Technique Acquisition

The fox observed his container absorbing the knowledge and memories of his clones, once Mizuki was defeated and an idea occurred to him. All he had to do was change it so the little monkey absorbed knowledge from any chakra he came in contact with…

"What are you doing?" the chakra ghost of the fourth hokage asked, coming out of the shadows, ready to reinforce the seal with his remaining lifeforce.

"Giving the runt a bloodline," the fox said while carefully enhancing the brat's ability to sense and absorb foreign chakra.

"And why would you do that?"

"The longer he lives, the greater a chance for me to escape," the fox replied absently.

The forth relaxed a bit, finding the fox' reasoning selfish but beneficial to his son. "And what will this new bloodline do?"

"He'll be able to sense, absorb, and gain knowledge from a wider range of chakra sources," the fox explained grudgingly.

"Like the Sharingan?" the fourth asked when it became apparent the fox was done talking.

"If he survives a chakra based attack he can duplicate it, if he's touching someone and they use a technique he can copy it."

"If an attack leaves a strong enough residue for him to absorb…" the fourth said in wonder.

"He'll gain knowledge of not only what was used but who used it and what they were thinking," the fox said smugly as he finished his work.

*0*0*0*0*0*0*0*0*0*

It was like a tingling in his extremities, if his extremities extended a dozen feet from his body. It had crept up slowly after the last two weeks but asking the few adults he knew and trusted just led to him getting 'the talk' from four different people and a couple of books to read.

It snapped into focus during a free spar with Sasuke…

"Phoenix fire jutsu!" Sasuke called out, shooting a large ball of flame at Naruto, or rather one of his clones and watched with some satisfaction as it vanished.

Naruto turned and in a near match for Sasuke called out, "Phoenix fire jutsu!" sending an even larger ball of flame at him.

Sasuke froze in shock, forcing Kakashi to save him.

"How long have you been working on that?" Kakashi asked Naruto as he appeared beside him, setting Sasuke down.

"Working on it?" Naruto asked.

"On learning Sasuke's favorite jutsu," Kakashi pointed out.

"I haven't," Naruto began only to get blindsided by Sakura.

"You could have killed him, you moron!" she yelled, her anger lending strength to her blows as she started wailing on him.

*WHAM*

Sakura hit the ground with a thud as Naruto's glare faded and he stared at his right fist as if it had betrayed him.

"Reflex?" Kakashi asked Naruto.

Naruto nodded dumbly, not looking at the unconscious Sakura.

"Looks like a broken nose," Kakashi said after examining her. "I'll run her to the hospital, you two stay here."

After Kakashi had left Sasuke turned to Naruto. "How did you learn that jutsu?"

"I don't know," Naruto admitted.

"You don't have the Sharingan," Sasuke said. "So how did you copy it?"

"I didn't see the jutsu, I felt it!" Naruto snapped coming out of his haze.

"Felt it?" Sasuke demanded.

"Yeah, you'd just hit me with it and then I knew!" Naruto yelled.

"Hit you with it and you just knew," Sasuke said trying to puzzle it out.

"Yeah," Naruto said.

"Make a clone," Sasuke ordered.

"Why?"

"Just do it," Sasuke ordered.

"Shadow clone jutsu," Naruto called out creating a half dozen clones.

"Come with me."

A/N: Stole the idea from El Hazard.

Typing by: Bankrupt Samurai