Thank you all so much for the amazing response!

Notes: (1.) I will try to update this fanfic at least bi-weekly. When my other fanfic is finished, I may be able to go to weekly updates. (2.) Naruto will not, I repeat NOT, turn into a wimpy crybaby of a girl who has to be rescued every other chapter. Her character will remain more or less the same with only a few, minor alterations. (3.) I make up a lot of details about certain jutsus like henge. If I say anything that directly deviates from the manga, please correct me. If not, just go with it :)

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.

The Mirror's Reflection

Sasuke stared, immobile in shock. Dumbly, some corner of his brain told him to make sure Naruto was still alive. He reached out a trembling hand and put it to Naruto's pulse, hesitantly, as though unsure if he should touch him - or her. Sasuke sighed in relief when he felt a pulse throbbing under his finger. Naruto's sides moved as he - er, she - breathed in deeply.

"S-saasssuke," Naruto moaned. Even his - no, her - voice sounded different. It was higher-pitched and somehow softer, more like a girl's. "Sasuke," he - dammnit, she - called in a muddled tone.

"N-n-naruto," he said shakily. "Are - are you okay? Can you hear me? Open your eyes if you can hear me."

The blonde moaned again and tried to obey. Brilliant blue eyes like shining sapphires blinked wearily up at the dark, blurry figure leaning over her. "Sasuke. I - I feel weird. What happened?"

You freaking just turned into a girl! That's what happened! he wanted to scream."You - uh - collapsed. I should get you to a hospital. Maybe." How could he explain this to the medic on call?

"Sleepy," Naruto mumbled, closing her eyes again.

"Maybe you should just rest for now," Sasuke suggested with false calm. "Sleep it off, and - and - and we'll go see Sakura in the morning."

"'Kay."

Not here, you dobe! Sasuke shouted inwardly, but the blonde had already begun to snore where she lay on the hardwood floor in the living room of her apartment. Her head was turned at an odd angle, and her hip was digging into the floor. It couldn't be a comfortable position.

Sasuke hesitantly poked her in the shoulder with his finger. "Oi, Naruto. Wake up, and get in bed. Oi!"

Her snores continued uninterrupted.

Sasuke looked at her uncertainly, the obvious solution glaring him in the face, however reluctant he was to do it. Sighing darkly, he leaned towards her, and with nimble fingers, he gathered the blonde in his arms and carried her towards her room. She was surprisingly light, her body soft in ways a boy's could never be. Almost fragile. Sasuke could have laughed had the situation been different. Naruto, fragile? Never.

He dropped the girl unceremoniously onto her bed. It wasn't much as far as revenge went, but she deserved the three-foot drop for the fright she'd given him. Fright, he realized suddenly. He had actually been afraid. Sasuke hadn't felt fear since the war, when Madara almost succeeded in ripping the Kyuubi out of Naruto. Dammnit, he thought anxiously, stupid dobe. This was the bond that he had tried so hard to break. This bond caused him to care about an idiot and to fear when the idiot was in danger. But fear was weakness, and weakness had to be destroyed. That was what he had believed.

Naruto slept on, unperturbed by Sasuke's turmoil. A contented noise sounded from deep within her throat as she snuggled into her blankets.

Sasuke stared at the girl for another long moment before he pulled the covers up to her chin. Moonlight fell across the blonde, illuminating the feminine features of the still familiar face, and Sasuke knew he wouldn't get a wink of sleep that night.

... ... ...

~ the following morning ~

Naruto opened her eyes wearily, still partly inside her dream - a strange dream, it was. Her body had screamed in pain as she convulsed. Sharingan eyes had widened in panic - Ha! As if the Uchiha teme even knew what panic was. Naruto sat up slowly, rubbing the sleepiness from her eyes as the last vestiges of her dream faded from her mind. She pushed the covers off her body.

The first thing she noticed was that she was still wearing her orange shinobi suit. Odd. She preferred to sleep in her frog pajamas.

The second thing she realized was that she couldn't remember how she had gotten in bed the night before.

As she reached up to scratch her chin, a third peculiarity intruded upon her notice. The sleeves of her jacket...they were, well, floppy. They had loosened considerably as though they'd been stretched, and her hands were buried somewhere inside of them.

In sleepy confusion, she pulled back the sleeves. "When did my clothes get so big?" Naruto mumbled. This was the same outfit she'd worn the day before, right? Her hand didn't make it up to her chin. Instead, her arm hit something along the way, something soft and...bouncy.

Naruto turned her face downwards to stare at a peculiar swelling on her chest. There were two of them. Cupping the bulges in her hands, Naruto looked at them in fearful amazement. She pressed them and felt where her fingers touched. In growing alarm, she squeezed them as hard as she could, digging her fingernails in.

"Yow!" she yelped as the unfamiliar pain made her twist in surprise. A moment later, Naruto's head hit the floor with a resounding thud.

The shout and thud alerted a nearby shinobi who burst into the bedroom without knocking. Sasuke gazed for a long moment at the blonde and orange conundrum. Naruto's head had solidly smacked the floor while her lower half remained on the bed. The orange jacket was slipping downward to reveal a very slender, white stomach. Sasuke averted his gaze.

Normally, Naruto would wonder what the hell the teme was doing in her room, but at the moment, there were more pressing matters at hand. More specifically, in her hands.

"Sasuke." Naruto looked at the upside-down avenger in confusion, not bothering to change her position. "What's going on? What are these?" she asked, indicating the lumps of flesh in her hands.

Was it her imagination or did the Uchiha's cheeks turn a curious shade of...pink?

"N-naruto," Sasuke forced himself to say, "you might want to go look at yourself in a mirror."

"Huh?"

"Just go look in a mirror!" he shouted as he edged back into the living room.

"Geez! Okay, okay." Naruto righted herself and stood up from the floor. She eyed the Uchiha in confusion as she walked past him. Had he gotten taller? No way. She was still half asleep, and from the looks of it, Sasuke should still be asleep, too. His eyes were red but not from the Sharingan. No, they were bloodshot, as though he had gotten no sleep that night. Maybe that explained his peculiar behavior, but it didn't explain the strange things on her chest. Nor why she couldn't walk without tripping over her unusually long pants.

Naruto pushed open the bathroom door and trudged in. She stood in front of the mirror and blinked as her reflection came into focus.

Blue eyes stared back at her, and whisker marks lined her cheeks. But somehow, everything else appeared curiously...off.

There was a long pause.

"GGGGGGGAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH !" she shrieked, backpedaling into the wall. Her hands brushed against something soft. Something that wasn't supposed to be there. Gripping the long golden strands of what was certainly not her hair, Naruto yanked and cried out. No good, the stuff was actually attached to her scalp. Flashing wildly, her eyes encountered the same reflection in the mirror.

In a frenzy of confusion, Naruto brought her hands together to dispel the Oiroke no Jutsu that she didn't remember casting, but the girl in the mirror remained the same. She tried again. And again. Her mind raced for an answer, but coming up empty, Naruto turned to the one other living being in her apartment for an explanation.

She moved so fast, Sasuke would have thought she had learned the Hiraishin no Jutsu, and she grasped him by the green chunin vest he wore, slamming him against a wall of her living room.

"What happened to me?!" she yelled, shaking Sasuke madly. "Why do I look like a GIRL?!"

"The seal," he choked, wanting to pull away from the girl but wary of touching her. "It had to be -"

"The seal," repeated Naruto, her eyes going wide. It wasn't possible. It just wasn't possible. She looked into Sasuke's bloodshot eyes, begging for him to say it was all a joke, but he had never been one for practical jokes. The seal used natural energy. Natural energy could be used for transformation. Today was October 10. Her birthday. The day the seal expired.

Sasuke pulled his head back, putting as much space between his face and the girl's as possible. "Don't get so close to me," he warned.

"I HAVE TURNED INTO A GIRL, AND YOU'RE WORRIED ABOUT A LITTLE PROXIMITY?!"

"I'm just a bit...disturbed," Sasuke said. He had lain awake all night on the couch restless but half-convinced that he was actually dreaming. Seeing blue-eyed blonde very much awake in this animated girl body had thrown him. From the girl's reaction, she truly was Naruto, which meant that Sasuke's best friend - hell, his only friend - was in fact a girl. It was no trick, no prank, and Sasuke didn't know how to react.

"You think you're the only one?! Sasuke, I have boobs! Do you know what they feel like?! They're heavy, floppy, and they're just - there! In the way. It's insane! I mean, look -" Naruto proceeded to grab her shirt and yank it up -

"Dammnit! Pull your shirt down!" Sasuke's hand darted almost instinctively and grasped Naruto's orange jacket before she could lift it over her head.

"Sasuke, are you blushing?"

"OF COURSE NOT!"

"Then let go of my jacket so I can figure out what's going on!" Naruto proceeded to fling Sasuke's arm away and rip the jacket off. Her black undershirt was tight in new places and strangely loose in others. Blue eyes widened and pupils constricted to pinpoints as they focused on the now well-defined shape of Naruto's chest. "Oh, god! It's true!" Naruto reached for the black shirt. She had to know. She had to see. She wouldn't believe it until -

"No!" Sasuke's hand shot forth again, unwilling to let the blonde to strip further.

As the two shinobis struggled, neither noticed that the door to Naruto's apartment had opened until a young man cleared his throat uncomfortably.

"Ah, excuse me. Wrong apartment," he mumbled in embarrassment. Nara Shikamaru had bad luck. When he had returned from his mission the night before, Sakura had been waiting at his apartment, which was odd enough on its own. Then the pink-haired kunoichi proceeded to order him to check on Naruto who was having strange attacks. He was a genius at putting clues together, she said, so maybe he could figure out what Naruto was hiding. Shikamaru had put her off, saying that it was late and he was tired, but he could not rest easily that night. Troublesome, he had thought to himself as he rolled over in bed. It would be just like Naruto to hide something from his friends rather than worry them.

So the reluctantly concerned Nara made his way to Naruto's to observe the blonde and possibly deduce the truth behind the mysterious attacks.

Clearly Shikamaru had been too absent-minded when he walked toward Naruto's apartment. Though why his feet had taken him to the Uchiha's room was beyond even him, but there was Uchiha Sasuke trying to rip the shirt off a girl. So not what Shikamaru wanted to see in the morning. Or ever. The strangest thing was that the girl had a familiar shade of blonde hair and startling blue eyes. All in all, she looked very similar to Naruto in his Oiroke no Jutsu, right down to whisker marks on her cheeks. Smaller and prettier than the usual Oiroke-Naruto, but too similar to be mere coincidence.

Another quick glance around the room told Shikamaru that he was indeed in Naruto's apartment, and that the two people looking at him in surprise were indeed Uchiha Sasuke and Uzumaki Naruto.

Either the two boys had developed a rather kinky relationship or something else was going on. Whatever the case, Shikamaru did not want to know.

This is what you get for trying to check on a friend. Troublesome.

These conclusions were drawn in a fraction of a second, and Shikamaru turned hurriedly on his heel and strode out the door.

"Ah! Grab 'im, Sasuke!"

A hand on his shoulder gripped Shikamaru firmly and pulled him back into the room.

"Look," said Shikamaru, waving his hands in front of him, "it's none of my business what you two do. In fact, I'd prefer never to -"

"You did not just see what you think you saw," snarled Sasuke.

"Right, I definitely did not see you try to rip Naruto's shirt off his female body. I swear I won't tell -"

Naruto flung herself past the two boys to slam the front door shut. "Don't say that so loudly! People might hear you!"

Shikamaru muttered that he wasn't the one yelling. He could not sense the henge, but then, Naruto had grown more and more proficient in ninjutsu, so perhaps he was able to hide the use of his chakra. It was a very good henge, realistic down to the ample chest that was far too close to Shikamaru for comfort.

"Shikamaru! I need you -"

The genius took in the sight of a henged Naruto and a rather breathless and red-faced Uchiha who were both blocking his exit. "I do not do threesomes," he interrupted firmly. He would use his Kagemane no Jutsu to escape if he had to.

After a moment of shock, Naruto made a gagging sound, and Sasuke looked rather sick himself.

Naruto finally forced her mouth to work. "No, Sasuke and I -"

"I really don't want to hear about your relationship with the Uch-"

"Hell, no! You've got it totally wrong! I just turned into a girl!" As was usual, the blonde put too little distance between herself and whomever she was talking to, and Shikamaru's vision was filled with the sight of an indignant young woman with flashing eyes filled with desperation and even a little fear.

Despite himself, certain wheels in Shikamaru's head had been turning from the moment he had realized who the blonde was, and at her declaration, his mind had conceived of a number of potential explanations as to why a boy was suddenly a girl - none of them likely but none impossible. He systematically catalogued the rapid breathing, jerky motions, and panicked eyes of the girl. If it were anyone else, Shikamaru might be prepared to accept it, but...this was Naruto, who had never outgrown a little mischief. "I'm not in the mood for a -"

"It's not a prank!" Naruto protested hotly. "I really am a girl. See?" She grabbed his hand and pressed it to her chest in the blink of an eye.

The genius jerked his hand away and stared at the unchanged form before him. A henge was an excellent jutsu for fooling enemies by sight and sound; its weakness lay in touch. Shikamaru's hand should have passed through the ninjutsu, and his own chakra should have distorted the henge. But according to his hand, that had been very real.

"You should have started explaining with the seal," said Sasuke whose face had returned to its impassive, unfeeling mask. Inwardly, he was relieved that someone else was just as astonished as he.

"Right, the seal!" Naruto's mouth was in motion, and a rarely expressed corner of Shikamaru's mind twitched in satisfaction as his soundest theory - a seal utilizing natural energy - was proven true.

Five minutes later, he blew out a breath as Naruto finished. Damn, this was troublesome. He frustratedly muttered something about having just gotten back from Suna and not needing this sort of trouble.

"Eh?" Naruto piped in excitedly, "Did you get to see Te-ma-ri-san?" She said the other girl's name in a singsong voice full of teasing.

Shikamaru stared at her for a minute. "Damn," he said, rubbing his neck as the last trace of uncertainly fled. "You really are Naruto. I thought maybe I died on the mission and awoke in an alternate reality. How troublesome."

"So you believe me then?"

Shikamaru sighed and nodded.

"Yosh! So, what am I supposed to do now?" Naruto asked the genius, desperate for guidance.

"I don't think there's anything you can do except to accept that you are a -" Shikamaru trailed off as Naruto's face fell. Damn. He rubbed his neck, wishing that he were under a tree somewhere, watching the clouds go by. He sighed, "Hokage-sama has access to data that no shinobi can see without her permission. Maybe there's some explanation hidden somewhere in those files."

"But that means I have to tell her -"

"Probably so."

Somehow it felt like the fewer people knew, the less true her condition would be, but right now, she was desperate to do something to find some sort of possible explanation for the Yondaime's madness. "Let's get this over with," she mumbled, glancing down at her new body. Her clothes were too large now, but she had kept some from two years ago that were a little smaller. Resigned to her fate, Naruto walked towards her bedroom, reaching for her shirt to pull over her -

"Stop."

Naruto turned at Shikamaru's command.

"Whatever is going on, right now you're a girl, so you can't just strip in front of us because we -" he motioned to himself and Sasuke "- are boys. Even you should know that girls and boys have different bodies."

Any color left in Naruto's face drained at an alarming rate. "No," she whispered, as though a terrible thought occurred to her. Without further warning, she reached for her pants and jerked them down to her ankles, revealing well-formed, very feminine legs that two pairs of male eyes latched onto before catching themselves.

Naruto's mind was elsewhere. Her boxers were the same frog pattern as yesterday, but they felt curiously...empty.

"It's gone," she whispered blankly.

A dark chuckle emanated from deep within Naruto's mind.

You damn fuzzball! Did you know about this?!

I had no idea.

Liar! You saw me before the Yondaime put the seal on me!

My mind had just been taken over by Uchiha Madara who had me destroy half of Konoha - not that I would have objected had I been in control of myself. Afterwards, I was in a murderous rage and was about to be resealed within an scrawny infant. Forgive me for not taking the time to glance between your legs, came the Kyuubi's acridly sarcastic response.

Growling, Naruto slammed her bedroom door behind her and tore off her clothes in a raging frenzy.

I'll be getting to the whole 'adventure' part of the genre soon enough. I just want to do a thorough job of describing Naruto's feelings and the reactions of his (*ahem* her) friends.

Please review! As a writer, it's so inspiring to get feedback!