DISCLAIMER: I don't own anything from the Naruto universe.
Thinking (+ flashbacks, "Naruto speaking to Kurama in her mindscape," etc.)
Emphasis
Bijuu, etc. speaking
Bijuu, etc. thinking
Her father was being weird but the only thing Naru knew for sure was that they were to wear standard attire rather than their ANBU uniforms.
"Kakashi and I can't go with you on this mission. Well," Minato said, looking back and forth from Kakashi, who was clearly miffed, to (his biological uncle) Dragon, "I think there would be far fewer problems if we did. But you have to forego the mask."
Nawaki sighed heavily but took his mask off, sealing it away into his arm - something that his grandniece found fascinating.
Minato flashed away again and this time, showed up with Tenzo and Sai. And then Shizune! "Yay," Naru said cheerily. "The gang's almost all here, huh?"
"Hai, hai," Minato agreed, glad that his daughter was happy. "This is an A-classed mission. Dragon has been informed of the mission parameters and will explain once you arrive closer to your destination."
Dragon turned toward his team, saying that he would go by "Ki" on the mission, and gave his team the coordinates.
Naru may have been a total goofball in her last life, (and totally overwhelmed with even maps back then,) but she knew that the place they had been flashed to was familiar - and on the other side of the Wind border.
Noticing the wheels turning in Naru's head, Minato pulled her off to the side. "You'll figure this out soon enough, Naru-chan, but please. Don't change anything - and don't say anything! ….The only reason you're here is because of our agreement with Kazekage-sama for you to bring our ambassador back to Konoha. After what happened last time, I want your team to stay with you."
She almost said okay but nodded instead. Kakashi pulled her into an (awesome,) embarrassing, desperate kiss and she had to lightly shove him off, laughing as she did so.
How he always hid his face from others while he did stuff like that was beyond her.
"We won't be gone long, brat," Nawaki said. Naru noticed that he was snickering to himself, though - and so did Kakashi. Minato flashed his student away again before he could interrogate the team leader.
Once they'd traveled north for a while, Nawaki pulled out the mission scroll. "We are hunting a missing-nin named Mukade who was last seen haunting the ruins of a place called Roran." He popped his niece on the jaw so that she would close her mouth; it had just fallen open. "There's a bunch of ley lines that converge in that area which is why the mission is ranked as highly as it is. Supposedly."
He passed out badass but big chakra blades to each of them and Naru remembered going after this guy: the missing-nin had been a puppet user. But what the hell had happened? Why couldn't she remember anything else if she remembered the guy so clearly?
TBI or the seals on my mind: either way, Naru figured that she would just go along with whatever needed to happen and catch the guy. Really, she felt that it was a wonder that she could do anything considering what a delicate organ the brain supposedly was and how much hers had been messed with.
The things Naru could remember about this mission happened exactly as they had before: they were each attacked by a mechanical puppet that was incredibly strong but considering the team and their skill levels now, it was pretty easy to overcome them. Naru was a sensor now and was used to using chakra-conductive weapons. Wind was also a bad thing for a puppet-user (or anyone) to go up against.
Sai made an ink bird which carried them far underground to the ruins of Roran. On the way down, Nawaki (aka Ki) explained more about the mission. "The ley lines are an enormous source of chakra. They were sealed away by Hokage-sama many years ago. Our job is to protect that fuuinjutsu formula at all costs."
Her father's kunai was sticking out of the center of the tunnel one of the newest gigantic puppets had made which went deep, deep into the earth. Fortunately, there were a few paths to get to it; unfortunately, their target made it down to it before them.
Mukade was already monologuing when Naru made a run at him. Claiming to be the future ruler of the entire universe, Naruto couldn't wait to smash a little humility into his thick skull. Instead of just pulling the kunai out, the bastard started somehow absorbing the sealing formula and then pulled on the kunai! It caused a huge explosion.
Naru regained consciousness, flat on her face, to the sound of singing. She turned over and saw a pretty redhead who was singing through her tears. "Hey! Are you an Uzumaki?" The girl gasped and began to run away. Naru chased her. "Wait! I promise not to kill you if you're not! It'll be okay!" Apparently, that was the wrong thing to say because the bitch tried to trap her in the tower she'd awoken in. Naruto got out quickly enough, breaking through a high window. She gasped when she found herself in a city.
Admiring the tall architecture for a moment, she reached out her senses and was shocked to find somewhat familiar chakra signatures nearby. Distracted, she was blasted underground by more of that asshole's incredibly sophisticated puppetry but was caught by an Akimichi's fist. Kikaichu flew up to break the things apart and Naru found herself sitting next to her owl-masked father - who didn't have Kurama in him! Either that or he'd really sealed her furry friend down.
He looked kinda skinny, though, too.
"Um, hello."
What kind of mission is this?!
Judging by the way her father's eyes were glued on her almost instantly healing wounds, he didn't know her and was suspicious of her. And he was with Choji's father even though he looked a little scrawny, too - she was positive it was him - and maybe Shino's father! They were all wearing owl masks.
"You are a Hidden Leaf kunoichi?" Minato asked, studying the young woman along with her headband and Jonin vest.
"Hai," Naru drawled out, her mind working fast as she became more and more irritated that she'd gotten herself into even more weird bullshit.
Then her skinny father ordered her to leave! —What a bunch of crap! The jerk and his team sunshinned away from her immediately afterward. "Did I go into another past?" It had to have something to do with the Hiraishin kunai's space/time fuuinjutsu formula that the guy had pulled out of the ground. She didn't remember this happening before!
Oh well, off to find her team then…
She sensed Tenzo but on the way to him, stopped to observe the potential-Uzumaki girl come out to wave from a balcony at a crowd of puppets. Naturally, (just Naru's luck,) the girl fell off of it. Naru got herself involved in more bullshit than she wanted when she rescued her. "Are you alright?"
After the redhead calmed down she introduced herself. "I am Sora, the High Queen of Roran."
"Cool," Naru replied, figuring that she could be a granny by the timeline she'd just come from. "Are you an Uzumaki?"
"Uzu… I don't know what you're talking about!"
"Oh." Naruto was disappointed. "I'm Hatake Naruto. I've, uhh… gotten myself into a situation, I guess you could say. That balcony of yours looked rigged just now."
"How dare you," Sora began but gasped instead of continuing to go off on the blonde. "I felt like I was pushed," she said in a small voice.
"If someone's after you, we better stick together."
"Who would be after me?" Sora asked, absolutely appalled. "I am the queen! My people adore me!"
"Why," Naruto began, rolling her eyes as the redhead scolded her. "You're the queen! That's one reason why someone WOULD be after you: politics?" she clued her in, nearly in disbelief that Sora couldn't or wouldn't imagine it. "There's always some bad guy that wants to take over and rule the world…"
Junior Minato and his team sunshinned in again. He startled her and was lucky that he lived to see the day. Fortunately, even during this time her father was very fast and avoided the kunai she tried to slash him with. He'd surprised her.
"So, you didn't keep your promise," he said. His chakra was sizzling.
"I didn't promise anything, jackass! Oh - sorry…" Her temper was going to be a problem, wasn't it? She didn't want to admit that she was scared and really wanted to get her teammates and go back home! The LAST thing Naru needed was to be even farther in the past than the one she'd just been living.
Naruto jumped again when Sora put herself between her father's team and her. –Sora seemed surprisingly brave at that moment and really layed into them.
"Why are you here, anyway?"
Minato huffed at both young women. "We are here to protect the queen." He stared at the blonde young woman in front of him and when she gave him a cheesy grin - so reminiscent of his soon-to-be-fiance - felt his heart speed up. He took off his mask and his teammates followed his example. Minato knew all of the shinobi in his village at least on paper - and she was definitely not one of them. "I… feel like I have no choice. We are on a secret mission. A shinobi from the future infiltrated Roran a few years ago…"
Naruto slumped back against the wall behind a brooding Sora as she listened carefully to what her father was saying. "This has gotta be your fault. You better be able to get me out of this, old man!"
"Old?" Minato said in disbelief then sighed heavily. "If my guess is right, you're also from the future."
"Not bad," Naru complimented her father's intuition. "Although telling an unknown ninja about a secret mission is dangerous. …I'm safe, though! My team and I are after a rogue shinobi named Mukade."
"As are we," Minato said. "Why don't we start from the beginning. How did you find yourself here?"
And so, Naruto explained what had happened to her and her team. The redheaded Queen Sora ran off like an idiot but it's not like she was getting far. When her father handed her his "most" special kunai, Naru could admit that she was a little bit touched. "So. You know who I am?"
"Let's not go there. Learning things from the future might change my decisions." Minato didn't like the look of heartbreak that took over her face and couldn't help but reach out and pat her head as she wiped away tears. "Let's concentrate on defeating Mukade, hm?"
"Right." Naru gave her young not-yet father a lingering look before taking off to find Sora. It turned out that Sora's people were in hiding from "The Puppet Princess" whom they thought was ordering her people to be taken from their families. Sora didn't believe it until she saw a puppet of herself come out on another balcony and wave to her adoring fans - who were all puppets, too.
It was creepy as fuck! And why go to all this ridiculous trouble?
Understandably, Sora was a mess. She told Naru the story of her mother, who could control the power of the ley lines - which meant that she could control vast amounts of chakra. Her mother and their advisor, Anrokuzan, had built a magnificent, modern city. Considering Anrokuzan's mechanical skills, Naruto guessed that he eventually changed his name to Mukade. It was either that, or Mukade was a descendant of Anrokuzan.
- Possibly, anyway.
The young women also discussed their absent mothers and their legacies. Naru realized that she had forgiven her mother for whatever happened in her seal - when Kushina pulled the chains out of her. Sora surprised Naru when she vowed to continue her mother's legacy and find the truth about what was going on in her beloved city.
Sora's people had been enslaved. When they found the center of the ley lines, Sora put a stop to their flow. Naturally, that was when all of the puppet parts laying around reassembled and attacked - under the control of Anrokuzan, of course.
Where the hell is my father?! Or my TEAM?!
They were nearby! Why weren't they helping?!
Anrokuzan - or his puppet: it was really weird - began monologuing (again) as he finally trapped Naruto in an enormous puppet while she and her clones desperately fought off the machines. He admitted that he killed Sora's mother and laughed about killing Sora now, too.
The bastard didn't expect a giant fox to work its way out of his big steel puppet, though.
"Hmph! As if a human could devise something capable of eating our chakra!"
"Damn straight!"
Minato, who was watching from above them, gazed upon the young woman in something between horror and wonderment. She has to be my daughter! But if she has the Kyuubi, that means… God: he felt sick! He jumped down with his team after "Naruto:" he'd heard the queen call out to her - her name is the same as Sensei's protagonist - seemed to kill Anrokuzan with a wind chakra-enhanced punch.
The man got right back up even though his skull had been partially crushed.
Naruto gasped as she felt Kakashi's chakra - it was small to be his but - OhmygodOhmygodOhmygod! A chibi kawaii Kakashi was blowing up explosive notes and running all over the room. Naruto made a clone to take off after him but followed her young father's orders to get Sora to safety.
Minato fought the puppets but almost tripped when he saw several of the blonde's clones make his Rasengan: something he'd only recently created! Hell, even his sensei had only managed to copy the thing less than a week ago… This is no time for an existential crisis! Minato knew that he had to accept things for what they were. "Don't let your guard down!"
Naru was pissed that this guy and his monster puppets just kept getting up - even when Shibi (I knew it was Shino's dad!) continued to absorb all of his chakra with his kikaichu. "OI," she called down to the puppet master. "Are you related to Akasuna no Sasori?" She turned to her father so that she could explain. "Sasori turned himself into a puppet, too, 'ttebayo. –Oops."
Her father began gaping at her
"Hey, do you think Sasori's an Uzumaki? He has red hair."
"...Please stop talking!"
"Kay."
Naru made more clones that tried - keyword: tried - to take down the giant, mechanized Anrokuzan/Mukade-puppet who was, at this point, destroying the beautiful city of Roran. Sora was encouraged to lead her people to safety but got caught in Anrokuzan's chakra strings. The redhead was such a trouble-magnet that Naruto felt that she had to leave her chakra blade with her in order for her to ever be safe.
It was only much later when she, Sora, AND the future Yondaime fell off a crumbling bridge and nearly into a pit of lava that Tenzo showed up with Dragon, rescuing them all.
Minato was grateful but utterly shocked. Mokuton?!
"Gah! Tenzo-sensei you've got Kakashi-kun," Naruto cried excitedly, bouncing on her toes. Tenzo rolled his eyes even as his adorably small future senpai tried to get away from him and bragged to the Yondaime about initially "rescuing" him! Little Kakashi is such a little shit!
Minato asked for the kunai he'd given Naruto back so that he could forever seal the ley line. He did so and looked up from his position to see that the woman he just knew was his daughter from the future - hell, their chakra even resonated - was holding his student to her breasts and smothering him with affection even as she and her team began to fade away, headed back to their own timeline. He cleared his throat, wanting (not for the first time) to punch Kakashi in the face. Shouldn't he be upset with this "Naruto," though, instead?
What in the world was going on here?!
Naruto couldn't help herself! Kakashi was so LITTLE! "Look at you! You're so kawaii!"
"Get away from me lady!"
"Maa, maa, Kakashi-kun," Naruto teased as she bent down to his height. Kakashi was blushing past his ears. "I'm gonna give you a decade or maybe two? And you'll be… well." Kakashi looked scandalized, but Naru sure did notice that he was staring into her cleavage. "My cute little pervert."
She cackled wickedly and something was said that made Tenzo pop them both on their heads.
She wiped the tears from her eyes, still chuckling to herself. It was sad that she already had to leave them.
Sora rambled on about how Naru had inspired her, surprising Naru greatly. They had spent a lot of time talking, but Naruto hadn't meant to say things that swooned Sora like this.
"Buildings are buildings; things are just that: things," Naru said to the queen as she continued to fade away. Sora's city was basically destroyed in this fight. "Lead your people well wherever you may go, Sora. The people - all of your children - are the future kings, ya know." She gazed at the young Kakashi lovingly.
"I will! I promise to never give up, Hatake Naruto!"
"WHAT?" Minato and Kakashi squawked.
Nawaki threw his head back and laughed as Tenzo put his face in his hands. "You might want to use this, Nephew." He tried to hand the completely bewildered Minato a memory suppression seal, but the future Yondaime was already running through hand seals.
"Memory suppression jutsu!"
Happily for Naruto, she'd appeared close to Sai and Shizune in the "future" before the jutsu had a chance to affect her team. "That was awesome!"
"You are a menace," Tenzo said hotly.
"You guys could've helped me a LOT earlier with those damn puppets! But seriously? Do you guys think that Mukade guy was related to Sasori? –I mean, we are close to Suna! And wasn't Kakashi-kun just SO cute?!"
Tenzo mumbled under his breath, almost in disbelief that he had to deal with a scolding chibi-Kakashi whom he SAVED before he had to save Naruto and her father. And then senpai told on him! "He was still the same shit he is now!"
"I'm gonna tell him you said that!"
"NO! Naruto, don't!"
The sad thing was that when they eventually returned to Konoha, Minato refused to pay them for that part of an A-ranked mission since he didn't believe anything they said. He'd forgotten the whole thing!
What a drag.
It wasn't until the team approached Suna after their jaunt to the past that Naru felt it. Something was very wrong.
"I… need to go." Naruto wasn't quite sure where she needed to be, but it was definitely not here. Shizune began fretting over her but Naru kept her eyes on the gates of Suna. She could feel Gaara close by and ran at full speed to him, startling her team.
"Gaara-kun! What's going on?!"
"It's good to see you, Uzumaki," he replied, puzzled at why she would be checking him for injuries. He watched as two of her clones sat down beside her. The Mokuton user dispelled them and he could've sworn that his first friend's eyes turned from yellow to blue. "What was that?"
"I need to find out what's going on," she said in just over a whisper before realizing that she was caught in chakra strings.
Naruto looked back at Nawaki who was wearing his mask again and hissed at him like a cat. "Let me go."
"Will you excuse us, please?"
Naruto was all but freaking out and felt only slightly calmer when she felt Shikamaru's calm, cool chakra in Suna.
"Naruto-hime," Dragon began, "what is wrong with you?"
"I - I don't know!" She searched internally and found a few of the bijuu sitting there in her mind, looking at her. Although everyone but Kurama occasionally disappeared from view; for some reason, it made her nervous that both Matatabi's and Gyuuki's avatars (or whatever they were: she needed to ask about that) weren't present. "Something's wrong…"
"Calm down: that's an order," Nawaki stressed in a hushed tone. He watched as Naru took a deep breath and wondered if Minato had yet requested that Naruto be relieved from the ambassadorial moving-protection duties. He used sign language to ask the key question. "Do you sense the Akatsuki?"
"No." Naruto didn't think that meant much but was sure that she'd at least feel Kisame's chakra if he was nearby. Or Zetsu's. Tobi's chakra, on the other hand, would just appear to her out of nowhere, so she didn't trust her ability to sense him nearby at all. "I don't."
"I think we've missed something."
"Exactly!"
"Not out loud, idiot!"
"Sorry," she smiled brokenly at her team. "Sorry, sorry, Kurama." She followed her team back to face Gaara and his brother. Geez: Kankuro was looking at her like she was some kind of weirdo. "Forgive my…"
"Nonsense," Gaara interrupted, studying her cautiously. "Temperatures have recently soared and I know you run hot, Naruto."
"That- that's true. Thanks, Gaara."
Kankuro began complaining about how informal the two were with each other. His complaints and weird comments - and the way he sometimes talked to himself in general - made Naru calm down considerably.
"How's Fu-chan doing?"
"She is well and integrating successfully into Suna."
"Ohhhhh? Will I soon be hearing wedding bells?!" She laughed at the way Gaara's cheeks turned pink and noticed, for the first time, that he had very light freckles on his nose and the tops of his cheeks. Ah! He's not wearing his sand armor right now!
"You're such a tease, Uzumaki."
Naru laughed and followed the Sabaku brothers to the hotel her team would be staying at. Collapsing in bed after a quick shower, she ignored Shizune who was determined to ensure that she wasn't overheated. It turns out that she had a frighteningly high fever. Shizune and Nawaki took turns putting cold cloths on her and Naru fell into a fitful slumber. She woke up in the middle of the night and it was only her ninja training that kept her from screaming.
"Naruto?"
"Shika," she gasped, grabbing onto her brother's shirt. He'd moved over to sit on her bed. "I… it was a dream!"
"I think your fever broke. I heard you were stuck in the desert."
"Yeah," Naru breathed, drawing her hand through her sweaty hair and getting her wits about her. "We got shoved into the past."
Shikamaru gave her a very dry look as he thought about the little he heard Dragon and Tenzo discussing their previous mission. "THAT'S what they meant. What happened?"
"We were sent way into the past, Shika-kun. I don't know how old Kakashi was but my dad almost looked like a teenager!"
"Troublesome." What was the deal with time-traveling jinchuurikis?
"Yeah. I just can't stay in one place or time, huh?" She took a long drink of the water that was sitting next to her bed but couldn't get the images she's just seen out of her mind. "Fuck. I - I know this sounds stupid but I had this nightmare about Ero-Sennin. He was battling it out with these redheaded dudes."
"The Pein guys?"
"I don't know." She walked over to the window. Suna was really beautiful but cold at night and the stars were particularly bright here.
"It was just a dream, imouto," Shikamaru said, hoping that was true. "Shizune-san and I switched bunks so I could keep an eye on you tonight. Go back to bed, huh?"
"Yeah," Naru agreed, feeling much cooler. She grabbed some fresh PJs and cleaned up in the bathroom, still feeling exhausted. Shikamaru was already going back to sleep when she realized what he meant. "Shika! Does that mean, by any chance, that Shizune-nee-chan and Tenzo-sensei are shacking up together tonight?!"
"You are so troublesome." Shikamaru couldn't help the wicked smile that grew on his face, though. He threw one of his pillows at his pervy sister who had begun giggling. It was good to see her again and Shikamaru was glad that she was feeling better now. "Go to sleep!"
But nothing was ever so easy when it came to Naruto.
"I think the Akatsuki attacked Kumo! While we were in the past!"
Nawaki tried to grasp what his grand-niece was saying; how she knew any of this. He had been deeply asleep - for him - when Naru kicked down his door.
"Calm down, Naruto," Shikamaru again scolded.
Naruto had KNOWN that something was wrong! "I have to get to Bee and Yugito NOW!"
Nawaki grabbed her hand as an extremely tousled Shizune and Tenzo staggered into the room. He wasn't positive but the hand seals that Naruto had just tried to use looked like Minato's…. "Son of a bitch, Naruto!" He threw a kunai with attached ninja wire that he kept under his pillow at the two clones that had dropped that would've otherwise soon put her in sage mode. If she pulled that, she'd be completely unmanageable! "How do you even know this?" He watched as his niece looked around as if she was a scared child before seeming to remember her shinobi role.
Naru put down a silencing seal. "I may have added some of the chakra of each bijuu I have recently come into contact with into my coils."
Shikamaru was the only one who didn't look either surprised and/or horrified.
"Look, I gotta move," she continued. "I'm not sure what's happened; I only got an inkling, I guess you could say, that the Akatsuki had hit Kumo hard. I already sent my father a toad about it…"
Kurama was totally bewildered about the whole thing and remembered Gyuuki telling him about the present attack on Kumo - and somehow he thought he heard about it when he was in her MOTHER. Now he couldn't reach Gyuuki or Matatabi.
But the fox swore he did NOT have that memory from before they had gone to the past.
"There's nothing you can do, Naruto," Tenzo said tiredly. He looked to Dragon to see if he agreed. He did. "I'm sure that Hokage-sama will advise us and the last thing you should do is hand yourself over to those that are after you!"
Naruto almost agreed to at least wait for her father to respond for a few minutes until a terrible thing occurred to her. "IS ERO-SENNIN STILL IN KUMO?!"