It took a lot longer than Minato would have liked and mostly included following the walls and heavily leaning on them, but he managed to get back to the kitchen. He had to sit on the kitchen table for a few minutes. It was there that he saw the baby's bottle. It was also pure luckk he thought of inspecting it closer before just giving it to him, because in the countless hours it had been laying there the milk had gone past sour. In fact thinking adjectives of what it had turned into would have been enough to make him gag, even without the smell, and he threw it away before he lost… whatever his stomach was thinking he had eaten. Instead he dove for the cabinet where he had seen a few clean bottles and just filled one with about 1/4th of water, quickly covering it and giving it to the baby while it was still faintly coolish.
'Here, love. I know you are hungry, but have a bit of water first, okay?'
The redhead grabbed the bottle, twisting a bit in his hold, as he did his best to catch the bottle and not let go of Minato at the same time. He succeeded, at least a bit with it as he still had one hand in the material and other on the bottle. Once the dummy went to his mouth, however, he quieted down and started drinking greedily, starring at Minato with still faintly pinkish eyes. They held admiration already – it seemed that even after all he went through he couldn't really stay unhappy at the blonde for longer than a few milliseconds. But after a moment the water stopped fulfilling his needs as he simply let go of the bottle and looked at the man with widely opened eyes and mouth.
'Awawaaaa—' he almost yelled at the blonde, then flailed his free hand before starting to sniff again. It looked almost like if he was accusing him of trying to sell him 'false' water for food.
'There you go~' Minato cooed in the same soft tones from before, because he honestly couldn't seem to be able to raise his voice to a normal level. Not as much as he would have liked, but at least he had wet his throat. He nuzzled the baby instead 'Good baby. Let's find something for you to eat.'
This time he found the bottles of donkey milk (the less he thought about it the better for him) and with some effort sat up in the counter. That way he could get the warmed up milk without having to move around too much. The good news was that in the desert things didn't really take too long to warm up. He didn't even wait for it to get hot, just a bit above room temperature, and then he was giving it to the little redhead, relieved by his enthusiasm for some sort of nourishment.
'At least you don't think I sing bad, do you?' he sighed quietly, leaning back until he hit the wall, eyes closing tiredly '…everyone's a critic.'
'…I think criticism is well forwarded if you keep on making mistakes.'
In the door of the kitchen, stood Yashamaru. This time he was fully clothed in jounin uniform, along with the bee hive-like cap and cover on the mouth. Only a tone of voice could indicate he was somewhat less manly than he looked like – even his fingers looked brute in the gloves and dust. He smelled of sun, sand and blood, but what was mostly noticeable was sweat and bloody bandage over his left arm 'I don't know who allowed you to bring this shit out of his room at the time like this, but you could be out there trying to help us all in this critical time instead of playing a fail of a nanny, Hokage-chan.'
And with that, he simply came closer and tore the bottle out of baby's mouth, making Gaara cry out for it. He didn't seem to be touched by this or the fact that Gaara started to cry all over again.
'I don't know if you're aware of the fact there's a catastrophe going on outside-' continued the man, as he opened the bottle and threw the contents to the closely standing empty glass '…but a group of ANBU decided to try to be smart and they made some sort of a seal that made half of the town collapse under its own weight. Isn't this wonderful? Isn't it?' With that he flailed the bottle filled with water to some weird measurement that seemed to be more of a 64% or 78% instead of normal halves and squares at the baby. Gaara reached out for it, crying for the bottle to be given to him, but Yashamaru took it away, opening the fridge and taking the milk out 'A help of someone who says was strong would be nice, but no, someone decided to play a good guardian of a baby monster… which should be locked in his room. Where's his guarding soldier and why are you here again anyway?' he asked and swirled the bottle carelessly, holding it like if it was covered in something nasty.
'Oh, we're being naaauuughtyyy, right?' he muttered at Gaara who looked up at him, but seemed to be more concerned about the fact Yashamaru was still holding the bottle 'If Kazekage-sama knows about this he will be informed about the mess in the living room anyway. You do everything to just make my life miserable, aren't you?'
And with that, he gave the kid the bottle – at least this time with proper care, making sure that Gaara didn't choke on it. He brushed his thumb over Gaara's nose also.
'Aren't you, right? Little horrible abomination.'
Gaara had only closed his eyes, but he was visibly interested in the caress, just as much as he was in the nuzzle he was given from Minato before. Yashamaru took off his face cover, revealing an ugly bruise on the cheek and smiled at both of them.
'Screw you both.' he cooed at them – more at Gaara, who took it all like a sponge – and left the room, more in a manner of an angry drama queen than tired soldier. Minato would have liked to answer with something smart, something witty (maybe comment he couldn't possibly have found time for it between learning to play the fiddle and painting his toenails). At the very least he would have liked to raise a middle finger, but he had to settle with channeling the inner Uchiha to it's utmost level of accuracy. He 'hn'ed at the blonde in a way that would have made Fugaku proud. He didn't really have energy to do much else either way, so it was just his luck such an answer was good on its own.
He didn't want to think about what the mednin had said- hell, he didn't even want to bother with mentally correcting him. He didn't even seem to be able to manage to care enough to hope he had irritated the other, and his brain was only too happy to provide him with all the 'please stand by' lack of actual work it could. Baby was happy with his bottle, too. Everything was all right in the then the door opened again, revealing Yashamaru's face, this time without a cap and healing his own cheek.
'And by the way, you stink of sickness. Go away before you make someone important sick.'
Minato didn't bother to open his eyes. He didn't think it was the best moment for the younger (older?) man to be playing funny, when he tried to speak his tongue felt, well… pasty.
'…sick with what?'
'I don't know, can't tell much more from the distance beside the fact you seem to be overheated and two steps from collapsing from dehydration. Drink that milk or I will have to throw it away.' said the blonde and smiled at him 'And then leave.'
Dehydration. Ha. Overhearted. Ha! Crazy words spoken by a crazy person. It was the desert. There was no such thing not overheated, he was perfectly fine, just… tired. Because this had been a very sad week. Very taxing, indeed.
He looked at the milk. It looked back at him.
'…if I drink that I'll make an even bigger mess of your kitchen, Yashamaru-san, but thank you.' he made a move as if he were about to get up- only to slump right back against the wall when what little drive he could muster died at the face of his repeated problem. '…I don't suppose you feel like taking the baby.'
'I'm not laughing at your jokes.' said Yashamaru as he slowly undid the upper part of his vest, not ungluing his hand from his face for once 'And don't make me French kiss you with that milk, it's something you wanted to give to the baby, so you should have no problem with drinking it.' And with that he opened the vest to the end, still holding his hand at the same place. Gaara eyes his every move, only to meep at the sudden tug of the gravity that Minato let him take him down. His gaze shifted to him and he tried to catch him on the material of the shirt with one hand, but he only managed to let go of the bottle and let it fall down on earth.
Yashamaru smiled at that.
'I bet you're immobile now. Kazekage-sama will be thrilled.' and with that, he had vanished behind the door again. If he had had the tiniest bit more of energy, Minato would have burst out laughing. He doubted that, form the very long list of things he had done this week that had a possibility to thrill the Kazekage, collapsing on his kitchen would be anywhere close to the top. He wasn't even sure if it would make it to the 'top 100 list' at all. In fact, now that he thought about it, it was better for him to stay there anyway. Chances were the moment he got to his house the man would call him back, so… better for him to stay there. And wait for him.
He looked at the milk again and made a face-it wasn't that he had anything personal against the milk (which he did, but as a shinobi, he had actually eaten worse. Mostly cooked by his own genin team). It was that he knew he would be sick if he had any of that thing. It took him fifteen minutes to get down the counter, pick the bottle and give it back to the baby, put the milk glass on the refrigerator and serve himself a glass of water. The cool liquid revived him a bit, but he strangely didn't really feel like having more than that, and he had to force himself to finish even that.
It was all time he was given to enjoy with the redhead and his starring. Gaara used them up thoughtfully, as he simply seemed to take joy in just being close to Minato and the bottle of milk. He also tried to mumble about something to him at one point – and that 'something' was a fly that sat on the wall, something rather rare in Gaara's life at any given moment, but since the man seemed to be out of it too much, he simply cuddled up closer and kept on sucking the bottle dry. He was still shaken by what's happened lately and only now he was getting used to the fact that things were setting back to normal. After that, the door to the kitchen opened, revealing the red-haired father of the toddler, seeming to be somehow a color or two more tanned than he was in the morning. The red make up he had applied to his eyes was now so runny he looked like if he cried bloody tears. In the state he was in, he looked like he as well could've.
'Why are you Konohanins all so stubborn, stupid and out of your mind?' he half asked, half shouted, then basked his hand at something that looked like a handful of dust out of nowhere 'And to add to the fact you had sneaked out from Gaara's room, managed to get rid of Vulture's body as I can't find him anywhere and messed up the living room you're now getting sick and attached to that monstrosity again! Is there even brain in this skull can of yours?'
He let out a breath, then another and then swapped away another portion of dust flying at his face. Then he closed his eyes and let out his breath a bit slower. It would look calming, if it wasn't for the fact the dust hit him in the middle of doing it.
'…at least this brat is back to normal.' he muttered, smudging his face out of sand 'I simply detest the fact I don't even know what to do with you. I should prison you in basement for your stupidity and behead for everyone who died. Do you have any proposition how would I do that without losing your valuable side?'
'You could kill me and have me impersonated by someone else.' the blonde answered morosely, opening his eyes to look at what the man was doing with more or less the same interest Gaara had held for the insect. He didn't know one took make up off with dust. 'You probably could get away with it for a year or two without anyone noticing.' With how often they would come to check? At the very least two, if not five. '…won't be nice when they do find out, though.'
And given how Konoha was more or less the only village who wasn't actively hostile to so much as naming Suna, that would be a big deal.
'I'm sorry it turned like this. It wasn't what I meant, but I guess that doesn't make much of a difference.' he cuddled the baby closer automatically, taking comfort in what pretty much was the only positive presence around him. How sad.
'If it makes you feel better, there would have been a lot more deaths if we hadn't. I don't know what the raccoon was waiting for, but that place sunk up because the holes underneath were already there and… I don't know. I don't know why was it holding them up. Maybe he was waiting for more people to be there so he could… gobble them all up at the same time.'
Dulled blue closed again. Dingo had said something about the wind changing. Maybe it had been that. Maybe.
'Maybe it was waiting for you to see it.'
The redhead only put his hands up, only to put them down at the same time. He had no answer to this as nobody really knew what was the deal with it not sinking sooner, but everyone kept on holding to the hope it wouldn't sink if they all wouldn't mess with it any more than they already did. He was too tired to argue though and the blonde seemed to lose his brain cells in a very quick tempo, so there was no point in even trying to. It didn't mean he wasn't angry, he just… couldn't take it now. Why was the man getting attached to the kid so much anyway.
'You took the brat out of his room. It could have resulted in your death and all those around you.' he said, swapping away yet another fistful of dust 'Why did you do that?'
'It didn't matter.' the blonde said in the same apathetic tone from before. 'He couldn't have hurt a fly, the monster-' he made a vague gesture with a wrist, even though he didn't point at anything specific. 'It left him alone.'
This wasn't exactly accurate and he wished he could explain it better, but he knew the redhead's type. He wanted certainties and specifications and if he so much as hinted to the fact he was supposing that the bay had gone into a brief period of…autism out of shock from suddenly losing a myriad of dying voices (courtesy of Shukaku-o vision), all he'd manage was to scare him more, so he'd get angrier and alienate the baby even worse. He looked down at the baby, who seemed to have refund his necklace and was again nibbling on it with his toothless mouth. He smiled and stroked a soft, lily-white cheek.
No, he couldn't explain such things to the Kazekage. He wouldn't understand them. He wouldn't even want to.
'It did what?' Kazekage bellowed, losing his cool in the blink of an eye 'It left Gaara alone? And where to? For almost six months all we do is trying to keep the mad monk in one place and now you suddenly let it out to roam wherever it likes and it's supposed to be good? Do you even know what does it mean?'
It was enough for him to bend down and grasp the collar of the blonde and to lift him up by that, despite the baby making a vague noise of protest.
'Things don't vanish into thin air! If you let it out making it move from under the ground then it means you're responsible for what's happened and there's no way I'm not charging you for this!'
Minato flinched - more at the tone than anything else- automatically shifting the baby to the side so he wouldn't have to bear with the worst of his kind of threatening looking father face first. At least now he wouldn't have to worry about getting up by his own means, wonderdaddy had helped him with that quite nicely, and all he had to do was straighten himself, which again left him some comfortable inches taller than the man, even if he didn't let go of his collar yet. And their faces were kinda close. Actually, the man looked more panicked than angry, or at least the anger was clearly panic born. There were tension lines all over his face and for some reason it suddenly occurred to him that this man wasn't really that much older than he himself was. It was an odd, disconnected thought that made him feel vaguely uncomfortable, so he pushed it away and blinked at the redhead slowly.
'…your voice makes my headache sad.' he finally said, then busied himself with gently prying the fingers off his collar one by one. After getting the material right, he realized he was just as close to the other as he had been and took a half step back, shifting directions for the chairs by the table and making a gesture for the other to follow. 'I'll try to explain. I take you didn't talk to wren much about what we did.'
The redhead followed, though not without hesitation. He saw that the man was not holding himself up very well – so it was possible for him to mix facts – but then, it was also possible for him to forget them later. There were still a lot of plotholes here – the especially urgent one being the fact that wren was currently sealed and imprisoned under the judgment of revealing the secrets of the highest level and importance to the outsider (currently living in the place, but still outsider). The council wouldn't let him go if he didn't do that and he had to play quick and hard in the matter – there was no time for questions of any kind. As much as he counted as the highest ranked person, his knowledge was still minimal to what he should have known. He tossed the glance to the pretty much unhappy kid, making uneven noises into the jounin vest. The reason of his all worries. He felt remorse.
'It'd better be worth my time.' he muttered as he sat down, his hands propped up in a basket. 'Speak up.'
The blonde sighed, obviously stressed by the situation, before shrugging helplessly. He didn't know how to explain for it to make sense. He supposed he could just explain and when he started sounding insane the redhead would only be too happy to interrogate him further into the right track.
'I don't know when the storm started.' he said as he sat Gaara sideways on his lap, arms loosely wrapped around him to keep him in place. 'When I woke up my summon told me it had been going for a full day and that the thing was eating people alive-' he almost stopped, as if he expected the redhead to correct him on this. When he did it, he made a face and continued.
'And I didn't know what to do, so I had the alphabet you gave me, so I... I tried to make a seal to make it stop-' and now the blonde just looked plain uncomfortable, almost ashamed of it 'And I know, I know, I know it sounds stupid, but that's what I do, that's what I'm good at. So I did this … long, long seal that was a mess, and I took it to Wren because I thought he'd know. And he didn't, he only told me I had one hundredth eight mistakes.'
Gaara gave a tug on one of the cylinders of his necklace, startling the blonde for a moment. He looked at the redhead as if he wasn't sure how such a thing had ended on his lap, then reached for it and pulled it off, wrapping it a few times around his hand before offering it to the baby.
'And that was it. If it was wrong, it wouldn't work. And I thought of going back home, but then I thought if I had the real thing I could make it work. And Wren was all 'I can't, I can't, I don't know if lord and Master will allow it-' so I told him he could just seal my memory if that made him happy, so he finally gave me the seals. And we spent…' he gestured with his hand again, the silver pieces jingling enticingly for the baby. 'Half a day, maybe more. Fixing it. There was this one- I don't know what's the name. At the beginning I wanted to seal it, but it would require dozens, maybe even hundreds of sacrifices. The seal you use, that is, I wanted something that required less chakra, and there was this broken seal- it looked like this, but I don't remember the name. It looked like this. It looked like this-'
He made quick lines on the table with his finger, showing the one he meant.
حرام
'And that was really strong. There was no way he could deny that, but it still required too much chakra, so I thought- I thought if I could just use a normal seal for absorption, I could use the things own chakra and make it stop. I made a seal that ordered it to stop in place. And… there's no real translation for the word. Stop it from craving human flesh. And that's what it did. The thing stayed immovable in place only gaping at stuff. That's why it wasn't with Gaara. It could come back- it could be everywhere it was at the time it activated because that's how big its chakra network was, it just didn't bother because he thought outside was more interesting. Then the seal spent itself and Shukaku came back and Gaara acted normal again. And that's it.'
The redhead had only looked at the blonde after that. It was a long, long silence. Gaara managed in it to grasp the silver cylinders and suck on them thoroughly, then to lose interest and stare back at his own father. Daichi also looked at the baby, not entirely giving it his attention, but not swaying from it. He did slap away dozen of sand trying to get to his ear though.
'There's so many 'I thought's in this speech it makes me sick.' he said finally, curling his fingers together a bit tighter. 'Wren was no allowed to give you what he did and he will be punished for that. He won't be coming out anytime soon, so you have one more secret to bear and I will kill you myself for if you even would dare to utter. By the way – you're an idiot for thinking that a seal made in half a day can solve all of our problems when all generations were spent in vain.'
Tight lips tightened even more, sharp glare returning to watch the man judgmentally. What a brat, he thought. What an obnoxious, nosy spawn! He worked like a kage, in his own village, like if he had any right to, like if he didn't fail before and like if he wasn't forbidden from playing his role by now. What kind of honor he had if he didn't remember his past mistakes and played around without any boundaries or regrets with such delicate matters as moody demon? Daichi didn't think of him highly before, but by now if he could, he'd simply spit on him. The man was salt in his eye, making the known patterns go the unusual way, making chaos from his life again and again and again and again…
'But if you're so keen on putting your nose where you could lose it, then fine, I can give you an opportunity you need so much.' he said and crossed his arms, leaning back on the chair. 'Get off the jounin duty and rinse your mind. Come close to study what you're dealing with and prove your usefulness to me, maybe then I will reconsider your stupidity and forgive you your mistakes. In the end, that's all you want, right?'
One of the hand extended from the gesture and pointed at the table.
'Become the guardian of the demon's host and validate your position. If not, you can as well go back to your missions and pay for all the damage you did, both monetary and physically. I can provide safety, but can't guarantee it will always work. Suna is not a safe place.'
Which pointed heavily that if there was crowd judgment to happen, he would rather sit and watch than interrupt it. He knew how it happened and that it happened with no exceptions. Once everything will calm down, people will want to find someone to blame for all this, and it won't be hard to point fingers at the blonde. Not because of revenge, but because of safety. He knew he had deals with Konoha and he knew that would damage his position pretty well, but so would protecting the man who carelessly sunk down one sixth of the town. In such terms, it would be easier to let people evacuate from drowning ship. And if the angry mob would rise, sacrifices would have to be made – either from his or the blonde's side.
He smiled cynically.
'Since you were a kage, I don't think I have to give you time to think about it, right?'
The only sign the blonde registered what was being said to him was a small flicker of emotion when he mentioned what had happened to Wren, the rest of the redhead's speech seemed to go right past his head if the lack of reaction was anything to go by. In truth, what happened was quite the contrary- the only matter was that Minato, as most ninja, tended to lock himself in a default expression when he didn't want to give away what he was feeling. And there was a lot to feel.
Just saying how the man had imprisoned Wren was bad enough; Minato didn't particularly like the ANBU, but he wouldn't have been able to do anything without the man's help. When forced to make a harsh decision he hadn't liked it, but he still had made it, and he had chose the alternative that had, if not ensured the survival of all civilians, at least made the difference between some dying and all of them feeding the sand monstrosity. The part where he tried to blame him for what had happened and asked him to renounce his status as jounin and become some sort of… babysitter and custom seal nanny for his possessed toddler was downright outrageous.
Minato hadn't been a Hokage for that long, barely a bit over three years, but that much had been enough for him to understand when he was being played, the who's of it, however, were a bit too complex for him to figure out immediately between the exhaustion, fever and rising temper. It took considerable effort to try to think about the man's offer as a politician instead of a high ranking nin who was being thoroughly threatened. Why would the man ask him to renounce his ninja way and just toss his youngest to him?
Off the top of his mind, the first thing he thought about was money. Even when dealing with lower ranked missions, jounin were paid more than genin or chuunin. Making him lower his rank or lose it altogether would significantly cheapen his services- and Suna was cheap enough as it was on what he was doing daily. Safeguarding of one of the Kage's heir (male one, which apparently carried extra weight in this backwater inferno of a village) who could easily rip his limbs out and apparently crippled ninja weekly? Quite a lot of money. And as a seal master, under normal circumstances, Minato's wages were far from cheap.
Speaking of the matter, not taking alternate missions also meant more time dedicated exclusively to working on, how had the man put it? 'Come close to study what he was dealing with'? He could mock him all he wanted, but Minato had managed to make a previously useless seal work in twelve hours when the man's experts had been unable to for two generation. Or maybe not, because apparently in Suna, things rolled by letting them accumulate dust without anyone doing any sort of effort to at least try anything.
Did the man really think that just by denigrating him and threatening with turning him into a scapegoat… what? That it would scare Minato enough for him to panic and mindlessly agree to such a thing? He could try to put the blame on him, but the matter was the district sunk because the holes were there to start with. Sooner or later the Raccoon would have stopped supporting it. It was hard to swallow down his anger, but feeling as terrible as he did helped.
'I'm afraid I actually do need the time, Kazekage-sama.' he said blandly, his position and tone sounding both uncaring and almost submissive… if one ignored the cold glint in his eyes 'A mednin and a half have already declared me unwell, so it's probably best I don't make any important decisions until I'm not half dead on my feet… unless you prefer to discuss this arrangement with Konoha's council itself. '
The man's red brows furrowed at that, but it was the only sign of him acknowledging what was said to him. He didn't expect much – Namikaze had already showed him how much hot headed he was and yet, how blatantly ignorant, and that was enough. He gave him a chance and if he did want to discard it that way there was nothing else left but acceptance.
'You council has no privileges to talk about secrets of Suna and it will stay that way.' he muttered from behind his hands 'The only person I'm asking is you and nobody else will take responsibility for you on that. You have guts to even propose something like that.'
He glanced at the redhaired kid in his arms and his face scrunched in disgust.
'If you have no interest in being close to Shukaku, then give him to me and go back to your duties. Medical help can be found everywhere at such situation.'
Minato refused to rise to the bait- in fact, he thought the redhead to be beyond scum for so much as trying to use his budding affection for the baby as a bargain chip. He was sorry, horribly so for this, but there was nothing he could do about it. The problem now was safely extracting himself from the little thing, only when he attempted to, save from the baby fussing, nothing really happened. The sand did rise and pawed at his legs a bit, but only that. Maybe such a strong order had rattled Shukaku more than it let on. All the better, that meant he wouldn't have to use.
He carefully hand the baby to his father, and tried to leave. His honor didn't leave him. The man didn't deserve it that was for sure, and it wasn't like if it would hurt him to leave without giving it. Then again, he had promised it. Even if it was to himself.
'I have something for you.'
The kazekage simply held the baby on the arm length, obviously unhappy he had to touch him at all – and alas, deaf to the loud wailing that happened just at the very moment of handing over. Gaara obviously tried to get back to the blonde, but his poor attempts meant nothing, at least now – and in such case he didn't really have to bother with his needs. He, however, looked up at the words tossed at him.
'You have something for me?' he asked, incredulously surprised as he wouldn't expect anything from the man now. 'If it's a threat, then please, keep it to yourself.'
The blonde stopped from pulling a piece of paper from his vest to give the redhead a rather flat look. He sighed.
'Yes, because threatening the Kazekage, who pretty much implied would sick an angry mob at me just for being better than two generations worth of attempts of sealing sounds like a smart plan. Brilliant, really.'
And he left a small square of paper on the table.
'Ten seconds of inactivity. If it works well, it should also keep fatass confused for another extra minute, just try to stay still.' he gave the crying baby a sad look, but turned his back to them all the same. 'I thought I could make it better if I ever got the time.' he added in something that was equal parts mocking and bitterness. '…but as you said, what the hell would I amount to against your generations worth of vain attempts? Goodbye, Kazekage-sama.'
He would have added 'enjoy your possessed toddler', but that would have been insulting to the baby, not the father, and his grudge was against the latter. Besides, he had better things to do. Like getting home, checking on his own baby and bobby trapping the house from top to bottom. The redhead didn't answer, only furrowed his eyebrows even more. Then he turned to look at his son who, with no good results, tried to grab at Minato and drag him back to himself.
'…who would have known that disasters come close together.' he muttered and simply marched out of the room. It needed cleaning and he could not be bothered by annoyed Yashamaru. Gods knew his passive aggressive side could be just as bad as open aggression of the monster.
A few hours later, however, everything that was obtained and gained through few hours of silence fell apart when completely out of nowhere, the sandstorm came back, just as mocking and just as disastrous as before.
'I regret many things, kids are some of them.' Daichi muttered after some time of playing the pillar for the village again, his muscles stiff and unhappy. 'Support the net for me for awhile, I need to get back on my priorities.'
'Forty seven minutes, Kazekage-sama.' muttered Baki as everything fell on his shoulders, even if he was supported by a few additional ninjas, who immediately got connected to the left place. 'I won't hold it any longer.'
'Could be enough.' muttered Daichi and vanished in a swirl of dust. A moment later he was greeted with some tricky traps and one angry samurai frog, but he discarded them all on reflex and nasty throw of poisonous scorpion as a sub.
'I don't really like your methods, but I came to apologize.' he muttered as he entered the room 'And if you cut off my head, we will all be swallowed alive by one toddler's remorse and then there's only one fate to us all.'
Minato obviously wasn't in the mood or in any capacity to cut anyone's head. The man was resting in the couch with a cold compress on his forehead and a baby who seemed to be in the last sniffly throws of a good wail curled on his chest. It stopped midway through it to gape at the man with wide eyes a shade or two more into the turquoise zone than his father's eyes, one chubby little hand rubbing at his cheek.
Minato also pulled the compress off to stare at the redhead, who was occupying most of the door coated in several layers of gritty sand, half of his face covered in darker powder from that he supposed was a halfway disarmed exploding tag. In the background, the samurai toad rolled around the dirt, for all appearances wrestling with a similarly sized scorpion trying to skewer it with two tails.
'…you are seeing it too, right?' he asked the toad sitting on the small table next to him, not looking away from the disturbing sight.
'Yep.'
'Huh.'
Baby sniffled and let out a tired wail, mouth working insistently on his father's necklace.
'Please call the scorpions back and close the door… Kazekage-sama, I'll assume.' the toad said after a moment, resuming its work on the tea it had been brewing before they were so rudely interrupted. 'You are letting the sand in.'
The redhead obediently closed the door without much noise, however he didn't come closer. The arms once again crossed in front of his chest in defensive stance as he observed the flat and the frog brewing the tea.
'Kurotaro doesn't go for a kill unless I tell him to, so you frog friend can train for awhile.' he muttered, ignoring the clang of the battle behind the door. He looked at the unpainted walls (very common view everywhere) and the blonde baby and pursed his lips in sophisticated nonchalant way. 'As I said, I came to apologize. My act was a result of foul mouth and foggy mind. I am ashamed of it.'
Then he looked at the frog and tapped his finger on his own shoulder for a moment.
'Is he very sick?'
'He's not sick.' the blonde said defensively, hugging the baby closer 'He's just fussy because he's teething and he hasn't slept too much.' The emphasis he used to say this was an act, though. Likely because if Naruto did get sick, his father would probably go into a blind panic.
'I think he means you, brat. And to answer your question, Kazekage-sama, he is dehydrated an running a fever.' The Toad clarified, finishing stirring the beverage and removing the spoon. 'Drink it while it's hot.'
Minato gave the mug a rather uninspired look.
'…sugar?'
The animal ninja made a gesture with its oddly human-like hands that provably hinted at this not being the first time such a question was uttered.
'Sweetening up medicine won't necessarily make it taste better; what are you, five?' Minato stuck his tongue out at his summon and drowned the tea down in two great shuddering gulps. 'I swear, you are worse than Jiraiya.'
For all answer Minato threw the cup at the summon (though softly enough it caught it and straightened it without much of an effort) and slumped on the couch tiredly, one hand groping around the table for more of the honeyed candy he always seemed to have around. The sound of the wrapper being torn seemed to catch the baby's attention, because he pushed himself up on his hands, and after a few moments of indecision, gave the sticky paper a decided swap.
Minato didn't seem very convinced of the idea, but he did let the baby take it to his mouth where it started to furiously chew on it, one corner safely held by his father's fingers so he wouldn't try to swallow it.
'What do you want from me?' the blonde asked bluntly, eyes following the baby's play with the wrapper. Because the man certainly hadn't come just to apologize. Even if he had really believed what he was saying –and Minato was willing to put some high stakes on that fact he didn't - he probably wouldn't have admitted it under torture.
The redhead didn't answer right away. Instead, he kept on watching the frog playing with a kettle – indeed, he cherished the talk between the man and summon, because thanks to it he could finally understand what was going on around there. The name 'Jiraiya' was an indication. He didn't know him personally, but fame was superior to his existence, even in such dead end as his village was. Finally, he turned toward the pair of blondes on the bed, watching them rather unamusedly.
'I wanted to apologize, that's all.' he said, but he didn't move from the spot. Instead, he got new object to observe, and that was a tiny toddler chewing on a sweet stick. It didn't look like if he was going to move out anytime soon. The baby stared back with bright, curious eyes, but other than making a vague waving motion that could mean 'hello', 'come closer', 'shoo shoo' or even 'your fly's open', he seemed a little too interested on the crunchy paper too specify.
'I'm sure.' the blonde said blandly, and since the redhead was looking fixedly at his baby, he pulled at him closer possessively.
'…Kazekage-sama, meet my son, Uzumaki Naruto.'
Hearing his name got the baby's attention from the stranger back to his father. The little blonde made an inquisitive noise, but since his father didn't answer, he settled for slumping back on his chest, one hand holding the paper securely and the other clutching his father's shirt.
Daichi nodded, not bothering to even address the kid in any way, as he only kept his eyes on him because he didn't look at anything else. In the back of his mind there was a clock ticking and it was hard to keep the straight face when he was in hurry to get back to his promised spot. He knew that if he would get back with empty hands, something would collapse – would it be another part of the town, Gaara's patience or his own spine. And then there would be very little to save from what would be left of four generations of ninja living on the loose sands.
He started tapping his finger on his forearm again, this time out of stress, not even seeing he was doing that. He knew that if he would ask, the man would simply refuse. And if he would demand, he would also get nothing. The only way would be literally seducing the man into wanting to go with him – not in sexual way, as he doubted it would have worked – but he had little to offer. He doubted that a gallon of milk or his pride would matter to him at all. He looked at the frog.
'Can I get a cup of tea too?'
The frog's horizontal pupils went to the man for a moment, before throwing the spoon inside the now empty mug and picking it up under one stocky arm.
'I only have medicinal, I'm afraid-'
'There's mint in the kitchen.' the blonde said before even thinking about it. '…there's also coffee, but it's instant.'
It was Minato's new best friend since a few weeks ago when Naruto went from sleeping eighteen hours a day to *not* sleeping eighteen hours a day and wanting company through it. He had never particularly cared for the thing, even though he found the scent soothing, so he did away with the cheapest thing out of necessity.
'No, just tea.' said Daichi and went back to watching the actions of the youngest person in the room. Normally he would ask for coffee – but he was sick of it. He would have never suspected that such day would come – in the end, he had always found the taste of coffee pleasant enough to drink it day after day for twenty years, but his stomach could take only so much; he hadn't been sleeping almost fifty hours now and he had gallons of those in his system – he was sure he could actually measure himself in amounts of blood in caffeine. Anything more and his stomach would break from the bitterness and his eyes would pop out of his head.
'Gamakijou-san…'
The summon grumbled something about summoning Gamamaido if he wanted to be served that badly, but he did retreat with the mug in his hands and that oddly duck-like step that toads got when they attempted to walk on hind legs. Once he wasn't around to nag him about it, Minato pulled the compress away from his face, pushing humid bangs out of the way and straightened up into a sitting position.
'I'm sure you have better places to go ask for tea.' he said bluntly, one hand going to cradle the baby's head when he started fussing at the change of position. The moment his father touched some secret spot inside that sunny mass, the baby practically purred and sagged on his arms, the amount of noise coming from the creaky wrapper diminishing significantly in both volume and redhead watched him quietly, then he unfolded his arms only to fold them again, only trading places between both of his hands.
'No, actually, I don't.' he answered truthfully. Nobody really thought about such things now and Yashamaru, whose only duty now was taking care of his remaining older children didn't even dare to show up in the room where all sensoring ninjas had gathered. He was most likely just taking care of his own safety. 'Nobody of us do.'
Minato knew what the man meant, but he wasn't in any mood to be understanding.
'Oh. I'm sorry.'
'So am I.' added the man as he looked at the clock on the wall. He had already wasted twenty minutes. 'And I assume you feel too sick to even get up from this bed.'
'…would you drag me by the hair again if I were?' That, however, was being petty, and feeling sick or not, Minato was aware of it.
'I can get up…' he sighed, fingers stroking lazily Naruto' scalp 'I can go out and try to help, but I doubt it would make a difference- my chakra is too low to do much, I don't think I'll be able to do something good enough before half of the city is ran under tons of sand and I don't dare to use the same jutsu from before.'
And not exactly because the redhead hadn't liked it or because it had traumatized his son. He literally didn't dare pull the same stunt on the raccoon because he could have figured something that would make them all regret it horribly. The redhead shook his head and looked back to the clock.
'I don't need your chakra, however low our resources are.' he muttered 'All I need is your presence. This sandstorm is not happening because Shukaku is a sadistic demon only because Gaara wants to express his rage.'
And that was enough for a saying. He wasn't enough to calm the child down, because the child didn't want him – not before, not now. It grew attached to Minato and it wanted him back, the whole village be damned. He felt like a minion on the mercy of crazy ruler, tossed by unpredictableness into every possible direction. And so far, it was not very far from the truth – it was Gaara who held them all in his little chubby hand, even if he didn't know that yet.
He was scared of thinking what would happen once he would reach age of awareness.
'Just you is all I need.' he muttered again, getting ready to even carry the man to his house, as he seemed to be seriously out of his medical condition. Priorities and all that.
Minato didn't know what to answer to this.
That the creature could create this amount of destruction out of an unhappy baby just didn't make sense to him, and not exactly out of lacking the amount of chakra. As all tailed beats, the thing was literally made of it, but why wasn't it affecting the baby? When the monster had been stranded, Gaara had been shocked stiff, but not sleepy. One would have thought that with the thing gone, the first thing in order of business would have been a good nap.
The summon came back while he finished trying to figure out what he could do, leaving the strong brew on the table in front of the redhead and jumping to sit next to the blonde on the couch, one hand running through the round beads of a smaller bracelet it kept on one hand. In the meantime, Minato thought. What could he do in such a situation?
One lesson his sensei had taught him and that he fully agreed with was 'never sell yourself cheap'. He couldn't let this man strip everything he had away from him just because it was convenient for him. If he gave the redhead a hand, he was likely to rip his arm out of his socket, and then how long before he was demoted to babysitter like Yashamaru? He didn't know the story behind that, but abrasive as the man had been, he seemed like a perfectly fit shinobi and there really was no reason the other blonde couldn't be living somewhere else and some genin girl or something taking care of the older kids. He couldn't give in so easily.
Then again, there were hundreds of refugees stored in the ANBU office and the hospital and… where the hell had the redhead stashed the ones who had previously been stranded in the village's center? The panic among civilians would be catastrophic, especially after just half a day of tranquility. If black eyes popping out of walls and floors could be called that.
'…I'll help you this time.' he said after a moment, shifting the baby in his arms. Naruto had seemed to doze off at some point of their conversation. 'But only if you release Wren first. You shouldn't have said you would give me those seals if they were so important. You weren't around to ask and neither was anyone of higher rank, and he did the best he could under the circumstances… If you have any survivors out of the sunk district, it's thanks to him.'
'I don't think he should be taking credit for those who have really helped to save those people.' muttered Daichi, openly rejecting acknowledging of Wren's gains 'And you have the nerve to ask me that.'
Really. Though he was more prone to being happy than angry now – if this was all it took, it was not a high price. In the end Wren was a faithful ANBU who knew his place more often than not. If he was a serious criminal, he'd have to stop and think twice, but in here, the answer was clear. He didn't let it show though. He went silent for another bunch of seconds.
'…all right.' he said finally, when the silence grew wide enough to become uncomfortable. 'I will let Wren go, but only because the situation is urgent and I value the village more than a single life. Now, that we have this resolved, come with me.'
The blonde nodded, eyes down to his son, who looked very small and very fragile like that. Very easily lost. How did he keep getting himself into these situations?
'Gamakijou-san, would you-"
'Yes, yes, babysitting duty again.' the toad's plump body grew even more as it filled itself in what surely was general toad expression of disapproval. 'But I tell you: I don't like it.'
'Thank you for your help.' Obviously the gods were on the Kazekage's side, because other than mewling lightly at being shifted, Naruto didn't stir. Minato covered him carefully with the blanket and somehow managed to stand up. Daichi watched him do it and allowed it, however when the blonde started wobbling on his legs like a one hundredth years old man, he had enough.
'Hold on tight.' he said as he simply grabbed him and tossed him over his shoulder like a bag of potatoes, in the next moment opening the door and whistling at one of many of his summons. Kurotaro seemed to be more than happy to vanish.
'Just going on a walk.' He said to a frog as he walked by it. In another second they both vanished in the swirl of sand.
'Boss!'
Having lost his 'don't hit yourself' partner for the moment, Gamanatsu quickly gathered her bearings and charged for the stranger.
'Hey- what are you doing?' Minato said, pushing at the man's back to get some sort of straightness back into the world. What the hell was wrong with this man? Why would he be so cruel to jab his shoulder on his tender ribs and make him bend over the fresh stitches? It was at this moment that he realized that he didn't just hate the Kazekage- the man hated him right back. This was further cemented when an instant later the man rewarded his squirming by gratuitous amounts of sand slapping him in the face and the redhead practically tossing him to an ANBU guard.
'I get back to work now.' said Daichi, most likely not disturbed by the fact what he did. 'You also do what you need to do.' With that he nodded to the guards and sat down to get connected back to the net again.
Minato personally thought he could do with a vacation, but doubted that's what the man referring to but doing what was needed. At least now he was practically on the roof of this weirdly round-roofed Kazekage tower, which meant it was only a matter of getting inside the building and down several stores to find an exit that would lead him straight to kage's house. One cursory search through the kage's person for his stash of pills (it earned him a weird look) Minato was good enough to get down by his own means, even if he was probably getting tachycardia, if the rate at which his heart started beating was anything to go by.
