Everything Sucks

Naruto and his team were on their usual bridge. Naruto sat on the rail, kicking his legs idly. Sasuke was doing something complicated with shuriken, and Sakura was reading. It was a bright summer day. The water below was a clear blue, interrupted by the flashing silver scales of fish swimming downstream.

Usually they spent their time waiting for Kakashi on sparring and other training. But it was the day after the tournament. Sasuke had spent the night in the hospital, and while a good night’s sleep was enough for Naruto to recover from most injuries, it wasn’t for Sakura. That food pill was starting to take its toll.

“All of my cute little genin made it to the final round,” Kakashi said, smiling down at them.

No one bothered to point out how late he was. They all knew. 

“No thanks to you,” Naruto muttered.

“What was that?”

“Nothing. I was just saying we need to start training.”

“We don’t have time to waste, Kakashi,” Sasuke said, frowning in disapproval. 

“Yeah, sensei,” Sakura said. “Are you actually going to train us?”

Kakashi raised his eyebrow. “You think so little of me. You three will be training. Missions are canceled for the next month to get you prepared.”

“Are you training all three of us?” Naruto asked hopefully. 

“About that…”

Two more people appeared at Kakashi’s side. 

“The closet pervert!” Naruto said, jumping off the rail to point at Ebisu. 

Ebisu pushed his sunglasses up. “Excuse me?”

“Closet pervert?” Yugao asked, taking a small step away from Ebisu. 

“There’s an Academy kid he tutors,” Naruto explained. “Konohamaru. He’s one of my minions.”

“Konohamaru is not a minion,” Ebisu said.

“He wanted to know how I defeated the Hokage,” Naruto went on, “so I used the same technique on his tutor. I had to cover Konohamaru’s eyes, though."

“What technique?” Sakura asked, turning to him.

Naruto rubbed the back of his head. “It’s a seduction technique using a variation on henge. Most people get distracted by nudity. Some people,” he said, pointing at Ebisu again, “are perverted enough to experience significant blood loss.”

“Or prudish enough,” Sasuke said, somehow looking down at Ebisu despite being shorter than him. “Naked, clothed, an enemy is an enemy.”

Sakura sniffed. “I wouldn’t fall for something so stupid.”

“Oh?” Naruto asked, grinning at her. “Wanna bet?”

Kakashi cleared his throat. “We aren’t here to discuss Ebisu's perversions. He’s Konoha’s top tutor, and as such, Sakura, you’ll be training with him.”

“What!” Sakura said, stepping back. “I don’t want to be trained by a pervert!”

Ebisu cleared his throat. “Young lady, I can assure you I was merely surprised by Naruto’s…unconventional use of henge. Do you think someone with such base inclinations would be allowed to tutor the Hokage’s own grandson?”

“I suppose not,” Sakura muttered, watching him warily. “What kind of training will we be doing?”

“That’s a secret,” Kakashi said, smiling at her. “After all, it’s very likely two of you will face each other.”

“I’ll be training you, Naruto,” Yugao said, nodding at him.

“So Sasuke gets Kakashi-sensei?” Naruto asked. It made sense, even if Naruto was a little jealous. Sasuke had Sharingan, Kakashi had Sharingan. Sauke was lightning-natured, Kakashi was lightning-natured.

Naruto liked Yugao. He wasn’t sure how useful kenjutsu would be against Hinata, but it could be effective against the others. 

“I look forward to seeing how you two progress,” Kakashi said, grabbing Sasuke and spiriting him away. Sakura cautiously approached Ebisu. 

“If you do anything gross, I’ll castrate you,” she said. 

Ebisu chuckled awkwardly, leading Sakura away. Sakura possibly had the worst match of all of them. There was no way she could reach Lee’s level of taijutsu in a month. Naruto likely could, with extensive use of clones, but only on a technical level. Naruto gained only the clones' memories. He couldn’t use them to build muscle.

“It’s just us, then,” Yugao said, smiling at him. “Come on, let’s see what you remember.”

Naruto’s kenjutsu had been limited to three skills: drawing, sheathing, and a straightforward overhead strike. He had spent ample time practicing those basics, and at Yugao’s prompting demonstrated them flawlessly.

They were in a shady, isolated training ground in the heart of the village. The trees were younger than others in Konoha, and had grown close together. It was quiet despite its location, with a gentle wind rustling the leaves. Birds called out to one another. A stream trickled nearby, water tinkling melodically over smooth rocks. 

“Good,” Yugao said once he was done. “I see you’ve been practicing.”

Naruto lowered the wooden practice sword she had given him. “I’ve never gone up against a kenjutsu specialist,” he said. “I don’t have anyone to spar with.”

“I know,” Yugao said. “Kenjutsu isn’t as popular in Konoha as in other places. We don’t teach it in the Academy, since that is geared towards a more general education and not specialization. There are a few tokubetsu jounin who gained their rank via kenjutsu, and it’s a common supplementary skill to teach ANBU recruits. Mercenaries, bandits, and samurai are known to use swords.”

“So bandits could be framed for an assassination,” Naruto said. He frowned at Yugao. “Are you ANBU?”

“If I was, would I be allowed to answer that question?”

“Fair enough,” Naruto said, looking at his bokken. “I could probably clobber someone with this.”

Yugao smirked. “My senpai had a similar approach to kenjutsu. Her clan’s style was…heavy-handed.”

“Senpai?”

“Uzumaki Kushina.”

Naruto stared at her. “Kaa-chan? There was an Uzumaki kenjutsu?”

Obviously, Kurama said drily. The Uzumaki were a big clan. 

Yugao nodded. She didn’t seem surprised that Naruto knew his mother’s name. Had Kakashi told her he knew?

“There is. She taught it to me, and now I’m going to teach it to you. I’ll also be going through the basic Konoha style. Now, exactly how many shadow clones can you make?”

Yugao couldn’t train with Naruto every day. She had missions, after all, more than the typical jounin if she really was ANBU. Having no missions himself, Naruto would arrive in the training area at whatever time the notes she sent said. He ran laps and swung his training sword at posts, and even broke out the Kubikiribocho a few times to test it out. It was heinously heavy for a sword, but Naruto’s Kurama-assisted healing meant he built muscle faster than others. He could also use chakra to augment his muscles, something he suspected Sakura did instinctively based on the ungodly strength behind her punches. His clones learned the Konoha kenjutsu kata from scrolls, while others received personal instruction from Yugao in the Uzumaki style. 

The Konoha style was subtle and elegant, evoking moonlight and leaves dancing in the wind. It was quick and flexible, slipping through an opponent’s guard to slice throats and tendons.

The Uzumaki-style was all about hacking off limbs, using heavy hits to break through someone’s guard, beating them over the head with the scabbard, anything goes. It was chaotic, and Naruto loved it. Yugao was surprised to see he had a chakra blade katana, and his wind affinity complimented both styles. Kubikiribocho was also great for chopping things up, but its size made it unwieldy and slower than a katana.

Yugao explained how Naruto’s mother had been able to apply seals on contact. Kurama confirmed that a true fuinjutsu master didn’t need paper or ink, that with refined chakra control one could use any medium to create and apply seals. One’s hand, the tip of a katana. Naruto wasn’t at that level yet. The quantity and density of his chakra made refined chakra control challenging. Kurama’s chakra mixing in with his own made things even more difficult. Big ninjutsu, overpowered explosion tags, complex seal arrays, brawling…those things came naturally to him. While the Uzumaki proficiency with sealing bordered on a kekkei genkai, it was really the years spent training their chakra into obedience that made them masters. Naruto compared it to Sasuke’s Sharingan. Simply having it didn’t mean he could use it well. He had to train.

Like all good things, Naruto’s time with Yugao came to an end. 

Over the course of two weeks, with the help of thousands of clones, Naruto’s kenjutsu had improved by leaps and bounds. He wasn’t able to beat Yugao in a spar, but he could hold his own for several minutes. He could deflect kunai and shuriken, channel wind techniques through his blade instead of merely sharpening it, worked on performing ninjutsu while holding his katana, and had some hints on how to start working on contact fuinjutsu. He had asked Yugao to teach him shunshin, and spent hours crashing into trees before getting it down.

“I have a two week mission,” Yugao said at the end of one of their training sessions. “There was another person I thought could train you, but he’s currently in the hospital.”

“That’s alright,” Naruto said. “I appreciate what you’ve taught me. I know you didn’t have to.”

Yugao regarded him coolly. “This village owes you a lot.”

Naruto shrugged. “I don’t think you’re obligated to teach me anything just because kaa-chan was your senpai. Like I don’t think Kakashi is obligated to because tou-chan was his sensei.”

Yugao shook her head. “Your parents would have hated us for neglecting you. Sandaime made a rule for us to not talk about certain topics, to not approach certain children. Those who broke it were punished severely, and it made their friends and families resentful. And, unfortunately, there are many who look at an orphan and see the child as someone else’s problem. We should have been better than that.”

“Is this your way of making it up to me?” he asked. 

“In a sense,” Yugao said. “You deserve to know the skills your clan, your mother, left behind. You have the potential to be a kenjutsu master if you wish, but I think it suits you better as a secondary skill.”

Naruto smiled at her. “Thanks, nee-chan.”

“The other skills I have aren’t exactly suited for a public tournament,” Yugao said. “You still have two weeks to train.” She pulled out a note and passed it to him. “Kakashi wanted me to tell you he’s arranged another instructor for you, but for now to go to the hot springs and relax.”

Though his oiroke no jutsu could be evidence to the contrary, Naruto wasn’t the type of person to read smut in public or leer at people in hot springs. 

The first apartment the Hokage had shoved him into didn’t have a bath, but when he had tried to use the public bathhouse he wasn’t allowed in. Naruto had no choice but to sneak in, which ended with a lot of people shouting at him, chasing him as if he were some kind of five-year-old deviant. He was soon moved to a new apartment. Things had gotten easier once he had learned henge, but the memory of how disgusted people had been at the kyuubi brat wanting to use a public bathhouse lingered.

Having been under near constant observation for most of his life, Naruto was a big proponent of privacy. He doubted anyone in his position would feel comfortable with being stared at and whispered about every time they stepped outside. He thought Sasuke could understand. Perhaps that was why his teammate was so committed to ignoring everyone.

Naruto didn’t know why Kakashi wanted him to go to the hot springs. Naruto certainly wasn’t going to spend time at the one in Konoha. His presence would only make people uncomfortable. Surely Kakashi knew that? But it wasn’t like Naruto could just leave the village and find an onsen where people weren’t bigoted against him.

Still, Naruto made his way to Konoha’s hot springs. The buildings were built into the mountain, between the Hokage Monument and the forests surrounding Konoha. It was mid-July, and the day was already hot. Naruto meandered around the hot springs, feeling uncomfortable. The steam wasn’t as enjoyable when one wasn’t actually in the water. It was hard to breathe, and made his skin clammy. It certainly wasn’t relaxing.

If he had been with someone else, his teammates, a friend, he would have been more at ease. He hadn’t seen anyone for weeks. Sakura was splitting her time between training with Ebisu and the hospital. Sasuke and Kakashi had vanished off the face of the planet. Shikamaru was holed up in the Nara compound.

Naruto didn’t know any other jounin, or even chuunin, who could help him. There was a reason new genin teams were assigned jounin sensei. It was a long term mission for those jounin, taking them out of the field. Ninja didn’t have down time. Yugao had to fit brief bouts of training between her regular mission work, whatever that was, not to mention her own training. Tutors like Ebisu were expensive and  extraordinarily rare.

Naruto wished he knew who the other person Kakashi wanted to train him was. There simply weren’t that many people Naruto actually knew. He could count his personal acquaintances on one hand, and that included Shikamaru’s parents. Maybe Yoshino was training him? But no, that wouldn’t be fair to Shikamaru. 

Not for the first time, Naruto resented his lot as an orphan. There were plenty of other orphans, though the more promising ones in the orphanage tended to get adopted. Those who didn’t have a nine-tailed fox sealed inside of them, who weren’t regarded as an unstable weapon, who weren’t blamed for the kyuubi attack which had killed so many. Instead of parents, he had that same fox to teach him, but Kurama wasn’t a ninja. He was a creature made out of chakra. He was limited in how he could help Naruto. 

Sighing, Naruto completed his circuit of the hot springs. He passed by the women’s section, and saw a white-haired man pressed against the wall, giggling to himself. Naruto paused to look at the man. His long hair was pulled back in a shaggy tail. He had a sleeveless red haori over olive green clothes. There was mesh armor at his ankles, and Naruto suspected his clothes hid more. On his back hung a large scroll. 

Naruto had a pretty good idea of who this old shinobi was, and Kurama’s angry growling confirmed it. 

“Did Kakashi send you?” Naruto asked, walking up to Jiraiya of the Sannin. “Does he only know other perverts?”

“Hmm?” Jiraiya didn’t bother looking at him, mesmerized by the minute cracks in the wall he was shoving his face against. Naruto had no idea what the man could even see like that. He was a ninja. Jiraiya could simply henge into a woman if he really wanted to enter the women’s side. Did doing it this way—the risk of exposure, of getting caught—make it more…exciting for him?

Naruto turned away, a little grossed out. Jiraiya was just another name on the list of the people who had shat upon his parents’ legacy. 

Your father signed the toad contract, Kurama said as Naruto walked off. 

So? Naruto asked. I’d rather have an Uzumaki summoning contract. 

You can have more than one contract, kid, Kurama said. There’s no love lost between me and Namikaze Minato, but the man was a brilliant shinobi. That old toad might know some of his techniques.

Naruto stopped walking. 

He had complicated feelings about his father. He knew what had happened the night his parents died. A masked man controlling Kurama with a powerful Sharingan, his mother’s seal breaking, his mother demanding Kurama be sealed in her so she could die with him, his father’s choice to summon a shinigami and tear Kurama in half, to die with his wife, to leave his newborn son with half of a bijuu and a village’s burden, Sandaime watching and doing nothing, consigning Naruto to his shitty life. It had been a night of bad decisions and tragedies. The way the village had treated his mother—the isolation, the bullying, the distrust, the destruction of Uzushio—and the way the village had treated him…

When things had been at their worst, Naruto had stared at the seal trapping Kurama inside of him and thought about ripping it off. It probably wouldn’t kill him.

Probably. 

A large toad slammed down in front of him, startling Naruto out of his thoughts. The toad was orange with blue markings, with bandages wrapped around his arms and back. He wore a necklace of large silver beads, the one in the center engraved with the kanji for loyalty. The toad croaked loudly at Naruto. He wrinkled his nose at the smell.

“Going somewhere, kid?”

Naruto looked up and saw Jiraiya striking a pose on top of the toad. 

“Impressed?” Jiraiya said, grinning at him. “Of course you are! It is I, the almighty Hermit of Mount Myoboku, the Master Sage, also known as the Toad Sage!”

“I think you mean perverted sage,” Naruto said, rolling his eyes. “Do toads even like hot springs?”

The toad croaked again, which could have meant anything. Naruto didn’t speak toad. He could barely get by in deer, and cat was a work in progress. 

“I’m working on my next novel,” Jiraiya exclaimed, brandishing a familiar orange book. 

“No one asked, ero-sennin,” Naruto said, walking around the toad. “You’re making a lot of noise for someone who likes to ogle naked women without their consent.”

Something thick and sticky wrapped around Naruto’s stomach and lifted him up. The toad had used his tongue to restrain him. Naruto poked at the appendage as he was spun around to face Jiraiya.

“It’s research!” Jiraiya shouted.

“Bullshit!” Naruto shouted back, pointing an accusing finger at the old man. “You’re just another pervert making excuses!”

Naruto didn’t think Jiraiya would hurt him, but he didn’t like being tied up by a toad’s tongue. “Let me go, unless you want to turn this into a fight?”

“And scare off all the ladies?” Jiarya said, crossing his arms. The toad did let Naruto down, and his tongue went safely back into his mouth. 

“So, did Kakashi ask you to train me or not?”

“I haven’t seen Kakashi in years,” Jiraiya said, waving his hand dismissively. “I don’t know anything about any training. Wait, do you already know who I am?”

“Do you know who I am?” Naruto countered. 

“Kid, I’ve never met you before in my life.”

The toad vanished in a puff of smoke, and Jiraiya landed with a clatter of his geta.

Naruto shook his head. “You’re full of shit, just like everyone else in this village. Later, ero-sennin. Have fun creeping around onsen and writing mediocre smut.”

Naruto, Kurama started.

“Mediocre?”

Naruto spun around. “You know who I am. You know who my father was. And that’s what bothers you? Someone criticizing your book?”

Jiraiya’s cheerful demeanor vanished, and he scrutinized Naruto. “Belligerent. Insubordinate. Murdered the Fire Daimyou’s wife and stole her cat. Attacked a jounin with a poisoned senbon. Multiple counts of breaking and entering, arson, vandalism, trespassing, civil disturbance. Practices highly restricted kinjutsu.”

Naruto barked a laugh. “Am I being arrested? That was all before I was a genin!”

“Madame Shijimi?”

Naruto shrugged. “I was aiming for the cat. The official cause of death is a heart attack. I know,” he said, smirking. “I checked.”

Jiraiya sighed. “Your file also says you’ve taken a leadership role in training your teammates. You’re mysteriously adept at fuinjutsu. You’re close friends with Shikaku’s son—who your sensei for some reason believes has been a good influence. Recently, you’ve evaded S-rank missing-nin Orochimaru. Defeated unaffiliated-nin Yuki Haku. Assisted Hatake Kakashi in defeating missing-nin and former Kiri ANBU Momochi Zabuza. You show exceptional loyalty to your friends and team. Only one incident in twelve years.”

Naruto didn’t need to ask what that last part referred to. “What’s your point?”

Jiraiya sighed. “It’s clear you don’t trust adults, and you don’t respect them. That’s a problem for someone at the bottom of the chain of command. You need to be able to take orders without fighting your superiors every step of the way.”

“Things are different on a mission,” Naruto said defensively. “I’ve never ignored an order while on a mission!”

“You’ve only been on D-ranks and one C-rank which was upgraded to an A-rank,” Jiraiya said. “There haven’t been many opportunities to prove that claim. Or disprove it.”

“Is an onsen really the best place to be talking about this?” Naruto asked, crossing his arms.

Jiraiya laughed. “Maybe not.” He looked wistfully around the hot springs. “I guess I’m finished here. Let’s get lunch, and you can tell me what kind of training you’ve been doing. Oh,” he said, smiling down at Naruto. "It's good to finally meet you, kid."

In the end, Naruto had to pin Jiraiya down to get him to pay for the ramen.

“I should have expected this,” Jiraiya said, pulling the kunai out of his sleeve, “with a mother like yours.”

“Good thing you aren’t denying it,” Naruto said, twirling a senbon between his fingers. He needed to restock his weapons. He didn’t want to use any deadly poisons during the third stage of the exam, but paralytics should be fine. If he had to go up against Sakura, it might not even matter. She’d probably spit any poison back at him.

Jiraiya gave his deflated wallet a sad look, then sighed and put it away. 

“Alright,” he said, standing up. “We’ll need to go outside of the village for what I’m planning. Don’t worry, I’ve already got permission from Sarutobi-sensei.”

“I feel like I should let someone know where I’m going.”

Ayame leaned over the counter. Teuchi loomed behind her with a ladle. 

“Don’t worry, Naruto,” Ayame said, smiling sweetly. “If you aren’t back in two weeks, we’ll know who to blame.”

Teuchi smiled at Jiraiya, arms crossed, ladle threateningly dripping miso.

Naruto hadn’t known civilians could produce killing intent. 

“Right,” Jiraiya said, unnerved. “Let’s go, kid. I know you can’t survive without ramen for prolonged periods of time.”

He grabbed Naruto’s shoulder and steered him away from Ichiraku.

“Thank you very much!” Ayama called out.

“See you later o-chan, nee-chan!”

Jiraiya set a quick pace out of Konoha. He kept looking into alleys and flinching away.

“You’ve got some dedicated people watching your back,” he muttered, frowning at a suspiciously dark patch of shadow near the front gate. 

“Training?” Naruto prompted.

“Right,” Jiraiya said, clearing his throat. “From what you’ve told me, you’ve got a mixed bag of skills.”

“Is that a problem?” Naruto asked incredulously.

“No, it’s a good thing. It makes you unpredictable, adaptable. If you’re known for one skill, people will develop strategies around it. That’s the problem with most genin, especially you kids fresh out of the Academy.”

Naruto huffed. “I know that.”

“There’s one thing you have that they don’t,” Jiraiya said, “one thing you forgot to mention when listing all your skills.”

Naruto frowned at him. “Tora?”

“No, you idiot, the kyuubi!”

“Oh,” Naruto said. “Are we allowed to talk about that now?”

“In Kakashi’s report, he mentioned some of the kyuubi’s chakra leaked out during your mission to Wave.”

“Me being the kyuubi jinchuuriki has to be the village’s worst kept secret,” Naruto said. 

He looked at the towering trees around them. Jiraiya had led them off the road and deep into the forest. Naruto could hear crashing water up ahead. He’d never had the opportunity to explore the forests around Konoha. He had only been beyond the village’s walls a handful of times. It was nice. He thought Shikamaru would like it.

“Sandaime wants me to check your seal,” Jiraiya went on. The trees thinned, and they reached a pretty waterfall. The pool it fell into was filled with clear, aquamarine water which flowed into a wide, shallow river.

“We had to come all the way out here for that?” Naruto asked, looking around.

“Not just that,” Jiraiya said. “We also need you to start accessing its chakra, to start training you as a jinchuuriki.”

Naruto bit his lips together, willing himself not to laugh. 

No one really knew what a jinchuuriki was or what they were meant to do. Uzumaki Mito thought of herself as a sacrifice, a pretty vessel hidden from the rest of the village. Uzumaki Kushina thought of herself as a prison warden. Uzumaki Naruto thought of himself as a friend.

For a long time, the only person he had trusted was Kurama. Kurama had always been there, willingly or not. And even if it was for selfish reasons, Kurama prioritized Naruto’s safety and continued existence.

“Okay,” he said once he got himself under control. “I don’t really want to use…its power. Isn’t it enough that it’s sealed in me? What do I get out of this?”

Jiraiya swung his hair around. “Trying to bargain? The kyuubi belongs to the village, you know.”

Naruto laughed.

Those damn toads have the key to our seal! Kurama growled. You need to sign that contract, or travel to Mount Myoboku in person.

“If you say so, ero-sennin,” Naruto said. “It’s not like there are any other Uzumaki around to sacrifice. Either way, you need my cooperation. So, what do I get in exchange for my body being possessed by the kyuubi?”

Jiraiya gave him a shrewd look. “What do you want, kid?”

“I want to sign the toad contract like tou-chan,” Naruto said. “And I want to learn a seal to lock away a bijuu’s chakra.”