Strong

Naruto and Kakashi spoke little.

Naruto didn't want his help, and Kakashi couldn't offer much more than that.

They talked about his mother though.

"I know… I don't want to bother you, but I need to tell you about your mother."

The blond scoffed.

"Why. You think I want to know the identity of someone else who sacrificed me, who put this beast inside me?"

"No, your mother wouldn't have wanted that for you. She would have fought your f- Minato on that. She was a jinjuriki herself. Holder of the 9 tails before you."

Then Naruto thought to himself.

"Well, it makes sense that there would have been one from before. But wait a second, that means she died when the 9 tails got ripped from her, right? How the hell did that even happen?"

Kakashi stayed silent for a bit, paranoia and anxiety and failure and a little bit of spite rising up.

"Well? Answer me?"

Grief too.

"Your birth. The seal weakens during childbirth. We took every precaution, but it still didn't work."

And that grief hit Naruto like an explosive note.

"My birth, killed my mother?"

Because what then? Was he a monster? He had caused this shit didn't he, from the start. He actually caused it, just by coming into existence. His mother could have never given birth to him without the 9 tails coming out, and killing her.

But he didn't choose this. Never chose to be born, to have the 9 tails sealed into him, to have his father choose him.

"They loved you, so much Naruto, even before you were born they-"

"What was my mom like?"

Kakashi swallowed.

"Like you. Boisterous and cunning and chaotic. She had rage too, people called her the red hot habanero because if you called her a tomato she'd beat the shit out of you."

And Kakshi didn't say Naruto was like his father, smart and analytical and nice to his friends, and filled with a deep cold rage that liked to dig so deep you didn't even know it was there. He saw Minato kill as his sensei, ever since 6 years old, and he was like a beast unchained.

"Wait, tomato- did my mother have red hair?"

"Yes in fact."

"She was a real Uzumaki then?"

Because he was different from the rest of those orphans then, because he at least had a mother who loved him, understood him, and he had an entire clan!

"One of the last."

And that dream came crushing down.

"Most were wiped out at the end of Uzushio. They fought hard, and Konoha came to save them, but they were too late. Most were dead, the rest scattered. Your mother was the only refuge here."

"Well then I'm alone again."

Kakashi bodyflickered away. Too cowardly, too fearful to deal with the child he had abandoned for years.

Naruto just sat there, training field. Desolate.

Then he began to train again.

…

Naruto became less loud. He stopped smiling as much. Maybe someone would have thought this was because he was sadder, despondent but it wasn't that at all. He just stopped caring.

The hypocrisy of it all though. He was the son of the most celebrated Hokage ever, yet they feared him. He thought maybe he could yell it out. Point at his father, and say "look, that is my dad! He loved me, and you should too." But he knew that was pointless. People didn't change, didn't see him for anything else because of context. The facts remained, he is dangerous, isn't he? He can fight one on one with Sasuke Uchiha sooped up with some bullshit curse mark, fuck up a tailed beast. Hell, he even beat back Orochimaru's fuck buddy for whatever that grey haired bastard's name was.

So why wouldn't they fear him? Why would telling them, I know I'm the 9 tails jinjuriki, I know why you all hate me, and hey, the former leader of this village, who was my dad by the way, sacrificed me, for all of you, and I know that too, even change anything? If anything, it would make things worse, Naruto look unstable or dangerous, knowing too damn much.

And they didn't matter anyway. He wasn't strong enough to be Hokage, so it couldn't. He didn't need support to become that man, he just needed power enough. The 1st was the strongest, the 2nd was his brother, and even beyond retirement they didn't dare contradict the Kami no shinobi. The 3rd was his student, and succeeded the 1st's title, and the 4th had stories telling of his massacres, macabre genocides, squads and armies alike taken out in seconds. Each one after the last, too fucking strong to get told otherwise.

Sasuke was stronger than him. That was the truth, ugly and bullshit and stupid. That he could beat him. Naruto hated it, and it drove him closer and closer to his goal. He would surpass Sasuke, he would surpass them all, push past them all into the fucking heavens!

Past all of them, but those close to him. He liked the rookie 9 (sans Sakura). They were nice and respected him, but not since the start. He needed to show his strength, his intelligence and drive and skill, but he had changed their minds. He knew that would work for everyone else.

It had to.

…

He had spoke to Ino a lot at the nearly by weekly meetings the rookie 9 had. He liked her, but he questioned wherever it was the hormones thing Pervy-sage joked about, or if he actually liked her.

Because she acted a lot like Sakura. And was that good? Was he just chasing a version of her that could be interested in him?

She laughed at his jokes though, acted flirtingly, and he didn't know what that meant, just that he liked talking to her, to seeing her smile.

He would wait on it he decided. No point overcomplicating things after all.

…

Sakura though, Naruto liked less and less. It started that day in the hospital but continued more and more.

For some reason she wanted to talk to him about the situation, even though Naruto knew it would end in tears. She wanted Sasuke back, she loved him, so how the fuck was she going to forgive Naruto for it?

And she had burnt those bridges anyways, too aggressive and too un-empathetic (a new word he had learnt) and cold hearted.

So one day, when he ignored her a little too much, she yelled.

"I know Sasuke leaving hurt you Naruto! It hurt me too, I get it, but you can't keep ignoring it, ignoring him because you don't want to deal with it! Please, I just want things to go back to the way things were."

That did it.

"The way things were? With you calling me a dumbass, with Sasuke ignoring me, with me pining over you both? You think I want that? No, you wanted all the attention in the world, a dark prince like Sasuke-kun and an annoying obsessed brat, both of them to be yours. You didn't care about either of us, just what you could get from us."

"What the hell are you talking about? I cared about you, you and Sasuke. Sure, I will admit I made some mistakes, but it doesn't matter. I still want to be friends, to repair this ok. Can we try at least?"

And Naruto, furious, turned, walking away fast.

"Try all you want now that it doesn't fucking matter."

She bit back at him.

"Yeah, I will try!"

He turned back, angrier than before somehow.

"Just like you tried with Sasuke huh? The most ridiculous thing, the worst thing, is somehow you still love him. Love this guy you barely knew, love this person that wants to kill you and everyone here, that would betray us all for a bit of power!

Don't speak to me again, Sakura."

And then he body flickered away.

After that, Sakura stopped trying to talk to him.

…

Naruto flew at Jiraiya with an overhead fist, his arm being flipped around, his body following, swung mid air by his sensei's large frame. He spawned a clone though, his doppelgänger swinging him around back towards the white-haired man but being kicked in the face right when he was about to impact. He exploded into smoke though, substituting with his clone in the last moment, Kunai at Jiraiya's neck.

"Good job brat. You forgot one thing though."

And then a blade came at Naruto's own.

"I know how to use shadow clones too. Spar over."

He might have pretended it was for the kid's benefit, but he was breathing heavily too. Heavier in fact. The training was brutal, he thought, but the kid kept up, at every single turn.

He was 15 now, shoulders wired with an impressive muscle, arms getting bigger every day. He was taller too, Jiraya thought he might get taller than even him, but estimated around 190cm to be a rational end point for him. Ha, irrational, he sounded like Orochimaru.

It was scary though, how he had trained all day and still had that look in his eyes, unchained and unstoppable, like nothing else.

"We're done for today, keep on those elemental exercises, and for fuck's sake rest. I know you heal quick, quicker by the day, but your brain won't, and Tsunade will have my head if your brain starts leaking through your nostril."

Naruto chuckled at that, though his smirk went thin, and he asked a question.

"You were my father's sensei, right?"

Jiraya raised his eyebrows at that. Why now, after about a year? Oh, and what a year it had been. He had hoped to show Naruto the world, give him some life tips (and visit every brothel he could find) as part of his mission on getting intelligence on Akatsuki, but He thinks it suited Naruto, at least this new Naruto, better to stay here, even if he did hate how people looked at him.

"Yes, why?"

And Naruto looked, hard and heavy and with all the perception he could muster.

"Why weren't you there for me?"

The white haired man, looked away, whistling to himself.

"Asking the hard questions, aren't we kid? Well, for one, I had no real reason to take care of you. You weren't my kid, and Minato wasn't mine either. The third said he would take care of you, and that was it. That, and… I'm just not a very good parent."

The inquisitive look his student had told the large set man to elaborate.

"I had a kid once. It didn't go well. Civilian mother, didn't want to go away from her family, that kind of thing. I tried to come for birthdays, but it never worked. I still feel guilty to this day. If I took care of you, well back then I wasn't going to try my luck against a man who had raised 3 kids, and an entire village himself. I just didn't know Sarutobi would treat you like an orphan."

"Wait, so he could have adopted me?"

"Made the most sense to. You're the jinjuriki, you need to be loyal, strong, smart, get taught the laws of the village. Having a Hokage as da- as a carer would do that for you. I think he had something against you. Not enough to make him hate you, but enough to make him not be able to raise you."

"Like his wife dying the day I was born?" Uzumaki asked, anger in his eyes.

"Ahem, something like that. I am sorry."

"For what?"

Jiraiya laughed. "I don't know. Everything. This whole fucking shitshow. I am the origin of your name, you know? Minato named you after a character in a dumb book I wrote. All of my students are dead, Naruto. Make sure you die after me this time."

…

Naruto headed home, stripped of his training clothing, and put on a set of more casual clothes, black jacket and orange shirt included. He could still fight in this pair, he could with all of his clothes, but he didn't want to soak these with sweat.

Soon, he stalked into a restaurant, henge in use. Most of the ninjas could spot him, he made sure it was weak enough even sensing him dispelled it, but the civilians, those who worked as waiters for example, just look at him like a normal brown-haired boy. It was refreshing, normal but weird. It was a fix, but he wanted respect, not normality.

He ordered a dish. He liked ichiraku's, a lot really but even he liked variation, and as much he really appreciated the old man and his daughter for being nice to him, he did scare away some of the customers, and sometimes the pity grated on him.

It came, steak, seasoned to perfection, northern recipe, probably originating from somewhere like Iwa. He had, regrettably, been studying, but he told himself if he wanted to be Hokage, he would have to be learned, smart. He couldn't go through life knowing nothing after all.

And then he overheard a conversation, 2 kunoichi, using an anti-eavesdropping jutsu, but it was easy enough for him to navigate his way through, opening a pathway, unscrambling their words, allowing him to understand.

"Did you hear about that Haruno Sakura?"

"The Hokage's apprentice?"

"Yes, her. Exciting news."

Naruto himself didn't find it that exciting. He didn't hate Sakura, not anymore, had no reason to, but the wound still stung, even if it had healed. She chose to love a traitor, and yet she gets taught by the Hokage herself? It didn't make sense to him, a liability, though maybe that was just his spite talking.

"Hm, why is that?"

"Well, every hokage, except the 4th, had been taught and tutored by the previous hokage personally. It follows the next one after, would be their student, and so, we would get a Haruno, a non-clan family, as Hokage!"

And Naruto stopped listening. His eyes glazed over, he couldn't see anything in front of him. Sounds seemed to be blanketed, halted by a sharp ringing. His face got hot, it felt like a thousand newtons of force was pushing into his skull from all sides.

He rushed out the restaurant, needing air. Air. He just needed to breath.

To breath.

Sakura, as hokage? No fucking way. Not under his watch.

But what did he have? Strength, something Sakura, any other ninja could have? Charisma? Didn't mean shit without support.

And Tsunade? She wouldn't support him, no, she would support her student, the one she made into a copy of herself, who she knew could work and make the village better.

So how was he meant to be hokage then, if Sakura and everyone else was in the picture?

…

A/N Drama, oooh. Important shit will happen soon, but tell me what you think of Sakura's potential as hokage. Note, I will take your responses into account.

Also to araz. Lol.