Budding Limbs

Sasuke startled awake from a dream that he already couldn’t remember.

His heart was racing, still, and his head was killing him. His surroundings were unfamiliar, but the scent in the air was familiar enough to not send him into a mild case of frustrated panic.

If he was at Ms. Namura’s house then surely everything was oka-the omega sat up urgently once the memory of what happened hit him like a wall of bricks.

Sasuke’s eyes were wide- painfully wide, if the sudden itch of airflow coming in contact with his eyeballs was anything to go off of.

He had- he- he was-

A pale hand shifted to feel at his stomach, like there would already be some type of evidence to prove one of his worst fears coming true. There wasn’t- not on the outside. No, it was all internal, just like the rest of his problems.

What was he supposed to do? He was in the middle of a mission- he was a missing nin for crying out loud! Missing nins didn’t have babies, certainly not sixteen year old missing nins. They were supposed to wreak havoc and achieve their morally grey goals and run from the law. Missing nins were supposed to be invincible.

Sasuke didn’t feel very invincible right now.

In fact, he felt nauseous and light headed. In hindsight, just for revenge’s sake, maybe he shouldn’t have let the guys who attacked him go. It wouldn’t have made him feel better, per say, but it definitely wouldn’t have made him feel worse.

Though, he doubted anything could make him feel worse than he already did currently.

How could this have happened? Since even before his first heat, Orochimaru had been pumping him full of various forms of birth control. Some experimental, some more common and reliable. One had given him a stomach ulcer. He hadn’t used that one again.

There was no possible way that he could have- could have-Sasuke groaned at his own stupidity.

Of course this would happen! Everything that included Naruto always went wrong! First accidental scent bonding, then accidental marriage proposals and courting, and now an accidental pregnancy. If he were even just a tiny less sane, he might have started laughing and just never stop. How shit was his luck?

He almost wished that Orochimaru’s last test poisoning had worked.

Oh no.

Could one of the toxin experiments have messed with his birth control? He knew from the bare bones lesson on dynamic health at the leaf village academy that some herbs could neutralize and tamper with certain types of birth controls. Since the class had been two years younger than presenting age, and everyone had been absolutely sure the great Sasuke Uchiha would present as an alpha, he hadn’t really paid it much attention.

If he could time travel and smack his younger self, he would a hundred times over.

The bedroom door opening stopped his early midlife crisis from developing any further. Ms. Namura poked her head in and met his eyes.

“Oh good,” she hummed to herself before addressing him, “you’re awake.”

She let herself in, causing his instincts to bristle. He remained neutral though, it was her home after all. She very well could have just left him in that alley way. The Uchiha remained quiet as she gingerly sat down on the side of the bed.

“How are you feeling?” the old woman asked. Her tone wasn’t soft, nor cold. It was gently firm, like how all the old Uchiha ladies would speak to him when he would play in the dirt and make a mess. They weren’t alive to reprimand him anymore.

He leveled her with a look, causing her to chuckle and pat his hand, “I know, you’re probably too broody and cool to answer this old lady’s questions. Kids these days- didn’t I tell you that omegas shouldn’t travel alone? Look what’s happened.” She scolded.

To be fair, he technically hadn’t been traveling alone, if the mass of cells currently living inside of him were anything to go off of. Sasuke smirked, amused and nauseated that he was the only one in on the sick joke.

“I can handle myself.” He replied, mood even worse than it had been when he’d woken up.

“Oh sure you can.” she grumbled sarcastically as she adjusted his blanket, tucking it closer around his body.

He hated how comforting it was. It’d been a long time since he’d gotten to feel anything close to a maternal figure caring for him. He also hated that it wasn’t his own mother.

“You can handle yourself just fine, but what about that baby, hmm?”

He jerked back from her, as if her question had physically burned him. His heart couldn’t take too many more shocks today- he was only human. How did she know?!

She smiled, although it wasn’t a happy one. “Don’t worry- your secret’s safe with me. I’ve lived a long time, known many omegas in my day. The early signs are obvious when you know what to look for.”

“How.” was all he could manage out. It sounded more like a command for intel than a genuine question. With Sasuke, though, the two usually sounded exactly the same.

She turned away from him to stare at the ceiling for a moment before she responded. When she did, she sounded tired, but not the sleepy kind. “Your skin, for one. People your age have skin issues, but you? You’re glowing. Second, when you entered my shop yesterday, you may not have realized it, but you were curling in on yourself- those protective instincts already kicking in, I’d wager.”

Sasuke could feel his face grow hot in both embarrassment and disgust with himself.

“I didn’t know.” he whispered, looking down at his lap- not his stomach. He didn’t think he’d be able to look at that part of his body for a long while.

Sasuke felt her body soften. The omega knew that if he looked into her eyes he’d probably see pity. He’d lived through enough life altering scenarios to grow resentful of people’s pity.

Her sigh was loud in the nearly silent room. His hair had fallen into his face, so he couldn't see what she was doing, but if he had to guess, she was probably wringing her hands together.
“You have…options, I’ve helped a few others in similar situations to yours before.” she breathed calmly. There was zero judgment in her tone, and oddly enough, Sasuke appreciated it.

He knew what she meant, but he didn’t know what to do or how to feel. Everything felt overwhelming and dizzying, like the world had started turning twelve times faster than it normally did since he’d woken up.

Was that because of the turmoil in his mind and heart, or symptoms of his…situation? Sasuke held back a grimace.

“I…am unsure.” he replied after a moment that felt like eternity.

Truthfully, he was. He never thought he’d ever be in this situation, much less having to make decisions regarding it. Sasuke had seen so much death, he’d felt it wrap itself around him in a cold, unrelenting vice grip as the years had passed. For the first time in a long time, maybe in forever, he felt life. It was foreign to him- both new and familiar, and it terrified him in the sincerest of ways.

“Do you need anything?” Ms. Namura asked from the doorway. He hadn’t even noticed her get up.

He wanted oranges and blue eyes and warm, tan arms. He wanted Naruto.

“No…thank you.” he muttered before lying back down to blankly stare at the wall.

Sasuke had a lot to think about.

~~~

She stumbled out of the hospital’s entrance in a daze. The alpha hadn’t even changed out of her operating clothes, and the blood stains were probably gruesome to the average person, but the part of her brain that would normally keep her irrationality at bay was frozen.

Sakura’s whole body felt frozen. Her fingertips were numb, her ears were numb. The only thing she could feel outside of the languid cotton in her moth was the deep, empty ache in her chest as she stumbled away from the offending building.

It was supposed to be a simple surgery. Routine, basic even. Lady Tsunade had coached her through it at least fifty times by now, but- the patient hadn’t made it.

She’d failed, and the price of her failure was a body bag and a wailing mother beside herself with grief over the child she’d just lost. The patient had been Sakura’s age.

Sakura had always felt so old, so mature- even when in hindsight, she’d been anything but. Staring down at the lifeless face of another sixteen year old made her realize how young she was. How young they both were.

There had been so much life in him, she’d felt it. She’d seen it with the green glow of her healing chakra as it roved over his bravely beating heart. How had the surgery not succeeded? She’d- she’d done everything by the book. Everything. How could it not have worked?

The alpha’s body jerked with a dry sob as her knees gave out in grief, causing her to plop awkwardly onto the nearest bench.

She didn’t know how long she sat there in complete and utter despair before she felt a presence next to her. She knew who it was instantly- not many people had such a small chakra signature like Might Guy and Rock Lee shared.

“I heard about what happened.” he murmured as he sat down.

Sakura looked up at him helplessly, words caught in her throat and tears not yet weighed down by gravity. She probably looked like a lunatic, and if she were in her right mind, she would’ve been embarrassed at him seeing her like this.

“I couldn’t-I couldn't save him!” she half wailed, half choked out. She furiously scrubbed at her eyes, not realizing that her surgical gloves were still on and who knows what fluids were on them. All that mattered now was that there was one less heartbeat in the world, and she could have prevented it.

“Sakura…” he whispered gently, like she was a wounded animal that could strike out if threatened. Maybe she was, maybe she wasn’t. Maybe she was just a girl who’d wanted to do some good, and had failed in the worst way.

He pulled her hands away from her face. The warmth of his palms grounded her, giving her something real to focus on. It wasn’t enough to chase away the cold fury of guilt that encased her, though. Softly and slowly, so as not to startle her, he peeled her gloves off, and threw them to the side.

Rock Lee didn’t let go of her hands afterward. He kept them and held them.

“It wasn’t your fault. Sometimes…sometimes these things happen.” he murmured. His scent, uniquely iron- a stark contrast to most of the leaf village’s nature-y scents, whirled around her in the air. As the scent of another alpha, it should have irritated her and made her metaphorical hackles rise, but instead, it soothed her enough to stop hyperventilating.

“I did everything right. Every step, every set of instructions. I did it all. He shouldn’t have- what did I do wrong?” She asked pitifully, knowing there would be no answer to her cries.

One moment her head is hanging in despair, and then the next it’s against the older alpha’s shoulder with one of his bandaged hands rubbing her back comfortingly. An odd thought, due to shock her mind supplied, occurred to her. The blood from her outfit would likely stain his jumpsuit.

“Life doesn’t always follow the books.” he hummed carefully, trying to reassure her, even if she wasn’t at the point where she could even think about being reassured yet.

“I just keep thinking back to what I could have done- if I could have done anything differently, but there’s nothing. I can’t think of anything. Logically, it’s not my fault, you know? But I was still the last person to see his chest rise. I was the person in charge of making sure he made it out alive- and- and he didn’t”

She didn’t know if he could even understand what she’d said with the way her face was shoved into his shoulder, but he probably did. Rock Lee was always managing the impossible.

He rested his cheek against the top of her head. She didn’t know why the action spurred her into venting again, but it did.

“You know, this bench is where I found Sasuke right before he left. I failed then too, just like I failed to be useful in the first chunin exams, just like I failed-like I failed to be what my parents wanted me to be.” she confessed the very anguish that she’d been sitting on for two and a half years now.

For a rare moment, the trees and other sounds of nature were quiet, like the entire earth was watching her at her most vulnerable moment like a tragic play that just kept on going with no intermissions.

“Sometimes,” he paused, and she was close enough to hear his quiet breath, “sometimes certain things are just beyond your grasp. It’s no one’s fault- it’s just what happens. You try and get back up, even when life kicks you down.”

Of course he would say that. Rock Lee knew the importance of perseverance more than anyone. He’d tried, failed, tried some more, then succeeded, then failed again, and kept trying. He didn’t know how to stop trying any more than she knew how to stop fucking up.

Didn’t they make for an interesting duo.

She sniffled, even though her poor nose was embarrassingly stuffy with snot. “How do you know that if I go back in there, and I do it again, I’ll succeed? It’s not just about training- it’s people’s lives I hold in my hands. What if I’m not cut out for this either?” she whispered as the numb feeling began to set in.

He pulled her quivering and clammy hand to rest against his chest, right over where his heart was thudding strongly, healthily, beneath the bones of his ribcage. It was a sensation she was familiar with, having dealt with the human body countless times by now. Out of everyone elses, though, Rock Lee’s felt different.

She felt him shift slightly, and realized he’d leaned his head down to where it was almost level with her ear.

“I know because you saved me.” he whispered firmly against her cheek.

“Lee, please, not now-”

He continued, cutting her off, “I know because you keep saving me. This heart? The one that’s beating beneath your palm? It beats because of you. So many times, you have nursed me back to health. Please, let me return the favor now.” He begged her softly, even though his voice was thick with determination and care.

Sakura nodded her head from where it was still buried in his shoulder. The flow of tears was beginning to dwindle into a miniscule drizzle, and her nose and ears were numb from her crying. But, she heard every single word he’d said. Felt them, too, in the vibrations radiating from his chest.

“Sakura, I know that this is probably not the best time… but I love you. Not for your skills as a medic, not for what you can or can’t offer the village as a shinobi, but for you. I love you for you.” Rock Lee confessed to the pink haired girl. “What you see as failures, I see as moments that have defined what a strong and capable person you are. I believe we share a few similarities, in that regard.”

His heart was beating so strongly underneath her palm, so fiercely. She recoiled at the newfound information, pulling away from him to search his face for any traces of a lie- of something more.

Large, wet green eyes met dark irises and read them like an open and willing book. She inhaled sharply before collapsing into his chest once more, small sobs muffled against the green fabric of his outfit. Pale, tired arms threw themselves around the older alpha and held tightly, as if he would disappear if she didn’t.

Her tears aren’t of rejection or disgust at his confession, quite the contrary. They’re for the life that was lost today, for the boy who had never gotten to know what it felt like to be loved, and never would.

~~~

It wasn’t every morning he woke up with a cloud of anxiousness tickling the back of his mind. Naruto didn’t really know why he felt off, but whatever had caused it had to be important, because even his scent bond felt a little weird. The change left his instincts unsettled and antsy, but for what, he couldn’t figure it out.

The bond never felt like this, even when it stung or was very obviously strained.

After his talk with Jiraiya last night, he’d gone to bed feeling optimistic. He’d apologized for not leaving a note or anything and running off for a few days, and his sensei had apologized for not trusting him. Naruto wouldn’t be half the man he tried to be if he denied that he’d ended up crying when Jiraiya had confessed to caring about him like he was a part of the sanin’s family.

He knew how much that word meant to the both of them.

Maybe it had been because of the dream he’d had, but right now, he really wanted to lay in bed and hide under his blankets. He’d dreamed of Sasuke, which was far from unusual, but the dream itself had been kinda odd.

Dream-them had been in Sasuke’s nest, but one of the old ones with the soft blankets and weirdly perfectly matched color scheme. Dream-Sasuke had been holding something that had looked like a bundle of blankets, but every time dream-him had reached out to take the blanket ball away from Sasuke, he’d push the blonde away.

It was weird, Naruto had no idea why dream Sasuke would be so protective over some blanket. But, then again, Naruto did seem to have some odd dreams. Like that one about a red haired lady in a green dress yelling at him to eat his vegetables.

Naruto would never eat vegetables.

He yawned and stretched before getting out of bed. It was early, though it was hard to tell because the desert surroundings of the sand village were kind of devoid of life round the clock. Everything was in a constant state of sand.

Not that he thought the sand village was ugly or anything. After growing up in Konoha, it was just a stark difference to what he was used to. The sunsets here were better than the leaf village’s at least.

No wonder Gaara liked to watch the sun go down. It was like a painter had made the sky his canvas. Pinks, purples, yellows and rich, beautiful oranges would fill the sky until even the clouds carried the slight tinge of blended colors too.

Speaking of Gaara, he was supposed to discuss his undercover mission findings with the omega and his siblings over breakfast before his daily training with Jiraiya.

Lately, they’d been working up to him channeling the nine tails’ chakra and Gaara had been kind enough to block off a training area from the public so that Naruto could train in peace. It was nice, having another jinchuriki around. Gaara understood his want for people to not know he had a literal demon inside of him in a way that his other friends couldn’t.

Maybe one of these days, he could steal Gaara away from his stuffy old office and they could go have fun exploring the desert.

The alpha’s thoughts trickled back to Sasuke as he brushed his teeth. He hadn’t heard from the omega, obviously, but he wished there had been a way for them to let each other know that they’d both gotten back from their uh.. activities.. okay.

It was a crazy idea, but maybe he could persuade one of the toads into hunting the Uchiha down and delivering a letter for him. What would he even say? ‘Hey Sasuke, hope Orochimaru hasn’t killed you- xoxo Naruto?’

He shook his head in frustration. Why was it so hard to simply find out that his ma-SASUKE was safe and sound?

He spit out his toothpaste and looked at himself in the mirror, only to be met with red tinged irises instead of his trademark blue. Vigorously, the alpha began to shake his head and opened his eyes to see if he were imagining things, but the red was still staring back at him in the mirror.

Not caring that he was still in his underwear, Naruto ran out of his room like a headless chicken and pounded on his sensei’s door. Whatever was happening, Jiraiya would know what to do.

~~~

Fresh air did little to make the queasy feeling in his stomach alleviate, but Sasuke soldiered on anyway. He’d left Ms. Namura’s home hours ago with the promise of returning once he’d completed his quest for Orochimaru’s stolen equipment.

He’d managed to get a lead, even though it was miniscule at best. A man had stopped at one of the bars in the town with a large bag strapped to his back, and wouldn’t let anyone near it. The owner of the bar had said the man was paranoid and made sure his back wasn’t turned away from anyone.

The timeline of the sighting had roughly matched up with the time the break in had occurred in the eastern hideout, with a few days in between to account from going from point A to point B.

Sasuke just had to figure out where point C would be, and determine if the supposed man was the guy he was after or not.

Luckily for him, he had a few general ideas.
Unluckily for him, getting to the next potential spot would take hours, even at the pace he was going. It was just him alone with his thoughts and…the thing.

He probably shouldn’t be calling it a thing, but what else was it at the moment? An obstacle, a wrench in his plans? Proof of something that should never have happened?

Thinking back, there were symptoms. He just hadn’t noticed them because there were other, more obvious causes. The slight nausea from what he’d assumed to be the toxin training, the sore chest around the time of his new sparring regiment, his irritable mood being even worse than usual which he’d explained away because of Kabuto being the worst person ever, seconded only by Orochimaru and Itachi. (Jiraiya and Neji Hyuuga were close behind on the list.)

Even the protectiveness over people coming into his room made sense, in hindsight. When had he ever allowed himself to care about those things before? When had he ever wanted to care?

What was he going to do?

He couldn’t just stroll back into the hideout with a bunch of blue and pink balloons and yell “Surprise! I’m knocked up!”. Kabuto would probably smother him to death in his sleep, if only to ensure that Orochimaru didn’t bump Sasuke up to number one lackey because of his “contribution to reviving his bloodline.”. Sasuke doubted he’d ever even get to see the thing after its birth. Orochimaru would have it whisked away, either to train or study.

He doubted he could show up to fight Itachi with a baby on his hip. If he did, his brother would just take more sickening glee in murdering another Uchiha infant. Sasuke may have been riddled with grief and numb with shock, but the ninja who’d been at the scene of the crime hadn’t been able to hide him from the tiny corpses on the bloodied compound streets.

Sasuke was a criminal- his name was in the bingo book, he had bounty hunters actively looking for him. How could he bring a child into that?

Sasuke crossed his arms to stop himself from doing something stupid, like touching his stomach to feel the tiny source of chakra. It was barely there, but it was growing, and the omega didn’t want to let himself get attached. Not before a decision was made.

If he stopped now, and ran back to Konoha with his tail between his legs like a coward, he could use Tsunade’s soft spot for Naruto to at least ride the pregnancy out before he was jailed for siding against the leaf village. Unless her fondness had run its course, and he ended up walking himself into a trap. She and Kakashi had been in that meeting with Jiraiya, after all. He knew she could be iron fisted when she wanted to be, and the Uchiha knew that the woman held no love for him.

He could try and find Naruto. Abandon his goal- for now- and try to play house with him for a few years. That’s what a small, but persistent, voice kept whispering for him to do. Just go to Suna, where Naruto would probably still be, find him and tell him the news.

As an ally of Konoha, the kazekage would have to alert the leaf village of his presence, but as a friend to Naruto, Gaara could likely be swayed to hide him there while he and Naruto figured out what to do.

What would Naruto say? He couldn’t imagine the blonde would react badly. If anything, he’d be excited because the alpha was just that naive. Sasuke’s skin began to crawl. Naruto would want to be a family.

But Sasuke already had a family. One he had to avenge, because he’d been too weak, too much of a child to do anything about their deaths back then. He had the power now.

But now he also had a baby to think about, whether he wanted to or not. He could get rid of it, and nip this issue in the bud. A deep part of him didn’t feel quite right about it though. Getting rid of a future Uchiha would be a slap in the face to every one of his clan members who’d been murdered. He’d be furthuring Itachi’s goals.

Hatred bloomed in his chest. No matter what happened in his life, his decisions were still influenced by that disgrace of an alpha.

He wished he could just run away with Naruto and leave everything behind. That’s what he was good at, wasn’t it? Running away? He’d run from Itachi at eight years old, he’d run from the village at fourteen, and after his heat at sixteen, he’d run away from Naruto.

Maybe the mass of cells currently sharing his body with him was the universe’s way of punishing him for not being strong enough, wise enough. What had Itachi said, back when he’d tried to steal Naruto from that hotel? That he was just a stupid and weak omega?

His ability to carry life had been something Jiraiya had tried to weaponize against him too. In fact, the only adult figure in his life that hadn’t insinuated the same thing was Orochimaru, and that was a disturbing thought.

If he went to Naruto now, chances were high that Jiraiya would be with him still. Sasuke couldn’t trust the sanin to not turn him in, or find a way to regulate his life to nothing more than a barefoot and pregnant omega whose sole purpose was to repopulate his clan and hope for alpha children.

He knew why Naruto was with him. It didn’t take a genius to figure out that he was the jinchuriki for the nine tails. Sasuke had figured it out on their first mission at the bridge in the land of waves. How their peers hadn’t, he’d never know. The signs were there.

Unfortunately, those signs were what attracted the Akatsuki’s attention.

The Akatsuki were another problem. If Sasuke were to go to Naruto, he’d already be bringing the attention of Orochimaru and Itachi to them, but the rest of Itachi’s team were after Naruto already. Uniting all of their foes was a worse idea than returning to Konoha and letting whatever happened, happen.

Maybe when he returned, he should take Ms. Namura up on her offer to help him get rid of it.

It would probably be for the best. What kind of life could Sasuke provide a child? He was young and hotheaded. He had entire days where he didn’t utter a single word, and others where all he wanted to do was set the next person who touched him on fire. He couldn’t provide the warmth, the stability that parents should be able to provide.

Sasuke couldn’t even build a functional nest anymore. What kind of omega was he? Unfit. That’s what.

The omega closed his eyes and took a deep breath, suddenly overwhelmed with an emotion he wasn’t familiar with.

Konohamaru’s chubby little face came to mind, with his missing tooth and his dorky little helmet that made Naruto’s fashion taste look superb. Sasuke had been fond of the bratty little kid, and Konohamaru hadn’t been subtle about the liking he’d taken to the Uchiha either.

Sasuke had fed him- healthy food only, none of that ramen and candy his Uncle would give him out of pity. Sasuke had made him take baths when his clothes were just a little too dirty for the omega’s neat freak tendencies to deal with. He’d scented him when Konohamaru was sad, showed him basic shinobi skills like how to center chakra.

On Festivus, when they’d found Konohamaru crying at the third hokage’s grave, and they’d taken him to Naruto’s apartment, Naruto had asked him what having a family had been like and Sasuke had said “Like this.” as the three of them were curled up in the nest he’d built.

Maybe, if he chose to keep it despite all the odds being stacked against him, he wouldn’t be the worst parent. Definitely not the best. But not the worst.

The omega continued walking well into the evening, making sure to keep aware of his surroundings at all times. His scent bond was itchy, an odd but not unusual sensation, and the pull to be close to Naruto was like never before. Probably because of the pregnancy.

Sasuke grimaced. Could Naruto feel a change on his end of the bond? If Naruto could, and he knew the reason, would he look for Sasuke?

~~~
“Come on guys, hurry up!” the Uzumaki shouted against the sandy wind at his mentor and friend, who were trudging through the sand at a snail’s pace. Well, Gaara not so much because he was using his sand to levitate himself.

Naruto had asked him why he did that, and the omega had just shrugged, causing the blonde to stick his tongue out at him.

“Chill out, kid, it’s not like the training spot is going anywhere!” Jiraiya called back.

“Everything’s made of sand! It could disappear by the time we get there!” Naruto retorted. He did stop to wait for them, though. If only because he didn’t quite remember where he was going.

Gaara remained quiet, although his arms were crossed, so Naruto could tell he was having fun. He was glad that the older jinchuriki was able to find time in his schedule to take a break and spend a few hours training.

For safe measure, though, Naruto had bribed Kankuro to cover for the kazekage if he was late to his afternoon meeting session.

The trio arrived at their destination sooner than expected due to Naruto’s energetic teasing of the pervy sage, telling him that he’d begun to show signs of his old age. That had put a pep in the old man’s step.

“So, what’s on the schedule for today, Jiraiya sensei?” Naruto hummed after finishing his stretches.

The two jinchuriki watched as the man crouched down and began to draw seals on his large roll of parchment that he was never without. Once, Naruto had asked about learning a few of the seals from him, but Jiraiya had laughed and patted the Uzumaki’s back, saying that he was still a ways off from having the control needed for the seals that the sanin specialized in.

The white haired man shrugged, “Whatever you’d like to do today, since we have a visitor.”

Naruto did a small, very uncoordinated, victory dance, causing Gaara to shake his head- probably out of jealousy, because obviously Naruto had the best dancing skills ever.

“Ooh! Can we show Gaara how to make a rasengan!?”

“What about you, Gaara? How do you usually train?” Jiraiya directed the focus to the omega, who’d been quiet. Maybe it was Naruto’s extensive experience with reading Sasuke’s own frustratingly neutral facial expressions, but it was obvious to the blonde that Gaara was enjoying his time away from his kazekage duties.

Gaara shrugged, and if he had eyebrows, Naruto guessed that they would have been perfect lines of polite indifference. “I’ve never trained with others before.”

Naruto spluttered, “What do you mean ‘never’!? What about Kankuro and Temari? Weren’t they your teammates?”

Gaara blinked at him, “I was possessed by a semi-sealed demon… it did the work for me. Plus, chances are I would have ended up killing my training partners.”

That put a damper on things. The blonde cringed at himself for having forgotten about that whole.. ‘Grr, me want blood and sleep’ phase of his friend’s life.

“Yeah,” Naruto coughed, “Uh-right..”

“Alright you two, since you’re both jinchuriki and haven't had much formal training on how to deal with your special circumstances, I suggest we work on meditation first and foremost. After a while of that, we’ll see how you guys fare with siphoning and controlling a portion of your tailed beast’s chakra. Sound good?” the toad sage instructed from the spot where he’d been creating seal barriers to encompass the training area.

If accidents happened, or even a simple slip up of concentration, it was best to have the destruction zone confined within the barriers. Naruto had learned that the hard way.

The two teens dutifully sat themselves down, legs crossed, and began to meditate under the careful watch of Jiraiya.

It wasn’t even an hour later that the duo found themselves trying out a few jutsu, intending to allow Naruto and Gaara warm up to using their demon chakra. Naruto had summoned some clones, Gaara had made a protective body armor out of sand.

Sparring with someone that wasn’t his sensei was fun, exhilarating even. Gaara had a completely different fighting style than he was used to. It was unpredictable, and the alpha had fun trying to match the older shinobi’s pace.

He hadn’t had this much fun in training since his training days with Sasuke. Oh, how he missed training with Sasuke. Every day, it felt like there was something new they’d add to their fighting rhythms, something unpredictable and alive. To them, when they would spar at the training fields well past sundown, it was like a dance of two rivals and two lovers. Sometimes, Naruto won. Others, Sasuke. But both came out better, stronger after their training matches.

Naruto wondered what sparring with Sasuke would be like now. Would the omega still be just as agile, just as sharp? Or had his fighting style changed as he became more seasoned and skilled?

That weird feeling in his scent bond came back the longer he thought about it. Maybe the bond was just evolving in some way? Jiraiya sensei had said it would do that.

Naruto spun on his heel to avoid a jab of Gaara’s sand daggers and backflipped to get out of close range. It gave him enough time to summon four clones, two to block Gaara’s attacks, and two to help him form a rasengan.

He smiled in determination, ignoring the memories of performing the same trick against a different opponent with black hair, and ethereally blacker eyes. Those thoughts were for later as he stared out of the window and gazed at the moon in contemplation.

Now… for now, he would allow himself to enjoy this time with his friend.

~~~

Deidara sighed in contentment as he continued to sculpt the statue he’d been working on for a few hours now. He’d just finished the base, and had begun to work his way up, starting with the legs of the figure.

Behind him, and his blissfully artistic bubble,Tobi was screeching as he ran around like a headless chicken, trying to escape the wrath of a pissed off Hidan. Sasori had taken to just rolling his eyes and ignoring them in favor of tweaking one of his puppet’s chakra infused strings.

Deidara had offered to give the puppet a piece of his art so that an explosive feature could be added, but Sasori had called him a beatnik and told him to take his art somewhere else.

“Ahhh! Deidara! Deidara! Save me- He’s going to kill me!” Tobi shrieked as he ran past him.

The blonde omega didn’t pay the alphas any mind, though. It was established a while ago, back when Kisame and Kakuzu had first butted heads over their annual budget, that none of the Akatsuki members were allowed to kill each other. They would save the dying for in the field on missions, like civilized terrorists.

Deidara couldn’t help but daydream about going out in one, big, massive BOOM. It would be the final piece of his puzzle, the defining moment in which his life’s entire artistic meaning would finally come to fruition.

Itachi, that silly alpha, didn’t like when Deidara would rant about how important his death was to the meaning of his artworks, but the omega would usually just scoff and remind him of the fact that he, the Itachi Uchiha, had already planned his death too.

“HOW DARE YOU DISRESPECT LORD JASHIN!” Hidan raged from somewhere in the background. There was a crash, and then another one of Tobi’s mangled pleas for help from either Deidara or Sasori. Neither one of them paid the other two any mind, though. They were too entrenched in their own hobbies.

“Oh, great. Tobi set Hidan off on another Lord Jashin rant again.” Kisame’s dry voice echoed from the entrance to their lair.

Ah, so Itachi and Kisame had finally arrived. About time. Sasori was clearly on his last nerve.

Nothing good happened when Sasori was pushed past his usual patience level. They’d learned that the hard way last winter.

The omega shuddered at the haunting memory of being buried alive with creepy chakra puppets for sixteen hours.

“We would have arrived on time if you hadn’t stopped to scare that group of children.” Itachi bickered evenly. The alpha’s voice was so calm that Deidara almost hadn’t noticed the slight sarcasm to his tone.

“They were asking for it!” Kisame argued, his voice getting louder.

“They only wanted to see your sword.” Itachi sighed. Deidara could feel the Uchiha walking closer to where the blonde was sculpting.

“When is this meeting going to start? I could be making money right now.” Kakuzu grumbled from where he was sitting, carefully counting stacks of money he’d collected in the past few days.

They had been waiting for a while. Sasori and Deidara had arrived first, mostly because the two were tired of being reprimanded for being late. The two had obviously found ways to fill their boredom with their own respective artistic creations. Tobi, the latest recruit and second to arrive, however, had not found a way to kill the time. When Hidan and Kakuzu had arrived, Kakuzu was in the middle of scolding Hidan for something- Deidara hadn’t cared to eavesdrop.

It had only been a matter of time before Tobi had set Hidan off. That masked idiot was always poking around and asking questions. In hindsight, maybe Tobi’s old partner had simply killed himself to get away from the annoying alpha. Though, with the gruesome end that guy had met, it was probably a little unlikely.

“AHHHHHHH HE’S GOING TO HARVEST MY ORGANS-AND THEY’RE NOT EVEN RIPE ENOUGH TO SELL YET!” Tobi shouted, though the others paid him no mind, even though Hidan had already gotten out his special ‘blood jar’. It was a jar that the white haired alpha kept to collect the blood of some of his more memorable victims.

Deidara didn’t care for the jar.

The other akatsuki members continued their casual conversation like nothing was happening and Tobi wasn’t running for his life, as per usual. Sasori cursed under his breath when Hidan ran into his work table, causing several screws and other nearly microscopic tools to crash to the ground.

“Tobi,” Deidara sighed, knowing when to diffuse the situation after a year of having Sasori as his partner, “Come here.”

The omega made eye contact with Itachi, who took it as his cue to force Hidan to calm down. Itachi and Konan were some of the only people Deidara knew of that could get the overzealous man to stop his trails of carnage.

Tobi stopped what he was doing, which was climbing the underground cave’s jagged wall to narrowly escape Hidan’s pronged scythe, to gleefully giggle and materialize beside the blonde.

“What’s up, Dei-Dei, do you want a sculpting assistant?” The masked man clapped his hands together like a child that had been given a new toy to play with.

The omega bristled at the horrible attempt at a nickname, but smiled sweetly at his fellow team member. He stuck his hand out, knowing Tobi would fall for the trick, just like he always did. Tobi grasped his hand, shaking it happily, thinking a deal had just been made.

Three…Two…One.

“AH!” Tobi wrenched his hand away from Deidara’s, causing the blonde omega to burst out laughing as a collective sight sounded from around the cavern.

“His hand mouth bit me!” The black haired alpha pouted as he jabbed a theatrical finger in the direction of the cackling omega.

It served him right for disturbing Deidara’s creative process.

“Pipe down, would you? You’re so loud, my deaf grandmother would have heard you!” Kisame grumbled from where he’d started to clean one of his swords. Not the big one- that one had too much of a mind of it’s own to let anyone clean it.

Itachi stifled a coughing fit, drawing Deidara and Kisame’s attention to his otherwise calm form.

Deidara felt bad for the alpha. He’d picked up on his illness sometime after they’d broken off their secret ‘situation-ship’ romance, and hadn’t fully known how to help him without stirring up old wounds.

He let his eyes zero in on the Uchiha’s fingernails, of which the nail polish had begun to chip since the last time Deidara had painted them.

“Itachi,” the blonde singsonged, getting the other’s attention, “I believe it’s time for another coat of paint, wouldn’t you say so?”

Itachi glanced down at his hands, and then back up at him. He gave a curt but not impolite nod, and came to sit in front of Deidara, who was already in the process of pulling his nail polish collection out of his art supplies box. He always had his nail polish with him for emergencies, just in case.

“What color are we thinking of today, hmm? I’ve got a new shade of black-see?” he waved the new bottle of nail polish in the air.

Itachi just smiled peacefully, “Sure, let's go with that one.”

~~~

It had only taken him four days to track down the theif and recover Orochimaru’s posessions. In those four days, Sasuke had been restless. He’d thought and thought until he’d made himself sick, although that could have just been his…body roommate. He’d ended up taking his frustrations on several criminals he’d witnessed harrassing omegas or elderly people along the way. It’d felt good to feel bones crack underneath his knuckles, but he’d made sure to keep himself in check.

He had a carefully crafted image to maintain, after all.

Sasuke wasn’t even given the chance to knock on Ms. Namura’s scavenged weapons shop, because as soon as his shadow had hit the door, the wooden slab was thrown open, and the old woman was pulling him inside. The large pack strapped to his back that was full of Orohcimaru’s equipment nearly threw his balance off as she pushed him towards the back room.

“So? Have you made a decision? I could have my doctor friend here in less than seven hours if you need him.” she rushed out once they were both in the back room- away from any stray ears.

Sasuke paused.

He actually hadn’t fully made up his mind. He’d thought endlessly while he was away, but that was all he’d done. It was complicated. Even more complicated than things usually were that he dealt with. On one hand, his life was not suited for the addition of a child, and on the other, it could have Naruto’s blue eyes.

If he had an infant to worry about, his plans would need to be altered. Itachi, or Konoha, or Orochimaru, or even the Akatsuki could catch wind of it’s existence and Sasuke couldn’t let that happen, not to anyone and certainly not a child of his.

But, he could also feel the tiny flicker of chakra within the pit of his stomach that didn’t belong to himself.

However, it would be stupid and reckless and everything in between to keep it.

But this was also a chance at family, and Sasuke wanted family. He’d had a family.

And now he didn’t because of Itachi.

If Sasuke created a plan, reworked some things maybe-No! It was stupid to bring a knife to a fire fight, but it was even worse to bring a baby to a fight with Itachi.

The image of chubby cheeks and dark hair hurt his heart. What would Naruto do if the roles were reversed?

Sasuke wanted to roll his eyes. That answer was obvious. The blonde would keep it, no hesitation.

But Sasuke wasn’t Naruto. Sasuke was his own person- scent bond be damned! He wasn’t going to let his feelings for Naruto cloud his judgement-

“I’ve decided to keep it.”