((A/N: I don't know if I told you guys this yet, but school has officially ended for me now! I've gotten all of my tests and finals finished, and I got all A's and B's in all classes - something I'm rather proud of, if I do say so myself 8)

But anyway, onto the review responses!:

readthishit- dear lord, can you imagine what the Narutoverse would be like if tumblr existed there? My god... Also yes, Rae is adopting all of the children. All of them. How can anyone live in a world where a ten year old girl doesn't have ten billion babies under her wings, hmm?

Ulsindhe- Though it's true this story won't be following the Canon path, it doesn't mean nothing from canon will happen here. A lot of things will still be happening, some small and unimportant, and others big and world-changing. I'm not entirely sure if the Invasion will happen the same way, but it'll still be happening in at least some sense, I can promise that. Also yeah, I really miss writing the Suna Family ): Gaara, Leo, and Happy have all grown on me, the poor babes need their albino chibi back in their lives. However, who said that they have to wait until the invasion to meet again? Her first C Rank might have something to do with travelling to another village... 8)

ALSO- I've been super duper busy lately. Sorry! I thought school ending would make this easier for me, give me more time to type up story chapters, you know? But boy was I wrong. I have so much regular work to do now that school doesn't take up my time, and I've been helping my father around the house a lot because he's getting old and my brothers are busy elsewhere most days. Chapters might come slower from here on out, or maybe not, I dunno. Either way, I'll be writing Omakes as often as I can and posting them soon after.

Enjoy this chapter!))

Two days pass by rather quickly in Rae's opinion.

She had spent the rest of her break day within the walls of the Uchiha Main Family's house, as Mikoto had thrown a little 'get-together' for Itachi's welcome back party. It was mainly just Itachi, Sasuke, Mikoto, Rae, and Kenta there, since it was obvious Itachi didn't have much other friends. There were, however, many people who came by to congratulate him for his promotion, and several others who came by just to drop off some food and welcome Itachi back home. By the end of the day, Rae had been bringing home leftover sweets to her house, something of which Kazuhiko made her promise not to eat them for dinner when he was away at work most nights(he'd peered at her suspiciously when she said she wouldn't eat them for dinner).

The next day passed fairly quickly, even if Rae was downright exhausted by the end of that day. When Manabu-sensei said he'd 'make up for lost time' for every hour she spent away from her regular training regime, he really meant it. She'd never been that exhausted and downright dead on her feet, not even during the first month when she felt as if it couldn't get any worse.

The day after that, Rae got up at nearly four in the morning to prepare breakfast - one for Kazuhiko, who she knew had to be up at four thirty, and one for Naruto and herself. After setting the still warm, freshly made breakfast for her father into the fridge with a note taped to it, she took the two bentos for her and her pseudo little brother, and left the house. She hesitated on the front steps, then went back inside, stuffed the two bento boxes into a shoulder bag, then grabbed Jirouko to come along with her.

The Coyotes were all back in their own homes now, as Manabu-sensei and Roba had both deemed their 'bonding' time to be over by now. They would still come over every time she started her training for the week, but they no longer were obligated to spend every day and night with her. She had already told them about Naruto's birthday the day before, while they were training, and they all told her to pass along their well wishes and taunts of how difficult it'll be to become Hokage, but none of them could make it.

Not to mention Rae didn't feel like using the chakra necessary to summon any of them.

She'd upped her chakra stores to just barely have enough to summon two, sometimes three, of the Coyotes nowadays. Two if she'd already been using Chakra, and three if she had all her chakra still there and was fully prepared to be knocked unconscious immediately after summoning the third one.

"Naru-chan!" Rae called, standing at Naruto's front door to his apartment. It was nearly five thirty in the morning now, because Rae had gone to the market with Jirouko first after leaving the house. It really hadn't taken long for Rae to find a gift for him - she'd bought him something that had caught her eye the night she was walking home from Itachi's house. It was such a tacky little thing, and it was cheap as all hell, so it wasn't of a very high quality. However, she just couldn't help it when she found it. She'd laughed herself silly, and was one hundred percent sure Naruto would do the same when he saw it.

Besides, even if he didn't like it, she'd gotten him a second gift either way. The first one was more like a gag gift than anything, something to just make him crack a smile or two. The second one, however, she'd put some actual thought into. She was sure he would love it.

There was grumbling on the other side of the door. A moment later, Naruto's messy blond hair appeared in the doorway. He peered up at her in what was probably supposed to look like anger or depression for being woken up so early - but she wasn't buying it. The fact that he was awake at this time right now meant that he knew perfectly well why she was here and what day it was today.

After giving him a disbelieving look, his faked anger disappeared, and he instead gave her a sheepish, yet bright grin.

She responded with a snort.

"Move, let me in," she mumbled, lightly kicking his leg with her own. One of her arms was full with babbling baby, the other was full with carrying her over the shoulder bag, which held both breakfasts she had made, and her two wrapped gifts for Naruto's birthday.

After settling herself down in front of his low coffee table, he immediately sat down in front of her on the other side of the table, poking at Jirouko's belly with his childish fingers. Jirouko let out high pitched squeals every time, attempting to either swat Naruto's hands away from him, or to put them in his mouth. Both of which made Naruto back away quickly.

The one year old baby boy was finally sitting up on his own now, rather than laying on something while swaddled in blankets. He still wore his diaper, of course, but he was also wearing a one-piece soft blue set of pajamas. They were fuzzy and warm, and he absolutely loved them. Most of the time, he refused to change into anything else. While sitting up on one side of the low table, he gripped onto the edge of the table with both hands in an attempt to make sure he didn't fall over, and peered around the room curiously.

Naruto, now apparently fed up with trying to get a reaction out of Jirouko, turned excited blue eyes in Rae's direction. He was still in his pajamas - plain white tee-shirt and blue boxers - and it looked as though he'd been up for only minutes before she'd arrived. Even though his school day started at six in the morning, he normally only ever got up at six thirty and just dealt with the yelling teachers later on. That, or he'd wait until someone else came to wake her up. 'Someone else' always being Rae, considering she was really the only person there who cared for the boy.

She grinned, and reached both hands into her bag.

Naruto's excited, wide eyes, narrowed at her in a childish pout when all she brought out were the two bentos she'd made for them.

"Nee-chan," he deadpanned.

"Now, now, Naru-chan, breakfast is the most important meal of the day. Don't you know that?" She tisked in his direction, even as she casually brought out the gag gift, a small yellow and orange wrapped box, out beside the two bentos. Naruto's eyes immediately latched onto the bright colors, and he reached over to the fist-sized box. Rae snatched it up and gave him a warning glare.

A sheepish grin was all she got in return.

Naruto went and grabbed two pairs of chopsticks from his kitchen, and Rae pulled out the small jar of mashed fruits that she'd bought at the market earlier that morning. Jirouko had already eaten breakfast earlier, but Rae knew from experience that he'd throw a big fit if anyone ate around him without offering him something to eat as well. He wouldn't even eat it most of the time because he was already full, but he'd still be angry if they didn't offer it to him at the very least.

When they began eating their breakfast, they made conversation about whatever came to mind, with the one year old boy sometimes adding in some kind of noise that nobody understood for whatever reasons.

"How has the Academy been, Naru-chan?"

"Great! I mean, it's super boring and the teachers are all stuck up fu-"

"Naruto."

"-jerks, but other than that, it's been pretty cool. It's super fun to prank the teachers, too! They have no idea it was me, even if I get yelled at most of the time anyway."

She smiles.

"Has anybody wished you a happy birthday?"

"...Nah, they don't talk to me a whole lot. They especially get real upset on my birthday. Maybe 'cos they'd feel weird for yelling at me on my birthday, y'know?"

Jirouko lets out a loud coo, stuffing his entire hand into the jar of mashed peaches. Rae nods her head in his direction, without ever taking her eyes off of the blond boy sheepishly rubbing the back of his head with his chopsticks - which was gross, by the way, he was supposed to be eating with those.

"What he said."

Naruto deadpanned and sent her a dry look. Rae grins.

"Happy birthday, Naru-chan."

The dry look disappears, and it's replaced by a cheerful, bright grin sent in her direction. Jirouko, seemingly catching onto the happy energy in the room now, smiled brightly at the both of them, licking peaches off of his hand from time to time.

It doesn't take long for the two of them to finish their breakfasts - perhaps because Naruto had been eyeing the small, fist-sized box for the last several minutes since she'd arrived. She forced him to help her with the dishes first. After washing them and having Naruto dry them and put them in the strainer, something of which she bought after first helping him clean up his apartment, she made him take a bath next. He let a full out suspicious glare color his features at that point, entirely certain that she was purposely just trying to get him to stay away from his gift for as long as possible.

She's simply grinned in retaliation.

While he busied himself with bathing off the dirt he somehow accumulates in the middle of the night, Rae dug out the second gift from her bag. The second gift was larger than the first, about the size of a plate. It was in the shape of a rectangle with slightly round edges. There was no wrapping around it, but rather, it was in a cardboard box the just a size bigger than the actual gift itself. The cardboard box was a plain lime-green color, with a bright orange gift-bow on the top of the lid. She set the gift down at the edge of the table, nearest to where Naruto had been sitting moments before.

She pushed the box further into the center of the table after Jirouko made several valiant efforts to grab the bow off the top of the box.

It was bright and puffy, so Rae couldn't blame him for wanting it. He pouted at her every time she made him stop trying to grab for it.

When Naruto stepped out of the bathroom, wearing his school outfit and pouting at her with a look of impatience, he immediately stopped dead in his tracks when he noticed that the amount of gifts on his table had doubled since he last looked at them. He stared down at the boxes, looked up at Rae, then grinned. He made a move to sit down.

"Put your laundry in the laundry basket."

He let out a loud groan, but immediately set out to do what she'd told him to do.

When finished, he sat down in front of her, beside the baby boy who kept trying to grab the box. Rae opened her mouth to speak, and Naruto shot her an impatient glare. It was nothing more than absolutely adorable on his face, but she shut her mouth anyway. She didn't really have anything else to say to him about cleaning up anyway.

So instead, she smiled softly, and pushed the smaller box towards him.

He didn't need to be told twice - or once, really, she hadn't even told him anything yet - and immediately made to open the wrapping. Rae supposes he was afraid that if he went too slow she would come up with something else for him to clean first. She couldn't help the grin on her face.

He finished opening the wrapping, and pulled off the lid of the box excitedly.

He stared in confusion.

"You gave me Ramen?" He asked, narrowed eyes pointed in her direction. Rae snorted, trying to keep her laughter down. She reached over the table and held out her hands to grab for the box, which he handed over with a suspicious look.

"No, no, it's not actual Ramen. You see," she pulled out the small necklace. The chain was silver and slightly plastic looking - as mentioned before, it was a rather cheap thing - and there was a small, plastic flower-looking object at the bottom. It was white with light a single light pink swirl in the center, and the edges were puffy. She held up the necklace with a grin. "This thing is called a Narutomaki. It goes in Ramen - but, uh, this isn't actual food, it's just a plastic decoration."

Naruto's eyes widen slightly at the name of the not-food object, and he takes the necklace back. He begins examining the small plastic thing he had seen often in his Ramen bowls, and Rae shrugged with a small smile on her face.

"I thought it was just funny. You know, 'cos you're named after that and all. Thought maybe you could wear it to school."

She says that last sentence with a sarcastic, teasing tilt to her voice, but Naruto looks up with wide, happy eyes.

"Hell yeah!"

"Language."

"Heck yeah!"

He immediately moves to put the necklace on himself, and since he was still so small, it slipped on over his head easily. He let it rest over his clothing, the white and pink swirled pendant obvious against the bright orange of his jacket. He held the pendant in his hands, grinning, then looked up at her.

"This is great! I never knew I was named after Ramen! Maybe that's why Ramen's so great - 'cos it got it's name from me! Ha!"

Rae held back on explaining that, technically, he got his name from Ramen and not the other way around, and simply smiled at him. She hadn't expected him to actually wear it, honestly.

She grabbed the box's lid before Jirouko could stick it in his mouth, and pushed the second gift over to Naruto.

He opened it just as quickly as the first one, eyes wide and excited at the idea of getting another great gift. However, just like the first, he was immediately confused when peering down at the open box. He reaches his hand in and grabs the gift, pulling it out to hold it up to the light. A small, black bag greeted him. It was only about the size of a dinner plate, and it had latches on either end of it so you could clip it to something for easier carrying. The outside seemed completely empty, but the bag had bumps in it that meant there was obviously something inside of it.

Naruto, however, was instead drawn to the orange lettering on the outside of the bag.

He grins at it, hands tracing the hand-sewn letters happily. There, his own name was spelled out in bright orange, Naruto Uzumaki.

"Open it, Naru-chan," Rae smiles. She really hoped he liked this one. Though, judging by his excited reaction to the gift that was supposed to just be a joke, she doubted he would hate this one at all.

And he did not disappoint.

When first viewing the contents of the bag, he looked as if he was having difficulty processing what he was seeing. His face went blank, then to curious, then to understanding, then his eyes got impossibly wide and began swimming with unshed tears. He whipped his head up to see his pseudo older sister figure smiling at him from across the table. He looked as though he didn't know whether to cry or shout aloud.

While he was distracted, Jirouko took this time to grab the bow off the top of the box. Nobody bothered to stop him, even if Rae did send him a suspicious look.

"Nee-chan?"

She focused her eyes back to the blond boy. She smiled again.

"What? You look like you've never seen a pranking kit before, otouto."

She scooted closer to his side, leaning over the table to point at each individual object inside the small bag.

"You see? Here's the lock picking stuff - I know you don't know how to do that yet, but I can get Kenta to teach you, he's super good at that kind of sneaky stuff - and right here is a bunch of written instructions for how to make homemade itching powder, since I know you love the stuff. Here's some smoke bombs, but you can fill them with horrible smelling gas, which I still think is hilarious. And here, look - this one's my favorite - it's a little buzzer! You can set it down somewhere, and when someone touches it it'll let out a small shock! Nice, huh?"

She pointed to each object while she explained them. The lock picking set had several small needle-looking objects in it for picking apart the tumblers of a lock, and they were a golden yellow color. There was, in one side of the bag, a small stack of square papers, which each held the instructions for how to make smoke bombs, itching powder, stink bombs, or some weird green goopy stuff from scratch in your own home kitchen. There were also some already premade smoke bombs in the bag, but for safety's sake, they were empty. The last thing, the small electrical buzzer Rae adored, was about the size of a regular ring. It was a simple band of metal, a muted orange in color, and had a small, bright yellow 'gem' on one side that would activate the buzzer and release electricity. She really didn't know how it worked, but she loved it.

Naruto let out a loud hiccup, and when Rae looked down, she was greeted by the sight of a runny-nosed little blond boy, looking up at her with wide, watery eyes and a huge grin.

He set the bag down on the table, and leaned over the small coffee table to latch onto Rae. She let out a surprised grunt, but wrapped her arms around him as well. His stomach and legs rested on the top of the table as he had leaned right over it to hug her, and his scrawny arms wrapped around her neck and shoulders. Rae let out a quiet laugh and leaned down to hug him better, so he wasn't bending his back to reach up to her. He was taller nowadays, of course, but he was still pretty small for his age.

Jirouko looked on at the scene in utter confusion, then let out a loud babble to grab their attention. He had no idea what was going on, really, but he knew he didn't want to be left out of it. Plus it looked like a hug - he wanted a hug, too.

So Naruto reached over and grabbed the baby boy with both arms, pulling him closer in between him and Rae. Jirouko scooched around in Rae's lap for a whole minute, trying to find the most comfortable spot to sit in for the time being. When he was finished, he held out both hands to either side of him expectantly. Rae leaned in and hugged him tight to herself, and Naruto did the same on the either side. When he was safely sandwiched in between the two bigger kids, he was finally satisfied.

"Happy Birthday, otouto."

((A/N: Ta-da! Shorter chapter than usual, whoops. it's only 4.1k words, but it's no biggie I guess.

Anyway, as stated above, I will be taking longer to get out chapters for the story due to life being a bitch to me. Not to mention we only have two laptops in this house, so I kind of have to get into an all out brawl with my four brothers and little sister just to use one of them for a while.

heh... yeah.

Question!: Should Jirouko become a Shinobi when he's older? He has Clan blood in him, not only that but he has main branch Clan blood in him, which makes him naturally stronger than the other members of his clan and a hell of a lot naturally stronger than any civilian. But should he become a shinobi, or should he settle down with a content civilian life? Maybe he can take over as Clan Heir and let his dear nee-chan elope with Itachi and Kenta to Suna...? Let me know what you think should become of Jirouko's future!

That's about it for this chapter. See you next time around. Leave reviews, reviews are love!))