He's a little Christmas present in the form of a new story. Let's hope you all enjoy it.

1: Waterfalls of Meeting

The waters seemed to be trying to crush him and guide him all at once as he flowed along limply, wondering how it had all come to this. It wasn't like running into Iwa scouts was on the training schedule. No, and neither was getting stabbed in the chest by a stray Jutsu intended for his master. Stupid sense of loyalty. Still, at least he had pushed Jiraiya out of the way in time. If only there hadn't been a cliff directly behind them.

Honestly, he thought it was a wonder that he was even alive at this point. Just how long had he been under water? Was the fox keeping him alive? Yeah, that would be about right. He knew enough that if he were to die then so would the Nine-Tails trapped inside of him.

Still, he thought tiredly, this isn't the way I wanted to go. The water began dragging him deeper as the flow of the river sped up. He was far too weak to put up any resistance. He didn't even feel the need to breathe. Was this what dying felt like?

Where was the long dark tunnel with the light at the end? Where were the flashes of his life up until this moment where his life was surely about to end? Wasn't that the way it was supposed to go?

It certainly screwed things up for his plans, dying that is. He wouldn't be able to keep his promise to Sakura, and bring Sasuke back to the village the way they both wanted.

In that moment, both of his friends appeared before him, smiling at him like they used to when they were on the same team.

'Come on, Naruto, are you really gonna stop trying?' Sakura asked, her arms crossed the way she did when she was upset, 'What happened to all that yelling about becoming Hokage? You can't do that if you're dead, you know?'

Naruto wanted to respond, but found himself drifting away slowly, overcome by his weakened state as he was.

'Naruto,' Sasuke said, looking at him with a hint of pity, 'We both left the village so we could get stronger. Is this as far as you can go? If that's so, then you can never hope to defeat me, Dead Last.'

Naruto grit his teeth weakly over that, attempting to move his arms, and only succeeded in pushing himself deeper into the black abyss as the river sucked him deeper and deeper until darkness overcame him.

=x=

She hummed happily for once as she looked down at the village from her home in the large tree in the center of the village. It was a nice day. The sun was shinning, and there was a lovely breeze blowing softly through the leaves. She say on a large, thick limb overlooking the lake down below, her legs swinging back and forth.

She may have wanted to be among the people, but, given their hatred of what she was, she couldn't regret her decision to move out of the hovel she lived in before her life as a shinobi, and build her own little slice of paradise here in the tree. It hadn't been all that hard as she had imagined it would be. Using materials she'd found all over the village that had been discarded, she'd built herself a nice, sturdy tree house, well out of the reach of the people that disliked her.

Most of the shinobi population didn't care one way or the other whether she lived or died on a mission. As long as she did her job, then that was all that was needed. Though, some of them feared her just as much as the civilian population did. Fact of the matter was, apart from Shibuki, there wasn't anyone that she could actually call a real friend inside the Waterfall Village.

Such was the life of Fuu, Jinchuuriki of the Seven-Winged Beetle, Chomei. Of course, Chomei herself didn't count. She was a prison for the beast, and the beast a prisoner. Still, as the girl sat on a branch overlooking the village, the loneliness was enough to drive her up the walls. Chomei often spoke to her, and the Tailed Beast's voice sometimes ebbed away at her loneliness, but she craved human contact...and see beyond the village's territory. She was never allowed to venture beyond their borders, as much as she wanted to.

Chomei had given her the ultimate freedom, as the beast had put it, in giving the girl a pair of wings at her back. Fuu loved them. She loved to fly, and flit about without so much as a care in the world when she was feeling low. She would even fly high above the village, out of their protective valley in wonder of the sky above her.

'Still', she thought as she tucked her legs close to her body, looking forlornly at the ever flowing falls around her village, 'I'll never be totally free...not until they find another body to put Chomei in, then I'm as good as dead.'

'You shouldn't think like that, little one,' Chomei chided gently, 'You will be free someday, and it will notbe because I have been moved to a new host.'

Fuu gave out a small giggle, 'And what should we do, Chomei? Dessert?'

'I'm all for it,' The beast said, 'Be honest, Fuu, how many people would you actually miss aside from Shibuki?' Fuu conceded the point. There weren't many that she would miss in the village. But going rogue wasn't something she had written down on her bucket list. 'Fuu, people that host my kind aren't even treated as human.' Chomei went on, sighing loudly. 'My previous hosts were all treated horribly. One of them actually committed suicide. You can imagine what kind of stir that caused. It was a mad dash to find someone to take me on before he was totally gone.'

Fuu shivered at that. Chomei had shared many stories of her past hosts with her, and, apparently, she was one of the more sociable Tailed Beasts apart from the Four-Tailed Lava Monkey. The person in which was referring to had been around her age, and the hatred of him and Chomei had been worse than what she had been through.

She was about to respond when she noticed something...off about the waterfall. For a moment, the water turned a pinkish hue, and then to red...blood-red! "What the hell?" She then noticed something falling through the falls, and down into the lake.

'That was a body!' Chomei shouted, 'Get over there! Whoever it is might still be alive!'

'Way ahead of you, Chomei!' Fuu shouted, and lept from the branch, and sprouted wings from her lower back. She flew down and over the surface of the water in search of the body that fell from the falls. When she reached the falls, all she found, though, was a flow of red moving with the water. Taking a deep breath, she dove down into the water, using her wings to propel herself down.

She followed the trail of bloodied water deeper down, and soon saw the outline of a body. She flared her wings and pushed herself deeper, reaching out to grasp the arm of the body she saw. She then hauled back and pushed her wings to the maximum speed back to the surface. She burst through, gasping for breath and rocketed into the air.

She looked down at her charge, seeing a head of blond hair, and a pale tanned face. 'He looks really bad,' she thought to her Beast, 'I don't know if I have the supplies to - '

'Fuu, whatever you do, do not take him to the village!' Chomei shouted, nearly deafening her, 'I can sense one of my kind within him, and from the strength of the chakra, it can only be the Nine-Tails!'

Fuu looked down at the man in her grasp, and flew back to her home double quick, already feeling the eyes of the villagers on her as she moved. She didn't have much time before the shinobi got nosy.

She landed right on her doorstep, and dragged the man inside. She laid him down on her bedding, stripping off his ruined orange and black jacket, only to freeze as she saw the size of the wound in his side. "Oh, gods..." she paled, bile rising in her throat.

'Focus, little one,' Chomei said soothingly, 'the Nine-Tails can stop the bleeding, but you need to give him air, and force the water out of his lungs. If you don't, my brother won't even be able to save him.'

'Air,' she thought, 'Right.'

She pinched his nose closed, and pried his mouth open, molding her lips over his own, and forced as much air into his lungs as she could manage. Then she worked on his chest, pumping it to get the air flowing, and the water out. It worked, as only a moment later the man spewed water out of his mouth, coughing and gasping for air.

Fuu rolled him onto his side to help him expel the water, only to have him collapse back onto the bed, shuddering. "He's freezing," she mumbled, reaching out to get the soaked clothing off of him. She would have been embarrassed had she not been so worried that he'd die right there and then if she didn't get him warm enough fast.

After getting him out of his clothes she worked fast to get him dry, and piled every blanket she had over him before she got a fire roaring in the hearth. To her, the room was sweltering, but the young man was still shaking horribly. Seeing no other choice, Fuu pulled her clothes off, and got under the covers with him. She shivered involuntarily as she felt the biting chill of his body against her own. 'He's so cold,' she thought at her tenant, 'What more can I do for him?'

Chomei didn't answer. The Beast knew full well that the young man was only suffering from the after effects of the cold waters, and blood loss. The Nine-Tails would soon put that to rest as his will to survive kicked in. She was more interested in the effect he was having on Fuu. It was the first time the girl had been so desperate to save another, and, given how prideful she could be, gone so far to do so.

From Chomei's point of view, she could tell the man was perhaps a year younger than her little one was, sixteen at least, and he was rather handsome. The blond hair and whisker-like marks gave him a roguish look. Blonds were rare outside of Kumo, but this man didn't have the complexion of someone from those lands. Either they were very dark, or extremely light skinned people, mostly having blonde or white hair.

While the Beast was wool gathering, Fuu's companion had stopped shivering from the combined heat of the blankets, fire, and Fuu's own warmth as the girl curled against him, one arm across his chest. He was now sleeping peacefully, his breath coming easier. It was a relief to the girl that he was doing better, and relaxed her slightly as she felt him warming up.

As close as she was, Fuu couldn't help but feel how sculpted his body was, much to her growing embarrassment. He was hard, almost like a piece of carved stone, showing that whoever the man was, none of his muscle was forced, but earned through work. There was also the fact that Chomei had pegged him as a Jinchuuriki like she was. And for the Nine-Tails of all Beasts.

'If he's got the Nine-Tails,' she thought tiredly, her eyes beginning to droop, 'He must be from Konoha.'

A Konoha shinobi in her village was bad news. The village itself was small, and had very few jobs as far as their shinobi forces went, and their Daimyo was all but a simple farmer. Rumor had it that soon there lands would be taken over by either the Fire Daimyo, or Water Daimyo. Whether or not their village would survive was all up in the air.

But if this man was from another shinobi village, their own Daimyo would no doubt demand compensation from his home in return for his health, the fact that he held one of the Tailed Beasts was only fuel on the fire. He was politically priceless.

What was she supposed to do with him, now, though? She agreed with Chomei that taking him down to the village was a bad idea, for more reasons than she could count. One Jinchuuriki was barely tolerated, but two would cause a riot. Shibuki wouldn't be able to protect him, either. At best, he would be a political hostage in poor health, and at the worst, killed so that the Nine-Tails could be extracted and placed in a vessel of their own choosing.

Deciding that it would be better to figure such things out when the man awoke, Fuu was almost asleep alongside him...that is until the door was pounded on loudly. "FUU!" Roared a familiar voice, "Fuu, I know you have someone in there! Come out and explain yourself, right now!"

'Shibuki!' She sat up in panic, drawing one of the blankets up to wrap around herself. 'No, there's no need to worry.' She thought, trying to calm herself as she scrambled about for her clothes, 'He won't just barge in here. He knows better!'

"Fuu, I'm warning you," Shibuki yelled, "The Anbu are with me, and I'm afraid I can't allow you to keep whoever that is with you!"

"Go away!" Fuu shouted, her temper flaring up.

Shibuki could be heard grumbling, "Fuu, be reasonable. The person is a stranger, and likely an enemy shinobi, I can't just let you - "

Fuu stepped up and slammed her fist against the door, rattling her whole house, "I said leave!" She shouted, "I found him, and he's hurt! I'm not gonna let you make things worse!"

"We'll help him, I promise!" Shibuki shouted, "Fuu, you don't realize what you're doing! People already ask me to restrict you, but this will force my hand! I'll have to - "

"To what?!" She shouted angrily, "Lock me up? I'm already a prisoner! I can never leave this damned village, even if I gave up being a shinobi! You'd just put me in a cell!"

"Never!" Shibuki yelled from outside, "Fuu, I'd never do that to you!"

"Come on, Shibuki, you know there's no reasoning with that thing!" Someone said angrily.

"I am the Kage of this village," Shibuki hissed, "And what chance do you think you would have if you just barged in there? She'd kill you in a second!"

Fuu ground her teeth, "Get out of here, or else I loose enough poison to make the whole village sick!" She growled, "You know I can do that!"

"You wouldn't!" Shibuki snapped, angered now, "Fuu, I'm warning you - "

"No!" She pushed out the door and came face to face with him and three other masked shinobi, her wings buzzing angrily, "I'm warning you! He's barely alive, and if you hurt him, or even attempt to hurt him, I won't be the perfect little pet you've seen so far!" She yelled, angry tears coming to her eyes, "I've got wings for a reason, and so help me, I'll use them to make you hate me more than this stupid village does!" Bright orange powder started wafting from her wings in her agitation, making the man stumble back in fear of her toxins, "For so long I've done nothing but do whatever you asked of me, never even going beyond our borders, never complaining about how the people treat me, even though I've never done anything to them! I want nothing more than to be normal, but I never got that chance!"

She advanced, more toxins fluttering from her wings, making the men back away, "Fuu, please, you know I've done everything I can to help you thus far!" Shibuki said, still trying to reason with the girl, but Fuu was done listening.

"And I love you for that," she said tearfully, "but I'm tired of being stared at...tired of being hated for no reason other than the fact that this village made me something to be hated." She sobbed, and pointed back to her home, "He's like me, Shibuki...just like me...and if I let you take him, you'll kill him, just to get what he holds to make you and the village stronger!"

Shibuki's eye widened at the girl's proclamation, "You mean he's - "

"No!" Fuu shouted, "I told you I found him! He's mine!"

"Don't be selfish!" One of the Anbu shouted, "If he's who you say he is, think of the political value he could - "

"Selfish?!" Fuu roared, her eyes flashing dangerously as a red shroud bubbled up around her slight body, "When have I ever been selfish!? Until now, never! I never asked for anything that you hadn't already provided, but now I'm trying to save someone, and you're telling me I'm being selfish!"

"N-now, Fuu, he didn't mean it!" Shibuki yelped as the veil covered her, "We're all just worried about - "

Rather than yell, Fuu sprouted two more sets of wings, bringing the total up to six, and kicked up a whirlwind, sending the shinobi spinning and sprawling all the way down the giant tree. Lucky for them that they were sticking to the bark with chakra. Fuu, however, was beyond furious. So furious that she was sending out toxic dust in all directions. It settled around her little cabin in the trees, on the leave, and on the branches. To her, it posed no threat at all, but to any other form of life that got too close it acted as a foul-smelling, vomit-inducing barrier.

Fuu calmed herself and whirled back into her house, slamming the door behind her. She sighed, "Well, now I've really done it, huh?"

A deep, amused chuckle rumbled through her thoughts. 'I would say so.' Chomei said, Fuu imagining a smile on the Beast's face, if she could smile, that is. 'I dare say that they won't bother you for a while after that little tirade.'

Fuu nodded and went to check on her house guest. "I acted like a spoiled child." She muttered, finding the man still asleep, despite the yelling that had gone on. "This isn't good. If they come back - "

'With all of that poison dust you spread?' Chomei chattered laughingly, 'Shibuki may be timid as a mouse, but he's no fool, my dear.'

Fuu smirked at that and went to the basin she collected rain water from, filling a small bowl with it, and taking a cloth from the kitchen area. She knelt back down at the man's side, dipping the cloth in and started wiping away the sweat now dotting his face. He stirred slightly at the cool touch of the cloth, and Fuu stilled for a moment as his eyes fluttered.

"Open those eyes of yours soon, my friend," she whispered more to herself rather than the sleeping shinobi, "I want to see what color they are. I wonder if they're as amazing as this hair of yours."

'He's a strong one, this boy,' Chomei said, a hint of laughter still in her voice, 'Old Kurama was never one to be placed inside of someone weak. Whoever this young man is, I bet he's got the power to back up holding him back.'

'Kurama?' Fuu asked mentally, 'Is that the name of the Nine-Tails?'

'It is, dear, but I wouldn't mention that to the young man if he doesn't know it already, and I'll bet he doesn't.' The Beast said, sighing loudly, 'Kurama never gave his name to anyone that I can recall. He always viewed anyone other than himself as inferior. Even his own kind.'

Fuu rolled her eyes, "He sounds lovely," she said, speaking aloud whilst dabbing away at the blond's face, "What do you think he's like?"

'Who's to say, little one,' the Seven Tails sighed, 'But I have to say, claiming him as yours was quite bold, my little hornet.'

Fuu's face colored brightly at that. She hadn't really meant it in the way it sounded, but..."Oh, no..." she moaned, "Shibuki must think I'm - "

'What he thinks doesn't matter, Fuu,' Chomei said, 'It doesn't matter what anyone says, as a matter of fact. Let them say what they want. Words are only words and only hurt you if you let them.' She said, 'And by the way, he's waking up.'

Fuu yelped quietly as her guest began to stir, his face twisted in slight pain. "Try not to move too much," she said hastily, letting him know she was there as he tried to open his eyes, "You're not strong enough, yet."

The blond groaned, "Where...am...I?" He asked weakly.

Fuu smiled and placed a calming hand on his cheek, "You're in the Village Hidden within the Waterfalls," she said as his eyes began to open slowly, "And you're safe with me." Her smile widened as his eyes revealed themselves to be a blue so deep that she couldn't recall ever seeing such a color in human eyes before.

Those same eyes stared straight into her orange ones, "Are you...an angel?"

Chomei nearly laughed herself silly at the rate Fuu's heart sped up as her face flooded with color. "I-I'm no angel...just a girl..." she said, trying to ignore Chomei's laughter, "My name is Fuu."

"I'm Naruto...Naruto Uzumaki." He sighed as he eyes fell shut once again, drifting away to unconsciousness.

=x=

Shibuki sighed as he watched Fuu's poison dust glimmering in the sunlight, a clear sign that the girl meant business. The elders were going to be on the warpath after this, he just knew it. "All of this over an injured boy." He said, shaking his head.

Suddenly, a heavy hand landed on his shoulder in an iron grip, "And what injured boy would that be?" A deep voice growled as the man turned, looking up at the large man standing behind him, wild spiky white hair blowing in the breeze.

"L-l-lord Jiraiya!" Shibuki stammered, "Wh-what are you doing here!?"

Jiraiya grasped his other shoulder, and hoisted the timid Kage off of the ground, "I'm looking for my apprentice who saved my life!" Jiraiya growled, "Now, what injured boy are you talking about!"

Someone requested that I write a Naruto story with Fuu as the main pairing, and I have to admit, it was just the excuse I needed to get back intot he Naruto verse with the slump I've been in lately. Let's hope this does well.

Like what you read? Leave a Review please! Ciao!