Life Revisited Chapter 1: Through the Looking-glass

EDIT: Fixed some spelling and grammar errors I had overlooked.

Naruto--

I had finally done it, finally killed that snake-bastard Orochimaru, if only I could have killed him sooner, I may have been able to save Sasuke as well. Orochimaru had taken Sasuke's body from him and gained his precious Sharingan but no Mangekyo. I was still alive, and Sasuke had never stopped thinking of me as his best friend, Orochimaru had no friends. The fact that it wasn't Sasuke I was fighting didn't make killing him any easier, I had thought it would.

I wandered around the now empty complex, formerly housing one now dead snake-bastard. The whole placed reeked like some twisted hospital. After fifteen minutes or so of wandering I came across a mirror. Looking into the mirror I saw what you'd expect I saw, a reflection of myself. I was a little worse for wear, my 25 year-old body covered in blood from my fight and my clothes were ragged, but otherwise everything was normal. I had grown my hair out some, and now I was the spitting image, minus the whisker marks, of the Yondaime Hokage. My father. I closed my eyes as I was assaulted with a flashback of the day I learned that the Yondaime was my father.

Flashback--

I was rummaging through the Hokage's personal library, since Tsunade baa-chan was Hokage I had pretty much free reign over what I read. I was looking for a new jutsu or two to learn. I came across a faded journal that looked like it hadn't been opened in a long time. As I looked at it, it became apparent to me why it hadn't been opened, there was a blood-seal on it. Intrigued, I bit my thumb and swiped some blood on the seal. The seal flashed and the blood disappeared. I tried opening the book, and it did. On the cover page was written, 'Journal of Kazara Arashi, Yondaime Hokage of Konohagakure'. Deciding that I really didn't care about the everyday life of the fourth, I skipped to the last entry, hoping it might have something about the kyuubi, me, and my parents. The last entry read like this:

'My son was born today, just minutes ago, it's a shame that he will know neither of his parents. His mother died after giving birth to him, of complications, and today will be the day that I seal the Kyuubi.' There was a smudge, from what appeared to be tears. 'It pains me to know that I won't be going to the same place as my wife, my destiny is to be sealed along with the Kyuubi until his container dies, and then fight with him, our souls locked in combat for the rest of time in the stomach of the Death-God. In order to seal the Kyuubi away fully, I need to seal him into a child, and I am sacrificing not only my life, but that of my son. I am going to seal the demon in my own son. My son who my wife named Naruto with her dying breath. I have placed a seal on this journal, only one with my blood will be able to open it, I hope my son has the chance to read this and I hope he understands that I'm doing what I think best. If you are reading this, I'm sorry. I'm sorry that I sealed the demon in you, I understand that you will be hated, but I know you can persevere and become the strongest shinobi ever, father knows best. Fare thee well. Arashi'

After reading the entry, my psyche was a tangle of different emotions. There was pride, loneliness and confusion. He would be sealed away with the Kyuubi? Was the Yo- my father sealed inside of me as well? If he was, why hadn't I noticed him before? I decided if anyone would know where he was it was the Kyuubi, so I decided to pay him a visit. I sat down cross-legged on the ground and started to meditate. Thinking inwardly, I soon found myself in the sewer-like corridors that made up my mind. Walking as I had done before, I soon came upon the familiar cage with the seal.

"Oi! Furball! Where's the Yondaime?" I yelled at him.

"I DON'T KNOW, BRAT"

"He's not in that cage with you?"

"NO, BUT WHY DON'T YOU COME CLOSER AND LOOK, MAYBE I'VE MISSED HIM ALL THESE YEARS"

"That's alright, I'll pass." Thinking back to the first time I came here when the Kyubbi tried to claw me to death, I turned around and started walking. If he wasn't with the Kyuubi, he had to be somewhere else in here, right?

I had been walking for what seemed to be hours and I still hadn't found hide or tail of the Yondaime. Just when I was about to give up I came across an odd looking ladder. What was so odd about it was that it was so clean, a sharp contrast to the rest of this place. At the top of the ladder there was a trap-door with the character for Heaven on it. Climbing up the ladder, I pushed open the trap-door and found myself in a brilliantly white room. The room was about 100 square feet, and was completely empty, save for a single bed with a man sleeping on it. The man had a scraggly blonde mop of hair, like my own but longer. I walked slowly up to the bed, where I stood unable to think of anything to say and not quite sure if I really wanted to wake him up or not. Before I could think of anything however, the man stirred, his eyes opened, and he sat up in bed. Sitting there, he took a minute to appraise me before standing up to be a full head taller than me.

"Naruto?"

"Dad?" My question seemed to strike something inside of him, and he smiled wide as tears started dripping down his face. Before either of us could say anything else, I was swept into the biggest hug I had ever had, which wasn't necessarily saying much but that didn't matter to me. I felt the tears leaking down my face as I returned the hug full force. After a minute the hug loosened and he held me at arms length, looking at me.

"You're so big! How old are you?"

"Sixteen."

"Wow... sixteen already..." he sized me up, "I think it's time you learned about your blood-limit." I just stared at him. "Yes, YOUR blood-limit. I wasn't called the Yellow-Flash of Konoha for nothing you know. Our blood-limit is possibly the blood-limit that is least known and most renown."

"What is it called?"

"There are two forms of our blood-limit. The first, primarily based on genjustu, is called the Kirameki. The second, which enhances speed and strength incredibly, is called the Shunshin."

End Flashback--

I had learned the basics of the first part of my blood-limit that day, and went back multiple times to refine it and learn the Shunshin later. The second time I went to see him however, it wasn't for training, even though I would have like that.

Flashback--

I had come back to see the Yondaime. When I got there he sat me down on a chair that appeared from nowhere and down on another.

"Now, I want you to tell me about yourself. I want to know about your past and present." I went through and told him all the stories of my childhood, about how I spent all the time being picked on and not having any friends. He looked sad, but I told him that it was alright because I had grown strong and persevered. He was surprised when I told him that it was my ambition to become the next Hokage, but not a bad kind of surprise. And then I got to my genin exam. I explained to him how I had been tricked by Mizuki into stealing the Scroll with all of the Leaf Kinjutsu in it and how I had learned the Kage-Bunshin to pass the genin exam. He broke into tears when he heard about what had happened between me and Iruka, and told me that he was touched that someone who had their family destroyed by the Kyuubi would treat me as kindly as Iruka-sensei did. Then there was the explanation of my team, team 7.

"We waited for hours for Kakashi-sensei to show up!" I told him.

"Kakashi-sensei? Little Kakashi-kun is your sensei?"

"WAS my sensei, I'm a chuunin now."

"Tell him I said 'Hi,' I'm sure it'll give him quite the surprise." After that I went on to explain about how we had mostly boring D-rank missions until that fateful 'C-rank' mission. He listened intently and had a surprised look on his face when I told him about defeating Haku.

"What about this Sakura girl, do you LIKE her?" His face had one of those looks that I had come to expect to see from Ero-sennin, I guess he taught him more than just techniques then.

"I do... But she'll never return the feeling because she's in love with Sasuke. Not to mention the fact that she left the village looking for him about a year ago." It would be another two months before I would hear of her death at the hands of Orochimaru, who had already taken over Sasuke's body.

"Ah... If she comes back, let her know how you feel." I nodded and continued my story. When I got to the chuunin exam, I got a little more spirited. When he heard about Orochimaru being there and what had happened with Sasuke and the cursed-seal, he closed his eyes and shook his head. "That Sakura is a fool to be chasing after the Uchiha boy, there is no redemption for him." I didn't say anything and there was a moment of awkward silence before I continued my story. When I got to the part about my training from Ero-sennin, he cracked a huge smile. "Like father like son I guess. You're gonna need to say 'Hi' to him as well, he won't be as surprised as Kakashi-kun though." And then I told him about my victory over Neji in the finals and he had a proud look on his face. And then came the Sand/Sound attack. He looked worried, proud, and then sad again as I went through the details of my fight with Gaara and then when I told him about how the Sandaime Hokage had died at the hands of Orochimaru. "Atleast he assured that the bastard won't be using his hands anymore, and it is a kind of amusing thought to think about Sarutobi-sensei battling it out with only Orochimaru's hands for the rest of time ( XD )." After that I told him about my travels with Jiraiya and my return to Konoha, upon which I heard about how Sakura had left in search of Sasuke just a week before.

End Flashback--

I opened my eyes and saw the mirror in front of me again, only this time the image reflected was me looking to be around 5 years old. The only thing running through my head was 'Wouldn't it be great if I could go back and fix things?' Unconsciously I had reached my hand out to touch the younger image of myself. I felt my arm go cold and then numb, what was going on?

I woke up in a bed in a familiar room. This was my apartment, a one-room deal with a refrigerator, a table with two chairs, some cabinets, a closet with a full-length mirror on the door, and a bed next to the closet. I stood up and stretched, feeling kind of light-headed. I looked at myself in the mirror and feinted.

A/N: Well there it is, the first chapter of my second ever Naruto fanfic. I hope everyone likes. I have my plans made for the second chapter already and I hope I can get it out soon. That is, if school and work oblige me to do so. Umm... as a side-note: I took the fourth's last name and the name of his technique's from a story by MaxFic called "Change For the Better." If you haven't read it, do. It's good. Review with comments and/or ideas, I'm open for everything. 'Til next chapter.