Naru-chan, in love?!

The first day of Academy was a truly bizarre experience for Naruto. All his friends and former-new classmates were there, and they were so… so tiny!

Naruto focused on that to keep from thinking about how completely, utterly different they were from the shinobi they would have had become in that other future. About how they no longer remembered all the times they would have had shared. About how they weren't the same people, might never become the same people.

His would have been teammates were the worst. Sakura, with her ribbon, was a shy little thing that hid behind Ino. Would she ever get trained by Tsunade? Naruto couldn't bring himself to chase after her the way he had as a child, so would she ever look at him the same way? Would they then manage to build the same bond?

Would they even be on the same team?

Of course, the differences in Sakura were nothing compared to the differences in Sasuke.

When Naruto was so lost in thought — not brooding, no matter what Kurama said, barely hiding the note of worry in his gruff voice — that he tripped on his own two feet, Sasuke was the one who stopped, helped him back up and asked if he was okay with a smile.

Naruto stared in shock. Sasuke knew how to smile?! And such a cute smile! It was only when Sasuke blushed violently, his eyes widening, while the rest of the hallways burst into whispers, that Naruto realized he had said that aloud.

~.~.~

Naruto proceeded to cement the mistaken assumption that the Hokage's son had a huge crush on the Uchiha clan head's youngest by staring at Sasuke all through class and stalking him during lunch.

Being that his stealth skills were still utterly abysmal, Naruto mostly just succeeded in making Sasuke incredibly uncomfortable. Or it might have been the killing intent Hinata was emitting.

In any case, the moment class let out, Sasuke all but fled back to the Uchiha clan compound. "What in the world is the matter?" Mikoto wondered as Sasuke slammed the door shut and locked it tightly, before hurrying to the kitchen to hide behind the counter.

"He's following me!" Sasuke hissed, his eyes narrowing as he eyed the windows distrustfully. "I think I managed to lose him, but…"

Beginning to get a little concerned, Mikoto wiped her hands on a towel and also glanced over all entrances with a practiced eye. "Who, Sasuke?" she asked. "A scary masked man?"

Sasuke shook his head. "A boy from my class…" he muttered. Now in the safety of his home, he felt a little ridiculous admitting it.

Mikoto opened her mouth to say something, only to pause, staring at one of the windows. "…That boy, right there?" she finally asked, pointing.

With a feeling of growing doom, Sasuke turned to look. A chubby, whiskered face was squished up against the glass.

Sasuke screamed.

~.~.~

It didn't end there.

Once she heard the whole story, Mikoto had to bite back laughter and a smile. She cooed — cooed! — over Sasuke, with sympathy that was blatantly patronizing. And then she suggested he make friends with that orange weirdo.

Sasuke felt distinctly betrayed.

Worse yet, his efforts to avoid Naruto were completely fruitless. By the next day, Naruto had recovered his mental equilibrium enough to give up on the stalking and just plaster himself to Sasuke's side. Classes, lunch, after school, Naruto followed Sasuke everywhere — loudly.

"The Hokage's son… He could be useful, I suppose," Sasuke's father said reluctantly, his frown giving away his remembrance of Naruto's many pranks.

But Fugaku's disapproval didn't stop Naruto from inviting himself back to the Uchiha district.

During those times, the number of ANBU observing the clan increased to the point that they simply ran out of hiding places and even Sasuke began to notice their presence.

Naruto noticed too, but he didn't understand the implications until Kurama explained them. And then he had a very unpleasant realization.

It wasn't precisely that Naruto had forgotten about the Uchiha coup and massacre, it was just… well, Naruto had mostly dismissed the issue from his mind, assuming that it wouldn't be relevant with the whole his father being alive and Danzou being behind bars thing. But nope, it seemed problems ran too deep to be so easily resolved.

If anything, the limited information that had been released regarding the masked man who had used the Kyuubi to attack Konoha had actually made the suspicions and distrust of the Uchiha clan worse.

It didn't help that most of the clan had avoided damage during the Kyuubi's rampage (thanks to Danzou, again). Even the civilians started muttering nasty rumors, which was a serious problem for the Military Police's duties. Naruto sympathized. He knew what it was like to be unjustly ostracized.

Even Minato had bowed to the demands of placing the entire clan under heavy surveillance. Not only were the elders and most of the jounin council demanding it, but he couldn't discount the possibility of at least some Uchiha being in contact with the masked man.

The really serious problem was that they actually were, kind of. He kept showing up at the Nakano Shrine. No one quite knew how or why, and the clan refused to admit to the whole thing. The Hokage would insist on investigating the shrine, the clan elders reasoned, and that couldn't be allowed. It was a sacred part of the clan's heritage. Even the Senju hadn't been allowed inside.

The fact that they could do nothing about the ANBU, who were directly under the Hokage's command, only made the clan angrier.

Old grudges and dissatisfaction rose up again, helpfully stirred up by Tobi, and more and more of the clan began to contemplate something frankly stupid.

More and more, the voices of reason that reminded everyone of "one-man take down of a thousand nin invasion force from Iwa" were drowned out.

It had been kept mostly under wraps and hidden from the general population, but Naruto became suddenly and unhappily aware of the situation.

His solution was simple — Friendship.

~.~.~

One day, Naruto simply stood up in the middle of class and declared, "We're having a study group at Sasuke's house!"

This was the first Sasuke heard of it. His protests were completely drowned out.

"Sasuke-kun!" most of the girls squeed.

"Are there gonna be snacks?" Chouji asked.

"Yeah, are there?" Kiba wondered.

"Sure!" Naruto agreed, as if it was even his house.

Hinata leveled an increasingly unsettling stare at the back of Sasuke's head.

Nobody bothered asking his opinion of the matter. But most of the class showed up after school at the Uchiha district.

Since this was an event masterminded by Naruto, it was naturally a complete fiasco that ended in half the Konoha clan heads having to come pick up their wayward spawn and apologize to the Uchiha for the disturbance and property damage.

As reparation, Minato ordered the ANBU to help with the cleanup. The sight of the much hated masks doing menial labor and getting ordered around by the little grandmas who lived in the vandalized houses was like a balm on the collective Uchiha soul.

Somehow, the study group became a weekly thing. The clan heads were forced come up with a rotating roster of chaperons for their children. Mikoto served them tea with a smile and traded embarrassing child-rearing stories. The Akimichi became enamored with their senbei. A couple of Nara started using the rooftops to sleep on, enjoying the peace and quiet of being so far from the rest of the village.

Fugaku found excuses to drop by; even if he didn't understand where it was coming from, he recognized the opportunity.

Minato always took Naruto out for ramen afterwards, instead of punishing him.

~.~.~

But it was all still incredibly annoying, and eventually Fugaku's impressive patience simply ran out.

"Hokage-sama," he greeted shortly as he stalked up to Minato's desk. Please do something about your little monster of a son, he wanted to say, but trying to find some polite way of doing so made him hesitate.

Minato looked up with a smile. "Ah, Fugaku. Great timing. I just wanted to ask your advice about this matter…"

"Yes, well…" Fugaku found himself distracted. Being asked for advice by the Hokage was an honor… as only befitting the Uchiha clan, of course. But he also didn't trust Minato's beaming smile. This man definitely not as simple as he appeared, and underestimating him would be very foolish.

But, it really was an honor…

"Thank you for your help. Your insight is greatly appreciated," Minato beamed, an hour later, as Fugaku prepared to depart. "And… if I may say, it's wonderful to see the Uchiha becoming closer with the other clans. I believe that it's through close bonds that Konoha will become truly strong."

He meant every word.

Now, Fugaku was no stranger to using your son for political ends and the greater good. It was, to him, a perfectly logical thing to do. And that was how he came to the sudden realization — false — that Minato had planned the entire thing and instructed Naruto to act in that way.

To build those bonds he so believed in among the next generation, with the unexpected benefit of bringing the current generation closer together…

"I hope you can stop by next week. I have several more things I'd like to discuss," Minato said.

"…Very well," Fugaku agreed.

Their Hokage was certainly brilliant and ruthless. But Fugaku was left with one nagging question — what were the pranks for?

~.~.~

"So, I think it's about time we did something with that masked guy," Shisui said casually one day.

Itachi gave a slow blink and tilted his head.

"It's an Uchiha problem, so we Uchiha should deal with it," Shisui insisted. "The elders might be wishy-washy about it, but he's an intruder. If they insist on not telling the Hokage about this, then it's up to us to take care of him quietly. It's pur duty to the clan and the village."

Itachi hummed thoughtfully.

"Things are finally getting better with the rest of village," Shisui continued, nodding to himself. "I heard Yashiro's team got invited out for drinks. My team invited me to poker! Poker, with an Uchiha! We can't let this get ruined by some masked weirdo!"

Itachi nodded.

~.~.~

Naturally, it didn't work out that smoothly.

They did manage to catch the masked weirdo when he appeared out of nowhere again. But even with Itachi's genius and Shisui's Shunshin, they couldn't quite keep up — though at least they managed to stay alive. The fact that the masked man was at least somewhat humoring them helped too.

"You have good eyes," he complimented them.

"You've got no right to be saying that!" Shisui roared.

It was like he was mocking them. Because of him, their clan had teetered on a razor's edge. Because of him, Konoha had almost gone the way of the Bloody Mist and their purges. How dare he?! Was that eye even his? No, that didn't matter, because as far as Shisui was concerned, Kakashi was a hundred times more worthy of the Sharingan.

Enraged, Shisui darted in his signature flicker. The masked man stepped back, then deftly dodged a flurry of kunai from Itachi.

There was the sound of a wire snapping.

And suddenly a can of orange paint toppled onto the masked man. By intention or accident, Itachi had set off one of Naruto's leftover pranks.

The paint can fell straight through the masked man and clanged against the ground — he had phased out on instinct. But as he returned to tangibility, he reflexively looked down at the puddle of orange paint at his feet, lifting one foot to stare at the stained bottom of his sandal.

It was just such a weird thing to have happen to you in the middle of a battle that even Tobi couldn't stop himself.

It was a costly moment of distraction.

In that moment, Shisui managed to activate Kotoamatsukami.

The problem was, Shisui had also acted on instinct. He hadn't actually considered what sort of order to give, so he ended up blurting out the first thing that came to mind.

"Stop being such an asshole!" Shisui ordered.

He froze as he realized what he'd done. Shisui and the masked man stared at each other, stunned, for a moment, before the masked man tilted his head bemusedly, looked around, seemed to think for a moment, then turned on his heel and warped out. Just like that.

After several long moments, Shisui and Itachi exchanged a blank look.

"…Oops," Shisui muttered.

"I won't tell if you don't," Itachi assured him solemnly.

~.~.~

"My Naru-chan? In love with Mikoto's boy?" Kushina fretted. "But that's so…" She gestured vaguely.

"I don't think that's what's going on," Minato said. Admittedly, he didn't know exactly why Naruto had reacted like that, but he really didn't think it was what Kushina thought.

Kushina shot him an incredibly flat look. "It's definitely love," she declared. "Besides, I don't want to hear anything about this from you. You were practically picking out houses and wedding decorations while still saying I was just a comrade."

In retrospect, that had been very blind of him, Minato conceded. He had actually realized that Kushina was different from everyone else, but it had taken, oh, a decade for him to figure out what kind of different she was to him. A decade, and a make out session, initiated by Kushina.

Jiraiya had been beyond disappointed.

"I wanted Naru-chan to find a girl like me," Kushina continued her previous thoughts.

"Isn't Naruto already like you himself…?" Minato muttered.

"But of course I'll support him no matter what!" Kushina insisted.

"He'll be happy to know that," Minato agreed.

"After I test that Sasuke boy to see if he deserves our Naru-chan!" Kushina concluded, fire in her eyes.

So much for peace with the Uchiha.

~.~.~