For Kuroi_Atropos

xXx

Naruto grunted and strained against the ropes holding him to the log again. And again his attempts at freeing himself failed (for the hundredth time that day). Some team he had, leaving him behind like this. Of course he'd get out of it! He didn't need them, after all… but… man, this sucked.

He slumped as his stomach growled again. He looked up at the sun that had crawled farther along in the sky. It would be evening soon and he still hadn't eaten more than a couple of bites of food all day. He hated going without food. Few things made him feel weaker.

But if anyone thought this would make him give up, he'd show them how wrong they were! With that little, mental pep-talk out of the way, he renewed his efforts, grunting and straining against the ropes again.

And he might have actually succeeded, too, had a figure stumbling into the clearing not distracted him.

The guy looked… kinda weird, for a ninja. He had shoulder-length dark hair, and half of it covered one of his eyes (kind of like Kakashi-sensei, now that Naruto thought about it). He wore a brown poncho and a wrap around his forehead. His pants looked worn, but were otherwise typical ninja pants, and his ninja boots and legs up to his knees had been wrapped in dark strips of cloth. He had a walking stick in one hand that he was leaning rather heavily on.

He looked weak, in Naruto's opinion. What kind of ninja just stumbled around like that?

The guy looked up and around, eye wide as he blinked (or at least, Naruto assumed it was blinking as he still couldn't see the second eye).

"Oh," the man finally said aloud. He had a soft voice that just made Naruto want to smack him one. Why could weak people like this guy be ninjas while he had to fight for every single ounce of recognition he got.

(The guy had to be a ninja, though, because no one else could get into the training grounds – Naruto had tried before, and if he couldn't do it, no one could!)

"Who are you?" Naruto finally called out, thoroughly unimpressed. "What are you doing here?"

The man turned his lone, black eye on Naruto, and his visible eyebrow crept towards his hairline.

"Oh," he said again. Then he put his hand to his chin… the one with the walking stick in it even. It looked so weird.

"What do you mean, 'oh', you jerk?" Naruto yelled and went to rush the guy… only to remember he was still tied to the log, so only ended up thrashing his legs. Still, that wouldn't stop Naruto from giving this guy a piece of his mind. "Just wait 'till I get out of this! Then I'll come over there and kick your butt!"

He wasn't quite sure why he wanted to beat this guy down, except that he looked so weak and he just happened to be right there.

The man just blinked for several seconds before he slowly approached and then squatted in front of Naruto, just out of reach of his kick.

"What're you looking at, huh?!" Naruto yelled, kicking out at the guy again.

To his surprise, the weak-looking ninja spoke a full sentence for the first time since he arrived. "How… long have you been here?" he asked.

Naruto got over his surprise at being approached and not shouted at quickly, only to pout at the question. "Why? I'm just practicing my ninja skills! Ninja have to get out of situations like this, you know?"

The man tipped his head to one side, studying Naruto intently. "That's not what I asked."

"So what?" the blond replied. "You gonna tell me I'm weak just 'cause I've been tied up here since noon? Huh?!"

To his surprise (again), the man didn't. He just blinked, then sighed.

"No one taught you how to get out of ropes… did they."

Naruto felt his eyes go wide. "Wait, there actually is training for this?!" he asked.

The man closed his eye and put his hand to the bridge of his nose (while still holding his walking stick… so weird).

"It's supposed to be taught in the academy."

Oh. That explained that. But… he'd gotten along without all of that so far, so why did he need it now?
"I don't need that stuff!" he exclaimed. "I'm fine on my own! I'm awesome like that and I'll figure this out! Then I'll kick your butt!"

The man raised his eyebrow, now looking thoroughly unimpressed himself. "Why?" he asked.

"For looking down on me! I'm the future Hokage, you know!" Naruto responded, kicking out again.

The man chuckled, which only caused Naruto's anger to build further. "You don't think I can?" he challenged.

The man just smiled a very, very small smile – although, it wasn't one of the cruel smiles Naruto had grown so used to on adults. "I believe you."

Naruto stopped kicking out as he felt his eyes widen in surprise. "You… you do?"

The guy just nodded, smile gone and face completely blank again.

Those words… weren't usual.

"Why?" Naruto heard himself ask before he could think better of it.

The man just shrugged. "Because you want it."

But… then why didn't anyone else acknowledge him like that?

Before Naruto could figure out something to say, the man sighed and spoke again. "Would you like to know how to get out of ropes?"

The blond's breath caught in his throat. "I… guess," he finally muttered. "Not that I need it, or anything," he quickly added on.

The man just nodded as if he completely agreed with Naruto.

This was getting really weird.

Naruto had wanted acknowledgment his entire life… so why did it feel weird?

"There are several methods for escaping rope. The genin method wouldn't be useful in this situation as you're tied bodily to the trunk. Normally, you would have to…" the man started, then went on to explain how to present oneself when being tied up, then what to do if that went wrong or one was unconscious when tied up.

Then he went on to ask what Naruto could move at that point.

"My my head, my hands and my legs," the blond replied, still pouting a little… but what the man had explained was interesting.

"Can you move your shoulder and arm at all?"

Naruto frowned and thought about that, then he tried to. He could move his arm up a bit.

"Work with that and see if you can figure out how to get that out."

"But what if I have to get out fast?" Naruto whined, even as he focused on trying to get his arm out of the rope. Kakashi-sensei had tied it really tight, but he was making progress, little by little.

"Then hope you have chakra."

Naruto frowned.

"Chakra?"

The man sighed. "The energy that allows you to henge and kawarimi."

"Oh, that stuff," Naruto said, recognizing what Iruka-sensei had explained to him… a couple of times… when he hadn't really been listening. Then he snorted. "I have chakra now. Hey, wait! Is there a super-cool jutsu for this?" he asked, completely emphasizing the accusation in his voice. The guy should have told him that to begin with!

"You need to know how to escape without chakra too."

"Why?" he pouted.

"Because you can't always use chakra. Getting out of traps like this takes time and patience."

"But I want out now," Naruto said again. He was hungry, dang it!

"Is that being patient?" the man asked pointedly, voice dry.

Naruto sighed. "No. You sound like Iruka-sensei." He didn't notice the man's eyes widening or the slight redness that came to his cheeks. Instead, the blond went back to working his arm out of the rope. He could almost… get his elbow… but he had to move his arm really weird and didn't have enough space to…

Then he grit his teeth and pulled as hard as he could. The rope hurt and scraped his arm, but it finally came out. And once he did that, he could move the rest of his arm out pretty easily.

"Hey! I did it!" he said happily, showing the man.

"Good," the man replied with a nod. "Can you get out of the rope now? Is it loose enough."

Naruto struggled and strained and felt the rope give a little more than it had before. Not a lot, but just enough…

"I… think so," he said, pulling on the ropes with his newly freed hand." After another couple of seconds, he got his other hand out and began pulling at the different ropes. Not long after that, he stepped away from the log, beaming.

"See! I told you I could get loose!"

The man nodded, looking utterly serious. "I never doubted you."

Naruto… actually really appreciated the guy now. "Uh, thanks," he finally muttered, rubbing the back of his head and looking away. Iruka-sensei said he had to be polite to people, and this guy had been really nice, considering. Even if he still looked weak. "I mean, I don't want to beat you up now."

"You're welcome."

The surroundings fell into silence for several seconds while Naruto tried to think of something to say to the guy he'd been threatening earlier. The guy who turned out to be pretty cool after all.

"So, what's your name?" he asked. "I'm Uzumaki Naruto!"

The man just blinked down at him for several seconds and Naruto almost wanted to take it back. The guy might not have known (although how, Naruto didn't know – everyone knew him, for better or worse), and now he might not be so nice. What if he hadn't recognized Naruto? Would his face twist up in the disgust the orphan had become so used to seeing? His stomach twisted up in a knot and he was about to say something before the man finally spoke.

"Indra. Call me Indra."

And he said it just as calmly as normal, no hint of disgust. Maybe he didn't know about the fox?

Naruto just grinned. "So, Indra, have you ever had Ramen?"

Indra just blinked.

xXx

Indra had insisted on a henge before going into town, and his henge was pretty cool. It looked almost as good as Naruto's! He'd said that he was on a long-term mission and some people might not recognize him and might attack them if he didn't henge, so Naruto suggested Iruka-sensei.

For some reason, the guy sighed at that. But he also henged into Iruka-sensei and accompanied Naruto to the food stand and even said he'd pay for the food. Naruto thanked him profusely and then almost slipped up and introduced his new friend to Old Man Teuchi and Ayame-nee, but he remembered just in time.

Indra didn't have much to say to Naruto, usually responding to questions with grunts or a 'hn' sound. He was almost as bad as the Teme, although seemed nicer and friendlier for some reason the Jinchuuriki didn't quite understand. Indra even gave him the idea that he could have used his kage bushin to untie him earlier! When he'd asked how, the man had pointed out that he'd freed his hands, however it might be really useful for him to get to a point where he didn't need to use a sign to summon his kage bushin. What a cool idea!

He decided he liked Indra.

He did seem genuinely surprised at how much food Naruto ate, even going so far as to mutter something about how he thought it would be far less as a child, whatever that meant.

Then he bid Naruto farewell and told him to keep practicing his ability to escape. It might save his life one day. Then he disappeared down a street with a wave of his hand – the one still holding the walking stick.

"Huh, what a weird guy," Naruto muttered, then shrugged and turned to go home, much happier than he'd been earlier that day. Besides, now he was officially a genin! How cool was that?!

He skipped home and went to bed that night with a smile on his face and a new precious person he would do anything to protect.

xXx

24-year-old Uchiha Sasuke looked over Konoha from his perch on the Fourth Hokage's head – the closest he could get to the stone head he was used to sitting on, but he had to make do with his best friend's father instead. He took what comfort he could from it, as his current situation really made him want to find the nearest bar and get completely and utterly soused, but he knew that would ultimately make everything worse (getting someone with a Rinnegan drunk always ended poorly).

Instead, he forced himself to focus on the situation and piece together what exactly had happened to him. The last thing he remembered was stepping through a portal opened by his Rinnegan eye to check on Kaguya's prison (something he did fairly regularly to keep his paranoia at bay). But instead of the smooth transition to his intended destination that he'd expected, he'd somehow stopped abruptly and been thrown? No… it felt more like he hit a wall and had then fallen down a flight of metaphorical stairs (or several). At least, that was the closest comparison he could think of.

He'd ended up on a very familiar training ground – one that had been destroyed years before in Pein's attack on the village. That had confused him initially (unsurprisingly), and still did to a small extent. Why would he end up here of all places and times? Here when the man he respected most among the living had been left tied to a log on the day they'd passed their final genin exam? His two high level doujutsu confirmed almost instantly that he hadn't been placed under any form of genjutsu, and so he could only conclude that he had accidentally traveled back in time. As implausible as that sounded.

So he'd dealt with the situation – trying to be as calm and patient with a young, bull-headed Naruto as he could be (he'd forgotten how bad his best friend used to be – although that gave him hope for some of Konoha's future generation), and now he had to figure out what to do.

His first thought had been to keep the timeline pure, simply because he could seriously screw up the future if he didn't (teaching Naruto how to escape ropes didn't count, and the kid needed to know things like that for his future anyway; besides it was so small, it couldn't hurt… right?). Then he'd thought back to some of the prevailing theories on time travel he'd studied, mainly due to the surprising amount of tales and anecdotes regarding people with high powered doujutsu having issues with time. If those theories were true, him going back this far should have created a branching timeline. Of course, that could only be true if there were now two Uchiha Sasuke's in the timeline, and so he'd sneaked into the Uchiha compound and verified that his younger self was, indeed, here.

In truth, seeing his younger self had been relieving. It meant his actions wouldn't directly affect his original time – for better or ill – which, in turn, meant he didn't have to worry about losing his own present. Which meant that he could honestly do just about anything he wanted in the here and now.

It was a heady feeling, knowing just how much he could screw with the future if he wanted to. He considered trying to get back to his own timeline and just leaving well enough alone, but he didn't know if he could undo the accident enough to get him home to the right time, let alone the right dimension. Which meant he'd have to wait for Naruto to come and find him (because he had little doubt the Uzumaki would, even if it meant defying all expectations and natural laws, because hey, it wouldn't be the first time), and in the mean time… well…

The penultimate Uchiha considered his options. He could go his usual route by, again, just leaving well enough alone, sitting back and just watching to see how the situation unfolded, then stepping in if he had to. He doubted he would actually have to do anything. He knew most of what the future held… and while that was likely the most intelligent route… it also sounded incredibly boring to him. It also felt… wrong somehow, to sit back and not do anything (and he wondered just when the dobe had rubbed off on him so much…).

He could go the Naruto route, he supposed. It would be interesting at least. If he just went in and told everyone the absolute truth and then dealt with whatever consequences came… he could just imagine the look on Kakashi's face when he told him about his future as the Sixth Hokage… That was honestly almost amusing enough to just go with it, but the idea of dealing with the fallout with the current Third Hokage (or even worse, Danzo) did not appeal to him.

With that out of the way, he moved onto the next idea, taking the Sakura route. Just insert himself here and there and punch through anything that he didn't like… that, actually sounded like a very appealing option.

Or the Kakashi route… and just troll everyone while observing the situation and showing up with low-key interactions while subtly teaching the past versions of his friends and family why any given situation was or wasn't the best idea. (He had to admit, screwing with his arrogant past-self did sound very… amusing.)

Hmm, as entertaining as the Sakura route would be, the Kakashi route seemed even better. It would also be a good way to head off some potentially damaging problems in the future…

Or he could combine them.

He felt a smile come to his lips that would undoubtedly make even his wife step back warily (it would probably make the future Seventh Hokage either sigh with resignation or prepare to meet Sasuke's challenge).

He chuckled quietly to himself as he stood.

Trolling everyone it would be.

Starting with Danzo.

It wouldn't be difficult to infiltrate root since, you know, he could make portals and had an unbeatable genjutsu.

This would be so cathartic.

xXx

Hiruzen woke to the flaring of chakra and immediately stood to unseal his door. Outside, he found one of his ANBU kneeling in submission. The others had remained at their stations.

"Hokage-sama," the ANBU, Rat, started, "I bring you news. Shimura-sama has been placed in the hospital."

The Hokage frowned.

"Why?"

"His arm and eye are missing."

Hiruzen felt his breath catch. Danzo, even now, was no pushover. Whoever could do that to him was a threat he would have to address (unless it had been a training accident, but somehow, the Hokage doubted it). He also felt his heart sink at his old friend's predicament. The advisor already couldn't use his bandaged arm and he only had one eye left.

"So he is blind," he muttered.

"No, Hokage-sama," the ANBU replied.

Hiruzen frowned again. "Explain."

"The eye that was taken… was his already damaged eye."

Well… that made no sense. "Why would someone take that eye?" he asked. "I was under the impression that it had been damaged beyond repair."

The ANBU, to their credit, didn't so much as fidget. "Head Medic Oba has asked for you, Hokage-sama."

Hiruzen didn't sigh, but he wanted to. He'd already gotten to bed late.

He was too old for this job.

He'd been too old for almost two decades now.

"Yes, I will be right there," he said and closed his door to get dressed.

Two minutes later, he appeared at the Konoha hospital. The girl at the front desk, a genin who had never passed her teacher's test, jumped at the sight of him, but she immediately gave him directions to find Oba-san. He followed them and two more minutes later, he found the man in question.

The head healer was a short man, with dark green hair slicked back into a low pony-tail and large, round glasses. He'd been a chuunin, but had never gone very far in the traditional ranks as he had focused more on healing after obtaining his promotion, simply staying in the hospital to work as a medic.

He was one of the oldest medics there – had even been there when Tsunade had been in charge of the hospital during the war…

"Oba-san," Hiruzen said seriously.

The man looked up at the Hokage and straightened his back, likely hoping to hide the tired slump of his shoulders.

"Hokage-sama," he said. "Earlier tonight, Shimura-san was… left in front of the hospital."

Hiruzen frowned. "Left?"

The green-haired man nodded, looking nervous. "He was not checked in by anyone, simply appearing in front of the building. No one was seen in the vicinity."

Hiruzen always had operatives watching the hospital. He would have to check in with them.

"I see," he said before gesturing for the man to continue.

"In any case, he seemed to be suffering from a hallucination of some kind. If it is a genjutsu, though, it isn't one we can break. He also had some blood loss as his arm had been completely severed at the shoulder."

"His left arm?" the Hokage asked.

The man shook his head. "No, his right arm."

"The right arm that had already been severely damaged?" the Hokage asked.

Oba-san shifted nervously. "Well, you see… that's not the only thing, Hokage-sama. His arm is already growing back."

Hiruzen's eyes widened. "What?" he asked.

The medic shook his head. "I… don't know what to make of it," he said as he handed over a sheet with his observations written down. "His skin in areas around his arm looked… pale and patchy, so we took a sample, thinking it was a poison. We merely found human cells, but they're modified, heavily. They have excessive healing and… I'm waiting on the DNA results. They should be here any minute because they aren't originaly Shimura-san's.

"The thing is, Hokage-sama, with the results we've already seen and the cells we've found, Shimura-san likely had full use of his arm. We've found active chakra pathways leading to said arm and the same to his eye."

The Third closed his eyes as the implications ran through his head. "So, just to be clear, you are saying that Shimrua-san has had full use of both his arm and eye for an unknown amount of time?"

Oba-san nodded. "All results we've seen are saying that, yes-sir."

So… Danzo had lied to him. Well… it wouldn't be the first time.

"Is he still under the effects of the genjutsu?" Hiruzen asked after several breaths.

"Yes, sir," the medic nodded, nervously.

"Let me see him," the Hokage ordered.

"Yes, sir," Oba-san said, sounding relieved. He turned and began to lead Hiruzen down the hall but a voice calling out stopped them.

"Oba-san! We need you to… oh!" the medic-nin running up to them, a brown-haired girl with black eyes, stopped short when she realized who else was in the hall. "Hokage-sama! My apologies," she said, bowing low.

Hiruzen waved her off. "No harm done," he said, forcing a smile. She looked up, relieved.

"What is it, Matsuo-san?" Oba-san asked.

The girl swallowed, glanced between the two of them, and then focused on her medic superior. "Sir, Uchiha Sasuke has just shown up with… um… well… an arm, sir."

They both stared at her.

"A severed arm. It seems to have multiple Sharingan eyes implanted into it."

Hiruzen and Oba both balked.

"Excuse me?" they asked at the same time, then shot each other glances before returning their attention to the messenger.

She looked between them again before pleadingly turning to the Hokage. "Please come and see for yourself," she said.

After a moment's contemplation, Hiruzen nodded. He and Oba followed her down the hall. He felt bad leaving Danzo in his current predicament, but a Sharingan arm?

He suddenly realized this would be a very long night.

xXx

AN: This year's birthday gift. Been working on it off and on for a couple of months. Hope you like it, hon! :)