Prelude II

Four years later

An ANBU was standing outside of a tall building inside of the Namikaze clan compound, the mask was easily identifiable as a kitsune. It was given to him as a prank when he was initiated into ANBU by the newly inaugurated sandaime hokage, which was his father Hiruzen Sarutobi. It was only a year ago that his father let him take the jōnin exams and he was able to pass through relatively easily only having to fight hard against a few mist ninja with the hyoton, though it was thanks to them that he discovered that if he used his Hiraishin kunai while it was in the air he could manipulate it so he appeared with the kunai back in his hand. He was grateful to his squad mates and a few other ANBU who filled out his recommendation forms as well, especially now that he was capable of getting a promotion to ANBU captain.

He was walking to the clan heads house so that he could catch up, since he had just gotten back from a month long mission in the land of rivers. He wasn't even able to open the door before a blur of blonde tackled him to the ground. He blinked a few times before he laughed and removed his mask saying, "I guess you were still able to sense me, even with how hard I was trying to mask my chakra signature." Clouds seemed to grow above his head, before quickly poofing away and a huge grin coated his features. "Well I guess the surprise I promised you will be ruined as well."

The blonde haired woman quickly jumped up and started bouncing, "What!? I hope you are kidding, there's no way I would ruin any of your surprises." The man raised an eyebrow as he dusted himself off, only to receive giggles from the girl. "Well other than when you come over to visit, those don't count." She said with a little pout.

This time the man grinned and said, "Well Ria-chan, I must admit it is helpful that I set up a surprise dinner at the The Twinned Leaf."

The girl gasped at hearing that, the twinned leaf was a fancy new restaurant that opened up a few months ago. It was almost always packed and you had to do something major for them to even think about accepting a reservation. She raised a brow as she examined the man standing across from her, "Well since it must have taken quite the effort to get a reservation there I will just have to accompany you An-kun."

She then gave a quick hop and gave him a chaste kiss on his lips. She grinned at getting the man to blush, before she grabbed his arm and pulled the dazed man inside. Anthony shook his head to clear allow himself to focus and said, "Well you will need to hurry and get ready the reservations are for six thirty and it's already five forty-five, so you might want to go get ready."

Ria jumped up and quickly ran up the stairs to get to her bedroom to get ready. It took her roughly thirty minutes to get ready and come back down to the living room wearing a dark blue form fitting dress that left her back bare and reached just above her knees, with the ocean blue lightning bolt of the main branch of the Namikaze clan. She walked in seeing Anthony in light grey dress pants, with a black buttoned up shirt, and his cloak (The same as when he came to the village a few years ago, but now the four clan symbols are a little more spread out on the back with the hidden leaf symbol in the middle. It also has seals that allow it to adjust to his prefered length, thickness, weight, design, and colors). In all they were both left in silence at how good they both looked. Anthony shook off the stun first and he said, "You look absolutely gorgeous Ria-chan."

Pink started to form on Ria's cheeks, but she was happy. She said, "You don't look too shabby yourself ninja boy."

This earned a grin from the boy and a quick chuckle from the two. Anthony looked at the clock on the wall and said, "We need to get there quick Ria-hime grab ahold of me." She reached over, and they disappeared in a bright golden flash and reappeared a few feet away from the restaurant in another golden flash. Anthony held her hand as he smoothly led them into the building and caught the attention of the hostess saying, "seats for two under Sarutobi!"

It didn't take much longer before they were quickly taken back to a table in the middle of the packed restaurant, which got another raised eyebrow from Ria and a dismissing shrug from Anthony. They ordered dinner and were slowly eating and talking when the restaurant slowly got quieter and quieter until it was almost completely silent. Ria looked around them and noticed quite a large amount of her friends eating nearby and that Anthony seemed to get nervous as the place grew quiet. She turned around again to look for the waiter and when she looked back she caught Anthony on the floor next to her on a knee. That's when it clicked in her mind, 'Fancy dinner, friends all gathered in a high-class restaurant at the same time, An-kun getting nervous, and the sudden silence.' Anthony took a quick and shaky breath before he started, "Ria-chan, I know this may not be the surprise you were expecting, but you must admit it has to be a good one." He took another shaky breath and pulled out a box, "Now Ria-chan I have been dating you for the past four and a half years and I must say that you have made me a very happy man, happier than even when I was traveling the nations with Madara-jiji. I started to fall for you the moment I saw how hard you worked back at the academy and have only continued to fall more and more in love with you as the time has passed. I know nothing on this plane of existence more beautiful than you, nor anything that I will ever love more. I would never leave you alone in this world and would like the rest of the world to know you are mine as much as I am yours. Will you Ria Namikaze marry me?"

The tension around the table was almost bone crushing as Ria just sat there, the tension was clear when Anthony let out a few chuckles and said, "Maybe it was an even better surprise than I thought, ne Ria-chan?"

This finally got a reaction from the girl as she started to laugh as tears started to fall from her eyes. She started by nodding her head and then choked out, "Yes… of course I would love to marry you An-kun."

An smiled a truly amazing smile, it truly brought warmth to all that were close enough to see it. It warmed up the room completely clearing out any of the remaining tension in the room as he slipped the ring that had gems showing her clan symbol surrounded by two diamonds in the shape of the leaf symbol. The whole restaurant sounded off clapping and as Ria looked around all she could see was her friends and soon to be family, when she looked at Anthony all she got was, "I may have rented out the whole place for tonight, or maybe as the owner of the place I just closed it down early to give us our special moment surrounded by friends and family."

She looked up shocked at her now fiance he was the owner of one of the most popular restaurants in the land of fire.

That would definitely come in handy in the near future.

Two years later

It was a good warm spring day in the hidden village and the recently appointed ANBU captain kitsune was making his way back from a quick mission that had only lasted a few weeks and he was eager to make it back home and see his wife. He made a stop at the hokage tower and gave his report to his father, who was also strangely eager to dismiss him. He didn't think too much about it and quickly flashed into the ANBU headquarters where he congratulated his team on their successful mission and dismissed them. He took his time taking off his ANBU equipment and putting it away securely in his personal locker. He reported the mission to the ANBU commander and after being dismissed from their he flashed back to his house where his wonderful wife was nervously waiting for him.

'How is going to react to the news? Oh I hope he's as excited as I was when I found out.' She was given any more time to think about it as a golden flash could be seen from the cracks of their bedroom door. She took a deep breath as she walked over the smooth and comfortably warm wooden floor of the hallway to the master bedroom, she shakily reached out her arm and quickly opened the door and without second thought or giving a waning she yelled out, "YOU'RE GOING TO BE A FATHER!" and bolted from the open door leaving a very confused and nearly deaf Anthony standing in the doorway. He stood there not understanding what was going on for another few seconds before it slowly started to piece together in his mind.

"I'm going to be a father?" He whispered to himself, then a smile lit up the room as he yelled out to where any houses near the compound could hear, "I'M GOING TO BE A FATHER DATTEBAYO!" He didn't stop there either he went ahead and flashed outside and ran through the leaf village announcing the same thing for everyone to hear his news.

Everyone was in good moods for the rest of the night, but none so more than the expecting mother who chased after her husband and dragged him home.

Seven months later

Anthony was standing in front of his father and was a little bothered by the fact that he was there in his ANBU gear while his wife was almost eight months into her pregnancy. Hiruzen could see the irritation in his son just by the way he was standing before him. Of course he knew he was and he deserved to be angry, but the situation was out of his hands the mission he was about to give to his son and the two other ANBU squads was of the utmost important and incredibly difficult. If there was even a possibility for it to be achieved he needed the best his forces had to offer and his son just so happened to be one of the few that fit that description.

"I know a few of you may not like to have been called in here on such short notice, but you are ANBU and I expect you to act like it." Many of the ANBU straightened and a the squad that used to be his sons all tensed at his words. This had him raise a brow, but he quickly dismissed it as loyalty. The aforementioned son straightened and regained his bearing as an ANBU captain, so he continued, "I needed the best this village has to offer and all of you in this room fit that description perfectly. ANBU Captain Kitsune, you are the main leader of this mission." The masked man stepped forward and took the scroll offered to him, before retaking his position at the center of the three squads. "This mission has officially gained the SS rank, that is why three ANBU squads have been selected to complete it, to sum up the mission you twelve and Captain Kitsune have been tasked is to find and eliminate the missing nin Haruka Uchiha. She was once an Uchiha elder, but the current head of the clan cleaned house and removed the old greedy elders and placed different members as his advisors. Haruka didn't take kindly to this and killed several other Uchiha and other Leaf ninja during her escape, she has been marked an S rank missing nin and it seems she has joined up with at least one other missing ninja as we have lost several hunter ninja and ANBU squads that were tasked with securing her. ANBU this is your mission, now get out of here and get it done."

A simultaneous response of, "HAI HOKAGE-SAMA" sounded before it seemed a breeze passed through the room and that was the only indication of the ANBU leaving. Hiruzen sighed and thought, 'Hurry back son and don't you dare and die on us out there. You are needed by too many people here.'

A little over a month later

The ANBU squad finally found their target and she was traveling with a group of other B and A-rank missing nin from all over the elemental nations, they were currently at the border of waterfall country, iron country, and fire country. This would be a delicate mission that could quickly escalate into a war between the three countries. Kitsune had the three squad leaders as he was explaining how he planned to surround and eliminate the six missing nin, as he finished he got a quick series of nods as they left to get their teams in position.

Kitsune sighed and waited to get the signal over his intercom on when they were all in position. It was only a wait of five minutes before he heard the all of the teams send in the signal of three quick clicks and the three keywords (Slug, Toad, and Snake). He took a deep breath and began his approach, the plan involved him engaging the enemy alone at first and then the other squads would then move in to surprise attack the nin from their positions. It was a plan befitting a Nara, but he did not take into account that one of the squad leaders didn't like him. It was hard to see why he hated Anthony, he was a good ninja and a good citizen of Konoha, Hebi was very jealous of the many things that Anthony had and he didn't. Hebi was a man from the Uchiha clan, but never was he given the respect that many of the other members got and he definitely didn't like how the grandson of Madara was so well off. So he thought, 'I'll just hold off until both sides are tired out or dead and finish off the survivors.'

Anthony was getting close to the missing nins camp when he sensed motion from them and quickly went through hand seals and called out, "Fire Style: Great Fire Annihilation" and as the great wave of fire swept into the small clearing he stopped and went through another set of hand seals and called out, "Wind Style: Great Cyclone Dome" The wind attack fueled the fire jutsu and made a large dome of quickly rotating fire as he saw this he called out, "Collaboration Technique: Blaze Release: Spiraling Dome of Annihilation" He smirked at the name thinking, 'I can't wait until I show everyone my new jutsu and I can't believe I thought up such a cool name on the spot like that Dattebayo!' He stopped feeding the jutsu chakra and watched as it slowly dissipated revealing a large blackened crater where six ash piles, but only two were large enough to be corpses and the other four were obviously objects the missing nin substituted with. He sighed and tossed a kunai at a seemingly inconspicuous tree and the kunai flew just to the left of the tree and continue passed.

Well it would have continued if there wasn't a flash of gold before Anthony appeared holding the kunai in his left while slashing out with the katana he had unsealed before performing the Hiraishin. The katana slashed through the tree and revealed the now headless form of a missing nin. As he resealed his katana he was forced to jump back into the clearing avoiding the kunai and shuriken that were thrown from someone in the forest. Anthony reached out with his sensing ability and felt the other missing nin trying to surround him, but he surprised them by signaling the other ANBU to attack.

This should have finished the mission, but the squad with Hebi weren't moving, in fact when Anthony pushed his senses farther trying to detect them he could only feel the signature of an alive Hebi and the quickly fading signatures of the deceased ANBU. So now he still had to deal with their final opponent, Haruka. He checked in with the other squads to see the assault squad was still fine with only a few minor injuries, the tracker squad suffered one loss and the other two made it only light injuries, and sadly the support and medic squad (Hebi's squad) had only one survivor and the other four were dead. He sighed again and signaled to the other squads to head back to the leaf while he takes care of Haruka with Hebi.

The others didn't like the thought of leaving him there, but also knew the importance of following his orders. They turned and started the travel back to konoha. Kitsune turned and rushed over to aid Hebi, or so he thought. He was surprised when suddenly he entered the clearing to see the two waiting for him to enter. Hebi took off his mask showing off a slashed forehead protector and his fully matured sharingan eyes. Anthony sighed as he too took off his mask and stored it in his storage seal and tightened his own unscathed hitai-ate. He then closed his eyes and displayed his own fully mature sharingan. He pulled out two of his kunai and got into a defensive stance. This got a chuckle from the other two sharingan users who also pulled out a pair of kunai themselves and charged at the lone ANBU captain.

Anthony took a deep breath and threw one of his kunai making the Uchiha jump in different directions to avoid his teleporting technique, but the didn't anticipate him using it anyway and threw the other kunai at Haruka while she was in mid jump and flashing to that kunai and slashing her with the one that he had grabbed after the first jump. Haruka followed up his strike by bringing her kunai in an x-defense, but Anthony's was using wind chakra with the chakra conductive metal in the kunai allowing it to cut through the kunais and left a deep gash in her arm. He couldn't do any more damage as he had to dodge the rock thrown from Hebi or, now that he got a better look at him, Akahito Uchiha. He took notice how the other two still had almost full reserves, while he was pushing just under three quarters of his reserves, which was just slightly less than what the two had combined. He silently sent a quick thanks to all of his ancestors for blessing him with his large stores of chakra and to his grandfather for having him hone his control and telling him to constantly improve his reserves and control.

He didn't get much more time to waste on those thoughts as both of the Uchiha were going through hand signs, with his sharingan active he copied them as he started his own set of hand seals, as they all finished they called out the jutsus. "Fire Style: Head Mincing Pain/ Wind Style: Wind Dragon/ Water Style: Tsunami" The Techniques all clashed with each other, the wind and fire jutsu of the two Uchiha combined and formed a large fire dragon that charged straight at the quickly building wave of water. For Anthony this depleted about a quarter of his chakra reserves, while the other two ninja still had good three quarters left still keeping it even, but as the jutsu clash the tsunami started to overpower and outlast the fire dragon and collapse down on the two Uchiha. Seeing this Anthony did made two quick hand seals and called out, "Lightning Style: Electromagnetic Murder" The lightning quickly spread out and coated the water, which made contact with the two Uchiha. Haruka was hit full on by the combined jutsu and was electrified, but Akahito was able to avoid the brunt of the jutsu by using the kawarimi no jutsu to switch with a nearby log.

While he was stunned Anthony moved over and quickly cut off the head of Haruka and placed it in a storage scroll and burned the rest of the body with a quick fireball. He turned back to see Akahito forming hand seals and not know what technique he would use went with one of his strongest fire jutsu. Finishing at the same time they both called out their jutsu, "Fire Style: Phoenix Flower Jutsu/ Fire Style: True Hydra Jutsu" The two expelled their jutsu from their mouths and clashed as they both continued to feed them, Anthony's jutsu was easily powering through Akihito's jutsu. Well it was until Anthony suddenly stopped feeding the jutsu and threw one of his kunai at the Uchiha's feet and tried to flash and surprise him, but Akahito caught the movement and pulled out his tanto in preparation. Anthony flashed to his kunai and slashed out with another of his kunai which cut through Akahito, which as he fell turned into a log indicating his use of the substitution jutsu once again. Anthony was about to look for his opponent when his own jutsu struck him from behind and knocked him down and left him with bad burns on his back.

This on its own wasn't too bad, so Anthony shakily started to get to his feet. He wasn't able to fully stand up, before he felt something push into his back and poke out of his stomach, as he looked down he heard, "I thought you would have been smarter than that, little An-kun."

The blade was pulled out of him and Akahito walked in front of the man and laughed saying, "Look at the famous Anthony Sarutobi, slowly dieing to the lowly Akahito Uchiha recent missing nin of Konoha. Now maybe if you look at me nicely I'll take care of that lovely wife of yours and maybe not kill you son." Anthony spat blood into the man's eyes. "How Fucking dare you spit your pathetic blo…"

That was all the farther he got as he finally cleared the blood from his eyes and looked at the grin on the dieing blondes face. He glanced down towards his chest only to find Anthony's katana impaled where his heart was supposed to be. He tried to say something else, but all that came out was a gurgling sound as he choked on his own blood and died. Anthony stood over the freshly killed Uchiha and pulled his blade out and cut of his head and burned the body.

He turned to walk away, but he only made it a few steps before he collapsed face first into the ground. He rolled over to look at his wound and saw that it was more severe than he thought at first, he would have to make it to a hospital before going back to konoha. He searched for the familiar pull of his Hiraishin seals and when he felt the familiar tug at where he thought his group stopped at a hospital he flashed to it. Arriving in the town an elderly man spotted him and had two of his workers carry him to the hospital. Anthony was barely conscious of his surrounding and when he noticed they were heading to the hospital he thanked them and then his last foot holds and fell into the bliss of unconsciousness.

A few moments later

A group of ANBU that were sent out immediately after the rest of the squad checked in with the hokage about their current status and location, justed reached the forest and saw the great destruction that had occurred only a few moments ago. They also took notice of the amount of blood that was in the area and quickly searched for their captain. After almost a full hour of searching and finding nothing, but the two piles of ashes and pools of blood they decided one of the piles must have been the remains of their captain and the other his enemy. They then left to report it to the hokage.

They rushed from the forest to the village in a few short hours and then shunshined into the hokage's office and in their grief and worry of the ANBU and hokage respectably they failed to notice the unexpected visitor outside the door. The hokage in his worry and rushed mindset rushed for the details uncaring about his privacy seals. "Hokage sama when we reached the location left by the last ANBU squads we searched and discovered two piles of ash that closely resemble bodies. We also noticed large pools of blood surrounding the area, we could not find anyone else or him anywhere. We were able to find and bring back the corpses of all of the other killed ANBU, but we fear that Captain kitsune was one of the piles of ash and the other was the enemy he took with him."

He would have continue, but there was a loud crash outside the door. They both rushed out to check who it was and they discovered a weeping Ria whose water seemed to have broken in her state of distress. Hiruzen looked at the ANBU and yelled, "Get to the hospital and have Tsunade there she would be the best choice to help with this operation."

The ANBU all nodded their agreement and with a hail of, "HAI HOKAGE-SAMA" they all took off to either find Tsunade or rush over to get a room prepped.

Hiruzen then spoke to his ANBU guards, "Help me get Mrs. Namikaze to the hospital room that is being prepared and we must be careful with her, she is in a sensitive state right now."

No acknowledgement was needed as the men quickly and gently picked the woman up and carried her to the hospital as fast as the they could without risking her health in the process. It was long until they were all kicked out of the operation room and Tsunade was trying her best to save both the mother and the premature child. She refused to lose anyone that was apart of her family no matter how distant and she was rewarded by saving the little boy's life. After she cleaned the boy up and held him out to his mother she glanced over and gave a strained smile, but shook her head. "Thank you Tsunade. You managed to save our son, but as it is I Know I don't have much longer. I know it's selfish of me, but I don't want to be in a world where he isn't. I know I should want to be here with my son, but I gave the rest of my chakra and energy trying to keep little Minato alive. Thank … you … Tsu... na...de." With those final words Ria Namikaze passed away without even having the opportunity to hold her son.