Naruto Fan Fiction ❯ A Beautiful Occurrence ❯ Two furry ears, four soft paws and nine tails! Part 1 ( Chapter 6 )

Edited by Obscure Omen.

Disclaimer: Naruto is © to Kishimoto, a Japanese mangaka.

A SasuNaru story. A slow kind.

Chapter 6: Two furry ears, four soft paws and… nine tails!

 

The sky was clear and dark that night—with stars shining brightly—but Naruto, who was lying on the cave's floor, staring at the cave's roof, couldn't see that. He was occupied with the pain in his lower abdomen. Sweat drenched him like rain, and he felt hot all over his body; he had taken off all of his clothing a few minutes ago—meaning that he was lying naked on the ground, panting.

 

Under normal circumstances, this kind of situation would never happen, except maybe that one time with Sasuke. But Naruto couldn't care less right now—he was in a lot of pain, damnit! Since that afternoon, he had been having contractions, and they got worse every time. By that night, he couldn't even stand; that was why he was lying on the ground.

 

When Kurenai-sensei told him that her delivery was painful, Naruto imagined it must have been something like how one feels when one falls off a twenty-story building and survives. However, the pain he felt now was like falling off a twenty-story building, getting crushed by a 100 kg weight immediately after—falling from the same height—and surviving, with “surviving” being the keyword here.

 

The pain was indescribable, and it hurt like no other. If he really had to describe the pain right now, all he could say was that it felt like something was using its sharp claws to rip out his belly in an attempt to break free. Or maybe—God help him!—that was not just a feeling but rather that was what really happening right now. Damn, who knew what was really inside his belly—the stupid fox wouldn't tell.

 

If this continued for a couple more hours, he might not hold out anymore and die. Was he really going to die this way? Naruto's eyes glazed with tears when that thought went through his mind.

 

If he really were to die now, it would be a very pathetic scene to see; he was sprawled on the ground, naked, spotting strange body parts and a stomach bulging with an unborn child.

 

As a shinobi, the thought of dying was not what made his eyes glaze with tears.

 

No, that was not it.

 

The thought of him leaving the world didn't faze him anymore, but the thought of what he left in the world was what made him sad—he was quite certain other shinobi felt like this too; there were so many deaths surrounding them in this line of work, so death was just an occupational hazard.

 

If he were to die now, he probably would feel regretful rather than anything else.

 

Yes, regretful.

 

And he was sure he was not the only one, too. `Cause, throughout his life, he saw it—the regret. In their eyes: during battle, during someone's last breath.

 

Most shinobi regretted it if they couldn't meet their loved ones before they died, and some people, like Sasuke—who held a deep grudge—regretted it when they died before avenging them.

 

But for Naruto—who didn't have a loved one and didn't really hold any deep grudges against anybody—his biggest regret was he didn't have his will prepared yet.

 

……

 

Right, that might sounds a tad bit ridiculous but…hey, different people, different perspectives, right?

 

Damn right!

 

Although he didn't have much to give, he had things that meant so much to him—like his sleeping cap, his hitaeate, his plants—and he wanted those things to mean something to somebody after he was gone, too.

 

That was his way of making sure people would remember him, because unlike most people, Naruto didn't have any family or relatives to remember him. Sure, he had friends, but friends couldn't be compared to family.

 

So, if he gave them his precious things, at least they would remember him when they saw them. For a person who was ignored almost all of his life, he would like it for people to remember him after he died (for a change).

 

That was his only wish. Truly, he didn't ask for much.

 

A tear slid down a whiskered cheek. Naruto was about to wipe it away when a very sharp pain—which was centered at his bloated stomach—invaded his senses.

 

He threw his head back reflexively and let out a loud growl of pain. After a few minutes of taking deep breaths in an attempt to lessen the pain, he moved a badly shaking hand to touch his stomach to find it bleeding.

 

Bleeding. From a hole. On his stomach.

 

Naruto began to panic. He was pretty sure his stomach didn't have this kind of hole before. Then, where did this hole come from?

 

Is it true that something is trying to come out from my stomach? By ripping it?

 

Another sharp pain coursed through his body before he even had time to contemplate the answers to his own questions. This time, unable to contain his pain, Naruto screamed out loud—he could feel another hole being made in his stomach.

 

Naruto tried his hardest to sit up so that he could clearly see what was really happened to his stomach; the pain had stopped for now.

 

Just as he managed to sit up, he heard a rustling noise followed by a tap-tap sound—like something walking—near him. For once during this painful ordeal, Naruto let himself take in his surroundings.

 

He was very surprised to find out that he was surrounded by foxes. The foxes were careful to keep their distance from him while still being close enough to monitor his every movement.

 

To say that he was surprised was a poor description of how Naruto was feeling right now.

 

What the hell had those foxes come to this cave for? Was it a fox tradition to watch somebody give birth?

 

That thought gave Naruto a chill—that was some twisted tradition if it was true. Not only were the foxes were watching him intently—he knew they were watching because their red eyes were focused on him, not blinking—they were standing on their fore-legs, too.

 

Naruto would consider them cute any other time, but now they looked intimidating to him.

 

So when one of them moved forward in order to get closer to him, Naruto jerked violently and knocked a water container situated beside his bed—he always kept a water container nearby so that he didn't have to get up in the middle of the night to get a drink.

 

The water soaked the blanket and made contact with his heated skin. And Naruto was startled awake.

 

Opening his eyes, he scanned his surroundings in the dark using the moonlight as an assistant.

 

No foxes—just the normal, empty cave.

 

As if he just remembered, he quickly checked his stomach.

 

No bleeding, no holes, no anything.

 

It was just a dream. That can't be true. Naruto tried to calm his erratically beating heart.

 

He had had nightmares like this ever since the Kyuubi's off-handed news about his not-so-normal-soon-to-be-born child. Initially, it occurred only once a week, but lately he had that kind of dream almost every night.

 

Only that, on any other night, the nightmares didn't wake him up. This time it seemed so real for some reason, and if not for the water knocking incident, he would still believe it was true.

 

Naruto was a bit grateful for that incident, really, but when he felt the water had soaked further into the blanket, irritation seeped in.

 

Great, now he had to dry it out in the sun, and it would take a few days before the blankets could be use again—he could even feel the wetness in between his legs.

 

……

 

Wait, that didn't sound quite right. The water in the container couldn't soak this far down into his blankets.

 

But—but there really was something wet between his legs! Tentatively, he reached down his hand to touch the wetness.

 

Uh-oh. I think I know what this is.

 

The panicked feeling came back.

 

But what should I do now?

 

That was when he felt the contraction. Naruto pinched himself to make sure this was not just another dream.

 

Uh-uh. This is for real then. I'm going to… give birth.

 

Naruto counted to ten to calm himself. He must be calm in this situation, or he might kill himself in the process.

 

Just do what the midwife said. He tried to encourage himself—he realized that talking to himself sometimes helped him in handling difficult situations.

 

Another contraction hit him.

 

Puh-puh. Puh-puh. Ergh!!! Naruto tried to push the baby out.

 

Okay, me. Try again. Push!! Erghh!!! Again! Ergh!!

 

Breathing hard, Naruto steadied himself using his elbows as anchors. Bending his head down, he looked between his legs to see the progress—he saw something!

 

Relaxing himself, Naruto tried to push again, this time with all his might because the labour process was starting to get really painful, and he would run out of energy eventually if he didn't hurry.

 

Maybe God took a pity on him, because with that last push, the baby came out fully—it came out with a momentum and skidded a few inches away from Naruto's legs.

 

Looking down at his legs, Naruto's eyes landed on his newborn baby.

 

Except that it was not a newborn baby.

 

It was a newborn fox cub.

 

He panicked for a total of two seconds and pinched himself again to confirm this was not a dream.

 

And it wasn't.

 

He cautiously bent his upper body to reach the cub, because by instinct that he felt now, if he didn't do something to the cub, it might die.

 

And, by any means, he couldn't let the cub die—he just gave birth to that thing and—and that was his child.

 

“My child,” Naruto said softly, but it echoed loudly in his mind.

 

Without any more hesitation, he picked up his child to inspect it fully; the cub was cocooned in a transparent, jelly-like substance, which looked like a balloon with a thick white wall—it was about the size of a small baby, oval-looking and slippery.

 

That was why the labour had been easy for Naruto. Lucky guy.

 

Still guided by his instinct, Naruto picked up the kunai that he always hid under his pillow and quickly pierced through the balloon—giving the cub some air to breathe. After that, he carefully peeled off the remaining jelly from the small cub and dried the rest of it with a nearby blanket.

 

Astonished by the miracle before him, Naruto seemed to forget his pain and tiredness and raised the cub closer to his face—the cub was so small, Naruto could hold it in his palms.

 

As if it knew its mother was holding it, the cub turn its head unsteadily to come closer to the familiar warmth that its mother gave off.

 

Naruto brought the cub closer still to his face and sniffed the cub tentatively.

 

“This is my child,” he said it out loud this time while touching the furry ears, stroking it gently. Carefully, he ran a finger along the spine—as gently as he could—beginning from its head to the start of its tails.

 

A bit shocked, Naruto pulled his finger away quickly.

 

“Nine tails!”

 

Naruto stared hard at the cub for awhile to take it all in.

 

“This is my child…. with furry ears, soft paws, a long nose, and nine tails,” Naruto said to himself as if to convince himself all the while touching his child softly.

 

Taking a peek. “This is my son.”

 

Naruto cried happy tears. His last sentence rang clear in his head because he knew, whatever or whoever it was—this wonderful creature that slept serenely on his palms—it was still his son.

 

And Naruto already loved it the moment he decided to keep it.

 

Naruto cried harder, the warm tears blinding his sight. He never felt like this before; the feelings of pure happiness and being scared shitless were so strong that he felt suffocated and contented at the same time.

 

Pure happiness for finally having his own family and one to call his own.

 

Scared shitless because he didn't know what would happened in the near future—could he protect his son? How should he raise it? What kind of parent would he be? And so many more insecurity issues.

 

But those thoughts he would deal with later. For now, he just wanted to savour this moment. Still stroking his son's head gently, Naruto brought it closer to his mouth and kissed it.

 

He smelled blood.

 

However, the blood smell this time was not a sign of injury or death or fighting or anything he ever associated with blood before.

 

The smell of blood this time was a sign of a new life—a new life for him to protect, to love, and to cherish.

 

The feeling of happiness was almost overwhelming for Naruto. Unable to control the overflowing emotions, he kissed his son on the head, the two furry ears, along the spine, on each of the nine tails, and on his soft paws, too.

 

Disturbed from his sleep—by all the kissing its mother had done—the cub lifted his head shakily as if to chastise the person. Naruto chuckled a little to his son's reaction. Deciding that he had enough of kissing his son—his son needed to sleep anyway—he brought the cub to his bosom to make it comfortable and helped it back to sleep.

 

A few minutes later, when the exhaustion finally settled in and his son was soundly asleep, he fell into a deep slumber himself—trusting his instincts as a mother to keep his child safe and comfortable while he was resting.

 

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His beloved alarm clock had always been his wake-up call for as long as he could remember—he had that thing since he was four years old. It was a present from the late Sandaime-sama.

 

One day, out of the blue, that old man had come to Naruto's house—personally, without his bodyguards. At first, Naruto was kind of wary towards the old man because of his mole and the ugly wrinkles on his forehead—Naruto might not confess to this, but he was afraid that the wrinkles would become alive and attack him.

 

But soon, Naruto warmed up to the nice old man, especially after he said he wanted to send Naruto to the Academy—and after he realized the wrinkles wouldn't harm him in any way! The old man also gave him an alarm clock—it crowed as its alarm!

 

“This is to make sure you will not be late for class,” that old man had said.

 

“Thanks, ji-ji!” That was Naruto's first gift, and he treasured it with all his heart (that alarm clock definitely would be in his will).

 

But now that he left Konoha—and left that alarm clock behind—his wake-up call now was the sound of the rooster crowing. A real rooster crowing.

 

Every day, he was forced to wake up early—usually at the crack of dawn—by the rooster's crow. The first morning that he was rudely woken by the rooster, he had tried to ignore it by placing a pillow over his head and hoping that the rooster would stop soon. Unfortunately for him, the rooster didn't stop until the first ray of sunlight—sometimes even after that.

 

To put it simply, his first morning as a caveman was not very refreshing.

 

Then came the second morning, which totally a repeat of the first. But for that day, Naruto had prepared himself.

 

He got himself earplugs—two pieces of cotton, to be exact.

 

Nonetheless, that didn't work either—the cotton was too thin to block the noise.

 

By the third morning, he used a different method. At the first sound of the rooster crowing, Naruto picked up a nearby pebble and readied to attack. Remembering to bring a torch along with him, he crept out of the cave to hunt the rooster; he found it on a low branch of a nearby tree.

 

Throwing with ninja accuracy, Naruto was so sure he would hit the rooster with one try. But, for some twisted reason, that blasted rooster had excellent dodging skills. It escaped Naruto's pebbles every time with an ease that left Naruto fuming inside.

 

On the fourth morning, a trap was ready for the rooster on its favourite branch. Like before, this time Naruto was very confident he would get that blasted rooster and definitely would get back his beauty sleep. Yet, when he still rudely awakened by the cries of the rooster, he knew that the rooster had successfully avoided his trap. Surely, when he peeked outside to investigate, he could see the rooster standing proudly on a nearby rock instead of its favourite branch.

 

Naruto honestly didn't know how the rooster could escape, but that didn't mean he would give up.

 

Feeling that he couldn't lose to a mere wild rooster, Naruto was set to catch it himself with his own bare hands—no more underhanded methods. So, when the day came, he used his best abilities to track down that blasted rooster; he found it just five meters away from the cave, scratching the ground for food. With all the stealth he could muster, Naruto moved closer to the rooster and tried to catch it, only to end up falling face-first on the ground.

 

As if it could sense an impending danger coming its way, the rooster leapt away from Naruto seconds before Naruto made his move, which sparked a run-and-chase game between Naruto and the rooster.

 

However, when dusk approached and he still hadn't caught that rooster, Naruto gave up—he finally realized that if the rooster didn't want to be caught, it couldn't be caught.

 

In the end—if you can't kill it, befriend it, or so he had heard—he accepted the rooster's presence and its crowing with peace. And later he found the crowing to be a welcoming wake-up call—he could wake up early, start his day early, and go to bed early.

 

Thus that became his daily routine.

 

Which made today a little bit different.

 

Why?

 

Because today he was woken by something nibbling on his nipples instead of the crowing—a gesture that was way too intimate, in Naruto's opinion. He wanted to swipe it away, but for some reason he was too tired to even lift his hand. Rather, he opened his eyes and looked at his bosom.

 

And all of the memories from last night came flooding back. He was definitely not dreaming now; he was sure of that.

 

Because it was his son who was trying to nurse some milk from his breast.

 

Too stunned to do anything, Naruto just could only look. He stayed that way until the cub finished its food and went back to sleep.

 

Only after that did Naruto realize his conditions: His privates still bleeding from the labour, his body totally naked except for the blanket covering his chest.

 

Naruto picked up the cub gently—careful not to wake it up from sleep—and put it on his pillow; he needed to sit up to scrub the blood off of his legs, and it was impossible to do that with the cub sleeping on his chest.

 

Randomly seizing a nearby blanket, he started to clean himself—his lower region still felt tender and sensitive from the labour, but he knew that the Kyuubi had done its magic because he was not in pain anymore.

 

For a moment there, he couldn't recognize the noise; it was so soft that if he didn't have ninja alert senses, he wouldn't have heard it at all.

 

It was a whimpering sound.

 

And that sound was coming from his pillow.

 

Well, not really his pillow. That sound was coming from his son, who was lying on the pillow.

 

Moving as fast as he could without hurting himself, he picked the cub back up, and immediately it stopped whimpering.

 

To test, he put back the cub on the pillow to see if it would start whimpering again.

 

It did.

 

Naruto fidgeted. Okay, now he didn't know what to do. How he was supposed to move if he had to hold his son all the time?

 

“There, there, sweetie. I'm right here. I'm not gonna leave you.”

 

That was his first time comforting someone—he felt awkward doing it—but he had to try. Moreover, he had a premonition that he would have to do more comforting in the future.

 

But, to his horror, not only did his son not stop whimpering, but now it was making some kind of distressed sound.

 

Did I do something wrong? Naruto began to panic slightly.

 

He tried patting his son's head; it didn't work.

 

Kissing his head—also didn't work.

 

For a lack of better things to do, he brought the cub back to his bosom, attempting to cuddle him.

 

The cub, sensing its mother warm milk nearby, nuzzled closer, and when it finally got the nipple, it calmed down.

 

Naruto smiled in relief.

 

That was easy.

 

His first lesson handling his child: Success.

 

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Yo! It's been a long time. So sorry; I've been busy like hell.

 

This chapter isn't finished yet; this is part one, since I figure it will take a while for me to edit the rest of chapter six, so I posted this first.

 

Many might be disappointed by this chapter because it is a bad one. I kinda lost my self-confidence in writing this.

 

But don't worry: I'll try again.

 

Jaa, happy reading—I'm still working on this chapter (it's in my notebook, actually).