Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or Aliens.

A/N: Sorry this one took me a bit, I had the chapter written for a while now, but I was editing it as I kinda gave away to much in it . The monster you know is far less scary than the one you don't ya?

It's a little on the shorter side, I know, but it's just a bridge explaining a few things.

Special thanks to LoPe21 for his help with the bit at the end ^_^ I wasn't sure what I was wanting to do there (As I want to save the apartment for the next chapter) and he had a good idea ^_^

UPDATE: I got a photobucket account and uped my pics for this story, the two comic pages that inspired it, and some of the character designs for the fem aliens.

And no, none will have 'sausage heads' as I've heard them called ^_^


Light's Last Gasp

Chapter 2: Monsters…


Awareness

It's something that most take for granted.

The reason is simply; most spend more time in this state than it's opposite.

For Naruto it's a bit more even.

First came the tingling of the other extremities, the pin-pricks of sensation were disturbing, like a limb that had been asleep for far too long.

Next came sound, again, the act of simply hearing what is going on around you is common, but if you have been asleep, or unconscious, that first bit of noise is either a blessing or a curse. If you were dreaming of something wonderful, say, a ramen bowl the size of a swimming pool, any kind, so long as it could hold a person, then it's something to be cursed and hated with an all consuming passion.

Again, sight can be treated the same way. The rising sun coming through your window is often something that will illicit more than a little cursing, and for many it's then followed by a punch from your significant other, or your pet bothering you.

For Naruto, it was a unique combination of these. First the accursed tingling that made him hold as still as humanly possible, less the pain become all the more entertaining. Then was sound, the steady electronic rhythm of a bit of equipment confusing him slightly. Last came sight, and the cursing and reflex to roll over only spurred more as the tingling erupted anew.

The first thing he saw when he finally was able to open his eyes and not scream was the sterile white of the pillow he was laying on.

That wasn't his.

His hadn't been white when they were 'new'.

Slowly pulling himself up to a seated position he winced, not at the pain in his limbs, but at the white walls of the hospital.

Before he could take in any more of the room he saw the door open to reveal a pretty young girl wearing the pale pink of the day shift's nursing uniforms. The woman didn't seem to notice him at first, as though she were assuming he would still be asleep, it was only when she came face to face with the monitors that her eyes widened and swiveled to look him in the eye not unlike a turret.

"Um…Hi?"

The girl let out a yelp of shock and to his surprise quickly slapped her hands into the ram hand-sign and started pulsing her chakra. After the fourth pulse the room was obscured with white smoke and a shower of leaves.

"Report!"

Stepping from the smoke were more people than he had ever seen in a hospital room that he had occupied; the Hokage, Iruka, the old man's personal doctor, three ANBU as well as a massive, scared man with a bandana covering his head, still, it didn't cover up much.

"S-Sir, he's awake."

The blond raised a hand looking more than a bit confused and gave a weak wave. The whole of the group did the same as the nurse, unnerving the young boy before he was surrounded by three of the adults.

"Naruto-kun, what happened?"

"When did you wake up?"

"Are you feeling alright?"

The teen shrank slightly back into the bed as he was crowded, his fear and shock making the scared one step up and place a hand on his leader and the teacher's shoulders.

"You all ask one more question, and I think you'll knock him out again."

Iruka had the good grace to look sheepish as both he and the doctor stepped back, "Naruto-kun, again, what happened?"

"W-what do you mean?"

The gathered people shared looks before, with a jerk of the doctor's head, they stepped out of the room. Once they had left the Hokage sat gently on the bed, "Naruto…I'm not sure how to say this, but you've been in the hospital for the last two weeks." The boy's eyes widened in shock, "You've been in a coma, after you hadn't come to see me after two days I got worried and went to check up on you. You wouldn't wake up no matter what I did…your apartment was covered in blood…you scared the shit out of me my boy."

Naruto winced at his 'jii-jii', he had never heard the man swear. "B-But…" That's when Naruto noticed just how thirsty he was, he sounded like a frog…

The old man gave him a glass of water and as a shaking hand reached out he gasped, his hands…didn't look right…Ignoring the glass for a moment he looked closer. It looked like someone had snuck in and painted his nails…not to mention someone had cut them to fine points. Further, his knuckles looked a bit more boney, his hands larger. All in all he could only say one thing.

"What the fuck?"

Sarutobi bit back a laugh as the blond finally took the water and downed the large glass as thought it were a shot. "That's not the only thing I have to tell you about Naruto. Let's start with the last thing you remember."

The boy was silent for a while, having a bit of trouble separating memories from dreams, "I…I had just told you about what came out of the scroll, after that I went home, got ready for bed, went to sleep…but I had strange dreams…

"Like?"

"Like I couldn't breathe, but not the pain of someone choking me…then of places I'd never seen…and some kind of monsters…but for some reason they didn't seem scary to me…like I knew them, and they wouldn't hurt me. They were capturing animals, other…things, things I'd never even thought were possible. Then more of my…pets…would jump on them, and later on made more of the monsters."

The Hokage was silent for a long while, trying to understand what the blond had been seeing. "Naruto…I'm not sure that what you were dreaming of were really, well, dreams."

He arched an eyebrow at that. "What do you mean jii-jii?"

"Naruto, what did these monsters look like? Can you describe them?"

Naruto glowered at the old man for a moment before relenting, "Well, they were big, and they all looked different, some more like the animals or other things that they…came out of…most of them had long tails with big blades on the end, all had claws. Their heads were all weird, and I never saw any eyes, their heads were most of the time really long and kinda curved and like tubes with lots of bumps…." Naruto gestured with his hands to show the length and the shape. "It looked like most lived underground, in these big tunnels, like termites. One of the monsters was HUGE, even when it stood next to the other big ones, it had this big crest on its head, and laid the eggs. What do you think they mean?"

Sarutobi flashed his chakra once and his doctor entered the room once more. Naruto had always liked the older woman, unlike most of those in the hospital she would bring him books, even read to him. However, this time the older woman was so fierce looking that he was shocked the old man wasn't heading for the hills. The only other time he saw her look like that was when he had found the orange book in the Hokage's desk, he never even got to open it, just dropped the book with a shout of horror when a half dozen syringes were embedded in the cover.

It was a bad day.

"My Lord?"

Now he knew something was up. Askua-baa-chan was always using their names, "Can you show Naruto the results of your scans?"

Hesitating a moment the doctor produced a file and handed it to Naruto, in confusing he opened the file and almost threw it across the room.

There, looking back at him, was the monster from his dream, but much, much smaller, thought the tail was still long. "W-what the hell old man! That's IT!"

The doctor shot the village leader a confused, but horrified look. "Sarutobi, what is he babbling about?"

Naruto was turning the bit of plastic over and every way he could, trying to take in all the details of the creature. "Well…it seems Naruto dreamed of this creature, and in them there were a great many more…like ants."

The older woman paled at that and stared at the blond for many long moments, seeming to study him, and almost expecting him to grow a second head. "O-Old man…what IS this?"

"Naruto…that's a scan of your chest cavity."

Before the duo could blink the blond had ripped his shirt open and seemed to be grabbing at his own skin, tears streaming down his cheeks even as his longer nails began to slice his flesh, before he could get further the Hokage snapped through a few hand-signs and pressed two fingers to the boy's forehead, at once he went ridged and fell back onto the bed, the doctor rushing around and placing bandages soaked in some kind of noxious smelling liquid to his chest. "Naruto, you need to calm down, as far as we can tell it's not hurting you, if anything it's been helping you."

The old man saw the look of pure, undiluted terror in the boy's blue eyes and sighed, after another quick jutsu he let the boy speak, almost regretting it from the moment he did so, "No! Jii-jii, you can do it, don't let me live! PLEASE! I've seen what they do! It's horrible! They'll kill EVERYTHING! Make more of them! It happened to Mizuki! There's one out there already! Please! Don't let another one out!"

Silencing the boy once more he tried to make his voice as calm as possible, doing his best to stem his own tears at the boy's desperate plea for death, "Naruto, like I said, it's not hurting you, it looks like it never properly formed, instead it looks like it's joined itself to places throughout your body. You saw it with your hands; it's stimulating your bone and muscle growth. It's changed your blood and the nature of your digestive system. It looks like your food will pass through this…alien organism, letting your body process things that could normally kill you. We've never seen anything like it before."

Naruto's eyes seemed to lose the desperate edge of fear somewhat, but not by a lot, once more the Hokage let him speak, "H-Hokage-dono…please…I don't want to hurt anyone…"

To the boy's surprise the elderly duo's eyes hardened, "You'll never hurt anyone Naruto-kun, now don't mess with these bandages for a bit…your blood is very dangerous now, so we can't afford it to get everywhere."

Naruto looked at the doctor in confusion as he looked to his blood covered fingers, wondering what she meant, and voiced the question. The older woman stepped up with cotton ball held firmly in a set of tongs. She swiped the fluffy white ball over his hand, looking to be cleaning him up, but to his shock the ball seemed to start smoking, the bit of fluff seeming to melt into nothingness before the tips of the metal tongs did the same. The melted slag fell from the handle a few moments later and to his horror landed on his stomach. At once his eyes were screwed shut but the pain never came. Cracking an eye he looked down to see the still smoldering substance slide from lightly scared abs to the surface of the bed where it stayed.

"We had to soak your sheets and the gauze in a base solution. It seems the creature has altered your blood to be an incredibly powerful acid, in addition your heart rate and blood pressure is much higher than a normal person's, I have little doubt that when it finally stabilizes that cutting you will be a grave mistake." She flipped a few pages in the chart as she continued. "To aid in that increased blood pressure your heart seems to have enlarged slightly. As the Hokage pointed out your bone structure is changing, it seems that your bone's basic size and density have increased. Again, your digestive system, thanks to the symbiosis, seems to be able to handle almost any organic matter. I don't think you could, say, take a bite out of a tree, but anything else…maybe. The creature also seems to be stimulating the rate that you absorb minerals, but a lot of this is just conjecture until you have been able to sit down and eat something. Your bones have a marked increase in iron, in addition your nails and teeth have changed, as you may have noticed. After the first week you…actually lost your old teeth, the new ones that grew in are much sharper and stronger."

Naruto's head was spinning as Miazaki-san rattled off the things on the chart. A regeneration rate that may end up slowing his aging, increased muscle density, so while he may remain lean, there would be little doubt he could beat most in raw strength, he was a bit taller and had filled out, as the creature seemed to counteract much of his malnourishment, making them exchange his saline bags so fast it seemed like he was trying to rehydrate after a month in Suna's deserts. Lastly it seemed the long, serpent like tail had extended towards his stomach and seemed to merge into his chakra network.

"O-Old man…" The Hokage, who had been about to light his pipe, arched an eyebrow. "Am I a monster now…"

The man's eyes softened but before he could open his mouth the older woman had pulled him into a bone crushing hug, "Don't you EVER say such a thing! Naruto, your body may not be normal anymore, but that's not your fault! This creature that has set up shop in you may have changed you, but your still you where it counts!"

The boy was still trapped in his paralysis but was fighting back the tears all the same, "Where…you just said that-"

She pressed a finger over his lips before she poked him in the forehead, "Here," She placed her other hand gently over his heart, "And here. So long as you keep these, you'll never be a monster."

The Hokage's eyes softened as the boy let his tears flow, taking a moment to release the jutsu he moved forward to embrace the boy as well, the young man releasing his fears for the night into the white coat of the doctor before they allowed the others in.

Taking a bit longer to compose himself, with the help of Iruka, he looked up into the eyes of the scared man who was looking more than a bit put out at having to stand in the hall. "Alright boy. Time for the Q and A." Naruto swallowed thickly before nodding. "Why did you take the scroll?"

"I-I already to-"

"Tell me. I know you gave your report."

"I was told by Mizuki-teme that if I could get the scroll and give it to him I would be skilled enough to become a genin, that I would pass."

"And you believed him. Why."

Never once were these real questions, Naruto realized, they were demands. "He…He was my teacher."

The large man crossed his arms, his eyes hardening as he seemed to study him for a moment, "And what did he teach you."

Naruto struggled to think for a moment what it was that the chunin had done for him, and came up with empty. Naruto lowered his head in shame, "Nothing."

Iruka scowled at the thought, he had left the man in charge of his class many a time, Naruto had to have learned something. "Records show that on two dozen occasions he lead the class. What did he teach you!"

Naruto shrank back into the bed as he looked to the Hokage who was simply staring out the window. "N-Nothi-" His eyes widened in terror as the man took him by the remains of his gown and pulled him within an inch of his nose.

"Don't LIE to me!"

Naruto, for a moment, thought he would cry, however, he had done enough of that already it seemed, as a cold fury built in his belly at being called a liar. "I'M NOT! Every time he took over he kicked me out of class! When we were learning to harness our chakra, when we were learning the basic three, when we had our first kunai class, village history, bloodline natures, explosive tag use and safety…Every time…I wasn't allowed to be there. I would sit outside just under the window and took notes…but I couldn't see hand signs or the blackboard…."

The scared man seemed to search his eyes for a moment before releasing the boy and stepping back, looking to the Hokage who was gripping the arms of his chair hard enough that the wood was starting to crack, when he looked to the teacher it seemed the man was about to cry. The ANBU exchanged looks with one another and cursed, this kid, improperly trained and outright sabotaged, had gained access to one of the greatest secrets of the village and had disabled the Hokage, all under their nose, the same thought ran through their heads, 'what would he have been like if he was really trained?'

"I believe you. Now, the reason I'm here…" Dull blue eyes met deep brown as Naruto seemed resigned to his fate. "Why is there so much blood in your apartment?"

Naruto tilted his head in confusion, "What?"

Askua stepped forward, "Naruto-kun, when Lord Hokage found you your apartment had heavy bloodstains on the carpets in your living room, it's walls and much of the furniture, he had feared the worse, but you seemed to be unharmed."

Naruto paled at the thought of his apartment and just gaped, "I-I don't know! I told the old man what I remember!"

The large ninja stared a bit longer, unnerving the blond to no end before he grunted, "Alright, let's say I believe you. What do you think happened?"

He gave a half shrug, "I don't know…maybe someone threw blood all over my place again…wouldn't be the first time." The last bit was half mumbled, but the seasoned interrogator heard it as easily as if he had shouted it from the top of the monument. He wheeled on the Hokage, glaring at the elderly man who looked to be showing his years.

"Explain."

The elderly leader simply stared at the man for a long moment before sighing and nodding, "Ibiki-san, you know as well as I what he has been through. The vandalism is but the tamest thing that has happened to him."

The bear of a man seemed to whither a bit before dropping into a chair beside the bed, a weak smile coming to his features. "OK kid…interrogation over. I know you didn't have anything to do with it, we just had to make sure."

"With what?"

"We had the blood in your apartment tested, it looks to have come from two people, people we can't find anywhere in the village. If it was you or the fox we had to find out."

Naruto flinched at the mention of the fox before looking to the doctor with wide eyes, "W-What will that thing do to my seal!"

The gathered shinobi looked to one another, tense and fidgeting slightly. They had been so concerned with what the creature was doing to his body they never considered the seal! At once the Hokage was on his feet and pulling Naruto's gown up, making the blond protest, seeing that four strangers were in the room with him, two of which were women, after a moment of struggling they got a look at the seal and saw that it was unharmed. The old man let out a sigh of relief before dropping back into his chair, a hand rubbing the bridge of his nose while he tried to calm his heart.

"Naruto…sometimes I wonder how it is I still have this job...You thought of something none of us did, even while you know the least about what's going on. It looks to be perfect, but I still think it would be a good idea if I sent for Jiraiya to be on the safe side." Seeing Naruto's questioning look he smiled, "He's Konoha's resident seal master, though he has to be out of town most of the time."

Naruto nodded at that before lying back in the bed. "So…what happens now?"

Sarutobi gave him a weak smile before placing a scroll on his nightstand, "As I promised Naruto-kun, this is the clone technique I I told you about. Seeing as you may be here a bit longer look it over and when the time comes come to me and demonstrate that you are able to perform the technique. Squads are to be assigned on Friday, if you don't have it by then we will find someone to take you as an apprentice for a time, until you can be placed on another squad."

"So when can I leave?"

Askua stepped forward and gave him a comforting smile, "Well, I think I can let you go in time for bed, but for now there are a few tests I would like to perform…"

Naruto's eyes widened in fear as the woman pulled a pouch from behind her back, the black cloth bundle seeming to appear as if from nowhere. With a snap of her wrist the cloth unraveled to show a brace of syringes, bottles of medicine and pouches of pills. His eyes cut to the Hokage only to see the wisps of smoke in the now empty chair.

Naruto's screams could be heard clear across town, causing a certain Uchiha to miss one of his hand signs and the fireball he had been practicing stalled half way out, causing the boy to start hacking and coughing bits of charred flesh onto the ground as he rolled on the ground in pain.

Absently rubbing his arms where the doctor had been drawing out blood samples and discovering how his system reacted with different medications and healing techniques. It was an enlightening experience for the aged doctor.

For him…less so.

Though he did find out he needed to keep balms with liberal amounts of the base solution mixed into it to ensure that his blood wouldn't simply burn through gauze. Special glass needles were needed to allow for injections and IV's otherwise the metal would be gone in seconds. He seemed to get more out of blood and soldier pills than others because of his unique tenant, and the little creature seemed to be causing some of his bones to start fusing together for added defense, namely his rib cage, in addition the sternum seemed to be extending and encasing the creature to protect itself even further.

Sighing as he considered what may be happening to him in the long run he moved back to his apartment, absently wondering what may happen to him in the months to come. Would it mature and punch its way out of him? Would he become more like the monsters in his dreams? Would the one that was already running about find him and kill him? Kill Jii-Jii? Sakura-chan?

He was still wrestling with these thoughts when the shock of his abrupt awakening finally caught up with him. Feeling the wave of exhaustion wash over him he let himself give in to it. As his eyes fluttered closed he felt a feathery touch brush his thoughts. Before his eyes closed completely he thought he saw a something at his window but before he could focus on it darkness washed over him and he knew no more.