Sizheng: This is too looooooong… forgive meeee… But it all had to be written. Even the awkward parts and the slow parts, even.

Artemis Arrant will probably be written parallel to Aphrodite Ardent and Athena Arising (whoo, alliteration!), because it's largely a collection of one-shots and outtakes that provide some background to its "sequels". More accurately, it's a prequel to the other two stories. And each of them can stand on their own.

This has actually been sitting on my harddrive for at least a month. I should prolly update with a new chapter as opposed to a new story… bad Sizheng!

The entire Antipodean trilogy is and will be dedicated to Falling Right Side-Up, whose encouragement gives me many butterflies of happiness. Or something corny like that.

Artemis Arrant

An Alternate Reality Naruto Fanstory by Zhang Sizheng

For Falling Right Side-Up

Part One—Latona's Labour

"Hey. Hey, kid." Minato jerked awake, but remained disoriented to all but the large pair of hands shaking him so insistently. "Wake up." The blond obediently cracked open an eyelid and honestly couldn't tell the difference; the night was thick and inky in the forest undergrowth. "Minato!"

"'M 'waked," the eight-year-old managed. His mouth was still clumsy from sleep. "Whatcher wan', Jirai'-sensei?" There was a sudden glow, like a splash of silver light in the darkness. It flickered, and then died. Minato sat up, suddenly alert. "What's 'at?" he asked, a little more coherently.

"Fuyubi, a summons." Jiraiya-sensei explained shortly. "We're wanted, so get up and pack your stuff." He didn't sound happy about being woken either and that made Minato feel better about being disturbed from his sleep. Rolling out of his blankets, he withdrew and tossed down a scroll with which to store them in.

As the smoke from the subspace storage technique faded, he knelt to pick up the scroll. "I'm packed," he reported with a sigh, then yelped as something soft brushed lingeringly against his side. Turning his head, Minato found himself staring into the glowing amber eyes of an enormous canine. "Holy crap! It's huge!"

The amber eyes shifted. Minato thought they looked amused and a little gratified. "Quickly, you two." Its voice was low, rough and snarling, like the growled conversation of a dog team.

While Minato was impressed, it seemed Sensei was far from it. "We're coming, we're coming," the white-haired man snapped. His back-length ponytail reflected the muted glow from the wolf's pelt. "Go and take a piss on a tree or something."

Minato winced. Those teeth looked dangerous. "Sensei—"

"Shut up, you asshole," Fuyubi growled. Although Minato didn't think he was the one being addressed, he nevertheless closed his mouth. "And let's go. I searched half of Konoha before Tsunade-san told me you were on a retrieval mission, and then I had to pick up your stupid scent before looking out here. So the two of you have caused me a lot of trouble already—don't try my patience."

In a whirl of silver motion the summons was racing away, the light fading with it. "What patience, you old mutt?" Minato heard his teacher sigh, and then the quiet rustle of dry leaves as Jiraiya-sensei followed their messenger-guide. Shouldering his pack, Minato followed, quickly catching up to his mentor.

"How old does that idiot think he is, anyway?" Jiraiya-sensei complained to no one in particular as they pursued the wolf's glowing form through the dense undergrowth. Minato guessed that he wasn't referring to their guide. "It's not like he needs anyone to hold his hand for this."

"But what's going on?" Minato flinched at the whine in his own voice. He hated whiners. Immediately adjusting his tone, he elaborated: "I mean, where're we going, and why? You said we'd press on to Konoha in the morning!"

"We're not going to Konoha," that was Fuyubi, his low, snarling voice cutting through the cicadas' song and night noises of the woods. "We're going to the Hatake plantation, on the edge of the forest. Now shut up, and run."

And Minato suddenly remembered that the only shinobi he knew with a wolf summons contract was Hatake Sakumo-sama, the White Fang of Konoha. "Why?" he yelped. What would such a famous shinobi want with either his perverted Sensei or himself, a newly promoted chūnin?

Sensei grunted. "His lover started giving birth last night. Apparently, he panicked and sent his mutts out to nab me and Tsunade."

Asking for Tsunade-san made sense. She was a skilled medic-nin, after all, although her bedside manner left much to be desired. But Jiraiya-sensei…? An image of Jiraiya peeping into the birthing room, then being forced out by a very angry White Fang made Minato feel distinctly uneasy. "And Orochimaru-san?" Minato hoped not—Orochimaru was charismatic and clever, but he had a speculative way of looking at other people that made Minato's flesh crawl.

"Nah, that headache ain't even in the country right now, and Sakumo's not all that friendly with him in any case. Elitist bastard," he concluded, but there was fondness in his voice.

For all his grumbling, Minato hadn't seen Jiraiya-sensei in such a good mood since… since before that mission. "Then you're friendly with Sakumo-sama?"

He couldn't see the look Jiraiya-sensei must be shooting him, but he could certainly hear the incredulity in his pause. "Where are those brains you're so famed for, boy?" Sensei snapped. "Not everyone gets invited to a birthing—especially not the brat of someone as powerful as Hatake Sakumo."

Minato had realised it was a stupid question as soon as it left his mouth. Sulking—well, what was he supposed to expect? That a perv like his Jiraiya-sensei could know and be on first-name terms with a legend like the White Fang of Konoha?—he remained silent for the rest of their journey.

The room was littered in origami creations. Paper animals and flowers and shuriken and pinwheels spilled over the edges of the only table and onto the floor in a gay riot of colour. There was a pretty white and fuchsia bellflower in Sensei's silver hair, a green fox mask that blended nicely into the potted plant in the corner and an origami toad—three of them—by Hiashi's right foot. He kicked nervously at them, and they skittered across the floor, coming to a stop against his dozing teammate's leg.

The point: paper creations were everywhere. And fifteen-year-old Hyūga Hiashi was beginning to feel chrysophobic with all the glittering colours crowding him in. His eye twitched as a muffled wail of pain sounded from the room two doors down, and he directed his attention to his teacher.

Hands trembling visibly, Sensei finished a red and gold dog toy, reached for a pretty bamboo-patterned piece of paper and Hiashi snapped.

"Stop it," he ordered shortly, irritated when Sakumo-sensei ignored him and folded the newest sheet diagonally. "I said stop. If you were folding cranes, you'd have enough to make three wishes at least. So just… don't do any more, okay?"

Jin mumbled something and turned on his side. 'Fat lot of help you are,' Hiashi thought rebelliously at the drowsing redhead.

Sakumo-sensei looked miserably at Hiashi, and Hiashi felt a little badly for how he'd lost his patience with the man. "Look," he said, trying to sound reasonable. Sensei liked to smile, and often did—they could always tell, even through that stupid mask of his. It was downright unnatural, seeing him look so glum. "Tsunade-sama knows what she's doing, so just… calm down." Though why Tsunade-sama, renowned for her prodigious ability in medical jutsu, would answer a summons from leagues-away Konoha to help deliver his crazy Sensei's kid was beyond Hiashi.

"I'm calm," Sakumo-sensei protested. His fingers placed creases in the paper he'd taken, and folded it deftly into a little box.

"Look, if you'll just think about this, rationally…" 'Why the Hell is Jin never conscious when I need him and yet never shuts up when I don't?' Sakumo-sensei reached for a new sheet, this one a pretty print of sparrows and maple leaves. "Sensei—"

"Don't want to think," Sakumo-sensei mumbled, and the new sheet took the form of a crane.

"I can see that," Hiashi sighed. He was beginning to get fidgety, himself. "Give me a few," he demanded at last. "I'm bored." And skittish, although he would rather bleed himself dry with a rusty kunai than admit to Sensei that the man's nervousness was catching. "That pile, there," he pointed to some expensive-looking, gilded sheets.'My god, how much does he spend on this stuff?'

Sakumo-sensei handed them over without protest, and Hiashi sighed and began to fold shuriken: the only shape he knew. He was completing his eighth one when the door slid open and the nervous father-to-be lurched expectantly to his feet.

But it was only Fuyubi, Sensei's summons, flanked by a jōnin with pure white hair and a blond several years Hiashi's junior. Hiashi felt a twinge of pity as the hope in his teacher's face crumpled as he did, sinking back to the floor. "Jiraiya," Sensei acknowledged dully. "Thank you, Fuyubi, you may leave." The wolf regarded them all fiercely for a few moments before disappearing in a poof of smoky chakra residue.

"What the fuck?" the white-haired jōnin yelled. "What's with the lukewarm greeting?"

Hiashi's eyes widened. 'Jiraiya-sama?' How did his happy-go-lucky, scatterbrained Sensei know two members of the elite team already being lauded as the Densetsu no Sennin?

"Sakumo, you stupid prick, you could look happier to see us! We were tired and sleeping, and then your damn mutt had to come and wake us up and—oh, your brats are here, too? Did you have them dragged out of their beds as well?"

"Ah, well, we were already here. For a visiting—erm. Training trip," Hiashi stammered, finding his voice and giving his listless teacher a subtle nudge in the hopes of prompting a more enthusiastic greeting. His hopes were quashed as Sakumo-sensei simply picked up yet a fresh sheet and began to make a chrysanthemum-patterned toad. 'How… appropriate.' "Plus, Sensei has a dojo," he said desperately. "We train there." 'Idiot. "We train there"?' Feeling a little frantic, he kicked Jin as surreptitiously as he could.

Of course, Jin had to wake up howling. "Hiashi, you bas… oh, hello, who are you? Wow, is that natural?" Coming from someone whose teacher had silver hair since forever…

Hiashi gave up. His entire team had somehow managed to individually humiliate themselves in front of the Toad Sage. Even the blond kid—Jiraiya-sama's apprentice?—looked very disillusioned at the scene in front of him. He had picked up a wind-patterned pinwheel and was now inspecting it with studied curiosity.

"Oi, you," Hiashi's redheaded teammate waved at the Blond Unknown—as if he couldn't see them sitting right in front of him! "What's your name?"

"Jin," Hiashi gritted softly out of the corner of his mouth. "Be polite."

"What for? He can't be more than six or seven," Jin retorted, and Hiashi had never been so glad to hear Sakumo-sensei speak outside of a battle situation as when he did just then.

"You've brought your team, I see," Sensei said softly.

Jiraiya-sama's eyes hardened into dark, iron-hued gimlets. "'S not a team when there's only one of 'em left," he said curtly.

'…or not. Sakumo-sensei, shut up.' The Blond Unknown's face had paled several shades. To his credit, he maintained a stoic mien, and Hiashi mentally applauded him while shooting angry vibes at his insensitive teacher, 'Who,' he decided furiously, 'was a complete douche bag.'

Sakumo-sensei stood, scattering origami everywhere. Hiashi didn't even see him move, but he was suddenly embracing the Toad Sage as if they were brothers!

He and Jin exchanged disbelieving looks. It was a sentiment, Hiashi noted, that Jiraiya's apprentice shared, if the huge blue eyes and dropped jaw were any indication.

"Don't do this gay crap to me," Jiraiya-sama was saying loudly, but his face was being muffled in Sakumo-sensei's neck. "You… you just… they were both…"

"I know," Sakumo-sensei's voice, deep and soft and very caring, murmured softly. "Me too, you know? Me too… it hurts, and it takes a while because it seems like it's your fault but it's not, it's not… but it hurts still, doesn't it? Let it out, old friend, let it out…"

'…Oh.' Hiashi remembered rumours that his teacher's first team of genin had died in an ambush by Suna-nin. Hiashi's father had been dubious about Sakumo-sensei's qualifications to lead another team—especially one with his son on it. 'That must be what they're talking about.'

"Becoming a Dad will turn you completely gay, you sentimental, flamboyant old fuck," Jiraiya-sama said into Sensei's neck. There was a growing wet spot at the collar of Sakumo-sensei's sleeping shirt. "Just watch. You're already more of a woman than your girl is. And soon your dick will fall off."

A soft snort—the levity was clearly welcome. "I should hope not," Sensei laughed, and pitched his voice lower to say something that Hiashi could not hear but that Jiraiya-sama gave a watery chuckle at.

And they stood there for a long moment, arms about each other, faces turned into each other, speaking softly. Caringly.

Hiashi felt horribly embarrassed for the both of them.

Resisting the urge to rake a hand through his hair—shinobi were discouraged from such nervous habits—he sat back down. The Blond Unknown sidled closer and Hiashi reclaimed a cushion from the onslaught of origami forces. "Here," he said gruffly, pushing the proffered cushion at the younger boy.

"Thanks," the kid said. "I'm… I'm Namikaze Minato. Pleased to meet you." And he bowed decorously.

Hiashi barely restrained a smile. At last, someone in the shinobi ranks who knew their manners! …and weren't from either his clan (where it was expected) and wasn't one of those snooty Uchiha. "Hyūga Hiashi," he responded politely, and bent at the waist. "A pleasure to meet you."

"You're such a fucking stick in the mud, Hiashi-kun," Jin's obnoxious voice rang in his left ear. "Yo, I'm Jin. Natsuno Jin."

"That's a cool name," Minato-kun said brightly.

Jin beamed. "Isn't it? I keep telling old Stick-in-the-Ass here that my name's way cooler than his, even if it's not one of the old shinobi clans', but he just goes 'hn' and ignores me."

"Uhh…" Minato-kun looked as if he didn't quite know what to make of this. "I'm from a civilian family, too! I think. So…"

Hiashi tuned them both out. And just when he'd hoped to be able to make a connection with someone who possessed some reason… it just figured. He'd kill Jin tomorrow.

Somewhere in the next room, Haruka-san screamed. And then she screamed again. Jiraiya-sama had to snag the back of Sensei's shirt to keep him from bolting through the thin rice-paper and wood structure that served as room partitions.

"Sit the fuck down." He ordered.

Sakumo-sensei sat.

Hiashi hid a grin.

And then the wails in the next room were joined by a new one. It was halting, hiccoughing and thinner than Haruka-san's, but it was there: an infant's cry.

Sakumo-sensei moved so fast not even Jiraiya-sama could stop him. There was a tearing noise as his sleeping shirt ripped, and Hiashi caught sight of a pale back and silver blur before his teacher careened haphazardly through the wall with a crash, leaving a vaguely man-shaped hole in the wood and rice paper screen.

Hiashi buried his face in his hands. Sure, he was worried and concerned, too… but why did his teacher always have to be so embarrassing?

Minato hadn't thought he'd be this entertained just waiting for someone to have a baby.

Watching the interaction between Jiraiya-sensei and Sakumo-sama had been interesting, to say the least. Sakumo-sama was not just a famous shinobi to Minato's teacher, and it seemed the feeling was more than mutual. The two were clearly at ease with one another, and close. 'A little too close, maybe,' he thought, recalling the embrace.

Mostly, Minato was just amused to see his teacher sniffling like a child into another man's shoulder, even knowing the reasoning behind it. He'd felt the familiar prickle of grief, of course—but he'd barely known his teammates beyond the boundaries of… well, teammates. And hearing the banter between the two jōnin had cheered him up considerably, though that other boy—the Hyūga—had seemed disproportionately torn between scandal and horror. Minato's amusement had been shared by Jin-kun, however, and the two had watched their teachers' antics with pleasure.

Especially when Sakumo-sama had run through two silkscreen walls in his haste.

Hiashi-san sighed, breaking the amused silence that had fallen over the room since Sakumo-sama's departure. "He has to stop doing that."

"What? Panicking? He's normally pretty cool," Jin-kun scratched at a scab on his cheek and winced as it began to bleed.

The dark-haired boy slapped his teammate's hand away. "Stop that, you idiot. And I meant running through walls."

"You mean it's not the first time?" Minato asked, curious in spite of himself.

"Hah!" Jiraiya-sensei snorted. "I met him when he had to lead my Cell on an A-ranking reconnaissance. I thought he was one of 'em anal guys who always wanted to be in control and cool… and then he saw us and was so excited he jumped through the window and tore a hole in the mosquito screening."

Hiashi-san winced.

"When we graduated the Academy a while back," Jin-kun said cheerfully, "I thought we were going to get a really cool, really powerful jōnin-sensei! And then he was late and ran into the sliding door and through it because he was planning on what to say to us to make a good impression! Of course, that ruined it all… but Sakumo-sensei's still pretty kickass!"

"That's the idiot alright," Jiraiya-sensei said fondly.

"'The idiot' can hear everything you're saying," Sakumo-sama's deep, mellow voice said from the hole in the screening. "And he'd be tempted to tow the lot of you outside for an asskicking for telling embarrassing stories unless you indulge him right now."

"Ah, what's the damage, Sakumo, you sap?" Jiraiya-sensei grinned. "Is the kid as ugly as you are?"

"Come and see!" Sakumo-sama was all but dancing on the spot. Minato found it difficult to reconcile the legends of Konoha's White Fang with this gleeful new father. "Come and see it!"

"You could at least do your kid the favour of calling them a he or she, you ass," Sensei accused. "Well, let's see the brat, then."

"Yes, yes—Haruka wants to see you, too. The two of them are nursing right now, so… kids, could you wait here for a bit?"

Minato wondered, privately, if that were the best idea Sakumo-sensei had ever had. From previous experience, the mere idea of putting Jiraiya-sensei in the same room with a woman with part of her chest exposed preluded a disaster of epic proportions. But Sakumo-sama was already leading the way through the new 'doorway', his slipper-clad feet crunching on bits of rice paper and wood splinters.

"Sure," he heard Jin-kun mutter when they were gone from sight, "he's been a father for all of five minutes and he's calling us 'kids'."

"It does seem slightly condescending, doesn't it?" Hiashi-san murmured.

Minato shrugged, his mind already exploring what Jiraiya-sensei had suggested. He'd never seen a newborn before, although he'd heard mixed tales about their appearance. His team had been too young to be considered capable babysitters, so they'd never received any D-ranks involving watching children.

"I wonder if it'll look like Sensei," Jin-kun thought aloud.

"It won't look like much of anything at first," Hiashi-san told them with an air of almost aggravating superiority. "Actually, it'll be the most horrific thing you'll see outside of a battle situation."

"Well, I think the baby's beautiful," Sakumo-sama whispered into Minato's ear. He jumped. He hadn't even heard the man's approach. "I'm here for Minato-kun, so step lively, Blondie." Minato felt a brief spike of concern—surely the man hadn't been foolish enough to leave Jiraiya-sensei alone in a room with his lover… was he?

Sakumo-sama laughed. Minato reddened as he realised he must have spoken his thoughts aloud. "Don't worry about Jiraiya, kiddo. He's got more respect for Haruka than that."

"Don't count on it," Minato muttered.

"I won't," Sakumo-sama agreed. "So come along—you can see them first, since you'll be able to keep Jiraiya from being a nuisance."

"Don't count on it," Minato repeated, but followed obediently.

"Hey!" He heard Jin-kun shout. "Why aren't we going in? Aren't we his precious team?"

"Idiot," Hiashi-san huffed, and then they were out of earshot.

Minato stared.

The thing in the bundle of blankets didn't so much resemble a baby as it did a giant, bloated prune. Its face was bright red and wrinkled in distaste at being bereft of its nursing; the blood and fluids matting its hair rendered the sparse wisps a light brownish hue almost completely indistinguishable from its dirty scalp.

All in all, Hiashi-san was right, and the baby was one of the ugliest things Minato had ever seen, inside or outside of a battle situation.

"I can't let you hold her yet," Tsunade-san said sharply, clearly mistaking the awed look on Minato's face for something other than fascinated horror. "But she's quite beautiful," she complimented the glowing Haruka-san. "Perfect form, too—and she can already open her eyes." She prodded a bloody, perfectly manicured finger at a little fist; the infant's hand unclenched slowly, wrapped itself clumsily, haltingly, about the slender digit. "Bless her," Tsunade-san said softly. "She's going to be brilliant."

"Thank you," Haruka-san said graciously.

Minato guessed that the hours of tending to a screaming woman had clearly snapped Tsunade-san's mind; surely no one could think this whimpering, screwed up little face anything but hideous. Then something clicked. "Wait… it—I mean, the baby's a she?"

"We didn't expect her to be, no, but she is," Haruka-san glowed. "Aren't you, little girl?" she crooned gently at the fussing infant. "You're my little girl."

Minato's hand reached out, seemingly of its own will, and he brushed at a gore-encrusted cheek. "Weren't you hoping for a guy?" Tiny nostrils flared briefly—sniffing him—and then an equally small hand came up to grope blindly at his fingers. Minato recoiled.

"I don't know," Haruka-san said, and Minato realised she had been watching his interaction with the newborn with a smile. "I didn't really plan the pregnancy—" here, she glared at where Sakumo-sama was speaking quietly to Jiraiya-sensei, "—but it's one of those things I don't think I could regret if I wanted to. Like being a ninja."

"You're a ninja, Haruka-san?" Minato somehow found it difficult to picture the pale, elfin woman in any sort of bloody conflict. The glow of motherhood suffused her features. She was beautiful and benign and looked as if she couldn't throw a kunai without cutting herself.

"One of the best trackers out there," Tsunade-san said, patting the woman in the bed with sisterly affection.

"Thank you, Tsunade-san," Haruka-san turned back to Minato, her fingers tracing her child's features. "Yes, I was a ninja—a tokubetsu jōnin. Until my fourth month, that is. Then I received permission to retire from the battlefield to carry the little one to term."

Minato didn't really know what to make of this, so he changed the subject. "What's her name?

Sakumo-sama wandered over at this point. "We don't know," he said cheerfully. "I guess one will come to us eventually."

Looking offended at his lackadaisical attitude, Haruka shot him an exasperated glare, which he cheerfully ignored until her mouth quirked into a smile. "You have something in your hair," she sighed. She reached forward and plucked out a pinkish purple origami flower from behind his ear. "Ah, it's one of yours. You do nice work, as usual." Slyly: "how many did you make this time?"

Recalling the appearance of the "waiting room" he'd initially been shown into, Minato laughed aloud.

"Not… not too many." Sakumo-sama took the bell-shaped flower and considered it. "Oh… what if…"

And he was gone in a flicker of pale movement, leaving Minato alone with Jiraiya-sensei.

"I don't like that feeling… the one rolling around in my gut," Jiraiya-sensei said, after a moment of silence.

"I just gave birth, so I couldn't possibly know what you'retalking about," Haruka-san responded drily. Minato laughed, watched the gore-spattered infant's eyes blinking open and closed, the irises impossibly dark.

"Well, I didn't," Sensei scratched the side of his nose. "But I have a bad feeling… like I do whenever Sakumo gets one of his stupid ideas. Y'know, like when he wore that geisha costume and—"

"I still have the pictures," Tsunade-san smirked. "You'll be fine," she told the two in the bed. "I'm going to wash my hands and take the room next to this one—the one that doesn't have a hole in the wall—and lie down for a bit."

"Thank you for coming on such short notice, Tsunade-san."

"How could I miss it?" Tsunade-san's pretty features softened as she looked at the baby. "The two of you make one good-looking kid. I don't know Sakumo-kun's face, but she's got his eyes for sure."

Minato wondered if everyone had gone mad. As far as he'd seen, there was no resemblance whatsoever between Sakumo-sama's eyes and his daughter's save perhaps the colour. But he'd heard that colour changes often took place, so who did they think they were trying to kid?

And then he saw the dark eyes open drowsily, slide carefully about the room before slowing to fix themselves on his face. And then the baby yawned, deliberately, but her eyes didn't leave his. There was something impossibly endearing about her halting little movements, Minato thought.

"Can she see me?" he heard himself whisper.

"She can, a little, but not very well. Her eyes won't be fully developed for a while yet," Tsunade-san informed him before leaving the room, skipping back to avoid running into a returning Sakumo-sama.

"Okay, I'm back!" Sakumo-sama held out a fistful of slightly crumpled origami figurines. "Look!" he said. "Here's a bird—'Kotori'—and an azalea, and a scarecrow—that's 'Tsutsuji', I guess, and 'Kakashi'. And here's a bell: 'Kaneko'. A fox, too… maybe 'Byakko'… but 'Inari' sounds better… and here's another bell…"

"…the Hell are you talking about?" Sensei rubbed a hand wearily over his face.

Sakumo-sama's dark eyes twinkled brightly. "Names, of course! Names for my daughter!"

"After origami?" His lover shrilled, having found her voice.

Minato couldn't help thinking that Haruka-san's incredulity was well-deserved, at this point, but held his silence.

"Look, the baby can decide." Sakumo-sama inched closer and held out the fistful of paper creations. "Pick one, aijou-chan!"

"You've gone nuts," Jiraiya-sensei said, shaking his head. "One too many knocks to the thinker…"

Eyes squeezed shut again, the newborn flailed in her mother's arms, and knocked all but one of the glittering paper creations from her enthusiastic father's large hand.

In the ensuing, incredulous silence that followed, Sakumo held the 'winner' aloft. "…it's the scarecrow! Good choice, little one—"

"Stop goofing around, Sakumo! We're not naming our firstborn child after a scarecrow origami," the new mother cried, outraged. "What sort of name is 'Kakashi' for our daughter?"

"Hatake Kakashi," her lover sounded it out proudly. "It has a certain ring to it."

"Oh, it does—if you have a bucket over your head, had an anvil dropped on you and are under the influence of mushroom hallucinogens, idiot," Haruka-san snapped.

Minato tuned out the ensuing argument and realised that Hiashi-san and Jin-kun must have followed Sakumo-sama in just in time to hear 'the naming'.

"Sensei's crazy," Jin-kun whispered, awed. "And that is the ugliest thing since the word was invented."

"Shut up," Hiashi-san hissed.

"Did the two of you say something?" Sakumo-sama inquired cheerfully.

"N-no, Sensei…"

"Sakumo! Don't ignore me, I told you, we're not naming our child after—"

Sakumo-sama winced, as did the baby. "But it fits so well!"

"It doesn't!" Haruka-san hissed.

And when Haruka-san started throwing things at Sakumo-sama, everyone fled the birthing room to find a corner to curl up and sleep, although the sun was already peering over the horizon.

"But she really was," he later confided to Jiraiya as they struck out for Konoha, though he was sure to say it well out of earshot of the main house. "Ugly, that is. She had to be the grossest thing I've ever seen."

And Sensei just threw his head back and laughed. "Hate to say it, kid, hate to say it—but put Sakumo and Haruka-chan together, and you can't have an ugly kid. It'll grow out of its ugliness, like all babies do."

"You didn't," Minato said, mostly because he was feeling insolent. And he received a hard sting about the head for his impertinence, and was chased to the edge of the forest, where he took to the trees.

But, remembering the way the little hand had tightened about his fingers, remembering the fragile strength in the little digits, remembering the residue of blood and natal fluids picking out every minute detail on the chubby, perfect little palms and nails and knuckles…

Minato wondered if Jiraiya-sensei might actually know what he was talking about, after all.