The night air was tense, filled with fear, panic, anger and an almost overwhelming lust for blood. The infamous and monstrous Nine-Tailed Fox stood outside the gates of Konoha and let out a deafening roar that whipped the air around it, ripping up trees from their roots. The earth shuddered and shook with every leap the Nine-Tailed Fox made, forcing the leaf shinobi to regroup as they desperately tried to psuh the giant tailed beast away from the village. The quaking ground and turbulent wind rocked and tore buildings from their foundations, rubble and debris flew through the air, sending some buildings tumbling and blocking roads, trapped terrified civilians seeking safety from the attack. Despite most civilians being unable to sense or mould chakra, even they could feel the oppressive miasma of hatred and bloodlust that blanketed the village and its inhabitants.
While the majority of the civilians were hurriedly being evacuated to safety, some had taken refuge in the hospital, praying that the shinobi and the Hokage would defeat the Nine-Tailed Fox. Inside Konoha hospitals' neonatal special care unit, the sharp and high pitched wails of a baby could be heard echoing through the corridors. The mother carefully picked up the baby, holding them up to her chest, swaying gently.
Despite her mother's attempts to soothe her, the baby, and the single occupant of the neonatal special care unit, continued to cry; her small pink face scrunched up as she wailed into her mother's chest.
She didn't understand what was happening, all she knew was that it was dark and she wasn't safe. The air felt heavy and wrong, like she was about to be crushed into nothing and all she wanted was to get away from whatever terrifying thing was causing it all. But no matter how much she tried to move her arms and legs, they wouldn't respond the way they should have. They weren't doing what she wanted them to. There was something wrong with her body and she couldn't help but think that this body wasn't hers. In fact nothing seemed right. This body was too small and sluggish to be her own, her voice too high pitched and wordless and from what little she could see with her eyes, everything was blurred and out of focus.
Fear and panic set in like a cold and heavy stone weighing down her chest and sinking down into her stomach. This couldn't be real, the air was too thick and heavy to be real, her mother's hands and body was too large, like a giants, to belong to her real mother. This had to be a nightmare, a terrible lucid dream that couldn't wake from.
As she continued to thrash and squirm, as much as a tiny month old baby could, the sound of soft and gentle humming slowly trickled its way into her small ears. A warm and comforting hand gently rested on her head, the large thumb stroking her soft, downy tufts of hair. Slowly the oppressive pressure began to lighten and disperse. In it's wake was the warm feeling of comfort and security wrapping around her like a soft cocoon. Surrounded by that warm and comforting feeling her cries slowly died down to small hiccups.
She wasn't sure how long she had cried for nor how long her mother, the imposter wearing the facade of a mother, hummed, rocked and soothed her. Nor did she know how long the warm disembodied hand had gently petted her head. Once she had completely calmed down, she felt the familiar grumble of her empty stomach, that uncomfortable and insistent gnawing feeling telling her it was time to eat. She wriggled around in her "mother's" arms, nosing at the clothes covering her "mother's" breast, wanting to get closer so she could be fed but also wanting to be put down so that she could get herself some food. Her hiccups turned into small fussy whines as she tried to understand what her own body was telling her to do versus what she wanted in order to be fed. It was frustrating for her to try to make sense of the strange disconnect between her mind and body.
"My sweet baby, it's scary isn't it? You cried so hard you didn't realise that you're hungry. It's okay, it's okay, Mama and Papa is here." Her mother's voice cooed gently and she quickly found herself drinking warm, sweet milk. Her body relaxed and she closed her eyes. Suddenly she didn't want to be put down, not when what she had been looking for was right there. Why had she wanted to be put down to find her own food again? Why had she been so frustrated over something so simple?
As she drank, she felt the warm and sluggish comfort of sleep tug at her. After crying so hard and for so long, and now with the comfort of warm milk filling her belly, she realised just how tired she felt. But she was still hungry and she needed to understand what was happening, why this lucid dream felt so real. She didn't want to fall asleep just yet, she still wanted to listen to her "mother and father" talk, listen to their familiar and comforting voices.
Her "father" laughed as he watched her yawn, clearly fighting a losing battle with sleep despite trying her best to continue feeding.
"It's alright little blossom, go to sleep, we'll still be here when you wake up. Everything will be better when the sun rises."
Hearing her "father's" reassuring promise she let out another big yawn, deciding that she would hold him to that; closing her eyes and letting the pull of sleep take her.
When she opened her eyes again, it was brighter and much louder, she now appeared to have a companion in the room, a companion that was crying very loudly and insistently. She surmised that it was probably daytime now or the lights had been turned on. Looking around with her blurry eyes, she couldn't see anyone and while she felt glad that her imposter parents weren't there to make her feel confusing feelings of comfort and security, she felt sad and abandoned for reasons she wasn't sure she was ready to explore yet. It looked like she was still in her lucid dream, but she had never experienced one where her eyes were blurry and unfocused to the point of being practically useless to her.
Actually now that she thought harder about it, lucid dreams always had situations where she was able to see and hear clearly move as easily as she would when she was awake; and usually when she succumbed to either sleep, unconsciousness or death in such dreams, she'd wake up. So why hadn't she woken up when she fell asleep? And the voices of her imposter parents, she was sure she'd never actually heard them before but somehow she knew them, they were so familiar to her. Everything was confusing and the other babies' piercing cries were giving her a headache and for some reason giving her the urge to cry. And why wasn't someone coming to take care of the other baby?
As her thoughts spiralled into constant questions she had no answers for, tears began to leak from her eyes, her chest heaving as she began to cry, warm and alien yet familiar hands picked her up and held her close.
'Ah, this scent...' she knew this smell, it meant "father" and safety and comfort. As he rocked her, her 'father', an imposter, softly asked her is she was sad because she woke up all alone. She wanted to lash out and scream. Of course she was crying, he'd promised her that they would be there when she woke up and they hadn't! They'd let her wake up alone in this strange, scary place with only another crying baby and no one was helping him!
Suddenly and with an uncomfortable feeling blooming in her gut, she realised that since she had woken up, she had thought of the crying baby as the "other" or "another" baby rather than just "the" baby. Now that she had realised this, she began to wonder why a baby had been placed in the same room as her. She was clearly being kept in a room in a facility of some-kind and if this truly was a lucid dream of hers, there would still be rules and general principles that would make sense to her. There was no rhyme or reason for a baby to be put inside a room with her, an unrelated adult who could barely see a thing and was unable to talk or move properly. Babies should be kept in a separate room, even her unconsciousness would still register that. And furthermore, lucid dreams were based on what she knew and she could only speak in two languages, English and Cantonese. From what she could hear, now that she was actually paying attention to the words being spoken by her "father" and not his tone and voice, she was fairly certain he was speaking fluent Japanese.
The more she had been trying to make sense of the situation, that uncomfortable feeling spread, a sense of dread as a small part of her mind filled in the blanks for her to understand the reality of her situation. If her body was too small, not hers but under her control in an unfamiliar place where people spoke Japanese, with parents that she knew wasn't hers but felt like hers, and in a room with another baby...then had she died and reincarnated?
'No, that can't possibly be true. I can't have died! I'm not dead!" She thought to herself desperately. 'I am from England, I live with my parents and my name is...my name is...why can't I remember my name? I lived in the North of England, I always wanted a pet dog and cat but couldn't because my parents knew we wouldn't have time to properly care for them and their needs. I graduated University, my favourite anime and manga artist is Yoshihiro Togashi and I just finished watching JoJo's Bizarre Adventures and reading Kimetsu no Yaiba. I was born in September and my name is…my mother's name is...my father's birthday is...why can't I remember this?!'
No matter how much she tried to remember her name, or her parents names, she kept drawing a blank, only able to remember their faces and voices. As much as she wanted to deny what was slowly becoming her current reality, a part of her knew that the longer she continued to deny it, live in denial wallowing in uncertainty, she'd be wasting precious time that she couldn't afford to lose.
'Okay, so assuming that I'm not being controlled by some weird sleep paralysis demon, I have reincarnated into the body of a baby, maybe probably. And since my imposter father speaks Japanese, I'm in Japan? So maybe I'm in a baby ward in hospital? Aren't there usually more babies in the baby ward? Shouldn't the mother be here to take care of them, there's no way the nurses would neglect a crying baby...at least the shouldn't.' She thought to herself, pushing aside the growing feeling of sadness and grief.
"There there, you feel better now, don't you Naruto?"
She immediately perked up hearing her imposter mother say the uncomfortably familiar name Naruto. Her face scrunched up and decided that since she was reincarnated in some hospital in Japan, surely some Naruto fans had named their child after the iconic character. But why was her imposter mother talking to Naruto? Was she a nurse there? An unsettling feeling swirled inside her. Whatever was going on was far too much information for her to try to process in such a small amount of time. Pushing her small face into her imposter father's chest, and as much as she didn't want to, she let out some soft whimpers that, much to her mortification, was beginning to teeter into tears.
"Sandaime-sama, I would like to request that I take Naruto in for the time being as his wet-nurse. Since Mao was born just 3 weeks ago and considering everything that's happened...I wish to adopt Naruto as well. Rumours are already beginning to spread and I fear that if things continue as they are now Naruto will be left completely alone." Her imposter mother said, her voice solemn and filled grief.
As much as she wanted to concentrate on what her imposter mother had said, truthfully she had been stuck on the fact that her imposter mother had called someone Sandaime-sama. Upon hearing that it felt like the final piece had clicked into place for her, a feeling of relief now that she had finally solved the puzzle of where she was.
'Ah, so that's it. I've transmigrated and reincarnated into the world of Naruo and Naruto's just been born too…please lords above, end my suffering.' She thought to herself as she, once again, began to cry completely tuning out whatever her imposter mother, or rather second mother was discussing with the Sandaime.
Only this time her tears were not the product of fear or sadness (mostly). She was crying at the thought of the impending stress and anxiety that she believed would be greeting her soon with open arms. It was an unfortunate truth that she had been reborn just at the cusp of the end of the "fuck around" era in the shinobi world. Now she had the infinite joy of growing up in the "find out" era where she would only be surrounded by the consequences and repercussions that was the result of the short-sighted and questionably competent shinobi forebears.