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"We have two lives and the second one begins when we realize we only have one" -Confucius

"You know you don't have to become a shinobi, right?" Shikaku looks down at me and asks as we walk to the Academy together.

It's been about three months since our father died, and now the next year of the Academy is starting. When Shikaku was reminded by Uncle Hiroto two weeks ago that I was supposed to start this year, it is safe to say, he wasn't too pleased.

It all started when he came to pick me up from Hiroto and Kiyoko's place one afternoon. Kiyoko had spent another day trying to teach me how to read, and let's just say, that was a slow going process.

It's not that I'm not trying at this point, because I am… sort of.

It's just hard, and all the characters still make no sense to me.

Anyway, Kiyoko had made a comment reminding me, "You'll need to know this stuff when you start at the Academy in two weeks. They'll expect you to know this stuff."

It wasn't the first time she told me that. But apparently it was the first time Shikaku heard it. It was understandable why he was confused, I guess he was just never informed of the changes.

Usually, especially in peacetime, kids start training at the Academy at the age of seven, younger if the parents really fight for it. But due to the current war and the need for more shinobi, the village elders have called to start shinobi training earlier. Hence me, starting two months before my fifth birthday.

"What are you talking about? He shouldn't be starting for another two years," Shikaku asked.

Kiyoko only looked at him, confusion on her face for a split second until she made the connection. "You mean you weren't told?" She asked him. "Things have changed since two years ago when you started, Shikaku. Due to the war kids need to start younger, your brother starts after next week."

For whatever reason, that didn't make sense to me at the time, Shikaku didn't like that answer. And he proceeded to grab my hand and drag me to one of the clan elder's houses, he was intent to stop me from starting so early.

He didn't have much luck in that though, seeing as how we're both walking to the Academy now.

"What do you mean?" I ask, turning my head to look up at him.

He stops in the middle of the road we are walking down. "I'm supposed to be the next clan head," he begins. "Once I make Chunin, anyway. So long as I don't die, it's not something you'll have to worry about. If you don't want to do this… be a Shinobi thing, just tell me, I'll do whatever it takes so you don't have to."

What he says makes me stop and think. For a nine year old, Shikaku must have really put some thought into this. Shikaku must have seen some effects from the ongoing Second Shinobi War that I haven't to make him not want me to join the shinobi ranks.

For one thing, the speed of his year's training was increased. Shikaku's year is now due to all graduate this year, at the age of ten, a full two years before they were originally scheduled to.

It's crazy really, to be sending ten year olds into war. In my Last Life, I wasn't even interested in joining the military until I was eleven. And that was really early. Most people I knew didn't become interested until they were in their last few years of high school.

But honestly, being in the military is really all I know, and it's something I'd like to say I'm good at. I have no idea what I'd do here if I didn't become a shinobi. It's as the Nara's say, it's too troublesome to inot/i be a shinobi.

"That's alright Kaku-nii," I tell him. "I want to do it, it sounds fun."

He only lets out an exasperated sigh. "You're weird, you know that. You could be sleeping at home, but no~"

Xx?xXx?xXx?xX

All this talk the last few weeks about if I wanted to become a shinobi and what I needed to know before I start training at the Academy has made me start to think about how I'm actually going to go about being a student.

After the chaos of losing my father at a young age in my Last Life, I used my school work as the only place I could escape to. After all, my mom was an engineer who placed great emphasis on education. As long as I was doing homework of some sort she wouldn't interrupt me and make me do chores or babysit my younger brother, a policy that was especially helpful when I was going through my teenage years and just wanted to get away from the world.

And you know what? After getting into and graduating from MIT, the world's best engineering university, she probably had something going for her with that policy.

Safe to say, in my Last Life I enjoyed studying and doing homework. But that's mostly because 1) I was learning new things usually, and 2) just about every type of school I was in had some type of impact on either future schooling or future jobs.

This though?

Considering the fact that I've been doing Shikaku's math homework for the past couple weeks, I can say for sure that the math they teach at the Academy most fourth graders can do. And I tutored a lot of fourth graders during high school and college for extra cash. I'm not sure if Shikaku ever questioned where I learned all the math from, maybe he is just too lazy to ask and thinks that if he does I won't do it anymore. Either way, I'm just glad he doesn't , because I have no story whatsoever to explain it.

At least from what Kiyoko-nee-san explained during her mandatory reading lessons I was subject to, Academy students are expected to know how to read basic Hiragana, Katakana and Kanji. Which makes sense seeing as how normally kids start at the Academy at seven years old. Most seven year olds should know how to read basic texts. And I doubt we'll need to know how to read anything too advanced as shinobi or genin. Even in the Air Force in my Last Life, most of the manuals and books were written at a fifth grade reading level to account for the varying academic levels people enter the military at.

Maybe whatever history classes they teach us might be useful (the Naruto series didn't really touch on the early years of Konoha, and it's been at least ten years in total since I watched the series). That's if they get detailed enough for elementary aged children. If memory serves me right, I barely learned any actual history in elementary school.

Crossing those subjects out, the only classes I will probably have to pay any attention to are the actual shinobi and ninja skill classes. Even that will be dependent on how detailed they get though. But even then, if I know anything about sitting through training modules, they are really only effective if they are hands on. Other than that it's basically information overload that leaves your brain after a week if you don't use it.

So in all, except for the chakra theory and stuff (which I'm looking forward to, who doesn't want to learn that crazy stuff), I doubt I am going to be learning much here. That's if I even stay awake long enough during the lessons. I've learned pretty quickly that this time around, I don't get too far without a midday nap.

Xx?xXx?xXx?xX

Once we enter the building, Shikaku points out a room at the end of the hall to me. "That's where the first years are, that'll be your classroom," he says. Then, like any older brother who is tired of having their younger siblings attached to their hip, he pushes me off of him and down the hallway.

"I'll see you later," he yells out as he turns up a stairwell and runs up. So his classroom must be upstairs. He could have at least shown me where in case I needed to find him. The bastard.

Walking down the direction of the hallway he pointed me towards, I start to see a crowd forming outside the door. It's mostly young children, who I guess will be my classmates, and some of their parents. Huh, It's almost like the first-day-of-school pictures I saw people doing in my Last Life. My family had never really done those. My parents both worked full-time jobs that started early in the morning, we'd be left at a neighbors house until the school bus came down our street to pick us up. But I remember seeing other parents doing those when I would get to school.

I feel almost the same as I did back then. Only instead of being alone because my parents were at work, my parents were dead. Should I feel bad or jealous? Maybe. But instead of dwelling on this, I walk past the crowd, and into the classroom. I can't be the only kid in this situation, and if I'm lucky, I can get a power nap in before class starts. I realized this morning when Shikaku woke me up, that I would have to start waking up really early now that I'm going to school.

The only thing better than getting naps in the middle of the day is getting to sleep in, you don't even have to get out of bed at all. I loved sleeping in. Probably the best feeling in the world is when I accidentally wake up three hours early and realized I had an extra three hours to go back to bed.

And lucky for me, today there were only two other kids sitting in the classroom right now, which meant I could try and get a little nap. I quickly pick out the perfect seat, a couple rows up since I never voluntarily sit in the first row, but still in a position that I can see the board if I need to. And once seated, I get comfortable.

After a couple seconds or resting my eyes I feel a bang on the desk. Opening my eyes, I lift my head up to find a young girl staring down at me. Strange, I must have missed her before, unless she just walked in. She's small, about my age with dark black eyes and equally dark pigtails sprouting off the side of her head. Her skin tone is pale white, just a shade or two darker from looking too pale to be healthy. Her traits almost look familiar somehow.

"What are you doing?" she asks.

"What's it look like I'm doing?" I reply as I let out a yawn, before putting my head back down on my arms, I add. "Napping."

I feel her face quirk above me. "Your voice sounds weird," she says bluntly like any five year old will do. "Why do you sound like that?"

Sounds like what? I wrack my brain for what she could possibly mean. Then it hits me. No matter how hard I try, I can't not speak in a strong, Texas American accent. Even in my Last Life, when I moved out of the state in ninth grade to Pennsylvania, went to college in Boston, and spent my military career moving between Europe and Eastern Asia it never seemed to leave me. It seems, even in this life, the accent still follows me.

When I first started speaking in this life, many people in the Nara clan were confused and tried to get me to stop speaking in this accent. They weren't successful. I remember Shikaku especially tried to get me to stop, saying, "It will be too troublesome trying to explain to everyone later on…"

Eventually someone said I probably had some form of lisp that I would eventually grow out of. That's what got most of the clan to stop worrying. I don't think I ever will grow out of it though.

But back to the girl, she's still staring, no glaring now, down at me. It's distracting, I have to get her to go away if I want to get any more sleep before this class starts.

"None of your business," I say through another yawn, waving my hand to try and get her to leave. "Can I go back to sleep now?"

This doesn't seem to appease her though, if the huff of breath blowing down on me says anything. I feel her slam her hand down on the desk again, right next to my head.

"If you're sleeping you'll miss the start of class," she says. And man, is she going to do this all the time, try and control me?

"No I won't" I say without even lifting my head up. "I'll be sure to get up before then."

She doesn't seem content with that statement though, but at this point, she gets distracted by someone else in the row in front of her. Hopefully she stays talking to them for the rest of the morning.

As time goes on, the number of kids entering the classroom grows, and so does the noise. Eventually it gets to the point where trying to sleep will be more effort than it's worth, So I sit up and try to see just who is in my class.

I don't recognize anyone. But that's not really saying much. In the years I've been alive here I haven't really been out of the Nara compound. My father never really did anything with me, much less bring me around to people like the Yamanaka's or Akimichi's and introduce me. And Shikaku never had a reason to take me anywhere. Can't blame him though, I didn't like bringing my younger brother around when I went to hang out with my friends either.

But it would have been helpful to know someone. The Nara clan is only so big, and I don't have any cousins who are the same age as me.

I wonder if there are any characters from the Naruto series in here. Honestly if there are, I wouldn't know unless they introduced themselves and I heard their name. If there's one thing I realized living in this world, thinking of anime characters as actual people is really weird. Not in the feelings sort of way, but in the imagining manga art as actual people way. I won't be able to recognize them from their looks, but at least once they introduce themselves I will know some things about them, provided I don't retcon any canon material, which I don't intend to do.

Shortly afterwards, the class is called into session by who appears to be our lead instructor. He introduces himself as Hajime-sensei. And from his looks, tall, short, light brown hair, bold cheek bones, and stern facial expression, he seems like the no-nonsense type of person, which could be both good or bad when you're leading a group of people almost five year olds.

The class starts by us going around, each person in front of the class, introducing ourselves including our name, if we're a part of a clan, and our favorite food. I guess they wanted to know who are the clan kids and who are the civilian-born kids. The last item is probably just something to keep us all interested. I listen in only because I'm curious about who is in my class. It will be helpful to know if I'm spending the next six or so years around them, especially if they eventually become actual important people in the Naruto series.

And to my… I don't know, surprise… delight? There are some surprising characters from Naruto in here.

I probably shouldn't be too surprised. There has to be at least one other character in my year, right? But I am surprised at who they actually are.

Uchiha Mikoto (The girl who was getting mad at me earlier.)

Uchiha Fugaku (They get married and give birth to Itachi and Sasuke if I remember correctly.)

Inuzuka Tsume (That's Kiba's mom right?)

And Namikaze Minato.

The last one most likely means Uzumaki Kushina will eventually join our class if my memory serves me right. Interesting. Very interesting.

After introductions are complete, the instructor, Hajime, I should probably remember his name, launches into a lesson on simple reading and math, elementary lessons really. Seeing how I already know most of this stuff, especially math, I find that this will be a great opportunity to resume the nice nap that was so rudely interrupted earlier.

It doesn't last long before I feel my small body being lifted up by the back of my shirt.

I look at the person holding me up. It's the Hajime guy. "Nara-san," he begins in a flat voice. "Mind sharing with the class what you were just dreaming about?"

Oh, he's one of those teachers. I look into his eyes for a couple seconds and blink twice before answering honestly. "I wouldn't know, your voice was interrupting my sleep."

Now, this might have been the wrong thing to say, especially in a culture where you are supposed to have high respect for your elders, but I did all that in my last life in a culture that didn't stress that as much. And I kind of want to see what it's like on the other side of the scale this time around.

I can visibly see a vein poking out of his forehead now, and before he puts me down the man carries me over to the chalkboard he was writing on and gives me a piece of chalk. "Since you seem to be so smart, why don't you answer the question here on the board.

I look up at the board. On it, he has written the beginnings of a long multiplication problem. Oh, I get what this man is doing now. From what I was overhearing while trying to sleep, he had only started to touch the topic of multiplication. Most of the other kids were still confused on it based off the questions i heard them asking.

So he's trying to make me feel like an idiot and embarrass me infront of the class. Well, little does he know that even in my last life I was years above my age in regards to math ability. This problem is child's play.

I take the small piece of chalk from his hand and reach up to the board to begin the problem. I know the answer from before I even put the piece of chalk down, the only actual problem with this task is that as a five year old, I'm too freaking short to reach up to where the answer should go. Nevermind that, I make do. If the kids sitting behind me are laughing about anything it's the fact that somehow I got the short genes in this life. Which, what am I supposed to do about that?

Once finished I turn back around to face Hajime-sensei and hold out the piece of chalk to him. His expression is quite hilarious if I do say so myself. I guess even with me being a Nara he didn't expect me to get this right.

"You can… just go back to your seat, Nara-san," he says quietly.

Kotaro- 1 Hajime-sensei- 0

On my way back to my seat, I ignore mostly everyone, who has their attention on what Hajime-sensei is now saying. Although I can feel one girl's attention on me as I walk past.

And would you look at that, it's little Mikoto-chan who sits in front of me. She doesn't look too happy though. If anything, it looks like this will be a long couple years of dealing with her. I worked with a couple people like her in my Last Life, the kind of people who got pissed off at me when I wouldn't do things exactly by the book yet still achieve the same results as them. And to be honest, it's kind of (a little) funny watching their reactions.

Xx?xXx?xXx?xX

Once lunch is called, I finally decide to wake up from my nap. I don't know what feels better, the post-nap feeling or the feeling of getting one up on my instructors. It's not wrong to say that I've always sort of been an instigator, but I've definitely never been one to actually get in trouble. I've always been a people pleaser, and my worst fear was that a teacher would call my parents and tell them that I was acting up in class. In my Last Life it only happened twice. And that was an experience I never want to remember.

It's not that I don't have any parents this time around though that makes me want to be like that. It's probably more along the lines of, I saw that having perfect behavior never really got you that far. I mean sure, if you're a dipshit all the time everyone above you is constantly going to try and get rid of you. But I'm not going for that. I'm going to the Nara that just wants to be left alone when they can be.

But right now I can't be left alone. I need to eat my lunch and make a friend. Because while being a kid can be boring in school, it will be much more enjoyable if I have a friend to complain about things to. (And in the world of shinobi, everyone needs allies.)

Most of the class has gone outside, so I decide to follow and start there.

It seems that they divide the lunch times per class. Makes sense, you don't want over two hundred kids running around during 'free time' (We were still under minimal supervision, but I assume as we grow older the supervision will lessen.). And isn't that something. In the Naruto series, it always seemed as if the Academy was a small school, and I guess only two hundred kids would be pretty small. But there are more kids overall than I expected. Although that might also have something to do with the current war. The village needs as many fighters as it can get after all, and is willing to look past certain medical conditions that would be caught in the pre-screenings for the Academy.

I look around the small outdoor area that's reserved for lunch breaks, separate from the training grounds of the Academy. Dotting the perimeter there are some tall trees, creating large shaded areas. Areas that would be perfect to take a nap under.

'No, don't think like that, Kotaro.' I shake my head. 'You need to make friends with a bunch of five year olds right now.'

Most people were sitting in large groups under some of the larger trees. I keep looking, I want to make friends, but would prefer a couple of really close friends than many not-so-close ones.

Then, under one of the trees, I spot what looks like two boys sitting and eating lunch. I'll go check those two out.

Walking closer, I notice that one of them is the Minato guy (or is it kid now?). Well, this is just great then, better to have friends in powerful places when you need a favor. That's why I made friends with my assignments officer in my Last Life, he hooked me up with all sorts of cool assignments at my dream locations.

"Hey, can I eat with you guys?" I ask when I reach them.

They both turn around, both giving me blank looks.

Well, not exactly blank, I could see a hint of curiosity underneath the blonde boy's gaze. "You want to eat with us?" he asks.

"Sure," I answer him. "I don't really know anyone else here anyway, and you guys don't seem too bad."

The other boy, who seems more interested in chewing his food, shrugs before returning to eating. Seeing as he doesn't look like he has any objections, Minato turns back to me. "Sure, you can join us."

Once seated, I begin unfolding my bento and try to make conversation, or try not to have an awkward silence between the three of us. "So, your name is Minato, right?" I ask.

"Yep, and this is Chojiro," Minato answers and motions to the other boy. He is a larger kid, with some puffy hair on top of his head and big cheeks. He must be an Akimichi. "What is your name again?"

"Kotaro," I answer as I take a bite of my lunch. "Nara Kotaro."

"Oh, you're a Nara," the other boy who was silently eating his lunch up to this point says. "I'm in the Akimichi Clan. I've heard a lot about you guys from my dad."

"Oh, What have you heard about us?" I ask, curious about what funny stereotypes his dad probably told his son.

"He said you guys are super smart… and that you sleep a lot."

"Hmm," Minato hums hearing this. "Aren't you the guy that fell asleep earlier today? And then you were able to answer that super hard question sensei asked."

"Yep," I say as I start to laugh. "You should've seen his face. It was hilarious."

Xx?xXx?xXx?xX

By the end of the day I want nothing more than to just… go home.

I barely got to nap at all today, but that's not the worst part.

After the lunch period, came what the instructors termed 'physical conditioning.' Eventually it will start to include learning taijutsu and sparring, but for today it was mostly calisthenics, a trial run of the obstacle course (which due to our heights and inexperience, most of us failed), and running.

The worst part was the running. There's nothing more in the world that I hate than running. Don't ask me how I consistently scored in the high 90's on the Air Force PFA in my Last Life, I HATE running. And running twenty laps around the exercise field. It had to be what? Six miles? In a four year old's body? I really need to go home and take a nap.

As I slowly trudge down the hallway with my eyes half closed I hear someone call out my name from back behind me.

It's the Akimichi kid from earlier. His name was Chojiro, right?

"Ah, Kotaro!" He says as he finally catched up to me. "I was worried you left without me!"

Without him? He's acting like we made plans. Which, for all I know, we probably did when I was trying to sleep during lunch.

"Leave without you?" I repeat, wondering what he meant.

"Yeah, you see," he says as his gaze slowly shifts to his shoes. He must get shy easily, just like Choji from the anime. Maybe he's his uncle. "I might have told my parents that I knew how to get home and they didn't need to pick me up but… I realize now that I don't. Isn't the Nara compound near ours?" he asks, lifting his gaze back up to meet mine. "Could we just walk home together then?"

This boy… I realize… Is way too pure for this world. I know I said I wasn't going to go out of my way to try to protect anything earlier, but I take that back now. This innocence must be protected at all costs.

But back to the problem at hand.

I have no freaking clue where the Akimichi compound is. In fact, do I know how to get back to the Nara one? I could probably get back eventually, but definitely not in time for my much needed nap.

"I don't know where my compound is either," I answer softly. Before I can watch the boy's face fall, I add. "My brother probably knows the way, he hangs out there a lot. Maybe he hasn't left yet."

And luckily I find as I exit the Academy building, Shikaku hasn't left.

Oh, and he's standing next to his Chouza friend too.

"Kaku-nii," I yell out as I run up to him, still dragging Chojiro behind me.

He turns to face me. "What took you so long, Kotaro? And who's with you?"

We stop running once we're standing in front of the older boys. After taking a second to catch my breath (that run earlier really took it out of me) I answer. "This is Chojiro, he doesn't know how to get back to his house and needs help."

"What? You don't know how to get back from here Chojiro?" Chouza asks, his voice is loud.

"Ah, um… no I don't" Chojiro says as he hides behind me. It's probably a comical sight really, considering the fact Chojiro is at least a full foot taller than me and almost twice as wide.

Shikaku sighs next to me. "Fine, let's show them how to get home from here, Chouza," he says.

As he turns around, I hold my arms up to Shikaku in the universal little kid position of 'pick me up and carry me.'

"Really Kotaro, you can't walk home from here?" Shikaku asks.

"I said I'm tired kaku-nii," I whine. "Carry me~"

He sighs and relents as he shifts me to sit on his back. The entire way home I wrap my arms around his shoulders, smiling into his neck.