When Fugaku finally stirs and lets go of Mikoto, Mikoto asks, "What happened?"
Kushina watches with interest, leaving off her painting for a few minutes. Kushina thinks it's cute how all a Hokage wants after a rough day at the office is a hug from his wife. Minato was the same.
"The elders found out about Itachi," says Fugaku, sighing. "Now I am in trouble because I didn't actually try to convince Akatsuki to send her back."
Mikoto laughs. "Itachi said she will come and visit once she has done a few more missions. She also sent Shisui and Karasu some new clothes." Mikoto points over to where Shisui is sloshing paint on the bookshelves with no regard for where he's putting his brush.
Shisui is wearing black pants and a red shirt with white polka dots on it. Karasu, who is sleeping in the play pen a few meters away from Shisui, is dressed in black overalls and a red top with white polka dots. Fugaku grins, the light coming back into his eyes. "Does Shisui know they match?" he asks.
"I do now," says Shisui. "I hope Itachi doesn't get us too many matching outfits."
Mikoto and Fugaku exchange a look that says We are never telling him the truth. Kushina gathers from that look alone that Itachi is dressing her baby and blind boyfriend identical without her boyfriend knowing. Kushina manages to keep her poker face, but later on she is going to have a good laugh with Kazama about it. Kushina can see Kazama's face twitching like she really badly needs to laugh. If they laugh now, they'll ruin Itachi's fun.
"I'm sure Itachi thought one matching father-son outfit would be cute," says Mikoto, completely straight faced. "I'm sure she won't get too many." By the look on Mikoto's face, Kushina can tell Mikoto thinks 100 matching outfits would not be too many for Shisui and Karasu.
"Indeed," says Fugaku, nodding and crossing his arms. "Itachi is very level-headed."
"I just had an idea!" says Yatsude, grinning. "Sazanka, Tachi, Sekitei, let's get matching outfits."
"No," says Sekitei. "We already look the same anyway. Same hair, same face, same eyes, same amount of skinny..."
"Really?" says Tachibana. "I didn't know we all look the same. I know our faces are similar shapes, but I didn't realize we were identical."
Yatsude throws his paintbrush at Sekitei and storms off to sulk in a corner. Sekitei catches the paintbrush and follows Yatsude, who runs outside to escape. Sekitei simply chases him.
"Where is Madara?" asks Fugaku. "Come to think of it, what are you doing here and when did you build this place?"
"Let me explain," says Kushina, grinning. "I've been wanting to try this jutsu. Flashback no Jutsu!"
The Uzumaki house appears around them. Kushina, Burifu and Kazama are outside. Kazama is hanging out laundry while Kushina trains Burifu. Mikoto turns up with Madara's foster kids, Shisui and Karasu in tow.
"Hey Kazama, hello Kushina, hi Burifu," says Mikoto, grinning at them. "Madara's left his kids with me so he can train Sasuke, and I had a brilliant idea I think you will like, Kazama."
"Oh, do tell," says Kazama, pausing in her quest to hang out Burifu's briefs.
"People keep leaving their kids with us - mostly you, but me as well sometimes," says Mikoto. "Let's start a babysitting centre."
"Count me in," says Kazama.
"Me too," says Kushina. "This'll be fun. Okay Burifu, we'll finish our training session later. Play with Madara's brats while we discuss this Babysitting thing."
"Okay!" says Burifu. "Let's play hide and seek!"
"What's that?" asks Tachibana.
"Let's make it hide and seek tag," amends Burifu, and begins to explain the game.
Kazama finishes hanging out her washing, and the adults head inside with Shisui and the babies. They sit down at the table to discuss the plan.
"Okay, so what services should we provide?" asks Kazama.
"Definitely round the clock care," says Mikoto. "This should be a place where shinobi can just walk in and leave their kids for a few days while they go on missions."
"We'll need to cater for those kids," says Kushina. "So we'll need a kitchen." She pulls out pen and paper from a seal and starts writing down their ideas.
"If it's overnight, you'll need beds," says Shisui. "And a building to use for the centre. You can't just have it at one of your houses."
"Where are we going to find a building that will suit us?" asks Mikoto.
"Maybe we could build one," suggests Kazama. "Why don't we ask Tenzou if she wants to get in on this plan?" Everyone agrees, so Kushina rounds up the kids and they treck across the village to Tenzou and Kakashi's house to ask Tenzou if she wants to join in.
They find Tenzou sitting on her front steps with Aki, playing dolls. "Oh, hello," says Tenzou, when she sees them. "You look like you're plotting something."
"We are," says Mikoto. "We're starting up a babysitting centre, and we want to know if you want to help."
"I did," says Tenzou, chiming in on the flashback. "So we started planning the centre: how it would be run, how it would be laid out, how many children we should allow room to cater for, whether we should allow room to expand, how we will get people to drop their kids with us and so on."
"I'll handle getting people to leave their kids here," says Fugaku. "I think this centre would be excellent for the shinobi who have to take low ranked missions so they can stay close to their children while they are young. It used to be common to leave your kids alone for days at a time while you went on a mission, but less and less shinobi are willing to do that, especially with children who aren't old enough for the Academy. I can send my ninjas on missions and tell them to leave their kids here."
"Oh, I never thought of that," says Mikoto, grinning.
"So we aren't doing the flashback anymore, I take it?" asks Kushina.
"Where's Minoru?" asks Fugaku. "And when did Kimiko turn up? She wasn't there at the start."
"Minoru is with his undead grandpa, his dad and his undead uncle," says Tenzou.
"Kimiko we picked up on the way to finding a plot of land to build on," says Kushina. "She went off to the library to return some books and then do some research before Mikoto came over."
"Research?"
"Yeah," says Kazama, shrugging. "She's been going to the library a lot lately, although for some reason she doesn't like us going with her when she goes off by herself to do research."
Kimiko seems like a natural loner to Kushina, so she doesn't see any problem with the nine year old going off by herself occasionally. It's only to the library after all.
"Any more questions?" asks Mikoto.
"How soon will you open?" asks Fugaku.
"In maybe a week," says Mikoto. "We have to sort out all the paperwork and organize enough people to watch the kids around the clock and do the cooking and so on."
"I can assign some shinobi who are good with kids to help whenever you need it," says Fugaku. "And the ones who like working here can stay. As for payment, I'll send you a percentage of each parent's mission pay. We can discuss how much later."
The door opens and in walks Ibiki with Eizo. "If Eizo wasn't a sensory type," says Ibiki. "We'd still be looking for you."
"Mummy, Daddy, I made a man cry!" says Eizo.
"What?!" demands Kushina. Why is Eizo proud of that?
"This kid is T&I's mascot," says Ibiki. "We call him in to help for particularly tough customers. Today he reduced a man to tears by singing the same song on repeat for about five hours."
"I sunged off key!" says Eizo. "An' I only stoppeded to go potty and drink water cause I got thirsty from the singing. I sunged with my mouth full for lunch-time."
"I wore earplugs," says Ibiki, laughing.
Fugaku laughs.
Then, in comes Madara, followed by Sasuke. Sasuke is dripping wet and has a scowl on her face that would turn fresh milk sour.
"...What happened to you, Sasuke?" asks Mikoto.
"He threw me in the river!" Sasuke growls, pointing at Madara.
"She flipped me off!" snaps Madara.
"Maybe I should try throwing her in the river," mutters Fugaku. "Might be more effective than grounding."
"You can have her back," says Madara. "But Sasuke is my apprentice now. Where are my fosterlings?"
Tachibana puts down his paint and brush and heads over to Madara. Sazanka does likewise, scooping up Ajisai out of the playpen on the way past. "We're here," says Tachi. "Sekitei and Yatsude are outside throwing paint at each other."
Madara sighs such a heavy sigh that Kushina is surprised he doesn't sink into the floor.
The next morning Madara takes Sekitei and Yatsude to the hairdressers for an emergency haircut because the paint would not come out of their hair. He leaves the other three at home with Lucy. All four of the older children have rather long hair that has probably never been cut. The hairdresser cuts Sekitei's hair to chin length, and cuts Yatsude's hair very short on the sides and a little longer on top.
As soon as he sees Yatsude's hair, Sazanka's face falls. Quite suddenly, he starts crying. "WEEE...DOOOON'T MAAATCH!" he wails.
Madara sighs.
"I don't want to match with you anymore!" says Yatsude. "I want to look different!"
Sazanka cries louder, snot streaming down his face along with the tears. "But twins should match!"
Madara can feel a headache coming on. "How about I get you two matching outfits? Will that do?"
Sazanka latches on to Madara's pants and nods, rubbing the snot and tears off onto Madara's clothes.
"I guess that's okay," says Yatsude, grinning.