AN: I had this story in my head for a very long...long...long time, and I finally had the energy to write it out. So please have a read and tell me what you think :)

Italics are flashbacks.

Wandering Fox

Prologue: This one...

His life as a ninja was over.

Naruto walked on the empty road, alone and...Depressed, if anyone were to walk the same road could tell that the blond was in an emotional breakdown. Just one look could tell that, from the way he walks, with how his hair was covering his eyes, and the expression of his face. The past few weeks were the hardest for him, he had just lost the most dearest thing to him. She was gone... and he survived. Why didn't she just let him die? It would've been better.

Naruto then suddenly fell down. Now, he let tears sliding down his face, landing on the dirt ground with a 'plop'. The memories of her flooded his head, if would just let him die – everything would've been better. Now, his tears weren't the only liquid dripping, it seemed like the sky was crying with him. The rain poured down, from just little by little to a whole downpour.

His once glowing spiky blond hair was now dull and soggy. His once bright blue eyes were now dark and empty like the black hole itself. Everything about him that used to be full of positive energy was now changed into negative energy. The tragedy that occurred in a mission a couple of weeks ago was the hardest thing he ever had to face in his entire life. It was because of him that she died... it was all because of him.

Naruto fisted both hands as the memory of it replaying in his mind.

Naruto collapsed onto the ground, his body covered in cuts, bruises and burns. He had just used the power of the nine-tails again, and because of that, his body was now weak, the weakest he ever felt in his life, even after he defeated pain, his body never felt this weak. He then suddenly coughed out blood, it never happened before, was there something wrong with his body?

At thundering roar was then heard from behind. Out of reaction, Naruto managed to jump out of the way of the charging beast. To be exact, it was the four-tailed beast. Naruto or anyone else on this mission hadn't expected the Akatsuki would use the tailed beast. And because of the beast, three quarters of the people who were part of the mission died. Now it was only him, Sakura, Kakashi, Yamato and Sai. Naruto suddenly felt a jolt of pain in his chest, the pain was so overwhelming that it made him collapsed on the ground, unable to move.

He tried to move his body, but it declined, it was as if, all the energy from his body was sucked out of him. Naruto laid there in pain, feeling weak and useless. How was he supposed to protect the others if he was like this? "I need to get up." Naruto groaned, he tried pushing his body up, but like before, his body wouldn't respond. "Damn it!" He muttered, the harder he forced his body to move, the more his body ached in pain.

The voice of Sakura made him jerked his head up, his eyes widened as he saw Sakura on the ground. His heart then felt relieved as he saw her stood up.

Naruto then sensed the beast charging towards them. But when he looked at the direction where the beast was coming from, Naruto could tell that it was going for Sakura. His eyes then travelled to Sakura, she was still trying to stand up. Naruto knew that in Sakura's current state, she wouldn't be able to dodge the charging 'red gorilla'.

With all his might, Naruto bounce straight up onto his feet and pushed Sakura out of the way, far enough so that she was out of the Yonbi's range, but, as a result of saving her, he was the one who got hit instead. It knocked him off his feet, throwing him back against the trees behind him. Naruto couldn't do anything at this point, he used his remaining energy to save Sakura, now, his body laid against a tree that he had hit from the impact. He was motionless as he couldn't feel his body. Naruto knew that he probably had a couple of broken bones or maybe damaged organs, but he didn't care, at least he saved the one he loved.

Naruto heard footsteps and someone calling his name, he recognised that voice, that beautiful angelic voice...it was Sakura's voice. She was calling his name; he loved the sound of her calling his name. He then felt her presence beside him, turned his head slightly to the side where Sakura was. She was currently kneeling beside him, trying with all her energy trying to heal him. Naruto could see that she was crying, her face was red, and her eyes were full of tears. Naruto raised his aching hand to her face and wiped a tear off, "Please don't cry Sakura-chan, it doesn't suit you." Said Naruto, gently caressing her cheek even though his arm was weak and was in pain, but he just had to feel her skin against his.

"Naruto, don't talk, please, just hang on..." she begged.

Naruto smiled weakly, his eyes suddenly felt heavy, and he felt the urge to close them. His body was becoming weaker by the second, slowly, Naruto let his eyelids close, the image of Sakura crying and begging him to stay with her, he wished he could, but it seemed like this was his time. He then said the very thing that he was trying to tell her from the first time he saw her, "I love you Sakura-chan" he managed to say, it was barely a whisper, but he knew Sakura would hear it, and that was when he let himself go.

Everything just went blank.

That was all Naruto could remember from the battle where he 'should've' died. But after that, everything started getting worst.

Naruto slightly opened his eyes. The first thing he saw was the colour white, he could've thought that it was heaven, but his nose picked up the unforgettable smell of the hospital. So he was alive, and since he was in the hospital, was the mission a success? Were the remaining members of the mission okay... was Sakura okay?

Naruto slowly pushed his body upwards using his forearms. His body was in a lot of pain, so it was hard for him to move, since every movement he makes with his body, a jolt of pain attacks him. He stayed in the upright sitting position for a while before dropping back down onto the pillow gently. Naruto just watched the ceiling for a few minutes with thoughts about how the mission went.

The door then suddenly opened, revealing the Godaime Hokage. Naruto saw that Tsunade was surprised to see him awake. "Hi baa-chan," Naruto greeted, "Is everyone else okay?" Tsunade looked away.

Naruto knew now that there was something wrong. It worried him to death, if anything happened to the others while, "Tsunade baa-chan, what happen to the rest?" Naruto asked, using a more serious tone.

She didn't answer.

"Tsunade, what happened?" Naruto asked again.

"Don't worry Naruto, get some rest for now. We'll talk about the mission later, ok." Tsunade said calmly. Naruto knew that she was hiding something from him but even if he wanted to push the answer right out of her right now, in his current condition would be useless. He should just wait till when they will have their 'talk'.

She then left, leaving Naruto alone in his room. Naruto stared out the window, he could tell that today was very lively outside, maybe, if everything for the next for days are quiet, he could ask Sakura for a date. Naruto smiled at the thought; hopefully Sakura would accept his offer. Naruto's brain suddenly remembered the words he said to Sakura. He blushed. What did Sakura think of him when he said it? Does she love him back or she didn't take those words seriously?

After a week of being in the hospital, Naruto walked through the corridor to the Hokage's office. He didn't look to happy, especially that Sakura hadn't visited him when he was in the hospital, though he always thought that she was on another mission. Also, on his way here, he didn't see her anywhere, he had been to her apartment this morning but found that it was empty. From then on, he was pissed and worried at the same time.

He knocked on the big two doors that leads into the Hokage's office, after hearing the Hokage's confirmation, slowly, he pushed on the door while twisting the door knob. He went inside slowly, and walked to the front of Tsunade's desk. Naruto could tell that she was stressed and that she was... crying, and a lot too. This worried him, why was she crying? "Baa-chan, are you alright?" Naruto gently asked.

She looked up, "Yeah, I'm alright Naruto" she answered, "And about the mission..." she paused for a second and took a deep-breath.

Naruto stood in front of her desk waiting for her to continue. On the inside, Naruto's heart was aching for the answer, he really wanted to know, and the way that everybody was keeping it as a secret, it made him desperate to know.

Tsunade sighed, "The mission was a failure, after you got badly injured, well, when you were dead, Kakashi decided to pull back, since there was really no chance to win against the tailed beast or Akatsuki with the current ninjas left." Tsunade explained.

"So the rest are okay?" Naruto asked his voice full of hope.

"Not everyone." Tsunade said and closed her eyes.

"What do you mean 'not everyone'?" Naruto's heart was beating faster by the second.

Tsunade looked away as she said this, "Naruto, Sakura didn't make it back."

Naruto heart stopped, causing him to stumble backwards, "That can't be true, I saved her before she got hit. That was why I passed out." Naruto protested.

"Really, cos' you wouldn't be here right now if it wasn't for her. You were dead and she saved you. Didn't you know that?"

Naruto suddenly felt harder to breath, it now took more effort to breath properly. Naruto clutched his chest. He stumble backwards, it was as if that his lungs weren't working properly. He started to hyperventilate, "This can't be happening, she can't be DEAD!" Naruto yelled breathlessly, "She can't be." Naruto was know on his knees, still clutching his chest.

"Calm down Naruto!"

He was gasping for air, his chest ached in pain. His heart was beating too fast that he felt that it was going to explode. Sakura, how could she die? The pain in his chest suddenly stooped and his eyelids were becoming heavy, then, everything went blank.

...

"Naruto, wake up." Naruto heard the voice, it was faint but it was enough to be heard. It was Tsunade's voice.

Slowly, Naruto opened his eyes slightly, only letting a bit of light in. He saw a faint but enough to see image of Tsunade. He groaned as he opened his eyes completely, the light was overwhelming his eyes, "Baa-chan, pull the curtain. There's too much light!" Naruto complained.

"Oh stop whining, just get use to it!" Tsunade replied.

Again, Naruto slowly opened his eyes slightly, letting the light in bit by bit. When his vision was back to normal, he found out that he was in the hospital again. "Why am I here?" Naruto asked, looking around the room while scratching his head as if he was lost.

"You fainted in my office, from hyperventilating too much" Naruto had a clueless expression on his face, "Don't you remember, about Sakura."

Sakura

His memory flashed back to the talk he had with Tsunade, about the mission, about how he died... and about Sakura saving him. How could he not remember? "I don't get it, why did she do it? Why did she exchange her life for mine?" Naruto looked down.

Tsunade put a hand on his shoulder, "Because she cares about you, Naruto."

Naruto then started to cry, tears were dripping down his face. "Still, my life is life was not worth it. She could've had a family!" Naruto covered his face with both of his hands as he cried harder. It was his fault that she was gone.

"Snap out of it Naruto!" yelled Tsunade, "It was her decision to save your life and you should be grateful for what she did. And wasn't it your decision to push her out of the way so you get hit instead? Wasn't what she was doing the same thing that you did, huh?"

"BUT SHE WASN'T SUPPOSED TO DIE!" Naruto shouted back.

"BUT SHE CHOSE TO!" Tsunade shouted.

Naruto was silent. He had nothing else to say. All the things that Tsunade had said was true, it was Sakura's decision. A question popped up in his head. Slowly, Naruto looked up to Tsunade, "Tsunade how did she save me if I was already dead?"

"You probably haven't seen it yet, but there is a seal on your stomach, above your other seal" Tsunade answered, pointing at his bandage covered stomach.

Naruto, now sitting under a tree on the side of the road, watched the rain continued to pour down. He was completely soaked, from his orange and black jacket, to his orange pants. All those memories were still replaying through his mind. He hated it and wanted it all to just vanish. Because of her death, he had been in a depression for weeks. He would always lock himself in his apartment, sitting in a corner and looking at the picture of him and Sakura standing together at a festival. He didn't go on any missions or at least go out for training, he didn't even went out for Ramen for those few weeks.

He pulled his orange and black jacket over his head and threw it beside him. It seemed like his black shirt was soaked as well, so he decided to take it off too. He put the soaked shirt to where he threw his jacket. There were still some bandages covering part of his body – like his shoulder and chest. His fingers lightly trace the diamond shaped seal on his stomach. The seal was a special jutsu that Sakura created. It was declared as an S-rank forbidden technique, since the user dies from using it.

Naruto then remembered the conversation he had with Kakashi about how Sakura saved him, it seemed that the user of the jutsu does not only die, but their body also vanished. So it explains why Sakura's body wasn't found. Before he knew that information, he always thought that Sakura was kidnapped by the enemy. Naruto shook his head and huffed, the memory was somehow funny because he was full on panicking about where Sakura was.

He smiled to himself, but the smile faded quickly and turned into a frown as Naruto saw his Leaf forehead protector in the pocket of his jacket, it brought back bad memories. It was the memory of when he asked Tsunade about quitting his ninja career. Naruto looked up at the sky while in his head, the memory was being replayed.

"You can't be serious Naruto. Quitting being a ninja? That's totally not you!"

"Baa-chan, you have to understand, I just don't have the motivation to continue being a ninja."

Tsunade sighed, "But Naruto, you have to think this through properly. You will regret this one day, and don't forget your dream of being Hokage one day." said Tsunade.

"How can I be Hokage if I can't lead a mission properly? The last mission was a total failure! Barely anyone made it out alive and the same for me too. I was supposed to die in that mission too! Remember?" Naruto untied his forehead protector and threw it into Tsunade's hand, "There's the headband, now I'm not a Konoha ninja anymore."

Naruto watched as Tsunade gripped his headband tighter, she closed her eyes for a second. When she opened her eyes, she threw back the headband to Naruto. Naruto looked confused and was about to say something but Tsunade beat him to it, "Keep it. it will be a reminder of you once serving Konoha as a shinobi. I know that thing has a lot of memory in it, so you keep it." Tsunade said and smiled weakly. Naruto saw that the smile was a sad one, it pained him to see it, but quitting being a ninja was the only think for him to do, so he can get away and think about everything that has happened in the past for a while.

The rain finally stopped, the sun was coming out, and everything was damp and muddy, so Naruto decided to just stay under the tree for a while to wait for everything to dry up; including his clothes, and himself. Naruto sighed, he was almost out of the border of the Fire country, but where would he go next? That question was running through his head since he left the village. How could he not think about it before he left the village? He really was stupid sometimes.

Naruto rested his head against the tree, feeling the roughness of the bark against the back of his head. He felt really tired, more tired than he should be feeling – maybe it was because of him not doing anything for weeks. He must be really out of shape.

His ninja senses started tingling, someone was approaching from the other end of the road. Naruto didn't move, just looked at who it was. The unknown person finally came into view; he looked like a swordsman, a samurai to be exact. He was wearing a hakamashita, the top part red and the hakama white.

The person was currently walking with his eyes closed, like he was in deep thought. His left hand was gripping the sheath of his katana that was tied to his belt. The person was close enough to see the face. Naruto saw that the person has light orange hair, tied into a ponytail. The person's face has an x-shaped scar on the left cheek. Overall, the person's face looked almost feminine, but still somehow it has a masculine side to it; the person was also not that tall.

Naruto watched the person walked, from when he first was in sight, to when he was in front of Naruto. The person suddenly stopped, he was just in front of Naruto. He slightly opened his eyes and stared down at Naruto, "You alright, young one?" the person asked.

Naruto raised an eyebrow, young one? No one calls him young one, even his enemies never call him that, "Who you calling young one! I'm seventeen, so that means I'm pretty old." Naruto replied.

The person chuckled. He turned his body around so he was facing Naruto, "Seventeen ay, that's still pretty young from where I came from." He person gave a light smile.

The way the person smiled was sweet; His face expression was soft, almost like a girl's. Naruto found it weird – all the males he saw never had soft face like this person in front of him... how weird. "Yeah, that's from where you came from, but here – if you become a shinobi, you're considered as an adult."

"Oh, so you are a ninja, young one?" he asked, his face looked very curious, like a child's face.

"Well I was, but I quit." Naruto answered, looking down at his feet.

"You quit? Why?"

"Don't worry, it's a very long story." Naruto replied.

Suddenly, the person sat down cross legged in front of him. Naruto looked at him with curiosity, what was this person doing? "Uh, what are you doing?"

"I'm sitting down. You said that it was a long story, that's why I'm sitting down. You don't expect me to stand up through your whole story, do you?" He said.

Naruto sweat-dropped, this guy was weird. "Fine, if want to know. It started about five weeks ago. I was chosen as the leader for a very important mission. The mission was an S-Rank, so it was pretty important for my ninja career. I made the mission as a test, so I can test myself, if I can lead the mission without any flaws, it would mean that I'm one step closer to achieving my lifelong dream."

"So what is this dream of yours?" the person asked.

Naruto grinned, "To be Hokage, greater than the ones before!"

"Hokage huh, so you are from Konoha, are you not?"

"Yeah I was, but I don't know when I would be returning back." The grin on Naruto's face disappeared.

"Oh. So you quit being a ninja and left the village?"

"Yeah, pretty much."

"Why?" The person simply asked.

"Because, on that special mission, so many lives were lost and the one life that I have sworn to protect, died. It was because I'm weak! I wasn't strong enough to protect all of them." Tears were now forming in Naruto's eyes. They almost dropped until a hand was put on his shoulder. Naruto looked up at the person, he was smiling at him. The smile somehow cheered Naruto up a bit, it made him feel better.

"So, is that why you're depressed. Young one, no one is strong enough to protect everyone, you know that you're just human, you are not god."

"NO! I may be human, but it was my responsibility to protect them, to protect her!"

The person sighed but the smile still stayed on, "Look. You may not have succeeded in protecting them all, but at least you tried. At least they know that you tried, and that was enough."

What the person said was true. He did try to protect them all. Finally, a smile appeared on Naruto's face, "Thank you, sword guy!" The smile on Naruto's face turned into a grin.

"No problem, but this one's name is Kenshin... Kenshin Himura."

"And My name is Naruto... Naruto Uzumaki!"

Kenshin then stood up, "Well this one has to go now, so I hope we cross road again one day." Kenshin said, smiling. He then turned around and started walking in the direction where he was walking before.

Naruto also stood up, "Wait, Kenshin-san!"

Kenshin stopped in his tracks and turned around to face Naruto, "Oro?"

"Can I come with you? I have nowhere else to go anyway." Naruto asked.

Kenshin smiled, "So, the young one wants to become a rurouni like this one?"

Naruto looked confuse, what the heck was a rurouni? Wait. His mind then started searching for a match for the word. Flash! He found it. A rurouni is someone who wanders around. so this person with the x-shaped scar is a Wandering Samurai. So if he goes with this guy, he would become a Wandering Shinobi! No, wait. Wandering Fox! That sounded much better.

Naruto smiled back, "A rurouni this one is!" Naruto exclaimed. He never knew why Kenshin said 'this one' but it sounds cool! To Naruto anyway.

End Prologue

AN: Okay, this is the first chapter. I have a feeling this story is going to be great. So for you readers that do not have a clue what the plot for this story is, you just have to wait for the next chapter. Remember, this is just the prologue, it does not tell what the plot of this story will be. So if you want to find out – wait for the next chapter.

Please review this story, it would help a bunch. I'm expecting this story to have more than 10 reviews, so for all you readers, please make that dream come true and i promise you won't regret it :)

Until next time!

PEACE!