DC and Naruto read 'Caterpillar'

by Issexwithyourcloneincest

Characters from Naruto and DC read and react to 'Caterpillar' by Grumpywolf. This was written with the author's permission and is rated M for a lemon in the future.

6. 'Tis but a question of morals

I might end up giving this fic to you, Whatif-inator, 'cause you seem to have far more ideas for it than I do. Thanks, you and the guest.

I can't really remember most of the stuff from the animated series so I might deviate from canon a little or a lot.

On a side note, Wande Coal's 'Iskaba' is forever a banger and I recommend you listen to it. Old but gold.

Anyways, join AizenTheGoat's server. There's lots of helpful people as well as good writers in there so if you need help with a story, ideas for one, motivation, help with starting a story or just want to hang out with writers, readers and everything in between, feel free to join. The code's: https/discord.gg/dQYrRG7n7P

Let's get down to business then.

"Okay guys, I think I speak for everyone when I say this Kurama is nothing like his alternate self." Oliver glanced nervously at the fox that growled at him, exposing teeth that looked capable of biting through diamond. It had heard him, wonderful.

Naruto, having noticed Batman call the archer into the gathering, gently but firmly led Kurama away from them with Diana following after him. The group watched the two leave before someone spoke again.

"What gave that away? Him snapping at Diana?" Dinah rolled her eyes.

"His overall hostility. He looked like he'd maul us for saying his name." Oliver responded, ignoring her sarcasm.

"In all fairness, Naruto already warned us about that. " Barry pointed out. "We should have known from the start that he wouldn't be all snark and gluttony like his alternate self."

"Doesn't make it any much better, man." Hal shook his head slowly. "He might just be pissed about his name, but you saw how he looked at us. If Naruto wasn't there, he'd have probably tried to kill us. What's going to happen if something triggers him again, maybe even worse than this one?"

It was a really good thing the fox wasn't in his world; a lantern ring would have found him in the blink of an eye assuming The Butcher himself didn't try making him into a vessel. The thought of the mountain sized beast being piloted and empowered by the embodiment of anger made him shudder.

"Hal's right." Batman spoke. "He might have calmed now, but next time might be worse. Naruto doesn't have him on as tight a leash as we thought he'd be."

"Because he's not a pet." Clark frowned at the man. If it wasn't that his paranoia

"And he's no mindless beast either." Barry agreed with the man of steel. "It's our fault for not listening to him."

"True." Batman admitted. "But it doesn't make him any less dangerous. We need something to make sure he doesn't attack us in case of any slip ups-"

"Like saying his name even though we've been told not to?" Barry scoffed.

"-like that." Batman ignored the speedster. "Seeing as how he's out now, Naruto won't be able to warn us about anything in time."

"So what, you're suggesting we subdue him now?" Clark's frown deepened.

"No, I'm suggesting we stop him from attacking us at all." Batman looked at Martian Manhunter who returned his stare blankly.

Clark finally understood. "You can't be serious. You're suggesting brainwashing a being you just met." He glared at the man.

"It's not brainwashing, Clark. Manhunter's just going to plant a few suggestions in his mind to keep him from reacting as aggressively as he did this time." Batman explained.

"Which in itself is unnecessary, Batman." Clark said. "You're just being paranoid."

"My paranoia, as you call it, has saved us all many times." Batman frowned at him.

"But right now, it's just unfounded, Bats." Barry shook his head. "We're heroes, we don't toy with people's minds like that."

Hal took that as his cue to leave. He wasn't getting dragged into whatever clusterfuck this would lead to.

"And even if we agree to it, what makes you think the fox won't notice Manhunter trying to get in his mind?" Dinah asked. "And if he fails, what do you think's going to happen?"

"We'll just have to make sure Manhunter doesn't fail." Batman said. "If we can keep him distracted enough, I doubt he'd be able to notice any attempted entry into his mind."

"The others could tell Manhunter was trying to get in their heads and they were as distracted as could be." Dinah pointed out. "I don't see much reason why the fox would be different."

"Maybe because he's an animal?" Oliver shrugged.

"An animal from their world. A world where animals can talk and fight alongside the soldiers." Dinah scowled at the lantern. "That wouldn't be possible if they didn't have similar training to the people they fight with or at the very least, are more evolved than ours."

"We won't know until we try." Batman said.

"And if Manhunter fails?" Dinah asked.

"We'll cross that bridge if we get there."

"I'm with Batman on this one." Oliver nodded. "I don't fancy having my face chewed off just because I said something I didn't know I shouldn't have."

Dinah scowled at the archer. "Of course you don't. Well, count me out."

"H-hey, pretty bird, come on, you know it's not like that…" Oliver followed after his girlfriend.

"I'm not going to be a party to this either." Barry shook his head and walked away, leaving only Clark and Batman.

"...I'm not sure if what Kakashi said to you a while back stuck, Batman, but it's the truth." Clark frowned at his friend. "At this rate, you'll only end up antagonising all of them."

Batman sighed inwardly. "You felt whatever it is that fox did, Clark."

"We all did, even the others, but you don't see us all dwelling on it, do you?"

"I don't and that's the problem."

"There's no 'problem' aside from you not being able to accept that some things are not yours to fix or control, Batman." Clark rubbed his forehead.

They'd had this conversation far too many times for his liking and honestly, it was getting frustrating to have to talk the man out of trying to enact his morally wrong and often unnecessary contingencies.

"So you're suggesting we all just sit with a murderous fox with it's temper on a hair thin line?"

"No, I'm suggesting we… you leave the fox to the person who actually knows him. Someone who can do more to calm him down than brainwashing him into becoming docile."

"They're partners, aren't they?" Batman glanced at Naruto who was gesturing between Diana and Kurama, probably introducing them both. "How can we be sure Naruto won't be the one to sic him on us?"

Clark rolled his eyes. Batman only got like this when he was running out of plausible excuses. "If that's really all you're going on, Batman, it's not enough. What happened to the 'benefit of doubt' agreement we had?"

"It's enough that you're keeping me from trying to probe any further into them, Clark, but I'm not going to just sit and watch a creature capable of…that, just stay with us without having any fail safes in place." Batman frowned.

Clark stared at the man for a few moments. "...You weren't going to have J'onn just plant a few suggestions in his mind, were you?"

"We need to know something about it, Clark and by proxy, the rest." Batman said. "Even better if we have a degree of control over it too."

"We?" Clark laughed quietly. "No, there's no we in this. If there was, you'd have asked Diana for her opinion but you didn't because you already know what she'd say and you don't want to hear that because you know she'd be right."

Batman didn't respond.

"For once, Bruce," Clark stressed the man's real name, causing the vigilante to glare at him. "Leave people be. We all see the danger in them, but we're not exactly harmless people ourselves."

"We're not contract killers and mercenaries, Clark." Batman said acidly.

"But we're just as much unknowns to them as they are to us and unlike you, none of them have been trying to form contingency plans against us since we arrived here." Clark argued. "Yeah, I get why you're cautious of the fox, we all are. But just…just trust Naruto to keep him in check, okay?"

"You know I can't do that."

Clark sighed resignedly. Knowing Bruce, he'd have J'onn try entering Kurama's mind anyway whether they wanted him to or not. It was just a matter of when he did it. "Whatever happens is on you, Bruce. Only you."

Bruce sighed as Clark walked away from him. He wasn't surprised by how the conclusion to their conversation turned out, the real surprise would have been if Clark had agreed with him, but it didn't make it any less displeasing.

He looked at the fox that was still scowling at a confused looking Diana. It didn't escape his notice how it's tails slowly moved in the air like serpents searching for prey. They looked long and strong enough to attack a person with. No, to kill with.

His eyes narrowed. So what if nobody agreed with him? It was his countermeasures that saved all their lives multiple times, even the ones they didn't approve of.

The fox was dangerous. It was something everyone knew, but unlike the others, he wasn't about to just pretend they didn't stand the risk of getting attacked at any moment. No good being was capable of projecting whatever aura it was that fox had given out.

He turned to look at J'onn who eyed him from a distance. The martian, getting the message, connected their minds together. When he felt the familiar sensation of conflicting thoughts, he nodded. "Do it."

J'onn stared at him for a few moments before nodding back and closing his eyes.

---

"...And that's when you woke up."

Kurama stared at Naruto but kept Diana within his field of vision. "If I were not seeing with my own eyes, I'd say you've gone mad or you inhaled that white power again."

Naruto chuckled, ignoring Diana's raised eyebrow at the 'white powder' part. "It's a good thing you're here then."

Kurama snorted and turned back to look at Diana. "And this is the woman my other self approves of?"

Diana tried not to squirm as the fox stared at her as if looking at something beyond her appearance. The last time she felt this uncomfortable was when she'd stood before one of Apollo's oracles.

"He's taken a liking to her, yes." Naruto tapped Kurama's ear with a finger, prompting the organ to slap his hand away. "Trust me, she's a really nice person if you talk to her."

Kurama didn't doubt that, but it didn't mean he really wanted to give her one. With Naruto, he didn't have much of a choice, but beyond the boy, he had no desire interact with any other humans, not even those from another world. So long as they had the same blood flowing through their veins, humans would always be the same.

But at the same time, he knew Naruto wouldn't stop trying to get him to speak with the woman unless he agreed now so he chose to spare himself the annoyance. "I'll be the judge of that."

Naruto smiled brightly. "Well, Diana, this is my friend and partner, Kurama."

"I already know that." Diana said.

"I know but this is a re-introduction so you two can start off on better terms."

Kurama snorted. No number of introductions would change a first impression.

"Right." Diana nodded. "It's an honour to meet you, Kyuubi. Naruto has said nothing but good things about you."

"You already know my name so say it." Kurama's found that his reply didn't come out as unpleasant as he'd intended. It was like most of his animosity towards the woman had been washed away, much to his annoyance. The woman was definitely something.

"Kurama then. I apologize for…you know, how I addressed you the first time." Diana smiled halfheartedly, having no idea how to placate a talking animal, much less one Lady Artemis' blessing didn't seem to have much, if any effect on.

"What's there to apologize for? Did you know not to address me by name?" Kurama frowned.

"Yes." Diana admitted. "Naruto warned us against it before you appeared."

"But you did it anyway."

"It was a mistake on my part. I was so used to hearing your name, his warning didn't cross my mind when I saw you."

Kurama wanted to say something else but at Naruto's pleading look, he sighed and reluctantly nodded. "No one is above mistakes."

"No one." Naruto agreed.

"Speaking of mistakes," Diana jumped at the chance to avoid conversing further with the fox. "You inhaled 'white powder.' Is that what I think it is?"

Naruto grimaced. "If you're thinking of a certain stimulant then yes, it is what you think it is."

"You really shouldn't do drugs, Naruto " Diana said disapprovingly. No friend of hers was going to ruin his life that way on her watch.

"I only did it once, Diana." Naruto shook his head. "I didn't even know what it was at the time."

"And you took it anyway?" Diana asked incredulously.

"I was drunk and everyone else was taking it. It's behind me now." Naruto frowned at the memory.

"Alcohol shouldn't be enough reason to go into something like that." Diana frowned at him.

"Lowered inhibitions means you're more likely to do what you normally wouldn't do. It's all behind me now anyways." Naruto shrugged, hoping she'd get the hint and drop it.

"That just means you lack self control."

Goddamnit. Naruto scowled at her. "I said it's behind me now, Diana."

Knowing not to continue the topic, Diana nodded. "I understand, sorry."

He sighed. "It's fine. It wouldn't hurt to learn to take a hint though."

Diana didn't look too pleased by that but silently agreed. She hated to admit it, but she oftentimes missed subtle attempts people made at switching topics and sometimes, obvious ones. "I'll keep that in mind."

Naruto shook his head. "I'm sorry, that came out a bit harsher than I thought it would."

"It's better to be blunt than to sugarcoat your point." Diana smiled slightly.

"True." Naruto nodded. "That's -"

"Sharingan!" Kurama who had been quietly watching the two talk, roared furiously and rushed towards the green skinned superhero, exuding his murderous intent for all to feel.

'Oh shit!' Naruto saw Diana take her lasso off her waist as she approached Kurama and followed just as the rest moved to subdue the fox as well. What the hell happened?

J'onn's eyes widened in fright as the fox leapt at him with it's face contorted into a visage of hatred and wrath and forced him to bear the full weight of its murderous intent. In his mild panic, he unleashed a telekinetic wave that sent everyone, including a shocked Kurama flying.

Naruto positioned his body in mid air to land on his feet and when he did, he saw a levitating Diana trying to wrap her lasso around a floating Kurama who had grown to the size of a bear and was struggling to break free of whatever was keeping him in place. He looked around and saw J'onn standing with a shaking arm outstretched in Kurama's direction.

"Kurama, what happened?!" He asked his friend who struggled against his binds. If Kurama had heard him, he didn't acknowledge him, instead focusing on the martian.

"I'm going to kill you! I'll bite your limbs off one by one!" Kurama roared angrily and grew to the size of an elephant, forcing most to step back. J'onn, unable to continue, released the fox from his grip and fell on a chair, tired.

Naruto groaned. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Oliver fire a few arrows near Kurama's feet and as they impacted the floor, they detonated, releasing a foam that quickly solidified and hardened around the fox's feet.

Kurama growled at the archer's act and raised his feet up, breaking free of the foam with an ease that surprised the man.

As the fox made to move again, Diana got her lasso around one of his legs and pulled hard, causing him to stumble. He glared at her and increased his size again, this time dragging her with him as he ran towards the green skinned man who'd been picked up by the one Naruto called 'Barry'.

A small wire wrapped around his tail, but he pulled on it hard, sending the one Naruto called 'Batman' flying. The little problem solved, he looked at the running man again.

Barry, seeing the fox's glare focus on him, yelped and ran off with J'onn in his arms. He'd chew the man out about listening to Batman when they weren't being attacked by a giant fox that wanted to kill them.

Diana grit her teeth as she pulled harder on the lasso. Her actions didn't seem to slow the fox down much but she could already see Clark and Kara moving in to subdue the fox. She was prepared to let go and leave the rest to them when Tsunade gripped the lasso in front of her.

"You look like you need a little help." The woman grunted and pulled along with her. Diana's eyes widened as they finally brought Kurama to a halt.

"You're a lot stronger than you look." She complimented the woman who smirked.

"That goes for you as well." Tsunade responded. It wasn't just a compliment, even Naruto couldn't hold one of the fox's tails in place without using sage mode.

Kurama snarled at the two women and moved a tail to bat them both away. Before the limb could strike them, it got restrained by a glowing green cuff from our of which came more cuffs to bind the remaining tails.

Hal grunted. "I don't know why nobody's bothered to ask you yet, Naruto, but how do we snap him out of this?!"

"You can't!" Naruto yelled back. "I need you to keep him in place so I can talk to him!"

"Easier said than done, pal." Hal strained as he struggled to keep the construct solid. The fox's aura had a similar corrosive effect on his ring as a red lantern and consequently, it put a greater strain on him to keep his constructs from fizzing out.

Seeing the man's situation, Naruto looked at Gaara who nodded and out of the small gourd he had tied to his waist, a large stream of sand flowed out and wrapped around the fox's legs, forcing them further apart. Kurama roared angrily and struggled against the sand, nearly freeing himself before Oliver fired another barrage of arrows at them, fortifying the sand.

Tsunade, seeing what the two were doing, let go of the lasso for Diana to pull back just as sand wrapped around the limb they had kept in place. The fox increased his size even further but Clark and Kara perched on him from above and pressed him down.

Kurama growled as he felt the two press him down into the ground, suddenly reminded of being in a similar situation nineteen years ago. He sent a large amount of his chakra leaking through his fur and took delight in hearing their pained hisses.

"Now would be as good a time as any to talk with him, Naruto!" Clark yelled, feeling his arms burn from the fox's energy. God, it felt like he'd dipped his hands in boiling hot acid.

Naruto jumped in front of Kurama who finally looked at him. "Kurama, what the hell are you doing?"

"What am I doing? What am I doing?!"

He growled at his friend. "Why don't you ask your green friend what he was doing?!"

"What was he doing?" Diana frowned.

Naruto's head whipped towards J'onn who had fully recovered. "What did you do?!"

"I attempted to enter his mind." J'onn confessed unhesitatingly. A tense silence fell over the group at the man's words.

"You've got to be shitting me." Hal whispered tiredly.

Naruto blinked. "I'm sorry, you did what?"

"I attempted to enter his mind."

Naruto stared balefully at the martian. "We let you off for it the first time because of Clark's bullshit about it being a habit, but you did this on purpose."

"I apologize, I didn't know-" J'onn nodded, unable to express his remorse. He hadn't been able to enter the fox's mind fully but he caught a few glimpses of its memories and understood why it reacted the way it did and it only made him feel worse.

"If you didn't know whatever it you didn't know, you shouldn't have done it in the first place." Naruto said angrily. "Why would you even try reading his mind at all?"

"Because I told him to." Batman spoke. Naruto glared at the man before turning back to J'onn.

"And you just went with what he told you to? What are you, his pet mind-reader?" He asked the martian who frowned slightly at that.

"Naruto, that's uncalled for." Dinah said.

There was no humor in Naruto's short laugh. "Neither is trying to invade someone's mind without their permission but here we are. I don't know how things are in your world, but we don't enter people's minds willy nilly in ours."

"But I'm pretty sure it's the same in yours." Naruto nodded to himself. "But you all gathered round once so I'm getting it was to talk about whether or not to have him enter Kurama's mind, wasn't it?"

"We didn't agree to it, Naruto." Clark said.

"But you knew about it." Naruto scowled at the man. "You, Barry, Hal, all of you who joined that meeting. You all knew and even if you didn't agree with it, none of you thought it proper to warn me or Kurama."

"It's not like we knew he'd have Manhunter enter his mind now." Oliver frowned at the boy who shook his head..

"No, but you knew he wanted him to." Naruto tapped his head. "If you're all of the mindset that you're not to be blamed for someone's offense just because you're not involved even though you could have prevented it altogether by warning the victim, you're not fit to call yourself good people, much less heroes."

"Hey, why don't we calm down a little, hmm?" Kakashi placed a hand on his student's shoulder only for him to shrug it away.

"And you." Naruto ignored his teacher in favour of turning to face Batman. "Since we all came here, we've been nothing but nice to you, but apparently, you still feel the need to know everything you can about us?"

"The fox is short tempered and quick to attack, Naruto." Batman said. "If you weren't around when it got out, it would have attacked us."

"Because you did what I warned you not to do." Naruto argued. "Kurama isn't some mindless beast that attacks the first thing he sees and even if J'onn got to enter his mind, what then? What would come after seeing his memories?"

Batman didn't respond.

"No." Naruto shook his head contemplatively. "You weren't just going to see his memories were you? Kurama wouldn't go that crazy just from feeling someone trying to get in his head."

Hadn't Kurama shouted something about the sharingan?

"You were trying to control him." Naruto's eyes widened. "That's what you were trying to have J'onn do, not just see his memories."

Batman, seeing that the boy would attack him if he said the wrong thing, decided to come clean. "I was going to have J'onn plant a few suggestions in his mind to keep him from attacking us should something trigger him again."

"I'm here, aren't I?" Naruto pointed at himself. "Didn't I warn you against calling him by name?"

"You might not have that chance, Naruto, he's out with us now." Batman argued. "By the time you give us any warnings, he'd have already flown off his handles. We need a way to make sure that doesn't happen."

"I've said it before, Kurama's not some rabid beast."

"But he's volatile. You saw it just now, he'd have killed J'onn if we weren't here." Batman said.

"Only because you're the one who poked the sleeping bear." Naruto shot back. "I've been ignoring all your paranoid shit because I didn't want to be the one to disrupt the peace and Clark promised me you'd get off our asses but this is too far!"

"N-"

Naruto didn't let the man speak. "We're not going to spring to our feet and try to kill you lot but that doesn't mean we're just going to sit and let you walk over us just because we don't want to fight. I'll let you off this time, Batman, but if you try something like this again, you best believe we're not going to settle for just talking with you."

"And you'd best listen to your people when they tell you not to do something. You might be their leader but I can tell most of them could turn you to a bloody smear on the floor before you could blink. They listen to you because they respect you, not because you're special."

"But respect only goes so far. You keep up like this and people are going to stop giving a fuck about whether you get shit done or not and when that time comes, they'll stop listening to you and there won't be a thing you can do to stop it."

Batman scowled at the boy but didn't respond. Naruto, having said his part, walked away with Diana following him. Kurama shrunk to the size of a housecat, slipped out of his restraints and followed after the boy without glancing at anyone.

Seeing that the tension was gone, Kara spoke. "You messed up, Bats."

"Kara." Clark said warningly.

"What? I'm not wrong. I get wanting to have a means of protecting yourself but we all know him well enough to say it was more because he wanted to be in control of something here than to keep us safe." Kara shrugged.

Clark sighed. Naruto's words about them turning a blind eye still hadn't left his mind and he could tell it affected most of them as well. "Just…now's not the time to talk about what just happened, let's just calm down a bit, okay?"

Kara shrugged. "Whatever, I'm going to meet Naruto."

Clark sighed again as his cousin flew away. Just as he had feared, the two had hit it off too fast for his liking.

---

Diana sat next to Naruto who was stroking a sleeping Kurama's fur. A part of her wondered how the fox had managed to fall asleep so fast but she chose to ignore it.

"He's not asleep if you're wondering." Naruto spoke. "He'll fall asleep when he calms down a bit. He's still pissed about the whole thing."

"Ah." Diana nodded.

They spent a few moments in comfortable silence before Naruto spoke again.

"If you want to apologize on his behalf, don't bother." Naruto said quietly.

"No, I wasn't." She lied.

He looked at her from the corner of his eye and smiled lightly. "Sure you weren't."

Diana shook her head and stared at Naruto's hand as it went into the fox's orange fur. She briefly considered asking if she could pet the fox as well but decided against it. She wasn't sure if the fox would take kindly to her touching her especially after what happened.

"I'm not mad at you, you know." Naruto said again. "You didn't know what they were doing."

Diana frowned. "I'm still going to have to talk with those two about keeping me out of meetings like that."

"I think they already knew what you'd say." Naruto absently curled a strand of fur with his finger.

"Even then, they should have included me." Diana shook her head. "Clark's stubborn but it takes more than words to stop Batman from doing whatever he has in mind to do."

"Amen to that." Kara joined in as she sat beside Naruto as well. She looked at Kurama who appeared to be asleep. "How'd he sleep so fast?"

"He's not-" Naruto looked at Kurama again. "Oh he is. How'd you know?"

"It's a little difficult to tell since there's no heartbeat but he's too relaxed to be awake." Kara said.

Naruto raised an eyebrow. "You can hear heartbeats?"

Kara tapped her ears. "Super hearing."

Naruto blinked. He knew people with keener senses than what was normal, heck he was one of them, but his hearing wasn't good enough to pick up heartbeats. "Huh, nice."

"Yeah, it's pretty helpful."

"I imagine it is." Naruto agreed. "You'd be difficult to sneak up on."

"Try impossible." Kara bragged jokingly. "Even Batman couldn't sneak up on me."

"Come to think of it, I thought you'd be with Clark, Kara." Diana said, trying not to let her annoyance show. "He did say he had something he wanted to ask you."

"He's occupied at the moment." Kara pointed at the kryptonian who looked to be arguing with Batman about something. "What, you don't want me around?"

"Of course not." Diana shook her head. "You're always free to talk with me."

Before Kara could respond, Kakashi got up.

"I'm ready to read now." He announced.

Within a minute, everyone took their seats as the man opened the book. Naruto felt someone tap him on the shoulder and looked back to see a guilty looking Barry.

"Hey man, I'm really sorry for you know, not telling you about Bats' plan. I swear I thought he'd dropped it after we all said no."

"I am too, Naruto." Clark said remorsefully.

"It's fine, I believe you." Naruto nodded. "Just don't let it happen again. Assumptions don't keep people alive."

"Thanks, man." Barry smiled and leaned back on his seat.

"You're awfully quick to forgive them." Kara noted.

"I prefer to speak my mind and move on immediately than hold grudges." Naruto said. "Besides, it's a large book. I'd rather we didn't spend up to days here at each other's throats."

"That's a good thing." Diana smiled at him. Being of a similar mindset, she understood where he was coming from.

When he saw everyone had gone quiet again, Kakashi opened the book and the screen came down again as he began to read.

Chapter 6 - Vandal Savage

"How dare you burst in and ruin my wedding?!" A petite blonde woman said accusingly.

"Straight into the thick of it, huh?" Hal joked.

"Is Princess Audrey married?" Kara stared at the screen confusedly.

"Who?" Naruto asked.

"The princess of Vlatava or something, I can't really remember the name." Kara explained.

"This happened on our world too." Diana rubbed her head. "Vandal Savage tried to gain control over her country, Kaznia by marrying her and having her assassinated afterward."

"I'm guessing you foiled his plan then?"

"Barely." Diana sighed annoyedly. "They got married anyway. We're just lucky he played his cards early enough for us to take action without consequences."

"Why? You'd let someone like that continue with whatever it was he had planned just like that?" Naruto asked confusedly.

"Well, there are things we're not allowed to do without consequences." Clark said. "Imagine going into a hostile country and suddenly attacking its ruler."

"I get that, but isn't that the point of you being vigilantes? You act outside the law, don't you?"

"Vigilantism in itself is a crime, Naruto. We just get let off because the world needs us to fight people the normal forces can't." Clark said. "And we're still public figures, so if we get caught breaking international laws left and right, we'd be public enemy number one in the blink of an eye."

"But you've got people capable of doing the things you can't?" Naruto asked conspiringly.

"Err," Clark glanced at Batman who sat away from everyone. "We're getting there."

He'd have approved of his idea to have the proteges act as a black ops squad for the Justice League if the man hadn't said they would be completely off the book and the League wouldn't be able to help them if they got caught.

In front of her, behind the locked bars of a cell, a tall and athletic woman was chained up to the wall with a pair of very high tech shackles that even someone of her strength could not break. She was none other than Wonder Woman.

"Look Diana, it's you." Naruto snickered at the woman who rolled her eyes.

"I get to see Wonder Woman in the flesh?" Kara said with pseudo awe. "It's a dream come true!"

Diana gave both blonds a blank look. "So you two are just going to ignore that I'm behind bars?"

"Aren't you even curious about what Savage is up to? He's dangerous!"

"Love is blind." Gaara said.

"If she doesn't get rid of that blindness, she'll be falling into the pit her 'beloved' dug for her." Tsunade replied.

"Good luck telling her that." Oliver chuckled before mimicking the princess' high pitched voice. "I know he's old enough to be my ancestor and might just be using me to gain power but that doesn't matter because I'm in loooove."

"Audrey didn't love him." Diana said. "It was an arranged marriage and Savage hadn't given her any reason to suspect him of having ulterior motives."

"You'd think she would be more inclined to listen to you then." Kara stared at the woman on the screen.

"She had to assure the people of her father's line's continuity, Kara. And for that, she needed to get married." Diana defended the woman. "You can imagine how she must have felt when her wedding got interrupted by her 'friend'."

"Oh." Kara didn't know what to say.

"Why? Do you think he might throw a tank through my wall?" The blonde woman crossed her arms and said sarcastically.

Clark blinked. "You threw a tank through a wall?"

Diana groaned. "I had few options at the time. I was being chased and I'd split up from Batman."

Clark still couldn't believe it. "But a tank?"

"Yeah, that is overkill." Hal nodded in agreement.

"What's all the fuss about a tank?" Naruto asked and whistled as the image of a tank appeared on the screen. "Oh, I see it now. That's really large. It must be heavy too."

"Try counting from sixty tonnes." Hal smirked. The ninjas gave Diana looks that ranged from surprise to awe.

"I knew you were strong, Diana, but that's insane." Tsunade said, impressed.

"Tell me about it." Clark said.

"You don't have anything to say here, Clark. You bench pressed the weight of the world for five days on end." Diana took the opportunity to divert attention from herself.

"Five days." Gaara whispered disbelievingly. What kind of people were in that world? Gods?

Clark hung his head as the ninjas stared at him. He forgot how feats like that would look to people who weren't used to seeing it everyday.

"I've seen my fair share of weird stuff but that's extreme." Naruto said.

Only a few hours ago, Wonder Woman crashed the blonde woman's wedding by throwing a tank through the walls of the church where the ceremony was being held.

" Tanks a lot for that, Di."

"Jesus, Barry." Hal sighed.

It was the wedding of Vandal Savage and Princess Audrey, the daughter of King Gustav, the ruler of Kaznia.

"Grow up! He's obviously using you. He's amassing military and political power."

"I don't think she has much choice in the matter." Tsunade said. "Arranged marriages can't get called off unless both agree to cancel it or there's a valid reason to do so. And seeing as how Savage has yet to do anything…"

"She has no grounds on which to call it off." Diana nodded, feeling sorry for her friend. The girl may have been spoiled, but she was a good person.

"For what?"

"World domination." Batman said easily.

"You're finally talking now?" Oliver asked but got no response.

"What do you think? He's got to be stopped!" Wonder Woman shouted, finally reaching the end of her patience.

"I get that you're in a hurry, Diana, but you won't get anywhere by just shouting at her to see reason." Kakashi said.

Diana didn't respond. It wasn't like her to lose her cool so quickly, regardless of how urgent the situation was.

"You're a raving lunatic. Not to say you weren't fun to go clubbing with~"

"Shake it, uh, shake it, uh, shake it." Kara beatboxed with Naruto bobbing his head along to her.

"I didn't know you go to clubs." Clark looked at the amazon.

"I rarely do." Diana replied.

"Shame." Barry shook his head.

"You don't go either, Barry." Oliver pointed out.

"I'm married, man. I can't go out like I used to." Barry defended himself.

"Even before you got married, you didn't go clubbing." Oliver grinned at his friend. "Remember when I dragged you to one? You were like 'where the hoes at' then went to hide when they did show up."

Naruto shook his head disapprovingly. "There are some things you should take with you to the grave, Oliver. That was one of them."

"Yeah, you don't expose a friend like that, man." Hal shook his head.

"That was pretty foul." Kara agreed with the two.

Oliver sighed. Could he not do anything funny here?

"This isn't a joke, Audrey. I think Savage is responsible for your father's sudden illness." Wonder Woman tried to reason with her but the princess - now queen - shot back angrily.

"Jesus, Di, don't just drop a bomb on her like that." Hal said.

"Would you rather I told her after they were married?" Diana asked, annoyed.

Hal went quiet.

"And I think you've just crossed a line!"

"Don't walk away, Audrey. You're making a big mistake."

"I can do whatever I please! Surely, you've noticed by now!" She shot back and strolled out of the prison without sparing her another glance.

"She's going to regret that." Clark sighed.

"Considering Naruto's coming there, I'm sure she won't." Barry said.

"I'm not sure that makes things better." Clark said. "Naruto's there to take Savage who won't go without a fight. I'm sure he won't think of Audrey as anything more than collateral damage if she gets caught in the crossfire."

"Damn, that's true."

"That's still me you're talking about." Naruto deadpanned.

"A you who's less inclined to save people without monetary gains as an incentive." Tsunade pointed out.

"He's still me." Naruto insisted.

Tsunade rolled her eyes at the boy's stubbornness. "We'll see, won't we?"

Wonder Woman frowned and started to struggle once more to break her shackles but it was to no avail. Just then, a very strange feeling washed over her, a sensation that made her become very alert. While she did not know what to make of it, she heard the sound of a man's footsteps approaching her cell.

"The princess senses the arrival of her saviour." Oliver stroked his beard.

Naruto snickered at Diana's sour expression. "Don't worry, Diana. Even I've had my fair share of being saved."

"You! What are you doing here?!" Wonder Woman said greatly surprised.

"He's here to bust you out." Barry nodded.

"My other probably didn't even know who it was in that cell so I wouldn't say he's here to bust her out." Naruto pointed out.

A white ANBU fox mask, blond hair, a fur-collared black cloak that covered his entire body and a tiny fox cub curled up on his right shoulder, looking as though it was glued to it: the newcomer was none other than the alien mercenary that had rescued and extorted Superman of a huge sum of money.

"We're really back to this." Naruto sighed.

"Four million's a lot of money." Clark scowled at the boy.

"You're not even the one who paid me." Naruto groaned. "Let it go, man."

Kara glanced at Diana. "Do they do this often?"

Diana nodded. "In fact, Clark's calmer about it now."

Kara idly wondered if Clark secretly complained about her making him owe Batman fifty thousand dollars.

But almost six months had passed since then and Wonder Woman had almost forgotten about the strange alien and his gluttonous talking fox. She had certainly not expected to see him again, much less at that moment in the prison inside the royal castle of Kaznia.

"Wow, that hurts, Diana. Forgot about me so soon?" Naruto shook his head as Kurama woke up.

"It's been six months, Naruto." Diana said. "I'm sure your other self has forgotten about me as well."

Naruto doubted that. Diana wasn't someone a person could easily forget meeting.

"Why is it that whenever I meet one of you guys, you're locked up in a cell?" Naruto said with a laugh.

"I hope it doesn't become a recurring theme in that world." Superman sent Diana a pitying look that she and Naruto caught.

"Hey, hey, I'm that bad a person." Naruto huffed.

"You refused to save a person from a dead world without taking money." Clark argued.

"I refused to go on a potential suicide mission for free." Naruto said. "What would have happened if there was nobody there? I'd have wasted time and resources for nothing."

"I agree." Diana nodded. "There's no point in taking risks that have no promise of rewards."

"Did it have to be money?" Clark grumbled.

"Life's like a sandwich, Clark." Kara said. "No matter how you flip it, the bread comes first."

Naruto clicked his fingers. "I have to remember that."

"Yeah, it's a pretty good quote, huh." Kara grinned at the boy.

"Tagline worthy." Naruto nodded. "You came up with that?"

"Yup." Kara lied.

"Nice."

"I think it's best we let Kakashi continue." Diana said. When the two went quiet, she gestured towards Kakashi who nodded.

When he had met Superman, the Kryptonian had been locked up by the Preserver in a cell. Now when he was meeting Wonder Woman again after half a year, she was locked up in a cell too by Vandal Savage.

"We've got to stop meeting like this." Naruto chuckled. The superheroes rolled their eyes.

At first, Wonder Woman's intention had been to ask for help but she was getting increasingly weirded out by the situation.

"I'm sure I'd be curious as to what he's doing on Earth." Diana said.

"Yeah, Earth's kind of a nonentity in space." Hal agreed. "Even though it's becoming a little infamous now, the chances of a mercenary getting a job that takes him to Earth are very, very low."

"What about Lobo?" Clark asked.

"That's your fault for wilding out in space, Clark." Hal said.

Clark sighed.

"What are you doing on Earth? How are the guards right next to you not reacting to your presence? Did Vandal Savage somehow hire you?" She asked in a low voice.

"Nah, he's not my client, he's my target." Naruto said. "Besides, I don't work with people like him."

Kakashi rolled his eyes at the lie. Naruto, like all ninjas, sided with whoever hired him, be they good or bad.

"I think we're not talking enough about why the guards aren't doing anything about him being there." Barry stared at the screen intently.

"That's true." Gaara agreed. "Since Diana can see him, it's safe to say he's neither invisible, nor did he stop time."

"I think there's one thing you're leaving out, Gaara." Kakashi said. "Genjutsu."

"You think he placed them under an illusion?" Tsunade asked. Naruto knowing genjutsu still sounded ridiculous to her.

"He seems to be very skilled in the art here." Kakashi said. "It's the most likely of the options."

Naruto waved a hand as to reassure her and said. "Don't worry. Vandal Savage is not my employer. He's my bounty. As for why these men can't see me, they're under an illusion. Something like a spell."

Kakashi hummed. "What do you know, I was right."

"Just keep reading." Tsunade said. She knew the kage well enough to know he was being smug.

It turned out that the strange sensation she was feeling and her instinctual alertness were due to the illusion that he had cast.

"Circe gave you PTSD ?" Oliver snickered.

"She turned me into a pig." Diana scowled.

"She made Batman sing." Barry shuddered.

"Why are you afraid? He's got a good singing voice." Dinah asked.

"Batman had to sing." Barry pressed.

"Am I blue?~"

Barry jumped and glared at a grinning Oliver. "I hate you."

"That wasn't even me." Oliver raised his arms.

Barry glanced at Batman who returned his look blankly and looked back at Oliver. "Well, I hate you anyway."

Batman smirked.

"Is what you said to that bratty princess earlier true? Is Vandal as bad as you claim?" He asked.

"He's worse." Diana said.

"Yes. He's the one who orchestrated World War 2 and caused the deaths of millions of people! He's-"

"It's still strange to think that he's what we know as many historical figures." Hal said. "I mean, this guy was Genghis Khan."

Clark shrugged. "I don't know how but he's also pretty easy to forget."

"Easy to forget?" Naruto asked incredulously. "You make him sound like the root of evil and you're saying he's easy to forget?"

"It's not like we forget him entirely." Clark said. "But the guy just fades away all the time. The only times we even hear of him are when he's enacting some plan of his that just ends up getting foiled eventually. I mean he's really skilled but most of the time, it's just like, err…"

"Someone desperately trying to gain control of anything he can." Barry completed it for him. "The guy's goals don't even make much sense. One moment, he wants humanity to evolve, the next he's all about world domination, the next he's genocidal, the next he thinks the world's better off without us or he wants us under his control. It's weird."

"Sounds inconsistent." Naruto shook his head.

"She's not lying," Kyuubi whispered. Due to his Negative Emotions Sensing, no lies or negative emotions could escape his radar.

"That's a bullshit ability." Hal grumbled.

"What did you say?" Kurama glared at the man who gulped.

"Err, keep reading, Kakashi."

Naruto had read up on the data about Vandal Savage that Rui Nak had provided to him but he always researched the veracity of his information by interacting with the locals and doing some research of his own on-site. He never trusted someone's words blindly.

"I'm glad to see that's changed." Kurama said.

"I don't trust blindly." Naruto frowned at his partner.

"No, you were just easy to win over." Kurama snorted. "Remember the Fuuma girl?"

"That was one time." Naruto groaned.

"The Fuuma girl?" Diana raised an eyebrow. She knew Naruto knew a lot of women, but they were becoming a bit too many for her liking.

"It's a long story, I'll tell you later."

"Alright, thank you," Naruto said and stepped away, about to leave.

"Sigma male grindset." Oliver chuckled. "Don't let anyone distract you from the main goal."

Dinah raised an eyebrow. "Should I be worried about seeing you on a podcast talking about how I crave you for your masculinity?"

Oliver smiled. "Hell no, I'd never do that."

"Good." Dinah stroked his beard playfully. "I'd hate to have to surprise you there."

Oliver winced. The last time she'd 'surprised' him after he said something she didn't like, she cleaned his clock in front of Roy who never let him live it down.

"Hey! Don't just leave, help me out!"

"See, I wasn't here to bust her out." Naruto looked at Barry.

"Yeah, yeah."

When Naruto stopped in his tracks but did not immediately say anything, Wonder Woman added quickly, thinking that he was going to try to extort her as he had done with Superman half a year ago. "If you want gold, I'll give you as much gold as you want!"

"Pfft-haha!" Clark laughed at an embarrassed Naruto.

"Oh gods." Naruto hung his head.

An amused Diana rubbed his shoulder comfortingly. "I'm sure my other self was just trying all her options."

"She only offered him money because she thought he was going to try extorting her too." Kara snickered.

"Way to shoot yourself in the foot though." Barry grinned at the amazon.

She was the Princess of the Amazons. She may not be as rich as a billionaire like Batman but the Amazons had enough treasures and ancient artefacts for her to live in a luxury few other women on Earth could afford. She just chose not to because of her upbringing as a warrior.

"I'm pretty sure you'd be richer if you sold a few of those treasures you have rather than just exchange gold, Diana." Dinah said.

"I don't see the use in having more money than I need to live comfortably." Diana refused.

"If only everyone could think that way." Dinah sighed.

"I get you." Naruto nodded. "Who cares about how many zeroes are in your account? I just want to be able to afford the things I want when I want them."

"You're just like me for real." Kara grinned at the boy who smiled back at her.

"Even if she wanted to, it would rouse suspicion if she traded artefacts of unknown make." Batman said.

Clark rolled his eyes. The man just didn't like the idea of someone being richer than him. He was still salty about Aquaman being a trillionaire.

"Sorry, princess, no can do. I have a feeling that if I let you out of this cell, you'll try to get in my way and stop me from doing my thing."

"I'm pretty sure my other self's going to kill him." Naruto said, quickly noticing how all the heroes' faces soured. "What did I say?"

"They're not huge fans of killing." Kara said. "Well, neither am I."

"Why, because you're heroes?" Naruto asked amusedly.

"No, because there's no reason to kill ." Batman argued with the boy who scoffed.

Kakashi cleared his throat. "We're not from the same world so I can't judge but on ours, sometimes it is but killing isn't something we do because it's enjoyable, it's done because it's necessary."

"Heroes don't kill. They find a better way." Barry frowned.

"There won't always be a better way, Barry." Gaara said.

"There always is. There's always a choice." Clark insisted.

"There's always a choice." Naruto agreed. "It's just a matter of whatever you're ready to deal with the result of your choice and sometimes, the good choice just isn't the right one."

"When is it never?" Batman scowled at the boy.

"Imagine this."

Everyone went quiet as Kurama spoke from his position on Naruto's legs. "All but one of you have been placed under the control of a man who uses you to wreak havoc on the world. In less than a day, hundreds have fallen."

"That one of you who wasn't enslaved confronted the man. You fought and you argued and you were able to claim victory. You ask him to release your people but he tells you the only way that can happen is for him to die. He is not lying, that is the only way. And expectedly, you can't convince him to kill himself."

Clark gulped.

"The morally good choice would be to leave him alive and search for an alternative means to undo his control. Who knows, you may find one or you may not. Eitherway, you know that for every second you spend searching, hundreds of people die by your people's hands and even if you find the alternative in a minute, no less than six thousand people would have perished."

"The morally 'wrong' choice would be to kill him that instant, saving the lives of all those people. It's not hard, just snap his neck. Take one life and that of hundreds, thousands are saved but you've never killed before and you know no amount of justifying it will keep you from suffering the guilt that will follow."

He looked at a sweating Clark. "Will you let hundreds die so you can keep a clear conscience or will you endure a potential lifetime of guilt so those hundreds can live to see another day?"

"I…" Clark's response was stuck in his throat. Kurama chuckled.

"Being a hero isn't about dressing up in costumes and saving people, it's about sacrifice. Your acts of heroism are also acts of sacrifice. You sacrifice your time, your energy and should the time come, your life. Is sacrificing your conscience really where you draw the line? Are you so willing to remain pure and 'good' that you'd rather see people die than taint yourself?"

Having lost interest in the group, he rested his head on his hands and closed his eyes. "If it is, then all your acts of 'heroism' are simply your attempts at appeasing a saviour complex. Nothing more."

Kakashi sighed at the fox's words. When he saw nobody was about to start saying anything, he kept reading.

Seeing the furious glare she threw at him, Naruto involuntarily chuckled.

"Relax. One of your hero friends - I think Batman was his name? - is actually hiding just a few feet away. I think he's been waiting for a chance to break you out from your cell but he fell under my genjutsu like the rest of the guards."

Batman sighed inwardly. He didn't hate being human, but he could do without being susceptible to every superhuman power there was.

"Unlike you who seem to have some innate resistance to magic, he's just an ordinary man. Anyway, once I collect my bounty, I'll release the illusion and he'll free you too."

Diana, who wasn't affected by Kurama's words, frowned at the screen. "I'd rather you freed me now."

Naruto chuckled halfheartedly. "He might, I'm sure other me's not all that bad."

With that, he merrily waved her goodbye and left.

"Hey! Wait!" Wonder Woman shouted after him but he just continued to walk.

"Sigma male grindset." Oliver whispered, trying to lift the mood. He succeeded a bit as Dinah snorted with Barry chuckling lightly.

But as Naruto left the cell behind him, Kyuubi suddenly jumped off from his shoulder.

Kurama who had opened his eyes blinked at the screen. "What?"

"Even you find it strange that you're turning down a free ride." Naruto asked.

Kuram ignored him.

"Yo, Kurama, what's up?"

"You go ahead and capture that muppet. I'll catch up a bit later." Kyuubi said.

At Kurama's confused look, Naruto spoke. "You're probably going back to stay with Diana. You've been on her like white on rice since you first saw her."

"How unsightly." Kurama muttered. He hadn't been as attached to even the sage as Naruto claimed he was to Diana.

Diana frowned at the fox. "You say it like I'm bad to associate with."

Kurama stared at the woman for a few seconds. "If Naruto's right about you, you're fairly decent. My other self, however, is an embarrassment."

'Only you, Kurama.' Naruto sighed.

Naruto looked at him strangely.

"Not. A. Word!" Kyuubi growled threateningly but Naruto would not be himself if he didn't poke fun at him when he had the chance.

"You liiike her~"

"Shut up! Just get going and stop wasting time!" Kyuubi barked at him.

"Tsun-"

"If you say that word, I'll bite so much flesh off your thigh, you'll see your own femur." Kurama growled, shutting Naruto up. Since Naruto had called him that once, his siblings never stopped ribbing him about it.

Kara squinted at the fox. It was acting just like in that comic. Maybe the fictional stuff wasn't all that far off. Barbara really had to be here.

After that, although Naruto did not continue to tease him, his chortles made Kyuubi gnash his teeth. Though he could not fully understand it himself, Kyuubi had an inexplicable feeling of attachment to the woman. It was ridiculous to him as well to believe that it was all because of just a belly rub.

"She did what?" Kurama's eyes shot open.

"She rubbed your belly and you liked it." Naruto grinned.

"And I didn't try to kill her?" Kurama asked incredulously.

"You can have her goddess' blessing to thank for that." Naruto pointed at her.

Kurama gave the woman a suspicious look. "Goddess' blessing?"

Naruto understood the fox's reservations about that being a good thing. Neither of them had a pleasant experience with the only real goddess they'd met.

"I have an affinity for nature." Diana explained. "Animals take kindly to me because of Lady Artemis' blessing."

"I'm no animal."

"You're much more than that." Diana nodded, inwardly smiling at the fox's proud look that left as quickly as it came. "But it didn't stop your other self from falling under its effects albeit to a much lesser degree."

Kurama didn't blame his other self for that. Whatever that blessing was, it affected him too such that he couldn't bring himself to be as unpleasant to the woman as he wanted to be. Even hearing her speak was calming.

"And he chooses to submit to it rather than resist." Kurama humphed. "Shameful."

In truth, Kyuubi's feeling of attachment to Wonder Woman was not a strong bond or anything like being willing to put himself in danger for her sake. It was just goodwill.

"No offense, but he doesn't strike me as someone who'd be all that into helping people out." Barry said quietly.

"Oh, he's actually nice deep down." Naruto poked the fox who ignored him. " Deep down. He's saved me multiple times in fact."

"It just happened to be the lesser evil compared to the other things that could happen if I didn't." Kurama muttered.

"See, tsu-shit!" Naruto yelped when the fox bit his thigh hard enough to draw blood. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry!"

Kara winced. That looked painful.

But that slight goodwill he felt for her was significant enough for him to not be comfortable with ignoring her plight like he would normally do with other humans.

Diana sighed.

In the first place, it would not cost him anything to just release Wonder Woman from her shackles once Naruto accomplished his mission.

"That's why he's going back." Clark realised. "He's going to release her when Naruto's done."

Although his masking technique made his eyes look blue, in reality, currently, his eyes were red and his pupils looked like a cross between a slit and a horizontal bar.

"Freaky." Kara said as she stared at his eyes.

"Yeah…freaky." Naruto nodded.

"Why do they look like that though?" Hal asked. "It's like you've got a plus sign in your eyes."

"Hell if I know." Naruto lied. In truth, he wasn't all that sure himself. His eyes never went that way unless he was using Kurama's chakra in tandem with sage mode.

At that moment, every single life signature in the castle was as clear in his perception as though he could see them with his own eyes.

"This sage mode of yours sounds more and more useful as we learn of it." Diana said. "To sense people, impressive."

"It's not limited to people, I can sense life. Plants, animals, people, if it's alive, I can see it." Naruto explained proudly.

"Nifty." Batman muttered.

"You can't get snuck up on either and you didn't say so?" Kara poked him in the side. "You've been holding out on me, Naruto."

"Can't-get-snuck-up-on gang." Naruto high fived her with a grin.

Due to his Sage Mode, it was a piece of cake for Naruto to find Vandal Savage's location because his life signature was clearly different from other humans. It was quite similar to that of the Amazon princess locked in the cell; not quite as strong, but still similar.

"Similar?" Diana frowned, not too happy with being compared to Vandal Savage.

Naruto tried to imagine what his other self had to have seen. 'What's the most unique life signature you've seen?'

'Kaguya's' Kurama answered for him.

'Right, Kaguya.' Naruto nodded, confusing Diana and Kara. 'The chakra aside, what made her special….life, life, life…she's immortal, isn't she, Kurama? Just like you. Like you, her life's light wasn't dimming. If Vandal Savage is the same, his life's light wouldn't dim either. If I think it's the same as Diana's, it's safe to say…'

"Diana?" Naruto called the woman. "You…you wouldn't happen to be immortal too, would you?"

Diana's eyes widened. "What?!"

"It's the only way I see you and Savage having similar signatures without being related in any way." Naruto said.

"I-I don't know, Naruto. I really don't know." Diana shook her head slowly.

On Themiscryia, the only way for an amazon to die was to be killed and most stopped aging past their prime. She wasn't any different and even on Earth, she hadn't felt herself aging one bit but didn't think of it beyond it being a likely consequence of being a Themiscryian.

"It's best you don't think too much into it, Diana." Clark shrugged. He wasn't immortal himself, but he'd live for thousands of years before dying naturally.

"Yeah, it's not going to change anything. You are who you are." Naruto agreed.

Diana nodded, making a mental note to ask her mother about it.

'Is that woman immortal like Vandal Savage too? Immortal like me?' Naruto asked himself intrigued.

When he had come to Earth the first time around, he had not used his sage mode as he had had no reason to. Unless it was for the sake of a mission, he would generally prefer to not use his sage mode on the planets inhabited by sentient creatures due to the high degree of pollution of nature and the harmful effects that drawing such infected energy would have on him when taken in large doses.

"We get it, our planet's a toxic mess." Oliver rolled his eyes.

"Still coming if I can though." Naruto said.

"Hey, let me know if you find a way to our world." Kara said brightly. "I know this one place that sells sticky buns that are to die for."

Clark looked at the girl suspiciously. Was she asking him out?

"I don't know what those are, but they sound good." Naruto smiled back. "I'll let you know when I show up."

"It's a date then." Kara grinned.

"Wait, what?" Naruto blinked.

Diana's eye twitched.

Soon enough, he reached the control room. In a puff of smoke, his body transformed into that of a housefly.

"At this point, nothing you do surprises me anymore." Hal sighed.

"Gives a new meaning to 'fly on the wall'." Dinah chuckled.

"Shapeshifting or not, becoming the size of a fly? Amazing." Barry said.

Naruto soaked up the praise, neglecting to tell them that he only blanketed himself with an illusion to look like a housefly rather than actually become one.

Henge was one of the first and easiest techniques that shinobi used to learn back in his homeworld. Even 10-year-old kids could perform it. But, despite its simplicity, it was invaluable for any spy, sabotage, or assassination missions that had to be completed covertly.

"You all know this?" Clark looked at the ninjas who nodded.

"Save for a few special cases, it's mandatory to have a degree of mastery over it in order to join the forces." Kakashi said.

Dinah frowned at the middle sentence. Children shouldn't be trained to spy, fight and kill.

"Vandal, what do you think you are doing?!" The new queen of Kaznia asked in disbelief.

"Betraying you." Barry said.

"No shit, Sherlock." Hal snorted.

Just a few moments before that, Colonel Vox (Vandal Savage's right-hand man) had confirmed the destruction of the Justice League's spacecraft.

The superheroes froze at Kakashi's words.

"Oh God." Clark started. "We weren't on time here."

Barry shook his head disbelievingly. "That's not possible, it's just not."

"Barry, Vox confirmed it." Hal told his friend. "The watchtower's gone."

"That's what Lex and his buddies thought too, remember?" Barry insisted. "And look how things turned out. It's not gone, you'll see."

"Yeah. We'll see." Hal admitted. He didn't really believe the watchtower had somehow been saved here but like Barry, he still had a bit of hope.

"Destroying the Justice League. Building a railgun. Assuming total dominion over the nations of the Earth." Vandal Savage said from his throne-like seat then chuckled. "Sweet foolish child. Wonder Woman was right all along."

"Ridiculous! You'd have to be over 100 years old!" Queen Audrey denied.

"He's far older than that." Diana shook her head. "Far, far older."

"I'm far older than that," Vandal Savage boasted. "It was over 25 thousand years ago when I got this power. While my fellows cowered with fear, I dared to approach the strangely glowing rock that fell from the sky. It was warm and the night was very cold. I slept curled up next to it, not realizing what its radiation would do to me. But over the millennia that followed, as I watched those around me grow old and die while I remained unchanged, I discovered the truth. I came to accept my destiny: I live to rule."

Naruto was unimpressed. "If you haven't achieved what you were born for in over twenty-five thousand years, there's no point in trying anymore."

Diana agreed. The stone age would have been the perfect time to assume control over all of humanity and stay in control even as the race evolved. His goal would only get harder as time went and with the constant popping up of metahumans, superheroes and supervillains with similar goals, he'd have an increasing number of opposition and rivals for his goal.

"Delusions of grandeur aside, I rule Kaznia." Queen Audrey shot back.

"Not for long if he has anything to say about it." Oliver's smile had no humor in it.

He doubted Naruto's alternate self would let her die but he wouldn't put it past the mercenary not to bother helping her if doing so would make his job harder.

"Eh, we've got Naruto there." Kara pointed at the blond next to her.

"The saviour." Tsunade smirked at the boy who sighed.

"Makes you wonder what he'd be like if he was evil." Barry looked at the boy.

"We are not the same." Gaara smiled lightly.

"Doubt it." Tsunade grinned.

"Chidori." Kakashi said, getting everyone to look at him. "Well you know, him and Sasuke had this little rivalry going on, opposite of rasengan, chidori. You get it?"

Naruto shook his head. "Just read."

Kakashi's shoulders sagged. Tough crowd.

"That's why I married you," Vandal Savage said smugly. "It's also why I poisoned your father."

"I didn't see that coming at all." Kara said dryly.

"You poisoned my father?!" she yelled and slapped him with all of her strength, leaving a trail of bloodied scratches on his face.

Oliver whistled. "She's got one mean slap, that's for sure."

"He did kill her father." Dinah said. "She probably put all she had into that."

"Too bad it won't mean much." Clark sighed. "All those marks will be gone in a second."

"He heals quickly?" Naruto asked.

"That's why he's immortal." Diana said. "His cells regenerate rapidly enough for even mortal injuries to heal in seconds without so much as a scar."

"What's with the one on his face then?" Naruto pointed at the scars on the man's face that could only come from claws.

"He probably had them before coming in contact with the meteorite." Diana answered unsurely. It was either that or there was something capable of negating his regeneration. She hoped it was the latter, the man had been around for too long already.

But after Vandal Savage grabbed her arms and immobilized her, she grew shocked when she saw the clawed skin of his cheek heal up in a second.

"There it is." Barry snapped his fingers.

"Guards, confine this brat to her quarters."

At his words, two soldiers grabbed the young queen roughly and started to drag her outside.

But everyone in the room froze when a masked man appeared behind Savage Vandal out of nowhere. The self-proclaimed king of Kaznia suddenly found his feet leaving the ground when a steel-like hand clenched around his neck and lifted him in the air.

"Saviour Naruto coming in clutch." Oliver imitated a sports commentator.

"I'm beginning to get creeped out by how many voices you can imitate." Barry gave the archer a strange look.

"I told you, it's a hobby." Oliver said.

Kakashi idly wondered if Naruto's encounter with Savage would be like his own with Hidan.

P erfect Russian came out of the masked man's mouth. "My mission was to capture you and hand you over in a perfect condition, but trash like you doesn't deserve to live even as a lab rat."

"I knew it." Naruto nodded. Most of the superheroes grimaced, already knowing what was going to come next.

"Unless your Naruto's got something capable of killing someone who can survive even decapitation, he's not putting Savage down." Diana pointed out.

"Well, the job's to bring him in alive and he'll heal from anything I do so I can't just cripple him and call it a day." Naruto mused. "I'd probably just chop him to bits and take away his parts like that."

Clark shuddered. He'd seen something similar done in movies and hated it a lot. He didn't want to watch Naruto cut someone to small enough parts to stuff in a box.

"Jesus…" Barry gave his friend disturbed look. He'd seen crime scenes like that, but he didn't want to have to watch it being done.

"That's…hardcore." Oliver muttered halfheartedly.

"It gets the job done doesn't it?" Naruto chuckled awkwardly. "I mean, he's not dead, just…cut down to size."

"Yeah…cut down to size." Kara nodded absently. She didn't exactly approve of it, but a morbidly curious part of her wanted to see it done.

Batman stared at the boy intently. Was this really who Diana was interested in?

At that moment, the soldiers in the control room and Colonel Vox woke up from their stupor and immediately started to yell as they pointed their weapons at him."Release him immediately!"

Vandal Savage also struggled to say despite his throat being choked. "Whatever you were paid, I'll give you double. No, triple!"

"Sorry man but when I'm paid, I always see the job through." Naruto nodded.

Dinah blinked. Did he just quote Angel Eyes?

But just as his words ended, Naruto's other hand clenched into a fist and punched a hole into his back, through his chest, obliterating his heart.

Rin's face flashed through Kakashi's mind but he banished it as quickly as it came.

Oliver looked away and Barry retched.

Gaara sighed when he felt the speedster's vomit splatter on his sandals and toes. He was no stranger to gore, but watching Naruto of all people punch a hole through someone's chest felt wrong.

Clark stared at the screen in mute shock and Diana just watched intently, secretly satisfied to see the man meet his potential end.

Kurama, who opened his eyes to look at what happened, smirked at the sight. 'I approve.'

'Of course you would.' Naruto thought tiredly.

"You could have just stabbed him, Naruto." Kakashi said disapprovingly.

"I'm just being thorough." Naruto shrugged. "The loss of a heart's going to at least leave him groggy for a bit. He'll be unlikely to throw a properly coordinated punch even if he heals fast."

Tsunade glanced between the screen and the boy she saw as a son. She'd never gotten to see him in action before the war, but even then, he didn't display the brutality she was watching.

Was this Naruto the same?

Naruto himself couldn't help the slight nostalgia from watching the impalement. "Brings back memories."

"Memories?" Batman stared at him. "You've done this before."

"No, but I've felt it before." Naruto grinned humorlessly.

"You've experienced this?!" Diana asked in shock.

"Yep." Naruto ignored the concerned and horrified looks he got. "Savage got off lucky, I was at the receiving end of a lightning coated fist. And I got stabbed twice."

Kakashi sighed heavily. Teaching Sasuke the chidori was one of his greatest regrets. The boy had done exactly what he had been warned not to use it for in his bid to defect from the village.

"Hardcore." Oliver gave the boy an awed look.

Batman stared at the boy in mild concern. No wonder he was able to bear to watch something like this easily.

A large amount of blood splattered over Queen Audrey and the two guards that had been the closest to him. The woman screamed in terror and she lost strength in her legs. The guards themselves were petrified and could not keep a hold of her as she collapsed on the floor.

"Yeah." Dinah grimaced. She could only imagine how Audrey was feeling. Spoiled party girl who went from living it up to watching her would-be husband who also murdered her father get his heart destroyed in the royal courtroom. It sounded like a nightmare.

Kara winced at the girl's scream. She'd seen stuff like this in movies, but it was considerably worse to see it actually happen in real life.

"Kill him!" Colonel Vox hollered and then he opened his mouth wide and initiated his sonic scream. But even before the sound waves could reach their target, a blade of pressurised air separated his head from the rest of his body. The other soldiers in the room became as still as statues. They did not dare to even move a muscle.

Batman's face soured further at the sight of the clean decapitation. It was too smooth not to be a practiced move.

"Y-you're not going to kill the guards too, are you?" Barry shakily asked Naruto who hummed thoughtfully.

"It depends on whether they try fighting me or not. I hope they don't though, my other self shouldn't be forced to shed more blood than he has to."

In the deathly silence that instilled, a sudden coughing noise came from Vandal Savage's previously lifeless body.

"I am immortal." *cough* "I can't be killed. There is nothing. Absolutely nothing that you can do to me."

"It's fortunate that the goal isn't to kill you then." Naruto smiled.

As he said that, Vandal Savage even broke into raspy laughter. But his laughter died in his throat when another blade of wind beheaded him too like his subordinate.

"It wasn't enough that you destroyed his heart?" Batman glared at Naruto.

"If he could still talk, he clearly wasn't as incapacitated as I thought."

"What do you know, I got to kill you twice and even complete my bounty too. This must be my lucky day," Naruto chuckled "Let's see how you're going to revive in an inanimate space, devoid of air, where even time doesn't exist."

"And there's the sealing." Naruto nodded.

"Thank God, it's finally over." Barry took off his mask to wipe the sweat from his chin.

"You should be happy he didn't chop him to bits, you'd have seen organs sliding around on the floor like fish." Kakashi smiled at the man's nausea from the mental image.

He took out 2 sealing scrolls from his cloak and unfurled them unhurriedly. Without even looking at the soldiers, he warned them. "Don't make any moves. Don't give me a reason to kill you."

What a joke. The soldiers around were too scared to breathe too loud, let alone entertain any thoughts of acting against him at that moment.

"They're probably not even paid enough to protect Audrey's life, much less risk theirs against someone capable of decapitating people with wind." Oliver snorted.

They were just average humans while, in their eyes, he looked like a demon. Even the bratty queen, Audrey, had none of her previous haughtiness. Her face was livid as she watched him, too terrified to move even an inch from where she had fallen.

"You're not alone in that." Kara sympathised with the girl. With Naruto's cheery demeanour, it was easy to forget he was a highly trained killer. Seeing his other self decapitate two people with ease in the span of a minute was an eye opener for her.

But Naruto himself could not care less about anyone else in the room. He had no interest in killing the others. He had been a shinobi in the past. In a way, he had been in the military as well. He knew that the soldiers were only following orders. Nevertheless, if they were to shoot at him, he would show no mercy, like with Colonel Vox.

"Like I said, they don't attack me, I don't attack them." Naruto nodded.

"I doubt they'd attack you even if they were ordered to." Hal shook his head. Having been in the military himself, he'd seen people choose to desert rather than follow orders that would lead to a guaranteed death.

He threw one of the scrolls on Vandal Savage's head and the other one on the rest of his body making them vanish in two small clouds of white smoke.

Bringing a finger to his left ear, Naruto spoke. "Aight, Kurama, I'm done here. Kiss your girlfriend good-bye and meet me at the ship."

"Girlfriend?" Naruto snickered at Diana. "You hear that, Kurama? You're in a serious relationship now."

Kurama snorted. 'I'm sure she prefers his partner.'

Diana rolled her eyes.

"She's not my girlfriend you piece of-" Kyuubi yelled into his earpiece but Naruto cut off the connection with a chuckle.

Kurama growled at Naruto's laugh.

After he grabbed the two sealing scrolls from the floor and pocketed them inside his cloak, he disappeared, leaving only a few arcs of yellow and black light flickering in his wake.

"Gets me every time." Barry said.

"I thought teleportation would be a common thing in your world." Naruto looked at Barry strangely. " You can run through time."

"The only superpowers that get around are immortality and flight." Hal replied. "Teleportation is surprisingly rare, even in the larger universe."

"Huh." Naruto looked back at the screen.

…

A few minutes after Naruto teleported away from the room, Batman and Wonder Woman burst through the doors of the control room. But they only found an obscene amount of blood splattered everywhere.

Clark winced at the sight. "I don't know how, but the aftermath looks even worse than the actual action."

"It's usually like that." Barry said. He'd been to messy crime scenes before, but seeing them never got any easier for him.

Soaked with Vandal Savage's blood, Queen Audrey was still lying on the floor with a blank look on her face while the rest of the soldiers in the room were looking at each other filled with helplessness and uncertainty. They did not know what they were supposed to do in that situation.

"I can get that." Naruto nodded. "When even the queen's lost, you can't really do much more than just stand there and hope nothing else happens."

"Speaking from experience?" Kara asked the boy who nodded.

Despite Queen Audrey's previous behaviour towards her, Wonder Woman came to her and asked kindly. "Audrey, can you tell me what happened?"

But the blonde woman was in shock. She was incapable of speech at that moment, just staring blankly at the pool of blood on the floor.

"She's traumatized." Dinah pitied the woman. Even with therapy, it would take years for her to get over something like that.

Barry nodded sympathetically. He'd been in a similar state after his mom was killed.

"You, tell me what happened here!" Batman ordered one of the soldiers.

"Being rough with them won't help you, Batman." Naruto frowned at the vigilante. "They're not exactly better off."

Batman didn't reply.

After getting the full story from the soldier, Batman's hands clenched into fists. Not for the first time since he had joined the Justice League, he had found out the hard way what it meant to be a part of a team of superheroes while he had no superpowers himself.

"Batman…" Clark looked at the man who didn't acknowledge him.

He had fallen prey to the alien mercenary's illusion technique without even being aware of it, just like the men guarding Wonder Woman's cell. Batman was confident about fighting against anyone if he was allowed enough time to prepare and make plans. But without preparation time, in front of an unexpected situation, he was too vulnerable. He was only human.

"Few plans ever survive contact with the enemy." Gaara said. "There's no guarantee you'd be able to fully prepare for him even if you knew he was coming."

Batman didn't respond, but he agreed with the redhead. There never seemed to be enough plans he could make for anyone, both ally and foe. If it had holes in it, there was always the chance that he'd be reduced to a bloody smear on the wall before he even got the chance to follow through with any of them.

But nonetheless, he tried. He tried because he knew his plans were all he had. He wasn't strong or fast or durable enough to keep up with most of the enemies the league faced. His only edge came from being prepared for every conceivable possibility and the moment he lost that edge, he was finished.

Clark sighed. He knew this would only send Bruce spiralling further down.

Even more alarming for Batman than falling into Naruto's illusion was that Martian Manhunter at the Watchtower had not detected an alien ship approaching the Earth. That was a massive breach in their defence.

What if this time around, the alien mercenary's mission had been to capture the president of the United States instead of the ruler of Kaznia? What would have happened?

"You're thinking too far into this, Bats." Flash sighed.

"Am I, Barry?" Batman asked.

"You have to think of this first. 'What work anyone in space have to gain from this?'" Hal chided the man.

"People on earth are just humans from a backwater planet in an irrelevant system in an inconsequential galaxy in an unpopular sector in a wide universe. Unless someone here achieves some technological breakthrough that's not been achieved out there, there's nothing to gain from us."

"Way to make us feel small, Hal." Barry chuckled.

"You got my point, Hal. We can't just let aliens come and do as they like." Batman insisted. "That was the whole point of creating the league in the first place."

The Justice League had been created primarily with the purpose of protecting the Earth from the aliens that would try to invade. If aliens could come to Earth and wreak havoc as they pleased then what did the Justice League even exist for anymore? They had to take action and they had to do it fast.

"That doesn't sound good at all." Naruto blinked.

"Tell me about it." Clark sighed. He didn't want to know what Bruce had in mind now.

"Wonder Woman, let's go. We have to meet with the rest of the Justice League immediately."

"But Audrey is... I can't just leave her like that. She is no condition to-"

Batman glared at her and although he did not shout, the words he spoke were very sharp."What's more important? Consoling a spoiled little girl or making sure the Earth is safe? I thought you knew better than that."

"Really, Batman?" Dinah frowned at the vigilante.

"He worded his point wrongly." Batman admitted, frowning at his other self.

"He's obviously just transferring anger." Barry said.

"It doesn't matter." Batman insisted. "He shouldn't have said it that way regardless.

The whole reason he became Batman was to make sure people didn't have to go through what he did in that alley when he was eight: scared, covered in blood and alone in his suffering. He wanted to prevent them from going through that and for the ones he failed to protect from that, he wanted to be there for them.

Batman wasn't just meant to be a symbol of vengeance and justice, he was supposed to be, in his own way, a symbol of hope.

Wonder Woman looked at him startled. The rough way in which Batman spoke to her now was unlike him. She thought that the two of them had become a little closer after sharing a dance yesterday at the engagement party of then-princess Audrey and Vandal Savage.

Diana sighed inwardly. It had been that dance that also led to her thinking there could be something between them. He'd been the one to shoot down her hopes. Apparently, it would be the same in this world.

She knew he was mostly speaking out of anger, but it didn't make her feel any better.

"You alright, Diana?" Naruto looked at the woman concernedly.

"Yeah, I'm fine." She smiled at him. What did it matter if Bruce had rejected her? Here was someone who seemed to be interested in her and she had to admit, she'd taken a liking to him as well. But now, she wasn't sure whether or not to be as direct as she had been with Bruce.

But Wonder Woman had no way of knowing just how rattled Batman was because of his vulnerability as a human and that he was not exactly calm at that moment. She thought that Batman was acting like an asshole to her on purpose, to distance himself from her. Because he had done that a few times over the past year since she joined the Justice League. He had even made it clear once that he did not want anyone else in his life, especially not a teammate.

"Relationships with teammates do tend to complicate things." Kakashi nodded.

"They don't always have to." Barry said.

"They will, whether you want it to or not." Kakashi said. "So long as there's affection, it's going to cloud your judgement."

Clark wondered why Bruce told her he didn't want anyone in his life. The last time he checked, he'd gotten close with some catburglar in Gotham.

In the end, Wonder Woman did not comment anything about her hurt feelings. She chose to stay silent and followed Batman to their Javelin to meet with the rest of the Justice League at the Watchtower.

Kara had to admire the woman for being able to bottle it up like that. She'd have probably flown into a short rant if she were in her shoes.

However, in her heart, she gave up on any thoughts she might have had about a possible relationship with Batman. He was a good man with qualities worthy of admiration such as his courage, tenacity and resourcefulness but, in the end, Wonder Woman was a valiant warrior and a princess blessed by the Gods themselves.

She was not a weak and needy woman that would blindly and endlessly chase someone that did not want her. She was Diana, Princess of the Amazons. She had her pride and dignity too.

Diana smiled proudly at that, getting a chuckle from Naruto who saw her.

"That you are, Di." Kara smiled. "You're the Wonder Woman."

Tsunade shook her head as her mind went back to one of her students. In spite of all her development, Sakura often regressed whenever she met Sasuke, walking on eggshells around him and trying desperately to gain his approval even though it was clear that while he acknowledged and commended her strength, he didn't see a partner in her.

Kakashi shut the book. "The chapter's over."

"Finally." Barry sighed in relief.

As everyone left their seats, Bruce tried to approach Diana who had already walked off with Naruto only for Clark to tap him on the shoulder. He turned back to look at the Kryptonian who shook his head. Getting the message, he sighed resignedly. "What is it?"

"We need to talk, Bruce."

I'm drained.

Ra's Al Gulh is a better villain than Vandal Savage and I'll die on that hill because if you've been around for over fifty thousand years and still haven't been able to rule the world, you might as well give up on your dream and die.

It might be my own bias talking but the only thing he has more than Ra's is the experience that comes with his age.