I do love crack pairings, I really, really do.

Characters:Kotetsu/Ayame, Izumo/Kaori, Kiba/Sakura, Naruto/Hinata, Aito, Raiden
Rating:T, for language

chapter two: expectations

Kotetsu doesn't even care for ramen.

He does, however, care a great deal about Ayame and back then he was more than willing to sacrifice his usual order at the steak house over on the east side of the village just to be able to sit down and have her, not anyone else, hand him a steaming bowl of ramen.

He's not sure how exactly the crush started but he figures it has something to do with that one time Izumo declared "I'm so sick of that goddamn steak house so we're going to Ichiraku's" and proceeded to drag him there. Sure, Kotetsu had initially thought she was pretty and was totally flirting because he tends to flirt with anything that bats an eyelash, but it hadn't been a crush. At least not at first.

This was all, of course, before old man Ichiraku had taken to the retired life and while Kotetsu was telling his only daughter just how much he loves the way she wears her beautiful hair, he had his eyes set on him like any reasonable father with a daughter would. It was like he knew before Kotetsu did.

By the end of the month, though, he was smitten.

All she had to do was smile and roll her eyes at his ruthless attempts to flatter her, and she had him. When he and Izumo finally made jounin, he actually suggested going to Ichiraku Ramen to celebrate and that was when Izumo knew something was up. Naturally, he did everything he could to encourage it.

"Ayame-chan, how great is it that Kotetsu-kun is finally a jounin?" he would say.

She giggled, of course, stirring the cooking noodles around in the large black pot. "Don't forget yourself, Kamizuki-san."

"Yeah, yeah. But really though, it's great, right?"

She turned from her work to look at the two of them, smiling, "Whatever you say."

Kotetsu grabbed Izumo's arm when Ayame turned around and pulled him in close so he could whisper, "What the hell are you doing?"

Izumo pushed him away, looking especially smug, "Oh, you know."

He really did know. A week later he asked her out, (they went to the steak house because he couldn't exactly take her to Ichiraku and even Kotetsu's favorite steak dish just didn't taste as good as Ayame's ramen,) and a year after that they were married and Ayame was two months pregnant before they could blink. Kotetsu literally almost shit his pants when she told him the news, partly because he was excited beyond comprehension so there was just nothing to do but shit himself and partly because he was scared well out of his mind at the idea of becoming a father.

The day after Ayame told him about her pregnancy, Izumo and Kotetsu went out on a mission. A-class, enough to make her worry. He had scoffed at her "be careful"s and "please stay safe"s and all that, but six days into the job and just his luck, he winds up with a katana sticking out of his chest. Luckily, it was well enough away from his heart and you only need one lung to live, so even though he was gasping for breath and swearing up and down that he was going to die any minute now, he ended up being okay.

Ayame, on the other hand, while visiting him, had crumpled to the floor, nearly screaming in agony and clutching her belly like her life depended on it. The nurses rushed her away to the ER. She miscarried about an hour later and four months after that, she was released from the psychiatric ward on the affirmation that she was no longer a threat to herself.

Some happiness did come out of the whole ordeal, though. Izumo didn't have much to do while Kotetsu was on the mend so he mostly hung around in his hospital room keeping his partner up on all the latest jounin drama. The nurse came in to give Kotetsu his medicine, and Kotetsu noticed it wasn't his usual nurse, Kaori-san. He figured it was her day off or whatever and didn't mention it, but oddly enough, Izumo did.

"She took a day out. Poor thing, I think her mother's passed away," the substitute nurse told him.

Izumo frowned and Kotetsu, grinning like a madman for the first time since the miscarriage, turned and faced his partner. "This is gonna be good."

Izumo replied with a facial expression that was somewhere between confused and horrified.

He and Kaori were officially dating about three weeks later, and it turned out that her mother was not dead, but a month earlier had thrown a brick through her neighbor's window and needed Kaori to bring her to court for her third offense of destruction of property.

They were married pretty quickly and Ayame was discharged. Kotetsu did literally everything his breathing body, (well, not so much after losing a lung,) would allow him to make their little apartment off of Konoha's main strip a paradise for her. He cooked her dinners and refused to let her clean anything and bought some plants, (which eventually died because Kotetsu forgot that plants need to be watered. Ayame began to seriously consider how fit he was to be a father after that.)

It got worse when Ayame became pregnant again. Kotetsu barely let her leave the house, he talked about things like allergens and irritants and deadly diseases and Ayame please think of the baby you know lately the flower shop has become pretty rowdy I've notice—oh my GOD put that laundry basket down you'll strain yourself!

Kaori soon followed suit and Kotetsu was able to relax a little. She and Ayame went out and bought all kinds of baby things together and Kotetsu figured that since Kaori was a nurse she knew all about the dangers of allergens and rowdy flower stands when it came to pregnant women.

Not having suffered the loss that a miscarriage can bring on, Izumo was much more laid back about his upcoming fatherhood. It was as if they had been sucked into some strange parallel universe because suddenly Kotetsu was the ridiculously responsible one and Izumo had taken to waving his hand at trivial things because "he had bigger things to worry about" like "thinking about being a father" and "babies."

Raiden, nearly two months premature, came out perfectly healthy despite being so early. Kotetsu nearly had a heart attack at the ripe age of thirty when Ayame woke up in the middle of the night, her thighs and the bed sheets coated in fluid, clutching her abdomen. She said, "I think the baby's coming," breathlessly but Kotetsu had already grabbed her coat and shoes and called the hospital.

The labor was relatively short, only five hours, and all Kotetsu wanted to do was hold his new baby son but the doctors had taken him away in a flash to make sure he was okay. Kotetsu struggled to get enough air into his single lung, while Ayame was perfectly relaxed from all the painkillers. She had seen him and heard the staff say he was alive, that was all she needed.

Kotetsu paced the delivery room like a wild animal. Izumo and Kaori showed up exactly a minute before one of the nurses came in and told Kotetsu that he could see his son now. Ayame was deeply sleeping, so he went in alone.

Raiden was probably the ugliest little creature he had ever seen in his entire shinobi life but Kotetsu had never been filled with such a powerful love. He loved the ugly little creature with every bit of himself. Every breath his one lung took, every beat of his heart, every rush of oxygen-filled blood flowing through his body was filled with love. He was purplish-gray and mostly bald except for some black tufts of hair, so impossibly small ad frail-looking in that chamber they stuck him in. Kotetsu wanted to hold him, but there were wires and tape and some important looking tubes that should probably stay where they were, keeping his son alive.

Kotetsu's face just broke into a grin.

That was his son.

Living, breathing in front of him was his own baby boy. His son. He was his father.

"Raiden," he said, still grinning. His little thunder god.

-x-

Ayame was fine, so she was discharged pretty quickly, but the baby had to stay until he could breathe on his own. The doctor talked about oxygen deprivation and brain damage and Kotetsu wanted his boy to be perfectly healthy, he really did, but he also just wanted to take his son home to their apartment. Ayame, for once, agreed pretty wholeheartedly.

Kaori visited Raiden a lot and just sort of stared at him with a detached look of longing on her face. Kotetsu figured she just couldn't wait for her own baby to finally get there.

They could finally take their son home and they barely had a day to just the three of them before people rushed in with gifts and coos and awws. Some more black hair had sprouted so it mostly covered his scalp, and he wasn't so purple anymore. He had gained a nice, healthy-looking pink look and he had opened his eyes, revealing that hazy baby blue. He was getting pretty cute, if Kotetsu did say so himself.

Izumo and Kaori had their son a little over four months after Raiden was born, right on time. They named him Tadashi, after Izumo's father Kotetsu assumed, and he was a perfectly healthy baby. They got to take him home right away and were met with the same swarm of people intent on admiring the shit out of that baby.

Tadashi and Raiden grew up together, naturally, there really wasn't any way to avoid it. Kotetsu and Izumo had been best friends since practically the beginning of time and since getting married to the two of them, Kaori and Ayame had gotten pretty close, too.

Ayame worried about Raiden's intelligence growing up, since he was premature, but Raiden proved to be one of the smartest in his class. It didn't help, though, that Chouji's second little girl was born premature and, as it turned out, with a heart defect. Ayame and Kotetsu set up more doctor's appointments when they heard that news for Raiden even though he still wasn't showing any signs of delayed development in any area. Ayame still had her worries about his physical development but he was a prime example of a good stature. He shot up like a tree before all the other boys his age and was still growing, nothing like what Kotetsu and Ayame had heard about "typical preemies".

Both Ayame and Kaori found themselves pregnant again, but there were seven months between the two of them and Ayame due first, in early March. Kotetsu was sweating like a pig by the time January rolled around because if anything scared him, it was having another premature baby and that baby being like other "typical preemies." He wanted happy, strong children. Not that he'd love any child of his any less if it turned out to be a little too frail to be a shinobi. It was just that he had a preference, really.

But four days late, Tadaaki was born, dark pink and screaming. They had a second son, miraculously as healthy as the first despite two previous complicated pregnancies. By the time October came around, everyone was waiting for Kaori. There were plenty of suspicions that she was having multiples because of her sheer size, and their suspicions were pretty on point. The end of the month drew closer, and on the twenty-fourth, she gave birth to twins, a boy, Yokuto, and a girl, Rei.

Yokuto and Tadaaki became inseparable, while, after being split into teams, Raiden and Tadashi more or less went their own ways. Their characters clashed, anyway. Tadashi was too brash and Raiden, too reserved and easily annoyed by Tadashi's loudness. Kotetsu was surprised he got along so well with his teammate Aito, since he and Tadashi were so similar. Camaraderie, he figured.

Sometimes Kotetsu wonders if sending his boys to the Academy and cheering loudly enough for the whole village to hear when Raiden graduated and made genin was the right decision. Yes, he wants them to be great shinobi and be renowned as fierce warriors in Konoha and the rest of the ninja world. He wants them to be able to protect their friends and their families if they ever needed to. Naturally Kotetsu wants them to be able to face down any variation of evil that comes their way, but there are things he doesn't want them to do.

Kotetsu doesn't like killing; most shinobi don't. It's ugly, dirty work and even though you know, you really know, that it's for the greater good, you never feel good about it. Kotetsu doesn't want them to know that feeling. He doesn't want them to become familiar with the sound of bodies breaking and with what death sounds like as it's coming towards a close. He definitely doesn't want them to know what a kunai taken in the thigh feels like, or a katana through the right lung. He doesn't want them to feel like the safety of the village is on their shoulders, like he can't help feeling sometimes when his mission isn't going as smoothly as he had hoped. He doesn't want them to know failure because when you're a shinobi, failure is unacceptable.

He sighs deeply at these dark thoughts. They wander often these days, while he has so much to think about. When he's going to be paid, when his next mission is, if he's going to survive.

Ayame comes in the room, not expecting him to be there by the look on her face when she spots him. He smiles, but it's very forced and she can tell. She goes to sit next to him on the couch.

"Hey."

"Hey."

"Wanna go out for lunch? Sakura invited me to come with Hinata," Ayame asks him.

He lifts an amused eyebrow, "You're asking me to join the ladies' day out?"

She smiles warmly, "Yes, we'll cheer you up."

No Kotetsu frowns, "Who said I needed cheering up?"

She rolls her eyes and stands up from the couch, brushing her skirt smooth again. "Oh, please. It's all over your face. You're thinking about dark things again." She sighs, but he can't tell what for like she could've. Ayame tends to be a much better mind reader out of the two of them.

"I guess I'll come. They won't mind?" Kotetsu asks.

Ayame shakes her head, "No, not at all. They love teasing you, it'll be like dinner and a show." She grins, waggling her eyebrows.

He can't help but laugh a little, "Okay."

They head out just shy of an hour later, heading to the eastern part of Konoha where there were plenty of restaurants. Hinata is already waiting for them when they come inside the hibachi place and waving them over to the table she got, as they're sitting down, Sakura comes in, looking around.

"Kotetsu-kun, I didn't know you'd be here!" She grins, sitting down across from him. "What a pleasant surprise."

"On your part," he muses, managing to smile at her. "How's Kiba?"

"Oh, the kids drive him crazy. I'm sure you understand, with two boys and all. Do they pick on each other? Aito is always teasing Kaiya. It's nonstop," Sakura tells him, waving her hands in that way women do when they talk heatedly.

"Raiden isn't much of a teaser," he tells her, and Ayame laughs her agreement and starts talking. "And Tadaaki, I think, is really only trying to be his friend. You know, he follows him everywhere, onii-san, onii-san, I want to play. Drives Raiden up a wall, but he doesn't say anything."

The girls begin their talk of their kids. All their oldest are on the same team under Shikamaru, so they talk a lot about him. Mostly criticism, although Hinata, typical, doesn't say anything bad on Shikamaru's part. Sakura, on the other hand, raves about how he constantly criticizes Aito's technique and form and everything else he does, (even though that's what a good sensei does.) Kotetsu has the pleasure of teaching one of the few two-girls-and-one-boy teams in Konoha's history, and now he starts to feel a tad guilty about critiquing them during practice.

Then he frowns, "Well if a sensei doesn't tell his students what's wrong, they might never be able to improve what they're doing. Or it'll take much longer for them to do so. A sensei watches his students and finds the errors so he can make them aware of them and help improve them."

Sakura stares at him, and she looks very angry for a moment and Kotetsu starts to draw back and apologize because she's very terrifying when she's angry, but she mercifully relaxes a bit, probably having thought it over, "Yeah, I guess so. It's just Aito gets so upset. He just wants to be the best." She sighs, "He's so much like his father."

Hinata nods in agreement, "Yes, Kiba-kun was always so competitive when we were a team. Hikaru tells me so much about Aito though; she seems to think he's a great shinobi."

Sakura smiles at this, "Aw, Hinata, your little girl so precious, honestly. Kaiya has adored her ever since she came over our house for dinner. I think she inspires her a little. I sure hope so, Kaiya reminds me of myself at that age: plenty smart but not really apt for fighting off enemy nin."

A small blush graces over Hinata's cheeks, (some things never change,) "Me too. I'm glad Hikaru is more like her father. It's so hard being a girl sometimes in the shinobi world. I think my little Kenzou may have inherited my clumsiness, though." She tries to hide her colored cheeks by taking a long sip of her tea.

"Oh, that's so cute," Ayame is saying after taking a bite of her salad with the house dressing, "how old is he now?"

"Oh gosh," Hinata replies, "almost eight now. And Hikaru's turning fourteen this year. Makes you wonder where time has gone."

"Yes!" Sakura and Ayame say in unison. They laugh at this for a moment, and Sakura continues, "I feel ancient! I'm married! I have children! I've become my mother!"

Ayame sympathetically pats Sakura's hand and smiles at Kotetsu, "I don't mind feeling ancient just 'cause I'm married."

"Stop, I'll throw up," Sakura says. Hinata laughs softly and agrees with Ayame. Sakura looks at the pair of them like they're crazy and shakes her head, "Ugh, I love Kiba and all and I love our kids, but sometimes I just wanna, I just wanna hit him! Like, not a slap-across-the-face kind of hit, I mean like, through our front wall, over the street and into our neighbor's."

Ayame and Hinata look slightly horrified by this and Ayame tries to relate, "Well, I mean, sometimes I get frustrated…"

"And a little mad…" Hinata adds.

Kotetsu can't help but laugh, "Hinata-san, I can't imagine you even raising your voice. It's hard to believe when you talk over a whisper."

She blushes and laughs again, "Oh, believe me, Kotetsu-san, dealing with Naruto and three of his children just brings it out of me sometimes. Like Sakura said, I love them all, and I do very, very much, but…"

"Sometimes they drive you literally insane," Sakura finishes for her, sending Kotetsu a pointed look.

He looks to his wife, "Do I drive you literally insane, honey?"

Her smile is sarcastic, "Oh, yes, dear. Quite often."

If he's being honest, he's a little hurt by this, but he doesn't show it because he loves his wife and he can relate because she sure can drive him up a wall at times. Never mind Raiden and Tadaaki, who seem to have some sort of personal vendettas against him and do everything possible to land him in a mental institution by the time he's forty.

Their food all comes, steaming and smelling heavenly, and their talk slows so that they can enjoy their meals. Sakura and Kotetsu start talking about missions, since Sakura still frequently goes on them despite being a full-time mother of two. Hinata and Ayame chat amiably away about cleaning and cooking and dealing with husbands and smaller, cuter versions of them.

Halfway through his meal, Kotetsu realizes that he had been cheered up. His guilt about pushing his sons into the hellish life he lives is still there, no doubt about that, and it will probably resurface to haunt him sometime in the near future, but it was nice talking to the ladies. He got a glimpse at a little bit of their world, though he doubts that the recently acquired knowledge will help him understand his wife's mood swings any better. Sakura, though a little harsh at times, (especially on Kiba, who had become a close friend of Kotetsu's since their kids were assigned to the same team,) was rather amusing, and Hinata was not as shy as he thought she was. "Naruto just…brings it out in me, I suppose," was her explanation of her personality change, although Sakura insists that she's still mostly the same, just a little more firm in her beliefs if anything, (good motherly traits, Ayame adds.)

They order drinks and only Ayame declines, then spend a considerable amount of time making fun of other shinobi's children, which Kotetsu thinks might be a bit out of line since none of them are over the age of fourteen and really have no sense of self-identity yet, but he bursts out in laughter despite himself when Sakura brings up Chouji's son.

"I mean good god, I know he and Fuki-san worry about their children since Sora has that heart defect, but overfeeding them sure isn't doing them any good. Isao is six years old and I'll bet any money that he weighs more than me. He looks like a tomato, a goddamn tomato. I have never seen a child so perfectly round. It's just…it's disturbing is what it is."

And about Ino's daughter, who is her youngest and only daughter out of four kids, "I don't think her clothing could be brighter. She will be the first one killed in action because of her friggin' outfits. The worst part is that she doesn't even like it, but Ino shoves it down her throat. She refuses to have a tomboy, that's her problem, so now instead of having a perfectly functioning little kunoichi, she has this angst-filled rainbow as a daughter. And all the kid wants to do is just wear normal clothes that won't make her a walking target for kunai but Ino dyes everything like neon green and orange."

After effectively making fun of everyone's children except for those of the ones sitting with her at the table, Sakura starts on her love life. "Everyone thought I would either end up with Sasuke or spend the rest of my life pining after him," she's saying over desert and a margarita. Kotetsu will be the first to admit that he had, in fact, thought that very thing about her and feels a bit like an ass for it now that she's mentioned it.

"Kiba-kun is a great guy," Hinata comments.

Sakura nods, shoveling a spoonful of ice cream into her mouth, "Oh yeah, definitely, I didn't marry him for nothing. Yeah, he's funny, good-looking, great in bed…"

Kotetsu almost chokes on his pie. Sakura, not a hint of a blush on her face, snorts at his reaction. On the other side of her, Hinata's entire face is beginning to resemble a tomato, (in color, not in size like Chouji's son,) and Sakura laughs at that, too. "Sorry, guys, it's true. It's a must-have in a relationship. With me, anyways. What about you, Hinata, is Naruto any good?" She nudges her in the side with her elbow.

Hinata looks like she might faint and Kotetsu really does not want to discuss this with his wife's friends, (who also happen to be his friends' wives,), "Um, I—I, um," poor Hinata struggles for words and probably also to remain conscious.

"Oh, Sakura-chan, please, we're in public and at dinner. And look what you're doing to Hinata," Ayame scolds.

Sakura finishes her last bite of desert and leans back in her chair, "Sounds like someone who doesn't want to talk about her sex life."

Now Kotetsu blushes and tries to think of ways to quietly die, "That's because it's coming from someone who doesn't want to discuss her sex life. My husband's right here."

"Yes! I am, I'm here, I am at this table, and I am part of this discussion," Kotetsu blurts, getting more and more red.

Sakura just chuckles, "Alright, alright, you bunch of prunes."

Sakura offers to pay the tip since she humiliated them all, much to her own amusement. They part ways after saying goodbye in the restaurant's foyer, and when Ayame and Kotetsu walk outside they are greeted by the familiar bustle of the streets and the sun hanging in the middle of the sky. Tadaaki is probably back from his lessons at the Academy and Raiden will be home shortly, too. Hand in hand, they make their way back to their apartment

"That was nicer than expected," Kotetsu says.

Ayame snorts, "Oh, I'm glad you set low expectations."

His smile is small, but genuine enough. "Yeah, well, you never know what to expect with Sakura."

Now Ayame laughs, "Yeah, I guess that's true.

They meet up with Raiden on the street, and Kotetsu ruffles his son's hair, which is the same color as his own but much shorter. He tells them about practice when they ask, and about his team. They don't say much else, but they do walk in a comfortable silence back to their apartment, where they find Tadaaki sitting at the table and dutifully doing his history homework.

After they give the kids dinner, because neither Ayame nor Kotetsu are hungry after their huge lunch, and get them off to bed, Kotetsu plops himself down next to his wife on their bed where she's reading.

"So," he begins, "any reason you didn't drink with us at lunch?"

She doesn't look at him and instead of answering, turns a page. A heartbeat later, she places the book in her lap and turns to look at him. "You sure do know how to spoil a surprise."

He frowns, "What's that suppose—" And then he stops because he understands and he's grinning and wrapping his wife in his arms and damn near crying if he's being honest with himself.

She laughs breathlessly in his embrace, but pulls away and places her small hands on both his cheeks, "But listen, this is our last one. I'm getting too old for babies as it is."

He kisses her, still smiling, because he doesn't know how else to answer her.