Through the Mirror

So… my second fan fiction… I'm taking canon compliance and chucking it the hell out of the window. Hopefully this new story lacks any sizable plot holes… canon has a lot of plot holes too, considering that Sarutobi could give Naruto enough money to get better food from his inheritance and decided no to… where'd all that money go? Hope you enjoy my new story that stomps on canon compliance with ice skates.

Hopefully this story is a lot less awkward.

Hiruzen will be dark grey-ish in this story because I doubt Naruto would leave Konoha behind if he loved the Hokage or it would be a lot harder for Naruto to hate Konoha. It also never made sense to me why he couldn't give Naruto an extra allowance, and if he actually cared about Naruto, he should have forced vegetables down Naruto's throat. I also never understood why Jiraiya didn't just take Naruto and make a run for it.

—

Uzumaki Naruto was a young boy who lived in Konoha.

—His kindness was spat upon

Naruto was just walking around the Academy grounds; it was the morning recess, and all of the kids were playing games, whether they be playing ninja tag, or ninjas vs samurai, among other games, including other strange games that strange people liked to play. He noticed two larger girls, probably near their graduation years, standing over and shouting and pointing at a small girl with pink hair; one of the girls in his class, who went by the name of Haruno Sakura. Naruto of course walked up to the pair of bullies; he knew the feeling of being bullied, albeit it was instead from older men and women, and bullying was something that nobody should have to go through.

"Hey, what're you two doing?" Asked Naruto in a bored voice, causing the two bullies to stiffen up and turn around with scowls on their faces. "It's not exactly nice to yell at someone or call them names or point at them."

"So, punk," one of them sneered. "We're gonna give you a beating if you don't step away in 5 seconds. Five… Four… Three… Two… One…" Throughout all this, Naruto just stood in front of them still, head tilted and observing them. And the girls pounced, Naruto easily dodging one of them's grasping hands and one of them's punches. Arrogant fangirls, the both of them… if this was the extent of their taijutsu, they should have been booted out of the Academy long ago. Then again, the Academy doesn't focus on ninja life in the slightest; it was weighted just as heavily in academics as actual ninja work; for girls, they even had a portion of their grade designated for flower arranging of all things. Useless skills for someone who was to become a shinobi and the Academy graduates all reflected that lack of ninja training. Naruto ended up bonking both of them, causing both of them to fall back, sneer, promise to come back to make it up to him, and then run away quickly.

Naruto offered his hand to the fallen girl. "Name's Uzumaki Naruto, sorry about those bullies; those two really were a pair of bores, weren't they?"

Sakura had been looking at him with something akin to admiration before he said his name, her face quickly morphing into a sneer. "You're the kid that my parents told me to stay away from… demon brat, was it?" She walked away with an ugly smile on her face. Why do I even bother, thought Naruto. It had, is, and always will be the same way. No matter what he does, even if he sacrifices his life, sentenced himself to eternal torture so the village could live, he would never be loved, never be appreciated, never be at home. It would always be this way and it would never change.

—He was sabotaged

Naruto was waiting for his test to be passed out; he had a history test today along with the rest of the class. History tests were boring. When was history ever going to be needed in ninja life? It could be understood that successful military tactics and the like would be extremely useful to fledgling ninja, but the information that was truly important like military tactics were as hard to find among all the other information as a needle in a haystack, or a person who loved Naruto in Konoha; nearly impossible to say the least, probably even beyond impossible.

Mizuki sneered at him for a moment when he passed him his test that he took from the bottom of the pile instead of the top. How less subtle can one get? That expression quickly replaced with a large fake smile with eyes that promised hurt. The eyes are windows to the soul, after all, not just for the Uchiha although the Uchiha have clearer windows. Naruto could feel a minor genjutsu on his paper - he listened in class, after all, and disrupted the genjutsu with a strong pulse that caused Iruka and Mizuki along with a couple students to stiffen and look around. Naruto looked at his completely blank paper and raised his hand.

"Iruka-sensei, my paper is blank. Can I have another one?" Iruka just sighed before handing another new test paper this time in exchange for his blank sheet of paper. "Thanks Iruka-sensei." Iruka nodded in response before returning to his desk in the front of the classroom. Mizuki gave Naruto another quick glare and sneer, no doubt thinking about more ways to make the "demon brat" suffer.

—He was attacked

Naruto was running, running, just as always. He was being chased by a couple of drunks who decided now would be a good time to give the "demon brat" a lesson. For what reason? That's a good question… for existing. Generally civilians didn't chase Naruto much, knowing about the Sandaime's law, but a couple of drunks with impaired decision making skills would chase Naruto if he was found outside of the apartment. Naruto had no honest idea why these weird old guys chased him; he didn't exactly know how to read the textbooks at the Academy and nobody had ever bothered to teach him. When he asked Iruka-sensei, Iruka just laughed as if it was a joke and took Naruto out to ramen, never thinking that Naruto was actually serious about not knowing how to read. Speaking is something you can learn by adapting, but writing and reading was a completely different matter. With all the random kanji that meant different things in different combinations with even different sounds, learning Japanese by yourself is a challenge for a cryptographer, much less a five year old Uzumaki Naruto.

"Get the demon brat! He killed my sister!" Yelled one drunk. It was rather strange that one would think that a five year old had killed his sister, considering that Naruto didn't remember killing anyone from the farthest reaches of his memories and he really doubted a baby less than three who could barely walk, let alone run, could kill somebody. One must also consider that this drunk isn't the only one that complained that Naruto killed someone close to them, and with all those people combined that death count went really high up. At this rate, Naruto would be charged with being a serial killer with over 500 murders…

Naruto dodged the hands of one drunk only to find himself in front of yet another drunk, this time ducking and diving between the man's legs. Being small and quick really did help sometimes, even if he wasn't strong enough to beat back the drunks… he would rather have fangirls, to be honest, because at least they were generally weak and only had strength in numbers, which Naruto could quickly cut down with the help of a couple traps all rigged with rather strong explosive tags. Imagine the All New Ninja Weapon! The Fangirl Cannon 2000! That would most definitely be a powerful game-changing weapon on the battlefield.

Another drunk threw a near-empty sake bottle at him. "Look what you did," the drunk complained sleepily. "Now I don' have anyyy sakeeee left… I'M GONNA BEAT YOU UP!" He finished his statement with a yell, charging towards Naruto before tripping and falling flat on his face. Naruto sniggered slightly at that; served the drunk right for trying to attack him. He could deal with these civilians fine, but ninja were a completely different matter, and he was glad that no ninja had thought about attacking him… yet.

—He was beaten on

Naruto attempted to dodge a roundhouse kick from a chunin attacking him, but as he ducked the kick clipped him on the side of his head before the chunin followed up with a kick straight to the stomach, causing Naruto to fly backward and hit a wall, head snapping back and then sliding down to the corner. The chunin's friends openly laughed at the "demon brat getting put in its place," and Naruto still had no idea why he was called a demon brat, of all things. It was true that he pulled pranks, but being called a "demon brat" had nothing in relation to his pranks. He was fairly sure that the Hokage's grandson pulled pranks occasionally and he just got praised for his ingenuity. They had also started calling him the demon brat before he started on his pranks, so it most likely wasn't related to his pranks in any shape and form.

Another chunin approached him, slugging the downed boy in the face, causing his head to hit the wall yet again. If the human body adapted, then Naruto in a couple of years would have a skull ten inches thick. He had a relatively pain tolerance, so it wasn't as bad as the first time a random drunk civilian decided to approach a four year old boy who could barely run. That had left many bruises on his skin, but for some reason, the next day all the bruises disappeared. It was rather strange in Naruto's opinion; he never got sick, his injuries healed at a rapid pace, and his exercising bore more results than any of his classmates. None of the civilians could keep up with him, and only clan children with training prior to the Academy could pass him. People like Sasuke and Kiba were fast because they had trained since they were four and they had clansmen to help them. Naruto had no such luck.

Naruto attempted to dodge another punch aimed at him, and instead of it breaking his nose it hit the side of his head. Naruto really hated broken noses; they were really messy and left a lot of blood behind. The water at his apartment was always cold and washing off the blood from his face could give him hypothermia. Naruto could swear that the landlord not just leaves his water unheated but also freezes it. Washing bloody clothes was also annoying, considering how he only had a t-shirt and a jumpsuit with a pair of pants. It was rather unfortunate that a drop of blood rolled from his forehead, causing him to groan and shift slightly, causing two of the three chunin to chuckle at the discomfort of a defenseless(relatively) six year old child.

"Oh, is the demon brat hurt?" One chunin sneered. "Well, you shouldn't have attacked Konoha in the first place six years ago, demon." Many things are not true, but one things that was most definitely true is that Naruto didn't exactly attack Konoha, and especially not during his birth year… After all, his birthday was in October of all months, how was he supposed to have time to attack an entire village and kill so many people?

"Let's get him," said the lead chunin, looking back at his friends. "We'll be celebrated as heroes after this."

—He was kept secrets from and was finally told the truth of it all

Naruto woke up deep inside a sewer, in a hallway with one dead end and the other side having two branches. The pipes on the wall constantly pulsed and occasionally leaked some orange chakra, causing Naruto to be come rather confused; was he inside some giant machine of something? He followed the pipes, leading him to the right pathway and through a rather large maze of passage ways. The foremost question is how the hell did he get in there? He was pretty sure he didn't have the authority to go inside a giant machine of chakra considering he was just an Academy student. He eventually after slogging through ankle-deep water ended up in a large room with a gate and only darkness behind the gate.

"Why the hell is there a big cage here?" Naruto wondered. "I wonder why people what put a cage in a sewer of all places…" He then leaped back by instinct, just barely dodging a large curved claw from skewering him in the stomach, slightly ripping his shirt, which to his surprise, began to mend himself. "So something happened to my clothes… that's cool. So back to the main question… why the hell was I almost skewered on a claw?" That of course, should be the main question, unless one had no sense of self-preservation.

"Come here, foolish ningen, come here so I can stab you!" Yelled a deep voice from the inside of the cage.

Naruto just shrugged. "I don't think it's a good idea to listen to someone who wants to stab me… Jiji always said to never talk to strangers, you know. By the way, do you know where the hell am I?"

"We are in your minds cape, a physical representation of your mind. Your mind is so dark that it is a sewer." Came the deep voice in response.

"If we're in my mind, do I get total control over everything or something like that?" Naruto asked.

"Of course."

Naruto raised his arms, willing the rather dark sewer to turn into a bright meadow with some animals made from his memories scattered across the landscape. He also illuminated the inside of the cage, revealing a rather large fox with nine tails waving behind him. "Woah! It's a giant fox! Cool!" Yelled Naruto. Giant foxes were rather uncommon, and seeing one with Nine Tails either meant you had the best of luck or you have complete garbage luck, depending what the fox does; skewer you, torture you, you know, the works.

"So the Kyuubi isn't dead… yeah, that makes sense, giant chakra constructs don't die. You know, there's always a question I've wanted to ask you. Why did you attack Konoha? I really doubt a giant fox like you would attack Konoha for no reason," asked Naruto. "Were you controlled or something? I'm assuming that you've been sealed before and your previous holder was somehow killed or something."

The now revealed Kyuubi snorted. "Very perceptive ningen… I was forced to attack Konoha by that miserable Uchiha Madara…"

"Anyway, why did the Yondaime choose to seal you into me? I'm sure there were plenty other children." Asked Naruto. "I'm assuming you know because you were there that night."

The Kyuubi's smile turned slightly malicious. "The Yondaime chose the seal the Kyuubi in his own son…" Naruto's jaw dropped and drilled straight into the ground. That was rather unexpected, even if Naruto had noticed the resemblance between him and the Yondaime Hokage. But it did make sense, how many blonds with blue eyes were in Konoha? "That's right, you're the son of the Yondaime and he sentenced you to your suffering. You live in poverty even though your name is rich and has miles of estate and millions of ryō to it. I wonder what the Sandaime did with all that money while you lived off of ramen cups and lived in an apartment without insulation or hot water…" Naruto was now deep in thought. If he was indeed the Yondaime's son, where did all that money go?

"The Sandaime's own grandson lives in his mansion and is treated like a prince… Too bad he wouldn't do the same for you, even with your own money that you don't even know that you have…" Now Naruto was really confused; the kind old man had kept his money and didn't use it to help him at all. All his visits… could it be that he just wanted to check on the Jinchuuriki of the Nine Tails?

"So now you know the corruption of all humans," the Kyuubi sneered. "You have absolutely no one. All of the Hokage's visits were just to check on the Jinchuuriki of me. He pretends to be your friend while the rest of the village hates you just to gain your loyalty. Nothing he does is out of kindness."

"Okay! Since you're not a human and therefore uncorrupted, we are now friends! Ha! I have a friend!" Naruto started dancing in place. "I have a friend… I have a friend… I have a friend…"

"Stop burning my ears and get the hell out!" Yelled the Kyuubi, literally chucking Naruto out of his mindscape.

Naruto woke up in the familiar white insides of a hospital, connected to several beeping machines. He sat up straight and looked under his shirt. He found a new scar across his stomach, this time one that would stay instead of just leaving like so many others. He was covered in bruises all over his chest, making his chest area look like an overripe fruit. He sighed; the boredom of being in a hospital was truly torture and could definitely be implemented in the T&I apartment of Konoha. They would get answers from all the prisoners in no time. That was until he noticed that he couldn't see to his left side very far, causing him to reach over to his left eye in panic, now feeling just a sunken eyelid and no eyeball underneath. So his enhanced regeneration wouldn't be able to heal that normally… he could probably ask the Kyuubi to regenerate it for him, but this would serve as an eternal reminder to him of the sins of the Leaf. If he ever did regenerate it, he would ask the Kyuubi to make it different.

—He was lied to

Soon enough, a nurse came in and checked on him, being extra rough and with the normal hate-filled glare, then walking out and the Sandaime walking in soon after. The old man, Naruto wasn't sure if he was nice anymore, sat down next to his bedside and gave a sad smile.

"Old Man, do you know why all of Konoha hates me so much?" Asked Naruto, wanting to see if the Sandaime would ever tell the entire truth to him.

"Sorry, but I can't tell you… I don't know either."

"Why not?" Naruto whined. "I thought you knew everything." Inside, Naruto sighed. So the Sandaime would still play his game after all he had went through; he was to suffer but never know the reason why.

"Nobody knows everything," chuckled the Old Man. Naruto was now fuming on the inside. He was just going to keep on this game, not tell Naruto why he had to suffer so much while all the other kids played their games. They played tag, ate their home cooked food, talked about whatever was going on, and soaked up the friendship and love of everybody around him. Naruto sat alone on a swing nobody wanting to go near him, opened a couple of packages of ramen is he was lucky, more likely something from a self-serve machine considering he couldn't even buy groceries and had only a couple small gardens, each one nothing more than a small square so that nobody would come across it and decide to ruin it, thought about why he was so hated and what the best thing to eat was going to be, and soaked up the hate and abuse of everybody around him. Some of the children even threw rocks at him, blindly listening to their parents "go hate that Naruto kid for no reason." It hurt so much sometimes. Having hate aimed towards you could build up your emotional barriers high if given breaks for the barriers to adapt, but the constant lack of love and the content hate tore at Naruto.

And the Hokage just chuckled after Naruto asked him why he was hated, while one of Naruto's eyes was destroyed, while he had a cut across his stomach deep enough to leave a scar even with his enhanced near-godly regeneration that could probably survive a hand through the heart. He had no hate for his mother; she had no involvement in his sealing. Towards his father, he felt nothing; a man who sentenced him to a life of pain, but Naruto could respect that he gave his life for his people, even if they were the wrong people. The commanders worthy of respect were the ones that sentenced themselves to the same life as their soldiers, nothing more, nothing less.

"Old Man, just wondering, if my parents were ninja, shouldn't they have money to pass down to me?" Asked Naruto, interested to see what the Hokage's response to this question would be.

The Hokage just sighed. "I'm spending the money for you to make sure you don't waste any of it, just the neccesities." Now Naruto was furious. I have the money to give myself a decent life, at least as much as any other orphan would get in a god damn orphanage, and you say I'll just waste it? You say you spend it for me, my mattress has springs poking out of it, all sharp, I can't get a more than a single kunai or shuriken to practice with, I don't have hot water and would get hypothermia if I tried to clean myself, and you have the nerve to say that you're responsibly spending it for me? The young Hokage's grandson has everything he wants and more. Where's the money that I'm owed? Spent on your grandson? I'm done, done with this village, done with its people, done with you. You don't deserve a jinchuuriki. Hashirama, Tobirama, Minato, so many other great shinobi are wasted on this village. The other villages may be just as bad, but at least they're honest about it, don't cover all that they do up. I wonder what would happen the funding of this village if the Daimyo heard that the six year old son of one of his closer real friends and also the Yondaime Hokage, Namikaze Minato, was kicked and abused by just about everyone, everybody else just passing him by. The only ANBU who treated him fairly and rescued him from his attackers while on their shifts were Weasel and Dog.

—The village does not want him or deserve him

Naruto reclined on his back in his mindscape, the fox not being in a cage anymore and instead having a collar representing the gate and seal. The fox might be an egotistic bastard, but at least he was honest with Naruto. More honest than any of those two-faced bastards in the village, one second prostrating themselves in front of the Daimyo and offering free products, the next second kicking a six year old boy from their shop quite literally. They had no egos at all, beating up a six year old up after work so that they could feel better about themselves, that they had "put the Kyuubi in its place."

"So it's true, huh? The Sandaime doesn't actually care about me and nobody does in this god forsaken village… except for Iruka-sensei just slightly. Nobody is nice to me either except for Shikamaru, Choji, Hinata, and Kiba, who at least treats me like an equal and a friend at times. Everybody else just doesn't care, doesn't care, doesn't care. Why should anybody care about the demon child?" Asked Naruto. "I also find it rather funny that all of Konoha blames you, Kyuubi, for attacking them even thought it was them in the first place that crucified you to a boulder… hypocrites, the lot of them. So what do we do now?"

The giant fox tilted its head in thought for a second. "I would recommend leaving Konoha definitely, and if you wish for it, start over in a new village. If you truly wish to see Konoha burn, going to another village would be the best option. Even so, if you don't want to destroy Konoha, going to another village would offer protection. You could fake your death and go to another village where you could get actual training. Definitely not Iwagakure because of their hate of the Yondaime and everybody who looks like him, not Kirigakure because apparently there is a civil war there, not Kumogakure because you would become breeding stock for Uzumaki, so that leaves Sunagakure… They have Shukaku, I believe, the One-Tails. Irritating he might be, but better him than most humans."

Naruto nodded in response and looked up at the sky in his mindscape, just thinking about where he would go on from now. This would be the turning point in his life, after all, this is where he would choose to go.

—So he leaves with the guidance of the one person who has at least been honest to him at all

Naruto looked around his apartment, which had been his home for a year. There was the bed with the broken springs, which Naruto put in a storage seal that he bought from a weapons store that didn't abuse him. That was because of the memories, and quite frankly, Naruto was a hoarder. He took all of his clothes, which was some underwear and socks, a pair of pants, a pair of shorts, a shirt, and his jacket, which he brought along as well. He brought his collectors edition of ramen along, the ones he had saved in case of an emergency. He brought his pet plant that he named Hana, which he put in a stasis seal. He also brought some of the writing utensils and chopsticks he had, and pretty much everything else was anchored to the wall or floor or was just plain garbage.

"So it's time to go, I guess, huh, Kyuubi?" Naruto thought, broadcasting his thoughts to the fox. "It's a dump, but it wasn't that bad…"

"Sentimental hoarder ningen," the rather grumpy Kyuubi growled back, annoyed that Naruto had woken him up from his nap. Giant foxes required sleep to function.

"Don't be such a downer, ya stupid fox," Naruto grumbled in response. "No need to be so grouchy all the time, fuzzball." The Kyuubi just started fuming in response to the new nickname bestowed upon him by the great and almighty Naruto.

"You know fuzzball, there's no need to be mad," inserted Naruto among the Kyuubi's grumbling. "I only speak the truth, after all. And nicknames are supposed to reflect one or more qualities of a person or animal or byjuu or whatever. You are quite fuzzy and when you nap you roll into a ball. Therefore, you are a fuzzball."

"By that same logic," the Kyuubi said in return. "Your nickname would be idiot-fishcake." Naruto just pouted and started crying anime tears, causing the Kyuubi to smirk ever so slightly.

—

Meanwhile, deep inside ROOT headquarters a young pale shinobi trainee sneezed. He looked up. "That's strange. I read that people sneeze when people are talking about them or along similar lines to them. That means someone has either noticed me, meaning I may have a chance to gain a new friend, or someone has a similar mindset to me, meaning it is a chance to gain a friend."

—And he flees to where he is destined to be

Naruto had rigged up a couple explosive tags to one of the weaker and older portions of the Konoha wall; this one was covered in random plants and had cracks all over. Naruto inserted a small ball of explosive tags he had gotten from the Higurashi weapons shop(Tenten's shop) with the help of an older Henge into one of the many holes in the wall and then primed and set off the small explosive tags, blowing a small hole in the wall, unfortunately rather loudly. Naruto squished himself through the gap before any guards could come inspect what caused the noise, running into the woods, away from Konoha and hopefully to a place where he could have people care for him. Having one eye was annoying because of the rather large blindspot, but Naruto could manage; moving through the forest would only need a straight line of sight and his ears could take care of anything else.

—

Kotetsu and Izumo always said that gate duty was boring; it was after all, just greeting the occasional ninja who came back among all the boring civilians; there were merchants, nobles, farmers, or sorts of people who came in but they were still all so boring. Sometimes they could see characters like Hatake Kakashi, but those were rare times. When a small boom sound made its way to their ears, they quickly went to investigate, quickly running over to the general area where they had heard the sound. If the village was breached, that would mean many very bad things.

—

For once in his lifetime, Naruto blessed his inactive ANBU guards who didn't want to guard the demon brat. He had studied the rotations of his ANBU guard, and Weasel and Dog came on the first and last weeks of each month; it was currently the second month of May, a time when it was warm and rained but didn't become too hot to travel through a large desert to get to his location. Naruto supposed he might be able to hunt some of the few animals in the desert or ask Kyuubi for help on deciding what kinds of brush were edible and the best ways to cook and eat them. He had saved up his allowance over time, enough to buy enough explosive tags to make a small ball and a couple of storage scrolls because carrying things with a backpack was a rather limited way of transporting items. He had enough to buy food on the way to Suna, in the couple of oasis towns that were located in the desert of Suna.

As he quickly ran between the trees, he kept himself running even after he felt like he was going to drop; he needed to get out of Fire Country as soon as possible, as hunter ninja weren't supposed to go outside of their borders and having hunter ninja to go into another county would take time and paperwork to arrange, time that Naruto could use to traverse the desert at a slower pace where the sandstorms and desert winds would hide his footsteps and the shifting sands would cover his scent. He moved around a thorny berry bush, ducked under an overhanging branch, and hopped over a rather large log. He had to lose his pursuers if they had even been sent out… it was rather unlikely that anybody would report him leaving, considering that everybody would be glad to see him gone and his ANBU guards didn't even watch him. When Naruto was reported missing, Naruto had no doubts that both Dog and Weasel would be sent after him, considering that those were the two ANBU that he was the most comfortable with.

He wouldn't let them catch him though; he wouldn't let anyone catch him, even if it was the First Hokage or Sage of Six Paths. He was free, and he would never want to be chained down again. True cruelty is when one is given a taste of something and then has the same things ripped away from them.

—People try to stop him from achieving what he really wants

"They will send people after you, kit," the Kyuubi warned. "There is also the chance of… other people… preying upon you."

—Whether they be a couple bandits

Naruto was quickly running through the woods away from Konoha to the borders of Fire Country and then hopefully Wind Country. The current terrain was kind, but the Kyuubi had warned him that the desert was much worse and completely barren except for sand, sand, sand, the occasional bush or cactus or small animal, sand, and even more sand. Better sand though than a civil war, a kill on sight order, or going into some sort of Uzumaki breeding program. Naruto had no doubt that he would eventually turn in a breeding machine slowly but surely if he had decided to stay in Konoha, not knowing if he hadn't met the Kyuubi or forced into it if he had met the Kyuubi. Konoha had their sealmaster Jiraiya of the Sannin after all. Naruto then chanced upon a clearing with three tents surrounding a no longer lit fire, with three people sitting around the fire and talking and laughing to each other. One of them glanced in his direction with a surprised look.

"Oh, lookie here, what's this?" One bandit asked no one in particular. "It's a little kid… I bet the slavers will want you."

Naruto blinked before he fired out his response. "In response to your first question, I am a six year old boy from Konohagakure, and as for the second part, how much do you want to bet?"

The bandit who had started talking sighed. "Come on kid, it was a rhetorical question! Why can't anybody understand that?"

The Kyuubi snickered from inside Naruto. "Hah, yet another idiot monkey. Why am I not surprised? From what I've seen so far, I worry for the mental capacity of all of you monkeys…"

Naruto just grumbled. "You shouldn't stereotype humans you know…" He started crying anime tears. ""You're making me feel bad!" Naruto grinned when he heard the Kyuubi mutter, "Troublesome ningen."

One bandit lifted up his club. "What was that kid? You talking to someone? Anyway, he was right; you'll have a fine price on your head, a pretty boy like you. I'm sure there's somebody who'll like you in more ways than one." Naruto literally choked while the Kyuubi burst out laughing inside him.

"Haha, kit! He got you there! Hah, I love this human! HAHAH!" The Kyuubi started bawling and rolling over and over inside Naruto's head, which indeed was a quite strange sensation, having a giant fox rolling in your head while laughing his ass off.

Naruto fumed. "You're all DEAD!" He channeled some demonic chakra to his throat to make it sound deep and guttural. He leaped towards the bandit who said that, punching the bandit in the middle of his face, causing him to literally rocket backwards, back hitting a tree and head snapping back to slide down to the bottom of the tree, feet straight in front of him and head bowed. Naruto then proceeded to make quick work of the other two bandits before brushing his hands off.

"Serves him right," Naruto grumbled.

"HAHAH! This is just too good! AHAHAHHAH!"

"You're never going to let me live this down, eh, Kyuubi?" Naruto asked, attempting to block out the sounds of a howling fox in his head.

—Or some Konoha ANBU squads piloted by the two he truly liked or maybe even loved for showing him friendship

Naruto was jumping through the trees like how Kurama told him; it was good exercise, and he wasn't even that tired because of the Uzumaki stamina and also being the jinchuuriki of the Byjuu that granted rather insane regeneration capabilities. The Kyuubi said he could survive a hand through his chest without too much difficulty. Whenever Naruto brought up the Uzumaki stamina, the Kyuubi just kept on snickering for some random reason and talking about beds and things like that, again, for no random reason. Naruto wondered if it was some secret joke among people who had lived at least 20 years in their lives, considering he had seen some civilians and ninja back in Konoha talking about beds in extreme detail. Quite strange.

Naruto heard some rustling behind him, just barely with his slightly enhanced fox senses granted by the Kyuubi and turned around quickly to see a small flash of black; ANBU cloaks. He quickly hopped down onto the ground and into a nearby clearing and just stood there, waiting for the ANBU to catch up. Better to wait somewhere he could see the ANBU instead of in the forest where they could easily hunt him and hide behind whatever they could hide behind; they had much more experience with those kind of environments because of their regular forays outside of Konoha and into the forests that gave Konoha its name; the Village Hidden Among The Leaves. Naruto supposed it wasn't exactly the best name; the Village Hidden Among The Trees made more sense, but it didn't have the same ring to it. It would have been cool though if Konoha had been a giant tree or something with the actual village hidden among the leaves and the shinobi were positioned at the roots of the trees; maybe underground, that would be really cool.

—

Danzo pumped his fist for no apparent reason, startling his two ROOT guards. After all, Danzo didn't normally show any emotion at all. They both looked at him questioningly. Danzo looked at them, assessed their looks at him, and replied, "Someone has finally embraced the ideology of the great tree and that we are the roots!" The two guards looked at each other, made a promise to each other to forget about this the next day and never talk about this moment again.

—

He really needed to get to a river where he could just float down and not leave a scent. Then the trackers would have a much harder time using their ninken, and Naruto was pretty sure that Dog had dogs. If Dog had dogs, did Weasel have weasels? That would be cool. He quickly sat down in a meditative position, allowing the ANBU to slowly surround the clearing around him before a pair of ANBU walked out; of course they were Dog and Weasel. The Sandaime knew that they were the only ANBU with any chance of bringing Naruto back to Konoha at all.

"Naruto-kun, we have been assigned to bring you back to Konoha under the Sandaime's orders," said Weasel rather monotonically. Typical Weasel.

Naruto pretended not to know anything about what he was talking about. "Well, the villagers don't like me, so I thought it would be better for the village if I left!" He said beamingly. His voice then dropped into a whisper. "Hey, do you know why the Hokage wants to bring me back in particular and not other people? I'm pretty sure that he doesn't send ANBU to retrieve kids, especially a no-name orphan that everybody hates and lives in a rundown apartment with hot water." He could literally feel Dog wince under his mask at that last part.

"Sorry, Naruto-kun, but that is a secret," said Weasel. "Will you come back to Konoha willingly?" There was the unspoken threat at the end.

Naruto tilted his head as though he was in thought. "Hmm… I don't think so." Naruto could feel an object deep beneath the ground, very very deep hopefully out of sensor range, surrounded by a pocket of air. Naruto wasn't sure about how big that pocket was, but… "Substitution Jutsu!" He yelled, substituting himself with a small rock in a large cave. That took a lot of chakra; the farther your use the Substitution Jutsu, the more chakra it took, and it grew exponentially. Naruto sighed; he would have to wait here for a while. God bless the fact he had brought some matches with him…

—And he is nearly there

Naruto trudged through the desert, wearing a t-shirt and shorts underneath a large white cloak that just barely dragged on the sand. The desert was hot; when he had decided to come to Suna, he knew that it would be hot but no this hot. Naruto truly felt sympathy for anyone who was sentenced to walk through the desert in the heat. He had stored some water bottles in his storage scrolls, enough to hopefully get through all the way to Suna from the small oasis town he had just came from. Sunagakure's location buried in a desert made sure it was defensible, but it also meant that they could get cut off easily. He took a small swig from a small bottle he carried, continuing his journey through the shifting sands. He had almost stepped on a scorpion at one point and was now much more careful about watching where he happened to step.

The sands scratched his face occasionally, but he just continued on into the wind and the sand to reach a new home.

"The desert is so hot and annoying, Kyuubi…" complained Naruto. "You could have told me it was this bad."

"And decline to watch you suffer?" Asked the Kyuubi in response. "I think not. This is literally free entertainment…"

—And then is finally all the way there to start a new and better life

Naruto finally saw the sand-obscured walls surrounding the village of Sunagakure. He sighed in happiness, finally having got through the vast and unforgiving desert.

"Looks like we're here, kit," said the Kyuubi. "We're at Sunagakure. When you talk to the guards, just say that you want to talk to the Kazekage."

"Isn't that kind of weird, Kurama?" Naruto asked in response. "Most kids don't walk up to a pair of shinobi and then ask for an audience with the Kazekage."

"They'll think you're interesting because you are a child who crossed the desert; crossing the desert is no easy matter, especially for children and most children don't have the motivation or a good enough reason to cross the desert. Even if they didn't like their home village or wanted ninja training, plenty of other places are available to young children to go to and Sunagakure is one of the harder ones to reach."

Naruto continued trudging through the sands to the indistinct walls, walking up to a pair of guards who looked at him weirdly, taking in his appearance, that of a child with a single older eye and another mangled beyond repair; it wasn't every day that you saw a small child make his way from the desert thought to be difficult to pass even for the most experienced of travelers.

"Can I see the Kazekage?" Naruto asked the two guards. "I have something he'll want to see. I don't have a passport though…" The two guards looked at each other and nodded; they would have to escort the child to make sure he wouldn't cause any trouble.

—

Naruto stood in front of the Kazekage, who just tilted his head with a scowl. "Well, boy, you said you had something to interest me. What is it?"

Naruto sighed. "I am the third jinchuuriki of the Kyuubi. I wish to join your village. And you can call me Uzumaki Menma." Whatever the people in the office were expecting, it was not that. Several ANBU fell from the shadows in the ceiling, in fact.

"Nice one," the Kyuubi snickered. "Real slick and subtle."

—

So this is going to be a Wind Master Naruto kind of story. In my opinion, wind is the most broken element of the five; fire can be defeated by forming a vacuum around it(fire can't burn without oxygen), water can be mimicked by water vapor in the air, earth can be mimicked by dust in the air or just pulling a Gaara, air is also a good insulator of electricity so lightning gets destroyed… I'm not sure if it would work, but wind style by physically rubbing two clouds together to generate lightning and then using air to shape around the lightning to give it form could potentially work as lightning style… fire style is basically lightning style onto fuel, and imagine using wind style to isolate oxygen as fuel… heheh…

Naruto's also going to have some level of sand manipulation, but no where as strong as Gaara, as he'll be focusing a lot on fighting with weapons… I'm thinking with small battle fans, think tessen. If you guys have suggestions, I'll gladly take them.

If you're wondering why Naruto brought all his shit along with him it's cause I'm a hoarder and I'm making Naruto one too… hehe. Don't kill me!

I'm probably going to write yaoi, but it's not going to be much; occasional kissing I guess. I don't write lemons and I really don't want to. I kinda want to make Naruto a trap for fun, but if you don't like that leave a review. I MUST TRICK YOU INTO LEAVING A REVIEW :P. So if enough reviewers don't like it compared to the ones that do, I'll change the story(Yeah I mean if everybody vetoes it)

If you're just going to leave flames, I'm willing to have a discussion on whatever you're unhappy about, but make it civilized please. I'll take "Well, it doesn't really make sense to…" among other things but I won't take "F*CK YOU YOU LITTLE SH*T! CHANGE THE STORY NOW!" If you want a story vastly different from mine and have me change my story to match yours, just write your own damn story.

Updates wise, I'll release 7kish work updates hopefully around 2 weeks between each upload… this upload came out really late because I had a huge test on Saturday… if you took it you know what it is. Fun fun 3 hour tests! The worst part is that it was scheduled at lunch time!(Cries anime tears) Yeah I failed it, made too many silly mistakes… I'm really worried about what's going to happen after… It's not bad relatively, but to what I wanted… yikes. I should be able to upload more often because now I can't have online classes for school anymore… (flips the bird at all my teachers). Why couldn't I have irresponsible teachers?

Really wishing I had one of those Ninja Storm games at the moment… eh, I'll do what I do best; make do with mobile semi-shitty version games!

Anyways, all the random stuff aside, hope you enjoyed, bye!