Authors note: Yup, I'm back, for those of you who know me from my other two stories. As for those, I'm sorry to say that I won't be continuing them any time soon, as I've lost most of my inspiration for both. I am considering putting them up for adoption, but I still have to think about that, so don't take my word for it.

That aside, I've recently started watching RWBY, and I've really enjoyed it so far. I've also been working on a Naruto fanfic, so I decided to combine both and write a crossover. Regarding the pairing, I know people will want a harem, which I understand to a certain degree seeing as how RWBY is pretty much full of female characters, but personally, I think Blake would be a good match for Naruto. Also, Naruto will be a lot smarter in this fic, and won't really hold Konoha in high regard, so it is kinda' a smart and grey/dark Naruto.

Well, I won't drag this AN out any longer, enjoy the first chapter of Naruto: Remnants of the Past.

Edit 30.10.14: Edited the first chapter of the story, reason being that I found it a little rushed and vague for a setup chapter after reading through it a few times. Also added lines when the scene changes, which was a suggestion of reviewer SilverFoxSage. Thanks for that.

Bold - Demon/Spirit speaking

Italic - Thoughts

Chapter one: Cutting ties

Tsunade Senju and Kakashi Hatake were currently standing in one of the many, bleak rooms of the Konoha hospital.

Both of the two shinobi were staring at the bed that was located in the corner of the room, or rather the blonde boy that was lying in it, the sunlight that was streaming in from the window lighting up his face, that was set in a calm, yet pained expression, as if he was having a nightmare, which was very likely the case considering the circumstances that brought this all about.

It had been a few hours after the first and second medic teams had arrived with the members of the emergency-response team tasked with Sasuke Uchihas retrieval. While some of them had suffered minor to moderate injuries, others, namely Chōji Akimichi and Neji Hyūga were in critical condition upon arrival, and required urgent medical attention.

Tsunade, along with Shizune and a team of medical-nin had worked tirelessly to ensure the survival of the two teens that were in critical condition. The medical encyclopaedia of the Nara clan was a huge help in that regard, especially in the case of Chōji Akimichi, as it described the effects and ingredients of the Akimichi clan's Three Coloured Pills that the boy had taken. Without the tome, Tsunade doubted that she would've been able to neutralize the poisons in the young Akimichi's body, even with her medical prowess.

Soon after Tsunade had brought the boy back from death's door, Shizune appeared with the message that Neji Hyūga's had also stabilized, thanks to her and the medic team, who had performed the Chikatsu Saisei no Jutsu (1) to regenerate the part of his chest that was pierced by Kidōmaru's arrow. The technique had a simple principle behind it, but was very difficult to perform. Basically, with the use of a medium, such as strands of hair, cells were converted to regenerate a missing section of the body. The success rate of the treatment, however, was considerably low, as it required immense concentration, which had to be maintained over long periods of time.

Shikamaru Nara, Kiba Inuzuka and his companion Akamaru had all been patched up as well, the former only suffering from a broken finger, while the other two had broken bones and damaged muscles that primarily required time to mend and heal.

The last person of the team, Naruto Uzumaki, was a completely different story. Kakashi had found the boy passed out at the Valley of the End, and returned with him shortly after the medic teams had arrived with the other members. As expected, he didn't suffer from any grievous injuries, as all of them were healed by the Kyūbi's potent chakra. The young blonde was still completely exhausted thought, and Tsunade didn't put emotional trauma beyond him, considering what he had been through.

"How's his condition?" The question asked by the cyclopean Jōnin next to her pulled Tsunade out of her thoughts.

After a few moments of silence, the Hokage replied, "Stable. All of his wounds were healed by the Kyūbi, but he still needs to take it easy and rest for now."

The man next to her nodded meekly, his normally stoic face, or what was visible of it, a mask of guilt. He was no doubt beating himself up for what had transpired at the Valley of the End. Tsunade of course didn't blame him for what happened, but that was simply how the silver-haired man saw it, as a failure on his part as their sensei.

"I...I should've seen this coming."

The blonde woman sighed in frustration, "But you didn't, and there's nothing we can do about that now...I'm just glad Naruto came back alive."

Kakashi wanted to deny it, but thought better of arguing with her. With a small nod, he turned on his heel and left the room, heading for the place that he always visited when he felt like this.

The room fell into a calm silence, only broken by Naruto's light snores, which caused a smile to appear on Tsunade's face as she regarded the boy she considered a grandson. It seemed that whatever bad dream he was having was over, and with a few steps she closed the distance between the two, gently laying a hand on his forehead before leaving the room as well, allowing the boy a well deserved rest.

Mindscape

Naruto awoke to the sound of dripping, slowly blinking and propping his body up as he tried to find the source of the annoying sound.

It didn't take long, as he spotted one of the many pipes that ran the length of the ceiling, and the water that was dripping down from it. That was when he realized that he had entered that place again. To Naruto, it just looked like a sewer system, akin to the one that he used to hide in when the villagers were out for his blood. But this one was different, in that it had a massive room that held a gate spanning from one wall to the other, beyond which was an inky darkness.

With a defeated sigh, Naruto let himself fall back into the shallow water that covered the floor of the room, the events of the past day replaying themselved in his mind. The blonde brought a hand up to feel the spot that had a Chidori rammed through it, and sure enough, the wound was completely healed, though he could still feel a phantom pain lingering over that spot.

He remembered the glare those cold, unfeeling eyes gave him as his friend rammed his hand through his chest, which most likely would've killed him if he hadn't diverted the attack.

Anger bubbled past the grief and sorrow Naruto felt for losing the person he considered a brother, and with a shout of frustration, he clenched his fist and brought it down to the floor, causing the water it hit to splash over him.

As a Jinchūriki, Naruto's life had been a living hell, from the relatively harmless glares he received from the villagers, to the harsh beatings that he would be dealt frequently. The few proverbial rays of light in that hell had been a few people, one of them being Sasuke.

While the "last" Uchiha considered Naruto anything but a friend, he had acknowledged his strength, and the bond that the two had, forged by the pain and loneliness both of them had experienced in their lives.

As such, it was beyond painful and infuriating to see Sasuke cut off that bond so easily and without a second thought, while he did all he could to preserve it, going so far as to risk his life to bring him back from the path he had began to tread on; a path that would slowly envelop him in darkness.

His hands clenched into fists, and he could even feel his nails digging into his flesh and drawing blood. He didn't notice the small streams of orange chakra slithering out of cage in the large room, converging at and being absorbed into his body, causing his pupils to turn crimson and his nails to sharpen into claws slightly.

He was snapped out of his anger as he heard a loud and markedly derisive snort from his right, and turning his head, he quickly found the source of it. Staring down at him with pure contempt and hatred was the Kyūbi no Yōko; the nine-tailed demon fox.

"Pathetic human. Drawing on my power again so soon?" he asked with barely concealed hatred.

Naruto didn't reply to the question, but took a few calming breaths to cool himself down. This seemed to work, as the crimson was drained from his eyes, and his nails began to retract. With a sigh, the blonde turned his head back to its previous position, not really in the mood to argue with his tenant.

The demon fox noticed this, and also the empty look in his eyes as he stared up into the ceiling of the room.

With an annoyed huff, he rested his head on his forepaws, 'Here it comes...'

Over the centuries, he had had many containers who suffered from the same experience as Naruto did. While that wasn't exactly the case for all of them, it was for the majority.

In his knowledge, they wouldn't pass up a chance to complain and rant about their misfortune whenever they were pulled into the seal. That was one of the reasons the fox had such a burning hatred for humans; in his eyes, they were fragile and selfish creatures. Not once had they considered the fact that he himself was suffering as well, seeing as he was the one that was imprisoned after all. No sentient being would be happy to be locked away behind a set of bars, never to see the light of day again and get passed from Jinchūriki to Jinchūriki, like some kind of toy, or a weapon, which was what the hidden villages considered him.

Moments passed, and the demon fox heard nothing. Deciding to find out what was taking so long, he cracked an eye open, only to find Naruto's gaze still fixed on the ceiling.

"...you're not going to start ranting and raving about the unfairness of all this?"

The blonde turned his head to the great Bijū. "No," he replied flatly.

The fox hid the surprise that began to show on his face, "What? Why?"

Naruto sighed, before letting his gaze drift to the floor as he sat up, "Because it won't change anything. It won't give me back the people that were dear to me, nor will it grant me a better life."

Kyūbi stared at Naruto for a good minute, as if evaluating him and his response, before he closed his eyes again, a small grin on his face that revealed some of his razor sharp teeth, "Heh, you're alright, brat."

Naruto looked up at the Bijū, his surprise hidden by an emotionless mask. From the few encounters he had with the fox, he knew that he hated humans more than anything else in the world, and would like nothing more than to rip each and everyone of them apart. So, it came as quite a surprise to have the demon fox approve of him so easily. Deciding not to ponder on that for too long, Naruto thought about what he was going to do now.

The blonde was sick of it, sick of the pain that the village and its inhabitants had brought him. And now even the person he considered a brother had abandoned him, nevermind the fact that he attempted to kill him for the sole purpose of gaining power.

"I take it you'll run away from the village then?" Kyūbi asked, his eyes open again and regarding him with...curiosity? Naruto couldn't exactly place his finger on it, as it was gone as fast as it came.

"Wait," he said with a slight frown on his face, "How do you know that?"

"I read your mind," the fox stated as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"How?"

This earned him an irritated huff from the Bijū, "Not very difficult, considering we are in your mind."

The blonde slowly nodded, making a mental note to keep certain thoughts to himself while he was in the sewer that was his mind. Dismissing those thoughts, Naruto noticed the pair of large, crimson eyes staring at him intently.

"I'm done with Konoha. It's not like they would care if I was gone, so that's exactly what I'll do; I'll get as far away from them and the elemental nations as I can, so I won't ever have to deal with them again."

"West."

"What?"

"You should travel to the West, between the Land of Wind and the Land of Earth. There's a place beyond the vast lands that connect to the two; a place where no one will find you."

Naruto frowned in thought; from what he could recall, the Village hidden in the Stones was located between the two, but he didn't know what was further West than that.

But that was exactly what he wanted; a place where they would never find him, and a place that wasn't even depicted on the maps of the elemental countries seemed like his best bet. The blonde was snapped out of his thoughts as Kyūbi spoke again.

"And before you leave, create a reinforced shadow clone to stay behind. If the village finds out that you're gone, they'll immediately send retrieval teams after you."

The Fox snorted loudly, sending a gust of air at Naruto, "After all, they wouldn't take too kindly to losing such a great part of their 'military strength'."

Naruto nodded, and turned around to leave, but not before turning his head to look at the mighty Bijū again, "Hey, Kyūbi...I didn't ever thank you for all the times you helped me, did I? And back at the Valley of the End..."

His response was a huff from the great demon fox, "Don't misunderstand me, brat. If you die, I die as well."

Naruto stared at the fox for a moment, before a small smile appeared on his lips, and his body vanished from the mindscape.

Naruto's apartment

Naruto had awoken in a hospital room after he had left his mindscape, and was relieved to notice that night had fallen over Konoha. Heeding the advice of his tenant, he quickly created a shadow clone, giving it an ample amount of chakra for it to last a good few days, which in turn would grant him a nice headstart.

Currently, the young blonde was in the small apartment his late Jiji had arranged for him. With the advice of the demon fox, Naruto began to pack a bag with things that he would need during his escape. Kyūbi had reprimanded him for trying to sneak a cup of instant ramen into the bag, with the reasoning that it had close to no nutrients, nevermind the fact that microwaves were rather...scarce in the wilderness.

What he had right now were a few bottles of water, some rations and energy bars, soldier and plasma pills, and a compass.

Other than that, he also packed his standard ninja equipment, such as kunai, ninja wire, a first-aid kit and some scrolls in which he had sealed some more equipment, so that he didn't have to carry another dozen kunai on his person, which would only result in slowing him down, and Naruto couldn't afford to waste time.

He had thought about sealing everything into scrolls at first, but once again, the voice of reason that belonged to his tenants resounded in his mind, telling him that unsealing, consuming, and resealing things that he would need as frequently as food and water was pointless.

Lastly, he had taken all the money he had saved up from the missions with team seven, which was hidden underneath a loose floorboard.

He threw the bag with its contents over his back, before walking over to the window. He was about to open it and leave, before a small glint caught his eye. The blonde turned to the night stand that was next to his bed, and looked at the framed picture that was placed on it, the moonlight that was flooding into his room reflecting off the glass.

He turned around and crossed the room with a few steps, standing infront of the nightstand now. The blonde grabbed the framed picture and closely regarded the four people on it.

It showed Kakashi, whose hair was gravity-defying as always, with his signature eye-smile on his face as he ruffled Naruto's and Sasuke's hair. Said boys were looking away with annoyed looks on their faces while their teammate, and Sasuke's number one fangirl was seemingly squealing in joy between the two.

Naruto remembered looking at the picture whenever he felt down, mostly due to the treatment he would receive by the villagers, and it would always manage to cheer him up.

Right now, however, there was no grin, or even a slight smile on his face as he stared at the picture. His eyes were empty, and his face was an emotionless mask as he slid the photo out of its frame and brought it up before ripping the portion that showed himself off from the rest of the photo.

He slid the picture of himself back into the frame and placed it in his bag, and let the other portion carelessly fall to the wooden floor.

That was when he heard Kyūbi's voice in his mind, "Kit."

Naruto's eyes widened a slight bit, before looking over to the window in his room, "Right, sorry."

With that, he quickly exited his apartment via the window, making his way to the gates as he melted into the shadows of the allies.

A couple minutes later, Naruto arrived at one of the gates leading out of the village, and silently cursed under his breath when he noticed the two gate guards, Izumo and Kotetsu standing to either side of said gate. Still, he considered himself lucky; with all that happened recently, he would've expected security to be considerably tighter.

"Henge," he whispered, after which he transformed into a small fox with grey and orange fur.

"How very subtle," Kyūbi remarked sarcastically.

'I couldn't think of anything else, so can it. Can you do anything to mask my chakra?'

"I can, but not for long because of this damn seal suppressing my influence."

'It'll have to do,' Naruto thought as he, in fox form, slowly padded his way up to Kotetsu, who was talking to his partner while they kept watch, and quietly slipped between his legs. Sticking to the outer wall that encircled the whole village, Naruto began to quickly get out of their sight.

He faintly heard Izumo ask his partner if he had seen anything just then, to which the other replied that it was probably just a cat. Naruto paid no mind to that as he darted into the treeline, entering the vast forest that Konoha was famous for. He released the Henge, and took to the trees, moving as fast as he could, without sparing the village another glance.

Two days later

The moonlight glittered faintly in the stream nearby which Naruto had set up his camp for the night. For the past two days, the young blonde had been on the move non-stop, without taking a break or even slowing down. Eventually though, his tenant had forced him to stop and get some rest, as tree-hopping for so long would cause him to collapse from exhaustion soon, even with his enormous chakra reserves that the blonde prided himself in.

Naruto was against the idea of taking a break initially, but had to concede as he did slowly feel exhaustion catch up to him, and he didn't want to pass out now, as that would leave him an easy target for whatever was out for his blood. Which were a lot of things.

So, here he was, grilling a fish he had caught over a small campfire, with several clones keeping watch for him at different positions around the camp.

"Naruto, come into the mindscape," Kyūbi's voice rang through his head as he stoked the fire. He tossed the small branch in his hand into the fire, and took a meditative position, feeling a pull in the back of his mind.

Mindscape

"What's up?" Naruto asked as he appeared before the gates behind which the giant fox was locked, currently resting his head on his forepaws.

"We will be starting your training beginning tomorrow," the fox said, eyeing Naruto with his large, crimson orbs.

"Training?"

Kyūbi growled slightly, "Yes, training. Do you expect me to have a Jinchūriki as weak as you currently are? Your pitiful excuse of a ninja academy has taught you what toddlers can do, and you haven't even started with advanced trainings, such as nature transformation."

Naruto thought about it for a moment; it was true, besides the Rasengan, the Shadow Clones and some other lower ranked techniques, he didn't have much else in his arsenal. And if the few missions he had taken in his time in Konoha were anything to go by, life outside of the village's safety was anything but rainbows and fluffy kittens, so it would only make sense to prepare for the worst.

"Alright, but how will you teach me? You can't leave the seal after all."

Kyūbi gave him an irritated look, "We can train in your mindscape, but you'll have to do the physical training on your own outside of the seal, I can only tell you what to do and point out any mistakes you make."

Naruto nodded his head, it was a solid plan. And if nothing else, he would receive training from a Bijū, the Kyūbi nonetheless, which caused a smirk to appear on his face. "Didn't think I'd live to see the day where the 'great Kyūbi' would decide to train a 'pathetic human'," he mocked.

The Bijū growled in response, which was gone as he gave him a malicious grin worthy of a demon fox, "It does get awfully boring here, and I could use some...fun."

The smirk was wiped off his face, and something told Naruto that what Kyūbi considered fun would cause him excruciating amounts of pain, but he didn't get to voice his worries as the demon fox spoke again.

"Now begone. You have to rest, and I want to sleep."

Naruto simply nodded as the fox closed his eyes and started snoring, though the blonde didn't know if he was really sleeping or just faking it. Nonetheless, his body vanished from the mindscape.

Real world

As Naruto appeared back in the real world, he noticed that the fire was slowly dying out, and he finally felt the exhaustion of running for nearly two days after recovering from a mortal wound and escaping a village catch up with him.

He laid down on the bedding he had made from leaves and moss, sighing as the warmth of the glowing embers washed over him, and relaxed his sore body. He felt himself slowly drift into a well deserved sleep, but he couldn't help but smile. He had taken the first step to starting a new life, a life free of the remnants of his past.

(1): Regenerative Healing technique

Well, that was the first chapter, hopefully of many to come.

As always, reviews are very much appreciated as they help the author iron out any flaws in the story or writing style.

Until the next chapter. See ya'.