'Is it smart to go to this 'Academy'?'

'I told you already; everyone has to go into the academy to become a ninja. It is mandatory.' Naruto was sitting in the middle of his tree house with his Watchers around him. It had been a full year since the night that he gained the ability to raise bones. After he had woken up that next morning, he met with the Hokage and told him a fake story about being kicked out of the orphanage. His Watchers didn't want him to go alone, but could not figure a way to be there with him and remain out of sight. After the subject of housing came up, Naruto asked to live in the forest near the Hokage monument. His request was granted in the form of a large house carved out of a dead tree that refused to fall. It was quite literally a tree house as the whole tree form roots to the bare limbs was his house.

'I know. Is it smart to become a ninja?'

'I want to know how strong I can get. I want to be strong enough not to need Watchers.' They were wrapped around like they normally were: snake draped around his shoulders, crow standing on his right shoulder, and dog sitting on his left side. He had decided against naming them as they had yet to tell him their names. 'You are precious to me. And we don't even know if you can be destroyed. I don't want to risk it.' A humming sound was heard coming from the animal bones; Dog's flesh had completely rotted off in three months, which soothed Naruto.

Dog spoke for them all. 'We understand. Snake is just worried that we be unable to aid you if you need us.' Naruto had to give Dog a point; he could see where Snake was coming from. 'This peace won't last for much longer. Going to the academy means stepping out of the forest and talking to people.' After getting his house, Naruto had clamped up and had only spoken when necessary. He also spent most of his time in the forest around his tree. He had stopped talking out loud to his Watchers; he found it easier to communicate with them in his head. Soon he had stopped talking all together as there was no one to talk to.

'Then I'll bring at least one of you with me then.'

'Snake can stay wrapped around your stomach and out of sight under your shirt.'

'Better yet, you all come and I show the villagers not to mess with me anymore.'

'We do not think that is the best solution.' They had all spoken at once.

'Just think about it, we'll show the villagers why they should leave me alone. It's getting annoying how many times they come over here to terrorize me.'

'Fine. But during your time off from the school you will start training with us into you power more.' So far Naruto had only learned how to preserve Crow's wings so she could continue to fly.

'That's awesome! Do you know what else my ability can do?' The animals drew closer to him to keep him warm as the sun fell under the horizon.

'You are quick to agree. In the future you must spend more time thinking over the consequences of your decisions. From what I can tell, your ability focuses on bones, whether it works on your own bones remains to be seen. We can help you learn how to call those in the earth near you for now.'

'Go to sleep now Naruto. You have to get up early and show us off tomorrow.'

'Somehow I knew you would like the idea of me showing you off to everyone Snake.'

--

When Iruka woke up this morning, he was excited to start the new teaching year. He expected loud children running around with screwed ideas about ninja. He had a plan for every situation that could happen that day; from a village wide evacuation to a little kid's nose bleed. What he wasn't expecting was Naruto Uzumaki and his pets. Or skeletons he should call them. The first thing he noticed was the dog, how could you not see a 24 by 40 inch skeleton dog sitting in the desk next to someone. But Iruka could handle it; he refused to break down on his first day back after break. 'As long as nothing else goes wrong, I'll be fine for today.' Too bad for Iruka, all of Naruto's Watchers were with him today.

Since Naruto was sitting in the back, he got made it to roll call before someone noticed something was wrong with a few of the bodies in the class. He managed to get out, "Hyuuga Neji," before he was cut off by an ear piercing scream.

"IS THAT A SNAKE?" The scream caused everyone to look back at the source of the screaming, a black headed girl who was pointing towards a blonde student. Upon closer inspection, Iruka could see that she wasn't 

pointing at the boy, she was pointing at the bones wrapped around his neck. Bones that formed a snake, a five foot snake.

'That's a big snake.' Iruka could feel himself grow sick at the thought of a five foot bone snake. He knew he was going into mental shock, hell he was already thinking at a five year old level. The shock wore off as another student screamed.

"THERE'S A BIRD TOO!" Indeed there was a bone bird sitting on the boy's right shoulder. Snapping back to reality, that seemed stranger than fiction (love that movie), Iruka figured out that he needed to get the class beck in order. The only way he knew to that is to yell at them, very loudly.

"Everyone SHUT UP!" He continued when everyone was focused on him and not the corpses. "Naruto, could you please come down here and explain why you have…bones with you in class." The student gave a quick nod and got up to walk to the front of the class. As he moved toward the front, the dog got up and followed right behind him. This caused some commotion that was quickly silenced by a glare from Iruka. When he finally stopped, the dog sat back on its haunches and watched the students' movements.

"Hello, I am Naruto Uzumaki." He stopped to clear his throat; he had stopped talking so it was hard for him to suddenly start. "These," he motioned to the snake, bird, and dog, "are byproducts of my bloodline trait awakening. I don't know or understand everything about it, but they will stay with me and protect me." His voice sounded raspy to everyone in the room. "I hope this will not be a problem, but I will not be separated from them."

"You won't be Naruto and thank you for the introduction. Now, who is willing to sit next to Naruto?" Most of the students kept their hands down but I Iruka was happy to see one hand in the air. "Okay Naruto, you will stay in the back with Hideaki. Is that fine with everyone?" Seeing no one willing to complain, Iruka nodded to Naruto, Who walked up next to the boy who still had his hand up. The other smiled at him and held out his hand.

"Hi, I'm Hideaki. Nice to meet you." Naruto gave a quick handshake before sitting in the far seat, leaving poor Hideaki to sit next to the bone dog. As Iruka started a lecture over the class curriculum for the year, Naruto took the time to observe the boy sitting next to Dog. He was easy to look over as he had no distinguishing features; average brown eyes, brown hair, and a tan face. The only notable trait was high cheekbones that are usually seen on paler faces. "I hope we can get along. I think the bones are cool."

"Thank you." His reply was cold, but didn't seem to throw the boy off. For the rest of the class Hideaki told a nonresponsive Naruto all about his life.

'I think you should trust him.' Naruto gave no outward sign that he had heard Dog, but answered him using his mind.

'I don't know. I'll keep watching him and decide later.' At the end of the day, Naruto was slowly walking back to his house when Hideaki called out to him. "Hey wait up." When he caught up, the boy continued on to his tree.

"What?" It sounded harsher than he meant it to, but his throat was sore from all the use of the day.

"I wanted to know if you wanted to come with me to get something to eat. It could be fun."

"Why do you care?" This stopped the other boy. He kept his head down and voice low while he answered.

"It's my fault, all of it. If I hadn't have come that night, you wouldn't have slept in the basement. If that hadn't happened, you wouldn't be living alone like you do now." He had broken out in tears right after starting to answer and now he was all crying. When he looked up, Naruto saw the tear tracks and the sorrow in the boy's eyes. "I'm sorry, I really am. I just want you to forgive me."

"Err..." 'What am I supposed to say?' Snake, sensing his discomfort, wrapped closer around Naruto.

'Do you forgive him?'

'There's nothing to forgive, it wasn't his fault.'

'Then tell him that.'

Naruto held up his hands to the boy, effectively cutting him off in the middle of his cry-fest. "I don't see why I should forgive you for something you didn't even do. It wasn't your fault the caretaker acts the way she does." Hideaki looked stunned at his words.

'How could he be so forgiving?' In Hideaki's mind, the whole episode with the dog was his fault. He expected to have to beg Naruto to forgive him, but here he was saying that he wasn't to blame. Hideaki blindly followed Naruto through the village, caught up in the words Naruto was speaking. Currently they were on the topic of where he was living. The boy at that time registered that Naruto had asked him a question. "I'm sorry, what did you say?"

"I asked where you wanted to eat." Naruto was looking at him with worried eyes.

"The ramen stand down the road, it is so good."

"Okay, lead the way." After they ate supper, Naruto and Hideaki separated to go to their own respective beds. Hideaki stopped Naruto before he could go very far with a shout.

"Hey, Naruto, wait a second." Naruto jogged back to his new friend. "Here, I want you to have this for your dog." In his outstretched hands was a dog collar. It was a worn piece of black leather that had a medallion hanging off it. The piece of aged metal was inscribed with the kanji mamoru which meant 'to protect'. "He protects you, so I thought it was fitting." Naruto took it out of his hands and put it around Dog's bony neck.

"Thank you very much." He said with a small bow.

"Don't do that! We're friends now right?" He nodded. "Then this is a gift from one friend to another. Goodnight Naruto." With that he was gone, into the orphanage to sleep, while Naruto turned with a smile on his face and headed home. It was a friendship that would have lasted for decades, if not for the villagers.

Naruto was numb. He couldn't feel anything as he kneeled next the body of his one true friend. He had run to the middle of the crowd as soon as he heard their cries of "demon lover" and "poor corrupted soul". The inner rings of people were viciously beating a seven year old body into the ground.

'No! Hideaki!' Naruto roughly pushed his way past the crowd and into the small area near his friend. He shakily checked for a pulse, but deep down he knew he didn't need to. His power had control over the dead bone in an area; he could sense Hideaki's death in the air. Sensing the dead was the first task his Watchers had him start on. He continued to kneel next to the body even as they started to hit him. He didn't feel anything; he was caught up in the memories of the time they spent together. 'Only a year. I only knew him for a year.' He finally spoke out loud.

"It's not enough. He was my friend, a year is not ENOUGH!" His yell caused the people to back off and allowed his Watchers to come up next to him. Dog was snarling, Snake pulled himself up in preparation to strike, and crow took to the air, preparing to gouge out some eyes. In response, the villagers backed up even farther. Naruto didn't see the chunin come up and fail to get past Dog and Snake. After the unsuccessful attempt to get passed the reanimated bones, the chunin took out a kunai and threw it at Naruto's unsuspecting back. It hit right between the shoulder blades and buried up to the grip in his back.

"So it's not enough that you killed him, but now you're trying to kill me? That's it; I'm tired of hiding my ability." Naruto hadn't really been hiding a whole lot, but intimidation gave you an edge in combat. And his whole life was one large combat zone. Naruto stood and cut his thumb on his elongated teeth. Spinning around, he forced the wound to stay open as he started his ritual. His movement caused a half circle of blood to land on the ground in front of him, splattering Snake and Dog in the process. He continued to move in what appeared to be random directions. None of the nearby people noticed that the blood was slowly forming a seal on the ground.

"Lo! Death has reared himself a throne in a strange city lying alone. Far down within the dim west, where the good and the bad and the worst and the best have all gone to their eternal rest. I call from this place, them all to serve me in bringing these others into Death's embrace." After he spoke his lines, Naruto stopped moving and the seal on the ground glowed maroon. Out from the seal, twenty skeletons rose up and started moving towards the crowd of people (idiots), intending to follow their summoner's request. They didn't get very far before several ANBU stood in front of them. Seeing as the soldiers didn't receive any new orders from Naruto, they formed a circle around the boy and kept everyone away from him. Dog, Snake, and Crow had each moved closer to Naruto when it started and were now right next to him.

"Naruto-kun, you can stop now. There is no one else here to hurt you, the crowd is gone." Naruto looked over to see the Hokage speaking to him from in front of the ANBU. Since the threat was gone, Naruto decided to send the troops back to where they came from. He swiped at the seal and disrupted some of the blood.

"So blend the turrets and shadows there that all seem pendulous in air. While from a proud tower in the town, Death looks gigantically down." With that, the skeletons slowly sank into the ground and the blood was absorbed into the street. Naruto's vision wavered, and he soon fell into blissful unconsciousness.

Ax: Done! Hope you like it. I only got done this fast because the other chapter was so short. So don't expect ANY of my stories to be updated this fast. Oh, and the chant (or poem) Naruto used to summon the soldiers is not owned by me. It is mostly "The City in the Sea" by Edgar Allen Poe. Which I love. Anyway, the character Hideaki was based off of my friend (drum roll) Dark Orb! Sorry for killing you! But fear not, you shall return! And don't anyone complain that I ruined it for them by saying that. I spent way too much time on his character to kill him off…permanently. I have a poll posted on my bio page. check it out. Please?

Ax