The first night

Hiruzen Sarutobi was having a very tiresome day.

As if dealing with the Konoha council wasn't enough, the fire daimyo was breathing down his neck ever since Minato's election. Now that Hiruzen was the incumbent of the Hokage mantle once more the pressure was on. Orochimaru's defection was the icing on the proverbial cake. Hiruzen sank deeper into his chair and stuffed his long stem-pipe.

He couldn't help but notice the deepening wrinkles as he held the kiseru, his skin a smattering of liver spots. He drew a long, deep breath and exhaled the herbaceous smoke, every day it tasted more bitter.

The years were catching up to him and although he carried his age well, he would much rather spend his retirement in comfortable leisure. Spend more time with his estranged grandson, dedicate the eve of his life to the next generation and sternly teach the brats his skills. There was so much he would love to do, but so little he could do. Then there were things he had to do, and what that was, was teaching the lippy Uzumaki kid some manners.

Hiruzen couldn't help but grin as he knocked the ashes out of his pipe. It was and will always be the Uzumaki's, troublemakers one and all, bull-headed, single-minded people, but foremost kind and selfless, and they would forever have a fond place in his heart.

Naruto was an uppity child, giving lip at every turn and snapping at everyone and everything, but that was to be expected and Hiruzen's heart ached whenever he saw the boy. To grow up without a family, branded as the Nine-Tails incarnation, treated like dirt, and it was all Hiruzen's fault. The masked assailant was still at large, surely hundred other enemies were lurking in the shadows as well, and he couldn't make an innocent child their target. It was his paranoia that stigmatised Naruto and alienated him from his peers. It hurt. But there was no other way and he hoped that someday, shall peace reign once more, he could tell Naruto everything - extol him and his clan for the sacrifice he never consented to. It hurt so, so much.

A knock came from his door and his frown disappeared with it. Images had to be upheld after all.

Kakashi strode in, languorous as was his trademark, and stood at attention. "Sir."

Hiruzen acknowledged the talented ninja, a fresh-faced child once and now a jaded agent borne by violence and tragedy, his heart ached again - maybe this world just wasn't for him anymore.

"Anything suspicious?", he had kept a close eye on Naruto's heist for the Shadow Clone Technique and had seen its heartening conclusion firsthand, however, his purview with the Telescope Technique only went so far.

"The case of the Shadow Clone Technique has been resolved, as you surely know.", Hiruzen noticed the smirk in the younger man's voice and chuckled himself. "But we have also captured and interrogated a peculiar man with a peculiar background and I hoped you, Sir, could shed some light."

Hiruzen balked. Now that was concerning. Kakashi Hatake was a man of peerless caliber, someone that could very well take on the mantle of Hokage in the near future, and Hiruzen was damn sure that any hitches he came to him with were a pure and absolute headache. There was almost nothing the man couldn't do and he reminded Hiruzen of a younger version of himself. Anyway, better to get it over with quickly.

"Speak freely, Kakashi.", he intoned with all the patience of a man standing on coals.

Kakashi's eye creased happily, the playful demeanor irked Hiruzen fiercly. "Sir, have you ever heard of the country: Germany?"

Hiruzen wanted to hit the smug man over the head.

------------------

Cole followed the directions of a helpful passerby, doing his best to not gawk at the... 'Bluehead? Redhead with blue hair? Blue-haired person?'

It was the little things, day-to-day stuff, that crept up behind Cole's back and reminded him that he was no longer on earth. Like a run-of-the-mill street food stall - Cole conceded that it did smell supernaturally amazing though -, right next to a rickety booth that sold all sorts of exotic weaponry and mystical paper talismans. Then there was the general ambience and pizzaz of the ninja metropolis: hawking and shouting by zealous salesmen, advertising their seven-folded super-kunai invention as the next big hit and what have you; merrymaking youths that braged just as much about their crushes as they did about their latest jutsu; elderly housewives that chittered conspiratorial in one breath and swatted missbehaving kids with super-speed in the next; or the gorgeous bluehead - that's how he would call it - that prettily winked his way because he just couldn't stop himself from gawking.

Cole was stunned. Everything was so trite, so ordinary, but also blended beautifully with the marvellous. He could drink in the sights and sounds all day every day. Were he not peniless, hungry, thirsty and tired to the bone, he might as well have watched the city for the entire evening. But he was all of the former.

Luckily his interrogator, or rather an Anbu agent, now that he thought about it, was nice enough to leave a crumpled note in one of his pockets. Apparently a one-night stay at "Konji's Konoha Hostelry" had been reserved for him, breakfast included. It didn't mention a shower, but by God he needed one.

That was his goal so far, made complicated by the strange sights and missing directions on the note.

There was a lot of ellbowing through presses of people to do in the late afternoon and more than once he thought his head would get bashed in for ticking someone off. Fortunately for him, the obvious foreigner was given a measure of leeway. How long that would last, he didn't know and when the time came and he couldn't protect himself still, well, that would be future Cole's problems.

Nightfall came and he finally reached his destination.

Being well-traveled in his... past life, Cole couldn't see anything but a rural japanese inn before him. Antiquated curtains, the noren, covered beautifully carpented and laminated sliding doors and above, in huge neon letters, was the inn's name written.

It still felt unreal to him. He was about to spend his night in some cheap-ass hostel, in Konoha! He passed by actual ninjas and had interacted with them, and although he didn't meet any of the series cast, the face of the third Hokage gazing down from the mountain was unmistakeable. He had people he loved back on Earth and people that loved him back, but this was a chance to experience the impossible and he would take that gamble every day of the week. He came here someway, it wasn't too far fetched to believe there may be a way back also.

Cole pushed past the curtains and the door and stepped inside, a weight leaving his shoulders.

(Second chapter, hope you like Sarutobi's and Kakashi's introduction, if not, tell me how you think they would behave.

Btw.: The start is gonna be slow, I really dislike these super quick-paced stories where the MC gets powers in seconds.)