Chapter Twenty-Nine
Minato grit his teeth as he checked the perimeter around the springs. He would have killed to be able to do this inside the barrier, but he also knew this was the best compromise if the Ōtsutsuki attacked. Five of them unable to mount a defense if something goes wrong. Acid climbed up his throat as the parallels with October tenth, nineteen years earlier played out in his head: secluded location outside the barrier, vulnerable personnel, and a looming threat in the shadows.
He stared around the group protecting the site, the one thing he could change from that terrible night. Almost a dozen KIB/ANBU operatives ringed the area. Captain Yamato, Sai, Ino, Hiashi, Sasuke, Asuma, Kakashi, and Naruto also interspersed with the protection detail. If they make a pass, it will at least be a hell of a fight.
"Sensei, if your ass was clenched any tighter right now, I could turn a lump of coal into a diamond with it," Kakashi spoke as he approached. "You got a bad feeling?"
"I get bad feelings all the time," Minato replied. "After the war, I've had nothing but bad feelings; it hasn't gotten better since my wife told me about what she found in the Land of Whirlpools."
"It is a disturbing prospect," Kakashi said, "that our generation was subjected to something that made us literally forget one of the most important events to every happen." Kakashi shrugged, "It does make you wonder how much history we take for granted is actually wrong."
What a comforting thought. "Given everything Kushina has found in the scrolls since, for that matter everything they found on the moon," Minato shook his head, "Well, everything feels unreal. That's coming from someone who has dealt with tailed-beasts and shinobi of immense power."
"Yes, it seems this generation and the next may have their work cut out for them," Kakashi shrugged, "Still, each generation eventually surpasses the generation that came before."
"You're not worried that Sakumo and his baby sister might have to deal with these things?
"Sakumo and Yoshiko worry me all the time," Kakashi chuckled. "However, more often that is because of something left in their diapers."
Even Minato had to laugh, "You're seriously not worried?"
"Oh, I am," Kakashi turned to see an approaching Naruto, dressed in ANBU garb and carrying the Hyūga Clan's blade, "Then I remember who will be leading their generation."
"You could be Hokage for a while, ya know," Naruto laughed. His eyes scanned, "So far, so good. They are starting things."
Minato swallowed the lump in his throat. Soon, very soon, they would know if Konohamaru would be whole again or not. It's just like they said, everything will be fine. You've done everything that can be done! He continued his patrol with the other two men.
"This is embarrassing!" Konohamaru complained as he floated atop the spring on chakra supplied by Akemi. He was bare-ass naked as the day his mother gave birth to him. Maybe if he was at his prime of a few months ago, he'd be a little less body conscious. However, the toll of gravity and atrophy left him with a less than impressive body.
"How do think we feel?" Lady Kushina retorted as she began to disrobe beside Hinata and Hanabi. "Aside from Minato and Akemi, no one else has seen me like this."
"Wait, what?" he asked.
"Before Naruto was born Kushina and I used a ritual similar to help her get pregnant when the conventional method didn't work," Akemi answered. "When tapping nature chakra, the more natural you are, the better the control!"
"Ku-Kushina?" Hinata stammered, hinting she was about to ask something embarrassing.
"Yes, dear?" Kushina asked without a hint of judgement.
"Being that we are on that subject… is it true, what Kyuubi said?"
"What did he say?" Kushina stared, face tightening in worry.
"Th-that you…" Hinata tapped her fingertips, something she hadn't done in a damn long time, "… made Naruto on the dining room table!"
"WHAT!" Konohamaru gasped in shock. If he could have jumped in shock, he would have.
Kushina's response was rather nonchalant, "Well," she shrugged, "cat's out of the bag – yes, we did."
"Ugh, Mom! You serve dinner on that table!" Konohamaru writhed his face in disgust.
"It was twenty years ago!" she protested with a shrug, "It's not like we didn't clean up afterwards!" Akemi snickered, earning Kushina's ire, "And don't play innocent with me, old friend! I can only imagine what antics you and Hiashi did to make Hinata!"
"Yes, Mom, just what antics did you have?" Hanabi asked, smirking as she watched her mother squirm.
"I don't know if it's the right time…"
"We're all naked in the woods, Mom," Hanabi laughed, "when will there be a better time?!"
"All right, smart ass, if you must know…" Akemi turned pink, "… You and Hinata were both made on the stone bench in the garden!"
"Ha! I knew it!" Hanabi clapped her hands.
"Mom, you and Dad… made us in the open?!" Hinata froze in shock.
"The first time, I had to sneak into the compound, and we couldn't go into the house." Akemi laughed, biting her bottom lip, "So, we went into the garden, instead."
"That was the first time," Konohamaru spoke up, "You stated that you made Hanabi there, too!"
"Well, after that," she choked, "It… just kind of was a tradition at that point!" Akemi laughed nervous and embarrassed. "All right," she straightened up, "enough of this, we need to focus!"
Hinata stood to Konhamaru's left, Hanabi to his right, Mom to his feet, and Aunt Akemi near his head. The ladies began chanting something, and Konohamaru sensed warmth around him, at least, in the parts of his body that still had sensation. He recognized the sensation of chakra, something he struggled to remember in the almost five months since he'd been paralyzed. He missed the sensation, much as he missed having sensation below his arms. Just noticing the absent friend made him long for what he'd been prior to his injury. Please let this work! Konohamaru closed his eyes against tears and tried to maintain focus on the chanting of his mom, his aunt, his big sister, and his girlfriend.
Konohamaru opened his eyes, and he was surrounded by an iridescent turquoise glow. Around him, small geysers of water began erupting around the circle. The chanting continued, and Konohamaru gasped as he noticed the glow was crawling up his arms. Given the limited motion of his neck, he couldn't see if there had been a similar effect in his leg.
The glow crawled up, tunneling under his skin. Konohamaru resisted the urge to panic, much as he resisted the urge to fight the flow, not that he could. His heart began thundering as the glow reached his shoulders, and he could see the glow emanating from his face and soon in the blood vessels in his eyes. Oh god! Konohamaru grit his teeth as the sensation of fire burned along the length of his spine. His teeth ground against a familiar sensation he knew all too well – pain.
Lightning traversed his body, and a thousand pins needs stabbed him throughout the course of his arms, legs, and torso. Only then did he begin to scream.
Naruto paced, keeping his Byakugan active despite the strain it put on him. He could see and sense everything for at least three kilometers in all directions. Hinata was still working with him to push his range out further. Having not grown up with Byakugan, digesting that much data visually still did not come natural.
Nevertheless, he could see the ritual, and it seemed to be going off without a hitch. He also had the reassurance that whatever his unusual Byakugan was, it could see space-time dimension distortions. Nobody had teleported anywhere nearby, and no one seemed to be pending. Why don't they attack? What are they waiting for? The questions swirled in Naruto's head as he paced the perimeter, maintaining sight of anything that could even remotely seem a threat.
"Naruto," Uncle Kakashi approached. Despite having seen him, the sound of Kakashi's voice in the still of the night nearly caused Naruto to jump.
"Uncle Kakashi," he nodded in acknowledgement.
"Naruto, there is a critical matter we need to discuss."
"Which is?"
"Namely, your mom is going to a summit of the Five Kages in a few weeks."
"The proposal on a nonproliferation treaty for scientific ninja tools," Naruto turned to face his uncle, but kept his Byakugan active, "She told me."
"Did she tell you that she wants you to go with her instead of me?" Kakashi's masked face gave away nothing.
Naruto furrowed his brow in confusion, "Me, why me?"
"For one, you were there in the Land of Whirlpools, you fought with Jigen and his minions."
The mention of Jigen set Naruto's heart pumping, and he resumed scanning. "What is for two?"
"She wants you to get more diplomatic experience while you are young."
"Why?"
"Naruto," Kakashi sighed, "while it is forgone conclusion that I will succeed your mom, I have no doubt that you'll be my successor." Kakashi paused, measuring him, "Before you get that look on your face, just remember you are the hero of your generation. You've survived things and faced off against things that no other Kage has in the history of the shinobi world."
"Kakashi, that's just it," Naruto shook his head, "I'm really scared this time. Madara and Obito were bad enough. This Jigen freak is something on the level of Kaguya, and he's running around freely. What if…" the terrible thought rolled in his head, "… what if Himawari instead of fixing the future doomed it?! We have no way of knowing if we're making things better or worse!"
Kakashi stared a long pause with his obsidian eyes. "Nothing we do now can tell us if we're right or wrong, son." Kakashi shook his head, "As for being afraid of the future, I've been there," Kakashi said with a gravelly tone, "I remember the night you were born. I stuck Obito through the throat with a kunai, carved him shoulder to skull. Up until then," he gave his head a shake, "I'd never seen anyone or anything survive something that would have killed a normal person. When I realized it was Obito, I pissed myself, literally. Then when it came time to bond Nine-Tails to you," Kakashi shook his head in a laugh, "Well, afterwards I woke in a hospital room, and Shizune informed he she had to cut off my outfit for sanitary reasons…"
The implication hung in the air. "You shit your pants."
"I shit my pants," Kakashi replied in unison with him. Both men laughed at the ridiculous statement. "What I'm trying to say is, at least you haven't yet shit yourself in facing Madara, Kaguya, or this Jigen character."
"Heh," Naruto laughed, "I guess there is that." Both men laughed again.
Laughter was cut off by primal screaming, and Naruto took an instant jolt of adrenaline to his heart. Kakashi turned to run toward the forest grove, but Naruto stopped him, "It's not an outsider, don't break the ritual!"
Hinata deep down knew things were not going to go smooth with the ritual no matter what. It took everything she had to not react to Konohamaru's screams. Despite his protests, the pain was normal and natural as damaged joints in his back and neck reverted to preinjury status and his badly damaged spinal cord and spinal nerves suddenly sprang back to life.
"OH GOD!" he writhed and cried. His flailing was disrupting the flow of healing chakra. His nervous system hasn't worked right in five months. Suddenly going from no information to new information can be a significant event.
"Konohamaru, I need you to hang on!" Mom demanded. He writhed and gritted his teeth, "I know it hurts!" He couldn't even summon words; Hinata could see his heart threatening to explode in his chest.
Hinata reached down for one of the first lessons Mom taught her apprentices in the White Kitsune. Hinata reach out with her chakra, sharing the sensation with Konohamaru, dividing it as she would helping a mother labor. Hinata equated the sensation to having jumped into a vat of molten steel as her body absorbed some of the sensation of what Konohamaru was experiencing, nearly causing her to break. He put his life in danger for you, the least you can do is the same for him! "Nine-Tails, help me!" She began channeling the Tailed-Beast's chakra, dispelling the sensation of being incinerated.
Hanabi caught on and began spreading the pain to herself, too. Soon, Mom joined in, and Konohamaru's screams eased. An incredible gathering of green-turquoise light flashed, temporarily blinding Hinata. For a moment, Hinata's heart almost ripped free, thinking the ritual had failed. Her vision and her hearing returned to normal. Konohamaru was still writhing, but Hinata saw the unmistakable signs of muscle contractions in his legs, and his arms were actually moving.
"It's okay, son" Kushina came beside him, clutching his left hand.
"Mom," he squeezed his hand, marveling like a child learning to grip an object for the first time. He moved his toes, "Mom," he began sobbing, "I can feel my legs!"
"Konohamaru!" Hanabi rushed closer to his side.
"Hanabi!" he cried, reaching out with his right arm, "I can move!"
Hinata wiped away tears, "Hinata," Mom's voice strained, and she turned to see her mom wiping blood from her nose, "please get dressed and grab your medical bag!"
"Mom?"
"I'm fine, but someone needs to check him real quick," she replied.
Hinata rushed to her things, throwing on the long white robe and tying her obi. She grabbed her medical bag and extracted her stethoscope and her neurologic hammer. "Konohamaru, hold still," she ordered. A quick listen to heart and lungs confirmed he was at least not going to crash suddenly. Hinata checked for upper and lower reflexes, miraculously finding both as she tapped the hammer on the reflex points in his arms and legs. "Konohamaru, can you feel this?" she stroked the metal base of the hammer along the bottom of his foot, grateful for not seeing a pathological reflex.
For the first time in a long time, he tilted his head up and looked down, "Left foot?"
"How about this?" she did the same on the right.
"Definitely right foot!" she heard the self-assured voice of a young man she hadn't heard in months.
"Good," she nodded. Hinata turned her attention to the others. Mom was getting dressed. "He's stable, and showing all signs that the ritual worked."
"All right, let's get dressed and get him home," Kushina said.
"Kushina, I need to take him to the hospital," Akemi said.
"Hospital, why?" Konohamaru protested.
"For one," Mom secured her obi, "we've just done something that hasn't been done in a hundred years. I need to keep you under careful observation at least for the night to make sure it is permanent."
"For two," Hinata added, "we will need to do some tests in the morning to be sure everything healed." She nodded, "It's only for tonight! Assuming all goes well, we can take you home tomorrow!"
He turned to Hanabi, now also robed, "You'll visit in the morning?"
"Wouldn't miss it!" she said, quickly tying her hair back up in a ponytail.
The group gingerly lifted him out of the spring and wrapped him in his robe. Hinata teleported him to a waiting team at Konoha Hospital. As the team took him away to a hospital room, Hinata remained in the courtyard, looking up at the moon. A bright flash, and Naruto appeared, "Hey."
"Hey, love," she said in return.
"I take it all went well?"
"Yes," she stared up at the April full moon, "yes, it did." Tears slowly dripped from her eyes.
"Honey," he encircled him in his arms, "what's wrong."
"After all the horrible things that happened last year," she cried into his shoulder, "I feel like we finally came up even!"
"Things get better from here, love," Naruto stroked his fingers through her hair. "And we will get stronger to meet the coming tide."
Minato came downstairs early, just as the sun was rising on what promised to be a beautiful late April day. Nothing prepared him for what awaited in the living room. Seated on one side of the dining table was Naruto, on the other side was Konohamaru. Two metal crutches leaned against the table, but there was no wheelchair. "Hey, Dad!" Naruto waved.
"Good morning, Dad!" Konohamaru shifted, semi-clumsy, in the chair, using his arms for leverage.
Minato blinked twice, processing what he was seeing. "Boys," he spoke incredulous.
"Left your breakfast in the kitchen," Naruto pointed toward the kitchen where a steaming bowl of noodles and a hot cup of coffee were waiting. A wide smirk stretched across both boys' faces.
"Konohamaru…" he had brought his adoptive son home from the hospital after what had become several days in observation and extensive testing. By the time Minato took him home last night, the boy had been passed out like a newborn baby. He's sitting unaided; he's using his arms! His throat constricted. What he was seeing was nothing short of a miracle on par with Kushina being alive after the trauma of Naruto's birth.
"Dad?" Konohamaru reached for his crutches, braced himself, and levered himself into a standing position. The boy clearly needed the crutches for support, but gone was the boy who'd lost hope and mobility in the same injury.
Minato's knees gave out, but thankfully, Naruto got up to catch him before he went down. Tears overflowed the dam holding them back, and Minato was the tearful wreck he was when Kushina told him she was pregnant with Naruto, when he watched Naruto take his first steps, and when he'd confessed the story about Himawari to Jiraiya in an alcohol-fueled haze. He stared again at Konohamaru, "Son, you're up!"
"Heh, that's not all," Konohamaru smirked, "I even used the bathroom for the first time in months!"
The three men laughed, embracing one another. Finally, everyone sat at the table around breakfast. "So," Naruto spoke.
"So?" Minato asked.
"So, Dad," Konohamaru hesitated, voice hinting mischief.
"Yes, boys?" Minato crossed his arms and raised his eyebrows, coaxing a confession from the two.
"Well, Dad," Naruto spoke up, "it seems wonder-boy here was in the running for the Iron Shinobi Competition that was supposed to be this year; obviously, it won't happen now…"
"You're not out of the wheelchair five minutes," Minato turned an incredulous look to Konohamaru, "and you two are telling me he wants to get ready for next year?!"
"A year should be enough, don't you think?" Konohamaru beamed.
Minato's first instinct had been to scold both of his sons for being foolhardy and overly ambitious. Did it stop you? He stared at the two. Naruto had come back rapidly from what should have been a fatal injury several times in the past. Minato, himself, had been paralyzed temporarily and used a risky method to heal himself rather than sit out the Fourth Shinobi War. Now, Konohamaru was standing in front of him when he was told that he'd never walk again via conventional means. "All right, you crazy bastards, but I have one condition."
"Name it," Konohamaru said.
"You go in it to win it," Minato said, staring at his sons with fierce intensity. "You don't go in to touch the bases and say our were there; you go there with the intention of ringing the final bell." Minato turned his palms up, "Fair?"
"Fair!" Konohamaru nodded.
"Fair," Naruto smiled the smile that had likely gotten him into the Hyūga Clan leader's bed.
"All right, in that case, let's finish her and head down to the Academy pool. We got to get him of those crutches, and that isn't going to happen if we sit here!"
Hanabi's heart bounced up and down as she bounced in the water of the Academy pool. She tread water beside a now swimming Konohamaru. Swimming! A little over a week ago, he was still in a wheelchair and barely able to move his arms. While he still wore a flotation vest, he was now moving both arms and legs with muscle memory that hadn't abandoned him.
As they reached the edge of the pool, he clung to a metal ladder, panting slightly from the effort. "You okay?" Hanabi asked.
"Fine," he gave a winded laugh, "doing just fine!" He took several breaths and began to unclip the fasteners on his flotation vest.
"Konohamaru, what are you doing?!" Hanabi protested as the only thing keeping him afloat began to slip off.
"It's dragging me too much in the water," he explained as he tossed the vest up on deck.
"Konohamaru!" she exclaimed in protest.
He grinned in response, "Catch me, if you can!" he pressed off the ladder and began swimming across the deep water of the lane.
Dammit boy, this all is for nothing if you drown here! Hanabi took off after him, keenly aware that they were over deep water if he were to founder. Much to her surprise, he was moving at a steady click, steady enough to where it took real effort to catch up to him. By the time she got even with him, they were most of the way to the opposite wall of the pool. As they came to a stop on the concrete edge, Hanabi huffed to catch her breath, "You're a friggin' jerk!"
"I told you I was doing fine!" he laughed as he caught his breath.
An overwhelming sensation of confusion came over Hanabi as he smiled and laughed. She hadn't seen this boy in months. He was the same arrogant, overly-ambitious, brat that she'd known and loved prior to the injury. Hanabi's chest tightened around her heart as the past five months seemingly faded like a nightmare in the morning sun.
"Earth to Hanabi," he splashed her, and she blinked. "You okay?"
"You asshole!" Hanabi brought herself body to body with him and pinned Konohamaru to the pool wall. Not missing a beat, she drove her lips into his, forced his mouth open, and explored his mouth with her tongue.
There was the sensation of fingers gripping her hand underwater, a reassuring grip she'd thought she'd lost forever. Salty tears joined the heavily chlorinated water running down her face. She broke from him, tears still running down her eyes, "Don't you ever do this to me again, Konohamaru! If I lost you again…"
He squeezed her hand tighter, "It won't happen, I promise."
"Ahem," Lord Minato's familiar voice came down from the pool deck.
"Lord Fourth!" Hanabi's cheeks burned.
"It's all right," he crossed his arms, "and it's Minato. And while I don't mind you two celebrating a bit, I do think we need to get Konohamaru to gait and balance training." He smirked, "All the same, I'm happy to see you swimming about freely again."
"So am I," Hanabi kissed him on the cheek one more time before they started the climb out of the water.
The formal, traditional robes fit loosely over Itachi as he stood with his father in an antechamber to the Uchiha Clan's audience chamber. Never a large man, Itachi had been a skeleton during his battle with leukemia several years ago, losing virtually all his fat and muscle mass. Even when his body recovered, he'd remained slim, almost sickly in appearance.
His father standing opposite him, however, was still a bear of a man, if a tired one. Long lines of worry had carved into the man's face, and long streaks of sliver were now present in the man's once obsidian hair. The presence of a study wooden cane also remined Itachi that his father was not a young man, even if he was no older that Lord Fourth or Lord Fifth. "Father," Itachi spoke, "I feel so unready for this."
"Son, I don't envy you," his father shook his head. "I was younger than you when I took the reins of this clan. I'm sure my life will be all the shorter as a result." Father smiled, almost like he was getting ready to cry, "My son, I'm so proud of you right now!"
"Father…"
"I mean it. You've survived so many things, cancer, the clan calling for your expulsion at one time, and the Fourth Shinobi War."
"You survived two wars, yourself," Itachi nodded.
"And I am," Father looked at his cane, "plenty the worse for wear as a result." Father had been wounded twice in the Fourth Shinobi War, and his right leg had never quite been the same afterwards. Father looked toward the audience chamber door, "This clan," he nodded, "needs a firm hand to guide it. I know after today, it is in good hands."
Itachi curled his toes at the mention of the clan. Unlike the Hyūga Clan, with its main branch and cadet branches, the Uchiha Clan consisted of five branches, each with an equal claim to head the clan. Itachi's branch was descended directly from Lord Madara, while the other four were descendants of his brothers. Perhaps by design, Madara had left the right of succession ambiguous; even after a hundred years, the Uchiha could not agree on branch seniority if the main branch were to go extinct or become unable to produce an heir. When you got leukemia, it was a miracle it didn't descend into civil war even before your recovery.
"I just wish…" Itachi couldn't finish his sentence.
"I know son, I blame myself for your brother not attending today," Father shook his head. "I can't blame him, either. Even now, there are members of this clan that would still see him dead for things he was not in control of."
Itachi nodded with grim acknowledgement. The various branches – the Oda Branch, the Nobunaga Branch, the Tensai Branch, and the Minamoto Branch – all lost considerable numbers during the war, a war they partial blamed on Sasuke. In the case of the Minamoto branch, it was down to only a few male members. "It's time," Itachi nodded. "Let's turn the page."
Father opened the double doors to the audience chamber and entered the room as an outgoing clan leader. He walked past the senior members of the clan to a raised dais on the far end of the room. Itachi took the same walk, eyeing each member of the clan leadership as he moved along. As he passed by the head of the Minamoto Branch, Itachi froze in front of a familiar figure, "Sasuke!"
"I wouldn't miss this for the world, brother," Sasuke smiled and nodded.
"I'm glad," Itachi nodded, "you came!" The eyes of the others reminded him the ceremony would not wait, "We'll talk later!" Itachi moved to the dais and knelt at his father's side.
"Friends, family," Father spoke, "Today marks an occasion our clan has had too rarely experienced – the peaceful transfer of power from one generation to the next…"
"Hahahahaha!" mocking laughter interrupted Father's speech. All eyes turned toward the source of the sound, fixating on Sasuke. Brother appeared manic, and he resumed laughing, "Hahahahaha!"
While muttering broke out among the other clan members, a faint, unmistakable sound caught Itachi's attention – hissing. Father must have noticed, too, because he immediately threw Itachi backwards and covered him with his own body. The explosion rocked the room, and Itachi regained consciousness in the rubble of the audience chamber. Flames were all around and the room was littered with the limp forms of the dead and dying.
Itachi pushed off what he thought was debris, only to be mortified when he discovered what was covering him was his torn and bloody father. Blood streamed from the man's ears and nose, and his body was limp. "Father…" Itachi said weak at first, "FATHER!"
Author's notes: Hi everyone, thank you for reading, and I hope you enjoyed the chapter.
If you are reading at time of publication, dear readers, this is your chance to influence what happens next. While I have posted this poll to my profile, it may be better if you comment in the review section given the recent issues with FFN. Does Fugaku Uchiha live or die? I am prepared for both eventualities.
Next chapter we'll find out! Stay health and stay safe until then!