Hey! How exciting is this! I got all the way through this chapter and then I was so close to the end that I finally finished this dmn thing off! Last 2 chapters at once! Yay! THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU to everyone who read and offered encouragement. Seriously, this was my first attempt at writing a slightly longer story. It's would have been really hard to keep my momentum up without people reviewing. I'm going to try to be a good reader in the future and review lots.

xoxoxoxoxo

Naruto and Hikari came home with Sasuke, home to a casserole that Sakura and Lee had made waiting for them; it's lovely warm smell filling the house as soon as they reheated it in the oven. The next few days their home was filled with people: laughter, homemade meals from all the girls, and Hikari-chan being passed from person to person like a prize ham at a county fair. The little girl was very good-natured: she slept a good deal, and when she was awake hardly ever cried: instead preferring to look around the room with more alertness than one might expect in an infant only a few days old- though Sakura swore that babies of that age couldn't even see clearly more than a few inches in front of their faces.

It was more visitors, Sasuke imagined, than the house had seen in thirty or forty years; especially since his parents had always been quiet and disliked a lot of company. He had always believed himself to dislike visitors, but suddenly all the noise didn't seem so bad: it was nice to see Hikari being fussed over, and to see Naruto laughing in a circle of so many good friends.

"How much did she weight, again?"

and.. "oh, look at those blue eyes. Definitely yours, Naruto…"

"Those dimples! She's so precious, Sasuke, you're gonna be beating the boys off with a stick in a few years, just wait and see…"

"Look at that little smile!"

Iruka came by every day for at least an hour or two after school, to help tidy up about the house and help with other things.

Kakashi came by and looked at Hikari-chan uneasily, finally picking her up in much the same manner one normally handled a potentially active grenade. The baby responded with coos and drooling. Gai came by and managed to defeat his eternal rival almost immediately, in the proud ninja field activities of diaper-changing and playpen assembly.

Jiraya visited bringing an order of Ichikaru's ramen which was well appreciated, only to wear out his welcome almost immediately by mentioning something inappropriate about, how nice it would be to visit in fifteen or sixteen years. Naruto blinked, but by the time he had figured out the implications of that statement, and started yelling, Sasuke had already unceremoniously shown the Pervert-sennin the door.

To Sasuke, it seemed like the warm home he had never had: a rather perfect arrangement even better than his dreams: family, friends, happiness: a perfect environment in which to raise his daughter, though perhaps they were still not things he believed held so much importance to himself. He might have been a little giddy, surrounded by so much pleasant activity, which could have been excuse for not attaching so much importance to the fact that Naruto's own reaction to all the fuss hadn't been quite as whole-heartedly postive.

He hardly noticed when Naruto, under the excuse of wanting to take a long walk one day, asked Sasuke and Iruka to watch the baby for a while, and slipped away from the Uchiha part of town.

As soon as he reached the main street, Naruto turned and made a beeline for the Hokage's office. Once there he managed to sweet-talk Shizune into giving him an immediate audience with Tsunade instead of being forced to wait. He was, after all one of their favorites.

Tsunade was rather surprised to see him visiting her so soon after taking Hikari home. But Naruto's expression rather suggested that he had wanted to talk in private. Neither was the subject of his conversation about food, or sleeping habits, or any of the other million questions he had been coming around to get answers too ever since his daughter was born. Tsunade was happy to answer those. She had even been happy to come over to the Uchiha compound to try her hand at assembling that damn playpen that no one seemed quite able to jam properly together.

"It hasn't even been a full week yet, Naruto," she said, frowning. "Are you sure you want to go back to being a man? Did you think about what I said about the breast-feeding?"

"I know, Baa-san," Naruto whined, "But I tried breast-feeding and I hate it, it feels really weird. And Sasuke loves to watch me do it, I think it makes him feel all… paternal…"

Tsunade bit back a laugh. "Is that really so bad? Anyway, I'm sorry, Naruto, but it really is best for the baby, and…"

She was surprised when Naruto stood up and slammed his hand down on her desk.

"No! Ba-chan, you really don't understand! I know it's better for Hikari-chan, but…"

To Tsunade's horror, his eyes began to well up with tears. Heavily he sat down again. "I know, but I feel like I'm gonna go crazy if I've gotta stay in this form another minute! It's like… it's like…" he struggled. "Hinata came over yesterday with a knitting pattern. A freaking knitting pattern! She used to have a crush on me, ya know? And now she wants us to knit booties together!" He looked at the Hokage with big, round blue eyes. "Baba, I'm a guy, remember! And it's like everybody's already forgotten that!"

"Is this about… Sasuke?" Tsunade asked carefully.

"Yes! No! I mean, not him more than anybody else. Maybe. I don't know. Maybe him more than everybody else." He stood up, looked around Tsunade's empty office, and then sat down again.

"I know I had a baby. And that's bound to give anyone a little bit of gender dysphoria. But it's like everyone's forgotting the real me. I mean, I felt that way during the pregnancy too, but there was nothing to do about it, right? And now… now that I know I can go back, it's like… it's like… every time somebody looks at my boobs, or treats me like a girl… I feel like I'm losing myself. So."

He looked at her miserably. "I really thought about it. If I feel like I'm going crazy like this, that can't be good for Hikari-chan either, right? I mean, she deserves to hate two Dads," he emphasized the word, "who are sane."

Tsunade nodded slowly. "I'm sorry, Naruto. I didn't think of it like that before. Yosh!" She banged her hands on the desk. "I understand. Let's do it!"

Belatedly, a thought occurred to her.

"Have you talked about this with Sasuke yet?"

xoxoxoxooxo

Sasuke heard the door open quietly and then close before Naruto came into the room. Iruka had gone for the day and Hikari was asleep on a blanket.

"Where have you been?" He asked. "You said you were going for a walk, but that was over three hours ago."

Naruto looked at him . "Sorry?" He said, sounding confused. "I just went to talk to Tsunade."

Sasuke looked at him and sighed. "You don't need to apologize. I just wondered where you went."

Naruto shrugged. "After I talked with Tsunade I went to the training fields, and then I came back here." He moved towards the hallway, leading back into the bedroom. Sasuke paused, decided that Hikari-chan was safe on the floor, and then followed Naruto.

Pulling off his t-shirt, Naruto went over to his dresser and rummaged for another one. Naruto had a lot of black t-shirts, Sasuke had realized. Almost as many as he had orange pants.

Naruto's voice was muffled as he pulled the clean shirt over his head. "It's my first time breaking a serious sweat since I found out I was pregnant. Man, Sasuke, it felt good. My boobs were flying around all over the place, though. I dunno how the girls manage it."

Sasuke smirked. "Lots of binding, I guess." Naruto's breasts really had gotten very big since he was breast-feeding. He found himself examining the shape of them, through Naruto's t-shirt, and was slightly distracted when the girl's voice called him back to reality.

"Sasuke." Naruto paused. "I dunno how you're gonna feel about this, but Tsunade's gonna do the jutsu tomorrow to turn me back into a guy."

"Huh?"

"Ooh, now your Uchiha jaw is hanging open." Naruto rubbed the back of his head, which he always did when he was embarrassed. "Now that the kid's born there's not much reason to stay like this, and frankly I'm getting pretty sick of it, so…"

Sasuke nodded. "That sounds reasonable."

It was Naruto's turn to let his jaw drop. He quickly clapped it shut again. "Really? It's ok? I kinda thought we were gonna have a fight about this, or…"

"It's your body, after all," Sasuke said. "It's perfectly reasonable. And it's not like it's really my place to interfere."

"Uhh… right," Naruto said. "Exactly what I was gonna say. Ok, then."

He paused. "Once I get my back to my old self, do you still want me to stay here? I was thinking you'd probably wanna be close to Hikari-chan, but I could start paying you rent… or… uh…" He stopped as he saw Sasuke's expression beginning to turn dangerous.

"Is that what you were trying to say?" Sasuke growled.

"Well, yeah, because, you know… back to the old… uh… daily grind… and… uh…" growing more and more nervous as he watched Sasuke, Naruto's voice began to trail off. Sasuke was starting to look really angry.

Sasuke was, in fact, currently considering the option of kissing Naruto, really hard, just to shut him up. He was leaning against it because, in real life, such things never turned out as good as they did in the films. Still, it was tempting.

"What are you getting so pissy for, anyway?" Naruto finally ended.

"Dobe, shut up!" Sasuke said.

Realizing that they were both beginning to raise their voices, Sasuke and Naruto both cast a guilty glance in the direction of the living room where Hikari was sleeping. Hearing nothing but the sound of her quiet breath, Sasuke began again.

"Dobe, haven't we been through this? I thought we were together, right?"

"I'm just saying! Geez! I understand if you don't wanna be with me once I'm a guy again!"

Sasuke glared. "Is it me who doesn't want to be with a guy, or is it you? I'm the one who said I liked you as a boy. Me, remember?" His voice was starting to rise again. "I want to be with you as a guy! Both of us as guys! I wanna do you as a guy, and.. uh…" he stopped, awkwardly, as he saw how red Naruto's face had suddenly gotten.

Without speaking the blonde rushed past him, out the bedroom door. Sasuke stood as Naruto's footsteps stomped down the hall, through the living room – in a moment the front door would slam, and….

No, wait a minute. The stomps were coming back again.

"What the fuck is with you?" Naruto yelled. "Teme! You aren't gonna chase me, or anything?"

Saske blinked and then yelled back. "Did you want me to chase you?"

"NO! I don't wanna be chased like I'm some fucking, pathetic girl who doesn't know what she wants and…"

From the other room, a thin wail brought them back to reality with a crash. Grimacing with frustration, Naruto went back to the living room and Sasuke followed. Swooping down to pick Hikari up and pull her to his chest, Naruto patted her back and tried to calm the screaming baby.

"Yosh, yosh… it's ok now… sorry we were being loud…" Naruto brought Hikari's forehead to his lips and kissed it gently. "Good girl, good girl. Everything's ok…"

He saw Sasuke looking at him. He glared back, angry again for just a moment, and sighed.

"We'll talk about it later, ok?'

xoxoxoxoxo

"But what if I'm not.. uh… attracted to him anymore after this?"

Sakura was on the verge of pulling her hair out. Yes, she loved Naruto. Yes, she felt bad for trying to keep her teammates apart in the past. But this was just the sort of disaster anyone with half a mind could have seen coming. And why did she have to be the one to talk Naruto through his romantic crisis?

She knew why, because Naruto, in his characteristically blunt, somewhat unintentionally rude way, had laid it out for her:
"I can't talk to Baa-san about it, that would just be weird, and Iruka gets all red when anything comes up about sex, and Kakashi or Pervert-sennin – Eww, they'd probably say something awful… and Sai doesn't know jack about relationships and Kiba would laugh his ass off and I know you know lots and lots and lots, Sakura, so puhleeze I really need your advice."

Inner Sakura was ranting and raving – I don't wanna know this stuff! why do I have to be the one to listen to this? Outward Sakura, however, nodded kindly and promised to help in any way she could.

"You know, Naruto…" She said, after listening to all his concerns, "You won't really know until you try. Right?"

Naruto looked at her doubtfully. Since being in his girl form with all that long hair, he had developed the habit of twisting one ponytail around his finger when he thought. It was such a cutsy gesture that it made Sakura want to throw up, but she was sure Naruto didn't realize how he appeared when he was doing it. If he had, he would have been horrified and stopped right away.

Anyway, Naruto's face was getting really red. "You mean you think I should… uh…"

"Yeah?" Sakura prompted.

"I mean… uh…" Naruto's voice dropped to a whisper.

"Look," she said, trying to be sensible. "You know other guys in gay relationships, right?"

"Right…"

"And you don't think its wrong and amoral or anti-religious or anything like that…"

"No!" Naruto said, more forcefully. "I think it's fine… if… uh…" his face seemed to take on an even deeper shade of red…"

"And even if you don't like it all that much the first time… uh…" Sakura took a deep breath, and began to dispel the kind of nuggets of wisdom that girls generally gain through exposure to indecent comic books. "ItmightnotfeelthatgreatthefirsttimebutafterallitsjustsexualstimulationoftheprostateandthatoughttofeelgoodtoanybodyespeciallyonceyourbodygetsusedtoititllprobablyfeelbettertoosoandafteralllovehasnogenderreallyImeanandwhatisaromanticrelationshipanywaybutjusalovingrelationshippwithsexthrowninsoIthinksinceyouandSasukereallyloveeachotherit'lldefinitelybefine."

Then she had to stop for a breath.

Naruto looked at her doubtfully. Then he began to nod.

"Ok, Sakura, I guess you're right…"

Sakura nodded reassuringly. "Of course I'm right."

"There's just one thing, though…" Naruto narrowed his eyes.

"What is it?"

"You kind of sound like you're assuming," he coughed," that I'm gonna be on the bottom."

xoxoxoxoxoxo

"Damn, Baba, why do they all have to be here?" Naruto complained.

Tsunade, the fifth Hokage of Konohagure village, smiled at him beautifically. "Naruto-kun, haven't we been through this before? Hinata and Sakura are here because it is beneficial to their training. Shizune is here to assist me."

"Fine," Naruto griped. "But what about them?"

Lined up against the back wall was Ino, Ten-Ten, Rock Lee, Sai, Iruka and Sasuke. Each looked at him defensively.

"I'm offering moral support," Ino said, challengingly.

"I as well!" Rock Lee said, punching his fist in the air.

"Me too…" Ten Ten mumbled.

"I'm just curious to see if you're finally going to grow a dick."

"I wanted to be here, in case, ah..."

Sasuke just looked at Naruto and smirked. For some reason that smirk made Naruto more nervous about Sasuke than about the rest of the on-lookers put together.

"AHHHHHH!!!!" He screamed. "Get out get out get out!"

"Now Naruto..."

"Naruto-kun…"

"Brat" Tsunade said. "This is my office, so we get to do things my way. Unless you don't want my help at all."

Naruto sulked.

"What's that?"
"Fine…" he mumbled.

"Good then!" Tsunade smiled, freakily cheerful. Naruto heard her say, under her breath, "serves you right for calling me an old bag…"

He stripped his shirt off and stepped into the middle of the circle Tsunade had prepared using special ink, sand, a minimal amount of Naruto's blood, and a couple of 'special ingredients' she didn't specify in her long-winded explanation of how difficult the jutsu had been to set up. (One had been semen, required for 'maleness', Tsunade had debated teasing Naruto about this but decided against it because he doubtless would have asked her who she had got it from.)

"You didn't use all this fancy stuff before," Naruto said, suspiciously.

"Well, this time I wanted a little extra insurance." Tsunade snapped. "Do you have a problem with that?"
She stepped with him into the center of the circle, and began to concentrate. First it was necessary that she block out the sounds of the room around her: everyone was required to be very quiet, but she had to be totally focused inward, which meant blocking the sounds of their breath, the soft shuffle of their feet on the floor, and even the faint sounds drifting in the window from the street below. Tsunade entered a meditative trance, and then began to focus on the chakra of her body. Every vein, every flow: she felt it ebbing and flowing, like blood in her veins or the movement of the tides, flowing in it's naturally occurring system of rivers and streams.

Now for the difficult part: even after having doing this a thousand times before, a ninja could still make a mistake.

She built a dam, slicing through an arterial flow of chakra; and felt the power within her surge and roll as it hit that barrier and was forced back on itself. Then she quickly constructed a second damn, and a third, until all the major chakra of her body was being forced, at extreme pressure, up through her arms and into the chakra-points at the center of her two palms.

With a shout, she yelled the incantations of the jutsu, and pressed her palms against Naruto's chest. Instantly her chakra jumped up, surrounding him, and for an instant she saw the Kyuubi's chakra beginning to rise. Then Naruto took control, struggling with the fox's chakra until it began to subside, allowing Tsunade's to flow over him.

Tsunade stood back, ready to receive congratulations, and this time everyone began giving them to her, all at once.

"Wow!"

"That was amazing!"

"You did it, Hokage!"

"He's really a boy again!"

The first thing Naruto did was put his hands on his chest, checking for breasts. The second thing he did was to grab his crotch.

"Yatta!" He yelled. "Baba! You did it! You're a genius! I'm a guy again! I'm a guy," He started to do a little dance around the room. "A guy again! A guy… again!"
"Glad you appreciate my talent," Tsunade said, She allowed everyone to continue fawning over her, which they did, appreciatively, for a good ten or fifteen minutes. It could have gone on a little longer, she thought, disappointedly, but soon they were excusing themselves to get back to missions or to school or other daily assignments. Well, it wasn't as if anyone but a medical ninja could possibly appreciate the difficulty of what she had done, anyway.

Naruto and Sasuke had left Hikari with Ino. The blonde smiled to them as they entered her parent's shop. Hikari was lying on a blanket on the floor, surrounding by small white petals, and Ino knelt next to her, trying, it seemed, to make a small tiara out of flowers. As Naruto watched the stem of one of the pieces of crown split, and Ino groaned.

"Shikamaru!" Naruto said. "I didn't know you were here!"

The Shadow-User came into the room from the back of the shop. "Oh!" He said. "You finally got your body back! Congratulations!"

"Yeah!" Naruto agreed, happily. He knelt down and picked up his daughter. "Thank you for watching her, Ino." He laughed as Hikari sneezed softly.

On the way home, they stopped at the grocery store, picking up several containers of formula for the coming days. Naruto noticed that Sasuke carefully avoided saying anything, as they paid for the stuff and began heading back towards the Uchiha quarter.

Maybe he's afraid of making me feel guilty… Naruto wondered. He looked down at Hikari, who was prone against his chest, resting in a snuggli. Her tiny fist opened and closed against his chest, almost where his breast had been. He wondered if she knew he was the same person. Would she be upset, thinking that her mother had disappeared? He felt a pang of guilt.

Feeling Sasuke's eyes on him, he looked up.

"It's alright," Sasuke said, briefly. "She knows."

Naruto felt his face growing red. "How do you know that's what I was thinking about, anyway?"

Sasuke shrugged. "We're here," He said, instead, inserting his key into the front door lock.

Naruto considered arguing, but it was probably better to let the conversation die. Looking down, he saw that Hikari had fallen asleep, and moved to lay her down in her crib. Though they had a bedroom prepared for her, the crib had been set up in the living room, and for some reason Sasuke hadn't yet gotten around to moving it. Naruto thought that he sort of preferred it that way. Though they had to be quiet and tiptoe around when she was sleeping, it was nice to be able to keep an eye on her while she was sleeping. Anyway, whenever they wanted to talk or make noise or something, they could always go into the bedroom…

That errant thought caused him to look at Sasuke again. Make a lot of noise or something…

Sasuke went into the kitchen and Naruto followed him. Sasuke opened the cabinet and started stacking the formula they had bought. Naruto watched his back, grateful that Sasuke wouldn't be able to see him watching him. Sasuke had a nice back… the nape of his neck was nice too… especially the place where the muscles connected to his shoulder blades.

Naruto shook his head as if he was a dog drying himself off. Sure, if someone told him Sasuke was good looking, he could understand that. He could tell if a guy was good-looking, or if he was average looking or even ugly – you didn't have to be attracted to someone to think that they were attractive or not.

But he did think Sasuke was just good-looking, didn't he? He'd be totally fooling himself if he didn't admit it. Was it since he was a girl that he'd begun to feel that way? Or had he felt that way since long before, but never - he shook his head again, trying to think it out – never realized it? Maybe he had never recognized the attraction because he'd been too naïve – after all, Sasuke was the first person – boyfriend, relationship, whatever, that he'd ever had.

Or maybe, looking at Sasuke now, he was only remembering the attraction he had felt as a female.

How was he going to know, unless they did something?

Sasuke finished putting away the dishes, and, taking a knife from a drawer, turned to sit down at the table next to Naruto. He took an orange from the bowl of fruit between them and began to peel it.

Naruto was avoiding looking at him, his face shielded by his hands as his gazed out the window. Inwardly, Sasuke winced. Was Naruto still upset with him about what he had done, his betrayal to Itachi? There was no way Sasuke could blame him, though Sasuke had hoped…

They hadn't slept together since Naruto and Hikari had come home. Sasuke had been afraid to make the first move: first of all, Naruto had just given birth, and Sasuke had no idea how that worked. And secondly, given that he'd screwed up so badly… he was lucky Naruto had forgiven him, and, if the blonde wanted time, he was in no position to insist.

Now Naruto was a guy… a guy, a guy, a guy! Inner Sasuke chanted with glee…. But Outer Sasuke was more cautious. They hadn't really resolved their disagreement from the other day, so he had no idea how Naruto felt about the idea of sex as men.

It was probably best to wait, and let the blonde make the first move.