Part four of my tumblr drabbles to celebrate reaching 500 followers. I love MinaKushi and they absolutely deserved better.

The First

"I hate it," Kushina muttered, hands twisting in the wet mud that was seeping through her clothes. "I hate this village, I hate this weather, I hate everything."

She watched as the Namikaze boy took another step towards her, moving with the cautious steps of a healer approaching an injured animal. He didn't say anything, and she hated that too.

"Most of all," the young kunoichi sniffed, trying to toss her waterlogged hair and failing miserably, "I hate this stupid mop on top of my head."

The boy - Minato, she remembered - suddenly beamed at her with a perspicacity she hadn't expected from his outwardly easy-going nature. "That's a shame," he replied, hand outstretched, "I quite like it."

The Fifth, and the one after that

"Sometimes," he said, and she could barely hear for the wind whistling in their ears, "I think about running from one end of the country to the other, just to see how fast I could go."

"Running's about all you're good for, you wimp," Kushina replied, and watched as Minato's face crumpled in upset. She didn't - she didn't - feel bad. The Hokage had to be stern, and if she wanted to make that her goal, well, she had to start somewhere.

But then Minato ran, and ran, and when she realised he'd left her behind with all their classmates, prey to their cruel words and crueler actions, Kushina tugged on her hair and wondered why being stern felt so very much like being mean.

The Fiftieth

She felt - full. But then empty. Like a glass, filled to the brim with something that was at the same time nothing. If asked, Kushina wasn't sure she could describe who, or what, she was any more.

"Congratulations on graduating," Minato said, hanging upside down from the tree branch he'd been hovering on, waiting for her to exit the academy gate. "I'm sorry I had to miss the ceremony."

Kushina looked at his stupid upside-down face. He looked uncharacteristically sombre, but the trailing lapels of his tracksuit jacket as they dangled over his shoulders ruined the effect. She knew better than to ask where he'd been; these days, it seemed like one or another of the older ninja wanted his fleet-footed assistance, so much so that they'd asked him to graduate early to be sent on official missions.

How sad, to be a glorified errand boy, Kushina thought, uncharitable. And then remembered she was now a glorified storage vessel. She frowned.

Minato must've seen the look on her face because in an instant he was in front of her, right way up, hands outstretched in the gesture she associated with when he felt sheepish. "Oh, I'm really sorry, Kushina, can I make it up to you?"

"I don't care that you weren't there, idiot," she snapped. Then stopped. Aunt Mito had said she might feel - vengeful - for a few days as she adjusted. Was that what this was? "I'm going home."

Minato followed her, hands in his pockets. She let him, happy to walk next to him under the stares of her hateful classmates and their parents as they took the busy road away from the academy. It almost felt calming, but then-

"What did your Great Auntie Mito want the other day?" Minato asked, all innocence.

Kushina stopped dead in the middle of the road. That was right; Minato had been on a mission on the day the village had sealed her fate for life. The kunoichi scuffed the road with her shoe, face curtained by the flaming locks of her heritage. Remembering the searing, screaming pain as the nine tailed fox was forced into her life essence; an unwilling prisoner guarded by an unwilling jailor in a balance of wills that had her clawing the walls of the hospital for days.

Minato had peered down to look into her eyes as she hesitated. "Did she give you anything nice for your graduation?"

He was all smiles. He was always all smiles. Kushina found she didn't want that to change.

"Ah, you know," and he was giving her that look again, the one that didn't suit his idiot face, "she just told me to be strong, and to be the best kunoichi I could."

It wasn't a lie. But from the way her sunny friend stared, it felt like it.

The Hundredth

"Thanks for saving me, Minato," she said, and held her hands to her face to feel the heat of the fires that burned there.

He didn't look down at her. She wondered when he'd gotten strong enough to carry her and run for miles.

"How did you find me?"

"It was…" Minato paused. Shifted her in his arms. "Why didn't you tell me?"

She knew what he meant. Of course she did. "What do you mean?"

"About-" there was a moment of silence where he picked up the pace, leaving the last remaining pursuers in his dust. So this is what it feels like to be the fastest person alive. It was exhilarating. "About you, and the - about being the next nine-tailed jinchuuriki."

"Everyone else hated me," she said, voice small. "I didn't want you to hate me, too."

Kushina was afraid to see the look on his face. Surely, he'd wear the frown of the Elders as she snarled at them one too many times. Or maybe he'd call her tomato and laugh at her redness, same as the rest of their peers. Worst of all, he'd drop her and-

But Minato just smiled. "You wanted to know how I found you," he said, and she heard him loud and clear above the rush of his travel. "I've been following your hair with my eyes for years."

And all at once, just like that, she felt the red threads of fate snap shut around her heart as he flew.

Two Hundred and Fifty, and just a few more

They called him The Yellow Flash, these days, and even his perverted old teacher Jiraiya watched him with a casual wariness in his eyes. Kushina was determined not to treat him any differently.

He… needed that, she knew, somewhere deep in the recesses of her heart where the nine-tails slumbered. So when he turned up on her doorstep after a month and a half away she made him wipe his feet before he crossed the threshold and asked him with a touch of fire whether he'd brought her very favourite snack.

She said nothing of the haunted way his eyes searched the shadows of her hallway.

"I forgot," Minato said. But he sounded more sad than sheepish, so she forgave him with a wink.

"Good thing I've already been to the shop," she called over her shoulder, and watched as the life came back to his bright blue eyes. "But if you want a kiss, I suppose you'd better get seconds…"

Kushina watched as the Yellow Flash disappeared in a haze of pink.

Five Hundred

"I'd like it if our children were friends," the kunoichi murmured, and watched as her husband wrinkled his nose in distaste.

"With an Uchiha?" he replied. "I've no problem with Mikoto-san, but her husband…"

"Come on, Fugaku isn't that bad," she teased.

"Wait until you see him in action in my office."

Kushina opened her mouth to retort that if he didn't like it it could very well be her office, but then the blonde rounded the table and placed a gentle hand on her swollen stomach.

"I just hope they have your hair," he said, ever so softly. "And they'd grow it long, and I'd brush it five hundred strokes at a time-"

"You can do that with mine," Kushina interrupted.

"-and they'd have my sweet and sunny disposition," he continued, unperturbed, "and one day, I'll tell them all about the first day I saw their mother with her shining red hair."

"And?"

"And, I'll say that's not exactly the time I fell in love with her - I'm sorry to say I preferred you after all the mud was gone - and then I'll say that I fell in love a little more every day since."

Kushina looked at the man crouched in front of her. With his unparalleled speed, and skill, and flee on sight commands, and idiotic face that was stretched into an even sillier grin. And felt, as she always felt, the five hundred threads of fate that bound them together pull tighter, and tighter still.