- It's not like one friend will change anything, right?
On her way home from work Kuroda Rae, an American studying in Japan, spots a blue portal. She accidentally trips and nearly gets mugged and killed for her trouble, only to be rescued and healed by a man in an ANBU costume.
Rae picks herself up and walks out to find herself in a strange place with old-fashioned buildings, people with strange clothes and a monument that shouldn't be there.
Now penniless and homeless, Rae sets off to look for work to earn herself money for food. After finding a job, she returns to the alley she started in to find a small blonde boy to also be taking refuge in the alley.
This work provides examples of the following tropes:
- Big Damn Hero: The ANBU who saves Rae's life in the first chapter.
- Contrived Coincidence: Rae trips over a dog and falls into the portal.
- Cornered Rattlesnake/Waif-Fu: As Rae points out, her martial arts are meant to be used by someone who doesn't have a lot of physical strength, focuses on using enemy attacks against said enemy and disabling/escaping threats.
- Dead Fic: Was last updated January 13 2015.
- Disability Superpower: Since chakra is basically lifeforce in Naruto, Rae's complete absence of chakra is considered a disability. As a result, Rae is completely immune to genjutsu.
- Expy:
Word of God is that Rae is a snarkier and grumpier Obito.
- The Heart: Rae grounds Naruto and later Team 7 and acts as their moral compass.
- Homeless Hero: She and Naruto had to live in the streets, but like real life homelessness, it was temporary until she could find herself an apartment.
- Jerkass Realization: Rae has one at the end of chapter 15 and the beginning of chapter 16. While she admits she doesn't like Sasuke and gets the impression she never will, Rae realizes that treating Sasuke like dirt for something he hasn't (and hopefully may never) actually DONE isn't helping. She resolves to be cordial if not actually helpful to the kid.
- Lampshade Hanging: Noted by Rae that in most stories where girls end up in the world of Naruto, they tell everything to the Hokage, get cool ninjas and have their favorite character.
- Mama Bear: For a few years, around Naruto's birthday, Rae has to fight off a few civilians who attempt to hurt him.
- Muggle: Unlike most Self-Insert Fic, Rae remains a normal civilian woman and doesn't gain any ninja skills or power.
- Non-Action Snarker: Rae mostly. She has some Action Girl skills but as the story progresses, she hangs around more and more ninja, who are clearly more skilled than she is. Not to mention the whole "not-having-chakra" thing.
- Occidental Otaku: Rae is an American Naruto fan.
- Opposites Attract: A platonic version with the dark and snarky Rae and the bright and hyperactive Naruto.
- Parental Substitute: Pointed by Iruka as she practically raised Naruto, she fed, she educated him and watches for him. She adopted him in all but in name.
- Real Women Don't Wear Dresses: Averted as Rae is beloved by reviewers for being a Non-Action Snarker Team Mom.
- Supporting Protagonist: While the story is in Rae's point of view, the story focuses on how she affects Naruto.
- The Stations of the Canon: Rae sat down one day and made a list. She starts getting worried when she realized how far the plot is deviating.
- The Unsmile: Rae taught herself how to do one and can't undo it.
