Chapter Text
Uchiha Madara had plotted this out for years. His protege, Uchiha Obito, would wind up doing most of the dirty work, but make no mistake, it was his (and Zetsu's) plan that set this all into motion.
Decades ago, he’d begun to silence and scatter the once isolationist clan who had any chance of stopping him. Having controlled a Yamanaka, forcing him to mind-walk a captured Uzumaki, he’d found a way to smuggle Zetsu into a small sect of them who refused to fight during the First War. From there, Zetsu’s numbers grew. Resentments in the small community also grew: Zetsu was good at that…
According to Zetsu, Uzumakis were scattered to the wind after getting a helping hand from the other hidden villages that finally attacked Uzushio. The few Uzumakis remaining were as hunted as ever.
The young man who used to be known as Uchiha Obito knew that the Uzumakis’ demise and lack of power weren’t as true as Zetsu promised. For one, the incredibly strong Uzumaki Kushina lived, and rumor had it that other Uzumakis were scattered across the continent. However, the only other descendants of the island nation of Uzu he’d met thus far were the two orphans in Ame. Both had parents from different Uzu clans.
Uzumaki Nagato was especially powerful, but he was but a cog in the wheel to achieve perfection. He was important for now, but he’d get those eyes back when the time came.
Around three or so years ago, Obito - who sometimes went by “Tobi,” or “Mizukage-sama,” or of course Madara - learned that Uzumaki Kushina, the jinchuuriki of the most powerful nine tailed demon, was expecting a baby. He’d learned that from his nemesis and former teammate, himself, Hatake Kakashi, who’d been painfully performing his near-daily Soliloquy of Guilt at Konoha Training Ground Three’s Memorial Stone.
Ha. If only Bakashi knew that the real Obito was watching him at the time, close enough to listen, not close enough to be seen, even fooling Hatake’s sensitive nose.
Kushina had lost that child.
It was Zetsu who brought him news of Kushina’s subsequent pregnancy. One of Zetsu’s clones stuck to monitoring Kushina like a stubborn barnacle in the early days beginning nearly nine months ago, and then moved to the cave she’d be giving birth in for the past month or two. When Zetsu summoned him, saying that tonight was the night, he could’ve jumped for joy.
The old Obito would’ve grieved the loss of Kushina and “Sensei’s” children but - inside the Infinite Tsukiyomi - Kushina and Minato could have all the spawn they wanted. In dreams, Kushina could live - but today she would die. That was a shame - the loss of life always was, in theory - but her death was necessary.
In the last remaining village with seal masters, it was important to move when their demon’s seal was weakest, and when as few of those with seal expertise as possible would be present to try to delay his quest to cast the ultimate genjutsu, to achieve a perfect world.
- Obito had assured that Jiraiya was busy out in the field chasing supposedly critical nonsense.
- Senju Tsunade had, for all intents and purposes, abandoned Konoha and was out drinking her inheritance away on the other side of the country.
- Orochimaru was in Danzo’s pocket and Sarutobi was retired and out of practice.
- Lord Third might fancy himself a seal master but that’s only because the Uzumakis weren’t around anymore. The same with the others, really.
- And Danzo, who was similarly minded, wouldn’t interfere. He was too eager to take the Hokage position once Minato-sensei was either dead or too grief-stricken to lead.
Without those five, the only seal masters left in Konoha were Minato and Kushina. Minato would have his hands full with Kushina and the greatest of the tailed beasts (and me, Obito thought) - and Kushina would be weaker than she ever would be.
Waiting three additional years for this opportunity had been torture.
Zetsu had tagged along with a container for the Kyuubi tonight, cryptically mentioning that he’d be sorely tested without him. Black Zetsu had even added that today was “Tobi’s final test,” making his white half giggle.
That’s rarely a good thing…
But Obito doubted that he’d have too much trouble. He’d gotten additional years to train and plan for this moment. He’d taken over the Mizukage’s role. Mizukage Karatchi Yagura was a “perfect jinchuuriki” and yet fully under his thumb. Hell, Obito was Mizukage and he only spent time in the Mist once a month on average.It wouldn’t be wise to doubt the Hokage’s prowess but Minato-sensei had finally taken the Hokage seat that Obito once coveted. …Uchiha Obito had been a foolish child. Konoha was a cruel place. Today would prove how out of practice Minato (and Kushina) would be. Obito looked forward to testing himself against his one-time sensei.
Not so much Kushina…
Minato-sensei: the fastest man alive.
The shinobi who was too slow to save his students and so many others.
Everything was perfect. Kushina had gone into labor early but here he was, placed just as they’d planned!
It’s Go Time.
He moved silently and efficiently, slashing the throats of every ANBU and med nin present, and went tangible again, grabbing the Uzumaki newborn, swiftly placing explosive tags on the blanket covering him. He pitched his voice low like Madara. “Step away from the jinchuuriki, Hokage Minato...”
Minutes later -
Minato had just caught his son - whom the masked enemy had thrown - having flung his blanket which had been covered with exploding tags. It would’ve killed him. It would’ve killed his baby - who was crying his little heart out. “Shhh. It’s okay, Naruto.”
Kami, if he hadn’t been able to teleport, his entire family would be dead.
“What did you do?!” Remi hissed, suddenly appearing in a flash of lightning and glaring at him, her teeth bared. She shrieked when white branches - Mokuton?! - grabbed her legs, digging into her feet and climbing.
He reached for his sister-in-law but something in the ground shifted, then suddenly it was exploding upwards, almost stabbing him and Naruto - as it had Remi. It was too dangerous to be here with a baby! He teleported away so that he could properly fight. So that Naruto would be safe.
“I’m sorry, Shina,” he said sadly as he placed Naruto down in a makeshift crib in one of his safehouses. He shushed his crying, beautiful son, covering him with a blanket and patting his tummy. He was perfect; beautiful. Naruto looked like Kushina but he has blonde hair like me! Minato choked back a sob. “Don’t worry, my perfect little man. Mommy and I will be right back.” Feeling sick, he teleported away again, to his Hiraishin mark on Kushina.
.
In the meantime, Remi had yanked the wood out of her leg and feet, screaming in frustration because Mokuton and earth spikes had erupted all around her sister. And then Kushina was being dragged down, into, and through the earth! “KUSHINA!”
Remi screamed and pulled another branch out of her knee, bit herself - and within a minute or two, teleported to her sister again.
…
Someone had managed to take her far from her. That man…
“Madara” grinned maniacally behind his mask. Poor Kushina (Kushina- nee his old conscious whispered, scolding him for doing something so vile to someone who was overwhelmingly kind to him) was covered with dirt, unable to move; the center of her seal gaping hot, and wide open; the lines of the seal spreading out to cover her entire body. Her mouth was open in a silent scream. He’d teleported to Zetsu to grab her.
Zetsu assisting him hadn’t been part of the plan. But there’s no time like the present. He placed his hand on the burning center of the seal, over her abdomen. “Come out, Kyuubi!”
“I’m gonna f*cking kill you!”
He’d never admit it, but “Madara” gasped, turning intangible when machetes sliced through him. They were attached to a whirling dervish of a redheaded kunoichi who - along with her clones - was blasting him with so many attacks - and airborne seals - that he had to retreat.
Reappearing behind her, he watched as the stranger ran to the jinchuuriki.
“Oh, God, NO! —-Kushina!”
“AAAAaaaaAAH!”
…
He moved back to the Kamui dimension.
Who the f*ck was that?!
No matter. The Kyuubi is out now… She’s probably dead.
Remi had been blasted back - sent tumbling ass over teakettle and through trees - by a wave of the Kyuubi’s virulent chakra.
The fox was out.
Then she was almost nailed by its giant paws -which looked much more like clawed hands than anything cute. She should’ve been frozen with terror but had no time to think or look around: Kushina’s life was at stake. Transporting back to her sister, her skin burning like fire, Remi touched Kushi and teleported her to her nearest marker at the Senju Compound.
“Remi,” Kushina breathed, her sister’s name a nearly silent but desperate plea. Her skin was burned, too.
“Where’s the other baby, Kushina? I saw Minato had one. Was… Are they premature?”
Kushina let out a sob and the tears wouldn’t stop as she shook her head. Remi - so talented and reliable - was feeling around on her empty belly, muttering something about an absence of chakra and using a stasis seal. “It’sss… okay. The baby’s… okay…. Minato’s got… They’re,” she silently sobbed again, unable to lie to Remi any longer. It was over… She’d failed. “Minato saved him.”
Remi thought she said “them.”
Quickly, Remi assessed what she could - the babies had already been born; they were in Minato’s questionable care - and she couldn’t feel any additional chakra in Kushi’s belly. Kushina began begging her for forgiveness and Remi shook her head, figuring that she was delirious. “You’re gonna be okay, I swear to Kami.”
“No… Remi…” Her son was going to have to be raised without her, by Minato and her sister. “Listen. I have to explain...”
“Whatever it is can wait. Save your strength.” Remi unsealed and pressed a modified medical stasis seal on her sister, adding an element that lightly knocked her out before she could say more. Just for now. Gods, if she’d just gone out tonight fully armed and prepared, this situation wouldn’t be so bleak!
If Minato had just f*cking TOLD her?
That baby he was holding didn’t look premature.
Kushina had been crying. She was in so much pain. She’d had to have been terrified. She’d been dragged through the earth right after giving birth! They’d taken the Kyuubi. “Oh, Kushi,” Remi cried, shaking all over as she went through the seals she could use in her mind. As far as she could tell, Kushina still hadn’t delivered the placenta(s?) Would the stasis seal stop that? Was she right or wrong about that?! “Oh, God if I let her bite me what’ll happen? Will it seal them inside her? Will that hurt her?!”
It would hurt her. Don’t panic, she pleaded with herself.
Remi had helped deliver babies before out in the field but this was a whole other disaster. She was shuddering. “You’re gonna be okay, I swear it,” she promised again. She had planned for this! But she didn’t have a whole lot of medical knowledge - and she’d thought she’d have months to learn before Kushina gave birth! Kushina had kept putting her off about it and Remi had only read about what to expect with babies and… Panicking, she turned to Minato, her hair lashing out around her, screaming at him when he appeared and went to pick Kushina up. “Where are the babies?!”
“I’m taking her to them right now,” he said calmly, lying about there being multiples again. How was Remi back on her feet? She had blood soaking her sandals and pants but otherwise seemed fine. He snarled at her when she dashed forward and slapped a seal on him but teleported away, far more concerned with Kushina and Naruto than he was with her.
That man… He’d taken the Kyuubi. Kushina was going to die. He’d taken the Kyuubi… The beast was out…
Minato gently woke Kushina up and placed his hand on her cheek, stroking it tenderly, brushing away dirt and tears after moving Naruto to her side. Oh, God. His poor baby had cried himself to sleep.
It wasn’t supposed to be like this.
“I think… Remi?” Kushina asked breathlessly, looking around and feeling shattered. Minato must have teleported her here. She gazed down at her baby boy. “She put one of those advanced medical stasis seals on me and… I think she added something.”
Minato didn’t fully trust anything that woman did but he could hope…
“M’na… I’ll be okay for a bit. She glanced down toward her navel, feeling only pain and a unique seal that she couldn’t see. It wasn’t a lasting solution; she was going to die; but thanks to it, she might have a few days. Maybe even longer to live if I don’t use chakra. Ha.
In the distance, they could hear the Ninetails; it was making a strange, pained, inhuman sound that echoed through the night. They could also hear screaming.
Kushina let out a sad laugh, stroking her sweet baby boy’s surprisingly whiskered cheeks before looking at her husband, her eyes sad - but her voice was determined. “Go. Stop him.”
This. Mother. f*cker.
Orange Mask Guy had appeared in front of her and Remi barely had a chance to move before he went after her with a chained gunbai. She cut the chains with a sharp wind blade - but it took a while.
Thank the gods the Kyuubi was standing stock-still.
Obito was concerned. The way this kunoichi moved; the amount of chakra she had… and her hair. He’d seen old pictures of Uzumaki Kushina’s sister but this couldn’t be her! But I’m supposed to be dead, too. No, this woman was too young to be Kushina’s older sister.
He was convinced she was an Uzumaki, though. “Who are you?” he demanded to know as he went partially intangible. Twice he’d nearly hit her and she’d substituted. With air? It happened so quickly, he wouldn’t have seen it without the Sharingan.
His eye traced the chakra - her chakra - that laced the rain that had begun pouring down. Nagato’s jutsu. Swells of water whipped around his feet.
Remi slashed at him, keeping her attacks up even if they wouldn’t hit. “You can call me Death, you MONSTER.” She sunshinned behind him, twisting, slashing, stabbing, and dancing away with her blades as she fought him tooth and nail. “I’m gonna send you to Hell!”
“I’m already in hell,” he stated plainly. His eye went wide when some kind of nasty unknown jutsu came flying at him from a clone - Suiton and Futon combined, like a circular saw. He had to repeatedly turn intangible as the kunoichi’s clone wielded it around, targeting him with it via a water whip. The original redhead had protected herself with a shielding seal that she pushed out of her palm. “Impressive.”
“f*ck you!” Remi activated a gravity seal through the swirling water into the ground and layered another one in the air on top of it. It was simple; but she hoped to see what he could do about it.
The bastard had the nerve to phase right through the seals as if he were floating in mid-air! Two of Remi’s clones had been taken out in the attempt, so she took over the buzzsaw jutsu, going after him again with it.
Minato teleported in and Obito took that as his cue to leave. The kunoichi had nearly hit the Hokage with her S-class jutsu. She was dangerous.
She needed to be permanently removed from all future fields of battle.
If she was a full-blooded Uzumaki, Minato could reseal the Kyuubi into her.
And that meant he had to take her out tonight.
Leaving to begin the next part of his plan - Minato needed to be brought down and run out of chakra, too - the world warped in front of him and Obito’s eye went even wider at realizing his Mangekyo had sucked in the woman or her clone. It (or she) had dived right for him! No matter. He’d leave her in the Kamui dimension for now. Or forever. He needed to summon the Kyuubi to Konoha.
.
Remi’s clone looked around at a strange, gray, block-filled dimension. Hopefully, she’d get assistance from other clones as planned - but the job her original gave her was to explode, so explode she would. As soon as this guy (or part of his body) came back.
IF that’s how it worked…
Those intangible body parts had to go somewhere, and Deedee’s story had given Remi a clue about how to beat this asshole. She shuddered, licking or working at her trembling lips and fisting her hands, refusing to cry but terrified for Kushina and her little niece and nephew.
Minding her chakra (and remembering how Kiryu had scolded her for wasting it on the teleportation jutsu,) Remi transported back to Kushina as soon as the guy phased out. Her clone hadn’t dispelled yet and she was positive that at least one of them was sucked into who knows where from that bastard’s Sharingan.
She’d let Minato deal with the Kyuubi. Remi was PISSED but she went right back to task. At least that masked Uchiha couldn’t track her to Kushina - otherwise, she would’ve left immediately: screw battling him right now. “Kushina, have you delivered both placentas?”
Kushina looked away from Naruto dazedly. “Just um… one baby. …My perfect baby boy.”
Remi stopped, staring at her sister for a moment, fear gripping her heart, although her instincts were steering her in another direction. Still, she had to make sure she understood the situation. “Kushina, where’s your daughter?”
Kushina looked away, smiling sadly when Remi’s voice cracked as she asked her desperate but quiet question again. She felt pathetic. “I lied,” she admitted plainly, refusing to look at her big sister who’d sucked in a little breath. “We… Minato didn’t want you to know my due date!” It wasn’t fair to fully blame Minato. She’d agreed to lie, too, after all. “And because I was already so far along… We thought saying I was having twins would… I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” she mumbled, kissing Naruto.
“I see,” Remi said, trying not to sound hurt. There were more important things to deal with here but there was something she had to say in light of this new information. If she died tonight, she wanted to make sure Kushina understood. “I - I love you, Imouto: so much. And I’m sorry I was gone so long, Kushi. I’m so sorry I put you in a position where you knew you couldn’t rely on me!” Kushina looked up at her with big eyes, appearing as if she was… surprised? Remi hushed her when she tried to argue. Why? What was there to argue about? Regardless, there would be time for Remi to prostrate herself before her sister later if Remi made it through this disaster - because Kushina was going to live. “Kushina, did you deliver the placenta?”
“I don’t,” Kushina began but in the end, everything had happened so fast. “I don’t know!”
“Did your midwife um… push on your tummy after the baby was born?” she asked, trying to be patient. She could hear huge numbers of jutsus (and feel the massive amounts of chakra) being used in the distance - and shouting. The earth was shaking. It sounded like a nightmare was taking place outside and she could already see the orangish red color of fires in the distance over the nearby treeline.
The sounds took Remi back to the last battle for her home, making her head swim and her heart fill with grief. She was screaming on the beach, watching her father disappear, trying to make herself MOVE. Caught in Uncle’s chains… No, sensei, don’t…
The Kyuubi roared and Remi let out a shaky breath, shuddering but coming fully back to the present. “Um…”
Breathe out. Breath out!
She sucked in another quick breath into her already filled lungs and it was only anger that edged her back down off the precipice of a full-blown panic attack.
If I’d just known, I could’ve been there. I could’ve stopped this! Not wanting Kushina to see her cry, she raised her hand to the top of her head and pulled down her sealed Singer mask.
“I just don’t remember, Remi,” Kushina answered bleakly. And oh… She hadn’t seen that mask in a long time. Remi’s mask always “felt” different from the small matching decorative one she had that was now hanging on a wall in Naruto’s nursery. “I don’t feel like I need to push or anything now?” she asked more than said.
Kushina smiled up at her, looking so devastated it made Remi sick. Remi finally took a moment to look at Kushina’s newborn son and closed her eyes, sending welled-up tears streaming down her covered face. Kushi’s child had the fox’s whisker marks on his cheeks. This is really the Orange Ninja: Naruto.
f*ck My Life.
“I’m gonna get Yua-chan.” With a flick of her fingers, she unsealed a machete and handed it to Kushina, wrapping her sister’s cold hand around the handle securely. “Protect yourself. Otherwise, don’t move. I’ll be right back. I promise.” Without delay, she made a clone to stay with Kushi and teleported to Yugen’s marked cousin who was running through the broken streets. The Kyuubi was doing massive damage to Konoha. Remi grabbed Yua’s shoulders and swallowed hard. They almost fell down together. Remi’s feet gouged into the ground as she brought her to a halt, helping keep Yua up.
She, too, had tears running down her face and was shaking. “Taicho,” Yua sobbed, unaware of what she’d called Remi for the first time in so many years. “K- Kushina...”
“I’m taking you to her right now. I need your help in evaluating her. …Yua,” she pressed, as serious as she’d ever been about anything as she looked at her friend through her mask while clutching her shoulders. “There’s a powerful, orange-masked Uchiha who did this. There’s also someone that can use Mokuton supporting him.”
“What?!” Yua was horrified. No one could use the First Hokage’s jutsu!
Remi jerked her head in the affirmative. Yua heard right. “Don’t get killed. That’s an order!” The two kunoichis disappeared in a thunderous flash.
While Remi went wild covering the room with seals she couldn’t make heads or tails of - and after putting one of her off-the-wall defensive seals on Kushina - Yua quickly determined the placenta had been delivered. Her hands were shaking and she wiped her teary eyes while she spoke softly to Kushina, telling her she loved her; assuring her that little Naruto was perfectly okay DESPITE having been thrown. Thrown! She helped Kushina sit up so that she could better hold her son.
“All considering, I feel… okay,” Kushina lied, smiling too brightly at her family. She knew Remi and Yua knew better although hopefully, they’d never learn of how her veins, blood, and chakra system felt like a sea of fire and pain. She knew her smile didn’t reach her eyes but she would try…
Remi had rubbed some kind of solution on her wrist and arm. “You’re gonna feel a whole lot better now.” She brought her wrist to Kushina’s mouth. “No questions, young lady,” she scolded like old times, knowing Kushina might not want to listen. “You have to bite me.”
“EhhhH?!” Kushina clamped her lips tightly when Remi tried to argue then shove her arm in her mouth. Remi even tried to pop her in the jaw to get her to open it!
“What the hell, Remi?!” Yua asked.
“Neither of you can tell anyone!” Remi tried to get her stubborn sister’s mouth open but Kushina was holding her baby high and close. “I can heal you by doing this!” I hope. “-–What?! Don’t use your son as a shield!”
Kushina scarily glared at her.
“Kushi, just do it, PLEASE! My chakra can…”
Minato teleported in (sort of,) slamming into a seal that electrocuted him before Remi let him in, pulling him off the floor. “Minato…” Ah, she didn’t want him to know BUT “I’m trying to get Kushina to...”
He touched Kushina’s shoulder and the three of them disappeared.
“THAT SON OF A BITCH!” Remi roared. She started to grab Yua to take her with her, but then pulled her hands back, stepping away. She pushed up her mask so that they could see each other, eye to eye. “I’m sorry, Yua. Please… You’ve always been such a good friend to me, and as I admitted before, everything you did for Kushina I’ll never be able to repay. Just… Get back to your family and be safe.” She turned and raised her hand into the air, yanking down seals so that Yua could do just that. Then she attached a protective array seal to both of their tops. “Don’t forget the chains Yugen gifted you. Forgive me.” Remi disappeared in a flash of lightning that blew the roof out.
“NO!” Yua cried.
Had she just lost all of them?! Yua tore out of the safe house, running toward the Kyuubi, figuring Minato would be there with Kushina, Remi, and the baby.
The next few minutes were utter chaos.
Minato had summoned an altar that Remi took a machete to (then, yelling at her, he summoned another!) Kushina had used her chakra - which Remi, regretfully, shouted at her for - and just as her sister had her beautiful adamantine chains around the whole area and the Kyuubi - just as Remi was going to destroy that second alter - Orange Mask Guy appeared, going tangible halfway through the ground. Remi summoned a set of clones to fight him, then untangled a seal from her arm that brought out more elemental clones.
Her chakra (altogether) already down to less than two-thirds of what it normally was, she grabbed her other machete from where it lay next to Kushina and sunshinned after the bastard. As her blade went through him, Remi felt her earlier clone’s memories hit and the bastard coughed, clutching his gut and crying out.
Her clone inside the SOB had exploded, giving her an opening. Panicking, Orange Mask Guy tried to get away but sucked two more of her elemental clones into his eye as he did it. Remi heard a whirl of condensed chakra form behind her and ducked, Minato flying over her as he nailed Orange Mask Guy in the chest. Wood spikes went shooting up around him. Her shadow clone’s adamantine chains had shot out of the enemy’s torso at the same time. Remi grabbed Minato with her chains, flinging him back toward Kushina as her water clone dispelled, sending icy water senbons flying out of the enemy’s body, too.
Avoiding the Mokuton meant working from a distance, so Remi shot him in the masked face with a series of water bullets just as everything went insanely cold. The mask broke into pieces...
Minato had just summoned the Shinigami. He turned back to see how Remi was progressing and his eyes widened with horror. “O- Obito?! No! …Oh, God.... No.”
He moved without thought - just as Remi’s blade came down, neatly slicing Obito’s head off. Ugly, gnarled Mokuton began blooming, creeping up all around them.
“YES!” Remi cried, jumping - and planning to move to her sister.
She never saw the hit coming.
Hit in the jaw so hard she almost blacked out, Remi was thrust into Kushina’s adamantine barrier, which broke. “No,” she tried to say. She pulsed her chakra - hard - and chains erupted from her back and Remi fell to the ground. “AH!” She half-bit herself - just for a second or two; she still had to heal Kushina - forcing her broken jaw closed on her wrist. It hurt… It hurt so badly… But her clunky chains had stopped the Kyuubi. They had also somehow automatically, protectively surrounded them all in a little circle.
You did something right for a change, you stupid chains!
Kushina was saying something that she couldn’t make out and Remi crawled forward in a pained daze, needing to heal her. Lightning struck, thunder rolling ominously through the cold mist, and Remi stilled, torment hitting her hard. She took a deep breath and forced herself to turn her head toward the presence she’d just finally noted. He had a different mask on but she’d know his chakra anywhere.
“Tou-san?”
Shinigami-sama looked at her and sucked in a long, pained breath, finally stepping forward from the mist from where he’d been summoned. “Remi?"
