Chapter 29: Homecoming
The road back to Konoha felt shorter than the road out. The trees thinned, the scent of pine and damp earth fading, replaced by the distant, familiar tang of woodsmoke, turned earth, and crowded humanity. The air grew heavy.
Jiraiya hadn't spoken much since the ridge. His usual stream of stories had dried up. He walked with a new watchfulness, eyes scanning the shadows. Naruto matched his silence.
The forest had been a simple world. Konoha was a machine with a thousand grinding gears. He was about to step back into its teeth.
They crested the final hill at dusk. Below, Konoha blazed with evening lamps. The great walls looked smaller. The Hokage faces were pale smudges in the fading light.
He stopped, looking down. The village that had been his cage. The village that housed the Hokage's guilt and Danzō's rot, Yūgao's kindness and the matron's coldness.
He felt no pull of belonging. No warmth of "home." He saw a system. A dangerous, living system he had to navigate not as a ghost in its basement, but as a piece on its board. A piece that had just shown it could move in unexpected ways.
Jiraiya stopped beside him. "Not much to look at from here, is it?"
"It's what's inside that matters," Naruto replied.
Jiraiya glanced at him. "Yeah. It is. And a lot of what's inside isn't pretty." He clapped a hand on Naruto's shoulder. "Stay close. Keep your eyes open. And remember the cliff."
They walked down as night fell. The massive gates were closed, but a small door stood open. The two chūnin on guard snapped to attention for Jiraiya. Their eyes, sharp and professional, slid to Naruto. A pause. Confusion, then uneasy recognition. They didn't see the boy from the rumors. They saw someone with eyes too old for his face, hair tied neatly back, dressed in clothes that spoke of the wilderness.
"This is Uzumaki Naruto, my apprentice," Jiraiya said, tone leaving no question. "He's with me."
"Of course, sir." The guard's gaze lingered on Naruto as they passed, the wary look of a soldier assessing a new weapon.
The streets inside were quieter. Lantern light pooled on cobblestones. A few late workers hurried home.
As they walked, people saw them. A glance at Jiraiya, a nod. Then the second look at Naruto. The stare. The whispered hush.
He looks different.
Is that…?
His hair…
Naruto heard the pieces of sentences. He didn't react. He walked beside Jiraiya, back straight, face calm. He let them look. Let them see the change. Their confusion was a shield. It was harder to hate a ghost when it looked you in the eye.
They took a route past the training grounds. From the darkness of Training Ground 3 came a sound - not of sparring, but of a single, ragged breath, hitched like a sob.
Naruto's steps slowed. Jiraiya stopped with him, silent.
There was no one there. The field was empty, lit only by a flickering lamp post. But the sound was clear. A child's hurt, lonely gasp.
Then, he saw him. Not with his eyes, but in his mind, vivid and sharp as a memory.
A small boy, sitting alone in the dust at the base of the lamp post, hugging his knees. His clothes were worn, his face smudged with dirt. He wasn't the bright, shouting hero from the manga. He was hollow. His eyes, the same blue as Naruto's, were empty wells of a loneliness so deep it had scoured everything else out. This was the real suffering. The true story. Not montages of training, but years of silent rooms, of shopkeepers turning away, of birthdays with no one, of a heart breaking over and over again because it had nothing else to do.
The vision-boy looked up, and his eyes met Naruto's across the empty field.
Why? The word wasn't spoken. It was just there, in the air between them. Why do they hate me?
Naruto felt it then, not as a story he'd read, but as a ghost-pain in his own chest. The spoiled milk. The whispers like cuts. The desperate, clawing need for a single kind word that never came. This was the life he'd been spared. This was the raw, aching reality of the name he carried.
The vision-boy's face changed. It wasn't sad anymore. It was determined. A fierce, wobbly smile stretched his lips, the same smile from the manga covers, but here, up close, Naruto could see the terrible cost of it. It was a smile built from sheer, desperate will, a dam holding back an ocean of hurt. The boy stood up, faced an imaginary enemy, and shouted a silent, defiant promise to the uncaring dark.
He would forgive them. He would love them. He would save them. Because it was all he knew how to do.
A cold, hard knot twisted in Naruto's stomach. This wasn't inspiring. It was a tragedy. This boy's love was a cage he built for himself, the only home he thought he could have.
No.
The thought was quiet, but final. It came from the deepest part of him, from Aiden, who knew the value of a life, and from Naruto, who refused to be a sacrifice.
He looked at the vision, at the ghost of the path he didn't walk.
"I won't," Naruto whispered, the words just for the two of them. "I won't live your life. I won't smile while they break me. I won't love the hands that starved me."
The vision-boy tilted his head, his fake smile fading into something confused and lost.
"I'll remember," Naruto said, the promise settling into his bones like ice. "I'll remember what they did to you. Every silent meal. Every turned back. Every day you spent alone in that empty room. They don't get to have that from me. They don't get to take anything else."
He took a step forward, not onto the field, but into the resolution. "Konoha took your parents. It took your childhood. It took your peace. And for what? For a 'Will of Fire' that let you shiver in the dark?" He shook his head, his own voice low and fierce. "Not me. I'm not giving them a thing. I'm taking. I'm taking my time. My power. My safety. And I'm building walls they can never knock down."
The vision of the small, lonely boy seemed to shimmer. For a second, he looked just like Naruto, the same face, the same eyes. Then he faded, dissolving into the lamp light and the shadows of the empty training ground, leaving behind only the echo of a loneliness so profound it made the air ache.
Naruto turned away. His chest felt tight. It wasn't sadness. It was the weight of a promise made across two lifetimes.
"Kid?" Jiraiya's voice was close, concerned. He'd been watching Naruto stare into nothing.
"I'm ready," Naruto said, his voice flat. He started walking again, leaving the ghost of his other self in the dark.
*
*
*
They walked the rest of the way to the Hokage Tower in a heavy silence. The building was mostly dark, a single light burning at the top. The ANBU hidden in the shadows were like statues, but Naruto felt their chakra focus on him. More watchful eyes.
-
The Hokage's office smelled of old paper and tobacco. Sarutobi Hiruzen stood by the window. He turned, and his tired eyes found Naruto.
Relief flashed, then was buried under duty and sadness. "Jiraiya. Naruto. You're back."
"We are," Jiraiya said. "He's ready for the next stage. And he needs a new address."
Hiruzen's gaze swept over Naruto, taking in the long hair, the calm posture, the eyes that held a new, unsettling depth. "I see." He sighed. "Danzō has been active. He calls your display a 'public destabilization event.' He is demanding you be transferred to a secure facility for 'assessment.'"
Jiraiya's face hardened. "He can demand. The boy is my apprentice. He stays with me."
"And where will 'with you' be?" Hiruzen asked, frustrated.
"The Hatake compound."
Hiruzen blinked. "That is clan property. We cannot simply..."
"I've made the arrangements," Jiraiya stated, a finality in his voice. "It's secure. Private. On clan land. It's the solution."
Naruto listened. It was a good move. A fortress. A declaration.
Hiruzen stared, then looked at Naruto. "What do you say?"
Naruto looked from the Hokage's tired face to Jiraiya's determined one. He thought of the ghost-boy in the training field, and the silent room that waited for him if he was weak.
"It is the correct choice," he said, his voice clear. He didn't thank the Hokage. He stated a fact.
Hiruzen's shoulders sagged slightly. He nodded, a gesture of weary acceptance. "Very well. Weekly reports, Jiraiya. He is still a ward of this village."
* * *
The Hatake compound was on the village's eastern edge, near the memorial stone. A high, mossy wall surrounded it. Jiraiya pushed the heavy gate open with a creak.
Inside was stillness. A swept path leading to a dark, traditional house. The quiet here was heavy with memory.
"Home for now," Jiraiya said softly. "Get the lay of the land. I'll see about food."
Naruto walked up the path alone. His footsteps on the gravel were the only sound. He placed a hand on the wooden frame of the engawa. The wood was smooth and cool.
As he turned to look into the dark garden, a voice spoke from the shadows right beside him.
"You're early."
Naruto didn't jump. His heart gave one hard thump, but his body went still. He turned his head slowly.
A man, a teenager, leaned against the doorframe, shrouded in gloom. Silver hair. A mask. A single, dark eye, flat and empty as a deep well. In one hand, he turned a familiar sandalwood comb over in his fingers.
Kakashi Hatake looked from the comb to Naruto's face. His eye just observed.
"I found this,"[1] Kakashi said, his voice a lazy drawl that didn't match the sharp intelligence in his gaze. He tossed the comb. Naruto caught it without looking. "A caretaker said no one's been here for months."
He pushed off the doorframe. The casual slouch was a mask. Underneath was something coiled and deadly.
"So," Kakashi said, the lazy tone gone, his voice as cold and sharp as a senbon. "You're the one who's moving into my father's house." He took a single, silent step closer. The empty well of his eye seemed to swallow the faint light. "Tell me something, Uzumaki. What are you really doing here?"
[1] More like he took it 🤭