Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.
Summary: After all the things that Konoha had had to face in order for Sasuke and Naruto's children to be born safely, now the twin girls are grown, and just starting their teen years. It seems that not only Naruto and Sasuke are playing favorites with the girls, but the rest of Konoha as well. Hemiko and Cheri are remarkably like their parents, but how will this affect their growing up?
A/N: So, here we go again huh?
It's great isn't it? haha
Or is it? I don't know. Review and tell me what you think. Reviews make me happy. They encourage me to write faster ;)
Anyway, sorry if there are a few typos here and there, or if the story seems a bit rushed. I didn't really look it all the way through.
"Hemiko! Hemiko open the door! I'm seriously not in the mood for this today, I have to use the bathroom! ...hurry up we're gonna be late!" Cheri grimaced as she received no response. It was like this every morning before school. Hemiko spent too many hours worrying about her looks. Not that she needed to worry; everyone simply adored her. Not like Cheri. She was sort of... the troublemaker - because no one really noticed her if she did anything else. Everyone simply knew her as the class clown; Hemiko's sister. The only reason anyone even knew her name was because she acted stupid, and because she lived with Hemiko. Not that Cheri really cared, of course.
"You can use the bathroom at school," Hemiko finally replied, her voice muffled because of the door.
"No I can't," Hemiko answered, annoyed. "Because I won't have time to because we're going to be late because of you! Now hurry up!" She pounded on the door at the last word for emphasis.
"Well if you're so worried about it then why don't you just go ahead and leave?"
"You know dad won't let me leave without you! I tried that already, remember?" Cheri rolled her eyes. Hemiko already knew this.
"Well, we should be old enough for him to stop being so protective by now." She finally opened the door, sweeping her long black hair over her shoulder. She had gotten in trouble plenty of times because of that hair. It was simply too long, and she never put it up. The teachers said that during a mission, her hair would become a weakness; it might get caught on something, or pulled by an enemy. But Hemiko simply refused to cut it - everyone thought it was just so beautiful. "Just because we were nearly killed as infants doesn't mean anything to us now. We're nearly fourteen for godsakes!"
"To tell you the truth, I don't really care about that right now," Cheri replied, hurrying inside. "All I know is that we need to hurry or we're going to get in trouble for being late. Again."
Once out of the bathroom -Cheri didn't spend nearly as much time in there as Hemiko did- Cheri went to the living room to say goodbye to her fathers. "Hey daddy," she said, quickly giving Sasuke a kiss on the cheek. "See ya dad," she said, throwing her arms around Naruto. He chuckled and kissed her forehead. "Hemiko!" she called. "Hemiko come on, it's time to go." She was answered with silence as she approached the door. "Hey!" she exclaimed, glancing down. "Hemiko's shoes are already gone!"
Sasuke and Naruto shared a look. Sasuke heaved a sigh. "She must have left already."
Naruto laughed a bit at that. "That's just like Hemiko. She is so like you Sasuke; she doesn't wait on anybody."
Cheri gave a frustrated sigh as she slammed the door angrily behind her. So now Hemiko was the one waiting on her? As was expected, Cheri was late for school. As it happened, she arrived just after the teacher did, but Hemiko was already in her seat, so Cheri was the only one that got in trouble. The teacher gave her a big speech in front of the entire class, and then a detention. Everyone laughed at her for it. She didn't care. She took her seat in the back with her friends and let her head hit the table in front of her with a quiet thump.
Cheri was not completely alone; she did have a few friends. Ayame and Amaya Hyuga - twin girls like Cheri and Hemiko, but these two were identical. Haru Hatake and Kiyoshi Akimichi. Mika Lee and Yasashiku Nara. Growing up, these had been the only ones who would hang around with Cheri, because even as a child Hemiko had run with the popular crowd. Cheri's little group of friends had always been considered "outcasts."
And apparently Cheri's two fathers knew all of their parents. Ayame and Amaya's parents names were Neji Hyuga and Hinata Hyuga. Evidently the twins' parents were cousins or some such, forced to marry and reproduce for the sake of the Hyuga clan, and for that reason Ayame and Amaya were outcast. Haru Hatake was the child of Kakashi Hatake and Iruka Umino - he was the only one who, like Cheri and Hemiko, had two male parents. Haru was the oldest of three; both of his younger brothers not yet old enough to attend the academy.
Kiyoshi Akimichi was the oldest son of Choji Akimichi and Ino Akimichi (formerly known as Ino Yamanaka). He only had one sibling; a little sister who was only just turning seven. Mika Lee was the daughter of Rock Lee and the former Sakura Haruno. Mika was surprisingly beautiful - thankfully she received her father's black, silky hair, and her mothers very normal looking eyebrows - but she was particularly clumsy, which was probably the reason for her bad reputation. Yasashiku, unlike any of the others, only had one parent - Shikamaru Nara. Rumors said that the mother of the child was Temari of the Sand Village, sister of the Fifth Kazekage, who had a notable reputation for spending most of her time with Shikamaru whenever she was in town, but Shikamaru was mum on the subject.
"Jeez," Amaya sighed.
"That really sucks Cheri," Ayame amended. Mika patted Cheri on the back comfortingly.
"Well at least I won't be alone in detention today," Yasashiku said yawning.
"You've got detention again today Yasashiku?" Amaya asked curiously, glancing around Cheri's slumped form at him. It was a bit of an open secret that Amaya liked him, but nobody ever really said anything about it.
Yasashiku shrugged indifferently, crossed his arms and put his head down. "Don't I always?" he asked, sounding bored. "Maybe I'll ditch today. Dad wouldn't care. He never really pays attention to what time I come home." Cheri rolled her eyes at that. Yasashiku thought that he was being neglected, but Shikamaru turned out to actually be quite a good parent. Cheri remembered the first time Yasashiku earned a detention - it was no surprise that he did; it's not like he was a troublemaker or anything, he just liked to sleep a lot and not pay attention. The reason why she remembered that day was because Shikamaru had dashed over to their house in a panic, wide-eyed and asking if any of them had seen Yasashiku. Hemiko, of course, had not a clue - she probably didn't even know who Yasashiku was - but Cheri had been able to fill him in. He'd been grateful, but had shrugged off his panic as if it had been nothing once he learned that his son was alright.
Cheri wasn't sure what Amaya saw in Yasashiku. He had dirty blonde hair, which he always kept up in a spiky ponytail just like Shikamaru's, and he was attractive enough, she supposed, but... he was Yasashiku of all people. Lazy, uncaring, boring, always-in-detention Yasashiku. Plus he was like a brother to Cheri, so that was probably why she just didn't see him that way.
When class was over that day, Hemiko waited until all the people not staying for detention had shuffled out of the room, hesitating by the door. "I'll tell dad where you are, okay?" she said. Cheri was still furious with her, so she didn't bother to reply. She didn't even look at her. "Sorry you got in trouble," Hemiko continued. She didn't sound very sorry. Cheri growled under her breath.
"C'mon Hemiko!" one of Hemiko's friends called from outside somewhere.
Hemiko was immediately all smiles and giggles. "Okay I'm coming!" she called, scurrying out the door.
"You're sister's a real stuck up bitch," Yasashiku muttered. Cheri nodded. She and all her friends had already pretty much covered that topic by now.
That night at home, Cheri was stuck eating a cold meal in the kitchen. She had come home to see the dirty dishes from supper already in the sink, and the table cleared of everything except for one plate. Assuming that the plate was hers, Cheri sat without washing up first, and began to eat slowly, ignoring the sounds of her fathers teaching Hemiko some sort of technique outside. The house was deafeningly quiet, which only made the sounds of her family's lighthearted laughs seem even louder. Cheri suddenly felt very alone, but it was like this pretty much every day anyway.
She was just finishing up when the others came inside. She had heard them coming and stood as if to leave the room, but she was a bit late, because they all walked in just then, with Hemiko in the lead. "Hey sis," she laughed. "I was gonna wait for you so that you wouldn't have to eat alone, but dad told me I should go ahead. I hope you don't mind."
If you really cared about me you would have waited anyway, Cheri thought darkly.
"Hey Cheri," her dad - Naruto - said grinning from the door. "I didn't know that you had come home yet."
The three of them stood there in the doorway, smiling and laughing, out of breath as they slipped out of their shoes. Cheri grabbed her pack and left the room without clearing her plate.
She slammed the door when she got to her room and sat down to try to study, but tears of frustration kept blurring her vision. A few minutes later, she could hear Hemiko entering her own bedroom, laughing. It sounded like she was having friends over. And since when was she allowed to have friends over on a school night? If Cheri had asked to have people over, she wouldn't have been allowed.
Unable to put up with it anymore, she hurriedly began to pack. She only needed a few things - her school supplies, clothes for the night and for tomorrow, a book she was reading and a pack of cards. She'd move the rest of her things tomorrow. With all her things gathered up in her arms, Cheri flipped off the light switch and left the room.
In order to get to the part of the mansion that she was headed to, Cheri would have to cross the living room, and she'd hoped that neither of her fathers would be in there, but sure enough there was Sasuke Uchiha lounging on the couch with his eyes closed. Cheri tried to sneak past without him noticing, but he opened his eyes just as she was about halfway across. "What are you doing?" he asked curiously.
"Nothing," she huffed. "I'm just moving into a different room."
"What's wrong with the one you're already in?" he asked, sitting up.
"I just don't like it." He crossed the room over to her, but she tried to ignore him. When he tried to take some of the things from her to lighten her burden, she turned out of his reach. "I've got it," she said heatedly, and continued walking.
"Well alright then," he said, shrugging and going back to his place on the couch. She snorted once she was out of earshot. Sasuke had never cared that much about her. If anybody in this family loved her at all it'd be Naruto, but he hardly ever had time for her now, what with trying to become Hokage and all. Why did he have to be the stupid Hokage anyway? Why was it such a big deal? Wasn't family more important?
Cheri stomped her way across the mansion.
She eventually found a room that would do. At least it had a bed in it - most of the unused rooms didn't. Maybe her fathers would help her move her own bed into one of these rooms sometime if they weren't too busy doing something with Hemiko.
After placing her things on the bed, Cheri stepped back out into the dusty hallway. Here, the mansion was quiet. Cheri often explored the expansive house when she was bored, and she had become quite familiar with the part of the mansion that nobody used, but still she had to wonder why it was never used. There didn't seem to be anything particularly wrong with the rooms, if you ignored the dust. Perhaps when her fathers had moved in they had just picked a random part of the mansion to spend their time in, but she still couldn't see why they wouldn't enter a certain part of their own home for over fourteen years or so. Why did such a small family need such a big place to live anyway? What on earth were her fathers thinking when they moved into this place?
Some parts of the mansion made Cheri shiver. It was so quiet and empty, and in some places you could hear the wind blowing in from an old broken window or something... it was like a ghost town. Why did one little part of their house seem so happy and alive, and yet the other so dark and full of emptiness? Cheri wondered all the time - who lived here before? Who used these rooms? What did they use them for? What were the people like? What happened to them, and why did they leave the mansion at all? Did they ever use all the rooms in the mansion, or did they leave some abandoned as Cheri's family did? So many questions... These empty halls seemed to be filled with so many broken memories. Cheri could feel it every time she explored that place.
That night Cheri wandered around from hallway to hallway, her hands brushing each dusty wall and each dirty, closed door. Old paintings and portraits hung on the walls - some of them broken and some of them so old that you couldn't even make out the faces of those in the picture. Paint was peeling from the walls and the doors around her. There were very few windows in any of the hallways. This place made her feel so incredibly empty inside herself. She felt so sad, so alone. Where were these emotions coming from? It was so disappointing to see such a beautiful place deserted like this.
Still wandering aimlessly, lost in her own thoughts, Cheri began opening the doors in the hallways. At least that would improve the place a bit. She felt it could use to be a bit more open anyway. So she opened every door in the next two or three hallways before finally coming across one that was locked. She jiggled the handle but the door wouldn't budge. She pushed. No response.
She wondered, what could be beyond this door? Who was the last person to open it? Why did they lock it? Eventually she managed to get the thing open - a locked door was usually no problem for a ninja, even for a ninja-in-training, but the thing was so old she'd been half afraid it would fall apart at her touch. When finally Cheri had the door open, she peeked inside and saw that there seemed to be nothing of any interest to see at all. There didn't seem to be any windows in there either, so it was quite dark, and this one was even more dusty than any of the other rooms; when she'd opened the door, a great cloud of dust had blown right into her face, causing her to cough and gag.
Cheri shut the door - there would be no point in going in there until it was light outside again. Well at least now she had something to do the next day, but would she be able to remember her way back to this door? She figured that she would, since she'd left most of the doors open leading to her way here. So, finally, she retreated to her newly adopted room and went to bed. Upon looking at her watch she discovered that it was later than she had thought it was.
It was late. The clock on the wall showed that it was almost three in the morning. Naruto was sitting at the table in the kitchen drinking coffee, dark rings under his eyes. Sasuke had woken upon feeling that his spouse was no longer in bed with him - he and Naruto had developed that kind of bond over the years. It was a comforting feeling, but it was painful whenever one or the other was away for too long.
Sasuke walked into the room, quiet so as not to disturb the silent Kyuubi container. He sat across from Naruto at the table, and his spouse attempted to smile up at him, but it seemed a little weak. "Mmm," Sasuke said quietly. "Black coffee. At this hour?" Of course Naruto could tell that what Sasuke was really trying to ask - Why aren't you in bed?
"Couldn't sleep," the Kyuubi boy murmured.
Sasuke nodded understandingly, and stood to fix himself a cup of his own. "Might as well drink it while it's still fresh," he muttered. "Why did you fix a whole pot?"
Naruto shrugged. "Just figured I'd be up for a while."
With his mug of steaming liquid, Sasuke sat back down, pulling his seat up closer to Naruto. For a long while they sat in contented silence, sipping their coffee. Finally, Sasuke asked, "You're worrying about it again aren't you?" His voice had that steely edge to it, saying that there was no need for Naruto to be worrying at all.
Naruto sighed heavily. "Of course I am," he said. "It's been over thirteen years, Sasuke. We've been trying so hard for the past couple of years... Why aren't I pregnant yet?" Sasuke could already see the tears of frustration building up in Naruto's eyes, though the Kyuubi boy was obviously fighting hard to keep them down - he'd already been thinking about this for a while, then.
It was Sasuke's turn to sigh. He shook his head. "I just don't know, Naruto." He paused a moment to take another long drink. "What does Kyuubi say about it?"
"Says there's nothin' he can do." He ran his fingers through his hair and chuckled bitterly. "It's funny; you manage to get me knocked up the first time without even trying, and now that you are trying you can't even do it at all."
"Well... what if you already are pregnant and we just don't know it yet?"
Naruto shook his head. "We would know it. I can't be pregnant and in my male form at the same time."
All was quiet again for a while. Sasuke glanced around the room, seeing the ghosts of all his memories running about the kitchen like a movie in his head. His mother, smiling down at him. His father, his brother, sitting near him at the table. Naruto, in woman form, kneeling at his feet, trying to make him believe that it was him under all that makeup and hair gel. Hurtful times; painful memories.
And then there were happier ones; Hemiko with her little hands grasping two of Sasuke's fingers, just learning how to walk. The time Cheri slipped and hit her head on the table a little too hard - Naruto had had a panic attack, but the girl hadn't even cried. Hell, at the time she'd been more upset at seeing Naruto upset than she had been by the bump on her head.
Sasuke smiled fondly at the tender memories of his children growing up, and he slowly reached out to take Naruto's hand. The Kyuubi boy looked up at him with hope and happiness dancing in his tired blue eyes. "Maybe it's my turn to give it a try," Sasuke suggested quietly.
"What?" Naruto asked. "What do you mean?"
"Maybe it's my turn to try to carry the babies. You know... I could be the mother this time."
Naruto laughed then - really laughed. He hadn't done that a whole lot since he had started trying to fill the position of Hokage. "Pregnant Sasuke Uchiha, grumpy as a son of a bitch and waddling around the mansion, probably craving ice cream and god knows what else. An enormous belly jutting out of his middle. Having to wear maternity clothes." He laughed a bit more at that. "Yeah, I can see it."
Sasuke grumbled under his breath and shifted uneasily. "If that's what it takes," he muttered.
Naruto smiled at him pleasantly - it seemed a little less forced than before. "You really want to have another kid as much as I do, don't you?"
Sasuke nodded. "I wouldn't mind," he said. "And... I'd do anything to see you happy." He and Naruto smiled at each other for a moment.
"Thank you, Sasuke."
He bowed his head slightly in acknowledgment. "You're welcome."
Their coffee was getting cold, and neither of them wanted any more, so they simply sat quietly; thinking, looking at one another, remembering... "I think something's bothering Cheri," Sasuke mentioned after a moment.
"What do you mean?" Naruto asked.
"Well," he sighed. "I didn't want to bother you about it. You've got enough on your plate already, and I think it's just a teenager thing anyway. But I don't know, she just seems... troubled. She's moving out of her room you know," he said, giving Naruto a look.
"What? Why would she do that?"
Sasuke shrugged, throwing up his free hand in a sort of helpless gesture. "Beats me. She seemed pretty pissed off when I asked her about it though, so I didn't bother her much. I think she's moving into the older part of the mansion..." He trailed off, memories of that old place filling his head and spreading across his mind like a disease. After all the years since, Sasuke still had trouble talking about the deaths of all his family members. He cleared his throat, determined to stay focused on the current topic of conversation. "I think you should talk to her," he continued.
Naruto nodded and rubbed Sasuke's hand gently with his thumb. "Okay," he replied quietly. "I will."
A/N: So what do you all think of chapter one? Is it any good? You think I should change anything? Also, I need some idea for this story. As of now, I have no idea where I'm going with this. So if you want me to keep writing it, message me or review and send me some ideas. I'm sure your little brains are buzzing with more creative thoughts than mine is at this point. ;)
