Wow. It's been so many years since I've written any story at all. Definitely feeling rusty, so hopefully writing this story will help the words flow out better after a while.

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or any of its characters.

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Prologue

Once upon a time, in an alternate universe, Uzumaki Naruto would have moved into his very own apartment at the tender age of six, after the Hokage despaired of finding an orphanage that would care for the boy without "incidents" that required either medical or physical intervention.

In that alternate universe, Naruto would've been accompanied by the Hokage from the hospital straight to his new apartment, protecting Naruto from further sabotage.

In this universe, however, his attacker was a little bit too clever, a little bit too fast, for all that he had ANBU guards, and thus Naruto found himself smacked around, whisked off in a shunshin, and dumped somewhere dark, damp and earthy, where he promptly fainted with no one wiser until the next morning, when all hell broke loose in the Hokage Tower.

Thus the Child of the Forest was born.

Something was tickling his nose.

Blearily, Naruto tried to move - and cried out when his entire body twanged in pain. Gasping, he flipped onto his back carefully and opened his eyes. He wasn't in the orphanage. Damp grass and earth poked his exposed neck and palms, and he could feel something gnarly under his head. He could make out bits of soft dappled moonlight shining through the canopy of trees high above him, though just watching it made him dizzy. He blinked and looked around.

Everywhere looked the same to him, endless expanses of grey and black, with trees and shrubs and vines stretching as far as he could see, which wasn't very far at all. Naruto stifled a sob and rubbed furiously at his eyes. He'd been picked on again! It wasn't fair! He didn't know why the villagers hated him, but it sucked and he didn't like it at all. Just wait till he became Hokage!

With a practicality that defied his age, the little boy forced himself to stop feeling miserable and sat up. The ache in his limbs was already fading, giving him another reason to put the latest incident behind him. He didn't know where he was, but he should find his way home. Hokage-jiji often warned him against sneaking out at night. Even if he didn't know how he got here, he'd better go home before he got into soooo much trouble.

First he had to figure out where "here" was. Naruto sniffed the air as he looked around; to his disappointment, he couldn't smell anything familiar, so he got up to wander around. By now, his eyes had adjusted to the gloom, though he still couldn't figure out his location. He was reasonably certain that he hadn't been in this part of the village before.

Well, nothing for it. He picked a random direction, hoping to find a landmark, the forest rustling and crunching and snapping wherever he went, breaking the silent night. If Naruto had been even a few years older, or if he'd sat through the wilderness survival class at the Academy, he might have known that so making much noise was a bad idea, but at six years old he had nary a clue. So he walked and walked and walked, stumbling over roots and rocks.

It was only when he finally stopped walking, tired and still nowhere familiar, that fear crept up his spine. Naruto shivered and pulled his jacket sleeves down to cover his hands, leaving only his head exposed to the chilly air, trying his best to not cry. He was a big boy now, Hokage-jiji said so, which was why Hokage-jiji said he could move into his Very Own House soon. Big boys don't cry. So Naruto shouldn't cry-

His foot caught on a tree root, sending him tumbling face-first into the soil. He lay there for a while, stunned. Then the crappiness of the day caught up to him, strangling him, squeezing his tears out…and despite his best efforts, Naruto cried anyway.

It wasn't a loud wail. Unlike most children his age, Naruto had learned the hard way that no one would respond when he cried, except to laugh or scream at him, so his tears streamed silently, broken by soft hiccups that wouldn't have been heard past any walls. Normally that wasn't a problem.

Unfortunately for him, he was out in the forest with wild animals, and many predators roamed the land at night, predators with much, much better hearing than the average human.

He didn't notice a large shadow watching him cry. He didn't notice a thing - until a big pair of jaws snapped down on his head and neck, threatening to tear him apart.

Naruto screamed.

No one heard him.

Naruto was beyond terrified. His entire head was caught in those jaws, so all he could see and hear was a wet blackness, hot and sticky, and a low, hungry rumbling that came from deep within the maw of the beast. Desperately, he wished for a weapon - kunai, shuriken, a rock, anything! - but he had nothing. He couldn't breathe. He couldn't think.

Sharp teeth dug deeper into his flesh. With a growl, the beast tossed Naruto up in the air, chomped down on his body, and bound away after giving Naruto one good shake. The constant jostling tore at his body, making him cry out in pain. He'd been snagged right between two canines when he was tossed, but the pressure of the upper jaw on his body was strong, hammering at him with every step the beast took. His feet flailed uselessly, unable to kick.

Naruto panted in pain and fear. Where was the beast taking him? The forest blurred past him, faster and quieter than he'd ever gone before, even though the beast was just running now, not leaping. Hot, thick saliva spilled from the beast's jaws onto his face, making him cough and spit. Eventually, the beast slowed to a trot, and Naruto could make out thinning vegetation before the beast jumped down to a clearing and dumped him on the ground. Naruto grunted at the impact.

High above him, the beast gave a half-howl, half-purr, snout pointed at the exposed root system of a great tree. For a moment, nothing happened. Naruto only had time to wipe saliva out of his eyes before four shadows emerged from the roots.

They were foxes, Naruto realised when they came closer. He curled into a crouch, ready to run away, when a large paw batted at him, sending him sprawling. He shook his head and looked up.

Oh, he thought faintly. They weren't just foxes. They were giant foxes, a mama and her four cubs, the four smaller dog-sized creatures looking just like her in miniature. Naruto scrambled to put some distance between him and them. The vixen just watched as her cubs approached him curiously even as he backed away. Too soon, he tripped over a root and fell on his rump, knocking him out of breath. The cubs, seeing him in a more vulnerable position, advanced faster. One nipped his foot and he backed away in alarm. His hand fisted the soil - no, a rock. Heart racing, he curled his fingers round the rock, picked it up, and threw.

It struck a cub.

With a terrible roar, the mother fox pounced and pinned him under a large paw. Naruto screamed as he scrabbled fruitlessly to escape the claws that threatened to pierce his neck. The vixen was truly angry, her jaws bare inches from his face, growling long and deep, saliva dripping. He gasped for breath, ribs creaking under her tremendous weight, sight blurring, no he couldn't die here nononono-

In desperation, he dug his nails into her paw, pushing upwards, muscles straining, wishing wishing wishing to hurt her, to escape, to stay alive, and slowly, slowly, a red haze seeped out around him as he poured more and more strength into his arms, digging his nails deeper, sharper into her flesh. Just a little bit more, he told himself desperately. A little more, and he'd be free-

A snarl, a final push, and he was out from under her, hands thick with blood. Wheezing, he glared at the vixen, who had ceased her approach and merely crouched warily. Her nose twitched, ears flattening, and she issued a low growl. Naruto snarled back.

Then, against the odds, the vixen retreated. Slowly, at first, then with one large leap that took her out of Naruto's sight. Stunned, Naruto dropped to the ground, greedily gasping for breath as the red haze dissipated. He didn't understand what happened, but somehow, he'd survived, and the vixen was gone.

A series of yips and barks snapped his attention back to his surroundings. Apprehension pooled in his stomach; he'd forgotten about the cubs. The four foxes were within reach now, all curious, all coming nearer. Naruto eyed them in despair. His hands trembled, spent and limp, barely fisting despite his best efforts. One cub dared to come closer than the rest. Its paw snagged his pants, and he kicked it away. But instead of attacking like its mother, the cub took a leap backwards, crouched, and started gekkering, a series of chattering that its siblings quickly picked up. They began nipping at him then darting away, or batting at him then crouching, leaving Naruto baffled. They weren't attacking. In fact, from his experience with dogs in Konoha, they looked like they were…playing?

What in the world is happening to me?

Dawn broke, and with it came the change in ANBU detail for Naruto. Or at least, it would have been a change, except for the distinct absence of a night ANBU guard. ANBU operative Cat quickly scanned the area for her colleague and, in finding no one, dropped in to check on Naruto. Shimmying through the window, she peeked into the dark room. It was silent, as expected, so she crept up to the bed to see the figure beneath the blanket…but no one was there. Blood drained from her face.

She concentrated and stretched her awareness as far as she could. But with his developing chakra coils, unused and dormant, Naruto couldn't be distinguished from any other normal civilian, and there were many civilians here near the orphanage, here in the civilian sector. She cursed under her breath, flared her chakra in alarm and shunshined to the Hokage's Tower.

The Hokage was already in office with his secretary when she barged in.

"Hokage-sama! Hokage-sama, Uzumaki's missing." She blinked when the Hokage's eyes, normally gentle, sharpened at her words.

"What! Since when? Where's Boar?"

"I was supposed to relieve him, but I didn't see him, Hokage-sama."

"Could Naruto have snuck off somewhere?"

"I'm not sure, Hokage-sama, but since it's 0600 hours now, it is unlikely; he's a late sleeper."

The Hokage whirled round and pressed a button on his table. Immediately, a team of shinobi blurred into view, saluting the Hokage.

"Uzumaki Naruto is missing," Sarutobi snapped. "We do not yet know whether he is truly lost or just walking around, but assume he is lost. Find him and bring him to me."

"Yes, Hokage-sama!" The team shunshined away.

Frowning, Sarutobi turned his back to Cat, facing his only window. She stood at attention as the Hokage stared off into the distance.

"We better hope, for everyone's sake, that this is another of Naruto's pranks," he said after a moment. He shook his head. "If Naruto isn't found within the hour, mobilise the Inuzuka. Dismissed."

"Yes, Hokage-sama!" She saluted and left the room, leaving the Hokage alone in his office.

Sarutobi sighed and sipped at his now-cold tea. Not for the first time, he wished his crystal ball worked on all his subjects, not just his ninja, even if it'd be a programmatic nightmare. The crystal ball could only be used to detect the ninja whose chakra he could identify; without it, it was like looking for a needle in a proverbial haystack, the haystack being the roiling mass of low, undeveloped chakra signatures of children and civilians that make up a large percentage of Konoha. He sighed again.

The hour came and went, and Inuzuka were deployed to track the boy down, even as other ninja investigated any and all potential suspects for clues. The Hokage's fury grew as the day dragged on with no whisker-faced boy in sight.

"We need more time, Hokage-sama," Inuzuka Tsume, the current head of the Inuzuka clan, told Sarutobi, rather stiffly. "It rained all night there yesterday, and with no idea where to start, my clansmen have been scouting in the village first. If they haven't found him by tonight, we may have to consider that Uzumaki may not be in the village anymore."

"We cannot allow that to happen, Tsume."

"I understand, Hokage-sama, but we have to be prepared. Hiashi has been persuaded to release a few Hyuuga to assist with the search; they will pair up with my clansmen."

A puff of smoke billowed from Sarutobi's pipe as he exhaled to gather his patience. Boar had been found in the afternoon, concussed, injured, and slurring nonsense, but there was still no news of Naruto. "See that you find him. And the perpetrator, if he was taken."

"Yes, Hokage-sama."

Sarutobi massaged his temples once he heard the door click shut behind Tsume. What a mess, he thought. What a mess.

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Yep, definitely rusty. I'll try better next time. So how was it? Tell me what you think!