Ch.18
"ka-chan! ka-chan! Help Fox-ka-chan want to gobble me up!" Naru cried in joy as she jumped on Kurama's bed with Kushina play-nibbling Naru's hair, the child having already grown a thick head of spiky blond hair. How unfortunate she got Minato's hair, poor girl.
"I'm trying to sleep, baby." Kurama groaned as Shikazu grumbled from his side of the bed. Kurama still found it strange that Minato and Kushina loved sleeping as feral foxes more than humans. Not sleeping as their therianthrope forms made less sense to her, but the pony-sized foxes could more casually sleep anywhere unlike humanoids.
"Now, now, Kurama-chan. You know the rules and so do I." Kushina teased and began giving foxy kisses to Kurama's face, making the redheaded woman laugh and push the vixen away.
"Get off me!" Kurama giggled and sighed before hugging Naru to her bosom. "ka-chan loves you sweetie, but she gets tired too and doesn't get much time with tou-chan." Although Naru was still just 2, she already grasped things that most children didn't get until they were 4 or older. Naru was genuinely a prodigy, likely only so advanced due to whatever the demoness's new chakra traits were doing to her host. Not to mention constant nurturing.
"Birbday, birbday! It maw birbday!" Naru sang as she hopped about the bed.
"It's the tenth already?" Shikazu groaned as he rubbed sleep from his eyes.
"You've been in bed with me for most of the week." Kurama groaned as she rose out of the sheets, her Doll fully human thanks to her controlling her chakra better. Now, she was so attuned to channeling her chakra this way, that she began leaking her bestial traits into her Dolls. That said, Shikazu enjoyed getting it on with a hot MILFy kitsune-onna. Still, at least Kurama has gotten in the practice of only letting 'appealing' features appear.
"No wonder I can't feel my legs." Shikazu joked and Kurama playfully slapped his thigh.
"I'm just hoping it takes." Kurama giggled, knowing already full well she was pregnant.
"With how much you two have been doing it." Kushina purred, hiding her privates with her tail.
"Party! You said party!" Naru complained when she recognized they weren't focused on her.
"Yes, yes, in a bit. First, it's bathtime." Kurama stated, knowing it would appease her.
"Yay~!" Naru cheered, she loved bathtime like always, especially since Kurama and Kushina often bathed together with her now.
=Fox=
"Party, party! I get a party! All about me!" Naru cheered as she ran around the house naked, fresh from the bath that Kurama and Kushina as a human, had just shared.
"Naru, get back here! You need to put on clothes!" Kushina yelled at her precious child while Kurama chased the adorable menace. "At least she's still sweet. I dread the rest of the 'Terrible Twos'." Kushina sighed as she helped Kurama put clothes on the squirming, happy girl.
"I fell, ka-chan!" Naru declared whacking Kurama with one of her brother's rattles.
"ka-chan is too powerful, you must train and become stronger to defeat ka-chan." Kurama jested because as much as she would like to play along, she was making the cake in a bit.
"Ah, terrible twos." Hiruzen jested when he entered with a pile of gifts in hand. While Hiruzen had his own grandchild on the way, he still acted as if Naru was his own granddaughter at times. "I remember my own twins at that stage. I hope these talks with Kumo end by this year so Naru won't have to grow up too fast."
"Is Kumo dragging their feet?" Kushina asked.
"Actually, the Raikage has been surprisingly amicable in our letters, but as we all know: One Man does not a Village make." Hiruzen set the pile of gifts on the coffee table and Naru had to be snatched up by Kushina to prevent her from attacking them with impunity.
"They are still at war with Iwa and cannot afford to send diplomats for a few months without escorts." Danzo voiced as he hobbled into the room. Hiruzen scowled at the man as the mummy set down his gift onto the table. "I am sorry for any…misunderstanding I may have caused. I have spent my time away cleaning up some of my…messes."
"Just be careful, you've snubbed a lot of people." Kurama warned the Shimura, not at all pleased with his presence, but willing to tolerate him if he maintained a cordial behavior.
"I'm only here to drop off my gift to the-erm, to Naru. I will not linger and ruin the festivities." Danzo said before hobbling back out of the house and away from the Uzumaki Clan grounds.
"That's as much of an endorsement to your value to the village than anything." Hiruzen huffed and lamented that he couldn't smoke his pipe weed while around children. It wasn't harmful, but the calming effects might adversely affect their development.
"I really hate that he's more valuable to us in his current position than not." Minato huffed when he entered in his fox form as Tsume carried a bag of rabbits. Both Minato and Kushina have taken to hunting with the Inuzuka, who were raising Furama's first litter alongside their Ninken.
"Got dinner!" Tsume cherrily sang as her companion started stalking the house.
"Kuromaru, Furama is off guarding Tsunade's kids. Don't bother her. Jiraiya and Tsunade are both busy." Kurama informed the Ninken.
Jiraiya was following some lead in Ame while Tsunade was performing surgery at the hospital all day. She was mostly apprenticing doctors, but today was an open-heart surgery, sadly. Luckily the therapy she had been receiving had cured her of her hemophobia, for the most part. If Tsunade encountered blood when she was not expecting it she would still freeze up, but it was not debilitating to her as much anymore. PTSD was rough, Inoichi told Kurama all about it.
"Where is Shizune-chan?" Kuromaru asked. It was rather jarring to learn that Ninken can talk.
"Out on her own mission." Kushina told the hound as she got Naru dressed for the day.
"Kuro, go have a nap or guard the door for now. I'll call you when the rabbits are done, don't be jumping on the table." Tsume ordered her companion before she entered the kitchen. "I'm sure Kushina would love playing with you if she's restless."
"Ack, don't volunteer me!" Kushina yelled at Tsume with a blush, because everyone knew Kuromaru was a total casanova. Seriously. That bad boy has more kids than sense.
"ka-chan! Story!" Naru begged as she reached for Kurama.
"Alright, which story do you want?" Kurama chuckled as she took her child to the couch.
"I'll check up on the twins." Minato voiced before he left the room, turning human as he went, clothes included, which was a nice trick he and Kushina both inherited from effectively being Kurama's chakra-children. Kushina huffed before turning into a fox and rushing out to check the compound, since she, Minato and Furama have taken up duties as 'guard foxes'. Kuromaru followed her with a wagging tail.
"What story do you want?" Kurama asked while setting Naru on her left thigh.
"Gutsy Ninja!" Naru cheered and Kurama rolled her eyes at how much Naru loved one of Jiraiya's less risque novel series.
=Fox=
"I need that seal." Minato groaned as she rubbed her lower stomach when entering the house in her female human body. She had left to check on Kushina an hour ago and Tsume went with her. "That was too damn close."
"I'm sure you do, I'm lucky I had mine, if Tsume-chan hadn't-." Kushina began.
"Let's not talk about it. I'm just grateful I came." Tsume commented with a bit of a cheeky grin.
"Uh huh, you sure did." Minato leered at Tsume with her own saucy grin, then shivered.
"You three have a quickie?" Kurama asked while she held a sleeping Naru. The party wasn't until the afternoon and she already tired herself out, but at least a nap will recharge her.
"Um, yes." Minato said uneasily.
"Okay." Kurama shrugged and settled Naru down on a sleeping mat in her play area. Kurama then went to the kitchen to check on the stew and start the cake.
"Minato needs the seal, we, um, we almost had an incident." Tsume said as she adjusted her pants while following Kurama to the kitchen along with the others while Mikoto had Nobu and Naga occupied with Sasuke, who was kinda being the ringleader of the boys.
"Right, I'll get the ink after the party unless Minato has any spillage." Kurama said as Hiata entered the kitchen with Hinata in tow. The shy little cutie utterly refused to leave her mother.
"No, nothing like that." Minato told Kurama with a blush.
"Hello everyone, I brought Hinata-chan. Where is Naru-chan?" Hiata asked before smirking. "Tuckered herself out already?"
"Yes, she wanted me to read her favorite story and it always puts her to sleep." Kurama chuckled with a shake of her head. The Gutsy Ninja is actually very energetic with a lot of action and adventure in every paragraph, but children are children.
"Oh, Minato-kun, I stopped by the orphanage you lived in before becoming a Genin to review some discrepancy in the records and I found your file." Hiruzen voiced as he pulled out a scroll from one of the large sleeves of his Kage robes. Seriously, what can't those things hide?
"Why should I be concerned? Some woman brought me there when I was a baby during the Second Great Ninja War." Minato said as she took the scroll to read it. "Why were you there?"
"Checking in on who had been dragged into ROOT." Hiruzen said with a shrug before Minato dropped the scroll. "I figured the secret was kept long enough anyways."
"S-she's my mother…but she was so close, I trained under her." Minato muttered before looking at Hiruzen in disbelief.
"She dropped you off in a fishing village outside of Konoha. It was attacked and burned to the ground by Kumo and all the surviving orphans were taken to the Konoha Gingerbread Orphanage with any surviving records. That was a hard night for her since we all thought you had died. I never kept track of you at her request after you were born." Hiruzen explained.
"What's up?" Everyone jumped at the voice of an unexpected person.
"Tsunade-chan?! Weren't you working at the hospital today?" Kurama asked in surprise at the woman who of course lived in the compound still, just in another house inside the walls.
"Yes, the surgery went splendidly. I went too fast for them, though, so I quickly wrote a detailed scroll of the procedure and came home." Tsunade boasted as Minato gaped at the woman like a fish. "What is it, Minato-chan?" Tsunade asked a bit teasingly, only to be stunned when the blond woman hugged her tightly despite their respective impressive busts. "What's wrong?"
"You may want to read this." Hiruzen said, picking up the discarded scroll from the ground and handing it over to the medic-nin. Tsunade looked at the sobbing Minato before giving Hiruzen a hard look, taking the scroll and reading it over before she dropped it in a horrified expression, then after a few stunned moments, embraced her daughter with choking, keening sobs.
"Uh, wow, that rumor was true?" Mikoto said before Kushina shot her a dirty look and everyone vanished from the kitchen who wasn't cooking or sobbing.
"Hey! I'm back for my God-daughter's party!" Jiraiya exclaimed as he jumped into the kitchen from the window.
"Honey, we need to talk." Tsunade said through snot filled sniffles.
=Fox=
"Happy birthday my granddaughter~!" Jiraiya cheered as he ran around with Naru above his head, the child squealing happily as her grandpa pretended she was flying.
"I'm surprised he took the fact that I never told him about you this well." Tsunade said in a daze while she watched her husband play with Naru, who was her granddaughter.
"He has raised me since I was thirteen. It's not like he never met me." Minato said, now as a man, sitting next to his mother, both holding plates bearing Akimichi-special bbq pork and greens. This was because Choza Akimichi was invited along with Inoichi Yamanaka and Shikaku Nara like they were for Nobu and Naga's birthday. Their children were age-mates with Naru, so the kids were all playing in the garden and laughing at the birthday girl's fun.
"This stew is amazing!" Choza called from the kitchen. "I must have the recipe!"
"No! Family secret!" Kurama barked at the man.
"You dareuse my own jutsu against me, Uzumaki~?" Choza laughed and slapped his knee.
"What are you talking about?" Kurama questioned and got more laughter.
"Who's my precious grandbaby?!" Jiraiya laughed as he started tickling Naru before he got mobbed by children who wanted the birthday girl's attention. "Ah~! I am defeated~!" He got dogpiled in laughing children.
"So I have six siblings now." Minato said, going back into his dazed state.
"Yeah, sorry that took like…twenty years. You were kinda the first loss I felt, then your uncle…and Dan." Tsunade began to tear up. "I was going to take you back when news of the attack came. Jiraiya and Orochimaru never understood why I wanted to cross half the country to get to a town with no name that day, nor why I couldn't stop crying. Jiraiya had to slap me to get my focus back on the mission."
"I'm just glad you two are even alive, the new siblings 20 plus years my junior are a plus." Minato ate a few bites of his greens. "Kami, Akimichi can cook."
"Eh, I've had better." Tsunade admitted.
"From our competitors I bet! The only folks I know who can meet or beat my recipes!" Choza loudly declared with a boisterous laugh.
"Maybe, I've run around most of the elemental nations." Tsunade told him with a smirk. "Of course, nothing tops sake."
"Eh, I prefer whiskey to wine, but to each their own." Inoichi shrugged from nearby. "I need the hard stuff for all the things I have to see."
"Like wh-?" Minato started before Shikazu covered his mouth.
"Never. Ask. That. Of. A. Yamanaka." Shikaku grimly told everyone.
"Good save, but a tame, child-ignorant example. I once witnessed the childhood of a murderer where he was beaten, forced to live in a literal hole in the ground and then survived being murdered by his own mother by killing her in turn. His death sentence was then made painless." Inoichi took a bite out of his pork.
"I what?" Kushina said, blinking in horror.
"And you all questioned why my family kept traveling. Still tame to the stuff I've seen." Kurama huffed as she sipped her juice, being banned from alcohol due to the fact she was definitely pregnant, even if the zygotes won't have formed for another week.
"And that would be?" Mikoto asked warily, eyeing the children to ensure they were distant.
"Such as a raiding party only take little girls from a village they've…emptied." Kurama said with a shiver at the memory. "My family put those girls out of their misery after a week once we tracked them down."
"Well, you're here now, among friends and family, away from such filth." Hiashi commented, having arrived later than his wife due to duties keeping him busy.
"I'll drink to that!" Choza declared and everyone took a drink.
"I wish I could." Kurama sighed as she swished her juice.
"Girl, stop having so many babies." Tsume said with a pout.
"You know I have to have at least ten more because of the CRA, remember? Besides, I love being pregnant. Losing alcohol for a year is worth it." Kurama stated, firm in her belief she would wipe out that requirement in one go.
"You're my best drinking buddy~. Minato holds his liquor too well." Tsume muttered.
"Kurama-chan has no tolerance despite her abilities, which is extremely odd." Tsunade mused.
"You can check my liver later." Kurama huffed before Naru ran to her to hide from her grandfather.
"ka-chan, ka-chan, come! Foxy and Froggy need to be rescued from evil toad!" Naru declared as she pointed to Jiraiya who held the toys hostage while all the children clambered to his legs.
"Ack!" Jiraiya yelped when Hinata juken'd his shines.
"Did…your two year old just juken my husband?" Tsunade queried in shock.
"I'm so proud!" Hiashi wiped a prideful tear from his eye.
"Let's save grandpa instead." Kurama chuckled as she went with Naru to help the man up. Jiriaya laughed when he was helped up and he went to the couch to rest while rubbing his shins before Tsunade swatted his hands away and worked on them herself.
"Aw~." The kids whined before they glared at Hinata.
"None of that. You should focus on me instead!" Kurama declared before she resumed the children's fun by playing the Kyubi in the next game of pretend.