"-and now the Yuki clan are coming to join us! They make ice, isn't that cool!"

Naruto has no idea about her unintentional pun; the Akimichi and Yamanaka Heads both groan, eyes rolling skywards. Wait, that's only two clan heads, where's— Ah.

The Nara's looming at the kitchen worktop, where the large bag of noodles Sasuke's used for cooking rests, now only three-quarters full.

"Very cool; maybe they'll be able to make ice cream!"

"That's if our favourite Uchiha can't do that as well as cook," the Yamanaka chimes, laughing all the while.

Well, with only the Nara noticing the Senju stamp on the bag, Sasuke doesn't think he's done too bad. One outta three... he'll take that.

This is a really bad idea.

Sucking in his lower lip, Izuna drums his fingers across the tabletop, utterly unable to rouse any motivation for the task at hand. Father is on his death-bed after a falling out with the Hagoromo clan (they'll slaughter them all after this; their allies betraying them in such a way, they'll get what they deserve, as far as Izuna is concerned) and Madara's busy whipping the clan into shape to get ready for the upcoming battle. A battle that won't be against the Senju, their first new opponent in two years. Hell, were they any other clan, he might be worried they wouldn't be able to remember how to fight anyone other than the Senju. But they're Uchiha; they can do whatever they put their minds to.

Yet, with the two at the top of the food chain preoccupied or otherwise indisposed, that means the administration jobs have fallen upon Izuna's thin shoulders (he's still filling out, he's got some growing years left, alright?).

Scrubbing a hand down the side of his face, Izuna forces himself to face the scrolls, unrolling seven different ones and activating his Sharingan. He'll shove them all into the correct mission ranks after he's scanned them and had a moment to find out who Madara isn't going to be leading into battle. There're the usual requests of 'retrieve my property from this Lord', two 'my enemies have hired Senju so I need a Uchiha who's better than them', one 'half my damn tenants have upped and moved to Konoha so I can't pay the tariff' and-

Wait, what?

Izuna snaps up the scroll in question, scanning it more thoroughly this time, his lips pressing into a thin line with the more he reads. Seventeen civilian families quitting their current housing, packing everything up, and making for the new village. That's… that's not good.

Scrubbing a hand down the side of his face, Izuna eyes the scroll again, hoping against hope that if he looks a little harder, the words on the paper will change. No such luck; it remains exactly the same. The lord hasn't even offered a solution, nor has he put in a request that they go and 'deal with Konoha'. Simply stated he won't be paying his tariff in a rather abrupt, rude manner. As if he fully expects the Uchiha Clan to continue protecting him and his and that they'll let this non-payment slide. Izuna's pretty sure what Madara will say in response to this, but he needs to go check anyway. For… For as long as father is still breathing, Izuna is not yet the Clan Heir and does not have the political weight within their family to make the decision to cut this lord off of their protection roster.

Which means he needs to interrupt Madara's war cabinet to get his approval on dropping the lord.

With a sigh, Izuna rises to his feet, making for the door with the scroll clenched tight in hand. He hates the idea of adding more to his big brother's work load, but there's nothing else for it right now. He makes for the door to his temporary office, pushing it open and stepping out into the hallway. His sandal clad feet slap against the wooden floorboards as he makes his way towards the grand meeting hall where Madara will be holding caught, one hand coming up to flick the tail of his ponytail back over his shoulders so it trails down his back instead. He makes it to the receiving room before the noise from outside registers and Izuna stops a foot before the little hallway that leads to the meeting hall's grand doors.

As such, he's in the perfect position to avoid the front door that is blasted open by one small foot, attached to a shapely tanned leg and oh— it's Naruto.

The current bane of the Uchiha clan's existence steps into the room, spots him, and smiles. She says, "hi Izuna!" before continuing onwards, blasting her way through to the grand meeting hall as Izuna stands in spellbound horror and her sheer guts. Consequently, he's still in the perfect position to see Sasuke slink in through the threshold, eye the door now hanging hazardously on a single hinge, and then eye him with a matching level of disdain.

"Brat," he greets, continuing to stride forwards after the hurricane that claims him as 'her Sasuke' and that's when Izuna finally manages to get his ass in gear, finally finds it in himself to get over the extraordinary gall these two have shown by barging their way in here.

"Hey!" He races after the duo, hands coming together for a water jutsu (because he's not foolish enough to use fire inside, not unless the opponent has already blown a hole in the building and then there's already property damage present). Izuna rounds the corner just as two Uchiha men find themselves flung out into the corridor on either side of him, followed by a blunt force burst of wind. He has to stick himself to the floor with chakra to remain on his feet and, even then, it still knocks the breath from his body.

A quick glance into the room and it's easy to find Naruto in the mass of bodies; her blonde hair stands out like a beacon in and among the Uchiha dark hair. Even the bastard (the time-traveller) Sasuke blends right in. The black figure she's got on the floor in a headlock is a new addition; Izuna hadn't seen the man being welcomed into the closed-door Uchiha meeting, nor had he blasted in before or after Naruto. What—

"Sasuke! Help me trap it!"

"What the actual fuck—" Madara's thunderous howl is cut off as dozens upon dozens of Naruto clones pop into existence, each one glowing that eerie gold, bursting with chakra that feels just too warm to be natural. Hands and arms snatch them all up one by one, leaping up and out of the building. It's absolutely peppered with holes and Izuna spits out his water bullet, already running through a list of fire jutsus he can use to get these two invaders the hell away from their clan. They're gonna have to move. Again. For fucks sake—

"You both need to leave," Naruto chirps, even as Madara pops the three clones that try to make him exit the room too. In the background, the left wall crumbles and Izuna burns the two clones that come at him with a neat little fire jutsu.

The black figure trapped in Naruto's embrace is hissing and snarling and Izuna's pretty sure it just tried to merge with Naruto itself before furious red chakra burnt it away.

"No time," Sasuke (who if not a bastard by birth is certainly a bastard by personality) states and then holds out one hand to Naruto. She does the same and then the ground just— breaks.

.

From there, it's a mad dash, running and fleeing by leaping down and down from the segments of ground that are lifting up and up (what the fuck what the fuck what the actual fuck?!) and gravity itself is a damn traitor because it's pulling him up and away to the huge stone mass that is currently only growing bigger and bigger between Naruto and Sasuke's outstretched hands.

In the end, Madara activates Susanoo, snatches Izuna up in one hand and digs its claws into the ground with the other, and they both watch in torn disbelief as the Uchiha encampment just— disappears. As in, it's gone. The few homes they'd painstakingly built, the majority they' commandeered from the clan who'd lived here before, even the posts from the training ground, the river water that'd run by it, a loose kunai or two; it all goes up to join the mass.

The only reassurance is Izuna can see the entire clan being held in place just at the edge of the huge crater beneath the new mini-moon the two have made, all clutched tight in the golden glowing arms of a Naruto clone. Whatever that black thing (person? Chakra construct?) had been, the two of them weren't playing around. If the pressure of the rock pressing in on it hadn't killed the thing, the way Sasuke the Bastard rips a hole in the very fabric of the world to drop the rock into a lava dimension should certainly do it.

From then on, it's quiet. The tear in reality disappears, its creator drops to his knees from exhausting and Naruto hefts him up with little effort. All the clones pop, the girl herself lights up gold, the light growing bigger and bigger and— and now there's a Kyūbi. A Kyūbi that instantly twists around to stare his brother down, looking damningly furious and Izuna's breath is in his throat. Only, the girl who commands the most dangerous being in their world knocks one tiny fist on his head and then gestures to the North, gestures to the direction in which Konoha lies. And then they're lumbering away, too tall to disappear behind the treeline, but soon enough they're too far down to see the beast.

Susanoo dies down and Izuna stands on the very edge of a very deep crater, left wondering what just happened.

When Sasuke wakes, he's laid out on their recently acquired mattress and Naruto is next to him, fully dressed. Not dead then; in heaven, she'd be naked and not threatening to bring the walls down with her snoring. In hell, she wouldn't be with him at all, the light of his life would be gone. Sucking in a low breath (his entire body aches, a hollow feeling to every limb and he's dangerous low on charka; apparently ripping holes in reality takes real effort but at least the entrapped Black Zetsu is now in a place with no humans and no access to the tailed beasts), Sasuke forcibly rolls onto his side. It jostles Naruto ever so slightly; not enough to wake her, but certainly enough that she feels the need to shift, pulling one of his arms flat against her chest to better mumble into his collarbone, her nose cold against the low collar of his shirt. Each of her long, warm breathes ghosts across his skin, soft and gentle. As if they hadn't just ripped a quarter mile of land from the earth in order to make a new mini-moon.

Sasuke buries his nose into Naruto's hair, throwing his free arm over her side to better hold her close. Zetsu's gone. He won't be able to whisper into Madara's ear, Madara won't attack Konoha, Konoha won't get suspicious of the Uchiha, Itachi won't be forced to kill the clan.

The Kyūbi will never attack this Konoha and Naruto's parents (should they both turn up in Konoha) won't die. It's not perfect, won't be for a long while (probably after Sasuke's long dead and gone). But for the little brats he can see in his future (dark hair, dark blue eyes, whiskered cheeks and he prays for a calm smile instead of Naruto's shit-eating grin) he's gonna try his hardest.

Naruto's tongue licks up against his collarbone and Sasuke groans, pressing the noise into the crown of Naruto's hair and gripping at her hip with the one hand he has free to do so. The other bunches in her shirt, pulling it up to expose a thin strip of tanned flash.

"Umm, ramen." Tch. Fucking typical.

Sasuke barks out a laugh, a noise he keeps low and light but is quite unable to supress all the same. It startles Naruto awake far easier than his jostling had done so. Probably not used to the sound. Well, fuck it. It's a sound only for her, only she can make him feel this abnormal bubble of contentment, of happiness.

"Eh? What're you laugh at?"

"Life," Sasuke states, quite unable to put into words his disbelief over how fucking lucky he's turned out after the shit start. Though he won't know most of them, his family will be fine. Naruto's here with him and the future's looking bright. There's nothing the Senju or the Uchiha clan could do to stop them, there's the Two Tails, Three Tails and Five Tails all in the nearby vicinity and just as enthralled with Naruto's idea of peace as the clan heads hear are. This Konoha is gonna be so much better than the original; how could it not be with Naruto in charge?

"You got so weird when we came back in time," Naruto grunts, snuggling a little deeper into his chest, releasing his arm to wind her own around him. Sasuke holds her close instead, considers mentioned he'd been in this deep for her for a while but he's just an ignorant bastard who hadn't realised. But this is pleasant as fuck and he just wants to indulge and enjoy it in a way he'd never believed he'd be able to.

So he says fuck all, instead allowing Naruto to wiggle one of her feet between his calves to press her freezing toes to his skin. She'd taken his shoes off before putting him to bed; how considerate.

So, I got reminded this fic exists. I had until Naruto kicking the door in wrote since the last chapter and then promptly forgot about it? Anyway, there's about 2/3 chapters left of this fic, as you can probably tell.

Happy new year all,

Tsume
xxx