Falling Down
Part IV

When Jiraiya strolled through his front door, he was greeted with the sight of his beloved nephew sprawled out face-down on the couch. It was always wonderful to get a visit from Minato, especially now that he was getting to be so reclusive, trekking off into distant wildernesses to avoid people whenever he could. But Jiraiya had never encountered the younger man in such a state.

"Er, Minato?"

The blonde grunted, but otherwise had no reaction.

Jiraiya dropped his bag by the door and walked up to him to poke him in the shoulder. "You okay?"

"I'm fine," the young man sighed, rolling over on to his side. "How was your trip?"

"It was good," Jiraiya grinned, taking a seat on the couch arm. "I headed down to Southport and caught a nice cruise to another continent. You should have seen the babes on that boat! There was one chick who would've given Tsunade-hime a run for her money!" The white-haired man sighed fondly at the memory.

"Anyway, when we reached our destination, I met this foreign gym leader. I almost thought he was you for a minute! But then the arrogant brat opened his mouth and I could tell he wasn't you at all. He called himself 'Volkner' or something—I bet it was some kind of nickname, it sounds too stupid to be real. Have you ever heard of him before?"

"No," Minato answered dully.

Jiraiya frowned at him. "…Are you sure you're okay?"

"I've just had a bad week," Minato answered.

"Oh?" the older man prompted.

"I don't want to talk about it," was the blonde's response.

"Alright. Well, I kept my eye out for Kushina, but I didn't see anything."

Minato's jaw tensed. "I know where she is."

"Eh?!" Jiraiya blinked. "…You do?!"

"Yes," the younger man grimaced.

It took a moment for Jiraiya to reorder his thoughts. "Where is she?!"

"Probably visiting at the hospital."

"The hospital?!' Jiraiya choked.

Minato abruptly sat up and stalked towards the door. "I'm going for a ride."

"But…what—"

The front door slammed closed and Minato was gone.

Jiraiya scratched at his messy white hair. I think I'm missing something here…

"…Well," he said to the empty air. "I'm not going to find answers sitting here. Maybe little Kushina-chan will be more enlightening."

And so he headed for the hospital.

Naruto frowned as he dug through the box that the nurse had brought him. It was supposed to contain his "personal effects". But as he went through the stuff, he found that a few things were missing.

The clothes that he'd been wearing on his way to Myouboku Town were gone. One of the three great-balls (those were expensive so he kept careful track of them) that he'd purchased in Saru City was missing. His backpack wasn't there. And his pokédex was nowhere to be found.

At least I still have my shoes, he thought as he pulled the scuffed gym shoes out of the bottom of the box. But what's this stuff?

While his old orange-and-blue backpack was gone, there was a brand new black-and-blue pack that still had the plastic tie on it that would've attached the price tag. Cautiously opening one of the compartments in the new bag, he found the patches that he'd decorated his old bag with, including the white spiral patch and the red fire kanji. And, in addition to his spare clothes, he found some clothes that were about his size, but not his.

Did they give me some of somebody else's stuff? He fingered the embroidered white spiral patch, baffled. But…how did my patches get in this bag?

"So, is everything there?"

Naruto looked up from the box to find his mother returning with some papers and a bottle of pills in her hand.

"No," he answered. "What's in the bottle?"

"Painkillers for your ribs," she told him. "What's missing?"

Naruto listed the things and showed her the mysterious backpack and clothes.

"Well…I'd heard that your pokédex was damaged…so it's probably in some repair shop. We can track that down later. And I'm sure that your clothes and bag were destroyed in your fall from the trail…and your great-ball could've been lost then." She fingered the mystery backpack. "…I guess this is a replacement for your old bag." And then she turned her attention to the clothes. "…And these are meant to replace your ruined outfit."

Naruto studied the thin white hoodie sweatshirt and wrinkled his nose at it. "It smells like mothballs."

"He probably kept it in the attic," his mother muttered, as if to herself.

"He?" the boy frowned.

"Let's get you out of these hospital pajamas," she smiled, firmly changing the subject.

It hurt to raise his arms too high or bend over all the way so she had to help him like he was some little baby that couldn't dress himself. She tried to get him into one of his spare outfits, but frowned at what she saw when she finished.

"You've been growing," she remarked. "This stuff doesn't really fit anymore. How have your shoes been feeling?"

"Fine," he answered. "Not too tight or anything."

"Hmm. We can wait to get shoes a bit later, but we'll have to find you some more clothes."

"No," Naruto moaned as his mother carefully peeled the T-shirt off. "I hate shopping."

"Too bad; it's a necessary evil," she sighed and grabbed the mothball-smelling mystery clothes. "Let's see how these fit."

Naruto grimaced, but let his mother put the clothes on him. The clothes were at least one size bigger than his usual clothes, so they fit better—they were even a little baggy on him. But they were so boring. There was no orange at all, just khaki pants, a blue T-shirt, and a white hoodie with thin blue stripes down the arms. And it all smelled musty and mothball-y.

"That fits nice," she smiled.

"I don't like it," he pouted. "I look stupid."

"No you don't!" She pulled his fingerless gloves and goggles out of the box. "Look, you still have these. No damage, your goggles didn't crack."

Naruto put the goggles up on his forehead to help keep his bangs out of his eyes. He put the right glove on, but stuck the left one in his pocket. His left wrist wasn't wrapped in bandages anymore, but he had to wear a black leather and plastic brace to keep it from moving until the sprain healed.

"There!" His mother gave him an appraising look and nodded at what she found. "You look very handsome. Now let's get out of her and find your monsters."

"Yeah," Naruto eagerly agreed.

His mother loaded his stuff into the new bag and then he shuffled after her through the hospital hallways and out into the bright sunlight. She led the way to the pokémon center, carrying the bag for him so he wouldn't aggravate his sore ribs. But they had barely gone a block before their trek was interrupted.

"Kushina-chan?"

She stopped short and looked over her shoulder at a towering man with long white hair and red lines tattooed vertically down his cheeks. He was an older guy and made himself even taller with old-style wooden platform sandals. The man also favored older style clothes—drab green clothes and red hoari-like vest—which made the guy look like some crazy mountain-man hermit.

"…Yes, Jiraiya?" she sighed.

"You grew out your hair?!" the man sputtered in disbelief.

Naruto tugged on the sleeve of his mother's yellowish leather jacket. "You know this guy, Mom?"

"Mom?!" the man yelped, his eyes immediately darting down to Naruto. And then his face paled and his jawed dropped. After a long stare that made Naruto squirm, the white-haired jerked his eyes back to his mother. "You-you slept with him?!"

"Why don't you just shout that from the rooftops?" she muttered bitterly back at the man.

"But you…and he…and…"

"…Come back when you have something intelligible to say to me," his mother grumbled and took Naruto by his uninjured hand. "In the meantime, we have things to do."

The strange, white-haired man kept sputtered as the two of them continued on for several blocks towards the pokémon center.

"Mom, who was that guy?" Naruto asked curiously.

"That was Jiraiya," she muttered tensely. "He's the gym leader here. He was off on vacation…but I guess he's back now."

"You know this gym leader, too?"

"Yes," his mother nodded.

Naruto tilted his head curiously. "How many gym leaders do you know?"

"A few others," she answered. "It's been a while since I was on the road so I don't know how many of the gym leaders that I challenged are still at it. Tsunade and Orochimaru for sure, but as for the rest…I don't know."

"Oh."

The rest of their walk to the pokémon center was uneventful, if a bit slow. It took a little while to get the attendants at the counter to retrieve his pokémon as he didn't have his pokédex to prove his identity and he wasn't the person who had them checked in. But eventually he was brought a tray with all six pokéballs on it…and his missing great-ball.

Picking up the blue-and-white sphere, it felt slightly heavier, indicating that there was something in it. But, if there was something in it, it would count as he seventh pokémon, and it should've disappeared to Professor Sarutobi's shortly after being captured. Naruto was left scratching his head as his mother led him away from the counter so that other trainers could submit their teams for treatment.

"Well if you captured it after your pokédex was broken, it wouldn't get automatically sent away," his mother explained as they sat down on some of the couches near the front door. "Until your pokédex is fixed and reset, that pokémon and anything else you might catch in the meantime won't go anywhere. Or you can go to a computer terminal in the center and manually send it off."

"…But I don't remember catching anything," Naruto muttered with a frown as he eyed the great-ball suspiciously. "I barely remember falling off the trail."

"That could be a side effect of your concussion," she mused. "Maybe if you let it out and see what it is, you'll remember."

"Maybe," he muttered dubiously.

"Well, I want to see all your beasties," his mother grinned. "Seeing them on a video phone is one thing; seeing them in person is so much better."

"Okay," Naruto eagerly agreed.

"Naruto?"

The blonde boy turned his head, and saw a familiar girl.

"Sakura-chan?" He blinked. "You cut your hair?"

"Yeah," she winced and self-consciously brushed at her now shoulder-length pink hair. "I got something really sticky in it that I could get out, so I had to cut it."

"…It looks nice," Naruto decided. "Your hair always looks nice." Girls like lots of compliments, right?

The girl wrinkled her nose. "Thanks, I guess. I—" She did a double-take when she spied his mother sitting next to him. "Mrs. Uzumaki?!"

"I'm not married," the red-haired woman sighed tiredly. "I've told you that dozens of times, Sakura. I'm 'Miss Uzumaki' or 'Uzumaki-san' or 'Kushina-san', never 'Mrs. Uzumaki'."

"Sorry," Sakura squeaked in embarrassment.

"Your mother is here, Dobe?" Sasuke snorted, appearing behind the pink-haired girl. "…And what happened to your face?"

"Yes," Sakura blinked with a concerned look. "What happened to you? It looks like someone beat you up."

Naruto self-consciously touching the yellowish trace of fading bruises on the left side of his face and the scabs from his fall. "I slipped off one of the hiking trails," he muttered.

"Hn," Sasuke grunted.

"Naruto," Sakura sighed, as if he'd done it on purpose. "You could've really hurt yourself."

Naruto slumped as low as his throbbing ribs would let him. "…I did."

"That explains why you mother is here," Sasuke said, sparing the woman a nod that was too brief to be completely polite.

"Yeah," Naruto grunted, embarrassed. "Where's Sai?"

When he encountered his old classmates back in Shinobi Town, Sakura, Sasuke, and Sai were traveling partners. Naruto had headed straight for Kunoichi Town straight after earning the Copy badge from Kakashi and he hadn't run into the trio since. It was nice to see them again, he just wished that they hadn't shown up when he was such a mess—it was embarrassing.

"He went his own way after Kunoichi Town," Sasuke muttered.

"He got a phone call and then made this weird announcement to us—that it was time he went his own way—and then he just left," Sakura shrugged.

"Weird," Naruto frowned.

"I always thought that boy was a strange one," his mother muttered. "I'd bet money that it was his 'uncle' that called him and told him what to do. Danzou always had that boy on a tight leash from what I could see."

"Do you have seven pokéballs there?" Sasuke asked with a frown, noting the extra great-ball in Naruto's lap.

"My pokédex got broken," the blonde stiffly shrugged.

Sasuke narrowed his eyes at the collection of minimized spheres. "…What do you have?"

Naruto hesitated. "Er…" …How can I tell him that I don't know what number seven is?

"Why don't we go outside? Get some fresh air?" his mother abruptly suggested with a smile. "I know the perfect place to let all your beasts out for a little exercise."

After a quick lunch at an out-of-the-way café and some walking, his mother led the three of them to a small mountain meadow a few minutes' walk out of town. There was a stream that was wide enough and deep enough for a gyarados to swim around comfortably running through it. The place was just as his mother promised it would be.

"Alright!" the red-haired woman clapped her hands and released her vaporeon. "Let's see what we've got!"

Naruto decided to go by seniority and set Demon loose first. The vulpix looked at him for a long moment, looked to his mother and Uzu-chan, glanced briefly at Sakura and Sasuke, and went about sniffing around the meadow. Sakura produced her bulbasaur and Sasuke released his charmander. Except…his charmander had evolved since Naruto had last seen it, so it was now a larger, fiercer charmeleon.

From there, Naruto set free Bolt. The pikachu seemed baffled that he mother was there in the flesh and not behind a video screen, but she soon had him in her lap and melted into a yellow puddle from her soothing touch. Sakura freed her wurmple, which was now fully evolved into a beautifly that happily fluttered around, examining the meadow's flowers. Sasuke set his shinx, which was now a smug-looking luxio, out and the electric type seemed to sneer at the pikachu luxuriating under the older Uzumaki's touch.

Next came Typhoon, the mighty gyarados. His mother almost dropped Bolt in her hurry to fuss over the magnificent blue sea serpent. She was so distracted in admiring the beast, she barely noticed Sakura's pink little happiny or Sasuke's larvitar. Naruto grinned, pleased at his show-stealing monster.

The next round had Sasuke releasing his zubat, Sakura sending out her cherubi (which was now a cherrim), and Naruto set free Shadow. Or…what should've been Shadow. He stared at the umbreon that sat before him blankly.

"Oh, your eevee evolved into an umbreon?" Sakura asked, hugging her un-bloomed cherrim.

"Er…" The umbreon walked right up to him and rubbed its head against his side. "…I guess."

Sasuke raised an eyebrow. "You guess?"

"It must have happened not long after you fell," his mother suggested while Uzu-chan got herself acquainted with what she might've become had she not been exposed to a water stone.

"How could you forget one of your pokémon evolving just because you tumbled off a trail?" Sakura asked skeptically.

"I got a concussion," Naruto pouted. "Does that flower pokémon always look so droopy?"

"No," Sakura glared slightly. "Cherry, use sunny day."

The grass pokémon with the concealing purple petals started to glow with a faint red aura. The few clouds in the sky seemed to fade and the sunlight brightened and the air grew warmer. The cherrim's purple petals lightened to a pale pink and its hidden pink body turned a bright yellow. The petals lifted, revealing a pixy-like body and a smiling face crowned with pink sakura-like petals. Hanging around its neck was a brown rock with red crystals jutting out of it.

Naruto cocked his head at it. "It blooms during sunny day? And what's it holding?"

"That's a heat rock," Sakura informed him. "It makes sunny day last longer. And yes, Cherry does bloom in strong sunlight, and her special ability boosts her attack and her partner's attack when she's this way, too!"

The bright sunlight brought on by the sunny day didn't just make the cherrim bloom. Sasuke's charmeleon and Demon drank in the bright light and heat. If they were to go into battle now with the sun shining so brightly, their fires would be twice as hot.

"Well, let's go on to who's next!" Naruto grinned. "Gamakichi!"

The poisonous fighter made a dramatic entrance, clapping his hands over his head and striking a fighting pose. Sakura set out a fluffy little eevee of her own, which quickly trotted over to Uzu-chan and Shadow. And Sasuke released an elekid, a yellow and black critter that looked like it had a giant electrical plug coming out of its head.

"You trudged through a marsh?" Sakura asked. "That's were croagunk's live, right?"

"Nah, I got Gamakichi from Gai-sensei's Fighting Pokémon Dojo just outside Saru City," Naruto grinned. "I really impressed him and he let me pick out one of the fighting pokémon that was attracted to his dojo. Did you guys ever go there?"

"No, Sasuke-kun didn't want to," Sakura shrugged.

"That place wasn't a real gym," Sasuke muttered. "There was no badge to win, so what would be the point of wasting time there?"

"Just because there's no official badge to earn, it doesn't mean that you could still learn something important there," Naruto's mother pointed out as she offered a candy to the croagunk.

"Hn," Sasuke growled.

"Hey, Naruto?" Sakura frowned in thought. "I know you were in Shinobi Town, and I heard that you were in Kunoichi Town and Saru City, but when Sasuke-kun and I were in Silk Town we didn't hear that you'd been there."

"What's in Silk Town?" Naruto asked.

"A gym," Sasuke replied simply.

"I think one of Shino's uncles ran it. It was crawling with bug pokémon," the pink-haired girl said with a shiver.

"Nah, I never went there," Naruto explained. "After visiting Gai-sensei's dojo, I went to Suna City in Kaze no Kuni and challenged the gym there. That's where I got Sandy."

To punctuate his statement, he let out Sandy the trapinch. The tan insect-like creature had an enormous head which was as big as the rest of its body. She jumped up in the air several times, as if trying to fly, but her stubby legs didn't give her much lift.

"A trapinch?" Sasuke muttered, squinting at it.

"It looks creepy," Sakura shuddered. "It's a desert pokémon?"

"Yeah," Naruto grinned and patted the ground-type's large head. "She used to belong to the gym leader there, but he was kind of creepy and she was afraid of him. After I helped the guy out, he gave her to me as a present."

"…So you got a reject pokémon?" Sasuke smirked.

"Shut up!" Naruto snapped with a glare. "There is nothing wrong with Sandy! Don't you listen to him," he quietly coached the trapinch. "He doesn't know anything about great pokémon."

"Yes I do," Sasuke huffed. "I only collect the best kinds of pokémon."

"Like what?" Naruto scowled.

"Like this," the Uchiha answered and set loose his final pokémon.

It was a small blue lizard creature. It stood upright and had stubby little front arms. And it had bony ridges on its head like a helmet.

"A bagon?!" Naruto yelped.

"Aa," Sasuke smirked smugly.

"We spent months combing through these mountains looking for it," Sakura sighed and set free her own final pokémon, a rather angry-looking mankey. "It's so nice to finally be back in a civilized place."

"Well, I've got a…" Naruto stared at the great-ball in his hand. "…A something."

"Show us," his mother urged. "I'm really curious!"

The blonde boy hesitated, then held down the button, snapping the sphere open. A burst of white light escaped to several feet away and coalesced into a shape. It was purple and spiky and floating over the ground. It cringed at the stinging bright light caused by the sunny day and hissed as it tried to shield its eyes from the glare with its disconnected hands.

The mystery pokémon was a haunter.

Naruto promptly screamed.