Author's Footnote, 2015 December 16: I just finished my latest novel! The name is "The Change Storms: Induction", and it's a rationalist superhero story. (Hint: no spandex!) As of this writing it's available for free over on my campaign (bit. do/dks-), so stop by and grab a copy.

Also, I am co-running a rational Naruto quest; the link is in my profile. I write posts every Sunday, Velorien of Lighting Up the Dark writes for Thursday, and Jackercracks and AugSphere help out with GMing, worldbuilding, and mechanics. Come join the fun! Everyone is jointly controlling one character, so the barrier to entry is very low.

"...and then he told me to eat my carbon," Naruto said, munching on a charcoal briquette. He made a face, looking at the soot-covered thing. "He said he fixed my gut so I could digest the stuff. I wish he'd fixed my tongue too. This is disgusting."

"It's...quite bizarre," Hinata said. "I can see your upper intestine separating the charcoal into extremely fine particles and preferentially screening some out for further crushing in the mid- and lower intestine. The particles end up finer than I can resolve, but I think they continue getting ground beyond that point." She paused, staring off into space as she focused on something inside Naruto's body. Eventually she shook her head in frustration.

"It's actually quite difficult to see," she said. The entire area is so flooded with your chakra that I have to really focus to look past it."

"What do you mean, my chakra?" Naruto said with a frown. "I'm not doing anything."

Hinata shrugged. "Maybe not, but it's there. It's like...tendrils, coming out of all the hairs on your body and stretching out. They twist around each other in a fractal pattern, and they reach as far as I can see."

"It's probably something about the Fox's 'bijuu senses'," Anko said. "Some kind of tripwire system, maybe?"

"Perhaps," Hinata said. "There's more changes, though. Naruto-kun, those nodules in your hypodermis are growing, slowly. I had to look carefully, but most of them are a very small amount larger than they were immediately after you changed. The ones in your eyelids are growing much faster than the rest; they're spreading out in a web that is starting to interconnect."

"Leaving Naruto's new nutrition requirements and rather disturbing eye-related issues aside, I think we need to get out of here," Anko said. "Naruto can't travel, so we'll carry him. And we need to go now. Sensei said he wouldn't stop us from leaving, but we shouldn't count on that lasting." She pushed herself to her feet.

"A moment, please, sensei," Shino said.

Anko raised an eyebrow; she didn't sit, but she nodded to signal she was listening.

"Leaving for Konoha before going into the fire made a great deal of sense," the genin said. "However, we did not do that and now the situation has changed. We still don't have a solution to Hinata-chan's abuse; perhaps that is something we might put off to the future, on the theory that returning is of greater importance. That is not the only problem we face now, though."

He gestured towards his fur-covered teammate. "Naruto-kun was already reviled by the villagers," he said. "To the extent that several of them apparently tried to kill him as a child—stabbing him and forcing him to drink bleach."

"Hey!" Naruto said. "That didn't happen, really! It was all fine, I was just—"

Shino ignored him, talking right over the jinchuuriki's complaints. "What will the response be if he goes back in his current form? I submit that he will be jailed immediately for the safety of everyone else. Failing that, he will face even greater isolation and quite likely more frequent assassination attempts. I ascribe a moderate probability to the proposition that one or more ANBU might feel that the risk Naruto-kun presents to the village is high enough to be worth risking their freedom for, and would therefore attempt an unsanctioned hit.

"Of course, then there is sensei," Shino continued, looking up at their teacher. "With respect, sensei, it is well known that many people in Konoha's power structure do not trust you. If we go back as we are now, after being away so long, being in Sound, and the changes to Naruto—well, the best thing that might happen to you is that you are sent to Torture and Interrogation. Most likely you will be killed. No matter what, you will no longer be our sensei."

Anko blinked. "Are you kidding me?" she said. "We've been trapped in Sound for weeks, we've killed five of their ninja in what could be considered an act of war between Konoha and Sound, the Fox has turned Naruto into a charcoal-chewing monster who can't even stand up without breaking the room, and you're worried about me not being trusted? I'm your jonin-sensei and, not to put too fine a point on it, you are two clan heirs and the jinchuuriki of the Nine-Tails. It is literally my job to throw myself between you and a kunai; whatever happens to me doesn't matter. Now get on your feet and help me carry Naruto."

"Shino-kun, you wouldn't be raising the issue unless you had an alternative," Hinata said. "What is it?"

Shino hesitated, then took a deep breath and squared his shoulders. "We should ask Orochimaru-sama for help," he said. "The medic-nin of Konoha are experts, yes, but my allies spent weeks in the labs underground, watching and listening to what went on. I don't understand the vast majority of what they saw, but I understand enough to know that the medical practices here are far beyond those of Konoha. If anyone can help Naruto-kun with his new body, it will be Orochimaru-sama. Hopefully he can find a way to revert the changes but, failing that, he can likely help Naruto-kun adapt. He can also provide protection for both you and Hinata-chan, sensei." His mouth worked as though he was tasting something sour. "In point of fact...our team is objectively better off here than we are in Konoha."

"You aren't," Anko said. "You have a decent family and parents who love you. Every day that we stay is one more day they miss their son."

Shino nodded acceptance. "True. But I find myself faced with a choice: protect the happiness-state of my family, or protect the lives of my team. From a utilitarian point of view, there is no contest between the two."

Anko stared at him, flabbergasted.

"Did someone scoop out your brain while I wasn't looking?" she asked. "Maybe replace it with horse manure? Naruto's changes would be like pure heroin for sensei; if he ends up in the labs, he's not coming out again, which means we can't stay. As to the risks to me—getting you three home absolutely outweighs anything else. On your feet, genin. We are leaving, and that is a direct order."

Shino climbed to his feet and stood to attention with drill-ground precision, hands clasped behind him and eyes locked on the wall behind Anko. "With respect, sensei, I do not feel that I can lawfully obey that order!"

The temperature dropped as Anko's face went blank.

"What did you say?" she asked calmly.

"With respect, sensei, I do not feel that I can lawfully obey that order!" Shino repeated. "Konoha Field Regulations, Chapter Eight, Section Four, Paragraph Three, Item Six states that an order is unlawful if: 'it places a team member at substantial and imminent risk of death or crippling injury without commensurate increase in probability of mission success.' Our mission was to scout the contested area between Sound and Waterfalls; returning to Konoha at this time places you at extremely high risk of death but provides no benefit to our assigned mis—"

Anko grabbed him by the throat and lifted him off his feet, slamming him into the to wall so hard his teeth rattled.

"Do not ever play barracks-house lawyer with me," she said quietly. "This is a field mission under combat conditions, and I am mission commander. What you are doing is incitement to mutiny, and I would be perfectly justified in shoving a kunai through your brain right now."

Shino choked, his airway blocked by the pressure of her hands. His face was turning purple and he struggled to push her hands away. His insects came pouring out of his body, swirling in a black carpet across the wall Anko pressed him against.

"If any of your bugs are still moving one second from now, I will kill you," she said.

The bugs all froze in place.

"Let him go, sensei!" Naruto said, jumping to his feet so hard that he smashed into the ceiling and bounced. He hit the floor with a sickening crunch of breaking nose and immediately tried again, more cautiously this time. He managed to get his feet under him and reeled drunkenly towards Anko, reaching out to pull her off Shino.

Only to be met with a no-look sidekick that sent him flying across the room.

"Hinata, Naruto, direct order: be still," Anko said coldly, not looking away from the Aburame she held pinned against the wall. "If either of you move, I will take that as proof that Shino has succeeded in provoking mutiny. I will kill him as the instigator and contain the two of you with all required force."

Hinata and Naruto froze, watching helplessly as Shino's struggles got weaker. He had given up on simply pushing on Anko's hands and was outright fighting, lashing out with fists and feet. Anko kept him suspended with one hand and slapped his blows aside with the other before firing a leopard strike up into his left armpit. His shoulder dislocated with a grinding pop that pulled a scream from deep in his chest. His thrashing became aimless, the pain and lack of oxygen rendering him unable to coordinate his limbs.

Anko waited until his movements had been reduced to bare twitches, then slammed him face-down on the floor and dropped a knee on his neck, pulling his damaged arm up in a submission lock that would have been brutal even if the shoulder weren't dislocated.

She leaned down until her mouth was only a few inches from his ear. The action drew grinding, ripping noises from his shoulder that sounded like someone tearing the leg off a turkey. Shino screamed so loud blood flecked his lips.

"Do not ever challenge my orders in the field," Anko said quietly. "If you do, I will kill you. Acknowledge your understanding."

"I understand, sensei!" he whimpered.

"What do you understand, genin?" she asked, twisting her body slightly to tear his shoulder further.

"I understand that I am never to question your orders in the field again, sensei!" Shino sobbed.

"Good," she said. "Now get your ass up and help Hinata carry Naruto." She dropped his arm abruptly and flowed to her feet, backing off. Shino whimpered in pain as his ruined arm slapped to the ground. He had to take a few deep breaths before he could roll to the side and clumsily get his feet under him. His body wasn't working quite right and he lost his balance.

Hinata was there to help him to his feet, a triangle bandage in her hands that she quickly tied in a sling for his semi-destroyed arm. Her Byakugan allowed her to do the work while still glaring to the side at Anko.

"Your arm is dislocated, the shoulder socket is fractured, and most of the ligaments are torn," the Hyuuga heiress said. "You are not going to be able to use this arm at all until it's had significant attention from a trained medic-nin."

"Yeah, should probably take care of this bit," Anko said, casually yanking on Shino's bicep while pushing on his shoulderblade. The shoulder popped back into the damaged socket with a clearly audible grinding noise. Shino screamed, his legs going out from under him. If Hinata hadn't been there to support him he would have smashed his head on the floor.

Naruto had managed to get to his knees without falling over. He reached for the door frame to pull himself up, but his claws sliced effortlessly through the wood and he fell again. He flopped over to hands and knees, stubborn and clumsy as an infant. His teammates were abruptly beside him, helping him up. Shino was reeling like a drunkard but managing to keep upright. It was unclear who was leaning on whom: Naruto on Shino, or Shino on Naruto. Hinata slipped under Naruto's left arm, draping it around her shoulders and setting her feet so that she could support most of the jinchuuriki's newly-magnified weight and some of Shino's.

Naruto tightened his arm around her, trying to pull himself more upright. His claws brushed against the outside of her forearm and she gasped, shying away from him as three crimson lines traced themselves across her flesh.

"Oh kami! I'm so sorry, Hinata-chan!" Naruto said, looking in shock at her arm.

"Maybe you should have thought of that before you let an inhuman monster redesign you body," Anko said tartly, wrapping a quick bandage around Hinata's arm. She had four small packs slung on her back—her own go bag and those of her students. "Let's move."

The four left the house, moving as quickly as Naruto's nigh-useless body and Shino's agonized stumbling would allow. They'd gone barely a block when Anko stopped in frustration and herded them into a shadowed alley.

"This won't cut it," she said, dropping the packs to the ground and rummaging inside to retrieve each student's storage scroll. She tossed the packs and their other contents into a trash can and turned back to her students.

"Naruto, Shino, you're getting a ride," she said, shoving the scrolls into one of Hinata's belt pouches. "We are running for it, and we are going balls-out. It's only a hundred, hundred-twenty miles from here to Konoha, so we should be able to make the run in three or four hours. We are not stopping for any reason until we get there; we will, if necessary, eat, piss, and crap on the run. If we encounter any resistance whatsoever, I will deal with it. Hinata, you will not attempt to assist me. You will not slow down, you will run your ass off. Acknowledge your understanding."

Hinata gulped and nodded jerkily. "I understand sensei. We do not stop for any reason until we reach Konoha. If we encounter resistance I don't slow down."

"Good," Anko said. "Now, these field boots are better than the training tabi you were wearing when we left Konoha, but at the speed we're going to be moving there's a good chance we'll run the boots off our feet before we get home. If you do, you block the pain and keep going; I don't care if your feet are in rags when you get home, as long as you get home.

"Shino, you're on me. Naruto, you're on Hinata. Try not to kill her with your claws." She waited for Naruto's wide-eyed nod, then turned to her Aburame student. "Your bugs are going to keep us all topped up as we run. Put a cluster on Hinata so that she isn't reliant on ones coming out of you if I have to drop back."

"Sensei, do you really think we'll encounter resi—" Naruto began hesitantly.

"I am on my last nerve with you three," Anko said. "Do you really want to speak up right now?"

Naruto shrank back, his shifting weight forcing Hinata to brace herself. "No, sensei," he said.

"Good," she replied. "To answer the question, yes. I expect that we will encounter resistance from one or more Sound patrols. Sensei said he would let us go, but he might have changed his mind or some patrol leader might not have gotten the word. No matter what the resistance is likely to be, though, we need to go now. Sensei loves puzzles and medical research; if he gets Naruto down into his basement torture lab none of us will ever leave this village again."

She shrugged. "Before, I was trying to find a way of escaping that didn't involve having to carve through half the ninja population of Sound. Right now, though, most of them are distracted by the fire, we have sensei's promise to let us go—for what that's worth—and I am officially out of fucks to give. There are very few people in this town that can get in my way if I really cut loose, and if they try they are going to have a very bad day." She snorted in grim amusement. "I honestly hope somone tries, because I am exactly in the mood to rip someone's head off and spit in their neck. Now, saddle up and let's move." She crouched to let Shino climb onto her back. Naruto climbed up onto Hinata, being very careful where he put his hands so that he wouldn't slice her open with the claws that he still hadn't figured out how to retract. She staggered at the weight of his inhuman form.

"Hinata, you've got infinite chakra available," Anko said. "Spend it like it's going out of style."

"Yes, sensei," Hinata said, straightening up easily. The barely-five-foot-tall Naruto probably weighed three hundred pounds, but he seemed weightless once she thickened her chakra sheathing enough. Ordinarily, she would never have been able to manage this for more than a few minutes, as her chakra was pouring out of her like blood from a decapitation. Shino's kikai pressed tight into the outline where Naruto's body touched hers, transferring chakra from the jinchuuriki to the Hyuuga heiress at a furious rate. Even that wasn't enough to keep up with the demand, so more kikai fed from Naruto's newly-broad back and hopped the short distance to Hinata to expel yet more chakra into her coils.

"Sensei, point of information: I still have a hundred times my usual complement of allies," Shino said carefully from his perch on Anko's back. "Should I push a shell out around us as an early warning system?"

"Not yet," Anko said, bouncing a little to get the sense of where his weight was. "Once we're out of town, I'll tell you when. Now, important note: if trouble starts, I'm kicking you off my back so that I can kawarimi. You hit the ground running and go after Hinata and Naruto. You do not muck around in the fight. Acknowledge your understanding."

"If you need to fight I will separate from you and go after Hinata-chan," he said. "Requesting clarification: May I leave some of my allies to assist you? I will tell them to attack anyone that you attack; all you need to do is strike once at someone with a hand, jutsu, or weapon, and they will designate that person a target from then until you leave the scene, at which point they will follow you."

Anko nodded. "Acceptable. Thank you. Speaking of your currently exorbitant number of allies: tank 'em all up, give us each a load out."

"Sensei?" Shino asked. "I don't understand the order."

"Have your bugs suck as much chakra out of Naruto as they can hold," Anko said. "Then assign a bunch of them to sit on each of us as a portable battery. If we signal—say, by tapping an arm like this—then they are to load us up with chakra. And, of course, you'll have another batch of bugs continuously tanking us up as we run."

Shino blinked for a moment before understanding struck. What sensei was saying-while-carefully-not-saying was that if the group had to separate she wanted Hinata to have an abundant chakra supply ready to hand.

"Yes, sensei," he said. A swarm of kikai so dense it was practically a solid object threw itself onto Naruto. The transformed tween shuddered but held still as they slurped greedily on his chakra.

"Wow," he said. "I can actually feel that."

Shino shook his head and sighed, waving his swarm back. He put a few hundred thousand kikai on himself, Anko, and Hinata, then assigned the rest of the swarm to shuttling chakra from Naruto to the other three as they ran.

Anko waited impassively while the kikai got into position. When everything was finally ready she looked carefully at her kunoichi. "Hinata, you ready?"

"Yes, sensei," Hinata said. Naruto clung uncomfortably to her back; being unable to sheathe his claws meant that he needed to hold tight with his legs and keep his palms facing out, weakening his grip. Hinata had a hand on his wrist to help him, but it was clear that his discomfort wasn't due to a weak grip.

"Good," Anko said. "On our way out of town, you lead. Keep us away from everyone as much as you can. If you have to choose between being seen by ninja and being seen by civilians, choose civilians." She paused for a moment, reviewing the preparations in her mind, then drew a pair of kunai with explosive tags attached and held them ready. "Let's move," she growled.

Hinata turned and flitted out the far end of the alley like a storm-borne cloud, Anko right beside her, the boys on their backs clinging tight.

They pounded through the streets, the thick leather of their boot soles barely touching the ground as they shunshined time after time, virtually teleporting through the city in a series of freeze-frames. It was an incredibly chakra-intensive way to travel, and the kikai couldn't transfer chakra fast enough to keep up, especially since, in order to carry Naruto's enormous weight, Hinata was using so much chakra sheathing that her body was effectively a puppet. Five hops was the maximum she could manage before her reserves were too low for another shunshin. At that point she had to run normally for a bit while the kikai caught up and refilled her reserves. Anko, with jonin-sized reserves, could have kept going much longer but she said nothing, matching her student's steps precisely.

It was a style of movement that no team that lacked a jinchuuriki and an Aburame could have managed. Even a jonin team would have been challenged to catch up with them, and they couldn't have done so over any sort of distance.

Of course, if you're already ahead of someone, you don't have to worry about catching up with them.

They came out of the woods on the edge of town and into their favorite training ground—the training ground that not-accidentally lay on a direct course for Konoha. Halfway across the field the world melted away to reveal the same world...plus Orochimaru twenty yards in front of them and three six-man heavy combat squads, all wearing ANBU armbands, in a circle around them. The ANBU waited silently, weapons in hand.

Anko slammed to a halt, looking around the circle in disgust before turning to her former teacher.

"You have got to be kidding me," she said flatly. "How in the hell did you know?"

"Kukuku," Orochimaru laughed. "Little bird, have you ever successfully managed to fly away from me?"

Naruto closed his eyes and stilled his breathing, turning his attention inwards and diving down into his mindscape.

o-o-o-o

Kurama was waiting on the mountaintop, sitting up with his immense head cocked as he stared thoughtfully off into the distance.

"Kurama, help!" Naruto cried. "Please, the Snake trapped us! He's going to put me in his labs and he might kill sensei, and I don't know what he'll do to Hinata-chan or Shino-kun! Please, you've got to help! I still can't fight like this, you need to run my body!"

Kurama nodded seriously. "Of course," he said. "I've been watching and I saw this coming, and I've already planned out how to deal with the Snake and his hatchlings." He snorted in amusement. "Don't worry, I'll keep the team safe."

Naruto sighed in relief. "Great!" he said. "Take 'em down!"

"I need your explicit permission to take control of the body," Kurama reminded him.

"You have it! Go, go, go!" Naruto cried.

The Fox gave him a vulpine smile and a polite bow of the head, then turned to smoke and streamed up into the sky.

o-o-o-o

Hinata was breathing deeply and evenly, using all the Hyuuga self-control techniques that her family had so carefully drilled into her since before she could walk. She didn't know what was about to happen, and she needed to be ready. Sensei stood to her left, her outwardly calm posture screaming combat readiness to the all-seeing eyes of the Byakugan. Shino stood to sensei's left, his arm still in the sling and his good hand resting very casualy near the open mouth of his kunai pouch. A steady swarm of his bugs was flowing out of his pant legs and down into the grass, spreading in stealthy lines towards each of the enemy ninja. Naruto-kun's misshapen body was still wrapped around her back, his soft fire-red fur ticking the back of her neck. His new appearance was disconcerting, but she had to admit that there were advantages; the fur was soft on her skin, and he smelled good. Distractingly good, since she was thinking about it while facing nigh-certain death.

"We're leaving, sensei," Anko said bravely. "You told us we could go."

"Yes, well, about that," Orochimaru said. "That was before your young friend here turned himself into the next step in human evolution. You three are free to go, but I'm afraid that he'll need to stay a bit longer."

"Not gonna happen, sensei," Anko growled. She glanced to her left at one of the ANBU who stood nearby, his oversized sword standing point-down on the ground, his hands folded calmly over the pommel knob.

"Hey there, Jiro," she said tauntingly. "How's the knee? D'ja ever get it fixed?" She waited a moment but he didn't respond. "Nothing? Okay, well, just so you know: this time I'm taking your hands." She switched her gaze to a woman two to Jiro's left. "Hi Mariko," she said. "Still got that scar, I see...guess I never did apologize, did I? Meh, you earned it; you're a raging bitch and you go down faster in a fight than in a bar."

She turned, always keeping Orochimaru in her peripheral vision as she swept her gaze across the other ANBU. "Some new faces, I see," she said. "Guess you guys don't know me, huh? I was the Snake's student back when this place was a mud hole with half a dozen huts. I fought my way clear of him, went to Konoha, and I was so damn good that they accepted me into service." A couple of the ANBU shifted their weight.

"Yeah, you heard me," Anko said. "The most powerful Hidden Village in the known world, they accepted a nin from another village because I was just that good. Every one of your friends here, the ones who know me? I've kicked each of their asses half a dozen times, and most of them are carrying scars I put there because I was bored. Right now, boys and girls? Right now I'm not bored, I'm pissed. Step on up if you think you're hard enough."

A slow clap...clap...clap rang through the dusk.

Everyone's eyes shifted to Orochimaru. He slow-clapped a few more times before stopping. "Well done, little bird," he said. "A decent piece of psychological warfare for something so off-the-cuff, and it gave you a good opportunity to look around and identify optimal escape routes. I see you've not forgotten your lessons."

Anko's mouth tightened but she said nothing.

"Child of the Aburame, I would very much appreciate it if you would call your allies back to you," Orochimaru said. "Should they continue extending their lines toward my men I will assume that your intent is actively hostile and I will take steps.

"Now, why don't the four of you set your weapons on the ground?" Orochimaru said. "You are outnumbered by superior opponents and surrounded. This is serious ground, but not yet death ground. Set your weapons down and let's talk. I promise you will not be harmed."

"Sadly, I cannot promise the same to you," said the Nine-Tailed Fox, making Naruto's body step casually away from Hinata and walk forward to stand between the team and their enemies.