Chapter Text
“I need to go home.”
The blue-eyed, pink-haired thirteen year old looks at her temporary caretakers, still endlessly thankful for their hospitality over the last forty-eight hours. She tells them as much, and the old couple give her a fond smile.
“Are you sure you can find your way back without your teammates?” the man, who had introduced himself to her as Botan, says as Hanami adjusts her pack on her shoulder.
Hanami nods. “You said it’s only a few hours from here, right? Just take this pathway?”
“That’s right,” the woman, Umi, says with a nod. She double checks the girl’s pack like a doting grandmother, ensuring she has everything she will need for her journey. A couple meals neatly wrapped and bagged, some emergency medicine if she manages to hurt herself, and a couple bottles of water. She should be fine.
“Thank you again,” Hanami says with a bow, and she doesn’t realize she had lost her balance on the way back up until Botan gently grips her shoulders.
“Try to take it easy, you hit your head pretty hard back there.”
Hanami grins sheepishly. “Right, sorry.”
Hanami says her final goodbyes before turning down the worn dirt path that would lead her home.
No matter how much she had tried to rack her brain, Hanami couldn’t entirely remember how she ended up here – wherever here even is. She remembers her father, somewhat hesitantly, handing her sensei their mission scroll. It was only supposed to take a week, her father had said. At the time, she had felt he would come after them himself if it took any longer than that, but Hanami could handle herself just fine. With or without her teammates.
She would prove that to him making this journey home on her own.
The only other thing she can remember about her predicament is that she woke up in the forest with none of her teammates to be seen. Not even her sensei.
Surely Mirai-sensei would have come to look for her by now, right?
Hanami is actually quite surprised by the lack of ANBU or her father even looking for her. She doesn’t know exactly how long she’s been gone, but her gut says something definitely went terribly wrong.
Especially if her lingering headache is any indication.
Sighing, the young girl internally strengthens her resolve to get home as quickly as she can.
Her parents are probably worried sick.
Weren’t Kage summits these days supposed to be boring ?
The last eventful Kage summit Uzumaki Naruto could remember is one he hadn’t even been a part of. That had been the starting point of the Fourth Great Ninja War, and the political landscape between nations had changed much since then.
A lot had changed for Naruto in the last nearly two decades. He got married, had kids, and…
Is that really all?
They’re the important things, he supposes.
But still, the last time a Kage summit had been this much of a headache for anyone had been about twenty years ago. Since then, there had been only two other such meetings – the most recent one landing him…wherever he is.
He can’t remember much beyond his splitting headache. He remembers they were meeting to coordinate an effort towards…someone…he can’t recall, then there was a bright light, and then…
And then he woke up stuck in a tree. It had only taken him a few minutes to get down, but getting his bearings is difficult being in the thick of the woods.
So, begrudgingly, he climbs back up the tree, hoping to get a firm footing on where he is.
He vaguely recognizes this forest from above. It’s definitely somewhere in the Land of Fire, but the only other thing he can tell is that it’s early afternoon.
He plops himself down on a sturdy branch for a minute to let his head stop swimming. Surely Shikamaru will have answers for him when he gets back to the office.
So he can worry about that later, he decides, and makes his way towards what he hopes is Konoha.
When Hanami finally sees those familiar gates in the distance, her chest suddenly feels a bit lighter.
Sure, she’s worried her father may never let her go on a mission ever again, and sure, someone (probably her mother) is bound to reprimand her for getting separated from her team, but she’s just thankful to be somewhere familiar.
She really does appreciate that old couple’s kindness, but nothing beats her mother’s umeboshi riceballs and the comfort of her own bed.
She can’t wait to get home and ask her mom for some–her little brother Arashi could have whatever meals she had left over in her pack. She doubts he’d complain.
She finds herself missing the little stinker. Hanami had never been away from her family beyond her days at the academy, and even then, she saw both her brothers before and after school and her parents when she got home.
Her older brother Shinachiku would sometimes offer to train with her, even after he graduated, and he always managed to be patient even as she and Arashi made absolute fools of themselves.
Her gut twists slightly. Hanami, missing her stinky, nosy, annoying brothers?
Yeah. She does.
Like she’ll ever tell them, though.
She looks behind her at the horizon and guesses it’s probably about to be dinner time. She can’t wait to see the looks on her parents’ faces when she bursts through the door in one piece–see, she can handle herself–!
“Stop.”
Hanami stops abruptly in her tracks, blinking rapidly and turning towards the voice. It has to be one of the gate’s jounin guards, but she doesn’t recognize him at all. So she stays quiet, but attentive.
Her mother would be so proud of her for not immediately mouthing off.
“Who are you, and what brings you to Konohagakure?”
Well, she’d never been asked that before. Was this guy new or something? Born yesterday, maybe?
“Uzumaki Hanami,” she responds easily, “I’m just trying to get home, so if you’ll excuse me–”
Hanami tries to sidestep the guard, but he steps with her, blocking her path and glaring down at her. She gulps and stands back.
Come to think of it, she’s surprised neither one of her parents are running up behind them and engulfing her in bone-crushing hugs. There’s no sign of them, or her brothers.
“Maybe you should call my dad to come get me, then?”
The guard blinks in question. “Your dad?”
The girl nods and readjusts her pack on her shoulder. “Yeah, I went on a mission and got separated from my teammates and Mirai-sensei–”
The guard blinks again and regards the girl with his brows deeply furrowed. “Who is your dad, exactly?”
This guy really was born yesterday. Hanami does her best to not groan outwardly, and it comes out as a soft grumble. The guard crosses his arms in annoyance, but Hanami decides she’ll humor him.
“The Hokage?” She motions towards the monument behind him. “You know, the Sev–”
And that’s when she sees it.
One, two, three, four, five, six–
Where’s the Seventh?
“We only have six Hokages, little lady,” the guard says. Oh, she accidentally said the quiet part out loud.
Hanami tries to say something, anything, but her mouth opens and closes like a gaping fish. She stops for a second, pressing her lips together, trying to figure a way out of this.
Her grandfather is the Yellow Flash. Maybe she could outrun him.
Or–she had been trying her hand at genjutsu, and sure she failed to have the chakra control Shina does, but maybe she could give it a shot.
Channeling her grandfather sounds like a better bet though, so she spins on her heels and tries to make a break for it.
And manages to slam herself into someone much larger and taller than her.
She looks up and is surprised to see someone familiar, but they’re…younger? Than she remembers.
Weird.
“Grandpa Kakashi!”
The older man bristles at that and stares at Hanami wide-eyed, and she can’t stop herself from snickering.
Kakashi had always complained that he was okay with letting them–Hanami and her siblings–get away with that nickname while they were still little, but it stuck and none of them would ever call Kakashi anything different.
No matter how much he’d hated it.
“What’d you just call me?”
Ignoring his question, Hanami says, “Grandpa Kakashi, can you call my dad and explain this silly misunderstanding? Pretty please?” Hanami gives Kakashi her best puppy-eyes, and she knows damn well they never work, but it will never stop her from trying.
But as she expected, they fail, and Kakashi scowls behind his mask.
“I’d need to know who you are before I can do that,” Kakashi says, and something in Hanami’s chest twists.
For all of Kakashi’s aloofness, everyone knows that he had a soft spot for his former students and their children. Even through all his griping, he gave them gifts for their birthdays, their very first set of kunai once they left the academy, and–.
Whatever happened to Hanami on that mission, it had clearly, definitely, been something terrible.
“Uzumaki Hanami,” she finally answers him, quietly. She looks towards the monument again, where her father’s visage is strikingly absent. She turns back to “Kakashi,” if that even is his real name, after a minute, and schools her features like her mother had taught her.
She can feel her own lip quivering in frustration, but she does her best not to waver.
“My dad is Uzumaki Naruto.”
When Naruto finally gets to Konoha’s gates, it’s a little after dark.
He’d never tell anyone, but he did get a little lost in the forest for a bit. He had gone in circles for at least an hour before he finally got back on track.
He’s just happy he hadn’t wasted any more time. He needs to get to his office, and soon, so he can get to the bottom of whatever happened to him. And make sure no one else got hurt or went missing.
He’s surprised to find the closer he gets to the gate, the more the guards start drawing their kunai. Had something happened while he was gone?
He stops a safe distance from the gates, and each of the shinobi watch him carefully but make no sudden movements. He tries to peer between the gates, and the sights are largely familiar, but he feels unsettled.
The village looks much like it had a year or so after the Great War. Largely intact, but just down the main road there were signs of continuing repairs. He then looks to the monument, and–.
Huh.
Naruto swallows thickly. Something went terribly, terribly wrong while he was away, and he needs to be careful if he wants to get to the bottom of it.
He approaches the gates with his hands up and finally makes eye contact with a guard. Maybe they recognize him, but all of the shinobi seem largely confused.
“...Naruto?” one of them calls, and Naruto’s head pounds with the realization that he recognizes none of his own shinobi.
And none of them, at least the guards, ever called him by his first name.
“...Yes?” he tries.
The other shinobi seem to relax and withdraw their kunai. They largely still seem confused, but they allow him to get closer to the gate. He drops his hands.
“You’ll never believe what happened a couple hours ago,” one of the guards starts, but he stops suddenly once Naruto’s within a few feet of him. Naruto blinks.
“Something the matter?”
“Were you always that tall?” the guard asks, using his hand to measure the distance between the top of his own head and Naruto’s. “And–” the guard stops again, brows furrowing.
Naruto sighs. He really doesn’t have time for this, or any other distractions.
“What?”
The guard looks at one of the other shinobi, and she shrugs, then nods, like she’s confirming something. The guard looks at Naruto again then, and shrugs.
“I guess it’s nothing,” he says, and clearly he is unconvinced but Naruto says nothing. “But, uh, I guess you should know, there was a young girl looking for you–”
Had to be his daughter.
“Where’d she go?”
Maybe something really had happened while he was gone. Maybe–could someone have gotten to his family? Or–
The guard had barely said, “Hokage’s office,” before Naruto was already sprinting towards his office.
He hopes Himawari is okay, whatever had happened to her.
The oddity of the guard’s statement doesn’t even cross his mind.
Hanami’s stomach grumbled as she sat opposite Kakashi, who is currently interrogating her like she’s some sort of criminal.
If she could just have her bag back, she could shove something in her face and maybe not be so irritable.
But no, Kakashi had ordered it taken away for a search, and she was brought here.
And she didn’t need to be the Hokage’s daughter to know the room was surrounded by ANBU security.
“I’m telling you the truth!” she says for what feels like the millionth time, “why don’t you believe me?!”
“I believe you,” Kakashi says, leaning back in his chair. He crosses his arms over his chest and sighs. “Or at least, I believe that you think you’re telling the truth–”
“Just call him already, he’ll sort it out–!”
“Hanami,” Kakashi says, firmly, and even in whatever twisted situation she managed to get herself into, Hanami knows to clamp it. “There’s just a very important thing that doesn’t add up.”
Hanami blinks and tilts her head. “And what’s that?”
“Naruto,” he starts, slowly, “the man that you claim is your father, is 19 years old.”
Oh shit.
Kakashi must have seen Hanami’s face pale, because he continues, “and given that you said you’re 13–”
“Right–! Right,” Hanami says, nodding furiously. Maybe if she knocked herself out from whiplash she’ll wake up and this will all be over–
Kakashi stands from his desk then and levels with the teenager. She feels slightly dizzy from all her nodding.
Kakashi still looks weird, so trying to knock herself out clearly isn’t going to work.
“Do you really not remember what happened at all?”
“No,” she says, looking down at her fingernails and picking at them. “Papa gave Mirai-sensei the mission scroll, and we were in…Mist? Rain? I don’t remember, it was just wet and gross most of the time, and then…I–I woke up with a massive headache and this old couple found me and they took care of me.”
Kakashi hums and stands, stuffing his hands in his pockets. “I take it, you know who Yamanaka Ino is?”
Hanami nods as she peels back a layer of her fingernail. “I love Auntie Ino,” she says.
Hanami is still having trouble wrapping her head around where she’s managed to land herself, but she feels slightly comforted by just the idea of seeing another familiar face.
Even if she’s rather unsure she’ll recognize her aunt Ino at all.
Kakashi seems unsurprised by this fact. “Then we’ll pay her a visit tomorrow, see if we can unlock those memories–”
Kakashi stops short and looks up, prompting Hanami to twist in her seat towards the office door.
“Papa!”
The blond man in the doorway stops short. He looks at Kakashi before he looks at Hanami, and his face visibly pales.
Hanami, for her part, furrows her brows as she examines the blond man who looks suspiciously like her father but somehow isn’t. His hair is too short, his outfit is actually too orange, and he looks…worn down.
And then there’s Naruto, swearing on his life he’s managed to go back in time, when he was thirteen and doing anything he could to impress a pink-haired girl–
Except this girl’s eyes are blue.
His blue.
“What the fuck is going on,” Naruto finds himself asking, stunned to his core. He finally really looks at Kakashi then, and he looks—twenty years younger?
How is that possible?
And then there’s the girl who’s staring at him, blue eyes wide and questioning.
“Why are you in my office?” he asks Kakashi then, and his head is swimming with so many questions. One thing at a time, he tells himself.
“This is my office,” Kakashi says, “for now.” For some reason, Naruto believes him.
“You’re clearly Naruto,” Kakashi says, “but not the one I know.”
The fuck is that supposed to mean?
“The Naruto I know is 19,” Kakashi says. Naruto must have said the quiet part out loud. He’s normally better about that. “How old are you?”
“Thirty-nine,” Naruto says, and he sounds breathless even to his own ears. He leans against the shut door behind him as he attempts to ground himself.
“That’s how old Papa is,” the girl says, her brows still furrowed, “but you’re not him.”
“Who are you?” Naruto finally asks her, biting the inside of his cheek to brace himself for her answer.
Because whoever she is, it’s gotta be trouble.
“Uzumaki Hanami,” she says, and Naruto feels his knees nearly give out.
He and Sakura had never–not in a million–no! This—situation, this girl—all of it was entirely impossible!
Kakashi’s hands are on Naruto’s forearms then, pulling him up and keeping him steady. “What happened?” Kakashi asks as he releases his grip.
“I don’t remember much,” Naruto says, “there was a summit, and then–a bright light, and then I woke up in the forest well outside of the village.” He rubs the back of his neck then, shrugging. “No wonder I didn’t recognize anyone at the gates.”
As Hanami watches Naruto, again, if that even is his real name, she does notice that his mannerisms and her Papa’s are largely the same. He just seems…dull and worn out.
It makes her stomach twist.
“I think,” Kakashi starts, slowly, “we should find you both somewhere to stay and address this in the morning.” He looks between both of them. “I was going to have Hanami just stay with me, but since you’re here, Naruto, we should probably keep the two of you together.”
Naruto feels blindsided by that. Them? Sharing a space? He knows next to nothing about what’s really going on or the potential ramifications, but even he thinks it isn’t the smartest idea.
“I–I’m not actually her father,” he stammers, “you know that, right? I don’t think it’s best if we–”
“At least until tomorrow,” Kakashi interrupts Naruto’s rambling, “you can stay in one of the rooms we typically use for diplomats that visit the village. Sound good?”
“Can I have my bag back, please?” Hanami says as she stands from her chair, “I’m starving and tired and everything here is weird.” She looks around Kakashi’s office as she crosses her arms and begins to pace. “I just wanna go home but can’t cuz I gotta be stuck here with not-Papa and not-Grandpa Kakashi so I should at least be allowed to eat.”
Naruto can’t stop the snicker that escapes his mouth, earning him a glare from Kakashi. “Grandpa Kakashi?”
Kakashi grumbles something that sounds like a, “shut up,” and leads the displaced Uzumakis to where they will be staying.
Naruto watches Hanami as she scarfs down her late dinner. Her back is to him and he’s sitting on a cushion on the corner of the room.
There’s a burning question on the tip of his tongue, but he doesn’t want to make the girl more uncomfortable than necessary.
There’s only one person who could be Hanami’s mother but it just didn’t—
It didn’t make any sense.
“We’re gonna go see Auntie Ino tomorrow,” Hanami says quietly as she throws the remnants of her meal in the garbage. “She’s probably gonna do her weird mind jutsu thing to get to the bottom of what happened to us.”
Hanami looks at Naruto then, and he’s beginning to think it will just gut him every time.
“Not-Papa?”
“Huh?”
“Did you stop loving Mom where you’re from?”
Oh, this is dangerous territory. Naruto stays quiet for a long minute, hoping she’ll forget about it and drop it, thinking he didn’t hear her.
She doesn’t.
“Cuz if you did, you’re kinda stupid.”
He could give her that–wait–
“Do you really say stuff like that about your dad?”
“No,” Hanami says with a shrug, “just you, and you’re not really my dad. You said so yourself. So did ya?”
“Is your mother Sakura-chan?” he asks, even though the answer is clear as day. Maybe it’ll actually sink in if he gets confirmation.
Hanami nods, and he swallows thickly.
Did he actually stop loving Sakura entirely? Or did he just…bury it?
He opts for a noncommittal answer.
“I must have, at some point,” he says, “in order to, you know, get married to someone else.”
Hanami scrunches her nose in what can only be disgust. “That’s so weird.”
“Is it?” Even with verbal confirmation from Hanami, anything between him and Sakura just…isn’t adding up. Even with proof of that happening somewhere, somehow, he simply can’t believe it.
Maybe he doesn’t want to.
“Duh. That’s like … Papa not liking ramen,” she says with a grin, and Naruto is stricken by how much it feels like looking in a mirror. “And you like ramen still…right?”
“Of course I do,” Naruto says without hesitation, but he immediately pauses.
He remembers Sakura saying something about conflating his love of her with his love of ramen–or something—
Had Hanami’s Sakura said something similar and the other him and her still…?
He couldn’t imagine it, and it’s making his head hurt again. This jumbled timeline or universe or whatever is also jumbling up his brain.
“We should probably get some sleep,” he finally says after a long minute. “I don’t know if you’ve ever been subjected to Ino’s mind jutsu, but it—it can be a lot.”
Hanami lays down then, and Naruto follows suit by making himself comfortable in the corner of the room.
Hopefully Ino could provide them with some answers.