Chapter 16: The Assessment
The space between them was not empty. It was filled with the silent hum of two prodigious intelligences taking each other's measure. Itachi stood just inside the doorway, a study in composed darkness. Naruto sat perfectly still, a pool of serene gold and blue light. Neither spoke for a full minute, a conversation conducted in stillness, posture, and the subtle pressure of chakra-aware perception.
Itachi's Sharingan remained inactive. To activate it now would be a declaration of war, a tool of extraction, not observation. He relied instead on the heightened senses honed by its latent potential. He saw the impossible order of the room, the absence of childish clutter, the deliberate placement of every object as if part of a sacred geometry. He felt the air, clean, still, faintly charged, like the atmosphere before a lightning strike that never arrives. Most of all, he saw the boy's eyes. They held no curiosity about a new person, only a deep, analytical focus, as if Itachi were a complex scroll that had just been unrolled before him.
"The Hokage is concerned," Itachi began, his voice a soft, neutral instrument. He did not move closer, respecting the invisible boundary of the other's space. "There are proposals to remove you from Konoha for evaluation. He disagrees. He wishes for my evaluation instead."
Naruto processed this. The Hokage's gambit was clear: introduce a third-party observer from a politically sensitive clan to create a competing narrative. The variable 'Danzō' was moving. The Hokage was counter-moving. He, Naruto, was the board.
He offered a single, slow nod of understanding. Then, he did something unexpected. He raised his right hand and, with a focused whisper of chakra, generated a three-dimensional model between them. It was not a demonstration of power this time. It was a flow chart.
At the top, a simple Hokage glyph. Lines branched down to two nodes: one labeled with a stylized eye (Itachi/Uchiha), the other with a tangled root (Danzō/Root). Both lines pointed to a central cube representing himself. From the 'Root' node, a dotted line led to a box outside Konoha's borders labeled 'Sanatorium.' From the 'Uchiha' node, a line looped back up to the Hokage glyph, labeled 'Report.'
It was a brutally efficient, politically astute diagram of the current situation. A three-year-old had just mapped the covert power struggle surrounding him.
Itachi's breath, for the first time in recent memory, hitched audibly. The clinical part of his mind admired the clarity. The rest of him felt a profound chill. This was not a child playing with chakra. This was a strategist communicating in meta-language.
"Accurate," Itachi acknowledged, his mask of calm firmly back in place. "My report will influence the Hokage's next decision. To report, I must assess. What would you have me see?"
Naruto considered the question. Showing power was easy, but crude. It would feed the 'weapon' narrative. Showing control was better, but he had already demonstrated that. He needed to show something that existed in the narrow space between 'asset' and 'person' that neither Danzō's calculus nor the Hokage's hopeful guilt could properly categorize.
He pointed first to his own chest, where the seal lay. Then, he pointed to Itachi's eyes, and shook his head 'no.' Do not look at the Fox. Then, he pointed to his own temple.
He wanted Itachi to assess his mind. Not his power, not his control, but the nature of his consciousness itself.
Itachi understood. "Very well." He finally moved, walking to sit seiza-style on the floor opposite Naruto, maintaining a respectful distance. "I will ask questions. You may answer in any way you choose."
Naruto nodded.
"The villagers fear you," Itachi stated, his tone flat, observational. "Do you understand why?"
Naruto's response was immediate. He created a small, simple animation. A stylized fox (crude, but recognizable) attacked a village. The villagers became blobs of chakra-colored fear (a sickly yellow). The fox was sealed into a small, human-shaped container. The yellow fear-blinks now surrounded the container, though the fox was invisible within it. The animation looped.
They fear the memory of the attack. They conflate the container with the contents. A logical error of association.
"Do you hate them for this fear?" Itachi asked, his dark eyes watching for any flicker in the pristine calm.
Naruto tilted his head, as if the question was curious. He generated two symbols. One was a raging fire. The other was a complex, interlocking knot. He pointed to the fire, then shook his head. He pointed to the knot, then gave a small nod. He then dismissed both and made a sweeping gesture around his room, his scrolls, himself.
Hatred is a volatile, consumptive energy. Useless. Understanding is a complex, constructive process. Useful. My focus is here, on understanding.
Itachi filed the answer away. No resentment. No wounded pride. A purely pragmatic dismissal of emotion as non-functional. It was more disconcerting than any outburst of rage.
"The power within you is immense. What is your primary goal regarding it?"
This time, Naruto's response was a single, elegantly crafted symbol that hovered between them. It was a perfect, multi-layered sphere. The outer layer was a barrier seal. The middle layer depicted chakra flowing in regulated circuits. The inner core was a stable, contained flame. Around the sphere, tiny kanji for 'Autonomy,' 'Stability,' and 'Function' orbited.
Total systemic management. Not dominance, not friendship, but perfect administration.
{He sees it,} Kurama's voice grumbled, a distant thunder in Naruto's mind. {The little Uchiha prodigy. He looks at your pretty picture and sees the death of the old ways. The end of the beast as a force of nature, to be replaced by a… utility.}
Itachi did see it. The ambition was so vast, so cold, it bordered on the philosophical. This wasn't about becoming Hokage or being strong. It was about achieving a state of absolute, self-contained order. He felt a strange kinship. Wasn't his own life's goal, to bear all sin, to prevent war, also about imposing a terrible, logical order upon a chaotic emotional reality?
He asked his final, most dangerous question. "The Hokage hopes you will protect Konoha. Do you feel any connection to this village? Any reason to protect it?"
Naruto went still. This was not a question of logic, but of allegiance. A variable he had not yet solved. He looked down at his hands, clad in the dark grey sleeves of the yukata. He thought of the cold walls, the fearful eyes, the bureaucratic machinery that sought to remove him. The data pointed to a hostile system.
Then he thought of Yūgao's comb, the feel of her gentle hands fixing his hair. Of the Hokage's weary eyes, offering scrolls instead of chains. Of the sandalwood teeth moving through a snag, creating order from tangles. These were not systemic functions. They were… anomalies of positive value.
He looked up at Itachi. Instead of a symbol, he performed a series of actions. He picked up the sandalwood comb from beside him. He held it out for Itachi to see, then carefully set it down. He then gestured to the scroll on elemental theory. Finally, he placed his hand over his heart, where the memory of his parents' sacrifice, a knowledge, not a feeling, resided as a permanent data point.
His message was clear, and heartbreakingly transactional: I protect the tools I am given, the knowledge I am granted, and the legacy I have inherited. The village is the context for these things. Its continued existence is currently the most efficient framework for my development. Therefore, for now, it is logical to protect it.
It was not love. It was not loyalty. It was a calculated, conditional pragmatism. It was perhaps the most honest answer any jinchūriki could ever give.
Itachi closed his eyes for a moment. When he opened them, his decision was made. He had seen enough. The boy was not a monster. He was not a weapon. He was an emergent system. A new form of consciousness, born of trauma, power, and impossible circumstances, trying to make rational sense of an irrational world. To hand him to Danzō would be to try to smash a diamond on an anvil; you might break it, but you would never shape it. It would be a crime against the very intellect the Shinobi world claimed to value.
"My assessment is complete," Itachi said, rising smoothly. "Thank you for your… clarity."
Naruto dipped his head in acknowledgment.
As Itachi turned to leave, Naruto raised a hand. He created one last, simple image: a single crow in flight, holding a scroll in its talons. He looked at Itachi, a question in his eyes.
Itachi almost smiled. A faint, tragic ghost of an expression. "An apt symbol," he said softly. "Yes. My report will fly. And I hope it will be enough."
He left, the door closing softly behind him.
In the sudden silence, Naruto accessed the Analysis Chamber.
[SYSTEM NOTIFICATION: INTERACTION WITH UCHIHA ITACHI CONCLUDED.
ANALYSIS: SUBJECT IS BEARING SIGNIFICANT EXTERNAL PRESSURE (PROBABILITY: 94%). HIS ASSESSMENT OF HOST WAS NEUTRAL-TO-POSITIVE.
PREDICTION: HIS REPORT WILL ADVOCATE FOR HOST'S CONTINUED AUTONOMOUS DEVELOPMENT. EFFECTIVENESS AGAINST 'ROOT' VARIABLE: 65%.]
It was not a guarantee. But it shifted the probability curve.
{You gave him nothing to love, and nothing to fear,} Kurama mused. {You gave him only logic. A cold comfort for a boy drowning in other people's passions.}
'It was the only currency I had to trade,' Naruto thought, picking up the comb. He began the methodical ritual of running it through his hair, stroke by stroke. 'Emotion is a variable he is saturated with. Logic is a respite.'
He understood, in a distant, analytical way, that Itachi was also alone, also carrying a terrible weight. Their situations were isomorphic. Different equations, same crushing variables.
His own path was clear. Danzō's move had been revealed. The Hokage's countermove was in play. Jiraiya was an approaching unknown. The only factor he could absolutely control was the speed and depth of his own development.
The assessment was over. The race had begun.
- - -
In the Hokage's office, Itachi delivered his report verbally, his face a placid mask.
"Subject Uzumaki displays cognitive function and chakra control at a level that redefines 'prodigy,'" Itachi stated, his voice devoid of inflection. "His mindset is not martial, but systematic. He views power as a system to be managed, and the village as the current operational framework for that project. He holds no observable malice, but no emotional allegiance. His loyalty is conditional upon continued access to knowledge and stability."
Hiruzen listened, his pipe cold in his hands. "And the risk?"
"The risk is not of him losing control," Itachi said, meeting the Hokage's gaze. "The risk is of him outgrowing the framework. If the village ceases to be the most logical platform for his development, or becomes an active impediment, his conditional loyalty will expire. The resulting entity would be… unprecedentedly rational, powerful, and devoid of sentimental constraint. Not a rogue beast, but a sovereign intellect."
It was the most terrifying assessment Hiruzen could have imagined. Not a weapon gone off, but a weapon calmly walking away, finding a better user.
"Your recommendation?"
"The proposals to remove him are the worst possible course. They would transform the village from a framework into a prison, instantly invalidating his conditional loyalty. He must remain. He must be given structured, challenging growth within the system, to strengthen the logical ties that bind him to it. His teacher cannot just be powerful. He must be intellectually formidable enough to remain a relevant source of data. Otherwise, the student will surpass the master and see no further value in the connection."
Itachi bowed. "That is my assessment, Lord Hokage."
Hiruzen dismissed him, his mind heavy. Itachi had just described the ultimate shinobi: a perfect, rational mind with ultimate power. And he had confirmed it was growing in Konoha's basement. The report was a masterpiece. It would hold Danzō at bay. But it painted a future so dizzying in its implications that Sarutobi Hiruzen, the God of Shinobi, felt like a man trying to catch a thunderbolt in a bottle.
He looked out at the village, at the monument, at the distant, secluded orphanage. The assessment was in. The child was not what anyone thought.
Now, they had to live with what he actually was.