Title: The Time Shadow

Main Characters: Minato Namikaze, Naruto Uzumaki.

Secondary Characters: Jiraiya, Kakashi Hatake, Others.

Setting: After the Second Great Shinobi War for Minato, before his learning of the Rasenshuriken for Naruto.

Disclaimer: I obviously do not own Naruto.

A/N: So, this is my first Naruto fanfiction and I have not write so much in general. English is not my main language and I hope my mistakes won't mind you too much.

This is a PROLOGUE. It isn't that important for the plot I have in mind. I could have easily started with the next chapter, but I needed to do this and give you an insight of Minato first. I hope you like how I characterized him, even if this chapter isn't that long.

Both Naruto and Minato will be sixteen.

No pairings (or at least, not centered on pairings).

Time-travel (I hope you'll like it even if it lack originality on that thing).

PROLOGUE

In was a quiet night. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary for once in a while. All the genin teams had already reported their successful D /C-ranked missions, as did most of the chuunin with their B-ranks. Some of them stood sleepily near the gates for guard duty, while the jounin were seen returning from the Hokage Tower after their late reports, presumably about A-ranked solo missions.

ANBU-nin were still probably 'roaming around', doing whatever the Hokage had ordered them to do. However, it was difficult to tell since no standard-nin could easily pinpoint them.

That was why nobody seemed to notice one of them currently sitting cross-legged on the top of the Sandaime Hokake's head at the Hokage Monument.

The young man sat in a sort of meditative stance. Face slightly frowned in concentration, hands resting on his lap. The wind gently brushed his blond hair out of his face, only to keep his course behind him to the trees, breaking the silence it usually reigned there.

The blond shinobi's stillness could have easily fooled most untrained eyes, believing him to be turned into a stone, but the odd picture suddenly broke as the young man snapped his eyes open, revealing a strange tone on yellow, black and orange, but full of determination nonetheless.

The young ANBU stood and took a deep breath. After placing a fox mask on his face, he shunshined out of the place, straightly heading towards the Hokage Tower, intent on finding what he was looking for.

J... J... Jin- UHG. Why there's nothing even here!

The blond shinobi silently sighed, but his expression betrayed none of his increasing frustration. He began scrutinizing all the J-section of kinjutsu from the beginning… again.

Well, there weren't many jutsu starting with the letter J anyway. He quickly realized that. Ne needed to start looking in other sections too.

He sighed again, dejected. After all, he should have not taken for granted that a Jutsu able to made someone a Jinchuuriki would be called Jinchuuriki Jutsu… or Jinchuuriki Seal Jutsu…. or Jin-something Jutsu.

He groaned in frustration, but managed not to make much noise. If someone ever found out that he -the always disciplined and role-model-shinobi in his whole generation Minato Namikaze- was illegally stuffing his nose into forbidden scrolls, looking for something he was absolutely NOT supposed to know… well he would be in very big trouble.

Minato suppressed a nervous shudder and kept on his search. This time, unrolling every scroll whose label might imply that what he was looking for was inside said scroll.

He was not doing something wrong, he kept reminding himself. He just wanted to know which Jutsu turned his friend into a Jinchuuriki and study it, so that he would be able to help her in the future if needed.

He hoped not, but still…

He stopped searching for a moment, remembering the day she confided to him. It had been a rogue day for her, he had been able to see it her watery eyes. She had needed someone to share with her that awful burden, even if it was an SS-class secret. And who would that be if not Minato? They had been close friends since he saved her from Kumo nin that night.

He really cared for her. He would do anything to help her.

The information she gave him surprised him, of course. He had been shocked, but his opinion of her never changed a bit –to her initial surprise- and he swore to himself that she would not ever be alone in this thing. He would be at her side. Hell, we would even become a Seal Master just for helping her!

He stopped his thoughts at that and blinked, bemused, taken aback by his own fierce mental words. Well… it was true that the day after her revelation he had thrown himself head-first into the basic of fuuinjutsu and had read all the information about Tailed Beasts and Jinchuuriki available at the public Library (very little information). However, he eventually came to the realization that he needed to study actual Jutsu on the matter to make a significant step further.

He hated not making steps further.

So. To Hell the good guy for once. He was ANBU. They will NOT catch him.

His Sage Mode strengthened senses alerted him in that instant that someone was nearing his position. He shifted his eyes on the left and focused on his senses again. A faint torch light appeared at the end of the otherwise dark large labyrinth of a room. The sound of footsteps made his heart pound in his chest but he forced his mind to maintain the control of the situation, recalling the simple-but-effective seal he had made to mask his position, making the light subtly divert from him.

It wouldn't work if the light hit him plumb, so he slowly stood and leaned flat against the wall of scrolls in the library, silently wishing to be a Mokuton user and merge with it.

However, the far light merely lit the hallway he was in once before the torch wielder turned it away and kept going in his walk through different ones.

Minato let a sigh of relief escape his mouth, but frowned.

Mental note: add some spare ANBU at guard of the kinjutsu when I become Hokage.

He decided it was time to flee. He would just finish checking quickly on the other H-starting Jutsu and then leave. He'd return at the next chance, he promised himself.

He was just going to use the shunshin when the last words he read on the last scroll made him freeze in overwhelming curiosity.

Hiraishin no Jutsu.

What…?

His reserve of Elemental Chakra dissipated and he abruptly exited Sage Mode.

The sudden change made him almost panic as he could not sense everyone and everything in his surrounding with that clarity anymore, but again he forced himself to calm down.

The Flying Thunder God Jutsu, it said. Whatever it was, it had to be amazing. Pity he had not the time to unroll it and take a quick look… Maybe only a little peak-

No. He was no more in Sage Mode. He couldn't risk it. He needed to leave now!

He mentally groaned in frustration. After all he went through, he just had to leave empty-handed without finding anything of importance about Jinchuuriki. It was so frustrating!

A smirk escaped his mouth as he made a single hand seal and a perfect-looking copy of the scroll pooped into his hands. He quickly switched the two so that the alarm would not wake up the whole village and took the original, hiding it in one of his pockets. Just then, he shunshined away, grinning like a child who managed to steal a candy.

Role-model-shinobi? Well, he felt a little bad for this. There was no excuse for his actions. It was a kinjutsu because it could easily kill the performer. That was the reason he should not… borrow it. But curiosity was practically written in his genes, and he was a studious, he didn't mean to actually use the Jutsu, just study it and understand its mechanics. Science had always fascinated him. He knew for sure that something called 'Flying Thunder God' could not but involve a lot of science before being a Jutsu.

Yes. He had just build himself an excuse for not feeling guilty. Good. Now he would rewrite the scroll on an unofficial blank one and then bring the original back on its rightful place.

Nobody would ever know he would gain knowledge about this Hiraishin no Jutsu.

Training ground 7. Noon. Nobody in sight (probably eating Lunch). Minato stood with a determined look on his face.

…

I'm going to die.

He had just spent the whole week trying to draw the seal that now laid displayed on a standard kunai stuck on the trunk of a tree in front of him.

Actually, to invent the seal. Because yes, this damn Jutsu needed a different anchor seal for each performer. No, he couldn't just copy the Nindaime's one as one would eventually take for granted! Why would it be there then! It took him three days only to realise he needed to build his own seal. And that was ways more easy to say than do.

At the beginning, he had to admit, it excited him. It was like solving a math problem (a very difficult one). However, after thousands and thousands of failed attempts, one simply began to hate and course the thing to the most awful of all the Shinigami's hellish tortures.

And that was just the last part to learn.

The first part was what Minato was supposed to stop at. It was the most difficult, because you don't need big Chakra reserves, great Chakra control, or awesome body strength to perform the Jutsu.

No. You just need a big-damn-sized Hell of a brain to understand all the shit that was in it.

And Minato humbly had it. It took him two weeks of intense study to fully grasp the meaning of all those concepts on his own. Space-Time, fourth dimension, wormholes, distortions of said Space-Time…

It had been hard, but in the end he felt all the information he gathered from the scroll turn into knowledge. He had been satisfied with himself and had been about to burn the copy of the scroll and get rid of all the trails left by his little stunt, but he found himself unable to forget what made the Jutsu so special.

Nobody but the Nindaime was ever able to perform it, and it was because nobody had ever been able to comprehend its deep physical meaning.

Sure, he'd like someone to answer all the questions those odd assumptions triggered, but he could manage. And he did manage! After all, just the fact of being able to finish a seal of that kind was something (even if it didn't work), wasn't it?

What if he was even able to perform the Jutsu?

It was dangerous, he knew. But it was only if you didn't know what you were doing, right? Did he know what he was doing?

Maybe I should wait for Sensei to come back…

No. Jiraiya wouldn't let him do it… or yes? Well… maybe. After getting mad, of course. But he was not here now.

He would not be here for a long while, Tsunade-sama said…

Minato forced his thoughts back on the matter at hand. He needed absolute concentration. If the seal was wrong, he knew nothing would happen. He would need to draw another one, but he was sure this one was good. Now, it was a matter of how activate it. The danger laid there.

"You need to channel the right amount of chakra into it and be aware of how the time-space envelops around you and forms a wormhole. You need to curve the space-time at the right angle and bring your current position to the one marked by the anchor seal that shall act as a beacon."

The scroll said it would be much simpler after the first time too…

Theory. It was time for practice.

Minato took a deep breath, help himself with some hand seals (he had to invent them too because at the top level of the jutsu you won't need them and so weren't on the scroll) and shoving the dread feeling aside he activated the Hiraishin no Jutsu.

FLASH-

Uh?

He looked around and found himself standing right beside his kunai on the trunk.

Did I…?

Adrenaline flowed into his veins and his sight fogged in overwhelming excitement.

I did it!

His sight worsened and a feeling of nausea pervaded his suddenly weakened senses. Stumbling a little, he run towards the nearer bush and punctually threw up.

Minato grinned despite the situation. Just wait for it, Sensei!

Sandaime Hokage – Third Hokage

Shunshin no Jutsu – Body Flicker Technique

Kinjutsu - Forbidden Techniques

Fuuinjutsu - Sealing Techniques

Mokuton – Wood style

Hiraishin no Jutsu – Flying Thunder God Technique

Nindaime Hokage – Second Hokage

A/N: Hope you got a little bit interested! I know nothing special for the plot happened here and I know you had probably found out many mistakes. I'll be more than happy if someone decided to join me on this story in the future and Beta-read it. Please give me feedback if you can. Reviews or only followers would be great! I'll update in these days and hope you will enjoy my work as much as I'm enjoying it!