From Time to Time

Chapter 1: Konohagakure no Sato

Okay, not gonna lie, I'm not entirely happy with this chapter. It's kinda boring but it is necessary and next friday will be much more interesting I swear.

Just so you're prepared, it takes place pretty much entirely in Konoha (hence the chapter name) and switches POVs a couple times, but Future!Naruto (who's name is revealed this chapter) will be the primary POV in most chapters moving forward (and Kakashi, but that's not for a little while yet)

On with the chapter!

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Chapter One: Konohagakure no Sato

Konoha was a calm village. During times of peace it seemed like the perfect place to live whether you were a civilian or a shinobi and during times of war it seemed like one of the safest places. Tall walls protected the village from most attacks and the well-trained shinobi, many of which were renowned throughout the Elemental Nations, were there to defend alongside it.

Konoha, the village hidden in the leaves, had produced some of the finest shinobi throughout the ages. The Shodaime and Nidaime Hokages Hashirama and Tobirama, Madara (as evil as he'd been, there was no doubt he was an exceptional ninja), the student of the Nidaime and his successor Sarutobi Hiruzen, all three of the Sandaime's students given the title of the Sannin, The Great Medic and granddaughter of the Shodaime Tsunade, The Toad Sage of Mt. Myobuk Jiraiya and Orochimaru the Snake Sannin, Jiraiya's prized student and Yondaime Hokage Namikaze Minato, who'd saved the village from the Kyuubi no Kitsune's brutal attack, the Yondaime's student Hatake Kakashi as well as his father, Konoha's White Fang, Hatake Sakumo, and the Uchiha prodigy Uchiha Itachi were all well known and feared shinobi, not to mention dozens of others.

For any shinobi, especially the best of the best, taking down an S-Rank nukenin or two was an accomplishment and a rare one at that. It wasn't often that lone shinobi survived encounters with multiple missing nin, let alone were able to take them down and come out relatively free of injury. Now, being a ninja meant you were used to rumors, most of the time far exaggerated (though that can also be an advantage), but that's usually all they were. Rumors. Based on some form of truth, sure, but overall mostly false. So when rumors made their way to Konoha about a mysterious red haired shinobi wearing an Uzushiogakure hitai-ate who'd apparently taken down five S-Rank nukenin, all from a group known to travel in pairs, all within two years when they've been trying to tack the group down for far longer, it was undertstabably shocking.

Deidara of Iwa.

Hidan of Yu.

Kakuzu of Taki.

Sasori of the Red Sand from Suna.

Hoshigaki Kisame of Kiri.

All S-Rank shinobi of the highest caliber, known for their destructive power and being utterly merciless in battle. All gone. All dead in less than twenty months.

Only it wasn't just a rumor because the bounties had been claimed with proof of the kill—the heads of each missing nin given to the village of origin as proof of their demise and, in Kisame's case, his sword Samehada. Which, if the rumors coming from Kiri were to be believed, was delivered to them sealed with a complex fuuinjutsu that even the seal master of the village had a hard time cracking.

Not to mention word spreading of the Yondaime Mizukage having been under a genjutsu since his reign of terror had begun, which had been broken by said mysterious shinobi upon the return of Samehada, and had started making amends with his village. He even acknowledged that though his actions weren't his own it was no excuse and he didn't expect anyone to trust his word, even going so far as to say he'd step down after fixing what he'd broken. The whole thing was odd, especially when word reached Konoha that the Mizukage was also the Jinchuuriki of the Sanbi and had declared the red headed shinobi an ally (as well as any village he chooses to align himself with, which what?) of Kiri. This man had single handedly stopped a civil war that had been destroying the village for years in a matter of days and Kiri was working toward forgiving the man for the actions that weren't his own.