Okay… this is my first time travel fic. I've had ideas for it for a long time, and now that I'm finally typing it out, I am so excited. The only pairings I can think of are MinKush and ObiRin; there may be others, the main thing is no KakaNaru. No Kakashi/anybody or Naruto/anybody, really, but the focus IS Kakashi and Naruto friendship.

Other story info: I've already written out a plot outline for myself, so I know that this story will have five arcs. I have written the entire first arc- Recovery Period. ...It's called that for lack of a better name, honestly, it's not them just lying around sleeping. I'm telling you this now because- well, it seems pertinent somehow.

Well... enjoy!

It was warm.

Warm and quiet.

After weeks and months at war, such a calming silence and an absence of the heat of battle and jutsu were enough to dull Naruto's senses into content. But this happiness was short-lived, because there was no reason for the sudden change. Not when all he remembered was acrid smoke, blood, and screams of agony.

Naruto kept his eyes closed and released a calming exhale. Something must of happened; he just had to remember. He could recall for him and his team preparing for what, one way or another, would be their final encounter with the Akatsuki. And then…

Naruto winced when he remembered the battle turning against them. No matter what he and his friends were capable of, the inhuman fiends of the Akatsuki were always one step ahead of them. They had fought on for hours, and Naruto had been forced to watch his loved ones and his village fall to those eight horrific ninja. So many of his friends were dead and it just hurt to remember them. The moments of their deaths felt burned into his mind and he winced again, biting down on his lip to stop himself from crying out.

No, there was more. Something else that was important, that he had to remember. He could remember his sensei being there until the very end. Sasuke and Sakura, too, and their faces stood out in his mind. Sakura's was wrought with devastation, friend after friend dying under her hands as she fought to save them and failed, because it was always too late- the Akatsuki fought to kill, not maim, and by the time the bodies came to her, they were already dead. Her furious screams and massive punches had taken down more than one mountain in their path, thrown up by mutant plant creature Zetsu, but her verdant eyes told the truth- that she would never, never be able to forget watching her friends die in her arms.

Then, there was Sasuke. Furious and enraged, fighting with a power that Naruto had never before seen, because… because of him. The leader of the Akatsuki had been there, within their reach, for the first time since the beginning of the war- and Sasuke's dreams were within his grasp. The Uchiha had risked everything to reach the man but he had failed, in the end, expression written in an unearthly hatred and fury as he fought on until his last breath.

Naruto shuddered again.

But there was also his sensei. He was dying, Naruto remembered that clearly, he was crawling through smoke and ash and choking on his own blood, struggling to reach where Naruto had been fighting the leader of the Akatsuki. And losing. Badly.

His sensei had so clearly been devastated, and his horrified look had been one Naruto was sure would haunt him forever. Tears had streamed down his dirty cheeks and Naruto could just remember him crying out to him, begging one last request with his dying breaths as everything twisted and blurred, seeming to swirl directly out of the man's crimson eye.

"Go back, Naruto! …Go back and save him!"

Naruto sat bolt upright.

His eyes opened to a small clearing, sunlight filtering down from above. It was the first time he had truly seen the sun in so many months; the sky was usually obscured by the smoke of war- and it was just as bright and beautiful as he remembered. The soft grass beneath him was clean and natural- not smeared with blood or guts or gore, and he rubbed his torn feet up against it and relished in the slight pain it brought, amazed that he could finally set foot to ground again and not step on death. He strained his ears and heard nothing but a soft breeze, no horrified screams and no deathly cries, and smiled. He tentatively sniffed and was almost overcome by the fact that he wasn't faced with the scent of war but the smell of the forest, so much like the one he had often played in as a child.

It was such a relief he almost wanted to cry.

Naruto forced back a swell of emotion by remembering all who were dead and his sensei's dying words. He wasn't a child anymore; he had responsibilities. If the war truly was over, he had to find out how and what was going to happen now. For the world was not going to just right itself after so long of teetering on the brink of destruction.

That, and he had to find out what his sensei meant. Go back? How, where- and who? Save who?

The blond tried to raise a hand to rub his eyes, then gasped. He couldn't move. He couldn't move his hands! He fought automatically, straining his body while he looked down to examine his restraints. He was tied tightly to a tree, thick ropes binding him against wood, soaked through with his own blood in places and, when he looked closer, embroidered with seals. He recognized them as Chakra-suppressing seals, and good ones, at that- their quality and their number made sure he wouldn't be escaping any time soon.

"Done feigning sleep, finally?"

Naruto's writhing came to an abrupt halt.

That cold voice…

No…

He twisted his head in disbelief to stare at the speaker. His eyes widened, and he felt bile rise in his throat. All previous elation at awakening to something other than a war-torn world drained away in an instant, and he felt horribly cold, sick to his stomach, because this- this right in front of him was the one thing worse than continuing war.

They had lost the war.

His eyes slowly moved up the dark form sitting across the clearing. The enemy's thin body was hidden beneath velvety black robes, scarlet clouds outlined in white drifting across the fabric like oversized drops of blood. One half-gloved hand rested on his knee while the other braced himself against the ground, the high collar cutting off just above the neck but dark mask continuing on. His long silver hair swept about his head in a defiance to follow the natural laws of gravity, making him look almost half-wolf, half-beast. His hair half-obscured his eyes, one a plain cobalt, the other a wicked crimson bisected by a vicious scar.

Naruto's hands clenched into fists, and he felt himself overtaken by such a violent hatred he actually snarled. The feral expression almost seemed to amuse the other man, who tilted his head to the side and narrowed his eyes. "What?" he taunted. "Is the caged beast going to kill me? Go ahead; growl again. I'm positively terrified."

Naruto strained against his ropes once more, baring his teeth and fighting while the Akatsuki just watched. "You bastard!" he hissed, meeting his mismatched gaze without fear and finding himself struck by the urge to rip his eyes out of his head. "You fucking bastard! Where are we?! What have you done?!"

Kakashi gave an unamused chuckle, the sound low and throaty and laced with a sadistic intent to kill that had made lesser men run for fear of their lives. "The question you should be asking is not where, but when. And if you're so upset because of that, why don't you call your sensei a fucking bastard? He's the one responsible for this."