Here is the next chapter! Late thank you to those who reviewed, and thank you to all who like my story so far.

This is unedited so sorry if there are any mistakes. I hope you like it!

Things written in italics are thoughts

DISCLAIMER: I do not own Naruto

CHAPTER 2

It has now been a week since Kakashi has taken Naruto into his care. Naruto was walking along side Kakashi in the new outfit he had gotten him, a black t-shirt, a sleeveless orange sweater, and blue jean pants. The whole outfit just emphasized the blonde's cuteness, which is why Kakashi specifically picked it out.

At this moment, the two of them were on their way to see the Hokage. He had made it mandatory for Kakashi check-in with him every week or so about Naruto's condition. Once they had reached the Hokage's office, Kakashi knocked on the door.

"Come in!" the Hokage yelled. When he saw who exactly had entered, he perked up a bit interested in how things were going. "So, how has Naruto been doing?" Sandaime asked Kakashi, full of curiosity about Naruto's condition.

"Naruto has been adjusting pretty well, though there have been no improvements concerning his memory loss. I, on the other hand, have been having some trouble adjusting. The kid keeps getting into trouble, one thing after another, and there are times that I keep forgetting that this ten year old boy has the mentality of five year old."

"Oh really? Explain to me," the Hokage asked, curious to hear about it.

"Well…"

FLASHBACK

Naruto and Kakashi were out training in the woods when they came across a lake.

"Ooo! Kashi, can we go swimming?" Naruto asked as soon as he spotted the lake, his short attention span not letting him stay focused on his training.

"Sure, why not? You could use a break," Kakashi said as he walked over to sit by a tree and opened his book.

As soon as he had gotten the word of approval, Naruto stripped off his clothes and jumped in the lake. However, he had wandered too far from the shore and the water became deeper quicker than he had expected it to, and since Naruto didn't know how to swim that well, he started drowning.

"Kashi! HELP ME!" Naruto shouted while trying to stay above water.

Hearing the cry for help, Kakashi looked up from his book only to see the boy drowning. Kakashi wasted no time in trying to save him as he ran towards the lake and jumped in, clothes and all. He grabbed the now limp boy in his arms and pulled them both out of the lake. He noticed that the boy was not moving, so he checked to see if he was still breathing. 'Nope, he's not breathing. This is not good,' and proceeded to perform CPR on the boy. Naruto coughed up water and looked up to see Kakashi hovering over him.

"Are you okay Naruto?" Kakashi asked looking down at the boy, worry written all over his face.

"I'm okay now," Naruto said while sitting up. "Thank you for saving me," he said as he gave the older man a hug, tears forming in his eyes, "I thought I was going to die!"

"I'd never let you die Naruto! But as long as your alright I guess everything is okay," Kakashi said as he hugged the boy back. "Maybe we should do something else today, now that the lake seems like a dangerous place to be," he said as he stood up with the boy. "But tell me Naruto, do you even know how to swim?"

"Ah, well… I actually don't know how to swim that well. No one ever bothered to teach me," Naruto grinned sheepishly.

"Naruto, you should have said so before, I would have taught you how to swim," Kakashi said shaking his head.

END FLASHBACK

"Well it sounds like Naruto gave you some trouble Kakashi," Sarutobi laughed

"Yeah, well Naruto almost drowning was not fun and I hope it never happens again," Kakashi said.

"But its okay since Kashi was there to save me!" Naruto cheered.

"Kashi?" the Hokage raised an eyebrow.

"It's the nickname he gave me," Kakashi said gesturing toward Naruto.

"Yo, old man!" came a yell as the doors busted open. "Ya gotta hide me! I got the women from the baths hot on my tail, they somehow found out I was there. Oh, sorry, didn't realize you were with someone already," the man said as he finally took notice of the other two in the room besides the old man. "Sorry to bother you. Guess I'll go find somewhere else to hide."

"It's alright Jiraiya, you can stay," Sandaime smiled at the man, using an extra dose of friendliness in his voice. "It's been a while since we last saw each other, hasn't it?"

"Ah, yeah it has," Jiraiya laughed nervously, he wasn't liking the tone his old sensei was using.

"After being away for over a year, this is how you greet your former sensei? Coming to me after getting yourself in trouble?" Sandaime said with a disapproving look.

"Well you see, I was just doing some research for my new book…"

"Enough already," the Hokage interrupted the man. "Kakashi," he said turning towards the silver haired ninja, "I'm assigning you a mission for today."

"But Hokage-sama, what about Naruto?" Kakashi questioned.

"No need to worry about Naruto while you're away, Jiraiya here will take care of him 'til you get back."

"What! You're saddling me up with a brat! You can't do that! Now I won't be able to do my research for my next book!" Jiraiya protested.

"I can, I will, and I just did," the old man said right back. "This is to keep you from doing your so-called research and causing more problems for me." That said, he turned to face the blond boy in the room. "Naruto, is that okay with you? This man is going to take care of you today while Kakashi is away on a mission."

"Okay," Naruto replied looking towards the less than enthusiastic toad sage.

xXx

Now that Kakashi had left for his mission, Naruto was walking behind a very unhappy Jiraiya.

"Alright, listen kid, this is what we're gonna do for today," Jiraiya said after stopping and turning around to look at the kid. "You are gonna keep your mouth shut and do as I say so I can do my research in peace. Oh, and you're not gonna say a word of this to the Hokage, got that?"

Naruto only nodded so as not to anger the older man any further.

"Okay, off to the baths we go!" Jiraiya smiled, having a complete 180 turn in attitude now that Naruto agreed to his terms, and marched off in the direction of the baths.

Once they reached the bathhouse, Jiraiya snuck around until he found a spot with a good view, with Naruto following right behind him.

"Ohoho, this is a good spot right here," Jiraiya said with a lecherous grin as he pulled out his binoculars and notepad. The two of them were sitting up in a tree right above the women's bath.

"I don't think this is very nice to the ladies down there," Naruto said, still full of innocence.

"Didn't I tell you not to talk so I could get my research done?" Jiraiya said, annoyance laced in his voice.

"But, still…"

"You know what? Forget what I said before. Why don't you just go down and play or something," and with that he pushed the boy out of the tree, completely forgetting where they were and not thinking of what would happen afterward.

Naruto screamed as he fell out of the tree into the women's side of the bath, hitting his head on one of the rocks when he landed. Jiraiya, realizing what he did, quickly went down to get the boy. The women screamed as the events played out: a boy had fallen into the baths and now a perverted looking man was there also. All the women were screaming and throwing things at the man as he grabbed the kid, trying to chase him out.

Finally, Jiraiya had made it out of the bathhouse with the kid. Looking down at the boy though, he noticed that the blond was knocked out from that bump he got on his head.

'Maybe pushing him out of a tree wasn't the smartest idea ever,' Jiraiya thought to himself as he brought the boy to the hotel he was staying at to rest until he woke up.

At the hotel, Jiraiya placed the boy down on the futon to rest. He was hoping that the boy would wake up quickly and that nothing would be wrong with the kid. Now he was left with nothing to do until the kid woke up. A couple hours passed with nothing but mumbling and tossing and turning coming from the boy.

"Ah, no… stop, don't…. " Naruto mumbled in his sleep.

'Wonder what the kid is dreaming about. Doesn't sound too pleasant from what he's mumbling and the look on his face. Must be having a nightmare,' Jiraiya thought as he looked down at the boy with concern, feeling guilty for what he did.

"NO!" Naruto yelled as he shot up in bed, panting slightly. "Huh? Where am I?" he asked aloud, looking around in confusion.

"You're in my hotel room. You've been knocked out for a couple hours now," Jiraiya said as he walked up to the boy. "Sorry about pushing you out of that tree."

"It's okay, it was my fault anyways. You told me not to talk while you did your research but I did anyways. Sorry."

Grumble. Naruto blushed looking down at his stomach.

Jiraiya chuckled. "Hey kid, you wanna go get something to eat?"

"Can we get ramen?" Naruto asked with big eyes, unsure of what to expect from the man in front of him.

"Sure we can get ramen," Jiraiya said as he walked towards the door. "Ya comin' or not?"

"Hai!" Naruto smiled as he scampered to catch up with the taller man.

xXx

Now that he was done with his food, Naruto leaned back in his stool and allowed for his stomach to digest. Jiraiya could only look at the boy in amazement. The kid had been able to wolf down five bowls of ramen! Jiraiya just shook his head to clear it of the disturbing scene he just witnessed.

"Okay, now that our meal is finished and the fact that it's starting to get pretty late, I think it's time we went back to see the Hokage to see if Kakashi is back or not."

"No need 'cause I'm right here," Kakashi said as he entered the ramen stand. "I figured you'd come here to eat, Naruto."

"Kashi! You're back!" Naruto yelled in delight as he ran up to give the silver haired ninja a hug.

"Yup! I finished my mission as quickly as possible so I could come back to get you," Kakashi smiled and hugged the blond back. "I'll be taking him now Jiraiya-sama."

"Ah, wait Kakashi, before you go there's something I need to talk to you about," Jiraiya said as he motioned for Kakashi to come closer. Curious about what the sannin needed to tell him, he set Naruto back down on the stool and got closer to the toad sage. "There was something that worried me a little when I was with Naruto today. After he had fallen and hit his head, Naruto started having this bad dream and was tossing and turning and mumbling things in his sleep. Maybe you should ask him about it since it seemed to freak the kid out, he woke up screaming and panting," Jiraiya said in a serious tone.

"A nightmare?" Kakashi wondered. "I'll be sure to ask him about it," he said as he turned back towards Naruto, holding out his hand out for the boy to take. "Come on Naruto, let's go." And with that the two left the ramen stand, hand in hand, to head back to Kakashi's apartment.

A little time had passed since Kakashi and Naruto had left Jiraiya at the ramen stand when he realized something very important.

"AH! Kakashi that bastard! He left me to pay for Naruto's bill!" he cried in sudden realization as he looked down at his now empty wallet.

xXx

It had become dark outside when the two had finally reached Kakashi's apartment. Naruto's eyes were drooping and his steps were becoming more sluggish and overall it looked like the blond was about ready to crash. With a yawn as they entered the bedroom, Kakashi got out Naruto's pajamas and helped the boy get ready for bed, however Kakashi just couldn't seem to get the sannin's words out of his head.

"Naruto, Jiraiya-sama told me that when you two were out you hit your head and had a nightmare while you were passed out. Is that true?" Kakashi asked worried about the boy.

"Yeah, I hit my head, then I had this really weird dream," Naruto said through another yawn.

"Can you tell me what your dream was about?"

"Well I can't remember much and it was kinda fuzzy, but there was this person – I think that person was very important to me – but he was turning away from me, leaving me all alone and no matter how much I tried to run and catch up to him, I couldn't," Naruto said a little sad towards the end.

'That doesn't sound like a normal dream. Could it be that when he got hit on the head, his memories started surfacing? I should go report this to the Hokage.' "That really is an interesting dream Naruto. Now you should go to sleep, I'm going to go see the Hokage to report about my mission so I'll be right back," Kakashi said turning to leave after tucking Naruto in. He was stopped though when he felt a tug on his sleeve and turned around to see Naruto gripping onto it tightly.

"Wait Kashi, don't leave. Stay with me?" Naruto asked looking up at him with his patented puppy dog eyes that were impossible to say no to. "I don't want to be alone."

"You won't be alone Naruto. I'll be right back," Kakashi said trying to reassure the boy.

"But…but…please stay, I don't like the dark. Bad things always happen in the dark," Naruto said quietly looking away.

"Fine I'll stay with you," Kakashi sighed, laying down next to the boy, stroking the soft blond hair. 'I guess I can go and report to the Hokage about Naruto's condition until after he falls asleep, though I wonder what it could be that made him afraid of the dark?'

TBC

I hope this chapter was good. Ah, I can't believe I made Jiraiya such a jerk towards Naruto! Well at least he warmed up to him later.

Please review! I would love to get feedback from you guys. Any ideas you have are welcome since I'm not 100% sure on where I want this story to go. Anyways, thanks for reading!