Chapter 2: Yuruyakana Kaifuku.

Yuruyakana kaifuku means Slow Recovery.

A.N: Chapter 2 is here. This was suppose to go up on Sunday but FF was playing silly buggers and the document wouldn't upload in its entirety. In this chapter there is the tiniest bit of Minato/Kushina fluff and we learn a bit about Tora's ninja potential. Yay!

Also, big hugs to wordcrafter, LuvAnime4-Ever, TrashedAndScatteredSidewinder, xxxxXLorreliXxxxx and kakashihatakelover for the reviews/faves/story alerts. I love you guys!

On with Chapter 2!

Listening to: Feeling Good by Muse (Told everyone that they would pop up again :)

Disclaimer: I do not own the Naruto franchise or Kakashi :'(


Kushina moved towards the girl and bent down so that they were eye level.

"My name is Kushina. Can you tell me your name?"

The girl blushed, bowed her head and spoke in a quiet voice. "My name is Tora Hayashi. Nice to meet you."

Kushina couldn't help but grin. The little girl was just too cute for words!

"Okay Tora. How old are you?"

Tora looked up at Kushina and tilted her head to the side. "Um..." She paused to think, "I was three one month ago."

Once again, the response elicited a smile from Kushina, "Three huh? So you're almost a big girl now aren't you?"

Tora gave Kushina a small smile that didn't quite reach her eyes and nodded. Minato now came forward and spoke to the girl.

"Tora. Can you tell us what you meant when you said that Kushina has nine red tails?"

He was surprised when he received a small scowl from the girl in response to his query instead of a straight answer. He was even more surprised by what Tora said next.

"You're rude."

Confusion replaced his surprise and so he asked her, "How am I rude?"

"Simple. You didn't introduce yourself. Mummy said that it is rude not to introduce yourself to someone."

Minato started spluttering and eventually settled for pouting at Tora. "I was going to introduce myself eventually!"

Before Tora could reply, she was interrupted by an extremely loud laugh. Jumping slightly, she looked over at Kushina who was now clutching her side and whipping away the tears that were rolling down her face, laughing all the while.

"You two -giggle- are just -giggle- too -giggle- funny!"

No sooner had Kushina finished her sentence, she was once again roaring with laughter. This brought a smile to Minato's face and he soon found himself laughing like a hyena as well.

Tora looked at the strange adults as they remained bent over, hands clutching their sides and laughing like hyenas.

'Yes,' Tora decided, 'They are very strange adults. No-one in the clan acted like that.'

It was nice. In acting so strangely and not constantly asking if she was okay like all of the nurses that came to see her, they actually made her feel better. They filled the hole in her heart a little and Tora liked that. Before she could stop herself, a small giggle made its way past her lips and soon, she to couldn't stop laughing.

After what seemed like an age, they all calmed down enough for Minato to ask his question again.

"So Tora, now that we've been introduced, what did you mean?"

Tora tilted her head to the side and looked at something behind Kushina that the other two couldn't see. "Well..; she," Tora pointed at Kushina, "has nine red tails, like I said. They're waving and see-through."

Minato pondered this information, turned to Kushina and nodded. Then he turned back to Tora and smiled.

"Thank you for your help Tora. We need to go now okay?"

Tora's smile fell. She didn't want them to go. If they went the emptiness would come back!

"Would you come and visit me again? I like you. You're nice." Tora asked in a quiet voice.

Minato and Kushina turned around from their position by the door.

"Of course we will Tora. See you soon!"

Tora smiled at them as they left, happy for the first time since she had arrived in Konoha. She would get to see the nice lady with tails and the funny yellow haired man again!


Two weeks had passed since Kushina and Minato had originally visited Tora and they now found themselves standing in a Council meeting as the Council and the Elders decided what should be done with Tora.

Danzo, a man who had most of his body covered in bandages and was one of the elders, was the first to speak.

"The girl must be put into intense shinobi training as soon as possible. She is the last of a unique kekki-genkai and has potential skills that would make her one of the most effective tools at Konoha's disposal."

Kushina felt anger flow through her at Danzo's words. She had never liked the man much anyway but hearing him refer to a three year old girl as just a weapon was shocking. Minato was also angered at his words. No-one that young should be a fully functioning shinobi. It would cause more harm than good.

It was then that Sarutobi spoke up.

"We may be at war but she is just a child. Even with intense training she would be killed almost immediately in the field."

At this remark Danzo sent a dangerous glare in the Hokage's direction. "I mean no disrespect Hokage-sama, but we are at war. We cannot afford to be soft and not use a great advantage when it is presented to us just because you want to coddle a little girl. A little girl who is the heir to a powerful kekki-genkai."

The two shinobi proceeded to send each other loaded glares from their seats on opposite sides of the room. Another member of the council, Koharu Utatane, spoke up, ignoring the heated glares that Sarutobi and Danzo were sending each other from opposite sides of the room.

"Both Danzo and Sarutobi are right. It is important that we get the girl battle ready and trained so that we can take advantage of her unique kekki-genkai. However, we cannot send her into battle at the age she is now. She will be inexperienced and will only cause problems that could end in her death. It would not do to loose such an important tool for the war."

Minato looked at Kushina. After hearing Koharu's words, her facial expression had changed to one akin of someone who was sucking on very sour lemons. He had suppress the urge to sigh. Kushina had always had trouble when it came to masking her emotions, in all honesty he loved her for it, however having Kushina go on an angry tirade in front of the Council was the last thing that was needed. Minato looked back up when the murmurs from the Council members died down. It looked like they had reached a consensus.

"We have made our decision. The child shall be trained in the shinobi arts for two years. We will then have her take the Genin rank test and from there she will be put into a team with other skilled Genin. Now her trainer..."

He didn't have a chance to get any further before he was interrupted by Kushina.

"Minato and I will train and care for the girl. We are both talented shinobi and Tora already knows and trusts us which will make her training go more smoothly."

Minato couldn't help but stare at the red-head beside him with complete and utter shock. 'Us? Take care and train a small child? Impossible?'

The Council were once again whispering to each other about Kushina's declaration. Many seemed to be in agreement with the idea of Kushina and Minato training Tora but below the buzz a few disapproving comments could be heard. Once again the chatting stopped and this time the Hokage stood up.

"The Council have agreed that this would be suitable. However, the two of you will still need to complete any missions and assignments that you are given. Is that understood?"

Both Kushina and Minato bowed politely at the Hokage. "Of course Hokage-sama."

"Alright. Both of you are dismissed. Go and collect Tora from the hospital before you go home. I hear that she is now well enough to be discharged."


As soon as they had stepped out of the Council chamber, Minato whirled round and stared at Kushina. A look of incredulity on his face.

"Are you insane?"

Kushina regarded him with a level expression on her face.

"I can assure you, Minato, that I am perfectly sane thank you very much."

"But Kushina. We're jounin, not babysitters. You can't possibly mean..."

As he said this her expression darkened and filled with anger.

"I meant exactly what I said in front of the Council Minato." At this point her voice was dangerously quiet. "That little girl is all alone and involved in things beyond her control due to circumstances that she didn't want. They were about to turn her into a cold, unthinking, unfeeling killer. Do you really expect me to sit by when they tried to pull something like that. DO YOU?"

By the end of Kushina's tirade she was shouting in near hysteria. Minato's face softened and he pulled her into a tight hug when he realised exactly why she was so upset.

"She reminds you of yourself when you received the Kyuubi doesn't she?" He murmured into her hair as he embraced her. "You don't want her to be sad, afraid and alone like you were, do you?"

Kushina shook her head as she hugged him back. After a few minutes spent in the comfort of each other's embrace, they stepped away from each other and Minato smiled down at her.

"Come on then. Let's go pick up Tora and get her moved in."


Tora looked up at the two people standing in front of her with wide and hopeful eyes.

"I get to live with you and you'll train me as well?"

Minato couldn't help put chuckle at the hopeful look on Tora's face.

"Yep. My team have also delivered everything that was salvageable from your home and delivered it to your room."

"I get my own room!"

Even thought it didn't seem possible, Tora's grin widened even further and, in a blink of an eye, she rushed over to both of them and gave them a big hug around their waists.

"Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you!"

Both Kushina and Minato laughed at Tora's antics.

"Let's get going and get you settled in then."

Tora smiled and grabbed Kushina's hand before they followed Minato out of the hospital and towards Tora's new home.


Tora smiled as she pulled on her toe-less sandals and strapped her kunai holder to her right and left legs.

'Sometimes being ambidextrous is a real blessing.'

Standing up from her bed, she inspected her room. Her unmade bed lay against the wall on the right side of the room, its foot ending near the door. On the opposite side of the room was a door leading to a small private bathroom that contained a toilet, a shower and any medical supplies that she might of needed. Next to the door to the bathroom stood a simple wooden wardrobe and chest of draws that contained all her clothes and ninja gear. Finally, underneath the window, was her desk and book case, stocked with different shinobi scrolls and scrolls that had been saved from the destruction of her old home. Walking over to the mirror, she checked that her shoulder length hair was tucked behind her shoulder. In the past year that she had been staying with Minato and Kushina, the black that made up the majority of her hair had lightened so that it now shone with a midnight blue tone. It still faded to a more sapphire blue colour at the tips no matter what Tora tried to do with it. Her yellow and green eyes looked a lot happier than when she had first arrived in Konoha and they no longer had a dead, unseeing look to them. All in all life in Konoha had been good to Tora. Rushing down the stairs, Tora almost ran into Kushina as she headed to the front door. Already partially through the front door, Tora shouted and apology over her shoulder.

"SorryKushina,I''tbebacktilllatersoI'?Bye!"

Kushina blinked a few times and started laughing once she managed to decode the garbled message that Tora had shouted at her over her shoulder. Shaking her head, Kushina made her way back into the kitchen and set the basket of washing that she was holding down on the table. Tora had become so much more open and friendly since she started living with them and it was obvious, even from the first session, that the girl had a talent for the shinobi arts.


Minato guided a three year old Tora into the back garden of their house. She was dressed in a basic pair of dark trousers and a dark t-shirt along with new toe-less sandals and was looking at Minato with an expression of wary curiosity. Minato turned to face Tora and started to speak.

"From today onwards Kushina and I will be training you in the three different shinobi arts. Do you think that you could tell me the name of the different paths?"

Tora tilted her head to the side, a movement that Minato and Kushina noticed she always made when thinking, and thought for a moment.

"Um, are they Genjutsu, Ninjutsu and Taijutsu?"

Minato smiled at her. "Well done Tora. Now, do you know what each of them is?"

Tora's smile fell and she shook her head.

"That doesn't matter. Let's start with the first one you mentioned, Genjutsu. Genjutsu are illusionary techniques created with chakra and hand seals. This can help a shinobi confuse or control an opponent. The second one you mentioned was Ninjutsu,these are any techniques that use chakra and , unlike genjutsu, they are very real. Taijutsu are weapon and hand-to-hand techniques that don't involve the use of chakra. However chakra can be used to enhance taijutsu and make it very powerful. Do you understand so far?"

Tora had a look of complete concentration on her face as she absorbed his words and committed them to memory. After a few moments she nodded her head slowly.

"Alright. The first thing I'm going to do is teach you a few taijutsu stances and movement runs. If you do these everyday they should become second nature for you to use them in combat and they also help keep your body in peak condition. I'll run through them first and then you're going to repeat them. I will help you correct any mistakes and we should be done in no time!" Minato finished with a grin.

Tora felt a grin form on her face in response and concentrated carefully on the stances that Minato was showing her. To her eyes each part of the stances were clear and well defined apart from the blur created by swift movements when he moved from stance to stance. Finally he stopped and turned to Tora.

"Alright, your turn. Run through them as slowly as you need to."

"Okay."

Slowly Tora moved her body through the different stances taking a great deal of time to make sure she was doing it right. Minato was impressed, Tora had only made a few mistakes to her stances as she ran through them and they were easily corrected.

"Tora, how were you able to copy the stances so well?"

"Well you were moving quite slowly. It was just easy to see your movements."

Minato thought for a bit. In all honesty, he hadn't been moving slow enough that she would have been able to see that much detail. Unless...

"Was one of your relatives a Uchiha? You know, the people with the spinning eyes."

"My granddad had red, spinning eyes. Why?"

'So I was right.' Out loud Minato asked Tora a question. "How much do you know about your clans kekki-genkai?"

"Kekki-genkai?"

"Its a skill that is in your blood. Your clan's kekki-genkai allows for an individual to accumulation many special skills and pass them on in completion. Kind of like someone saving up a big collection of books and then giving them to you. The reason you were able to read my movements that well is because your grandfather no doubt possessed the Uchiha's Sharingan and passed some of the skills down to you."

Minato pondered it for a little while longer. "Because you inherited some of the sharingan's skills, you probably will be able to see through basic illusions when you are older."

Tora's eyes were round with disbelief. "I could really do that?"

"I guess you could if you trained enough. Let's head back. I put Kushina has made ramen for tea."

"Yay for ramen!"

Minato chuckled and after ruffling her hair, he picked Tora up and carried her back to the house for tea. Kushina smiled as she saw them walking in, Tora falling asleep on Minato's shoulder.

"How well did she do?"

"Very well actually. I think we can expect big things from her."

"I'm glad that I decided to take her in."

Minato pouted at that and mumbled, "It was a group decision."

Kushina laughed at that and patted the shoulder that wasn't being used as a pillow.

"Think whatever you want dear, it doesn't make it true."

With one last laugh she walked into the kitchen. "Hurry up, the ramen's done."

Minato's face brightened and he quickly followed Kushina into the kitchen with the new addition to their family clinging to his back.


Chapter 2 done!

Hope you enjoyed.

R+R Please!