Chapter Fifty-Three

Angry hammering of the skull greeted Kakashi's return to consciousness, as did the sensation of his throat being dried out by air being forced in and out mechanically. His eye scanned the room, darting frantically as adrenaline surged through his mind. Lord Third! Minato! The memories flooded over him, right up to the point where he felt something stinging him in the neck. He needed to scream, but his vocal cords were blocked by the tube down his throat. He began flailing about in panic. Oh god!

"Kakashi!" a female voice boomed, "just stay calm; you want the tube out, right?" Hands firmly, but gently pushed him back down on the bed. All he could do was try to nod. "Okay," a loud click and the mechanical force of air in and out was replaced by his panting, "deep breath!" the woman commanded, peeling off surgical tape from his mouth. "Here we go!"

The sensation of the tube being withdrawn almost caused him to vomit he gagged so hard. A violent coughing fit ensued as his lungs took over control again. Despite the raw throat, he managed to wheeze, "Where am I?"

"Konoha Hospital," his eye finally focused to see the source of the voice – Shizune. Kakashi began feeling self-conscious at her presence. He wasn't wearing his mask, and she was staring at him with a smile. "How do you feel?"

"Lousy," he wheezed, "Lord Third?"

She shook her head, "I'm sorry Kakashi, he was long gone before medics could get to him."

"Orochimaru?"

"Slipped out somehow," she shook her head again.

"My team? Minato?" Kakashi sat upright to only have the hammers attack his skull again.

"Just relax, they're all fine!" she forced him back down. "You need to rest, Kakashi. You almost didn't make it!" She took him by the hand.

"Naruto? Is he?" Kakashi almost didn't ask. The kid had been damn sick when the evacuation had started.

"They just let him out of the ICU; his appendix ruptured. He's going to be okay," she reassured him.

Kakashi sank his head back into the pillow; he'd let everyone down again. As his eyes closed, he could see his fallen ANBU comrades, Lord Third's wife and assistant, Rin, Obito, and Father. Their eyes weighed on him, reminding him of his failure. Tears began leaking from his good eye.

As Shizune released his hand, there was a barely perceptible sound of paper sliding between cloth. The curious noise alerted Kakashi as he cracked his right eye. Even through the distortion of tears, Kakashi recognized the telltale envelope sealed with a red heart being pulled from the medical-nin's robes. As ill-prepared as he was to confront this situation, he knew it was now or never. He seized her by the hand as she moved to set the envelope down, "I knew it was you," he whispered as he captured her wrist.

"K-Ka-Kakashi!" Shizune shook as he held her by the hand.

"You had Tsunade leave the letter in Minato's office before the one meeting, and you dropped the letter as you left the infirmary in the stadium, didn't you," he guessed.

Shizune's lips quivered as she nodded. "H-how did you figure it out?"

"I had suspected Anko, but remember, I have a dog," Kakashi tightened the corner of his mouth into a smile, "Pakkun recognized the scent of cherry blossoms on you, on your lipstick to be specific. He matched it and your scent from the letter." He paused, considering for a moment, "You kissed the letter… do… do you really feel that way about me?"

"K-Kakashi!" Shizune began crying, "I-I watched you protect the village, protecting Lord Fourth and his family, and raising you team like they were your children! I," she stopped, staring him deep in the eyes, "I know all the tragedy, all the pain you've endured! And somehow…" she brought a hand to her mouth to stifle a whimper, "… somehow, you never broke from it!"

"Why?" he collected his scattered thoughts, "Why did you never tell me?"

"I knew about Rin's death from Lady Tsunade… I… I was afraid you'd reject me. When I learned that Naruto would be leaving next year and Sakura and Hinata would have other responsibilities, I thought," she choked on her words for a moment, "I thought it might be time to make myself known." Shizune began sobbing. "I must sound stupid saying this all!"

Ill-prepared as he felt for such a situation, Kakashi sat up, warding off dizziness as he pulled her closer and put his arms around her. Her body hugged into him, cool to the touch. After years of minimal physical contact, and nothing remotely approaching affection, her touch sent a cold shiver down his spine while his heart began boiling to heat him back up. He felt Rin looking over his shoulder, her eyes a lead brick sitting on him. However, the weight suddenly vanished, and it was replaced with the sensation of reassurance. "Let go; live for me. Stop closing yourself off from the joy around you." Rin's voice sounded in his head. He couldn't explain it, but it was there.

Shizune rested her head on his shoulder, "I'm sorry, Kakashi," she cried, "I know you were badly hurt. It's not fair of me to do this to you!"

"Shizune," he hugged her closer, slowly tracing his fingers through her dark, silken hair. "You've chosen a difficult path; I'm not particularly good at this sort of thing." He pulled back, feeling exposed without his mask as he stared into her dark baby-doll eyes, "You might have to be patient with me; I'm learning this all for the first time."

She traced her delicate hand along the side of his unmasked face; his toes curled at her touch. "Then we'll learn together, okay?" she smiled

"Okay," he said as they embraced again.

The sterile white of the hospital room took Kushina back to all the dark places her mind had been in the past thirteen years. What kind of a mom are you? How could you let your son go into danger? Too many days and nights had been spent in rooms like this: recovering from the trauma of Naruto's birth, visiting Akemi as she battled breast cancer, nearly being torn apart from the inside in the aftermath of Naruto's first mission, and more swirled in her head like a hellish maelstrom. If I never see the inside of a hospital room again, it will be too soon.

Her eyes flitted to Naruto. Shizune and Tsunade had opened him up in the operating room, and his appendix had fully ruptured and begun leaking out. The sickly mix of blood, pus, and bacteria draining into his abdominal cavity had already begun its lethal spread. Tsunade raced to get the offending remnant of his appendix out, suture off the hole in Naruto's intestines, and clean the awful mess out of his abdominal cavity. Through several desperate hours of surgery, Kushina could do nothing but pace the hospital hallways, waiting for news.

When they called her into the recovery room with him, Naruto had been anything but lucid, talking gibberish at best. He had a drainage tube in his right side and was on a steady IV drip of fluids and antibiotics. Still, he had been deemed stable enough to move to a regular hospital room. Between meds and exhaustion, Naruto's brief consciousness had given way to a near-coma. Then the drama began. First, a sobbing Hinata had come to check on Naruto, blaming herself for Naruto's condition.

After calming her, Konohamaru had come in the door, also in tears. His mom and dad were missing, as if losing his grandfather today hadn't been bad enough. Kushina had been prepared to go to the house and retrieve the emergency adoption order she and Minato had prepared with the Sarutobi Clan's approval in the event the worst should happen. Thankfully, his parents had shown up to take him home. By the end of the ordeal, Hinata had to assist Kushina into a chair as she almost suffered a fainting spell from sheer emotional exhaustion. She and Hinata just sat there, staring at Naruto's pale, sickly form.

The opening of the door distracted both Kushina and Hinata. "Minato," she raced from the chair, and engulfed her husband in a hug, finally letting the tears loose that she'd kept at bay until now. Minato too began letting his tears flow as he embraced her the way he had when she'd woken up after recovering from having her chakra network repaired. In spite of sweat, grime, and other nastiness coating him, her husband still cut his dashing figure – he was her pillar of strength.

"How is he?" he whimpered.

"Resting," Hinata spoke the words that Kushina couldn't get out of her throat.

"Hinata, you'd better get going," Minato lifted his head from Kushina's shoulder, "Curfew will be going into effect soon, and the hospital will be throwing us all out, even me."

"I… I really don't want to leave him," she began crying as she turned her eyes back to Naruto.

"Hinata," Kushina finally spoke, "there was nothing more you could have done." She managed a weak smile through tears, "And there is nothing more we can do tonight. He'll be all right!" Kushina said the words as much to reassure herself as much as Hinata. "Head down to the lobby, and we'll be down in a few minutes to walk you home."

Hinata stared at her, and then stared again at Naruto. "You're right," she nodded. Hinata stood up, looking sullen. "I'll meet you downstairs."

Hinata skulked to the door, opening it to reveal a curious looking girl, maybe sixteen or eighteen, with long black hair and cute, rounded cheeks. "L-Lady Hyūga!" the girl bowed deferentially, "I'm sorry!"

"Um… it's fine," Hinata replied, perplexed at the strange display of honorifics, "please, it's just Hinata or Lady Hinata if you must."

"P-please, I-I need to speak to Lord Fourth," the girl didn't rise from her bow.

"You!" Minato exclaimed.

"Hon?" Kushina's eyebrows curled in confusion.

"She's the messenger that lured me away from Lord Third!" He rushed forward, seizing the girl by the wrist and dragging her into the room, "Hinata, get security!"

"No! Please wait!"

"Why should we!" Kushina's ire erupted as she shook the girl by the shoulders.

"G-Grandma, please! Don't!" Kushina froze as the girl's familiar blue eyes turned pale violet, and the blood vessels around her eyes protruded, cracking what looked like prosthetic makeup around the girl's soft cheeks.

"B-Byakugan!" Hinata stammered.

"What did you just call me?!" Kushina felt her grip slacken as the words resonated in her head. Grandma! She knew the word's meaning, but it didn't make sense. "What did you just say!" She stared back into the girl's eyes, now reverting back into tear-soaked sapphires – Minato's eyes, the same he'd given to Naruto.

"Who are you?" Minato took the girl by the cheek, peeling off the makeup to reveal whiskers the same as Naruto's. Minato froze with eyes wide open as he stared into the alien-yet-familiar features.

Wordlessly, the girl turned her teary eyes to Hinata, then Kushina, and back to Minato. "My name…" the girl sobbed, "… is Himawari Uzumaki!"

The points of data lined up, but Kushina's brain refused to make sense of them. Himawari Uzumaki, Grandma, the whiskers! "You," she took the girl's chin in her hand, staring into the eyes that belonged to Naruto, "how?"

"I'm," she peeled away the makeup concealing her whiskers, wiping away tears in the process, "I'm from the future, Grandma, Grandpa. I…" she cried, "I've wanted so badly to meet you, ya know!" Himawari buried her face into Kushina's shoulder. Minato embraced both of them.

"Himawari…" Minato glanced at Naruto and then Hinata.

Hinata's mouth hung open as she stared. "Y-you're…" Hinata turned bright pink.

"Mom," Himawari stared with a sweet smile, "the old photos didn't do justice to how cute you were at this age."

"You mean…" Hinata's eyes shot open wide.

Himawari nodded, "Yes, in about ten years you grow up to marry my father," she turned to look at Naruto, "and you give birth to my brother, Boruto, and later me."

Hinata's eyes rolled back in her head, and Minato barely caught her as she fainted. "Hinata!"

"Hinata, honey, breathe!" Kushina and Himawari desperately raced to Hinata. Kushina gently tapped Hinata on the cheek.

Hinata's eyes shot open, and she blinked twice, staring blankly at her future daughter. "You took that a lot better than I expected," Himawari chuckled as she bit her lip.
"W-what do you mean?" Hinata stammered, still shocked by the revelation.

"I guess my little experiment changed the timeline more than I expected. Where I came from," Himawari explained, "You were known for fainting at the mere sight of papa until you were seventeen."

"Himawari," Kushina stared curiously, "where exactly do you come from?" She felt her face wrinkle, "And why did you say you had always wanted to meet us?"

The girl began tearing up again, "The timeline I grew up in, I never knew Dad's parents, neither did he," she wept.

"The vision," Minato's eyes widened in realization, "that was you!"

Himawari nodded. "When I was looking through dad's old journals and Uncle Konohamaru's scrapbook, I read about the death of Lord Fourth and his wife, about an attack of the tailed beast on the village the same night." She wept, "Grandma, Grandpa, you would have died, never having the chance to see Naruto grow up! And the village blamed him for it!"

"No," Kushina whispered as the stone landed on her guts. The village my husband and I protected turned on our son! "Why would they do that?"

"Being known as jinchuriki is a dangerous thing," Hinata said, "that is why you kept it a secret from Naruto and me until we were five. And look at poor Gaara for that matter." The hard reality of what would have been Naruto's reality had she and Minato died twisted her heart.

"Jinchuriki, mom?" Himawari stared in shock.

Hinata nodded, "Yes, the night Naruto was born they tried breaking Nine-Tails in half, my mom used herself and me as a conduit for the transfer, but I ended up absorbing part of Nine-Tails."

"And now she's holding a full half of him," Kushina said.

"I- I didn't know! I… I'm sorry," Himawari cried. "Father grew up so alone!" she wailed, "After all the heartache and suffering he endured to be recognized by the village, I wanted him to know happiness!"

"You didn't mean to hurt anyone, Himawari, and you may have saved the village more heartache than you know," Minato reassured her. "Your father is already a hero at this age."

"Himawari," Hinata's voice became haunted, "Who is the leader of the Hyūga Clan where you came from?"

"Aunt Hanabi," Himawari answered, "She became clan heir after defeating you in a duel when you were eight years old, not long after Grandma Akemi died."

"Mom died?"

"She's alive?!"

"Hinata spotted the cancer growth when it was early stage," Kushina remarked. Maybe a few things went wrong, but it sounds like she did a better job than anyone could have hoped for! "Akemi is alive; she's even my student right now."

Himawari's cheeks turned pink as tears traced down, "She's alive, but who is the clan leader then?"

"I am," Hinata smiled, "Naruto kept me moving forward when I would have given up and thrown in the towel."

"Wow, things did change," Himawari sighed.

"But what about Lord Third?" Minato asked, "Why not save him? Was that something that didn't happen in your timeline?"

"Perhaps," Himawari extracted a letter from her pocket, "his last words to you might give us some insight."

Kushina and Minato took the letter, carefully opening it and read together:

Dear Kushina and Minato,

You'll have to pardon my informality, but right now being formal seems unnecessary. If you're reading this, I am dead, and I only hope my last act as a shinobi ensured you two will have a long and fruitful reign.

First, a confession. I knew the imposter pretending to be Lord Rasa was my former apprentice the whole time, Orochimaru. Minato, if I had told you then, you would have insisted on relocating me to someplace safe, along with Jiraiya and Tsunade. You always looked out for the safety of others above your own safety. I always admired that trait in you; it is why I chose you to be Hokage. However, I have my own selfish reason for withholding that information from you until now. It is the same selfish reason I pressured Kushina so hard to get her instructor's license back. I was already dying when I wrote this.

You may have noticed my grandson complaining I wasn't keeping up with him in training. Asuma you may notice has been struggling to quit smoking at my request. I am gravely ill with lung cancer as I write this. I had my own private physician keep this fact from Tsunade. I was given only a year at most when I was diagnosed this spring. After living a life in service, I have decided that rather than die increasingly an invalid, I will die as I lived – in service to my village.

Minato, know that my death is not your fault, and I want this end for my life. Please tell Jiraiya and Tsunade the truth; let them know that nothing could be done for me. Please give them my blessing and my best wishes for whatever renewed future they share.

Kushina, I'm sorry that I kept you away from the war, but I'm not sorry that you live. Please teach my grandson well, and look after him. Please tell him I died the death I wanted, and I couldn't stand the thought of him watching me decay in front of him. Please make sure he doesn't take after my bad habits or that of Asuma.

I've written everything that needs to be said. You'll have to find your own way forward now. I know that I leave this village in good hands, your hands. I'm sure Naruto will grow up to be just like you both, and one day he will make a fine Hokage.

Sincerely,

Hiruzen Sarutobi

P.S. If you haven't done so already, you might want to ask the messenger who sent this her name and where she comes from. She has a very interesting story to tell.

Kushina took her eyes from the letter. "He knew he was going to die."

"In my timeline, Konohamaru didn't learn about it until many years later; it wasn't well known when I left for the past," Himawari explained, "That's why I went to Lord Sarutobi; I knew I could convince him of my origin if I knew what no one else here did. I didn't expect the elaborate plan for him to keep you safe."

"So, what happens now?" Hinata asked.

"I have to go," Himawari said, "the Jutsu that allows me to travel through time becomes increasingly unstable the longer I spend in any one point in time." She shook her head, "I have to return to the future, whatever it is, and hope it turned out better than when I left it."

"Himawari," Minato spoke gravely, "who is the one pulling the strings? It can't just be Obito."

She shook her head, "He's just a puppet on a string, terribly misguided, but," she trailed off.

"But what?" Kushina asked.

"Even the person pulling his strings is being manipulated by someone else, someone with much worse intentions."

"Madara Uchiha?" Kushina asked.

Himawari nodded,"But I'm afraid the end puppet master even I'm not sure of. All I know is," she paused, considering, "another Great Shinobi War will break out in a little over three years, and I doubt anything we can do can change that."

Kushina's stomach twisted. Naruto and Hinata would be old enough to serve on the front line if war broke out in three years. "So, what do we do?" Kushina asked.

"I've given everything I can," Himawari said, "I'm afraid the rest will be up to all of you."

"Mom…." The sound of Naruto moaning from behind them shifted everyone's attention.

"Son," Kushina rushed to his side.

"N-Naruto!" Hinata cried as she took Naruto by the hand.

"Where… am I?" Naruto struggled.

"You're in the hospital, honey," Kushina explained, "Your appendix ruptured after you suppressed Gaara. Y-you're going to be okay!"

"Who?" he gestured with a finger toward Himawari, "Who is she?"

"Just a villager grateful to you, son," Minato quickly spoke up. "She wanted to meet the boy that probably save the village from a tailed-beast."

"F-," Himawari stumbled, "Naruto-kun," she bowed, "Forgive me, my name is Himawari. I just wanted to tell you how brave you were today! You probably saved countless lives if not everyone in the village!"

"Think nothing of it," Naruto raised his thumb, "Someday, I'll be Hokage like my dad, and I'll protect this village just like he does!" Kushina felt tears running down her cheeks.

"I know you will," Himawari wiped away her own tears.

"Believe it!" Naruto exclaimed before clutching his side.

"Okay, son," Kushina adjusted the blanket over him, "Visiting hours are over, and we have to take Hinata home."

"Of course, Mom," Naruto took Hinata by the hand, "Visit me in the morning?"

"I'll be here," Hinata kissed Naruto on the forehead. Kushina grinned as she noticed Himawari turn pink with the display of affection between her future parents.

As the group left the hospital, Kushina committed every feature, every detail of her granddaughter to memory. Someday, this is my future. Thoughtful like her mother, spirited like her father. "Himawari," Kushina stopped her as they prepared to part ways, "thank you!"

"No," she smiled in return, "Thank you! Thank you for giving my parents the love they deserved in their childhood, the love they showed me in my future."

"Will we ever see you again?" Minato asked.

"I hope so!" Himawari smiled, and then turned to Hinata, "Mom, I'll see you in the future." Himawari began to glow softly, and she faded away.

For several moments, nothing was said. Finally, Hinata asked, "Do we tell Naruto?"

"No," Kushina answered.

"Why not?" Minato asked.

"She didn't reveal herself to him," she shook her head. "I say we respect that wish for now; besides, he has a rough recovery ahead." Kushina turned her attention to Hinata, "Now let's get you home, daughter." She and Minato took Hinata hand in hand.

"Kushina, everything she said, about the clan, about mom," Hinata spoke nervously as they neared the Hyūga Compound.

"Yes?" Kushina stared at Hinata thoughtfully.

"Well, if what she said is true, then you and Lord Fourth are the reason I have everything I have," Hinata's tears began reflecting the dim moonlight.

"Hinata," Kushina sighed against her own tears, "remember you end up marrying my son in a time my husband and I weren't there to love him," she squeezed Hinata's hand gently, "that means you are special, and not just because of some title in your family or some clan that you were born into." Kushina smiled at the girl who would one day be her daughter-in-law, "Don't ever forget it. We have a chance to make the future any children you and Naruto have a good one; let's make the best of it."

Author's notes: Hi everyone. Thank you all for reading. A thousand apologies for this being so damn late getting posted. I had a crazy week at work and this needed major revisions at several points. I hope you all enjoyed reading as much as I enjoyed writing it. I'll see you all in a week. Stay safe, stay healthy!