Sasuke had been expecting to sit through the night, waiting anxiously to hear if Naruto and the baby were alright.

In actuality, Yamato was just walking through the door of the waiting room with Gai after retrieving him from a training session with Lee (meaning Lee was just a step behind) when Sakura walked out of Naruto's room stripping off a pair of gloves. "Done! It's a girl."

Kakashi looked up from his book, having barely gotten through one chapter. "… You were in there barely half an hour."

Sakura shrugged. "What can I say? I'm good. Anyway-"

Gai grabbed Kakashi by the arm and dragged him closer to Sakura. "Can we see her? Can we see our new… daughter? Oh Kakashi, never had I dreamed we would have a little girl to help nourish and grow into the finest kunoichi-"

Kakashi shook him off, though he didn't take his gaze off of Sakura, for once looking strangely intent. "I understand if Naruto isn't feeling up to it, but-"

"Of course I'm feeling up to it, Kakashi-sensei! Look how beautiful she is!" Standing directly behind Sakura in the doorway was Naruto—completely unselfconscious of his remaining rolls of baby fat in nothing but a pair of pants—holding a small bundle.

Gai, Lee, and a not-even-trying-anymore-to-seem-unaffected Kakashi crowded close. Sasuke also shot to his feet, but that was just to glare at Naruto. "Idiot, what are you doing already out of bed? You just had your stomach cut open!"

Naruto gestured downwards with his free hand. "Do you see a scar? I've already healed from the damage. Not like I haven't had worse before. Now come see your boyfriend's kid, jackass!"

Sasuke begrudgingly came closer and looked down.

It was very pink. There were only fine wisps of hair, and it was too pale to tell the color. From what he could see of the eyes, they were a light blue. It was also ugly.

"That is an ugly baby," said Sai, looking over Sakura's shoulder.

Sakura, without looking away from the baby in the crook of Naruto's arm, elbowed him in the stomach. "She was just born! All newborn babies look like that!"

Kakashi squinted down at her. "I can't tell who she takes after at all. I mean, the eyes are Naruto's, I guess…"

"Maybe not," said Sakura. "A lot of newborn babies have blue eyes. They could still change color."

"Well," said Yamato philosophically, "At least based on the hair we can now be fairly sure that this wasn't Sasuke's child all along. Uchiha black hair is a dominant trait."

Everyone let this sink in for a few seconds. Gai looked faintly horrified. "Are you telling me there was a possibility that Kakashi and I were stealing a child from a happy couple?"

"Yep," said Kakashi, not looking terribly bothered by the possibility. "We aren't really sure how the curse on Naruto worked. The other parent being me was mostly an educated guess."

Gai continued looking horrified, so Kakashi patted him consolingly on the shoulder. "At least then I'd still be able to teach her how to use her bloodline limit."

Gai continued looking horrified.

Lee, who had been faintly vibrating since he entered the room, finally burst out with, "Can I hold her? Please?"

"Sure!" said Naruto, and handed her over to Lee, who took the bundle as if it were made of spun glass and looked down at the little girl with even wider than usual eyes, freeing Naruto to cross his arms and beam. "Pretty awesome, eh? Of course any kid of mine would turn out perfect!"

"Good job," said Kakashi, still managing to sound bored, "Though this does ruin most of my ideas for names for the kid."

That, at least, managed to break Gai out of his stupor. "But I thought we were going to wait until we saw our child until we discussed such things, Kakashi!"

Kakashi shrugged. "Doesn't matter now." Then he looked thoughtful. "Though I guess the names could be turned more feminine. How does Obitoko sound?"

As one, everyone turned to look at him, though Kakashi was still squinting thoughtfully down at his new daughter and didn't seem to notice. "Or perhaps Sakumoko? Sakuko? Is that better? Or maybe Rin would-"

"Kakashi," said Gai. "Kakashi, light of my life, my eternal rival, my ever-blooming lotus?"

"Yeah?" said Kakashi.

"No," said Gai.

"No?" said Kakashi.

"We are not naming our daughter for a dead person, Kakashi," said Gai, gently. "She has the right to blossom in her own way without the expectations of a lost friend being placed upon her."

"Ah," said Kakashi. "Yeah, I could see how that could mess up a kid."

"Also those names are terrible," said Gai, still gently. At that, Kakashi frowned and looked up, only to see everyone nodding solemnly.

"None of those names really fit her, anyway," said Yamato, diplomatically.

"I think everyone who you have lost would prefer you to look to the future instead of the past, Kakashi-sensei," said Sakura, laying her hand on Kakashi's shoulder.

"What the hell," said Sasuke.

"I have no idea who any of those people were," said Sai, thoughtfully.

"Yeah!" agreed Naruto.

Everyone, that is, except for Lee, who had returned his gaze to the baby in his arms. "I think she looks like a Botan."

Six years later…

"… So then I punched him in the face!" said Hatake Botan, fresh from the end of her first week at the academy, and even fresher from her first fight. "But I didn't aim for anything vital, just like Papa Gai told me too!"

"Great!" said Naruto, walking her back to his place for a meal of ramen as had already become their custom after school, since Gai walked her in the mornings and scheduled his time with his newest genin team commensurately, "Sounds like the kid had it coming, but he will still be a Leaf-nin one day. Don't want to kill him by accident."

Botan nodded firmly. Her pale-blonde hair, eerily pale blue eyes, and complete inability to tan lent her a ghostly air that mirrored the most famous of her fathers, but in personality that was the last parent anyone thought of. Impulsive, courageous, and not willing to stand slander or injustice, she was not one to ask questions when action would do. She was also a prodigy and had thus far gotten away with it, which wasn't helped by Naruto and Gai's encouragement.

Kakashi would just shake his head, but because of the necessities of his new job he no longer had the time to be as involved in Botan's upbringing as he would like. Around the time Botan turned four—right after the last of Kakashi's newest genin team passed the chuunin exam—Tsunade had solemnly handed Kakashi her hat of office and told him that she knew he would lead the village well, and there was something she needed to do but had been putting off for far too long.

Two weeks later she had been spotted getting uproariously drunk in a bar in Cloud Country with a dangerously pale, golden-eyed man and someone who suspiciously resembled the long-thought-dead author of the famed Icha Icha Paradise series. The bar had shortly afterwards been destroyed under mysterious circumstances, and no one had seen any hint of her since.

In the meantime, Kakashi was left with the title of Sixth Hokage, a three-year backlog of paperwork, and the eternal ire of Uzumaki Naruto for stealing the job out from under him while Naruto had been out on a mission. Kakashi had promised Naruto that he planned to retire the moment Botan had graduated from the Academy, but Naruto wasn't holding his breath (though if Kakashi broke his word, he might very well decide to hold his. By choking him. Hah!). In the meantime, Naruto tried to cherish the time he spent with his daughter, the time Kakashi wasn't spending with his daughter (hah!), and the fact that his and Sasuke's relationship had actually managed to outlast the betting pool.

By how much was still uncertain, because by the time Naruto walked Botan back to Gai and Kakashi's place after dinner so Gai could put her to bed and Kakashi could stagger home just in time to read her a bedtime story, then returned back to the apartment he and Sasuke shared, Sasuke still hadn't shown up.

This normally wouldn't have been a big deal. Naruto had missions, Sasuke had missions, and they weren't joined at the hip anyway. But Sasuke had been gone for over a month on what Naruto knew to not be a mission without so much as a word, and today was their seventh anniversary. Naruto had baked a cake and everything, and it would piss him off if Sasuke didn't even both to show up and sneer at it.

It was just minutes before midnight, Naruto drowsing on the couch, when he heard the key turn in the lock of their front door and Sasuke walked in, managing to look exhausted and manic at the same time. "I did it. I found it!"

Naruto yawned. Well, better late than never. The cake probably still tasted pretty good. "Found what?"

"The jutsu that was used to make you pregnant. I heard rumor of its creation in the Mist a month ago, and I knew I couldn't waste any time and maybe lose the trail, so I left immediately. I have spent countless hours in the mud. I have trekked hundreds of miles. Men have died for this information. But it was all worth it. I know it now." Sasuke's grin was more than slightly unhinged. "The future of the Uchiha Clan is finally assured."

At that, Naruto jerked totally awake. "No. No. I am not going through that again. Botan's great, Botan was totally worth it, but pregnancy sucked and I think it really hurt my cred when it came to choosing the Sixth Hokage to be knocked out of commission for a year. No way am I going to pass on taking over when Kakashi-sensei gets sick of the job."

Sasuke's grin only dimmed slightly. "I don't have your ambitions, Naruto. I am willing to take on the burden this time." He walked over and grasped Naruto's hands fervently in his own. "I only need you to acquiesce to being the other parent. And to tell me that you would gladly raise our child with me."

Naruto squinted and slowly extracted his hands from Sasuke's grip. "Sasuke, that's… can we have this conversation in the morning? It's late, and you are looking like a crazy person, so maybe we should take some time to think this over and-"

"No." Sasuke took a step back, and ran his hands quickly through a series of seals, faintly glowing the entire time. "I have waited so long, Naruto. Seven years we have been together. The Uchiha Clan has stood on the brink of extinction for over a decade. If you aren't willing to commit, I love you, but… I must find someone who will."

For a long moment, they stared at each other, Naruto's gaze assessing, Sasuke determined but more than a little desperate. Then Naruto nodded, "I guess I wouldn't mind not having to timeshare a kid with Gai-sensei and Kakashi-sensei," grinned, and reached out to take Sasuke's hand.

Which was when the far wall exploded and something barreled into Sasuke, knocking him off his feet.

Naruto stared in disbelief, his hand still outreached. "…shit," said Naruto.

"Shit!" said Kiba, shaking off some dust. "Sorry guys, didn't mean to wreak your place. Hinata was just trying out a new technique and I- Sasuke? Did I hurt you, man? Why are you crying?"

"… Fuck everything," said Sasuke from the floor, and then didn't get up for a long time.

"Well," said Naruto philosophically sometime later while patting Sasuke consolingly on the back, "At least Kiba enjoyed the cake."

FIN

!-*-!

Author's Note: I decided that leaving a story one chapter from being unfinished was sick and wrong, so finally got around to writing this. I will not be finishing any of my other incomplete Naruto stories, but I hope at least people enjoy this. This is more or less the ending I had in mind all along, though I prevaricated as to who the unfortunate father would be.