I don't own Naruto, but it means a lot to me.


"Do you recall my order?"

It was the way the words echoed through the room. Lingered and cracked like vines through a forest floor. Deep demands echoing inside a chamber of darkness and stone.

"Because I do." The commandment continued. "That I am to be made aware of all activities between Jiraiya and the child."

A wooden cane scraped along the stone floor, rattling before the ragged body of a masked and faceless shinobi. Beaten, bloody, and barely breathing.

Danzo Shimura scowled.

"Did you forget this simple directive?"

There was a gurgle, likely blood, that pooled behind a Frog mask. The shinobi trembled, their body straining to maintain the weight beneath wavering arms.

"N-no, Danzo-sama." Frog shuddered. "We didn't..."

"And yet," Danzo continued as though the creature before him had not spoken. Creatures did not speak, after all. "Not only is Jiraiya able to continue another month unmonitored, he manages to find time to teach the Kyuubi Jinchuriki the Hirashin no Jutsu."

Danzo's cane shimmered and glinted in the dark. The stick parted, and the shining fang of a blade emerged from hollowed wood. The nearby torchlight danced for but a moment, before the blade plunged into the stone floor. Frog's right hand happened to be in the way.

The sword went through that, too.

"Mhhhhhfff." The scream muffled against blood and restraint, but Danzo's lone eye simmered in the darkness.

"Do you have anything to say for yourself?"

The ninja writhed, hand pinned and body shaking. Sweat poured down his body and bowed head, leaving damp smears of water and blood.

"We did not approach closer so as to not alert Jiraiya-sama to our presence."

"We, commander?" Danzo snapped, his head tilting. "Are failures so easily shared?"

"No, Danzo-sama." The frog corrected. "My decision is my failure."

Danzo twisted his cane. Frog whimpered.

"Your failure, indeed." He agreed, lone eyes shifting up and into the surrounding darkness. A chorus of blank masks surrounded the display. Danzo spoke to the assembly.

"Your failure that you have wrought on your village. On your family. A failure that Root cannot abide or else the future of this village will be naught but ash and misery."

There was a wet squelch as Danzo ripped his blade from the floor. He held it forward, scanning the point among the dozens of surrounding figures.

"Failure is weakness." Danzo declared, his voice rising and drowning out the labored breathing of Frog. "Weakness is decay. Decay is treason."

"Burn it." The faceless ones replied, all but a whisper. Quiet alone, but together heard. One voice, one answer, chanting in the darkness.

"The Tree must be nurtured." Danzo continued his sermon. "Must be protected. There will be those unwilling to do what is necessary. To give what is required."

"Burn them."

It was louder this time. Larger.

"There will be those who would take from the Tree. Surrounding the Tree. Feeding off its strength and its future. They are parasites. Weeds."

"Burn them."

From around the circle, torchlights erupted. Dozens of fires flickered into existence. A cavern system of rock and roots, now illuminated by dozens and dozens of torchlights chanting.

"The garden must be tended. These elements must be cleansed! Weeds must be pulled. Parasites must be destroyed!"

"Burn them!"

Danzo's voice was shouting, now. Disappointment and restraint roaring into a blaze of fury. The chorus followed their leader.

"And if the gardeners are found weak, if they find failure, then they have become decay. They have become the disease that chokes and kills the Tree."

Danzo's cane cracked against the stone, and silence flooded the carven once more. A lone figure, face obscured in a blank and empty mask, stepped forward from the crowd carrying a bucket. It looked silently to its master, but Danzo turned his gaze only down the the bleeding Frog. Crouching low, Danzo reached forward and pulled the Frog mask from the shinobi's face.

Brown hair was matted and torn, clots of blood and bruise mixing like water colors across the nameless boy's face. With what swollen vision remained, the young man met his master's single-eyed gaze and gave a shudder against pain.

"What is the cure to the disease that kills the Tree?" Danzo asked. There was a moment, fleeting and instinctual, where the boy's body spasmed. Lesions and scars oozing on his skin rattled and his body seemed just moments from collapsing. But as he met his master's steeled gaze, a sudden calm flushed across Frog's battered body. He gave a pained but deep inhale, rising his back with the last of his strength and meeting the gaze without question.

"Burn them." Frog answered, and the chorus of faceless ninja replied in kind.

As they chanted and echoed his words - 'Burn them! Burn them!' - the ninja holding the container stepped, spilling the bucket forward. Brown liquid like sap oozed, and blood and bruise were replaced by viscous flow.

Danzo nodded as the pour finished, not moving until the final drop had left Frog covered in the substance. Rising to his feet, he gave a nod.

"Very well." He called out, motioning forth a second faceless mask. This one carried a single torch.

"Then I commend you this final directive.

Blood and oil and shame.

Shame.

"Failure is weakness." Danzo shifted, his cane bashing against the ground. "Weakness is treason."

"Burn them." The chorus answered. Another slam of the cane.

"When we find parasites in the tree, we remove them. Disease, we remove it. Failure, we excise it."

Danzo's arm extended, and an unlit torch was placed between his palm by a faceless one. His finger's curled around the wood.

"We are the fire that keeps the Forrest clean." Danzo shuffled back, his footsteps ending at the edge of pooling oil and blood. "The gardener in the dark who ensures the future of the Hidden Leaf."

No hand signs. No words. Danzo's lone eye flashed red, and small pillar of fire erupted from his tongue. The unlit torch burst into a blazing crackle. A single black eye met the wavering brown of the unmasked Frog. Danzo extended his arm, torch ablaze.

"For the Hidden Leaf." Danzo's voice echoed. Frog's eyes reflected only the flicker and crackle of fire. Frog swallowed, and grabbed the torch.

"For the Hidden Leaf."

Frog brought the torch to his chest,

His screams joined the chorus.


The first thing Naruto noticed upon waking up was that he was in a hospital.

Strapped to a bed, gown and all, with at least four sets of monitors pressed with little stickers along his skin. Fluorescent lights made his eyes squint and the smell of chemically cleaned surfaces left a crinkle in his nose. A machine next to his head went beep beep boop in that rhythmic pitter patter that both annoyed him and made him want to fall back asleep.

The second thing he noticed was that he HURT.

Like, everywhere.

"Mhmm." He groaned, because even his jaw ached and anything close to language felt like hell. He blinked under the glow of nearby lights and tried to shift his vision from one side to the other. While it might have felt like a prison, the wide windows on one side of his room let the mid-day sun flood across his face. It felt warm against his full bodied anguish, and he turned his face to soak in the rays.

"Finally up, kid?"

Naruto's head whipped back to his left, ignoring the burning pain the motion shot through his body.

"Ji..." His voice cracked like gravel from disuse. "Jiraiya?"

The white haired Toad sage laughed, a deep rumble in his chest that finished with a hacking cough. Gone was his traditional red and olive Gi, replaced by the simple white of a hospital gown identical to Naruto's own. His left hand wrapped up the shaft of an IV drip, but Jiraiya held it like a walking stick.

"You're..." Naruto's eyes surged, taking in the battered and bruised appearance of his teacher. Jiraiya snorted.

"What?" He challenged, rising from his seat with a small but audible groan of effort because his entire being hurt but dammit he had a reputation to uphold. "You thought fighting Orochimaru and the 4th Hokage and an invading army was something even I walk away from without a scratch?"

Naruto didn't say 'well, yeah', but the expression was written across his face like it was tattooed. It had never occurred to him that Jiraiya had ever or could ever be injured. Famous shinobi like Jiraiya or Kage's didn't get injured, never bled or bruised as they completed missions. They just came back, normal and ready and maybe a little covered in blood.

Never theirs, though.

Naruto's eyes traced the wrappings on Jiraiya's stomach and down his left thigh.

"But you're okay?" The words left Naruto's mouth as the panicked tension set in. Jiraiya gave a deep and strained laugh that looked painful to do, but his teeth were wide and white with a smile.

"I'm gonna be fine." The sage answered. "A little knocked around, but I'll be back on my feet at the same time you will, I bet."

Relief rushed through Naruto's veins like liquid anesthetic. He didn't even know how to register the idea of Jiraiya being injured. It had been jarring enough during their wave mission to see Kakashi out of commission, but Jiraiya and the third Hokage was another thing entirely and -

The air left Naruto's lungs with a dull his, his hands a vice around the frame of the bed.

"The old man." Naruto's spine trembled as the words passed his lips. "Is the old man..."

Naruto stopped short of saying "alive", the word tasted like it would make him vomit. Jiraiya nodded, reaching a bandaged hand to the blond's arm and giving a squeeze.

"He's alive." He said, and Naruto felt stress leaving his lungs like poison bled from a wound. Naruto was halfway through leaning back and thanking whatever god was choosing to listen when Jiraiya continued.

"But he's..." Jiraiya swallowed hard, his own eyes glazing over in the fluorescent light. The stress rumbled back through Naruto's gut, a bubbling storm.

"What?" Naruto forced, his voice squeaked and strained between exhaustion and worry. "What happened to him?

"He's not going to be able to move much, anymore."

Naruto blinked. Empty.

"Not move?" His lips had words but his brain sputtered. Wheels spinning and tearing into mud - making a mess and going absolutely nowhere. "What do you mean not move?"

"He's paralyzed." Jiraiya's eyes gazed off into the distance and Naruto didn't know if he was talking to him. It was weird seeing the Toad Sannin like this. Wrong. Wrong and it filled Naruto's gut with something that twisted and dragged and made him want to spit.

"When he crashed through the roof, a beam struck his back. He..." Jiraiya lurched in a cough that was covering for the fact that he his throat was closing up. "He isn't able to move his legs." His voice was hazy, fractured. "And his arms aren't much better."

Naruto blinked and took a big breath in that hissed through his teeth. His lungs burned and his chest stretched and both hated him for it.

Can't move his legs? Hiruzen Sarutobi?

The 'God of Shinobi'?

Old man?

"I don't understand." Naruto repeated, because that's the only way he felt. It looked like the words slapped Jiraiya in the face. Not hard, but the red stinging on the sage's cheeks hand't been there before they had started talking.

"He won't ever be able to walk again, kid." Jiraiya's voice teetered in and out of a tone that ached and scrapped, and Naruto felt his gut sink. His body sitting on a void, teetering by the flimsiest of rope torn to nothing but loose strands.

"But, he's alive?" Naruto voice cracked.

"He is." Jiraiya tilted his head and swallowed through the response. "He's alive because you were able to hold Orochimaru off and summon me."

It was so flimsy, so fragile. A thousand shards of glass with elephants on top. Spider-webbed fractals and ominous cracking sounds. But the glass was holding.

Barely.

"He's alive."

Naruto leaned back and the pillow beneath his head wrapped around his skull like a cocoon. He wanted the bed to swallow him. To take him back to when he had been unconscious and couldn't feel the world and the hateful truths that it made him feel.

Hiruzen was alive. Naruto forced himself to remember that's what mattered.

"Can I see him?" Naruto asked. Jiriaya's shifted in his chair.

"He's unconscious. The medics aren't going to wake him until we have the right conditions to perform surgery."

Naruto shifted, and a pain shot through his left side.

"What does right conditions mean?"

Jiraiya gave what sounded like a laugh but not in the least bit out of humor.

"I'll tell you everything..." He assured the blond. "As soon as you're out of that hospital bed."

It was a testament to how little energy Naruto felt in his whole body that he accepted the answer without a fight. The blond leaned back, blinking slowly and steadying his breathing to the beep beep beep of his monitors.

"Jiraiya." Naruto said. No jokes. No hyperactive. No voice. The sage's body was hunched, ragged, but he gripped his IV stand and raised his head.

"Yeah, kid?"

Naruto's tongue clicked in his mouth while his eyes traced endless mazes into the ceiling tiles above him.

"Did I get strangled by my dad?"

Years later, Jiraiya would realize that there had never been a right answer to that question. He would think and think and spend nights staring at the stars wondering what he should have said in response this exact moment. Jiraiya didn't think he ever found the right one.

"Yeah." he said. "Yeah, that was your dad."

"Huh."

Jiraiya watched the boy like one watches a burning building. Waiting for that one cross beam, that one stubborn support to crumble and crack and send the whole thing into a heap of rubble and ash.

Naruto tilted his head and just kind of...stared.

"Huh." He said, again. Jiraiya forced his arms to pull his body to his feet, rising tall so he could see the boy's face despite that pain movement shot through his ribs.

"Kid." He tried, softer. "Naruto."

The blond's face didn't move, didn't tilt or turn to the call. But his eyes stretched, just to the left, to catch Jiraiya's own.

"Are you alright?"

Naruto's eyes drifted to the ceiling. He tried to do that thing he'd been trying to do, lately. What was it, again? Oh yeah, thinking. Before he spoke. He'd been trying to do that so much lately so that Jiraiya would be proud of him and take him as his apprentice and he could be a better ninja and save his friends.

The fourth hokage's face flickered in his eyes. Crumbling and distant and blue and so...so...

"I didn't think I had a dad."

Something inside Jiraiya shattered. A torpedo through stained glass and Jiraiya's entire heart wrinkled and it hurt worse than any bruise on his body.

"Sensei." Naruto continued. His voice was robotic - an intercom through a steel wall. Jiraiya had long imagined what blessed peace he would find the day Naruto learned to talk with restraint and didn't yell when he spoke. The quietness was awful, and the sage would give anything to have the joy back.

"I'm gonna go back to sleep." Naruto said. "But when I'm out of here, you said we were going to go somewhere. On a training trip."

Naruto's eyes shift, landing back on Jiraiya and the focus makes Jiraiya's heart jump.

"We can still do that, right?" He pressed. The weight of the air pressed into a thin line and sizzled in the distance. "You're going to teach me how to be strong?"

Jiraiya nodded.

"That's the plan, Naruto."

"Good."

It was wrong. It was all wrong. They were lucky to be alive and a part of Jiraiya was horrified to imagine what would have transpired had he not found the blond walking through the streets looking like a kicked puppy. Had Kakashi not gotten caught up, yet again, in the inky black red of the Sharingan and neglected the diamond sitting right in front of him.

Naruto shifted, rolling to his side with his IV line pulled across his chest. Jiraiya exhaled, but stayed standing in the silence until the dull beeps of the boy's heart monitor matched his breathing.

Satisfied that the kid was out, Jiraiya turned his bruised and aching body to the door. He didn't look like much of a shinobi, much of a warrior as he hunched and shuffled with his IV stand in tow. He didn't feel like much of a warrior now, anyhow. Without a sound, the sage turned the door to the blond's room and made it into the hall. He was greeted by a single eye and a mop of white hair.

"Lord Jiraiya." The copy ninja said, seconds from entering the room. Jiraiya's gaze chilled.

"Kakashi."

"I didn't..." Kakashi blinked, taking in both the state of Jiraiya's injuries and the way his own name sounded like an insult when the sage spoke.

"How is Naruto?"

Jiraiya pulled the door closed behind him, the soft click echoing in the fluorescent light of the hallway.

"Asleep." He said. "Exhausted, but recovering. He's fine."

That was a lie, the kid was a lot of things but 'fine' sure as shit wasn't one of them. Kakashi probably knew that, but the man nodded, physically sighing in relief. It made Jiraiya's body tense.

"That's good." The copy-ninja replied, sidestepping the sannin and reaching for the door handle. "I came to come check on him and see how he's -"

Jiraiya's hand snapped, grasping Kakashi's a breath from the door.

"What are you doing?"

Kakashi blinked and Jiraiya's eyes narrowed.

"I'm here to check on my student." Kakashi replied.

"Your student?" Jiraiya laughed, salt and anger and ash. "Is that what he is? Your student"

A single eye stared, narrowed and eyeing the points on Jiraiya's body where bandages were wrapped the tightest. Words and escalation danced on his tongue like a reflex, but they died in his throat and jounin slumped.

"I'm here to see Naruto, Jiraiya." Kakashi answered, pulling his arm back and out from the sannin's grip but taking a step away from the door in response.

"I understand you might not be happy with me right now..."

"Happy with you?" Jiraiya's voice strained. He doubted it was good for his recovery or his blood pressure to explode with fury. Too late. "I'm not *happy* with the ANBU security detail assigned to screening the chunnin exam candidates. I'm not happy with the way it took me two doctors before finding someone who was willing to check the kid for any serious injuries."

The sage took a step, more menacing hunched and clutching his IV stand that he'd ever been at full health.

"I'm so fucking furious with you I can't even think straight."

The silence settled like shards of glass around them. Kakashi carefully stepped.

"It was never my intention for Naruto to train alone." Kakashi replied. "I had specifically recruited an elite tutor in order to..."

"An elite tutor?" Jiraiya balked. "An elite tutor? Do you hear yourself? You were his jounin instructor and you left him alone!"

"He wasn't alone." Kakashi shot back. "He had Ebisu and..."

"And what, Hatake?" He didn't channel any chakra, but the force that Jiraiya pushed into Kakashi's chest sent the man stumbling backwards. "He didn't have anyone. I found him, sitting by himself trying to brute force stupid his way into fighting a kid older, stronger, and better trained than him."

Jiraiya held his hands up, abandoning his crutch and letting his anger steady his balance.

"Against one of Gai's kids! You knew exactly what the hell he was up against and chose to abandon him to someone else."

Jiraiya's eye's bore into the copy-ninja and Jiraiya wished his bones didn't hurt and he didn't need to go to rest. He wanted to take his fist and shove it so far up Kakashi's ass he'd see it with his blindfold on.

"What were you thinking, Kakashi?"

"I just..." Kakashi whispered, unable to meet Jiraiya's eyes and pointing his vision to the nearby window. "I had to prepare Sasuke. His opponent had a technique he had no way of overcoming and he needed training."

"He needed it?" Jiraiya barked in a hollow laughter. "And what about Naruto? What about that girl on your team? Thank kami she didn't have to fight an opponent in the next round, would you have abandoned her, too?"

The word abandoned hit the air and Kakashi recoiled. Jiraiya's arm trembled, barely restrained.

"I didn't..." He stammered. "I wouldn't..."

Jiraiya's blood went from simmer to boil. There was so much anger. So much hate and broken trust and fire. His fingers ached in his palms at how hard he was trying to squeeze them together so that he didn't do something he regretted. That Minato's own son would be abandoned by his teacher. Abandoned by Hiruzen and the whole village and...

A nauseating wave of self-loathing hit him. Where the hell had he been for the last fourteen years, anyway?

A feeling like ice shot down Jiraiya's spine and landed in his gut. It tasted like hypocrisy and smelt like shame. Jiraiya's stomach lurched as Kakashi's head fell, white hair falling and covering his face.

"I'm...sorry." Kakashi said, voice dark and broken and weak. Jiraiya wanted to scream. "I never meant to..."

Jiraiya couldn't. Couldn't handle the seeming sincerity of Hatake's guilt mixed with his own. Like a cocktail of vinegar and gasoline. With a single raised hand, he halted the jounin.

"Don't." He ordered. "Just...don't, Kakashi."

There was a long silence between the two. Jiraiya was growing sick of long silences.

"Naruto..." He began, burying his want to punch both Kakashi and then a mirror. "Has been through enough. From everything. We both know the kid's road won't get any easier, but I am going to be damn sure that it changes starting today."

Kakashi didn't speak, responding only in slow and solemn nods.

"I'm taking him with me. We're going to find Tsunade." Jiraiya continued. Kakashi's eye widened.

"Lady Tsunade?" He asked. Jiraiya nodded.

"Hiruzen's paralyzed." He said, the words leaving his mouth but leaving a sick behind. "If anyone's going to fix it, it will be her."

Kakashi tilted his head. Doubt.

"You think she'll return to Konoha?" he asked.

No, is what Jiraiya wanted to say. That's why he was going in person in the first place. Tsunade's thoughts on Konoha be damned, Hiruzen was paralyzed and Orochimaru was responsible - it was time to come home.

"I do." He lied. "And I'm bringing the kid as backup."

"How long will you be gone?"

"We'll be back before the fall with Tsunade." Jiraiya answered. "But after that I'm planning to leave the city for some time."

"Some time." Kakashi flipped the words on his lips like it was a threat.

"Will I..." He swallowed. "Can I say something to him?"

The thunder of Jiraiya's heartbeat had subsided, but a dull ache that remained made him feel old and tired and not in any mood to deal with this.

"If he wants to talk, you'll talk when we get back."

Jiraiya's gaze lingered to the door, and then back to Kakashi's open eye.

"If he doesn't, he won't."

There was more to say. Words and glares. Punches. Enough self-loathing to power a small city, at least. But none of that came. Kakashi's eye lingered on the point in the wall where Naruto's bed was, but a nod was his only answer. Jiraiya met it with his own, but he didn't leave the door until the copy-ninja had turned and retreated down the hallway.


Naruto was recovered in two days. They didn't prepare to leave for another week. The kid was...Jiraiya couldn't pin down the right word to adequately capture the situation. Quiet? Different? Nothing adequately captured 'traumatized learning you aren't an orphan by being strangled by your dead father'. Jiraiya opted to lean in the doorway of the blond's small, studio apartment while the kid packed his things.

"We're going to need to get you new clothes." The sage offered as Naruto folded - attempted to fold - a spare jumpsuit. The boy paused, staring into his orange clothing as though apologizing for considering the prospect of abandoning the outfit.

"I can't afford something new."

Jiraiya wanted to snort, but his gut did that thing where he felt like he wanted to strangle someone.

"It's on me, kid." He rushed the words out and turned his head to look at anything other than the scene before him. "If you want to bring it, bring it, but don't worry about money."

Jiraiya's head tilted, a small smirk.

"Can't promise it'll be orange, though..."

"But it's the best color!"

Five minutes later, Naruto crossed through his doorway, nothing but a wrapped bag of a single orange jumpsuit thrown over his shoulders. No triumphant jumps. No giddy jitters. Quiet lips and quiet eyes while his hands traced circles along the hiraishin kunai lining his waists.

"Ready?" Jiraiya asked, because the kid wasn't saying anything.

Naruto gave a nod, eyes shimmering with at least the ghost of an emotion - determination.

"I'm ready."

It wasn't a lot, but Jiraiya would take what he could get. As the two set for the city gates, Jiraiya slowed to a step behind the boy to take in the city. Jiraiya didn't go many places without being recognized, one of the curses of fame and a core reason he often entered cities while henged. In Konoha, his home, he was a full blown celebrity.

At first, the villagers tried to pretend they weren't tripping over themselves to get a glimpse of him. Eventually, some of them gave up being discrete and just started walking in the street beside them. Rushing from behind just to get a look at the toad sage's markings. Were they really written in the blood of Iwa ninja? Did he have a toad's nose? Adults and children alike, curiosity driven and not going to miss the rare chance of meeting the only actively loyal Sannin.

Then they realized who was walking beside him.

It took every ounce of restraint Jiraiya possessed to not grab the boy and just run. Summon Gamabunta and tell him to jump until they were somewhere in wind country.

The people's eyes would drift to that single tuft of golden blond hair, and the entire demeanor changed. Awe turned to loathing. Curiosity to judgment. Hate.

'Is that Lord Jiraiya?'

'What's he doing with that...thing?'

'Maybe he's here to take it away.'

'It stole the Hiraishin! Lord Jiraiya won't allow that creature to corrupt the legacy of Lord Yodaimane!'

By the time they reached the main gate, a small trickle of blood ran down Jiraiya's clenched and shaking fist.

"Kid."

Naruto turned. "Yeah?"

"Is it..." Jiraiya paused, giving a deep exhale and trying to remember his decades of meditative training. It brought him little peace.

"Is it always like this?"

Naruto thought for a moment, tilting his head back and giving a sideways glance to the crowd that had assembled behind them as they walked. The blond shrugged.

"Not really." he answered. "They're only still following because you're here."

Jiraiya grunted, a semblance of acknowledgement, but there was a growing darkness behind his eyes. His face carried a look between disappointment and rage, but he quickly turned his head from the blond to address the ANBU stationed at the village gate. Gate duty was usually a job for Chunnin, but having the village overrun made the border security situation...tense. Naruto's eyes wandered the blades held by the ANBU on duty. It looked a lot more scary than when Chunnin were...

"Naruto!" A voice rang out over the bustle of the gate, a blob of pink and red following. Naruto turned on a heel while Jiraiya gave only a glance before returning to his hushed negotiations.

"Sakura!" He called back. He tried to make his voice sound more excited, but he was worried all he could sound was tired. Judging from how Sakura's shoulders slumped, she heard the difference.

"Naruto." For her part, Sakura opened her mouth a few times before finding the words that felt right. It took longer than she'd anticipated. "I'm...I'm so glad to see you're safe."

Naruto gave a soft smile, but it met his eyes.

"I'm happy you're safe, too." He answered back. "I'm sorry I wasn't around when everything kind of when to shit. I got all caught up trying to find Gaara and Ero-sennin had this plan and..."

He trailed off, but Sakura only gave a small smile and laugh.

"It's okay, Naruto." Sakura held up her hand, open palm and not a fist. Her voice was a weird mixture between soft and tired and unsure. She was privately relieved that Naruto wasn't observant enough to notice the tension between the two.

The silence that came after, however, even Naruto could feel.

"So..." Sakura tried.

"So..." Naruto mimicked, because he didn't know either. When did this get this hard?

"I came to the hospital." Sakura fidgeted, shifting onto her heels. "You were still asleep, but you looked so peaceful."

Naruto found a nervous laugh that felt like a cough.

"Yeah, Ero-sennin mentioned you came by." A genuine smile. Small, but genuine.

"Thanks for that."

Sakura's gaze softened, but her nod was resolute.

"Team 7." She offered. "Gotta check on our own."

The mention of their name, the team, brought a steep inhale from the blond.

"Did Sasuke..." He started, but his voice trailed off as though he was unsure he even wanted to complete the question. Sakura swallowed and her eyes darted away.

"He's still recovering in the Uchiha mansion. Broken arm." She answered, before meeting him in the middle with an offering. "I haven't seen him, either. Just Kakashi-sensei and now..." Sakura's arms made a strange, pointing gesture forward. "Now, you."

The answer lingered, floating between the two like an off tune melody. Naruto rocked on his heels and Sakura played with the fringes of her dress.

"You did well in the tournament." She said. Sakura wasn't used to being the one who filled the empty silences and it showed. "Everyone couldn't believe how your fight went."

Naruto blinked, and it took him too long to realize she meant Neji. His fight with Neji. Between Gaara and his zombie father and Orochimaru, Naruto had all but forgotten the chunnin exams had even taken place. He couldn't force a grin this time, but he did give a nod.

"Yeah." He answered. "I could hardly believe it either."

...

...

"I'm sorry, Naruto."

Naruto's eyes shot open, snapping from the dirt and meeting Sakura's own. Whiplash.

"What?" He replied.

"I'm sorry." Sakura repeated. "We...I...never bothered to find you or ask you what was happening last month. I feel like I've blinked and now everything's different."

"It's okay." He told her, because he wasn't certain what else to say but that felt right. "It's...I don't think I understand it either but it's okay."

Sakura shook her head, and Naruto could see moisture welling under her eyes.

"No, it's not." She continued. "We're supposed to be a team and we weren't there for you. I want you to know we're here for you."

"Sakura, really, it's fine. I'm okay and..." He tried to reply, but Sakura didn't stop.

"...And now you're leaving, again, and I just want us to be able to sit down and talk as a team because it's not right."

Naruto's smile straightened to a thin line, and his back tightened to match.

"Again?" He said. "What do you mean again?"

Sakura blinked.

"You're..." Her voice wavered, and her eyes gave quick glances to Jiraiya's back. "You're leaving with Jiraiya-sama."

"No, no. I know. But again? Why are you saying again?"

His face was so focused. Blue eyes looking straight at her. Through her. His voice wasn't angry, but Sakura couldn't place the distance separating the two.

"Like during the tournament when you left and..."

"When *I* left?"

Naruto's shoulders rolled, his eyes narrowing a fraction but his tone dipped and chilled. Sakura blinked wet eyes, but her words didn't form a response.

"Do you think that *I* left?" He asked, voice empty. Sakura gaped.

"I..." She stammered. "I don't mean you left, but we didn't know where you had gone off too and -"

"Where I had gone off to?" Naruto repeated, but his voice sounded...lost. Sakura's insides twisted further. "I didn't know where *you* were. No one even came to ask where I was or what I was doing for a full month!"

"With Ebisu?" Sakura interjected, quietly. "We had assumed you were training with Ebisu like Kakashi-sensei said."

Naruto leaned back, and a fire surged in his stomach that he didn't recognize. He felt sweaty.

"And no one thought to check?" His voice cracked, and Sakura felt the guilt that had been building in her gut since the tournament swell like a typhoon. The girl's posture shrank.

"I didn't..." Her voice tinged with guilt and forming tears. "We tried to..."

The pinkette sniffed, wiping a fist across her flooding cheeks. She was crying. Sakura was crying in front of him.

"I didn't..."

He couldn't place the heat in his stomach, but the sight of Sakura breaking quenched his insides. The fire roared, feelings that he didn't understand but made him want to go punch a tree or yell at someone really loud until the world went back to easy and simple. His reflexes tried to reach out, to grab Sakura's arm and tell her it was okay because she was Sakura and Naruto never wanted to see Sakura upset. But at the same time, something in his chest snarled.

The gesture stopped halfway with Naruto clutching naught but air. He lowered his hand back to his side in a frustrated fist, and Sakura kept crying.

It didn't make him sad. It didn't make him happy.

He just felt tired.

"I..." Naruto began, trying to find words that worked. "I'm tired, Sakura-chan. And I'm upset. And I don't feel like...good, right now."

Sakura sniffled, her breath ragged as stood rooted before her teammate. Naruto had never lectured Sakura. Is this what it's like to be lectured? Naruto's head felt heavy and he just wanted this to stop. This wasn't what he wanted.

"I'm not leaving for good." He corrected, shifting the the focus and trying to keep his head from filling with hurt. "I'll be coming back. But I can't handle this right now. I can't..."

Naruto clenched his fist and tried to will his frustration out from his hand. His fist didn't stop shaking.

"I just can't do this right now." He finished. "But when I get back maybe you and Sasuke and me...maybe we can talk?"

Sakura's head tilted, blinking through clouded eyes.

"Talk?" Was it a question? What did that mean? This was not how she saw this conversation going. Not how it had gone in her head. This was Naruto! Loud and obnoxious Naruto! Happy go-lucky, most talkative knuckle headed ninja in the world Naruto!

Her eyes drifted up and down, soaking in the boy standing before her. His hair looked like Naruto. His clothes looked like Naruto. But he wasn't loud. He wasn't yelling or smiling or jumping or asking her on a date.

This Naruto looked distracted. Tired. His mouth was low and his hands were shoved into his pockets. Sakura couldn't see, but his fingers made little fists around the hilt of the Hirashin kunai.

It was the moment Sakura realized that she didn't recognize Naruto, anymore. What's more, from the way he was looking at her, he felt the same way.

Had it really only been a month?

"Yeah." She whispered, hurried and increasingly upset. "Yeah, when you get back."

Sakura gave Naruto a...bow? An apology? Well wishes? The blond doesn't get a chance to ask. A muted sound, a mixture between "I'm sorry" and "goodbye" escaped the Pinkette's lips before she turned and darted back into the city proper.

Naruto blinked, standing silently by the gate before being consumed with a feeling of frustration. His hands shot from his pockets and covered his eyes at the palm, exhaling a strained and captive groan through closed lips. Jiraiya took this as the moment to re-enter the scene. He didn't have a quip or a wisdom. No lewd comment and no learned lecture. Jiraiya just placed his hand on Naruto's shoulders and gave the boy a squeeze.

"Let's go, kid." He instructed. "I think you need a little space from here.

Naruto nodded, and the two walk out of the city without another word.


Hey Everyone,

I hope you're doing well! Been a long time - crazy how easy it is to get lost on the road of life.

Before we get started, I want to make a statement - none of my stories are ever discontinued. I write because it's a good way for me to unwind and express myself, and I keep doing that on and off pretty much every day. I only post on here when I'm happy with what I've written. Sometimes that takes a week. Sometimes it takes years.

A while ago, I received quite hurtful feedback in the comments on this story and my DMs. Multiple users with messages stressing that I was a terrible writer, that I should Un-alive myself for not posting or finishing this story. The comments were alarming, spiteful, and had me taking a small step back.

I'm a little too old to be cyberbullied for fanfiction, but it does makes me sad to think someone would feel like their way to express themselves is to post hateful comments on another person's hobby. This is my hobby, and I love writing when I can. I post this story because I'm silly enough to think other people might like it, too. I'm not going to stop writing - it makes me too happy! If anyone's curious, I've got the next three chapters of this lined up and two more new works for other fandoms!

That being said, I hope to take a moment with you all to reflect that every time someone posts a story, they're choosing to share part of what makes them happy with the world. You don't have to like anyone's story. If it's not your taste, don't read it. If you want to share constructive criticism with my plot or writing (or my terrible grammar!), please know you're welcome to do so for all my works. This will be my last post to, as the story will completely migrate to Ao3 after this.

It brings me a lot of personal joy to write and engage with you all, but that negative interaction made me profoundly sad about the way we treat others on this website.

Respect is a wonderful thing to spread, and kindness is never out of place.

I hope you enjoy this chapter!