First and last author's note at the beginning of a chapter

This is my very first attempt to write any story, so please consider it and be gentle. Give me reviews and advice if I mess up anything.

Grammar: English isn't my native language, so if you find any mistakes blame me and never my precious beta readers! However I won't upload any unchecked chapters, you can still find some missed mistakes. Especially in the Author's note if I add something later. Feel free to point them out, so I can correct them, but do not harass my past or current Betas because they are doing me a favour, by dealing with my insane grammar in their free time.

About the plot: I will stick to the facts of the manga (beside some techniques and abilities) but I maintain the writer's freedom if it is absolutely necessary for my plot. However the future where Naruto came from is an Alternative Universe. I will try to adapt the new actions of the manga until it doesn't interfere with my plans.

Pairings: You won't find any pairings beside Minato and Kushina's relationship.

General: Note that the seal isn't always visible on Naruto's stomach, nor he is emitting Kurama's chakra continuously.

I got a strict and deliberated storyline, so don't feel offended if I won't change it even if you advise it in the reviews or flame me that you don't like it. I'm stubborn and I will stick to my original plans even if you are going to hate me. If I like your idea it could be that it won't appear for a long time, because I'm at least five chapter ahead on my Hdd.

I've got a NO SPOILER philosophy, so don't ask about upcoming events, because I won't answer those questions.

Warning! If you are impatient don't read further. Also stop here if you like to know everything at the very beginning, because it won't happen and you will be only disappointed in this story. There are reasons and logic for everything, and it will be revealed in time. I know some of you won't like it because of that, but I do not want to write a fic where everything is clear in the first few chapters. Read it carefully and you will find hints and pointers here and there. One last warning: I adore cliffhangers, so sorry in advance for the future teasing.

What you WILL NOT find in this story: romance beside Minato and Kushina. This means: no harem, no yaoi, no yuri, no lemon. There will be no battle hardened, bloodthirsty, easily killing Naruto. He is cool the way Kishimoto imagined him. There won't be any extra bloodline limits or dojutsu, nor fast pacing in the first part of the story.

What you WILL find in this story: suspense, drama, action, comedy, angst, family moments, doubts, fast advancing plot in the second part.

Disclaimer: Naruto and every character of Naruto's story belong to Kishimoto Masashi and companies I don't know.

I want to thank the hard work of ScarsOfTime who was by first beta reader. This chapter's revision is thanks to Riya3and ImaginationJunkie1412

Upload date: 14/10/2012

Last update: 05/04/2014 (complete revision)

Chance for a Prophecy

Chapter 1. – Face the door of a new life

The impact was overwhelming. For a moment that felt like hours, nothing could be seen through the thick, foggy dust. The wind seemed to have stopped blowing, and the grass no longer swayed, almost like time had paused. Everything froze for a moment, or perhaps for an eternity.

A light groan echoed from a limp body at the bottom of the crater, instantly disturbing the stillness. It was hardly visible through the clouds of dust that surrounded it.

"There's somebody down there!" a voice yelled as the air finally started to clear, revealing a still form. A boy laid there motionlessly, only his chest's faint rising and falling indicated that he was still alive. His clothes were torn beyond recognition, but the remains of his once vibrant orange jumpsuit still stood out under the thick layer of dirt.

The only thing he could feel was the pain in his stomach. None of his senses seemed to act normally. He tried to breathe but the simple act of respiration was beyond him. Muffled voices echoed around him, as if he was submerged in water.

He groaned again faintly, as debris rained on his form as someone rushed toward his side, slipping down on the edge of the crater.

"Hey! Wait! That could be dangerous!" another voice shouted, sending another dose of small rocks at his already abused body. "Has he got a hitai-ate? Or anything to identify him?"

A gentle touch. Someone with small hands stroked the hair away from his face. A soft moan escaped at the feeling and his eyes slowly fluttered open.

But the only thing that registered in front of his eyes was something blue. Maybe the sky. A silhouette appeared above him. When he blinked and tried to focus his eyesight, he only achieved a new stabbing pain in them by the harsh sunlight. He tried to raise his hands to cover his face, but they fell back to the hard ground.

"Hey blondie, stay still. I'll help you," someone whispered gently above him.

The still lingering soft dust irritated his lungs and his throat, and his chest squeezed to cough. However, after the sudden stabbing pain, he had to force down the urge. His ribs screamed inside his chest by the sudden strain.

A warm sensation entered his stomach and seeped into his internal organs while green light reached his eyes. He tried to speak, tried to push out any word, but the only thing he managed was another groan. The pain in his abdomen increased and he gladly accepted the offered unconsciousness.

Muffled noises rapped harshly in his sore ears and brain. He tried to groan in his displeasure but he couldn't even moan. Consciousness returned to him slowly as he started to hear the conversation next to him. He vaguely registered a sterile felt his mind become clear but he didn't open his eyes. He strengthened his senses as much as he could and tried to detect any other presences in the room with him.

"So, how is our patient today?" the faint sound of flipping pages could be heard.

There were only the two men talking around him. They reeked of disinfectant, blood, and illness. Must be some kind of medic. He mused bed was uncomfortably hard beneath him, he registered faintly.

"Surprisingly well after how he had arrived here. I bet he will regain consciousness soon with his extremely high regeneration process. Wanna join the bet? I'm all finished with my shift, he was the last one. Wanna go grab some coffee? We can discuss the bet there."

"Sure."

His eyes snapped opened as he heard the door fall shut, but he regretted the motion immediately. The sudden light stabbed him painfully and he squeezed them shut again.

Gradually, he tried again, blinking rapidly to clear away the fog of his vision.

There was nothing but white around him. White ceilings, white walls … white machines beside him. Yup. Hospital. He closed his eyes and tried to think. I was fighting with … wait … hospital?! He jerked up on the bed and doubled over immediately gripping his stomach at a harsh pain in it. His scream echoed through the room and most likely over the whole section.

Panting heavily, he mapped his surroundings and looked for an escape route. He checked every corner for an exit but couldn't even find a window. Then he realized he couldn't feel his chakra flow, and recognized a familiar pattern covering his forearms. A chakra binding seal. His brows immediately raised in confusion.

Just a second after he screamed, people rushed into the room. Two appeared to be medical staff, judging by their white uniforms. Most likely the ones who were discussing the bet over his recovery. His eyebrow raised until it reached his hairline and his eyes were wide open as four cloaked and masked people appear next to his bed. He glanced up at the masked soldiers and then to the medics in confusion.

"Ah. How are you feeling?" asked one of the medics after he shook off his surprise. He received no answer, only a suspicious, sharp glance from the man's electric blue eyes as he finally also gathered his composure.

A seventh man entered the room. The blond immediately locked his gaze on the newcomer in green vest.

"Who are you and what are your purposes here?" asked one of the masked men as he stepped closer to his bed.

However, he didn't hear the question, freezing at the sight in front of him. His pools was locked on the symbol on his hitai-ate. A whirl with a stripe and a triangle. A stylized leaf.

Confusion ran across his face, but it was soon replaced with a pained grimace. His expression finally hardened and his eyes narrowed as he forced his brain to work as fast as it could. 'Come on. Remember. Remember. I was fighting… I hit that jerk with my last Rasengan and then… Oh shit…'

"Idiot, egotistical, red eyed son of a…." he hissed between his clenched teeth and squeezed his eyes shut. The people in the room froze at the statement and shared confused looks.

Suddenly he jerked his head up. "Why are you doing this to me?!" he shot toward the white ceiling. "Is this really necessary?" His voice died down to a soft whisper. He locked his gaze at the empty surface for a long minute, maybe waiting for an answer. But, not surprisingly none came.

He flung his legs off the bed and hopped down, only to wobble from the sudden burden. With a surprised look, he noticed that other than his boxers and bandages, he was naked.

"Wow. Great plan you red-eyed moron. Embarrass me to death," he muttered and shook his head with irritation.

The medical staff could do nothing more than take a step backward when the boy slowly raised his hands in front of his chest, attempting to perform a familiar jutsu. One of the ANBU jumped closer, gripped his hand and hissed, "Don't bother trying anything. Your chakra is already sealed away. You can't even perform a kawarimi."

The only visible reaction was a raised eyebrow as the boy stared at the Cat mask, as if he was silently accusing him of being an idiot. "This is the stupidest genjutsu ever…" he muttered to himself, shaking his head disapprovingly once more.

"Genjutsu?" asked back the confused Cat.

The boy didn't answer, instead finished what he started "KAI!"

The effect was instantaneous as a shockwave of chakra flew from the center. Only the four ANBU were able to stay on their feet, everyone else stared at the boy wide-eyed from the ground.

"What the hell?!" he mumbled. "What the hell is going on!? KAI!"

Another chakra wave lashed out from him, bigger than anything they'd ever felt. It sent them all crashing into the walls, knocking most of them unconscious with its force.

At this point, in the center of the village, an old man let his mouth drop; his ever-present pipe fell to the desk with a clatter, spreading ash and embers across the papers and scrolls waiting to be inspected and signed.

In the hospital, the boy burst through the room's only exit to come face to face with another small group of people in the hall. He froze immediately, wide-eyed, as he looked at the older man standing before him, Surprisingly, the older man also paused and stared in disbelief despite his years of experience on the battlefield.

It was like looking into a mirror, their age and some minor physical characteristics the only difference between them.

The boy suddenly averted his eyes, as if he didn't dare to face the man in the hall anymore, like a small child would do, who couldn't look up to his parents' eyes after doing something bad. He glanced back at the newcomer only from the corners of his eyes. The boy finally braced himself to look back at the man, his pools were filled with sadness, love and… shame? before he closed his eyes and muttered to himself, "You're not here. You aren't real. Everything is just part of his sick mind game."

"Minato! Brace yourself!" one of the man's comrades barked in an attempt to break said man's frozen state.

"I know," he hissed back.

The boy snapped his head toward the voice as he also came out of his temporary stasis. While his attention was focused on the shouting man behind Minato, a strange kunai with three prongs flew towards him. He didn't even bother to deflect it, he just leaned his head to the left to let it pass by him. At the moment the weapon passed his ear, Minato's form appeared behind him, with the same blade pointed to his neck, ready to slice his throat open. Nothing had been visible, only the yellow flash of his golden hair.

"You know I'm as real as the weapon which threatens to slice your neck."

"I don't think so," the younger blond replied as if they were casually discussing their day over a bottle of sake. "But I always wanted to see this with my own eyes. Or… whatever. Great. Now I'm talking to myself."

"What are you talking about?" Minato blurted out.

"Shinobi fighting lesson number two: Genjutsu." he stated casually with the air of a sensei. "Kurama! Would you please be so kind as to do something about this ridiculous situation?"

"Naruto…I think this isn't a genjutsu."

Naruto's eyes widened and in the next blink he entered his well-known mindscape, the canal where the Nine-Tailed Fox enjoyed his hospitality.

However, during the last half year, it had changed. It still resembled an underground canal, but in the middle of the ankle deep water, there was a large patch of green grass with soft light and slowly swinging osier trees despite the lack of wind in the place. A bright orange canine rose behind the trees and watched the boy with his glowing red eyes.

"What?" Naruto asked, a strain in his voice.

It revealed its razor sharp teeth and answered with a puzzled expression. "I said, I think this isn't a genjutsu."

"What do you mean this isn't a genjutsu? This must be because of that bastard's sharingan! The last thing I remembered when that red-eyed—" Naruto's breathing and heart rate increased, while something squeezed his chest inside his mindscape. Thoughts raced inside his mind with insane speed, the irritation was slowly replaced by panic and confusion.

The giant fox narrowed his flaming eyes and barked out to snap his jailer out from his state. "Calm down you idiot or you'll get us killed! I'm trying to figure out what's going on and think of a plan!"

And with a flicker of an enormous tail, Naruto was kicked out forcefully from his own mindscape.

Minato was still holding his kunai to his neck. Naruto's breathing soon became grasping as thoughts raced across his mind. Then he suddenly closed his eyes, with a deep frown on his face, obviously started to think.

"Just calm down!" Minato hissed into his ear.

A heavy snap echoed in the passage and Minato's stomach twisted as he blinked down with one eye just to see what he had already known. The boy had broken his own finger on his left hand. His index finger was now accusingly pointing at him at an awkward angle. When nothing changed, Naruto slowly turned his head to look over his shoulder, the kunai drew a thin red line on his neck. Not so deep as to threaten his life, but deep enough for any other shinobi to hiss in pain. But Naruto didn't show any sign of pain, his wide and confused eyes were glued on Minato.

The mixture of emotions fell from his face. Denial. Confusion. Relief. Than devastating joy.

"Now do you see that I'm speaking the truth about this being reality and not a genjutsu?" Minato muttered once again to the boy, who winced as an only reaction when his voice reached his ears. His eyes were still stared at him unblinkingly.

"This is impossible," he finally pressed out in a powerless voice, muttering more to himself than to the surrounding people or to Minato.

"I told myself the same thing when I felt that burst of chakra back at my office."

The voice came from beyond the shinobi in front of him, who were now parting as someone approached. The boy froze and his muscles tensed. Naruto tried desperately to will his body to remain upright. His lungs began to burn, screaming for air despite his quickening breath, and a cold feeling seeped into him.

Suddenly, his body refused to hold his weight and he crumpled limply to the cold floor. Minato had just barely been able to move the three-pronged weapon away before it could seriously wound the trembling boy.

Naruto dimly heard that the fox was speaking to him continuously, but he couldn't comprehend Kurama's fading words anymore. He looked up just in time to see a familiar old man step in front of him in a white robe, a pipe protruding from his mouth, before his vision started to become foggy. He could still smell the familiar scent of the burning tobacco wafting from his pipe.

"Jiji," he softly whispered toward the aging man's blurry silhouette.

The raw panic that had been clutching his mind and soul began to shift, morphing into a semblance of hope as his vision closed in on itself. His lungs were desperately pulling in air but it still felt like he couldn't breathe. No longer able to withstand the stress of his situation and over-rampant emotions, his mind surrendered the fight to stay conscious.

He passed out with a gentle smile on his face with one last glance toward the blurry image of the old man, his eyes full of hope, before his eyelids buried his irises.

Sarutobi looked up from the unmoving body to meet Minato's blue pools, with the same unmistakable shade which only seconds ago looked up at him from the floor, hope, relief, respect, and… love abundant within them.

Sarutobi sighed and turned fully toward Minato. "I would be very pleased if you could explain what the hell happened here within the last five minutes."

Minato blinked and stayed silent, his eyes still glued on the motionless form at his feet.

"Minato?"

The named man shook his head with a confused expression on his face. "I don't know. I really don't."

Minato had decided to stay with the boy when he had lost consciousness. He slowly stood up from his chair next to the door and walked to the bed where the young boy laid beneath the white sheets. 'He couldn't be more than eighteen. Possibly less.'

Originally he had been asked to check on the boy because a sealing scroll and many tags with seals transcribed on them had been found among his belongings when they brought him to the village. They couldn't figure out if they were dangerous, or even what they were for.

When Minato had first seen him, he'd frozen. He hadn't reacted like that in years, not since he'd been promoted to chuunin. He'd frozen from surprise. If he hadn't seen his parents die during the war he could have sworn they were relatives. The boy's hair was slightly shorter, his facial features were a little rougher, there were strange whisker marks on his cheeks, but he resembled Minato too closely. His eyes were the same color, same as his own and his father's. Exact copies, right down to the little white flecks in the center.

What really upset him was the boy's strength. A Hyuuga medic had already checked his chakra system before he first woke up, and he said that the boy had extremely well-developed chakra coils: something that someone at his age would never have. Only the veteran of veterans should have had a chakra system developed to that level. The Hyuuga could only compare it to Sarutobi. To the Hokage himself!

Minato sighed and strolled back to his chair. They made a lot of security enhancements because of the boy. When he woke up for the first time he knocked out four ANBU, one Jounin and two medical ninja with his chakra pulse to release a non-existent Genjutsu. Now, two whole ANBU squads were surveying him, and Minato also put a new chakra binding seal on him, which would continuously consume most of his chakra and leave the boy on the level of a normal civilian. As extra precaution, he also put paralyzing seals on the boy, so when he woke up the only thing he'd be able to do is blink. A special treatment to restrain even a rampaging Kage.

His thought was interrupted by a new sound from the bed as a groan escaped from the boy's mouth.

He blinked in surprise as he tried to raise his hands to reach his throbbing forehead. But he couldn't move his arms, as a pair of bindings tightly constricted his wrists and ankles. Nor could he move any other parts of his body, not even his pinky. They were heavy as lead. The only thing he could do was blink and groan.

"If you stay still this time, I'll remove some of the paralysis seals, so you can move a little and speak properly." a strict voice said from one of the corners. His eyes snapped toward the voice, but he still couldn't see who was speaking.

"Blink once if you understand, then twice if you accept the deal."

The boy hastily blinked three times and a blond man appeared in his line of sight and towered above him. The man eyed him suspiciously with a frown on his face, but after a short moment he put his hands down on several parts of his captive's body and channeled chakra into them.

Finally, he started to feel something. But every part of his body that was released was now tingling with numbness, like there were thousands of ants marching inside his veins. He grimaced and hissed at the uncomfortable feeling.

The other blond above him give a small smile, but his eyes were observing every twitch of his muscles suspiciously. "The numbness will wear off in a minute."

The blond only nodded and shut his eyes tightly, waiting for the remaining tingling sensation to wear off from his body.

"Can you talk?"

"Y-Yes," the young blonde's voice cracked back to him. "W-Why am I f-fettered?"

"I'm asking the questions. Once I'm finished, you can ask whatever you'd like. Understood?" The young blond immediately nodded and shut his halfway opened mouth. "What are your purposes here?"

"I-I don't k-know. Where am I anyway?"

Minato didn't answer, only asked another question in the same commanding tone. "Why did you think this was a genjutsu?"

"Genjutsu?", the boy muttered confusedly. "What genjutsu?"

A deep frown crawled up on Minato's face as he chose his next words carefully. "Do you know me?"

"This is the first time I've seen you."

Minato blinked in surprise and his eyebrows creased as he frowned. "What's your name, rank, and village?"

"I…." The boy stopped and stayed in silence for several seconds. His gaze dimmed as he concentrated for long, silent seconds.

"Answer the question!" Minato barked out in a commanding voice, making the young blond flinch, his eyes suddenly focused again. The voice lacked any kindness, only contained the impatient demand.

"I…" He stared to his left just like someone who does his hardest to remember something. Or to make up something. His eyes suddenly widened. "I don't know! I don't remember a thing!"

Author's note

Every review will be answered by pm, I don't want to overflow the story with replies.

If you don't like my story, just know that I'm doing it absolutely only for my own entertainment. Nothing more, nothing less.

If anyone is interested, the awesome Blazekit made an audio fic from this story. You can find the link in my profile. :-)