Falling In Reverse

Chapter 2: Same, yet not the same

The blond knitted his eyebrows together. "I have a feeling that it wasn't the last time we saw that unknown," he stated, fixing his hard gaze on Obito. "Maybe it's a new plan to divide us."

"Pff, fat chance," the raven snorted. "Uchihas will always stay loyal to you, sensei."

Minato's eyes softened, but he didn't smile. No one witnessed his smile from the events on that fateful day. "I know, Obito, and I appreciate your clan's support," he said gently. "But that man never starts something without being sure about it. We need to be cautious," he warned his pupils, and they both nodded. "For now, we have a mission to continue. The unknown might or might not be part of what is killing our allies, and we desperately need to figure it out. We can't lose more people."

"I will send one of my crows to a rendezvous to warn Itachi's and Rin's teams about the unknown ninja," Obito informed, already making the sequence of summoning seals.

"Good. After that, we'll be moving out."

xxx

Naruto woke up well rested. His body felt stiff, but the pain was finally gone.

The Jinchuuriki pushed Kurama's tails off of him and sat up, yawning and stretching out, working out all the kinks in his muscles.

The Kyuubi observed the young blond before asking, "Feeling better?"

"Yeah." The teen's stomach rumbled, demanding food, and Kurama chuckled. "How long was I out?" Naruto inquired, jumping to his feet and starting some easy exercises.

The fox hummed. "About fourteen hours."

The blond froze in his stretching. Then he whirled around to glare at his friend. The fox was now sitting instead of lying, and Naruto had to lift his head up that he could look into red eyes of the Kyuubi clone. "And you let me sleep for that long?!"

"Of course," Kurama answered easily. "We cannot have you falling out of trees. You need to be at your best if we want to figure this strange situation out."

A deep frown creased Naruto's face. "Strange situation... That's one way to put it when your father and sensei are trying to kill you..." he muttered before his stomach growled again and he rubbed it soothingly. "First, I need to get some food and water inside me." He looked at his clothes and his frown deepened. "And I need to wash and change."

Without even thinking, Naruto put his hands into a cross seal, and ten clones popped into existence. "You two – try to find something to eat," the original ordered the clones standing at the very left, and they saluted. "The rest of you – find some water."

One copy wrinkled his nose in disgust, then turned to his fellows and announced, "Let's find a waterbody big enough for our stinky boss to bath!"

"Aye!" shouted all the others and then promptly scattered, ignoring Naruto's indignant, "Oi!"

Kurama was laughing his tails off. It always was hilarious to watch the blond brat bicker with his own shadow clones; it seemed like after using them for so long and so often, they got the mind of their own. Or maybe that was Naruto's way to cope with everything that happened, his own method to keep himself sane.

"Oh, shut up, you overgrown raccoon!" the Jinchuuriki barked, already spinning on his heel to walk in the random direction.

This time it was Kurama's turn to splutter in indignation. "Hey!" he exclaimed, trailing after the human. "Do not lump me together with that loudmouth imbecile!"

"When stop acting like him!"

"Hn." The fox jogged past Naruto and 'accidentally' slapped one of his tails across the latter's face, causing the human to stumble.