The Many Minds of Namikaze Naruto

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or any other shows, books, movies (Etc. Etc.) that you may or may not associate with this fan fiction. If I did, I wouldn't be here writing fan fictions, now would I?

Kyuubi's thought-speech

Thoughts

(Author/Narrator Commentary)

Introductions of new summons will continue to be less elaborate as the story goes on, partially for story purposes (to keep the story moving) and partially because as it gets more commonplace repeated introductions will become boring quickly.

His eyes were red with black tomoe, three of them.

This time Naruto laughed as his form shifted. "You can't copy me, snake." He resisted wincing as he took on his strongest shapeshifted form.

Perfecting his mastery of his borrowed techniques had been difficult. He'd tried a dozen tricks to manage to manifest multiple abilities at once, and finally landed on an idea that panned out…

But Rogue's power to absorb was fatal to clones, and even himself if applied too long…so Naruto himself had been subjected to the ability a dozen times to absorb every ability he could…and with the recovery time between, he'd had to shapeshift a clone into the newest learned form before absorbing the next, or the whole exercise was pointless…rogues ability absorption faded before he could recover a second time and then he'd be stuck with nearly a dozen separate Rogue form variations, none with more than two abilities. Instead he finally achieved a combined form, but he still looked like rogue.

He figured out quickly that changing minute appearance things was much easier than minute genetic changes. Every attempt to fine tune his genetics resulted, so far, in a dead clone.

Yet changing his outward appearance from Rogue to Naruto had taken him only a single training session to master. True, inwardly, his body was a girl, a mutant girl from the x-men universe, but outwardly, no one would know unless they investigated deeper than the skin and bone shape, things that could be altered without changing his genetics. Hinata might notice, if she ever looked at him in this form with her Byakugan…He didn't know how she'd react if she saw girl parts on her formerly boy crush…

But that wasn't what was important. He'd done it, he'd created a form that could use all his borrowed genetic abilities at once. It was incredibly tiring to maintain, but it was useable, and for him, that drain was not as crippling as for most.

He took a deep breath as he took on the form, and then let chakra flood his system again.

Orochimaru apparently decided he didn't like whatever was happening, because he threw out his arms and launched several snakes at Naruto.

The fanged serpents were intercepted by a blade-like wall of sand that sliced their heads in two and blocked the rest of their bodies before collapsing back to the ground.

Six tails sprouted from Naruto as the fox-traits manifested, and the group of transformed clones all launched forward with an even mix of spirit Rasengans and swords leading.

The ninjutsu master countered with a cloud of fire that killed all the Rasengan clones, the sword clones leaping through the flames to the other side with a thrust of their blades.

As Orochimaru dodged a sword swing from one Naruto, he jabbed another one in the stomach with something that made him dispel.

A third went for a downward flip kick that "threw" a blade of wind from it, the snake dodging the kick but being gashed by the wind, his arm going limp from severed muscle tissue…until it dispelled in a puff of smoke.

And the real Orochimaru, perhaps, jabbed another clone in the stomach even as he backhanded the one who'd kicked at him with a sword that Naruto hadn't seen where he'd gotten. The clone was struck in the head and both dispelled.

One Naruto stood facing Orochimaru, sword drawn, and grinned as he thrust forward and his sword buried itself In Orochimaru's gut even as the snake Sannin jabbed him once again in the gut.

Both dispelled into smoke.

Another Orochimaru rose swiftly out of the ground with a laugh, but even as he did a wave of sand rushed toward him and surged forward in what looked like a three foot wide fist.

Oorochimaru dodged the attack to one side, chuckling still, but then was unexpectedly cut short as a sword blade jabbed out of the sand and gashed his chest open.

This time he didn't dispel, rather, he backpedalled and vomited out a snake which vomited out a disgusting, dripping new body, lacking the wound he'd just received.

"Impressive for a brat." He said as sand streamed off of Naruto where he'd landed after emerging from the sand combination attack. "But even working together you…" Orochimaru froze.

Naruto had turned around in the middle of the sentence and revealed his face. Orochimaru may not have been especially familiar with the boy in front of him, but he knew the clones he'd been killing had blue eyes.

This one's eyes were red.

Red, with black tomoe.

"HOW!?" Orochimaru screamed angrily. "How did YOU get those eyes?" He threw out his arms and snakes flew at Naruto, who easily separated their heads from their bodies, then responded by throwing back the same attack at Orochimaru.

"You'd love to know that wouldn't you?" Naruto smirked as the sannin severed the snakes heads with his own blade. "But it's not just that. I've been watching you this whole time, Orochimaru…and you've been able to copy what? Shadow clones? I don't expect a shinobi as skilled as you wasn't already capable of that…"

"And I already know you can't copy this." Naruto grinned, and then, without another word, vanished.

Orochimaru howled in fury, unleashing fire at the spot where the boy stood before. When that seemed ineffective, he redirected the flames toward Gaara, whose sand shield protected him, albeit not indefinitely, the sand beginning to melt from the intense heat, which was radiating out from the wall.

But it didn't last that long.

Orochimaru heard the Kyuubi brat's voice near his ear as he was attacking. "There's one other trick I have, you've seen it before."

He spun, sword swinging wide, fire evaporating into heat haze, and a puff of smoke indicated he'd hit an invisible shadow clone. His Sharingan tried frantically to dispel a Genjutsu that wasn't there, but then…there! He saw, vague, and indistinct, but present, a cloud of chakra, roughly the size of the boy.

"Jiraiya's seal, perhaps?" he chuckled. "You can't think that will work on me again, boy. I'll just remove it."

Orochimaru saw the chakra cloud suddenly triple in size and intensity and suppressed a grin. "But if you think it will, you are welcome to…" He was looking around as if searching for Naruto and the cloud was beginning to move closer. "TRY!" Orochimaru lunged, swiping the sword, and a series of smoke clouds once again indicated clones dying…

But then, the sannin felt a stab as Hishoumori entered his abdomen as Naruto shimmered back into view, a single clone behind him, holding a Rasengan.

Naruto yanked upward, cutting the Sannin's torso almost in two from abdomen to shoulder before dispelling as the real Naruto thrust a Rasengan through it and into Orochimaru's chest.

The near-immortal shinobi flew back through the air, trailing blood, and cratering the ground as he skidded across it. Naruto smirked as with a thrust of his sword, he was right on top of the snake sannin.

He had enough time to recognize the wounds he'd caused sealing over, before Orochimaru jabbed a hand into his gut…it was not the first time the technique had been used in this fight, but it was the first to hit the real Naruto.

He saw sand rushing toward them both as he felt his chakra flow almost halt, instantly. His body weakened suddenly, shapeshifting shut down, reverting his form to normal, and he felt suddenly tired without Kyuubi's chakra bolstering his abilities.

"Kukukukuku…." Orochimaru turned his head upward and vomited a blast of water at the approaching sand, soaking it and causing it to collapse.

The stream of water continued until there was water standing in the area, soaking every grain of sand visible.

Another stream sprayed at Gaara as he broke through the glass formed earlier, his sand leading as that little amount protected by the glass tried to crush Orochimaru into pulp.

His sand blocked the jet, but the wet sand was unable to stop the serpent that burst through the center of the water jet and bit Gaara on the shoulder. Wide eyed, he looked at the snake, and then, gasping, collapsed in a heap.

The snake wound its way free from his mouth as the water trickled off. "Don't worry, you'll both live…for now. Some old associates of mine want you alive. And since they so generously donated the services of the Sanbi, I want to stay in their good graces."

Naruto scowled, breathing heavily as he collapsed to his knees. "You're….working with…the Akatsuki?"

Orochimaru chuckled. "Oh so you know of them? I really did underestimate you, Naruto-kun. You gave me far more of a challenge than I'd anticipated."

The Snake crawled over toward him, and he struggled back to his feet. "This isn't over yet, Orochimaru."

He pulled back his sword to thrust again.

"Kukukuku….you can't kill me so easily Naruto-kun. You should realize that by now."

"Konoha Senpuu!" A green blur struck the Sannin in his distraction, but nothing meaningful came of it besides further distraction.

He had just enough time to brace with his arms and the spinning kick only caused him to slide back a few feet through the dirt.

He lashed out with his blade, fast enough to almost catch his attacker, but not quite, and chuckled. "There's no end to the foolishness of the Leaf, is there?"

"Lee, damnit, I told you to leave." Naruto practically growled.

Lee posed in front of Naruto, facing Orochimaru. "You also told us you would be coming with us, Naruto-kun."

Naruto looked guilty. "How did you know to come back?"

Orochimaru lunged forward suddenly. Lee moved, but…The sannin's arm bent at an impossible angle stretched, and the sword still hit its target, severing Lee's legs at the knee, which sent him toppling to the ground, screaming in pain.

"NO!" Naruto screamed, thrusting his blade forward at the sannin instinctively, the sword meeting Orochimaru's, grinding, as the sannin sidestepped the expected thrust and parried downward. He blasted Naruto with a spray of water, and the boy was sent tumbling across the ground.

Before he could get his bearings, the Sannin was beside him. "Kukukuku…I suppose Akatsuki doesn't need you to have all your limbs."

He raised his sword to slice Naruto's legs off, but for the second time, was interrupted as another person appeared and moved in to attack him.

The first juuken strike hit.

The second and those after it did not.

The sannin pivoted, stepped out of the path of the strike, and drove the grass-cutter blade to the hilt into Hinata's chest.

She looked at the blade stuck in her with shock. "N-Nar…"

Orochimaru pulled the sword free with a sickening squelch, letting the girl crumple to the ground.

"That is quite enough distractions from you brats."

Naruto stared. His mind churned to process what was happening, Lee was crippled, probably forever. His chakra was barely there, almost as bad as what they'd done to Orochimaru before. Gaara was paralyzed by poison. His borrowed abilities were mostly gone, he had only his Shinigami power and Quincy bow…and Hinata…

Hinata was bleeding to death in front of him.

Kataki…

He heard nothing in response.

KATAKI…

His anger and frustration were boiling over.

"You…"

Orochimaru looked at him with a grin. "This is your own fault, Na…"

"…BASTARD!"

Naruto's chakra flared ripping through the seal Orochimaru had placed on him. The chakra was so dense it was visible around him, not just when it first flared, but even after it had stabilized. His canines became more pronounced, his eyes became the slit pupils of a fox, and tails began to sprout from him again.

Naruto…kit…what happened? I couldn't connect to your mind…

Naruto didn't answer.

"What?" The snake hissed. "No…"

Naruto shifted as the eighth tail appeared, his eyes turning red with the three swirling commas around the pupil, flickering between that and the fox-eyes before settling on the Sharingan along with the other, less visible traits of the ultimate form he'd managed to create.

A huge number of clones surrounded Orochimaru as Naruto stood up and straightened, The chakra coming off of him so thick it could be felt like a physical force. "I don't care if it kills me, you are going to die here, you bastard." Naruto hissed through gritted teeth.

Clones moved, a half dozen with swords meeting a fireball that was washed away by a wave of water.

A dozen clones died to earth spikes that were cut in half by blades of wind.

New clones appeared to replace those that were lost, and the fight was rapidly becoming a blur of orange and black. One sliced Orochimaru's body in half at the waist only for snakes to pull the halves back together.

A Rasengan struck as a sword cleaved off an arm, only for a dozen snakes to bite down on the clones and another to vomit up a new body.

The ground shook and rippled and cracked, taking out many of the clones but many more took to the air using airbending to increase their leaps.

Back and forth the exchange went, Orochimaru killing a few clones, Naruto doing some damage that ultimately just got ignored or shed away.

Naruto noted, as the fight progressed, that he was apparently not being spared deadly attacks any longer. That was fine…he didn't intend to get hit, and it's not as if capture by this sadistic lunatic was a better fate than death anyway.

A couple groups of his clones grabbed and protected Hinata and Lee, then Gaara just after, carrying them away from the fighting and laying them down to allow him to see what could be done about their wounds. Blood loss had brought both Hinata and Lee merciful unconsciousness, but wasn't doing them any other favors.

As the fighting continued behind him, Naruto paled. He pushed out some healing sparks into Hinata's chest, grateful her wound was at least simple…it had hit her lung, but not the spine or heart. Serious, but not anything excessively complicated to heal.

Lee though…

He couldn't see any way that Lee would ever be able to walk again. Naruto had nowhere near the knowledge or experience needed to properly reattach a limb.

Unless…

Kataki…can our regeneration heal something like this? If I reattach the limbs, will the nerves and vessels and muscle regenerate on their own?

Only if it's done quickly…you don't have time to wait for a demon to form from my chakra, kit.

What if I use more?

You don't have enough for him to turn that fast and still win this fight.

Then I'll just have to finish this quickly.

How? You're barely keeping up with him and this is the best you have.

I just need to actually disable him. Jiraiya's seal…

Isn't fast enough. He'll be able to continue the fight, and will just remove it later. He clearly understands how.

There has to be something.

Naruto was growing increasingly aware that he was struggling to continue producing clones faster than Orochimaru was slaying them.

There has to be something…

He looked up suddenly, then down at his own stomach, where a hole in his jumpsuit revealed the broken but still present seal Orochimaru had used on him.

It was risky, even with Sylar's natural understanding and the Sharingan together, but…

He had an idea.

Naruto finished healing what he could of Lee's legs and moved on to Gaara…but he quickly determined he was in no danger, his own regeneration would overpower the poison eventually.

So he turned and stood to face Orochimaru again.

He drew his sword and waited for the right moment, as Orochimaru was in the middle of shedding his skin, and thrust the blade forward to jump beside the Sannin, his hand coated in chakra as he jabbed it against the Sannin's chest and applied the seal to his newly forming body.

He tried to finish the attack with an upward slash to cleave the enemy in two, but Orochimaru's reaction was a hair faster, and Kusanagi cut deep into his shoulder.

He grimaced and let out a breath from the pain, but reached up and grabbed the legendary blade to hold it in place.

His clones began flashing through a series of handseals and each and every one of them raised a hand to their mouths.

And exhaled a series of massive fireballs as Naruto thrust backwards with his sword, transporting him backward and out of danger a split second before the area went up in flames.

Naruto had combined portions of Orochimaru's own seal with Jiraiya's to create a much improved seal that almost totally blocked off all chakra flow, near instantly. Unfortunately, it was far too unstable for most circumstances, but here the goal was merely to prevent Orochimaru from restoring himself. It might last only 30 seconds, it might last 5 minutes before it destabilized, but he didn't intend to leave enough to matter intact.

As the fireballs he'd copied from the sannin baked the area, he took a mental inventory of how much chakra he'd used.

Sometime toward the end he'd dropped a tail, which meant he'd used nearly half of his available chakra...

The fire faded, revealing the charred husk of Orochimaru. The remaining clones moved in and dissected the body with their swords before totally incinerating each piece. Surely even Orochimaru couldn't come back from that?

Naruto move over to Lee, letting his body return to the seven-tail state without his extra shapeshifting transformation, and laid his good hand on the boy's chest to begin pumping chakra into him.

Forcing that much chakra out at once was exhausting and painful. It couldn't have felt good for Lee, but fortunately he wasn't awake.

Kit…this much chakra…you're going to be out of commission for weeks.

Better than Lee being out for his whole life.

No rebuttal came as Naruto drained every spare drop of chakra he could scrounge up, just over six tails worth of power, into the Taijutsu expert.

Naruto struggled to maintain consciousness even as he was finishing the process. He'd never drained his chakra so thoroughly before, though, and it was futile.

Naruto's next sight was the dark sky, the moon the only meaningful source of light.

Everything hurt, everything was sore. He was tired. His shoulder throbbed, but he noted that he could move his arm again.

"Naruto" A familiar voice spoke from nearby. He looked over to see Kakashi. Beside him was Gaara, looking fine but asleep leaning against a tree.

"We came looking for you after you didn't return for two days." Kakashi explained, motioning to the other side of him, where he now saw Sakura examining Hinata for wounds.

"It looks like everyone here is going to live. Gaara gave you a chakra infusion after Sakura flushed the poison from his system. Hinata and Lee are recovering but Sakura has them both in an artificial coma to allow them to rest. They both lost a lot of blood, but she tells me that it looked like they had already been treated before we arrived. I assume that was you?"

Naruto nodded. His stomach growled.

Kakashi handed him ration bar before continuing. "What else happened here, Naruto?"

So Naruto recounted the story, in light detail for now, up to the point he had passed out.

Kakashi looked, quite simply, amazed. "Naruto…even with the Kyuubi's chakra, do you realize how impossible it should be for a chuunin to beat someone like Orochimaru?"

Naruto's answer was interrupted by a pink blur suddenly grabbing him. "Naruto" Sakura said from where she was hugging him. "You almost died you dummy. I've never heard of such a bad case of chakra exhaustion." She pulled back and Naruto saw her eyes watering somewhat. "Never do that again. That was so stupid. Trying to take on Orochimaru…" She wiped her eyes.

"What about Shino, and Temari and Kankuro? How are they?"

Sakura and Kakashi looked at each other. "Shino will recover, he was stable when we left. Gaara told us Temari and Kankuro would be on their way back to the Hidden Sand. By now they've probably also sent out a search party of their own."

It occurred to Naruto that he hadn't heard from Kyuubi since waking up.

"And where's Kataki?"

Kakashi looked legitimately surprised at that question. "She hasn't been active since she left to come help you."

Kataki? He questioned.

"Give me a moment." He said as he dropped into his mindscape.

He was immediately relieved as he saw Kataki's human form, curled up beside a considerably shrunken, weak, but still alive, Kyuubi no Kitsune. Both were asleep.

He came back to reality with a sigh. "She's fine. Just recovering I think. I've never used so much chakra before."

He moved to stand up, but Kakashi held him down with a hand on his shoulder. "Wait. We're going to move out in the morning. None of you are critical enough to need to move, and all of you need to rest. Hinata was in a pretty bad state of chakra exhaustion as well and both lost a lot of blood. I'll send a nindog messenger to Tsunade and Suna to fill them in."

He summoned three dogs and filled them in on the message to pass on. Naruto wondered about the third, but the dogs seemed to know who to go to without being told, so he didn't find out. At least, not yet.

With Kakashi and Sakura watching over the four recovering fighters, Naruto nodded understanding, and allowed himself to drift back to sleep.

Naruto woke to find Sakura and Lee both awake, and Gaara and Kakashi missing.

Naruto straightened up quickly. "Is anything wrong?"

Sakura shook her head.

"No, Naruto-kun." Lee commented, his back resting against a tree. "Jiraiya arrived with a team from Konoha while you were asleep, and they and Kakashi have gone to examine the hideout now that Orochimaru is gone." He chuckled. "Gaara is keeping watch. Sakura-chan would not let me back on my feet yet." His face grew serious. "She says my legs are still too weak to risk getting in a confrontation…but, Naruto-kun…I did not expect to survive, much less recover as fully as Sakura says I will. I must thank you, Naruto-kun, for whatever you must have done. And Congratulations for you youthful defeat of Orochimaru! This is truly a joyous victory for the hidden leaf!"

Naruto nodded, smiling softly, but his mind was on something else. He started to stand. "I want to see the hideout."

"Absolutely not." Sakura snapped. "You are going to conserve your chakra, do nothing unnecessary, and I am going to inform Gaara and Kakashi that you are awake. Then we will be heading back to Konoha. Jiraiya's team was handpicked for this." She shot him a warning glare and then when he sheepishly nodded at her, moved off away from their camp.

A few minutes later she'd returned, Kakashi in tow, and Gaara close behind.

Kakashi smiled that one eye smile he sometimes did. "Good to see you're awake, Naruto." He paused. "We'll be returning to the village. Gaara will accompany us until a squad arrives to meet him."

Naruto nodded, and Gaara picked up Hinata on a floating bed of sand, and they began to move.

Ok, here's chapter 22 for you. It sat 90% finished for a few weeks while I panicked over finals, work deadlines, and some other life drama, so sorry it's late.

I have about half of the next chapter written out in my head but am struggling with a scene which may take me a little bit to get right.

Next chapter covers some fallout and kicks off the next "arc" of the storyline, which is the first one that isn't based on an arc from the anime or manga at all.

Please review if you like it, or if you have constructive comments to help me improve. Please don't if you are going to say "This story sucks it would have been better if you (insert description of unrelated story here)."

Further note: I wrote everything above and uploaded it more than a week ago, but then my family got hit by a medical issue before I could edit and post the final version and...well, we've suffered a loss that's left us all pretty upset. I can't promise when I'll get my next chapter out. Maybe I'll write to take my mind off things, but maybe I won't feel like it for weeks.