Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto

"Speech"

Thought

Jutsu

Naruto and the Tornado of Konoha

By: Sealed-Dragon

It had been a few hours, and Kurogane was beginning to get worried. He and Tazuna had planned on going to the bridge earlier today with at least two of the genin. But with both Naruto and Ryuu gone, he wasn't sure that would work out.

He looked around. He could've sworn that the chakra spike came from this direction. Maybe he was getting a little rusty. He sighed. He couldn't turn back without one of his students. He was starting to think that he was going to go insane from their antics.

He took a quick moment to think over what had happened at the table. While Naruto wasn't the calmest of the group, he didn't usually take that much offence to having someone say that he wouldn't become Hokage. He'd normally just yell that he'd do better than anyone else just to make sure that he could become the Hokage. But then, no one had ever told him that he wouldn't become Hokage because he would die before he achieved that dream.

He sighed. Inari had been really troubled by what had happened, and how violent the reaction to his words were. When he found out how he'd been treated in his village, and lived through it, he felt a great deal of remorse. He told them he hoped he could apologize for his words.

Kurogane stood up again. Well, he'd better go and get the boy's before they got themselves into a world of trouble. He grinned again, and took off. Maybe he could overhear them talking about their loves and tease them about it when they got back.

Several minutes later, he came to a giant clearing. He was shocked by what he found. The entire earthen area was destroyed. There wasn't any grass or herbs that would normally reside in that area, just a deep pit. He looked into the center of the pit, and was surprised to see Naruto.

"Hey, sensei." Kurogane turned around to see Ryuu sitting against a tree, looking quite exhausted. While he didn't have a clue on what happened, he was more than sure that it wasn't good.

"What happened here?"

Ryuu glanced at him. "I did a little family jutsu and it had a bigger impact than I thought it would."

"A bigger impact?" Kurogane looked down at Naruto. He wasn't wearing anything on the upper half of his body, and it appeared that there were some sort of burns on him. He jumped down to him. When he finally got close to him, all that registered was shock and disgust. "Holy crap…"

Naruto looked almost exactly like that. His entire body was thin, like a skeleton. Any muscle he'd gotten from his training was obviously gone. But the most noticeable aspects, were his face and stomach. For his face, the three whisker marks were darker, more angular. His hair was wilder, a darker shade of yellow, and quite a bit longer than when he left the house a few hours ago. And for his stomach, there wasn't any sign of the seal used to contain the Kyuubi.

He jumped back to Ryuu. "What was that jutsu? Do you realize that you may have endangered the entire human race?"

Ryuu smiled up to him. "Relax, the only thing scary here will be Naruto's appetite when he wakes up. After all, from several years of malnutrition catching up to you, it's no wonder he's like this. That, and it takes a lot of chakra to reject and fuse with a demon's soul."

Kurogane looked at him in confusion for a moment. Then it finally hit him. "Wait, so the Kyuubi's been permanently removed?" Ryuu nodded. Kurogane sighed, "Well, at least we don't have to worry about that. Come on, Inari is waiting to see Naruto, and I think we should put his shirt back on."

Ryuu grimaced. "Yea about that, I didn't put them far enough away from the blast, and they were completely destroyed." Kurogane blinked for a moment, and then sighed again. This kid either was the luckiest person alive, or he was doomed to die young.

Another thought came to him. "He's not wearing his headband."

Ryuu looked at Naruto. "Oh, I didn't remove that. It should be around here somewhere."

After several moments of searching, they finally found it. Propelled by the blast, it had landed nearly one-hundred feet away, after going through two trees before imbedding itself into a rock. All of the cloth was burnt off, and the trees it had gone through were smoking. Kurogane looked at Ryuu. "You know something, I really don't want to know what happened here."

l – l – l

Hinata was beginning to get a little worried. Ryuu had been out for a long time, and if Naruto had to vent some anger, he would most likely take a while. She sighed, wishing she had gone with Kurogane to look for them. Kurogane had explained to her that Zabuza could still be alive, and stated that he might not be alone this time. After all, if the hunter-nin hadn't killed him, then he was most likely with him.

After another couple of moments, she heard a knock on the door. She let Tazuna get it, and let herself continue the mope. That is, until she heard her sensei. "Yo, I'm back."

She shot straight up, on her feet and rushing over to the door. When she got there, she was mildly surprised, to completely horrified. "Ryuu!" She quickly noticed Naruto. His condition didn't tell much. "What happened to Naruto?"

Kurogane shrugged. "I don't know, but we're going to leave him here and go to the bridge. Naruto won't be able to wake up till later this evening. Tsunami can take care of him for now. Oh, one more thing. Tsunami, make sure you make up a huge amount of food for when Naruto wakes up. That's all, let's go team."

After a few moments, Tsunami began to work. She quickly minced up different foods and put them together. She wasn't sure what Naruto really liked, so she tried to make some thing with a little bit of everything.

After another couple of minutes, the food appeared to be ready. She took it all of and set it on the table. She heard a soft moaning behind her. She whirled around, and saw that Naruto was staring at the food. That can't be right, he wasn't supposed to wake up till this evening! She thought as she watched him stumble into the room.

"I-is that food f-for m-me?" Naruto asked, breaking her from her thoughts. She smiled and nodded. Naruto's eyes gleamed for a second and he quickly dug into the food.

Within ten minutes, Tsunami found herself repeating the same process as before. Naruto had nearly finished up the entire thing of food, and told her that he was still hungry. So, she decided to try a double batch.

She watched in curiosity as the boy ate. It almost appeared like he was becoming less of a skeleton as he ate. But that was probably just his cheeks bulging from the food, right? No one can eat and go from skeleton to human.

There was also his eyes. Unlike before, they were a darker blue. She could've sworn that they were almost slits, but because he was eating so fast, she really couldn't tell.

She heard a small knock on the door. As she stood up, she heard a loud blast. She jumped and ran to the door. Standing there were two samurai, looking rather pleased with themselves. When they noticed her, she could see a certain lust in their eyes. She really didn't like that look, it wasn't right.

"If you come quietly, we may just spare the rest of the household. Besides, if you don't, Gato said we're allowed to do whatever we want to the people in the village." A large grin spread across his face. You didn't have to be a mind reader to tell what he was thinking, and it couldn't be pretty.

She was just about to tell the that she would willingly go with them when she heard a small scuff behind her. "You guys sure no how to make an entrance. And because of that entrance, you ruined my lunch."

The samurai looked past Tsunami at the boy standing there, looking at the ground. He didn't pose any threat to them. "Go away kid, this isn't any of your business."

Naruto looked them in the eye. "I overheard the name, Gato, and decided I need to know more. Would you mind explaining, or would you like to die?"

The samurai felt a chill run down their spin. This, kid, could easily kill them just by looking at them. They were more than sure of that. They'd felt Zabuza's killer intent, and it paled in comparison to this. But it was also his eyes, while they still had a dark blue center, around it, where normal white should be, was something closely related to a sea of darkness. Then, when they got over it, they saw that the blue part of his eyes were thickly silted, upping his danger to new heights.

"W-well, he wants Tazuna dead so he can keep his business going. He plans on killing Zabuza so that he doesn't have to pay him, a-and he plans on going to the bridge to see his death. That's all we know of his immediate plans." The poor man waved his arms around as if to ward off some evil spirit. And in a sense, he was dead on.

Naruto nodded. "Well, since you willingly gave me the information, you can go back and tell your immediate superiors that Tsunami was moved to a new location shortly after our genin team got here. If you don't, I'll remember your faces, I'll track you down. Then there will always be that fate worse than death, a fate that you will share if you don't do as I've said."

They both nodded quickly. While they were loyal to their employer, they didn't want to die right now, especially not to the hands of a kid.

As they ran off, Tsunami finally looked back at Naruto. He looked much better than he did before, more muscular. She wondered how anyone could ever get abs like that by eating. After a moments thought, she decided that there were some things, that she wouldn't ever understand.

Naruto glanced at Tsunami. "Do you have any shirts that I could borrow?" Tsunami shook her head, and Naruto sighed. "That's right, you don't have anyone my age. Oh well."

Tsunami thought about what the samurai said again. "Naruto, what are we going to do about the samurai? If another comes back to check on us, we'll be toast."

Naruto sighed. "I told them I moved you to a different place, so just go into your basement and hide out for a little." He formed a quick shadow clone. "My shadow clone will be here, so you won't have to worry, I'll get you through this."

He turned around and started out. Just as he was about to leave, he turned to his clone with a grin on his face. "Tell Inari everything."

He would later wonder why he'd rushed out with out putting a shirt on, but decided that he could almost feel that his only friend, was dying.

l – l – l

The battle on the bridge wasn't going so well. First, Zabuza and his accomplice, the fake hunter-nin, Haku, had neutralized the builders. Then, they held Kurogane's attention long enough for the Demon Brothers to reappear and attack them from behind. Now it was the Demon Brothers and Zabuza verses Kurogane, and Ryuu verse Haku.

After five minutes, Ryuu was panting heavily. Haku was putting a beat down on him. Of course, not having that much chakra was giving Ryuu a rather large handicap. Haku had finally gotten Ryuu into the Demonic Mirrors, and was proceeding to bombard him with senbon.

Kurogane was faring pretty well. The Demon Brother's were more of a nuisance than anything, but with Zabuza, they were quite formidable. They would attack from the rear, and from above, and Zabuza would attack in a way that left almost no opening. Needless to say, Kurogane was having more difficulty than he felt should be necessary.

Hinata, was watching from a distance, wishing that someone would ask for her help. But because Ryuu had decided to engage Haku, she was stuck babysitting Tazuna. She really wished Naruto was here. She glanced over at the mirrors, just in time to see Ryuu fall.

It was like all of time stopped. Zabuza, the Demon Brothers, Kurogane, Hinata, Haku, and even Tazuna turned towards Ryuu. He'd fallen, and was dead. But what made them all freeze, was the killer intent that was washing over them.

"I see. I'll never forgive you for this." A quick burst of air flew through the mist to reveal Naruto standing on one side of the bridge, and Gato on the other.

"Well, I must say I'm disappointed. Zabuza, the demon of the hidden mist? What a joke." He turned to Haku, and snorted in disgust. "I should've told my men to do as they pleased with you when they had the chance. After all, a weak girl like you should be handled by as many dogs as pleased." Haku recoiled, and then froze, realizing what was about to happen.

Gato tapped his cane on the ground, and as if from no where, a small army of mercenaries. They all looked primed, and ready to do whatever Gato asked of them. After all, he was paying their bills, why should they worry?

"You seem to have forgotten me, Gato." Naruto felt his anger rising. "I told you I'd never forgive you for this."

Gato looked perplexed. "Weren't you speaking to the girl? After all, she was the one who killed your friend."

Naruto snorted. "It would be wrong to kill a girl, much less do as you said to do. Besides, if you hadn't hired them, Ryuu would still be alive!"

Naruto felt his strength quickly returning. His chakra was finally starting to push their way through the coils. He began to walk forward. "This is the end for all of you here." Forming several hand signs, he concentrated his chakra. "Wind Style - Gale Dragon Jutsu!"

A large dragon of wind formed, charging down the ranks of mercenaries. Gato was yelling at them to kill them, but no one heard them over the coming dragon. It continued forward, quickly going through all of the opposition, slicing them and pushing the remains towards the water. Most of the men died when they jumped into the water, snapping their necks from the whiplash.

After another moment, it quieted down. Naruto looked at Zabuza. "It's over, I win."

Zabuza had no idea what to say. What do you say to someone who had a higher killer intent than you? Good job? It was really ridiculous, that any child could be that strong. Even Haku had to train a lot just to get to her current level, and in two weeks, this boy had surpassed her.

Naruto looked back at Haku. "Do you mind telling me why you didn't kill my friend?"

Haku cocked her head. "Why did you kill all those mercenaries for no reason?"

Naruto smirked. "Without Gato, you have no employer, and you're free to stay with us. That is, if you want to. Besides, I really didn't want to think of what else might have happened."

Haku blinked, confused by his sudden offer. "Well, I didn't kill him because I didn't find it necessary. He wasn't my target."

Naruto thought it over for a second. "While it does make sense, I still don't think I'll ever get it."

A moment later, Ryuu stirred. Naruto and Hinata walked over and stood over him. Ryuu opened an eye. "Naruto? Am I dead?"

Naruto smiled. "Not likely, after all, I haven't become Hokage yet. After all, I need someone like you who is there for me."

Hinata smiled down at him. "And besides, I wouldn't let my future boyfriend die now, would I?"

Ryuu smiled, and then he grimaced. "Could you help me up?"

Naruto nodded and lifted his friend onto his shoulder. Haku glanced over at Zabuza again. They were once again without a home, or protection. Zabuza had a curious look on his face, like he was thinking something over. "Haku, you've seen what this boy can do. I can tell that he could do more if shaped right. What do you say we see how far we can get this boy."

Haku felt puzzled for a second, but then smiled. "Yes, Zabuza-sama."

Naruto turned around. "So, you're coming with us?" When Zabuza nodded, a small grin crossed his face. "Cool, but I think we should finish the bridge."

Zabuza smirked. "I really don't care. Besides, if you could help me, then I guess I just might teach you. After all, you did save me from killing Gato and all those around him. That, and you have a lot of potential. So, do we have a deal?"

He put out his hand to Naruto who, after a moment, shook it. "Deal."