Chapter 17

Naruto had noticed a pattern. Every time he was in town and tried to get together with any of his friends, Sai and Yamato would show up and tell him he had a mission. He was getting the impression that Danzō didn't want him hanging around non-Root members, which Sai begrudgingly admitted to when Naruto had asked him. He also felt like he was being watched whenever he left his apartment, not that he was home often. He was starting to believe that not all the missions he was going on where from the Hokage either, because he didn't know anyone else who spent more time on missions than not.

Shikamaru and Sasuke, specifically, had been trying to flag him down for weeks. They had almost turned into stalkers, which Naruto would find funny, if not for the fact that Shikamaru never put this much energy into anything.

Naruto had been extra careful with his skills lately, but felt taking a risk in this case was necessary. He had summoned a kitsune to follow Shikamaru and tell him when he was alone in his room. Around nine that night, when the kitsune had informed him that Shikamaru was finally alone and in his room, he created a clone that used Hiraishin* to appear in Shikamaru's room.

"Naruto, what-?" Shikamaru started in shock.

"No time." Naruto said, grabbing Shikamaru's shirt and using Hiraishin to get back to his apartment. Once back, the clone dispelled.

"What is going on?" Shikamaru asked angrily. Naruto had never seen him so angry. He was also looking unsteady on his feet and a little green. Naruto had made some ginger tea just in case he reacted this way and gave it to him, watching Shikamaru drink it slowly and start to look better.

"They don't want me talking to you guys." Naruto started, moving to sit on the couch.

"Who?" Shikamaru asked, still angry. He followed Naruto to the couch and sat down.

"Have you heard of Root?" Naruto asked him in return. Shikamaru almost dropped his tea.

"So they weren't disbanded then." He said when he got over his shock. "My dad's mentioned of them before."

"Officially, they were." Naruto said with a nod. "But they are still operating under Shimura Danzō." This time Shikamaru did drop the tea.

"Shit." Shikamaru said, trying to clean up the mess. "Is he behind your reassignment?" Naruto nodded. "Your new teammates are Root?" Another nod. "Is he trying to get you to join?"

"I don't think you 'join' Root. I think you're selected and kind of…forced to become part of it." Naruto said, crossing his arms and frowning. "But that's usually when you're young. Apparently, I'm a special case."

"You think it's because of the Kyūbi?" Shikamaru asked. Naruto nodded.

"I'm sure of it. I don't really know what he plans to do with me, but I doubt it's anything good."

"I don't like the sound of this." Shikamaru said looking worried.

"It's fine. Tsunade-sama and Jiraiya-sama both know about the situation." Naruto told him.

"Good." Shikamaru said after sighing in relief. "I haven't heard anything good about Danzō besides the fact that he feels that he's the only one that has 'Konoha's best interest' at heart, but that he'll do anything, including destroying lives, in order to achieve his goals."

"That I know." Naruto said darkly. "This is a rare chance that Konoha needs. Everyone else in Root is dedicated to Danzō, due to his training, or just not able to say anything because of the seal he places on him. I'm the only one that can actually find out what Danzō is up to and maybe even stop him before he does something catastrophic." 'Again.' Naruto thought to himself.

"Mendokusai. If you need my help, let me know." Shikamaru said with a sigh, not wanting to continue with that line of thought for the moment. "On another note: Sasuke seems to be reverting back into his old ways."

"What do you mean?" Naruto asked with a frown. So this is what he was trying to get his attention about.

"He's going around challenging anyone he can. And he's going all out on whoever accepts his challenge. Kiba was in the hospital for a week after trying to take him on."

"That was Kiba's mistake." Naruto said, raising his eyebrow.

"Obviously." Shikamaru agreed. "But his normal arrogance has elevated to a dangerous level. Not that I care much if he gets put away, or put down, but I thought that you would."

"Since when did I become his keeper?" Naruto asked in aggravation. Shikamaru shrugged. "I need to take you back." Naruto said, seeing a small toad hop out of his sink and creating a clone that took Shikamaru home.

Naruto was surprised to see both Tsunade and Jiraiya come out of the toad. Usually it was just Jiraiya who came in using his toads. When the three of them met, it was usually in the Hokage's office. He raised his eyebrows and turned to the toad with a sympathetic look on his face.

"I am so sorry. They really have no self-restraint." Naruto said seriously with a bow. "If you need to wash your mouth out, please feel free to use my sink." Jiraiya gave a bark of laughter and had to hold a red-faced Tsunade back from smashing Naruto's face in.

"You're lucky we can't draw attention, kid, or else your ass would be punched straight to the first floor." Tsunade said, pulling out a large bottle of sake and taking a large gulp before passing it to Naruto who took just as large a gulp before passing it to Jiraiya. This had become a weekly occurrence, the three of them having a secret meeting while drinking. The only reason Naruto was able to drink with them was because he had stolen the sake from them during one of their first meetings and started drinking it, barely getting drunk after drinking an entire bottle.

"You said the other day that you had news?" Jiraiya asked sitting down heavily on Naruto's couch.

"I heard that Akatsuki are indeed planning on going after the jinchūriki's." Naruto said, taking another gulp of sake and sitting on the ground next to his couch as Tsunade sat next to Jiraiya on it. Jiraiya had mentioned it at a meeting and Naruto had put his kitsune and Zabuza and Haku on the job to find out if the information was accurate.

"But they haven't captured any yet, right?" Tsunade asked.

"Not that I've heard of." Both Jiraiya and Naruto replied.

"I've heard that they want to start with me and go down the line, though." Naruto said.

"I heard that too. Which is actually why we're here." Jiraiya said. Naruto lifted his eyebrow in question.

"We think you and Jiraiya should go on a 'mission' for a while. You've got some dangerous eyes pointed towards you right now and it might be good to get you away until things cool down a bit." Tsunade said.

"You mean until the Akatsuki temporarily give up on me and go after the other jinchūrikis." Naruto clarified. Neither responded with anything more than another gulp of sake. "We still don't really know what they want us for. Shouldn't we at least warn the others?"

"I'll be sending warnings to every country with a jinchūriki. From there, it's each Kage's decision on how they react." Tsunade told him. Naruto nodded, but had already started formulating his own plan.

"Very well. I assume we will be slipping out silently during the night?" Naruto asked Jiraiya, getting a nod in response.

"We'll leave tomorrow night."

"That should be enough time to deal with the problem." Naruto said out loud to himself.

"The Uchiha problem, I assume?" Tsunade asked. "I was going to speak to you about that next."

"Hai, hai, I'll talk to him. Kami, I wish everyone would get off my ass about that." Naruto said, downing the rest of the bottle.

Luckily Tsunade and Jiraiya didn't stay too much later, just long enough to finish the rest of the sake and hear Naruto tell them the missions Danzō had him doing. Naruto went to bed right after they left and got up early the next morning. He began walking towards the training ground in the Uchiha District, knowing that was where he would find Sasuke, when he sensed some unknown chakra signatures there with Sasuke. He took off as fast as he could with his weight seals activated while sending two clones back into town.

Once reaching him he found four people he instantly knew to be Oto-nin from the Otogakure hitai-ate on one of them and the purple rope tied around their waists. It looked like they were just talking to Sasuke as Naruto landed next to him in a defensive stance, holding the Kiba, which he had finally mastered.

"Oh good, the other one's here. That makes it easy." The male with two heads said with a smirk.

"All right fuck heads. Into the barrels." The only female said, sounding bored. Naruto narrowed his eyes, only then noticing two barrels behind the four.

"No thanks, I get claustrophobic." Naruto responded dryly. Sasuke snorted next to him and stepped forward. "Sasuke?" Sasuke turned to Naruto with a blank expression on his face.

"Orochimaru wants us to join him. Think of how strong we would be if we could learn from him." Sasuke said.

"That's not what I meant when I said to ask for help from Konoha's strongest." Naruto replied seriously.

"He's offering to make us stronger, Naruto." Sasuke told him, in exasperation.

"He's offering to take your Sharingan, Sasuke." Naruto replied with a frown.

"He can try. In the meantime, I plan on learning from him and getting stronger." Sasuke said, stepping into the barrel. The male with six arms put the lid on. Naruto just stared at the barrel blankly before sighing.

"So, what exactly does that barrel do?" Naruto asked.

"Why don't you step in and find out?" The one with two heads said, smirk still in place.

"Again, no thanks." Naruto replied narrowing his eyes.

"Well fuck. Looks like we'll have to beat the shit out of you and force your ass into it, then." The female said in annoyance. Naruto crouched further into his defensive stance, preparing to release his weight seals.

"We can't do this here." The large male, who had yet to speak, said.

"Fine, fatso. Let's see if you can keep up, shit stain." The female said, taking off towards the forest, followed by the other three, the large male carrying the barrel containing Sasuke. Naruto took off after them feeling his aggravation level rise.

"Wow, who actually walks deliberately into a trap?" The two headed male asked in surprise when they had stopped just a few miles from the border of Hi no Kuni and Oto no Kuni, a little over half an hour later.

"Someone who thought ahead." Naruto said calmly, feeling eight chakra signatures approaching quickly before landing next to him. "Nice choice." He said looking at the group.

"Not so much choice as who was near me when your clone told me what was going on." Shikamaru said in a bored voice.

"Where's Sasuke?" Sakura asked with worry. Naruto just pointed to the barrel that had been placed on the ground. Sakura gasped. "What did you do to him?!" Sakura yelled at the four Oto-nin.

"Chill out, bitch. You're little boyfriend is fine." The female said, picking her ear.

"Excuse me?!" Sakura shrieked, causing the Konoha nin to flinch and step back slightly.

"We really don't have time for this." The six-armed male said in annoyance. "Jirōbō, take care of them." The largest male nodded while the other three took off, taking the barrel with them.

"Wait!" Sakura yelled while running after them. Naruto's eyebrow twitched in annoyance. He looked back at the rest of the group.

"Chōji, Tenten, you two take care of him." Naruto said. "Let's go." He told the rest of the group, following Sakura and the other Oto-nins.

"Piece of cake." Tenten said, pulling out some of her weapons. Chōji didn't say anything, just got nervously into a defensive stance.

"Still following us, are you?" Yelled the head facing them on the two headed male.

"You bet you're ass we are! We're not stopping until you give Sasuke-kun back!" Sakura yelled at him.

"Very well. You leave us no choice then!" The male with six arms said as the three separated, going in different directions with each carrying an identical barrel.

"Did anyone happen to notice which barrel is carrying Uchiha? I can't see through them." Neji said, Byakugan activated. Nobody responded.

"Guess we're just going to have to split up. Kiba, Lee. You two go after the two headed guy." Shikamaru ordered.

"You got it!" Kiba yelled, running in the direction their target took.

"Yosh! We will save Sasuke-kun in no time!" Lee yelled back, while following Kiba and Akamaru. Naruto took off after the female without saying anything.

"Dammnit." Muttered Shikamaru. "Neji, Shino. You go after the six-armed one." He ordered them, taking off after Sakura, who had already started following Naruto.

Naruto caught up to the female in a small clearing in the woods, just in time to see her throw her barrel and take out a flute. Naruto didn't even hesitate and rushed past her, following the barrel. Sakura and Shikamaru were not so lucky, entering the small clearing just as the female cast a genjutsu over them.

'Mendosukai… Hope there isn't anymore of these guys.' Shikamaru thought, looking after where Naruto disappeared to after breaking the genjutsu. Sakura had broken it the same time as Shikamaru and was trying to follow Naruto.

"Oh no, bitch. You have to get past me first." The female said, bringing her flute back up to play.

"With pleasure!" Yelled Sakura, going for her.

Naruto ran into a large clearing in time to see the barrel land in the trees on the other side. He paused only briefly, feeling that someone else was in the clearing with him, before starting to run towards the other side again. He was intercepted only a few feet into his run by what looked like a large, smooth white stone shooting out of the ground right in front of him. Naruto tried to ignore the stone and ran around it, not even pausing in his run. As he did so, more started jutting out of the ground all around him, making him jump high into the air to avoid being impaled.

While he was in the air, he looked down to see the entire clearing full of the strange smooth, light-colored sharp stones pointing straight at him. He took out the Kiba and used Fūton: Kazekiri no Jutsu* to try and destroy the stones on his way back down. His eyes narrowed when the jutsu bounced off them harmlessly.

He quickly sealed the Kiba and coated his hands and feet with chakra, grabbing onto one of the larger stones just past the pointed edge, stopping right before the sharp point of another one and examined what he was holding on to. He was surprised to see that the stone was actually a bone.

Before he had a chance to test some theories on the bone, he felt a chakra signature directly behind him and jumped right before a blade made of bone pierced the bone that he had been holding on to, held by a male with silver hair.

Naruto narrowed his eyes in observation, noticing how the bone blade the male was holding was able to damage the bone he had been on, with no chakra use. He had never seen nor heard about using bones to battle. He shifted in time to barely miss a kick directed at his stomach.

He's fast. Naruto thought nervously, again barely managing to dodge a swipe of the bone blade.

And good. The Kyūbi responded in awe. Best be careful with this one; it's going to be a tough fight. Maybe you should let me-

Not a chance. Naruto cut him off, dropping his weight seals to dodge another fast, well-aimed attack. Naruto was having a hard time formulating a plan with how the male just kept coming at him. It looked like he had been holding back too, because even though Naruto was moving faster from dropping the weight seals, the other male was still pushing him back.

The male was able to scratch Naruto's face with the blade, but Naruto was able to grab the blade with a chakra covered hand and chop with his other hand down on the male's elbow. The male let go of the blade and the elbow bent, but it did not break like it should have with the force Naruto used.

Naruto narrowed his eyes and instead threw the male over his body and behind him. Quickly trying to examine the bone blade in his hand with the second he had, but the blade crumpled into dust in his hands.

"Very impressive. I see why he is interested in you." The male finally spoke. It looked like he had landed perfectly on his feet after being thrown, but did not come back to attack Naruto.

"Who are you?" Naruto asked in slight wonder.

"My name is Kimimaro. I am the leader of the Otogakure no Shinobi Gonin Shū*." Kimimaro responded, with very little emotion.

"Why is he interested in us?" Naruto asked, glad for the break to think.

"He requires a new vessel and a powerful new leader for our team. You will be one and the Uchiha the other. Orochimaru has not yet decided which shall be which." Kimimaro responded.

"A vessel for what? And why do you need a new leader? You seem powerful enough." Naruto asked. Kimimaro did not respond.

Naruto felt a strange shifting of chakra from where the barrel that Sasuke was in had been thrown.

"It is complete for one, but you have not gone through the process yet. I wonder why… Please step into the barrel, so that we may be on our way." Naruto noticed a barrel appear next to Kimimaro, which looked similar to the one that they tried to get him into before.

"I wasn't told what the barrel does. I tend not to climb into strange looking barrels when I don't know what they do." Naruto replied.

"It will make you more powerful." Was all Kimimaro said.

"That seems awfully subjective." Naruto replied calmly, crossing his arms. Kimimaro did not look amused. In fact, it looked as if he was starting to get irritated.

"We do not have much time. If you do not get into the barrel on your own, I will have to force you in." Kimimaro said with slight annoyance.

"That's a shame. I thought we were having a nice chat." Naruto responded feeling as though he was ready to get back into it. Kimimaro narrowed his eyes in irritation, but wasted no time coming at Naruto, strange markings starting to cover his body.

The hell? Is his chakra changing? Naruto asked the Kyūbi.

Yes. I know this chakra. The Kyūbi responded with a bit of worry in his voice.

Naruto did Katon: Hinoiki* straight at his approaching form. He saw the bones shoot out from Kimimaro's body as a type of armor against the fire. When Kimimaro reached him, he saw the bones crumble to ash, but Kimimaro remained untouched although his body was starting to change. Naruto dodged the bone blade that Kimimaro swung at him, the large drill-type bone that formed over his other arm and the sharp bones that jutted out from Kimimaro's back to stab the ground where he had been standing, noticing that Kimimaro looked to have finished his change.

More bones came out of the ground behind him as he was moving away to trap him and Kimimaro shot bullets of bone at Naruto. Naruto quickly unsealed the Kiba again, pushed his chakra into the blades so that they had electricity sparking from them and created a wall of electrical volts, making the bullets bounce off them harmlessly.

He met Kimimaro's bone blade with his own blades after Kimimaro used the bone drill to destroy the electrical wall and they started facing off with the bone drill, swords and speed. Between slashes and stabs, Kimimaro would elongate the sharp bones jutting from his body that Naruto would dodge and Naruto would releases bolt of lightning towards Kimimaro from his blades that would be blocked by more bone.

Kimimaro made the clearing once again full of sharp bones, making Naruto jump away from him so as to not be impaled and he shot more bullets and sharp bone blades at Naruto. Naruto quickly moved behind bone pillars to dodge the bullets and blades and stabbed the Kiba into the ground, forcing enough chakra into the blades to create hundreds of bolts of lightning to shoot up from the ground and cover the entire clearing. Naruto saw Kimimaro block the lightning with his bones again. All the bones in the clearing disappeared and Kimimaro seemed to pause and then jerk slightly before coming at Naruto again with his blade and drill.

Naruto started thinking that maybe he should take the Kyūbi up on his offer to help when he saw Kimimaro coming at him again, but then he noticed a minute change in Kimimaro's speed.

'He's slowing down? Maybe I'm wearing him out.' Naruto thought, once again meeting him with the Kiba and doing another Katon: Hinoiki*, this time directly at Kimimaro's face.

Kimimaro blocked the jutsu with bone, but instead of continuing to attack Naruto as he was before, he backed off and created another forest of bones, this time managing to nick Naruto in the arm and leg before shooting bullets and blades from his body again, following right behind with him and his blade.

Before the barrage of bone and Kimimaro was able to reach Naruto, he once again stabbed his blades into the ground, but pushed a good portion of what was left of his chakra into each blade, one shooting electricity throughout the clearing as before, the other creating a blaze of fire, mixing with the electricity and causing a massive explosion. The ground shook and the trees closest to the clearing were blown away and burnt.

When air was clear of smoke again, Naruto saw the bones that had surrounded Kimimaro blow away into dust again. Naruto couldn't believe Kimimaro was still standing, but then Naruto noticed that he definitely wasn't looking good. He was paler than ever and the dark circles under his eyes looked even darker than before. He stumbled when he took his first step, but then came at Naruto quickly.

Naruto noticed that Kimimaro's speed was definitely a lot slower. He dodged the drill and the blade, moving so that his body was just off to the side of Kimimaro that had the hand that was holding the blade, covered the Kiba with fire and slashed again at his elbow. The blade did not go through the bone that covered the skin of the elbow, but the force behind Naruto's blade caused Kimimaro's arm to once again bend, making the bone blade cross in front of Kimimaro's body. Naruto used the butt of his other blade which he shot wind out of to push the bone blade into Kimimaro's chest with as much force as Naruto could muster. Kimimaro's slowed speed and Naruto's precision cause the blade to go directly through Kimimaro's heart.

Kimimaro slumped over dead and Naruto bent over to catch his breath.

"I always knew you were holding out on me. I just didn't know how much until now." Naruto looked up to see Sasuke walking towards him from across the clearing.

"And all that I learned, on my own, through years of hard work and asking for help when I needed it." Naruto replied, straightening up. "You can do it too, Sasuke. You don't need to leave the village and become a missing-nin to do it. Or become some slave or vessel of an alleged pedophile to do it."

"I never heard about him being a pedophile." Sasuke responded blandly with a raised eyebrow.

"I said alleged, because I am pretty sure he is one, though I have yet to prove it. He has a particular interest in obtaining and experimenting on children." Naruto answered seriously. "Seems like you're more than happy to test that theory for me from the looks of it." Naruto noticed that Sasuke wasn't coming very close and didn't look like he was prepared to come back to Konoha.

"I want to learn from him. I see now that even you didn't train me in everything you could. I told you I wanted to be strong, Naruto. You said you would help me." Sasuke's words carried a hint of hurt and betrayal.

"I was helping you Sasuke. I told you it took me years of training every day to get where I am now. It's not something that can be done in such a short amount of time. Look at how far you've come already." Naruto pleaded. Sasuke furrowed his brow in thought and sighed.

"You're right. You have helped me. But it isn't enough. You don't have the time to train me anymore. I need to be more powerful and I can only do that quickly with Orochimaru." Sasuke stated with finality.

"I see. If that is how you feel, then I won't stop you." Naruto stated calmly with a shrug. Sasuke looked surprised. "I understand that you want to be stronger, though I don't agree with your methods, but it is your choice how you do it. Nothing would be gained by my forcing you back to Konoha. You would probably just find some other way to leave anyways."

"I would." Sasuke said with resolve.

"And I can't deny the fact that Orochimaru is strong and you definitely could learn a lot from him." Naruto told him with a sigh, before smirking mockingly. "Though I worry what he might make you do in exchange for his tutelage."

"Would you lay off with that? He's not going to touch me." Sasuke said in annoyance, but Naruto could see that the thought was starting to creep in.

"How about this? I'll check in on you every once in a while to make sure nothing untoward is being done towards you." Naruto said, holding back a laugh. He was starting to like this idea. He couldn't go with Sasuke to join Orochimaru, which would be a great way to gain intel on the snake freak and his activities and motivation, but if he could stay in touch with Sasuke and add him to his growing list of contacts, it would be just as good.

"How are you supposed to do that? You're always gone on missions and I'll be in Orochimaru's hideout. You think we can just meet up in the woods somewhere? Just tell everyone we're going on a midday stroll, be back in a bit?" Sasuke said in exasperation. Naruto was glad to see that even though he and Sasuke hadn't been around each other much lately, the sarcastic humor Naruto has installed in him hadn't gone away.

"We could definitely start with that. You never know, maybe they'll be okay with it." Naruto said with a shrug. At Sasuke's unbelieving stare, Naruto continued. "Or, you can call me with this when you're alone and I'll come as soon as I can get away." Naruto said, pulling out some paper and his ink, creating the same Hirashin seal that he had given to Haku. Sasuke frowned at the seal when he took it.

"What is this?" Sasuke asked.

"It's my calling card. Just push some of your chakra into it to call me and then put it on the ground and step away from it." Naruto explained.

"Really? And you'll just, what? Knock on the hideout door and expect to be let in?" Sasuke asked in disbelief.

"No, I'll appear right where the seal is. It's something I've been working on." Naruto said, seeing a weird look in Sasuke's eyes.

"Something else you haven't taught me." Sasuke said his eyes taking on a blank look.

"Uh, how about this? In exchange for letting me come check on you, every time we meet up I'll start teaching you some Fūin, if you want to learn. How's that?" Naruto asked with slight hesitation. He didn't want Sasuke to learn all his skills, but Fūin was definitely hard to learn if you didn't have the knack for it, and he had a feeling Sasuke wouldn't. Fūin took a lot of time and patience, something Sasuke seemed to have a hard time with. He was sure Sasuke would appreciate some knowledge in it though.

Sasuke contemplated for a moment before pocketing the seal.

"Alright, deal." Sasuke replied. "Looks like it's time to go." He added. Naruto felt it too. The other Konoha nin had finished their fights and were on their way.

"See you later, Sasuke. Good luck. In more ways than one." Naruto said, putting his hands in his pockets and giving Sasuke a rare true smile. Sasuke snorted.

"Yeah, you too. Later." Sasuke replied with a smile of his own, before disappearing into the woods.

Naruto quickly moved to sit near the still impaled corpse of Kimimaro and didn't have to fake as hard as he wanted to exhaustion from the fight as the Rookie 9 sped into the clearing. They paused at the scene before running to Naruto's side in worry.

"I'm fine, I'm fine." Naruto said, slightly embarrassed by the attention. He gave them a somber look. "Sorry guys, Sasuke's gone."

Sakura and Ino were the only ones that seemed bothered by this fact. He did feel bad then. He realized that it was just Kakashi and Sakura left on Team 7 now, and he doubted Kakashi would keep up the team with just Sakura on it. Naruto made a mental note, as the group slowly made their way back to Konoha, to speak to Tsunade about Sakura and see if he could convince her to take Sakura under her wing before Naruto had to leave. He thought it was the least he could do, since he felt like he had inadvertently tore Team 7 apart.

Jutsu Used:

Hiraishin no Jutsu (Flying Thunder God Technique) Allows the user to transport themselves to a marked location instantaneously using a special seal or "technique formula" to mark an intended destination. After this is done, they can enter a dimensional void at will that instantaneously transports them to the location of the seal. S-rank, Supplementary, All ranges.

Fūton: Kazekiri no Jutsu (Wind Release: Wind Cutter Technique) - Using chakra or a shinobi tool, user can manipulate or create an external source of wind or a single or several blades of wind capable of slicing through a target with ease. Offensive, Mid-range.

Katon: Hinoike (Fire Release: Fire Breath) - The user breathes a powerful stream of fire from their mouth. The flames have enough power to break enormous boulders. Offensive, Long-range.

Translation: