A/N: Sneak Attack!

Two Months Earlier from the Present Day… Outskirts of Suna...

He felt them the moment they touched the eastern waves of sand. His sand. They were like lightning bugs in a dark room, chakra so voluminous and bright that he had wandered to them like a child would, with an intrepid curiosity about him. It wasn't long before Temari and Kankuro were on his tail; They hadn't left him out of their sight since they'd returned to the village after the Konoha Crush. It was still odd being around people. He was not yet used to the feeling of space in a room being taken up by someone else, someone who lived and breathed as he. No, he wasn't used to caring about other people in a room.

He glided across the sand as if being pulled on a sled. The icy desert wind across his face, his real face, was a fascinating feeling. He'd dropped the sand armor when in Suna and her territories, as proof he was changing. Temari appreciated it, but he could feel her hesitance sometimes, her conditioning to be scared of him returning in knee-jerk reactions. It did not frustrate him. He was remorseful for his past actions.

But the blood still called to him. His migraines would return and his body would ache for days until Shukaku's temper cooled. Thankfully, this was not one of those times.

The nearer he got, the more he could feel the chakra bounding across his dunes. Two massive, thick bundles of life, two Jinchuriki like him. And he paused for a moment, because one felt vaguely familiar, but the other was unknown. Temari's fan came plummeting from the sky above him and landed in the sand vertically. She landed atop it, binoculars out, scanning the oceanic waves of micronized pebbles. Kankuro rode up next on the back of a spider-like puppet. His warpaint was on thick tonight.

"What do you feel, Gaara?" Kankuro asked. He always was the impatient one of the three. A strategic fighter but an aggressive personality.

"Jinchūriki," he whispered. "Strong Jinchūriki. Kankuro, Temari, go back to the village. Raise the guard. This could be an attack."

Temari took the binoculars from her eyes. "They're too close, Gaara. I can see them from here. If it's an attack, it's not going to be much of one. They look like shit."

Kankuro gave her a look. Gaara crossed his arms and waited for them to crest the dune a mere fifty yards away. He spread his chakra through the sand, felt every grain individually, readied himself to sink these intruders.

And a giant, like the ones of legend, the ones that were said to have descended from Iwa's mountains to live upon the sands, dragged through the amber sea a shirtless body with a dirty head of blonde hair.

Gaara felt what he felt when Naruto punched him the first time: shock.

"Halt!" Temari shouted through the windy desert night. "What business do you have here?"

"The boy," the armor-clad giant panted. He was exhausted and dehydrated. They could've been running to their deaths if Gaara hadn't felt them. "He knows someone in this country. He said he was like us, that he would help us. A brother!"

Temari narrowed her eyes and jumped down from her fan, kicking it open with her foot and using it to glide over to Gaara. Kankuro pulled beside him to present a unified front.

"What do we think, Gaara?" she whispered.

Gaara did not answer. Instead, he let the sand ensnare the giant's feet and colossal tendrils rose around him, snatching the body from his grasp. Gaara's sand whipped it across their divide and he cradled the body in front of him, its head slumped, its body battered by man and nature alike. With a small gesture, Gaara sent forth a thread of sand to pull the head back by the hair. As it rose to face him, Gaara knew who he was holding.

Uzumaki Naruto had come calling. His brother.

Now … Konoha

It was hellacious- the early morning meetings, the late-night clandestine debriefings, the constant juggle of pulling resources from completely depleted projects and injecting them into basic village functionality protocols. The immediate threat of subversives, the lack of competently trained builders and nurses, etc., etc., etc.

And yet, the village flourished. People hadn't stopped working a single day in the three months since Tsunade's butt hit the Hokage chair. Restaurants converted into kitchen lines for laborers, architects and engineers picked up hammer and nail alongside them. Tsunade herself was welcomed as a savior, a prodigal child returning to pave the way to greatness. Her works in the hospital alone had already earned her tremendous social acclaim. It made the civilian population feel safe; the less restless they were, the easier it was to keep them in line.

The Ninja Forces supported her wholeheartedly. She was a connection to the greatness of Konoha's past. Granddaughter of the Shodaime, Grandniece of the Nidaime, student of the Sandaime, now the Godaime herself. The first officially recognized female Kage of any of the Five Great Shinobi Nations. But Tsunade couldn't take all the credit.

Relations with Suna were becoming stronger through their mutual hatred of Orochimaru.

The daimyo did his job and spun Konoha's successful defense as a show of power, while mitigating reports that the village had taken heavy damage. Suna also held these reports, so long as Konoha did not retaliate or penalize them economically. It was a comfortable arrangement.

But some things were troubling.

Kakashi was back on active duty and had been pressed into a leadership role in charge of the Jōnin. A switch had been flipped in the once-lazy man, a fire lit since he awoke from Itachi's torture, she'd been told. Ibiki Morino, the Interrogations Expert, had informed her that Kakashi was cleared and ready to return to active duty. He also told her something was terribly wrong with the man.

The Kakashi she knew was quiet, almost stoic in every interaction. A light panic would overtake his body, but never his face, when conducting business. He moved manically, as if his joints were tightened and he fought against them to operate. He and Jiraiya had long talks in the evenings when Jiraiya was in town. Which was often these days. His spy network was more independent than she realized.

Sasuke stayed attached to his sensei, with an uncomfortable deadness about him. He was no longer brooding or volatile like he was when Tsunade met him- brooding required an intense thinking. Instead, he just went through the motions. He helped where he could, he trained to upkeep his fitness, he ate to retain his body, and he breathed to breathe again. No more, no less. Jiraiya kept an eye on the boy, but Itachi's mind games hurt him much the same as they did Kakashi.

These things would usually be cause for alarm among the shinobi and kunoichi that knew them, but no questions were asked. The entire village, for all its business and building and blossoming, was silent. Tsunade remembered when Orochimaru left. It'd been one of the last straws of her time in Konoha. People looked down on her, the strongest kunoichi of her time, with pity. It was soulsucking to see her peers treat her like broken glass.

But she had been like broken glass then. She'd lost Dan, Nawaki, her grandfather, and then her teammate. She'd been stripped of everything but Shizune and her inheritance. She was isolated from her own community, so the liquor followed. And after weeks of people refusing to meet her gaze, she left without a word. If only she had been able to get away from that vacuum of emptiness earlier…

For that exact reason, she had called Kakashi into her office. Thick, desperately needed rain beat against her window while she waited.

With a light groan, the Kage door eased open and in strode the last Hatake and the last Uchiha. Sakura Haruno, their pink-haired teammate, followed behind.

Even with the circumstances of the village being in disarray and her teammate being pronounced dead, Sakura stood strong in front of Tsunade. Her attire was perfect, her shoulders were back, her feet were set. But her face had the remnants of tears, and Tsunade hated that she noticed.

"Kakashi, any updates?" Tsunade asked, retreating her gaze to her messy desk.

"I had an interesting report come back on the village surrounding the Katabami Gold Mine. A lightning storm destroyed the mine and has made it inaccessible to the miners there," he recited.

"And this is relevant to us, how?" Tsunade led. She kept reading the building proposals spread in front of her. "They're not even in Hi no Kuni."

"That mine has one of the highest gold yields of anywhere not firmly entrenched in Iwa or Kumo, Hokage-sama." He stood stiff as wood, lone eye looking at nothing and everything all at once.

"And assisting them in restarting operations could tempt them into a permanent relationship with us," Tsunade finished. She sighed. "What would it take to open it?"

Kakashi gave a tight shrug. "The report was from the daimyo's men, so it wasn't to our standards of description, but a small team led by a competent Jōnin should suffice. No known bandits in the area, but when something like this occurs to a valuable target, it's unusual to be mere coincidence."

Tsunade nodded. "Why don't you and Maito Gai combine teams? He's got a Hyūga, Neji I think his name is. Their eyes can help you clear the blockage." She stamped a proposal for a private weapons shop. "Talk about striking it rich, though. What're the odds of a thunderbolt hitting a gold mine entrance so perfectly that it collapses in on itself? Wish I could've taken that bet."

Kakashi sighed. "I concur. Gai should be able to handle four Genin, with Lee still in the hospital." And with Naruto dead, Tsunade knew what he wanted to say.

But she looked up and smiled. "Gai will be staying in the village- you can lead the team, Kakashi. Thank you for volunteering. It'll be good for the villagers to see a famous Konoha shinobi helping them. Dismissed."

His eye widened but he reined himself back in. "I see. Thank you Hokage-sama. I will assemble my team and leave within the day." On a dime, Kakashi rotated and silently stepped from the Hokage's desk. Sasuke fell into step, as did Sakura.

"Haruno, could you stay a moment?" Tsunade called. She'd caught the girl off guard, if the shock in her face was an indicator. Sasuke also froze for a moment, but simply shut the door behind him as he left. "Step forward," she commanded.

Sakura did as she was told. "Yes, Hokage-sama?"

Blunt as a club, Tsunade hammered home. "I understand the recent passing of your teammate has made these past few months particularly difficult. How is your team holding up?"

Sakura tried to control her emotions, but Tsunade had been alive too long to not see the pain in her face and feel the sadness in her voice. "Naruto was the nicest person I've ever met. He was an idiot, but he was a great friend. Sasuke and Kakashi-sensei are different now that he's gone. I can't talk to Sasuke because he just won't talk at all. He told me that nothing matters anymore… He used to be so driven. And Kakashi-sensei is quieter. He works himself to the bone instead of lazing about. He sits in front of the Memorial Stone when Sasuke and I train. I don't think he sleeps."

Tsunade nodded. "That is troubling to hear, Sakura. But that's normal, or as normal as grief gets. Keep an eye on Sasuke, be a good teammate and help him rise from that funk he's got. A ninja without a purpose is about as reliable as a boat with no motor or paddle."

Sakura was surprised by the request, but nodded her head while tears welled in her eyes.

"A ninja's life is not without loss, Sakura," Tsunade continued. "Remember your friends and loved ones. That's how you keep them alive." She looked at the photographs of her Grandfather and Granduncle on the wall to prove her point.

The girl cracked and began to sob. "Part of me doesn't believe he's gone," she choked out. And she started pouring out to Tsunade what she'd kept in for months. Words flew out in such quick succession that it would've been useless to tell her to stop, even from the Kage chair.

Tsunade kept her sigh internal. She hadn't meant to pop the girl's pressure valve. Only to let her know someone else understood her pain.

'Perks of the job,' Tsunade thought as she put down her pen and felt more her true age now than ever before, trying to console a Genin she saw too much of herself in.

The quiet group sat huddled underneath the remnants of a large shed near the village wall; Storm clouds rolled over Konoha that day and beat against the shed's thin tin roof. Rain blew into the open structure when the wind caught it. It was a miserable little thing constructed in haste during the rebuilding of the wall, to store wooden boards under when the weather was rough, but now that the wall was fixed, few knew of or cared for its existence. It was the perfect meeting place for subversion and conspiracy. But to others, they were simply sheltering from the rain.

"You're telling me this mine is in the same small country where Naruto was found?" Shikamaru whispered, his eyes narrow and his voice dangerously low amid the thrum of rain. "And that lightning blew it to pieces? Natural lightning?"

"It's what was in the report, but it could be wrong. I think it is wrong, actually," Sakura contended. Others shook their heads. Rain hammered against their cloaks and outerwear with every sidelong gust.

Shikamaru thought for a moment, searching for connections. "So troublesome. Who is she sending?"

"Gai's team and Team 7," Sakura answered. "She's getting Kakashi-sensei to lead it. Isn't that odd?"

"He controls the Jōnin these days, my dad isn't thrilled about it- and she's sending him out on a C-Rank mission?" Choji questioned.

"Yeah, that's super weird, right?" Kiba voiced. Everyone gathered nodded in unison.

"I just don't know if that's enough of a lead," Ino raised her voice over a particularly violent surge of rain. She shivered against it. "My dad always says three months is the average survivability of a rogue or missing ninja when out of their original territory."

"I know, Ino," Sakura said, trying not to sound defensive. She'd memorized every scrap of detail about missing ninja. She'd learned about all of Konoha's and committed them to memory, telling their stories to herself when she went to sleep at night.

Sakura was grim in her outlook; It was hard not to be when the odds of finding Naruto alive or, really, finding him at all were so low. "I just think out of all of us, Naruto would be the one to make it. I can't sit here and believe he's gone until we have some sort of proof."

Another group nod. Shino spoke next, a surprise to everyone. "Have we thought about broaching this subject with the Uchiha? Why? He was on the mission when they supposedly found his body. And he was the last of us to see him alive."

Sakura bit her lip. Shikamaru looked at her, but she just shook her head. Her face was still red from her meeting with Tsunade. "He refuses to talk about it," she said, and turned from them for a moment to compose herself. "I'll talk to him on the mission, but I doubt it will get anywhere."

Shino grunted. He seemed to agree with that prediction. The rain continued to unload on the entirety of Konoha.

"Well, this is the closest we've come to something happening since he left. If he's out there, I'm sure he'll make some kind of noise. You know how Naruto is. I'm surprised Iwa couldn't hear him when he snored," Kiba joked. It was well received, but the mood was still sullen. Hinata nodded quietly but said nothing.

"Yeah, he's too troublesome to go out quietly. We'll find him, Sakura," Shikamaru said. He put a hand on her shoulder and prepared to go home. It was Shogi night at the house and his father was waiting. "We should all meet up again when you're back from your mission."

"Agreed," Sakura nodded. She stepped away from the group and braced to step out under the rain, but paused. A dark figure, soaked to the bone, was walking their way. She felt her friend's chakras ready, and heard the soft pull of kunai from their holsters. They couldn't run; They'd already been spotted.

"Sasuke?" She heard herself call through the beating rain. She knew it was truly him when he didn't answer her in the slightest. He paused a few feet outside the tin shed's roof and let the rain envelop him.

"I saw his body, Sakura," he said suddenly. Most of them gasped; Shino buzzed slightly, suddenly very uncomfortable. "I saw him lying there, in that hole of Orochimaru's, cut to pieces. I used to lie awake at night and think of what he could've done to us in the Forest of Death. What he did to Naruto was worse than anything I've ever seen." Sasuke's face was pale. Shikamaru thought he might throw up.

Those words meant even more coming from the sole survivor of the Uchiha Clan Massacre. From the person who had already witnessed the worst things on earth. Sakura felt her knees weaken. She collapsed, but Choji caught her and he and Kiba laid her down against old building supplies. She mumbled to herself that he was wrong, that Sasuke had been tricked. But he stood there plainly, hiding nothing, not even hiding his body from the elements.

His voice was flat. "We burned him to ash, Sakura. We burned everything to ash. There's nothing left to find. There's nothing left."

Shikamaru took over. "Sasuke, are you sure he's gone? We were just never given any solid evidence-"

Sasuke pulled something from his pocket and tossed it to the Nara. He caught it and turned it over in his palm.

It was a melted headband, with someone's handprint indented around the middle. On the back, in thinly etched lettering, was a name.

It was Naruto's.

"I wouldn't lie about seeing my best friend in seven pieces, Shikamaru."

Sasuke said one more thing before he walked further into the village: "I think we're leaving soon, Sakura. You should pack."

Now... The Kazekage's Royal Chambers...

"Huh? The Katabami Gold Mine Incident was you two!?" Kankuro asked. His lightly painted face couldn't hide his shock. He gawked at the bony blonde boy and his large companion. The two Jinchuriki were seated across from eventual Kage Gaara and his siblings. Underneath their feet was a rug over 500 years old, and in the great dining hall they commandeered was a table fit for fifty, yet only occupied by five. Suna's family dynasty had amassed a horde of trophies since their rise to power over the desert clans.

From these trophies came Naruto's new clothing: a light orange, satin shirt covered by a beige robe with white pants cuffed at the ankles. He was now noticeably bigger than Gaara, more athletic and thick. He stood eye to eye with Kankuro and was caught having to look down at Temari to meet her eyes, a startling transition from the runt he was less than half a year ago.

Han folded his arms. They'd somehow managed to hold off the specifics of this conversation for the duration of their stay, but it seemed tonight was the night. "It was Naruto, more precisely. A mountain collapsed on him after Raiga struck him with a lightning bolt and upset him."

"I just don't understand how you took a lightning bolt to the face and are here in front of us," Sabaku no Temari stated bluntly. "It's impossible if he used natural lightning. That would have made his attacks twice as powerful, at least." She sat erect and focused like a woman of her prestige should. Her battle fan was also propped next to her, within arms reach, ready to fight like a kunoichi would. The last time she'd seen this little blonde monster was when he'd pummeled her brother into the earth. She'd thank him for that before he left.

Naruto rubbed the back of his head with a big hand. "I just got lucky, I guess."

"Your power…" Gaara said. His voice was steady and quiet, but held much weight in the large, open room. "You've changed, Naruto. You feel stronger now. Shukaku hides when you are in the same room as I."

"Yeah," he answered, "I don't really get it, but I think the Kyuubi and I are becoming one person. So every now and then I just… explode," the boy continued. "It's actually why I can't go home." His face fell mightily.

Naruto was awfully moody tonight. Han theorized it was from the visceral memory of tearing someone to pieces with his hands, but he didn't know if the boy remembered at all.

"Explode?" Temari questioned. "Are we in some kind of danger with you here?" She made no defensive move, she only asked out of curiosity- Gaara in the desert was a virtual guaranteed win against any ninja foolishness.

Who on Earth would fight Gaara in a sandbox?

"No danger," Han assured. "At least, not for a while. I am beginning to think his absorptions come in either elongated stages or when maximally stressed."

"Sounds like a lightning bolt could cause some stress," Kankuro quipped. His puppets sat across the room. Every now and then he'd wiggle a hand and one would come and refill their water glasses from a gourd in its head, flowing through its nose and out into their cups. It was quite a party trick, if a little unnerving. The water was crystal clear and as beautiful as the massive chandelier that stretched the length of the great table. There could've been a thousand diamonds and crystals littered about its frame.

"Naruto," Gaara repeated. He said nothing else, but his eyes reflected the closest thing to concern anyone at the table had ever seen.

"It really wasn't that big of a deal," Naruto downplayed. "We met a bad man hurting good people, so we handled it."

"Destroying the wealthiest mine in the southern nations is a unique way of 'handling' something," Temari smirked. "In fact, it was so unique that Konoha is sending a team to help fix it. And here you two have been saying you need to lay low!" She chided them like a motherly figure would- Han took it that she assumed this role out of necessity, with no mother in sight.

Naruto balked. Han took over. "They won't find any trace of us, unless the old lady or her son rat us out. But even then, they didn't know where we went. We fled after we killed Raiga."

"Who killed Raiga?" Gaara asked. His eyes were squarely on Naruto.

Naruto was quiet. His large frame degenerated into the grand chairs of Suna's royal court.

"Do you remember it, Naruto?" Temari asked. Her demeanor did not change. "Was that your first kill? Surely you've had psychological training, no?"

"It might be good to talk about it," Kankuro awkwardly chimed in. He could care less about death; it was the confliction in Naruto's eyes that made him feel ill. At one time, he had been in the same position the boy across from him was in. It was an up-close look at the desensitization they had all endured to reach this point in their ninja careers.

"I remember every speck of blood across my face," Naruto said. His body was still shriveled into the chair, but he began to recite his fateful clash with Kurosuki Raiga, wielder of the twin swords Kiba, a former member of the Kiri no Shinobigatana Shichinin Shū, and now a very dead man.

A/N: Been on a kick lately. I'd really appreciate feedback because this is a bit of a turning point in the story, with the Konoha 12 trying to deal with Naruto's 'death'/ disappearance.