We won, of course.
Don't tell me you're surprised!
With a bag of tricks like that an an ENTIRE SUPERHERO ROSTER did you really think we'd lose?! To Loki? Seriously? They would've won even without me! Sure, there was some collateral damage and I may or may not have blown up Tony's tower, but all's well that ends well, right? Good guys win, bad guys lose, good guys go back to whatever they were doing before. All in a day's work and just the way I like it...what? Why are you looking at me like that?
...
...
...
Alright, you got me.
Granted, its occasionally fun to see evil triumph, but only rarely. I can count the number of times that I've ever genuinely been the bad guy on my right hand. There was that one time with a mad princess, too...honestly felt bad for her. Ah, but I digress! And if someone wants to raise a stink about a few broken buildings, I say let 'em.
What're they gonna do?
Arrest me?
Because that worked out SO well when I was with Rize. Don't ask.
Now, where was I?
Let's see...ah. Thor went back to Asgard, and while that's nice and all, I wasn't about to go poking my nose where it didn't belong, not without an invitation. Last time I invaded another god's world...well, it didn't end well for either of us. Bruce was being good ol' Bruce, which is rather boring when you think about it, because he's no fun unless he's angry. Clint and Natasha went back to working for Shield. Also boring. Stark didn't shoot me outright, but he DID toss me out after I "ahem" tried to appropriate one of his suits. What? I wanted to copy the tech and he said no, so...you get the point.
Which, in the end, left me with precious little to do.
Besides track down a certain running man.
Speaking of running...
"On your left!"
At first, Steve Rogers didn't recognize the voice. It had been some time since the chaos in New York, after all. Nearly a full year even. He hadn't said much in the way of goodbyes after the battle, a few words here and there, then he'd simply...left. No one had any clue where he might have gone-well, he suspected Stark MIGHT-and to be quite honest, the american was glad to have him gone. After the insanity of that short-lived war with the Chitari he was beginning to suspect that he really was a deity of some sort; that, or he himself was beginning to seriously lose control of his mental faculties.
"Don't worry," he'd laughed, winking. "I'll be back."
If there was any truth to what the self-proclaimed god claimed, he wasn't looking forward to meeting him again. In fact, he'd worked very hard to forget all about him.
Thus, when a blond blur just-so-happened to hurtle past him during his morning run Steve initially didn't give it much thought. And why would he? Lots of people had blond hair. He'd gotten a late start today after all too; had he been running at full tilt he was certain they'd never have passed him to begin with. And it was rather heartening to see he wasn't the only one getting a move on so early in the morn. So on he jogged, not paying it any more mind than he would any other passerby.
Not five minutes later, the man came upon him again.
"On your right!"
Once more Captain America found himself lapped, but this time he managed to glimpse keen blue eyes, before the stranger dashed on ahead of him at a steady pace, long blond braids bouncing in the breeze. Unbidden, Cap slowed slightly, staring at the retreating back. An orange and black jacket. Now wait just a minute. A spark of recognition dawned somewhere inside him and his mind frantically sought to smother it, to no avail. Not a heartbeat later, he heard the sound of running shoes relentlessly advancing on his position.
But this time, instead of passing him, the woman spun to face him, jogging backwards.
"Seriously?" she grinned at him. "Are you that slow?!"
Captain America nearly ran headlong into a tree before he finally recognized the voice, if not the face, disguised as it was. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Fool me thrice...!
"Oh, you have got to be kidding me!"
The blond woman snapped off a merry salute and took to her heels, cackling.
"Pretty much! Eat my dust, boy scout!"
For a fleeting moment he actually kept pace with the blond. Just a moment. Then Naruto streaked past, leaving him to eat dust. By the fifth lap he'd all but broken into a sprint. Even then he wasn't able to keep up, not for long, and he soon found himself eating proverbial dust once more. By the sixth, he'd all but given up. When the horned deity finally circled back around and skidded to a halt to greet him, he was grinning like a man who'd just played the ultimate prank. He'd also shed his distracting guise,
"You should've seen your face! Ha! The good ol' Sexy Jutsu! Get's em every time. It certainly got your attention!"
...I hate you so much right now." he gasped out. "Since when can you do that?"
"What, that old trick?" Naruto snickered softly to himself. "It's an old favorite. You'd be amazed how easily someone drops their guard when they see a half-naked buxom blond in a string bikini. Believe me, you got off easy. I skipped half my usual routine for you!"
Rogers frowned.
"Aw, c'mon! Don't be like that." the horned deity admonished him, clapping the super soldier on the back with a clawed hand to elicit a startled grunt. "I mean, you're no Flash, but you nearly made me work for it a bit there towards the end! That's more than most can claim."
"Flash?"
"Meh, no one important." the dimension-hopping ninja shrugged, plopping down beside him, "Wears red spandex, runs real fast, thinks he's hot shit but really isn't."
...sounds a little off to me."
"This from a man who wears red-white-and-blue." a hand waved and Steve started, mildly alarmed to find the blond holding his beloved shield in hand. "Anyone yielded to this shield of yours, yet?"
The silence was telling.
"Alright, alright." Naruto edged back, returning the prize possession and raising his arms in self-defense. "I can take a hint. Here. Have a Gatorade. On me."
Steve looked to find, that he did in fact, have a blue bottle in his hand. One that hadn't been there before!
"How did you...?"
"God, remember?" the reality breaker wagged a finger, "Simple shit like that's easy. You asketh, and I giveth! Now drink up. Replenish those electrolytes!"
For a fleeting moment, the world fell silent, broken only by the sound of morning crickets.
"You're still in hot water, you know." Steve said after a moment, finally getting his breath back as he drank. "Fury isn't happy with you. Mass destruction, threatening the council, not to mention what you did with that skyscraper...
"What skyscraper?"
"The orange one."
"Oh...
"...ha!"
The horned deity somehow managed to trip over his own two feet despite sitting and tumbled to the ground, clutching his sides in a vain attempt to stave off his laughter. Needless to say, he failed. Spectacularly. At first, Steve Rodgers didn't rightly understand. One, why the horned demi-god was following him in the first place and two why he was laughing; by rights it was a serious matter, and Fury had been utterly serious when he'd said it. Yet, Naruto continued to laugh, rolling about the grass as though it were the funniest thing in the world for some reason.
"What's so funny?"
"Tell me," he exclaimed, whipping a mirthful tear from his cheek, "How can Fury fire me if I was never a part of the team to begin with?! You can tell Samuel L. Jackson that if he wants me gone, he needs to come down off his high helipad and tell me himself. Oh, and tell him I want his eye-patch. Or lightsaber. Whichever."
"You've lost me again."
"Sorry, sorry," Naruto apologized, tilting his head back against the tree. "Obligatory fourth wall break, there. Speaking of breaking, have you seen Nat? She's surprisingly hard to track down."
"You're just all over the place today, aren't you?"
"Let me answer your question with another question." the blond retorted, pulling himself upright. "Ever heard of Multiverse theory?"
...no?"
"Well in one universe, you were a sleeper agent for Hydra."
The captain snorted without thinking.
"That's the most absurd thing I've heard. And I've heard a lot of strange things since they defrosted me."
"See, that's what I thought, too." the blond mirrored his disgust with a small shudder of his own. "Bunch of crap, that. I mean, you, working for Hydra? Who in their right mind thought that was a good idea?! Blame the comic writers. I mean, they took it back eventually but, ugh! It just felt wrong. I was half-tempted to pop in and wipe them off the face of the map for that."
"Then why don't you?"
Naruto actually blinked. "Why don't I snap my fingers and end it all? I'll tell ya why...
...because that's just no fun!
"So...why are you here? Really."
"Really? No bullshit?"
"Language."
"Aaaand?"
"Naruto!"
"Alright, jeez! Party pooper. See, I've been doing some thinking lately." the annoyed being confessed, plopping his head into a hand. "A LOT of thinking, which is actually pretty rare for me when you stop to think about it. I mean, I like this place. I like it alot. There's no end of fun to be had here. Seriously-I haven't even seen a fifth of it yet! You guys are awesome! Especially with all the shit's that's happened-or going to happen-while I'm away. But then I thought to myself, Naruto, you're being greedy. All you do is take, take, and take again. Why don't you give back once in awhile? Why don't you imrpove things! My wife agreed. You're my first stop-
"You have a wife?!"
An eyebrow twitched.
"Several, actually. Now would you kindly stop interrupting?" At his silence, he continued. "I wanted to show-give you something, actually. You'll like it, I promise."
Steve stood swiftly, not liking the look in his ally's eye.
"I'll...pass."
"But I haven't even told you what it is, yet!" Naruto whined. "Here, just hold still and I'll-
"No, no, no, don't you-
POP.
(...)
-dare!"
By the time Steve finally found his voice, he was no longer anywhere near the Smithsonian. In fact, the room actually looked rather familiar, now that his vision had cleared. Painfully so. There were the flowers he'd left for her only a few days ago, still fresh and vibrant in their vase. His mind caught up a moment later. No. No, he couldn't possibly be here. Naruto had never struck him as the cruel sort. Unhinged, perhaps, and prone to mischievous fits of course, but he'd never struck him as someone who would deliberately do something to hurt another human being.
"Notice anything missing, boy scout?" the blond's voice chimed.
A splinter of icy dread plunged through his heart when he saw the empty bed.
"What did you do."
A laugh answered Rogers.
"...things." came the eventual reply. His gaze snapped up, startled to find the deity all but hanging from the ceiling, hishair hanging down like a wild mane. What, was he trying to act like that spider-kid or something? "Important things. Terrible things. Technically, unethical things. Things that broke the laws of ethics and physics." This momentary thought was immediately washed away by the tide of anger coursing through Captain America. Right. Focus. Peggy was more important than that damn grin of his.
"WHAT KIND OF THINGS DID YOU DO?!"
"Well, I wouldn't say do as di-UGACH!" Naruto actually gurgled a little as Steve's hands wrapped around his throat, ripped him off the ceiling and slammed him into the floor, squeezing. "Owowowow! Why so serious all of a sudden?! I didn't hurt her, I swear by the log!" He'd never seen ol' boy scout so furious; which was a given, considering Peggy Carter, the one and only love of his life-despite being old and gray-was currently gone. Absent. Departed from her hospital bed. And Naruto was laughing at him, despite being pinned against the tile, despite the fingers on his neck, in SPITE of everything.
"Where is she?!"
"Places, I'd say-
Before he could get a word in edgewise, Captain America smashed a clenched fist into his face-it actually hurt, too! Even as he opened his mouth to speak, a knee hammered into his stomach, knocking the air out of his supposedly impervious body.
"Damn boy scout! Don't get your knickers in a twist! Let me finish!"
Steve growled.
"If you've done ANYTHING to her, I swear-
A hand closed around his wrist and, with surprising strength, pulled him away. Whirling to face this new threat, he raised his shield...
...and froze when he saw Peggy.
His mind short-circuited.
Young.
She looked every bit the woman he'd fallen in love with, so long ago...and she was actually restraining him. She, who should be every bit a normal human, was actually holding him back, preventing him from choking all the life out of a man who-technically-couldn't die. He was still trying to get over the first part. His addled mind struggled to process it, at all. How was she this strong?! How was she back to her old self?! His gaze all but snapped back to Naruto, who, oddly enough, wasn't resisting...
"Calm down, Steve." even her voice was the same, like soft, satin sheets tickling his ears. "It's alright. He's...an acquaintance."
"P-Peggy? I...you...how?!"
"Ahem." Naruto croaked from where he lay, face still pressed into the floor. "Not a bad guy here, boy scout. Remember, I did say I first visited ya'll during a world war...can I get up, now?"
Reluctantly, Steve released him.
"Thanks. Ow! Quite the grip you've got there!"
"Why?"
"Why?" Naruto hissed quietly, rubbing his neck as he righted himself. "Presents, remember? Jeez, you tell a man one thing and he starts throwing punches five minutes later before I can explain, 'ttebayo! I couldn't think of anything else to cheer you up, boy scout. So I decided to put my, erm, talents to good use." He cast an arm at the slightly-flushed Peggy. "Now you can have that dance. And many more! I sir, believe I am owed a thank you."
"I...don't know what to say."
"A thank you would be nice." the blond repeated with a huff. "Time isn't easy to fuck with, even for me!"
Something about the way he worded that gave the good captain pause.
"This isn't just about her, is it?"
For a moment, Steve suspected Naruto was going to pull a page from his old plabyook-that he would simply bail out the window and leave them to his own devices. Imagine his surprise then, when he stayed. In the end he sighed, shoulders sagging. "Nope." he relented, his smile collapsing for a brief second. "Is isn't." But only just. Peggy must've seen it as well; because she stiffened.
"What are you on about?" she asked.
Blue eyes glinted devilishly.
"Cap, what would you do if I told ya you really WERE working for Hydra...but just didn't know it? Yet."
"And?" Steve posited.
"What, just like that?" the blond blinked, momentarily taken aback. "Seriously? And here I had a big ol' explanation lined up to make you believe me! There was even a slideshow and a power-point describing how they infiltrated SHIELD and-
"What?!"
"What do you want?" Peggy interjected quickly, interrupting him. "If you're telling us this then you must have some sort of proof."
"Well, yes, actually. But as to what I want?" Naruto grinned, spreading his arms wide. "I thought that would be obvious."
In the end, the answer didn't surprise Captain America one bit.
"I want to play the mother of all pranks on them."
A/N: And there we go. ONTO WINTER SOLDIER and all the chaos to come before and after! Prepare to pity Hydra!
After all, just about everyone thinks he's as mad as a hatter.
Rightly so!
I tried my best to capture the classic humor of the Marvel franchise here. And yes, this is post-war Naruto, who is nearly a God in his own right thanks to a certain Rabbit Goddes. Why doesn't he act like it? Partially because he is (1) easily bored, (2) has been hopping dimensions and messing with reality simply to amuse himself, and of course (3) underneath it all still our favorite blond, he's just...a tad more unhinged that usual.
MORE INSANITY COMING NEXT CHAPTER! LOOK FORWARD TO IT, YA KNOW! And don't you just love Killa's antics? He's a good boy! Er...most of the time. So, lets clarify here. This Not Going Home Naruto has been to Hellsing Ultimate (Unreleased fic) the Fate Stay Night/Zero universe (Unreleased fic) Alien Isolation (Unreleased fic) Star Wars (Unreleased fic) God of War (Unreleased fic) and many, many more!
So...In the Immortal Words of Atlas...
...Review, Would You Kindly! And of course, enjoy the Preview! Its a bit of a teaser and an omake in the same verse! Hope it makes ya smile! I could really use one right about now...AND BY MASS DEMAND, THAR BE THREE ONCE MORE! The first one, aye, references events upcoming as well as Iron Man 3, which is next!
(Preview/Omake!)
"English, motherfucker! Do you speak it?"
"Depends. Will you stop being a badass?"
"Hell no!"
"There you go!"
"No."
"What do you mean, no?"
"NOPE NOPE NOPE! NOPING THAT SOMETHING FIERCE!"
Naruto looked all of three seconds from crawling under a table and hiding until everyone was gone. No, wait. He already had! When Stark turned his gaze he found the table-cloth had all but fled from the table and was no half across the room, physically shuddering. If that weren't noticeable enough, he could see a pair of red horns jutting through the fabric. Unbidden, a snicker escaped him.
Tony couldn't help himself after that.
He laughed.
"This is great. No, seriously. Who would've thought you were afraid of ghosts?!"
A pair of angry blue eyes poked out from under the table.
"I swear revenge!
Now it was Naruto's turn to laugh.
A long, loud guffaw resounded through the wintry forest, broken only by the sound of Tony's helpless sputtering in the suit. This. This was what he got for letting his guard down around the blond. Mandarin be damned, he was beginning to seriously consider the prank loving blond to be the real threat here...
"Yes, yes, I know. Pink. Could you help me out?"
The blond shook his head slowly, never wavering from his crouch. "Depends."
"On?"
"On which suit I get to keep."
"KEEP?! Over my dead-
"I could always gag you and leave you trussed up for the wolves." the blond interjected politely. "THEN who'd stop the Mandarin. Not me! I'm a very busy man...erm, god."
...fine. You can have the Mark II."
"See? This is why we get along so well!"