Prologue Opening

Night of the Kyuubi attack after the sealing

Hiryu Himura and Itachi Uchiha raced from the battlefield shortly after the fox had vanished; both had been one of the few to see the Chakra chains holding the huge Biju down preventing it from causing more damage. Both were also very fearful for their sensei, thankfully Itachi's Sharingan had traced the fox to its location as it began to spiral downward no doubt being resealed. What they came upon was a crying infant and two prone figures lying around the infant both with sad smiles on their faces. "Sensei?!" Itachi cried out running to the prone figures.

Hiryu stood calmly assessing the situation looking as distraught as his teammate, "They're gone Itachi," Hiryu was a rather plain looking person with short brown hair that parted from the mid left of his head to the right giving it kind of a smooth wave, he had bright blue eyes that seem to sparkle. His contributions to his team however made him slightly stronger than Itachi terms of ninjutsu; but it is his speed in both taijutsu and kenjutsu which made him almost god like so much so that even the Hiraishin could barely catch him, Kushina had been proud of him in this regard. The sword he carried strapped to his back was black with a metallic silver edge; the handle guard was in the shape of a swastika with an all-black hilt. Hiryu gently picked up the infant, tears lightly falling from his cheeks. "Itachi, we should seal them up. We can't have sensei and her husband just lying here on the ground." Neither moved to wrapped up in their grief to do anything at the moment.

The dark haired teen's feelings of intense sadness and regret cascaded over the young boy; he had been looking after his baby brother until he spotted the chakra chains. Leaving Sasuke in the care of an aunt he went out to search for his teammates finding them they split up to look for their sensei hoping against hope the Kyuubi was just some elaborate genjutsu, that was until the first strike from the fox's tail slammed into the ground and the huge earthquake afterward. He looked up at the infant that Hiryu held, "Is that Naruto?"

Hiryu nodded sadly, "Can't you tell the whisker marks must be the influence of the fox's chakra while Kushina-sensei was carrying him," the young man sat down holding the infant who was still crying, he couldn't really blame the infant at all. Looking at the seal on the child's stomach noting it was the death reaper seal. "Sensei and Lord Minato must have called the Shinigami to seal the fox inside Naruto."

"What do you think will happen to him?" Itachi asked.

"He has only one living relative that I know of but I doubt she's in any condition to look after a child," Hiryu stated gently rocking Naruto, eyes closed in thought, "Orphanage sounds like the most likely scenario."

"What about Jiraiya or my mother, they're his godparents," Itachi explained.

"Itachi, Lord Jiraiya's spy network will force him to stay away for long periods of time. As for your mom, do you really think after what happened tonight that the civilian council will let a clan of the only two known kekkei genkai that can control a biju in the world have twenty-four hour access to him?" Hiryu stated hearing in the distance people heading in their direction.

Itachi winced cradling his sensei's head in his lap gently trying to wipe the blood off her chin and mouth. Tears began to fall again looking down at the woman who basically became a second mother to him, "I will become an ANBU so I can look after my sensei's son."

"So you made up your mind about the promotion," Hiryu stated seeing a nod. "I'll put my mine off a few years, become Naruto's Jonin sensei."

"Didn't Kakashi ask for that privilege?" Itachi asked.

Hiryu scoffed, "Don't get me wrong Kakashi is a great shinobi and he deserves his accolades, but as a sensei to future shinobi he'll be terrible."

"How will Hana react to how sensei passed?" the Uchiha asked.

Hiryu sighed heavily, "I'll deal with it, if anything it'll give me a chance to hold her," he stated the last part with a sad smile.

XXX

Sarutobi sat behind a desk he thought he never would sit behind again getting the final reports from all those in involved. He looked at the picture of his wife, mourning her loss, it was determined quickly that her death wasn't caused by the Kyuubi. Someone had penetrated the protective wards and killed the ANBU assigned to protect Minato, Kushina, and his wife. But the speculation behind that had to wait as the two people who arrived on the seen first were standing across from him now.

"No trace was found of any suspect at where Lord Minato and Kushina-sensei were found at," Hiryu stated. "All Itachi and I saw was Naruto-kun and the two bodies," the browned haired young man stated sadly looking down. "How is he, by the way?"

"Resting though I suspect as any infant does that he knows he was orphaned tonight," Sarutobi explained with a heavy sigh.

"Who's going to take him in, Lord Jiraiya, my mother, or Lady Tsunade?" Itachi asked.

"Jiraiya has been informed sad to say it'll probably be weeks before I hear from him, the civilian council has already denied Mikoto's godparenting rights on the grounds that it was possibly an Uchiha that brought Kyuubi out of the seal, until the evidence can disclaim it I'm inclined to agree with their judgment on this matter. As for Tsunade I don't know how far their blood relation is to warrant bringing her back to raise a child."

"Orphanage?" Hiryu's one word question sounded almost like a statement.

Sarutobi nodded, "But it will be doubtful he'll ever be adopted though I've heard Mebuki Haruno and Minoru Higashi have asking about him."

"I don't remember who they were?" Hiryu asked.

"Mebuki is a member of the civilian council and runs the village library has a daughter a few months older than Naruto. Minoru is the weapon smith and has a daughter a year older than Naruto. Minoru was Kushina's former teammate and Mebuki was a family friend," Sarutobi stated placing his hands under his chin. "I doubt either will get him, even with her influence Mebuki and the village council will spend years fighting over him while the rest of the village will no doubt ignore or belittle him."

Itachi stepped forward, "I wish to enlist into the ANBU and be assigned to any detail that will guard Naruto from any assassination attempts."

"Are you sure Itachi, ANBU is a tough life and you will be assigned other missions on the side," Sarutobi asked.

"It is for sensei that I do this. I will watch out for her son," Itachi stated firmly watching the old man first sigh then nod.

"And you Hiryu?" Sarutobi glanced at the other boy.

"When Naruto graduates from the academy as I know he'll want to join at some point, I wish to be his Jonin-sensei," Hiryu stated.

"Kakashi has asked the same he feels obligated to do so for both Minato and Obito, what makes you a better candidate?" Sarutobi asked in earnest.

"Kakashi is a great shinobi I do not doubt that, however he is lazy, unmotivated, will play one student against another to create rivalry. While the last is a good idea but in some cases can bring resentment and sometimes," Hiryu looked pointedly at the third, "create an imbalance in one or both shinobi. Example would be Orochimaru and what caused him to do what he's done."

Sarutobi winced at this example, one of the many learning points he had in his life and one that had cause him the most pain. "I see your point, what would you do?"

"Teach them like Kushina-sensei taught me; she treated her team like an extension of her family. Be kind, be fair, be truthful, and stay true to your Nindo," out the corner of his eye he saw Itachi nod in response to Kushina's first speech.

Sarutobi smiled softly, "Sounds like something Kushina would say, she was always a cheerful girl. Very well I'll put you in as Naruto's Jonin sensei when he passes the exams."

"Thank you, Lord Hokage I just hope Kushina-sensei and Lord Minato will watch over their son alongside Kami. I also hope that one day Naruto becomes Hokage like his mother wanted," Hiryu chuckled sadly.

XXX Chapter 1 XXX

Hiruzen Sarutobi sat at his desk as nine Jonin had gathered to await his announcement of what three genin they would take under their wing and train to become the future Chunin and Jonin of the Hidden Leaf. Many of the Jonin consider it a great pride to train the next generation. Sarutobi himself had both great pride and great anguish at the three students he had trained, to which they earned themselves so many such accolades but two had fallen to vices and the last had fallen into madness. But that was neither here nor there anymore; it was time for the next group of Jonin to achieve a measure of pride and accomplishment. "Gather round it is time," the old man smiled seeing the group stop conversing and stood facing him, he glanced around the room and sigh seeing one missing. "Kakashi will just have to wait for his assignment."

He began naming off groups to first six, when team seven was about to be announce, Kakashi finally appeared. "Team Seven consisting of Naruto Uzumaki, Sakura Haruno, and Sasuke Uchiha, will be assigned to Hiryu Himura." Kakashi lowered his head slightly but said nothing he knew this had already been set up thirteen years ago and the argument against him training his sensei's son had been a very good one, he didn't know how to teach back then and unfortunately his inability to teach was still present even after three tries at the academy some being very comical attempts.

When the rest of the teams had finished Kakashi, Hiryu, and the Hokage were the only ones left in the room. "Kakashi you are not being totally left out of his training, please understand that, you and Lord Jiraiya are the only ones that know Lord Minato's Rasengan and the fact it needs to be completed. I will ask Lord Jiraiya to train him in the Rasengan when he is ready and ask you to teach him how to complete it depending on what element Naruto has."

Kakashi nods giving a small smile, "And Sasuke?"

"If I can lift the anger and hatred in his heart then yes, I'll send him to you for training if not then I will turn him over to Inoichi for evaluation then a recommendation to have him removed from the Shinobi program and have his chakra sealed," Hiryu stated firmly.

"That bad, huh?" Sarutobi asked.

"His mind right now is solely devoted to avenging his clan and nothing else, what I find hard to believe is the fact that Itachi killed his mother. Or he had someone else with him that did the deed for him, he knew what it meant and somehow this other person prevented Naruto from obtaining a family," Hiryu stated.

"What do you mean?" Kakashi asked.

"You know who Naruto's godmother was Kakashi, she would have been free of her clan and had her rights as Naruto's guardian reinstated. I do not believe it was Itachi or even his accomplice if he had one to do this deed," he held up a crime scene photo of that night which showed Fugaku prone form lying across Mikoto. "Many would consider this photo as evidence that Fugaku died protecting his wife, if that was the case Fugaku's body should have been the one underneath not the other way round. If Fugaku was protecting her he would have died first or had been injured first and Mikoto would have been the one prone over him trying to protect him."

"Mikoto had been attacked first," Sarutobi's eyes widen looking at the photo taking in every detail and spotted something. "The pool of blood it's centered behind Mikoto's body around her torso."

Hiryu nodded his face grim. "Yes, Itachi would have wanted to end his mother's life quick a stab to the heart or her brain. Also take in the fact that there are no foot prints in the blood pool," Hiryu's eyes closed. "I believe Fugaku killed his own wife in the chaos of that night probably believing his benefactor in the coup de tat that was coming, and would help him. Instead his son killed him as evidence by the stab to his heart."

Sarutobi sat down putting his hands under his chin looking at the photo shaking his head mournfully. "Now it begs the question, who was Fugaku's benefactor?"

Hiryu nodded and frowned, "Whoever stood to gain with the village being unstable outside the other hidden villages, my money would be on Danzo or Orochimaru, maybe both."

"Evidence is slim at best and I would need a lot more to go on, but with this I can make a case that Fugaku wasn't acting alone and that he murdered his wife," Sarutobi looked at the plain looking young man. "Best get going, your students are waiting." Hiryu nodded and shunshin out of the room leaving Kakashi and Sarutobi alone. "Kakashi, I'm giving you an S-Rank mission with orders to have it completed before the Chunin Exams."

"The mission?" Kakashi asked.

"Find out who among the Shinobi and Civilian council were involved in the Uchiha attempted coup de tat, if possible, I want them taken care of quietly, I'm assigning Yamato and Yuugao as your squadmates for this assignment. I'm sick and tired of Danzo constantly undermining my authority, but I can't attack him directly."

"So take out his conspirators and destroy his subtle power base in the council," Kakashi nodded. "This isn't just because Mikoto?"

"No this is for Naruto; Mikoto was simply the final straw. The Massacre was a necessary evil to preserve village stability, but Mikoto was never involved and I've always found it strange Itachi killed her," the old man held up the photo eyes flashing in anger. "But this proves one thing, Naruto's life is being made more difficult than I first thought, and it is going to end NOW!" the old man slammed his fist onto his desk shattering it into a million pieces. Kakashi's eyes grew wide seeing the unexpected power the old man before him just displayed and how cold he sounded. The once dwindling fire in the old Hokage had been reignited and was fixed to burn anything and everything in its path. "You have your assignment Kakashi, get to it."

Kakashi bowed and shunshin from the room as Sarutobi walked to the office door, "I need a new desk something a bit sturdier, oh and make sure it has a nice dark finish to it." His secretary nodded dumbly.

XXX

Naruto paced impatiently while every now and then glancing at the door contemplating setting up a prank on their sensei for being late, when the door opened. In walked one of the most unassuming people the whisker marked blonde had ever seen before in his life. Short smooth brown hair, blue eyes, wearing the standard Jonin outfit and strapped to his back was a sword, he wore his shinobi head band around his neck like a collar. "I'm sorry for being late, was in a meeting with the Hokage," the man stated with a friendly smile.

"Its okay sensei," Sakura stated cheerfully.

"Excellent, now let's go to the roof and proceed with a little chit chat, like to get know my team," the unassuming Jonin stated. A few minutes later the foursome were gathered around a set of small benches sitting facing one another. "This will be simple, I will tell you a bit about myself and you will do the same, maybe find out about your teammates a little more. First before introductions are made I like to point out something, I do not tolerate, fangirlism, acts of betrayal, or avengers among other things," he glanced mainly at Sakura and Sasuke; one looked a bit down the other looked absolutely livid. "Aside from that, I hope we can be a good team together. Now I'll introduce myself. My name is Hiryu Himura, Elite Jonin S-Ranked. My former team was Hana Inuzuka and Itachi Uchiha," he watched Sasuke's eyes flash in shock; Hiryu smirked slightly to himself before revealing something equally juicy. "My Jonin captain was Kushina Uzumaki."

"U-Uzumaki?" Naruto's voice squeaked.

"Yes, Naruto I was trained by your mother," Hiryu stated watching the myriad of emotions run along his face. "She died the night of Kyuubi attack alongside your father, I'm afraid I can't give more about him mainly because of the amount of enemies he had and your current skills."

Naruto nodded tears at the corner of his eyes, "D-Did they…,"

Sakura simply looked confused she hadn't seen Naruto act like this the entire time at the academy, he was usually so loud and annoying. She a part of her suddenly felt badly about how she often thought of him and treated him.

"Yes, Naruto I know for a fact that they loved you very much," Hiryu chuckled slightly. "Sensei often times wouldn't shut up about parading you around the village in your stroller, bragging about how cute you were going to be and how many girlfriends you were going to have when you got older. To quote the Nara, it was really troublesome."

Naruto chuckled sadly lowering his head to hide the new tears forming, Hiryu sighed reaching up and gently rubbing the boy's head. "Take your time Naruto. Now onto my likes. I love my fiancée, BBQ Chicken, and anything to do with history, my fiancée constantly tells I'm a History otaku. My dislikes are traitors, those that cannot tell the difference between a kunai and the storage scroll to which it is sealed in," he stated looking at Naruto's bowed head pointedly who seemed to tense a second before relaxing even more. "I also hate written test as they suck and make my head hurt," he chuckles seeing Sasuke smirk and Sakura frown, he saw Naruto clutching his sides suddenly all sense of melancholy had flown out the window laughing his head off. Once Naruto had calmed down he continued. "Dreams for the future I have already achieved one, I'm engaged to the woman I love. As for my second dream it is to train a future Hokage."

"Sensei why do you have two dreams?" Sakura asked.

"Simple dreams are the ultimate goal in one's life, once you've achieved that dream there would be nothing left for you to do afterward, so you set another dream and proceed from there. Goals are smaller dreams that can be easy or hard to achieve, depending. My first dream was to win the heart of the girl that I fell in love with," he saw Sakura's eyes seem to dart toward Sasuke. "She wasn't my school crush either, I found my school crush to be shallow and very one dimensional as well as one sided, she wanted nothing to do with me. I gradually came to accept that and before she left with her sensei we became great friends I wish her all the luck in the world."

Sakura looked a bit deflated but nodded, "Why don't you introduce yourself?"

"My name is Sakura Haruno, I like my mom, reading, and learning new things," Sakura stated restraining her rampant fangirlism, focusing on only things she knew of without resorting to her school girl crush. "The things that I hate," she frowned a moment at first she wanted to scream Naruto's name but that wasn't true she just found him annoying and deep down she found his attention was flattering. But she had deeper dislikes that had been there since she was four. "I hate people making fun of my hair or my forehead."

Hiryu's eyes widen thinking back to when Kushina introduced herself to his team, By Kami that almost sounded like Kushina-sensei for a moment.

"But Sakura-chan, I like your forehead and your hair, I think it's really cool," Naruto stated.

Sakura blushed slightly not expecting that, "M-My dreams for the future," she thought about it long and hard, "I don't know," she said sadly.

She felt Hiryu's hand on her shoulder she looked up and saw a small smile. "It will come to you given enough time." Sakura smiled and nodded before subtly glancing at Naruto, finding his comments had left her heart beating a bit faster and wondered why. "Now onto the last member."

"Sasuke Uchiha, I don't like a lot of things, hate a lot of things, and I have a goal that I will make a reality," the Uchiha stated keeping it vague and keeping his thoughts of revenge to himself.

"I see," Hiryu frowned when the boy didn't clarify more. "At any rate tomorrow will be the final Genin exam," he chuckled at their expressions. "Did you seriously believe that three basic jutsu, a written test, and a taijutsu spar would grant you passage into the shinobi world," he watched each of them look uncertain. "You truly have a lot to learn, meet me at training ground seven at nine in the morning, eat hardy," he looks at Sakura, "no dieting, shinobi need all the complex carbohydrates they can get to maintain the energy they need to perform jutsu. It was tolerated in the academy as you were not facing life or death situations, from this moment on I expect you to eat like every meal is your last. To quote Kushina-sensei, every paycheck is a fortune, every meal a banquet, and everywhere you sleep is a five star resort, OORAH!"

"Wow mom was badass, believe it!" Naruto chirped happily, Sasuke raised an eyebrow while Sakura looked sick mostly at the pictures.

"Yes she was, the second strongest shinobi in the Hidden Leaf at the time with the fourth topping her slightly," Hiryu explained then handed Naruto something, "here Naruto this is a team picture I have taken just after we we're assigned to her." The three young teens looked at the picture; the thing they notice was how beautiful Kushina Uzumaki was.

"Wow Naruto, that's your mom," Sakura stated in awe not entirely sure what she was expecting, the image she painted after hearing Hiryu's quote didn't seem to match what she saw in the photo. Then again, Naruto has always been unpredictable, guess I know where he got it from now. She and the rest of team seven took in the rest of the photo. Hiryu was on Kushina's right in the photo holding up a peace sign while trying to smile which was apparently being made difficult by two things a puppy on his head and the wild looking girl who had thrown her arm around his neck. The wild looking girl had her hair pulled back in a tight ponytail, dressed in a yellow tank top, camouflage pants, she also had a puppy on her head with her free hand she was making her own peace sign she had a huge smile on her face. The last figure was easily recognizable by Sasuke who tried to maintain an impassive frown only to come off looking confused. In this photo his brother was actually smiling though his looked a bit strained, holding up his rather stoic peace sign with a puppy on his head as well. Kushina wore a beige battle dress similar to Kurenai with a few minor differences she also held up a peace sign and her smile was just as big as Hana's. "Um, sensei what kind of unit was yours?"

"Ah picked up on that already, as you may have guess with teams 8 and 10 they have specific unit tactic. Team 8 will be a primary hunting and tracking team, Team 10 is a capture and resonance team, ours is infiltration and elimination," Hiryu stated noting Sakura's face get pale. "You have nothing to worry about in terms of actual elimination until you're older. However infiltration is about one thing and that is stealth. My old team was primarily a tracking and elimination team. Hana-chan would track our targets then Itachi and I did the elimination, she was also our back up and medic-nin, if things got too tough for us Kushina-sensei would step in and take care of it."

"How many times did she have to step in?" Sasuke asked.

"Early on when we we're starting out I'd say once every other mission, usually when it involved a missing-nin of an A rank or higher," Hiryu explained. "Your brother did not become the person he is now overnight Sasuke, his strength happened gradually." Hiryu rubbed his chin thinking about something for a few minutes and sighed. "I can't do it; sensei would come out of her grave to get me if I did." The plain looking man groaned. "The Hokage is going to chew me out a bit for this but screw it, we will not conduct the final Genin test tomorrow. So you all are officially genin as of right now."

"R-Really sensei?" Naruto asked.

"But tomorrow I will test each of individually; I want to see your strengths and weaknesses, so we can strengthen your weaknesses and refine your strengths. You all can go." Hiryu watched the three leave and looked at the photo a sad smile on his face.

A second later however a shadow appear, looking up he saw Naruto holding his right arm nervously, holding up the photo, Naruto took it gently. "Thank you, sensei."

"I never did get your introduction Naruto," the plain faced man stated.

"I'm Naruto Uzumaki, son of Kushina Uzumaki, my likes are ramen, training, Teuchi Ichiraku and his daughter Ayame, Iruka-sensei, Hiryu-sensei, and the old man Hokage. My dislikes are traitors and hypocrites. My dreams for the future are to marry Sakura-chan and become Hokage to make my mom proud of me, believe it!"

Hiryu smiled as Naruto left, "I know she is already very proud of you Naruto," he whispered and felt two very warm arms wrap around his neck.

"How's my alpha male doing?" Hana whispered.

"Feeling a bit nostalgic," Hiryu smirked turning his head and kissing the Inuzuka woman. "How's Kiba?"

"Ugh, that brat has not shut up about being teamed up with Hinata, I just know he's going to drive me crazy with it all day," Hana groaned sliding into her fiancée's lap. "Can I stay with Anko tonight?"

Hiryu chuckled, "I seemed to recall you doing the same thing when you got assigned to Kushina-sensei's team."

Hana pouted and blushed, "Oh yeah, I still can't believe you had that crush on Shizune, I was practically throwing myself at your feet like I was in heat and you'd ignore me."

"Yes, but I came around eventually," Hiryu stated softly nuzzling the wild looking young woman's nose. "And you spent nearly a year and a half playing hard to get, just to make sure I wasn't faking it."

Hana's face turned solemn, "I didn't want my heart broken if turned out to be some ruse to get Shizune jealous."

Hiryu nodded holding the woman close, "I know and I'm sorry for being such a stubborn male, can you forgive me."

"Hmm," Hana tapped her chin thinking. "If you take me and make me scream your name at least twice I think I can forgive you."

"You're an insatiable bitch you know that?" Hiryu snickered.

Hana smirked darkly, "Yes, but I'm your insatiable bitch and don't you forget it, I've claimed you and no other female can have you."

Hiryu kissed her long and hard, "Hmm I like the sound of that."

Author's Note: First of the edited rewrites for this fic hopefully they'll go by fast and I'll have the new chapter up before the end of the day.