Chapter Twenty-Seven
Despite her fatigues being soaked in cold ocean water, beads of sweat traced along Hinata's sides, gluing her black t-shirt to her body. The rest of the outfit chaffed and itched unrelentingly as the group slow marched toward their destination. The insides of her boots became a squishy swamp of water and socks, and she'd probably peel off a layer of skin when it finally came time to remove her camo paint when this was all done. The cold damp and nagging itches seeped into the layers of her, reminding her of where Toneri had broken her ribs and her nose only a few months earlier.
Hinata shunted the ache aside and turned her attention back to the hellscape around her. The devastation of the Land of Whirlpools was unlike anything Hinata had seen, even in the wake of the Fourth Shinobi War and Pain's Assault. At least you're not surrounded by corpses like you were in the Land of Sound. Years later, the event was still nightmare fuel.
As for current geography, few things resembling buildings stood, and what still stood was covered in creeping ivy and other plant life as the land reclaimed what once had been a Shinobi country as populated as Konoha at one time. I wonder how much of it Aunt Kushina saw before she was evacuated. Did she walk this street at one time?
There were enough tracks to indicate what had been streets even if overgrown, and enough clearings in the growth to indicate what had been intersections and market squares. In terms of buildings, most were the outlines of foundations, and nothing stood higher than chest height. What unholy force could have done this? Even Ten-Tails didn't unleash this level of devastation anywhere. Unsettling as the thought was, Hinata was keenly aware that the form of Ten-Tails they'd encountered in the war wasn't at full strength. The unpleasant thought made the eerie sense of walking through ruins that had been a bustling village less than fifty years prior made Hinata's bladder shrink to the size of a walnut.
Naruto signaled a hold, and she understood why. They were only about a hundred meters from their objective. As Hinata's Byakugan looked past the rubble of buildings and other wreckage, the temple came into view. Unlike the other buildings in the area, the squat building was relatively intact – except for a large hole where the main entrance should be and the large hole in the center of the atrium. The temple's architecture was reminiscent of the Hyūga Compound, easily built in the same era. The compound survived Pain's attack, but this thing was at the epicenter of something that could have leveled the compound several times over!
"Do you see what I'm seeing?" Naruto whispered as he held up his right hand in a fist. Everyone dropped to a knee. Hinata locked onto what got him spooked. She could see a chamber beneath the hold in the atrium, clearly housing hundreds of scrolls. There were a dozen men present, some loading scrolls onto carts, others excavating through the floor of the building's foundation. Of the men, two of them stood out – one was spectacled with wavy brunette hair, cigarette between his lips and smoking as only chain-smokers could. The other was a bald man with pasty-white skin. I have a very bad feeling about this.
Hinata's eyes locked on what the men were digging into. A massive trigrams seal was on the ground, and at the center sat remains of something that was vaguely humanoid. It had two arms, two legs, and a long, lean torso. The human features ended there. The corpse's skull had a prominent crest, split in the middle, giving the creature the appearance of horns. By her estimate, the creature would have stood at least two meters tall, maybe taller, given how remains shrink over time. "I see it," her jaw dropped. "In the name of god, what the hell is that thing!" The ghoulish appearance was not helped by a massive gathering of cosmic energy beneath the corpse and seal running through it.
"Ōtsutsuki by the look of it," Naruto's voice was deep, throaty. "Although, if it's dead, why would the Uzumaki Clan have put such a ridiculously powerful seal on it?"
"What do you see?" Sakura asked.
"You know that thing in the drawings the grave robbers were carrying?" Naruto asked, pulling the scrap of paper from his pocket. Sakura nodded in reply. "They're digging it up from under the temple," he tapped the paper dead center. "Beneath that, some kind of concentration of cosmic energy."
"We have to stop them!" Akemi blurted out, barely keeping her volume down. Thankfully, none of the men seemed to notice as far as Hinata could tell.
"Care to enlighten us, Mom?"
"Grandmother once told me a story about something so dangerous the Uzumaki, the Senju, and the order sealed it away somewhere safe… This was supposedly during the second Shinobi War."
"What else did she say?" Sai asked.
"It was imperative that what was sealed never got out, or it would have world-ending consequences!"
"Just like the Satori in the Box of Infinite Bliss," Kushina spoke up.
The mention of the hellish artifact made Hinata's bladder jump. Kyuubi, do you know what the hell it is?
"No clue, girl! Whatever it is, it predates me!"
"Wait, it predates Nine-Tails!"
"So, it is Ōtsutsuki, then?" Sakura added.
"But… how?" Hinata asked.
"What do you mean, dear?" Naruto asked.
"I mean, Kaguya supposedly betrayed her lover and birthed Hamura and Hagomoro over a thousand years ago. There is no other mention of other Otsutsuki until Kaguya was brought back."
"And?" Naruto clearly didn't follow.
"And, the Uzumaki clan wouldn't exist for hundreds of years later! How would they have sealed it?"
"Wait," a haunted look came over Sai, "Remember Queen Serenity said this was not the first time the Ōtsutsuki attacked earth?" Everyone nodded silently. "What if it was already sealed here, and the Uzumaki were just making sure it didn't fall into the wrong hands – just like how Queen Serenity protected the earth!"
"We are descendants of hers," Naruto exchanged a look with his mom, "It makes sense!"
"Maybe that was why our Kage destroyed the village rather than let it fall into enemy hands," Kushina stared in the direction of the temple.
"Wait… oh god!" Hinata realized the seal wasn't to keep the remains held.
"What is it?" Mom asked.
"The mass of cosmic energy under the remains! It's a booby trap! The seal isn't holding the remains; it's holding that mass of cosmic energy from destroying the remains!"
"Oh god!" Kushina's violet eyes popped wide open, "The Kage didn't set off the explosion! He sealed it, stopped it from going off full-force! He was warning people not to approach so that someone didn't unseal that mass of energy!"
"Shit," Naruto moaned, "they've almost broken the seal. "If they disturb the remains that's all it will take."
"We have to get in there!" Kushina demanded.
"Wait!" Hinata didn't keep her voice down. "If we come home without the scrolls, Konohamaru may never walk again!"
As she spoke, Naruto and Hinata froze with the gravity of the situation. There were easily hundreds of scrolls to sift through in the temple's basement, and none of them knew which was the one they needed. Assuming it is still here! "Sorry Hinata, but this story might not have a happy ending." Nine-Tails' warning left her hollow. They'd come far in the name of helping Konohamaru; now, they easily would have to choose between stopping another catastrophe or seeing him walk again.
"Merow," the meowing of a black cat distracted Hinata as the cat rubbed its length against Naruto's leg. What the? "Merow?" The cat sat before Naruto, staring him in the eyes. A cat? Here? They hadn't encountered any animal larger than an insect since arriving in the Land of Whirlpools. Hinata blinked. Something about the cat was familiar; Hinata couldn't place it. Nothing survived the devastation. None of the men we've seen strike me as being cat-lovers. How did it get here?
"Sai," Naruto spoke, a new spark in his eyes, "can you run interference? Make a diversion?"
Sai pulled out ink and paper, "Let me at 'em!"
"Okay, here is the plan," Naruto explained. The cat curiously remained rooted in front of Naruto as he spoke.
Shikamaru's neck and back ached like hell after sifting through box after box of records. Dammit, where in the hell is it! He rifled through another box, almost ready to start upending things when he opened the lid and found what he was looking for. Jackpot!
He pulled the box to a nearby table and this time did upend the box, spilling papers across it. As feared, most of the logs were not sorted, but he was at least in the right era. March, approximately thirty years ago, where are you… there! Shikamaru opened the gate activity log and found what he was looking for. "March Fifteen, 1300 hours, Clan Leader leaves on a schedule trip to Suna," Shikamaru spoke aloud as he thumbed ahead, knowing he'd found another clue, "and he's back only five days later," Shikamaru smirked, "and Ichika dies the next day, and the last maid dies only a week after that."
"Shikamaru!" Sasuke came running through the door with Hiashi and Hanabi in tow, "I have major news!"
"You go first," Shikamaru said.
"That last maid, he poisoned her with Ichika's sleeping pills!" Sasuke exclaimed.
Shikamaru cocked up an eyebrow. I wasn't expecting that! "Can you prove it?"
"I just got off the phone with the military police. They still had them in storage. The maid had sleeping pills from a bottle labelled for Ichika Hyūga."
"Fascinating," Shikamaru tapped his nose and then held up the log book, "And I can prove he went to Suna and arrived back the day before the murder."
"Shikamaru, are there personnel records in here? Pay records, employment records, especially for outside staff?"
"Same time period?" he asked.
"About eleven years later, around the time Hinata was born."
"What am I looking for?"
"Any record of the maids working at that time, preferably something with a name or an address." He paused, "She would have left or been terminated around the time Naruto was born."
"That is going to take time," Shikamaru eyed the rows boxes on shelves.
"There may be more," Hiashi spoke solemnly, "The maid might be from the Uchiha Clan."
"What?" Shikamaru froze. "The… Uchiha Clan?" He repeated the words, and they sounded ridiculous. The Uchiha are so proud when they shit they have to stand up to get off it.
"This way, both of you." Hiashi turned for the door, "Hanabi, you should come, too."
"Where are we going?" Shikamaru asked.
"Storage room," the older man said, "my father's things were thrown into a box after his death. We'll find them there."
He sounds about as excited as I was when Akemi said, "This might feel weird." Shikamaru measured Hiashi mentally, sensing no deception. "All right, lead on."
"Wait! If we come home without the scrolls, Konohamaru may never walk again!" The weight of the world once again found itself on Naruto's shoulders, not that it had ever left after what happened on the moon. He knew his wife didn't mean to place the burden, but it landed, nevertheless. Whomever was robbing this grave either was blissfully unaware of the destructive force of what they were dealing with or actively were trying to release it – neither was comforting.
Naruto eyed the racks and shelves throughout the surrounding room. Hundreds of scrolls were scattered on the shelves, dozens having been loaded onto a cart nearby, and there was no way of telling which was the one they needed.
"Naruto, there may not be a happy ending this time," Kurama warned.
Naruto didn't respond; he just scanned the area with his Byakugan. While he didn't expect much challenge from the men digging up the floor, the bald dude looked like he was an Otsutsuki or maybe bonded to a Zetsu. The pasty man's lifeless features radiated malevolence. He would as soon kill everyone around them as look at them. A chill came over Naruto, as did a sickening wave of foreboding, like he knew this man, like he did something terrible to Naruto in the past. How? We've never met?!
"Merow!" a sudden pressure against Naruto's right leg distracted him back to reality. A black cat rubbed herself across his leg, from head to tail before sitting in front of him. "Merow?" The cat stared him in the eyes. Am I imaging things, or is that cat smiling at me? Naruto blinked, and the cat blinked in return.
Naruto didn't know why, but he nodded at the errant feline, "Sai, can you run interference? Make a diversion?"
Sai came alive with the request, "Let me at 'em!" He readied to make beast summons.
Naruto eyed their opposition – ten men, half armed with scientific ninja gauntlets and pickaxes, the spectacled man, and the leader. The leader radiated sinister malevolence Naruto had sensed before when fighting Kaguya. The man had a thin strip of hair along the crest of his skull accented by a long, black ponytail. The man's pasty-white skin only had one notable feature, a small tattoo under the man's left eye. The other thing that marked him as different was his dress – archaic robes versus modern work clothes and miliary-style fatigues worn by the others.
"Okay, here is the plan," Naruto spoke up. "Sai, you begin with a distraction. Sakura: you, Mom, and Akemi gather all the scrolls possible back onto the various shelves.
"What are you going to do?" Mom inquired.
"I'll break up the group digging through the seal on the floor and tangle with the leader," he said.
"What about me?" Hinata asked.
"Hinata, your priority is to mark the cart they've been loading and all the shelves containing scrolls with Thunder God Marks, and get them back to Konoha as fast as you can!"
"Aren't you being a bit reckless, taking everyone else while we just distract and gather?" Sakura spoke up."
"Feel free to jump in," Naruto said, eying the scrolls on endless shelves, "after the scrolls are secured." He began gathering up chakra, "We don't have time to argue."
"Naruto," Akemi spoke up, "what about the cat?"
He stared down at the earnest little feline, "We'll take her with us," Naruto nodded. "Black cats are good luck, and I don't want her left behind if the place goes kerflooey again! Everybody ready?"
"Yes, sir!" the group answered in unison. Sai had already summoned two lions and his twin golems.
Naruto ignited in Tailed-Beast Sage Mode, glowing yellow-orange. "Let's do this!" Sai sent the lions and his golems charging toward the temple; Mom, Sakura, and Akemi charged after; and Hinata made for the wagon. Time to get stuck in! Naruto zipped across the distance to the temple, dropped down through the hole in the entryway, and landed amid the group near the seal. He didn't even say a word; Naruto shot flaming chakra from his beast tails, immolating the half-dozen men closest to the seal. They didn't even have time to scream it was over so quickly.
The overwhelming malevolence of the mostly bald man alerted Naruto back to his presence, now that the seal was temporarily safe. "You're an annoying little fuck, even worse than I thought!" The man spoke, stony-faced.
"Don't think I've had the pleasure," Naruto whipped his flaming tails, incinerating the remaining foot soldiers.
"Call me Jigen," the man smirked, eyes turning yellow, "I hope you believe in god; you're about to meet him, Naruto Uzumaki!"
The distortion of a dimensional shift formed before Naruto's eyes, and he barely moved out of the way to dodge the attack. Not Flying Thunder God, but still really damn good! Naruto spotted another rift and again barely got away as the man swiped through empty space again. As Naruto retreated, he stole a second to eye the group. Hinata had already teleported the cart away and was joining Mom, Sakura, and Akemi in transporting the next group of scrolls. Notably, the last man, the man in glasses, jackrabbited.
Naruto returned to focus as the man named Jigen threw what looked like a collection of fine needles. The needles, themselves, glowed an inky black in Naruto's enhanced vision. Oh shit! He rolled and dodged to a Thunder God Mark he'd left near the entrance to the hole in the floor above. In the blink it took to reach his mark, the needle grew to full sized black receiver rods. Just like Pain's!
As Naruto scanned the man's chakra network, an unusual node appeared in the man's left inner ear. Whatever it was, it had its own chakra network. What the hell is that thing! Jigen sent another barrage of receiver rods; Naruto in turn tossed a series of marked Kunai and shuriken. Naruto barely teleported out of the way as the rods cut the air.
Sai's beast summons charged the man, Jigen, from the side. Paying little heed, he kept his eyes on Naruto and pointed an outstretched hand toward the summons, all of which dissolved as they suddenly were impaled with black receiver rods.
Naruto ready when he noticed Sai was standing atop something with the same glowing black signature. "SAI, GET BACK!" The other man surged backwards, but one of the rods that sprouted from the ground impaled Sai through the leg.
"FUUUUCCCKKKK! Sai howled in agony as the razor-sharp blade ran through his leg, staining his fatigue pants tar-black with blood as he stumbled backwards – blade ripping skin and muscle.
Naruto took the second to observe the far side of the room, Hinata had by now transported some half of the scrolls. Jigen must have noticed his distraction because he turned his attention toward Hinata, and their mothers. The man was again charging to send needle-sized rods toward the group.
Before Naruto or anyone could move, there was a loud THUD followed by the ceiling collapsing on top of Jigen. A quick look upward, and Sakura was standing at the edge of the collapsed ceiling. She winked with a thumbs up.
If Jigen was injured, he didn't show it. He stood up, pushing off heavy wood beams and panels. Naruto didn't give him the chance to recover, he threw a kunai, which the man expertly dodge. The slightest grin cracked at the corner of the man's mouth until Naruto teleported to the kunai as it sailed by. A quick focus of chakra to his fingers, and Naruto struck the man with gentle-fist at the base of the skull.
Jigen crumbled, but remained on his knees. Naruto sent flaming beast-tail chakra at the man, immolating him. Unexpectedly, the burning man turned, rose up, and rammed a fist into Naruto's face with enough force to send him on his ass and to dispel his Tailed-Beast Sage Mode. As he landed on his back, he caught the pink blur of Sakura moving to assist, only to be punched through the ceiling and into the air. When she landed with a hard flop, she remained limp and bleeding.
Fingers wrapped around Naruto's throat as Jigen choked him. Naruto struck several times into the man's wrist and forearm with a hammerfist, but the pasty man grit his teeth against the pain, not loosening his grip. The corners of Naruto's vision began turning black. Shit! Think of something or you're going to FUCKING DIE!
"Reow!" Jigen's grip slackened and he stumbled off of Naruto. "GAAHHHH!" he screamed. Naruto spotted the black cat biting the back of the man's neck as it dug its claws into the man's back. Having once been scratched silly by the Fire Daimyo's cat, Naruto almost felt sympathy for the man – almost.
Jigen got his hands around the cat and hurled it across the room, screaming as claws and teeth ripped flesh. The wounds self-sealed, much as Obito's had when bound to the Zetsu creature. Jigen again raised a hand, this time to impale the cat, now struggling to get on its paws. As Naruto got to his own feet, a flaming orange and red chain shot across the room and encircled Jigen's neck and torso. The acrid scent of singeing flesh filled the room as Mom whipped the chain holding Jigen around, smashing him into walls and the ground.
Mom pulled the chain, and Jigen went sailing forward toward her. Before he could impact, mom punched with a solid uppercut, and the man went flying into the air. The chain dissolved as he flew into the stratosphere; mom smirked as she watched the man fly. The look of satisfaction on Mom's face turned to horror as she ran up to Naruto. "Honey, are you okay!"
The mere tap of her fingers on his nose and cheeks lit his face on fire. "AAAAHHHH!" Naruto's senses sharpened, and he realized he could tasty the salty, coppery taste of blood in his mouth, and his nose pulsated like his heart had traded places with it as the adrenaline kick wore off.
"Son, hold still," Mom bear hugged him, "This is not going to feel good!" There was aquamarine light and the sensation of bones and his nose cartilage moving.
"AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!" Naruto screamed, fighting the urge to faint. Mom let him free from her grip, and he scrambled backwards, "Wha," Naruto spoke nasal, feeling blood and swelling around his face despite the healing jutsu, "What the hell, Ma!"
"You're welcome," Mom replied with a scowl. "He broke your nose and some of your facial bones with that hit. You'll probably have two black eyes by the time we're done."
"Mom, Sakura, Sai!" Naruto turned his vision back to see Hinata tending Sai and Akemi with a healing jutsu over and still unconscious and bloody Sakura.
His eyes shot painfully wide open as he spotted another sight: the spectacled man. The man reached into the hole in the basement floor and began to tug at the thigh bone of the skeletal remains – the seal began to fail as the man tugged. "NO!"
The bone snapped loose from the seal, and blinding white light began emanating from beneath the skeletal remains. The spectacled man turn and ran, clutching the bone with greedy delight, oblivious that he'd probably killed all of them.
"SHIT!" Mom charged at the failing seal and tried reinforcing it. "Naruto! Get everyone out! I can't hold the seal!" Mom moaned in agony.
Naruto froze, seeing his life flash before his eyes. Mom had come so far, and he couldn't let her die now of all times. Adrenaline broke the ice holding him, and he ran to Akemi and Sakura, "Hang on!" he made a nasal moan and teleported them both to the hospital courtyard in Konoha. Naruto returned to the Land of Whirlpools before Akemi could open her lips in protest.
When he arrived back, he noted the absence of Hinata and Sai; Hinata flashed back not a second later. Mom still grit her teeth and her body rained sweat as she held on for dear life. "Mom, just hang on a sec!" He turned to Hinata, then to the shelves "Split them with me!" Hinata went left, and he went right. Naruto had never teleported anything so large as a bookshelf full of scrolls, and the effort taxed him to his limit to get it back to the Hyūga Compound. "Come on Kyuubi!"
Nine-Tails lent everything he had, and he deposited his load at the courtyard, scrolls spilling over the ground as he teleported back for the last one. Mom writhed and the floor was beginning to buckle as Mom held back the expanding mass of cosmic energy. Against better judgement, Naruto strained with his chakra to transport the last rack of shelves. The effort nearly caused him to faint, and he collapsed to his knees on the ground in the courtyard. Mom!
Summoning his strength, Naruto teleported back one last time. Naruto fought against dizziness and nausea as he ran to his Mom, seeing the black cat sitting before her. He placed his hands on both and teleported them away.
"Ouch!" Naruto squirmed on the bed as Hinata delicately wiped off his camouflage pain with a makeup removing towelette. Sometimes, you can be such a baby, love! She worked quickly but delicate, removing layers of paint over his puffy, nose and face. Once finished, she activated her healing jutsu and applied the Hyūga healing ointment to Naruto's nose and neck at the same time. "AHHH!" he hissed.
"Sorry, love, but if you'd prefer, I could take you to the hospital." She smiled slightly, knowing how much Naruto hated going to the hospital, "In fact, I should insist on you going."
"What would they do," he groaned, still nasal, "that isn't already being done?
"Admittedly, not much" she shrugged. "Your Mom did a good job of healing the broken bones in your face…" she trailed off as his sullen black eyes stared. "Honey, what's wrong?"
"He took me out in one hit," Naruto groaned deeper.
"I've taken plenty of people out with one hit, Naruto," she massaged ointment into his neck, "you're damn lucky he didn't paralyze your like Konohamaru!"
"That's my whole point!" Naruto remained sullen, sinking back on the bed. "He knocked me out of Sage Mode like it was nothing."
"It's wasn't nothing," Hinata chided, "you we up against someone easily equivalent to Toneri or Kaguya."
"I nearly lost it, Hinata," he sighed, "If it hadn't been for Mom…"
Hinata cut off his dour train of thought, "And do you think your Mom was there when that same thing happened in the timeline Himawari came from?" Naruto's darkened eyes widened at her statement, "Do you even think we went to the Land of Whirlpools in that time?" She shook her head, "Jiraiya was likely dead that time. How would we have known to go?"
"What are you saying?" he continued to stare with his wide sapphires.
"I'm saying," she sat beside him, "things aren't as bad as you might think!"
"How are you so sure?" he asked.
"We found the scroll we were looking for," Hinata raked her fingers through his hair, "And this Jigen character ran rather than stand and fight."
"How do you know?"
Hinata smiled, pointing to her eyes with her free hand. "After your Gentle Fist strike and your mom punting him into the stratosphere, he decided to take the guy with glasses and run."
"They got away with whatever the hell that thing was, at least a bone from it," Naruto's voice was sounding much less nasal as the swelling began to reduce around his face.
"And we'll find them," Hinata's free hand slowly clenched into a fist, "and we will kill them." She caught Naruto's concerned stare. Deciding she didn't want him to sink back into his dour mood, Hinata stood pulling him up to a seated position, "Come."
"Where are we going?" he asked. Hinata ignored the question and dragged him to his feet and wordlessly towards their restroom. Hinata began filling the hot tub and began stripping out of her fatigues – still wet from the mist and ocean spray. So much had happened in the past few hours, Hinata scarcely could believe how much of it fit into only one day.
Naruto stared motionless as her shirt and bra came off. Hinata fumbled with her socks as she asked, "Are you going to join me, or are you in fully clothed?"
Naruto took the hint and began shedding his outfit as Hinata removed the last of her lays and sat in the obsidian tub. But the time Naruto joined her, the water was up to her waist. He put his arm over her shoulders, and leaned into her. "I'm not sure I deserve this," Naruto whispered, "I thought this was reserved for winners."
"You won my heart," Hinata stopped the water at chest-deep and turned on the jets, "and we got what we came for, maybe more."
"More?"
"There are literally hundreds of scrolls we collected that haven't been seen since the end of the Land of Whirlpools, maybe even longer." Hinata smiled, "Who knows what we might come armed with to the fight that we didn't have in Himawari's original timeline?"
"They know about time being shifted," Naruto said. "That will make her and you a target."
"Then I guess I'll have to balance being a mom and a warrior," she stretched out, leaning her head on his shoulder.
"You could spare yourself a lot of misery…" she put her hand over his mouth to stop the words "by leaving me for some other guy."
"Naruto," she stared fierce and determined, "all that I have, all that I am is because I love you in this timeline and the one our daughter came from! Don't think for a minute that an alien with a bad haircut and desperate need of a tan is somehow going to change my mind!"
"Wouldn't dream of it," he smirked, "That would be against your ninja way."
"And don't for a second," she continued to stare serious as ever, "think that trying to distance yourself from me in the name of protecting me is going to work! We're going to fight through this, and we're going to win!"
"I wouldn't have it any other way," he grinned deeper, "That would be against my ninja way, too!"
Hinata finally softened her expression and her tone, sinking until her head was on Naruto's shoulder. He began lovingly stroking fingers through her hair. "As scary as this all is," she clutched him tighter, "I right now have everything I've ever wanted in the world."
"As do I," Naruto hugged his arms around her even tighter.
"We have a lot to do," she said.
"Like?"
"We'll probably need to fix Konohamaru, if we can," she said.
"Catch up with Shikamaru on the murder investigation,"
"Assist Mom in explaining to the other Kages when the hell happened in the Land of Whirlpools."
"Find a place for that cat we rescued."
"She already took up residence on the couch in the living room," Hinata giggled.
"Well, after that, we need to start thinking of how to beat possibly multiple Otsutsuki."
"And see if the ancient Uzumaki had any dealings with them," she added.
"We still have to plan our wedding in all of this." She pushed back, staring wide-eyed at him. "Come on, you really didn't think I was going to call things off or push things back, right?"
"No," she laughed, "at least, I hoped you wouldn't." Hinata again rested her head on his shoulder, "We have another issue to discuss."
"Oh?"
"Naruto, my injection will be due just prior to our wedding. Do you want to have a baby right away?"
"Any harm in delaying the few months?" he purred, hands slipping down off her hair, tracing her spine, and finally gripping her ass. "I mean, as long as we get the job done within a year, is there any reason we shouldn't enjoy being young just a little longer?"
"You just want to have super-sexy time non-stop!" She playfully splashed him.
"And you don't?" he bared his teeth like a shark. "Dr. Hyuga!"
Hinata bit her lip, knowing the game was up, "You know, it is a bit awkward getting aroused every time someone calls me that, now!"
"You started it!" he teased.
"And I'll finish it!" Hinata covered his mouth with hers and invaded him.
Author's Notes: Hi everyone, I hope you enjoyed the chapter. As you may have noticed, FFN tracking stats have been non-functional for the past two weeks. As a result, I have no way of knowing if you're reading this or not. I hope this story is still interesting. With that in mind, I still can track reviews/comments. Please do feel free to leave commentary; I do treasure feedback.
The characters will be nearing another crisis point in the near future and some major changes will begin to occur as a result. Until then, stay healthy, stay safe, and I'll see you next chapter.
