One Hundred and Eighty Nine.
It's been about a month since the Chunin Exam Finals and Iruka is still away. Madara is annoyed by his prolonged absence. By the time Iruka gets back, Madara is going to have even bigger paranoia when someone is behind him. At least school is over for the day. Madara collects the worksheets his students left behind when he told them to scram, because school's over until tomorrow. Tachibana went to collect his siblings as soon as Madara dismissed the class. Once the worksheets are collected, Madara sits down in Iruka's chair to enjoy a moment of peace - however brief it will be.
CRASH.
"AHHHH!" That sounds like Sazanka.
Madara sighs and goes to see what happened. He heads outside to find Tachibana, Sekitei and Yatsude standing under a tree. Sazanka is lying on the ground beside them crying. "What happened?" Madara asks.
"Sazanka fell out of the tree," says Sekitei, sounding for all the world like she is telling tales not reporting an accident.
"My arm hurts!" Sazanka whines.
Madara crouches down and takes a look at Sazanka's arm. "Broken," he says. "Let's get you to the hospital." He scoops the boy up and turns to the others. "You three go to Mikoto's Daycare and tell her where we've gone. Stay there until I come to collect you, understood?"
"Yes, Uncle Madara," says Tachibana. "Ajisai will cry if at least one of us doesn't turn up at the right time." He and Lucy lead Sekitei and Yatsude away.
Madara watches them for a few seconds, thinking how much more independent Tachibana is now that Lucy is more he turns and takes Sazanka to the hospital. The doctor who sees Sazanka sets his arm and puts it in a sling and cast. Sazanka requests a red cast, and gets one. Madara is sure they didn't have coloured casts when he was a kid. As they are leaving, Madara sees a commotion beside the Emergency Doors. He asks a passing medic ninja what is happening.
"Oh…" The Medic Ninja takes a moment to collect her wits and says, "A C Rank Mission turned into an A Rank. It happens sometimes, you know. Well, enough that we joke about it. Usually it turns out alright, but this time the genin team came back badly injured, and the man they were escorting is dead. Now, excuse me - I need to find Tsunade." The medic ninja rushes away.
Madara activates his sharingan and examines the commotion. Three boys, about 11-12 years old. Their jounin is a woman - now missing one leg. They look as though they caught the worse side of an explosion. Possibly a high level trap, Madara reasons, based on the kunai and shuriken wounds.
Something like this wouldn't have happened inside the Infinite Tsukinome. Madara deactivates his sharingan and leaves the hospital. Sazanka trots along beside him, hanging on to his hand.
"Uncle Madara?" says Sazanka. "What did the medic ninja mean about the C Rank turning into an A Rank?"
"Missions are ranked according to their difficulty and the danger level," says Madara. "The lowest rank is D, genins do those missions. C Rank is the next difficulty up, chunins and stronger genins do those missions. B rank, which is the third difficulty, is done by chunins and jounins. A rank is the second hardest difficulty, done by stronger chunins and jounins. The hardest is S rank, which only jounins and ANBU Black Ops can do. Well, there is a harder difficulty - the SS rank, which only the strongest of the strong do, but that's not important right now. Sometimes a mission turns out to have been incorrectly ranked, and the team who was sent is not strong enough. That team probably went on a simple mission to guard a merchant from bandits."
"Why did it turn into an A Rank, though?" asks Sazanka.
"Most likely the bandits turned out to be rogue ninjas," says Madara. "Strong ones, judging by the damage they did."
"Oh," says Sazanka, then falls silent. After several minutes of silence he says, "Uncle Madara?"
"Yes, Sazanka?"
"One of the kids at school told me you want to destroy the world. Is that true?"
"No, not really," Madara assures him. But if it is the only way to stop all the pain and suffering that obviously still goes on, then I must enact my plan, no matter the consequences.
"Good," says Sazanka, sighing in relief. "Because if you did, you'd be an evil villain. And you're too nice to be an evil villain."
Evil? Madara never thought about it that way. He wants to save the world, not destroy it. That is why he is hesitant to activate the Infinite Tsukinome now that he knows what will happen. But perhaps he is strong enough to defeat Kaguya. If that were the case, then his plan might work. Or perhaps he could spare a few people - a few handpicked people and restart the world. Hmm, that is a plan worth considering.
Iruka paces the hospital waiting room nervously. Namiko sits on a hospital chair nearby and swings her legs. Meanwhile, Mei is in a birthing room yelling at the top of her lungs while she pushes out a baby. She would not allow anyone but the doctor and nurse in there with her.
"Daddy, pacing is not going to help," says Namiko, sounding like a little old lady again.
"I know," says Iruka. "But it's helping me stay calm."
"Is it?" asks Namiko. "You don't look any calmer than you were when you started pacing."
Iruka scratches the back of his head and laughs nervously. "Probably not, but it's something to do at least."
Namiko tips her head to one side then says, "If you want something to do let's play Paper, Scizzors, Rock."
"Alright," says Iruka.
Namiko beats him five times before he manages to win. After that, they get so caught up in the game that time passes much more quickly. Soon, a nurse appears to them them Mei has finished giving birth.
Namiko and Iruka follow the nurse. Namiko holds Iruka's hand so tightly that it hurts a little. The nurse takes them to the birthing room, where Mei is lying in bed holding a bundle in each arm.
Namiko screws up her nose. "No wonder your tummy was so big," she says. "There were two babies in there."
"Twins?" says Iruka, a little stupidly.
"Yes," "says Mei. "A boy and a girl. The boy was born first."
Namiko lets go of Iruka's hand and walks up to Mei's bedside. She leans forward to peer at the baby closest to her. "Does that mean the girl will be named after undead Grandma and the boy will be named after undead Grandpa?"
"Yes," says Mei.
"Which one is this?" asks Namiko, poking the baby's cheek. "My brother or my sister?"
"That one is your sister."
Namiko pats the baby's hair and says, "Hello Kohari."
The baby just stares at Namiko.
"Are you going to stand there staring or are you going to come and meet your new son and daughter?" Mei asks Iruka, who is still standing by the door staring.
The following day, Minato uses the Hiraishin to bring Arashi, Kazama and Kushina to the Mist to meet the new babies. The day after, he brings Kimiko and Burifu. The day after that, Iruka finally manages to get hold of Naruto. Naruto arrives in the Hidden Mist a week after the twins are born and makes a great fuss of them.
Iruka spends most of that week in a state of disbelief and mental distraction. There has never been a set of twins in his family line. In fact, the Umino clan was once well known for never having multiple births. The Uzumaki Clan used to joke that Uminos are far too sensible to have more than one baby at a time.
Iruka isn't sure how it happened, but he is the father of the first pair of twins in his clan's entire history.
And damn he is proud.