Falling Down
Part II

Minato peered through the darkness as he and Kiroi picked their way along a treacherous rocky path that hugged a mountainside after the strangely-colored vulpix. To be able to see the narrow trail, he'd had his raichu use flash, turning her into a walking lantern. The circle of light cast by her glowing cheeks barely reached far enough out to keep the vulpix in view as it impatiently pranced ahead of them, leading them ever further down the road.

This stretch of trail is dangerous, even in full daylight, Minato frowned. Perhaps the vulpix's trainer walked too close to the edge, or part of the trail collapsed. If that happened, he or she could be very hurt…maybe even dead.

They rounded a bend in the trail and were greeted by the sounds of battle. The shrieks of ghost pokémon echoed against the mountainous cliffs. Minato didn't hesitate as he broke into a run.

Ghost pokémon only appeared in certain environments. They favored graveyards, abandoned buildings in remote places, and some forests and caves. It was rare to find them in open places like high on mountains, even at night. When they appeared in the Kage Mountains, it generally meant that a human was hurt or sick and drifting towards death.

The vulpix stayed in the lead before abruptly veering off the path. There was a short but steep drop-off and then a slope of jagged gravel and a few large boulders. Several yards down-slope, Minato could see a limp body up against one of the large boulders and a battle raging around it.

A haunter and gengar tried to get at the helpless human, but a dark-colored monster continually attacked them. Minato identified it as an umbreon by its glowing yellow markings. There were at least two other pokémon present, but it was hard to see what they were in the darkness. It was clear that they were incapacitated, though.

The umbreon pinned down the gengar and hit it with vicious bite attacks. The haunter tried to attack the dark pokémon from behind, but the vulpix intervened with a burning hot flamethrower strike. The ghost howled in pain and shock and faded away as it fled in a panic.

"Kiroi," Minato said quietly, "hit that gengar with a volt tackle."

The raichu's flash canceled, leaving Minato in darkness as Kiroi sprinted down the mountainside shrouded in crackling lightning. She collided with the gengar, electrocuting it as it was knocked down the mountain. The ghost knew that it was outmatched and quickly faded from the scene.

"Kiroi, another flash please!"

There was a burst of blinding light which tapered off into the soft illuminating glow that he wanted. With the area properly lit, Minato could see the hurt trainer and his pokémon much better. The boy was young, wounded, and unconscious. His two other loose pokémon were a paralyzed croagunk and a pikachu still trapped in the throes of confusion.

Minato sighed and unleashed his venusaur. "Hana, tie me off, I'm going down there."

The venusaur obediently wrapped a pair of her vines around his waist and eased him down the slippery mountainside to the boulder. He paused on his way to the boy to treat the croagunk's paralysis with a medicinal spray. The vulpix took care of the pikachu's confusion by smacking it in the face with its six curled tails until the yellow mouse returned to reality.

Upon reaching the boy, Minato carefully evaluated his injuries. He was no doctor, but he knew enough first aid to make a decent assessment of the young trainer's condition. The boy definitely had a head injury—his continued unconscious state and the dried blood caked on his face and scalp were clear signs of that. His ragged breathing could indicate cracked or broken ribs, maybe even a partially collapsed lung. And his left wrist was swollen—either sprained or broken. There were superficial scrapes all over the exposed bits of his skin and there were some impressive tears in his clothes, too.

"Poor kid," Minato muttered. "You had a nasty fall, didn't you?"

The boy didn't reply, of course. Minato found the boy's bag, the zipper torn and destroyed, and looked through it for some identification. The trainer's pokémon had probably had probably tried to fix it while they'd waited for help, which left the bag's contents a mess. He found basic supplies, a good stock of berries, two used pokéballs, and a handful of empty pokéballs and great-balls. In the very bottom, he found the trainer's pokédex.

Opening the device, Minato found the small screen cracked and dark. No matter what he did, he couldn't get it to turn on. Without it he had no way of identifying the boy.

A cold chill seeped over his skin and Minato looked over his shoulder to find the haunter diving at him. This ghost had less sense than the gengar and still wanted a piece of its prey. Now that it was over the shock of the flamethrower it was back in a rage.

The umbreon lunged through the darkness in a faint attack and intercepted the haunter moments before it reached Minato and the unconscious boy. The ghost shrieked, but tried to attack again, reaching out with a floating disconnected hand. Out of pure reflex, Minato hurled the nearest pokéball—one of the boy's great-balls—at the haunter. Just as the haunter was being sucked into the ball, the umbreon hit it with a pursuit attack, the move doing double the damage it normally did.

The air was tense as the sphere sealed shut and tumbled several feet down the slope until the croagunk caught it. The blue ball twitched in the toad pokémon's hands, the button glowing red. Then the sphere stilled and the light went out.

"Phew," Minato sighed. "That was unexpected."

The croagunk glared at the great-ball and made as if to throw it and the haunter inside away.

"No, no, no, don't do that." Minato beckoned to the fighting toad. "Bring it here."

Under normal circumstances, the great-ball which was registered to the boy would've been teleported away by satellites after the containment field of the ball stabilized and the haunter was trapped. But because the boy's pokédex was broken, it couldn't detect that the boy now possessed seven pokémon on his person; one more than was legally allowed. Until his pokédex was repaired, the haunter wouldn't be going anywhere.

Now that the threat was past, the mystery trainer's pokémon had the time to study Minato—the strange human in their midst. The pikachu and umbreon watched him tensely, while the vulpix didn't seem to care. The croagunk stared uncertainly at him for a minute before approaching him.

Minato gently took the great-ball from the purple toad. "I know that this haunter hurt your master, but he's one of you now. Would your master like it if you threw him away?"

The croagunk puffed up its red cheeks and looked away under the gentle reprimand.

"Alright, now let's get your poor master out of here." Minato put the great-ball into the boy's bag and looked back up the mountainside. "Hana, more vines!"

His venusaur produced more vines and Minato arranged them so that they would pull the boy and his ruined bag back up to the path. Once Minato had that accomplished, he had Hana lash the boy to her shoulders so that he wouldn't slide off. With a little coaxing, he got all of the kid's pokémon back into their balls.

"Okay, Kiroi, light the way," Minato instructed. "Hana, let's head home…"

Minato yawned as he stepped out of Myouboku Town's pokémon center. He'd walked all night and arrived back in town early in the morning. After he'd dropped the boy (who'd remained unconscious) at the hospital he'd brought the young trainer's pokémon to the center to be cared for until the boy had recovered. Now there was one more thing he had to do before he could retreat to his half-uncle's home and get some sleep.

He made his way to a small electronics shop and waited at the counter for the owner to appear. With the boy's pokédex broken, there was no way to know who he was or discover his next of kin to let them know that the kid was in the hospital. Getting the device repaired was very important.

"Ah, Minato-san, what a pleasant surprise!" a gray-haired man with thick glasses greeted as he appeared from a back room. "You look a bit tired."

"I am," Minato smiled politely. He removed the damaged pokédex from his pocket and placed it on the counter. "Could you fix this for me?"

The older man carefully examined the device before nodding. "Yes, this I can fix. It's not yours, is it?"

"No," Minato replied. "It belongs to a young trainer who fell from one of the more dangerous trails outside of town and is out cold in the hospital. I need to get his information so that I can notify his family."

"I see," the man nodded gravely. "It'll be a while before I can repair it; I'm really backed up in my repair work. But I can retrieve the information that you need from it in a few minutes."

"That would be great," Minato smiled tiredly.

The repair man took the pokédex into the back. "It should just be a few minutes…"

Leaning heavily against the counter, Minato settled in to wait.

Admittedly he was very curious about the mysterious boy. When a nurse in the hospital had cleaned the blood from the boy's head, he'd been startled at how eerily the kid had resembled himself at the same age. The boy could've doubled for his son…if he'd had one.

And when he'd been transporting the boy to town, he'd noticed the kid's collection of gym badges. One of the badges he didn't recognize—some kind of stylized hourglass—so it had to be from another country as he knew all the badges that could be obtained in Fire Country. The other three badges he did know. There was the mirror-like Copy badge, the rainbow flower of the Illusion badge, and the flaming fist of the Fire-Will badge.

So he's met Asuma, Kurenai, and Kakashi… Minato drummed his fingertips on the counter top. That reminds me… Kakashi keeps leaving messages on my Capital City apartment answering machine. I really need to remember to call him back and see what he wants…

"Here we are!" the repair man declared as he returned with a computer print-out. "I should get that pokédex fixed in a week at the very latest. I hope that kid will be okay."

"The doctors are sure that he'll recover just fine," Minato said as he took the paper. "Thank you."

Information in hand, Minato left the shop and headed home.

Although he'd been given an apartment in Capital City as the League Champion, home would always be his uncle's house in Myouboku Town. When he'd been very young his father had drowned when his fishing boat sank in a terrible storm. His mother had brought him to stay with her and her younger half-brother, Jiraiya, up in the mountains, far away from the sea. When she'd tragically passed away a few years later after a sudden illness, it was just him and Jiraiya-oji-san…

Despite being a gym leader, Jiraiya liked to travel. Three or four months out of the year he'd be out in the world somewhere—sometimes just beyond the mountains, sometimes in an exotic land far, far away. So when Minato arrived at the house and found it empty, he wasn't at all surprised.

Fighting back fatigue, he started brewing some coffee to get a much-needed boost. He put his camping gear away and washed his face. After a simple breakfast and a cup of coffee, he pulled out the print-out and started to skim the information.

The boy's name was the first thing that grabbed his attention. Naruto was an odd name to be sure. But his family name…

She said that all of her family lives in Whirlpool County… But he was born in Konoha Town…that's in Fire Country. So…maybe it's a different Uzumaki family…

But then his eyes came to the boy's listed emergency contact—his mother—and time froze.

…No. This…this has to be a coincidence. It can't be her…

Frantic, he tripped over his chair in his rush to get to the video phone. He mis-dialed the phone number listed on the print-out several times in his haste. When he finally got it right, he had trouble remembering to keep breathing while he waited for the connection to go through.

There was a click and the screen slowly came to life…

Her hair was long, too long. Her face was older. But the color of her eyes, the color of her hair, and the recognition and shock on her face…

"…Did Kakashi give you my number?"

"You talk to Kakashi, but not me?!" he shot back.

After all these years, he could finally see her, but not touch her. All the old wounds—the loneliness, the confusion, the anger and resentment—tore open inside of him. She'd disappeared over a decade ago after perhaps the stupidest argument they'd ever had without a word to him or anyone… And the first person that she speaks to again was Kakashi, the boy she used to barely tolerate?

"He got my number and called me first," she replied defensively. "How did you get my number?"

Her face was pale and drawn; she was guarded. It was like she was afraid of him. She rarely ever showed that she was afraid of anything, and she'd never been afraid of him before.

It made him feel sick.

"I got it from a broken pokédex."

"A broken…" Her face practically turned gray and her eyes widened in panic. "How did it get broken?!"

"It probably got smashed while he was tumbling down the mountain—"

"Mountain?!" she yelped, sliding straight into hysteria. "Where's Naruto? Is he alright? I want to see him!"

"He's in the hospital—"

"Hospital?! Where? What hospital?"

"The hospital here in Myouboku—"

"Okay," she mumbled, turning away from her phone's video pickup. "Okay…"

And then the screen went dark.

Minato stared at the black screen. "Kushina…"

Shaking his head, he stumbled away to a couch and collapsed onto it. His mind was a mess. His heart hurt even worse.

Why did she run away? Why didn't she tell me? Why did she hide him from me?

He wanted to call her back and demand answers. He wanted to reach through the video-phone screen and shake her until she explained herself. He wanted to grab hold of her and never let her go so that she couldn't disappear on him again.

And that boy… The boy who'd fallen from the mountain trail… The boy who the ghosts had tried to devour… The boy that he'd taken to the hospital…

…My son?

Kushina could barely think through her panic. She circled around her house wringing her hands and occasionally pausing to grab some articles of clothing and toss it haphazardly into a bag. All she could think about was getting from Konoha Town to Myouboku Town as fast as possible.

If I ride Tsunami down the Star River, that will get me to Southport. I can catch a ferry there to Northport. And from there Myouboku is just a train ride and cable car trip away… I could be there in four days.

Her route mapped out in her mind, she finished stuffing her bag and went to gather her monsters. She made a few quick phone calls to cancel plans, take time off from her part-time job at the Professor's place, and arrange for a neighbor to take care of her berry plants. And then she was out the door, barely remembering to lock it behind her.

She didn't think how she was running right into everything that she'd been hiding from for so long. The dread and indecision was overridden by a single driving need. Her baby was far away and hurt, and he needed her.

Mommy's coming, Naruto. Mommy's coming…

…He was standing on the edge of the lake. Everything was misty and rather colorless. Out in the water, he watched his mother's pokémon play with a smile. But as he watched, the mist slowly swallowed them and he was alone alone alone alone…

He was in a bright white room that made his head hurt. Two people in white coats were standing by his bed and talking to him, but he couldn't focus on their words. He asked them questions, but they didn't seem to be answered. His chest hurt and it was hard to breathe.

…He was in the woods outside his house and walking. He wasn't sure where he was going or why, he just kept walking. And then Demon was there and running away from him. He gave chase, but Demon just got faster and faster. He couldn't breathe and it felt like cold hands were reaching into his body and sapping his strength…

He was in a bright white room that made his head hurt. A woman in a white dress was standing by his bed and talking to him, but his mind kept wandering to gravelers for some reason. She offered him food, but he felt too queasy to eat much of it. His chest hurt and it was hard to breathe.

…He was walking in the mountains and it was dark. Rocks fell all around him, then geodudes, then gravelers. He was crushed and trapped and all his monsters were driven away by the rain of rocks. And then the rocks stopped falling and shadowy tentacles reached for him. They were icy-cold and he felt weaker and weaker. He was dying—

He was in a dark room and he couldn't breathe. A shadowy figure that he couldn't really see caught him by the shoulders and eased him back down against the bed. He was frightened and cried out for his mother, but she didn't come. The shadowy person stroked his hair gently and whispered kindly to him.

"Go to sleep, Son. Your mother will be here soon…"

And he slept.

Sunlight stabbed at his eyelids and Naruto groaned. He tried to move to escape it, but a sharp pain in his left side kept him from squirming away. Blinking, he found himself in a strange bed in a sterile white room that smelled like nasty medicine. He was wearing strange pajamas and he had no idea where his stuff was—or where he was, for that matter. He tried to remember what might've led him to end up in this hospital sort of place, but aside from a bunch of really weird bits of dreams he really couldn't recall how he'd ended up here.

"Good morning!"

Naruto turned his head to find a smiling woman in a white uniform entering the room.

"Hi," he greeted warily. "Where am I?"

"You're in Myouboku Hospital," the nurse cheerfully informed him. "How are you feeling?"

"Okay, I guess," Naruto muttered. "It hurts to breathe too deeply."

"Well that's normal for bruised ribs. The pain will be gone once they've healed," the woman assured him. "Does anything else hurt?"

"No, not really," Naruto replied. "How'd I get here?"

"A traveler found you off a dangerous hiking trail and brought you here," the nurse told him. "It was very lucky for you that he found you. With your injuries, there was no way you would've made it in on your own. In addition to your ribs, you sprained your wrist and suffered a very nasty concussion."

Naruto rubbed at his scarred cheek. "Who found me?"

"I don't know," the woman shrugged. "I wasn't on shift when you came in. Maybe one of the doctors knows. Would you like some breakfast?"

"Yeah," Naruto nodded, but before the nurse left to get him some he had one more question. "How long have I been here?"

"Almost four days," she told him.

Four days? Naruto frowned and studied the bandages wrapped around his left forearm. That long? …I wonder how much longer I'm going to be stuck here. And where are my pokémon?