[Caterpillar] Chapter 14 - Crisis (II) (Patreon)

"I've told you about Themyscira. What about you? Where do you come from?" Wonder Woman asked curiously.

After talking to Naruto about the worries and frustration weighing on her, she became noticeably calmer and more relaxed. With fewer things clouding her mind, she was free now to think about other things as well and that moment looked like the perfect opportunity to find out more about him. Any information she could get about him might prove to be very useful for the Justice League later on.

"My homeworld revolved around the use of chakra. To put it simply, controlling the elements of nature with magic. Because of that, we called it the Elemental Nations. As for where it is, I don't know. An enemy of mine, because she could not defeat me, pushed me into a dimensional portal. It's been almost 98 years since then; all this time I've been searching for a way back home but to no avail. I have given up on it...even if I did find a way back home right now, of what use would it be anymore? By now, everyone I've ever known would be dead."

What he said was very depressing but his expression was serene. He had come to terms with it. Almost a century of being obsessed with it was more than enough. Thanks to Kyuubi, he had finally let go of it half a year ago.

"So your people don't live as long as you do?"

"Most people back in my homeworld were regular humans, just like the ones on Earth. I was not much different when I was born either. It's through years and years of bitter training that regular people could become superhuman back on my planet. We called ourselves shinobi but we didn't live long lives. Our world was ridden with wars: 4 world wars took place in less than 8 decades. Heck, just in 4 years, my nation was invaded two times and even razed to the ground. Most shinobi didn't pass the age of 60. There was too much war, too much killing. Even so, it was my home."

Wonder Woman could not mask her surprise.

"You were an ordinary human too? You mean that everyone can achieve that kind of strength just through training?!"

Kyuubi stopped eating at that moment and snorted.

"Hng, as if! He forgot to say that he is the reincarnation of the son of a god and that I was his source of power for over 40 years. No regular human could ever reach that level of power. Most shinobi were so weak that I could kill hundreds of them with just a swipe of my tails."

Naruto scratched the back of his head and chuckled.

"He's right. That's also why I look like this," he admitted and gestured to his face. Hard work was a major reason why he became so powerful but he could not downplay the importance of his background as Ashura's reincarnation or Kyuubi's Jinchuuriki either.

At that, her eyes were involuntarily drawn to the dark scars on his cheeks and the slit pupils and red irises of his eyes. She was not sure what the fox's words meant exactly but when she was about to ask another question, Martian Manhunter's voice rang in her mind:

"Wonder Woman, it's me, J'onn J'onzz. After we arrested Lex Luthor in Metropolis, a portal appeared and someone that looked just like me came out. It was me from another dimension, similar to ours. Now we're all crossing over to their dimension to help them with their crisis but Batman thought you ought to know that and stay vigilant."

"Wait, J'onn!"

She wanted to ask for more details but their mental connection was severed because Martian Manhunter and Batman stepped through the portal crossing into the other dimension. She stood up from the table and said:

"Thank you for listening to my problems. It was of great help for me to talk about it, it made me feel more at peace. But now something urgent came up and I have to go."

After saying that, she rushed out of the room.

Pushing the wheels with all his strength, Naruto's wheelchair became comically fast, fast enough to even catch up to the running princess from behind. A distracted look appeared on her face when she turned her head around and saw the speeding wheelchair hot on her trail and she found herself smiling in amusement. But that smile quickly turned into full-blown laughter when she saw a tiny fox also coming from behind running but with all kinds of meat and other food wrapped into his 9 tails.

Still giggling, she stopped and said:

"Why are you two following me? You can't be thinking of coming with me! Superman and the others won't let me live it down if I let you leave the Watchtower."

"Oh come on, what's the worst that could happen? I'm in a wheelchair."

"It's not you that I'm worried about," she said.

But as Wonder Woman's eyes trailed to the nine-tailed fox that was running towards them as fast as his tiny limbs could take him her resistance almost melted.

'Adorable.'

She was finding it difficult to imagine that a fox cub as cute and as harmless-looking as that could transform into a half a mile long behemoth and destroy a planet.

Finally catching up to them, Kyuubi swallowed the remaining food in his jaws and said:

"Stop worrying over nothing. Even if all of you were together, you'd have no way to stop me if I wanted to do something. We've been cooped up in this satellite for more than 3 weeks. I want to see the world below and get some fresh air."

"You know, I'm not going down to relax! It's Justice League business!" Wonder Woman retorted.

"You could fight it out and then lose and still do our way. Or you might as well take the chance to strike up a friendship with us. At least that's what I would do if I were you."

Naruto looked at the fox weirdly. When has Kyuubi ever taken the initiative to approach someone just to become friends with them? Naruto had been together with Kyuubi for over 100 years and he had never seen the fox offering his friendship to someone other than him while having no ulterior reasons.

Mildly amused, he decided to just go with the flow. Surprisingly enough, the stoic princess caved in under the fox's persuasion very quickly. Just then, Naruto's red-slit eyes happened to meet with Kyuubi's red-slit ones too. Having lived together for so long, Naruto could discern every little bit of emotion in the fox's eyes and on his face. How could he have not noticed the shrewd look Kyuubi had thrown his way?

'What is your mind cooking up this time, Kurama?'

But just like Naruto could read Kyuubi like a book, it went the other way around too.

When had Naruto ever talked to someone about his private life or his native homeworld? The answer was almost never. Until then, he had consciously gone out of his way to not become attached to other people and he avoided personal conversations too. He had only been obsessed with finding a way back home and doing business (his work as a mercenary) in order to support his space travel expeditions. There had been no room for friends or other types of relationships in his life.

However, over the last few days, Naruto talked about his past with Doctor Fate and with Wonder Woman too. Seeing Naruto finally start opening up to people, even if just a tiny bit, made Kyuubi happy. And they were not just random people. With his Negative Emotion Sensing, Kyuubi could discern a person's true nature and he approved of both Doctor Fate and Wonder Woman's characters.

Unknowingly, the fox had taken over the role of a father watching over his son. All he wanted now was for Naruto to be happy.

⁂

When Naruto, Kyuubi and Wonder Woman arrived in Metropolis it was already night. But just as they got out of the Javelin, a distant boom resounded over the entire traffic of a city of millions.

"There is trouble!" Wonder Woman said "Please don't do anything to break the law and don't destroy those trackers. You promised."

Not waiting for an answer, she took flight urgently towards the place from where the booming noises were coming.

"Hey wanna see what's going on?" Naruto asked after the princess left.

Kyuubi narrowed his eyes at him.

"Don't give me that look. No way I'm letting you ride on me!" Kyuubi barked at him.

"Why not?! You have no issues with it when I'm giving you chakra in return, heh?"

"It's different when I'm the size of a mountain. You're no bigger than a fly then. But now? How do you want me to carry you? Idiot!"

"Just get as big as a horse or something," Naruto said with a smirk. He knew exactly what buttons to push to make the fox angry at him.

"I'm not your mount! I'll kick your ass, asshole!" Kyuubi shouted.

Naruto chuckled in amusement. The fox was over 1000 years old but he fell prey so often to such small provocations. His pride truly knew no bounds.

"Aye, aye, calm down," he said with a smile and then stood up from his wheelchair.

Now standing on his feet, he stretched his stiff back and limbs until he heard a satisfying pop. He was still not at 100% but that did not mean he was a vegetable. He had used a wheelchair over the past few days mostly to lower the Justice League's guard against him rather than not doing any effort because of Doctor Fate's nagging.

"Ha! As I thought, you were pretending!" Kyuubi shouted triumphantly.

"But I wasn't. I still feel a bit faint and dizzy when I stand. For example, I can't use wind chakra to fly right now...but I guess that some simple wall dashing is not too much for my current condition."

With that, he left the wheelchair by the Javelin and jumped high into the air, landing on top of the roof of a smaller building nearby. He made a slow clawing motion over his face with his hand and a white ANBU-style fox mask appeared. Just as he was getting ready to jump onto another rooftop, a small weight suddenly landed on his shoulder. It was none other than Kyuubi.

"So you don't wanna carry me around but when I carry you around it's fine, eh? Not this time, boi!" Naruto said and grabbed the fox cub by the scruff of his neck and threw him off the building.

"NARUTO!" Kyuubi screamed as he fell.

"Wahaha!" Naruto laughed out loud and jumped off without a care in the world.

He was still in mid-air, halfway across the distance between the two buildings' rooftops when a furry red appendage wrapped around one of his ankles. His laughter abruptly died in his throat and this time it was his turn to yell:

"KURAMA!" he hollered as he fell to the ground, dragged down by the fox that had suddenly become as large as a horse... just like Naruto had asked.

One man screaming and one fox laughing, the two of them crashed onto one of the cars parked below, completely flattening it and making alarms blare all around them from the surrounding cars. For a moment, they glared at each other but then they started barking with laughter.

⁂

While Kyuubi and Naruto were play-fighting and fooling around like man-children, the situation was completely different on the other side of Metropolis. An 8-foot-tall humanoid monstrosity was destroying everything in its sight. The alien was grey-skinned, extremely muscular and vicious-looking bone spike protruded from his shoulders, arms and head.

Wonder Woman arrived in time to see the Justice League fight against him.

"They're different."

If their different costumes were not enough to tip her off, seeing a twin version of herself, her counterpart from the other dimension, was enough to convince her of that. But, as a trained warrior, she also took notice of how well they coordinated with each other as a team. It was not something that she and the other members of the Justice League were capable of.

Her first impulse was to join the fight and help them subdue the monster but she stopped herself from doing that. She could not exactly put her finger on what was wrong but Martian Manhunter's telepathic message and the fact that she could not see the Justice League of her dimension were making her wary.

'They don't look like they need my help anyway.' she thought.

She decided to take on a wait-and-see approach. Not long after her arrival though, she noticed a masked man with a fox cub on his shoulder appearing on the rooftop, right next to her. Coincidentally, it was also at that moment that the grey-skinned alien started fighting back against the other dimension Justice League even more fiercely than before. He shattered a railway bridge making the Wonder Woman of the other dimension rush to stop the train before it fell off to all the passengers' deaths, and then he almost knocked out Hawkgirl with an uppercut and blew up a car's gas tank into Martian Manhunter's face, almost taking him out too. With seemingly endless energy, he also jumped at the black and white costumed Superman and started to slam him against the ground and the walls of the nearby buildings like a ragdoll.

"20 bucks on the ugly guy," Kyuubi said, making Naruto chuckle.

"I bet on the edgy Superman. Kryptonians are tough nuts to crack and this guy isn't a pushover like the other Superman we know."

Seeing two identical Amazonian princesses and the rest of the Justice League wearing different costumes, it was not difficult for Naruto to deduce that they were not the Justice League he knew.

Wonder Woman frowned when she heard the two of them chitchatting and making light of the current situation but she did not comment on it because just then, the monster slammed the black and white costumed Superman so hard that it made a crater in the street below. However, despite the violent slam, Superman stood up with no apparent difficulty.

"What do you want?" the other dimension Superman said.

The muscular and grey-skinned alien walked towards him slowly, his monstrous physique being seen even more clearly now under the lights coming from a helicopter flying above.

"Same as you I imagine." the alien's coarse voice rang. "Power. Control. But I had to see the best this planet had to offer. I am not impressed."

At those words, Superman narrowed his eyes and lunged at him.

*boom*

A shockwave exploded from the impact of the grey-skinned alien's fist against Superman's face and it shattered all the glass and windows of the builds and cars 300 feet around them.

"Dayum, that's some serious strength!" Naruto whistled impressed.

"Superman!" Diana cried out in distress and was about to jump off from the sidelines and finally join the fight but two red tails suddenly wrapped around her wrists, stopping her.

"What's the big idea? Let go of me!" she shouted at Kyuubi but he said seriously:

"Naruto and I made a bet. The fight is not over yet, so don't butt in."

"Puhu!" Naruto almost burst into laughter but he quickly masked it with a fake cough.

Momentarily, Diana didn't know how to react to how ridiculous that statement was.

"Don't worry, I'll stop your friend from getting mangled if it comes down to it."

At those words, Diana remembered just who exactly the tiny fox that had immobilized her was. Especially feeling the incredible strength in the tails restraining her, she no longer had any doubts about Kyuubi's powers.

The muscular alien came to the new crater that Superman had made with his body.

"You think you can hurt me?" he said and his massive foot stomped on Superman's prone body several times, further burying him into the ground.

"My skin can withstand a nuclear explosion!"

He grabbed Superman by the neck, raised him in the air and prepared to throw another devastating punch.

"My bones are-"

But just as he was speaking, 2 beams of red light came from Superman's eyes and hit him right in the forehead.

Drool came from the corner of the creature's mouth and he lost all strength in his limbs, falling to the ground on his knees.

Kyuubi no longer needed to restrain Diana because she stopped trying to break free, too startled by what she had just witnessed: Superman had just lobotomized someone in front of so many people!

"What the hell, you really never lose a bet do you?" Kyuubi said irritated.

Naruto shook his head and admonished.

"Kurama, Kurama, have I ever lost a bet? Over a century has passed yet you never learn your lesson. Tsk! Tsk! Shame on you."

The fox growled unhappily but did not retort.

"That creature single-handedly almost defeated the Justice League, why are those humans even pointing their backwater crappy guns at him? Tell me, Naruto, why are most humans so stupid?"

Naruto chuckled at Kyuubi's abrasive words. It did look ridiculous to him too that the policemen were pointing their pistols at the alien creature and then tried to cuff his hands. It was as if they had not just watched how he tanked Green Lantern's power ring blasts without even getting scratched.

A huge swarm of reporters popped out seemingly out of nowhere and flocked around the Justice League throwing dozens of questions at the same time.

"You...lobotomised him!" Lois Lane said, her voice betraying her shock.

"What's your question, Lois?" Superman asked curtly.

"It's-, it's so out of character..." she added.

"It's about time if you ask me." one of the nearby journalists said and many others voiced their agreement.

"That's right!"

"Absolutely!"

Another one among the reporters asked:

"And what's with the new costumes, guys?"

"We just felt it was time for a change." the black-and-white costumed Superman said.

⁂⁂⁂⁂⁂

AN: Still part of the first episode of 'A Better World' mini-arc, when Justice Lords Superman fought against Doomsday for the first time and lobotomised him.