, of being in this dark and lonely place. He remembered those days when he swung on the swings all by himself, when no one else played with him. It was just like those days. Expect that was then and this was now.

It's midday. There's just a slight bit of sun left; and a slight breeze in the air. Red, orange, and yellow leaves float all around him and he imagines himself on what it would be like to have his head on the hokage mountain. Is that so far-fetched, now? Or is that dream just now impossible in his eyes?

Naruto sleeps on the trees, snoring his insecure thoughts away. And as he sleeps, he sees a bubbling of red from the sewers and the Nine-Tails takes full form. "Oi, Kit." Kurama says through his mindscape. "Release the seal; let me free. And I will kill all of those that have done this to you. You do not deserve them, Hero. This is why I wanted to kill them all to begin with. But then your mother and father stopped me from my spell and sealed me away inside of you."

'No can do, Kurama.' Naruto thinks internally. 'You can't go Kyuubi, remember? I hate them so much, but killing them isn't the right thing to do. Honestly? I don't know what I should do. I'm still part of the village, but just barely. And I'm broke right now, my froggy wallet burned off along with my house.'

"You're running out of energy. If I were you, I'd buy myself a ramen. Or meat! Of all the people I slaughtered." The fox licked it's lips, "I wonder what the Uchiha's blood tastes like."

'That's the thing...I can't buy anything. See, and this is why I contain you. So that no one innocent can die.' He flinched at the mention of the teme. 'He has nothing to do with this, Kurama!' He shouted internally, stomping his foot with a feral growl.

"Someone's getting defensive." The fox smirked," You're in lo -!"

'S - shut up! Goodbye, Kurama.' Naruto wakes up back to the real world, brushing off his wacky conversation with the fox and hops down from his branch. Time for some Ichiraku's!

Using a henge (transformation jutsu), he walked around the streets of Konoha, making sure not to stand out as much as possible. He sticks to the sidelines and walked over to the ramen stand and sat at a stool. He hoped he had enough somewhere...

"I know that's you, Naruto, you can't fool me." Ayame, Teuchi's daughter, says with a knowing smile. "Aww, dang it!" Naruto pouted, POOF!ing back into his normal self. "I tried so hard to mask myself, too. Guess I was pretty obvious, huh?" The brunette hummed in response, slipping a bowl of miso ramen right in front of him.

"None of our customers are like you, you know." She admits, "They never last this long. And they aren't daily customers, either. This is a token of our thanks to you."

"W - Wha? I...this is free? 'Cuz, I'm kinda broke right now." He scratches the back of his head sheepishly. She giggles into her hand, blushing at how cute he was right now. "Yup! Free of charge, just for you." She winked at him, walking behind the counter. "Consider it as my treat for you being a special guest of ours."

"Thanks," He says, with red on his cheeks. If he's learned anything at a young age, it was always to be thankful for what he had. In this case, he couldn't be more the merrier. "That's really, erm, considerate of you."

"You're welcome, sweet heart." she exclaims with a bashful smile."And don't worry about your apartment. I'm sure the hokage will think of something."

"Hehe." He snickers. Someone from behind the front door walks in and takes a seat from beside Naruto. "Ah, nice to see you again."

"Iruka-sensei!" Naruto cheered, waving at him excitedly. "Good to see ya! I missed you, ya know."

"Did you, really?" His former teacher chuckled into his hand. "I'm flattered. Your sensei has told me a lot of things. You sure are growing up, aren't you?" Seeing the blonde's head tilt, he added, "You used to make fun out of everything on the off chance you would get noticed by somebody. Now, you are becoming quite the shinobi. I'm real proud of you, Naruto." Iruka placed a hand on his shoulder and beamed at the younger male.

'He's maturing so fast...I still remember the times when he was just a child. Now he's right aging before my eyes! I feel so old already~.' The Uzumaki was taken aback for a second, but then beamed back just as brightly. "He he. Guess I have, haven't I?"

"Take this." His sensei offered his bowl to him in his awaiting hands. "F - for me?" It was as if someone was giving him the whole world! Naturally, he had to take it. After all, why wouldn't he? "Consider it my treat." The blonde chowed it up into his maw and lays back on his stool with a foxy grin."Listen, I've heard things about you and Sasuke." Naruto almost choked on his food. He didn't like what was about to come next. "Are you two getting along alright? Kakashi has kept a status quo on you almost every single day. Apparently you two are fighting again."

'He has? Since when? Wait - never mind that!'

The blonde looked down guiltily. "Well...I," he scratches the back of his head sheepishly. "I did mess things up between us..." The words themselves were vague. Iruka raised a condescending eyebrow at him, as if saying, 'Go on.'

"Well, it's just that..." Naruto fidgeted on the spot, not knowing what exactly to say. He finally sighed and gave in. "I'm gonna say sorry to that asshole if it's the last thing I do, 'tebayo!" With newfound resolve, he stood up and pushed his plates away. This was his chance!

"Thanks again!"


''At the hokage's', huh? That's what she said." Sasuke sprinted street to street, trying to spot anything out of the ordinary. So far, nothing came to mind. 'She also said something about his apartment...' He thinks; contemplating whether to go or not. Maybe there he'd see the dobe because he really needed him. He needed all the power he could get his hands on, especially after all the hell he went through. And there was one man in the village...rumored to have survived and to have seen Itachi as a spy firsthand.

Maybe he'll visit him sometime; to seek out the strength to become stronger. Even if it meant he'd have to fall into the darkness again. If that was the case, then...

No.

He had Naruto, now, who reminded him a lot like his brother. And he could still get stronger with or without him. (The after effects of the aphrodisiac are wearing off at this point). As he stopped his pace, he took in his surroundings with wide eyes. Where his home was; there was only ash and dust. The guards there were trying to situate the problem at hand, and commanding the builders to undergo construction. They were trying to architect another building, since the last one had burned down into cinders.

'What the hell happened here?' Sasuke thinks, slowing his run to a walk. He could still see a leftover flame, but he could easily tell it wasn't just some wildfire. His intellect told him that it wasn't just an accident that this had happened. Someone had set it on purpose, cautiously knowing that people were living inside the apartment complex.

That was enough for him to lose his calm composure. Someone had done this to him! And only now it was being addressed. What if the dobe had cried in there, after their argument and just...died? What if he was set on fire? What if...

'If he died, I swear I'll...' He stopped his inner conflict when he heard voices nearby; talking about a certain someone. It piqued his interest once he heard a familiar name.

"...Did you see his face? That demon looked like he pissed his pants! It was hilarious! Ha! And it was all worth it, too. To see him suffer like that. After all he did to my wife and kids..." The taller of the trio laughs, drinking a sake. "I hope he died in that fire, though! All I saw was a lot of people, so I couldn't even see myself if the damn demon burn alive..."

"You know those old stories about witches? That if they're burned alive or drown to their death; their cursed magic goes along with them? It's kind of like this." The other laughs, lighting a cigarette. "Damn right," said the third, "the only difference is that it's the demon, not the witch. And that it's the Nine Tails dying, not the cursed magic."

'Demon? Why are they calling the deadlast a demon? If anything, he's a moron...' He edged closer to them, but under his disguise, he blended in with his surroundings and wasn't suspicious in the slightest. But still, now that he thought about it, Naruto had hid a lot of things; it was enough to even fool him for awhile. Although, there were times when he recalled seeing odd chakra spikes from the boy. Sometimes it was so overwhelming he couldn't breath the same air as him. But, that was only intense during battles...but outside of that. He was a good person, unlike himself.

He decided it was time to step in. He needed to know exactly what happened. After all, they didn't call him a pure genius for nothing. He'd get to the bottom of this mess. "Hey," He introduced himself, without even bothering to say his name first and foremost. They probably knew already by the his clan symbol on his back.

"Oh, it's the Uchiha boy. How yeh doin', kid?" The one chugging down alcohol asked. Sasuke eyes his beer belly with distaste. 'These drunkards are a joke...'

"I'm trembling with...excitement. How about you..."

"...go ahead and die."

With clenched fists, he walks up to the drunken man and punches him in the face. And promptly leaves, with a rush of adrenaline.


"WHERE IS HE?" Sasuke shouted, bursting out the front door and barging in on the office uninvited. Sakura and Karin are at his shadow.

"Homeless, for the time being." Hiruzen sighs, signing his signature on a ranked mission. "My boy, why are you here?" He asks, in a tiresome voice. As if he'd seen hell ten times and back and lived to tell the tale. But, the old man was still here; alive and well. If not a bit grouchy and tired all of the time. "I know you have him!" Sasuke snarled, looking between the villagers, the Anbu, and the hokage. "What the hell happened to his house!"

"We crushed it." Someone steps forward with a twisted smirk. The man with the moustache replied as if they were talking about nothing more than the weather. "We raided his home, 'stroyed his $h!t. And you wanna know why?" He cracked his knuckles with a satisfying smirk.

"He damn well deserved it, after all of our family died. Innocent lives were taken that day during the Attack. It was only when the Fourth had -" He was stopped midsentence when a cane slammed onto the wooden floor.

"Stop, Yamamoto-san. That's classified information. Only the ANBU, ROOT, and I can tell you that." The man in question reluctantly took a step back. No one dared to go against the leader of the village. It was a death wish, indeed. Hiruzen sniffed the smoke and then turned his head to Sasuke with the same dead-eye look.

"I trust you, Boy. And I feel Naruto himself should be the one to tell you the truth this time. But, enough of that. We cannot wait any longer during these dark times."

"Naruto...is the Jinchuuriki of the Kyuubi. There are others scattered around the Elemental Countries, of course. But they are rare, and are often shunned by their village; just like Naruto. People of my generation already know about this; this is why they are against him. All history documents or textbooks about the Attack were modified so that your generation wouldn't ever know about his powers in order to protect the Uzumaki. Your library, however...is another story altogether. It's database goes back through the ancient years of the four noble clans: the Aburame, the Akimichi, the Hyuga, and, of course, the Uchiha. Though you inherit it yourself, what you do with it is completely up to you, Boy. It is not within our powers to "

Sasuke nodded in affirmation. He knew this already. What he didn't know was that he'd never thought in a million years that his teammate actually contained something as monstrous as that. No wonder he felt so lonely.

"And this is why the villagers want to do everything they can to destroy the very source of his existence. From their perspective, he is not a human boy; trying to become a hokage. He is a monster, who has taken thousands and thousands of lives. You can see how this is problematic on both sides."

'The dobe is...the Nine-Tailed Fox...' Sasuke realizes only a moment too late. He should've known from the very beginning, back to when they first kissed. 'First...kiss...' He places a hand on his cheek, feeling it redden at the thought. Glaring back at the others, he felt a boiling hot white rage overcome him like a shroud.

"Don't you even lay a finger on Naruto!" A dark aura surrounded Sasuke, and he was about to launch at the other man at superhuman speed. But Hiruzen's guards blocked him halfway through. "Sasuke, that's enough!" Sarutobi shouted. "Your emotions are clouding your judgement. You still do not know everything. THAT is the difference between you and I."

Sasuke glared daggers at him, gritting his teeth.

"I'm sorry, Sasuke, but the hokage's right." Sakura said as the voice of reason, placing a hand on his shoulder. "None of us knew what really happened that day, and it's probably best if we didn't know. Imagine if we knew everything that happened after the Kyuubi Incident and the Uchiha Massacre. They hide the information away from us not because they wanted to, but for all of us to stay safe. It could put the village at risk and we would be at war with each other. That's why only the elders know, and our generation doesn't." She then added haughtily, crossing her arms, "And if you're so smart, then you'd realize this, too."

Sasuke brushed past her and her friend; his black bangs covering half his face. His narrowed black eyes stared daggers at the hokage. Not one person ever looked at the Old Man like that.

"You...you! He's the only one that understands me! Why the hell are you shunning him just like…" he chokes, "...just like me?" He looks down at his feet, his body trembling with rage. His fists are clenched, and he feels like tearing the whole village apart; piece by piece, brick by brick. If it weren't for them... if it weren't for them and Itachi ...

"Sasuke," Kakashi reassures from beside him. "This isn't your place to intervene. As a friend of Naruto's, it's understandable that you feel this way. That's why we're trying all we can to prevent it from ever happening again."

"Just leave me alone..." The Uchiha mumbles sourly, slapping his hand away in the process. Shoving them into his pockets, he looked at them all one last time.

"I HATE ALL OF YOU!" Sasuke screams, slamming a fist on his desk. It cracks in half, and the old man squints at him in surprise."Always acting the same! No one was there for us from the start! And...you…and you call yourselves shinobi! If you want to ridicule me as an emotional teenager, go ahead. As you have no idea what it's like to have brotherly bonds. You don't know what it's like, how much it hurts inside, to see a precious person in pain. This is exactly why my hatred is growing stronger and stronger, each and every passing day..." He says, closing his eyes and turning his heel.

"As for this village, I'm done with the likes of you." Left speechless; he swept through the door at a run. With one last hated look, he tore off away from them. "SASUKE!" Sakura and Karin shout after him. But, it's all to no avail.

Because the door slams shut; leaving the hokage in darkness.


i.e. The idea that if people get too close in a relationship, they'll only hurt one another a.k.a the challenges of human intimacy. Ex) When two hedgehogs snuggle together for warmth in winter, but not too close. Otherwise their spines will harm the other hedgehog.