Caught in the Whirlpool

Part XII

Minato sagged in relief as he watched Genma hurry along the reporters, photographers, and cameramen back to the small boats that waited to bring them back to the main island. Even keeping the mini-press conference brief had been tiring and he was ready to get out of the gym and spend the rest of the day relaxing. Once he'd used the gym's healing machine to restore his monsters, he'd ride Ryuu back to Uzu Town and visit the Pokémon Center to adjust his line-up, eat some lunch, and then do a little exploring of the wilder areas outside of town.

He made his way to the back room where his creatures could be refreshed that had been pointed out to him earlier. The gym leader had already made his escape while Minato had been busy with the media, but Kenshin Uzumaki was still there, waiting for him. The Uzumaki helpfully set the machine up for him while he set five of his six pokéballs into the proper slots.

"What's your sixth?" Kenshin asked as the machine ran through its cycle.

"Senkou, my jolteon," Minato replied. "With how tough your father turned out to be, it seemed prudent to keep him in reserve in case I needed him."

Kenshin nodded as the machine clicked off. "Well, my father invites you to have lunch with the family if you don't have any plans."

Minato blinked in surprise. "Really?"

He was very surprised. It wasn't often that an opponent of his was willing to share a meal with him after a battle. That Kenjiro, after being defeated, was offering him a lunch with his family was rather amazing.

"If you've already made other arrangements, it's fine," Kenshin shrugged.

"Oh, no, no I'd love to come over if it's not any trouble," Minato hastily replied. "I'm very honored by the invitation. I just need to tell my friend where I'm going and make a stop at the local Center."

"Alright," Kenshin nodded. "After that, I'll take you to the house."

"Thank you," Minato smiled.

But, as he went to find Genma and share his latest plans, his level of anxiety started to creep upwards. The uneasiness he'd felt on the way to Uzu no Kuni about Kushina's relation to the Uzumakis here was back at the front of his mind again now that he didn't have a battle to focus his mind on other things. He didn't know the names of her father or brothers and he wasn't sure if or how he should ask them about their possible relation to a Kushina Uzumaki.

Hopefully accepting this invitation wasn't a bad idea…

Kushina was still a bit peeved as Tsunami brought her back to the shrinking beach below her childhood home. Arashi wasn't far behind her on his own gyarados, Storm. And behind him came Ichi-Tora and Ni-Tora and their gyarados, Jaws and Bruce, with Aunt Asuka and Akane as passengers. Her father had stayed behind to supervise the media getting back on their boats, and she wasn't sure why Kenshin was staying behind.

"I can't believe you have a gyarados," Akane said as the four water serpents reached dry land and let off their passengers.

"Of course I have one," Kushina snorted. "Why wouldn't I?"

"It must have a calm or gentle nature," Arashi decided as he returned Storm to his pokéball.

Kushina snarled at him and flashed him a rude hand gesture.

"Lunch will be late today," Aunt Asuka announced and gave Kushina a narrow look. "That is, if you care to join us this afternoon."

"I don't know," Kushina grumbled. "I need to visit Professor Utatane sometime today since I didn't get around to it yesterday."

"Then you should call on the professor," Aunt Asuka told her. "It's irresponsible of you to neglect your work. A woman should be dependable."

Kushina barely restrained another snarl. "Fine!" she snapped instead as she put Tsunami away. "I'm out of here."

"But, Kushina—" Akane started to protest.

"Hush!" Aunt Asuka scolded. "She has important work to do in aiding the professor. Besides…"

Whatever else her aunt said to her cousin was lost in the rush of the waves as Kushina stomped her way up the steep trail. She really didn't care what the old widow's reasoning was. It was probably something stupid that would only piss her off more.

I hate that old viper! I wish that Daddy never let her move in and stay for so long. Nobody likes her except for Akane, and Akane has to like her because that's her mom.

Kushina flipped her braid over her shoulder as she reached the top of the cliffs and struck out towards Koharu's laboratory.

So long as Aunt Asuka's still around, I don't want Naruto coming here…

Naruto sat by the window of the train car with Vee napping in his lap. Sakura and Sasuke sat across from him, and Ken-Ichi was sitting to his left, sleeping. The view outside of the window didn't change since the locomotive had broken down two hours ago and it was still being repaired.

I guess this means that we won't be getting on a ferry today, he sighed.

The travel plan, as he understood it, was to catch a ferry ride in the late afternoon to one of the islands of Uzu no Kuni, eat dinner, and spend the night in a Pokémon Center. Then the next morning they'd catch another ferry that would take them to Uzu Town and Ken-Ichi would escort him to Professor Utatane's lab where his mother was supposed to be working. But with the train at a standstill it seemed like they'd miss the first ferry and have to wait until tomorrow.

Sakura was passing the time by chattering to her new torchic that she'd acquired in the Safari Zone. She'd decided to name him Shamo, supposedly after some ancient breed of chicken that had been popular in non-pokémon fighting. Earlier she'd been playing with her axew, Lizzie, but Kitsune had slipped out and the two had gotten into a fight that Ken-Ichi's wartortle, Gamera, had had to step in to break up.

Sasuke leafed through some free magazines that he'd found on the train although it didn't look like he was actually reading anything. Grimm, the eevee, which had seemed rather depressed and wary of people when it had been first captured, now sat beside Sasuke without a problem. The eevee now appeared much better adjusted to its new circumstances and his name no longer seemed as fitting as it had been before.

Naruto leaned the side of his head against the window and sighed as he rubbed Vee's soft ear.

I'm so bored…

The train car suddenly jolted and the locomotive whistled loudly.

"They finally fixed it!" Sakura said to her torchic. "We're on the move again."

Alright, Naruto grinned. Maybe we'll be in time to catch that boat after all!

A quarter before twelve, Minato followed Kenshin Uzumaki out of Uzu Town to the gym leader's home. It was a very similar path to the one that he'd followed the previous day when Kenshin had given him and Genma a tour of the area. The ground sloped upwards from the fringes of town until it leveled off just before the steep sea cliffs, and perched on this flat strip of land directly across from the offshore gym was the house.

It was a weathered old building that needed some fresh paint and some roof repairs but otherwise seemed to be in decent shape. The tall wild grass was cropped down in a ragged circle around the house and there were a few gnarled pine trees around the building. But beyond that there was no garden or decorative landscaping. Nothing really set it apart from the handful of other houses scattered along the cliffs and he probably wouldn't have found it without Kenshin's guidance.

"Nice place," Minato commented.

"The land has belonged to the family for as long as anyone can remember," Kenshin said as they stepped onto the stone front steps. "The old house used to be bigger but a terrible storm knocked it down about ninety years ago and this is what replaced it."

Kenshin knocked on the door to announce their arrival and an older woman let them inside. She wore a nice kimono in shades of pale gray, blue, and green, and greeted him with a demure smile. Minato smiled politely back at her and bowed before stepping inside and removing his shoes, and took her to be the gym leader's wife.

"Hey, Aunt Asuka," Kenshin greeted the woman. "Where's Dad?"

Aunt? Minato blinked. She's the gym leader's sister?

"He's waiting out back," Asuka said and bowed slightly to Minato. "Welcome honored guest. Lunch will be served at noon."

"Thanks," Minato replied, feeling a tad awkward at the formal words, and followed Kenshin to where the gym leader was said to be.

The inside of the house was as plain and practical as the outside. All the furniture looked old and worn but clean, and the wooden floors had long lost their shine. There were some pictures on the walls, but most were oil paintings of generic sea-scapes, and the two family photographs that he'd spied he didn't get a good look at before they reached the kitchen and the back door.

Behind the house were the gym leader, Kenjiro Uzumaki, and three other men sitting in plastic chairs. Two of the men had rusty-orange hair and were clearly identical twins, and the third man had black hair and nursed a beer as he slouched in his seat. Kenjiro rose when they appeared and nodded in greeting.

"Welcome, Namikaze," Kenjiro said. "You've already met my eldest son; here are the other three." He gestured towards the twins. "Ichi-Tora and Ni-Tora." Then he nodded towards the black-haired man. "And Arashi, the youngest."

"Yo!" the twins greeted, speaking and raising their beer bottles in unison.

Arashi barely grunted, and otherwise ignored everyone, staring sullenly out at the sea.

Minato found himself put into an open chair next to Kenjiro and a cold opened bottle of beer pressed into his hand before he could politely refuse it. Kenjiro returned to his seat and Kenshin took the chair on Minato's other side. No one said anything for several minutes and Minato fidgeted with the brown bottle as he started to sweat.

He knew that Kushina had several older brothers. He was pretty sure that she'd mentioned having twin brothers once or twice. And she's admitted to running into a brother in Jungle Country whose name might have been Arashi…or maybe she's said Akashi…or—

"I know that you don't need this," Kenjiro said so suddenly that Minato flinched. "And it won't mean anything outside of the Land of Whirlpools, but…" He held out a small pin with a white circle that had a spiral carved into it. "…I would like you have this. You defeated me and I concede the symbol of my gym and my family to you."

"Thank you, sir," Minato said and accepted the badge from Kenjiro. It felt too light and smooth to be made of stone, so he wondered if it was carved from some kind of animal bone. "This is also the crest of your family?"

"Yes," Kenjiro nodded and sipped at his beer. "The gym has always been run by the Uzumaki, and the Uzumaki have always handed out the symbol of the clan upon defeat."

Is this why he's never thought of the championship? Minato wondered. He feels so bound to tradition that the idea of doing something else just doesn't occur to him?

The ice now seemed to be broken, and the twins lobbed a question at him.

"Where'd you get that red gyarados?" one asked.

"Yeah, where'd you get it?" the other added.

"I caught Akai as a magikarp during a charity fishing event," Minato told them.

"That gyarados of yours didn't seem so tough," Arashi muttered.

Minato shrugged. "I haven't had him for a whole year yet. Considering his opponent, I don't think that he did too badly."

"Do you like to fish?" Kenshin inquired.

"Not really," Minato admitted.

"Did you have any inside information before you took Dad on?" Arashi asked suspiciously.

Minato frowned. "What do you mean?"

"Are you accusing him of cheating?" Kenjiro demanded, his eyes turning chilly.

"I just want to know what he knew before the fight," Arashi grumbled. "That's all."

"Well…" Minato picked at the beer bottle label with his thumbnail as he carefully ordered his thoughts. "I couldn't find much information on the 'Net before I arrived, and I had no idea what specific pokémon that I might have to fight, but—"

The back door opened and a woman and almost glided over to them. She bore a resemblance to Asuka, but she was much younger without the wrinkles and gray hair. The kimono that she wore contained brighter colors, her red-brown hair was done up in a more complicated style, and her pretty face was carefully enhanced with make-up. She looked like she could be a model or a movie star costumed for a part in a film set in the ancient feudal era.

"Good afternoon," she bowed. "Lunch is almost ready. Is there anything I can get anyone in the meantime?"

"Geeze, Akane, did you put on a fancier dress?" Arashi snorted. "Are you trying to sed—"

The twins, who sat on either side of Arashi, smacked the back of his head at the same time.

"Ow!" Arashi hissed. "What was that for?"

"Leave Akane alone," Kenshin warned him. "Aunt Asuka changed her kimono, too. I'm sure that they just wanted to make a nice impression on our guest."

"Y-yes," Akane nodded eagerly. Then she turned her full attention to Minato. "Is there anything that I can get you, Mr. Namikaze?" she asked, fluttering her eyelashes and blushing slightly.

If he hadn't encountered so many women like her since becoming the league champion of the Land of Fire, he might've thought that she had something in her eye. But he'd long lost count of the shy, nervous girls that had approached him and desperately hoped to draw his special attention. It seemed that, even though he was fairly anonymous in this country, he still couldn't escape from this extremely awkward sort of encounter.

"Um, no thank you," he replied. Now how to politely tell her that I'm engaged without her bursting into tears…

"Oh," Akane blinked and fidgeted with the trailing edge of one of her sleeves. "Well, um…"

"Namikaze, allow me to introduce you to my niece, Akane Uzumaki," Kenjiro said. "She's my late brother's daughter and very accomplished in basic and Super Contests. On several occasions she has even competed in Contests in other countries."

Minato's polite smile stiffened. Crap, he's promoting her; he wants me to like her. "I can't say that I know much beyond the bare basics of Contests, but that sounds…impressive."

Akane beamed at his weak praise. "You really think so? I'm not able to get to half of the Contests that I want to. So many of them are so far away and travel expenses get so high with all the props and costumes that I need to bring with me for Super Contests…"

She rambled on about her Contest exploits with shining eyes while Minato's mind raced in panicky circles. He didn't want to led this poor girl on and raise her hopes falsely. But on the other hand he still had the nagging worry that these people could be Kushina's close relations and he had no idea how they'd react. And if they reacted negatively—

A strange woman with black hair in a tight braid and wearing a modern-styled purple dress strode around from the side of the house. Her murky blue-gray eyes were bright with unshed tears, her eyelids were red and puffy, and her mouth was twisted in an angry line that might also be holding back sobs. She zeroed in on Kenshin and stormed right up to him without a word and slapped him across the face with all of her strength.

"Suzume?" Kenshin yelped and cringed away from her, almost knocking over his plastic chair. "What the hell—"

"It's all your fault!" she shrieked hoarsely.

"What's all my fault?" Kenshin frowned, rubbing at his abused cheek.

"My baby's out there all by himself," she raged, "because you got him all obsessed with those horrid beasts—"

"For crying out loud, Ken-Ichi's almost eighteen years old!" Kenshin snapped back. "He's more than capable to taking care of himself."

"No he's not!" Suzume shrilled. "He's not eighteen, he's seventeen! And he's in some foreign country where he'll get robbed or murdered—"

"That won't happen," Kenshin scoffed. "He's got a whole team of pokémon that he's been training—"

"I don't trust those filthy things!" Suzume cried, wild-eyed. "They're dangerous animals that could crush him, drown him, drop him out of the sky, electrocute him, poison him, burn him alive—"

"Suzume you're being ridiculous!" Kenshin groaned.

"You're supposed to be his father!" Suzume snarled back. "And yet you encourage him to do dangerous things in foreign countries while you barely give him any financial support and don't allow him to live with you!"

"I pay you more than the court ordered me to," Kenshin glowered. "And the only reason that he doesn't live with me is that there's no room in the damn house because Aunt Asuka, Akane, and all my brothers still live at home!"

"That money is barely enough to cover my bills!" the woman protested.

"Maybe you should get a job, then," he retorted. "Surely there's something that you're good at besides being a pain in the ass!"

"How dare you!" Suzume screamed as she started to cry.

Minato cringed in his seat as his eyes darted between the gym leader's son and the hysterical woman. I have no idea what's going on…and I'm not sure that I want to know.

"Kenshin," Kenjiro rumbled. "Please escort your ex-wife someplace else if you two have something you need to discuss. Our guest doesn't need to be disturbed by your domestic issues."

"Yes, sir," Kenshin agreed and stood up to drag Suzume away by her arm. "Quit crying. Ken-Ichi is just fine."

"No he isn't!" Suzume wailed. "I don't know where he is, and neither do you! He could be laying dead in a ditch somewhere for all we know!"

Kenshin just rolled his eyes and towed her away around the corner of the house and probably back towards town.

"I apologize for that," Kenjiro sighed once their voices had faded to indistinct faint shouts.

"It's alright," Minato smiled weakly. "It sounded like some kind of emergency."

"Not likely," Arashi snorted derisively. "Suzume's a paranoid pokémon-a-phobe who is incapable of realizing that Ken-Ichi doesn't need her to change his diapers anymore."

"Um…" Akane fidgeted nervously. "I think we can go inside for lunch now."

"Yes, let's do that," Kenjiro decided and led the way back inside.

Minato lingered at the tail end of the group a few steps behind Arashi, still hanging on to the opened un-drunk-from bottle of beer that had been pressed on him. He took his time studying the house's interior as he was led to the dining room. Nothing really caught his eye until he reached his destination.

As Akane shyly led him to his place at one end of the table, he saw a family photograph hung on the wall. It was old as all of the gym leader's children were teenagers or younger instead of adults. He saw a younger looking Kenjiro with Kenshin at his shoulder, the twins on his other side, Arashi positioned beside his oldest brother, and right in front of the father was a fifth child…

…Oh shit.

Kushina trudged back to her childhood home from the professor's cozy little laboratory. She'd dropped off all the data that she'd collected the previous day and given Koharu an update on the feebas. The old woman had suggested some new areas for Kushina to investigate later and allowed her to play with the professor's persian and purugly before kicking her out to eat lunch.

Aunt Asuka said that lunch would be late today, she thought as she walked. That means that food will be ready at one o'clock at the earliest… I should be able to fix myself a sandwich and steal some leftovers for Kyuumaru before she starts complaining that I'm in her way.

As she drew nearer to the house, she passed Kenshin embroiled in an argument with his ex-wife, Suzume. The woman was clearly hysterical about something; her face was all blotchy and she was half-screaming, half-crying. Kenshin kept trying to make a point to her but she wasn't letting him finish his sentences and he looked like he wanted to shake her until she shut up.

Kushina gave them a wide berth to avoid getting sucked into the drama.

She crept into the front door and frowned when she heard a murmur of voices coming from the dining room. Her frown deepened when she smelled cooking food coming from the kitchen. She hesitated before kicking off her shoes and walking to the dining room.

It's barely noon and if lunch is supposed to be late Aunt Asuka shouldn't be cooking anything yet—

Everyone except for Kenshin, who was outside with Suzume, and Aunt Asuka, who was presumably in the kitchen, was in the dining room. Her father was already sitting at the head of the table—which was set with the nice china—and Kenshin's seat was empty at his right hand. Ichi-Tora sat at her father's left hand with Ni-Tora next to him. Arashi sat on the other side of Kenshin's empty chair, and Aunt Asuka and Akane's seat were vacant at the end of the table, along with a third place setting at the very end—a place of honor. Akane was standing near the family portrait that had been taken mere months before Kushina had fled the Land of Whirlpools on her pokémon journey…and Minato was staring at it.

Eh? What's he doing here—

And then she remembered Akane's idea, and everything made perfect, awful sense.

"This is an old picture of my uncle's family," Akane explained brightly to him. "See, that's Uncle Kenjiro, that's Kenshin, that's Ichi-Tora, that's Ni-Tora, that's Arashi, and that looks like a boy but it's actually my girl cousin Kushina!"

"I know," Minato replied faintly.

"Huh?" Akane cocked her pretty head in confusion. "You know?"

"Yeah," Kushina said tightly. "He knows."

Everyone turned to stare at her in surprise. Minato guiltily peeked at her over his shoulder, looking rather pale. Akane transferred her confused look from Minato to Kushina.

"How does he know?" Akane asked.

"Because I know him and he knows me," Kushina half-snapped. Aunt Asuka stepped out of the kitchen with a plate of onigiri appetizers and Kushina hit her with a fierce glare. "You lied to me! You said that lunch was going to be late today so that I wouldn't be here to embarrass you while you pushed Akane off on Minato!" The red-head balled her hands into fists and wished that she could hit the sour old woman. "Well, you're wasting your time. Minato's engaged already."

Akane's shoulders slumped and her lower lip trembled. "He is?"

"How do you know this?" her father asked.

"What gives you the right to be so familiar with him as to use his given name?" Aunt Asuka demanded frostily.

Kushina growled deep in her throat and deliberately sat down in Aunt Asuka's chair, which would place her at Minato's left hand when he sat down.

"I know that he's engaged," she replied coldly, "because he's engaged to me!"

Screw minimizing conflicts while I'm here—it's time for war!