-I don't own Naruto. Naruto was created by Kishimoto, please support the official release.-

Italics are thoughts. -Italics inside hyphens are the setting-

"Italics in quotation marks represent the Mind Body Transmission Jutsu/Shindenshin Jutsu (Telepathy) of the Yamanka Clan"

-The Land of Earth: Iwagakure, the Village Hidden in the Stone-

Onoiki sat at his desk, reflecting. The old man held no love for Konoha, and watching them slowly rebuild their two most important clans over the past couple of years had been disheartening and worrying. Now, it seemed that the Uzumaki would be added to the list of powerful clans upon which Konoha could call. Naturally, this was of great concern to Iwagakure, where Konoha was considered their most hated enemy.

Ever since Konoha had announced the revival of the Uzumaki Clan the previous year, Iwa's spies had been digging up as much information as possible, and a year later that information was finally on Onoiki's desk, compiled into one big report for him.

It was very thorough. Detailed reports on finances, strengths and weaknesses of the three known members, their associates, possible allies and enemies within the village, and abroad. Among all the details, one particular paragraph stood out to him.

"The Clan's new leader is a young boy named Naruto Uzumaki. He is 16 years old, and a jonin of Konoha's barrier Corp, by the time this report is filed, he will be married to the daughter of Inoichi Yamanaka. He appears to be only partially Uzumaki, since he lacks the clan's distinctive hair color. His appearance is highly reminiscent of The Namikaze, but it is well known that The Namikaze had no children. Tsunade Senju seems to view the boy like family, so perhaps heis the offspring of some union between survivors of the two clans?"

Minato Namikaze, or simply "The Namikaze" as Iwa referred to him, was the single most hated man in the entire Land of Earth. If there was definitive evidence that this Naruto was The Namikaze's child, than every single resident of Iwa would gladly follow Onoiki to the metaphorical gates of hell to kill him. Such was the collective hatred Iwa felt for their old enemy, that a lesser Tsuchikage may have declared war just based on the fact that the boy looked so much like the Yellow Flash, but Onoiki wasn't known as the "Fence Sitter" without reason.

The intelligence archives of Iwa were full of conspiracy theories about the possible survival, or existence of relatives of, The Namikaze. The village conspiracy theorists were fully consumed by the idea that the single most evil man to ever exist, at least as far as the Stone village was concerned, was still alive. If Onoiki listened to all of them, the village would constantly be at war.

Unless the spies proved without a doubt that Minato Namikaze had a child, and that child was this "Naruto," or if they proved the old conspiracy theory that the Yellow Flash was secretly the child of Jiraya and Tsunade, Iwa would watch and wait. The moment it was confirmed that a relative of that man still lived, Onoiki would issue an ultimatum to turn said relative over to Iwagakure for immediate execution, and if that was ignored, there would be war!

With those thoughts on his mind, Onoiki wrote a response to the head of the village's spy network in the Land of Fire: "Continue to monitor the Uzumaki Clan, but do not pay them any more special attention than you do the Uchiha or Senju. Assume the boy has no connection to TN unless you have definitive proof otherwise. Do not allow some conspiracy theory to lead you to pull resources away from spying on all of the other 9 clans, and on their military forces in general. We've wasted far too many resources chasing down TN'sphantom relatives, only to constantly proved wrong. I won't allow it anymore."

-The Ruins of Uzu-

Neji had just finished using a stick to draw a rough map of Uzu in the dirt, as Kakashi went over the plans for rescuing the mysterious red-headed woman. "We'll split into two teams. Neji, Gai, and I will maintain a secure area and standby to help as needed. Naruto, Ino, Kiba, and Karin will sneak through one of the holes in the walls, and go rescue the woman."

"She's currently being held in a cage inside this building" Neji said, pointing to a large rectangle near the center of his rudimentary map. "I think if you approach from here," he said pointing to a spot on the opposite side of the ruins from their current location, "it should minimize the amount of enemies you encounter en route to your destination."

"Once we have her," Naruto said, "Karin-chan and Ino-chan will get her out of the ruins and head to our rendezvous point, while Kiba and I cover their exit. It'll be the middle of the night, so hopefully most of the guards will be sleeping and we won't have to fight, but Kiba and I will be ready in case stealth fails."

"No." Ino responded, "I'm supposed to be your bodyguard, not Kiba-kun, I'm not leaving your side." "Ino-chan," Naruto said, trying to reason with her, "I appreciate how much better you have gotten these last few months, but Kiba and I are still far stronger than you. We don't have a three year gap in our training."

"Naruto, as someone who has been married a few years longer than you, all you're doing is making it so she is going to be mad at you for a longer period of time." Kakashi said, knowing from experience, and given that Ino was even more fiery and stubborn than Shizune...Kakashi really hoped Naruto wised up, and quick.

"Ok, ok, fine. Ino-chan will be with me, and Kiba will be with Karin-chan." Naruto said, the look of murderous intent in Ino's eyes and Kakshi's words of advice combining to win him over.

"Everyone clear on the plan?" Kakashi asked, making sure to make eye contact with everyone in order to confirm. "Yosh, Naruto-kun, signal us if your team needs help, and we'll youthfully charge in to assist. If I end up causing problems for you, I will run 10,000 laps around the ruins of Uzu on nothing more that my index fingers!" Gai said, in what was the loudest whisper anyone had ever heard, trying to keep his voice down given their proximity to the gates, but unable to contain his enthusiasm.

Neji looked extremely embarrassed at his sensei's actions, but then again he and Tenten were well known to be the only reasonably sane members of their old team, so no one held Gai's antics against the Hyuga.

"All right, good luck guys, stay safe." Neji said, and as the four current and future Uzumaki were leaving, The four of them just nodded in return, acknowledging Neji's words, but focusing on their mission.

-One Hour Later-

Uzu was surrounded by walls on three sides, and the ocean on the fourth. The Walls only had two gates, but over the years of neglect, a few cracks had opened up in the walls. One such crack was actually big enough for people to fit through, and it was here that the Uzumaki stopped and prepared to sneak into the ruins of their home.

Ino and Naruto waited for Kiba, Akamaru, and Karin to finish a preliminary reconnaissance, which consisted of Karin sitting in a meditative position, eyes closed, totally focused on her sensory abilities, while Kiba and Akamaru alternated between sniffing around the area and guarding Karin.

Kiba and Akamaru were finished long before Karin was, they were just sniffing out the immediate area where as Karin was trying to use her sensory ability to figure out the movement patters of the guards, something that took much more concentration than just identifying where a chakra signature was.

About an hour after they parted ways with the escort team, and a half hour after they arrived at the infiltration point, Karin finally stirred. "No good, they don't have any patterns to their movements. The good news is that our immediate vicinity is clear, and the area around their captive is only lightly guarded, and by people who have pathetically low chakra signatures, we shouldn't have too much trouble."

"Where are the people with larger chakra signatures?" Ino asked. "About half a kilometer from the building our potential clanswoman is in. In the center of the main bandit camp, the outskirts of which stop right before the building we need to go to." Karin responded.

"Alright, we're shinobi, that's doable." Naruto said. "Stealth is our objective everyone. That being said, quiet kills are ok. Once we have the woman, it doesn't matter if they discover bodies or not. We just don't want to draw attention to ourselves while we are infiltrating."

Everyone nodded, taking his words to heart. The Uzumaki would kill to protect their own, or in this case, people that were possibly their own. Naruto looked each of the other three humans and one dog in the eye, making sure everyone was ready, and then gave the Konoha hand signal for "move out."

Five shadows crept through the hole in the perimeter wall. As Kiba, Akamaru, and Karin had all discovered, it was unguarded.

They found themselves in a very ruined section of Uzu. No buildings were recognizable, but the amount of rubble indicated this area had once been home to many buildings. A study of Kushina's maps and notes prior to infiltration had revealed that this area had once been predominately residential, for the non-Uzumaki citizens of the village.

However, due to its close location to a perimeter wall, it had been leveled in the final assault, and the ensuing inferno. It was a testament to just how strong the walls of Uzu were, that they still stood with only a few large cracks and holes, while everything next to them was completely destroyed.

Moving swiftly, they made their way towards the central part of the ruins, what had once been the government district, the ruins of which housed the captive woman, and just beyond, the bandits' main encampment.

Given that the bandits had been in the ruins for years and had never encountered intruders, most of their security was keeping people out of the ruins. Within the ruins, there were relatively few guards, and the Uzumaki team found that it was quite easy to make it to their destination undetected.

Just before arriving at their destination, they stopped and hid themselves behind a pile of rubble, as Karin and Kiba went to work, using their abilities to check the area around the mysterious woman.

Both were in agreement, there was just one guard. Karin added that he seemed to have larger and stronger chakra reserves than most of the bandits, indicating he likely had some shinobi or samurai training. But even then, his chakra seemed to be at the same level of refinement of a rookie genin, or perhaps talented academy student. Nothing that would pose a threat to a group of four chunin and jonin. Quickly and quietly dispatching the guard would the be easy part.

The hard part, as Ino pointed out, would be convincing the poor, captive woman that they were there to help her, and to that end the newest member of the Uzumaki clan had a plan that she thought would work. After a few moments of discussion and debate, everyone agreed that Ino's plan was a good idea, and almost immediately they went to work, putting it into action.

The bandit guarding the prisoner was bored. The woman never caused any problems, any will to resist the bandits' orders had long been beaten out of her, and her cell was generally kept well stocked of food and water. The boss wanted the woman to be in good health, physically at least. Guards were really only there so that someone could respond in case of emergency. It was a boring assignment.

So he was surprised when a dog nonchalantly strolled into the crumbling building. There was a small population of feral animals around the ruins of Uzu, descendants of pets who had survived the village's destruction, but they generally avoided the human inhabitants.

Curious, the guard slowly moved closer to the dog, who seemed frozen in fear, as if it had just realized there were humans present. The guard continued to creep forward, and as he did so, he passed a hole in the wall.

Crouched in vegetation on the other side of the hole in the wall wall were Naruto and Ino, and the former Yamanaka had her hands and arms out in a familiar position: The Shintenshin, the same technique she had tried to use on Sakura in those first chunin exams years ago.

With her target now in sight, she gave her husband a quick kiss after muttering "wish me luck" and then activated the jutsu. As her soul raced towards her target, her body crumpled into Naruto's arms, as he began his part of the plan: guard his wife's body until she returned to it.

In a matter of just a few seconds, Ino found herself fully in control of the bandit's body, with Akamaru looking at her curiously, wondering who was now in control. "Good job, Akamaru-kun." She said, letting him know she had succeeded "you made the perfect decoy."

Ino then turned around to face the hole in the wall, and blew a kiss towards Naruto, letting him know she had succeeded, but her husband seemed to have mixed feelings about seeing a grown, scraggly, scruffy bandit blow him a kiss, even if his wife's soul was currently occupying the body.

Having let Akamaru and Naruto know that she was safely in control of the bandit, Ino busied herself by taking stock of what her current host body had on it. Let's see here. We've got a rusty machete, a pair of handcuffs...aha! This key must open the woman's cell.

Key in hand, Ino made her way to the cell. The woman was awake, and before Ino could say anything she stood up from her "bed" and faced the far wall, hands behind her back in a position that would make it incredibly easy for someone to put handcuffs on her. Clearly, the woman had been broken to the point of compliance, and it made Ino's heart sink a little.

Ino quickly unlocked and opened the door, before softly saying "turn around please," though it sounded strange since it was in the bandit's voice.

The woman complied, but seemed confused by the fact that she hadn't been cuffed, and that her guard was being polite. She continued to silently stand against the wall, silently, clearly waiting for instructions.

Due to the fact that her birth clan specialized in the workings of the mind, Ino had some knowledge of what prisoners can go through mentally, and given how compliant she was, Ino was worried that she might resist the opportunity to escape, either out of fear of being caught and punished, or some form of Stockholm syndrome.

So rather than offering her freedom, Ino simply stayed in character, and adopted an authoritative tone: "Follow me, Prisoner." She walked out of the cell, and was pleased to see that she was followed by the red headed woman, and then quickly offered a "remain silent until I tell you that you can speak." Which was really designed to prevent her from possibly making noise and alerting other guards.

Before Ino left the decrepit building, she tried to activate the shindenshin jutsu, to let the other Uzumaki know what was going on, and to stay out of sight of the woman, but while this guard had some control of chakra, his reserves were far too weak for her to be able to use a technique of the level of the Shindenshin.

Instead, as soon as she set foot outside she was using Konoha Sign Language, a hand sign based language that served two purposes: communicating with deaf and mute residents of the village, and serving as a fully functional, non verbal language for shinobi to communicate with each other in instances where sound wasn't an option.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw that Naruto was reading her signals, and going out of his way to stay out of sight of the woman, still protectively holding Ino's actual body. Kiba, Karin, and Akamaru also seemed to get the message, because she wasn't able to see them at all.

Ino retraced her steps back towards the hole in the wall, followed by the mysterious red-head. She was on edge the whole time, but thankfully, they made it without incident. At the wall, Ino closed the distance between the woman and her, placing the bandit's hand over the woman's mouth, preventing her from making noise as Naruto, Kiba, and Karin revealed themselves.

"Everyone get out clear?" Naruto asked once Ino had guided the former prisoner through the hole, and everyone was safely on the outside of the ruins. "Yeah, I had to take out one guard before he noticed our guest, but I hid his body well enough." Kiba responded.

"Let's just hurry," Ino said, still possessing the bandit's body. "This body is gross, and I want to get out of it as soon as possible, but I figure we'll let Kakashi-sensei interrogate the guy."

"We'll move faster if we don't have to deal with her." Kiba said, motioning to the women who Ino still had a hold of, and who was clearly having some sort of panic attack, struggling to break free of bandit/Ino's grasp.

"I'll take care of it." Karin said, and quickly put a light, low level genjutsu on the woman, putting her to sleep.

"Once we get back and Ino gets back into her body, we'll talk to our guest here, while we let Kakashi-sensei talk to Ino's current host." Naruto said. "Tomorrow we're going to kick the bandits out of Uzu. Wether they leave alive or dead is dependent on if they've been holding one of our clanswomen prisoner or not."

-Back at their basecamp-

Phew, I'm glad to be back in my own body. Ino thought, as she watched Kakashi drag the startled bandit she had been inhabiting off for a "little chit-chat." She then mentally ran through the "post shintenshin checklist." A quick check of their body that every Yamanaka was trained to do upon releasing the jutsu. Of course, given that her husband had been guarding her body, nothing was off.

She then turned to said husband and offered him a lewd smile: "Have any fun with my body while I wasn't using it, Naru-kun?"

"What? No way! We're in the middle of a mission! Besides, I'd never do anything to your body without your consent." Naruto protested, causing Ino to put on a fake frown. "Really? You were able to resist the charms of my body? I gotta say, sometimes I wonder if you really are the legendary pervert's apprentice or not, Naruto-kun. If the roles had been reversed, I'd have been all over you.."

"Hmph." Naruto grunted, "unlike the Pervy Sage, I'm actually able to tell the difference between the time to be serious and the time for fun. Also, I think my definition of consent is a little stricter than his." Obviously not wanting to get into detail about their sex life in front of everyone, Naruto quickly changed the subject: when is our guest going to wake up, Karin-chan?"

"Whenever you're ready for her, Naruto-sama. I can release the genjutsu at any time."

Naruto nodded to Karin, then turned to speak to Gai, currently the most senior shinobi with the group, since Kakashi was off doing a preliminary interrogation of their most recent prisoner. "Gai-sensei, we're going to to go speak to the woman, I'd like some privacy, just my clan members."

"Of course, Naruto-kun. Just be sure to send your youthful wife over to my eternal rival at some point, after all her Yamanaka training will be useful in interrogating our captives!"

"Couldn't she have just read his memories while she was inhabiting his body?" Neji asked.

"No, I was too busy focusing on getting in and out as quickly and quietly as possible." Ino said. "Remember, my Yamanaka training isn't actually complete."

That was a lie. In his quest to curry favor with some member of the new Uzumaki Clan, Danzo had made sure his Yamanaka subordinates had given Ino a full clan education. Still, since the clan had officially stopped training her, she had to pretend like she only had a genin's skill level in Yamanaka secret techniques. Not even Naruto knew her true skill level, though she wasn't consciously withholding that information from him.

"Let's go," Naruto said, motioning to Ino and Karin, before picking up the woman. Kiba started to follow them as well, having been counted as an Uzumaki for most of this mission. However, Naruto held up a hand to him. "Sorry Kiba, but this one is for current Uzumaki only, there's a big difference between seeing our clan home and having a discussion where clan secrets might possibly come up."

Karin actually looked a bit upset, and despite her usual unquestioning loyalty to Naruto, looked like she might actually protest against leaving her betrothed out, but Kiba forestalled any protests by insisting that he understood, and that it didn't bother him.

A few minutes later, after making sure they were out of earshot of everyone else, Naruto leaned the woman against another tree, and directed Karin to release the genjutsu. For a moment, the woman showed no reaction, but slowly she began to stir.

When her eyes finally opened, it took a bit for her to process where she was, and her immediate reaction was fear. Clearly, she was worried not about who the strangers around her were, but what the bandits would do to her. Her initial action was just to leave and go back to her captors, hoping she could convince them to have mercy, it wasn't her fault that she escaped.

Eventually, Naruto, Karin, and Ino convinced the woman that she was safe, and she finally seemed to calm down, allowing the three Uzumaki to finally have a conversation with her.

"Hi there, my name's Naruto, Naruto Uzumaki, this is my wife Ino, and my clanswoman Karin. What's your name?" Naruto's voice was soft as he spoke, the woman had only just calmed down, he did not want to get her riled up again.

"H-Honoka." Came a clearly nervous response. "It's nice to meet you, Honoka-san. Do you happen to know your family name?" Ino asked. "No." The woman responded. "I've never known my family." "I'm sorry to hear that, I'm an orphan myself, so I know what it's like, though obviously I have family now thanks to these two." Naruto said, pointing to Ino and Karin.

"Honoka-san...how did you get to be a prisoner?" Karin asked, adjusting her glasses as she did.

"I was raised by a team of scientists on an island." Honoka said began, "They used my blood to seal things, but overall they were very kind to me. Some of them even treated me like a family member. I lived in that research facility most of my life. One day a monster killed everyone. I only escaped by playing dead." As she spoke, she grew more and more emotional. "A couple days later, Kazuko-sama and her crew showed up and insisted I come with them. I've been with them ever sense."

Naruto, Ino, and Karin listened with baited breath as Honoka recounted her life's story. It gave them quite a few clues. If scientists were using her blood for sealing, it was almost assured that she was an Uzumaki, even if she had no knowledge of the clan. The name Kazuko was also a clue, and almost immediately after Honoka mentioned the name, Naruto had a bingo book out, and was rifling through it.

Finding an entry for a kunoichi by that name, Naruto showed Honoka the picture, and it turned out to be a match. Kazuko Tamagachi was a missing-nin who had previously been affiliated with one of the minor villages, Getsugakure. She had apparently defected because she wasn't being given difficult enough assignments.

Kazuko was listed as an A rank Shinobi, with bounties on her head from a number of nations, two major nations and four minor ones wanted her dead, and her old home of Getsugakure wanted her dead or alive. Turning her over to them dead, and providing proof to all the other villages that wanted her dead would provide a good chunk of ryo to whoever did it.

The extra intel helped, and the three Uzumaki pressed ahead with a light interrogation of their likely elder clanswoman, with Ino taking the lead due to the fact that she had the most training for things like this. They learned a lot of details about the bandits from her, as well as her daily life.

Honoka was fed well, and allowed to exercise for a little bit each day, but was generally kept in her cage unless her blood was needed. She was being used to activate and deactivate seals in various places around the ruins, and had been a captive for about two years, having been taken prisoner when she was 22 years old. At 24, she was the oldest known Uzumaki, with everyone else 16.

Then came the difficult questions: Had anyone ever bitten her and sucked out blood or chakra? The answer was, thankfully, no. Either Honoka wasn't a pure blood, or her captors didn't know about that particular Kekkai Genkai. Had she ever been raped? Again, thankfully no. Had she ever been beaten? Yes, at first it happened almost every day, but after she stopped resisting her captors it was generally used only as a punishment.

Everyone's face turned a little darker after that, Naruto especially, and he hardly said anything for the rest of their discussion.

Finally, it was time for the big reveal: "Honoka-san, our clan, the Uzumaki Clan, is known for being able to seal things, and those ruins are the ruins of our home village. If your blood opens seals there, that means you're a member of our clan too. A member of our family. If you can prove that you can open such seals, we'd love for you to come home with us after this is all over."

"Wha-What?" Honoka froze. This was a metaphorical bombshell that she had not been expecting. "It's ok if you need to think about it, we came here to do our own expedition of the ruins, so after we kick the bandits out we'll still be here for a while." Karin added when the woman showed no reaction.

"You...you can't beat them, there's so many of them, and only three of you." Honoka said, concerned. "There's actually seven of us," Ino responded, "And we're all shinobi. Kazuko will be a challenge for us, but the regular bandits will be a piece of cake." Only when Ino brought up the fact that they were shinobi did Honoka notice the headbands they all wore, marking them as ninja of Konoha. In that moment, she had an epiphany.

"Yes, please." "Yes what, Honoka-san?" "Please take me with you." "Of course," Karin said, smiling. On the off chance this woman wasn't an Uzumaki, Konoha still had a program to resettle refugees, and this woman's situation was bad enough that she'd clearly have a strong case for asylum. Especially with a clan backing her claim, which the Uzumaki certainly would.

"If you don't mind, could you show us what your blood can do?" Naruto asked, he had been writing a seal during the last part of the conversation, and produced almost the exact same type of seal that he had used to convince Karin that he was an Uzumaki.

The prospect of actually having a real family was too much for Honoka to ignore, and she willingly let Ino take a small amount of her blood, which, when a little chakra was channeled into it, opened the seal. "It worked! Seems we're related, Honoka-chan!" Ino said, giving the older woman a hug, joined shortly by Karin.

When the embrace was over, all three women looked to Naruto, who stood by, a far off look in his eyes. "Uzumaki Honoka." Naruto said, his voice a bit distant as well, "as head of the Uzumaki Clan I promise you that no one will ever hurt you like that again. Come on, we should head back to the others."

20 minutes later, after whirlwind introductions to Kakashi, Gai, Neji, Kiba, and Akamaru, a mentally and emotionally exhausted Honoka fell asleep, as Naruto grimly gazed into the fire, it was about two hours until dawn. "Naruto, what's on your mind?" Kakashi said, sitting down next to his old student. "They hurt a member of my clan." Naruto said, his voice totally void of emotion. "Every single one of them dies. No mercy."

Unknown to them, the guards at the main gate of Uzu had quite an eventful shift. When their night had just begun, Naruto had been sneaking into the village to deactivate the seals that prevented Neji's Byakugan from looking into the village. Now, at the end of their shift, their deaths came swiftly, as Naruto clones jumped down from the walls, each one stabbing a Kunai into one of the bandit's heads as they landed.

With the gate guards out of the way, an army of Naruto and Karin clones snuck into the camp. The vast majority of the bandits were still asleep, and the clones simply entered the tents and slit their throats. An unlucky few were awake, but the vast majority of them simply didn't have the skill or chakra abilities to resist. There were some who could fight back, and even managed to dispel a clone or two, but these bandits were quickly overwhelmed by the large number of clones that had been sent into the ruins.

By the time six shinobi waltzed into the ruins of Uzu, there weren't many bandits left to fight. The clones had killed the vast majority of the bandit force, with only Kazuko Tamagachi, her two samurai body guards, and a small few others still holding out.

Each of the six shinobi heard a voice in their ear: Neji was back at camp, both to watch over Honoka and to provide information on the fight as he watched with his Byakugan, and thanks to the radio transmitters they were using, each Shinobi heard his plan.

The challenge would be Kazuko and her guards. The remaining clones could easily handle the others, and should be directed to do so. Meanwhile, Kakashi and Gai would distract the guards, while at Naruto's request Kazuko would be personally dealt with by the surviving members of the Uzumaki Clan.

As Naruto, Karin, Kiba, Ino, Gai, and Kakashi made their way toward Kazuko's location, any and all clones they ran across were told to make their way to the ruins of the Uzumaki temple, where the last few bandit holdouts besides their leader and her guards were. Once these stragglers were dealt with, the clones should dispel as quickly as possible, Naruto and Karin would need as much Chakra as possible for the upcoming fight.

Finally, their targets came into view. Kazuko had taken to higher ground, and was perched on top of one of the exterior walls, near where it met the ocean. Her long turquoise hair seemed to match the color of the sea as it swung about while she fought. On her head, the standard Getsugakure headband, which featured a crescent moon, had a large slash through the middle of it, indicating her choice to sever her allegiance to her old home.

At her side were two Samurai. Personal features of the two of them couldn't really be made out because of their thick armor, but it was clear that these were no ordinary samurai. Chakra was clearly being used to make their blades sharper, stronger, and faster. Clearly, these were ronin from the Land of Iron.

Sharp kicks from Gai and Kakashi surprised the two Samurai, who had been focusing on the clones around them, and they were knocked off the wall, leaving Kazuko by alone. Before she could even react to the sudden attack on her guards, the Getsugakure missing-nin was on the defensive, as 5 assailants attacked her.

"Children? Konoha sends Children after me?!" She said, incredulously, "The nerve of the great villages. Its because of places like Konoha that I couldn't find any challenging work and left home, and now they have the nerve to send children after me?!"

Any further complaining from Kazuko was quickly silenced. Individually, none of the Uzumaki were a match for her, but collectively they were proving to be a thorn in her side. Their teamwork was just too good.

Naruto and Ino, having trained together just about every day for a bit over a year, were perfectly in sync with each other. Ino's skills were best suited to a support role, which was fine because due to his incredible chakra reserves, Naruto was more of a brawler and a tank then anything else.

Naruto would fight while Ino would run through hand signs or make a fuinjutsu seal. Once it was ready, Naruto would disengage at just the perfect time, not giving Kazuko even a moment before Ino would fire off her technique, which was immediately followed up with a furious charge from the former Yamanaka heiress, pressing ahed with Uzumaki style Taiujutsu until her attack ran of out steam, at which point either Naruto would jump back in, or the fight would shift over to Karin, Kiba, and Akamaru.

Having spent their whole ninja careers together, Kiba and Akamaru were the ultimate example of incredible teamwork, and both worked well with Karin as well. Kiba and Akamaru would keep Kazuko distracted while Karin would prepare a technique, or wait for the right moment to lash out with her chains.

Slowly, they were wearing her down, but Kazuko seemed to be enjoying herself. "You kids are better than I thought you would be, and it was so kind of you to bring me a new Uzumaki." She said, staring at Karin as she did so. "Once I finish off the rest of you and beat the resistance out of her I can get back to learning the secrets of this place."

"You bitch!" Kiba yelled, growling and stepping in front of Karin. "Lay even one hand on her and I'll kill you."

"My my, so protective aren't we dog boy? What is she, your girlfriend?"

Kiba was provoked, and lashed out in rage, doing his best to defend Karin. Unfortunately, his mind was so clouded by his anger at what Kazuko wanted to do to fiance, that he missed the hand signs she was running through, and spikes of earth shot up, impaling Kiba. Both of his arms had been pierced, and one spike was sticking out of his lower left torso. No vital organs had been hit, but there was the distinct possibility that he'd bleed out.

Possibly hoping to speed that possibility up, Kazuko created a mud wall right underneath him, and in addition to dealing a direct hit to him, the mud wall pushed Kiba off of the spikes and launched him off the Uzu wall, where he collapsed into a heap on the ground.

"Kiba-kun!" Karin cried, rushing to his side. Akamaru looked conflicted, he clearly wanted to attend to his master as well, but wasn't comfortable abandoning Naurto and Ino to fight a superior foe alone. "It's ok, Akamaru, we've got this." Ino said, letting Akamaru take off. Her attention then turned to Naruto, actually, almost everyone who could still fight turned their attention to Naruto, and the distinctly foul KI he began giving off.

-Karin & Kiba-

"Hold on, Kiba-kun." Karin said with a hint of desperation in her voice, as green chakra came off her hands. No one had ever really bothered to train her in medical ninjutsu, but thanks to her new friendships in Konoha she had at least learned the mystic palm from Sakura, and through her time as a researcher for Orochimaru, she new enough anatomy to diagnose the problem.

Kiba had three holes going clean through his body. The most serious one was on his torso, with the other two, both much smaller, on his arms. Thankfully, bones and vital organs had all avoided being punctured. Also, due to the impact he took from the mudwall, he had a couple of fractured ribs and a concussion.

As Naruto's monstrous chakra flared up, Karin pushed all the red flags her sensory abilities were raising to the side, Kiba needed her focused. It was an easy task to close up the wounds on his arms and heal the fractured ribs. Mystic palm could take care of that no problem.

It was as she was working on the hole in his torso, that Kiba seemed to become aware of what was going on. "K-Karin."

"Shh, save your strength, Kiba-kun. I'll have you patched up soon, but this wound is a bit too big for me to just magically heal with chakra. I'll fix it up and get you out of danger, but you'll need to rest so it can heal."

A few moments later, Karin seemed satisfied that Kiba wasn't going to die, and began to remove his jacket and shirt, so that she could wrap his torso up in bandages. Normally, the well defined chest of the man in her life would have caused her to blush, or at least internally perv out for a moment, but she was a woman on a mission.

Once he was all wrapped up, she offered her arm up to her boyfriend. "Bite me, Kiba-kun." "N-No." Kiba said, aware of how Karin had been mistreated in the past because of her healing abilities. "I won't give you another scar to haunt you."

"Baka." Karin muttered. "Kiba, you need to get your strength back so you can heal, my chakra will help. Please." "No. I know how all those people biting you hurt you, I know what it did to your mother, and I swore to myself that I would never break the trust Naruto placed in me when he set us up."

"Kiba-kun. those other people in Kusa were just abusing me, I'd never willingly let them bite me. But you, you're important to me. I want you to do this, because I know that it will help you heal quicker. Seeing you like this hurts me, because I love you."

Kiba didn't react for a few seconds, processing Karin's battle field confession. Finally, he spoke. "I love you too, Karin-chan. I promise I'll never do this without your consent." And with those words, he sunk his sharp canines, a hallmark of the Inuzuka Clan, into the arm Karin had offered to him.

After he finished, Karin lay his head back onto the ground, she'd been cradling it the whole time, placing his jacket underneath it as a pillow. "I need to go now, Kiba-kun. It seems like Ino-sama needs my help getting Naruto-sama to calm down. I'll be right back though. Don't go anywhere."

"Be safe." Kiba said, as Akamaru walked over and lay down next to him, and the two of them watched the fiery redhead run back towards the walls of Uzu.

-With Naruto and Ino-

Almost immediately after Akamaru ran off, the fowl KI Naruto had been giving off gave way to something that Ino had only heard stories of: The Bijuu Cloak. This was not her Naruto, it was clear that the man she loved was not in control of his body at the moment.

His eyes had gone to a dark red and become more angular, his teeth became more like fangs, claws began to form as he dropped to all fours, all while the orange coat gave way to a single tail.

"Fuck." Was all Kazuko managed to say. She was a good shinobi, but not good enough to match with a jinchuuriki. Before she could react any further, a claw like wave of orange-red chakra shot out and severed her head clean off of her body.

Almost immediately, Kakashi was beside Ino. "What happened here?" "Kakashi-sensei! Kazuko almost killed Kiba, and Naruto-kun just snapped!"

"It's ok, Ino. Gai's just searching the bodies of the samurai, then he'll come and get you out of here, leave this to me."

"No! I will not leave my husband!" Naruto, meanwhile, had turned around, and was now glaring and growling at Kakashi and Ino. "Naruto-kun, it's me, it's Ino-chan." She pleaded with him, "don't you recognize me?"

Apparently he didn't because he lunged at them, and only Kakashi's timely shove got Ino out of the way.

"N-Naruto." For a brief moment, the idea that Naruto of all people would try to attack her was heartbreaking for his wife. Then, her resolve steeled. This wasn't her husband, Naruto would never raise a hand to her like this. This was the fox, he had some how taken control of Naruto.

Kakashi lunged back at Naruto, a suppression tag in his hand. He was able to get through and apply the tag directly to Naruto's forehead, but nothing happened. For whatever reason, the tag didn't work. "Why didn't it work?" Ino asked aloud, and the answer came in the form of Karin, who had joined them on the walls after patching up Kiba.

"Basic suppression seals don't always work." the redhead said. "Jinchuuriki require a very specific type of suppression tag. If the person who designed the tag doesn't know enough about Fuinjutsu, they might not have made it correctly."

"I thought Jiraya-sama made the tags?" Ino screamed. "Eh, no, I kinda ran out of them, I made this one myself. Obviously there was a problem." Kakashi said, sheepishly.

Her resolve firm again, Ino's first instinct was to use the Shintenshin, go inside Naruto's mind, and free him. She raised her hands in the familiar position, but was interrupted by Karin. "No, Ino-sama. It's too dangerous for you to go in there when he's like this. Help me with the seal."

The Seal? Oh right! That seal!

-Flashback, The Uzumaki Temple on the Outskirts of Konoha-

"Karin-chan, Ino-chan. This seal is really important. I need you both to make sure you learn it." Naruto said, suddenly very serious. Just seconds earlier, he had been joking around with the two of them as they continued to practice Uzumaki Fuinjutsu, but after turning the page in his treatise, and seeing what the next seal was used for, his demeanor had suddenly changed.

"Of course, Naruto-kun. But why?" Ino asked.

"This seal. If I ever lose myself to the Kyuubi again this seal just might be the thing that saves you from me."

-Present, the ruins of Uzu-

Kakashi and Gai were doing their best to distract the One-Tailed Naruto as Ino and Karin franticly worked on an intricate string of kanji and symbols. This seal was one that both had dutifully learned, but neither had hoped they would need to use.

As opposed to a normal suppression seal, which in theory would work to suppress the Kyuubi's chakra, as Jiraya had done in the past, this seal was much stronger. Not only did it suppress the Kyuubi's chakra, but Naruto's as well. It meant that he'd be unconscious longer, but the exchange was that it was almost guaranteed to be effective.

"It's done." Karin said, holding the tag in her hands, only for Ino to snatch it away and charge at Naruto. Karin and Kakashi both screamed at her to stop, but Ino wasn't willing to listen. Her body came into contact with the Bijuu Cloak, burning her skin, but even still she didn't stop. Instead, she lunged at Naruto. Even as her whole body came into contact with the Bijuu Cloak, she succeeded in applying the tag.

Immediately, the cloak disappeared, and Naruto began to slump to the ground, unconscious. Relieved, Ino wrapped her arms around him, only for the two of them to hit the ground together in one heap.

Her mission completed, Ino succumbed to the pain of her chakra burns, and passed out, as Kakashi, Karin, and now even Gai raced forward. The last thing she heard before the darkness fully took her, was Kakashi's voice. "Well, I know from my time with both Kushina and Naruto that Uzumaki are incredibly stubborn. I guess in that way, Ino fits right in. So reckless."

-End of Chapter-

Thanks for reading,

-Col. Bogey