First Posted 10/12/2014

Ah, and once again we have a conclusion to one of the plots! :) Okay so tomorrow I am going to try to write a LOT. ;-; I have a bunch of ideas I think I can put into words, but once again I would REALLY appreciate any prompts you guys can offer. Any tiny ideas will do. Seriously, they are helpful! I already got one in a review that I love and kind of want to try working with in some way (but maybe a bit differently) xP If that gives you guys a spoiler... (BUT I'M NOT SURE!)


Minako sprinted all the way home, leaping from one rooftop to the next in her hurry. She had just shown her father her newest acquisition, and while he was busy finishing up a conversation with someone-or-other-who's-important from someplace-or-other-that's-important, she intended to get home before him and show her mother as well. "Uh, don't—don't show Mom just yet," he had said, scratching his cheek and trying to pay attention to both her and the delegates in his office equally. She had agreed cheerfully with her fingers crossed behind her back and then leapt back out the window. If it weren't for those delegates, he probably would have been hurrying home as well right now.

"Mooooom! I'm back!" She called out into the large, open home. She heard her mother's call from somewhere across the house—to tell her to wait, she was busy—and threw her arms in the air with an exasperated moan. Her seven-year-old sister Yuu looked up from some toy dolls wearing frilly dresses to regard her with an adorably skeptical frown before shrugging.

"Neechan is so weird," she told her doll, whom she then shook up and down to form a nod of agreement. With a frown, Minako jumped to the floor on her hands and knees, eye level with the tiny blonde. Then she grinned and picked up one of the dolls.

"No, I'm weird for wearing a dress like this when it'll only get in the way of my missions!" Minako parroted in a high-pitched voice, shaking the doll.

"Ugh! Tsubaki, all you ever think about are missions! Missions, missions, missions!" Yuu had her doll respond, and then, like always, their doll-play devolved into a taijutsu battle with poor Tsubaki getting tangled in her dress every step of the way. Yuu was reduced to giggles. This was the state that Sakura found the two in, and she couldn't help but let a proud smile ease onto her face. Minako looked to be in one piece—not a scratch visible on her this time. Naruto was right. She was growing out of it, wasn't she?

"How did the mission go, Sweetheart?" Sakura asked.

"Great! We even finished it early, and we got some free time, and look what I got!" She cried happily, jumping up in her excitement and pointing both index fingers to her cheeks. Sakura's eyes widened. Three black whisker marks were drawn onto each cheek to match Naruto's, but around them her skin was red and irritated.

"Oh my gosh, you need to—Minako, wash that off right now. You're having an allergic reaction to whatever that was drawn with." She rushed forward, running a thumb along her right cheek and feeling the welts of raised skin along each line. She retracted her hand to lick her thumb, but before she could rub it on Minako's cheek, the girl jumped backward to perch carefully atop the back of the couch.

"Mom, don't touch them. You'll mess up how they heal!" She whined, gingerly poking the whiskers her mother had just touched.

"How they... heal?" Sakura repeated quietly, suddenly realizing what those might be. But no. Never. Not on her face. Lee never would have let her... Lee wouldn't have even noticed. Her thoughts quickly turned from disbelief to anger. "Are those..." She started, unable to make her mouth form the word. She wouldn't have. Not on her face.

"The best tattoo ever? YUP! Now everyone, all over the world will know that I am daughter of the great Uzumaki Naruto!" She stood atop the couch and took a triumphant pose with her arms in the air, a wide grin on her face. On. her. FACE. Sakura was speechless.

"You got a tattoo." She said, voice tremblingly low. Yuu had watched the entire exchange quietly and was now collecting all of her dolls into her arms and departing from the room. "On your face." Her voice was so quiet it was just above a whisper.

"Dad likes it." Minako said, her grin quickly becoming a scowl, then morphing fluidly into a smirk. "And it's not like you ever let me do anything anyway. I've been saving up for these babies for years." She could see her mother's shoulders begin to tremble, and for the first time in her life, she suddenly believed that she might have done something she'd actually regret. But Minako was not one to run from a fight, ever. That was her ninja way. She hopped off the couch and squared her shoulders, waiting with a surprising amount of patience for her mother's outburst. But it never came. Sakura slowly lowered her chin until her bangs covered her eyes from Minako, and then she quietly stepped from the room.

Minako heaved a sigh of relief bigger than a Yamanaka's ego.

Then Naruto stepped in the door. He gave a half-hearted smile to his daughter and hurried straight past her through the door that Sakura had disappeared behind.

"You." She said to him, raising her head just enough so one of her eyes glinted dangerously at him through her hair. "We need to talk. Somewhere private." She hissed, her voice seething with so much anger that it was barely escaping from between her clenched teeth.

"S-Sa-Sakura-chan, I'm sure—"

"Now." Her voice, quiet as it was, cowed the hokage into silence. Her fists were trembling at her sides, knuckles white.

"Wh-where do you want to—"

"Just... pick me up. And take me somewhere." He didn't miss how hard she was working to keep it in. He lifted her bridal style, her body stiff in his arms, and felt exactly as though he were carrying a bomb.

"Minako, watch the babies for us, would you?" He said, smiling reassuringly as he passed her on his way to the door. Her nervous expression gave away just how much his grin had failed.

Then he departed, taking his wife as far away from Konoha as he could in the seconds he had left on her ticking clock.

Sakura was home after just a few hours, back to her normal routine. She grounded Minako, picked up her academy-aged children from their day at school, took care of the baby, and otherwise kept the Uzumaki household in order.

The village, on the other hand, had to make due without a hokage for two days. It somehow managed.

Then everything was back to normal.

Except now there were two loud, unpredictable, blonde-haired, blue-eyed, whisker-cheeked shinobi in Konoha.


The idea for this chapter actually came to me when I thought about the fact that Naruto's kids probably (sadly) won't have whiskers on their cheeks. That made me sad, so I came up with the idea of his kid—or who knows, maybe kids getting them tattooed on instead by choice. Ahaha! I'm sure Sakura will come to love them! ...but it might take a while.

If you're curious about what happens out in the woods, I've reworked that part a few times and decided to save it to post as a separate chapter some other time (possibly tomorrow, but I doubt it). It was just one of those scenes that doesn't want to happen quite right no matter how hard you think about it. Blah!

Thanks for the reviews once again, and see you tomorrow!

Chronological Arc/Chapter List:
Confession: Chapters 33-37 (NaruSaku ages 18-19)
Let's Wait: Chapters 5-6 (NaruSaku ages 20-21)
Stealing First: Chapter 1 (NaruSaku ages 21-22)
The Uzusagis: Chapters 3-4 (Narusaku ages 21-40)
It'll Be Okay: Chapters 18-24 (NaruSaku ages 21-22)
The Godfathers: Chapters 13-14 (NaruSaku ages 22-23)
Momma's Boy: Chapter 27 (NaruSaku ages 24-25)
The Day Kakashi Tried: Chapter 2 (NaruSaku ages 25-26)
Kakashi Tries Again: Chapter 16 (NaruSaku ages 29-42)
A Tiny Crush: Chapter 25 (NaruSaku ages 33-35)
That Jutsu, Part 1: Chapter 8 (NaruSaku ages 37-38)
Bedtime Routine: Chapter 7 (NaruSaku ages 37-38)
That Jutsu, Part 2: Chapter 9 (NaruSaku ages 37-38)
Every Family Has One: Chapters 10-12 & 17 (NaruSaku ages 38-39) * You Are Here
A Terrible Dream: Chapter 32 (NaruSaku ages 38-39)
A Not-So-Tiny Crush: Chapters 26, 28, 30-31 (NaruSaku ages 42-44)
Teenage Girls: Chapter 15 (NaruSaku ages 44-45)