Destiny Talks
---
Destiny stalks the tales of man like a shadow on his trail. The battles he fights, the trials he endures, all he was destined to win or to lose. Yet the irony remains thus; only he who wars against his destiny will be remembered in the end, until the End.
That is the way of the Hero.
---
For two and a half years now he had had the strength to do it, to bring the bastard back, beaten to a bloody pulp but alive. Yet he never set a foot on that ground, Uzumaki Naruto, not once. It suddenly seemed like the universe that contained Sasuke as a person had vanished somehow, along with the fiery will of the Jinchurriki. He would not, and could not go after the Uchiha prodigy again, not for a long while anyway. His reasons were his own, as he had stated on a number of occasions when asked. Sakura was the only one who had an inkling of what those reasons truly were. That guess was blurry at best though. Naruto was Naruto she figured, and he would tell her when the time came.
As usual, life went on in Konoha, leaf-nins trained, graduated, advanced. All except the time weary figure of a blond ninja who spent his days on numerous missions which he uncharacteristically told no one about. Naruto had passed the Chuunin exam a year and a half ago but had repeatedly avoided the Jounin position to everyone’s concern. Tsunade had finally taken a stand six months ago and chewed the irate young man out to within an inch of his life. Apparently that is all it takes to jump start a training frenzy in Uzumaki Naruto. However bodily harm threatened by the strongest woman on Earth can be quite the incentive so the theory is up for grabs. Half the village had heard the furious shouting of the Godaime Hokage as she verbally skewered the poor boy to the wall.
“Shape up or ship out ninja boy! You want to be Hokage someday? Then act like it!”
Naruto did shape up. Though not in the way that most would expect. He disappeared for hours at a time. Sometimes entire days went by without anyone seeing hide nor hair of the blond shinobi. Months of this kind of behavior wrought quite the change in his mannerisms. Fire was back in his eyes again, but somehow, contained. One day he asked Tsunade for permission to leave the village as a favour for a little while. When she asked him what for as he stood facing her in the Hokage office Naruto’s only response, with that shining grin of his was, “ to tame a beast.” Tsunade blinked sipped a cup of sake and then said, “Alright then, get to it.”
Naruto was stunned for a second and then shook himself free of the moment.
“What?” He thought he was in for a struggle to get her consent. “You’ll let me go?”
Tsunade smiled and nodded.
“You’ve been so focused lately that I doubt I’d be able to keep you here even if I wanted to.” The Hokage was unusually happy. Finally he was showing that spark again.
“So go! Your mission, Uzumaki Naruto, as of this moment, is to go out and do whatever it is you need to do!” Tsunade handed a form of permission to Naruto which he grabbed enthusiastically and stuffed into his jumpsuit. The boy’s smile could have lit up the whole of Konoha at the moment, it was shining so brightly.
“Thank you, thank you, thank you Tsunade Baa-Chan! Thank you!” He screeched with some of his old hyperness. Tsunade had a feeling that quality of his personality would never go away. Now all she needed to do, she thought as she watched her precious one zoom joyfully out the door, was explain to the council why in seven hells she was letting the Jinchurriki, the demon vessel of Konoha go away without any definable reason at all.
---
Naruto’s glee at being able to leave was public knowledge within minutes. At least for most people with ears it was. He bounced from rooftop to rooftop with a candor that had been omnipresent in his younger years. Now that he was 16---well, the world had grown tolerant and generally ignored his random outbursts these days. The first person to take any significant notice to the blazing happiness of the young shinobi was one Hatake Kakashi. The sliver-haired sharingan user was crouched on a rooftop reading the latest edition of Icha Icha Paradise as per his usual custom.
“Kakashi-sensei! Sensei! Guesssss whaa-aat!” Came the warning cry.
Kakashi’s one visible eye trailed up to watch as the orange clad human-rocket of Konoha literally barreled into him at speeds that the average man would cringe at. Luckily Kakashi was accustomed to becoming the target of Naruto’s ‘happiness’ and neatly sidestepped the springing youth. Maito Gai would have been very proud to see such youth; if it were not for the fact that seconds later Naruto became very well acquainted with the brick wall that had decided to make a most unwelcome appearance behind the sighing Jounin.
“Oww…” Came the faint groan from the less than happy teen. Peeling himself off the wall Naruto whirled around and pointed unsteadily at his one-time teacher.
“You did that on purpose!” He said angrily. Kakashi shrugged.
“There was a bee on my book, so I had to flick it.”
Naruto didn’t buy it.
“LIAR!” He exclaimed in the age old fashion that he and Sakura were accustomed to when it was painfully obvious that their sensei was fibbing…again.
“Anyways,” said Kakashi, “what’s all the commotion about?”
Naruto’s mind backtracked to its earlier mode of inspired joy. Kakashi could almost hear the click.
“Oh yeah! I asked Tsunade Baa-Chan if I could leave the village for a time and she said yes! I can go out on my own Kakashi-sensei!” Naruto whooped and punched the air. The eternal child in him would never die, but Kakashi’s eyebrow raised in mild curiosity that masked concern.
“Oh?” The Jounin asked blandly. “And why do you want to leave the village so badly Naruto?” The young man stopped smiling.
“Is it…Sasuke?”
Naruto’s expression fell into a serious visage.
“No,” he said softly. “Not Sasuke…”
Kakashi’s eyebrow raised even higher at that.
“No? What then eh?”
Naruto’s eyes grazed the ground with a guarded quality that Kakashi had almost never seen until recently. It was that look that the volatile teen had been sprouting more and more often as of late that disturbed the Jounin the most. It was about as un-Naruto-ish a look as Naruto himself could wear. It was in those moments that his resemblance to the late Yondaime Hokage was breathtakingly startling, and painful. Kakashi knew in these small instances of life, more than ever before, Naruto’s likelihood of becoming Hokage was solidifying at a rapid pace. It was frightening.
“I have to do something,” The Kyuubi vessel stated, a breath above a whisper.
“Something that I can’t involve you guys in, not this time. Not even Jiraiya can help me.”
Kakashi’s blood almost ran cold; he had a feeling what Naruto would be trying to accomplish. As his former sensei he wanted to scold the young-man till hell come high water. As his comrade on many an occasion Kakashi also knew that this was a challenge that Naruto would have to face alone, for his own safety, and pride.
“I’m sorry,” Naruto began, “I-”
“You don’t need to explain yourself to me,” interrupted Kakashi. “I won’t stop you, but I want you to be careful alright? Make sure to say good-bye to everyone important before you leave. Don’t leave room for regrets.”
Naruto smiled at that.
“Yosh!” He shouted happily as he leapt away over the house tops. “I won’t forget! Thank you, Kakashi sensei! Take care!”
And with that he was gone, off to tell the rest of his small world that he’d be leaving them for the second time in his life. Kakashi returned to his book but couldn’t focus as full-heartedly as he had before.
‘Take care…Naruto.’
---
Sakura didn’t need him to shout her name enthusiastically. She didn’t even have to see him to know he was present. Naruto was like a force of nature in that sense. The slightest mention of him would tell a person he was there. That, she figured, is why hiding, for him at least, was the hardest shinobi skill to master.
“Sakura-chaaaan!” He yelled while skidding to a stop outside her hospital center door. In recent years Sakura had become one of the most sought after medical-nins next to the Hokage Tsunade herself, not to mention the second strongest woman on Earth.
“Yes, Naruto?” She sighed in exasperation without looking up from her work. When he was this hyper it usually meant trouble or something that had dire pointlessness written all over it. Naruto pouted.
“Aw, don’t be like that Sakura. I just came to say, well, goodbye before I leave.”
Sakura looked up in surprise.
“You’re leaving? Why? Another mission this soon after your last one is a little unbelievable Naruto.”
“No, nothing like that.” He said sheepishly with a hand behind his head. “I’m leaving on my own this time. And… I probably won’t be back for a while. So I wanted to say good bye while I still can.”
Sakura chuckled at that.
“Geez,” she said laughingly. “You’d think you were about to go off into a life or death battle.”
Naruto gave his trademark grin, teeth wide, ear to ear.
“You could say that,” he chuckled. “I was hoping you’d tell the others for me after I leave. I only managed to find Iruka-sensei, Lee, and Hinata. She’s still weird you know. I can’t figure why but she turns red and then she faints every time she sees me these days.”
Sakura smirked.
“Oh I’m sure you’ll understand someday,” she snickered. “Until then, where do you think you’ll be heading?”
Naruto put a hand to his chin in thought.
“You know, I hadn’t really thought about that.” He said.
Sakura was not surprised, and said as much.
“Really Naruto, You can’t just run off without a destination in mind! This is exactly the sort of thing that gets you into so much trouble all the time! Think!”
Naruto saw the punch coming before she swung it, and a good thing too. He stared wide-eyed and wigged-out at the crater Sakura had managed to create in the otherwise solid concrete wall.
“Really,” he said with a shaky voice, “Sometimes, Sakura, you’re scary.” ‘Note to self.’ He thought. ‘Sakura packs a mean right hook. Yeee!’
The young woman in front of him just shrugged.
“I guess I haven’t learned to control it that well yet.” She said matter-of-factly. “Tsunade is a good teacher, but I have my own temper to worry about, let alone your own carelessness. So where are you going to go, Naruto?”
In pensive thought Naruto stood for about a minute. Where could he go? It wasn’t as if the world opened him into its arms exactly. Who could he ask to let him stay in their land? Who…It struck him.
“Gaara!” Naruto snapped his fingers. “That’s where I’ll go! To Suna village it is then!”
Sakura nearly punched the unsuspecting boy again out of sheer irritation.
“To Suna? Why, of all the places on Earth would you go to Suna? I know you’re friends with Gaara, Naruto. But he is the Kazekage, don’t you think that just popping up out of nowhere is going to be a little less than welcome? Besides that, Suna is just a wasteland of sand and wind. Its completely barren!”
Naruto nodded in agreement.
“Exactly,” he said. “That’s why its absolutely perfect for what I have to do. Miles of nothing is just what I need right now. Take care, Sakura!” He turned to leave suddenly and, for no other reason than he had put it through far too much abuse over the years, Naruto’s orange and black jumpsuit ripped from shoulder to waist. Rrrrrip!
“Aw man!” He groaned. “Now I’m going to have to buy another one.”
Sakura was very amused.
“Well it just goes to show,” she said jokingly. “You’re a growing boy.”
Naruto groaned again.
“Don’t let Sai hear you say that,” he said unhappily. “He’d start going on about how other parts of me aren’t growing.”
Sakura stifled the urge to laugh like a maniacal hyena and retorted.
“In that case you’d better hop to it ninja-boy. And take this med-kit with you.” She handed him a case of ointments, bandages and the like. “Knowing you, you’ll have yourself turned into a pile of bloody hamburger in no time. Whatever it is you’re doing out there. And I am not going to be responsible for it!”
Naruto just smiled and hugged her in thanks.
“Hai, Sakura. Thank you.”
Sakura turned a light shade of pink and hugged him back.
“You take care of yourself,” she said quietly. “I won’t be there to patch you up when you decide to do something foolish again.”
Naruto nodded grimly.
“I will,” he said. And with that he let go of his long-time team member and walked out the door carrying Sakura’s gift.
“I’ll write to you guys!” He yelled back. “I won’t forget! I promise!”
Sakura smiled sadly.
‘I know…you won’t.’
---
After everything but the kitchen sink was stuffed into his travel bag Naruto barely made it out his front door with the heavy pack weighing him down. It was quite a sight to watch him, like some deformed yellow turtle, slunking forwards at a snail’s pace. Many people laughed and he just grinned at some of the more crude remarks as he made his way to the front gate. He was used to it. The attitude of the older generation towards him was fading however. As the years flew by so did the lives of the people whose world had been so badly affected by the attacks of the Kyuubi that was sealed inside him. They never forgot, but the people of Konoha were strong ones, and life had to continue, no matter their feelings. That was the Shinobi way; bear your burdens, and move on. Naruto had some problems with that policy, but that was Naruto. He had his own “ninja way”, and he stuck to it, no matter the cost to himself.
Once at the front gates he noticed that the guards on duty were two of the testers that had been at his Chuunin exam. He waved at them awkwardly from under the hefty pack and handed them the permission form Tsunade had given him. One of them had a wry look on his face as he surveyed the teetering back-pack and then the form.
“It looks like everything checks out,” he said. “You’ll be leaving for an indefinite amount of time…The Hokage actually signed this?”
Naruto scowled.
“Of course she did! So that right there?” He hobbled over to point at Tsunade’s signature. “Only the old hag writes like that!”
The guard still stared at him dubious of the form, wary of the bright yellow pack that threatened to squash everything with a three foot radius of the young-man before him.
“Your shoulder is ripped.” The guard observed distastefully.
“I know!” Naruto fumed. The guard just shook his head.
“Alright,” he sighed. “You can go. God knows why you want this Naruto. There are perfectly good places to train in and around the village.”
Naruto just shrugged and would have said, ‘Not for my kind of training. Mine is super hard!’; but he just grunted this time. After all that he had done for the village you’d think that they would trust him at least a little more. But some, he figured with a sigh, would never be able to get past the ‘Evil Kyuubi Roadblock’, no matter what he did. He just let it go, like always.
“I’ll see you guys later!” He shouted brashly and trotted off down the dusty road towards a future that not even a sharingan master could predict.
---
Thousands of miles away, in a hollowed mountainside, another young man awoke from a fevered dream that featured the one person he wanted most to forget entirely. Shaking his raven hair from his eyes he struck out at the ceiling angrily to dispel the memory of those perfectly clear blue eyes staring at him, staring through him.
‘Didn’t I sever that bond with you?’
“Naruto…”
[Reviews - 2]Chapter or Story
Table of Contents
- Text Size +
Chapter notes: Spoiler warning, chapter 331 and under.
Blanket Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto in any way shape or form. I aim for no copyright infringement or the like. This disclaimer applies to all chapters hereafter. The creation of Naruto* is the sole property of its maker. I simply terrorize the characters therein.
PG Rating for language, and the mischief that teenagers usually get into.
Please feel free to give 'constructive' criticism. As far as familiarity with Japanese terminology I'm not the sharpest kunai in the pack. I do however make the best educated guess I can. The rest is up to you.