A Minato-centric chapter all in his PoV...if the title of the chapter didn't already give that away xD

Minato

The house was quiet. So quiet, he winced when the bed creaked as he sat up. The cricket in the window wriggled its antennae, hopped a little. Minato stared at it. He reached under his pillow and pulled out a kunai.

It felt heavy in his hands. Weird. It was darker than flint and had a blade that pointed to a wicked end, its edges sharper than teeth. He gripped the wrapped handle in both hands. Imagined himself running through the grass and throwing it like a real ninja, and his little brow scrunched up in what he hoped was a terrifying sneer (Father could do the most terrifying sneers Minato had ever seen, and Dad would attest to that), and he brandished it, making a whoosh sound for effect.

Awesome.

He swallowed and traced the edge with a finger. A real one, Enma had said, laughing when he'd given it to Minato, who'd stared at it wide-eyed, as if it was the most precious thing anyone had ever given him. Enma was ten, but he was Minato's best friend. Even better, Enma was a ninja, a genin Minato remembered, and he was home for the weekend, fresh from graduation, proudly wearing his newly acquired hitai-ate that gleamed silver in the sunlight. Next week he'd be shipped off. Minato had wanted to touch the hitai-ate, but Enma wouldn't let him.

The academy seemed like one of those far-off fairy tale places to Minato then. I guess it's okay, said Enma, who only said that because the other kids made fun of his name (So my mom picked my name out of a book, she didn't know he was a shinigami! he'd despair). Because boys went into it, and men came out of it heroes. You saw places. Graduation from the academy meant going someplace bigger, better, a place only for ninjas.

The kunai was Enma's birthday present to him.

"Guess how I got it? That one's not mine." His brown eyes were teasing, like he couldn't wait for Minato to ask how.

"How?" Minato dutifully asked. Enma grinned.

"It was taken off an enemy," he said, very seriously (though he'd failed to explain that this most formidable enemy was the teacher's mangy evil cat, who'd toppled over a box of kunai in the classroom after the students' hapless attempts to catch Cuddles, though if Minato had known this, he would have still thought it was the most dangerous and amazing thing he'd ever received and wouldn't have cared much anyway), and Minato's dark eyes went wide. He held it closer.

"It's freakin' awesome."

Minato took a breath. The cricket was still singing, fat and black on the window, and Minato aimed the kunai, narrowing his eyes. He threw it. It bounced off the wall below the window and scratched the paint. The cricket had stopped singing, sat still, then jumped away, as if it had paused to laugh at him before leaping away after avoiding certain death. The little boy winced, diving under his covers and waiting for one of his fathers to come check up on him, but nothing happened. Minato blinked, slowly peeking out. He listened.

Sometimes he could hear them talking at night, voices low and steady, and it would lull him to sleep. One night he'd listened to them talk, and it hadn't been low, it had been angry. Minato had stepped out of his room, worried and frightened, because someone was using the f-word and that word never got used unless someone was pretty dang mad. He rarely saw his fathers fight. Sometimes they talked about things in too quiet voices, eyes narrowed in that angry way, and stopped talking whenever Minato tried to listen. Sometimes he watched them poke at each other and laugh, watched Father chase Dad through the yard while Minato laughed his butt off because Dad actually looked scared.

But no one had been playing around this time. He'd watched his Dad poke his Father in chest, like bullies did whenever they said whatcha gonna do now, huh? saying something too quietly for him to hear. Father had narrowed his eyes, Dad bent his head, and Father sighed, placing a hand on Dad's shoulder and pulling him forward. Then his eyes had wandered, and he caught Minato watching. Minato had frozen, wondering if he was in trouble. Father only jerked his head as if to say go back to bed.

And he had, and sometimes he wondered what they'd been fighting about. He'd heard words like They're probably dead. and why are you so selfish. It had chilled him. Minato had wondered, for a couple nights straight, who was dead.

Slowly, he'd forgotten about it.

Tonight, he heard voices, more than two, and curious, he slipped from bed, kunai still in his hand. He opened his door a crack. Dad had left clones of himself tonight, and Minato crept quietly down the hall to peer around the corner. All the lights were off, except for the hanging light above the kitchen table, and a few moths were diving at the lightbulb. There were five of them, the clones, sitting at the table with a deck of cards, and one of them was sleeping on his hand, drooling on the cards, snoring. Loudly.

One of his brother clones smacked him over the head. "Wake up, lazy ass, we got kid duty tonight."

"Ow!" moaned the clone miserably, his eyes still closed. "He's asleep, ain't he?"

His fathers had obviously gone somewhere tonight. Sometimes his fathers left the bossy little red toad to babysit, and those nights were always full of rules, rules, rules and Minato go to bed! He smiled, the clones were more lenient, and he stifled a giggle when one waggled his fingers and tried to sneak a ramen cup from the pile of loot. The prize, the name of the game! Ramen! He got his hand smacked and he yowled.

Suddenly, one of the clones (he didn't even look over his shoulder! Did they have eyes on the backs of their heads?), shouted, "Go to bed, Minato!" The clones all craned their necks and laughed, ("aw, poor kid just wants to play.") Minato's heart kicked into gear (hadn't be been quiet?!) and he sulked back to his bedroom. after throwing them a scowl. Unfortunately, they thought this was cute.

"Leave it to Minato to make a scowl look damnably adorable! If I did that I'd just look constipated."

"Oi, he ain't the only one with the cute scowl if these memories serve right," said one with a suggestive grin that was lost on Minato at that age.

"Oh look, a chibi Sasuke, ehehehe!"

And Minato had wrinkled his nose in confusion. He huffed, closing his door and crawling back into bed. The cricket in his window sang louder and Minato couldn't sleep. He held his kunai and thought of throwing it again. He eyed the window for a good five minutes before slipping out of bed and wrenching it open with a grunt, pushing his toy box over so he had something to step on. He felt like a ninja as he toppled out of the window and into the grass.

He bit his lip to keep from laughing. The clones were getting louder ("CHEAT!" one of them was hollering while the others laughed and argued). Outside it was darker than he'd thought, and he paused, knees pressed into grass still wet with rain. The moon was full, the stars were bright, and he held his breath. A raccoon chattered nearby, lumbering through the yard and pausing to stare at him with luminescent eyes that winked yellow-green in the dark. Minato just sat there, wondering what it would do. He gripped his kunai and gave it his best glare. The raccoon shot off with a hiss, and Minato snickered, standing and running with a little hopskip, off to the pond near the trees.

But at night, the trees were nearly black, and Minato hesitated. He held his kunai to his chest and swallowed. This tree looked like it was making a face. The next one looked like it was reaching out for him with bony hands. Minato glared at them, and reared his arm back, throwing the kunai as if it might hit them.

It landed with a dull thud in the grass. He sighed, wriggled his toes, used a cuss word he'd get sent to the corner for just for effect, and trudged over to get it.

And that was when Minato saw them. His fathers.

They were fighting on the pond, and his first thought was to say stop it! but he froze, and his eyes grew wide. It wasn't fighting he'd ever seen them do. Their feet made the pond's surface ripple, and it was bright under the moon. They made it look as solid as a sheet of glass, and they moved like ninja, but even better than the ones on the television at Enma's.

They flipped and kicked and fought with kunais and swords, ducked and bent in ways that almost made it look graceful. They gathered wind in their hands and fire in their mouths-

"Whatcha doin'?"

Minato squealed as a hand settled on his shoulder and a familiar raspy voice whispered in his ear. The clone clapped a hand over his mouth.

"Shhhh! Geez, kid, you just wanna get me popped, don't ya? Did it seem like the perfect night to you for sneaking out? There are wolves out here you know! Oh man, if boss finds out...!" it said worriedly, casting a sneaky glance to the pond. Minato looked too, but his fathers were gone.

The clone whimpered. "I'll never babysit again and that cheat back there is gonna get all my ramen!" it cried morosely. There was a shift in the wind, and the clone stiffened. It groaned, slapping a hand to its forehead in a typical Dad manner. "Shit!" Then he was gone in a puff of smoke, just like he'd said, and Minato turned to look up at his fathers. Dad looked amused (until he saw the kunai "Where the-?!"he sputtered), but Father had his arms crossed. There was a katana strapped across his back. Minato gulped and tried not to stare.

"Where'd you get that?" Dad finally asked, crouching down to point at the kunai.

Minato shuffled his feet, holding it tight. "Enma gave it to me today."

There was a pause. A sigh.

"You'll cut yourself," Dad chided, reaching to take it.

"No! It's mine!" Minato looked at them angrily, shying away, still clutching the kunai. It wasn't fair, he decided. It wasn't fair that they were ninja, but they wouldn't let him do anything.

"You're not being fair!" he shouted, and Dad looked confused, then furrowed his eyebrows like he did whenever he'd say "Now, Minato...". Father said nothing.

"You're not big enough for something like that-"

Minato stamped his foot. "I'm big enough for anything! I'm five, I'm big enough to go to school if I want! You can't make me stay at home all day!"

"Pssh, don't lie! You don't stay home all day!"

Minato decided to ignore that, because he had lied a little. "I wanna be a ninja too! How come Enma can go to school and I can't?!"

Silence. But then Father decided to speak.

"Alright. Minato, come here," he said, and started walking back to the pond. Dad's eyes widened. Minato didn't move.

"No, he's not-"

"Come, Minato."

"Don't," said Dad, more forcefully now, in that low voice. He looked mad. Really mad. The type of mad that usually made Minato shrink away and hurry to his room. Minato still didn't move. He watched, and a part of him felt frightened, another part of him was excited.

"He's not ready for that."

"If he's big enough to hold the kunai, he's big enough to throw it." Father looked back, but only at Minato, who took a hesitant step back. "Bring the kunai," Father repeated.

"Sas-" Dad stopped and ran an aggravated hand over his face. "Akira. No."

Father gave him a sharp look. "He's got to learn some day. You can't always protect him."

Dad looked away. Minato looked up at him, and saw a part of his Dad he'd never seen before. He saw someone angry. Someone sad. Dad glared at Father. Covered Minato's ears and said something muffled, then he was gone, so quickly Minato blinked, wondering what had happened. A wind broke the trees with a sigh, but Dad was gone.

Father turned around. "Bring the kunai, Minato."

Later that night Minato went home bruised, tired, and feeling like something special was happening. The house was dark, silent. The moths were still striking themselves against the hanging light over the kitchen table, and Dad had to be awake, because Minato couldn't hear him snoring, yet he was nowhere to be seen as Father gently hefted Minato up on the counter by the sink and washed away the blood on his knee, under his chin.

There was a feeling he couldn't explain as his father cleaned him up, something big that made him smile because it felt like it was trying to claw its way out of his chest.

He wanted to feel like that again.

He stayed awake after Father tucked him in, listened to the sound of his parents' bedroom door creak open. He waited a minute, then they started to talk. Lowly at first, then louder.

"...didn't have to make me look like that in front of him. You know what happens nowadays if you're found and not registered. If they're seen in action...yet you'd wanna put him in that position-"

"He's got to learn. He won't understand why he can't go."

"We're better off letting him be. Just for now, until something gives and it gets better. It's not always going to be like this. Give it a chance for it to change. It's safer for him that way. And we still don't know what's going to happen. After a while, I needed a fucking babysitter in order to train, and they say he's supposed to be able to control it, but we don't fucking know that. You remember what happened after he was born? You couldn't see straight for three freakin' days, your eye would bleed all night, hell, I probably had to wipe your miserable ass. You don't have both eyes-"

"You're being a fucking coward-"

"I'm just saying wait until he's a little older and has a better chance of controlling and understanding it-"

"You can't just sit here and pretend-"

"He's five. Five fucking years old. I know it's going to happen one day, you know we wake up every morning wondering when we'll see it, and the last thing he needs is to lose control in a moment where he doesn't know what the fuck is going on. I think I'd know what that feels like. I know the Kyuubi. He needs to ease into it first. Make a wrong move and everything will go to hell, and next time, you'll probably lose that eye if we don't do this right."

There was a pause. Minato couldn't keep his eyes from closing.

"You know I'm right."

"Sasuke-let me just-! Fuckin' A. And what happens if someone sees? He's a little kid, you think he's gonna understand right off the bat why it's all gotta be a secret? You heard about what happened to that kid over in Ohisama? Immediately labeled a rogue. Strung up. Strung fucking up like a goddamn deer. He was twelve. We can wait until he's older. What's going on right now is our fight, not his." And Minato had wondered, as his eyelids fluttered closed and sleep threatened to overtake him, who Sasuke was.

"Dammit, you can't always protect him. You'll inhibit him! He's an Uchiha, an Uzumaki. There's so much he can achieve and you don't want to face it because you're letting your own shit get to you. Stop. Listening. To. It. Do you want him to be faced with something one day and not know what to do about it because we're not there? No one is coming. No one is ever coming."

Something clattered to the ground. Broke. Someone cursed. Minato thought he heard his name.

Silence.

Minato didn't hear anymore talking after that. At some point he thought he heard footsteps, felt a warm hand on his forehead. He dreamed of foxes running through wheat and Enma throwing kunais at raccoons. He dreamed of his fourth birthday when Father had tried making a cake. Minato remembered that day. Dad was sitting on the counter while Father frowned at Natsumi's recipe, and Dad swung Minato on his arm like a little monkey, laughing at everything and nothing at all. They'd ended up going to the Kobayashi's for dinner because the cake burned and nearly set the house on fire...but they were laughing, and Dad had one of Minato's hands, and Father had the other. They smiled. When they thought Minato had turned his back, he'd seen them grow close.

The next morning he tiptoed to the kitchen, wary, but found Father sitting on the porch in the back, his arm wrapped around Dad, quiet, watching the sunrise, saying something in his ear that made Dad say pssh, but he laughed anyway, and it was like Minato hadn't heard them arguing last night. It was one of the moments that usually made Minato pull a face and scamper away, but this time, he watched. Rubbed his eyes and cautiously stepped on the porch to wedge himself between them. Father pointed out an eagle.

The next summer, after Minato's sixth birthday, the fat cricket came back to his window to sing. Minato sat up in bed and stared at it, smiling. He took the kunai out from under his pillow.

He threw it.

His bedroom was silent, and the kunai had embedded itself in the window sill. Minato's smile grew wider.

He hadn't missed. He'd brag to Enma about it in the morning. By he time he'd turned seven, he was throwing shuriken for target practice with Enma out in the wood whenever Dad and Father let him have a break, whenever his friend got leave to come home. Being a child, and a genin at that, Enma had a lot of leave.

After a while, Enma got huffy. Minato's aim was better than this, though Minato missed intentionally once or twice.

"You should be a ninja," said Enma one afternoon, looking like he couldn't decide whether to be awed or jealous, and Minato only smiled.

Minato was ten years old when he killed Tsuki.

Tsuki was Natsumi's greyhound, a vicious little bitch. It had bitten Minato when he was eight for crawling under the porch to look at her puppies, and he still hadn't forgiven it.

Damn dog, Father had seethed.

It was evening, and the fading light was drawing shadows on the forest floor. A squirrel chattered, darting up a tree, blinking large black eyes at the boy with the wild black hair stomping through the leaves, humming a song and kicking up dead leaves. Anybody who knew Minato, and knew him well, knew that he always took a walk after training with his fathers. Today it had been meditating with Dad, and Minato hated those days, because they were boring and nothing interesting ever happened.

Look, Dad would say simply, this is important. Once you start to get the point of all this, I'll tell you what we're doing. It was a challenge. Minato loved challenges, because there were few he couldn't win. He was competitive. The kind of competitive where if it seemed he was going to lose, there was nothing left to do but cheat or blow through it with brute force and hope it'd stun the competition.

Brute force that, for a ten year old, wasn't as much as Minato would have liked.

So naturally, it had enraged him when he couldn't figure it out, and couldn't seem to pick the right answer as to what they were doing. Dad would close his eyes, and Minato would scrunch up his brow and do the same. He only ever saw the back of his eyelids. Every damn time. Didn't know what he was supposed to be looking for. Sometimes he'd feel his own chakra, running like the blood through his veins. Sometimes he'd hear his heartbeat. Every time he'd crack open an eye and watch Dad, wondering if he was asleep. Two times out of five, he usually was.

Although, no one but Enma, who at fifteen had been promoted to chuunin (for someone so young, he had an effective, admirable water style that was responsible for his young start as genin) knew that Minato trained. It was a gloomy evening. Enma was away on a mission in Grass Country, and Minato hadn't seen him in a month. Wandering the forest at night grew boring when there was no one to sneak out with, or sneak up on, or to teach you jutsus when your fathers were sparring, to argue with over whose jutsu was better: Minato's katon (which was he was very proud of, and he'd wished the little burn marks he'd earned around his mouth had actually stuck around to show Enma, but they'd been gone by the next day) or Enma's tsunami.

What Minato really wanted to learn was Dad's rasengan. And he imagined speeding over treetops while wisps of wind gathered in his palm. But his imagination only took him so far, and he was bored again. He threw a rock at a curious squirrel. A kunai when he missed.

There was no one to complain to, so Minato sighed and threw shuriken stars at the same tree he always threw them at, and by now it had a butchered trunk, and too many scars to count. He was rearing back before a throw, when he heard a snarl in the leaves.

Wolves, he thought, and a twig behind him snapped. The growl grew louder. The hair on the back of his neck stood on end. He whirled around and tossed the star, heart hammering. Something yelped and fell heavily to the ground.

Minato paused.

It wasn't a wolf. Just grumpy old Tsuki, and the star was embedded in her eye. He didn't move. He hadn't liked Tsuki, it was true, but he hadn't wanted to kill her. His throat tightened. Slowly, he walked up to the greyhound, as if the dog might suddenly shiver back to life. But it didn't, and sudden tears pricked the corners of his eyes. He bent over to look at it, in its unharmed glassy eye.

Minato, someone whispered, and the greyhound's eye burned like fire, its mouth curling into a grin. Minato cried out, scrambling away, nearly tripping over his own feet. He had that feeling again, like when he was five and sitting on the counter, prouder than ever, like something was trying to break free. But this time, Minato didn't want it to. His throat burned. His heart raced.

Minato.

He ran faster, through the brush, leaping up into the trees. Something sliced against his cheek, and it wasn't tears slipping down to his chin. His heart seemed to be clawing at his chest, and suddenly he fell. Minato never fell. He stared at the chip of sky through a break in the trees dumbly as the vertigo hit, and the the ground knocked the air out of his lungs. He rolled over onto his stomach with a groan and wince.

"Minato!"

He gasped, looking up, but it was only a toad. A red one who'd been assisting the family since Minato was born. Kosuke. The toad stared at him with wide, gold eyes. Its throat puffed out before deflating.

"What?" Minato wondered, scrambling upright. "What?" and his hands went to his face, smudging the blood on his cheek. Panic was setting in, black and raw and like a block of lead on his shoulders, until it started to slide down and constrict him like a snake. He didn't know why. Didn't know why he was so scared, but he only thought of Tsuki's eye, swirling orange and bright like fire. Minato! it seemed to cackle His hands shook, and he looked at the blood on his fingers.

"Nothing," said Kosuke flatly, a webbed hand tapping the goggles around his neck. "Nothing at all. I thought I saw-"

"Minato?" and Minato almost sagged in relief, and he wondered why he'd been so scared. Dad was bounding through the trees, dropping from a branch before him. He wore a broad grin, but it slipped when he looked at Minato. He frowned.

"What's wrong? What happened?" He bent down, blue eyes hard and searching.

Minato swallowed. "I tripped," he lied, pointing to his cheek. Kosuke said nothing, and Dad didn't look convinced.

"If you got something to say, son, you say it. Don't ever feel like you got to hide anything from me. alright?"

Minato looked away and felt his face heat up. He didn't say anything, and finally Dad sighed, taking him by the wrist. When Father saw him, Minato said nothing, only snuck away to his room to sleep.

That night Minato fell asleep listening to his fathers talk. He dreamed of foxes in the wheat. He never did tell anyone about Tsuki.

He was thirteen when Dad got sick.

He and Enma were in the field. In the morning light, they swayed with the wheat, doing a kata. Enma's six year-old twin siblings, Ai and Takeo, watched wide-eyed on the blanket their mother had set them on as she hung laundry.

Minato noticed a pause in Enma's movements. He sighed.

"You're off, just by a little," chided Minato, and Enma scoffed.

"Hey, who's the ninja here, kid?" He mumbled something like perfectionist. Suddenly he turned, aiming a kick, and Minato calmly blocked it. He grinned. Enma whirled, kicked again, and Minato blocked it with his forearm. Enma smiled, just a little. He made to kick again, swiveling his foot around to grab Minato's attention before suddenly stopping and rearing back for a punch.

Minato jerked his head to the side with just enough time to breathe and say, "Almost."

He ducked and blocked another punch, jumped and whirled to plant a kick, aiming for the side of Enma's face, who redirected his foot with a hand and sent him spinning in the air. The twins cheered ("Go, Minato, go!" Ai cried, flushed).

"You're faster than the last time I saw you," Enma said, and he smiled, really smiled.

"You've been gone too long," Minato agreed. Suddenly he was a blur, and it amused him to see Enma try to keep up with his movements, brown eyes swiveling so fast it probably hurt. Minato finally landed a kick to Enma's chest and sent the chuunin sprawling. Minato laughed, but suddenly water whips jutted out of the ground, and he narrowly avoided being grabbed by the ankle and slammed into the dirt like a ragdoll.

Enma's Tako or "octopus".

Minato formed seals, and suddenly four more of him popped into existence. "Spicing it up, huh?" said Minato, though Enma probably couldn't tell which. The water lashed out with increasing speed, but the clones were only interested in the jutsu user, weaving in and out. One popped with a curse after being hurled. It was just about to get good, really good, when Minato formed the seals for a katon to take out the octopus, but that's when Natsumi intervened.

"OI, YOU BOYS BETTER STOP THAT ROUGH HOUSING BEFORE I-"

The octopus turned into a harmless splash and Minato nearly choked on his own jutsu (ow, the burn!), Enma smacking his back with each cough and sputter, not making it any better.

"Sorry, Ma! Sorry, we were just-"

"Just-ack!-weren't going to-oomph!" He nearly choked again.

Natsumi sent them a glare cold enough to snap their spines straight and Minato held his next cough in until his eyes watered.

Someone started laughing. "Oi, Enma, don't smack my kid into the ground too hard, eh? I miss his chibi days, but I kinda like 'im the way he is!" Dad and Father came into view, walking up the path to the farmhouse, and Father was smirking.

"Nice jutsu you got there, kid," said Father as they crossed the lawn. Minato straightened, prideful, and wondered if they had seen him.

"Yeah, comin' along nice." Dad patted Enma on the back with a wink. "So eighteen now, huh?" Enma opened his mouth, but his mother beat him to it.

"Eighteen," sniffed Natsumi, shaking out a sheet with a snap! "And not going out tonight because of it!" She looked pointedly at Dad, who looked chastened. Father hid a laugh behind a cough, and Dad hooked an arm around Enma's neck when Natsumi turned, jabbing a thumb up the road.

"Nice little joint up the-"

"DAISUUUUKKKEEEEE!"

"Well what are ya waiting for Minato, hurry up!" Dad cried, sprinting away to avoid Natsumi's vicious sheet-slap attack ("Not the ass, not the ass! Iiieeeeyyyyee!") Father was full out laughing by then, waving to the Kobayashi's and trailing behind and saying "That usuratonkachi."

They walked home in companionable silence. When they got home, Minato would hear his fathers bet each other, like they always did, he'd watch them spar, like he always would. He'd catch them trying to steal a kiss during it, like always ("Hey, I'm still here!"). They'd eat dinner like normal, he'd spar with Father, meditate with Dad, and sleep. He'd sneak out and catch Enma training in the woods.

It was normal. It all was. Dad, Father, Enma...and maybe Minato had taken it all for granted somewhere along the way, because it was that particular summer that Minato would come to think of years and years later when he was grown and wondering where it had all began. It was that summer when his life had started to change.

It was a year of firsts after that summer. The first time he broke a bone (his arm). The first time he kissed a girl (Kotori, who was sixteen and visiting the mountainside with her merchant father to sell to the farmers in the summer. She had this voice that made Minato forget things. Enma had laughed until he cried when Minato had, in horrifying detail, described his terror when her tongue had pushed into his mouth). The first time he got the hang of the Shadow Clone jutsu (and he would lazily order them around when it was time to clean his room while they grumbled venomous things and tried to conspire against him, for cleaning Minato's room was a terrible fate indeed).

The first time Minato used the Sharingan.

He first noticed the change a morning Father had gone to market that fall, out to town at the mountain's base to purchase something for the garden...Minato couldn't remember. What he did remember was Dad.

Dad wasn't in the kitchen. He wasn't in the backyard doing a kata and calling for Minato to join. He wasn't on the porch. The sun had fully risen, and Minato was alone at the kitchen table, munching thoughtfully on his cereal, and was about to summon a shadow clone to go explore the forest with him and spy on Kotori (mainly spy on Kotori) when he suddenly heard it. A thump. Like someone had punched a wall. Then a curse.

Curious, Minato summoned a clone, who stood to attention dutifully. Together, they crept along the hallway ("Stop breathing so loud, he could probably hear you coming a mile away!" Minato complained, while his clone puffed up and spat back, "Shut up, shit for brains, if we had been in real cover, you'd have just blown it!")

They glared daggers at each other before Minato realized he was essentially arguing with himself and shrugged (his clone stuck a tongue out at him. Obviously it still remembered having to pick up Minato's underwear). They'd almost reached the door, when it flew open, and without sparing them a second glance, Dad hurried into the bathroom.

The door locked with a click.

Minato turned away with a cringe when he heard the gags.

"Dad's never sick," he said with a frown. The clone blinked.

"Everyone gets sick though...right?" it asked, worried. Minato shrugged again, and they trudged outside, where they proceeded to dig out Minato's sling shot from under the porch and take shots at sparrows.

The score was 5-3 when Dad wandered outside to watch before disappearing again. He was quiet. He got worse as the day wore on, and Minato would glare at the bathroom doorknob, as if it might tell him something. Sometimes Dad would open the door a crack, tell Minato there was something to eat in the fridge, or if he wanted, to walk over to the Kobayashi's.

He'd realized, unbelievably, one of the bathroom breaks wasn't to be sick. He'd backed away, truly frightened, when he'd realized Dad was having a panic attack behind the door. He could hear the sharp intakes of breaths, the gasps, over and over and over. He didn't know what to do. He dispelled the clone.

Minato went to sit at the kitchen table, pulled his knees up to his chest. And he was still sitting at that table when Father returned. He took one look at Minato, slumped and looking dejected at the kitchen table and hurried down the hall. Checked the bedroom, ("Bathroom," Minato called). He watched Father jiggle the knob, persuade Dad to open the door. He slipped inside.

An entire ten minutes later (and Minato had been ready to creep over and listen) the door opened, and a strange thing happened. Dad smiled weakly, Father was silent but it was different this time. It was the type of silent when Minato couldn't tell if he was angry or pleased, and the house seemed to try and catch up with itself.

That night he pretended to sleep, and after a while he knew Dad was leaning in his doorway. He was watching Minato, like he did some nights when he thought Minato was already asleep.

"...it's happening again."

"Hn."

A pause, then Father spoke again. "We'll get through it."

"It's already moving. Who knows how long we have left." Dad sounded sick again.

"What did it say?"

Silence. And Minato could feel the chill in it. Dad didn't speak, and from the corner of his eye, Minato saw him slump against the door frame. Father put a hand on his shoulder.

"Hey, come on. Let's go to bed. We'll get through it. We always do."

They wandered away. As soon as the bedroom door closed and locked, Minato used the Shadow Clone Jutsu. The clone saluted, looking wary.

"Find out what's going on."

The clone nodded smartly and slipped out through the bedroom door, silently. Minato lay in bed and waited. And waited. Thirty minutes later, he knew the clone was gone. He closed his eyes, and the memories came.

"The Kobayashis think we found Minato on the side of the road."

Minato's heart picked up the pace. He'd always wondered, always, where he came from, though his fathers never spoke of it. He remembered his father saying, "You have me, your dad, and that's all you need." Who had his mother been? He'd never known. Now his curiosity was insatiable.

"It'll be no different this time."

"And Minato, he-"

"Perhaps he still isn't ready. You say he still hasn't discovered the reason for meditation. He can't feel it? Maybe it's still dormant?"

Minato inhaled sharply. Feel what? What was dormant? He suddenly felt uneasy, like there was something lurking inside him he didn't know about. It made his skin itch, and his legs scissor the sheets. Randomly, he remembered the vivid, black spiral tattoo that would sometimes appear on Dad's skin, on his stomach. And he'd stare, and Dad would say, "when you're ready. Have you found it yet?"

He'd lie and say he had, but Dad always laugh and say, "No, you haven't."

For the first time in a while, he grew angry with his fathers. They knew things about him. Things he had always wondered and daydreamed about. And they were keeping it from him!

"No, he'll come to understand even if we wait. He's a smart-oh, shit."

And that was when the clone was discovered. That night Minato fell asleep with a knot in his gut. He dreamed of something whispering Minato.

...

It happened on the seventh of February. Snow crunched under Father's footsteps, and the trees were bare, skeletons reaching for the sky and pleading for a pale sun that stayed hidden behind heavy clouds.

Father stood still, tapped his fingers absently against the bells on his belt, and Minato watched warily, fingers curling around his kunai. Father whirled, put a kunai through the head of a clone bursting out of a snow drift. It vanished in a puff of smoke. Lately his only sparring partner was Father.

Minato winced, shifting his weight slightly. How had he known it wasn't Minato?

"Again," came the harsh demand. Minato grimaced, chucked the kunai for a weak spot. Father blocked it with an easy flick of his wrist.

"What was that? Put some effort into it. You're getting lazy."

Minato clenched his teeth. Suddenly he charged. Father's eyes widened only a fraction. He kicked, punched, ducked, weaved, whirled, spun around until he was at Father's back, but Father was quick and blocked the kick. Minato went flying, crashing into a snow drift. Two more of him raced out of the snow, kicking and punching and wild, fingers reaching, but never touching the bells. Father began to smile. Just a little.

Up in a tree, Minato breathed fire. "Katon: Gōkakyū no Jutsu!" The forest cackled in a roar as as the fireball raced towards Father. He leaped away...

In exactly the same spot Minato had expected him too. To the right, near the snowdrift. He'd been watching, carefully studying. Anticipating. A kunai went flying, and Father spun out of the way mid-leap. It was while he was fending off shuriken that Minato made his move, as soon as Father's feet hit the snow. He lurched out of the drift, and the pads of his fingertips grazed the bells, just enough to make them chime...

Then Father grabbed his wrist, sent them both hurtling away from the shuriken, and threw him. Dazed, Minato looked up at the sky, and realized it had begun to snow.

"Better," said Father, "but not enough-"

"I want rasengan," said Minato suddenly, shaking the snow out of his hair and rising to his full height. His father raised an eyebrow.

"I have the kage bunshin, I have katon. I want another." He'd found, much to his dismay, that he didn't have the elemental affinity to learn his father's Chidori. But Dad's rasengan, that was something Minato wanted. He'd been delighted to learn he possessed an affinity to both fire and wind.

"Hn. That's something you need to take up with your dad. Besides, you're not ready for another if you can't even take the bells off my belt."

Anger licked his insides. In a flash, he'd unsheathed the tantō hanging from his belt. He flew at his father, who'd drawn his katana. Sparks flew, metal sang, and Minato roared. He parried, the blades slipped away from each other, and Minato flipped back, forming seals. The clones burst into existence. This time, five of them. They charged, all shouting a war-cry that made his father's grin broader.

But he swatted them away, more in favor of the real one slashing with the tantō. He dispelled three of them lightning fast, and turned to kick another. But his foot met solid flesh and bone, and the real Minato skidded through the snow in a cloud. His father paused when Minato didn't immediately rise.

"Come on. Get up."

Minato didn't move.

"Get up, Minato."

Minato groaned, rolling in the snow. His father drew closer, and closer, and finally, when his son's face pinched and he clutched at his ribs with a gasp, his father dropped to his knees.

"What-"

Minato smiled and disappeared.

"Katon: Gōkakyū no Jutsu!" His father leaped away with just enough time to avoid a face full of fire, when another katon fireball came barreling in on his right, on his blind side. In that moment as he twisted and actually activated the Sharingan to deflect the rain of shuriken stars , a precisely timed shadow star with another shadow star hidden under it, from a clone who had been hidden in the trees since the beginning of the fight streaked through the air, sailed right for the bells. Naturally, Father deflected it, seeing through the initial illusion (the only genjutsu Minato had been able to master so far) but as soon as his wrist moved, the shadow beneath it cut the bells from their restraint. Minato leaped from his hiding spot in the snow to grab them.

He came away with one. Father held the other.

"You hid it and took advantage of my blind eye," said his father simply.

"I want rasengan now," said Minato, "And I want you to help me convince Dad that I'm ready." He jingled the bell. This little, insignificant thing he'd been working so hard to get. He prized it for a moment, before it became useless to him. He wrapped it around his finger.

His father watched him for a moment. "Ask when this isn't about greed."

Minato sucked on his teeth in a fresh wave of anger. "I'm good enough now for another technique!" He stalked across the clearing to grab his tantō, hidden in the snow after dropping off his clone.

"You're pursuing power for the wrong reason," came the cold reply. "You're letting your pride guide you. A shinobi is not about power. A shinobi is about survival, endurance, and the respect of power."

Minato scowled. "Yeah, yeah, yeah," he scoffed.

"Minato-"

He whirled around. "You want respect?" he asked, voice trembling. "Is that it? You want me to respect you?" A new quiet settled over the forest, and his father watched him with a curious gaze. He looked powerful, standing there in the winter light, dressed all in black, dark hair cropped close to his scalp, red eye spinning. Since August, the knot in Minato's gut had grown, twisted, intensified, until he couldn't look at Dad, or Father without feeling the anger.

"You're gettin' pretty cocky thinking you can go around acting like that," Dad had growled after Minato had told him to "get the dishes himself" when they were cleaning up after dinner. He'd just walked away.

"Oi! Minato! What's going on with you? Hey!" And Minato, for the first time since he was seven years old, slammed the door in his dad's face. Minato still dreamed of that conversation he'd overheard. He wondered where he came from, what dark truths about himself he had yet to discover. He'd listened to his dad curse and complain, and something about it felt good because Minato hadn't felt good in weeks.

He sneered. "Is that what you want, Father? Or should I even call you that? Why did I ever call you, either of you, father in the first place?"

A strangely wounded expression flickered across Akira's face. "Minato-"

"You think I didn't hear? Back in August?"

Akira stared.

"Does everyone but me think I came from the side of the road?"

Silence.

"Who is my mother?" he shouted, and his voice cracked.

Silence.

Then Minato was gone, in a flurry of rage and snow, leaving the man he called father to stand alone in the clearing, but if Minato had hesitated a second longer, he would have seen the toad, Kosuke, appear in the snow with a shrill cry of "Sasuke!" leaving the snow stained red in his wake.

Minato burst through the door back at the house, intent on grabbing whatever-the-hell he saw first in his room and taking to the trees without so much as a goodbye, but something stopped him. He paused in the doorway, breathing hard, the rage in his blood beginning to cool.

There was blood in the air. He could taste the copper on his tongue.

Minato didn't move. For one absurd moment, he thought of calling Dad out by name, just to spite him, but he swallowed. "Dad?"

More silence. He took a hesitant step into the house. The footfall seemed to echo. "Dad?"

Every single light was out. The late afternoon darkness was beginning to creep into the hallway, and Minato stood before it, looking down at the brass bedroom doorknob, and it was like it stood all the way at the end of a throat, waiting for Minato to step through the teeth. He swallowed.

"Dad?"

His heart began to pound. His palms began to sweat. He reached out for the doorknob and yanked the door open.

But the second he peered inside and screamed, someone grabbed him around the waist before he run forward, into the chest of the man glowing gold and red like fire, to the man with the feral, red eyes and the teeth that gleamed like bone in the dark. To the man bleeding on the floor by the foot of the bed, the man who started to howl. His dad.

And Minato had never been more scared in his life.

"DAD!"

Minato was slammed into the wall, hard enough that his head snapped back viciously and he bit his lip. Then his father's eye was before him, and it widened in surprise just before whispering his name, before the tomoe began to spin.

"Not...like this..." he could hear Dad raging. "Not...like...this...!"

And Minato knew no more. When he woke, it was to cream wallpaper and a ceiling fan missing a blade. He wasn't in his bed. He wasn't in his house. There was a plate of eggs and bacon on the nightstand by the bed. A glass of milk.

He was in the guest bedroom at the Kobayashi's.

Daisuke had had an accident, Natsumi explained when Minato finally calmed himself and wandered into the hallway, to the kitchen. His father would be by to pick him later that morning.

Minato waited.

And waited.

Morning slipped away to noon, and noon to afternoon until the sky began to darken at the edges. Minato was alone in the living room. Enma and Hiro were gone, and Natsumi kept asking him if he was alright and patting his head. Ai and Takeo kept watching him from a distance, whispering and giggling. They ran away in tears after he refused to play with them.

"I'm sure Daisuke will be alright," Natsumi kept saying, until Minato ground his teeth together. Finally, around 5 o'clock a knock came to the door, short and loud. Minato leapt from his spot on the couch, heart racing and feeling ill. Natsumi answered the door, and Akira strode inside. He spoke in whispering, halting tones, and he looked tired. His eye was red, but he smiled. He looked to Minato, and Minato waited for him to say something. For him to be angry at him for the day before. He politely refused a cup of tea.

"There is a lot Minato and I need to discuss," he said, "But thank you. Thank you for watching over him. We appreciate it." He turned back to the door, gesturing for Minato to follow, and Minato put one foot in front of the other, until he'd left Natsumi and the twins behind, until all he saw ahead of him was Father and the road beaten with sludge and snow.

"I know you have questions," Father said finally. Minato said nothing.

"They'll all be answered today."

He said no more, leaving Minato to worry and guess. He said nothing about Dad, and when the house came into view, Minato shot forward, running for the door. Father was behind him the instant he reached the door and wrenched it open.

A baby's cry echoed through the house and Minato paused, taken off guard. Still, the house looked empty. His father slipped past him.

"Come, Minato. We have a lot to talk about."

And when he walked into the bedroom, Minato hesitantly followed, suddenly frightened of what he would see. His eyes widened. In the bedroom was Dad, and in his lap, was a very angry newborn. His dad looked up at him, and it was almost apologetic, but mostly, Minato saw relief. Minato's throat tightened. His chest hurt. He wanted to say I thought you were dying yesterday. But here Dad was, pink-cheeked and looking like the weariest man in the world, but alive. The toad Kosuke was sitting on his pillow behind him, catching a quick nap.

The baby was a mystery, and Minato stared at it.

"Is...is this how I was born?" he finally asked. His fathers looked at each other. Dad sighed, beckoning him forward.

"Come 'ere," Dad said, and Minato wandered close.

That day, Minato met his sister Mikoto. That day he learned where he came from. It was also the day he discovered he'd awoken the Sharingan.

A/N: Next chapter is called The Summon, and there will be a time skip. It will the last chapter before the final one. I'm not sure if I can get it up in time by tomorrow, but if I can't, at least I got this up :)

Merry Christmas, all!