disclaimer: i don't own this shit

also, none of this has been proofread or even thought about too much. there are probably errors everywhere

The Chain of Change

Chapter Eight

Minato was at his desk when he felt the summons. The ROOT infiltrates had all been arrested and taken to the ANBU Interrogation Force, but progress had quickly been halted when it was discovered that the curse seal placed on the prisoners' tongues rendered them immune to the traditional means of questioning. At the moment, only the Yamanaka clan jutsus had shown any usefulness, but Inoichi was only one person, and there dozens of ROOT to get through.

To make matters worse, they were operating on a time limit. No one had any idea how often ROOT checked on its own. Not too often, it seemed, in order to prevent their ANBU squadmates from becoming suspicious, but, from what little information Inoichi had managed to uncover, it couldn't have been less than once every few days. Contact was mostly made in the evenings, after normal working hours, so the Interrogation Force had at least a few hours before Danzo was tipped off about the situation. That was assuming he didn't have any fingers on the ANBU Minato had assigned to the investigation. They needed more intelligence, and quickly.

And so it was that the foremost seals authority in the village – Minato himself – was stuck poring over the ridiculously complicated arrays that Danzo (or one of his cronies) had cooked up. The Yondaime had already contacted Jiraya about the situation via toad, but there was little chance that the Sannin would be back in time to be of any use.

It was like someone had hooked their thumb into a corner of his consciousness and given a little yank. Immediately he knew that one of his kunai had been activated, and not soon after, which. To his horror, he realized it was the one he'd given Naruto, all those years ago, when his son had graduated from the Academy. Naruto had beamed at him from underneath his shining new hitae-ite, and when the three-pronged weapon exchanged hands, Minato had felt an intense mix of worry and pride, emotions so potent his chest ached from the strain of containing them. In all that time, the kunai had never left his son's weapons pouch; had never been thrown, or even dropped. Until now.

The curse seal lay forgotten on his desk as Minato flashed away in a blur of yellow and white.

The Hiraishin left him in the middle of a desert.

Minato was used to being dropped off in strange places as his signature kunai made their way around the elemental countries. But it was damned inconvenient to be turned on your head in the middle of a crisis, so he did the first thing experience had taught him – look down.

The face of Hoshigaki Kisame, frozen in a ritcus of death, gaped back at him with all the charm of a dead fish. Blood, so dark it was almost black, oozed from his gills and the weapon buried up to its hilt between his glassy, sightless eyes.

Next to the missing-nin, Naruto lay in a crumpled heap on the ground. Quickly, Minato knelt by his son's body, taking care not to move him too much as he searched for a pulse. He almost cried out in relief when he found one – faint and unsteady, but at least it was theer.

The relief was quickly overtaken by fear. Naruto was clearly in a bad way; from what the Yondaime could see, his entire side was covered in blood, and he was breathing in a shallow way that couldn't have been healthy. But Minato had no medical training whatsoever – hell, he didn't even know how to give CPR – and he would probably do more harm than good if he tried to help his son. He also had no idea where the hell they were. Given the climate, probably not far from Suna, but there was no telling which way the city was.

"Come on, Minato, think!" he said outloud, tugging at his hair with one hand. He could Hiraishin back to Konoha, but there was no way they would reach Naruto in time. If only there were another…

"Kakashi!" he exclaimed, suddenly remembering that his one-time student also happened to possess one of his special kunai. After the mission resulting in Obito's death, the jounin had asked him to keep it as a reminder of the lessons concerning friendship and teamwork he'd learned that day. It only took Minato to locate it, mentally. And suddenly, he knew where he was.

Kakashi almost leapt out of his bed in shock when the Yondaime appeared. Belatedly, the jounin recalled that he kept one of his former sensei's weapons in his utility pouch, which was slung over the back of a chair by the bed. He was just about to come up with a bizarre and inappropriate greeting when he caught a glimpse of Minato's face and instantly snapped to attention.

"Sensei, what's wrong?"

"It's Naruto." Briefly, the older blond outlined the situation, leaving out the details in interest of time. "My clone is with him, but he needs a medic. Where's Sakura?"

"She and Sasuke left to get dinner." They would never find her in time; there were seven restaurants on this block alone. Kakashi pulled himself out of bed. A wave of dizziness hit him in his hastiness to stand up; he steadied himself against the bedpost, legs almost buckling from under him, and waited for it to pass. He didn't feel particularly better or worse than before, but ruminations over his recovery could wait. "I'll go to the hospital, tell them to send medics out to meet us at the gate." He was already wrenching open the window as he spoke.

Ten minutes later, the two Konoha-nin were speeding back out into the desert with three medics in tow. Thankfully, the medic-nin of Suna were just as well trained as the ones in Konoha; it had taken them less than a minute to collect what they needed from the hospital, including a folding stretcher that one of them now carried strapped to his back. Without the requisite chakra capacity to make a clone, Kakashi had left a note to his two remaining students explaining the situation tacked to the apartment door, although not without wincing a little at the thought of Sakura reaming him a new one for this latest escapade.

According to his father, Naruto was some fifteen miles away from Suna's outskirts. Driven by haste, the covered ten miles in half an hour: no distance at all, to a conditioned ninja, but Kakashi had to strain like a genin to keep up. Miraculously, his legs held steady, and he silently reminded himself to thank Sakura later for her dedicated nursing.

Sometime after the eleventh mile, Minato suddenly shoved something in his hands and said, "Something's happened," before flashing away in a streak of yellow. The jounin realized that the clone assigned to watch over Naruto must have somehow been dispelled. But even if it were Akatsuki, Kakashi had every faith that the Yondaime would be able to handle it. He slipped the three-pronged weapon into his vest and doubled his pace.

Itachi might have been the sort of prodigy that appeared once in a generation, but Namikaze Minato was arguably the most talented ninja the Leaf had ever produced. As soon as his feet hit the ground, Minato threw another two kunai to surround his opponent. Less than a second later, he had the Uchiha pinned to the ground, a third blade at his throat. A little pressure behind the weapon produced a thin trickle of blood against the pale skin.

"In honor of your past service," the Yondaime said, taking care not to look at the missing-nin's eyes, "I will give you thirty seconds to explain what you are doing here before I slit your throat."

The Uchiha made no attempt to move. When he spoke, he answered in short, clipped tones.

"Naruto and I fought. Kisame intervened. It looks like Naruto killed him." He paused, and Minato made no hesitation to dig the blade in a little deeper. It was a futile move; Itachi was not the kind of man to be intimidated, even when he was at another's mercy. Instead, he said, almost clinically, "You have been blind, Hokage-sama."

"What do you mean?" The blond's voice was calm. For all anyone knew, they could have been conversing in a pub over a few pints of beer.

"You have been blind," Itachi reiterated, "Especially in the past, but now you can no longer afford to be so willing to overlook Danzo's transgression. Your ANBU have exposed only the very surface of what he has done."

Minato made no reply, waiting for the missing-nin to say more. He wasn't disappointed.

"Go to the residential sector. In the east side you will find a storage yard owned by one Yama Hisano. Look in unit 14C."

The Yondaime narrowed his eyes into blue slits. "I trust you about as much as any other traitor, Itachi. Which means, not at all."

"Go alone, or take Hatake-san only. The ANBU have been compromised for years. You are running short on time. Madara has begun to collect the bijuu."

"And why," Minato said quietly, "should I believe anything you say?"

But Itachi pressed on, talking over him. "We were sent by Akatsuki to capture the Ichibi and the Kyuubi." The missing-nin's voice seemed to be growing weaker. "The Ichibi is now with Sasori of the Red Sand. I leave Naruto-kun in your…"

"What are you implying?" The blond snarled, his hand gripping the kunai so tightly that the knuckles blanched. But there was no response. Itachi seemed to have trailed off mid-sentence, sagging back against the ground. A moment later, his body seized up, then suddenly jerked back, chest compressing as all of the air went out of his lungs. Then he was still. Pretty soon it was clear that he was dead, but that was not all. Minato watched as the missing-nin's features melted away to reveal the corpse of a ninja he didn't recognize.

"Fuck," he said out loud. "I should have seen it. Fucking Shoten no jutsu."

A quiet, choking laugh came from behind him. Minato turned to see his son, who had somehow woken up and managed to drag himself into an upright position against Kisame's dead body. "I thought you said that swearing is the sign of a weak mind," Naruto said, leaning back with a short gasp of pain.

The Yondaime was immediately at his side, supporting his head with one arm. "Don't try to speak. Help is on its way."

Naruto shook his head. "They took Gaara," he persisted. "It was my fault." Then he, blinked in confusion and suddenly seemed to forget what he was saying. A second later he turned to the side and retched.

"Naruto!" Minato cried in alarm, but his son didn't appear to hear him, and instead collapsed back against Kisame's corpse, head lolling to one side. Minato pressed a hand to his forehead; it was unnaturally warm. Swearing at himself for overlooking the possibility of heat stroke, the older blond quickly formed the seals for a doton jutsu, raising three walls of earth around Naruto's prone form. Then he stripped off his hokage robe and draped it over the structure as a crude shade.

The younger blond's lips moved, and his father realized that he was muttering something under his breath.

"A shinobi gives himself to his village..." Over and over again he repeated this mantra, and Minato felt his stomach drop a little further with every iteration. The words were horrifyingly familiar; only an hour ago, he had heard them uttered by the ROOT operative being interrogated by Morino Ibiki.

Kakashi and the Suna-nin arrived five minutes later. The medics immediately surrounded Naruto and, in no time at all, had agreed on a diagnosis of heat stroke. One of the set about lowering his body temperature while the other two started to rehydrate him. After this was done, they moved onto his injuries, taping his ribs and bandaging up his superficial wounds.

One of the medic-nin came up to Minato and said, "He's going to be just fine, Hokage-sama."

"Thank you," the older blond said, feeling, above all else, a great sense of relief. Naruto was going to be okay. Everything was going to be okay. He watched as the Suna-nin carefully lifted his son onto the stretcher, strapping him down so he could be carried securely.

But it was as if his mind were discontent with the sudden lack of stress, because it immediately latched onto the next item on the list of things for Minato to worry about. Itachi's words replayed in his head, quietly at first, then louder and more insistent, mixing with the phrases he'd heard Naruto utter barely ten minutes ago. For someone who was said to be insane, the missing-nin said things that made a whole lot of sense. And though he desperately wanted to remain by the side of his only offspring, he had more reason than ever to need to crack that seal, and quickly.

Kakashi must have caught something in his expression, because the jounin exclaimed, "You're not thinking of leaving, are you?"

Feeling like a total bastard, he said, "Naruto's safe now, and I have something I need to do."

His former student practically exploded. "What could possibly be more important than your son? For fuck's sake, he almost died fighting Shukaku, and now this happens… what do you think he'll do when he comes to his senses and realizes that you've left him?"

Minato was taken aback by the vehemence of this statement; it had been a while since he'd seen Kakashi so angry about anything. Vaguely some part of him realized that the jounin's relationship with Naruto must have improved exponentially in order for him to react this way. The rest of him was fixated on what his former student had said.

"'Almost died fighting Shukaku'?"

"Naruto single-handedly took down the Kazekage when he was possessed by the Ichibi. He was bed-ridden for days afterwards. But you should know this already – Gaara sent you a message about it."

"Did he?" Strike three, Danzo. I'm going to have you hanged for treason the first chance I get. "It must have gotten lost in the mail then. And where were you when this happened?"

The jounin stared flatly back at him. "The Uchiha's genetic disposition toward mental illness asserted itself at a bad time. I was trying to stop Sasuke from burning down Suna."

Minato didn't really know how to respond to that. So he settled for telling Kakashi the truth.

"I have arrested fort-three members of ANBU who are suspected of having ties to ROOT. I don't think Danzo is aware of the fact that I'm onto his organization just yet, but doubtlessly he will be in a few hours' time. I need to crack the seal placed on his operatives before then and expose him before he catches on and skips town."

"Can't you just hand the seal over to someone else? We have people in ANBU trained for that sort of thing," the jounin pointed out.

"The thing is insanely complicated. Listen, Kakashi, the Kazekage has been taken by an Akatsuki member named Sasori of the Red Sand. Make sure to let the Suna council know. Normally, I would ask you to do everything in your power to help Suna recover him, but the organization may also be after Naruto. It's unlikely that they'll try again so soon, but at least have Sakura watch over him until he recovers. I leave it up to you to decide what steps to take in helping rescue the Kazekage. Keep my kunai to contact me by."

"And when Naruto wakes up?" Kakashi's expression was dubious.

"Let me know the minute it happens." Minato rubbed the back of his neck. He knew that he was leaving the jounin in an impossible situation, but there was nothing for it now. He settled for saying, "Kakashi, I think I know what happened to Naruto. I think Danzo got to him."

Clearly taken aback, Kakashi opened his mouth to ask another question, but before he could form a single coherent word, the Yondaime was gone. The jounin looked over at his student, who the medics were applying cold packs to in preparation for the trek back across the desert, and buried his head in his hands in frustration.

"Dammit, Minato-sensei!"

Temari and Kankuro were waiting for them at the gate. Sasuke and Sakura were with them. Both kunoichi were livid; if their companions were equally angry, they didn't show it. It was also painfully obvious to Kakashi from the way they were standing apart that his team and the remaining Sand Siblings were on less than friendly terms.

"Where's Gaara?" Temari demanded as they approached. "He's been gone for hours – is that Naruto? What the hell happened?"

"Stay clear, Temari-sama," one of the medic-nin warned as they brought Naruto's stretcher into the village itself. "He's been hurt badly."

"Kakashi-sensei." Sakura turned to him as the medics bore Naruto away. "What's going on?"

"I'll explain later," the jounin said wearily. "You should go look after you teammate. I need to speak with Kankuro and Temari." Sakura flushed a little at the subtle rebuke, but sped off toward the hospital without another word.

Kakashi turned to his remaining student and the Sand Siblings. "Gaara's been taken by an Akatsuki member known as Sasori of the Red Sand." Seeing Temari and Kankuro stiffen at the mention of the name, he surmised, "You know this person."

It was Kankuro who spoke. "We should go see Old Lady Chiyo."

Sakura was running out of patience. Not only were the medic-nin keeping her out of the loop on Naruto's condition, but she had further been consigned to a bedside position, forbidden to do anything herself. Protests concerning how she was also a medic, a highly-trained one at that, seemed to fall upon deaf ears. It was only the knowledge that it wouldn't do Naruto any favors that kept her from strangling them.

At least the blond's hyperthermia was beginning to subside. The medic-nin had finally been able to regulate his temperature, and he had been hooked up to IV fluids to prevent him from vomiting. But his wounds looked bad – especially his shoulder, which appeared as though it had been giving a few rubs with a giant cheese grater. The Suna medics had identified five cracked ribs, some of them broken in multiple places, but miraculously none of them seemed to have pierced his lungs.

They sedated him in order to work on his injuries, but after half an hour he seemed to regain enough lucidity to glance over at her. His lips moved faintly, and she went to his side.

"Sakura…" he said hoarsely, staring up at her. For a moment, she saw a different Naruto – the sweet, outgoing boy who had helped her through her insecurities about being a kunoichi from a civilian family, who had stopped Sasuke from being too hard on her or Ino from teasing her about her apparent uselessness. She felt as if someone had given her heart a short, tight squeeze. Where had that Naruto gone? Why had he left her with the monster who had sent her home crying practically every day of training?

Get a hold of yourself, she told herself, viciously forcing the thoughts away. Those days are gone, and you're stronger now. "I'm here," she said to her teammate, voice steady.

"What happened?" he rasped, throat still dry from dehydration. "I thought my father was here..."

"Kakashi-sensei was the one who brought you here," Sakura said.

"Gaara!" he exclaimed suddenly, then gave way to coughing. Quickly, Sakura poured him a glass of water and held it up to his lips so he could drink. "Little sips," she warned, "or you'll throw it all back up."

"They've got Gaara," Naruto continued as soon as she withdrew the glass. "I've got to go find him."

"His brother and sister are already on it," Sakura told him. "They know who's taken him. They'll bring him back soon."

"They don't know where to look," the blond insisted. "I can find him. I need to get out of here."

He was ranting, practically delusional, and in obviously no position to leave. Sakura motioned to a medic, who turned up the dial on his pain medicine. The kunoichi stayed by his side, stroking his hair as he gradually fell asleep.

He woke up about an hour later and asked for more water. His eyes were clearer, and the delirium seemed to have mostly cleared away. Once he finished drinking, he asked Sakura for his clothes.

"You're not going anywhere," she said, preempting him.

"I need to find Gaara," came the stubborn reply.

"You can barely move. You wouldn't get very far before collapsing again," Sakura pointed out, trying to appeal to reason -- not that logic ever got very far with either of her teammates, when they were in this sort of mood.

Naruto stared hard at her. "Do you think I give a shit what happens to me? It's my fault Gaara's been captured by some psycho in the first place!"

"And it's exactly this kind of attitude that will compromise his rescue!" Sakura snapped. Her tone startled him, and he blinked at her, biting back whatever he had planned to say next. Feeling a little guilty about being so sharp with him, she added in a softer voice, "Temari and Kankuro have already gone after the Akatsuki member who has Gaara. You know they're both jounin. They know what they're doing." She didn't mention that Sasuke had gone with them, or that Kakashi was currently in the process of trying to convince someone who had tried to assassinate him at first sight to help with the rescue effort.

Her teammate shook his head. "I can't just sit here and do nothing!"

"Then here's something to do," Sakura replied, handing him a familiar-looking weapon. "Kakashi left this here for you. Contact your father. Let him know you're okay."

Naruto turned the kunai over in his hands, confused. What did his father have to do with any of this? Typically there was no need for a Konoha-nin to report to the Hokage mid-mission, and besides, Gaara had already sent him a message by hawk. The blond traced the characters that formed the Hiraishin seal with a finger, the symbols that formed the basis for one of the most powerful jutsu in existence. Without realizing it, he smiled faintly as his eyes ran over the clause that Minato had added to the seal when he'd been born. In effect, it served the same purpose as adding one's name to a summoning contract -- it allowed Naruto to use the technique, if he ever chose to learn it. However, Naruto had never been very interested in using the jutsu. He wanted to escape from the shadow of his father, not be bound by it.

Then it dawned on him. He'd used up all his kunai in the fight against Kisame – that must have included the one his father had given him when he'd graduate from the Academy, which meant…

"That bastard!" he said out loud. "It wasn't a fucking hallucination! He was actually here!" And, of course, gone again, now that his safety had been guaranteed. Probably some paperwork that needed filling out, trade agreements that needed signing – no time to stay an hour with his only child while he was in the hospital.

Why the hell are you letting this get to you? Naruto snarled at himself, furious that such a trivial piece of neglect had affected him to such a degree. He forced the feelings down, although they left a wake of bitterness in their departure.

"Naruto." It was Sakura. For a moment, he'd forgotten that she was even there. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing," he lied. "Did Kakashi tell you where he got this?"

The kunoichi nodded. "From the Hokage, of course. He was the one who found you. I think he had something important to take care of back in Konoha though, so he left you with Kakashi-sensei."

Who, conveniently, isn't here either. At least he had a good excuse for leaving. Naruto scowled. He was in no mood to deal with Minato at present.

"You know," he said, turning to Sakura, "I think I'm pretty tired. I'll talk to my father later."

His teammate's eyes narrowed. "Just a second ago you couldn't wait to get out of bed."

"Just a second ago I felt more awake," Naruto retorted.

"Stop making up excuses and let your father know you're okay," Sakura bit back. "He's probably really worried."

The blond's temper was quickly fraying. "How the hell would you know that? He obviously doesn't seem too worried, seeing as he sent you to watch over me."

Ignoring the thinly veiled insult to herself, she rounded upon him. "For once, could you stop acting like a complete bastard and think about the situation? Your father is the Hokage. Yeah, it sucks that you've been left here by him, but he probably feels miserable about it too! Quit whining and talk to him!"

In a sudden, vicious movement, Naruto sat up and flung the kunai into the far side of his room with all the strength he could manage. The blade embedded itself an inch and a half into the drywall, vibrating with the force of its impact. He ignored Sakura's shocked expression.

"You know what, you've convinced me. I'll go see him now. Let's hope I don't fuck this up and die on the way there." It probably wasn't the right time or place to try something that he only knew how to do in theory, but Naruto was incensed and not thinking straight. For a moment, he was focused in the deepest concentration he'd ever managed to achieve in his life. Then, a second later, he was gone in a blur of yellow.

Notes

Before I get any enraged cries of "what the fuck, Naruto knew how to do Hiraishin no Jutsu and didn't use it??" I'd like to point out that he's never actually tried it before, and it's the kind of technique that could probably fuck you over pretty well if you got it wrong. Plus he only carries the one kunai with him.

Also, I'm currently working 60 hour weeks. Do not expect updates to happen with lightning speed. I'm shooting for once a month here.