Raven groggily sat up in her bed, looking at her alarm clock: 8:37. Usually, she would have woken up earlier to watch the sunrise before meditating. As it was, she figured she still had some time to meditate before getting some tea. She smiled fondly, remembering the previous night. After everyone had settled down and introduced themselves, they'd decided to allow Naruto to stay at the tower, seeing as how he had no way back to his home dimension.
When she'd accidentally mentioned that it was her birthday, Naruto had insisted on celebrating. She'd initially refused, prompting him to ask the other Titans for help convincing her. She laughed softly, remembering how he'd tried to pantomime his words as the others looked on in confusion. Eventually though, he got his point across, and together they managed to convince her celebrate. It had been surprisingly… fun. Even if she had to play translator.
She frowned, remembering how he'd been mostly healed by the time she left for bed. Normally, she'd be happy to see her… friend? Yes. Her friend healing, but all she could think about was how injured he must have been before rescuing her. With how fast he healed, he must have either been near death no less than a day before meeting up with them, or injured just minutes before. Yet, he still risked himself to help her.
Going through the door leading to the roof, she paused after a few steps, having finally spotted the figure at the edge. He was sitting so perfectly still that she'd missed him at first. She recognized his posture, he was meditating. No, there was more to it than that. She could feel the flow of powerful energies centered around him, almost as if he was acting as a conduit for it. Her eyes widened in realization.
"You're a sage." She breathed. Sages, contrary to popular belief, were not just wise old wanderers. Sages were people who had become so in tune with nature that they became one with it, thus able to wield its power. Unlike 'The Green' that Poison Ivy and Swamp Thing use, Sages were not limited to the energies of plants, instead they were able to draw upon energy from every aspect of nature. As he turned to face her, she noticed that his eyes had changed. Gone were the sparkling sapphire orbs, instead, yellow toad-like eyes stared back at her, surrounded by a red pigmentation.
Last night, instead of sleeping, he'd gone into his mindscape to talk with Kurama about their situation. According to him, they were stuck in this dimension. While the toads could reverse summon him to Mount Myōboku, they could not summon him back to the Elemental Nations. The Summoning Jutsu works like a rubber band. One end is anchored in your home dimension, and the other end can be 'stretched' to another realm. When summoning a toad, who's anchor is at Mount Myōboku, you 'stretch' their rubber band and anchor it to your dimension with their chakra. When their chakra runs out, it releases the rubber band, sending them back to their realm; hence why they don't need another summoning to go back home. With Naruto's reserves, he could have stayed at Myōboku for months. Unfortunately, you can only 'stretch' another's rubber band while in your anchored dimension; if you tried otherwise, you would 'release' your own before completing the jutsu. When Ma had summoned him home to battle Pain, she wasn't actually summoning him. Instead, she 'released' his rubber band and used her location as a beacon for his arrival. Once there, he'd immediately summoned the other toads to fight with him.
Seeing as how the only ones who were able to summon him were anchored at Mount Myōboku, they couldn't actually get him back to the Elemental Nations. However, he could send messages home through them. By giving the toads a message, they could pass it along to the slugs, who could reverse-summon Tsunade and give it to her. She, in turn, could give the slugs a message to give to him through the toads. That is, assuming she'd been freed form the Infinite Tsukuyomi.
He had to wait till morning to gain enough chakra to summon Pa. However, they had decided to use Sage mode, both because they did not know how much it would take to 'stretch' Pa's rubber band to this new dimension, and also to help Kurama recover his chakra faster. His ridiculous reserves would normally take over a year to refill, however, by boosting it with natural energy, the wait could be as short as several months, so long as they didn't use it too much. He'd been about to summon Pa when he's sensed Raven walking towards the roof with his enhanced senses, and had decided to wait for her.
"You know about senjutsu?" Naruto asked, surprised.
"Yes, though most people here just think they are wise old men."
"Well, while all the other sages I met were old, only Ma, Pa, and Super Gramps were wise. The other two, well one was senile and Ero-Sennin was a pervert." He chuckled, and Raven was curious about the fondness in his voice. "He'd probably yell at me for calling him that."
"Well, no one want's to be called a pervert." She replied offhandedly as she sat down beside him.
"He didn't, but not for the reason you'd think." He laughed again, confusing Raven. "When I first met him, I called him a pervert. You know what he said to me?" She shook her head. Using his best Jiraiya voice, he bellowed "'I am not just a pervert! I'm a SUPER PERVERT!'" Raven, for the second time in years, flat out laughed. To Naruto, it was a beautiful sound. Back in the tower, the other Titans shivered, feeling a disturbance in the natural order of things. As her laughter died down, he continued. "Despite his perverted nature, Jiraiya was a great person. He was like a father to me."
Though he spoke with only fondness, Raven noticed his use of past tense. "Was?" she asked.
Naruto looked down, a sad smile gracing his features, but still reaching his toad-like eyes. "Yeah, he died how he lived, searching for peace. He was killed by his former student, Nagato." Raven gasped, but sensing that he wasn't finished, didn't interrupt him. Naruto turned and looked out towards the bay. "He lost someone precious to him and lost his way. He thought that Pain was the only way to peace, perverting Jiraiya's teachings. I actually learned Senjutsu so I could defeat him, and when I finally did, I had to decide whether or not to kill him. I wanted to; I really did. He took away one of my most precious people then attacked my home, but I knew it wasn't what Jiraiya, so I let him go." He turned back to her, and she could see a tear forming in his still-yellow eyes. "And you know what, I'm glad I did." This shocked Raven. If it had been her, she probably would have killed him, despite being a hero. He took away his father in all but blood. "Because I did, he was able to redeem himself. He gave his life to save a lot of people that he had hurt. He put his faith in me to find peace where he had failed."
"Naruto…" She let out softly. This boy, no this man, had been through so much, and she had a feeling this wasn't even half of it, and yet he was still so happy. He hadn't become jaded or closed off like so many other heroes who had suffered had. "I'm sure he'd be proud of you." She said. She knew he didn't want an apology for bringing up old memories. He could have stopped at any time, but for some reason, he'd trusted her enough to tell her this, to let her into his past. She was glad he did.
Thinking back on everything that had happened since Pain's invasion, especially a certain distraction jutsu against Kaguya, Naruto chuckled. "I'm sure he would." He agreed. "Now, enough depressing stories, I've got to summon Pa before Sage Mode runs out." Technically, with Kurama's help, he could keep up Sage Mode indefinitely, but he was currently resting, and he wasn't going to wake him up for this.
Startled as he grabbed her hand and pulled her to her feet with him, she asked, "Pa, as in the Sage Pa?" He nodded. "Do you want me to leave?"
He shook his head. "Nah, I'm sure he'd love to meet you!" He took a step back, not realizing, unlike Raven, how close they'd been. "Now, stand back a little bit."
He raised his good arm to his mouth before a thought occurred to Raven. "Wait!"
He stopped, "Yeah?"
"If you can summon him here, does that mean he can summon you back home?" For some reason, that thought didn't sit well with her.
"No. It's a bit complicated, but he can't. I can summon him here, and he can summon me to his home for a short period of time, but he can't summon me back to my home."
"Oh." She replied, curious as to why she was happy at that answer.
He nodded and bit his thumb, not really surprising Raven seeing as how most summoning involved blood of some sort. He performed a few seals with his hand, then slammed it on the ground with a call of "Kuchiyose no Jutsu!"
Naruto released Sage Mode as the smoke cleared revealing an old toad in a cloak. He was about waist high with a spike of hair at the back of his head, a goatee, and the thickest eyebrows she had ever seen. (Off in another dimension, two spandex clad men shouted about a challenge to their youthful brows). He kind of reminded her of that green alien from that movie Beast-Boy had forced her to watch. What was his name again? Yoga or something? It didn't really matter. She was surprised when it spoke in a weird language.
"Eh, who summoned me!" He looked at them, shocked. "Naruto-boy, you're alive!"
"Hey Pa! How've you bee- OW!" Naruto rubbed the growing lump on his head while the toad stood over him, stick in hand. "What was that for!" He shouted in indignation.
"That's for not summonin' me earlier. You had us worried sick!" As a seeming afterthought, he whacked him again.
"OW! What was that one for!"
"That one was from Ma. Would you have preferred to summon her so she could hit you instead?"
Thinking back to her rolling-pin-of-pain, he shuddered. "No, I wouldn't" He said, defeated.
"Good boy." He turned to Raven. "And who's this pretty lass?" He asked with a smile, which soon turned to an expression of horror. "This better not be why you didn't summon us earlier! You are NOT turning into a pervert like Jiraiya-boy! Ma would kill us both!"
"What are you talking about Pa?" He asked, before turning red as his meaning sank in. "Of course not, are you crazy! I just met her. Besides, it would never get to Ma! Baa-chan and Sakura would kill first! Then they'd find a way to bring me back and do it again!"
Off to the side, Raven just watched the odd spectacle. "This is what the others feel like watching us talk, isn't it?"
Naruto paused, remembering his friend. "Oi Pa, this is Raven-chan!"
He hopped over to her. "Nice to meet you Raven. My name is Fukasaku, but you can just call me Pa like everyone else."
Naruto, knowing that she couldn't understand him, translated. "He said his name's Fukasaku but that you should call him Pa."
The old toad looked at him questioningly until Raven replied, "It is an honor to meet you, Sage Pa." She gave a little bow, feeling a little stupid for bowing to a toad.
"What's she saying Naruto-boy? And why's she talkin' like that?"
"Well Pa, people here speak a different language. I can understand her, and she can understand me, but everyone else is out of the loop. As for what she said, she said it was an honor to meet you, 'Sage Pa'"
"Finally! Some respect!" He exclaims, before asking "So where is here? And what happened to you're arm!"
"You might want to sit down Pa, it's a long story." He said while sitting down and motioned for Raven to join them. He told Pa how his final clash with Sasuke propelled him between dimensions, how he landed here, and everything else that had happened, all the while translating whatever comments Pa made for Raven, and vice versa.
Pa chuckled. "Only you, Naruto-boy. Only you."
"What's that supposed to mean?!" He shouted, forgetting to translate.
"You're always getting into the most ridiculous situations! I mean, when has anything gone according to plan for you."
"Heh, I guess you're right." He responded, before telling Raven the gist of the conversation. Now, with that over, he asked the question that had been plaguing his thoughts but been too scared to ask. "Pa," He asked, more serious than Raven had ever seen him. "What happened after I left. Is everyone ok?"
"Heh, don'cha worry Naruto-boy, everyone's fine." Naruto let out a sigh of relief. "It seems like you really got through to Sasuke. After you disappeared, he was apparently wracked with guilt. He dispelled the Infinite Tsukuyomi with that eye of his before turning himself in. Everyone's worried sick about you, but no one really thinks you're dead."
Naruto lets out a shaky breath as the fear he's been holding onto since his arrival left him. "They're ok." He let out in a breathy whisper. He'd been hoping against hope that this would be the case, but with how Sasuke had been acting, he'd feared the worst. However, he did what he did best: he shouldered that pain and moved on. However, it had still weighed heavily on his heart, and with that weight now gone, he was overwhelmed with emotion. "They're ok!" He shouted this time, and leapt up, bringing Raven with him. He embraced her and spun in a circle before realizing what he was going. Setting her back down and quickly backing away, he started apologizing.
Red-faced, she managed to get out "It's fine, Naruto." While she still didn't know everything that had happened, from what she'd learned during their conversation, most of his world had been trapped in an infinite illusion of some sort. How he'd remained so cheerful was beyond her. Knowing that they were free must have been an immense relief. She figured that was why she wasn't pounding him into the ground with her powers for hugging her like that.
Before anyone could say anything else, the door to the roof slammed open. "Yo BB! You up here!" Cyborg called looking around. "Yo Raven, Naruto, you guys seen-" He then caught sight of Pa. Now, to be fair, most of the time when he sees a large green animal, it's usually Beast-Boy. Unfortunately, this was not one of those times.
"There you are BB! We gotta go! I got Robin in on the Stankball Game! Took some blackmail, but I did it!" He yelled, grabbing Pa.
"Unhand me metal man!" Pa yelled, whacking him on the head with his stick.
From the ground, Cyborg lifted up a finger. "You're not BB." He said shakily, before collapsing back to the ground with swirls in his good eye.