Chapter One

She looked again into the mirror on the back of her bedroom door. She'd been messing with her hair for the better part of twenty minutes and it still didn't look any better than when she started. Fine! If that's how it wants to be. Today is important, but if it doesn't want to behave, then pigtails will have to do.

She turned around and looked herself over again. Her frilly white sundress hung loosely around her. She didn't normally wear anything like this, but Ino likes "normal people" fashion, so there she was, wearing the most impractical, girly-girl dress that she could find. She laughed at the thought, everyone, including her Hokage, had been trying to get her to wear less orange for years, and none had yet been able to convince her to change. They'd tried bribes, begging, and blackmail and none of it had worked. But the thought that it would make Ino happy and she couldn't get out of it fast enough.

The time read six fifty-eight on the neon red display of her digital clock. Shit. I'm supposed to be on the other side of the village to pick Ino up in two minutes. She grabbed her heels and dove out the window. She jumped from rooftop to rooftop, all she could hear was the rush of air passing her ears, all she could see was the blur of tiles and gaps beneath her feet

"Hey Naruko, where are you running off to so fast?" Someone was running up next to her.

"Can't chat, gotta go, sorry!" She pushed off faster, sprinting ahead. Some of the roof tiles started to peel off under her feet as she added chakra to her legs to go faster. She'd deal with that later, right now the only thing she could focus on was not being late.

She landed on the balcony outside of Ino's apartment. She took a moment to compose herself and slip on her heels. Alright Naruko, deep breath. She knocked on the door.

"Shit," She could hear Ino mutter from somewhere inside of her apartment. Naruko smirked at that, apparently, she wasn't quite ready either. A minute later the door swung open.

"Hey- wow, hey…" She couldn't help but stare. Ino always looked incredible, but today… she couldn't put her finger on it, nothing was different that she could tell, Ino was wearing her normal purple crop top and skirt, and her hair was in its normal ponytail. Maybe it was just the day, but something was making Ino look especially beautiful.

"Hey Naruko," Ino smiled, "You look really nice."

"Oh, thanks." Naruko spun around and Ino giggled, "You look…" Naruko trailed off as she started staring again.

Ino looked down at herself and brushed at her skirt, "Is something wrong?"

"You look incredible." Ino blushed and Naruko snapped out of her stupor. "So umm, are you ready?" Ino nodded and took Naruko's arm, "I was thinking before we go to dinner we could take a walk around the village."

Ino started leading them out of her apartment complex, "Sure, it's always so pretty this time of year."

Naruko and Ino walked through the village at a leisurely pace. Not needing to say anything, they held each other's hands and walked in a comfortable silence. Naruko slowly guiding them to where they needed to be. Eventually, they got the base of the Hokage monument and started the ascent.

As they got to the top, Ino walked over to the edge and gazed out over the village, "It's beautiful up here."

"Yeah, it is." The words felt corny in her mouth as she looked not at the village but at the woman standing before her. One more time Naruko, deep breath, "Listen Ino, I didn't just bring you up here for the view." She swallowed and looked out over the village, "I umm, this place has always been really special to me. Before I knew he was my father, the fourth was my biggest hero. I'd come up here when I needed to think or when I just needed to be alone. And I'd talk to him about whatever was on my mind and somehow, just saying the words helped… I don't know where I was going with that. I've never really been good with words." Naruko took Ino's hands in hers and looked deep into her eyes, "What I'm trying to say is that I love you Ino. Will you marry me?"

Ino leaped into Naruko's arms and kissed her. All of the nervousness that Naruko had been feeling about this moment suddenly left her in a rush through her lips as she melted into the woman she loved. Ino's hands went into Naruko's hair as hers went to the small of Ino's back. Naruko's knees grew weak and her head felt light. They fell to the ground in a tangled mess. Their lips only separating long enough for them to take quick shallow breaths as they rolled around in each other's arms. Ino slowly started to run her fingers up Naruko's thighs.

The quick, sharp snare of skin on skin pierced the air. And again. Naruko and Ino pull away from each other to look around and see who's clapping.

"Well isn't this a pretty picture? The village slut and dobe shacking up together. Of all of the things I expected to see when I came back, I gotta say, this was near the bottom of the list." Sasuke said smirking. He was standing on the branch of a nearby tree, dressed in full Orochimaru brown nosing regalia: a white tunic, black puff pants and a giant purple rope tied in a bow around his waist.

Naruko and Ino flipped up off the ground and Naruko started walking toward him, "You're back! Ah Sasuke, I'm glad you've finally come to your senses. Hey, wait, what did you mean village slut? Ino isn't a slut! You take that back!"

"Tch once a dobe always a dobe. I'm not back, I came to take this from this stupid village." He held up some kind of scroll. "And fine, if she's not a slut, then she must be a whore. And a cheap one at that, if you're able to afford her."

Naruko kicked off her heels and jumped up at him, "Take it back asshole!" She swung her fist but he blurred away as it connected. Her face went red. How could she have missed such an obvious illusion? A dozen clones appeared in a puff of smoke around her, they all nodded and started fanning out looking for him. "Ino, go tell Baa-chan that Sasuke is here and he stole something."

Ino bit her lip, "Be careful Naru-chan. I still haven't had a chance to answer you yet." With that, she turned and jumped down the face of the mountain.

One of Naruko's clones got destroyed and her head snapped in that direction. She started jumping through the branches of the trees. She had to get Sasuke back, whatever he stole was probably dangerous, but more importantly, she needed to bring Sasuke back to the light. She knew the Will of Fire still burned inside of him, even if it was only smoldering, and she was determined to stoke it.

Naruko landed in the clearing where her clone had burst not a minute prior. There was no wind here to rustle the leaves, and the color of the trees started to fade to duller browns and muted greens. The air smelt faintly of rot. Something about it all was off, but before Naruko could think on it, Sasuke spoke up.

"Took you long enough dobe." He was leaning against a tree on the far side of the clearing, cleaning his nails with the tip of a kunai.

"I'm bringing you in Sasuke. We can do this the easy way or the hard way. But you're not getting away from me again." She reached behind her to grab a kunai from her belt pouch. Which I'm not wearing. Shit.

"How many times do we have to go through this dobe? I'm better than you. I always have been and I always will be." Sasuke kicked off the tree and started running through hand seals. As he finished his short string of seals, he put his fingers to his lips and called out, "Grand Fireball Jutsu!" A fireball as big as the canopy of a tree launched itself from Sasuke's mouth, screaming towards Naruko.

Naruko dodged out of the way and formed a hand seal herself, and with a plume of smoke that filled the clearing, there stood fifty perfect replica's of Naruko, all staring menacingly at Sasuke, all wearing the same froofy white sundress. As if on cue, all fifty-one Narukos launched into a melee assault on the lone Sasuke.

He dodged as well as he could but he was surrounded, and the occasional fist or foot slipped through. Even in the most uneven fights, it happens on occasion, and when there are over a hundred fists flying through the air, those occasional missed blocks add up fast. So it was a triumphant Naruko who stood over a battered and beaten Sasuke in less than a minute.

That's when the dark laughter started coming from every direction.

"Did you really think I'd be so easy to defeat? Honestly dobe, pay attention. I didn't even activate my Sharingan." Cracks started forming in the scenery and the sky turned red. Black chains burst from the ground and captured the original Naruko as all of her clones faded away. "You're in my domain. And for the next 72 hours, I control everything." Naruko felt her body being bound to a wooden cross and she saw Sasuke draw his sword. As Sasuke was about to start cutting into her, there was a shudder in the world. A brief moment passed and then a crack formed in the sky, and Naruko saw a look of panic and surprise on Sasuke's face.

Naruko found herself lying on the ground in the clearing she had just been in, but this time there was a wind, and the colors were as vibrant as they always were in the forests of The Land of Fire. Standing before here was the remainder of the shadow clones she had made earlier, fighting with Sasuke, the real one this time. She jumped to her feet just as Sasuke finished destroying the last of her clones.

"Nice try Sasuke, but you're genjutsu won't work on me again." She formed a cross-shaped hand seal and created another dozen clones. "I'm done playing around." Each of the clones started forming Rasengan in their hands. "Uzumaki Rasengan Barrage!" All of the clones called out together and launched into a full frontal assault, leaving huge craters in the ground and trees whenever they missed with their attack.

One finally managed to land a hit on Sasuke and he fell apart into a pool of mud. All of the Narukos started looking around, trying to find him.

"I was going to wait to use this until I got back to base, but why waste the opportunity to give it a test?" Sasuke was standing on a branch of a tree again, holding out the scroll that he had stolen, "This is going to give me the power to kill my brother, and restore my clan. You weaklings in Konoha have had it at your fingertips for years and never even considered using it. That's where we're different. I don't waste power." Sasuke unfurled the scroll and his Sharingan started spinning. The sky started to turn dark as if night was falling. The air started to cool and the wind picked up. Black flames leaped from Sasuke's Sharingan and started burning the scroll. Sasuke let out a blood-curdling scream and fell over dead. A black void started growing out of the scroll and a dark crack in the air opened around it. Before Naruko could react, she was being sucked into the abyss.

#

Naruko wasn't sure how long she had been floating in the darkness or how many times she had tried to break this latest genjutsu that Sasuke had put her in, but she was getting bored. "Hello, Sasuke? Are you out there?" She called out for the umpteenth time. "Come on Sasuke, come fight me like a man!" She started swinging her fists wildly in the dark.

Looking around all she could see was a vast emptiness, or at least she thought it was vast. If she was being entirely honest with herself, she could have been in a box seven feet on a side and she wouldn't be able to tell the difference, so total was the dark that surrounded her.

She hung her head limply, resigned to wait for whatever attempt at torture Sasuke would concoct for her this time. And time passed by, without any way of keeping track of how long it was, she was starting to think that she might be here for days, only the knowledge that Sasuke didn't have the kind of chakra control or reserves to hold a genjutsu for that long kept her from fully believing it.

Out of the corner of her eye, she started to see something different. Just a spec at first, but it was definitely there, and it was definitely growing. A pink light was coming from below her. Or, at least what she thought was below her. She suddenly realized that she couldn't actually see her body to tell which way was up, but before she could fully start to panic about that the speck was in front of her, and it wasn't just a glowing pink light, it turned out to be a small person with wings.

"Hey! Are you awake?" The fairy asked waving a hand in front of what Naruto would call her eyes, but without a body, she wasn't sure.

"Who the hell are-"

"Ah, good, you are. My name's Tamiko, I'm you're guiding spirit! Nice to meet you Naruko." Tamiko smiled. "You're probably a little confused."

"Yeah, what is Sasuke trying to pull here? This is the weirdest genjutsu I've ever heard of."

"Sasuke is dead Naruko, and so are you. But luckily for you, Sasuke was an idiot." Naruko's face paled.

"What do you mean I'm dead? How am I still here and talking? Am I a g-ghost?" If Naruko had a body, she'd have been patting herself down. The weird thing was, she could feel herself doing it.

Tamiko laughed, "No Naruko, you're not a ghost. Not yet anyway. As I was saying, Sasuke was an idiot, which is quite lucky for you. You see that scroll that he was bragging about stealing had a very powerful seal on it. It was originally designed by your father as a means of field testing shinobi, and giving them really valuable field experience without putting them in any actual danger. The original design used a part of his own soul as a way of generating combat scenarios. But after he died, that piece of his soul got corrupted, with the rest of it being in the Shinigami's belly. Not only that but other people who weren't as talented with fuuinjustu as him started messing with it. It became something of a legend outside of Konoha, a scroll that contained a part of the fourth Hokage's soul that could teach his most devastating techniques, which attracted Sasuke to it. Combining all of the new poorly written seals, the corrupted soul fragment, and Sasuke's Sharingan spontaneously releasing Amaterasu, the whole thing kind of blew up and tore a hole in the universe… Are you paying attention?" She flicked where Naruko felt like her forehead should be and to Naruko's surprise, it actually hurt.

"Ow, yes! So you're saying I got sucked out of the universe? What the hell does that mean? Ow! What was that for?" Tamiko flicked Naruko's forehead space again and then crossed her arms.

"I was just getting to that if you hadn't interrupted me-"

"You asked if I was paying attention! Ow! Stop that!" Naruko rubbed her forehead, ignoring how disconcerting it was to do that when she couldn't see her body.

Tamiko ignored Naruko's indignation and continued, "As I was saying before you interrupted me," Naruko started grumbling under her breath about stupid fairies, "You got sucked out of a crack in the universe. A crack that isn't supposed to be there."

"You mean there are cracks in the universe that are supposed to be there? Ow, quit it!"

"Yes, they're called plot holes. Anyway, this crack needs to be repaired, and that's where you come in. Kami has asked me to use the remnants of the scroll to send you back in time and fix this whole mess." Tamiko waved her hand and large white letters were floating before their eyes. "Naruko, welcome to the new game screen."