Mushroom

by Lord Dragon Claw

Disclaimer: "Naruto" was created and is owned by Masashi Kishimoto. The ArbyFish were created by Danny Oliver and are owned by Danny and Benjamin Oliver.

Chapter One: Bruce and Ribbons

A gigantic, nine-tailed demon fox, also known as the Kyubi, was just strolling through the forests around Konoha, the ninja village hidden in the leaves, when something happened. A small, little black seal-like creature began to flitter and hover in front of the fox. And it began to annoy the beast.

"Have you got the time? I say, have you got the time? I really need to know it because Black ArbyFish don't do time. I can't tell the time. Have you got the time?"

The whole time, the fox tried to tell him no, but kept getting interrupted. Though the fox was thousands of years old, it did hate to get interrupted, so it had a rather short temper at that point. It tried to attack the flying seal/fish/mutant/thing. And the ArbyFish ignored him and flew towards the nearest town, knowing that people have time (clocks) so that he could finally know the time. And the fox followed.

And thus, the Kyubi Attack was instigated.

Just before the Yondaime Hokage sealed the fox within the body of a small blonde infant, the demon managed to catch the flying annoyance in his jaws, sealing the ArbyFish within the boy as well.

Nearby, a little white seal-creature and another pink one, both similar to the black, had watched the whole scene.

What the- Why! thought the white one. That human has done the same as what the First has done, on multiple occasions. Sacrificing himself to save those humans. Why? Hmm... I must study these humans.

Meanwhile, the pink one was thinking, That poor little boy! He's so cute! But, now he hasn't got any parents! Maybe I can convince Bruce to let us raise him?

And the universe had a chill run up its spine.

A few years later, the White ArbyFish and his Pink companion, known as Bruce and Ribbons respectively, could be seen still arguing over whether to raise the blonde-haired boy. If anyone could see them, that is.

"I don't care how cute he is!"

"But, he needs us! Look how the other apes treat him!"

"I can see that. I've been observing them for the past THREE YEARS! I think I know how to conquer them properly... I just need some sort of super weapon and a malleable apprentice to teach."

"Bruce, sometimes you are an idiot."

"RIBBONS! Don't make me slice you to ribbons!" he said as he pulled a switchblade out of nowhere.

"Really? That would be cute!"

"ARGH! Why I bothered saving you from the Greens I'll never know!"

"Bruce, we both can get what we want. You saw that fox, right?"

"... yeah."

"And the fox is inside that boy along with a Black, right?"

"Yeah. Your point?"

"And that cute boy is attention-starved..."

Bruce smacked himself in the head, except he forgot he was holding a knife, so he stabbed himself in the head on accident. Though it hurt, it wouldn't do any real harm to him. But he continued the rest of the conversation with his switchblade sticking out of his cranium.

"Thank you, Ribbons. That is one of the weaknesses of Whites - we don't typically see opportunities until someone else points them out."

Yeah, Bruce realized. The blonde boy is not only malleable, but he also counts as a super weapon!

Bruce then cackled an evil cackle like the evil little White ArbyFish that he is. The universe knew something was wrong at this point - it had that familiar chill run up and down its spine again.

The next day, Naruto had apparently found a pink seal-like plush toy which he carried with him at all times. The Sandaime Hokage was perplexed, but wrote it off as unimportant, even if the boy talked to it like it was alive.

What nobody else knew was that a white one was perched on his shoulder almost constantly and told him all sorts of things.

About a year later, a number of people went and got drunk during the Kyubi Festival (marking the fourth anniversary of the defeat of the Kyubi). They decided to "kill the demon once and for all (hic)!" So, Naruto was targeted. He was found skipping around in a flower field. He was quickly surrounded, and the boy began to feel afraid. But then he saw that the drunks were trampling the flowers - one of the few things that didn't spit on him when he walked past - and that made him angry.

The blonde child pulled out a switchblade causing some of the drunks to laugh, thinking that the demon wouldn't be able to defend itself, so they didn't realize what sort of danger they were in.

Later that evening, four ANBU dragged Naruto's unconscious, blood-covered body into the Hokage's office. The boy, though under a genjutsu, was still clutching his pink seal doll with his left hand.

"What happened?" asked the old man.

One of the ANBU, Yamato (if the Hokage remembered correctly), spoke up: "Seems some of the drunks from the festival got a little bold, and attacked Naruto."

"Don't worry," said another ANBU (this time it was Itachi). "None of that blood is his. Unfortunately, this incident will cement the idea that the boy is the demon in the minds of the villagers."

"Agreed," replied the Sandaime Hokage. "Wake him up; I want to find out from him what had happened."

"Kai," said one of the nameless ANBU whose only importance and purpose was to wake up the demon's container in this scene and will never be mentioned again.

"Wha-" muttered Naruto as he rubbed the sleep from his eyes.

"Hello, Naruto," said the Hokage.

"Hi, gramps!" This elicited a chuckle or two from the ANBU.

"Naruto, do you know what you're covered in?"

"Blood."

Sarutobi began to sweat a bit. "Do you know why you're covered in blood?"

"I kilt da bad peepoll."

"Why did you kill them? What made them bad?"

"Dey called me... um... deeman? Yeah, deeman. Innit dat a bad werd? And dey crush da flowers too."

"And what did you kill them with?"

"Dis," said the blonde boy as he pulled out a switchblade and flicked it open with practiced ease.

"Where did you get that?"

"Bruce gabe it to me."

"Who is Burusu?"

"He's my garden angel!"

"I think you mean guardian angel..."

"Yeah. Dat too."

Room full of sweatdropping people.

"And is this Burusu?" asked the Hokage, pointing at the pink doll.

"No. Dis is Ribbons!" replied the boy, hugging his doll tightly. "Silly gramps!"

The Hokage sweatdropped again, as did the four ANBU in the room. Then the old man put his fingers into a one-handed seal and Naruto zonked-out again. He then turned to Yamato.

"I am reassigning you. You are to care for him as if he were your little brother. Train him, teach him, and minimize the effects of the demon housed within him. Also, you are to resign from your position in ANBU-Ne."

"Hokage-sama," began Yamato, also known as Tenzou. The Hokage remembered this, and he also remembered that Tenzou was only 14, though he was living by himself.

"Report."

"Although I had him in various jutsu to subdue demonic influence, as well as demons themselves, just in case, Naruto's behavior has not changed in the slightest. He still talks to his doll and he still has that thrice-damned switchblade, no matter how many times I take it from him."

The Sandaime sighed. "He might very well be brain damaged. Or something traumatizing happened. Or it could be stress from the seal or something. See what you can do."

Neither of them noticed the White ArbyFish sitting on the sill of the nearby window. They wouldn't have been able to see him anyway.

Tenzou quickly learned that Naruto was quite smart, despite being a little crazy. Perhaps he was just eccentric due to mental stress and trauma? Also, he seemed to have a talent for all sorts of jutsu, even if he had a wind affinity with his chakra.

What Tenzou didn't know was that Naruto was on good terms with nearly all the ArbyFish he had encountered. Since ArbyFish constitute anywhere between two percent and ninety-nine-point-nine percent of the universe's mass at any given moment, it was no surprise to find them on Naruto's world, even if they preferred to remain invisible from most humans. But Naruto could see them all, probably because he had one of the most powerful colors of the little flying seal mutants sealed inside of him.

At Bruce's insistence, Naruto learned how to move rocks and dirt from the Browns, how to play games and play with water from the Blues (as well as figure out the rules to any game in under twenty seconds, similar to how the Blues did the same thing, only ten seconds), how to mess with all sorts of written laws from Greens, and fighting techniques from Reds (it was really difficult for Bruce to find an active volcano near Konoha, but he found one). Also, Bruce and Ribbons encouraged him to learn everything he could from Tenzou.

But we are getting ahead of ourselves.

"Wot's 'Shroom Day?"

"Naruto, stop talking like a Green," commanded Bruce.

"'Kay."

"'Shroom Day is today. The eighth day. It happens in between Sunday and Monday. The rest of the universe sleeps through it, but we ArbyFish must observe it. And you must too, since you're awake during it."

"Why must I ob... ubsarve?"

"Observe," corrected Ribbons. "We have to celebrate this day, or else the Greens will find out that we didn't. So they'll come after us, and we don't want Green lawyers coming down on us."

"Lawyars? But I taut ArbyFish were an arachnid!"

"Anarchy," corrected Bruce. "But we're a constitutional anarchy. Much better than the plain old regular anarchies! Besides, we really don't need the Greens to take an interest in us; since they hate Ribbons because she's a Pink, they'll try anything to throw us in the Tea Party of Singularities. Better to not give them a reason."

"'Kay. Whaddya do on 'Shroom Day?"

"Mostly, we play pranks."

From that day forward, all of Konoha found itself pranked regularly every Monday morning. The most unsettling part was when the entire town was watchful at 11:59 one Sunday night, only to find themselves completely covered in purple paint only an instant after midnight. Not just them, but all the buildings, food, soap, books, scrolls, animals, trees (within two miles of the outer walls), and eyeballs as well. There was much screaming in pain from those who weren't blinking at that particular instant due to the purple paint covering their eyeballs.

One week saw the Hokage Monument having been transformed into the Monument to All the Cute Things in the World, whereas the next saw it restored to normal, but then the Hokage Tower had the entirety of Hamlet written all over the outside, not to mention the monkeys stuffed into the Hokage's closet with a typewriter.

If that wasn't enough, every member of the Hyuga Clan found themselves wearing a pink, frilly tutu the next week.

Unfortunately, these acts of chaos were attributed to Naruto (but he only helped with those after he convinced the ArbyFish of the planet to prank the people of Konoha). Naruto's pranks were on a more personal level, such as putting a fishbowl over Uchiha Sasuke's head the night after the Uchiha Massacre. Etched on the fishbowl was the phrase: "So long and thanks for all the fish!"

Age six, when Naruto began to go to the academy, was a little awkward. Naruto didn't really want to leave Ribbons behind, but he did at her insistence. Still, Bruce would remain perched on his shoulder while Ribbons played mind games with Tenzou, such as moving around when he wasn't looking, putting salt in the sugar bin and sugar in the salt shaker, that sort of thing. Tenzou was "really cute" when he was confused or flabbergasted.

At first, all the teachers spat at him or made rude remarks, or whatever, but then they quickly learned to leave him alone when he was with flowers.
Some of them still had nightmares about Mallet-sama.

Speaking of which, Naruto seemed to have an aptitude for battlehammers and knives. He preferred the switchblade over the kumai, despite it being weaker than the all-purpose-stabbity-object. He liked it because it was lighter, easier to conceal, and was more maneuverable. If he wanted to throw something, he'd just use a shuriken rather than a kunai.

And he both annoyed and confused everyone there when he started to learn how to use earth jutsu using a hammer by singing the song "I've Been Working on the Railroad". What was a railroad anyway? And why did it matter if someone was playing a banjo in the kitchen while Dina was in it? The Chuunin instructors never learned why, and when asked, Tenzou was just as confused.

Of course, the fact that Naruto was so strong didn't sit well with much of the village. The Sandaime was tempted to impose martial law, but decided better of it as many ninja hated his guts as well.

The problems really began when the entire Uchiha Clan, save Sasuke, was annihilated by Uchiha Itachi. He did it under the Sandaime's orders, as well as gather intelligence about a new nukenin organization by joining them. Of course, the fact that the clan had been killed off in a single night caused many to blame Naruto for it, despite the fact that the Uchiha Clan was found dead on a Friday morning, not a Monday morning.

"Great. Now we have to deal with ninja lawyers - almost as bad as dealing with Green lawyers!"

But Naruto was already formulating a plan of action of how to deal with his trial. A claim that he had a new bloodline limit could work - all he'd have to do is show off his mad mushroom-growing skillz (TM)! Yes. This could work. Mushrooms had nothing to do with how the various Uchiha were killed and had nothing to do with snakes (which Naruto noticed people hated almost as much as they hated him and foxes).

"So he's not really crazy? Just drugged up on 'shrooms?"

"That could be it. But did you see the mushroom creature he made before our eyes? He can almost instantly create hordes of cannon-fodder out of a simple shiitake mushroom! He might just be a little eccentric. Did you notice how he talked to his pink doll like it was alive?"

Danzou decided to put his two cents in: "A bloodline limit with a Jinchuuriki - we should train him!"

"Already taken care of," replied Sarutobi Hizuren, the Hokage. "He is being raised by Tenzou, the only living possessor of the mokuton, and he's been trying to correct Naruto's behavior, but it seems that his behavior has nothing to do with the demon sealed within him. But they have very similar Kekkei Genkai, so I was thinking that we could just let them learn from eachother, making two powerful ninja out of the situation."

"What about the law placed by the Shodaime? The Kekkei Genkai Revival Statute?"

The Sandaime sighed. "Very well. But I would like to point out section 3, subsection G, article 42 pertaining to that law: 'Any Kekkei Genkai possessor must be allowed to choose his/her spouses.'"

That staved off the Clan Heads, but as far as Hiruzen could tell, the civilians on the council were going to try and have their daughters seduce the blonde. Oh well. He'd deal with those headaches later. Where did he put that aspirin bottle?

"So," began the Hokage anew. "It is generally agreed that Naruto has no connection whatsoever to the Uchiha Massacre?"

A resounding chorus of 'aye's filled the room.

Naruto smirked as his plan to get out of trouble and absolve himself from the blame of the council worked. Also, it had the bonus of making Bruce totally slack-jawed.

End Chapter One.

Author's Note

I got permission from Ben Oliver to go ahead and write this. Fanfiction of another fanfiction. Fanfanfiction. Only one other author I know of has done this and his name is Chibi-Reaper. Go. Read. His. Stories.
Now.

EDIT: Well, it seems that Benjamin A. Oliver is not as well known as I thought. So I have included a link to his main fanfiction page:
boliver DOT florestica DOT com

Bleh. Badly written. Forgot where this was going. Brain Dumping it for posterity.