A/N: I am so, so sorry for this.

I just learned that aunt's in a really bad way. Not only has she's lost both her legs to gangrene but her mind is going as well, and she...she doesn't recognize any of us anymore from what I've been told. When she does, she's mostly delusional. That...that really hit me hard, and before I knew it, my fingers got to typing. I suppose writing is a coping mechanism for me these days. A way to put my feelings onto pen and paper, a way to communicate with those I've lost.

...I'm rambling. This is the last new story; an exception to the rule of sorts. Won't happen again.

Now, I don't like airing personal issues here. Its something I seldom do unless a loved one has passed, or if my own health deteriorates. I already lost an uncle to suicide, and after losing my grandfather last year...I can't bear to lose anyone else. I never got to say goodbye to him. And it feels like I'm about to lose her. So I had to say something, do something, dedicate something to her. She isn't the greatest fan of some anime, but I like think she'd enjoy RWBY. She told me to chase my dreams after all, so here I am, doing what I love.

I'm hoping this proves to be a novel take; not many go for this angle these days.

Hopefully folks like this If not...well...I'll be sad, but I'll understand.

I already have a plan for this story. It won't be all that long.

Maybe ten chapters at most. Possibly less.

Depends on the reception it gets.

*bows head*

"Change seldom starts at the top.

On the contrary, it often begins at the bottom.

With the weak, the powerless, the outcast and the helpless.

The tiniest of ripples effect the greatest of changes, wouldn't you say?

Sometimes...sometimes those we consider "weak" turn out to be the strongest of us all."

~?

A Bit of Bread

It wasn't meant to be this way.

We killed her. I know we did. I felt it. I saw her die. Tore her head off myself even as Sasuke sealed the rest. It was a hard, bitter victory, but it was our victory. Good men and women died to get the two of us there; to give us the final opening we needed to finish Kaguya off once and for all. I devoured her body with my chakra. He sealed her soul away with his new eye. She's never getting out. Never coming back. We fought together, set aside our differences, used up the last dregs of our lives to put her away for good.

So why am I here?

Why am I bleeding to death?

Why? I don't understand. Where did we go wrong?

Were we we betrayed? By whom? Were we defeated at the last minute? How?

None of it makes any sense. There's no one left to fight. How could we have been betrayed? Sasuke and I made settled things...well, after we blew each other's arms off, but still! That totally counts! We can't possibly die of something like blood loss or chakra exhaustion after coming this far. That's too cruel! Are we...really going to die like this? Just like that? There's no one left to help us. All our allies gave their lives to get us to bring us to this moment. Is there anyone left in this world? Did our battle burn it down to a husk? A faded remnant of its former self? No. There must be something left. Someone. There has to be. We can't go out like this.

Here I am, lying on the ground, guts gripping in the dark.

I can see their bodies all around me.

Sasuke, Sakura, even Kakashi.

Everyone I've ever failed.

And the others.

So many.

Bodies.

So many ghosts.

In the end, I couldn't save them, could I? Couldn't save anyone. We won the battle, but lost the war. Its not fair. What good is all this power if can't help anyone? If can't save anyone? Damnit, move! Move, move, move! You stupid body! Don't just give up now! Don't quit! Fight! Damnitall! Don't close your eyes! Don't fall asleep! You won't wake up again! Kurama? Are you there? Did you die too? C'mon furball! Help me out here! You can't be gone! You can't be! Shukaku? Guys? Anyone?

...

...

...

...guess not, huh?

I'm cold. I'm scared.

I fought. I lost. Now I rest.

That's the way life should be, right?

You spend your life striving to a single point, then burn out.

Is this what I get for trying? Maybe Madara was right...maybe a dream would've been better than this...

NO!

I refuse to believe that! If there's a god out there, please! Not like this! I don't want to go out like this! I can't! Not without knowing why! Did I accomplish anything worthwhile? Did my life truly matter? Give me a chance to find out! That's all I ask. I don't care how many lives it takes. I'll gladly die over, and over and over again if that's what it takes. Please! Let me save everyone in front of me! If its too late for my friends...then another world! Good or evil. I don't care if have to start over! Let there be some meaning in my end! Let me make a difference! Let me help someone! I'll do whatever it takes! So...please!

Just one more chance. Let me save someone.

Just one life. Let me make a difference.

I'm...begging you...here...

(.0.o.0.)

Then Carry on, My Wayward Son. Carry On.

They'll Be Peace When You Are Done.

Lay Your Wear Head To Rest.

(.0.o.0.)

Everything hurt.

Her arms, her legs, even her poor, poor tummy. No, especially her stomach. She hadn't eaten in three whole days now. Hadn't had water in two. Her world was pain. Her tongue was all but glued to the roof of her mouth, unable to move. She'd try to eat it if she could. The mere act of moving took nearly everything she had and more; sent sharp shards of pain skittering down her broken leg like thousands of angry black spiders. Just the thought of it made her shudder and shiver as she curled her little body into a ball.

Emerald HATED spiders.

She was only a child after all. Girls were afraid of bugs. Bugs were nasty. Yucky. Icky.

She'd eat a bug now, if she could catch one. Anything to stave off the hunger shredding her stomach.

All the while the searing summer sun of Vacuo relentlessly beat down on this girl in her ratty green dress, a harsh reminder of reality.

On some distant level Emerald knew she was dying; wasting away in a slow death of fevered starvation alongside a broken heart. No one cared about an orphan in Vacuo; they were as common as the very grains of sand themselves. They cared even less so when said orphan made her living as a thief. Not a very good one at that. She was took weak now, too weak to use her power. The faunus left her alone these days. No one had come to check on her, no one had stopped to ask if she was alright. No, she had been left to crawl along in the alleys like a rat, living off whatever scraps she could find. She was weak. Helpless. Powerless.

Because she'd screwed up; gotten herself caught.

Her "power" that one special gift that made her unique, the precious ability she'd used to survive for as long as she could remember, had failed her for the first time in her life; and she had no one to blame but herself for it. She'd made a mistake; there had been too many people around and she'd been too hungry to distract them all. When she'd tried to steal food from a merchant, his guards chased her down. They'd didn't care that she was hungry. They still hurt her. Broke her leg as a reminder. She couldn't afford any treatment; what little lien she managed to scrounge was soon stolen. She had no parents to speak of. There was no one to rely on. Only herself.

Her stomach growled traitorously, and she slapped at it in a fit of pique. It only made the pain worse.

Emerald hated this place; wanted to leave it behind.

They said Vale and Mistral were better than this. Why didn't everyone just go there? She would have gladly done so, if she but knew the way. Alas, she did not,

Every day the sun rose to scorch her back.

Every day Emerald would always mustered what little strength she could to crawl under an awning and find some shade.

Every day, everyone walked right over her; men, women, and children alike. None spared her so much as a passing glance. She wanted to speak, wanted to reach out, but she lacked even the will to do that. On the rare occasion she dared to try, she found herself beaten again. Vacuo was a harsh place with only one rule. Survival. If you couldn't survive on your own, you weren't welcome. Today should have been no exception.

Today, everything changed.

"Oh, jeez." a new voice made her jump. "You don't look so good."

Faltering red eyes looked up, squinting against the harsh afternoon light.

Whomever they were, they were clad in little more than dirty rags not unlike her own. His might have been red, once upon a time, before he the sand and the sun bleached them of color. Silhouetted against that blinding radiance, she glimpsed a boy nearly of her age in the light. Sharp eyes the color of bright blueberries -her stomach growled at the thought- gazed down at her, framed by whiskered cheeks alongside a messy mop of blond hair. Wait, one of those eyes was blackened by a bruise. As if he'd gotten in a fight of some sort.

But there was something else, something her blurry vision couldn't quite discern.

Emerald blinked again as she squinted into the sun. Only then did she glimpsed that pair of golden, furry ears jutting out of that tawny mane. Faunus, then? Oh no. Realization dawned, bringing with it a yawning abyss of horror that threatened to swallow her whole. Faunus were worse than people, she'd seen them do terrible things to those who dared cross them. And here she was, a helpless child, barely able to crawl away. Was that a weapon in his hand?! Fear blazed to life in her chest and emerged as keening sound through her teeth. She couldn't run. Couldn't fit. She was easy prey.

Emerald curled into a fretful ball.

"Go...away..." her own words emerged as a dry croak. "I don't have...anything left to take...

"Um, why are you doing that?" the boy's voice asked, utterly befuddled. "I'm not going to hurt you, ya know."

When it became readily apparent that he wouldn't leave her be or lay a hand on her only then did she, she dared to peek at him through aching fingers.

Something bright and yellow swished at her feet to tickle her toes and, she noticed the tail a heartbeat later. Wait. Tails? She couldn't be sure. "Who are you?"

"Me? My name's Naruto." His head tilted, ears twitching in mild curiosity. She found it strangely adorable. his sunny disposition didn't waver in the face of her fear. "Who're you?"

...Emerald."

"Huh." a blink. "That's a pretty name."

Those words were spoken with all the innocent that only a child could possess, yet something fluttered in Emerald's chest all the same. Pretty. She'd never been called that one before. Trash, street-rat, waste of space, but never pretty. His smile swayed her opinion, won her heart in an instant. Even if it hadn't, the tiny canteen at his belt and the battered loaf of bread clutched in his right hand -not at all the sort of weapons she first feared- dispatched the last of her hesitation with ruthless efficacy. Her eyes were drawn to them like a moth to a flame, her throat burning, stomach curling painfully in on itself.

The boy must've seen her staring too; because he glanced at the hardened loaf.

Only then did his gaze fall back upon her.

"You want this?" he asked.

Emerald would've lunged at him, tried to take it, if she were strong enough. In her current state, she could only paw at the air and hang her head in despair. Stupid. Of course he wouldn't give it to her. Only a fool would give a starving girl their only food and water. Only the strong survived here. She tried to take her "Power", her Semblance, and push it at him. Trick him. Make him see what she wanted to see. She couldn't. The pain was too great, her hunger too taxing for her to focus. She could only groan and resign herself to failure-

Her heart just about stopped when something warm and metal and wet gently pressed itself into her hands.

Emerald's first fearful instinct was that the canteen might have been poisoned. That this was a trick of some sort, meant to make her lower her guard. Thirst overrode this irrational paranoia as she unscrewed the cap and drank deep of the gift she'd been given. After going so long without, she nearly choked as a result. Bile threatened to swarm up her throat, but she bit it back down and forced herself to swallow. It was...not very good water all told, but it was far better than anything her parched mouth had seen for the last few days. It was, in a word, bliss.

"Slow sips, now." Naruto's voice snapped her out of her daze. "You'll not want to waste it."

In that moment, she would've died content.

Then he offered her his only bread.

Emerald went terribly still.

"What about you?"

"Eh, I'm not hungry." the Faunus favored her with a grim grin. "I already ate. Take it."

Liar.

Now that he'd gotten this close, Emerald could see the truth; he looked worse than her. Much worse. His body was covered in bruises and scratches. He'd probably fought for that bread and water. Fought hard. Yet here he was, giving her his only food. But she was so very hungry and it was right there...just waiting for her...

'Forward, ho!' cried the tiny Emerald in charge of her brain as it threw a lever forward.

With that finally decision made, Emerald all but snatched the loaf from his hands, nearly biting his fingers in her haste to consume this precious sustenance. It wasn't soft, warm, or even doughy at that. If anything it was hard and stale. She nearly chipped one of her teeth on it when she bit down. It wasn't all that good either. There was nothing particularly special about the meal. It was just a bit of bread. Looking back, it might have been a little stale at that.

And yet it was the single best thing Emerald had ever tasted.

Because for the first time in her life, someone had given her food of their own volition.

Hot, bitter tears stung at her eyes as she tore into her meal, but she didn't much mind them. Because someone was here. She'd found someone who cared. For a small child who'd been neglected all her life, any form of positive attention was enough to rattle her world. Even if it came from a scruffy boy barely a year older than her. It changed Emerald's world; shunted aside the beliefs she'd held for so long. Just a hair. A touch. Just enough for a tiny seed of hope to plant itself in her heart. This also altered her focus. There was something about his eyes. They seemed...older somehow. Impossible, surely. She must be imagining things.

As she polished off the last of her meal, her gaze turned back to her savior.

She was still gnawing on the last of her bread when Naruto bent down and began to massage her head, rough fingers smoothing her green hair slowly and deliberately. Startled by this unexplained act, she glared up at him, expecting an attack. It never came. He simply continued his ministrations, stroking her scalp in small, soothing motions. Rather, her hair. The very same hair she'd ever hated, always been mocked for.

"Why?" she demanded between the last of her tentative bites. "Why would you give me your only food. Are you stupid?"

Naruto tilted his head again. "Because I wanted to." he said simply. "Do I need a reason to help someone?"

The younger girl faltered. "No, but-

That disarming grin flashed out again like gold. "Then shut up and accept my goodwill, greenie."

Apparently that "goodwill" consisted of much more than mere food; because in the time it took Emerald to nibble down on the very last of that crusty bread, her newfound friend -dare she call him such- released her head, reached down and swept her off her feet. Literally. She scarcely had a moment to gasp before she wound up on the blond's back. Her small fingers dug into the tattered fabric of his shirt. Her bad leg screamed furiously at this sudden movement, forcing the girl to grit her teeth against it and ride out the pain. But even that searing agony paled in comparison to her confusion.

"Wha?! Hey! Stop!" She spat. "Where are you taking me?"

Naruto didn't even deign to look back at her. "Home."

"I don't have a home!" she hissed.

"You do now."

Something fractured deep inside of Emerald.

It began as a tiny crack in her defenses, a faint line etching itself against the walls she'd put up around herself. A faint tremor rattled her shoulders, followed by a fully body shiver. She fought it at first, refusing to accept the truth. With each passing step, her defenses began to crumble. Naruto kept walking. Heedless of the looks they garnered, heedless of the jeers. All the while, Emerald continued to tremble. One hand rose to cup her mouth, while the other fastened itself firmly onto his shoulder. She bit her lip to hold back her tears, worrying it between her teeth as her emotions went to war with one another. Though she had no way of knowing, even in another life, Naruto was still, well...Naruto. No matter the life or incarnation, he had that effect on people. That, and he simply didn't take no for an answer.

Still, her fears fought her for every step he took, trying to claw her back. "Y-You're just going to betray me-

"Nope." Naruto chimed in loudly over her words. "Dunno what that word means."

Emerald twitched. "You can't just force me to be friends with you-

"Nope. Can. Am." her captor disagreed with a whistle. "Did!"

Em wriggled wildly. "Let me argue with you, dummy!"

A blue eye peeped at her over his arm. "Nope!"

"Uggggggggh! Where are we even going?!"

"Nope. You'll see when we get there!"

"Naruto!" she cried, seething.

"Aha! You said my name!"

Emerald couldn't win; every argument was utterly dismantled before she could find her footing, each path crumbling. Resistance was futile. Much to her dismay, she soon realized she didn't want to win this fight, it was far, far too late for her. She wanted to hold onto this tiny, fragile hope in her chest, cradle it for all it was worth. At some point, she realized her leg had stopped hurting her altogether; the boy had done something, used some strange power to heal her while they bickered and she hadn't even noticed. Once she realized that, the last of little Emerald's walls came crashing down and she was lost. She wept and sobbed and wailed and clung onto Naruto's back for dear life, terrified that he would finally come to his senses and drop her at any moment. He didn't. He never did.

And from that single act of kindness, that tiny transient friendship between two children, a ripple formed.

That ripple would one day become a towering wave, sweeping everyone before it.

The echoes of this action would forever shape the world to come.

But for now? It was Just A Bit of Bread.

A/N: Yup, nice and wholesome for little Emerald.

Only a heartless bastard would refuse to feed a starving child. Funny how a single act of kindness can change the world, huh? Cinder won't be getting her claws into Emerald in this story. Somehow, I don't think that'll stop miss Fall for long. Or will it? Who can say? A LOT of what happened in Vol. 3 hinged on Emerald's involvement. Also, consider this: if she has a chance to train her Semblance and let it evolve...dear god she'd be a terrifying opponent.

Obvious timeskip next chapter, of course.

Naturally, Naruto and Em will both be attending Beacon Academy before anyone starts asking. Furthermore, they'll be on a team together. Can't say anymore for fear of giving things away. I'll leave it to you readers to guess the who, what, when, where and why; though I think I've been dropping come big honking hints. Main pairing is NarutoxEmerald, but its also a bit of a harem...and not just for 'ol whiskers either.

Now for the fun part. Just what do you think their team will be?

*grins*

Now onto your questions. This is a REINCARNATED version of Naruto who died and merged with the very last dregs of Kurama's chakra. His memories of his past life are still there, just...buried. Yes, he's a Faunus this time around. He's still himself, but he's not a walking nuke either. He'll possess two Semblances rather than the traditional single. Emerald keeps hers, and Narut certainly isn't immune to it. He doesn't have an angry fox to deflect that sort of thing this time around. Of course, he also has his own weapon. Its...different to say the least.

So in the Immortal Words of Atlas...

...Review Would You Kindly?

Keeps an old man alive.

Have a preview.

Hints ahoy!

(Preview)

"WE'RE LATE!"

Naruto's eyes snapped open a heartbeat before a pillow collided with his face. He caught the first. Not so the second. No, the second was anything but an illusion; it smacked him right on the nose and sent him tumbling out of bed like a startled Ursa. "Hey! What the hell, Em?!"

"Shush! We worked our asses off to get out of that hole in Vacuo! I'm not going back there because you slept in!

"Slept in for what...?"

A tan teenage blur shot past him, shedding and donning clothes in a writhing whirlwind of brown and green.

"You dolt! We're gonna be late for the Hunter exam! Quick! Use your Semblance to get us there!"

His ears twitched. "What? No! I'm not some glorified teleporting taxi!"

"I'll buy you a weeks worth of ramen!" she shot back.

Blue eyes lit up. "DONE!"

"Huh." Naruto noted. "That guy just died."

Emerald shrugged. "And nothing of value was lost."

With a silent fist bump, Gold and Emerald continued onward.

"We stick together. No matter what."

He thought her saw her blush, just a touch. "Always."

R&R~!