Chapter 28:
Inoichi Investigates

When Naruto met up with his team for a day of training, he found Ino and Sakura having a screaming match. That wasn't anything special. The two girls got into fights all the time over Sasuke. But then Ino rounded on him.

"It was you!" the blonde girl snapped, jabbing a finger at him. "You were the one!"

"Huh?" Naruto squeaked. "What'd I do?"

"You promised not to spread around what I told you about the Hokage, and you did!" she accused. "It had to be you!"

"…How do you know that I told anyone?" he asked warily.

"My dad grounded me because the Hokage found out about it!" she shrieked furiously.

"Oh." Naruto nervously itched at the back of his head and leaned away from the angry girl. "Well, I asked the Hokage if it was true—because it totally sounded crazy."

Ino gaped at him. "You told the Hokage?!"

"Naruto," Sakura groaned. "Can't you keep any secrets?"

"Of course I can!" he huffed, insulted. "I'm good at keeping secrets."

"Well what secrets do you know?" Ino asked skeptically.

Naruto rolled his eyes. "If I told you what I know, it wouldn't be secret anymore, would it?"

The Kyuubi was the biggest secret he knew, and there was no way he'd willingly tell anyone about it. The fact that the Yondaime was…doing stuff…with his mom was another, and something he wished he could forget. The other secrets that he laid claim to were minor in comparison and involved people he doubted that Ino or Sakura cared about, like Konohamaru.

Ino ground her teeth at his response.

"Why were you even talking about that stuff with Sakura anyway?" Naruto asked with a frown. "Whether or not Yondy-sama has some lost secret life isn't any of your business."

"I wanted Sakura's opinions on some theories of mine. Hokage-sama's amnesia—it's like something out of a novel—it's romantic, it's tragic, it's mysterious…" Ino's blue eyes grew starry and she sighed. Then she flashed Naruto a dismissive look. "It's a girl thing, you wouldn't understand."

"We were just harmlessly speculating, Naruto," Sakura sighed.

Naruto stared at the two kunoichi. I don't get girls…

"So is it true?" Sasuke asked.

All three jumped, having forgotten that Sasuke was standing only a few feet away on the small bridge.

"Is what true, Sasuke-kun?" Sakura blinked.

"You talked to the Hokage." Sasuke's dark eyes focused on Naruto. "So is it true?"

"The amnesia thing?" Naruto guessed. "Yeah, it used to be."

"Used to be?" Sasuke repeated.

"When I talked to him, he said his memory wasn't a problem anymore," Naruto shrugged.

"Like…he doesn't have amnesia anymore?" Ino blinked.

"Yeah," Naruto nodded.

"Hokage-sama remembers everything?" Sakura asked.

Naruto nodded again.

There was silence…and then both girls squealed in excitement. While his ears were still ringing, they pelted him with questions. Was there a secret girlfriend from far away? Was there a secret child—a girl or a boy? Was the girl pretty and smart? Was the boy handsome and talented?

"I don't know," Naruto grumbled. "I didn't ask about any of that."

The girls looked…displeased.

I just don't get girls…at all.


After grounding his daughter, Inoichi shadowed her, just to make sure that she was being honest with him about only telling Team 7 about the Hokage's secret condition. He wanted to trust her, but the village's security was potentially at stake and he had to be sure. And after her grounding, she would surely find time to slip away and confront whoever she suspected was responsible for spreading things around to the point where the Hokage found out about it.

She headed straight for Team 7 and immediately tore into her old friend, the Haruno girl. Inoichi had to agree that she would be the most likely source of the leak. Girls liked to talk, and the Uchiha boy was unlikely to say anything to anyone.

And then the other boy showed up.

Inoichi knew it was stupid, but his stomach clenched at the sight of the container all the same. He wasn't a stupid civilian who didn't understand the concept of sealing. He knew that the boy and the demon were two separate entities—one imprisoned within the other.

But he remembered the demon. He remembered the crushing aura of rage that had choked the air, the reek of smoke and death, the fear of the ninja all around him, his own fear. Ino had just been born, his precious baby girl, and his darling wife, and all his family, and his friends new babies—they were all going to die because it just kept on coming. It swatted at them like they were little more than annoying flies and shrugged off their attacks like they were nothing. No matter what they did, it just kept on going, lumbering towards the village with murder and destruction in mind.

He knew that the demon was sealed away. But there was always the fear and the doubt, especially in the beginning. What if the Yondaime was too addled by his mysterious injury and there was a flaw in the seal? What if the demon found a way to corrupt its host into a pawn or a puppet? What if it got free?

Killing the child seemed to be the safest thing. It was horrible and cruel and wholly unfair to the boy, but how could he justify letting such a dangerous thing exist? The Yondaime had ascended to power then and put a stop to that drive in the Council, and with each passing year it seemed that the new Hokage was right. The fear and doubt was weakened, but still it lingered.

And then the boy had gotten tangled up in that mess with Orochimaru's seal and seemingly did the Hokage serious harm. The old fears seemed justified then. But Jiraiya-sama had assured them all that is wasn't the fox's doing, just the boy wanting to help but being stupid instead.

Now everything was fine.

…It turned out the demon vessel was the leak…and the kid had gone straight to the Hokage, too.

Of course he would, Inoichi grumbled to himself as he lounged on a nearby roof. When does that kid ever not talk to the Yondaime?

It was fairly well-known in the ninja community that the fox-boy spent a lot of time in the Hokage Tower, and a lot of time with the Hokage. Inoichi had trouble counting all the times he'd been in the Tower for some reason or other and seen the boy playing in the halls, playing in the Hokage's office, or following the Yondaime around like a cheery little shadow. One time, when the boy had been small, he'd turned up underneath the long table where the Council had been meeting, and the Yondaime had taken time out of the meeting to hand the child over to his assistant (who conveniently was the child's mother) and waited until she came back from dumping the boy with another ninja before getting back to business.

At the time, the interrupted meeting had been annoying. Those meeting were so long and tedious and anything that made them longer was something that he immediately hated. But now that he looked back on it years later after the annoyance was long gone, it was actually rather funny.

Inoichi was so busy reminiscing that he nearly missed what else the blonde fox-boy revealed.

Wait, what did he say?!

He almost yelled the question out loud. But doing so would reveal him spying on Ino and her friends. And his little girl was already mad enough at him.

The Hokage…has his memory back?!

If that was true, it was a very good thing. It was very likely to be true. It would explain the Hokage's strange behavior in his first meeting back and the snake-can too. And Inoichi doubted that the Hokage would lie to his favorite kid unless he had to, and as this was good news there was no reason to lie or hide it.

The Hokage regaining his memory negated the fear that other villages would invade if they learned that his memory was a mess.

I need to confirm this, just to be sure.

With that thought in mind, he left his daughter and her friend to squeal over this new development and bounded over the rooftops toward the Tower. There was a line for the Hokage's office; various teams or team leaders waiting for a chance to pull a mission from the pile. And, being at the end of the line, Inoichi had to wait his turn.

It was maddening.

Eventually, his turn did come, and the Yamanaka eagerly darted inside.

"…I don't think you came to get a mission," the Yondaime observed.

"No," Inoichi shook his head. "I had a chat with Ino. She won't be spreading around sensitive information again anytime soon." He grimaced slightly. "She only spread it to the three genin of Team 7, but only…" He had to think for a moment to dig up the boy's name. "Only that Naruto kid told…but you knew that already."

"I did." The Hokage leaned back in his chair. "Was that all you wanted to say?"

"I also happened to hear that your lost memories aren't so lost anymore," Inoichi innocently remarked. "Is that true?"

"Yes," the Hokage smiled faintly. "I thought the last Council meeting hinted at that."

"It did hint at something," Inoichi snorted. "No one was entirely sure what, though."

"Well, now you know for certain," the Yondaime shrugged. "Feel free to spread that around if you're so inclined."

"Sure." While Inoichi was very happy that the fox-child's news was confirmed, he had a bit of a bone to pick with his restored leader. "What was with the fake peanut can?"

"You said that I wasn't any fun anymore, and I felt like proving you wrong. I didn't feel like doing what you used to find so fun about me—as that involved getting me drunk and then laughing at me—so I came up with something else." The Hokage flashed Inoichi one of his famous cheesy grins, so wide that his eyes tended to get squeezed shut by it. "I do believe I succeeded, don't you?"

Inoichi gave him a disgruntled look. "Yeah, sure," he huffed. "I suppose we can't have people finding out that the Hokage can't hold his liquor and turns into a whiny girl when he gets tipsy."

Now it was the Hokage who was frowning. "Yes, I'd rather not have that opinion floating around."

"Sure thing," Inoichi agreed, cheery mood restored. "We missed you, you know."

The Yondaime nodded. "I can imagine."

There was silence for a minute before Inoichi spoke up again.

"If you don't already have a girlfriend tucked away somewhere, you should get one."

The Hokage stared at him. "…Why?"

"Female companionship for one," Inoichi answered, "but, more importantly, for the future!"

"The future?"

"If you just have one kid with a tenth of your talent, it'll be fantastic," the Yamanaka explained. "Your line should continue, and the sooner the better. Babies are exhausting."

The Hokage just kept staring at him and Inoichi started to wonder if he'd pushed the you-need-to-spawn-an-heir-as-soon-as-possible idea a bit too hard, too fast. Various members of the Council had brought the matter to the Hokage's attention throughout his reign, but he'd always done his best to ignore it. Now that his memory was restored, surely whatever hang-ups he had on the idea would be resolved…right?

Is there some reason he doesn't want kids? Inoichi wondered incredulously. I can't imagine one. He likes kids. He adored those students of his…

"Heh," the Hokage chuckled and stood up from behind his desk. "I'm touched that you're so worried about my legacy, Inoichi." He walked around his desk to pat the other man on the shoulder. "But you don't have to worry. My line is ensured." And then he walked out of the office.

Inoichi stood in the empty office and wrangled with this new snippet of information.

…What the hell does he mean by that?! Does he have a—no, he's an only child. Some other relative? I don't remember hearing of any… Could he have a kid already? …No, that doesn't seem likely. Maybe he just knocked some girl up…?

Maddened by the possibilities, he strode out of the office intent on catching up to the Hokage to extract more information—

THUD.

"Hey!"

Inoichi cringed at the mess of dropped papers, and more so at the irritated glare that the red-headed woman was giving him.

"Uh, sorry…"

She growled and crouched down to gather everything up.

The Yamanaka almost continued on his mission, but he recalled Chouza's desire to know more about the Hokage's assistant. And who better to ask than the woman herself? So he joined her in gathering up the spilled documents.

"Sorry, I wasn't looking where I was going," he muttered.

"Obviously," she grunted.

Well aren't you a ray of sunshine? "One of my friends swears that he's met you before—before you came to your current position—but he can't remember where."

"I've lived in this village for a long time," she shrugged. "Until I got pregnant, I was a kunoichi. I'm sure that I've crossed paths with you and your buddies at least once or twice in the past."

And then, with her stack of papers restored, she swept off down the hall without another word.

"But, that doesn't help at all…" Inoichi sighed to thin air.


Naruto took a swig from his water bottle, and then splashed some over his head. Sasuke studied some of his used kunai, throwing one to the side when he determined it was unsalvageable. They'd just finished a spar and were taking a breather before they started up again. Kakashi was off on another part of the training field they were practicing on with Sakura, teaching her some more about genjutsu.

"Heh, I totally got you!" Naruto grinned.

"No, you didn't," Sasuke scoffed.

"Yes, I did!"

"Hn," the Uchiha grunted.

"Why do you always grunt like that?" Naruto frowned. "And why do all the girls seem to like it?"

"No idea," Sasuke shrugged, ignoring the first question. "I wish they didn't."

Naruto rolled his eyes and stretched, mindful of his sore spots.

"Hey, Naruto," the Uchiha muttered after a pause. "What do you know about your father?"

The blonde genin blinked. "Huh?"

"Stupid," Sasuke muttered. "Do you know anything about your father? Did your mom show you any pictures or tell you any stories?"

"…No." Naruto frowned at his teammate. "Why?"

Sasuke had finished going through his kunai and blinked disbelievingly at the blonde. "Are you serious?"

"Yeah, so what?" Naruto squinted at him. "Why do you even care?"

"I was curious," Sasuke replied. "You've never said a word about him, not even back in school where everybody always argued whose dad was better. Your mom never said anything either."

"Geeze, you're just as nosy as Ino and Sakura," Naruto snorted.

"No I'm not," Sasuke scowled.

"Yeah you are," Naruto retorted.

"Hn," Sasuke sneered and got up to stand out in the open part of the field. "Let's go."

Naruto rolled his eyes and went to spar with his partner again. Sometimes Sasuke could be as touchy as a girl…especially when he was compared with a girl. Too bad he didn't hit like a girl.

I'll ask Mom about it tonight, Naruto decided as a nasty punch clipped his shoulder. Just for Sasuke-teme…


Yamanaka Inoichi sighed as he slunk into the Nara household. As he and his wife were going to have dinner with the Naras in an hour, he didn't see much point in going home just to leave and come here. All he had to do was use the phone and let his wife know that he was already with Shikaku and Yoshino and he was set.

After losing the Hokage in his office, he never managed to catch up with the man again. It was the same with the village leader's assistant. So after chatting up a few office ninja (which netted him no useful information) he ended up leaving.

At least I found out something… Which is better than nothing, of course. But still…

"How troublesome," Shikaku muttered at the sight of him.

"Did you not find out anything?" Chouza asked between chewing on his salted nuts.

"What on earth are you talking about?"

Inoichi did a bit of a double-take. "Not to be rude…but what are you doing here, Hiashi?"

"I've come to pick up some medicine for my uncle," the Hyuuga leader replied.

Like the Yamanaka were known for flowers, the Nara were known for their traditional medicines. They had assisted in the refinement of the Akimichi's special pills and raised deer to use their shed antlers as medicinal ingredients. Of course the Hyuuga would buy their medicines direct from the other clan; most clans did. Only the proud Uchiha seemed to shun giving the Nara (and most other clans) their business.

"…Why not send a Branch member to get it?" the Yamanaka wondered.

"I like to run errands myself on occasion," was Hiashi's haughty response.

"Inoichi went to the Tower to see if he could find out the cause of Hokage-sama's altered behavior," Shikaku explained before Inoichi could respond.

"Did you ask about the Hokage's assistant?" Chouza asked.

"Yeah, I asked about her," Inoichi sighed as he sat down on the couch between a snacking Chouza and an irritated Hiashi. "All I really got was that she used to be an active field kunoichi so she might've run into us a few times doing ninja things."

"The Hokage's secretary?" Hiashi sniffed disdainfully. "I recall her earlier years. She was a rather vulgar woman, and could never tell the difference between my brother and I. She would start talking to me, realize her mistake mid-sentence, and then complain: 'Oh, you're the wrong one. Where's your brother? You know, the one of you two with the pulse.'" He shook his head gravely. "I don't understand how she managed to gain her current position."

Inoichi struggled mightily not to laugh. "'The one of you two with the pulse'!"

"But where did I see her?" Chouza frowned.

"Most likely wherever Namikaze-san was," Hiashi replied, pointedly ignoring Inoichi's snickers. "She tended to appear wherever he was."

Chouza was silent for a moment before his round face brightened. "Oh yes, now I remember! At that bachelor party we went to for Inoichi's cousin, when we got Minato drunk and were dragging him home she ran into us. She got all mad and was swearing at us and she started to take Minato home herself, but he got sick on her shoes so she started swearing at him."

"Oh yeah," Shikaku snorted. "I remember that…"

"Disgusting," Hiashi muttered.

Inoichi frowned in deep thought as he dug up the appropriate memory. As he'd been drinking, it wasn't entirely clear, but once he reviewed it, the other bits of memory that dealt with her soon followed. And it was kind of hard to believe that that girl had grown into the woman who served the Hokage.

Most of the time he'd barely noticed the Hokage's red-headed secretary when she was around. All that really stuck out about her in his mind was her red hair and every now and then she got a bit snappy with people. But other than that, she just seemed to fade into the background. She was quiet and polite and patient.

It didn't seem possible that the loud-mouthed, foul-mouthed girl that he vaguely remembered following Minato around and pestering him, was the same person as the much quieter, much more controlled secretary that served Minato, the Hokage.

"You sure it's the same chick?" Inoichi asked Hiashi dubiously. "Not her crazy sister or something?"

"I'm certain," Hiashi glared. "She is a refugee from the war; the only Uzumaki in the village…until the birth of that child of hers. Now, could we please get onto the subject of the Hokage's sanity?"

"Oh he's sane," Inoichi sighed and leaned back against the couch. "Heck, he's all better now! I mean, all better, no memory problems at all."

Shikaku's eyes actually widened. "Eh? He's got his memory back?"

"He does," Inoichi smirked. "He's back to his old self."

"That is a relief," Hiashi remarked sedately.

"That's great!" Chouza grinned. "But…what was with the fake snakes?"

Hiashi raised an eyebrow. "What snakes?"

"He just didn't want to go drinking with us again," Inoichi hurriedly answered. "Hey, guess what else I found out?"

"What else did you find out?" Shikaku grumbled, his bored demeanor firmly back in place.

Inoichi folded his arms over his chest. "I hit Minato with the you-need-to-find-a-girl-and-have-kids issue, and he said something really weird."

"What did he say?" Chouza asked curiously.

"He said not to worry, that his line was already ensured." Inoichi paused for a moment to let the three other men chew over that tidbit. "Now, Minato's an only child, and most of his family is dead as far as anyone knows, so I figure that means one of two things. Either he somehow already has a kid running around that none of us know about, or he just recently got busy with a girl and got really lucky."

Yoshino, Shikaku's wife, chose that moment to enter the living room with a paper packet of the medicine that Hiashi had come for.

"Here you go, Hiashi-sama," she said with a polite smile.

"Thank you," he nodded and handed over the payment he owed. Hiashi stood and stiffly bowed to the other men. "Thank you for your...enlightening…information. Good day." And then he made his exit.

"Inoichi," Yoshino frowned. "I'll call your wife for you."

"Thank you, Yoshino-chan!" Inoichi called after her as she disappeared back into the kitchen.

"You really think Hokage-sama already has a kid somewhere?" Chouza muttered as he sifted through his bag of nuts.

"I guess it's possible," Shikaku shrugged.

Inoichi closed his eyes and sighed deeply as he mulled over the possibilities again. The "recently conceived" child was most likely. It didn't really seem possible that he could've had a child already and no one had noticed.

What girl would he get busy with? About the only woman I know he spends time with is his secretary. She's his age, so a bit on the old side for having babies…

He frowned.

She already has a kid, though. She's…that kid's mother. So at least she's fertile…

He thought about the secretary, and how she was supposedly the crazy red-head who used to platonically chase the future Hokage around. He thought about the kid she had, the one cursed with the demon. And, now that he thought about it, he realized that he didn't really know the details of the kid's face. He knew the yellow-blonde hair and whisker-marked cheeks well enough, but little else. It made him wonder about the other half of the equation that made the kid.

"Hey, Shikaku," the Yamanaka muttered. "Does your wife order those class pictures from the Academy?"

"Of course," Shikaku yawned. "Why?"

"I want to look at 'em, why else would I ask?"

The Nara shrugged, peeled himself out of his armchair, and trudged into the kitchen. There was a brief discussion with his wife, it sounded like Yoshino smacked him, and then there were some footsteps on the stairs and then the floor above. Eventually Shikaku returned with a stack of photographs, most of which were still stored in the clear plastic sleeves they had come in.

Every school took some form of class pictures, even the Ninja Academy. There were the individual photos, and then the class photos. The first years' class photos were full of students, with the number shrinking each year as the less promising students figured out they weren't meant to be ninja and transferred to one of the civilian schools.

Inoichi jumped straight to the last class photo. Most of the faces were unimportant; the kids had lasted all the way to the last year and passed the exams, but their teachers hadn't rated their teams as acceptable and they'd either gone back for a remedial year or given up and gone into the civilian school. That left nine faces: his daughter and her teammates, and six others divided between two teams.

His eyes eventually picked out the blonde-haired boy that he was seeking. He studied the hair, the face, the smile…and swallowed a curse. He's seen that smile dozens of times before, most recently just hours ago in the Hokage's office. That same stupid grin. It looked rather foxy on the kid, though.

"Damn," he muttered, tossing the picture down onto the coffee table. "He did do his secretary…before she was his secretary."

"How'd you figure that?" Shikaku frowned and picked up the photo. He squinted at the image for a while, and then answered his own question. "Oh. Damn."

"What?" Chouza piped up. Shikaku showed him the picture and pointed out the face. "Oh. How come no one ever noticed before?"

"Because no one ever wanted to look," Inoichi sighed and rubbed at his eyes. "No one wanted to see."

The Hokage protected the boy, so no one dared harm him. No one wanted him around, so they un-saw him. Even when the child scampered innocently after the Yondaime, no one really looked at him, let alone noted the uncanny resemblance.

Fear made people stupid and blind.