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chapter twelve

No one said anything, so Tōketsu continued.

"Of course, that wouldn't be possible... the children were only five, after all. So I looked into your lives and found signs of mental illness." Her tail flicked towards Kakashi. "Your ANBU file has you down for clinical depression, PTSD, the works. You handle it better than the kids." Kakashi's eyes widened. Her tail moved towards Sasuke. "I suppose they've diagnosed your anxiety, but you haven't told your parents. Your anxiousness is affecting your sleep, but I'm assuming someone (probably Sakura) is helping you with it. Sleep paralysis sometimes? I think so. Your sleeping habits are extremely unhealthy and will be detrimental to you someday." Her eyes moved to Sakura. "Sakura, darling, you're not doing so well either, are you? Just from looking at you I can tell that you have issues with eating and sleeping. You're worrying your parents, dear." She turned to Naruto. "Looking at you now, I can see you have restless leg syndrome, (which sometimes effects your sleeping habits) and anxiety. You're also suffering from ADHD, although something tells me you've learned how to control it. A five year old who can control his ADHD? Absolutely unheard of, even for an adult."

Still, none of the humans said anything.

"The one thing you all have in common is PTSD. You're a group of broken people who stick together. Why? Because you've been through something together. But the question us, what? All of you are different. Different families, different experiences. While the Third Shinobi World War happened, you kids weren't even born, so it couldn't have been that. But based on the way you hold yourselves, it had to have been war. But Konoha hasn't been in a war in a long time. Sure, you could all just be prodigies, but unlikely. Know why it's unlikely?"

"Why?" Naruto asked, finally speaking up. His eyebrows furrowed.

"Your chakra." Tōketsu said, flicking at all of them with her tail. "Perhaps it's been millenia, but all Queens have been trained to recognize Sage of the Six Paths chakra ever since Hitojichi worked with Indra. Now we get to the kicker- why do you have Sage chakra?" Naruto opened his mouth to answer, but was cut off.

"You could've been born with it, I suppose, the Sage can be generous sometimes, but again- unlikely. Why would four different people be born with Sage of the Six Paths chakra? So you four are special. Due to the fact that his chakra is split evenly among you, my guess is you've met him before. When could you have met him? How? And then it came to me. You died. And since you're here again and trying to get stronger... well, you must be working towards something. The future. That means you've done this before. And don't think I don't know what you did, Kakashi, choosing to save Kushina and Minato instead of Lord Third. Fate was written, and you changed it. Meaning you knew what was going to happen. Conclusion- you four are time travelers."

"You remind me of my brother." That was the first thing Sasuke said. "He thinks a lot like you do."

Naruto wolf whistled. "You're good, panther lady. You got all that just from seeing Kakashi, Sakura, and Sasuke once?"

"Yes." Then her eyes sparkled in amusement. "Of course, Sasuke, Kakashi and Sakura GETTING to Tsukinoyo was courtesy of the Sage, but everything else I discovered on my own."

Kakashi couldn't remember a time his team had been so quiet. Sakura was staring at Tōketsu with an absolutely awed look on her face. Kakashi knew that her coming finding Tōketsu was definitely something that was useful for the team, and was secretly extremely thankful to Sakura for pushing him into that long, strenuous journey to Kumo. It was more than worth it. Sasuke looked skeptical, as he was last time, but otherwise extremely shocked. Naruto looked at Tōketsu like she was an incarnation of a goddess. Kakashi himself was a little bit awestruck, but he recovered quickly.