About halfway through his meal Minato saw someone sit down next to him out of the corner of his eyes. He thought, 'Hey, isn't that…' as he heard the woman order a bowl of seafood ramen.

Once she had ordered Hinata said, "So. Here you are. I might have expected it, but even so, how did you find your way here?"

"Easy. I just followed the scent of the food of the gods."

Hinata and Ayame thought, 'The food of the…then…?' Hinata asked, "So, what did you say your name was again?"

"Hmm…" Minato said, thinking over the memories that he had gotten from his clone's destruction and said, "I don't think I gave it, did I?"

"No."

"Hmm..." Minato thought quickly, 'Otōsan said that I shouldn't give anything away that could lead them to Onigakure, but leading them to him would be fine. In that case…' "My name's Uzumaki Minato. What's yours?"

Hinata and Ayame smiled at the same time, thinking, 'Then he's alive!' even though the thought that he'd had children and must be married brought a hint of sadness to Hinata. Hinata asked, "So, who's your father Minato?"

"Hmm," Minato said, thinking, 'I probably shouldn't tell them outright.' "I'd rather not talk about it," a sad look on his face.

A look of concern fell over Hinata's face and she asked, "Why not?"

Minato sadly said, "I can't see him anymore." He thought, 'Not technically a lie.'

"Hmm," Hinata said thoughtfully. 'I wonder what he meant by that. I've dealt with consoling people over their loved ones' deaths before and, while Minato-kun is doing an impressive act that would fool anybody that hadn't done so, there's not enough grief behind that look. That said, I don't think that he was lying. So a partial lie then? Hmm…interesting.'

Minato interrupted Hinata's thoughts as he said, "Hey, you wouldn't happen to have seen my cloak lying around, would you? It wasn't with me in that room."

"Your…why?" Hinata asked, well aware that the coat had been taken away to be examined when Sakura had seen the seals all over it.

"It was the last thing that I received from my father, so…"

"No. I'm sorry," Hinata said, telling a partial lie herself, as she hadn't actually seen the coat, only told about it by the Hokage. "I'll see what I can do about it."

"Thanks."

"That's fine. Just out of curiosity, what was that technique that you used in the hospital? I could be wrong, but I'd say that it was based off of the Kage Bunshin jutsu."

"You're not wrong."

Hinata interrupted Minato, asking, "I'm sorry, but how do you that jutsu? It's only taught here in Konoha."

Minato said, "Well, Otōsan trained me some before he…went away," sticking with the story that he had come up with over the month since he left Onigakure.

"Do you mind my asking what you know?"

"Well, Otōsan always said that information is the lifeblood of a shinobi, so…yeah, I do kinda mind."

"Oh? Well, if you say so," Hinata said, thinking, 'Bugger. If only he had told me that then we could get past the traditional waiting period.' She sighed and said, "Well, in any case, is there anything in particular that you want to do while you're here?"

"Well, if it's possible, could I become a ninja?"

"You want to…" Hinata said, somewhat taken aback by the blunt way that he put it. She sighed before continuing. "That may not be possible."

"Why?" Minato asked, shocked that he might be denied the right to even try.

"Well, normally there would be no problems. But…"

"But?"

"Well, you see, you're not from Konoha, or even the Land of Fire itself in all probability. On top of that, the first thing that you did was to attack one of our shinobi when you got here."

"Attack? I didn't attack anything."

"Then why did you need to be knocked out and dragged to the hospital?"

"Oh! Wait…then you mean that that bit of ham that I saw drop onto my shoulder wasn't ham after all?"

"Bit of…" a look of stunned half-comprehension found its way to Hinata's face. "So…you're telling me that you actually thought that Kamizuki-san's hand was food?"

Minato said, "Ya-hah," before ordering another six bowls of the same miso-pork ramen.

Hinata sighed and rested her head in her hand as she looked on, smiling bemusedly, as Minato shovelled his second helping of too many bowls of ramen into his mouth, unsure of either what to think, or how to proceed. "Well," Hinata said, hesitation evident in her tone, "at least now we know what happened. But just out of curiosity, why did you think that Kamizuki-san's hand was food?"

"Well, I ran out of food and water a couple of before that and…well…just about everything around me was looking like food at the time," Minato sheepishly said.

Hinata sighed before saying, "Is that so?"

"Yep."

Hinata thought, 'Well, that's one thing done at any rate. On top of that, I'd say that I've got enough information to make a rational assessment that Minato-kun is Naruto-kun's son. That should get him past the whole not being from the Land of Fire bit. Based on a best guess, he's probably of an age where he could enter the academy, but if he can use Kage Bunshin already, then he's past the stage that his peers would currently be at. Hmm…I think I really should get him to talk to the Hokage and let her decide what to do from here.' She said, "You know what Minato-kun…I think that I'm going to have to take you to meet the Hokage after all."

"Seriously?!" Minato exclaimed, excited to meet the leader of another village. Hinata nodded. Minato scoffed down his last bowl of ramen and said to Ayame, "Thanks ma'am."

Ayame asked, "Who's paying for these?" referring to the twenty-four bowls of ramen that he had stacked up next to him.

Minato grinned as he said, "That nice medic, Sakura said that she'd pay for them when she let me out of the hospital earlier," and hopped off his seat and exited the ramen stand.

When Minato had gone, Ayame looked at Hinata and asked, "Is that true?"

Hinata said, "Sure it is," wanting to see what her friend's reaction would be. Then she left.

"Well, if you say so," Ayame said to Hinata's back, not having any reason to doubt the Hyūga's words.

XXXXX

About twenty long minutes later, for Minato at any rate, Hinata and Minato were let into the Hokage's office. Once they were Hinata nodded respectfully and said, "Hokage-sama."

The Hokage groaned as she spun around her chair, crossing her legs onto the side of her desk as she said, "How many times do I have to tell you Hinata, you can still call me by my first name."

"I could never," Hinata sarcastically said, "Hokage-sama is Hokage-sama after all."

A tick mark formed on the Hokage's forehead and Minato said to her, "Hey. You know, when my mother was angry my Otōsan told her that anger makes one look old."

The Hokage's lip started to twitch as she tersely said, "Is that so?"

"Yeah."

"Why are you telling us that?"

"Well…no offense, but I'd say that that sentiment applies to you."

"Is that so?" the Hokage asked in a scarily calm tone, sending shivers down Minato's spine.

Minato ignored the danger sense that he was getting from the blonde Hokage and said, "Yeah. Wh-aAAAHHHH!" screaming as he flew through the door to her office, through the outer wall of the building and into the distance.

Hinata said, "Well, as you can see, he clearly behaves just like 'him'."

"Him? You don't mean…?"

"Yeah. Beyond that he told me that his name is Uzumaki Minato."

"Uzumaki!?" The Hokage exclaimed. Hinata nodded. "I see. Well, I am curious as to what he was doing in my office before I sent him flying. I thought that he was due to be stuck in hospital for at least three more days yet."

"Well, according to him, Minato-kun heals quickly."

"Even so, he should have been secured in his bed. On top of which, I had Sakura look after him too. So how…"

"Apparently he used the concepts of the Tajū Kage Bunshin to create some kind of weird flower clone to take his place. Though he has been reticent to reveal to me exactly how he managed to get out of the restraints in the first place."

"I see. Well, he'll have to, at the very least, tell me what he can do."

Minato, who had found his way back to the Hokage Tower, entered through the window, shocking both Hinata and the Hokage, neither of whom had been looking to sense him, expecting him to rush through the tower to get to them. He said, "Tell you what?"

The Hokage swivelled around on her chair and said, "So, you can do the tree-walking exercise?"

"Yeah. It's one of the first things that Otōsan taught me, although he didn't use a tree."

"Oh?" the Hokage said, interested in the method used by the boy's father. "So what did he use?"

"He chucked us down to the bottom of a ravine and told me to get back up within a day, neglecting to mention that there were Bottle Trees lining the cliff."

"Bottle Trees?" Hinata said, speaking for both herself and the Hokage. That's because, despite the Hokage's vast experience with plant life, neither knew just what a bottle tree was.

"Yeah. You've never heard of them?" Minato asked, surprise in his voice as he had always figured that everyone would know about them. "It's a really annoying tree. You see they aren't very big, but they have these really hard, sharp, spikes all over them."

The Hokage asked, "Why'd you only have a day to do it?"

"Well, it was about to enter the rainy season and the ravine tends to flood."

"I see," The Hokage said, thinking, 'of all the irresponsible…'

"Well in any case, it worked. I got out of there."

"Did your father not care about you at all?"

"You take that back!" Minato fiercely said. "Otōsan loved me very much I'll have you know."

"Then why…?"

Minato said, "I asked him why he gave me such a hard time," while he thought, 'Well, technically Amayah asked him.' "And he told me that it wasn't his job to protect me from the world, only to get me ready to face it."

"I see. That's an interesting way of looking at it," the Hokage said. "At any rate. Before we see about your status in Konoha, I'd like to know why it is you came here."

"Well, Otōsan used to tell me stories, and I wanted to see if any of them were true. So far they seem to be."

"Okay, so what would you like to do while you're doing that?"

"Well, if it's possible, I'd like to take part in Konoha's shinobi program."

"Hmm…alright." Minato started to exclaim his glee, but he was cut short when the Hokage said, "But you'll need to tell me what you can already do."

"Why?" Minato asked, not too willing to tell anybody more than they needed to know about him to keep his past secret.

"Because I'm Hokage and I need to know what my shinobi can do to properly utilize them if the need arises."

"I see," Minato said. "In that case, as you saw, I can use that tree-climbing thingy that we talked about before. I am rather skilled in Bunshinjutsu if I do say so myself."

"Oh?" the Hokage said, "how so?"

Well, for starters I can use Kage Bunshin. I can also incorporate other materials into it." Minato turned to Hinata and said, "That's how I made that flower clone in the hospital." He then turned back to the Hokage. "I can also use Kawarimi, but I'm having some issues with the Henge."

The Hokage thought back to her time in the academy and thought, 'Well, given who his father is I suppose that that doesn't really come as much of a surprise.'

"That's about it," Minato said, leaving out his knowledge of a jutsu that he created with his sister as his father had analysed it completely and made it mandatory for all students in the Onigakure Academy; As such, it would give the game away before it even began.

"I see," The Hokage said. She thought, 'That means that he was being trained on a system similar to that which we use, despite the use of Kage Bunshin rather than the normal Bunshin taught here. If that's the case, then it should be relatively easy to stick Minato-kun in with the kids the same age as him.' The Hokage said, "Well then Minato, I see no problem sticking you with other students your own age."

"Thanks. But…there's just this one thing…"

"Oh? What would that be?"

"My coat…"

"Oh," The Hokage said. "That's a bit different."

"Why? It shouldn't be that difficult to give it back, should it?"

"Well, my people aren't finished with it just yet. When they're satisfied, then we will return it to you. Until such time though, I'm afraid that you're just going to have to wait."

"I see," Minato said, sad to be parted with the last gift his father gave him so soon.

"Don't worry. My people are really good at what they do, so it shouldn't be too long."

"Okay, thanks," Minato said perking up at the possibility of getting his cloak back soon.

"That's fine. In the meantime you shall be under the care of Hinata here. I hope you don't have a problem."

"Uhh…no…no problem…none at all," Minato squeaked, catching the Hokage's tone that told him that 'no' wasn't an option.

The Hokage smiled and said, "Good. Well then, with that settled, I think that I can let you go for now."

"Thanks," Minato said, for some reason wanting to leave the office as soon as possible.

The Hokage said, "See you later Hinata."

Hinata called out, "You shall, Ino," as she left the Hokage's office.