Hey all! This is a side fic to Not Just Rivals dedicated to Crispybaconlove for winning a contest. Check out their profile! Now you all know how Kyuu and Naru got along the one time they did meet in person (over a decade before NJR).
Word count (minus A/N's)- 1,125
Kyuubi may have acted as if Naruto was a random brat not worth saving, but he was a liar. A deceiver, which is not so surprising given his kitsune like nature. He remembered the blond haired son of Minato and Kushina all too well, a fact he tried desperately to forget.
"Kurama-kun, would you mind watching Naruto-chan for a little while? I need to go to a meeting with the Hokage. I won't be gone long," Minato's innocent face and somewhat pleading grin should have warned Kyuubi that such a favor would not be so simple.
"...um, okay, Namikaze-san," the new intern accepted the small child, holding the little boy rather awkwardly. "Are you sure it's alright if I looked after him? I don't know much about babies."
"You'll do fine!" Minato clapped him on the shoulder. Poor, skittish Kyuubi very nearly dropped the squirming one year old. The blond man did not seem to notice this nor did he see the red headed teen's nervousness. "He won't be any trouble at all," there was that damnably charming smile again. "If I don't pick him up, Kushina-chan will." The newly popular Akatsuki/ANBU agent dropped a baby bag on the reception desk. "Everything you need to help care for the little guy is in there."
Kyuubi clumsily tried to adjust his hold on the infant Naruto, balancing the wiggling child on his hip. "Namikaze-san, surely you have more instructions than that! I don't know the first thing about child care!" He protested.
"Now, now, Kurama-kun," Minato began.
"Don't call me that!" The redhead glared at his superior. "My codename is Kyuubi! Kyuu-bi." He enunciated his name slowly for the benefit of the blond man before him.
"Okay, Kyuu-chan, you don't have to call me by my last name, though. That's a little cold." The man smiled, laughing a little.
"Whatever you say, Sempai, but are you sure-"
"You'll do fine Kyuu-chan!" Namikaze Minato looked at his watch, "oh, I have to go now, I'm almost late! Ja ne," and with that he disappeared from view.
Kurama (aka Kyuubi) moaned pitifully as he watched his superior's retreating back. Looking down at the little boy in his arms, he sighed, "what am I going to do with you?" He asked the baby.
"Pray!" The one year old chirped, his adorable little voice mispronouncing the word he meant to say.
"Maybe," the intern said, but after you're changed. You stink!" Not recognizing the insult, little Naruto only giggled.
Surprisingly, caring for the blond little boy wasn't as hard as Kyuubi had expected it to be. Aside from changing the kid's diaper, it wasn't too bad. The poor intern shuddered at the horrors of dirty pull-ups. Once he changed the kid, Kurama looked around for something to entertain the little guy with. He looked in the baby bag and found a rattle. He handed the small toy to Naruto.
"Yeah! Rattah rattah go rattah," little Naruto chattered. The red haired intern grinned a little at the boy's baby gibberish until the baby bonked him on the head with the rattle.
"Itai!" Kurama yelped, covering his head with his hands. "Don't hit! It isn't nice," he glared at the small child. Naruto, in turn, merely shook his rattle and babbled on about nonsense.
Aside from the rattle incident, Kyuubi had little trouble from his charge. No trouble at all, except for when the miniature Minato managed to crawl away. "Ne, Naruto-chan," the intern said, "what do you think about-Naruto-chan? Oh, no!"
It took poor Kurama two hours to discover that Naruto had somehow crawled into Uchiha Mikoto's office. The babe sat peacefully in the dark haired woman's lap, chewing on a teething ring while Mikoto was typing something on the computer. "Uchiha-san! I'm so sorry about him! I was supposed to be watching Naruto-chan, I only looked away for a minute to file some papers and he was gone!"
"It's alright, Kurama-chan," the good natured woman smiled, handing the troublesome blond baby back to Kyuubi. "He was no trouble at all," she smiled.
"It's Kyuubi," the intern mumbled half heartedly, much too low for Mikoto to hear. "Arigato gozaimasu, Uchiha-san," he gave a polite bow before returning to his place at the reception desk. He set Naruto on the counter. "You don't go anywhere else, ya understand, Naruto?"
The baby gurgled happily and grabbed a handful of Kurama's long, red hair. "Pwetty Koo-wa-ma hair."
"Let's not pull my hair, Naru-chan," the now distressed Kyuubi attempted to remove the one year old's small fists from his hair. Unfortunately, the next thing Naruto's small hands found was a stapler.
"Ooh, wha's this?" The young blond wondered, dragging the object towards himself.
"No, no, Naruto-chan!" Kurama took the stapler away, "don't play with that."
"WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA AAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!" The small child hollered at having the interesting, new thing taken away from him. It took Kyuubi half an hour to pacify him.
By the time Minato returned to pick up his son, the intern was worn out. The blond man smiled warmly at the semi-conscious Kurama. The red haired intern sat in his desk chair, nearly drooling on his paperwork as he struggled to stay awake. Naruto was curled up on the desk next to Kyuubi fast asleep, his tiny fists clenching fistfulls of red hair. The agent thought it was absolutely adorable how little Naruto was snuggled up against the intern, curled up at the juncture of his caregiver's shoulder.
"This is too priceless," the blond man whispered, taking a picture with his smartphone. "Kurama-kun," he said a little more loudly, "I'm here to take Naruto-chan home, thank you for watching over him."
Kyuubi awoke with a start, "who.. what... you!" His eyes narrowed as soon as he recognized his superior. His face flushed red once he saw the phone in Minato's hand. "You didn't..."
The Akatsuki agent from ANBU merely chuckled at Kurama's reddened cheeks, noticing how the young man now held baby Naruto rather comfortably in the crook of his arm. The slumbering infant seemed not to have noticed his caregiver's waking or loud voice and continued to sleep, sucking his thumb, while still gripping Kyuubi's hair in one hand.
Minato couldn't help himself. He snapped another photo despite the intern's flustered protests. Grinning a little, he took his son from Kyuubi, "thank you Kurama-kun. You should probably go home soon, you look a little tired."
"I'm fine, Sempai," the redhead grumbled, glaring at his superior.
Now, holding the two old pictures, Kyuubi wondered why he couldn't bring himself to destroy them. He didn't need reminders of the little blond Namikaze brat or the shy weakling he had been, and yet these two old photos clenched in his hand were too precious to throw away.
Aww, Kyuubi is/was such a softie! I bet you guys didn't think such a blunt and tough character like him would be so sentimental. I know none of you expected him to be a caring, sweet, but insecure guy when he was younger. The majority of this story takes place about fourteen years before Not Just Rivals, my how times change people! I hope you liked it, Crispybacon :D