The sun was just starting to set as Naruto walked through the streets of Konoha. At this time of day the village's roads and pathways were crowded with people on their way to or from the markets, restaurants, or various shops.
It was times like these where Naruto truly got to interact with the average villager, and Naruto always paid careful attention to how the villagers reacted to his presence.
The majority left him alone, which is to say they treated him like any other villager. If he initiated some sort of reaction they would respond, but they didn't go out of their way to interact with him. He was just another person in a stream of people out on the streets.
A visibly sizable minority treated Naruto in a way that was appropriate for his standing. Shopkeepers especially would bow to him or call out to "Uzumaki-sama" as he walked by. Naruto dutifully waved or offered a few kind words, though he usually had to weasel out of one or two conversations where an overzealous shopkeeper walked up to him and tried to entice him to enter their store with special deals or free samples.
The third type of reaction that Naruto got was not one he had noticed at first, he had been too young and his shinobi skills not honed enough. But by the time he was an upper-level academy student he had noticed it.
This reaction first came to Naruto's attention based on the way older members of the clan would react when he was with them. Occasionally, the jonin or chunin Uzumaki he walked with would hurry him along, or put themselves between him and a villager. It was very subtle, but Naruto had noticed that older clan members seemed overprotective of him at times when outside of the clan compound. He followed their eyes, and that's how he noticed the third type of reaction from the villagers.
Sometimes it was a look of fear, the villagers were terrified that Naruto was there. Other times it was a glare. If looks could kill, Naruto would be dead several times over. At first, Naruto the academy student had been unable to figure out why this third type of reaction occurred. By the time of his graduation, he had put 2 and 2 together.
Naruto was born on the nigh the Kyuubi no Kitsune broke free from his mother's containment and attacked the village. The Kyuubi's chakra was so great and so potent that only Uzumaki clan members, themselves having considerably higher chakra reserves than other clans, could serve as its Jinchuuriki, so the Yondaime Hokage had sealed the Kyuubi inside the nearest Uzumaki, Naruto.
The villagers that looked at Naruto in fear or hatred did not see Naruto the person, Naruto the ninja, or Naruto the rightful ruler of Clan Uzumaki. They didn't even seem him as the Kyuubi's jailer. When they looked at him, they didn't see Naruto at all, they saw the Kyuubi itself.
Thankfully, the number of people who had this reaction to Naruto was relatively small. Between the fact that he had been whisked away to the Uzumaki Clan compound within minutes of becoming a Jinchuuriki, the fact that it had not been until years later that he had left the compound and his hair had changed color from blonde to Uzumaki red in that time, and the Sandaime's law condemning anyone who spoke of Naruto's jinchuuriki status to death only a small few non-shinobi knew what Naruto contained.
So as Naruto walked through the streets he was largely left to his own devices, with the occasional person addressing him, and even rarer was a time when Naruto would catch a villager subtly turning from him in fear or glaring at him.
As Naruto came to a 3 way intersection he spotted pink hair moving through the crowd coming from the opposite direction. Sakura appeared shortly after, meeting him in the middle. After a quick exchange of greetings they turned down the third path, heading towards their destination.
Before too long the crowds began to thin out as the pair of teammates left the crowded central district of Konoha behind. Eventually, they turned onto another street. Hanging over said street was a wooden arch emblazoned with a lattice like pattern. They had entered the Hatake District.
Rather than an enclosed compound, some clans preferred open districts. In such districts outsiders were often allowed to live or own businesses in these areas, but would have to pay more money to do so than a member of the controlling clan would.
The streets of the Hatake District were largely empty. The clan had been almost completely wiped out by the 3rd Shinobi War, and without the members of the Hatake Clan to support them, many businesses in the district had gone under.
Still, hope remained for the district, as it did for the clan in general, and before too long Naruto and Sakura stood in front of the most visible manifestation of that hope: a large, but not gigantic, house; the traditional home of the head of the Hatake Clan.
Approaching the home they found that the front door was slightly cracked open, with Kakashi's dog Pakkun lounging around on the front port.
"Naruto, Sakura." Pakkun said, acknowledging each of the arrivals as he slowly got up.
Sakura was the one who responded "Hi Pakkun, we aren't late are we?"
"Nope." Pakkun said, pushing the front door fully open before entering the house, "you're just in time."
Sakura and Naruto followed the dog into the home, closing the door behind them.
Kakashi's home was an interesting mix of the more spartan upbringing and preferences of the Lord and Lady of Clan Hatake combined with the opulence that would be expected and required of clan heads.
A small few rooms were quite luxurious, but these were largely used for entertaining guests and putting on a proper show of glamour and style that one would expect of people of Kakashi and Anko's standing.
However, the further one retreated into the Hatake Manor, the more the real personalities of of its occupants shown through, luxury giving way to plain, simple, and at times almost minimalist furnishing. Appropriate for a pair of orphans that had lived so much of their lives consumed by personal demons, only to have the power and prestige of leading a clan unexpectedly thrust onto them.
The private living room was one such plain and simple rooms. All the expected furniture was there, but was considerably less stylish than those in the larger living room used for hosting guests and outsiders.
While technically outsiders, Team 7 were exempt from that, and got to see the normal lives of the Hatake family.
In the private living room, on a reclining chair sat Hatake Anko, Kakashi's wife. A feared tobuketsu-jonin who had made her name in the village's Tortue & Interrogation department, she looked nothing like the feared interrogator as she relaxed, wearing baggy clothing, and with a swollen stomach due to her condition, 7 months pregnant.
On the floor not too far away sat her first child: Hatake Obito. Just 3 years old, the heir to the Hatake Clan was currently preoccupied by showing his favorite toys to Naruto and Sakura's other teammate. It seemed Sasuke had beaten them to their destination.
Anko's face lit up when she saw her other guests enter the room: "Gaki, Pinky, you made it just in time! I think Squirt was getting lonely playing with Obito-chan by himself."
From the kitchen, next to the living room, Kakashi's voice called out: "Ah Naruto, Sakura, welcome! I'm just putting the finishing touches on dinner, it should be ready shortly."
After roughly 10 minutes of conversation and playing with Obito, another of Kakashi's dogs, Bull, came in to inform the group that dinner was ready, and the three genin moved quickly to assist. Sasuke went to set the table while Sakura saw to Obito and Naruto went to assist Anko, much to her protests.
And so in a matter of moments everyone was seated, and the current generation of Team Seven's Team Dinner began.
Conversation was lively, though the host and team sensei was largely silent. Too consumed by the nostalgia of Team Seven dinners, Kakashi's mind wandered back to simpler times, when him, Rin Nohara, and Obito Uchiha dined with their sensei and his wife, Minato Namikaze and Kushina Uzumaki.
Kakashi was suddenly pulled from his musings by a sharp and well placed under-the-table-kick from his wife.
"Huh?"
Naruto quickly repeated the question he had been asking, the reason Anko had forcefully brought Kakashi back to reality: "Have you and Anko learned if your second kid will be a boy or a girl, Sensei?"
"Oh, uh, yes we have. We've known for a couple months now."
"What!? And you haven't told us!" Sakura seemed upset.
"Maa, well...you see...uhhh...it's an old Hatake Clan Tradition to not reveal the gender of a child until after the child is born. We didn't tell you about Obito's gender did we?"
What Kakashi said was certainly plausible, many clans had seemingly odd traditions and rituals around birth. However, based on how he was sheepishly rubbing the back of his head the genin of Team 7 couldn't tell if Kakashi was telling them the truth.
"We didn't know you back when Obito was born." Sasuke quickly pointed out.
"Heck, Anko was pregnant with kid 2 before we met you." Naruto added.
"Oh...you're right." Kakashi sheepishly responded. Meanwhile, Anko could barely hold back her laughter.
Thankfully for Kakashi, Sakura threw him a metaphorical bone and decided to change the subject.
"Sensei, you remember a couple of months ago when we talked about shinobi skills that I might be able to specialize in?"
"Yes, of course."
"And you remember how you asked me to take some time and consider support fields like medical ninjutsu and genjutsu?"
"Yes."
"I've made my decision."
"Oh?"
By this point all eyes were on Sakura, except for Obito, who was still to young to understand what exactly was going on.
"I've decided I'd like to prioritize medical ninjutsu. I want to become a great medical ninja...but I was hoping you'd still teach me some genjutsu as well."
"Of course, I'm happy to hear that you have made your decision. I'm also pleased with how hard you have all been training the last couple of months. Your Chakra reserves and control have improved. I'll be happy to start working with you on genjutsu at our next meeting."
"Great!" Sakura was clearly excited to get to work. "I'm excited to get started tomorrow."
"No, not tomorrow. You all have the day off. The Uchiha requested Sasuke be available for a clan thing, and Anko has a doctor's appointment that I would very much like to be at on top of a couple of meetings in my role as a clan head."
Seeing Sakura's disappointment, Kakashi then added: "but if you want to get started with medical ninjutsu I'd recommend you seek out Uzumaki Shizune. She's the apprentice of Lady Tsunade, and outside of Tsunade herself is probably the best medic in the village."
Hearing that her recommended teacher was an Uzumaki, Sakura's eyes turned to Naruto, and unspoken question clearly visible in them.
"Yeah, I'll ask her tonight and send a clone to let you know." Naruto yielded, getting a big smile from his pink haired teammate in return. "I think she's been giving Karin and a couple of others a rundown on medical stuff in the mornings anyways, so there's a good chance she'll say yes."
-Later that night -
With little Obito finally sleeping peacefully in his bed, Kakashi made the short walk from his son and heir's bedroom to his own. Before too long he had finished preparing for bed and collapsed into his own comfortable sleeping position.
Before sleep could claim him, he felt the familiar motions of the mattress as his wife climbed in beside him, as her pregnant belly nestled against his back and one of her arms draped over him.
"You ok, Kakashi? You seemed kinda out of it while talking with the brats at dinner."
Shifting onto his back, Kakashi began to gently rub his hand on Anko's stomach, sensing the chakra of the life form he had helped create growing inside her.
"After the darkness that had claimed me for so many years, I never thought I'd experience that feeling again...the team dinner. I felt like I was Minato-sensei looking over at Rin, Obito, and I. I even saw Kushina when she was pregnant with Naruto in your place, but that never happened. Rin and Obito were both gone by that point. It was...both incredibly nostalgic and incredibly weird."
Anko had been slowly drifting off to sleep herself, but Kakashi's rather serious answer to what she had thought a trivial question woke her back up. "It's understandable I suppose, when you've been through as much shit as you and I both have, to find parallels in the few moments of happiness."
"I guess so. And I am glad those moments of happiness have been increasing the last few years. I shudder to think where I'd be if I hadn't finally accepted Uzumaki Yoshide's invitation to visit the Uzumaki Compound. It still took a few years before I acted on anything, but in a lot of ways that conversation set me straight, saved me from my darkness."
"Saved us from both our personal darkness." Anko said, leaning forward to kiss Kakashi's cheek as she did. "Don't forget how marrying you has made my life so much better as well, and not just because the villagers stopped looking at me like a traitor. I could have never imagined this life for myself back after the snake bastard betrayed me. And to be free of his curse seal to...I guess we really do owe quite the debt to the Uzumaki, huh?"
"Ah." A simple verbal agreement from Kakashi was the last verbal communication between them before exhaustion finally claimed the heavily pregnant Anko. Kakashi stayed awake for a while still, pondering all the changes in his life over the past decade.
Eventually though, even the legendary copy-ninja Hatake Kakashi fell victim to the need for sleep, and peace reigned supreme in the Hatake Manor, and through the largely empty district.
-The next morning -
The various shinobi clans of Konoha tended to organize their land holdings within the village in one of three ways. Most clans opted for a district, allowing non-clan members to work or live on their land, and often it was difficult to tell when one was on general village streets, or on streets controlled by one of the clans. The Hatake, Akimichi, Sarutobi, and Yamanka were among the clans to live this way.
Then, there were semi-open districts. Again, much of the land was left open to outsiders, but with sections of the land secured and cloistered away for the exclusive and private use of the clan. Often for some specific use, such as the Inuzuka's dogs or the Nara's pharmaceutical practices.
Very few clans had so called 'closed' compounds, where the lands controlled by the clan were walled off and gated and outsiders generally prevented from living or working on the land. Haruno Sakura had been encouraged to study the clans of Konoha for her whole life, and could only think of three clans who had their lands configured in such a way: The Hyuuga, the Uchiha, and the Uzumaki.
Such were the thoughts of a very sleepy Sakura as she stood outside the main entrance gate to the Uzumaki Clan Compound. True to his word, Naruto had followed up with his clanswoman Shizune the night before and sent word to Sakura: Shizune was willing to meet with Sakura, provided Sakura was willing to start at 6am.
Thus at 5:45 Sakura had reached the gates and checked in with the guard on duty, an Uzumaki jonin that Sakura was not familiar with. After inspecting her identification documents, confirming her identity, and confirming why Sakura was asking permission to enter the Uzumaki compound at such an early hour, the guard finally relented, allowing Sakura into the compound and making a shadow clone to escort her to Shizune.
After a short walk Sakura easily spotted Shizune, the few Uzumaki clan members who did not posses the trademark red hair really stood out. Shizune was supervising Sakura's former academy classmate Karin and another Uzumaki girl that Sakura did not know. As Sakura got closer, she could see that the two girls' hands were glowing green, and that they seemed to be holding their hands over some seemingly dead fish.
Seeing Sakura approach, Shizune stood and greeted her. "Hello there, you must be Sakura, my name is Uzumaki Shizune. It's an honor to be given the opportunity to teach one of Naruto-sama's teammates and Hatake-sama's students. Thank you for coming so early."
"The honor is all mine, Shizune-sensei, to be able to learn medical ninjutsu from an apprentice of Lady Tsunade is a rare privilege."
"Of course, I'm always happy to help aspiring med-nins. Lord Naruto told me that you know Karin already." Karin broke away from focusing on the fish to offer a quick wave to her former classmate, which Sakura reciprocated.
"And allow me to introduce my daughter, Tenten."
Tenten looked up and gave Sakura a polite nod, but quickly pivoted her focus back to her own fish.
Turning her attention back to the one present Uzumaki she had previously known, Sakura spoke again.
"I didn't know you were also interested in medical ninjutsu, Karin."
"Just a little bit." Karin responded. "You know me, fuinjutsu is where my passion lies. I don't want to become a doctor or anything like that, just some basic medical skills to help my team."
"I'm not actually interested in medical stuff at all." Tenten said, joining the conversation, "but my team is leaving on a border patrol mission in a couple of days and Mom insisted I at least learn the mystic palm."
"I can't help it." Shizune said, defending herself. "It's a mother's job to worry about her children, you'll all learn that in time."
"Besides," Shizune pivoted the conversation, "the fact that I'm even teaching you this at all is a testament to just how hard you've worked, Tenten. Even six months ago your chakra control wasn't good enough for you to be able to learn this technique. Your father and I are extremely proud of you."
"Mom..." Tenten was clearly embarrassed at being praised in public, but Shizune decided to turn the embarrassment factor up to another level.
"You're growing up so fast, it makes me miss that day where a little 5 year old red head came up to me and asked if I was going to be her kaa-san despite the fact that her father and I weren't even dating yet."
Tenten's face was now bright red, matching her hair color.
Sakura didn't want to say anything, but she was clearly curious, which caused Tenten to launch into an explanation.
"I'm adopted. I don't know who my birth parents were. Dad adopted me the day before my fifth birthday, and started dating mom shortly after. Obviously it worked out since they are married and I have siblings now."
"I would have never guessed you were adopted." Sakura responded, "your hair makes you look like an Uzumaki."
"Just because I wasn't born into the clan doesn't change the fact that the Uzumaki gave me a family, home, and sense of belonging." Tenten responded, sidestepping discussing the adoption ritual in the process, "I love my clan."
Wanting to let Tenten focus on reviving the fish, Shizune stepped into the conversation, keeping Sakura occupied.
"Well you've heard that neither of my other students actually wants to be a medic, so their training is quite a bit lighter than what you are going to be doing, Sakura. I hope you're ready. This won't be easy, but if you succeed I might even recommend you to Tsunade-shishou."
Shizune then pulled out a scroll and unsealed several thick books on subjects like human anatomy. "Normally I'd only give someone one week to memorize these books like Lady Tsunade did with me" Shizune said, getting a surprised look from Sakura, "but since you have team training and missions as well and can't fully devote your time to the study of medical ninjutsu I'll give you two weeks. Now, come over here and I'll show you how to do the mystic palm justu."
Shizune got Sakura seated at her own mat and walked her through the technique, all while also giving feedback to Karin and Tenten.
It didn't take long before Tenten successfully revived the fish, depositing it in a nearby pond.
When her daughter finished celebrating, Shizune spoke up again. "I know you didn't want to learn that jutsu, but thank you for doing so dear. As your mother I feel much more at eas about you going on missions knowing that you can now heal yourself and your teammates. Ultimately your father and I love you and just want you to come back to us safely."
"Mom..." Tenten was once again embarrassed, but made Shizune's morning when she meekly got out "I love you too, so much."
Shortly thereafter Tenten and Karin departed for the day, each off to their individual team training, while Sakura, who had the whole day off of training, had decided that she'd stay as long as Shizune was able to continue to make time for her.
Once Sakura was successfully able to get a green glow around her hands, a fish was shoved in front of her along with instructions to revive it and a warning that it would take time. Tenten had been doing this for 3 hours every morning for two weeks before successfully reviving the fish. Karin, who had better chakra control and was a better natural fit for medical ninjutsu, had been working on it for just over a week and still had no luck."
Filled with determination, Haruno Sakura got to work on her first of what would be many unsuccessful attempts to revive a fish, her first step on her journey to become a medic.
AN: Just a clarification here. It's mentioned earlier in the story but I felt the need to put it here as a reminder: Naruto does not know who his father is, only his mother.
Minato and Kushina's relationship was largely a secret (which IIRC mirrors canon), and very few people outside of the adult Uzumaki who were in Konoha when they died knew of their relationship. Hokage, Sanin, Elders, those sorts of people know, but the average rank and file Konoha jonin is unaware. To most, Naruto is just Kushina's son.
Sandaime decided to keep Naruto's heritage a secret to protect him from Minato's enemies. The Uzumaki clan are just thankful to have won custody of the boy (we saw Danzo argue against that way back in chapter 1) and agree to keep his paternal heritage classified. As the newest clan in the village and a somewhat unknown entity they decide to just take the small victory of getting Naruto and not push further. So Uzumaki old enough to remember Kushina know that Minato is Naruto's father, those who were too young or weren't yet born don't. But the Sandiame's law prevents even Yoshide from revealing Naruto's parentage.
Still, while his hair may be red now, many of his facial features still come directly from Minato, and I'd imagine that includes how similar his hairstyle is. One would think that at some point, someone who doesn't know Naruto's father's identity would notice how similar Naruto looks to the Yondaime and start to put 2 and 2 together. He's still a rookie genin. In canon it would be another what? 3 years or so until Naruto learns either of his parent's identity? Plenty of time for that to happen.