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In spite of all of that, in spite of the fact that the Kyuubi's senses were so sharp that it could hear through the solid mountain to the individual stones that clicked and clattered down forgotten, hidden caverns never touched by man, it was a child.

Naruto's head ached through his teeth (which he realized were still clamped down so far that his cheeks ached) to the flesh behind his ears. It hurt trying to understand the Kyuubi as physically as if there was a shuriken inside of his brain that was trying to get out the hard way (which was actually probably the only way a shuriken knew how). The Kyuubi was millennia old, and it had bore witness to everything that led to the rise of ninja. It had seen empires rise and fall. It had sank continents into the sea, and had made mountains rise so high with it's footfalls that even he couldn't scale them.

It was frightening to think of the fact that the Kyuubi, millennia old, last witness to a thousand cities and histories and societies, was nothing more than a child.

There had never been anyone for Naruto to play with on rainy days. On sunny days, he would go into the woods and explore, or go into the playground and watch the children around him, an act which usually ended in trailing one of them to their homes and their families. But it was never more evident that he was alone than on rainy days when the crack above his bed leaked and the sound of rain pelting the window muted everything else, even the sobs he never, ever cried.

It was impossible for Naruto to sit still. He was energy in flesh, he was movement bound by bones, and even chains would rattle out of the ground because he wouldn't stop fidgeting. Naturally, the days when he'd be confined in his apartment were torture.

Within hours, he'd flick through every book propping up every table and cabinet in the house. His kunai would be polished spotlessly (well, half of them), and his refrigerator would be emptied before the light in it could turn off. This had resulted in disastrous cooking sessions such as "Fried Sugar Water", "Ramen-wrapped Ramen", and "Burnt Jell-o", the last of these being something that he was still moderately proud of.

The heart of the matter was that Naruto had gotten bored of every single one of those things, and after there was nothing new to try, he'd get angry. As a child, he couldn't help but wonder about his life - about why people hated him, about why all the other children had parents, about how all the other people around him never seemed to have to worry about creepy people in masks staring through their windows, or about people following him down alleys in the late hours of the night. There were never any answers, which led to frustration, which led to kicking his closet door, which eventually escalated into the fact that that door had been replaced five times before he turned nine.

The Sandaime had inspected the damage after the last request, personally wandering around the apartment, glancing at the crack in the ceiling, the dented furniture and the occasional crater in the wall. He had forced Naruto to fix all of them himself, and for years, Naruto couldn't help but wonder why.

Except, now that he looked back on it, he was less inclined to head-butt the wall because of the fact that the plaster he used to fix it clung to his clothes and stank horribly. It was hard to find replacement tables, and it was even harder to find dressers that had shinobi-grade locks on them. The Sandaime "persuaded" the landlord to fix the roof above Naruto's apartment, but he'd also shown Naruto how to cover the crack with plaster and paint from inside of the apartment.

Old Man Sarutobi had shown Naruto exactly why (needless) violence caused more problems than it was really worth. But, there was no one to tell the Kyuubi that lesson.

Somehow, Naruto could feel that there were others. Maybe there weren't actually others like him, but there were others like the Kyuubi. It was like being in a large, dark room, bumping into furniture and continually slamming toes and elbows into walls. You never saw anyone else in it, and you never felt anything but cold, but the sound of someone laughing themselves sick at you proved someone else was there.

The Kyuubi was an angry, lonely, energetic being of limitless potential and power, bound into the navel of an equally angry, lonely, energetic human boy with slightly less potential and power.

A Twist of Chance, Chapter 11