A little boy who burns brighter than the sun (Parte-1)
In a hospital, Ryo was lying down with machines attached to him trying to slow down his heart but it's beating too fast for doing any effect
"How is he?", asked Mikoto
"Same like the last 3 times, his heart is giving out, he needs to calm down", said the doctor controlling the machines
"Again...what trigger it this time, if I remember correctly he can effectively control his bloodline limit in a battle, he is a god given talent there is nothing he can't do.....there must be something that must have trigger it"
"I don't know and Lord 3rd Hokage refuses to speak about this matter, and other than the Kyuubi attack nothing happened, I will talk to the 4th Hokage the moment he returns"
"Sigh...can you please leave us alone?"
"Are you going to do it again"
"I have to calm him"
"Don't do it, you are making him more miserable than he already is..if you are doing it at least tell him the truth"
"I know, just, Please Leave us alone", replied Mikoto with sad eyes
-------
Mikoto put one hand on Ryo's cheek
"Someone as great as you can't die, you didn't even see your kids grow up, come back my love", as she kissed him and starting removing his and her clothes
Ryo's tears were falling down as he held Mikoto tighter subconsciously
*hic* "I love you.... please don't leave me alone"
She held him tighter as well, "I love you too... I always did"
They slept nude on the hospital bed for the entire night
-------
Ryo wakes in the hospital, bandaged and worn, with Kakashi sitting beside him on the chair.
For a brief moment, he wonders if everything that happened was just a dream
"What happens"
"I don't know, I was told you were here by lord 3rd Hokage and I came here"
"T-There was someone else with me right?"
"No"
Ryo smiled wryly as he understood that everything that happened was just a mere dream as he started collecting his thoughts
He then remembers...
Kushina is dead. Minato is dead. Shouji is dead. Hotari is dead. Yukimura-Sensei is dead. Keiko is dead. Obito is dead
Dead!!Dead!!DEAD
There is no one left except for him.
He feels emptier than ever.
-------
Kakashi comes to visit her every day and the two of them stay silent throughout the visit.
Till one day.
"Minato-sensei and Kushina-san are dead," he whispers brokenly. And all Ryo can see is that boy on the day Obito died. He sees himself in the boy
And he holds Kakashi in his arms as he cries.
-------
The Third Hokage visits him a month after the aftermath of the attack as he is still bedridden from chakra exhaustion.
To be frank, the man looks exhausted and wears his grief behind a mask. Ryo can understand his pain well; he knows what it feels like to love someone so deeply only to lose them.
They spend the time discussing the past, about the present, about the future, and the empty seat of Hokage.
"Minato is dead, Jiraiya has left the village, there is no one else but you who can become Godaimei, besides you are already a pseudo Hokage, as you hold the decree of the Hokage," Sarutobi Hiruzen states calmly.
He knows that....he knows but he does not want the position of Hokage.
"Think about it, Ryo."
-------
The memorial stones hold more names than it last did, as he traces Hotari's name along with Shouji's, Obito's, Kushina's and Minato's. All of them dead and gone.
But he feels no pain, only emptiness, as he wonders why the loss does not hurt him anymore.
And he wonders if all of it was even real.
-------
The village moves on.
The destruction is being repaired.
The people are buried and mourned.
But Time stops for Ryo
He does not cry anymore, he drinks heavily and he stares at the memorial stone more often
He is tired, he is broken, he wonders why is he even alive...
-------
The Third Hokage takes him and Kakashi to meet Naruto. Kakashi is quiet, tired, and so broken over Minato and Kushina's loss. The Third Hokage also wears his grief over the death of his wife.
The two males cannot bear to look at Naruto's small form and turn their attention to other things. But Ryo steps closer and holds Naruto in his arms, and places the little boy at the crook of his arm. Ah!! the small but heavyweight, so warm and delicate, lay there. Naruto opens his eyes and regards his uncle with curious, innocent eyes.
Hotari, Shouji, Obito, Kushina, Minato… all dead, dead and gone.
he holds out a finger and Naruto's small hands clutch around it.
'Blood, so much blood, it won't wash off.'
Naruto coos and smiles, bright and beautiful.
'With your love for ramen, I wouldn't be surprised if you name your child after it.'
'Ryo-Kun, Minato and I decided to name our baby Naruto – for Maelstrom, not the fish cake'
'Yes, your boy will be as bright as the sun, after all, it's your son'
*Huff*Huff
Naruto cries.
Ryo put little kid inside the crib afraid of hurting the little sun
-------
For a brief few weeks, he takes over as Hokage for Hiruzen as he mourns with his and her wife children. The Uchiha Elders sees this as a chance to display their powers and authority over the rest of the village and they plot and plot.
Ryo works from the crack of dawn until the moon sets the sky begins to lighten. There is so much to do, papers to sign and contracts to negotiate.
All in all, it's quite the headache but it must be done.
he wonders why anyone would ever want this job.
'I can't take it anymore!' Minato yelled as he harshed slammed the Hokage stamp onto the piece of paper.
Ryo smiled as he started working again
-------
Politics is messy, dirty and Ryo despises it.
As he is filling in for the Third, the council decides to meet.
"What about the Kyuubi?" Danzo questioned.
"The 4th and his wife kushina-hime wished for me to take their child and raise him as my own...so that's what I am about to do"
The Clan heads and Jonin were going to let the issue drop there, however, Danzo brought up another issue. "Are you sure it's wise to be raising that child yourself?"
"Excuse me?" Ryo said turning his head back to the old fossil. The anger was showing in his eyes
Danzo apparently didn't get the hint. "For one thing, that child is now carrying the very beast that nearly destroyed our village. The very same beast that caused the death of your beloved friends." Danzo said.
With this the entire council freezes and the civilians display their anger over the fox and the clan heads are all silently plotting and thinking.
Ryo internally sighs at the Third Hokage's decision to announce Naruto's condition to the adult population of Konoha. Sometimes he wonders if age has made the God of Shinobi weak, but he removes that thought as fast as it comes because the only God that shinobis would respect is one who builds their path in the blood of foes and allies alike. For all his age and kindness and mercy, the Third Hokage is still a God, revered and respected. What his reasons are for revealing such a delicate fact, Ryo might not know, but all he cares is that that old man has left him a large task to deal with.
There are suggestions thrown across the council room.
"Kill him!" This one was widely encouraged by the civilian population.
"Turn him to a weapon for Konoha." This was Danzo's suggestion, supported by Koharu and Homura.
"Have him be adopted into one of the clans." This was the opinion of the clan heads, especially the Uchiha and Hyuuga.
Rationally, it would be most beneficial to have Naruto be trained as a weapon for Konoha's uses or adopted into one of the clans to breed for loyalty towards the village. To exploit the Jinchuuriki for all that he is worth.
He dismissed the council...he cannot silence the anger of so many people...if he does that forcefully, he might create a civil war, Konoha at this point of time can not handle civil war, or there will be death, the death of innocent peoples who did nothing
-------
Konoha was once beautiful at night, before the Kyuubi attack. Now it is only a village in ruins and covered in mourning and tears.
he sighed as he took a deep sip of his sake cup. These days it seemed as though the only escape from all this was found through the bottle, no wonder Tsunade drank so much.
As he sits there on top of the Hokage statues, drinking and looking at the moon, beneath the night sky, he mourns for what he has lost.
-------
"You do not want the position of Hokage, do you?," Hiruzen states as he stamps another paper. After three months of mourning, the Third Hokage has finally returned and Ryo knows that the Jinchuuriki Issue will be raised again, seeing as he did not make any decisions.
Ryo stands before him, and nods, "I am the most powerful and smartest person in the entire village yet I couldn't do a single thing, in the council when they all say things about Naruto, I didn't do anything for the fear of having a civil war, forgive me, I don't think I am right fit for the title"
"Minato was like you, That kind of thing comes with experience, of course, you couldn't do a thing in the council if you did, I must have thought something was not right, not to mention even first Hokage, even I was the same"
He stares and smiles, "But you know, you remind of Hashirama-sama."
Ryo says nothing but raises an eyebrow in surprise.
"In his later years," Hiruzen amends and his eyes gain a faraway look, as though he is back in the past. "He had the same look of loss in his eyes as you do, I never really noticed it as a child but when I grew older I saw how much being Hokage hurt him. Tobirama-sensei said that he couldn't forget someone and I never knew till both of them passed."
"He couldn't forget Uchiha Madara," Hiruzen sighs, "Hashirama-sama was always a sentimental one and the loss of that one person haunted him till he died."
Ryo bows and turns and walks through the door.
"Much like you, Ryo, that's why I absolutely trust you because you are just like him, a person who lost so much how can he be an evil person", muttered Hokage he is sure Ryo didn't hear him
-------
Sometimes Ryo wonders if everything was real.
If his losses were real losses.
But then he remembers the love, the hate, the sorrow, and the bitterness.
Now, he knows that everything he has lost was real and true.
And this realization hurts him more than anything.
-------
One by one we all fall down into despair, to hatred, to sorrow, to life.
And we wait till one day a Hero will come to save us.
Till that day. The destined day when the waves of time... flow differently, the destiny of Ashura and Indra changed