It was midnight. Moonlight fell on the roof of the Senju Fortress. The air was still, and the only sound was the soft wind passing over the tiles and the distant chirp of crickets.
Naruto was sitting on the edge, his legs dangling over the several-story drop. A few feet behind him, Hinata stood, her Byakugan active. Her dark hair moved in the breeze as her white eyes scanned the sleeping village.
Naruto was keeping her company on her guard shift.
The silence stretched for several minutes.
"Nothing?" Naruto asked, without turning.
"Nothing," Hinata replied. Her voice was soft, but clear in the night. "The perimeter is quiet. No movement on the main streets."
"Good. Good."
Naruto leaned back a little on his hands.
"It's... boring, isn't it?" he said.
Hinata deactivated her dōjutsu and blinked, her lavender eyes returning to normal. She turned to him. "Boring?"
"Yeah. I mean, it's good. 'Boring' is good. It means no one is trying to kill us," he said, letting out a small laugh. "But being up here, doing nothing but watching... gives you a lot of time to think."
"I suppose so," Hinata said, moving a couple of steps closer. She kept a respectful distance.
"It's weird, you know?" Naruto said suddenly, picking up his train of thought.
Hinata tilted her head. "What is, Naruto-kun?"
"Being up here, watching the stars... All of this. It makes me think a lot about... 'home.' What it means."
He glanced over his shoulder at the fortress structure behind them.
"Before, my apartment was just... a place to sleep. Sometimes not even that. Loud, empty. It always smelled like instant ramen."
Hinata smiled slightly.
"But this..." he continued, "isn't. It's big, but it doesn't feel empty. Even when I'm alone in my room, I know Sakura-chan is nearby, or Karin is probably rummaging in the kitchen, or Grandma Tsunade is yelling at some scroll."
"I understand," Hinata said. Her voice grew warmer. "Me too. With all of you... it feels different. It feels warmer than the Hyūga compound."
"Really? Even with how chaotic it is? Karin and I almost blew up the kitchen yesterday trying to make rice."
"Especially because of that," she said, her smile widening. "In the compound... everything is silence. Order. Discipline. Here... I feel like I can... breathe. I feel like... I belong."
Naruto looked at her and smiled. A genuine smile, without the usual overflowing energy. It was calm.
She's always been like this, he thought. She's always seen past the idiot everyone else saw. Even in that other life...
"You know, Hinata..." he said, his tone turning more serious, "What you just said... it reminds me a lot of you."
"Of me?"
"Yeah. In that other life I remember... in my 'dream'... you were the first."
Hinata tensed slightly. "The first...?"
"The first person my age who really believed in me. Seriously."
"Naruto-kun, that's not..."
"No, listen to me," he said, sitting up straighter. "I'm serious. Even before Iruka-sensei, I think. You were always... there. Watching. You'd give me that weird medicine of yours at the Academy when I got hurt, remember? And you'd always turn red and run off."
Hinata blushed deeply, looking down. "I-it was just... ointment. For bruises..."
"Not to me, it wasn't. It was the only time anyone, besides the old Hokage, was nice to me for no reason. And then," he continued, "when Pain attacked the village..."
The mood on the roof changed. The breeze seemed to stop.
"I remember being pinned to the ground. Immobilized. And he... he was there. And no one could get close."
"Naruto-kun, you don't have to..."
"And then," Naruto said, his voice lower, "you jumped in. You knew you couldn't win. You knew it perfectly. You faced him anyway."
"You..." she whispered.
"I remember it all. I remember him hitting you. And hitting you again. And you got back up. Just to buy me time. Just to... protect me. You've always been incredibly brave, Hinata. Even when you couldn't see it yourself."
Hinata's voice trembled. "I... I would do anything for you, Naruto-kun." She paused and looked up, her eyes meeting his, firm. "In this life, or any other."
Naruto stared at her for a second. Then the tension broke, and he let out a laugh.
"I know! And that's what's so amazing!" He scratched the back of his neck. "You're incredible, Hinata!"
His smile became a little awkward, softer. He leaned back again, looking at the moon.
"In fact... it's funnier than that."
Hinata relaxed a bit, though she was still blushing. "W-what's funny?"
"That I'm here," Naruto said, looking at the stars, "trying to protect you from everything, from Danzō, from Root, from this whole mess I dragged you into... when in that other life... you were the one who saved me."
"Saved you? Me?"
"From myself," he said simply. "I was about to give up. To let it all go to hell. And you stopped me. You grabbed my hand. You told me to stand up. And it worked."
Hinata stared at him, breathless.
"It worked so well that... well..."
He was still looking at the moon, as if he were talking about the weather, lost in the memory.
"Yes...?" Hinata whispered.
Naruto turned, looking at her with absolute casualness. "...we got married."
Silence.
A cricket chirped in the distance.
Naruto continued, not noticing the catatonic state he had just put his companion in.
"We had two kids," he said, as if it were the most normal thing in the world. "A boy named Boruto, who was a stubborn headache. Just like me. Blond, loud. Always trying to get attention."
"And a girl named Himawari," he smiled fondly. "She was sweet, like you. Looked a lot like you. But... she was scarier when she got mad."
"M-mad?" was the only sound Hinata could produce.
"Oh, yeah! The day I became Hokage... Boruto ripped her favorite teddy bear. And she... well, she awakened the Byakugan," Naruto laughed. "She almost killed me, she was furious."
There was absolute silence on the roof.
Hinata stared at him. Her face, pale in the moonlight, was frozen. Her brain was trying to process the information.
Married?
Him and me?
Kids?
Two?
Boruto?
Himawari?
A... teddy bear?
Byakugan?
HIM... AND... ME?
"Yeah," Naruto said, oblivious to the total collapse happening in front of him. "And Boruto was always stealing my Hokage cloak and painting the stone faces, and I had to chase him all over the village. It was a disaster, that kid was so loud."
Finally, he noticed the silence.
"Hinata?"
He looked at her more closely. She was trembling.
"Hey, are you okay? You got really, really pale. And... is that smoke? Hinata, I think smoke is coming out of your ears!"
Hinata, whose face had gone from pale white to a color that rivaled a ripe tomato, rolled her eyes back. Her knees buckled. She fainted perfectly backward, like a felled tree.
Thud!
The sound on the roof was flat.
Naruto froze for a second.
"Ahhh!!" he yelled, panicking completely. "Hinata! Hey, Hinata! Don't die!"
He knelt beside her, shaking her by the shoulders. "It was just a possibility! The future can change! Wait, no, that's not what I meant! It was a good future! I swear!"
"Oh, crap! Crap, crap!"
He jumped to his feet, ran to the roof door, and kicked it open.
"SAKURA-CHAN!! KARIN!!" he yelled at the top of his lungs into the fortress. "HELP!! QUICK!! I THINK I BROKE HER!!"
A few seconds later, the roof door burst open.
Sakura appeared in her pajamas, fists clenched, pink hair wild from sleep. Behind her, Karin, her red hair a mess, held a cast-iron skillet like a weapon.
"Naruto! What the hell...!" Sakura stopped short, seeing Hinata unconscious on the floor. "What did you do to her!?"
"Nothing! I swear on my life!" Naruto held up his hands, terrified. "We were just talking! Really!"
Karin lowered the skillet, narrowing her eyes. "Naruto. You said something perverted, didn't you? I knew we couldn't leave you alone with her."
"No! Of course not!" Naruto shouted, offended. "We were talking about the future! The 'dream'!"
Sakura knelt beside Hinata, checking her pulse. "Her face is burning. Naruto, what exactly did you tell her?"
"I just told her that... that in that other life...!"
"What?" Sakura asked impatiently.
"That we got married and had two kids!" he blurted out.
Sakura and Karin froze.
They looked at each other. Karin's skillet wavered.
"Idiot," Sakura said with terrifying calm.
"The world's biggest idiot," Karin confirmed.
"But it was true! And it was nice! We had a scary little girl and...!"
Sakura stood up. She grabbed Naruto by the ear and pulled, hard.
"Ow! Ow! Let go! Sakura-chan, that hurts!"
"Shut up!" she hissed. "Help me carry her inside! Karin, grab her legs!"
"Why me!"
"Just do it!"
"Ow! My ear! Seriously!"
"And never," Sakura said, dragging him toward the door as Karin awkwardly lifted Hinata's feet, "ever talk about the future to a Hyūga again! Got it!?"
"I don't understand what I did wrong!"
"SHUT UP!!"
******
The next morning, the atmosphere in Tsunade's office was anything but comical. It was icy.
Kakashi stood by the wall, arms crossed, looking more like a shadow than a man. Shizune stood by Tsunade, holding a stack of reports.
Across the desk were Naruto, Sakura, Karin, and a much-recovered Hinata. Hinata, however, was blushing furiously and refused to make any eye contact with Naruto.
Naruto, for his part, had a red mark on his ear and was rubbing his head.
On the oak desk lay a single, unrolled scroll. It bore the unmistakable seal of Root.
"My report is clear," Kakashi said, his voice a quiet murmur that cut the silence. "They were Root agents, no doubt. They were in the ravine to the west."
Tsunade gritted her teeth. "Did they see you?"
"Yes," Kakashi said. "They detected me in the ravine."
"What?" Naruto said.
"They didn't act. They didn't try to hide once I was there," Kakashi explained. "They're sending a message. They think Sasuke and I are 'outside the circle.' That we're loyal to you, but not part of your... special team."
"Damn Danzō!" Tsunade slammed the table, making the papers jump. "He knows he can't touch the fortress."
"My parents," Sakura said, her voice firm, though tense.
Everyone looked at her.
"Shizune's report," Sakura continued, "said the ANBU you posted are watching them. But Danzō isn't stupid. He knows they're my weakness."
"And he's right," Tsunade said, leaning back in her chair. "We can't leave that loose end. If he decides to press there..."
"He won't," Sakura said, taking a deep breath. "Not if I give him something easier to bite."
Tsunade raised an eyebrow.
"Let me go. Let me be the bait."
Naruto looked at her. "Sakura-chan..."
"I've been cooped up here for days," she continued, her voice gaining strength. "It's normal for me to want to see them. It's normal for me to be worried. He'll be expecting that. He'll be waiting for me to make a mistake, to leave the fortress's protection."
"It's our best chance to catch his agents," Sakura said, looking at Tsunade. "Let them see me. Let them try something."
There was a moment of silence.
"I agree with Sakura-chan," Naruto said.
Sakura looked at him, surprised.
"It's the logical move," Naruto said, stepping forward. "Danzō wants information on the Falna. He thinks Sakura is the weak link because she has family outside. We're going to let him take the bait."
"It's risky," Tsunade said, staring at Sakura. "If they capture you..."
"They won't," Sakura said with iron confidence. "I won't go alone."
Naruto smiled. "Exactly! I'll go with you! It's the perfect cover!"
Sakura turned to him, a mix of shyness and embarrassment.
"Y-you? With me? To my house?"
"Of course!" Naruto said with total casualness. "I'm your teammate! It's normal! Besides, it's about time I met my future in-laws, right?"
A green, ominous aura began to glow around Sakura's clenched fist. Hinata flinched.
"Kidding! Kidding! Poor choice of words!" he yelled, backing up comically. "I mean, I've gotta meet my teammate's parents! That's all! And besides, I've heard they have the best bakery in Konoha and I'm dying to try that cinnamon bread you talk about so much!"
Sakura glared at him, but the green aura faded.
Cinnamon bread? she thought. When did I tell him about...? Oh. Right. The Falna. He remembers things.
"One genin escorting another," Tsunade said, hiding a smile behind her steepled fingers. "It's normal. It's believable. It won't raise suspicion."
She looked at her other ninjas.
"Alright. Kakashi," she said. "You'll be the shadow. Stay two hundred meters out. Hinata, you'll be the eyes. I want you sweeping a five-block radius from the moment they leave."
"Grandma, wait."
Naruto interrupted her. He did it respectfully, but it was a clear interruption. Everyone in the room looked at him. Even Kakashi seemed to take an interest.
"What is it, brat? It's a solid plan."
"It's not," Naruto said. "I have a better idea."
Tsunade raised an eyebrow, defiant, but motioned for him to speak.
"We can't send Kakashi-sensei. And we can't use Hinata-chan."
"Explain," Tsunade said, her voice dropping a tone.
"Danzō's not stupid," Naruto repeated, shifting into his tactical mode. "He knows Kakashi-sensei would protect me. If Kakashi is anywhere near Sakura, Danzō will know and call off the mission or whatever he has planned."
Kakashi nodded slightly. "He's right. Fū is an excellent sensor. And Torune... is dangerous up close. If they detect me, they'll know it's a trap."
"Exactly," Naruto said. "And the same goes for Hinata-chan. Danzō knows all about the Byakugan. He'll have his own agents looking for any sign of Byakugan activation near Sakura. If they detect the Byakugan, he'll know it's a trap. The mission will fail before it starts."
"So what do you propose, genius?" Tsunade growled. "Let them go alone?!"
"Yes," Naruto said. "And no."
He looked at Karin.
Karin, who had been trying to blend into the background, jumped. "Hey, why are you looking at me? I didn't do anything."
"Karin. Your new ability," Naruto said, his voice full of sudden confidence. "'Perception Chains.' You said you could 'anchor' them, right? Like a thread. A thread no one else can see."
Karin nodded, nervous. "Y-yes. I can... I can feel chakra and emotions at a distance. If I concentrate. It's... crystal clear."
"That's our thread," Naruto said, turning sharply to Tsunade. "Karin stays here. With you. She'll anchor her chains to me and Sakura. It will be you, Grandma, watching us... through Karin."
Tsunade's eyes went wide.
"Karin will be your eyes and ears," Naruto continued, the idea taking shape. "She'll be able to feel any change in the atmosphere or our emotions."
"And if something goes wrong..." Shizune began, worried.
"You and Kakashi-sensei will be the quick response team," Naruto finished. "You'll be ready, for any emergency."
He looked at Sakura. "Sakura and I will go alone. Like two normal genin going to visit their parents. We'll make Danzō believe Sakura really is vulnerable. That she's leaving the fortress without elite protection, Grandma. We'll make him think it's his golden opportunity."
"He'll take the bait," Sakura concluded, understanding the plan.
There was a long silence in the office. Tsunade looked at the boy in front of her.
Damn brat, she thought, and this time, it was with pride. He's using his team, creating a counter-intelligence trap... using the resources available to him.
Tsunade smiled. This time, it was a genuine, predatory smile.
"A decent plan. Loud, as usual, but decent. I like it."
She stood up abruptly.
"Shizune!"
"Yes, Tsunade-sama!"
"Prep the room! I want a tactical map of the civilian district, with all escape routes and ambush points marked! Now!"
Shizune ran out of the office.
"Karin!"
"Y-yes!"
"Come with me! You're going to be my personal 'radar'! You're going to drink so much coffee you'll be able to feel an ant sneeze a kilometer away. Move!"
"But I hate coffee!" Karin complained, but she followed Tsunade out of the room.
"Kakashi!"
"Yes."
"I want you on the outer perimeter. Don't get close. Be the rapid-fire contingency team."
"Understood," Kakashi said, and vanished in a swirl of leaves.
The office fell silent. Only Naruto and Sakura remained.
"Sakura! Naruto!" Tsunade's voice echoed from the hallway.
"Yes!" they both said, running to the door.
They found her at the end of the hall, watching them intently.
"Go. Buy bread. Act normal. Be the annoying teenagers you are."
Her voice turned icy.
"At the first sign of Root... you do not engage. Do you hear me? You are not an assault team. Your mission is to confirm the threat, not defeat it. Shizune and I will be ready to move."
"Understood," Sakura said.
"Leave it to us, Grandma!" Naruto said.
"And Naruto..."
"Yeah?"
"Try not to get hit before the mission even starts."
"Hey!"
They left the Senju Fortress a few minutes later. The mid-morning sun bathed Konoha, and the village was full of life. It was hard to believe shadows were moving just beneath the surface.
They walked side-by-side toward the civilian district. Sakura was visibly nervous, adjusting her combat gloves over and over.
Naruto, in contrast, seemed almost ridiculously relaxed. He walked with his hands behind his head, whistling an off-key tune. But his eyes weren't relaxed. They constantly scanned the rooftops, the shadows in the alleys, the faces in the crowd.
"Stop that," Sakura muttered.
"Stop what? Whistling? I thought it added a nice 'I don't care about anything' touch."
"I'm nervous. Aren't you?"
"Of course I am," he admitted, stopping his whistle. "But I'm more excited. We're finally doing something. Taking the initiative. I was sick of hiding."
"Yeah... me too."
They walked in silence for a moment, passing the Yamanaka flower shop. Ino was outside, arranging some pots.
"Hey, Sakura! Naruto!" she waved.
"Hey, Ino!" Sakura said, waving back.
"Hey, Ino! Don't work too hard!" Naruto yelled.
"Shut up, idiot!" Ino yelled back, but she was smiling.
They kept walking.
"You acted well," Naruto said.
"It was natural," Sakura said. "She's my friend."
"I know."
They approached the main street that led to the shopping and residential district.
"Thanks, by the way," Sakura said, not looking at him.
"For what?"
"For backing me up in there. With Tsunade-sama. And... for the Karin idea. It was smart."
"Hey, I have good ideas every once in a while," he said, sounding a little offended. "Besides, we're a team. I'll always have your back, Sakura-chan."
She looked at him and smiled. A small, genuine smile. "I know."
She paused, and the smile turned a little mischievous. "But... about that 'in-laws' joke..."
"Cinnamon bread!" Naruto said, way too fast. "I was just thinking about the cinnamon bread! I swear! I'm hungry!"
Sakura let out a giggle. "Idiot. ... But you're right. My mom's cinnamon bread really is good. She's going to be so happy to see me."
***
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