It definitely doesn't feel like a week has passed since I last updated...but that's probably because games took over my life. In particular, a visual novel called Katawa Shoujo; it's one of my favorites, and I recently got sucked back into it.
And if any of you know about it, then let's talk about about how the routes go from Shizune to Rin with exactly one decision that changes the length of the game by about six hours or so.
Ah, to hell with all of my ranting. Let's get this trainwreck moving.
It shouldn't have come as much of a surprise when Naruto found Jiraiya in the onsen, peeping through a hole that had likely been drilled; the man was rather infamous for his spying habits, which extended from his job to his lechery.
"Hey, kid." He said, without bothering to look behind him and see who it was. "What's up?"
"Not too much. Why did you call me out here?"
"...you know why. Don't think I'm stupid, brat, I know that those seals are broken. You're out, just as planned."
The news came as a shock, even to Naruto; first was the information that Jiraiya had been the one to seal him away, likely at the Sandaime's insistence, and second was that the seals were designed to degrade. It made no sense, and went against everything that the sage should have stood for.
"Why?"
"Because of who you are. Your parents and your grandparents. Blood runs thicker than chakra, but family doesn't end with blood. Minato was my student, and later my apprentice. I fought with your mother's parents in the second war. You're like my grandchild, and sensei tried to break that off by asking me to seal you away. He was paranoid then, almost as much as Danzo, and it's started coming back in the past year or two. After you vanished, things got...complicated."
He wouldn't say how, which meant that everything had basically gone to hell after about ten seconds.
"You've probably seen how bad it is. Even if it's not obvious, the nations are building up for a fourth war. Akatsuki's not helping the problems, either...though none of the Jinchuriki have been captured yet. Iwa, in particular, is strong. To match them, we'd need to take Konoha's whole, including your and Danzo's black- and white-masked tools-"
A poor choice of words. Naruto snarled, giving a deathly glare, but Jiraiya refused to acknowledge it.
"-in addition to all of Kiri and Suna. Kumo isn't too far behind them."
"Kumo is on our side. I got a message through to E, so to speak."
"This wouldn't happen to have anything to do with a certain blonde hellcat or that black ring on your finger, would it?"
"Got it in one."
Perhaps Jiraiya's candid speech was just his way of lording power over the younger man. Maybe he was just being an ass for the sheer hell of it. Naruto wouldn't have put it past the white-haired pervert, to be certain...but, then again, perhaps he was just trying to show his concern; the man had said that Naruto was like a grandson. And that he'd engineered the seals to fall apart.
There might have been a slight chance to trust him after all.
"Well, that's good. I'm glad I can still gamble and win." Or not, the brass-balled bastard.
It just wasn't worth the bloodshed, though, so Naruto simply opted to laugh before leaving.
"Be careful, Jiraiya." The teen warned his godfather. "Not all winnings get to be cashed. Take care when you place your bets."
It's a thinly-veiled threat, one which didn't slip by the wizened Toad Sage, but there was nothing that he could do about it; even though he had all kinds of tricks up his sleeves, there was no guarantee he could win against the man they called the God of War...the boy had earned that name for a reason, and Jiraiya didn't ever want to know what that reason was. Though he thought of Naruto like family, there was no denying that the boy legitimately scared him sometimes.
Jiraiya's eyes were downcast as the young man left, their last words about gambling having given rise to particularly cruel memories of a blonde-haired teammate.
"Tsunade...did I do something wrong?"
He vanished.
"It looks like you'll be ready, Sakura. There's just a week left, and you have a great grasp of the skills I've tried to teach. How does taking today off sound?"
"That's...nice. I think it's a good idea."
"You do?" Sozetsu looked surprised. "You actually believe in taking days off?"
"Maybe."
There was a knock at the door. It was powerful and short, a loud staccato, two quick raps against the wood.
"I'll get it." Sozetsu said, wheeling around and rolling to the doorway. "It's probably just some tax collector or another."
When he opened the door, of course, he found that it was decidedly not a tax collector or other casual visitor. A man in black, from his boots to his mask, and a plain t-shirt that was ripped to a tank top. Two very different tattoos adorned his shoulders, one nearly flame and the other one more of a scarred engraving. Red eyes, blood eyes, stared out from behind a black mask of passivity. This was Kitsune, the shadow of death, the master of the Kurojutsu, who Sozetsu had pledged his life to as Kame.
The teacup fell from the pink-haired man's hands, but Kitsune caught it before it shattered against the ground. Handing it back to the paralyzed man, an invisible smile ghosted upon his lips. This was almost nostalgic; he walked in with a short nod to Sakura.
"Hello again, Kame. How has life been treating you?"
"More or less the same as it ever has. The best thing about what happened, though, is that I get to spend more time with my daughter...and that makes up for everything that I've lost."
"I'm hurt, Kame. I enter your home, and you assault me with the one thing I can't have?" It was more of a joke than anything, but it was best to mock hurt in this situation; he would finally be able to explain Orochimaru's words in the Chunin Exams. "What would you have felt like if I had asked how it felt to 'walk' the path of life?"
"I would have laughed at you. Probably thrown a kunai, too."
"Exactly. So don't...bring up children." The last word seemed to stick in his throat, for reasons unknown.
"Fine."
"Um...Why can't you-" Sakura began, also remembering the snake-summoner's words about Kitsune being unable to have children.
"Because I'm a Jinchuriki...but also because I'm male. Female Jinchuriki, for whatever reason, have the ability to pass down some level of demonic chakra from the beings that they host to their children. However, they don't get nearly the same boost to chakra reserves or other perks that men do...like my being able to control seven chakra natures. That's a gift from Kurama, not passed down from me. Our trade-off is that we can't have children. It's frustrating, to say the least."
After that, the day passed in relative ease. They talked and ate, though Kitsune made sure to be gone before Sozetsu's shrill wife (who had passed more genetic traits down to Sakura than would have been fair or necessary,) got home from some council meeting or another. He didn't want to have to deal with her whining about civilian finances and the like, though it was more a general distaste for politics than the woman herself; he'd heard that she could be a very nice woman when she wanted.
That still wasn't enough to prevent him from backflipping from his seat, through the window behind him, when he heard the door open and a shrill female voice declare, "I'm home!"
The night was dark as he came across a redhead and a corpse...though not enough that he missed them, as the full moon illuminated Gaara's silhouette. An auburn-haired woman stood several hundred feet away, though that wasn't likely to let her escape if Gaara actually chose to hunt her down, but then a black-and-white man grabbed hold of her and pulled her back.
The sai was at work, breaking the swords of not-allies so that they couldn't become enemies; that meant that it would be his job to communicate with Gaara...Jinchuriki to Jinchuriki, demon to demon. Brother to brother.
"Do you fear death?" The desert-born boy looked up as he asked the question. "Or are you content to be mother's next meal?"
"You're in no match to fight me, Gaara. Maybe you enjoy the night, the moon and its light, but it's a black time of dark thoughts and darker deeds. The night's time is my time."
"What do you want?"
"An answer to a question."
"What is the question?"
"Why do you fight?"
"To prove my existence. Because I love myself, and only myself."
"Why do you kill?"
"To give mother blood. Because mother loves me, and only me."
"Would you kill otherwise?"
"Yes."
"Then join me, and together we can kill the world. You remind me of myself, Gaara. You're powerful, you're violent...but you lack direction. You need a tunnel to go through, to channel your power into, and I can give you that outlet. Fight for me, fight with me, and I promise that the blood will never stop flowing."
That was enough out of him. He had better things to do than talk to a homicidal psychopath about the virtues of teamwork and alliances.
"But tell me, brother," Gaara began, "and tell me truthfully. Why would you tell me to fight for you when I can simply fight only for myself, and love only myself? In a world where others only exist to magnify that love...a perfect world...why must I rely on others?"
"Because of reasons. You may fight for yourself, but there are others who are counting on you. You're fighting for them, too, in a sense. You might love yourself, and yourself alone, but there are plenty of others who love you as well...or perhaps not, but there certainly can be after a long enough time. Even as you cling to your thoughts of yourself, your selfish love and hatred, you gather people to you. They want to use you...and I don't. I just want you to do what you do best: go, fight, and win."
Sasuke was tired, worn down to the bone. He had a week before the finale of the Chunin Exams, where he was fighting Hinata; given her sudden change in attitude, she was sure to be as hard on him as she possibly could. He needed to be ready...but he needed sleep. He finally managed to find it, at long last, with the help of his red-stone heart. Shiro watched over him, as she always had. She would continue to do so until such a time as there were no Uchiha left, no remainder of her favorite son other than his beastly form of a fox. It was a duty she had chosen for herself, and one she had accepted gladly. She was the Uchiha Spirit, the one who had seen the rise and fall of centuries as no more than the drippings of individual sand grains down an hourglass.
"He looks at peace."
"He certainly does." Shiro responded. "He reminds me of my husband, in fact. So do you, Naru-chan. His drive to cleanse and absolve himself, your desire to understand and control. His gunbai is in Sasuke's hands now, and the Ring of Samsara lies on your finger. The only difference is that he's not the one who wanted to conquer. That was all Kurama's doing. It was a continuation of a pattern long lost to the world, but remembered still...and sometimes I wonder if there are others like me, survivors of the third or even second ages who managed to survive through the rebirth of the first. My son, my favorite child, was you in every sense of the world. He acted like you, talked like you, and even fought like you. He was the first Dark Lord of any particular reckoning, just as my husband was the first Sage and yet somehow the last as well. The path continues with you and your uncle, though you haven't met the man yet, and will continue even after both of you are long dead. I have seen the vision you did, and Sasuke as well. That boy and girl are the inheritors of your power, one a descendant and the other a Sage."
"But you know I can't...Shiro. You know that it's impossible."
"There are ways to go around such a thing, as will come to pass. Four boys and a girl, Naru-chan." The moonlight shone in through the window, lighting up a strip of Shiro's face. "And before that comes, I will be dead. My years are finally ending, my grief too great. I will return to my original state and be destroyed by those who I love. And you will lead that charge...just as you always did, and always is our destiny: to kill what we hate, what we love, and anything that might fall between. You will beg for death before the end, and then grant it to yourself in rage and grief."
"...enough. I didn't come here to hear you talk about the future."
If it were anyone else, perhaps Shiro wouldn't have been able to tell that he was actually afraid. As he walked out, she couldn't resist the urge to call to him one last time.
"Naruto."
He froze. That was the first time, the only time, that she had ever called him by his full and true name. It had always been "Naru-chan," or "Naru-kun," and sometimes even just "Naru," but she had never once said his name aloud.
"Take good care of them. You're my last hope anymore...you, Sasuke, and the other eight. The only chance I have left to say that millions of years of work wasn't for nothing, that my husband and I were right."
Kitsune bowed, red eyes giving off a somber and solemn look through the mask he wore.
"Yes."
He left, giving space to the ancient and yet youthful woman who was alone in her thoughts. She was alone now, in a sense, so she didn't have to be strong for anyone's sake anymore. A set of tears fell from her eyes as she leaned back against the doorframe, closing her eyelids and starting to slow her breathing. Only when she was certain that Kitsune had left, that nobody would hear her, did she let the tears fall freely.
"Kazama..."
As he walked away from the Uchiha district, abandoned for more than eleven years except for two homes, emotions ran amok in his mind and on his face; he had reached his decision, though it had been made for some time, and would stick to it. He was the shadow across the leaf, the knife that pierced it and nailed it to a tree. He was black and red, hatred and rage, the soul of the Dark Lord now firmly ensconced in his body. It had consumed Kurama, and his hosts, and many others before or after them...but he, as always, was different. He was, for real and true, the Dark Lord Kitsune.
Believe it.