Disclaimer: Naruto belongs to Masashi Kishimoto
Thank you MS3923 for beta-ing this chapter!
I forgot to thank Vyoletpanda96 last chapter, for naming Akira's friend ^^ And thanks to everyone for the favs and alerts :D
-oXo-
Chapter 11: The beginning (of the end?)
8th of June
It hurt so much, Naruto barely dared to move. The baby was pressing his intestines away and squishing them. He was glad he had a catheter, as he didn't know how he would be able to get to the bathroom. Not that he thought he needed it much lately; the baby was blocking most of his intestines.
The baby pushed against his stomach. He had the feeling he could vomit every moment, and actually had had to swallow bile away several times.
His spine and pelvis hurt, as the baby pressed against his hipbones, trying to squeeze in between his small pelvis. He had only been able to lie down and every once in a while sit up, so his backache wasn't really getting better either. Plus his skin... it felt too tight. The scratch marks on his stomach were bigger than ever. It felt like his skin was burning. And on top of this all, he hadn't been able to sleep for two days now; before that not even half of the time that he needed.
All in all, he felt miserable.
Even though everything hurt, he tried to stay lying on his side as still as possible. Sasuke was holding his hand beside the hospital bed, looking worriedly at him; his eyes looking sad. Sasuke, by just being there for him, made things a little better. He squeezed Sasuke's hand and the corners of Sasuke's mouth went up a little.
Naruto remembered almost two weeks ago when the first real pains had begun.
He was sitting on the porch, looking into the back garden, slowly moving his legs while they hung over the edge. He was watching how Sasuke tried to teach Akira the Henge jutsu.
Naruto looked down at his large belly, and laid his hands on top of it as he felt the baby try to stretch out, pushing softly against his bladder.
He couldn't believe when Sakura had told him that he actually wasn't that big compared to most pregnant women; that was because the baby had less space and was rolled up more. He couldn't believe her; woman could handle more than this? He felt like he was already stretched to the max, and he actually still had six weeks to go; theoretically, because it could even be more.
He groaned as his hip began to hurt again, and glanced to the plate with beef that rested beside him. He sighed and took it, letting it rest on his belly. He began to feel like some sort of meat eating monster.
He was chewing on a piece of beef and tried to ignore all the pains and uncomfortable pushing inside, which he thought so himself, he was handling rather well as he had sort of become used to it.
The baby moved again, almost making the plate fall. Bile started to rise as his stomach was pushed against from the inside. He slid down the porch and sat down on the grass, his feet under his buttocks, trying to sit straight so to take some pressure from his stomach.
The bile subsided. He sighed and was happy he'd gone to the toilet not over 15 minutes ago, because he didn't wanted to stand up again. It was rather bothersome to stand up lately.
Another kick in the right direction and Naruto gasped. An empty bladder also brought this other thing with it, as his prostate got a quick attack.
He calmed down again, and slowly turned to get the plate he had placed on the porch. It was then that had set everything in motion.
Pain, he felt pain coming from his stomach, but it wasn't the child. It was the fox.
Tsunade had told him a few weeks ago something he already knew; the moment of weakness in the seal of a jinchuuriki was during childbirth.
Even though he was a rather special case, having partly merged with the beast inside him, Tsunade had still worded her thoughts about this to him; that it might very well not occur, especially since he wouldn't really give birth to this child the normal way. Also his seal was very strong ever since he and the Kyuubi had partly merged.
"Aah!" he yelled. He felt a lot of red chakra starting to leak from the fox. His own chakra mixed with it, and it became orange before it leaked out of his body; though, it was leaning a bit more to the reddish side.
Sasuke immediately turned around to Naruto when he felt the chakra, and noticed the slightly more evil chakra than usual creep over his stomach.
"Akira, go to Kakashi's place, now!"
Akira looked at Naruto as well and fetl the evil aura spread. He shivered, for he had never felt anything like this before. He couldn't move and started shivering. He didn't feel so good.
Sasuke grasped his shoulder and looked down at him. Finally he was able to move again. Slowly he looked up into his father's black eyes.
"Go!"
Akira ran as fast as he could away from his home.
As soon as Sasuke had seen Akira move around the corner, he went to Naruto; his Sharingan spinning in his eyes.
Inside Naruto's mind he saw the fox still safely locked in his rather small cage. However, his chakra was everywhere and was also enveloping Naruto.
"Naruto!"
Naruto tried to turn while the chakra held him firmly into place.
"Sasuke, the baby." He was able to free one arm, and pointed to a place not that far away where some sort of cocoon stood that was slowly being surrounded by the red chakra. Yellow/orange chakra tried to fend the red off.
Sasuke saw it and used Susano'o to wrap one hand around the cocoon, and the other to get Naruto free. Naruto wriggled himself out the chakra and jumped away, landing next to Sasuke. Sasuke noticed he was his normal self here, no round stomach.
Naruto looked around, like he was searching for something.
"What are you looking for?" Sasuke asked as Susano'o wrapped its other hand around the cocoon too.
"There," Naruto yelled and he made one Kage Bunshin; he didn't dare to make more. He began running forward, avoiding the chakra, and made a Rasenshuuriken.
Sasuke was almost afraid he would throw it at the cage, which he subconsciously noted was a lot smaller than that it had once been. Naruto was running straight for it, but at the last moment he jumped and graciously turned in midair. He tossed the Rasenshuuriken to a small mass of chakra that tried to form into a shape of a fox. Sasuke had not even noticed it.
The Rasenshuuriken made contact and expanded, obliterating it to smithereens. Immediately the red chakra turned orange.
As Sasuke blinked himself back to reality, he saw Naruto hanging on the porch, heaving and holding his stomach. His tail was curled between his legs and his ears lay flat on his head.
"Naruto? Sasuke?" Kakashi appeared next to them. "What happened? Akira came to us in quite a panic, and I thought I felt-"
"The Kyuubi tried to break from the seal somehow," Sasuke explained as he rubbed Naruto's back, and held him so he wouldn't fall over.
"I'm- I'm fine now," Naruto panted. "For now," he said as he gripped his painful stomach, closing his eyes in pain, some saliva hanging from his mouth.
"And the baby?" Sasuke asked, wiping Naruto's mouth clean with his sleeve.
"I think he wasn't harmed. Ughn." Naruto laid his hand on his side. "He still kicks anyway."
"Let's get you to the hospital," Kakashi said.
"Uaagh," was Naruto's answer, as the rest of the beef that he hadn't already thrown up made its way to the surface world.
He sat there for a moment longer, hoping nothing else would come out, while Kakashi and Sasuke kept a close eye on him. After that he tried to stand up, but his hips protested, as well as Sasuke.
Finally an hour later he was lying on a hospital bed, sweating from the pain.
Tsunade and Sakura were just done checking him and his child. Sasuke actually seemed quite nervous as he watched them, Kakashi tried to calm him down a bit, by laying his hand on the raven's shoulder. It didn't help much.
Naruto, while lying on his side and making some jerky motions, tried to roll himself up around his painful stomach, making whimpering and moaning sounds of pain. "Ugn."
"Everything's fine with the baby," Sakura said.
"Aargh," Naruto gripped his stomach, "Aah, can't you, can't you… Uhh." Tears formed in his eyes from the pain. "Get it out!"
Sasuke winced.
"It is still too early, I would rather wait. The baby is doing fine, only Naruto is in pain, but if you have the delivery now I can't guarantee that the baby will survive or develop completely," Tsunade said worriedly.
"Can't you do something about the pain?" Sasuke asked, as he winced again at another cry from Naruto.
"I'm afraid not." Tsunade turned to Naruto.
"Naruto," she stroked some hair out of his sweaty face. Her hand moved further over his flattened ears. "Do you want us to get the baby out now?"
Naruto stared at her. Tsunade pitied the boy; she hated seeing him in so much pain. Naruto could handle a lot, and if he was actually crying, it had to really, really hurt.
"What are the risks?" he asked shakily.
"The baby's lungs aren't fully completed yet. Generally speaking the baby would have a surviving rate of 75%, but this case is different and I would estimate it lower. Around 55%. But removing the baby know might also have…" she paused a moment, looking for the right words.
"I could die." Naruto finished for her.
She looked into his blue eyes, which were despite all the pain he was in still shining fiercely. "Yes, seeing how the womb is still connected to you -to your intestines-, and what we found out about those other men... you might die."
"And when would i-it, hnng… be fine?"
"Before 35 weeks the baby will be born preterm, after that the survival rate of the baby will rapidly increase. You're in week 32 now. But things also depends on the womb and how it changes. If it changes…"
Naruto was silent for a moment, closing his eyes. "I can…" he gasped again, "I can wait," he said finally very softly.
"Naruto, you must also know that on the other hand it might also get worse instead of better. We don't know if the womb will weaken the barrier or strengthen it. From now on the longer the baby stays inside of you, it might end up damaging only more. If he stays too long, you might-"
"Or things m-might t-turn out bet-ter." Naruto tried to smile a bit, but it was lost in the process. "Besides, I can… can handle it. I'm a- a fast healer."
Tsunade looked at him with a look that was full of emotion. She stroked his hair again. She was so unsure of what might happen to him, she couldn't help it. Sakura had told her she should worry less, Naruto could handle things. She didn't need to tell him everything she worried about, but she just couldn't help it when she saw him there.
"We'll let you and Sasuke be alone, so you can decide together." Sakura said, gripping Tsunade's arm and guiding her to the door. Kakashi followed them out.
Sasuke sat beside Naruto and gripped his hand.
"You don't have to take too many risks; you know that, don't you?"
"But I can handle it. Just w-wait another week at least. F-find out i-if things change." He tried to roll himself up some more, and squeezed Sasuke's hand hard.
"Are you sure?"
"Yes." Sasuke stared into Naruto's eyes and saw his determination.
Finally he said, "Okay, but as soon as things get to turn for the worse, if it becomes too much, I want the baby to be taken out." You mean too much to me, he thought, but decided not to say right now.
Naruto nodded. "Okay."
That had been two weeks ago. The fox hadn't tried to take over anymore; or more precisely it couldn't. It had been a onetime chance. The seal was too strong, and the fox was way too weak as most of his strength had merged with Naruto.
Pain flared violently through his body, and Naruto gave some spasms from pain; he kept his eyes closed.
He felt hungry, but he couldn't eat since this morning. He felt his intestines being closed off. It wasn't a good feeling at all. He knew Sakura would come very soon and then he could tell her.
His tail gave a violent sweep under the sheets as he tried to curl up, but his legs didn't want to; there wasn't a lot of blood able to circulate through them, making them feel numb. His hand let go of Sasuke's and went to his painful stomach. Sasuke placed his other hand on Naruto's side. Somehow Sasuke's touch was the best thing to help him feel slightly better recently, so Naruto accepted his touch whenever he could.
Sasuke was so worried, Naruto could see it in his shining black eyes and the way he acted around him, but Naruto hadn't been able to say that everything was alright. Besides, Sasuke would know he wasn't telling the truth. That was what Naruto liked so much about Sasuke's presence, not only his touch, but they could understand each other without having to say a word. Naruto thought they could actually have long soundless 'conversations'; Sasuke was always the one that was listening like he always did, and let Naruto do the 'talking'.
Someone knocked on the door. Sakura came into the room and walked over to the bed.
"Naruto?" she asked, letting him know he should tell her how he felt. She didn't ask anymore to tell her, or how he felt, because he'd said he hadn't like it that everyone, every time as they walked in, the first thing they asked was 'how are you?' They knew full well he wasn't okay.
"I can't eat," he said as he closed his eyes in pain.
"You're not hungry?"
"Intestines," was all he said, grinding his teeth.
"The baby is cutting it off?" Sakura lowered the sheet, and together with Sasuke carefully pulled Naruto up, so he could lie on his back against a heap of pillows, without cutting off his blood system immediately. She pulled up his shirt and started pushing on his stomach, trying to move the baby a bit. She actually didn't need to push a lot to feel the baby, but to move him was a lot harder, since there was almost no room to move. Naruto groaned in pain as his skin was too tight, while Sakura kept pushing painfully.
"Aagh," he finally couldn't keep from screaming.
"Perhaps I can try to 'stretch' your skin a bit. It will make it feel better." Sakura's green eyes looked up to Naruto's closed eyes, frowning in pain. She began moving her hands over his skin in a way she had done a lot more lately. She had showed Sasuke too, but Naruto never asked Sasuke to do it, and Sasuke didn't really dare to hurt Naruto more, so he didn't do it a lot. Sakura was much better at doing this; probably because she could get over things like that more easily, being a medic.
"Do the leg-massages help?" she asked.
Naruto only groaned as she moved her hands, so she looked over to Sasuke.
"They do."
"Any other things?" she asked, turning her head to Naruto again.
"I'm tired," he said as he winced.
"You haven't slept again?"
Naruto shook his head.
"Hm, but you do sleep a little, don't you?" She looked over to Sasuke.
"Mostly a couple of minutes, but not much more than 20 minutes or so," Sasuke said. Sakura's eyes narrowed.
"Well, the baby seems to have grown a lot this last week, like he knew he had to catch up a little." She stopped stretching Naruto's skin, and now tried to move the baby again, to get his intestines more space. "I want to suggest that if tomorrow you're still unable to eat, we'll do the c-section."
"Isn't it still too early?" Sasuke asked, looking at Naruto groan while he asked.
"It is, you're still only in week 34, but the baby is stronger now, and more importantly I see too many risks if you stay this way for much longer. It's not good to let your intestines being pushed away like this for so long, and if you can't eat, it means the baby also is cut short on his food supply."
After a moment of silence, only interrupted by Naruto's moans of pain, Sasuke finally spoke up.
"I think you're right," he said.
"Okay, Naruto, I want you to get up for a moment, you need some movement. Just like two days ago, we will walk to the scale and back. You think you can do that?"
"Hm," Naruto growled. He hated how she talked to him like he was a small child asking if he could do that; if he could handle it. He was handling pain 24/7 for the last two weeks! Of course he could handle to walk a bit!
His anger was shown on his face, and Sakura got the message.
Sasuke and Sakura stood on either side of Naruto as they helped him up, fist letting him sit on the edge of the bed.
"This doesn't feel good," he told them, feeling even less blood flowing through his legs since they began to tingle.
They lifted him up, holding him up so he wouldn't fall. Slowly Naruto began taking small steps to the scale. He held Sakura almost in a death grip with one arm. Out of pain, not anger he told himself, but he wasn't so sure.
"50.2 kilo. That's exactly 13 kilo's more than you used to be."
"That explains why I feel so heavy," he said with sarcasm. He was aware that the longer this pain was going on, it was getting harder to stay serious and actually smile.
Sakura and Sasuke just ignored him, and helped him back to bed as his knees gave out.
"Whose idea was this again?" He asked as he lay down on his side again, groaning.
"That doctor's, don't blame us," Sasuke said, trying to be himself for Naruto's sake.
"Right, but he's dead, so I can't kill him anymore."
Sakura smiled at that. "You couldn't kill if you wanted to right now. Just stay in bed and try to rest. You know that every day you keep this up, it increases the chances of the baby."
This sobered Naruto up a little bit. "I know, but I would still like to kill someone."
-x-
The next day had come and another long night had past. Naruto had actually been able to eat something, even though his intestines began to protest as they were still blocked. He hadn't told anyone that, he just wanted -like Sakura had said- to feed the baby. It didn't matter if it couldn't get out anymore, just as long as the necessary substances would be taken, it was alright. Or so he hoped.
As the clock said it was 5:29 in the morning, Naruto lay awake trying to concentrate on Sasuke's soft breathing, as he was sleeping in his chair, instead of the pain in his intestines and what else. The baby tried to move again, pushing against all the organs and his still painful pelvis. Naruto clenched his jaws shut and closed his eyes.
He felt so huge as he felt his big belly. He almost couldn't believe he'd actually gained 13 kilo's. Normally he already had difficult gaining even a half a kilo. Even if he hadn't been on a mission for a few weeks and ate some more, he didn't grow above the weight of 37.6 kilo's.
He wanted his smooth and flat stomach back. He wanted the pain gone, he wanted to sleep again and eat normally. Not eating plates full of meat and other things Sakura wanted him to eat, like some eating machine, or his intestines getting clogged. He wanted to be able to get to the toilet again, to sleep on his stomach, to be able to walk normally, without walking like a goose or his legs giving out. To not having trouble keeping himself standing as he lost balance and his legs couldn't support him anymore. To do whatever he wanted and would be able to do it. To train, he wanted to train again; go on stupid missions with his genins, chasing lost pets and painting fences. Anything, it didn't matter.
He sighed, he wanted so much, but when he thought why he was in this situation, and what it could give him in the end, at least half of these desires could be ignored. Of course there were still things he really wanted, but what could a man do? A baby can't make everything alright.
Suddenly pain like he hadn't felt before made him almost lose consciousness. His eyes flew open and he screamed in pain, louder than he had before. His organs cramped up as the chakra womb did. It was very painful.
Sasuke almost fell out of his chair at the sudden outburst. His Sharingan activated at the alarm. He saw Naruto cramped up around his stomach, and quickly stood up and pushed a red emergency button.
Shizune came running into the room, and tried to hold Naruto still as he squirmed on the bed. Her hand moved over his abdomen. She turned to Sasuke.
"Get Sakura, now!"
This was bad.
Sasuke left the room immediately, and not much later he returned with Sakura in tow. Sakura checked Naruto as well. Her face dropped.
"The chakra womb is getting unstable. The baby has to get out now. Move him to the operation room. I'll get Tsunade-sama."
-x-
"What's wrong?" Sasuke asked as Naruto still lay silently screaming in pain on the operation table. His brain couldn't think clearly as he saw Naruto's sweaty face.
"We need to either stabilize the womb or get the baby out, we need to open him up to take a better look," Sakura told him before she pushed him out of the way.
Sakura grasped a scalpel, and was about to make an incision after she tried to feel the best place to do so.
"Don't we have to give him some medication against the pain?" Shizune asked.
"Won't help anyway," Sakura said as she put the scalpel in the flesh.
Naruto stopped moving suddenly, taking in a ragged breath as he felt the scalpel move, cutting his flesh and peeling it away, opening him up. He tried very hard not to scream too hard.
Sakura and Tsunade were taking a look inside of him, and he felt their hands move some 'things' away.
"It's letting go of the organs over here," Sakura told Tsunade.
"But it's still attached on other places, and the chakra is fluctuating too much," she answered.
Sakura lifted her head to Sasuke and Naruto. "We're going to take it out."
Naruto tried to nod, but cramped up instead. "H-hurry up," he said with a broken voice. Sakura bit her lip at the tone.
She and Tsunade tried to open the womb, which turned out to be very hard to do, but luckily Naruto had stopped moving. He now just lay still, staring at the ceiling, tears streaming down his cheeks. It looked like he had trouble breathing as he sucked in air very slowly, gasping.
"Why has it tightened to his organs like this?" Shizune asked as she too was helping to open the barrier. "Over there," she appeared to point somewhere. "While at other places it's letting go?"
"Don't know, but if we don't hurry, it will damage his organs permanently," Sakura said.
Finally Tsunade was able to make a small hole, and Sakura could make it bigger.
"Take the baby out," Sakura told Shizune, as she and Tsunade held open the barrier. Shizune's hands disappeared into Naruto.
"Aah!" Naruto gave a jolt. He could feel Shizune's hands move inside of him, trying to take a hold of the baby. He had difficulty to lie still at that, and Sasuke gripped his hand, which he regretted as it felt like Naruto was pulverizing his bones. Naruto felt how Shizune's hands tried to get around the baby. Naruto gasped for air with difficulty. Tears streaming down his face. This was hell.
Finally Naruto could feel how her hands moved and took hold of something. Then Shizune's hands emerged again with a baby holding in between.
Sasuke noticed he had been holding his breath, and he squeezed Naruto's hand softly as he tried to breathe again.
Shizune laid the in blood covered baby down on a table, and began to do some check-ups to see if everything worked alright. Suddenly wailing could be heard.
Sasuke looked down to Naruto, smiling, but then he realized Naruto was extremely pale and his eyes began to close.
"Naruto, hold on!" he said, trying to keep him awake.
Sakura and Tsunade probably had a hard time, as they made rapid movements and tried to clear all the blood.
"Get some blood Sasuke, it is in that cabinet over there."
Sasuke carefully tried to pull his now tingling hand away from Naruto's death grip, to get the blood. He got it and hurried back to Naruto. He put a needle that was connected to the sack of blood, into Naruto's arm.
"Naruto, stay with me," he said as he cupped Naruto's face in his hands. "Look at me, I'm here for you."
Naruto turned his eyes ever so slightly to Sasuke. It looked like he wasn't seeing very much, they were unfocused. He gave some sort of cough and blood came from the corners of his mouth.
"Quickly, Sakura, close it!"
Sasuke looked over to the now bloodbath that was Naruto's stomach, and wished he hadn't.
"Naruto, we're almost ready, you can do it." He didn't know if he was trying to comfort Naruto or himself.
Naruto's eyes began to close. "Naruto!"
Finally Sakura pulled out her hands of Naruto, holding a bloody thing in her hands, and immediately Tsunade began cleaning and closing the opening as far as she could.
"Naruto, look at me, Naruto!" Sasuke was beginning to panic, Naruto wasn't responding to him anymore, and he almost wasn't breathing. Sasuke moved his hands over Naruto's face and shoulders, hoping he would open his eyes, blink or anything else that let him know he was still conscious.
"Sasuke get over here," Shizune called as she looked at the situation. It was better if he wasn't there.
"No, Naruto," he said softly, not turning away from Naruto.
Shizune walked over to him with the baby and placed it in such a way, pushing the baby in his arms, that he just had to take it. Sasuke seemed shocked at the sight of the small person in his arms and automatically folded his arms carefully around the small still in blood covered body.
Before he could think or do anything, Shizune pulled him out of the room. "Come, you need to take the baby to the next room with me and into an incubator." She guided a stunned Sasuke away.
"But Naruto-," he said slowly, continuing to stare at the baby and the small hand that was grabbing the blanket. "Naruto." He looked up around Shizune to see Naruto. Sasuke actually seemed lost at all that was happening. "What about Naru-"
"Will be fine, but you're in the way." Shizune looked worriedly over her shoulder as she saw Sakura checking Naruto's pulse, looking a bit greyish from shock, before she closed the door behind her.
Naruto wasn't breathing and there was no pulse. Sakura began to panic. His intestines had taken a lot of damage, even though the womb had partly detached itself. The wounds hadn't been completely closed yet, and Sakura saw how Tsunade was still working on his intestines.
"Come on Naruto, don't give up now!" she said a bit panicky as she started CPR. Tsunade let his stomach be and grasped some paddles from a defibrillator.
Naruto's eyes were slightly open, staring blankly into the room. He was awfully pale and getting cold.
"Naruto! Come back!"
-oXo-
Next: ...?
A/N: Review? ^^
