Naruto 1. Chapter 1

**AN: Yes, I know. I'm starting another story when I should be working on the old one, instead. Unfortunately, I haven't had much inspiration for Bebop Wizard over the past year and not many have been willing to help me work it out - conversely, I'm in the process of moving closer to family and, hopefully, should be able to find someone in the area off of whom to bounce ideas.**

**In any case, the idea for this came to me a couple of days ago (although I've read through and even discussed variations on the theme several times since I stumbled across the fandom) and began writing it up this morning. Hopefully, the OC won't become too much of a Sue as this progresses, but that's always a danger when authoring anything.**

**AN2: This story is blatantly AU. While I am aware of certain revelations from canon due to various third-parties, this does not require me to take all such elements into account when authoring stories.**

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Disclaimer: I don't own either of the Naruto series, its canon elements, the fandom, its popular or otherwise-known plot devices or any original characters you may recognize from other authors.

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"By the way...I'm a boy."

Shocked by this sudden revelation, Uzumaki Naruto stared in dumbfounded amazement as Haku slowly disappeared into the distance. After spending the entire night in this forest glade training to climb trees using only his chakra, Naruto had awoken to the surprising sight of a very pretty individual leaning over him. With little delay, they had introduced themselves to each other and Naruto had then spent the following hour helping his new friend to gather medicinal herbs. Needless to say, learning that Haku was actually a boy running around in a girl's kimono was entirely unexpected.

Eventually, Naruto shook himself free of his stupor and turned away to resume his training. He had to get this figured out before that Zabuza guy got healthy again if he wanted to outshine Sasuke-teme and eventually become Hokage!

* * *

Another hour and an half had passed, and Naruto had made a good deal of progress controlling his chakra and climbing the trees. He had also noticed that he often felt a subtle, though sharp, stab of pain about his navel shortly before the chakra output from his feet would surge just enough to make him fall. This wasn't the case every time, but it happened often enough to make him suspicious.

Nearly two months previous, in a complex sequence of events, Naruto had learned that he was the living prison of a creature called the Kyuubi no Kitsune - the Fox of Nine Tails. Twelve years before then, on the day of Naruto's birth, the Kyuubi had attacked Naruto's home in Konohagakure no Sato - the Village Hidden in the Leaves. The leader of this village, a great ninja and Seal Master known as the Yellow Flash and holding the position of Fourth Hokage, had found a way to defeat the Demon Lord by sealing it within the body of a newborn human infant. Unfortunately, this came at the cost of his own life and, with him unable to tell the villagers of his plan in time, many of the civilians and ninja ostracized young Naruto, ignoring their savior's dying wish that the boy be treated as an hero.

Over the years, Naruto had occasionally noticed what seemed to be an elaborate tattoo centered around his navel that always disappeared soon thereafter. In those days, he had assumed it to be his imagination or, in times of desparate fantasy, evidence of some unknown Bloodline Limit he had inherited from his parents he had never met. Now, however, he knew it to be the seal his childhood hero had used to defeat the Kyuubi, having studied what little of Seals he could manage to in the Konoha Library. With that limited knowledge, he could only assume that the pain had something to do with the Seal. Considering his swift healing and overwhelming stamina, which even he could recognize as unusual, Naruto suspected the Seal might even be leaking some of the Kitsune's chakra into his own coils.

As Naruto again paused to rest in the middle of the glade and began to contemplate how to overcome this latest obstacle, he thought he heard noises coming from deeper in the woods. Focusing closer on the sounds, he thought he recognized branches snapping and leaves falling, as well as uneven footfalls. Finally, he noticed there were also stifled sobs and short cries of pain. He stood back up, settling into a comfortable fighting stance in case there was trouble.

A moment later, leaves rustled and a red-haired girl not much younger than Naruto stumbled into the glade and collapsed, wearing clothes that were filthy and shredded.

* * *

_Light, heat, pain...fire..._

She was scared, horribly frightened.

_Noise, wind, debris...explosions..._

She hurt. She felt lonesome.

_Red...fur...blood..._

_White...pale skin...bone..._

Her eyes and throat burned from crying.

_Her sisters were already gone..._

_Her mother..._

"Onee-san...Okaa-sama..."

_"Ake..mi-cha..n..._

She stumbled. She didn't know where she was going.

_"Run...li-live! Find...your Otou..san... Warn him...or his...Host...Sha..ringan...Rinne..gan..."_

_Black, red, white...blue...white, black...red, black...purple, black..._

_Black, red, white...blue...pale skin, metal, magatama...black, lavender-indigo...orange...five scratches..._

The trees' branches scratched her again. She gasped in pain.

_Her mother struggled upright, facing their attackers._

_"Okaa-sama!"_

_"Hurry, go now! Survive!"_

_The orange one stiffened. Akemi turned and ran as her mother charged. Tears flowed._

Akemi had never met her father, but she had heard stories. Her mother had told her tales of the Hosts, also, but she had never seen any. Not knowing what else to do or where to go, she had fled into the forest and just kept running.

Two days.

Two days she ran. Two days she cried. For two days, she did not stop, not even for food or drink.

Then she felt it.

She stumbled again, not recognizing it at first. It came again and she slowed, eyes narrowing slightly in fright and suspicion before they widened in realization, shock...hope.

A chakra signature - and one that felt familiar! Did her mother escape? Had one of her sisters survived, now searching for her?

No. She knew all their signatures by heart and, when this one came a third time, she still didn't recognize it. Despite that, she still thought it was familiar.

As the distant pulse of the intermittent chakra signature washed over Akemi yet again, she felt...humbled...kinship...the promise of safety and healing...

She turned and headed toward the source, hoping she would arrive to find help and that the monsters that destroyed her family had stopped hunting after her.

She never noticed that her tail had been raised behind her since the early twilight hours.

It would be hours yet before Akemi reached her destination, and she would be too exhausted by then to appreciate the event.

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Seeing the girl fall, and the condition of her clothing, Naruto sprang toward her.

"Hey! Are you alright," he shouted along the way. Receiving no response, the whisker-scarred blond grew worried. When he reached the spot where she lay on the ground, he bent down to gently grasp her shoulder. "Come on, now. You can't fall asleep here like this; it's not safe!"

Had anyone been present at this time and when Haku awoke him earlier, that person would likely have reflected upon the irony of this statement. As it was, Naruto, himself, had a strong suspicion that this young girl's numerous injuries had not originated from training, like his own.

At that moment, Naruto's hand alighted upon bared and slightly bloodied skin where part of the girl's yukata had been torn from her shoulder, and he felt a stronger jolt of pain from where the Seal was inked. Almost before he could jump in startlement, he also felt a sudden familiarity and possessiveness concerning the redhead. Unfortunately, these sensations were accompanied by a slight headache, so he didn't care to examine them too closely and, furthermore, failed to notice his traditional senses sharpening and some of the girl's wounds closing slightly.

What he did notice was a quiet whimper emitting from where her head lay, reminding him of the situation. He decided it would probably be a good idea to move her someplace where he could check her for any serious wounds, but didn't want to injure her further in the process.

"I've got it! Kage Bunshin!"

With a slight popping sound caused by displaced air, five blond clones appeared in a burst of smoke.

"Henge!"

There was another burst of smoke as one of the clones vanished, a blanket stretched between two poles taking his place. The four remaining clones and the original Naruto carefully lifted their new charge onto the makeshift stretcher, then the clones lifted that by the poles as Naruto ran his hand through the scarlet locks in a motion he hoped was comforting.

"Wait a second..." he muttered as he felt a soft protrusion of flesh. "What's this...?" He leaned closer to inspect what he had found.

"Hey, Boss! You need to see this" called one of the clones.

Withdrawing his hand, Naruto walked around the stretcher to where his clone was loosely holding up what looked like a length of red fur near the girl's waist.

"What is it?"

"Well, Boss...I think it's a tail."

At this comment, Naruto jerked his head around to stare at the back of the girl's head. His mind was racing, as though he was fighting in a battle or planning or executing a prank.

_If she has a tail, then could that bump on her head be..._

Naruto ran back around the stretcher, making certain not to jostle or dispel either of the clones standing on that side. Carefully brushing aside scarlet strands of hair until he revealed what he had earlier found by accident, Naruto's expectation was confirmed.

_An ear! An animal ear!_ He stared in shocked awe, before his thoughts began racing again. _Wait...tail...ears...red fur...Kitsune!_ Naruto knew most of the villagers back home hated anything to do with the spiritually powerful shapeshifting foxes because of the Kyuubi's assault, even to the point they were suspicious of any normal fox found in the forests native to the Land of Fire, but he couldn't bring himself to feel the same way. Jiji had told him some of the older legends as a child, and had used others from the Library to teach him to read, so he knew they weren't all as evil and malicious as the Nine-Tailed Demon Lord and that many were pranksters, just like him. He also knew the hostility of those from Konoha for what they didn't understand, as well as how his teammates and sensei were likely to react to the knowledge of a Kitsune in the area, much less in their very presence.

_I can't let them find out!_ His face shifted to a determined expression. _I'll just have to take her somewhere safe and heal her, myself._

With a sharp nod, Naruto made three more clones and sent them back to Tazuna's house, then led the way to a waterside cave he had glimpsed when Team Seven arrived, keeping to the ground since it was unlikely he and his clones could all find even perches on the tree branches without endangering their precious cargo.

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Akemi felt so tired.

For the past three hours, Akemi had been more exhausted than ever before in her life. She didn't even have enough energy to sense the pulses of chakra, anymore. Fearing more with each passing minute that she wouldn't make it to her possible savior in time, she kept pushing herself to stumble through the forest in the direction she had last felt the source, hoping it hadn't already moved again.

_Please let whoever it is still be there..._ she prayed silently, fallen twigs snapping underfoot and branches tearing away cloth and skin causing her to cry out in pain.

Suddenly, there were no more trees or bushes to either help her stand or cause her harm. The last sight she saw as she fell to the ground and closed her eyes was a glimpse of the color orange.

There were noises, but Akemi had no energy left to try to understand what she was hearing. She knew she was dead, even if this monster left her there alone. It was all over.

A weight fell painfully on one shoulder, and Akemi whimpered pathetically. This was it, he was going to kill her. Then she felt a soothing heat flow through her body and a little of her energy came back to her. It was just enough for her to recognize that the heat was caused by that same vaguely familiar chakra signature, and Akemi found herself relaxing into unconsciousness as hands lifted her into the air and another stroked itself across her head.

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**AN3: Well, there's the first chapter. I'll try to work on and upload chapters for this and BW more often once I've settled in, along with new one-shots and prompts for Voices. Thanks for reading!**

**AN4: It has been brought to my attention that my tendency to alternate perspective can cause some confusion over the course of this chapter. For those for whom this is an issue, the end of the first Akemi segment is set when Naruto is training in the Tree Climbing Technique alongside Sakura and Sasuke and the second begins near the end of the dual Naruto segments at the beginning of the chapter, whereas the first Naruto segment begins just after the scene wherein he befriends and aides Haku in the forest glade containing the herbs needed to help heal Zabuza.**

**AN5: Anyone who wants to critique or to suggest future elements of storyline or plot is welcome to do so, preferably in a PM in the case of such suggestions.**

**Special thanks and appreciation go out to InsaneScriptist and DocNan for their help!**

**Hope you enjoy the story, everyone!**

**TTYL**


	2. Chapter 2

**AN: Sorry for the delay, folks; I'm afraid that I've been buried (sometimes literally) in cardboard boxes for the past month trying to get everything put away after the move. Most of the hard stuff seems to be done - and I've got a new desk - so I should be able to start shipping chapters out somewhat frequently..._if_ I don't keep getting blindsided by family wanting to get together. :P**

**Out of curiosity, does anyone else wonder whether the next backend update to FFn will make it impossible to combine punctuation with quotation marks?**

**AN2: Thanks for the reviews; there were some interesting points brought up.**

**ChaosLord:**** Thanks for the praise. As for your suspicions...I shall neither confirm nor deny...yet. ;)**

**UzumakiCest:**** That's certainly my expectation, although I don't exactly have the story planned out as of yet.**

**notgonnasay:**** Nice name there, friend. I must ask, though; what gave you the idea Naruto would be getting a daughter? I rather thought the line specifying Akemi as not much younger than him would preclude that possible deduction...**

**Bleeding Inside:**** Ouch, that's not good; although I suppose you probably _are_ comfortably numb. The perspective changes pretty much just appeared on the screen, as I reckon it; I didn't really have much say and wasn't going to try to argue. It helps that I'm used to writing individual scenes for the story challenges over at EDelta88's forum (which, btw, I hate that the site mods decided to delete most of our longer threads without warning). The story will probably remain mostly chronological from here out, but the introduction wasn't really going to let itself be worked that way, nor as later flashbacks. Trust me when I say that I doubt I could stand to write that way for very long much, if any, more than you could stand to read it.**

**Bonkers:**** *raises eyebrow* Quite.**

**AN3: I figure I should probably go ahead and mention this now before some high-horse berates me or reports this unannounced - although it should be apparent from a line or two in the previous chapter - but this story is rated for Mature Dialogue, Violence, Nudity and Adult Situations. *rolls eyes***

**AN4: I actually had this done over a week ago, but it's taken this long to get even a mildly constructive beta to look it over for me. Once again, I apologize for the delay.**

**Additional Thanks for this chapter go to: Selonianth**

_**Without further ado, I present to you:**_

**Naruto no Kitsune: Chapter Two**

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"Where is that blond baka," angrily shouted a young girl with pink hair. "When I get my hands on him for making us worry and keeping Sasuke-kun from training..."

"Maa, maa; calm yourself, Sakura-chan." This came from a gentleman with silver hair who was wearing a cloth mask and reading an orange-covered book. "I'm sure Naruto-kun is fine and just wore himself out training. He'll be back before you know it. Right, Sasuke-kun?"

"Hn. The dobe probably hit his head falling out of a tree. Why are we wasting our time waiting around?" The boy was the same age as Sakura and Naruto, and his blue shirt had a red and white fan emblazoned across the back.

"Well, Sasuke-kun, that's because -"

"Kakashi-sensei! Hey!"

Turning toward the source of this shout, the trio immediately saw their blond teammate, complete with his thick orange and blue coat and orange pants speeding in their direction.

As Naruto closed the distance between them, Hatake Kakashi heard a very animalistic growl emitting from his kunoichi student.

"Naruto...!" Haruno Sakura stepped forward and swung her fist toward the new arrival, channelling all of her anger into a single blow meant to show the boy just how she felt about his disappearance.

Naruto, himself, highly familiar with his long-time crush's extreme temper, cringed back and clenched his eyes shut, waiting for the inevitable impact with his skull.

It never came.

A moment later, Naruto opened his eyes to see their sensei restraining Sakura by the elbow and forcing her to look at his face.

"Now, now, Sakura-chan. That wasn't very nice. Weren't you just saying how worried you were about your teammate?" Kakashi closed his single visible eye in the smile that his students were beginning to dread. "How are we going to train together if you knock him unconscious for the rest of the day?"

He released the pink-haired genin kunoichi, and she slumped into herself and crossed her arms with an aggravated huff.

Kakashi glanced at Uchiha Sasuke, who wore a scowl on his facial expression, then turned to Naruto with a serious expression of his own. "Care to tell us where you've been all night and morning, Naruto-kun?

The blond smiled and reached one hand up to ruffle the hair at the back of his head self-consciously. "Eh-heh...well, sensei...Boss spent the whole night training that technique you showed us yesterday. He just sent me to tell you that he found a girl injured in the woods and took her somewhere to help her get better!"

"Really," Kakashi drawled in response, eyeing the now-obvious Shadow Clone with suspicion. "Just how is he supposed to do that without any supplies?"

"That's already being taken care of, Sensei! Boss sent another clone to bring him his bag. Hey, wait!"

As soon as the clone had mentioned the other one sent for supplies, the remainder of Team Seven had immediately turned and rushed back to the house where they were staying, hoping to follow it back to Naruto so they could ask him some..._pressing_questions. After a moment, the second clone hopped out of the window from the room where the shinobi had been sleeping and dashed off into the woods, Team Seven close behind.

With that quartet vanishing into the distance, the first clone was unable to hold back a smirk as a third clone also hopped out the window, this one carrying Naruto's real bag.

_Mission accomplished._

The first clone's chakra ran out, and he dispelled.

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"Wait here," Naruto hissed to his clones, signalling a stop with one hand. Forming an hand-seal, he whispered the jutsu name as he formed more clones to act as scouts.

"Three of you come with me; we'll make sure the cave is safe. The rest of you new guys, spread out and check the area for trouble."

"Yosh!"

The three groups separated, those clones supporting the mysterious kitsune maiden retreating back into the woods slightly to avoid being seen if there was any trouble.

_I wonder what happened to her_, Naruto pondered. _She looks like somebody attacked her, but she was also covered in leaves when she showed up, and nobody else appeared after her. Did she catch her attacker off guard and kill him? No...why would she run afterward in that case? Unless there was more than one..._

Naruto bowed his head and cupped his chin in thought, trusting the clones he had brought to pay attention. _For that matter_, he continued, remembering the attitudes and behavior of his female team mate. _Why am I so sure that it was a _guy_attacking her? Maybe she got in a fight with another girl, like Sakura-chan and Ino keep doing!_ He shook his head. _In any case, she got away from them and looked like she ran pretty f_-

The blond ninja stumbled slightly at an unexpected sensation of achievement, briefly catching the attention of his clones, who paused and waited for him to recover.

"What the hell? Why do I remember talking to Kakashi-sensei, Sakura-chan and the Temee when I sent a Shadow Clone to take care of that for me?"

"Maybe it's a part of the jutsu, Boss. I mean, what's cooler than a physical clone that can use awesome jutsu _and_ give you its memories of the bad guy's base it just scouted out even if someone destroys it?"

"Hey, you're right! Can you imagine the potential this has for pranks now? More importantly, we can use it to train to beat Sasuke-temee and finally show Sakura-chan how cool we are!"

"Yatta!"

"Yatt-itai!"

At that instant, Naruto broke off from the cheer he was sharing with his clones to crouch down and grasp his head in a pose they all recognised intimately.

"Maybe we should hold off on trying to impress Sakura-chan; she hits us too hard...and remind me to tell her that I am _not_ a **pervert**!"

"Ano, Boss...that might not be a good idea, either - she might hit you again..."

With that said, they reached the back wall of the cave and started their return to the others, having found nothing of note.

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"Oof!"

The cloud of smoke and dust quickly cleared as Kakashi and Sasuke approached, revealing a dazed Sakura lying across an ambiguous mission pack with her face in the dirt.

"Sakura."

The girl twitched, then began to groggily raise herself back up. "Sa...Sasuke-kun?"

A moment passed as she looked around, before she remembered what had just occurred.

"That...that baka! How dare he trick me? Which way did he go?"

"Maa, Sakura-chan...that was a clone. Naruto-kun was never really here." Kakashi's voice took on a saccharine-sweet note as he continued. "Furthermore, you just lost our only lead. I guess that means _you _get to take his place in sparring practice this evening! Isn't that lovely, my sweet little genin?"

"Ah! Ha-hai...Sensei..."

Sasuke just grunted reluctantly.

"Ano...Sensei..."

"Ah, Sakura-chan?"

"Won't Naruto have to come back for the supplies?"

"No. The dobe grabbed my pack, instead."

"Aa...it was a good distraction."

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"All clear, Boss. Did you find anything?"

"Nah, the cave's empty. We should be just fine, so long as we get inside before anybody floats by and sees us. I did learn that I get your memories, though!"

"Really, Boss? That's awesome! Can you imagine the-"

"-potential for pranks and training? Yeah. Let's hurry, though; there's no telling when somebody else might come."

"Yosh!"

The clones Naruto had sent out as scouts dispelled themselves as the last four approached him carrying their charge.

"How is she, guys?"

"Not much change, Boss. She's still out of it. Her breath's a bit more even, though, even if she's still pretty pale."

"She's probably dehydrated, Boss; not to mention her obvious exhaustion."

"Un. Let's get her inside and get her some water while we wait for the supplies."

"Right, Boss!"

Together, the group of five transported their precious cargo to the roomiest section of the cave and carefully laid her on the floor. Two of them then raised her to a sitting position as Naruto opened his canteen. Supporting the kitsune's head, he slowly poured a few sips of water into her mouth, then closed it and tilted her head back until she swallowed, repeating the process before having his clones lower her back down.

"You two go guard the entrance - make sure to disguise yourselves so nobody passing by gets curious."

Naruto gave her water twice more while he waited, several minutes apart, before his clone arrived with his pack.

"Thanks. Good job."

"Any time, Boss."

The first thing the blond did was to pull his bedroll from the pack, worrying that the younger girl might be getting too cold between her possible dehydration and the fact she was separated from the cave floor only by the thin sheet of the stretcher into which his clone had earlier transformed. He rolled it out on the floor, then had his clones help him to move the girl onto it, though it was still closed.

Going back to his pack, Naruto searched for the emergency medical kit Hokage-jiisan had given him the day Iruka-sensei had insisted before his class that every ninja have one as part of their standard Mission Kit. The boy had never used it for attending his own injuries, but the class on doing so for others was one of the few at the Academy not taught by Iruka-sensei where the teachers hadn't ignored him, insulted him or kicked him out. Opening it and retrieving the bottle of alcohol, some cotton balls and a roll of gauze, he set these aside and had his clones sit the girl up again so he could open her yukata and see to cleaning her wounds. Immediately, he found himself thankful for the research he had done for his Oiroke no Jutsu, as he suspected he might have passed out from his own blood loss without it - as it was, he still blushed furiously.

Then his fingers brushed her bared skin as he continued to remove the garment and he froze as three things happened simultaneously; the Seal holding the Kyuubi twinged, the girl squirmed and her skin gained just the slightest shade of healthier pigment. Forcing himself to relax, Naruto pulled his hand back, his blush growing and a trickle of blood leaking from his nose when she squirmed again and moaned quietly as he accidentally grazed a slight bump on her frayed and straining chest bindings.

"Boss, we can't hold her up for long like this; I think she's drawing at _Its _chakra within us whenever we touch her skin..."

"What are you talking about? _It's_ inside the Boss, not us!"

"Think about it! When the Boss was climbing those trees, the Seal kept hurting before he fell. Then, after he created you guys, the Boss touched _her_shoulder and the same thing happened before she relaxed! Now we're getting weaker whenever we touch her skin, only we don't have nearly the amount of either kind of chakra to notice it again, and _that's_ probably all balanced throughout us."

Naruto was looking back and forth between his clones. This almost felt like watching a sparring match, or one of Jiji's meetings with the Village Council. He decided to stop them before it could get out of hand.

"But-"

"No, guys; I think he's right."

The two clones who had been helping all along stared at their creator in disbelief.

"He's telling the truth about what happened, and I think it makes sense that _It_must be leaking chakra into all my jutsu and I just didn't notice before because I was putting so much more chakra into them that the other chakra didn't have to fight as much to get out. It hurt trying to make regular clones, too; remember? Kawarimi wasn't fun to learn, either..."

The clones looked like they were getting ready to cry until they remembered where they were and noticed how weak they felt. Firming their resolve, they nodded to each other and their creator, then lowered the now half-nude kitsune maiden back to the bedroll, setting her down just as their chakra ran out and they dispelled. Naruto himself noticed that, though she was again breathing more easily, her skin still looked the same. He figured that probably meant that his regular chakra wouldn't help her much and that there wasn't enough of the other in his clones to make any difference.

Squaring his shoulders, the young boy leaned over the younger girl and set to work cleaning her wounds. Another thought occurred to him as he did so - he was glad nobody was around to see his face; blushing wasn't very manly, even if his had mostly faded.


End file.

Naruto, Hurt-Comfort