The Fox And The Tiger

The Request

"You wanted to see me, Yugito?" Ay asked as he walked over to her. They met in a secluded field and she was seated under a tree. It had been three weeks since her rampage that Naruto took the fall for. There still had been no sighting of him, similarly to the time he actually rampaged.

"You need to release Naruto, from wherever he is being held."

Ay raised an eyebrow, "Oh? Why's that?"

"He isn't the one that rampaged...it...it was me. He took the blame...for me..." She buried her head in her knees and began to cry. The guilt she was feeling for letting him take the fall was becoming too much. She couldn't stop replaying the glimpse she saw of them beating up her defenseless savior. Had it not been for him, she would have killed Rin, and countless others. Who knows the potential amount of lives she could have taken. The village's true savior was Naruto, and the thanks he got was being beaten after already being badly hurt by her in that state and having somehow stopped her rampage. That was something that she still didn't understand to this day. Matatabi hadn't explained to her all that happened, just telling her to put it behind her...well she couldn't just put it behind her.

"Is that so? What happened?"

"That day, he demonstrated an amazing Jutsu, utilizing Fuinjutsu. It drained him though because it isn't fully ready. Afterwards he just left and had been ignoring me for the two weeks prior. I tried looking for him to figure out what I did to hurt him or something...I couldn't find him. Eventually he just came to me and had been really kind to me, offering me his hoodie." She gestured to the hoodie that she currently wore.

"So you were pretty surprised given that he was detached at first it seemed. Why was he?"

"Naruto had come across a rumor that Rin was spreading." She said with disgust "His actions were to try to keep the peace in the squad, but he said that he still and always did care about me, just was putting distance between us to have appeased a relationship that didn't even exist."

"So it was all a misunderstanding."

She nodded "But the rage I felt for Rin's lies...the crap he was spreading...I wanted him to pay. I was going to make him pay, I still want him to pay..." Yugito clinched her fists and stared ahead. Before turning to Ay with a fond smile. "But Naruto stopped me. To let me release some anger, he took a beating, then did something that got me out of the rampaging mode...when I awoke, he was really exhausted...hurt...because of me...then he did by far the kindest and most selfless thing, just so my image in the village never changed...only rose...so that I could be safe, saying he was already feared as the Demon."

"He took the blame. As he was wounded, had the burns from absorbing your potent chakra into his own body. That was the cause of the burns-"

"HE ABSORBED MY CHAKRA?"

Ay nodded and placed a hand at the back of her neck in a way to comfort her. "Yes, it is how you were brought back. We don't know exactly how he did it, but it was what he did."

"So you knew he wasn't the one that rampaged?"

"Yes, he possesses the Kyubi, there is a large difference in the chakra output between his Biju Chakra and yours."

"Then why do you have him locked up somewhere? He isn't a cr-"

"For his safety, and so the villagers believe he really was the one to rampage. Remember, he was gone for three months when he did. They will expect him to be gone a while."

"I see..." She frowned and looked to the ground. "Is he doing ok?"

"All things considered, he's fine. He still has some recovering to do."