A/N: Alrighty, folks. One chapter left. I'm picking up a new job with long hours/few days off, as well. My next project will be a Hobbit soulmate fic posted over on AO3 (username Veriduin), but after that's done, I'll be picking back up with LMS2. I have a few ideas for the sequel, but nothing like a plot yet. If anyone has any ideas they want to see in the LMS sequel, toss 'em out in the comments.
Sakura hadn't been very close with Haruno - now Otomo - Mebuki. After the wedding, they had parted ways without so much as a whisper of a promise to see each other again. So when Mebuki had asked - via mission log no less! - for Sakura to visit, she was more-or-less baffled.
"You can watch her, can't you Uzumaki-san?" Mebuki shoved the bundle of pink cloth at the jounin.
"Why?" Sakura looked down at the little baby in her arms and felt an amount of confusion she didn't expect.
"I can trust you not to fuck up Saku-chan's standing in the court." Mebuki snorted, "We'll be back in a month or so. Kizashi has to do something up in the Land of Iron. Samurai business or something. It's either naming you as her godmother or leaving her with Ryoma. As much as I love my brother-in-law, he is not the kind of person one asks to look after a baby."
"I'm needed in Konoha, though." Sakura blinked. It was only the first week of October, but...
"Just talk with Sarutobi-san. He's on the Twelve Shinobi Guardians, and he's agreed to help out when you need to be on the council." Mebuki dropped a kiss on her daughter's head, "It'll be fine. Bye, Sakura-chan. Mama loves you. Be good for Auntie Sakura."
Sakura sighed. Completely steamrolled by her mother once again, and this time she was left holding a baby she could barely stand to see. Not exactly what she was expecting when answering an urgent summons from the Otomo clan.
The fall wind blew her hair away from her face as she looked out over the Otomo gardens, but it offered her no comfort. October had just started, and ill winds were brewing. If only she could tell where the danger was.
"What's wrong, Uzumaki-san?" Asuma couldn't help but notice the way his fellow ninja stared out in the direction of Konoha.
Sakura couldn't hide the nervous energy that had been filling her all week, even though Asuma had been hovering around the Otomo compound since Meibuki's entourage left. When she had first awoken - closer to midnight than dawn - she had been filled with an anxious jittery calm that shook her soul even as it steadied her hands.
A little over a week playing at being a mother had Sakura on edge already. She wasn't built for long-term care-giving. Part of her was thankful she hadn't seen Jin in months, because if this was part and parcel of being married, she didn't know if she could do it.
"I need to go." she pressed baby Sakura into the ninja's hands. "I have a terrible feeling that something's wrong. I just…"
"It's never good to ignore your feelings." Asuma nodded, pulling a cigarette out with his free hand.
"No smoking around the baby." she snatched the death stick from him and crushed it. "If I find out you did, I'll make certain you never smoke again."
"Got it." he nodded nervously, but Sakura was already gone.
She flew through the forests. October tenth was dawning red, and she couldn't shake the feeling that she was already too late.
Naruto was crying. Naruto was crying his tiny head off, and baby Sakura was crying. The scarred ninja stood in the middle of her living room unable to get herself to move to answer the door, shattered glass all around her.
"I'm coming in!" Mikoto bellowed, concerned, smashing the door almost before she finished speaking.
"Oh, Sakura." practiced eyes took in the broken baby bottles, screaming infants, and singular, shell-shocked woman at the center of it all.
Her eyes filled up with tears. She couldn't even move to grab the babies, trapped by the mental barrier of glass and indecision and pain. Shikaku entered close behind, sending Mikoto to the children as he crossed the room.
"I…"
He wrapped his arms around her, cautious of the glass.
His voice was soothing, muttering useless platitudes.
"I was too late." her voice broke.
"You couldn't have known."
"I did. I knew something was wrong."
"No. I didn't say something. I should have…"
"I was too late." Sakura hiccupped, "And Kushina's dead. And Minato's dead. And…"
"Minato's still alive. Sandaime-sama completed the ritual, not Minato-sama. It's different..."
"Minato's going to die. Cause I was stupid. There can't be anything good around me. This whole situation… It's like fate wants me to fail…"
"Fate can go fuck itself." Shikaku held her. "Now you're coming with me. Mikoto-san, Yoshino's going to help, you have enough on your plate. Nothing's going to happen. I won't let it."
Sakura slipped out of his hold to kneel in the broken glass, grinding it into her shins. It didn't hurt as much as the knowledge that no matter what she did, her future was still going to come to pass.
Mikoto expertly gathered the little tote bag filled to bursting with baby gear in the background, feeding one babe then the next with practiced hands. Sakura didn't even notice.
Sakura lay on the Nara's couch staring up at the ceiling. Kakashi, Rin, Kushina, and soon Minato were gone. Sandaime-sama wasn't here to take the reins back up, which left only Danzo, and he was going to run the nation into the dirt.
Sakura's hand on the soju bottle gave it a little shake. Empty.
"...asleep. The children are fine." Shikaku's voice was soft, barely drifting over to her.
"What's going on with her, really?" Yamanaka Inoichi's voice followed, and the sound of both men sitting heavily on the kitchen chairs.
"She blames herself." the sound of more booze being passed out made Sakura almost sit up to steal some. Almost. She wanted to know how much her supposed friend was telling his best friend. Did she really place her faith in someone who broke her trust so easily?
"Survivor's guilt." the Yamanaka spoke.
A sake saucer clinked heavily on the wooden table.
"I should have insisted on seeing her myself."
"I still can't tell you why she won't talk to you. It's not just a matter of national security." Shikaku gave a bitter laugh, "If I were a Kage, I'd have classed it a SSS secret and sealed her in a dungeon for what she knows. But that would be detrimental to the nation, too."
Another clink. More liquid being poured.
"She's probably feeling survivor's guilt. Kushina's death… It was unavoidable after the seal broke. She couldn't have stopped that, even if she knew it were going to happen." Shikaku continued.
Sakura wondered if they were putting on this show for her benefit.
"Not that anyone could have known that. Not for certain." Yamanaka sighed, "I mean, we all knew it was a possibility. But we all expected Biwako-sama to contain the beast!"
A saucer slammed down.
"She was in such ill health! How did nobody catch that?!" he continued his thought, growing louder and less controlled with every drink.
"Biwako-sama was an old woman. She must not have even realized how poor her health had been. Remember your grandfather? Yamanaka-jiijii went the same way, barely even mentioned he was having chest pains until he just fell over during a meeting. Thought it was just a part of being old."
"Grampa didn't have the destruction of Konoha on his hands if he ignored his health."
In the lull of conversation, Sakura rolled her soju bottle against the floor. Still empty. Realizing she might have given herself away, Sakura snorted and rolled over, hugging the bottle like a teddy bear.
"Kakashi and Rin… That incident must have messed her up worse that I thought. If I had just…" Yamanaka let out the breath he was holding, picking up the conversation before Sakura could actually fall asleep.
"The blame game can't be won." Shikaku's voice shifted, and the sound of a heavy pat told Sakura that he probably put his hand on Inoichi's shoulder, "You taught me that."
"No use in 'what ifs'." Inoichi sighed again, heavy with unshed tears.
"What do I do?"
"Don't leave Sakura alone." Inoichi assessed slowly, "She's probably thinking something along the lines of 'it should have been me'. And if she isn't, she may try to suss out who she thinks is the culprit. The Kyuubi Incident… It's more like an act of nature, but it's natural to want someone to blame. If we humans can find a way to shift the blame to the physical world, we will. And unless she's secretly a God or something, there's nothing that could have been done."
"I've been trying to ground her in the present." Shikaku's chair gave a creak. Probably leaning back against it. "Naruto-chan and Sakura-chan… She has to take care of them both, at least until Mebuki-san comes back."
"Sakura...chan?"
"Uzumaki Sakura's precious little goddaughter. If I didn't know better, I'd say Sakura-san's her mother. The kid is Mebuki through and through, though." Shikaku gave a bitter snort, "They have that same pink hair."
"Oh, lord. So Otome Sakura? That's Mebuki-chan's husband's clan, right?"
"Otomo. Yeah."
"I had heard a rumor that Saku… Uzumaki-san was a Haruno as well."
"Probably close to the truth, looking at Sakura-chan."
"What's betting someone at the meeting tomorrow accuses Sakura of having a secret family?"
"No bet. If someone else doesn't, you will." Shikaku snorted, "Just wait till you see the kid. It's like looking at Sakura's past. Kinda makes me a bit unsettled, though."
"I'd guess you see Otomo-chan and think that's what Uzumaki-san could have been, once. We're all like that, though. I remember the first time I saw you holding Shikamaru. I couldn't stop wondering what your life might have been like if it weren't for the war."
"Yeah." Shikaku sighed heavily.
Sometimes, Sakura forgot. Forgot that even though these people didn't see the worst the future could offer, they still had their own war, their own demons. She closed her eyes and let her head fall to the side, asleep before she had a chance to decide if she wanted to or not.
Sakura's head pounded, but at least she wasn't the only one hungover. The lights in the council room were dimmed. The only people in the room who were clear headed were the Sandaime's old teammates, though even they looked haunted. Thunder rolled overhead. The lights flickered.
So many issues needed to be addressed, and each one was just as important as the next.
"What we need…" Sakura muttered to herself, "Is an interim Hokage. An acting head to cover the village matters."
"Seconded." Shikaku, spoke loud enough to be painful.
She glared at the man.
"Third." Danzo raised his hand, "The motion passes."
"Ground rules." Tsume glared holes in the wood paneling over the old bastard's shoulder, "No one can vote for themselves. No one can nominate themselves. And it must be someone in this room."
"Wouldn't it be better if…" the Akimechi head, Chouji's grandfather who refused to give up his seat until he was dead, rolled his head up.
"Namikaze-sama will. Wake. Up." Tsume insisted, "And when he does, it's best if the information learned by the interim Hokage doesn't leave this council."
"Ground rules seconded." Shikaku groaned with his face pressed into the cool desk.
"Third." Sakura groaned. She didn't believe Minato would wake. She had been the medic on-site, had been the one to heal the man, but her control wasn't back where it needed to be. She wasn't exploding fish any more, but it was like she was a newbie again. She had no faith in her own skills.
"Motion passes." Mitokado agreed.
"I nominate Uzumaki-sama." Shikaku mumbled against the table where he had fallen. "She's already privy to select state secrets by virtue of being the Hokage's sister-in-law."
"Isn't that a bit…" Danzo sneered.
"What 'state secrets' do you think he meant, Counselor Danzo?" Sakura gave a headache weakened glare. "Cause he obviously means the location, age, and name of the jinchuriki. You know, considering I was there, unlike some coward."
"If Shimura-san is a coward, then so am…" Tsume growled, to be cut off by a wave of Sakura's hand.
"You were doing your duty. He was ordering Uchiha away from the Kyuubi on the off chance they could control it."
"You weren't even th…"
"Mikoto is one of my best friends. Do you honestly think she and her clan members weren't going to talk to me?" Sakura sneered back at the hardened old man. "Sure, you told them to protect the civilians, but I can read between the lines."
"We're getting off topic." Shikaku cut down the argument with a weary sigh. "Back to my nomination. Uzumaki Sakura."
"I nominate Yamanaka Inoichi." Sakura shot back. She had no desire to be anywhere near the office of Hokage. She had two brats to look after and running a half-downed nation the size of Konoha was no small time sink.
"Fuck it." Shikaku ran a hand down his face. "Just write the name of the interim Hokage on a slip of paper and throw it in here."
He held up the Hokage's coffee cup, empty and clean since the last meeting.
They were given two minutes to decide, then the cup was passed around. Most nominations were folded into origami shuriken to protect the name written on the paper.
Tsume was given the cup to ensure that no one tampered with the election. She sniffed each page to ensure that each council member only voted once, and that they didn't quietly palm a few votes to cast a ballot for their own selves. Then she checked the scent against the name on the ballot to ensure that no one voted for themselves.
Once she was done with the authentication process, Tsume passed the cup of names back to Shikaku who counted each slip out in case Tsume slipped, or - more likely - cheating for the sake of her own candidate.
"So, the total is four votes for Uzumaki-san, four for myself, one each for Yamanaka-san and Mitokado-san, and six abstains." there were sad looks from around the room at the six empty chairs. Five belonged to clans that had been wiped out. The Senju seat waited for the return of the last of it's clan to take it's place, a silent observer.
"Since the Uzumaki and Senju have been intermarried so much, can't Uzumaki-san break the tie?" the Hyuuga clan head, a wizened old man who seemed less a friendly grandfather and more the crazy old man in the park who forgot his meds again, spoke with a calm voice. He worked at the radio station on Thursdays as a weekly newscaster, so in spite of looking like a half-crazed dumpster jockey, he sounded like the epitome of Hyuuga calm.
"Wouldn't matter. Uzumaki-san was the one to vote for Inoichi." Tsume grunted, "And the rules say she can't pick herself. And even if she could, she's too modest."
Each point was punctuated by a tap from one of her long nails against the desk.
Suddenly, Tsume stood up, hands in her pocket.
"Heads or tails?" she bellowed, pointing between Sakura and Shikaku.
"Tails!" Sakura jumped, watching the coin flip through the air. Tsume didn't even flick it, just chucked the coin in the vague direction of up with a hand full of pocket lint.
"Uzumaki wins the coin toss." Tsume declared.
"Two-headed coin…" Sakura was muttering.
"What was that, oh great interim-Hokage-sama?" Shikaku snorted.
"That was a two-headed ryo. I know it." she had seen it as it flipped. It was false.
"The one who spoke first." Shikaku assessed, "Tsume played us all. It wasn't about winning the coin flip, it was about who could make snap decisions to determine an outcome. Very clever."
"If we didn't need every hand on deck, I'd kill her." Sakura snorted. "I'm not taking the Hokage seat." she nodded at the empty chair at the head of the room.
"Of course not." Tsume laughed. "Namikaze-sama's gonna wake up any day now."
The council couldn't afford to dilly dally over the minutia of running the village, but key issues were addressed. Naruto was officially assigned to Sakura's care and granted the name Uzumaki Naruto. He needed a guardian who was currently awake, and since he was half Uzumaki… Well, no one wanted to fight Sakura for custody. She was fierce in her defense of her nephew, cold and hard as the Yuki clan ice mirrors after it became known who the newest jinchuriki was.
Search and rescue teams were formed around the Inuzuka, Hyuuga, and Uchiha clans. The first two were trackers, looking for anyone that may still be alive in the rubble of ruined homes. The Uchiha used their Sharingan to identify the best way to remove the rubble. It reminded Sakura so much of the destruction of her home that she had to look away. How many lives could have been saved if the Uchiha were still alive back then? She didn't know, and that line of thinking only lead to more trouble.
She asked Mikoto to open the Uchiha clan compound to the homeless. The more people that interacted with the Uchiha now, the less ill will would breed between them and the rest of the village. It was seen as a shrewd move, considering they had been ordered not to help against the Kyuubi even knowing they held the potential to control it. Sakura just wanted to do damage control.
The Akemichi were to open soup kitchens and be in charge of the rationing, and Nara land was being annexed for the time being as makeshift farm land. No one was allowed to hunt the deer, but food was going to be tight for now. Yamanaka were being roped into the role of therapists to deal with the trauma of the events, since it was too easy to allow ill will to breed in the hearts of the populace.
Her most unconventional order was to allow Naruto's status to be open to the public. Both as a jinchuriki and as Minato's son. The old guard were leery of announcing either fact, considering it just invited the enemies of Konoha to attack. Sakura put her foot down, though. To defeat the enemy, first you have to defeat the one in your own home became her mantra. It didn't matter what she said, though. It wasn't a crime to talk about it, but she wasn't going to be announcing the fact. If curious children found the information, they wouldn't be killed for it, and parents wouldn't be punished for answering questions.
She knew it wasn't going to curb the hatred some people felt for her young ward. After all, the people wanted someone to blame.