Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto. Any recognizable characters, locations, and concepts are property of Masashi Kishimoto. There may be times in the story that scenes from the anime Naruto appear in this story, such scenes belong to Kishimoto and those at VIZ media. No copyright infringement is intended, I am just doing this for fun.

Hey guys! I'm back with another chapter! First off, I wanted to say thanks to everyone that reviewed the first chapter (Deus Namikaze, sortofbored, ahmadaziz, XxAshishxX, edochan68, LordCanine, RedCrownActual, YellowFlash85, thor94, SawDawg10, CursedSage95, Okiro Benihime, Rakasa, and Senseye318, as well as the guest and anonymous reviewers as well!).I decided that I'd probably just send you PM's with responses to your reviews, I felt that it would kinda make it more personal, and then it would be less bulky during the next chapter, as I wouldn't have to write responses to the reviews. To those that didn't get a PM, I tried, but for some reason I didn't see the PM option on your profile? I'm not really sure what that's about, but I didn't forget about you!

Also, thanks to the people that followed and fav'd the story, I hope it lives up to your expectations!

Chapter 2

It's hard to tell time when you're stuck inside of a cave. A normal person could do it. An experienced person could do it. A ninja could damn sure do it. But those were statements that only held under the most normal of circumstances. Not everybody got constantly trapped in a genjutsu that manipulated time so efficiently that months spent in the genjutsu were only a couple of seconds in real time. Not everybody was tortured almost every moment of their lives, either in the genjutsu or not. It was only due to Zetsu telling him how many days, months, years had passed since he had been brought to that cave.

Madara was ruthless. Ever since Naruto had woken and found himself in that unfamiliar cave, Madara had tortured him relentlessly. Madara stated that it was a form of training. Naruto wasn't sure why, but he knew better. Something told him, gave him this feeling, that Madara's words were nothing more than eloquent lies. The second Naruto had opened his eyes that first day, he was trapped in the Tsukuyomi. A younger, black hair version of Madara explained things about the cycle of hatred, how men that learned to love also risked learning to hate. He said that he was going to create a new world, a world free of pain and hate. Where everybody was equal. Where dreams come true. It sounded nice. Too nice. Naruto wanted to believe it, but there was always that feeling that Madara was a liar, like he cared nothing for the people in the world, other than himself. He reeked of a man that knew and wanted nothing but power. And then the torture began.

Naruto was subjected to everything imaginable inside the Tsukuyomi. He would be tied to posts while and sliced and impaled repeatedly with swords, whipped for hours on end until rivers of blood flowed down his body, set on fire until his skin was covered in grotesque burns, beaten with metal pipes until bone fragments flew out of his broken skin, anything that crossed Madara's demented imagination was fair game. After Madara had his fill, usually after months of torture inside the Tsukuyomi (mere seconds in real time), he would release Naruto to begin training his body with physical exercises and taijutsu. He was made to run laps around the cave. If he didn't run fast enough, he was punished. If he tripped, he was punished. If was breathing too hard at the end of the run, he was punished. He was made to do pushups, sit-ups, squats, and all other kinds of exercises for hours on end. If he didn't do them fast enough he was punished. If he couldn't complete the allotted amount he was punished. If he got tired before was done, he was punished. If, at any time, he expressed noises of pain, he was punished. He tried not to voice his pain, but sometimes it was unavoidable. If he expressed noises of pain, or even acknowledge pain existed while he was punished, he was punished even more. Once the physical training was over, it was right back into the genjutsu to be tortured. Rest was nothing more than a hopeful wish. The times he did sleep felt too short, before the cycle was repeated. Madara was thorough. But he always recovered. Madara stated that he had a remarkable healing ability which allowed him to recover from almost any type of wound. It was one of the few things that Naruto felt Madara hadn't lied about.

After his physical strength met Madara's standards, Madara began to train him in ninjutsu. Madara tested Naruto's chakra with the chakra paper. When chakra was flooded into the paper, the paper would then have a reaction based on the type of nature the chakra possessed. If the nature of the chakra was fire, the paper would burn away. If it was water, the paper would get soggy. If it was wind, the paper would spit in two. Earth, and the paper would crumble to dust, and if it was Lightning, the paper would crinkle up. When Naruto touched the paper, he noticed his chakra acted strangely. Instead of pouring into the paper uninhibited, it felt like his chakra split into five parts, and only one of those parts touched the paper. Once that happened, and his chakra met the paper, the paper burst into flames. Naruto would never forget Madara's smile. It was a sadistic smile. It turns out that Madara, as an Uchiha, was very well versed with Katon. Because of the physical "training" Naruto went through, Naruto's chakra reserves had already increased exponentially, which would aid Naruto when using higher level Katon jutsu that Madara would be able to teach him.

Madara had even higher demands for Katon training than he did for the physical training. Madara demanded that Naruto have precise chakra control, which he could monitor due to his Sharingan, but due to Naruto's incredibly vast chakra reserves, control was a struggle. Madara delighted in Naruto's pain, but never more than when he applied the Amaterasu, a technique exclusive to the Mangekyo Sharingan in which the user summons black flames that can never be put out (except by those with considerable prowess like Madara), to each one of Naruto's limbs and watched as the black flames from Hell cooked Naruto alive. Madara told him that normally, the Mangekyo Sharingan had a limit on its life. The more you used the Mangekyo Sharingan, the faster the Mangekyo would degrade the users' eyes, before finally disappearing forever and leaving the user blind. However, Madara had the Eternal Mangekyo Sharingan, a form of Sharingan even higher than the Mangekyo Sharingan, since it would never lose its light, meaning, as Madara had said after explaining it to Naruto, that he would be able to light Naruto on fire with the Amaterasu as much as he wanted. The sadistic smile on his face and the glint in his eyes said he would enjoy every second of it as well.

At times the pain was unbearable. On more than one occasion, Naruto had wanted nothing more than to die. To give up. His life was meaningless. He didn't know anything of his history, where he was from, family or friends he might have had, save for his name. His future consisted of torture, torture, and more torture. He knew nothing but pain. And blood. And suffering. How he wished to die. Nobody would miss him. There were times he found himself praying for Madara to kill him. For Naruto's healing ability to stop working. For Madara to forget to put out the Amaterasu. For Madara to whip him once more, when he knew that the next strike would slice through his heavily damage body and cut him clean in half. But he never did. He always drove Naruto to the brink, and then stopped, only to let him heal and repeat the process. He wished for death.

However, for some reason, what he got wasn't death, but comfort. At first he thought it was a trick of the light, so he blinked once, but it was still there. Then he thought it was a hallucination, a reasonable assumption in his mind, due to the constant torture. But the "hallucination" was persistent and didn't just present itself to him during times of torture. Sometimes, when he would be preparing to go to sleep, afraid for what the next day would bring, it would weasel its way into his head. After a while, he noticed a pattern. The image would present itself whenever he had thoughts of giving up, or death. When the pain was at its height. The image soothed him. Comforted him. Encouraged him to move on. Gave him…hope. Made him feel like everything was going to be ok. And then, he had remembered. The image had shown itself that very first night he woke up in the cave. He wondered if he would ever see them again. That pair of beautiful emerald eyes…

And finally, Madara had determined he was fit to fulfill his mission. Madara told him of an organization, the Akatsuki, which was gathering the nine Bijuu that were sealed in Jinchuriki, human containers for the beasts, that lived in various parts of the world. Madara then informed him of all the members of the Akatsuki. He gave Naruto descriptions of faces and names to match. He described the Bijuu as massive entities of chakra, given both form and self-awareness, each having a distinct appearance and a different number of tails. The tails signified the strength of the beast. The higher the number, the stronger the Bijuu. The Kyuubi, he said, was the strongest. His mission was to join the Akatsuki, and help them to gather the Jinchuriki, and extract the Bijuu from them. He wasn't told what for, but just hearing his assignment made his skin crawl. The emerald eyes appeared when Madara had finished telling him of his role, and Naruto knew that this plan was not to be allowed to come to fruition.

After telling Naruto his role, Madara died. His last words were that they would meet again, sometime in the near future. As he died, his eyes changed from a blood red sharingan, Mangekyo Sharingan, to the Eternal Mangekyo Sharingan, to a new pair of eyes, completely colored purple, with concentric circles surrounding the pupils. And, one last time, his eyes closed.

Naruto walked out of the cave and into a dark tunnel, Zetsu close behind. The tunnel was long, Naruto had walked for an hour before finally, for the first time in three and a half years, Naruto stepped out into the night, into a forest of trees.

The night was clear, the pale moon full and high in the sky, casting its light over everything in the vicinity unhindered. It washed over Naruto, who merely looked at the moon, staring as if he had rejoined a lost friend.

He was tall. Much taller than he'd been since he first woke up in the cave. He stood at over six feet tall, his body lean and corded with muscle, visible due to his lack of a shirt. Golden spiked hair flowed down his head, framing his face perfectly, stopping at his chin. His face was thin, his jaw strong. On each cheek rested three whisker-like marks. His most striking feature, however, were his sapphire eyes that seemed to twinkle in the moonlight. He wore black pants and black ninja sandals.

"Here, put this on." Zetsu said, handing him a hooded cloak. Naruto slipped on the cloak and raised the hood, effectively hiding his face. The pair continued to walk until they left the forest, and came to a large hill overlooking the grassy fields below him. "Wait here, I'll go get him."

Zetsu left, leaving Naruto to his thoughts. Naruto sat down on the grass of the hill, staring up at the moon. He sat, and as he sat, he noticed a pull somewhere in the back of his mind, pulling his attention to the north-east. The pull seemed to want him to go in that direction, and Naruto decided that he would. But only after he dealt with his company.

"Do you want to tell me how that jutsu works?" Naruto asked, seemingly to nobody.

"And why would I do that?" A cool voice answered back from behind Naruto, a spot that was previously unoccupied a few seconds prior.

"So that if you ever cross me, I can kill you easier."

"I think I'll pass. It would take much more skill than you have to be able to kill me, Naruto Uzumaki, even with Madara's…'training'."

Naruto looked over his shoulder. He saw Zetsu standing next to a figure of middling height, a couple inches shorter than Naruto. He wore a cloak embroidered with the red clouds of the Akatsuki. Black pants and standard black ninja sandals could be seen at the bottom of the cloak. The man's face was covered by an orange mask, which seemed to spiral out from the lone hole in the mask over the man's right eye. In his hands he held an Akatsuki cloak and a ring. He threw them at Naruto.

"Take these. The ring is something all members of the Akatsuki have, it allows Pain to be able to contact members to brief them on assignments. In the event of the capture of one of the Bijuu, Pain will contact all the members of the Akatsuki, and will begin the sealing ritual of the Bijuu. The sealing process takes roughly three days, so once contacted, find a secluded spot close to your location and make yourself comfortable."

"We don't have to be physically present for the sealing?" Naruto questioned.

"No. The jutsu used to contact members of the Akatsuki also allows for projections of the members to be present during the sealing. It's a simple task to supply the necessary amount of chakra from there."

"Fine. I'll be off then." Naruto said, standing.

"Where are you headed?" White Zetsu asked in his musical voice. Naruto hated that voice. It annoyed him to no end. The first few days in the cave, Black Zetsu had been alone, before producing a White Zetsu from the statue in the cave. Naruto remembered very clearly the disgusting squelching noise the pair made as they merged into one being. Why in god's name someone would willingly create something as stupid as White Zetsu was beyond Naruto, but he couldn't even begin to fathom why anyone would want to be stuck to one of those things.

"None of your damn business. By the way, what am I supposed to call you?" Naruto asked, glancing at the man in the mask.

"You can call me Tobi around the Akatsuki. The one who leads the Akatuski in my stead, Pain, as well as Konan, Itachi, and Kisame know me as Madara. Around them, feel free to address me as such, but do not tell them about the real Madara. Let's go Zetsu. See you soon…Naruto."

Naruto watched on as Tobi and Zetsu disappeared in a swirl of motion centered on the hole in Tobi's mask. And just like that, they were gone.

Naruto turned and sped down the hill, heading north-east towards the pull in his mind, cloak and ring in hand.

'That jutsu…could be formidable if I have to go against it.' he thought.

Naruto noticed that the further he went north-east, the stronger the pull got. After a while he came to a small town. As he sped through the streets, he noticed that there was a shop for ninja. It made sense to find one here, this town wasn't near anything as far as Naruto could tell, it was the first thing he reached after nearly an hour of running. The town probably operated as a place for ninja to resupply on food and tools while on missions. Naruto kept the small town in his mind and sped onward.

Naruto ran for hours. Finally, as the full moon began to touch the horizon, Naruto climbed a hill and saw the ruins of a village in the distance, surrounded by grassy plains, and farther off in the distance, the ocean. The village was small, not more than a couple hundred yards wide. It might have been larger in the past, but it was hard to tell, the further Naruto looked from the center of the village, the more desolate the ruins became. Buildings lay broken everywhere, reduced to piles of rubble. Naruto noticed one building in the center of the ruins that seemed in better shape than most of the other buildings. It had damage, there looked to be several large holes in it, but it was still standing. Naruto supposed he should start with that building. He wasn't sure what he was looking for, or even if he should be looking for anything in the first place, but the pull on his mind was strong now, and began to pulse. He knew that the ruins were where he was supposed be. He wasn't sure why, but he was supposed to be here. A flash of emerald eyes in front of him reassured him, coaxing him to move forward. He descended the hill.

A couple minutes later, he entered the ruins. The road he walked on, if you could call it a road, was covered in the rubble of the broken buildings surrounding it. The crumbling stone buildings were covered in vines, showing that the village had been in this condition for quite some times. The road winded as Naruto walked. Occasionally, among the dull colors inside the buildings, Naruto could make out a small red circle with a swirl that started from the center of the circle and ran outwards painted on some of the walls. That was about the only color left in the village, it seemed.

Naruto walked on, finally coming to the only building that was, for the most part, intact. The building was two stories tall and had a couple of windows three on the first floor, one close to the roof on the second floor. All were broken. Naruto walked up to the door and pushed, earning a creak as the door slowly opened. The pull in his head started pounding, and pounded even harder as he stepped into the building. He took one step and the pounding increased. He was beginning to get lightheaded. He looked around and saw a long stone table in the middle of the room with a couple chairs surrounding it, the only things that occupied the place that wasn't broken. There was a fireplace off to the left of the table. Portraits were dangling awkwardly from the walls, the paint so faded nothing could be made out of the original work. Broken glass from the windows, as well as some other unknown objects littered the floor. Behind the table were two doors. The one on the left was open revealing a staircase leading to the upper level of the building. As Naruto walked around the table to the doors, the pull in his head directed him to the right one. He opened the door to find a stone staircase descending to whatever lay below. He took a step into the darkness, then another. The pounding in his head was beginning to hurt. Placing a hand on the wall for support, he took a third step and the door slammed shut. Naruto started to panic, but the pull moved him forward, down the stairs. Eventually, the stairs evened out, and Naruto's hand came to the end of the wall. He took another step, and light flashed. Naruto blinked, waiting for his eyes to adjust to the sudden light.

When his eyes began to tolerate the light, he started to look around. He was standing at the entrance of a large rectangular room, torches adorned the walls, burning brightly with fire. Three of the four walls in the room were bare. The fourth wall, directly across from Naruto and the staircase behind him, had a large red circle with a swirl in the middle. Surrounding the circular pattern on either side were rows of demonic looking masks, each with different facial expressions. A larger version of the same symbol found on the wall was covering a large portion of the floor. The pull in his head directed his attention to the middle of the swirl on the floor. He took a step into middle of the circle at the center of the swirl and the pounding suddenly stopped, granting Naruto a second of relief.

And then he felt pain. Mind numbing pain. It felt like his head was splitting in half. He screamed louder than he ever did during Madara's torture. His hands shot up to grip his head as he fell down to his knees. And then he saw black.

Memories from a lost life flooded his mind.

He saw villagers glaring at him, beating him, spitting on him, telling him that he should just die. Over and over again. He remembered going to the hospital after beatings with cuts and bruises and broken bones, only to get turned away by doctors that said they had paperwork to do. He walked into stores only to pay double for rotten food, and if he complained, he would get thrown out of the stores, only to get beaten some more. He remembered the pain, the sadness, the lonely nights out on the playground, watching as parents came to pick up their children, who ignored him because their parents had told them to. He remembered being teased by the kids at the academy because he had no parents and nobody wanted him. He remembered getting thrown out of classes at the academy before teachers were to give demonstrations of jutsu or important lessons, only to be allowed back in after the demonstrations or lessons were over. He remembered crying himself to sleep most nights because nobody liked him. He remembered each and every day, each and every beating, each and every curse, everything.

He remembered the night he graduated the academy, witnessing as Iruka jumped in front of a large shurikan meant for Naruto. Naruto listened as Iruka defended him from the rogue ninja Mizuki. "Yeah… the monster fox would do that… but Naruto is different. I've acknowledged him as… one of my excellent students. He may not be the hardest worker… and he is clumsy and no one accepts him… but he already knows what it is to feel pain inside your heart. He isn't the monster fox. He is a member of the Konohagakure. He's Naruto Uzumaki!"

He remembered being picked for Team 7 with Sakura-chan and that asshole Sasuke. He remembered being tied to the stump and Sakura-chan feeding him, and Kakashi-sensei passing them, saying that the bell test was a test of team work. "In the ninja world, those who break the rules are trash, that's true, but those who abandon their comrades are worse than trash."

He remembered Team 7's first big time mission in the Nami no Kuni, meeting Zabuza and Haku. He remembered Haku dying for Zabuza at the hands of Kakashi-sensei, and then Zabuza dying at the hands of Gato's men to protect Haku's honor. He remembered Haku's words from before their fight on the bridge. "When a person… has something important they want to protect… that's when they can become truly strong."

He remembered the Chuunin Exams, and Sasuke's words to him before the preliminary round. "You're one of the ones that I want to fight the most."

He remembered training with Ero-Sennin, Jiraiya, learning to walk on water and then summon toads. It took him forever to summon even a simple tadpole. He remembered getting thrown into a ravine by that damn pervert, meeting the Kyuubi, and finally summoning the chief toad, Gamabunta. He had to fight to stay on top of the giant toad to make the toad acknowledge him.

He remembered Sakura cheering for him during the exams when he fought Neji. He remembered fighting for her life against Gaara, going all out so she would be safe.

He remembered the Sandiame Hokage's funeral after his death at the hands of Orochimaru, and leaving with Ero-sennin to look for some old hag. During the trip he met Itachi Uchiha for the first time. Itachi, and some shark man named Kisame had been looking for him. Sasuke had showed up, and got his ass whipped by Itachi. Ero-sennin managed to drive the two off, Sasuke was left in a coma. Apparently the old hag was a legendary medical ninja, hopefully she would be able to heal Sasuke. Along the way, Naruto would be able to train, Ero-sennin began to teach him a jutsu created by the Yondaime Hokage, the Rasengan. It took Naruto forever, but he finally began to get the hang of it.

He remembered finding the old hag named Tsunade at a bar along with her niece and assistant Shizune. Ero-sennin told her that she was chosen to be the Godaime Hokage. She started to talk bad about the Sandaime, as well as the title Hokage, so Naruto got angry and challenged her to a fight. She beat him with one finger. He charged at her again, and tried to hit her with a Rasengan. Her eyes widened at the jutsu. He hadn't mastered it yet, but he was close. "Why do you care about the Hokage so much?"

"Because…to be Hokage…that is my dream!" Her eyes widened in recognition. She began to spout off at the mouth to Jiraiya, saying that he was a fool for teaching Naruto a jutsu that he couldn't learn and giving him hope for a dream that couldn't come true. Naruto got angry. "Just watch! I'll have this just down in a week, and then I'll kick your ass!"

Tsunade looked at him. "I'll tell you what, brat, let's make a bet. If you can master that jutsu in a week, I'll give you my necklace."

"…why the hell would I want that?"

"Naruto, you idiot. That necklace belonged to the Shodiame Hokage, it's one of only two in the world. It's supposed to be worth a gold mine and the mountain that sits on it." Jiraiya said.

"Fine! I'll be taking that necklace from you, hag! Believe it!"

He trained for a week relentlessly. On the last night, he passed out. He didn't wake up until the next morning. Shizune was in a panic and Jiraiya was pissed. The old hag had left. Apparently Orochimaru offered to bring back Tsunade's dead brother and boyfriend if she healed his arms that were damaged in the fight against the Sandaime.

She was in fighting Orochimaru and Kabuto when they got there. Kabuto took advantage of Tsunade's fear of blood to gain the upper hand. Shizune jumped in but Kabuto beat her after a struggle. He was going to kill Tsunade. Naruto got involved and tried to beat Kabuto back. Kabuto rushed at him with a kunai in hand.

"Naruto move! Don't protect me! Dreams don't come true if you're dead!"

"Just watch, Baa-chan. I'm gonna win that bet." He caught Kabuto's hand, the kunai lodged itself between his fingers. It hurt like a bitch. He paid Kabuto back, a hundred-fold…with a fully formed, perfected Rasengan to the chest. Kabuto managed to use medical ninjutsu to sever the arteries to Naruto's heart before being blasted away. He was laying on the ground, Tsunade hovering over him, praying that he not die. He reached up, and touched the necklace. "I win, Baa-chan."

He remembered hearing that Sasuke left the village to join Orochimaru. He remembered Sakura's at the gate before he left. He remembered his anger at Sasuke for making her cry. He remembered his heart shattering at her words. "Please, bring him back. Bring Sasuke-kun back to me! You're the only one who can do it!"

He remembered the pain. None of the beatings, glares, curses, or death threats had ever hurt him more. But he smiled. "Hey, don't worry Sakura-chan! It'll be alright! I can see how much you care about Sasuke. I'll bring him back! I promise! It's the promise of a lifetime! Believe it!"

He remembered the fight against Sasuke, the Chidori through the lung.

He remembered meeting the Yondaime Hokage, Minato Namikaze…his father. He remembered the discussion they had, Naruto's mission.

He remembered Madara's "training". The torture. The beatings. The Tsukuyomi. The Amaterasu. The fear. The hope of death.

He remembered the emerald eyes. Sakura-chan's eyes…

He rose with a start. His head hurt terribly. It was hard to move. His entire body seemed to be on fire. He was sweating profusely. Flashes of the memories appeared in his head. The pain. He almost threw up. But he couldn't. There was nothing in his stomach. He looked at the ground and saw the Akatsuki cloak and ring beside him.

'How long have I been here?'

He struggled to stand up, grabbing the cloak and ring as he went. The sweat-drenched cloak he was wearing made it difficult to stand but eventually he stood, legs wobbling, and almost fell back down. He made his way to the stairs, using the wall to help him. He finally made it out of the basement, after struggling with the closed door for a few minutes, due to his weakness and the doors weight. He looked around and noticed faint sunlight trickling through the windows.

He hadn't seen the sun in over three years.

With his cloak and ring in hand, he made his way to the door. He eyes flicked over one of the larger broken pieces of glass as he tried to avoid them. He paused and carefully bent down to pick the piece up. He held it back a little bit, so he could see his full reflection.

'Holy shit! I look just like the Yond…my dad…' He stood there for a second, before dropping the piece of glass. He was still unsure of what to think of the Yondaime, his childhood was still at the forefront of his mind. He'd give it more thought later though, he had some things to do.

He managed the rest of the way to the door without falling, and walked out.

The sun hit his face, its warmth filling him like it never had before. Amidst a rush of adrenaline, he sprinted to the large hill that overlooked the ruined village and faced west, staring at the sun. It was late evening, and the sun was not yet touching the horizon.

He collapsed to his knees and cried. Cried for his pain, and cried for being alive. He was alive.

The sun was well on its way to setting by the time he finally stood. He was tired and starving. He had no supplies, but he needed to get some. His mind wandered to the small village he passed through to get to the ruins. He recalled the ninja shop he sped by. He'd start there.

He looked behind him, at the desolate ruins, and the crashing ocean far behind. Knowing he might never come back to this place, he took one last long look, drinking in the view. It was a beautiful sight, but melancholy. The light of the setting sun splayed over the ruins and the plains, the slight wind blowing softly over the area. It was a lonely sight. He turned, and was off into the sunset.

Naruto reached the small village around an hour later, the sun having finally set and the night taken over. He folded the Akatsuki cloak and slipped it under the cloak he was wearing, holding it against his body so that it would not fall. He made his way through the streets of the village, luckily not many people were around. He pulled on his hood so it hung low over his face, making sure that no one could see his features. He passed a drunk man lying on the ground outside of a bar. The bar rang of laughter, but no one seemed to notice that this man was passed out just outside. Needing money, Naruto searched the man and ended up taking a healthy amount from him. He felt remorseful for taking money from a sleeping man, but he had things to do, and the money was probably going to just get spent on more booze anyway, so what the hell. He was doing this guy a favor.

He found the ninja shop and stepped inside. Looking around, Naruto picked out three pouches, two large and one small, a holster that would fit a couple kunai, a couple smoke bombs, some wire, a couple blank scrolls, some ink pens to write with, and a pack. He was about to head to the counter to pay for the items, when he noticed a rack of masks at the far side of the shop.

'Probably a good idea to pick out a mask, this cloak will only do so much to hide my face. It's not a good idea walking around looking like the spitting image of the Yondaime Hokage in Hi no Kuni…well the spitting image, but with whiskers I guess…'

He walked over and picked out two masks (it couldn't hurt to have a spare, just in case), one was all black with a large white 'X' in the middle, right between the eyes. The second mask was a dark blue color. Both masks had a piece of elastic stretching around the back that was meant to grip the head so that the mask wouldn't slip off. It would also serve to conceal the hair of the person wearing it.

He walked to the counter and paid for the supplies, the shop owner payed him no mind, probably thinking he was just another ninja passing through. He stepped out of the shop and into the ally next to it. He placed all of his items in his pack, as well as the Akatsuki cloak and the ring, and slipped it over his shoulder. He would arrange all of his gear later. Naruto had just enough money for something to eat, so he managed to find the town store and bought three loaves of bread. He began eating one as he went to the edge of town, where he noticed a signpost with the names of different villages written on arrows pointing in different directions. He took note of the name of the village to the north of the town and smiled.

He had an idea of what he wanted to do, but there were things that he needed to get a hold of first. He took a bite of one of the bread loaves he bought, finishing it, and looked up into the sky. He reached in his pack and took out the black mask with the white 'X' mark on it. He slipped it on, making sure that the elastic covering completely concealed his hair and raised his hood back over his head.

He ran off into the night, heading north. Towards Konoha.

Ok, so that was chapter two, hopefully everybody enjoyed. Naruto got his memories back, now what's he going to do?

Anyway, just wanted to make a quick couple of statements, the first of which being that I might not be able to update for a while, as it's getting close to that time of year when school decides to be a pain in my ass, meaning that I have two papers due Friday and three finals to study for next week. Hopefully I can get a chapter out the week after next, but I'm not entirely sure.

Also, I ran across a good idea from the author of one of my favorite fics where you list an NS story at the end of each chapter to engage the NS fans a little bit and keep our wonderful fandom alive and well, since we all know that NS should have been canon because it made sense, it wasn't forced, it wasn't disgusting, and it didn't destroy the character development of every single character in the story for the sake of a side-character that never really did anything lol

So since it was her idea, the first story I'm going to recommend is The End of Shadows by azfaerydust. It's absolutely one of my all time favorites, it's cute, it's charming, and it's absolutely hysterical! I've been meaning to leave a review for the longest time, but I keep forgeting because I'm a clumsy, forgetful bastard, but the next chapter, I swear will review (assuming az ever sees this). I highly recommend it, it truly is a great fic.

Mmk, that's it for my little spiel, hopefully everyone has a great week, two weeks, holiday, whatever it turns out to be! See ya next time!