A/N:

Agh, ANOTHER canon spin-off?

Yes, ANOTHER ONE. Thanks to my deranged brain that dreamed the prompt, which became a challenge, and some peeps of mine at Tumblr that pushed me to develop it.

WARNING - This is HEAVY shit. The characters' behaviors and motives are based on what happens in canon AFTER chapter 700, that includes The Last. Due to Kishimoto's screw-ups I WILL HAVE TO DECONSTRUCT TO REBUILD THEM as believable, tridimensional characters that can be recognized as what they were being somewhat developed to be BEFORE the shitfest canon ending. So don't you all go filling my inbox with hate mail, it's NOT my fault the characters are presented as different people from what they were for 698 chapters.

Bolt and Salad ARE neglected by their fathers in canon, Sakura and Hinata don't mind that behavior at all, Naruto doesn't care that his child feels neglected, Naruto DID only fall in love with Hinata due to a genjutsu, ninjas ARE unnecessary and the harmful ninja system was NOT addressed at all by either Naruto or Kakashi who was Hokage before him.

IT ALL HAPPENED IN CANON, so take your complaints to Kishimoto.

By the way this MIGHT turn into a full on SNS story. It certainly will deal with SNS on the deepest platonic emotional level, but I'm not sure if the destruction of their bond done by Kishimoto can be fixed to the point they (especially Sasuke, that boy is fucked up) can become romantic towards each other, so don't expect smut to happen, or any romantic pairings.

Other than about that, PLEASE DO REVIEW MY STUFF. I NEEDS CONSTRUCTIVE CRITICISM LIKE A PLANT NEEDS SUNLIGHT. REVIEWS KEEP FANFICS ALIVE!

Thank you.

Special thanks to mah homies que-bae (still waiting on your version you lazy-ass bibiri-kun!), uchihanochidori, fangirlandiknowit, kizukatana, Kitsune-Ohime-Sama and my WONDERFUL, AMAZING, INCREDIBLE, UNBELIEVABLE beta Lohrendrell for their support.

It was almost past the ninth of October, a stormy, dark, freezing night. Ominous thunder sounded through the old village neighborhood of the only large city in the continent, while a tall man crossed the streets in a hurried pace, towards the old hospital.

And inside, in a delivery room, a woman with pink hair screamed in pain.

"Come on, Sakura, you're used to this already, it's just labor," old Tsunade chided the crying woman. "You don't want to scare your husband, do you?"

Uchiha Sakura immediately stopped her crying, and reached for a towel to dry her face.

"Good," Tsunade grunted, and paid attention to her work, the child already crowning.

"Where's Sasuke-kun?" Sakura asked, putting on a brave face and trying to fix her hair with a mirror through the contractions. It did not do to look disheveled at a time like this.

She did her best to hide her anxiety. It was nine years after she had scored her biggest prize, and she had spent eight of them trying to convince her husband to try for another child, after the disappointment that was Salad.

She crossed her fingers one more time, hoping desperately for a boy, a boy that would make Sasuke stay, would make him proud of her, would make him love her.

The contractions suddenly spiked, at the same time a burst of lightning hit the hospital's surge arrester. The lights went out, and Tsunade sighed. Damn old building had given all it could, already. It was good enough to tear down, but it was the only free hospital in Konoha, and Tsunade would only let it close over her dry, dead body. Which would take some time to happen, due to Orochimaru's help with her rejuvenating jutsu.

"Come on, Sakura, a couple more and it's over," she encouraged the pink-haired woman, navigating by feel and preparing to catch the newborn.

Another bout of lightning suddenly lit the room, at the same time the mother gave the final push, and the silhouette of the tall man showed against the open door.

No cry was heard.

"Tsunade!" Sakura exclaimed in worry. No. Not now, not after all this trouble…

"It's ok, I'm on it," the old Sannin said, turning the baby over her knee and massaging its back.

The technique worked, and the baby's first cry was heard at the same time the lights came back on. The old doctor cut the baby's cord and moved it to a side table.

"Sasuke-kun!" Sakura called out, a victorious smile on her face. The man gave her a cold look as he entered the room.

"Oh." They heard, along with the newborn's loud cries.

"What is it?" Uchiha Sasuke asked drily.

Tsunade sighed, knowing exactly what he wanted to hear. "It's a boy," she answered, and Sakura squealed in delight (and a great amount of relief).

"But," she amended, giving the couple a sad look.

"But what?" Sasuke spit out, scowling.

"Tsunade-shishou, what's wrong?" Sakura asked, tilting her head and giving her best innocent look, a ball of fear suddenly weighing on her stomach.

Tsunade finished the first care measures on the newborn, and wrapped him in the blue blanket with the Uchiha symbol that Sakura had provided, before she carried him over to his parents.

"I'm so sorry, Sakura," she said, before showing the child's face to them.

Uchiha Sakura screamed.

The Nanadaime Hokage, Uzumaki Naruto, raised his head from the desk mid-snore at the sound of the cell phone.

"What?" he asked after picking it up, in an irritated voice. The signs of slumber left his face as he listened.

"Don't let them do anything until I get there, I'm on my way," he warned, before opening the window and jumping out into the stormy night.

A couple of minutes later he was busting through the delivery room's window, drawn in by the screaming and the sound of a thousand birds.

"Sasuke stand down!" he shouted, extending his right arm out to the Uchiha as he jumped over Tsunade, who was crouched next to the window, clutching a wailing bundle to her chest.

"Get out of here, Naruto. This isn't your business," Sasuke said in a calm, icy tone, his Chidori-enhanced katana drawn.

"You're trying to kill your own child, a citizen of Konoha, of course it's my business," Naruto retorted angrily.

"That," the Uchiha said, pointing at the child on Tsunade's arms, "Is a monster, not a child. It must be put out of its misery."

Naruto's eyes widened. He looked at Sasuke's haunted look, and then at Sakura, who was curled up into a ball on the bed, crying convulsively.

"Sakura-chan, what the hell is he talking about?" he asked her.

"Sasuke-kun… I'm so sorry… I'm so sorry… please forgive me…" she babbled, oblivious to Naruto's question, and the Hokage turned to the crouching elder behind him.

"Baa-chan, what the hell is going on?" he asked, and she showed him.

Under a mop of black hair, and right over the distinct Uchiha nose, rested a single larger than normal eye.

The child was malformed.

"Does it have any other abnormalities? Will it live?" Naruto asked Tsunade.

"None that I could detect, and yes, as long as it's allowed to," she answered him.

Naruto turned his head back to look at Sasuke. "It's not a monster just because it's different, Sasuke. It's your child. An Uchiha," he said. "And a citizen of Konoha. I will not allow you, or anyone, to kill a defenseless citizen who has done nothing to deserve it."

Sasuke scowled at him. "That," he said, and pointed to the child with his katana, again, "Is no Uchiha. It is not my child. I will not acknowledge it, or allow it under my roof," he snarled, and turned around to leave the room, but stopped at the front of Sakura's bed.

"This marriage ends here. I have no interest in women who can only produce defective children," he informed the crying woman coldly, and left.

Naruto was left gaping. Sure, he himself didn't exactly treat his children as lovingly as other fathers did their own, but that was extreme.

Tsunade stood and deposited the newborn in the nearby cradle, before moving to console the grieving mother.

"Sakura… please, your baby needs to feed," she said softly.

Sakura started to chuckle darkly between sobs. "My baby… THAT. MONSTER. IS. NOT. MY. BABY!" she hollered, raising her head.

Tsunade and Naruto both flinched at her rabid expression.

"All I ever wanted was to give Sasuke-kun a son! A healthy, perfect heir so he would finally recognize my worth and love me! But no, oh no, it wasn't enough that I suffered and longed for him all my damn life, it wasn't enough that I had to snivel and beg and humiliate myself for years to convince him to marry me, it wasn't enough that my firstborn was a useless girl that turned out to have bad eyes, no!" she screamed in fury, standing up, the residual blood from the birth running down her legs.

"I just HAD to be cursed and have this… this thing," she spit out, and started walking toward the crib, "come out of my disgraced womb, to disgust Sasuke-kun and make him hate me!" she yelled, and lunged forward.

Naruto barely intercepted her, but was able to hold her back. "Sakura-chan, you're not yourself, calm down, it's nobody's fault, these things happen to anyone!" he shouted at her.

"Sasuke-kun is not anyone! He's Uchiha Sasuke! It was bad enough when Salad's eyes turned out to be faulty! You heard him, he's going to leave me… and it's all this freak's fault!" she yelled again, stretching her arms to the deformed child, her hands curled into claws, nearly toppling Naruto in her murderous rage.

"Sasuke-kun doesn't have to do it, I'll kill this deformed beast myself! Monster! Demon!" she raged, until Tsunade grabbed her arm and injected her with a heavy sedative. "Naruto… please… kill it… please destroy this thing… if it's gone, maybe Sasuke-kun can forgive me…" she mumbled as the sedative took effect, holding onto Naruto's robe.

He carried her to a nearby room and deposited her on a clean bed, following Tsunade back to the delivery room afterwards and taking a seat next to the crib.

"Holy shit," he whispered, and rubbed his face. "What do you think, baa-chan? It's just the shock, right? They ought to come to their senses, I mean, shit…" he said in a low voice, and looked down at the sad, ugly little baby.

He couldn't hold himself back from touching the little hand that escaped the wrappings, and gave a soft, sad smile as it grabbed the tip of his finger. The unsightly infant opened his bleary eye, and looked at the finger in confusion, and then up at him, pouting.

Tsunade sighed, and pulled a chair for herself. "Naruto, how much do you know about Sakura and Sasuke's marriage?" she asked in a tired voice.

"Not much, well, you know… what with me and Hinata getting married, and the kids, and all, we kinda lost contact," he said in an embarrassed voice.

Honestly, he had decided to shy away from his friends to keep the peace at home.

Being part of the Hyuuga clan wasn't easy, especially considering that neither Bolt nor Himawari had inherited the Byakugan. That had been such a disappointment for the clan that Hiashi had stated them unfit even as part of the branch family, so both children carried the Uzumaki name, instead of their mother's, and Hinata had been demoted in the family ranks, the official heir to the clan's leadership being young Hanabi, who had already been set up to marry a cousin.

So Naruto tried to atone for that disappointment by doing all he could to emulate his father-in-law's behavior. It pleased Hinata that he did all he could to conform to her family's standards, so that's what he did. It also didn't seem to bother her that he hardly ever had time to spend with their children; she waved his worries away saying that it was a mother's job to raise them, and the father should work hard to be a respectable provider.

In the end, both Naruto's embarrassment for ruining Hinata's future as clan head and his stance on fatherhood had distanced him from his children, and vice-versa. Himawari never complained, having inherited her mother's meek, understanding nature, but Bolt… Bolt was a problem. After many fights, the boy simply stopped caring about what the clan thought about his attitude, and did all he could to stay away from the family.

It didn't help that his father-in-law and his wife both frowned at Naruto's choices of friends, so he had given up on those, as well. Not to mention that, in Sakura and Sasuke's case, the pink kunoichi had actively pushed him away, citing Sasuke's jealousy as the reason.

"Wasn't my fault either, Sakura-chan always said Sasuke was jealous of her being around me," he defended himself, as Tsunade gave him a meaningful look.

The old Sannin sighed again. "Naruto, Sasuke only married Sakura because he took her virginity," she said, and Naruto's eyes widened.

"I don't know the details, but apparently somehow she convinced him to have sex with her and then her father demanded he married her to keep her honor," she continued, "so he did. It's never been a loving relationship, even though Sakura does her very best to be a good wife. And then Salad was born, and… Sasuke's reaction wasn't the best at having a daughter as his first child. It got even worse when she developed vision problems"; she took a deep breath, "Sakura has spent the last eight years trying to convince Sasuke to try again. He has been wandering all these years, coming back once a year at most. His relationship with his daughter is inexistent, and with his wife… according to Sakura, it's complicated."

"So you mean that…" he started, not sure if he wanted to hear the rest.

"Yes. I don't think either of them will want this poor thing," Tsunade stated, looking down at the deformed newborn with pity. "To be brutally frank, I don't think there's anyone who would want a child with such a severe abnormality. It's not life threatening, but the disfigurement…" she shrugged.

"I'll take him," Naruto said without thinking, and then stopped, startled.

What was he thinking? He was the Hokage, and a married man with two children of his own, who he barely saw! He couldn't just up and bring another child into his home as if it was a lost kitten, especially not into the Hyuuga compound and a child with this kind of issue. It was enough that his own children were viewed with prejudice…

But then the baby shook his finger, and cooed, raising his face to look at him again in what seemed a questioning look, pouted again, and Naruto's defenses fell.

"I'll take him," he repeated. "What better parent for a monster than another, huh?" he asked, and grinned at Tsunade, before picking up the ugly little Uchiha.

She looked at him with a sad, but resigned expression. "Fine, it's better to take him away from Sakura, anyway. But you need to sign a few documents for me to release him. I'll get you some diapers and formula, and get him fed -"

"Bring it here, I'm not completely useless, baa-chan. I know how to bottle-feed a baby," Naruto interrupted, seemingly fascinated by the newborn in his arms. "There's probably some of the kids' old baby clothes at home, too, so don't raid the charity closet too hard," he told her, and she nodded before leaving him and the newborn alone in the delivery room.

"Hi, I'm Uzumaki Naruto. I'm sorry about your mommy and daddy not wanting you… I didn't have a mommy and a daddy too, so I know how it is," Naruto spoke to the baby in a soft voice. "And I know it's hard to grow up with people being afraid of you. So, if you don't mind, I can be your Papa, at least until your daddy stop being an asshole long enough to realize this isn't your fault, ok?"

The deformed child started crying in hunger, but much more quietly than Naruto was used to.

"Heh," he chuckled, "can't deny you're Uchiha, you're all uptight, huh?" he asked.

The baby looked at him startled, and stopped crying with a chin-crunching pout.

Tsunade stood quietly by the door, unnoticed, with a bottle in one hand and a large baby bag under her other arm.

"Don't give me that look, it's true! You should've seen Bolt cry when he was your age, little dude could be heard across the village," he said, and his voice went sad as he walked to stay next to the broken window, shielding the baby against the cold air. "I wanted to call him Menma, but Hinata chose Bolt because of Neji… and I couldn't deny her that. Couldn't deny her anything, really, her cousin died to save her, and she's been so fragile since then, I feel bad all the time."

He stood pensive for a while, but then his eyes sparkled. "Yeah, but you aren't Hinata's… so maybe I could call you Menma, right? I always wanted to give that name to one of my sons, Menma was my bestest friend after your stupid daddy, he was a great guy, I really loved him," his eyes went misty with memories, "he lived with me for a while, and he was really, really important to me, dattebayo. So, now that I'm your Papa, and you need a name, then you'll be Uzumaki Menma, ok?" he asked softly.

The baby gurgled, and Naruto smiled.

"Food's here," Tsunade called, and Naruto turned, walking over to her quickly.

"Please put his name down on the provisory documents as Uzumaki Menma, and me as the father. You can leave the mother's name as "unknown," I… I don't want Sasuke and Sakura to have to deal with repercussions, but I don't want to be just his legal guardian, so I need you to do that to include him into my family registry. And as to Sakura's pregnancy… can you make it seem as if it was stillborn?" he asked her quietly, while feeding the baby, and she nodded.

"Sure, brat. But… what about Hinata?" she used the same tone to him.

He gave her a determined look. "I gave up a lot of things for her, baa-chan. But I'm not giving him up, not even for her. I can't do that, and all I can hope for is that she understands."

Tsunade nodded. "I'll get the papers ready then. Need help getting him ready to leave? I brought Sakura's baby bag, it's got his clothes and stuff… I don't think she'll want to take it back home," she added, and Naruto nodded gratefully.

"Thanks," he said, and turned his attention to the ugly child. His Menma.

A/N: The origin of the name Menma is NOT the Menma from RTN, it is the Menma from the anime part I filler arc, the amnesiac boy that Naruto saves while looking for menma at a riverbank for Ichiraku. The Menma from that filler arc became Naruto's best friend after Sasuke, lived with him for over a month, and Naruto built a little shrine for him close to Konoha after his death.