"I'm going to have a baby brother or sister!" Saku was ecstatically telling everyone the news since the start of the new year, even her parents that knew to begin with. Initially Mebuki and Kizashi wanted to keep it a secret, but Saku had been working on sensing chakras ever since Minato suggested it. During her training at home she noticed the tiny flicker of a chakra that seemed so similar to her own. It also explained why her mom seemed to be getting a little fatter and more temperamental lately. After that her mom spilled the beans and nothing could stop Saku's constant excited cheering. She told everyone. Kushina-sensei and Minato-san, Itachi-san, the whole hospital, random strangers on the street that smiled and congratulated her, the library staff and basically the whole village. She even started reading parenting books and sibling stories because she had to know how to be the best sister ever.
Not even a week into the new year, while Saku ranted about what she had read in this one parenting book, Minato and Kushina dropped the bomb that they were going to have a child of their own and would like some book recommendations. To which Saku first asked if she could be his god-sister and then proceeded to recommend the parenting books her parents said where the most accurate, with their experience with her. After all it was always best to fact check with people that had real experiences when it came to these things. She wasn't allowed to tell anyone about that development, though. They both sat her down and explained the dangerous implications of the information, what with Minato being the new Hokage and everything.
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The next time she saw Itachi, she excitedly told him how she was going to be, not only a big sister but also a big god-sister to her parent's friend's kid, and how much more research she had to do. She knew she couldn't tell him who's kid, but she still had to tell someone, besides Itachi didn't know and didn't ask about those things.
"What kind of research have you been doing exactly?"
I stand corrected, guess there's a first time for everything.
"Well research on how to take care of a baby of course! I will be the best sister and god-sister in existence, so I have to know how to take care of my younger siblings. I have a list of parenting books I've been reading from the library that I've fact checked with my parent's account on myself. They don't have books on how to be a good big sister, so I'm supplementing that with novels on siblings and how they are supposed to interact."
It was quiet after that, so Saku figured he asked to be polite for once. But before they parted ways Itachi asked for the list she had made.
"Of course! It's at home right now, I can bring it to you tomorrow. Wait. Why are you interested?"
"I will be getting a younger sibling a well."
"That's amazing! Shannarō! Forget tomorrow, let's go to my place right now and get that list. Finally, someone to talk about all this stuff with."
Itachi avoided Saku for a few months after he got the information he needed. Saku was usually talkative, but when she was excited it was on a completely different level. Not to mention, her list of books was significantly extensive. She didn't notice his disappearance, though. She had more important things to worry about, like how to make sure her siblings are protected at all times.
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"Minato-san I have a question."
"Hmm?"
"What do you know about protective seals and barriers?"
Minato finished chewing his food, responding with more attention on the documents he was filling out then the actual conversation.
"Kushina should have a book or two. She should have already assigned them to you. The really powerful seals and analysis of them are kept under lock and key for emergency cases, and I can't give them to you. Why?"
"Can you teach me how to make the most powerful kind, or lead me in the right direction, or at least check my seal to make sure I don't hurt myself or someone else? I want to make a protection barrier seal for my siblings. Something that will protect them from physical attacks and malicious chakra."
"Already trying to make your own seals? It takes years to be a fuinjutsu master you know. It's not easy making seals. Why don't you ask Kushina?"
Saku frowned "Because I'm going to make a protection seal for not only my baby sister but for her and the baby too. Pay attention will you! I said 'siblings' plural. You can't tell her either! I just need to make one really good one. I'm sure I can do it if you can help me. Please?" and there were the puppy eyes that have slowly become more and more effective.
Minato couldn't help but sigh. Since his new appointment as Hokage he had been digging into Saku's history even more. He has gone back a few generations in her family but he didn't find anything significant. It didn't help that his new job also came with so much paperwork, either. He knew Saku was only a child, and she meant well, but her journal of nightmares was unsettling. That's when he remembered who was coming to town.
Smiling he told her "Ok"
Saku smiled and did a little victory dance.
"But I won't be able to help you. There are a few things I need to take care of as Hokage. Don't give me that face. I have a master that knows more about fuinjutsu than me, he's going to be in the village soon for a while, I'll introduce you."
"Alright! Yeah! Shannarō!"
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Next on her list Saku headed to the hospital. She had begged the nurses of the pediatric center to let her hang around and observe the daily proceedings of child care and birth. Saku had a large repertoire of medical text and, at this point, could fix broken bones fairly easily and with minimal chakra. But with the coming birth of her siblings, she quickly realized how much she still needed to learn about medical ninjutsu, and, more importantly, child care. The parenting books had listed may diseases and conditions that can befall newborns and young children. So she planned on getting some firsthand experience on how to care for babies. No matter how boring and gross it was at times, this was valuable experience. A least that's what she kept telling herself after a baby threw up on her shoulder.
So, she observed as a baby screamed bloody murder while the nurse changed its diaper.
Ew this is so gross! Wait is that blood?
"Ah wait! There's blood in there you should check to make sure there isn't anything around the baby that could lead to an allergic reaction."
"Shut up kid. A little blood in stool is perfectly normal and has plenty of reasons behind it that have nothing to do with allergies."
Saku frowned, but she didn't say anything more. Technically the nurse was right, but would it kill her to take some extra precaution? Infant mortality was serious business, at least that's what the books had said. But Saku knew she could just as easily be kicked out since the hospital didn't need as many extra hands as before. The annoying process of observation continued and just when Saku was ready to call it quits for the day, she saw the same child with the bloody diarrhea struggling to breath. Saku lightly touched his throat analyzing his heart rate and surrounding tissue. His throat was swollen, the tongue was too. None of the other nurses seemed to have noticed since they were handling the crying ones. She had to do something!
For the third time in her life her body moved on its own. Saku fell into steps that seemed like second nature. Using her chakra to reduce the inflammation around his throat and trying to find the cause.
"Hey what are you doing to that child!?" a nurse screamed as she pushed Saku to the side.
"He couldn't breathe, his airways are inflamed. I was using my chakra to reduce the swelling enough for him to breath while I try to find the cause of it."
"How w-" whatever the nurse was about to say was interrupted by abrupt half crying that quickly turned to wheezing. Saku remembered the blood.
"Move!" Saku encased the child in chakra with one hand as she used her other to clear his airways.
"Get the allergy expert here now!" Saku screamed.
The nurse did as she was told. It wasn't long until the head nurse came in, moving into action as well.
"Prep the clean room! You three don't just stare at the kid, help her! As for the rest of you, we could have a possible contaminate, start procedure 5 and make sure the rest of the children are stable!"
The allergy expert came in just as the baby was moved to a clean room in stable condition. The nurses had moved the reset of the newborns to an alternative location as per procedure. Saku moved back to the main room looking for broken fixtures. When that didn't help, she looked in the baby's unit searching through the blankets.
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"Is my baby ok?" a mother cried, her weirdly clad husband holding her close.
"He'll be perfectly fine. Luckily one of our interns was extra vigilant and got to him just as the major inflammation was developing." The head physician explained, the parents visibly relaxed.
"That same intern also found this in the unit where your son was, was this from either of you?"
The head physician held out a small piece of a broken chain.
"Oh! My grandmother's necklace broke during labor I didn't know it broke into multiple pieces."
"It seems this caused your son's allergic reaction. We are doing an analysis of the air in the infant main room right now to make sure."
"Can we meet the intern that noticed? We would like to give them our thanks for saving our child." The father asked his sunglasses glinting under the lights
"Unfortunately, she is out for the day, but I will pass on your message. You will be able to see your child in the clean room. Please follow the procedures my staff requests of you."
"Thank you!" the mother exclaimed.
As they left her office, Saku walked in and bowed.
"Close the door Saku-chan." she complied.
After being quizzed on the basics of child care, diseases, symptoms, cures, and a practical demonstration of chakra healing, Saku started her official internship with the pediatric section of the hospital with the opportunity to move into another section when she gained more experience.
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As promised Minato did schedule a meeting between Saku and his master Jiraiya, but he left out one very important detail.
He didn't tell me he was an old pervert! Shannarō! That's not appropriate in any way!
Saku huffed as she stomped to Minato and Kushina's house.
"Sensei, have you seen Minato-san?" Saku asked in a sweet voice.
"Ah Saku-chan! Minato should be in the living room right…Where did he go?"
It's truly a sad day when the Hokage has to use his flash technique to avoid a four-year-old, but honestly he had a lot on his plate right now.
After about an hour of trying to track Minato down Saku grudgingly found the old pervert again.
"Hello Jiraiya-san, Minato-san said I could come to you to learn about barrier and protection seals."
Jiraiya didn't seem to really register he words, barely even noticing her existence, or even look in her direction. So she pulled on his sleeve. He waved her off, too into his "research". She gave him an unimpressed look and kept bugging him.
"Go away, can't you see I'm doing some research?"
It's disturbing to hear a 50+ year old man refer to his peeking at a women's bath house as 'research'.
Well I tried to be nice.
The air got completely knocked out of Jiraiya from the punch Saku sent to his stomach. She hated perverts.
"What hell! If I was anyone else I could have been seriously injured!"
"It's your own fault, you old pervert! I know exactly how much chakra I need to use, for you to end up in the hospital so don't tempt me Shannarō."
The sound of the child's voice finally caught Jiraiya's attention. As he looked at the child, the pink hair clued him in on who she was.
Was it that time already?
Jiraiya's face formed a bored, unimpressed look.
"Oh, you're that brat that's been hanging around Minato and his wife."
She doesn't look anything like her but talk about a weird replica. That personality isn't too far off either. Even her chakra kind of resembles hers. Judging from that punch I can understand why Minato is keeping an eye on her.
Jiraiya sighed
This is going to be more trouble then it's worth.
"What do you want?"
"I want to make the most powerful protection barrier seal, that will protect a person from both physical attacks and malicious chakra, and since Minato-san is busy he told me to go to you."
Jiraiya raised an eyebrow "What makes you think you're ready to make your own seals? You don't even look tall enough to be in the academy."
"I've been learning all about fuinjutsu from Kushina-sensei herself. Most of the basic set up is pretty simple. I've read all the books in Sensei's and Minato-san personal library about the art of sealing, but I need a master to, at the very least, look over my seals. If you could take a look at my notes and give me pointers on how to make the whole thing more chakra efficient, while still being sturdy enough to deflect most attacks, that would be a good start."
"Why don't you go ask your Sensei, she taught you everything you know, didn't she?" Saku blushed
"I can't."
"And why's that?"
"You can't tell her! It's for her! I want to surprise her with the completed array and then if she thinks it's good enough maybe she'll use it."
"A protection barrier seal? Why would she need that?" Jiraiya asked, there was nothing about the child that seems wrong, but he couldn't help but feel a level of suspicion, or maybe it was apprehension, about her wanting to make something even as nonthreatening as a protection barrier seal for Kushina. It doesn't take much to make something dangerous after all.
"Sensei and Minato-san are really strong right? So that means they have a lot of enemies. I want to be able to help. As a thank you for everything they've done for me. Even if this ends up being useless, if it's used even once for their benefit, it'll be worth it." Jiraiya sighed in faked exasperation.
"If I do this will you leave me alone?"
"I'll leave you alone when I have a working seal."
Jiraiya sighed again.
"Fine then, where are your notes?"
"Oh, they're at home"
"You don't keep them on you?"
Saku shook her head.
"I don't want anything bad to happen to them, last time I lost some notes to the wind and a river."
"Why don't you use storage scrolls? You said you understood sealing, right? Shouldn't be too hard to make a storage seal."
Saku shook her head again.
"I have made a few storage scrolls already, like the one for my lunch, but I don't have the best reserves to be able to constantly store and retrieve that many notes. To increase how much chakra I can output, I'm constantly using chakra and physically exerting myself so that I'm at the state before chakra exhaustion. Then I use meditation before bed to increase my storage capacity. But because of this I don't always have the minimal chakra needed to open and reseal more than a few storage seals. It's really frustrating when I want to look through my notes and I can't even get a hold of them. I have some sequences that I can add that would reduce the amount of chakra needed to open a storage seal, but Kushina-sensei has been too busy to really go over that stuff with me."
"Is that right?" Jiraiya didn't believe her for a second. The amount of chakra needed for a simple space conversion of one little journal of notes is almost nothing.
Saku pouted hearing the disbelief in his words.
"It is!"
She preceded to drag the old man to her house where she showed him a wall full of thick journals full of messy pages. They almost looked like encyclopedias.
"These five are the sealing notes I made from what sensei had me read. These other two detail what I have planned for the main body of the protection barrier seal as well as a few other seals I've wanted to try out."
"Wait, then what's the rest of this?"
Saku looked confused until Jiraiya motioned to the rest of the bookshelf.
"Oh, mostly my medical notes with a few borrowed books here and there. I like keeping references at hand. So, like I was saying before, I need you to look over these."
Jiraiya took the journal only for some pages to fall out.
"Hey be careful! I don't always have all the space I need in those, so I like to draw out the final seals in bigger paper and then fold them into there. They're also good bookmarks"
Saku took the journal back picking up the missing pages and putting them back in the journal, before opening it to the parts she wanted him to see.
"Let's start here. Since we were talking about storage seals before. This is a big part of how I want the barrier to work. I wanted to make the amount of chakra needed to activate it small enough for a baby to be able to trigger no matter how big or strong the physical danger, of course physics and dimensional-space jutsu just don't work that way. So, I made this."
Saku turned the page
"This sequence will store chakra, the capacity being equal to the amount needed to activate the seal about 300 times, but the real kicker comes in this part. I have two copies here. This one just grabs a minimal amount of chakra from the user and directs it to the chakra seal periodically. The more chakra needed for the seal and the smaller the reserves, the longer it takes to reload. And obviously the larger the reserves the faster it reloads. In a case where they need to activate the seal anyway, the stored chakra can still be used but the user has to compensate for what's missing. I used this symbol here to redirect chakra into the chakra store if too much chakra was channeled in when activated. Of course I can't really expect a baby to have the reserves for this so I was thinking of some how havinga a shared location for the chakra reserves. That way I can put my own chakra there. I'm still working out kinks for how that will work. And I have to figure out an auto activation methodology since babies can't be expected to know how to activate the barrier."
"I thought you said that this was for your Sensei, why are you mentioning a baby's chakra capabilities when you obviously aren't talking about yourself."
Jiraiya couldn't help himself. He knew they had told Saku about the baby, a huge secret entrusted to a child of all people. He couldn't help but worry.
"Oh...Um that's cause it's more efficient that way. Sorry, with my own baby sister on the way and my shifts at the pediatric center, I've kinda had baby on the brain lately."
Jiraiya chuckled under his breath.
Nice save kid.
"Oh and I also have this"
She brought out a folded sheet that she opened on the floor.
"This sequence should draw in natural energy from the environment as well as a user's own chakra, balancing the two out so that total chakra input from the user is half the amount needed to activate the seal. Again, the user's reserves determine the rate of the reload but in this case, you only need half of what you would need. I've been trying to find a way to alternate the ratios within the lattice structure so that a user would only have to input 25% of the total chakra needed with 75% being natural energy but it doesn't seem to work out no matter how many times I do the math."
Well this was unexpected
"Hey brat do you know senjutsu?"
"No. What's that? Wait why are you changing the subject?"
"This won't work." He pointed to the seal laid out on the floor. Saku pouted.
"Combining natural energy with one's self is senjutsu. This lattice only accounts for natural and spiritual energy, as it is the person could turn into a tree. To use natural energy there has to be a balance between spiritual, physical, and natural energies. What that ratio needs to be varies from person to person, so while you could make seals that help accumulate natural energy they would have to be custom built for each person and not even a sage could tell you what ratios would fit a person just by looking at them. I suggest you stick with your first idea of a shared chakra reserve, don't mess with natural energy until you become a sage."
Saku was dishearten. There went the basis for some of the stuff she planned to do with natural energy.
"Don't look so down kid, it takes years for some to even reach what you made here, so you're not doing too bad for yourself. As for your seal, you made a few errors in this lattic structure, as it stands this will take too much chakra from a person."
Jiraiya ruffled her hair and gave her a smile. The kid was bright, she a lot of potential, and her heart seemed to be in the right place. By all of her notes it was obvious she worked hard to get to where she is. She definitely fit the bill for an autodidact. Saku smiled too.
The more he interacted with her, the more it seemed that she was just a special child. He had read into the file Minato gave him. Her parents are average, her father only a genin. Her family was nothing special, but she isn't the first child he met that was born special from seemingly normal roots.
"Ok I think I got this figured out. Say, Jiraiya-san how would I learn senjutsu?"
"Well you either need to be really smart or learn from other sages."
"Do you know any sages?"
"Why of course your staring at one of them now."
"I guess I can figure it out on my own."
"Hey!"
Before he knew it Jiraiya spent the larger part of his day talking about seals with a kid.
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Saku spent the next day explaining the rest of her theories to Jiraiya. She even showed him all the seals she had put together (most where just optimized version of simple storage or transportation seals). Jiraiya gave her the go ahead for some of the ones he couldn't find any fault in.
The day after that Saku tried them out at a clearing while Jiraiya wrote down the errors he found in the rest of the journal. Overall Jiraiya was proud of the munchkin. Seemed Minato wasn't downplaying her abilities when he talked about the third genius in the village. She has a good work ethic to boot. And an uncanny similarity to Tsunade and Kushina for some reason.
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"Keep that munchkin on your good side."
"I take you approve of Saku-chan. Of course, it's expected since she's my apprentice."
Minato laughed. Kushina loved to brag about her sometimes. To both of them, the little girl had become something like a daughter in the time they've known her, despite his suspicions and worries about her.
Once Kushina went to bed Jiraiya and Minato had a chat in one of the extra rooms.
"She's well on her way to becoming dangerous, keep an eye on her." Jiraiya warned. Minato nodded as he took a drink of water.
"I've been trying to. Just in case, I used my recent Hokage privileges to do some extensive background checks on both Saku and the incident she was in. Speaking of, did you check what I gave you?"
"Madara Uchiha's, no doubt about it, think she saw or read it somewhere?"
"I've had people look over it, she wouldn't know the exact shape of his sharingan from a book. She also knew Obito's, and Kakashi swears he's never her before."
"She knew about Kushina and the fox as well, at least some part of her subconscious did, even down to the chakra chains. The dream is dated days before you met her, isn't it?"
Minato nodded, he suddenly became serious.
"There's one more thing. She predicted Obito's death."
Jiraiya was silent.
Minato dreaded saying what we had to say next but he knew he had to.
"Is it safe to assume that those dreams aren't just regular dreams and she has some kind of newly developed kekkei genkai? Or do you think she's being manipulated in some way? After all she doesn't start to write down her dreams until after the incident. Even though she says that she had them before that, there's nothing confirming that besides her parents who could likely be lying or manipulated as well, they're too close to her."
"Manipulation wouldn't be too far fetched, after all neither of those sharingan were ever fully recovered, and during times of war it isn't hard to lose track of a child. She also faced off against some high level Iwa shinobi during that incident. She could easily have been overpowered and manipulated in the time she was exposed to them, before the Anbu came around. But, I also wouldn't be surprised if it was some kind of weird kekkei genkai, wouldn't be the first time I've come across something like this in my travels. More often then not they tend to develop under stress and extreme conditions. The incident fits the bill for that."
Minato rubbed his face. It hasn't been long since he took the mantel of Hokage and already there's so much to worry about and consider. The most dreadful being identifying threats even if they are people close to him.
"I have hospital records, personal accounts with her parents, as well as her own account that she's had nightmares since about the time she was born. I've kept close watch and haven't seen anything out of place. Although she has more chakra than a regular kid, there's hospital accounts showing her coils developed early and she does enough meditation and physical training for her reserves to make sense. After the Iwa incident, an Anbu has kept his eye on her but even he admits that she's fairly normal for a regular genius. If she was a daughter of a clan or there hadn't been that encounter with the Iwa shinobi she wouldn't raise so many red flags. Plus there's the fact that she knew things that she couldn't possibly know, like Obito."
"So, you think this could be a kekkei genkai?"
"I can only hope. It's the only thing that makes sense. If it is, it could be a huge asset to the village."
"You should have Inoichi take a look at her head just in case."
"I'm not going to subject a child to interrogation methods just after a war."
"It's only peaceful until something happens. How can you guarantee that she won't use everything she's learned so far against the village?"
"I can't, but my instincts are telling me that she won't. She looks like a child but sometimes I forget that she is."
"Are you sure this isn't you growing fond of the child rather than your instincts?"
Minato could only sigh "I don't know."
Jiraiya smacked his shoulder
"Don't look so glum, I'm playing devil's advocate. I'm sure eventually, you'll figure it out. After all you still have time. Which reminds me, Congratulations! it's about time you knocked up that red head." Minato turned a deep shade of red.
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"She's going to be born soon! She's going to be born soon! Oh, I'm so excited!"
"Settle down now. You don't even know if it's a girl or not." Kushina laughed at Saku's antics. It took a few minutes before the four-year-old finally stopped hopping around like a bunny.
"Just because Mama and Papa want it to be a surprise for themselves doesn't mean I can't cheat, as long as I don't tell them. I've gotten good at identifying it from a distance at the pediatric ward and she's definitely a girl!"
Kushina just laughed.
"So does your baby sister have a name yet?"
Saku pouted
"Not yet. Mama and Papa wanted to name her after she's born in case she's actually a boy, but since she's supposed to come out around my birthday I get first picks for the name!"
"Dattebane! I should probably start coming up with names of my own huh?"
"I'm sure you and Minato-san will have the perfect name!"
Kushina nodded and smiled "Right. But first back to your fuinjutsu practice. Oh I forgot to ask how's the earth jutsu from that scroll we gave you coming along?"
"Really well! I almost have it down I can manipulate earth that's about 3 inches below us without upsetting the topsoil, but my range is really bad."
Kushina nodded "Don't worry about the range right now. Your control is really good, the range is more dependent on your reserves which you're steadily growing. This is a lot of development!"
Saku smiled.
After her lessons with Kushina, in which she was taught new sequences for storing chakra, she headed home. Along the way saw Jiraiya by the bathhouse again. Saku did the most logical thing she could think to do.
She kicked him in the face.
"Would you stop peeping you pervert!"
"You insufferable brat! Would you stop doing that!"
"When you stop being a pervert. I don't care if you're a sage and my elder or not, that's not something you should be doing! Hey, wait where are you going?"
"Away from here obviously. You've already blown my cover with all the yelling, I have to escape at some point."
"What!? Hey, wait, I'm not done with you!"
When Saku did catch up to him they were already pretty deep in a nearby forest.
"Wait that reminds me, can you check over this barrier seal? My baby sister will be born soon I want to have a preliminary seal ready by then."
Saku gave him a paper she had folded up in an inner pocket of her shirt.
Jiraiya looked over it only to give her a strange look.
"So this is your final lattice, using sister seals huh?"
Saku smiled so wide her eyes closed
"Isn't it clever? Not only as a good joke but it works really well. Since the whole natural energy thing went out the window and I have to be able to not only activate but also funnel chakra into the seal since she's just a baby, I figured these kinds of sister seals would be the easiest way. I would just be doing all the heavy lifting and then all the benefits fall to my baby sister. It also helps me with training since I'm constantly using up that chakra anyway. Now it gets put to good use. I also added a similar lattice premise that Minato-san uses for his transportation seals just in case she accidentally gets lost or gets in trouble, then I can always be there."
Jiraiya nodded "Not a bad. I don't see any errors in this nor should there be any issues in practice but what happened to making a seal even a baby could activate?"
Saku rubbed the back of her head
"Well I'm still kind of working on that. Trying to make a sequence that activates according to specific circumstances is a little difficult. I can't rely on distress and chakra responses very well since it's a baby, so I have to have a seal that senses its environment and that's kind of difficult. I'll hopefully have something ready by...sometime soon."
"Are you giving the new seal to Minato and Kushina's child rather than your own sister?"
Saku gave him a confused face.
"Oh you know...Of course, I was planning to make them for both of them, but I won't be able to maintain two seals of that magnitude. so I plan to hand it off to Sensei and Minato-san as a gift. I wish I had it all figured out already, but this first one should be fine for my baby sister. I'll test out the improved one after getting your approval, but my family isn't as high profile, we don't really have any enemies that would need too powerful of a seal. That can change any time but for now I guess it is more for Minato and Sensei."
"Well, I guess you have your hands full so stop getting in the way of my research you midget."
"When you stop being a pervy old geezer!"
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The day Saku turned five was also the day her baby sister came into the world.
"Sakura!" Kizashi and Mebuki looked a Saku as they held the infant.
"He hair is pink, so her name should be Sakura like the cherry blossoms!"
Kizashi laugh "Well I guess it is a fitting name."
"You both are joking right?"
"You already denied me when Saku was born. I always wanted her name to be Sakura."
"It was a bad omen since the there weren't any cherry blossoms that spring!"
"But Mama that was then! There's cherry blossoms falling outside right now."
Mebuki turned around to face the window at her back.
"Would you look at that. How did I miss that?"
"You were in labor and making papa promise this would never happen again."
Mebuki barely felt the birth and pregnancy of Saku. She didn't even look pregnant. It wasn't until labor that Mebuki went to the hospital to find out she's giving birth. This pregnancy though was 100% different, with all the horrible things they tell you in those parenting books.
"You both are dead set on Sakura, aren't you?"
The two nodded vigorously. Mebuki could only sign.
"Ok. You win. Welcome home Sakura"
With that Sakura let out a big cry.
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"Saku-chan are you ok?"
Kushina patted Saku's head as she slumped against the table in her and Minato's living room. Kushina expected her there for training as always but this is the first time she's seen Saku so, well, 'dead on her feet'.
"Hmm? Oh sensei. Mmokay, Sakura-chan just cries a lot." Kushina giggled.
"Keeping you up at night?"
Saku nodded.
"She cries a lot when I'm home. Mama said that it's just a coincidence I'm always around when she cries her loudest, but I think Sakura-chan just hates my guts."
Kushina frowns. "I'm sure that's not true!"
"She hates me cause I'm the one that suggested calling her Sakura. She doesn't like dad that much either her favorite is always mom, it has to be because of the name!"
"She's a baby. I'm sure you're just exaggerating."
"I'll beg for forgiveness when I get home today." Saku mumbles under her breath.
"What was that?"
Saku straightens.
"Ah, nothing sensei! How about I show you my progress with the earth jutsu?"
"I thought you already had it down? Weren't we going to do target practice?"
"But my range has increase by twice the amount! And I wanted to show you part of those seals I've been working on. The old perv- I mean Jiraiya-san has been looking over my work and I want a second opinion haha."
"Well ok then."
I'm sorry sensei, Minato promised me unlimited access to some restricted medical journals if I keep you from doing anything dangerous.
"By the way Saku-chan?"
"Hmm?"
"I hear from your mom that…um…your spending more time than normal in the hospital." Saku nodded
"The nurses there are helping me progress in my medical training."
"So…What have you learned, just out of curiosity?" Saku looked over with a raised eyebrow "What are you getting at Sensei?"
Kushina sighed "Ok, so you know how I visited when Sakura-chan was born?" Saku nodded.
"Well I asked your mother for some tips you know? I'm a new mother an all. Honestly she terrified me!" Saku nodded that's understandable.
"But she also told me that you happened to be learning a lot of stuff even she didn't know at the hospital?"
Saku nodded "Yeah. Ever since I knew about Sakura-chan and my future god-sibling I've been there more often to learn about pediatrics and medical ninjutsu. I'm set to be transferred to general in a few months though. Is something wrong?"
Kushina shook her head "No nothing is wrong but well I don't trust the people at the hospital to do a chakra check for me, so I was wondering if you could?"
"I don't think I'd be the most qualified to do that sensei, you should see a professional."
"Please, please, Saku-chan! I know you can do it! I just want to know if it's a boy or a girl and what their chakra nature is!"
"Sensei it's no fun if you know the gender. Although if you really what to know, it feels like it's a boy. But it's a bit too early to really tell." Saku winked
"As for affinity, based on what you and Minato-san are proficient in, their chakra is most likely going to have a wind affinity."
Kushina pouted
"But you don't know that for sure! Come on just a little peak? I want to know more about them."
Saku smiled sadly "Sorry sensei but I don't trust myself enough to do that. Besides once they're actually born you'll learn a little too much about them. Trust me."
Kushina pouted. "Then I guess training will have to wait today!"
Saku nodded "Ok. I'll see you later then sensei."
"Ah wait!" too late Saku was already gone.
Kushina frowned Why did Minato have to teach her that? I'm going to give him a piece of my mind!
Saku sighed from a nearby tree. Sorry Sensei. My chakra hasn't been the easiest to control since Sakura-chan was born. I need some sleep.
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As Saku dragged herself in the direction of her home, she barely made some of her leaps. Her chakra control needing more focus than usual. As she tried clearing a big gap between a rooftop and a wall her chakra momentarily wavered casing her to land head first into someone's back.
"Ow…I'm sorry" Saku got off the poor boy and helped him up "…Oh hi Itachi-san I haven't seen you in a while."
Without even thinking she was already extending her green clad hand to heal the scratches on his face and damage to his back only for her to realize what she was doing and quickly pull her hand back.
"Ah sorry. My chakra's been weird lately. I haven't been getting much sleep recently because of Sakura-chan. Oh I didn't tell you, Sakura is my baby sister. Sakura-chan was born the same day I was, isn't that weird?"
"You look dead."
Saku cringed I know but you didn't have to say it so bluntly SHANARO!
With a twitching eyebrow her voice very sarcastically said "Well I guess not all of us are as well prepared for the screaming nights of their siblings now are they. By the way how's your sibling?"
"He's going to be born sometime in July."
Saku nodded then yawned. "I think I should still be in pediatrics till mid August. If I'm still around I'll make sure your family gets the special treatment." She winked and then yawned again.
"Well I'm going to beg Sakura-chan for forgiveness and hope she'll let me take a nap. Thanks for breaking my fall. Get the injures checked out if it hurts for more than a week." Itachi raised a brow but Saku was already walking her way up the wall.
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As expected the minute she opens the door Sakura's shrill crying is heard.
"Saku-chan are you back?"
"Yes mama!" Mebuki shows up with the crying Sakura in her arms, quickly handing her off to Saku.
"Can you watch over Sakura-chan? There's a sale at the market I can't miss today. Thank you! Mama loves you both."
Sakura continues screaming. Saku holds her close, rocking her a little, despite the damage to her eardrums.
"There, there, Sakura-chan." Sakura cries louder.
"I'm sorry I named you Sakura. I humbly apologize for giving you such an appalling name. Please accept my apology, please Sakura."
Surprisingly that worked. When Saku looks down at her hands she noticed the child staring up at her.
"Everything ok Sakura-chan?" the baby seemed about ready to cry again.
"I'm sorry! I'm sorry! Um what's wrong? What do you want?" Without really thinking about it Saku started doing a chakra check, which turned out to be completely useless. As she fumbled about looking for Sakura's bottle, Saku ended up touching the full diaper "Oh, her diaper is full." Oh, gross I have to change it.
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Everything turned out smoothly after that. They even napped together, by the time Mebuki was back the two were laughing and playing without a care in the world.
"I'm back! How was everything?"
"Surprisingly well Mama. I begged forgiveness for naming her Sakura, she pooped, and she hasn't cried since!"
"See Saku-chan I told you it was a coincidence. She was just constipated and was a little cranky since she hadn't pooped in a while. You and papa are just never around long enough to deal with the diapers"
That was very true. Saku had enough of that at the hospital. She will never doubt her mother's wisdom again.
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Spring had brought a lot of changes for Saku but new changes were yet to come. She was especially excited about moving out of pediatric in August. Not that she didn't love the babies, and sure, it was a good challenge figuring out what was wrong with them half the time. But she had enough of the crying and diapers. She actually had enough of it a few days after Sakura was born. While working at the pediatric branch Saku's mainly kept in the back. The Director made it clear that the parents are not to see her, since they could freak out. It wasn't horrible though. The back is where all the important stuff happens, but with the move to general she'll be able to do a lot more than she had been doing. Her experience at pediatrics also came with a few unexpected benefits. For one, she has gotten really good at being a fully functioning human with only 4 hours of sleep. Her chakra hasn't acted out since the time she fell on Itachi, in fact, its gotten much easier to control now. She's also found she can do most basic medical diagnostics and healing without much thought. With how often she's been doing the same thing in the hospital for what seems like years, Saku figured it was about time she moved to bigger things, or in this case people.
When Sakura turned a month old and Saku was beyond certain that nothing would go wrong, Saku applied the sister seal protection barrier lattice that Jiraiya had approved of. All in all, it has been working perfectly, and has come in handy a lot more than she expected. More often than not, it's been used to find Sakura or protect her from falling objects. The sleep deprivation was really starting to get to her dad. Her parents keep singing her praises about the seal, and even Kushin-sensei keeps asking for one of her own. Saku eventually had to ruin the surprise and tell her about the other seal she's been working on with Jiraiya. Kushina was so touched she started crying. It ended up working out though, since Jiraiya had to leave again soon. Saku's confident that she'll get the seal working before he leaves, but honestly she desperately wanted to talk to her Sensei about the seal. Kushina-sensei always provided a prospective that not even Jiraiya would think of.
In other news, Saku recently started sparing with Itachi. It was a natural development since he's been more high strung than usual and she can't full out spar with Kushina-sensei since the slight nuances caused by the baby's chakra keep distracting them both. The first time they sparred both Itachi and Saku went all out and caused some destruction by the river.
"Your more gentle than I'd thought you'd be. Were you underestimating me?"
Saku couldn't help but grumble as she laid on the ground panting. She was slightly mad. While she went all out right from the get go, Itachi didn't get serious until she didn't give him a choice with a chakra punch.
Itachi shook his head
Not at all...
He thought panting. He was exhausted but he covered it up by drinking some water.
"Your more aggressive than I'd thought you'd be. What would you have done if I hadn't dodged your punch?"
Saku got up and took her water bottle back to take a drink herself.
"I would have stopped the chakra flow, or redirected it. You should know by now not to underestimate me. Sparing is to get better, not to hold yourself back."
"Where did you learn that?"
"Learn what? The chakra punch?"
Itachi nodded.
"...When shinobi-san died, I almost died too. It was a fluke but when a bolder came my way, I just did it. It took a while to remember and even longer to get it working without hurting myself."
"How does it work?"
"Have you ever used chakra to keep a leaf on you?"
He nods again.
"It's like that, and like tree climbing and water walking." Saku got up and turned towards a tree motioning for Itachi to follow.
"Just like in all those examples, a chakra punch does the same thing. You concentrate a specific amount of chakra to a part of your body, the only difference is the amount and the distribution. For a leaf you don't have to use much and the distribution only really plays a factor if you want to be chakra efficient, but it's just a leaf so it doesn't take much to make it stick to you anyway. Distribution matters more when it comes to tree or water walking, since you're holding up your own weight."
Saku demonstrated walking up a tree.
"Solid surfaces need an even distribution of chakra, for the most part. Water on the other hand is too fluid, so that one requires uneven and ever changing distributions so as to make a flow. Both require as much chakra as it takes to support your weight."
Saku got down from the tree.
"A chakra punch is something in between. I use the chakra to increase the force and momentum of my punch. You need enough to break a tree but if you use too much you could hurt yourself. Distribution is a little more tricky here, but for the most part you want to direct the chakra to your muscles to optimize a motion. Like this"
Saku demonstrated in slow motion flaring her chakra as she did so.
"Eventually with enough practice you can do this..."
Saku punched an outlaying tree, knocking it down completely.
"I wouldn't recommend trying this right away though. The human body is pretty delicate so you have to be careful. How well can you walk up a tree or on water?"
"I haven't tried."
Saku cocked her head. For some reason Itachi struck her as the type that would already know this and more. Saku shrugged.
"You can try now. There's plenty of trees. If you fall I'll catch you."
Itachi nodded. Keeping what Saku said in mind he placed one foot on the tree. When he felt it was stable he tried the other. Before he knew it, he was halfway up the tree.
"I thought you said you've never done this before."
"I haven't."
Saku's face screamed disbelief.
Yeah right.
She knew he wasn't lying though. Itachi isn't the best at it.
"Want to try water walking then?"
Itachi nodded and they went back towards the river. At least this time Saku was more likely to believe he's never done this before, after he keep falling ankle deep in river water. Saku giggled a bit, it was funny seeing Itachi not be innately good at something for once. She helped him out though.
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The more they met to spar, the more it became obvious how different their combat styles were. Saku was better skilled at using her chakra to her advantage, while Itachi had more physical combat experience and practice. He often over powered her when it was just taijustu sparing, but she won every other time. Together Saku's taijustu and aim got leagues better, while Itachi soaked up everything that Saku taught him, from chakra enhanced strength to basic ninjutsu like cloning and transformations. He wasn't the best at medical ninjustu though, no matter how hard he tried. It depressed him a little.
"Medical Ninjutsu take a lot of time and studying, you can't expect to be able to do some of the stuff right away, so don't get discouraged ok?"
"Your one to talk."
"I have a good reason to be discouraged! I takes me weeks to do things you've learned in the span of a day or two. Why wouldn't I be discouraged?"
Itachi looked at her with a raised eyebrow. He didn't believe her.
"Your not much older than I am."
"I meet shinobi-san when I was three, I turned five this past March. I've been training since he died. I've had close to two years. Besides medical ninjutsu, you're already where I am now in everything else. It won't take long for you to be better than me."
Saku's eyes dimmed a bit, but just as soon as the expression came to her, it left.
"Wait. I'm older than you?"
Itachi nodded.
"How did you know I was older? I never told you my birthday."
"When you fell on me."
"Oh that's right I told you Sakura and I have the same birthday. So wait how old are you?"
"I'll be five in June."
Saku nodded. "That's coming up soon. What day?"
"9th."
Saku nodded again. Itachi stared, but Saku's expression gave nothing away, and soon enough sparing continued.