The Great Exchange

By TheCrackShipper

Thanks to Dragonheart0000, Anonymous, xXHyuugaSakuraXx, crzyaznsroxursox, Azote, Psyicman, and The-Eight-Sin for the wonderful reviews.

A/N: Hey I got a beta, the absolutely wonderful Coco-Minu, special thanks for the edit!

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.


"I can't believe this is happening," Sakura grumbled, as Temari knelt beside her, adjusting the kimono. The last minute 'formal ceremony' was a pity wedding courtesy of the new Hokage. Sakura was still not pleased.

"Hold still," Temari scolded, carefully stitching the hem, "and be grateful, Hokage-sama is only giving you this wedding because he cares about you."

"Double Wedding." Hinata added quietly. Hanabi knelt beside her elder sister playing with the intricate knots of her hair. Her face was narrowed in an expression of irked concentration.

In the adjoining room Naruto clapped his two best ANBU on the back and grinned, a grin reminiscent of a simpler time and a simpler man.

"I'm telling you guys, its great, being married and all."

Neji graced him with a quick disdainful frown, and Sasuke didn't spare him a glance. Naruto sighed, and adjusted his hat.

"Poor girls." he muttered staring at the two equally stoic clan leaders before him. It wasn't exactly a festive affair, not really joyous, and no one here was very happy, but it was a good way to prevent the whole shindig from being too awkward.

"I'm serious guys," he persisted, as Sasuke flicked a piece of lint off his stunning formal wear, "it's great!"

"You keep telling yourself that, loser." Sasuke replied.

Naruto scowled, it was difficult being optimistic when everyone was just so pessimistic.

"Where are we holding this thing anyway?" Neji grunted, displeased with the whole annoying arrangement.

"Ichiraku!" Naruto smiled, his eyes twinkling mischievously.

"Somehow I never pictured myself marrying outside a ramen stand." Sasuke muttered dryly.

Naruto's expression immediately turned to one of displeasure, "Look, it was the best I could do, you could at least try and pretend as though your happy with your matches. They're both wonderful girls, they'll both be good wives, and they'll both be great mothers, it's not the ideal match, but it's not exactly ideal circumstances. Grow up, be men, and do it for Konoha."

He was breathing heavily, greatly upset with the lack of motivation in his two friends.

"Yes sir."

They really didn't have a choice.

The streets were fuller than usual. People were excited, it was still scraggly and far less glorious than pre-war days, but it gave Naruto a reason to smile

The girls were waiting. The sight of his wife made him smile slightly, and she returned the gesture. Her hands were on Hanabi's shoulders, keeping the younger girl in place. Shikamaru was holding a conversation with Chouji and Hanabi stared at him, the faintest irritation glimmered in her large pale eyes. Sakura was glaring. At what Naruto didn't know. Hinata stood to the side, Kiba had his arm around her shoulder and he was chattering loudly in her ear. Hinata smiled timidly, but she was obviously trembling, and Kiba wasn't hiding his own glare toward Sasuke either.

All in all, the perfect wedding for his dearest friends. He couldn't have been more pleased.

"Let us start the ceremony." Naruto called everyone to attention. The two couples paired off, Neji next to Sakura, Hinata next to Sasuke.

"We are gathered here today…yadah, yadah, official nonsense, yadah, yadah." Naruto skimmed nervously through the tiny print, Temari fought off the urge to roll her eyes.

"Just get on with it Naruto." Sakura sighed rubbing the bridge of her nose with her free hand.

"Um stay loyal to each other, take care of each other, have plenty of babies…stay loyal ninja." he slammed the book shut, "I think I've covered the major points, sign here." he pulled out the wedding contract, and motioned to it. The villagers cheered, Kiba sniggered, and Shikamaru sighed. There would be a new addition in his household today.

"Kiss the bride!"

No one heeded his order.

"It was worth a shot." he shrugged.

What proceeded was the normal procedure, chattering, eating, drinking, avoiding new significant others. It went as was expected. And when the end of the day came, Ichiraku's was well used and most of the guests had filtered out, ready to wake up with their post wedding hang over.

Those who remained to clean up were sober (or partially sober). Temari did a good job of dragging the drunks into a semi productive work force. They finished relatively quickly, and Naruto did his best to fill the awkward silence with war strategies.

"Well, we'll see you in the morning." Sakura yawned, her kimono now rumpled and awkward looking.

Naruto silenced much too quickly for her liking.

"What?" she arched an eyebrow, the other stragglers turning to stare at what promised to be an interesting spectacle.

"Well," Naruto started," There an eensy weensy tiny detail I forgot to mention."

Shikamaru and Kiba had backed away to a far corner.

"What detail?" Sasuke's eyes were dangerously calm, like the calm before a very violent storm.

Naruto straightened up to his full height, and gave a nervous glance at his wife, the newlyweds, and Hanabi.

"You'renotallowedtoleavethegatesofKonohauntilyouhavechildren."

There was a unanimous look of confusion.

Naruto sighed, "Until Sakura, Temari, Hinata, and Hanabi have children Sasuke, Neji , and the girls can't leave the gates."

There was a moment of stunned silence.

And then a howl of outrage.

"Are you crazy?!" Sakura shrieked.

"He's insane." Shikamaru was looking at Naruto with a mixture of horror and slight gratitude for not being involved in the deal.

"Are you aware you're going to lose your two best generals, your head of hospital and top medical ninja and all three of the remaining Hyuugas?" Kiba questioned conversationally.

Naruto nodded, "They've no choice, it's in the contract."

"Screw the contract!" Sasuke lost control for once, his eyes scarlet, "You can't coop us up here, you'll lose the war!"

"Then start with the baby-making!" He avoided Temari's gaze, "Don't you think I know what's going to happen? You'll sleep in separate beds we won't get anything out of the agreement, we need to insure that we will get a generation of ninja, make sure you don't find a loophole in this whole damn arrangement." he spoke evenly, and firmly like a true Hokage.

"You can't lock me up for 5 years!" Hanabi roared, "It's different for those guys but I'm 13 and there won't be any baby making any time soon."

Naruto's calm gaze held hers, "We're protecting the women and children involved, and both of those include you."

"Shikamaru isn't stuck like the rest of us, and neither are you." Hinata pointed out quietly, a horrible sinking feeling in her stomach at the very though of being trapped in the dark Uchiha compound for maybe years.

"I'm Hokage and I'm exempt, Shikamaru is top strategist and his wife isn't at the age for having children, therefore he is exempt but if anything happens to him Hanabi will be married to someone else."

There was a very awful silence.

"We still have other very superb captains, Kiba being one of them, we'll make do, but if you want to get out on the battle field there better be a kid in that house."

The pleading in their eyes was too much for him to bear.

"That's it guys, that's an order, goodnight!" he turned around toward the direction of him home, leaving Temari staring sadly at his back.

They said their good-byes and Hinata held her sister tightly as they said good-bye.

"Take care Hinata." Hanabi whispered. Hinata who had grown so close to her baby sister in the light of this colder world they had inhabited. They reluctantly parted, heading in opposite directions.


Shikamaru was stifled by what he usually loved. Silence. The girl was much more bitter than was appropriate for a 13 year old.

Hanabi glared straight ahead of her, slowly undoing the knots in her own hair.

"Need help?" Shikamaru asked casually.

"No." she didn't bother to look up at him.

It was beginning to get dark, and there was a very faint roar somewhere in the distance. The ground began to tremble slightly and Shikamaru shuddered. His new apartment was in the center of the village, which was no longer bustling and lively at night. You could hear a pin drop in the tragic silence. The grey home surround his own were inhabited by ghosts, howling, wailing ghosts. It was all very eerie, very frightening.

And yet she was completely calm, utterly unafraid and surprisingly serene.

They pulled into the apartment, and climbed up the crumbling stairs.

"You're going to leave me in this place all day?" she asked disgruntled, scrunching up her nose in disgust as a rather unpleasant looking insect disappeared into a corner.

Shikamaru chose to ignore her, and Hanabi did not like to be ignored. She reached up on tip-toe to smack him upside the head, and he winced not only from pain but surprise.

"You answer me when I'm talking to you!" she snapped , stopping on the middle of the stairs and shoving her hands unto her hips.

"Yes I am going to leave you here all day…troublesome." Shikamaru frowned.

"Don't you have any manners?" she yelled again to his complete and utter confusion.

"What are you talking about?" He asked unhappily.

"Your fiancée is tired shouldn't you help her up the stairs?" she demanded haughtily, eyeing him imperiously.

"Sorry, I didn't want to get bitten." he retorted and offered her his arm.

For a minute he was afraid he would get bitten, and then she surprised him again. Completely ignoring his arm, she clambered onto his back, wrapped her arms around his neck, and her legs around his waist. She did this so fast, he still held out his hand his arms hanging out stupidly by his side.

"Now carry me up." she demanded burying her head into his neck.

Shikamaru had had the last straw, this was absolutely ridiculous.

"I don't know who." he stopped trying to unwind her from around him. She was sobbing into his neck. Her entire tiny figure trembling.

He stayed silent as they ascended three more flights of stairs, around the second flight she fell asleep against his back, her trembling body going limp.


Hinata's thoughts were on her cousin and her sister as she walked beside Sasuke. She chanced a glance over at him. His handsome face was marred by a very small, but nonetheless obvious frown. His hands were shoved into his pockets and he appeared to be deep in though. He caught her gaze and she immediatley cast her own pearl eyes downward, her cheeks reddening magnificently.

"I don't know about you, but the thought of being locked up in the house is not sounding to great."

She lifted her chin slightly.

"I don't want to rush you but the sooner we start the sooner we can get back to fighting."

Hinata could feel the tears silently stream down her face. He had sounded so final, she was never going to have a say, ever. She let out a little gasp, and could of hit herself. He looked over, but wasn't startled continuing on faster.

"What are you scared of?" his eyes were closed, "You don't have to be, I won't hurt you, I won't force you to do anything."

The sound of his voice made her cry harder, and she hurriedly tried to wipe the tears away with the sleeve of her kimono. For the first time in a long time Hinata wanted her mother.


Sakura and Neji were anything but a happy couple as they made their way to the large, empty Hyuuga compound.

"I hope you know I'm not sleeping with you tonight." Sakura said bluntly, the minute they were out of sight.

"That's fine," Neji replied coolly, " And then we can let the village burn to the ground, and let innocent 12 year olds die while we stay stubborn, look I'm not happy about this but you can't be selfish Haruno."

Sakura glared at him, "Don't you dare call me selfish, you don't know a thing about me."

"You sound like your twelve again Haruno," Neji sneered, "Listen and you don't know a thing about me, that's not the point this isn't about us, this is about Konoha and if you're not willing to sacrifice for it, than hand in your kunai case because you're not fit to be a ninja."

"You keep your mouth shut Neji," Sakura snarled, screeching to a halt, "you have no right to question my beliefs as a ninja."

Neji stopped raised an eyebrow, "I don't need this , you don't have to do anything and I'm not going to do anything, but your going to crack soon, once you see a few casualties."

Tears of frustration swam in her green eyes, and she punched him. He flew backwards hitting his own front door, a drop of blood on the corner of his mouth. Neji jumped to his feet, his eyes flashing in rage.

"The hell, Haruno?!" he shouted.

"Just try holding that over my head one more time Hyuuga and it'll be more than a little blood," She stepped around him and headed into the dark house.

That night the newlyweds slept as far away from each other as humanly possible.


Naruto was pretending to sleep when Temari entered their bedroom. She sat on her side of the bed, and sighed. She looked down at her intertwined fingers.

"I know you're awake Naruto, I raised two little brothers."

He shifted, but did not face her.

"You got pretty upset out there," she continued conversationally.

"It's not my fault, it's different for them than it is for us." Naruto's voice cracked but he still didn't face her, "We had to sleep with each other the first night, you, me, and the Suna girls. This was an arranged marriage between countries, if we didn't that could mean even more disaster and war. We understood that and our duty, but to them this is unnecessary, they're being stubborn, and our numbers are low, we need them to do this." He sat up, and buried his face in his hands.

"I understand," Temari moved closer to him, "I'm not happy about having to stay out of the fighting but I know its needed, this is for Suna."

"For Konoha." Naruto corrected her.

"For both," she conceded, "and you're worried they won't follow orders like we did, or like Tenten and Kankuro, and Ino and Gaara because its not a matter of life or death or duty to them, they just see it as unfair, and you don't want to upset them."

"Don't deduce," he finally turned to her , "I'm alright, I did what I had to do, and they'll respect my authority and my orders this way, I'll make them see the seriousness, oh shoot how bad things are."

He expected her to snap at him, but she merely moved her hand atop of his.

"You know you can be the rough and tough Hokage-sama out there, but when you're alone its okay to be human."

And so the big strong Hokage broke down and cried.


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