I do not own anything from Naruto, that is all Masashi Kishimoto.

This is my first fanfic and because it is my first, criticisms are welcome, feedback is appreciated, and flames (well, no one usually likes you anyway :P), no I'm kidding, please still feel free to post reviews.

As previously stated, I do not like to write to canon, but some parts will be as per canon. Though that will be up to my discretion. I have read and thoroughly enjoyed the reviews.

"Normal conversations"
"Thoughts"
"Kyuubi talking"
"Kyuubi thoughts"
"Jutsu"
(Jutsu name)

Author's Edit: Special thanks to amir26r and scottaa for the correction on my japanese terms for this chapter. Its greatly appreciated.

Chapter 13: The Second and Third Seal

Naruto turned his head towards the sound of the noise, his eyes widening as he saw a large wall with multiple holes of different sizes. "I'm going to guess that... Whoa!" Naruto turned his body to the right slightly as he dodged a senbon that was launched from the wall, only for it to hit the vault behind him and come to clink and rest on the floor. "Great, a large kunai launcher." He didn't have time to think as he began dodging and weaving between launched kunai, shurikens, senbons, fuma shurikens, spears and swords. He began panting waited until there was a small gap between the launched projectiles and began forming hand signs before slamming his hands onto the ground. "Doton: Doryuheki"(Earth Style: Earthen Wall) As he finished the jutsu, a giant wall of rock sprouted from beneath the ground in front of him and he began sending chakra into the wall to reinforce it as wave after wave of launched ninja tools was hurled into the wall. After what seems like minutes, the recessed wall soon is once again hidden and the ninja tools vanish in a large cloud of smoke, as if the whole thing had never happened. As he releases the jutsu, the wall recedes back into the ground, leaving nothing but a little rubble and broken earth behind.

He walks back over to the vault and studies the next seal, noticing it's a seal that has a small amount of chakra in it, but that it was similar to the first that it required a pulse of chakra. He put his hand onto the seal and pulsed his chakra into it and stepped away from the vault door. Slowly, he saw someone forming in front of him with chakra from the seal until it formed an exact mirror of himself, except this Naruto had black eyes with red pupils and a slit in the middle. Naruto stood there, shocked as he looked at himself. Almost stupidly he asked, "Who in the world are you?"

The dark-eyed Naruto looked at the boy in front of him, "Isn't it obvious? I'm you, with one major exception." He grinned as he knew what the next obvious question that was going to be asked of him.

"What is this major exception?" Naruto asked calmly, reaching into his pouch to grab a kunai, noting how the clone in front of him did the same thing.

"I'm the dark you, the one that's given in to the hatred. You want in that vault, you have to beat me." he said as he grabbed a kunai of his own.

"Hatred? I don't have any hatred. I don't hate anyone." Naruto said, spinning the kunai in his hand by the loop at the end of the kunai.

Dark Naruto laughed, the kind of laugh that would give any normal person goosebumps and fear for their life. "You expect me to believe that?" he laughed again, before stopping the laugh suddenly and looking at his opponent. "Please, you remember how the villagers would treat you when you were younger. You're still afraid to walk the streets of Konohagakure without that pathetic mask of yours on, because you know how they would treat you." Dark Naruto stated, grinning.

"That doesn't mean I hate them. They just don't understand the difference between me and Kurama." He said as he launched forward, swiping at this clone of him with his kunai, only for it to be blocked easily and him getting a kick to the side as he is pushed away.

"If you want to be blind to the truth, that is your choice, but that won't change anything. The moment you walk out of this house without your mask, you know you will be attacked and chased like an animal. Same goes for the moment that your mask breaks in battle. Do you think your team and anyone else for that matter will spare you?" Dark Naruto said, giving him the brutal truth.

Naruto refused to accept the fact that he hated anyone. He didn't want to hate anyone. Yet, here he was fighting his darker half who said that he did, in fact, hate the people of the village he would die to protect. He flashed behind his darker self and was about to deliver a kick to his head, but his kick was stopped by the Dark Naruto's hand and he pushed himself off the hand that blocked his kick and backflipped away.

"So, you just want to fight huh. Fine, then lets fight." Dark Naruto said as he ran forward to engage into a fierce taijutsu battle, neither Naruto's gaining any leverage over the other as they knew the exact way to counter each other and block each others attacks.

"Damn it. How do I beat him? It isn't true that I do hate the villagers, is it?" He thought to himself as he fought, his mind flashing back to different moments in time where he was beaten and bruised, left for dead more times than he could count, the many times he found himself in the hospital. He sighed and blocked a punch and backflipped away from Dark Naruto. He realized that Dark Naruto was right, he did hide behind the mask because he did know what would happen if everyone knew it was him behind the mask. He also began to slowly realize that he did hate the villagers for what they did, but he also knew how to forgive as well. "You know, you're right. I know the villagers would beat me and attack me if they knew I was the one behind the mask. You're also right that I do bear some hatred towards the villagers, because of how they treated me over the years. However, unlike you, I know how to forgive." he sighed and closed his eyes, thinking of the warm smiles everyone gave him, even if they did know him by an alias. "For a few years now, I have used the alias of Menma Shonjiki and the people have come to accept me and like me. I would hope, that when I take my mask off one day, that they don't hate me, but still see me. I forgive the villagers who had beat me and left me for dead and put me in the hospital. They were naïve and in pain because of the rampage that Kurama did..."

"Hey! That wasn't my fault! I was being controlled by a damn Uchiha. If it weren't for him, I never would have attacked your stupid pathetic village!" Kurama yells out, slamming his head into the bars of his cage, giving his jailor a headache. "And don't you DARE forget that. Got it, brat?"

Naruto brought his hand to his head and closed his eyes, the headache Kurama giving him being momentary and nothing compared to the pain he's felt before. "Yea yea yea, I remember. Now will you stop beating the cage, you're giving me a headache."

"Get me out of this cage and I wouldn't NEED to give you a headache." Kurama countered as he lay back down in the cage, growling at Naruto.

"Working on it, Kendama-sama." Naruto said to his captive demon, grinning to himself.

"Hmph." Kurama growled out as he punched the bars of the cage again at being called the nickname he so hates being called by the brat he calls his somewhat friend.

Naruto turns back to Dark Naruto, ignoring the pain of the second headache he got from Kurama. "Regardless of everything, I forgive them. All of them and I would gladly put my life on the line to protect them." he said, putting away his kunai.

Dark Naruto looked at the boy. He could feel his resolve and hatred wavering and dissipating. He didn't understand. How could someone forgive people for practically trying to kill him? "So what's going to happen if the villagers don't accept you when the mask comes off?" Dark Naruto said, trying to get the hatred to take hold once more.

Naruto shrugged his shoulders casually. "I don't know, but I do know that I will still forgive them and will do my best to get them to see me and not Kurama. Only time will tell how they will react." He watched the Dark Naruto slowly become incorporeal. "The life of a shinobi should not be one ruled by hate. We should strive to protect those we care about with our life and if you have hate, you can't do it effectively." Naruto said, almost as if he had heard someone else say it.

Dark Naruto looked at his counterpart and sighed. "I hope you are right Naruto, or else I'll be back, but next time, I won't go so easy on you." he said before the chakra goes back into the seal on the vault.

Naruto watched his hateful half disappear and sighed, smiling to himself. "You won't be coming back. I promise." He took a step toward the vault and looked up as he saw the chakra flowing out of the seal again as someone else began to appear, this outline taller than the previous form. As the form began to become more corporeal, Naruto couldn't help but stare wide eyed at the person who now stood before him.

"Hi... Naruto." the man said.

Somewhere in the middle of ?

Pein looked over the village he was the leader and protector of. It had been a few weeks since he last spoke to his subordinates about the searching of the jinchurikiis and he needed an update. He rubbed his ring and sent chakra into it, "I want everyone to meet me in the cavern via astral projections in five minutes." He said telepathically as he sent an astral projection of himself into a cavern that had a giant statue in it, his projection being on the right thumb in accordance with the finger he wore the ring on.

In five minutes, everyone was assembled on the fingers of the statue respective to the rings they wore. Pein looked at everyone, taking in their body posture and the way they looked. "Deidara, Sasori. How is your search coming for the Ichibi (One-Tail) and Gobi (Five-Tailed) jinchurikiis?"

Deidara was a blonde man with a high ponytail and had bangs covering his left eye, over which he had a miniature camera. He groaned, "Not well as we can't find them. They must either be good at keeping their chakra subdued, sealed away, or in the worst case dead." He knew giving bad news to their leader was never a good thing to do, considering how much of a planner he was.

Sasori, a man of short stature almost as if he was a hunchback, rolled his eyes at his partner. "Speak for yourself Deidara. My spies tell me that the Gobi was last seen wandering around Tsuchi no Kuni (Land of Earth). However, that was nearly four days ago, he could have gone anywhere else by now."

Pein growled at the two of them. "Unacceptable. You know I do not tolerate failure, despite how short of a time I call you. Now, feel pain." Pein went through hand seals faster than they could follow and suddenly the astral projections of Deidara and Sasori had lines of red crossing their bodies as they started screaming out in pain before the connection to them was cut, the sounds of their screaming echoing in the cave until it goes away. "Kakazu? Hidan?" he said, his attention turning towards them.

Hidan gulped and laughed as he scratched the back of his head, "Hey, uh, Kakazu. Do you wanna give him the report?"

Kakazu was a tall man with a mask covering his mouth that attached to his hitai-ite which marked him as a missing nin. He looked over to the grey haired man, "What does it matter who tells him, either way Pein-sama is getting a report."

"Yes, but you are so much better at delivering news than I am. I just joined this group for the thrill of the kill." Hidan countered back.

"If you say so, but if you were so brave to speak up first, why didn't you give the report?" the masked man said calmly, watching Hidan's expression.

"I already told you! You give better reports than I do!" Hidan shouted, getting a tick mark on his forehead.

"I should kill you." Kakazu said before turning away from his partner.

"I would love to see you try. I would even welcome it really." Hidan said as he gripped the triple-bladed scythe he carried on his back.

"Enough you two. Give me a report, now!" Pein said, spiking his chakra to inhuman levels to get their attention.

Kakazu sighed and crossed his arms. "I have heard rumors that the Nibi (Two Tail) and Hachibi (Eight Tail) jinchurikiis are housed somewhere in Kumogakure, but none of the rumors have proved true so far. However, the jinchurikii of the Rokubi (Six Tails) proves to be quite elusive as no one has even heard about there being a jinchurikii for the Rokubi." he finished as his fingers started to grip his arm in preparation for the same pain his other two colleagues had received, however unlike them, he would not scream.

"I see. Your report seems to be more fruitful than the other two, however, you still failed part of your mission." He did the hand seals once again, as the same red lines showed up on both Kakazu and Hidan, the latter of the two screaming in pain while the former just closed his eyes and began digging his fingernails into his arm. Pein rubbed his ring and the two Akatsuki members also vanished, Hidan's screams dying down in a matter of seconds. "Your turn Tobi and Zetsu."

Tobi was the only one of the Akatsuki to wear a mask, but also like Pein, didn't like to beat around the bush. "As of right now, the mission is unsuccessful." Tobi was not the type to just stand around and let someone dish out pain to him so he quickly dismissed himself, even though he knew he would still feel the effects of the jutsu despite leaving early.

"Finally, Danzo and Kisame?" Pein said, looking at the final two members he had sent out to search for the tailed beasts.

Danzo shook his head, while Kisame spoke up. "We have yet to find either of them. Though I have heard a rumor that the Yonbi (Four Tails) is a traveller while the Kyuubi (Nine Tails) was killed in battle when the Yondaime of Konohagakure was still alive."

Pein looked at Kisame and frowned, "Pity that it happened that way. It will set back my timeline a little bit. Keep an eye on the reformation of the Kyuubi then."

Danzo smirked to himself. "Actually, the Kyuubi wasn't killed, just sealed into a small child. However, I will never tell you that information without getting myself killed." As he thought it, the seal on his tongue activated, which sent a burning sensation throughout his entire body, but due to his own intense training he did not show a single ounce of pain, even as Pein activated his own jutsu against Kisame and himself.

Pein stood in an empty room, pondering the information given to him before letting his projection go. He looked over to Konan who was looking at him a bit sadly. "Don't you think you were a bit rough on them?" she asked him.

"Not at all. There will never be room for failure. The last time we failed, one of us was killed." Pein said, his memory going back to his friend whom he had killed himself a few years back. "I will not tolerate anything less than perfection."

"Hi... Naruto" the man said.

Naruto looked at the man in front of him. He was a tall toned man, with blond unruly hair and blue eyes. He had on a white cloak with flames at the bottom and around the bottoms of the sleeves and had on the standard Jonin flak jacket. "You're... How are you here?"

The man laughed and walked forward. "That's easy. The seal has my chakra signature in it and anytime the seals are activated, my chakra absorbs that and becomes more potent, thus allowing me to become corporeal for a short time." He put his hand onto Naruto's head and smiled, the same kind of smile that Naruto has.

Naruto just looked at the man in front of him before hugging him tightly. "Since you're here, I have one question to ask you. Why did you seal Kurama into me, I mean, you're my dad. Shouldn't you want to protect me?"

"Who's Kurama?" The man asked the boy.

"Kurama is the name of the Kyuubi." Naruto answered the blonde man.

The blonde haired man nodded in acknowledgement while giving Naruto a hug and smiled sadly. "I did it because I thought the village would treat you as a hero and because I knew that you would be able to control his power, though you don't have Kurama's full power, as I only sealed half of it inside you."

"What about my kaa-san?" Naruto said pulling himself away from his father.

"She didn't want me to do it, but she understood my reasoning and agreed to it. We had hoped that one of the shinobi clans would have adopted you. Did they?" the father asked of his son.

"No. I was kicked out of the orphanage at five and just began living wherever I could. According to one of my friends, Hokage-jiji had squads of ANBU look after me. Mostly I was beaten and bruised and left for dead more times than I could count by the villagers because they saw me as Kurama and not me." Naruto said, sighing softly but smiling instead. "I don't hate them though. They will see the real me in time. How do you know that you both died, I mean, this seal must have been created long before the Kyuubi attack, right?"

"I see." Minato sat there in thought for a minute. "Well, I wish I could talk to the village, but I can't as I would never have enough chakra to sustain my corporeal form away from the seal, plus it would likely put the village into a state of slight confusion and chaos. So you can't tell anyone you saw me." he moved beside Naruto and put his hand on his back, leading him towards the seal. "You also can't tell anyone about this vault. Not even the Sandaime knows about this vault and his council advisors would likely try to get their hands on the information in this vault. Since you already passed the tests, you just have to pour some chakra into the third seal until it turns blue and then step away. After that, to get in, you just send a pulse of chakra and you can enter at your own will, but only you. Your mother was a fuinjutsu master and made intricate seals even I can't begin to comprehend." he told his son. "As for why I know all that happened, Kage Bunshin (Shadow clone) is an incredibly useful jutsu to use when you want to pass quick knowledge to seals or write letters and I always had them everywhere around the village. It was my own way of protecting the village while I was Hokage."

Naruto blinked in realization and nodded and put his hand on the third seal and began pouring chakra into it. "So, what was my kaa-san like?" he asked curiously.

"Kushina was a wonderful woman. Deadly in her own right. Even though she wasn't a missing nin, she managed to make her way into the bingo book of other villages with a run-on-sight. I had the same kind of order in the bingo book as well. Her nickname was the Red Death of Konohagakure and she was a master of kenjutsu and fuinjutsu. Other than that, she was just a roundabout incredible woman and would have made a great mother if she had survived the attack of the Kyuubi." He answered as he watched the seal turn blue for a single moment before going back to black. "Well, the chakra is almost up. I'll see you later Naruto. Remember, you have two amazing shinobi to follow and huge shoes to fill to surpass us. I know you can do it though, you have our intellect and I'm sure you have our ideals as well." he said smiling as his chakra began to flow back into the seal. "Don't forget, we both love you dearly, even in death." He smiled as he disappeared, leaving Naruto to himself.

Naruto smiled both sadly and happily. Happily that he got to see his father finally, sadly because he couldn't stay. He put his hand onto the chakra seal and sent a pulse of chakra into it, the vault door opening up as he did so. As it opened up and he walked inside, he saw a table with many papers and books on it with scrawled notes on it, a vast library of books and scrolls and he saw a weapon rack with a few missing swords. "Hey Kurama, does any of this look familiar to you?" he asked his tenant.

Kurama closed his eyes as he began mental images from his jailor and somewhat friend, "Not really. This is all new to me. Your mother didn't let me see into her mind the way you do, so I never saw anything she did. However, from the looks of it, it looks like a large study of some sort. It's worth leaving a few clones behind to catalog and learn what everything is. Maybe spend a week or two down here yourself to learn what you can personally."

"Maybe." Naruto walked over to the desk and began looking at all the papers, noting that there were different formulas for chakra on them. "My dad was working on a few extra jutsus and this must be part of his project room."

"Learn what you can kit, because once you change the seal on this Kami forsaken cage, I'm going to be training you rigorously." Kurama said before cutting the communication and going back to sleep. "You have a lighter heart now kit. Seems you've conquered your hatred, maybe my tou-san was right about you."

Naruto decided he would take a closer look at his father's projects more in depth later as he was getting tired and had to meet with the Hokage the next day to start his next mission. He walked over to the weapon rack and noticed a swirling circle on it and on the pieces where the weapons were missing. "Must be Uzu weapons, but where are they?" he thought to himself as he made a mental note to himself to check the house later for any small inconspicuous seals or markings. However, he had other things that took priority, at this point in time, it was sleep. So he headed out of the vault, the door closing behind him silently. He pulled a kunai out from his pouch and made a seal on it, throwing it into a dark corner so that no one could find it if they managed to make it to the bottom, and he went back up the steps to his room to sleep.

AN: Hope you guys enjoyed the chapter. I am hoping to be able to keep on updating my story a bit faster as it's starting to get to the part I really want to write the most, and I am quite sure you readers will get as excited as me once that gets going. As always, please leave a review, please. Reviews are what keep stories going. Again, suggestions and criticisms are always welcome. See you around. -Tohrment