D: I do not own any Naruto copyrights.

For someone whose entire persona revolved around youth and glory, Gai could pull off stunned silence rather well.

He stared at the little girl with his hair, Junko's curls, and surprisingly deep brown eyes. She stared at the man with her shiny, thick hair, a green jumpsuit, and the largest eyebrows she'd ever seen.

Mao cleared her throat.

"Well then, I can prepare the chakra test now that you're here. If you're ready . . .?

It was a question Kaori really felt should be aimed her way. Didn't anyone care if she was ready? Because she wasn't, not in the slightest. Her thoughts kept bouncing every which way. It was like her mind was rebelling. Gai, spandex wearing, youth spewing out the ass Gai . . .

Holy shit, the freaking 'Fabled Green Beast' of god dammed Konoha is my father.

Yeah, that.

In short, this was a bombshell and she needed time to process it.

Thankfully said 'Green Beast' seemed to be on a similar page.

"Ah, Uchiha-san? Perhaps . . . perhaps we could have a moment?"

His voice –soft, shocked, and like the proverbial rug had been pulled from his feet- threw Kaori for a loop. She'd expected the boisterous proclaimer of rivalry, youth, and glory he'd been in his first second through the window. Thiswasn't anything like that. This was the voice of someone who needed to sit down before they fell over, preferably with a large glass of water.

Why the hell would he-

Oh wait, Gai was real now. A real guy who'd just had the spawn he didn't know he'd had thrown at him. Of course he'd react outside of her expectations. Real people didn't throw 'youth' at every situation. Exuberant personality or not, it was actually quite a surprise that he hadn't keeled over.

Mao gently placed Kaori at Gai's feet. The new perspective made the man nothing less than a giant.

"Of course." The Uchiha woman sent a very pointed look at Kakashi. "Hatake-san? Would you like to help me prepare the test? We can set it up over there, in the other room. You two wait here, alright? We won't be long."

She then latched onto Kakashi –who shared a very unamused look with Kaori- and proceeded to drag him out of the room. The fact that the ninja left willingly – as the unsubtle Mao would have to be one heck of a ninja to force him- only meant one thing.

Mainly that her and Gai were being left to bond.

Or get used to the fact that she was the living embodiment of a very bad decision on his part.

Whichever came first.

For a long and awkward moment, the staring continued. Then the man in the green spandex knelt to her level and grinned brightly. The smile, so wide that she was positive it 'pinged', was most definitely for her benefit.

"Hello Kaori-chan. I am Maito Gai, legendary Green Beast, greatest Taijutsu master in all of Konoha." There was a blink, if only because she'd never actually thought he'd introduce himself like that. "Do you know who I am?"

It was a simple question with only one real answer, one that both Kakashi and Mao had hit her with multiple times just that day. A normal child would've burbled a 'daddy', 'papa' or even a less cute 'father'. Kaori, as the metaphorical 'adult in toddler's clothing', heard it and suppressed an evil grin at the possibilities.

"You're the one who slept with Junko."

It was a shame Gai wasn't drinking anything, the spit take would've been marvelous.

Oh well, guess a coughing fit will have to do.

"W-why . . ." –Cough- "D-do you say . . ." –Cough, cough- "that, K-Kaori-chan? It's n-not very . . ." Seriously, was this guy hacking up a lung? "y-youthful."

There was a shrug of little shoulders.

"I've heard things."

In retrospect, that probably wasn't the best thing to say to a ninja who probably thought she was abused. Kaori could practically see him connecting the wrong dots in his head, all but leaping to the conclusion of Junko sleeping around. Junko, the woman who's first male contact in Kaori's lifetime -besides an occasional 'how much for the apples'- had been Kakashi.

Ooops.

Oh well, she'd let him have his conclusions. There was no point to fixing the misunderstanding. Not when the woman in question had a lot more to deal with than a tarnished reputation.

Like her sanity, for one.

At least, there was no point . . . until Gai glomped her.

"Worry not Kaori-chan, I can see now that you have indeed been misled on your path to life! As of now, it is upon myself to show you the way of youthfulness!"

No, scratch that, there's definitely going to be some corrections in his assumptions. No way am I going down any road ending with 'youth'.

Though she didn't actually fight it –him being a ninja kinda made the point moot-, the hug earned a very long-suffering sigh on Kaori's part. It was a strange thing to hear from a toddler. "Actually Mr., we don't know if we're related yet. If you're not who they say you are, I'll go to the Orphanage. "

The option might actually end up the lesser of two evils. Maybe she'd throw whatever this test was and go there after all. It still sounded like a cesspool of misery, but she bet she could survive it. She'd lived through the Hospital –well sorta- and there'd been plenty of misery there.

After all, what would she end up with Gai? A spandex wearing munchkin with large eyebrows and a penchant for all things 'youth'?

She shuddered.

No thank you.

Kaori's wording seemed to throw Gai for a brief loop. He recovered with a kilowatt smile. "Ah, but we can find out! Uchiha-san!"

Because why go and get someone when yelling works perfectly well?

"Yes, Maito-san?" Mao popped her head out of the room she'd disappeared to earlier. Seeing Gai snuggling Kaori like a strange apathetic teddy bear, she blinked once, twice, and then let it drop. Apparently she didn't want to know. "Did you need something?"

"Yosh! I have decided to take the young and misguided Kaori-chan under my wing! For her sake I will undergo the burden of parenthood!"

The woman didn't even flinch.

"Oh, well the test is ready if you want to come in now."

"Of course, Uchiha-san! We are ready."

He promptly walked them both into the testing room.

Kaori, relocated to his hip somewhere along the way, was left to scowl at the development.

Why? Because this was twice that she was ignored in the big decisions. They affected her too! The girl let out a low huff. She hated being two. No one ever expected opinions on the important stuff. To them sweet little Kaori was just the slightly lively doll brought along for the ride. No intelligence needed.

Unfortunately, it wasn't like she could just go and say that. No, that was only likely to get her more cutesy baby talk –Mao- and the likely possibility of another death hug –Gai-.

Ironic as it was, Kaori as the former sick kid -life was planned by doctors- had taken 'being taken seriously' for granted. Now she realized how much she missed it.

The room they entered looked pretty much like one of those interrogation rooms in cop movies. In fact it only held two things of note. Kakashi -propped against the back wall in a nonchalant way- and a scroll splayed across the sole table. The scroll, or –more accurately- the three scribbles laid out in a triangle pattern on its paper, caught Kaori's attention the moment they walked in.

Why? Because those, despite formerly fictionalized, could only be one thing.

Seals. Honest to God, ninja magic, seals. Is it healthy that I kinda want to touch them and see what happens?

Kakashi's brow rose as they came in.

"Well aren't you two cozy."

As Kaori had been trying to nonverbally beam 'please help me' with her eyes, this earned the copy ninja a not too friendly glare. Being scooped up by the crazy spandex guy preaching parenthood was not her idea of 'cozy'.

"If you're ready, let's begin. Now the chakra test works like this-" Mao pointed to the two outlying scribbles. "One of you will channel chakra into these two kanji here. It's the job of the seals to analyze both signatures and search for common frequencies. If it is, this seal-" She tapped the middle scribble." -will turn green. If not, red. Usually, if you're related, you're chakra's going to be similar. Sometimes sensors don't even need the test, it's just that obvious. To be safe, we'll do it anyway."

To be safe? That sounded like they'd already had a sensor look at her. Which would've been fine . . . if she actually knew any.

Or do I? Did the anime ever say Kakashi could sense chakra?

Suddenly Kaori had a flashback to her first day alive, back to the only time she'd ever felt the lava. Not that she managed to do it again. She'd tried, a while back, but had gotten nothing. Now she realized that her 'lava' would've actually been similar to a chakra flare. A weak one, sure, but probably still enough to get a good ninja's attention. If Kakashi had been close by at the time . . .

And if he'd thought her chakra was someone else's . . .

Is that why he showed up back then? Had he thought she was Gai?

"But I can't channel chakra."

Again, she had tried.

Mao smiled in that sickeningly cute way she seemed to revert to whenever speaking to Kaori directly. "Oh, don't you worry about that, sweetie. That's what the funny kanji is for. It'll do the magic for you."

Kakashi just shot her a look.

Oh, that settles it. He definitely knows that I've done it before.

"Alright! Let's get started then!"

Had she ever doubted that this Gai was as hyped up as his cartoon counterpart? Because he wasn't. The man practically dumped her on top of one seal, all in a mad rush to slam his hand down on the other.

There was a very large puff of energy. Gai's kanji started to glow.

"Uh . . . just touching it would've been fine, Maito-san." Mao, in the split second she faltered, looked to Kakashi for help. The silver ninja's answering shrug could have been many things. Kaori figured it was either a 'what do you want me to do?' or 'well, that's Gai for you.'

Of course, after that mini drama had played out, all that was left for everyone to turn as one and . . .

Stare at her expectantly.

Right, my turn now.

The girl looked down at the Kanji she was now sitting on, allowing herself to wonder for a brief moment what it meant for her. There was evidence, but she still sort of wished it'd still turn red and save her all the trouble. Gai didn't seem like the sort of guy to parent lightly. That thing turns green and her days of cloud watching and independence were as good as gone.

She gently pressed her hand over the kanji.

And then she prayed with every ounce of willpower she possessed in her tiny body. Prayed for it to turn red.

It didn't.

oOoOoOoOoOoOoOo

Standing in Gai's apartment, Kaori was struck with how different it was from the one she'd shared with Junko. Besides being nicer and bigger -it had two bedrooms instead of one-, this place wasn't as personal as what she was used to. Junko, however cold towards her daughter she might have been, had lived in her home. Hell, she'd never left it.

It wasn't hard to tell that living was not something Gai did there.

The sparsely decorated apartment wasn't dusty from neglect though. It was clean to an insane level actually. Wandering around the living room and running her toddler's hands along dust free surfaces, Kaori wondered if the spandex-clad ninja only returned just to clean the place.

Surprisingly enough, Kakashi and Gai weren't actually in the apartment with her. No, they had taken off shortly after bringing her there. The reason for that? Well, it'd started with Kakashi asking the innocent enough question if he could grab her stuff from Junko's. At the revelation that what she was wearing was her stuff, Gai had promptly gone into a tirade on how it was his duty to provide for her. Not the next day –like any sane person-, but right then.

That's about when the man had taken off to shop and Kakashi -just as enthused by Gai's mood as she was- had been dragged along. Fortunately for Kaori, she was a toddler who'd just had a very long day. That made her exempt.

And left behind.

Not that she was alone, per se. No, in a feat that already proved him leagues above Junko when it came to parenting, Gai had summoned her a babysitter.

"You better not be getting into anything, brat."

Literally.

As she'd already discovered how fun it was to push the buttons of said sitter, Kaori purposefully ignored him. Her explorations became braver, more widespread.

Nikame, the red and yellow tortoise summon, seethed.

"Oi, brat! Don't you think I can't see you! You human hatchlings move too much. Come back here and stand still!"

Toddling down the hallway on short legs, the girl tried and failed to open the few doors she passed. Discovering quickly that she wasn't tall enough, nor strong enough to accomplish that, Kaori settled instead for peaking inside the one door that wasn't closed.

Honestly, what she saw in there didn't surprise her in the least.

It was an exercise room. Or at least it was a bedroom that Gai'd probably converted into an exercise room somewhere along the way. There were several worn punching bags, sweat and blood stained matted floor, and various other weights and bars. Compared to the living room, this room was far more lived in.

Though Gai was a Taijutsu Master. The guy probably was in this room more than the rest of his house combined.

A huge mirror suddenly caught Kaori's eye, not in the least because it was floor length and occupied the entirety of the back wall. To be more accurate, it wasn't the mirror that captured her attention, but the little girl that stood within it.

Now Kaori had seen her reflection before, it'd just always been fleeting. A glimpse while she was brushing her teeth usually. This was different. This was all of her.

And, at the same time, it was also none of who she used to be.

The reflection stared out at Kaori with her dark cinnamon eyes set in a pale face. -Blue eyes, face sick and gaunt- Soft black ringlets framed the young features before it cascaded down the back of her too short dress. –Her hair was blond, yet also limp and stringy. She hardly wore anything but hospital gowns.-

How could this be her?

How can I be so different?

A heavy book thumped to the mats beside her.

"Didn't I say to stay put? What am I saying? I knew what you'd be like when he told me he'd reproduced. Any day now and you'll be jumping out the windows and doing handstands down the street. Probably crawl over the ceiling as well." Despite the wording, the gruff voice of the nin-tortoise didn't actually sound angry. In fact he didn't seem to be anything but grumpy.

Maybe he secretly enjoys Gai's antics. The tortoise certainly seems the type to complain just for the sake of complaining.

The summon in the doorframe nodded to what he'd just –and how he'd managed that without thumbs, she'd never know- thrown at her feet. "There's a book. Read it and stay out of trouble, brat."

Rather than pick up what was sure to be heavy, Kaori knelt down next to the book and ran a pudgy hand over the cover. It really was a beautiful thing, made from soft leather with words she didn't know engraved at the top alongside a myriad of other designs.

Speaking of which . . .

"I can't read, tortoise-san."

Nikame blinked his yellow-rimmed eyes at her, obviously taken back. "You can't? Don't humans teach their hatchlings anything? No matter, that book's not the kind with words in it. We don't do the same in the Tetsu Sheru Plains, but it's my understanding that humans store memories in these. You don't know Gai. Perhaps this will interest you."

Translation: 'Here's a photo album to help you get to know your dad better'.

Awww. For a grumpy old guy, Nikame's actually kinda sweet.

So despite it still being a tense and unnatural action for this face, Kaori smiled at him.

Then she tried to pick up the book, failed, and ended up lugging it to the living room. There she somehow managed to push it up onto the couch. Clambering up after it, the girl plopped down, opened the cover, and prepared to 'read'.

Seeing anunhealthy amount of scribbles on the first page, she turned to the next page-

"That first character is 'Ko', say it."

Or at least she tried . . . only for a giant nin-tortoise to appear out of thin air. Right next to her.

Understandably, she was surprised.

"GAAAAH! How did you do that?!"

"Ninja tricks." Was the simple –rather blunt- answer. "Don't think I don't know you heard me, brat. 'Ko'. Say it."

Gulping at the very subtle intimidation in his tone, Kaori played it safe. Very carefully, she repeated the sound as perfect as he'd said it. It wasn't hard. She did know the language. But, then again, she really doubted it was meant to be.

Nikame wasn't trying to challenge her . . .

"Good. The second one is 'N'. Say it."

He was trying to teach her.

Yup, sweet. Grumpy, but sweet.

And so the little girl sat, listened, and learned. Taught as grumpily as only a tortoise summon could, Kaori was slowly learning how to read.

Not that she did all –or even most- of it that day.

They never even got to the photopart of the album, let alone made it through the scribbles on the first page. The lesson didn't progress past the first line, not even ten minutes in.

Kaori did have a young body, after all. She tired easily and had to fight hard to have an attention span larger than a squirrel's. Focus was hard at the best of times. At the end of a long day of ninja tug-a-war? Impossible.

Shortly after they'd established the first word as 'Kon'nichiwa', her eyes drooped.

She'd drifted off.

Later and unbeknownst to Kaori, Gai came home. He saw the sleeping girl -curled up against Nikame in a way that was probably not comfortable - and quietly deposited of his bags. An old Polaroid camera was gently pulled from the shelf.

Gai snapped the photo with a faraway smile.

Then he stared at the camera for a very long time.

oOoOoOoOoOoOoOo

If there was one word to describe living with Gai, that word would be 'interesting'.

Within the first few days of her moving in, everything was fine. Gai did take 'youthful parenting' to the extreme, though not in any way that was too far from what she expected. The entirety of his exercise room was relocated to the living room, for one. Then came the literal flood of things Gai had bought to fill the void.

As someone with little in one life and less than little in another, Kaori was overwhelmed.

Gai, without the slightest clue on what she'd actually need, had bought everything. If it'd had the words 'baby', 'child', or 'toddler' on it, it had ended up stacked somewhere in her new space.

It was so different from anything that she'd experienced before, whether the hospital bed or the cramped basket, that she simply had no words.

It was only afterwards, when the dust had settled and Kaori's 'room' was actually livable -and a rather bizarre matchup of furniture- that the girl truly realized what living with Gai would really be like.

To put it simply, Gai wouldn't know what to do with a two year-old if one hit him in the face.

Not that the man didn't try. He, very much so, did. Whether it was cooking -when he was more likely to blow something up than make anything edible- or just going out of his way to make her smile, the trying was there. It was obvious he wanted to be a good father.

No, the problem was that he expected her to be like a mini-adult, a carbon copy of his mature ninja comrades. When he went for his insane -I swear this guy has no off switch- amounts of daily training, she was expected to be there training right beside him. Kaori wasn't an athlete. It was unlikely she'd ran a mile once in either of her lives. Just an hour of Gai's warm-up had her tired. Half the time she never even made it to the training.

To be honest, it was a personality trait that could be fully blamed on Gai's own upbringing.

He'd become a ninja young. Seven, if she remembered correctly. Nearly the same as Kakashi's five.

There was no childhood for him to base her off of. Insane exercise and rigorous training was all he'd known so, as a result, it was what he passed down to her. It was somewhat sad, seeing a full grown adult with no concept on how to be a child. Even Kaori, an adult in everything but body, had been truly young once.

So rather than hold Gai's faults against him, the toddler pulled Kakashi aside and planned.

And though the masked ninja was only chosen because he and Nikame were the only true company she kept, the other man was surprisingly up for what she had in mind.

The day to strike?

Her third birthday, of course.

A/n: Hello everybody. Sorry this took so long, I thought it'd be easier to write than it was. Now, at 2 AM and finally done writing, I'm pretty sure there might be a few mistakes the exhausted me missed. If there are, feel free to point them out. And again, any questions asked will be answered here next chapter.

Also as another reminder, the fanart for this story on deviantart are 'Through the Eyes of a Beastling Cover' and 'Kaori Maito Age Meme'. If you haven't already checked them out, feel free to look them up. My username on deviantart is 'sweetlilsunshine.' And if you have any ideas for more fanart, I'm always up to hearing them as long as they're reasonable.