The twittering of bird reached his ears, the faint smell of flowers wafted into the blonde's nose as he sat up. White, that was all he could see, the hospital. Naruto swung his feet around and lightly touched the floor. Doggedly he looked in the drawers next to his bed for his clothes, putting them on he walked slowly out of his room and down the hospital steps, to the main lobby. People were being rushed around, there was a man on a stretcher his hitaite was lying next to him, Naruto stared at the sight, a dead ninja. He stopped for a moment as time seemed to freeze around him, as his mind recalled his battle with the suna-nin.
A touch broke him out of his reverie. "Excuse me Uzumaki-san, what are you doing out of bed." A nurse, she looked at him inquisitively. Naruto turned to face her and stared up at her, "I'm declaring myself fit to return to active duty and am discharging myself from the hospital." With those curt words he walked out the doors of the hospital into the dreary Konoha that he loved so much. Looking around he noticed that he hospital was being refaced, damages were obviously due to the invasion. Sitting himself down Naruto watched the builders work for a moment; he looked around and spotted the head technician. He walked towards the man, "Demo Tech-san do you need more workers?" The old aged man looked down at the young-nin with a questioning gaze. Naruto simply formed his favourite cross sealed hand sign and summoned 50 clones, all packed with chakra, so they could withstand heavy hits.
The man looked at the Nin, and gestured him to come over to him. The man put 10 of his clones to work under each of this contractors evening the workload out, Naruto himself helped the technician in organizing the work effort. Within 8 hours the hospital front was as good as new, the technician smiled down at the boy. "Come with me to the Kage-tower Naruto-san." Naruto dutifully followed the man, keeping in time with the larger individuals loping strides.
When they reached the tower, Naruto noticed everybody's sullen visages and asked the secretary where his Ojii-san was, needless to say he was shocked at the choking of tears that came from the normally angry woman's eyes as she engulfed the jinchurrikki in her embrace. "He's dead Uzumaki-san, Hokage-san is dead." Naruto's world rocked, his cornerstone, the bedrock of his reason to live had gone, a void had opened in the young-nin's heart that could never be filled. Slowly he left her embrace and walked through the double doors past her that led into the Hokage office, and came face to face with the council members, and tech-san. Danzo looked at the jinchurrikki with barely concealed distaste. Homura smiled at Naruto, and thanked him for helping in the effort to rebuild the hospital; she threw a small scroll to him and told him that it was the equivalent to the pay of a D-ranked mission. " I express my deepest regret that the pay could have not been poor young nin however we are going to be facing much difficulty in the coming few years to build our village back, I'm sure you should understand."
Naruto silently, turned away from the elder and placed the money pouch onto the sill as he walked out of the office. Carrying on walking he failed to notice the brief smile that flitted along the face of the council members, unknowingly he even made Danzo gain some respect for the blonde loudmouth who obviously cared very much for the village. A lone onyx eye watched from out of the window, as his student walked past Kakashi quickly sunshinned in front of the boy and grabbed him, and sunshinned once more, to training grounds 7.
"Where have you been all day gaki?" Sakura's screech caused Naruto to keel over slightly; he looked at her with red eyes from crying. "Nothing sakura-chan I was discharged from the hospital earlier so I help tech-san work on the hospital"
Sasuke sighed at his blonde friend. "Come Naruto we have to get ready for the sandaime's funeral." The voice brought both boys out of their staring match, Naruto felt a hand on his shoulder and looked up to see Kakashi-sensei towering over them.
They walked slowly along with the procession of shinobi to the gathering at the gravesite of the Kage. Team 7 stood together silently watching as the council members made speech after speech to the memory of the god of shinobi. One by one the ninja loyal to the third walked to the mans grave and placed their white lilies by the deceased mans photo. Naruto stepped up, most of the ninja gathered knew about how the old man had cared for the boy, and stood in respectful silence, as the boy gave his own speech to the dead, to their leader.
"Ojii-san if you can hear me know this, as a child I looked up to you I worshipped you and I always wanted that hat off your head. Now as a teen I still want that hat, I envisioned myself taking it from you in your old age, and standing there with you watching me proud of me. One day I will be as you were. And I will protect this village with my life, with the flesh of my body the blood in my body I will work for Konohagakure as you would've wanted. In your memory."
Kakashi stood and walked forward and gave the surprised teen a hug and they walked, out of the congregation with Sasuke and Sakura on their heels.