Hey guys new story.

Thanks to ABitterPill for brainstorming.

Chapter 1

"What is going on?" Naruto asked the technician.

"We're still trying to figure it out Hokage-sama." The man bowed in apology. "There is a lot of interference."

"From the Stone?"

"No sir, from a field surrounding the Stone." Naruto looked past the Konoha technician at the last remnants of the Stone of Gelel, it was no bigger than a thumb but was a source of endless grief.

Naruto remembered many years ago of his mission against Haido and the invasion of Suna. Haido used Temujin and his royal blood to manipulate Gelel with the overall goal of conquest. Naruto, Shikamaru and Sakura put a dent in those plans. The vein from where Gelel originates was supposedly destroyed by a black hole, taking the Book of Gelel and most of the vein with it.

It has laid dormant for almost twenty years buried under rock. Except everything changed when Suna started picking up energy readings from Gelel's resting place; the world destroying kind of energy. Garaa made the call and Naruto responded immediately, bringing his best fuinjutsu specialists along with him.

"Of all the things to come back and bite us, this was the last thing I expected." Naruto sulked as he looked at the Stone with mixed feelings. It stood at the centre of a crater surrounded by experts from both Suna and Konoha. Strange silver energy pulsated around the stone, only for every few minutes to discharge with a thunderous boom. The problem was the discharges were becoming more and more frequent.

"I know what you mean." Garaa nodded. "The energy field has been sporadically discharging and building up."

"Like a generator firing up?"

"Exactly." Garaa's sand rattled around in the small gourd on his belt. Years of training resulted in having to carry less sand than what was required, but his deadliness was without question. "My concern lies with why the Stone is doing this now, after all this time."

"I think I can answer that." One of the technicians called out. Naruto and Garaa were on him immediately giving the rather diminutive shinobi their complete and undivided attention. Having two kages watch you like a hawk was both flattering and incredibly intimidating. "Uh…heh…the field itself is not originating from the Stone."

"What?"

"The field is not being generated from the Stone, but rather the energy is being gathered around the stone, almost focused."

"Then what is the stone doing?"

"Near as I can tell, it is acting as a beacon for the field."

Garaa furrowed his brow in confusion. "Then what is generating the field?"

"Unknown sir." The technician winced. "We are still having a trouble getting a lock. It's like the field is being generated by itself."

"You know that makes absolutely no sense, right?" Naruto stiffened slightly.

"I know that sir, which is why I ran it by everyone else before I told you. That is the consensus." The technician jerked his thumb back to several fuinjutsu specialists and sensors who all nodded in agreement, albeit some were more reluctant than others.

"Great." Naruto pinched the bridge of his nose. "This is more confusing than I thought."

"Uhh….sir?" One of the technician's piped up. He sounded more worried than what Naruto was comfortable with. "Something's happening here."

The field around the Stone pulsated with the pace of a rapid heartbeat, strange terrifying light slid off the field casting shadows and began to drown out the sun above them.

"It's going to discharge." Garaa concluded. "Everyone evacuate the area." Naruto had to admire Garaa's calmness in the situation. He had the ability to act nonchalant when he was in fact just as terrified as Naruto.

"No sir!" The technician cried out. "It's not discharging, the field is stabilising! Stand back!"

The silver energy field began to expand and grow, encompassing an area of at least forty square meters with no signs of slowing. The light was almost blinding. "Stop it from expanding! Seal it off!"

"Sir!" Several men acknowledged and began to form the seals. "Fuinjutsu: Kurobe."

Black swarms of ink sprung from the ground wrapping around the silver ball of light in a lattice structure, each string of seals falling over one another reinforcing the whole. The ball of energy ebbed and finally girded to a halt.

The light began to die down but rather than dissipate, the energy took on a distinctly liquid characteristic. The strange field looked like a globe filled with mercury, sliding seamlessly in the air like oil. "Can somebody tell me what is going on?" Naruto asked, and silence he was given said it all. "Great….Can somebody please take this thing offline?"

Several shinobi started whispering in hushed tones to try and find a solution. While Naruto was waiting for a solution he could not help but notice something was moving inside the ball of silver liquid.

Naruto approached the silver energy field, until he was so close he could see his reflection. His reflection however was radically different than his current appearance; different clothes, different hairstyle…different eyes. "What the hell…?"

Then his reflection punched the silver liquid sending ripples across its surface.

Naruto yelped in surprise and instinctively used his Shunshin no jutsu to distance himself from the reflection. Only the reflection did not dissipate, it remained where it was and it looked very angry.

"Why won't this fucking thing OPEN?!" The reflection howled, slamming his fist against silver orb.

"Naruto! Stop it, you'll collapse the field!" A voice called out, the Hokage instinctively looked around only to realise no one was calling to him; the voice came from within the orb. Men who were busy working stopped to marvel at the spectacle wondering what the hell they were witnessing.

"We are so close." The reflection turned to the side. "I am not going to let this entire thing fall apart on the last spurt! Now help me or get out the way!"

"Sir!" A technician called. "There is more energy build up. The seals are beginning to fall apart. Recommend we supress it now."

"Goddammit!" The reflection cursed. "Why can't we get through, what is going on?!"

"Naruto…" A voice replied, a calmer older voice, one that Naruto knew well. "This is a dead end. Come on we have to leave now."

"And go where?!" The reflection screeched slamming his fists against the barrier. "To hell with that!"

"What the hell…?" Naruto gasped. Maybe he was too loud in his surprise because his reflection immediately zeroed in on him.

"Kakashi…there is someone out there." The reflection squinted at Naruto, clearly the view was not as clear from….whatever it was' end.

"Naruto, forget it." The voice the Naruto immediately recognised as his sensei replied. "You made a call, it didn't work. No blame."

The reflection made a violent gesture as if he was throwing something off. "I know someone is out there and I know you can hear me! You have to help us!"

Something twisted inside Naruto, what it was he could not define, but he knew he did not like the feeling. Whether it was because it was his reflection desperately pleading or because its eyes showed fear and terror, he could not say. "We have no food! No water! We have nowhere else to go!" The reflection cried out. "Please help us!"

"Sir," a shinobi spoke up, "we have a lock on the source, and we can seal it off now."

"There are people here!" The reflection yelled. "They're dying as we speak!"

"Sir, what are your orders?" The shinobi whispered.

"If you turn us away, we're as good as dead!" The reflection smashed itself against the silver barrier. "You're killing us!"

If this was someone's idea of a joke it is not funny. Naruto turned to look at Garaa who was just as stumped as he was. The look in the Kazekage's eyes said it was his call.

Jackass…Naruto thought.

-your orders?

-you're killing us!

"Release the seals." Naruto ordered, though in actuality it was more like a question.

"Sir?" The shinobi asked.

"Release the seals." Naruto repeated a little more confidently.

"Sir, if we do that, we cannot guarantee containment if it gets out of control."

"I understand…" Naruto bit his tongue at the chance to back out, "release the seals."

'Kai' was uttered several times. The seals encompassing the silver orb began to fade.

"Naruto! The portal is working! We're getting through!" A voice called out from the silver orb. The reflection jeered in surprise and steadily walked through. After a brief gulp of air, the doppelganger began to cough violently and roughly collapsing to his knees.

0o0o0o

"You're real..." Naruto did not know what to expect but this silver orb turning out to be a portal was not one of them.

"Of course I'm real." Naruto's reflection gagged, well it would be inappropriate to call him a reflection now it was clear he was more than a mirror image. "Thanks for not turning us away."

How does one say thank you to yourself, much less say you're welcome? "Well I could hardly say 'no' could I?"

"What do you mean-?….oh" The doppelganger looked at Naruto clearly for the first time and his eyes widened briefly and surprise. "Huh…this is awkward."

Awkward was right. Naruto's vision was blurred because of the barrier but now that his doppelganger came through he could see how similar they were and also how different.

Naruto loved the colour orange, something to do with it fitting his personality. Looking at this other version of himself he saw not a trace of his favourite colour, what he wore instead was standard shinobi attire covered head to toe by dust and soot. His sleeves were tattered and riddled with holes, the kind you get from being close to an explosion. His shoes were little more than pieces of leather held together by duct tape and blind luck. His hair although spiky did not have the 'sheen' Naruto had and his skin had a disturbing grey-pale colour, which reminded Naruto of something that was dead. Whether it was his actual pigmentation or dust was something to be discussed later.

More importantly though were his eyes. His left eye was just as blue as Naruto's, but he could tell that they lead very different lives. His eyes were full of fear and misery, mistrust and paranoia. Whatever life the doppelganger lived was nothing like Naruto's, the way he crouched the way he held his scarred hands told Naruto that his life was filled with danger, without opportunity for rest or respite.

His right eye, made Naruto's breath hitch. Rather than the usual blue, the right eye held the grey ringed pattern of the Rinnengan.

The Rinnengan.

What the hell?

"I know you have many questions." The doppelganger interrupted Naruto's train of thought. "But I have more pressing matters. I am not the only one on the other side. I need them to come through, they'll die if they don't."

The very urgent nature of the reflection's request made Naruto want to concede almost immediately. But as he said, Naruto had many questions.

"Who are you?" Naruto asked, realising how dumb that question must have sounded. Clearly his doppelganger was losing patience.

"Do I really have to dignify myself to answer that question?" The reflection seethed.

Naruto slowly shook his head. "Guess not. Bring them through." Naruto could feel the tension uncoil inside the doppelganger. "Thank you…." He whispered, he stood up shakily before calling out behind him. "Come on! We don't have all day! Move it!"

The next person to walk through was an eerie man with strange grey hair followed by another person…and another.

….and another.

…and another.

Naruto gave up counting after the number of people that came through reached two hundred. This is definitely not how he planned on ending that day.

0o0o0o

Naruto had seen war, he had lived it. But he was on the front lines, close to the fighting, not near the back like Sakura was. On the rear, there was only the wounded, sick and the dying. Only now did he wish that he brought some medic nin, what came out of the portal could only aptly described as victims of war.

Everyone, man, woman and child were famished, filthy and tired. They were all covered in soot and bundled in rags. Some could not walk through the portal due to injury and had to be carried out, others were unconscious.

These were the moments that made it difficult to be a Hokage, or indeed any leader; everyone looked up to you for guidance. Only now could he see his shinobi looking at him, almost pleading to tell them what to do.

Garaa was thankfully more up to the task. "Contact Suna, get the medic corps over here immediately." Garaa turned to another nearby shinobi. "You forage the surroundings, food, water, anything you can carry."

"How many people are there?" Naruto asked.

"I've got 364." Garaa paused. "And counting…"

"What the hell is going on?"

"I'm sure 'you' can shed some light." Garaa hid a small smirk.

"Jokes? At this time?" Naruto tried to play the straight man, but failed horribly when a smile escaped his lips. "I don't even know where to begin."

One of the war veterans, the strange man with grey hair walked to Naruto's copy. "That's the last of them Naruto. There are 376 souls accounted for."

"What? Bullshit!" The doppelganger grabbed the stranger by the scruff of his shirt. "Where are the rest of them?!"

"They're dead Naruto. You know that." The very words seemed like a slap across the face. The copy gave the stranger a look, the same look Naruto gives when he thinks someone is lying.

"No…no that's impossible." The doppelganger walked back to the silver portal. "I'm going to get them."

"Naruto!" The stranger ordered. "What are you doing?!"

"I'm going to help them. I'll bring them back. You'll see." The reflection's advance was halted by a tight grip. Naruto could sense Garaa's sand rattling around ready to break out a potential fight.

"You have to listen to reason." The stranger grunted as he tried to wrestle the reflection away from the portal. "Naruto, there is nothing living in that world! It's over!" The doppelganger froze and turned to face him, a look of horrid disbelief. The stranger sighed and reluctantly let go leaving only a tight grip on his shoulder. "You have saved 376 souls. You did it Naruto." The stranger's voice was barely a whisper. "But that is all you can do."

"I can't….I can't leave them." The reflection frowned, eyes shining from tears. "They depend on me, they trusted me, I have to save them."

"Naruto, you saved the last of us. We have a future, and for that, alive or dead, they will be forever indebted to you." The stranger's tight grip turned into a gentle touch. "But if you go back there, you won't make it. Look the portal is beginning to destabilise." Sure enough the silver ball, was beginning to lose its liquid composition. It was falling apart faster than it could reassemble itself. "Let them go."

After an eternity, the reflection looked away from the portal and huffed out something between a sigh and a sob. The portal collapsed in on itself until the only thing that remained was the Stone of Gelel.

It was over.

0o0o0o

Many of the shinobi, Naruto's and Garaa's shinobi tried to help the new arrivals. The kage were not worried, most of them were in no position to pose a threat. Most of the arrivals were inflicted by some form of injury, some debilitating, others critical. The medics of Suna were on their way and Naruto sent word to Konoha to send a squad as well. In the meantime all they could do was wait and make them comfortable.

Naruto's doppelganger sat shakily back on the ground away from the others that came with him, facing a rock face. His body was shivering with frustration and sobbing, trying to hold himself together.

Naruto was a master of the kage bunshin, he has seen and fought himself a thousand times. But this was not a bunshin; it was a strange feeling looking at himself as if for the first time, thoughts flooded his mind. Could this be another version of me? An alternate universe where things went different? Naruto paled when another thought came to his mind; he recalled a time when he had to stop a shinobi called Mudake from altering time and he was sent back into the past. Could this be my future?

He had to know. "You think we can get some answers now?" Naruto turned to Garaa, who nodded in agreement.

They approached the doppelganger with care –

"I think he will be in no mood to talk." Both Kage spun around to see the stranger. The man was garbed in a black mask, with only his left eye revealed, his voice although familiar had a bland robotic tone about it. He wore a suit that was eerily similar to the Chakra armour worn by the Shinobi during that fiasco in the Land of Snow.

"I think we are entitled to answers, sir." Garaa spoke smoothly.

"I am not arguing that, but I am saying that my Naruto is not in any position physically or emotionally to give them." The stranger ruffled his grey hair. "But I am willing to answer them for you."

"Very well then." Naruto stood forward. "Who are you?"

The stranger glanced at the kage in a way that was both familiar and bemused, something which made Naruto very uncomfortable. "My name is Hatake Kakashi, Konoha jounin." Naruto blinked several times. "Kakashi-sensei?!"

"Now that's a title I have not been called in a while." The stranger closed his eye as if savouring it. "So I taught you in this world too huh?" The stranger pulled off his mask to reveal Kakashi. Only it was not Kakashi. Like Naruto's 'reflection', there were similarities, but at the same time completely different from the Kakashi he knew.

Kakashi looked old. Really old, as if he was thirty years older than he should be. Something that made Naruto blanch at the thought of this being a future he has yet to experience. Naruto smirked slightly when he saw the trademark fabric covering the lower part of his face, but lost it immediately upon seeing the upper part of his body; half his head was metal. It was not a helmet, Naruto could tell that much, but rather a part of him. The Kage could see this Kakashi's flesh seamlessly transfer to cold grey. Now that Naruto noticed, a substantial part of Kakashi's body, specifically most of his left side was metal. The Sharingan glowed brightly in Kakashi's metal 'socket' where his eyes would have been. This Kakashi looked less like a man and more like a cyborg.

"Kakashi…" Naruto repeated dumbly, "…w-…what happened?"

"Ah, I see that my accident did not occur to this dimension's Kakashi." The duplicate mused. "He must be devilishly handsome."

"D…does it…"

"It doesn't hurt." The duplicate winked.

"Where are you from?" Garaa spoke up. Kakashi turned to look at the Kazekage, only he did not have a look of affection but rather wary mistrust. Naruto had a feeling that their Garaa was nothing like his world.

"A dying world." Kakashi responded. "A war broke out, one that devastated the planet and all life on it."

"The Fourth Shinobi World War?" Naruto gasped, what could have possibly gone wrong to warrant the death of a whole planet. "Did Ōtsutsuki Kaguya win?"

Kakashi looked surprised as a man with three quarters of his face hidden could be. "Who the hell is Ōtsutsuki Kaguya?"

Naruto blinked in confusion. "That's not what happened?"

Kakashi quickly recovered his composure. "There was a war but did not involve whoever Kaguya was. It was a war between men. It just spun out of control and engulfed the whole planet."

"Then who won?" Naruto followed up.

"Nobody won."Kakashi shook his head. "All we got was the end of the world."

"How?"

"You would be surprised what kind of weapons people make to kill someone else…weapons that you can't even believe exist." Kakashi explained. "Have you ever heard of nuclear weapons?"

"No."

"They're weapons capable of unleashing devastation greater than a tailed-beast bomb…and were unleashed to all the corners of the globe. Black clouds smothered the sun, sending the whole world into darkness." Kakashi turned to the arrivals. "Many chose to stay behind to try and buy us time to escape. Naruto grabbed who he could and lead them as far away from the battles. But there was nowhere to go. He decided to use the Book of Gelel to try and save us, we don't know what it would have done, but it couldn't have made the situation worse. It would've either destroyed us or it wouldn't work and we would die out from hunger and fatigue. We had no idea it would take us here to your world."

Naruto sucked in a breath and asked the question he feared the most. "When does this happen?"

"Ah, you must think I'm from the future?" Kakashi paused in contemplation. "How old are you Naruto?"

"I'm twenty-eight."

Kakashi chuckled mildly in amusement. "I wouldn't worry about that."

"Why not?"

"Because our Naurto is twenty six as well." Kakashi nodded. "The war broke out thirteen years ago. If it hasn't happened now, it will never happen."

Naruto heaved a sigh of relief, and deep down he felt guilty for being so relieved. "Thirteen years of war…Did…?"

"Come on Naruto, I'm sure I taught you better than that, no matter what dimension I'm in. People die in war Naruto." Kakashi explained. "We lost a lot of people: good friends, family, loved ones."

"I'm….sorry." What else could Naruto say? 'Better you than me'? 'Wow, sucks to be you'?

"It's in the past. I thank you for letting us through Naruto. I know it couldn't have been easy." Kakashi winked again. "If you didn't we would have all died."

"You're welcome." Naruto felt himself blush slightly. "But in all honesty, I sounded pretty genuine and I couldn't turn people away when they need help."

"Seems you and my Naruto have some things in common." Kakashi glanced behind him to see the other Naruto still twitching and shivering. "…he lost many things. I don't know how he managed to hang on for so long. He used all the strength he had to get us here…and now that we're here…"

"I get it." Naruto nodded; burnout, nervous breakdown he's seen it time and again, but only in other people. Never did he suspect that it would happen to him. "But if he's anything like me, I'm sure it's nothing Icharu ramen can't fix." Naruto grinned.

"I…don't think that's wise." Kakashi glanced back at the doppelganger warily. "He…needs to be introduced to things slowly." Kakashi turned back to the kage, "I know you probably want to speak to him, but I'm asking you treat him with kid gloves. He's not in a good place right now and he needs time."

"Kakashi, we need to get these children medical attention ASAP." A voice called behind them that gave Naruto a strange sense of déjà vu. Garaa turned around to explain the next step. "Medics are on their way you have - oh shit."

Naruto turned to face the new arrival, only to see a man who has been dead for many years in his world.

Hyuuga Neji blinked at them in mild fascination.

"Oh shit…" Naruto wheezed. "Hinata's going to freak."

0o0o0o

There you go guys hope you enjoyed it.

Review and PM