They were lounging around the living room when suddenly, there was a sound of a manic laughter outside their house.

Lily paled, on instinct picking up and clutching Harry tight to her chest, while James went on his feet and hastily searched through the drawer nearby for his wand.

"Lily, take Harry and run! I'll hold him off!" With that, James left to face the monster that had chased them everywhere for the past year.

It didn't take a minute for Lily to understand that this was their end. They didn't plan for an invasion ― one-man invasion or not. And it all because they grew comfortable with the plan Sirius and James came up with. Choosing Wormy―Peter was clearly a mistake.

"Be good, Harry," Lily whispered to her fussy one-year-old son, as she ran upstairs to her ritual room slash nursery. She didn't have time to grab her wand ― a foolish overlook on her part. "I love you, Harry, remember that. Don't cause too much trouble with Sirius, okay?"

She placed her son on the crib and stood before it. Just under a minute later, Voldemort entered the room.

"You don't have to die," said the murder-happy wizard that had invaded her home so brazenly.

"Have mercy," Lily pleaded, arms spread protectively. "He's just a boy!"

"Stand aside."

Lily shook her head, her eyes didn't meet with her would-be-killer. "Please not Harry!"

"This is your last chance!" Impatience coloured Voldemort's shrill scream. "Stand aside!"

"No, not Harry! Please! Kill me ― kill me instead!"

Voldemort breathed deeply. "Not today, girl." A red bolt shot from his wand, hitting Lily dead on. With a slump, the woman fell. He didn't waste any time and pointed his wand at the crying toddler inside the crib. "Die, Harry Potter! Avada Kedavra."

Bright green light enveloped the room.

"Ahhh!"

"Young lady! That is disgraceful!" her mother scolded, as she wiped her sweating daughter's face. "We Uzumaki women do not raise our voice in childbirth!"

Inasa couldn't protest, a strand of red hair falling to obscure her eye. Her everything felt like in pieces. Her first child, the union between the Uzumaki and Uchiha, was begging to be out just hours ago. She had endured the pain and she pushed and pushed. For the last hour, she could feel blood dripping out from her birth canal. The baby was big, that Inasa could tell. But she just didn't have the strength to push again as she sat there on her butt, her back supported by her mother-in-law, hands clutching desperately on the thick rope 'chikaradzuna' her husband arranged to hang from the ceiling.

"Inasa-sama!" the midwife, an Uchiha (as it was dictated by the Uchiha), commanded. "I see the baby's head now! Push, Inasa-sama!"

She almost let out a pained groan. It was her fault she landed in this situation. Her body and chakra were weaker than the average Uzumaki. That was why nobody complained when Uzumaki Ashina gave her to the Uchiha ― her mother was strangely ecstatic, even.

Inasa cursed herself. If she were strong she would be in Uzu as the honoured, unmarried daughter of the clan head.

A wave of incredible pain hit her and she could not think more. She swallowed back a cry and pushed.

"All right, the head is out now, the shoulders are almost there..." the midwife trailed off before exclaiming, "One more push and the baby will come out!"

Inasa quietly whimpered at the back of her throat. One deep and sharp breath in and then she put everything into that one push, including all of her life-force. She didn't want to live, but she didn't want her baby to die before he reached the age of seven ― so her chakra was to become his, in exchange of her unwanted life. Inasa was sure the baby was a 'he'.

She smiled as she welcomed darkness. Maybe in the next life she could be herself.

Tajima waited for over two hours for the birth of his first child with the Uzumaki. He had married twice before this. The first one with a Nara produced two daughters and the second wasted a total three years of his time, thus he summarily divorced and banished the useless Hagoromo woman out of his life. This time was with an Uzumaki ― the outcast daughter of the clan head.

An outcast or not, Uzumaki is still Uzumaki, they possessed strong vitality and life-force. His wife was perfect for giving him perfect offsprings.

The sliding door of the room he occupied opened.

The Uzumaki met his eyes for a moment before his mother-in-law bowed and presented the newborn in her arms to him. "I present you your son, Uchiha Tajima."

A son. Finally he had a son.

"May I ask his name, Tajima-sama?"

Some pause from him before he opened his mouth. "Madara. Uchiha Madara, after this very mountain my clan lives on for generations."

"Aha, that is certainly a strong name." The Uzumaki woman nodded in approval.

The Uzumaki guard, Tajima's wife's brother, piped in unnecessarily, "But Haha-ue, that's the name of a type of fish we commonly consumed back home?"

His mother-in-law twitched, but didn't say anything. Tajima chose not to discuss over his choice of name and instead asked his wife's condition. "How is my wife?"

"My daughter has passed away," his mother-in-law informed. His mother-in-law managed to exclude the shame from her voice, but Tajima caught the faint turn of her lips.

"Is this unusual?" he asked, as he had never heard of such thing before.

The woman, still looked around thirty although over sixty years in age, smiled wryly. "Oh, very. No Uzumaki woman has ever died from childbirth in over two hundred years."

So he was right that his wife was weak by standards of the Uzumaki. Not that it mattered. His twin daughters' mother was weak also, but his daughters were strong.

"I see," Tajima said. "Will this be a problem between us and the Uzumaki?"

His mother-in-law smiled at last. "Oh, no, no. We Uzumaki are neutral. We will not stand with you nor the Senju. We are, after all, descended from the same man." She handed the baby to him. "However, I shall visit my grandson every two years."

"Very well." Tajima nodded and looked at his son in detail. There was a faint birth mark on his forehead. Maybe 'spots' fit his son better?