The Sacred Forest Whispers
+------------------+
By Flight
+------------------+
Disclaimer: Dude if I wrote this, why would it be on Anyways, Naruto does not belong to me blah blah blah but THIS STORY DOES! TAKE THIS STORY AND YOU DIE! Thank you.
+---------------------------------------+
"I'm Pregnant."
Taka's eyes bulged out of his sockets.
Yes, it wasn't just pregnant. It was Pregnant. With a capital 'P'. He felt all desire to eat the bento box in front of him drain away completely as fast as the color drained out of his face.
The family was silent for approximately five minutes, with Miki making odd growling noises as she played with her food. The way his father was looking intently at them, this was definitely not a joke. Finally, the little girl looked up and squinted.
"…Daddy, men can't get pregnant."
Taka made a note that his mother looked ready to take a kunai and stab it into his father. Many, many times. Until he was a bloody mess on the floor. Which she would never do because his father was a much better ninja her.
Fortunately, his father was a smart, smart man. He got up, took his bento box and headed upstairs.
"Where do you think you're going?" His mother hissed through gritted teeth. His father stopped and turned around, pale eyes glaring so deeply through his mother that everyone in the room could instantly feel the temperature drop below zero. His father was probably imagining their mother frozen into an ice cube and him hacking away at her, breaking her into tiny, tiny bits…
"Dear," He said with as much contempt as he could fit into that one word, "It is common knowledge that you and I've already planned for a divorce for over six months. It's no big deal." Then he turned back to the stairs and quietly ascended above.
The rest of lunch was silent and comfortable. Miki was still trying to figure out how men could get pregnant. Taka growled and jabbed his food.
Yeah, Dad, but that doesn't mean you could get yourself pregnant!
+------------------+
"Your dad's pregnant?" Kizune paused in her swinging for a little and looked thoughtfully in the air for a minute. Taka held his breath for her reaction. Disgust? Disbelief? Horror? She opened her mouth. "…so?" She resumed her kunai swinging. Taka's jaw dropped to the ground.
"… Doesn't that strike you as ODD!"
Kizune stopped her swinging long enough to say, "Taka, you're talking to a girl who's parents are not only two MALE raving, homicidal demons but are also the lords of their respective countries who are responsible for everything that goes on in their territory while everyone who personally knows them both know they're completely and absolutely INSANE. NO I do not find your father odd. I mean, it makes sense doesn't it? He's almost thirty-six and he's still pretty hot."
Taka blanched at the idea of Kizune thinking his father's hot. I mean, teenagers just don't think of their friend's parents that way.
But, if he stopped and thought about it for a while, it made sense.
Father was pretty hot. Or cute, depending on what era you came from. He didn't have any of the tell-tale wrinkles that came from middle-age. He brushed his (long, silky and flowing) hair back every day so it wasn't messy. He took a shower twice, once in the morning, once at night. He was well-toned and lean from being a ninja. Any girl (or guy, for the record since it was his father that had gotten himself knocked up) would die to spend a night with him, despite his age.
"Yeah," He mumbled under his breath as he took a shuriken and half-heartedly threw it at the stupid red and white dummy they were practicing on, "But it's still weird."
Daisuke, their other teammate (who is easy to lose because he's so quiet without his twin brother that you just don't notice him and when he's actually gone you don't know until thirty minutes later) scrunched up his nose and finally joined into the conversation. "Pregnancy aside, shouldn't you be wondering who got him pregnant in the first place?"
Taka immediately turned white.
Goodness, he did not want to know (or imagine) what kind of man his father had been fooling around with. Actually, if he thought about it, his father was too stiff and serious to imagine fooling around with anybody… but still… who!
He tried to think back on all the days his mother was not home. No can do. His family was pretty tight. There wouldn't have been any time for his father to /ahem/ make love with anyone without his mother knowing. And from her reaction yesterday, she definitely did not know. His train of thought took another route. Who said that his father did it at his house? Maybe… wait… the only time his mother didn't get to see his father was when…
"OH MY GOSH!" Taka suddenly screamed, hands in his hair, "HE DID IT ON A MISSION!"
"…Taka…" Shika-sensei growled at him as he woke up from his afternoon nap, "Shut up. Get your nose out of your father's love life. And if you actually use your brain, you'd know who he slept with. I know. I'm pretty sure Naruto knows. And about anyone in all of Konoha if you told them about it. Which you better not. Or he'd get mad. So just shut up." And with that, their (lazy) sensei fell back into his slumber.
Daisuke stared at the sleeping adult and scratched his nose thoughtfully. It was a habit. A bad one. Kizune would constantly tease him about it, but he never replied. "Well, I guess we really shouldn't be worrying about it. We have to train, after all."
"Oh, screw training!" Taka growled as he flopped onto the grass, moaning, "My father's pregnant for goodness' sake!"
"We know," Kizune said dryly.
+------------------+
Because he wouldn't stop whining and he really didn't want to go home, Taka finally made Kizune annoyed enough to invite him (and Daisuke, who Kizune wouldn't leave out for anything) to her house. For dinner. Which was made by Kizune's mom. Who was THE Food Goddess Of Konoha. Or God. With all capitals, of course. Just the smell alone made his mouth water.
Daisuke sighed and slumped on Kizune's couch. It was a leather couch. A red leather couch. With the big kanji character 'wind' printed on the arm-rests. Despite the treason, the couch was pretty comfy. Wait, why was he thinking about Kizune's couch?
"Dai-chan!" Kizune popped her head into the living room, "Do you like sweet-and-sour chicken or ramen better?" Taka, who was staring intently at the show playing on the television, slumped. Kizune never asked him what he liked to eat. But then, anything made by Naruto-sensei really good. He'd even eat some pork buns (which he hated) if they were made by Naruto-sensei. That was because Naruto-sensei was a good cook. A really good cook. He told you that already, right? Yeah, he's just reminding you. Because Naruto-sensei is such a good cook. Ok, he'll stop now.
"Mm… I like sweet-and-sour chicken… in my ramen." Daisuke replied. Taka face-faulted. Who ate sweet-and-sour chicken with ramen!
But Kizune, who had a sort-of-not-really crush on the Aburame boy, clapped her hands and said, "Ok, MOM! Dai-chan said he likes them both! What? You already made them both anyways? That's great!"
Taka looked back at his TV show. It was some stupid puppet thing with one guy acting out the awesome genius Sharingan-Kakashi battling the evil Sasuke. Here's the dialogue for said stupid puppet show, just for the record.
Sharingan-Kakashi: Sasuke. You were my student but you betrayed me!
Evil Sasuke: HAHAHAHA! I was NEVER your student! I was always evil!
Sharingan-Kakashi: (gasp) NO!
Evil Sasuke: YES!
Sharingan-Kakashi: Than… I will have to KILL you!
Evil Sasuke: I'd like to see you try!
(Sharingan-Kakashi and Evil Sasuke 'fight' for a bit. Aka bang puppets together in this weird, perverted way. Er, moving on…)
Sharingan-Kakashi: (lying on floor, defeated) I… am defeated.
Evil Sasuke: BWAHAHAHA! I AM THE MOST POWERFUL NINJA IN THE WORLD!
(Super-hero music suddenly starts in the background. Five new puppets pop up)
Puppet Number 1: Stop in the name of the Hokage! Uchiha Sasuke!
Sasuke: Ha! The Elite ANBU squad? BRING IT ON!
(---------BLEEP---------)
(At this point Taka has turned off the TV in its stupid-ness and has joined the Sabaku family to a…. er, 'normal' dinner…)
+------------------+
The food was awesome. Just as he expected, from The Food God(dess) Of Konoha. There was sweet-and-sour chicken, some plain ramen, beef strips, lettuce and other things to eat your ramen with. In other words, it was sort of like a 'personalize your ramen' dinner. Daisuke, though he never really talked on the outside, generously helped himself to a large scoop of ramen.
All was going well except for one thing…
The head of the house was missing.
As in, the 'father' of the household was not there.
At the table.
And no one could eat without the father of the house coming down and declaring 'It is ready to eat'.
Which he couldn't do, because he wasn't there.
So everyone had to wait.
And wait.
And wait.
And wait just a little bit longer…
"SABUKU NO GAARA WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING UP THERE! GET YOUR ASS DOWN HERE THIS INSTANT OR I'M MOVING TO SAKURA'S HOUSE FOR TWO MONTHS, YOU HEAR ME! AND NO ME MEANS NO FOOD, NO MASSAGE AND NO SLEEP SO GET DOWN HERE THIS INSTANT! OLD MAN!" (for those who did not get the joke, mothers usually say 'young man' when they're talking to their teenage sons, but as Gaara is not exactly young anymore; Naruto can't call him young man, therefore resorting to call him 'old')
Taka swore he could hear the echo bouncing around the house.
Kizune winced. "I bet one on three Mom and Dad are going to have another fight… again…" She whispered to Daisuke, who just nodded. Taka seethed. Why didn't she whisper to him? At least he'd answer!
But to him, Kizune was lucky. No matter how many times Naruto and Gaara literally almost kill each other in their ninja-battles (aka 'fights') he knew they'd probably never even thought of divorcing.
His parents never liked each other from the start. In actuality, his father felt so little emotion towards his mother that he just simply didn't care what she was doing. She spilled hot soup on herself? So? She's sleeping around with another man? Who cares? She wants to divorce me? GOOD!
Taka growled as he remembered the constant fight/ignore glances that were exchanged in his household. He was pretty depressed that his parents were divorcing, but please! Its way better off if his parents were happy separate than it they were unhappy together. But there was that huge pregnancy issue… argh! Taka mentally berated himself in the head. Stop thinking about that! Stop thinking about WHO he had done it with, WHEN he had done it with and most importantly HOW it was all possible!
Shoot, he was thinking about it!
"…Hey, Taka, if you're not going to eat that piece of beef, can I have it?"
Taka snapped out of his reverie to look at Kizune intently staring at his piece of beef. "Er, no, I was just going to eat it…" He looked up and realized he's just missed a couple of events in his thinking. Gaara-san had finally come downstairs. Wearing nothing but some red long pants. Of course, this got Naruto-sensei pretty mad and he made the Kazekage go back upstairs and change, which took another ten minutes. When he came back downstairs, Naruto yelled at him for another five minutes before Gaara finally blessed the food and allowed them to eat. Which was good, since Taka was starving.
He liked going over Kizune's house. Ok, so maybe her family life was pretty much as weird as his; her parent's were both guys who had been forced into marriage. They were both demons. They were both the Lords of their Countries and could probably fight in a battle against each other for two weeks straight, if the other ninjas let them. But even so, the way they argued (ok, so maybe Naruto did most of the arguing, he argued enough for two people) sounded amazingly normal to the silence his parents gave to each other over dinner.
"—And then we were like, 'Hey Neji, ya want some sake!' and he just turned around and glared at us with that damn Hyuuga glare and was like 'No Thank You' with all capitals and we were like, 'dude, lighten up!' But he'd been acting bitchy all week I think something's wrong with him and—"
"Naruto if don't stop talking for more than second, you'll choke on your ramen."
"—thank you very much oh-almighty-Kazekage… anyways, so we just shrugged and drank the whole bottle and of course we didn't let Lee have any since he goes deranged every time he has some but seriously, something's really wrong with Neji he's been giving us a bunch of stupid orders that don't make any sense, maybe the divorce is getting to his head? You know he's getting divorced from Tenten right, I mean they weren't BUILT for each other anyways, and so maybe that's why he's acting all funny? I can't place it he's been kind of emotional and I don't know what's wrong with him and hey wait a minute, Taka, you're his son, what's wrong with him!"
Taka looked up, confused, into Naruto-sensei's face. It was a well-known fact that the when the Hokage got excited he talked so fast almost no one could hear him, so Taka had a right to be confused.
"…huh?"
"Taka, Mom just asked you what's wrong with your dad." Kizune explained wearily.
Taka, who was still in a daze, just stared at Naruto-sensei and said, "Dad? Oh, he's pregnant."
There was a silence so deep that you could actually hear the pet fox, Kitchi, scratching herself behind her ear in the backyard. Then, Naruto leaned back in his chair and laughed. "HAHAHAHAHA! Taka, that's real funny! Where'd you come up with this stuff?"
Taka just blinked.
Still laughing, Naruto leaned forward again and said, "So what's the real reason?"
Gaara turned around and glared at the blonde, "…Naruto, I don't think he was joking."
Naruto stopped laughing. "…eh!" He leaned forward, "Neji's really pregnant! But—but… that's impossible! Men can't get pregnant!"
There was even more silence after that.
Kizune looked at her mother. "Mom…"
Gaara rolled his eyes, "Hypocrite."
Naruto's face turned red.
"WHAT DID YOU CALL ME!"
Daisuke continued to slurp his ramen…
+------------------+
"…so do you have morning sickness?"
Taka was trying to make some light talk. His father, the almighty, all-knowing, Hyuuga Neji, could definitely see through such a fake and phony attempt.
"…No."
Taka sat awkwardly in a large brown (probably leather) chair, which had been dragged from his dusty corner right next to his father's more comfortable standard wooden one. This was his father's study, and even then Hyuuga Neji would always find a way to make all his scrolls and notes, annoyingly and tediously neat. It drove Taka crazy how neat everything was.
"…Do you want to talk to me about something?"
Taka growled as he plopped his chin onto the desk. Neji's eyes flickered once down at him before returning to his note-taking. It was at this position that Taka could get a good glimpse at his father's profile.
Handsome, but stiff. No wrinkles, but when the light shines the right way into his eyes, you can see a small sparkle that screams 'I've lived longer than you and I know it so don't you dare argue with me mister' every time you spot it. His hair was pulled back in the standard Hyuuga way (this is the reason why Taka cut his hair. He hated looking geeky with his hair pulled back all the time, so one day he just rummaged through his weapon holster, took out a kunai, and chopped all the hair off. Of course, Neji was pretty pissed off about it for a while and spent the whole afternoon straightening out his hair so it was at least presentable) but he wasn't wearing his ninja headband.
Neji was completely ignoring him.
Taka pouted.
Neji continued to scribble notes onto that stupid note-scroll.
Taka glared.
Neji put his brush down and took off his glasses. Wait, he was wearing glasses!
"Taka, what do you want?" Taka's brain finally started to function. Of course his father has glasses. Not that 'oh-my-gosh-I-can't-see-anything' kind, but the 'I'm-too-lazy-to-use-my-eyes-so-I-have-to-use-glasses' kind. It was a Hyuuga thing. Something about, if you spend less time using your eyes for something like reading or writing, then you'll have more energy to use your Byakugen in battle or something like that.
"It's just that… um… well, you're the head of the elite ANBU unit, right? So what are you going to do… in your… um…"
"Condition?"
"Er, yeah!"
Neji stared at him with this look that screamed 'you are my son! Did you inherit Tenten's genes in the gene pool?' Neji made this weird 'tch' noise in the back of his throat. You see, Taka always wanted to make that 'tch' noise. He's tried to ever since he was a kid, but he only managed to make this weird growling noise. Thus, whenever he's annoyed, he growls. But back to Neji 'tch'ing.
"That is my problem, not yours. And it's ten. Isn't it past your bedtime?" Taka glowered at his father as he got up and headed for the door. He hated it when Neji unleashed the bedtime thing. Sure, he had a bedtime, but he never followed it and Neji really didn't care unless they were in an argument (or a 'special occasion'. Or an emergency. Or when his father really didn't feel like answering his stupid questions and wanted him to shut up, which is likely the case here).
'Hmph…' Taka growled to himself (you see? Growling. Not 'tch'ing. Growling), "…hate it when Dad's being a smartass…"
Neji leaned back in his chair and said, in perfect monotone, "I heard that."
+------------------+
Daisuke was probably the happiest boy in the world at that moment. He and his twin brother, Daike, were going on vacation! To visit some far-away aunt in the Hidden Rock Village or something, but still, Daisuke was happy.
There were many reasons why he was happy. One, he got to spend time with his twin brother, which he almost never did anymore due to them both being on different teams. Two, he could finally relax after months of brutal training that never did them any good as the Chuunin exams were, like, five months away. Three, he got to be far, far away from, f-from that Hyuuga boy.
I mean, it's not like he hates Taka or anything. He just… dislikes him. Because he makes him feel all funny and squishy inside. And feeling funny and squishy makes him really worry about his bugs and what's wrong with them. Maybe they're allergic to Taka? Ok, maybe that was a really stupid conclusion. But anyways, the Aburame twins were going on a vacation.
And four, on with the why-Dai-chan-is-happy list, is that they won't have to listen to The Ghost. Daisuke and Daike never talked about The Ghost anymore. No one believed them anyways, not even their mother, who thought they were pulling some stupid prank. But besides that point, the twins were happy they were going away. Really.
Ok, so maybe Daisuke would miss his team a little.
C'mon, with people like that, they grow on him. Seriously. He didn't just miss one person.
One person in particular.
Who had tussled, short brown hair that shown in the sunlight.
And flickered gold, occasionally.
And the darkest chocolate eyes ever which you can just stare into. Along with a fine straight nose that screamed 'nobility!' and small pouting lips stained a little red that hardly moved when talking and totally contrasted against that real sexy white complexion--
…
Shit.
+------------------+
Author's Notes: Ok, so maybe it's a little cliché, Naruto's Second Generation after all, but c'mon! I wanted to give it a shot! R/R PLEASE! I'll even give you people a cookie. Thanks!
