Hey guys! I'm baaaaack in this story! I'm awfully sorry that it took so long to update, I was too focused on the Namikaze Uzumaki's Legacy. But anyway here it is. Enjoy, and please review!

Disclaimer: We have to do this every time, right? (sighs) Yes, I don't own Naruto!

Enter, Mei Terumi!

(Just a few miles away from Konoha walls)

"Ao! Hurry up! We're leaving!"

Mei Terumi called out to her right-handed man, clearly impatient by the fact that she was tapping her foot.

The others, her two body guards looked quite uncomfortable, wishing that Ao-san would just hurry up so that they could go back to Kiri as soon as possible. Of course, they were not overlooking the fact that when Mei-sama was getting really irritated, it meant nothing good.

Just when Mei was starting to shout out Ao's name for what it seemed to be like the hundredth time, a response was heard, "Just a second, Ma'am! I will be there in a moment!"

Mei heard this and grumbled, but none less waited for the blue haired man to come back.

A few minutes later, Ao came back, stumbling through the weeds, carrying a little bundle in his arms.

The three glared at Ao before their eyes locked upon the bundle, and they stared at it in confusion and surprise.

"What's in the bundle?"

Mei finally asked, her emerald eyes narrowed, but at the same time sounding curious.

Ao looked at his superior and averted his gaze, looking uncomfortable before answering uncertainly, "Um, well..." he trailed off, before summoning up his courage and muttered, "It's a baby. I found this little kiddo when I was looking around there, and I couldn't leave him alone!" Ao pulled the sheets a bit back to reveal the infant's bright blond curls.

Mei's eyes bugged out and her mouth fell agape, along with the others as they voiced their opinions in a frantic unison, "What?"

After a few moments of uncomfortable silence that followed, Mei finally choked out. "Care to repeat that?"

Ao's tightened face said it all. Ao walked over to Mei and showed her the baby in his outstretched hands.

Mei looked down at the boy, and the other two craned their necks to see.

What they saw was indeed an infant, probably barely 1 year old by the looks of it.

The baby was a boy, with golden sunshine blond hair, fair skin, and exotic whisker marks sweeping across his cheeks. His eyes were of a bight blue that put the sky to shame.

"Cute…" That was the word that escaped the trio's lips.

Ao's stiff face relaxed a bit at that comment.

Mei then started to smile softly as she caressed the boy's chubby cheeks.

"Where did you find him?"

"He was abandoned in the clearing," He cocked his head in the way he had come from, "out there."

The two bodyguard's eyes widened, while Mei's showed sudden uncontrollable fury.

"He was abandoned, left to die out in the forest?" She almost yelled.

Now Ao started to look uncomfortable. "Uh, well…" He fumbled around in his pocket and pulled out a small indigo-colored scroll. "T-this was beside him. I haven't read it yet."

Mei's anger lessened somewhat, as she reached for the scroll with her open hand, the other still holding the boy to her chest.

She opened it with some difficulty -it was really hard to do so with only one hand- , then started reading the contents out loud.

"Name: Naruto Uzumaki. Orphaned since born; both parents dead in the Fox Attack, born in Konohagakure; The Leaf Village. Birthday: October 10th. Right now: 9 months old. Please take good care of him."

When she had finished, she was silent for a while before she opened her mouth once more, looking directly into the others' eyes. She whispered, "Uzumaki. The boy is an Uzumaki, his clan and mine were both distant relatives before the Uzumaki perished along with Uzushiogakure."

The others looked surprised, they hadn't known.

But what she said next surprised them even more.

"I will take full responsibility and raise him. I will become his mother, a family that the boy never had."

She stated firmly, her gaze locked firmly on the little blonde in her arms.

"But then, how will you be the leader..." Ao started with his voice wavering, but was cut off when Mei replied firmly, "I will raise him, and at the same time I will continue to fulfill my role as the leader."

The three looked at their leader with new found respect in their eyes, and then they swooned over the little infant cradled in Mei's arms.

"Aww...He's so cute!"

Mei smiled at their reaction, and silently agreed. And of course, when the others wanted to hold him, Mei would just not let go, stubbornly saying that it was a mother's job.

She stroked the three whisker marks on his rosy-colored chubby cheeks, and smiled warmly, "Welcome to the family, Naruto-kun! From now on, your name will be Naruto Terumi-Uzumaki!"

The others also grinned, and Mei spoke again cheerfully, addressing the blue-haired man who seemed to be dying to hold little Naruto again, "Ao, if you want, you could be Naruto's uncle! After all, it was you who found him in the first place..."

And then Mei added silently to herself, 'If he was left out there, he would have died…'

Then she shook her head mentally. No, no, that was in the past, now that Naruto was in her safe hands, she would protect him no matter what.

There were similar thoughts running through the others' minds.

After a few minutes of discussing some matters, Mei and her trio of guards along with Naruto who still hadn't woken up yet -lying contently on Ao's arms- , got ready to head back to Kiri (Mist).

While they walked at a steady pace (which meant pretty fast since they were shinobi), something clicked in Mei's mind.

'Wait...' She stopped abruptly and spun around to face the surprised Ao. "When was Naruto's birthday again?" She asked, looking at Ao straight in the eye.

This got Ao pretty scared, as he answered with a gulp, "It's October 10th, wh-"

He stopped short when he realized what Mei was saying, and the last words came out barely in a whisper, as he choked them out, face blanched.

"...Kyūbi..."

The other two shinobi realized it too, and soon they found their faces to be white as sheet. Mei bit her lip and grimaced, "Yes. The Nine-tailed Demon Fox attacked Konohagakure at the same very night, the day when Naruto was born..."

When no one said anything, Mei looked at her three bodyguards straight in the eye and summed up exactly what they were worried about.

"I think...," She said very slowly, testing out her words carefully in her mouth, "that there might be the possibility that Naruto might be the Jinchuriki (Power of Human Sacrifice) for the Nine-Tails."

Silence fell upon the group of shinobi. Ao finally spoke up, clarifying the information more into depth, "That explains it. Since Jinchurikis are hated among the general populace, it is not unlikely for a Jinchuriki to be killed. But in Naruto's case, a shinobi must have kidnapped him from the grasps of the Hokage and left him out of in the forest to die. Or maybe, he was wanting a good family to take care of him, since there was that note."

The others nodded at that.

"And the 3 whisker marks on his cheeks…they're not birthmarks, they're the signs of a being a

host for the Nine-tails." Natsu*, one of the bodyguards concluded.

They nodded once more, much more slowly than before. It was a lot of information to take in. While a having a Jinchuriki meant having a strong weapon, it also came with the dangers of the demon itself being released. And needless to say, if word got out of his status outside of Konoha (since Konoha probably already knew), many would want to seek him out in order to capture or kill him.

The more she thought about it, the more suspicious everything became. When she had visited Konoha the day before, asking for support in the rebellion against the Mist, had heard what had happened, directly from the Hokage-sama himself. She had heard the rumors flying around even long before she came to the Leaf of course, and when she had actually visited there, it was in shambles, just as expected, rows and rows of houses, utterly destroyed to a degree that it looked no different from a trash dump. Though 2/3 of the village was already being re-constructed, which was a pretty speedy recovery, there was an air of stiffness that lingered, and she even saw several villagers that had fear and fury etched clearly all over their faces. Since the Legendary Kiiroi Senkō had successfully defeated the all mighty biju; Kyūbi, shouldn't they be happy?

It really hadn't made sense before, but now she understood. What had made the villagers so tense was the fact that there was a Kyūbi Jinchuriki among them, and probably some, or most of them thought that Naruto was actually the Kyūbi incarnated.

And above all, she couldn't just believe the fact that she had actually believed that the 4th Hokage had actually defeated the beast. Wasn't it like days ago when she had researched crazily on everything about the tailed beasts and the hosts because of Yagura?

A sudden wail startled Mei and the others out of their own thoughts as they spun their heads at the crying blind baby, panic evident in their eyes.

Mei bit her lip as she quickly made her decision, and closed her eyes for a moment before opening them again at the next second. She adjusted her grip on the infant as she cuddled him, and rocked him, in hopes of wanting to calm down the baby. "Shh…shhh…" She whispered reassuringly, "It's all right…there, there. Go back to sleep…"

Several minutes later, Naruto was sleeping soundly, smiling as he felt the warmth of a mother.

The other trio of shinobi gaped at their leader in disbelief, after a long exhale of a breath that they hadn't realized they were holding.

"That- was…close." Aki* whispered lowly, not wanting to take chances of wakening the baby again.

The others nodded slowly in shared agreement, as Ao spoke up, "I didn't know that you were so good at handling children, Mei-sama."

A slight blush adorned the rebel leader's cheeks as she looked up from the baby. "Well, I guess it was something like a woman's instinct." She replied modestly.

The others smirked, now assured, knowing that Mei-sama would make a fine mother. Who knows, under Mei-sama's guide, the blond kid might become a great shinobi, capable of being the heir of Mei-sama and her clan! And needless to say, a Jinchuriki would also be a good asset for winning their war!

Natsu* then bowed his head slightly. "Shall we get going then, Mei-sama?"

Mei nodded, and the four disappeared into the shadows of the now darkening forest.

Destination: Kiri.

Hey guys! How was that? I know it wasn't action-filled, but you know, I had to make this… Anyway, I think that the next chapter's gonna be a time skip. And now, please don't forget to review!

*Dictionary*:

Natsu: It means 'summer' in Japanese. And…

Aki: And… this means 'fall(autumn) in Japanese.

I know. It's pretty lame, right? The names I gave to those two bodyguards. But I couldn't think of any other! Sorry^

Goodbye for now!