Author's Note (A/N):

Well, here is chapter 2. Check my A/N at the bottom for all the important things I have to say.

Disclaimer:I don't own Naruto.

Legend:

"Naruto" - talking

'Parents' - thinking

Flashback – Flashbacks

"Kit" – Kyuubi / Summon talking

'Naruto' - Kyuubi / Summon thinking

Chapter 2: Second Death

After having run after the small summoned dog for a while now Team Gai finally arrived at their destination. They stood on a quite stream narrowed by the huge walls of rock on both sides. All their heads were turned towards one of these flanks of the canyon, a huge rock boulder blocking the supposed entrance to the cave they had to go if you trusted their guide. "Gaara is inside these rocks" Pakkun, the small, summoned nin-dog, said from his position on top of Lee's shoulder.

Hearing this Neji activated his Byakugan to look inside the cave and find out what was happening inside. "How does it look, Neji?" the female of the team, Tenten, asked.

"Wh…What is that?" Neji asked more to himself then anything else, not understanding what his eyes were showing him.

"Neji, what's happening inside the cave?" Lee inquired curios of the situation and a bit perplexed by his normally so stoic teammates reaction.

"Words can't explain…" Neji answered. How could he describe the scene he was seeing with his all seeing eyes, when he himself couldn't really understand what he was seeing?

Hearing this Gai had enough and rushed forward, covering the few meters in an instant and struck, intending to destroy the huge boulder that was blocking the entrance with one hit with his fist. But his fist was stopped before it reached the stone of the boulder by an invisible shield. "A barrier" Gai mumbled under his breath.

"What should we do?" his green clad student Lee asked, as Gai stepped back from the barrier. Even if lee had become a chuunin most chakra based arts where still beyond him, as he couldn't study them because of his condition.

"First we have to break the barrier, Lee!" Gai answered his favorite student with much enthusiasm. Even as a jounin Gai didn't know much about the sealing arts on which the barrier obviously was based. He hoped that Kakashi would get here soon seeing as his rival was one of the most knowledgeable jounins in the village on this topic.

Tenten being the most knowledgeable in the art of sealing with her weapon sealing, asked after her sensei had answered Lee's question. "How do we do that?"

A second later Kakashi landed on the water only meters away causing a few small ripples on the quite surface, followed by Sakura and Chiyo and answered the question, not even bothering to greet the other team. "It's a five seal barrier." He said simply as it was an obvious fact, his face not showing that he clearly knew, that his answer wouldn't help most of them anyway as he didn't go into any detail and that most of them had absolutely no knowledge about the art of sealing.

Turning away from the protected entrance and towards the newcomers Gai greeted his eternal-rival. "You're late Kakashi."

"Eh, well, we ran into a bit of trouble on the way." Kakashi reasoned lamely, not having to use one of his normal excuses, but was stopped from elaborating further as Lee interrupted him.

"Sakura-san!" Lee greeted with a lot of enthusiasm.

Sakura turned towards Team Gai and introduced Chiyo, as advisor from Sunagakure, to them before any of them could ask a question about their companion.

Seeing that they still had a mission and not just any mission, but the mission to rescue the Kazekage, the leader of their allied village Sunagakure, to accomplish Gai captured everybody's attention. "Right!" he said in his usual loud voice. "Let's go for it, Kakashi."

With a quick nod and a quick 'thank you' Kakashi dismissed his summon and not a second later Pakkun vanished with a 'pop' leaving nothing but a small cloud of smoke behind. Turning towards Kakashi who had the most knowledge about seals from all of them Gai moved everybody's focus back on the mission as he questioned Kakashi about the barrier. "First off this barrier, eh, Kakashi? How do we take it out?"

Taking a quick look at the paper slip on the boulder that blocked the entrance of the cave Kakashi replied. "This particular 'five seal barrier' is created by tokens with 'kin' written on them in five places in the vicinity. To remove the barrier all of them must be detached."

"So where are the other four?" Tenten asked curiously.

"Neji-kun" Kakashi said simply looking at the youngest jounin amongst them and giving him a short nod.

"Understood" Neji answered and activated his doujutsu searching the whole area with his all-seeing Byakugan. Having found all of the token's locations, Neji informed the others of their exact locations. Gai took five radios out of his bag as a means of communication and gave each member of his team one and Kakashi took the last. After a quick check of the functionality of the radios Team Gai took off to detach the four tokens in the surrounding area, having Neji to direct them all over the radios.

It didn't take them long to reach their destinations and having received an affirmation that everybody was in position a few moments later, Gai gave them all the order to remove the tokens. "Right, everyone! Remove the tokens." he ordered.

Having received Gai's command Kakashi peeled the paper slip that was placed on the boulder off and with a short nod he commanded Sakura to destroy it. "Sakura." He said to her as he jumped to the side. Hearing Kakashi saying her name and nod Sakura rushed forward and struck the boulder, her fist hitting the huge stone shattering it into a million pieces with her inhuman strength.

Waiting for a second to let the dust clear, Kakashi then gave the hand sign to infiltrate the cave. Landing in the rather dark cave Kakashi waited for a millisecond until his eyes were accustomed to the new light conditions before he took everything in analyzing the situation they found themselves in. They were in a large almost circular cave he realized in a split-second before he focused on the person's he saw. 'Is it too late?' he thought as he saw one of the two Akatsuki members sitting on the Kazekage's stiff body. Kakashi recognized the other Akatsuki as a puppet in an instant, meaning that it had to be Sasori of the desert, former puppet master of Sunagakure. He didn't recognize the other member, but seeing the bird made of clay behind him, Kakashi realized that it was the one who took the Kazakage if one trusted the reports he had read about the attack in their time in Suna.

"They didn't bring the Jinchuriki." Deidera, the blond haired Akatsuki said. "How disappointing." He added after a short pause. He had wanted to play a little more and Gaara had been quite a challenge after all, so fighting another Jinchuriki should have been a challenge, too, and with that a good end to the whole mission.

"Wrong." A new voice from the now open entrance of the cave cut in. 'The voice sounds familiar.' Kakashi thought as he spun around fearing the worst being caught in between the Akatsuki even if the voice sounded familiar.

Facing the new arrival Sakura couldn't believe her eyes. There stood her former teammate who had been away for the last two and a half years. "Naruto." She said not really believing the picture her own eyes were showing her. 'Naruto has grown quite a bit; he must be taller than me.' She thought eyeing him up and down and he did wear a new outfit, though it was still orange it was way better than his old jumpsuit as it had large black parts and so way better suited for a ninja, than his former bright orange outfit.

"Sakura-chan" Naruto greeted looking her once over and realized that she had grown into quite a beautiful woman (A/N: leaves to puke [didn't really want to write this, but had to if I wanted it to be realistic]), before he moved on to the others. "Kakashi-sensei." He greeted his old sensei giving him a short nod to which his sensei responded with a nod of his own, knowing that now wasn't the time for greetings or explanations.

'Why does everything have to happen to Gaara?' Naruto thought as he saw Gaara's body lying limp on the ground, the blond Akatsuki member sitting on top of it. His anger began to rise as he remembered Gaara's lonely past filled with hatred and pain and now he was dead, having died all alone in a dark cave. 'I've to stay calm' Naruto thought remembering what happened the last time he had lost control because of his anger. 'Ero-Sennin.' He thought sadly as he remembered the incident from about a month ago. During his time with the toads they had tried everything they could, but Naruto couldn't help it, he still felt guilt about it.

Stepping besides Kakashi Naruto regained all of his control as he suppressed all his anger, sadness and guilt and waited for the Akatsuki's first move, much to the surprise of his old teammates. Kakashi had thought that Naruto would have rushed forward by now, seeing one of his friends laying there on the ground, most likely dead.

On the other side of the cave the conversation between the two Akatsuki members had turned to which art was better, after they both had sparred Naruto one glance when he had spoken up, revealing his location to the presence both of them had already felt and conforming his status as Jinchuriki. But their conversation didn't stay long on their usual topic and changed to them arguing which of them would get to fight the Jinchuriki, as they both wanted to fight him on their own.

"Deidera you little shit… are you trying to piss me off?" came the deep voice of the unusual looking Akatsuki standing to the right side of his partner, from the Konoha ninja's point of view.

"I was right when I said it'd probably make you angry, mm?" the blond haired Akatsuki, now identified as Deidera, said.

Naruto tried to stay calm with all his might trying to ignore that they were talking about him. He wanted to get some action soon, which would make it a whole lot of easier for him to keep his calm, working his anger out of him. Fighting always seemed to calm his temper.

"My fine art is explosions." Deidera said slowly standing up from Gaara's lifeless body as the clay bird besides him stretched its wings and took Gaara's corpse in its mouth. 'It seems like they, or at least him, are readying themselves for departure.' Naruto still trying to stay calm thought as he tried to analyze the situation they were in. "Completely different to your little puppet show!" the blond haired Akatsuki member's voice cut Naruto's analyzing thoughts short.

Angered by his partner's words Sasori's tail lashed out at him, as he the great puppeteer Sasori wasn't one to take insults to his art lightly, aiming to cut his partner in two with the attack. Deidera dodged the attack, which wasn't meant seriously, by simply jumping up landing on the clay bird which had taken flight the same second Deidera had jumped.

"See you master." Deidera said to his partner as the bird began to fly towards the exit of the cave and flew out of said dark cave not much later.

Seeing the clay bird fly out of the cave taking Gaara's lifeless body with it, Naruto quickly took after it rushing outside stopping short to survey the situation and to wait for help, as he was sure that Kakashi would come after him or at least send one of the other after him. He realized that he had unintentionally fulfilled the Akatsuki's anticipation of his actions in taking after him. Deidera had hoped to get the chance to fight against another Jinchuriki, preferably in an one-on-one battle and Naruto did fulfill just that wish.

Kakashi for his part rushed after Naruto only giving Sakura and Chiyo a last command before he, too, was out of the cave. Stopping besides Naruto Kakashi contacted Team Gai over his radio. "Gai, can you hear me? Come back quickly, you're needed!"

"Can't really do that." Gai's voice came over the radio. "We all fell into the enemy's jutsu. It'll take a bit longer." Gai's voice sounded grave so Kakashi didn't even want to know what it was that they were facing seeing that his team had after all been delayed by an Itachi-clone on their way to the cave. Receiving the negative answer Kakashi focused entirely on the bird flying above them. 'I can't afford to hold back here.' He thought as he uncovered his single Sharingan eye.

The bird held its position, enough distance to the Konoha shinobi to be able to dodge all kinds of attacks without much effort at all. "Sharingan Kakashi." Deidera addressed the jounin ignoring Naruto who stood besides his sensei also facing the Akatsuki on the bird. "Are you sure it's me you wanna fight? I dunno if I should be saying it, but master Sasori is stronger than I am."

'He's trying to get Kakashi-sensei to leave, so that he can fight me one-on-one.' Naruto realized but also knew that Kakashi would stay as his sensei would never leave Naruto to face an Akatsuki by himself without knowing how much his student had actually improved and if he was ready to fight against an opponent at such a high level.

Tired of staring the blond Akatsuki down Naruto launched himself forward trying to hit his opponent with a simple punch. The attack however was easily dodged when the clay bird flew a bit higher. Naruto quickly created a kage bunshin which appeared in his way and used it as a stepping stone and launched himself from it gaining the needed height. Surprised by the movement Deidera barely managed to dodge the punch, the bird going into a steep fall for a few milliseconds. Not being able to stop all his momentum while still in the air Naruto hit the flank of the valley with a crash.

Deidera who saw his chance to win the fight simply sent a small clay bird flying from his hand, which took flight towards the orange-clad teen only to be surprised when the Naruto vanished in a cloud of smoke. Reacting in time Deidera quickly directed the small bird towards his other opponent who intercepted it with a single well thrown shuriken not thinking that the shuriken would be sent back at him when the bird actually exploded. So he could do nothing but deflect the shuriken with a kunai as it raced towards him after the bird had exploded.

Suddenly Naruto appeared behind the Akatsuki member kunai at his opponent's throat surprising both Kakashi and Deidera, who both didn't see this coming yet both showing absolutely none of their surprise on their face. "There is no way I'm letting you take Gaara's body." Naruto said from behind Deidera his voice barely above a whisper.

"You are quite the odd Jinchuriki." Deidera said his voice laced with fake confusion trying to buy some time to get out of the situation he found himself in. "I heard that Jinchuriki generally hate people because of their own bad moods. But this Gaara is unusual, too."

"So far there haven't been any Jinchuriki who care about others. Besides him …" the blond Akatsuki said gesturing towards the head of the clay bird's head, in which Gaara's corpse was in, with his hand. "…two Jinchuriki, up until now, were defeated by my peers. Their friends and those of their villages, it seems, not a single one came to save them. Instead, it appeared that they were more on our side … kukuku."

'Nobody should have to endure pain and loneliness all their life only to die alone, abandoned by their own friends and comrades.' Naruto thought and pulled his hand back in his anger, slicing the Akatsuki's throat only to be surprised when instead of blood pouring out the whole body turned into clay.

Alarmed Naruto tried to sense where his enemy was at, failing to find any presence of him anywhere besides the clay bird which had been made by him. Cursing inwardly, he caught a movement below him as a hand broke through the surface of the clay he was standing on and leaped away dodging an attack from Deidera, who broke through the clay and came out of the inner of his bird, by mere inches. Naruto landed besides Kakashi, both totally focused on their obviously cunning enemy.

„Both pitiful and detested, you couldn't ignore each other, mm?" Deidera asked sarcastically. "Because Gaara's 'Ichibi' was extracted, he died. You will share the same fate shortly. Got it?"

Getting angrier with each passing second it got harder and harder to suppress the Kyuubi's chakra, which wanted to get out, but he didn't want to use it ever again after what had happened the last time he had done so. "I will kill you all." Naruto stated as he began to draw the nature's chakra, which was all around him, towards him, eyes turning yellow and were surrounded by red markings, the sign of a true sage.

Perplexed by the change of the Jinchuriki's appearance, totally different then what he expected and what has been reported about his change in appearance while using his demon's chakra, Deidera couldn't dodge the incoming attack and was hit fully on the jaw and sent flying upwards. Only to be met with a kick in the back sending him even higher, only to be yet again met with an attack as a fist crashed into his face sending him down and into the flank of the valley.

Kakashi for his part could only stare in wonder at his student's attack barely able to follow it, not having been prepared for such speed. He saw as Deidera crashed into the hard rock, large stones breaking away from the flank from the force of the impact and dropped into the normally quite stream below them. 'He's not using the Kyuubi's chakra' Kakashi thought as he wondered what and how Jiraiya had taught his student in two and a half years. He hadn't seen Naruto's eyes change and he couldn't feel the Kyuubi at all so he assumed that it was all Naruto's normal speed and strength. 'You've grown a lot, Naruto.'

Naruto could already feel the natural energy spilling away as he moved so he tried to end the fight as fast as possible and launched a handful of kunai, all prepared with an explosive note attacked to them, towards the cloud of dust and debris caused by the impact. 'Fuck!' Naruto nearly screamed inside his mind as he saw the clay bird, which was still able to fly even if parts of it were missing, vanish in said cloud of dust. The kunai, too, vanished in the cloud not a second later, but the clay bird was already out of the cloud with Deidera on its back when the ground began to shake from the force of the explosions.

Dropping to the ground minimizing the force as much as possible Naruto sped after the Akatsuki, whose bird has begun to fly away, not caring if Kakashi was actually following or not. "Wait, Naruto! Don't go too far away from me." Kakashi shouted to his student who slowed his pace down by a bit, even though Kakashi could have easily caught up to his student if he had picked up the pace. 'I'll have to save as much chakra as possible, if I want to win this fight' he thought as he caught up to his student.

They were moving out of the reach of the radios signal Kakashi realized as they followed the Akatsuki member. 'I'll have to end this as fast as possible.' He thought thinking about the possibilities this situation led to. The Akatsuki could lead them into a trap or an ambush, if they followed him long enough.

"Naruto, I have a plan to take him down, just give me some time." Kakashi said to his young student as he began to gather the necessary chakra for his attack. Naruto could feel his sensei's chakra beginning to gather especially in his sensei's single Sharingan eye. "I'm ready now. Let's go Naruto." Kakashi said after a few seconds and Naruto saw his sensei's eye turning into a different form, a form of the Sharingan he had never seen or even heard of.

"Mangekyou Sharingan." Kakashi said focusing his technique on the Akatsuki member in the air attempting to force his head or neck into another dimension. Quickly reaching his limit with the chakra taxing technique, Kakashi had to settle on cutting Deidera's arm of as he hadn't been able to focus his technique good enough on the moving Akatsuki.

Naruto looked in awe at the sight of Kakashi's new technique and he quickly realized two things. The first was that it didn't have the desired effect and second that it took a lot out of his sensei. Realizing this Naruto knew that he should come up with a plan to help his sensei as soon as possible. Coming up with a plan Naruto waited for Kakashi's next try to start his plan.

Just as Kakashi began to attack a second time with his Sharingan technique, Naruto saw his chance and used the natural chakra he had been gathering while waiting to jump as high as he could. Reaching the bird's height Naruto quickly formed a Rasengan in his hand intending to end the fight with it. Seeing the attack both older shinobi reacted. Kakashi deactivated his technique and Deidera leaping away from his position on the clay bird in order to dodge the attack directed at him.

Naruto having thought of that possibility used the Rasengan to cut through the clay bird, splitting it in two parts. A kage bunshin already formed under him which Naruto used as a stepping stone to get to the Akatsuki member who was still in the air and unable to dodge. Meanwhile another two clones pooped into life and caught the head of the bird and brought it safely to the ground. With solid ground under their feet's the clones began to use their hands to dig their friend out of the clay.

Naruto used all his momentum to get more power behind his roundhouse kick and sent Deidera who blocked the kick with his arm speeding downwards. Naruto went after his opponent intending to end the battle as he brought his knee in the Akatsuki's gut shortly before they reached the ground, causing Deidera to spit out blood from the force of the attack just before they hit the ground. Being in the position to end the fight once and for all Naruto brought his right hand down on the man's face, Rasengan forming on the way and drilled into the blonde's face only to have him turn into clay. Growling out of anger Naruto leaped back and landed besides his panting sensei. "Kakashi-sensei, are you okay?" he asked concerned.

"Yeah, one way or another …" Kakashi answered cryptically already feeling the first signs of chakra exhaustion, but also knew that he needed to push on.

Deidera was in a bad situation. He only had one arm left and had to face off against two enemies. His one opponent, none other than Sharingan Kakashi, was still a serious threat even if he was already showing signs of exhaustion. The other was no other than the Kyuubi Jinchuriki, who was a lot stronger than he had anticipated. So he knew that his chance to win was pretty low, seeing that they had reinforcements who would most likely arrive soon. 'Thinking of the devil' Deidera thought as two ninja's landed next to his two opponents.

"Finally caught up" Sakura exclaimed after Chiyo and she landed besides Kakashi and Naruto.

"You are still having trouble here, it seems." The old lady from Sunagakure said with a weak voice, she was obviously already exhausted or at least pretty tired Naruto realized.

"Sakura-chan, the two of you did it." Naruto said happily knowing that his team mate was okay for now.

"Yes." Chiyo answered for Sakura trying to cut the catch up time short. "More importantly, what of Gaara?"

Naruto looked down; eyes cast on the ground and nodded his head once in the direction of his clones, which had finished digging Gaara's body out. Chiyo saw his movement and turned to the area he had nodded to and saw his clones with an unmoving Gaara and understood what it meant in a split second.

Deidera saw his chance to get away without being noticed and began to back away slowly, but was soon intercepted by Team Gai appearing in front of him. Cursing his bad luck Deidera knew that now he didn't have any other chance but to use it. So he leaped away going into the direction of the remains of the clay bird he had flown on earlier.

Evading all the attacks from Team Gai he quickly arrived at the clay remains and took a bite. "Take a look at my ultimate work of art. Art is a bang!" he yelled after swallowing the clay, his body already beginning to blow up.

Neji, his Byakugan activated, saw Deidera gathering all his chakra in one point. "Everyone hurry, get away from here!" he shouted as he understood what the Akatsuki member was doing. Hearing their team mate's shout Team Gai took off, trying to get away as far as possible.

Not a second later Deidera shouted "Katsu!!" and exploded in a huge ball of fire.

Cursing in his mind Naruto tried to come up with a quick escape plan and began to gather the natural chakra all around him, cursing that he still hadn't completed the sage mode; his brain tried to come up with a plan, but failed to do so. Seeing no other possibility to escape the explosion Kakashi activated his Mangekyou Sharingan once again sending the explosion into another dimension. Letting out the breath he hadn't known he was holding, Naruto relaxed and let the natural energy once again dissipate and return towards his surroundings. Kakashi collapsed from the strain and was glad when Naruto's clone landed with Gaara's corpse interrupting Sakura as she asked him about the technique he just used.

Seeing Gaara's body Sakura began to check him shaking her head after she finished with her examination, proving what they had all already known. Naruto couldn't help himself as he started to walk away from them, tears spilling out of his eyes. "Why… was Gaara … always Gaara." Naruto said not making any sense to those who heard him. "To die like this …"

He took another step and leaned against a tree trunk, tears dropping down on the ground beneath him. "First you… and now Gaara" Naruto whispered to himself, so low that nobody could hear him. 'Why? Why did they all have to die? Leaving him alone. Why did it happen to them? I would have gladly died for them.' He spoke in his mind as sadness began to overwhelm him, both the sadness from Gaara's death and the sadness, which he had locked away deep inside his mind, from his sensei's death.

An uncomfortable feeling overcame him as he stared at the tree trunk not really seeing anything at all as his mind was just returning to normalness. Something wasn't right he realized still feeling uncomfortable. He tried to reach out extending his senses as he turned one with the nature. Yes he could feel it, there was a disturbance in the nature's chakra, but he couldn't quite make something out of it, in his state of mind. Coming to a conclusion he went through some hand signs, much to the surprise of his fellow nins.

"Kuchiyouse no jutsu" he said as he slammed his hand on the ground, a bit of his blood still on it from the fight earlier.

"Ah. Naruto-chan, what can I do for you?" a new voice asked out of the cloud of smoke that had yet to clear. The smoke began to clear revealing and obviously quite old and small toad.

"I'm not sure yet" Naruto said as he nodded in the direction in which he had felt the disturbance in the natural energy.

"You've improved quite a bit if you were able to feel that" the toad elder, known as Fukasaku, said as the cloud of smoke finally dispersed completely. "It's a human being beneath the surface." Fukasaku stated calmly putting anybody on edge when they heard his words.

'So it was only a trick to try and get away' Naruto thought as he saw Deidera breaking through the surface and out of the ground knowing that he had been discovered having listened in on their conversation. Cursing his luck once more Deidera looked at his opponents one last time before he vanished in a cloud of smoke.

'Sunshin no jutsu' Naruto thought as he debated in his mind about what he should do. Kakashi was at his limit, Sakura and Chiyo looked quite exhausted as well and the same could be said about Team Gai. Seeing that it would be up to him to follow the enemy, Naruto came to the conclusion that it would be better for all of them to let him get away, this time. Looking back to his team mate's he saw that they had come to the same conclusion.

He saw the old lady from Sunagakure beginning a jutsu, probably a medical jutsu if his knowledge and the green glow of her hands were any indication, on Gaara. While it looked like a medical jutsu to Naruto he knew that it was impossible to bring back the dead, so he looked on in confusion. Next to him Fukasaku looked on quite interested in the proceedings as well, probably also wondering what the old woman was trying to do.

"Damn, not enough chakra" Naruto heard her say. Finally understanding that she was actually trying to bring Gaara back to life Naruto decided to help her. He could feel it with the help of his awareness of the nature, that she was using her own life force to bring him back, sacrificing herself so that Gaara may live again. "Please use my chakra" he said to her waiting for her response.

"Put your hands on top of mine" she said after a few seconds, in which the green glow lessened by a lot. Naruto did as she had instructed and began to focus chakra in his hands laying on top of hers, allowing Chiyo easier access to it.

"Why?" Naruto asked her quietly. "Why are you willing to give your life for his?"

"In the past everything I did was mistaken, but at the very end it seems I am finally able to do the right thing." The old woman said exhaustion clearly showing in her voice. Naruto didn't know what exactly she meant but he hadn't thought she would answer his question directly. "Sand and Konoha, their futures are differing from our past" Chiyo said before she turned away from Naruto and towards Sakura saying a few words to his pink haired team mate.

Naruto closed his eyes paying Chiyo the respect he thought she deserved as she died giving her own life to revive Gaara. Opening his eyes a few moments later having spoken his prayers for the old woman in his mind, he saw Gaara beginning to sit up. "Naruto" the surprised and confused Gaara asked. The last thing he could remember was fighting the Akatsuki member and then there was darkness, only broken through by some pictures and dreams.

Deciding that it's time to leave Fukasaku hopped on Naruto's shoulder. "It's time to leave, Naruto-chan" the toad elder said to the surprise of everyone present, who had all thought that Naruto would return to Konoha with them. "If we come back any later, Shima will get upset, because we will miss dinner."

"If you're sure" Naruto said sadly. He knew that he needed to return to Mt. Myoboku, but a part of him really wanted to stay with his friends catching up with them and just spending time with them.

"Well, by guys" Naruto waved half heartedly to his friends as Fukasaku brought his two small hands together, readying the reverse summoning.

"Wait, Naruto!" Sakura yelled, having been too surprised by the old toad's words before to say something. "When will we see you again?" She didn't want him to leave again after just seeing him for the first time after their years spent training individually, each trained by one of the Sannin.

"Sooner than you might think" Fukasaku answered her question cryptically just before both of them vanished in a cloud of smoke, as if they were two kage bunshin dispelling themselves, as they returned to the mountain of the toad to finish Naruto's training.

"Wha…?" Sakura asked confused about what just happened, never having seen anything like that before. 'Was it just a clone?' she asked herself as she tried to figure out what happened.

"That was a reverse summoning" Gai told the confused teens and the exhausted Kakashi nodded besides him as all the teens looked confused from what they just saw, even the Kazekage himself. They all remained where they were, all staring at the spot Naruto had just been standing on when suddenly a lot of Suna shinobi appeared all around them forming a huge crowd around them.

In the middle of a small room inside a house on Mt. Myoboku Naruto and Fukasaku appeared, just as another older, female toad was setting the dishes on a small table obviously in the finishing state of cooking dinner. Fukasaku hopped of Naruto's shoulder and greeted his wife, while Naruto walked over to the small table and settled down sitting down on the ground.

'I'm growing stronger, Jiraiya-sensei' he thought as he sat there while Shima brought dinner in on a plate setting it down on the small table. 'I will make you proud.'


A/N: That's it.

Well first thing first: I'm not really happy with this chapter. I've even thought of not putting it in the story, but as I wanted to stay near the canon plot (at least for a bit) I had to put it in. I've tried to show some improvements in Naruto, but not exactly a huge growth in strength, etc. As you've noticed while reading the chapter Naruto trained with the toads at his time there, but hasn't mastered sage mode. (More about this will appear in later chapters) Other changes include that he is able to use Rasengan one handed and that he thinks before acting and that he didn't use the Kyuubi's chakra.

Next thing I've wanted to say is that I know I said that there wouldn't be many scenes that weren't about Naruto, as he is the main character, but I had to write the whole introduction to the arc. I could have just started it with Naruto appearing, but I think for a good story (which I aim to achieve) the writer has to write a bit about the whole background situation, too. If not it would look more like a collection of scenes out of the life of him, rather than a story about it.

And now for those of you that actually read these Author notes, I ask you to send me some ideas for the reunion between Naruto and Sasuke (manga chapter 306 – 311). I'm currently thinking of how to write this scene as it is the first scene I haven't planned out yet. While I have a few ideas about this scene, I'm lacking a really good one. So if you have a good idea you want to see in this fanfic send it to me and I'll see if I put it in or not. For those who wonder the scene will only appear in chapter 7 or 8. Many thanks to all who actually send me their ides.

And last but not least I wanted to thank all my readers for their interest in my story. It has already reached more hits than I would have dreamt of it reaching in one week and a lot of you put it on their story alert or favorite list. Thank you all for your interest, I appreciate it.

As a small thank you, I'll give you a small preview of what will happen in the next chapter:

Naruto returns to Konoha. Yugao will have her first appearance and they will meet each other.

For any more detail you have to wait until the actual chapter is out, so I wish you all a happy guessing.