(BREAK) Cause my normal breaks don't save.
Kenshin sprinted torwards the first obsticale, a rope hanging from a beam about twenty feet long. When he got within a few feet of it he jumped and hit the rope with both feet about eight feet off the ground. Everyone thought that he'd missed when the rope flexed around to let him pass.
But the samurai stayed on the rope, swinging back and forth with just the flats of his sandles touching it then he began to slowly walk up the rope.
Most of the gathered students were scraping their jaws of the ground at the sight and even a few of the teachers were impressed, for someone without a history of intense ninja training to use an advanced chakra control technique was definately a surprise. They were even more surprised when Kenshin reached the top an tranferred to walking long a rope suspended between the first pole and a second forty feet away. And not just walk along it, but rotate around it as well.
At the end of the second rope Kenshin hopped down the twenty feet onto a small pond, landing without a ripple, and started to walk acrossed the pond torwards a group of rolled up reed mats. Easy enough for most genin to do with a little training, until the teachers noticed that a part of the pond was boiling hot with a cloud of scalding steam over it, and the samurai went right through it without a second thought.
Kenshin walked out the other side of the steam cloud without a mark on him, heck he wasn't even wet, and continued towards the rolled mats. Before he got there Kenshin pickup a stick about four feet long and maybe an inch in diameter in his right hand and held it loosely at his side.
None of the students could keep up with the speed of Kenshin's movements as he walked through the group of rolled mats, slashing at each multiple times as he past by. When the samurai was done with the mats they fell as one in about ten pieces each. Kenshin dropped the stick and crossed the finishline like he had just taken a light stroll and not run a highly difficult obstical course.
"Now that was just plain cool!" one of the older students shouted as Kenshin picked up his coat and put it back on. Naruto and Kushina just tried to keep a straight face as they watched the rest of the class talk about what they had just seen. they were used to Himura-sensei doing this kind of thing, in fact they had seen him do things that made this course look easy.
After class had let out the Uzumakis and Kenshin walked back to their house together for the last time. Naruto and Kushina both were practically silent the whole way, which led Kenshin to believe that they were slightly depressed about the situation.
"Alright you two, out with it" Kenshin said as the door closed. Naruto and Kushina looked at each other for a second before they both launched themselves at the person they saw as their friend, father and mentor for the last four years. They didn't say anything and Kenshin didn't need to hear anything to know what was going through their heads so he just let them get their emotions incheck before he told them what they didn't wont to hear.
"You'd better have a damn good reason for leaving us!" Naruto finally shouted as he clung to the front of Kenshin's kimono, Kushina would have added her two cents but was to bisy tightening her deathgrip next to Naruto to speak.
"My two year contract with your granfather is up and I am needed in the court of the Fire Lord to resume my place as a Hitokiri. I would have loved to stay longer but my request was roundly denide." Naruto and Kushina both clung a little tighter too him "But I will be back to check on you both around the time you make Genin."
"Promise?" they both asked.
"Too with in a couple of months a most." Kenshin answered. The two kids seemed to relax a little bit and loosen their grips on him. Kenshin pick them both off of him and ushered them towards their room.
"Now I wont you both packed and ready to go in thirty minutes. We need to get you both settled in your new apartment before I need to leave and make sure to your both fimiliar with the surrounding area." None of them was fooled by this light tone of voice, being 'fimiliar with the area' ment that Naruto and Kushina would be putting in so many booby traps that an army would be hard pressed to get in safely.
When the Uzumaki kids were packed the group walked to the address that the Hokage had given them. Kenshin was becoming more and more discusted as the path went farther into the seedy districts of the leaf village before finally leading them into the 'old' district, a section of the village that had taken serious damage during the Kyubi incident and never repaired. It covered several blocks and was made up of the former Namikaze compound and the old shopping district.
After the group had been walking for a few minutes they were meet by a pair of Ambu agents that led them to a large gate. in front of the gate stood the Hokage and a person in an ornate red and silver wolf's head mask with an orange swirl on the back of a black cloak that hid the rest of their body.
Kushina and Naruto didn't bother to hide their emotions from the two men as they walked up and the Hokage could feel his alliance with they clan getting weaker by the moment and the city council wasn't helping the matter.
"Sorry 'bout the walk but this is the best I could get for you." He didn't mention that the they owned the Namikaze compound any way and that he and Koga had used a small amount of that money to buy the rest of the old district which ment that Naruto and Kushina now owned one-tenth of the whole leaf village. Said kids could tell that he wasn't lying and that just made them madder.
"I would also like to introduce you to one of your grandfathers Ambu, who will be checking up on you from now on" the Hokage indicated the person next to him before he walked away from the small group back towards the Hokage's tower and his paperwork. The Ambu walked towards the Hitokiri and the two kids in his care. the kids backed away at the ninja's approach, which didn't make the ninja any happier about the way this 'great' village had treated them and vowing to rip some new assholes when they got home.
"Would you mind if we continued this conversation in the house Himura-sama?" the ninja asked, Kenshin nodded his agreement and the group trooped into the main house. Naruto and Kushina sat as close to Kenshin (and as far from the Ambu) as possible.
"Ambu, if you would please remove your mask and introduce yourself? I assure you that your Identity will remain a secret and that I have authorization for this from Koga Uzumaki and that the Fire lord backs the request." Kenshin asked. The Ambu paused for a moment before reaching up and unclipping their mask.
"I know this Himura-sama, my name is Nami Uzumaki, of the Third house of Uzumaki. My code name is 'Hound' and I would like you to refer to me by it when in public Naruto-sama, Kushina-sama" The Ambu removed her mask to reveal a girl about sixteen years with cherry red hair and light blue pupil-less eyes, Nami's hair was braided very tightly and reached almost all the way to the small of her back and was wrapped in a cherry red silk scarf for most of its lengh.
"I have been instructed by Koga-dono himself to serve, protect and train you both in the basic jutsu of the First house of Uzumaki for the next two years though I won't be living with you on a permenant basess as I still have to conduct other missions for the clan, if I am away for more then a two weeks another of the clan Ambu will take up my station until I return, probably from the Third or Forth Houses. Do you have anything you would like to ask me Naruto-sama?, Kushina-sama?" Nami asked as she knelt in front of the two children.
"Ya why the hell were we left in this Kami forsaken hell hole?" Naruto asked. Kenshin leveled a stern glare on Naruto for his mouth but didn't say anything. Nami though flinched at the simuring anger that she could detect in the less then civil way Naruto asked his question. She would have to be very! careful in how she answered the question or she and the rest of her clan could loose the trust of two of their most promising youngsters.
"If what I've been told is accurate, then it was to protect you for outside threats Naruto-sama, though if we'd been aloud we would have removed you from this place at birth and raised you in one of the creshes of the First House, but the Hokage said that scence you were born in Konoha then you were a citizen of the Leaf village and would stay in the village. He and Koga-dono came to an agreement that you would stay in the village until you made Chunnin then you would be free to choose weather or not to stay in Konoha or leave it, with the clause that where ever you went so to would the rest of the Uzumaki clan." Naruto and Kushina spent several minutes thinking about what they had just heard before Kushina asked a question that would dictate how the two delt with their relatives in the future.
"And what would or could happen if someone in this village were to succeed in kill us?"
The temputure in the room seemed to drop almost instantly into the subzero range as a chaotic auroa of death surrounded the female Uzumaki Ambu as she looked her young changes straight in the eyes.
"Then this village would have been razed to the by Koga-dono and the rest of us Uzumaki clan!" Nami said in a low growl that would have (and did) scared the Kyuubi No Kitsune shitless.
BREAK.
Later that night Kenshin slowly walked down the road that would lead him to the capital and the court of his lord.
As he walked he though about the two kids that he was leaving to the mercy of fate and a hateful village. After everyone had calmed down from a very tense first introduction Kenshin and Nami had gotten down to the buisness of going over the training scedual with each other and the two munchkins and ended with their elemental type being determained (Wind and Water) and an explaination of what that would mean for their future training and jutsus, then Kenshin had shuffled Kushina and Naruto off to bed with a cup of tea and a warning to not be late for class in the morning.
After the pair were asleep Kenshin spent and hour informing his releaf about the more important (the nessessity of hot cocoa and ramen was repitedly mentsoned) and/or dangerous (like their habit of throwing knives at people who entered their room while they slep unanounced), then bide Nami good night (and good hunting) and departed for the capital.
He only hope Konoha didn't do anything stupid before he got back.
Chapter End.
I would like to appallagise for the long wait that my readers had before this chapter came out and will make no excuse for the tardyness. Hope I at less made it worth the wait.