Chapter 3 - Reminiscing

Most life-changing events don't come with warning label, much less an instruction manual. Ask Asura, for example.

The day had started off like any other since Sasuke's fall.

Naruto awoke to the chime of his alarm, unexpected as it was. He'd fallen asleep to the sounds of the heart monitor in Sasuke's room the night prior, so Kakashi held the position of prime suspect for his sudden displacement. Propping himself on his elbows, he rubbed the sleep from his eyes and squinted at the calendar. The latest red 'X' crossed the twenty-fifth of July, much like the rest of the other days of the month. One particular box stood out, however, with a stick figure drawing of Team Seven around a colorful circle (read: cake).

Naruto had never claimed to have been the most artistic person he knew.

The special box was the twenty-third of July, Sasuke's birthday. Although the birthday boy had been asleep throughout the celebration, the rest of Team Seven was happy to eat his share of cake for him.

Crawling out of the pilling fabric of his cotton blanket, he padded along the wooden boards of his rundown apartment towards the closet. He opted to wear a set of navy blue standard issue shinobi pants, a black jacket, and an orange T-shirt underneath. He could instantly feel Kurama's amusement at his particular color choice, but brushed it off just as quickly. In the past few days he'd gotten more used to having Naruto's personality shining through his own every now and then, and even started to identify himself as 'Naruto' in his subconscious.

He left his apartment briskly, excited not for the many D-rank missions his sensei would surely try to dump on him and his bubblegum haired teammate, but because Kurama expected Sasuke to wake up soon. Reaching the hospital in record time, he was directed for the umpteenth time towards room 207.

Sakura shot up from her position beside Sasuke's hospital bed, walking over towards Naruto with a look that reminded him of the times he'd been caught mid-prank by Iruka-sensei. "Oh, Naruto! You're here!" she began sweetly. "Early?"

"Gee, Sakura-chan, can't a guy be on time to see his hospitalized teammate without being hounded on?" was the flippant reply. Sakura's eyes briefly glimmered with disbelief before her suspicion fell, and she moved to sit beside Naruto on the chairs to the right of the bed.

After an unfruitful couple of minutes waiting for Sasuke to wake up, Naruto decided to use the time to refine his chakra control. He walked over to the assortment of pamphlets describing an assortment of different diseases on the wall. Grabbing the one about chakra exhaustion, he ripped a square of paper off, placed it on the back of his hand, and flipped his hands so they faced palm-side-up. Immediately, the piece drifted to the floor and Naruto furrowed his brows. Going through the motions a few more times, he gradually got better at keeping the paper from falling.

Snoring from the corner broke his concentration during his thirteenth attempt. Sakura had entertained the idea of joining whatever idiotic scheme Naruto was doing with the hospital pamphlets, but instead took a leaf from a certain pineapple and deemed a nap more important.

The next two hours passed along to the same tune, a nurse coming in every forty-five minutes to check on the patient. A sleepy and disoriented Sakura looked up to the sound of the door opening once more, but unlike before, it was their sensei who stepped through the doorway. She yawned and stretched limbs, while Naruto continued with his paper fascination. The boy had a semblance of unawareness, though any shinobi worth his salt would be able to recognize the twitch of his fingers and tightening of muscles in his back and deem such an assumption null. With his signature eye-smile securely in place, Kakashi waltzed over to Sakura and Naruto.

"What'll it be today? Babysitting? Capturing Tora? Painting fences?" he asked in a jovial tone, setting his hand on the blond's head.

Finally addressing the jōnin's presence, Naruto looked up with a deadpan expression, left eyebrow twitching erratically. "Ne, Sensei. Can't babysitting Sasuke count as a full-day D-rank mission?"

Kakashi brought his hand's ghosted over the mask on his chin, contemplating the idea. "I suppose I could propose the idea to Hokage-sama. Are you sure you two would rather stay here instead of feeding little Akari-chan?" he finally replied, chuckling at the horror passing over his students' faces at his mention of their most recent babysitting mission.

"I think it's in everyone's best interests that Naruto isn't put in charge of a child ever again, Sensei," Sakura responded, glancing at the accused uncertainly.

"C'mon, I'm not that bad at preparing food, right Sensei?"

"I'm afraid I'll have to side with Sakura on this one, Naruto," he sighed. "Speaking of food, you two should grab a bite to eat while I go mention our new mission to Hokage-sama. Ja ne!" Kakashi saluted, opening the nearest window and jumping from the sill.

Sakura half expected to be bombarded with requests for a date at a certain ramen stand, but deemed it unlikely a second later, remembering Naruto's personality shift. It stung, a little, that the person she could always count on to praise the ground she walked upon had moved on, but she supposed it was for the best.

"I'll have a bowl of ra–" he began, before being whopped on the back of the head by a deceivingly dainty hand.

That wasn't to say his new personality didn't have it's own faults either, though.

"I am not your personal servant, Naruto," she hissed through a sickly sweet smile. "But since you've so kindly offered, I'd like a turkey sandwich, an apple, and a water."

Grumbling something about bubblegum haired hypocrites, he sauntered over to the door, countenance uncharacteristically surly. "Aight, Sakura-sama, you got it," he replied as he stopped at the doorway, turning his head back to the kunoichi. "I heard the hospital's got a one day special on jello, y'know. You wanna split some?"

"Mmhmm," she responded absentmindedly, picking up and tossing the scraps of ripped pamphlet left on the floor.

After paying double price for the hospital food, he set off once more to the room.

"Sasuke... What's going on with your eyes?" he heard from outside the door, the words freezing him mid-step. Naruto–well, Asura, understood from personal experience that anything going on with the eyes of a bearer of the sharingan was not a good sign.

Ignoring the gnawing dread pouring into his stomach, he mustered up a veneer of his usual exuberance and carefree attitude and stepped through the doorway. "Huh? Sakura-chan, what about the princess' eyes?"

Only to lock gazes with a pattern of red and black he would give anything to both see once more and at the same time never see again.

Indra.

x

In the forest by the waterfall.

"Ne, Aniki! I can balance a leaf on my forehead now! That means I'm gonna be even cooler than you soon!"

"Alright, Asura-chan."

"Hey, I'm five years old as of today, mister! You can't call me chan anymore!"

"Alright, Asura."

x

In the family cave.

"Aniki~! Stop meddling with my fun! I was this close to making Kurama's fur white for a whole week! Then his bunny ears would actually fit with the rest of 'im!"

"I'm sure you were, Asura. But you need to train more. How are you ever to be as strong as Tou-san or I if you waste your time with nonsensical pastimes like pranking?"

"Mm, I think you need to lighten up. Why don't you come play in the waterfall with me before lunch?"

"Sorry, Otouto. I need to get back to trai–"

"Why?"

"...Why what?"

"Why is it always training, training, training, with you, Indra? You're only twelve, I'm only nine, were children! Children are supposed to have fun!"

"I suppose you heard that from Tou-san, then."

"Well yeah, but–"

"Do..."

"..."

"Do you really want to know why I do what I do?"

"Of course."

"Have you ever felt like–like you have a destiny? A fate, a role with no understudy in the play of life?"

"No. I can't say I have."

"Boys~! It's time to eat! Well, it would be if you two had actually caught our food instead of sitting around like a couple of lazy bums! Well? Get to it!"

x

In a newly-formed desert – courtesy of the lands two most powerful shinobi, also formerly known as the Land of Plains.

"Hey, Indra. How did you of all people manage to have children?"

"Do I really need to explain the mechanics to you again? I felt last time would be more than informational enough to sate your curiosity."

"No, no! Not again! I just think it's funny s'all. I mean, who would've ever thought the great Ice-Princess himself would be capable of love?"

"You're wrong, you know. I did not marry nor procreate for the sake of 'love.'"

"...Hey, Indra."

"Yes, Otouto?"

"You say you don't love your wife... did you ever love me and Tou-san?"

"No."

"You should know better than to lie to your brother, y'know. Who are you trying to convince? Me? Father? Yourself?"

x

At the Final Battlefield. Would later be coincidentally – or fatefully known as the Valley of the End.

"Suiton: Suijinheki (Water Release: Water Formation Wall)! Brother, do I look like I'm lying to you? It's almost as if you don't want my forgiveness. Yes, you did kill father. Yes, you have tried to kill me at least 37 times now. And yes, I will give you my mercy."

"I don't deserve your forgiveness or mercy. But if I'm going down, you're coming with me!"

"You're supposed to be the smart one here! Would it be mercy still be mercy if it were deserved? Please, just join me. We can restore this world to the way it was when father lived, but we have to do it together."

"Together."

Waking up on the hospital floor was surprisingly pleasant. Well, pleasant compared to reliving a gruesome death for the sixteenth time.

Opening and blinking the blurriness from his eyes, Naruto lifted himself into a sitting position and leaned back on his palms. Recognizing the ebony spikes from his position below the hospital bed, he half expected to find the same Mangekyō again, but was relieved to meet the usual coal black.

"Naruto? Are you alright? What happened?" came a frantic voice to his right. He turned to see Sakura, eyes wide and worry-lines creasing her forehead.

"I'm ok, Sakura. How long was I out?" Naruto said as he stood up briskly, smiling brightly in an attempt to conceal his unease at Sasuke's intimidating and calculating gaze.

Sakura rushed over to him at once, grabbing his forearms and guiding him to one of the chairs. "Twenty, thirty seconds at most. Are you sure you don't want to lay down or something?"

"No, no. I'm fine now. I think I'll head home and rest now, though. Can you tell Sensei what happened when he comes back?" he responded a bit hurriedly, stealing glances at his enigma of a teammate on his escape. The door shut behind him harder than intended, and he got a few suspicious looks from the nearby civilians. He slid down with his back on the door and rubbed the bridge of his nose with his hand.

His shoulders shook as silent tears polished his cheeks, and mangled sob of his brother's name escaped though the fraying reins of his emotional control.

"It was probably just a hallucination, anyway," he sighed, getting up and heading home once more.

The hospital room was eerily quiet after the blonde boy, Naruto, closed the door. Indra was so used to it, he almost missed how the furtive glances the boy had been sending his way and his suspiciously skittish behavior.

While Indra could already tell his chakra control was shot to hell, he could also tell his senses hadn't dulled much at all. The slam of the door had been loud, but not shouldn't have been loud enough to make him flinch. The five senses – six, including chakra sensory – were much like chakra in the sense of control. Without his previous control, Indra's senses were stuck at an extreme level, a blessing and a curse.

"Ne, Sasuke, what do you think's going on with Naruto since that first day back from Wave?" Ouch, way too loud and shrill.

"No idea. How long was I out for?" Indra broke the silence first, voice raspy from thirst and unuse.

She counted her fingers before turning to him and replying, "Nine days if you count the first half of today, eight if you–"

He heard a muffled sound from behind the door, and his curiosity was immediately piqued.

He turned to the girl leaning a little bit too closely for comfort with his index finger to his lips. "Shh."

He leaned forward in his sitting position and honed in on the sound outside of the room. He heard a couple sniffles and what sounded like his name, a coincidence that would be much too coincidental for his liking if not for the fact that it sounded like it came from the mouth of a dying monkey. They wouldn't have dying monkeys in a human hospital in this world, right?

"It was probably just a hallucination, anyway." Well, that crossed coincidental dying monkey off of the possibility list. But what were the chances of his new "teammate" randomly blurting out his name after seeing him and probably his sharingan, if the girl's words had been anything to go by, and then summing it all up with "It was probably a hallucination"? It just didn't make sense. And Sasuke didn't like when things didn't make sense.

He shook his head as to clear the stray thoughts form his mind. Did I really just refer to myself as 'Sasuke'? Kami, I'm messed up.

"Ugh, don't you start acting weird on me too! I'm gonna go tell Sensei about Naruto," Sakura's voice pulled him from his musings, and he turned to see her picking up her things and heading for the door.

"Wait! Sakura!"

"Yes, Sasuke-kun?"

"Can you keep what happened with my eyes today between us?...For me?" She seemed uneasy at the unusual request at first, but he knew he had her with the personal touch at the end.

"Mm, I guess I can," she finally replied, pretending to zip her lips like a zipper. "See you, Sasuke-kun!" she added over her shoulder on the way out, long, bubblegum hair following behind.

"Bye," came his reply, some thirty seconds late. Only some ten minutes after awakening in this new world and he'd been shocked nearly speechless.

This should be... interesting.

The Sandaime looked up from the paper with apprehension, though with a mask of calm indifference upon his visage. "Kakashi?"

The Hatake stepped forward dutifully, eyes set dead forward and tone terse and formal. "I nominate my genin Sasuke Uchiha, Sakura Haruno, and Naruto Uzumaki for these Chūnin Exams, Hokage-sama."

The old man blew the spicy-sweet smoke resignedly. Though he wanted more than anything to hold Naruto within the village walls and keep him safe at every turn, the boy was destined to move forward at some point. "Very well."

Hundreds of kunai were instantly poised to strike when a brown and green blur sped through the crowd, but put back just as fast when said blur was recognized as academy teacher Iruka Umino. Panting and arms waving around frantically, he stepped forward and shouted, "Wait! Hokage-sama! Naru – I mean those three – are not ready to take such big risks and responsibility! As their academy Sensei, I strongly advise they wait another six months at the least!"

Kakashi too stepped forward, although much more intimidatingly than his predecessor. "Iruka, let's get one thing straight here. My Genin are not your students anymore. They became my soldiers the instant they joined Team Seven," he growled. His superior height was prevalent when he stood face to face with the pineapple haired Chūnin, realeasing just enough killing intent to show he meant business. "Understand?"

"Hokage-sa–" Iruka started determinedly, but was cut off abruptly by the commanding voice of the Sandaime.

"Iruka." The sensei cowered imperceptibly and looked to the blank wall to his left, refusing to meet the Hokage's eyes, not unlike a child being reprimanded of a parent. "Kakashi-kun is right. They are no longer your students, and if he deems them ready for the trials, then so be it. I will hear no more of this. Kurenai?"

The next jounin stepped forward. "Hai, Hokage-sama. I nominate my genin..."

"So glad you could join us, Sensei," Sasuke spoke as the infamous copy-nin trudged up the prickly green hill to their determined meeting spot of the day, a bridge between the civilian residency and a jounin training ground.

"Who are you and what have you done with my cute little Uchiha?" Indra couldn't help but think even his teammates could hear his pounding heartbeat. Meanwhile, Sakura and Naruto eyed their teammate suspiciously; Sasuke never showed so much emotion from Kakashi's snide remarks, and would likely forgive Itachi before showing fear.

"Ehehe~, it was only a joke, dear Sasuke. I was just surprised that you called me 'Sensei' for the first time instead of 'Kakashi', not that I don't feel honored by the change," the jounin said with his signature crinkled eye, quickly appeasing Sasuke's deer-caught-in-the-headlights fright.

Kakashi, however, was not appeased in the least. While his genin had certainly stopped being nearly as boring as he'd predicted they'd be, he was getting tired of their constantly enigmatic changes in behavior. On the plus side, this particular incident would fill up more of his weekly three page report to the Sandaime on team 7, something the old man had ordered shortly after Team Seven's first comatose.

"Well, anyway," he began again, "I've brought you each a present today!" If he'd had was any doubt that the young shinobi were excited–not that there was, it was quickly squashed by all of their, yes, even Sasuke's, eyes immediately brightening with curiosity and excitement–although mostly curiosity. Kakashi smirked beneath his mask, Naruto was practically bouncing in place. He handed them each a brochure and waited for their reactions patiently.

Unsurprisingly, it was Naruto who asked first, a pitifully disappointed look upon his whiskered face. "'Chūnin Exams,' Sensei? I thought we just all got promoted together or something like we did from the academy."

"No, no, this is much better," he responded cryptically, and Naruto and Sakura recognized that devilish angle of his eye crinkle well enough to know whatever was to come did not bode well for them. Sasuke was as impassive as ever. "Ask your parents–er, ask the your parents or the Hokage to sign these for you and you can participate! Remember," he began, looking at Sakura less than discreetly, "none of you need to do this now, and seeing as there is a risk of death, your teammates won't blame you if you feel unprepared. We can always try again in six months or a year, but then it'll be held in a different village, so this is most convenient. We don't have training today, so each of you should take some time to think about it. Ja, ne!" The jōnin said before mock saluting and disappearing in a swirl of leaves.

The genin sat in silent contemplation for a few moments before Naruto and Sasuke got up at the same time, Sakura trailing behind. They split up after reaching the intersection from the main road to the bridge and another road, Sasuke going left, Naruto straight, and Sakura left.

Continuing home along the orangey gravel pathway, Indra was a little confused – and rightfully so. While most of the tablet was completely false information and propaganda made by some wacko, he'd gotten enough information from it he'd found beneath his new home to realize that he was not in a different world, but thousands of years in the future, and that people had corrupted his father's teachings and Ninshū into jutsu and shinobi – something he partially blamed himself and Asura for.

He also understood enough about how things worked in the village to understand that he was a genin and the white haired man was his sensei, and Sakura told him when and where to meet most of the time. Luckily, his body's old personality was similar enough to his old one that he didn't have to act very much, but being on the bottom of the shinobi food chain still didn't sit well with him. He was adjusting slowly, but his issues with authority affected his life much more severely now that he could no longer boss around whoever he wished – other than Asura, that is.

The night of the day he'd woken up he'd thought long and hard – a luxury of not having a phsycotic voice whispering in your ear every couple of seconds – about his past life's actions and decisions. He sorely regretted killing Asura, his father, and himself, and decided to use his new chance at life to right the wrongs of the new 'shinobi' world and himself. He was by no means planning on being a hero – no, he was way too far gone to be the good guy. He'd do things the same violent ways as before, but with a new goal in mind.

A high pitched yelp to his right yanked him from his musings, and he turned to see a small boy being dangled by the neck by a young boy with purple – is that makeup? – and a black jacket. Next to them was another young shinobi, a blonde girl with four buns and a large fan strapped to her back. Indra recognized their foreign headbands as being from Suna, and chalked it up to them coming to participate in the Chūnin Exams.

Just being the great person he naturally was – yeah, right. – he slowly walked over to investigate, and maybe help the boy. Only because he reminded him uncomfortably of when he teased Asura during their childhood. Perched in a tree above the scene, he waited for the right time to intervene.

Another person approached the group, and his eyes widened a fraction of an inch. While his blonde teammate, Naruto, had a heated altercation with the boy with purple makeup, he felt shift in the branches to his right, and mentally cursed his lack of chakra sensitivity. Turning to the sound, he was greeted by an auburn haired boy with eyes clouded with insanity, something he recognized instantly – he'd seen it in his reflection for years, after all.

Upon seeing Naruto, the redhead immediately gripped his head with his hands and screamed. The sound was a mixture of rage and anguish, and trailed off into a guttural, melancholic moan. The youngest boy had been dropped from the Suna-nin's grip and was now hiding behind Naruto, who himself held a look of horror, pain, pity, and empathy.

"Mother wants your blood!" the redhead screamed, lunging from the tree and diving directly for Naruto. He stopped abruptly, though, when the blonde bent over and bursted out in loud, carefree guffaws.

"M-m-mother?" he giggled, drawing curious looks from all onlookers. "That–" a couple more giggles, "eheh sorry. Phew, okay," he said, standing up and wiping the mistiness from his eyes. "Okay, let me get this straight. She told you she's your mother? Wow, I heard from the Kyūbi that she'd gone insane, but I was definitely not expecting that!"

Breaking out of his daze, the insane shinobi seemed to listen to a voice only he could hear for a couple of moments before turning to Naruto and growling cyptically, "You're lucky Mother warns me against your chakra signature, you'd be dead if you were the person she'd recognized you for at first."

Most shinobi with even jōnin level observation wouldn't have caught the few drips of surprise and seriousness through Naruto's mask, but Indra was definitely not 'most shinobi'. From his few interactions with his enigma of a teammate he'd been able to recognize the hidden genius lying beneath the loudness and eccentricity, and he continued to wonder just how much of his boisterous persona was simply a façade.

The three Suna-nin turned and walked away slowly, and snuck a few glances back at the blonde when a stray giggle escaped through the hands covering his mouth.

Indra was happy to find new information, and particularly happy to find out that the tailed beasts had been imprisoned. In his opinion, they'd always been too unstable and powerful to let roam free. Having Kurama sealed inside his teammate was unexpected, but also made for a very good opportunity at extracting the beast to control with his sharingan, a technique he'd learned about from the tablet beneath his home.

Granted, he'd have to take the life of his teammate, but what was victory without a couple sacrifices here and there?

AN: Happy Late-Halloween! Has anybody else watched the Boruto movie yet? It's out on kissanime if anybody that wants to hasn't. I was kind of disappointed by the ending and how fast the plot went, though. Thoughts?

p.s. and an answer to a review - Indra is by no means falling for the tablet's lies, only using the information from it that stayed true. (the Sharingan and Kyuubi technique, shinobi corrupting Ninsuu, etc.)