Naruto: The Rise of Kurama

Chapter 85 85: Eve

Kushina couldn't sleep.

She'd tried for over an hour, lying in the darkness of her quarters while the baby shifted restlessly inside her. The child seemed to share her mood- too alert, too aware of something coming. Tomorrow she would stand before her clan and bind herself to Kurama in the old way, the Uzumaki way, and nothing would ever be the same.

Not that anything had been the same for a long time now.

She gave up on rest and slipped out into the night, padding barefoot along the mossy paths of Mount Myōboku. The mountain never truly slept- bioluminescent fungi cast soft blue and green light across the landscape, and somewhere in the distance she could hear the deep croaking of elder toads conducting whatever rituals they performed in the small hours.

The air was thick with natural energy, pressing against her skin like warm water. She'd grown used to the sensation over the past weeks, learned to let it flow around her rather than fighting it. The toads said she had an unusual affinity for sage chakra, which made sense given her history. She'd been absorbing strange energies her whole life.

Her feet carried her to a cliff overlooking one of the sacred pools, a spot she'd found during her first days here. The view was strange and beautiful- twisted trees with glowing bark, waterfalls that seemed to fall upward in places, the vast bulk of Mount Myōboku rising against a star-filled sky. Nothing like Uzushio. Nothing like anywhere she'd ever been.

She sat on a flat stone at the cliff's edge and let her legs dangle over the drop. The baby kicked, and she pressed her palm against the movement.

"You should be sleeping," Kurama said from behind her.

She didn't turn. She'd felt him coming before he spoke- the familiar warmth of his chakra approaching through their bond. "So should you."

"I don't sleep." He materialized beside her in his human form, settling onto the stone with the fluid grace that still caught her off guard sometimes. In the soft glow of the fungi, his features looked almost gentle- the sharp angles of his face softened, his fox ears relaxed against his hair. "Not the way humans do, anyway. I rest, but it's not the same thing."

"What's the difference?"

"Sleep is vulnerability." He stretched his legs out beside hers, nine tails fanning across the stone behind them. "What I do is more like... withdrawing. Pulling back from the world while remaining aware of it. I can still sense threats, and react if needed."

"That sounds exhausting. Never actually letting go."

"I've had a thousand years to get used to it." He glanced at her sidelong. "What's keeping you awake?"

Kushina considered the question. There were easy answers- nerves about the wedding, worry about Madara, or the physical discomfort of pregnancy. All true, none complete.

"I keep thinking about how I got here," she said finally. "Not just Mount Myōboku, but everything. Uzushio, Konoha, the seal." She looked at him. "You."

"Having regrets?"

"No." The answer came without hesitation. "I'm just trying to understand it. How an eight-year-old girl who could barely control her own chakra ended up here, about to marry a thousand-year-old demon fox and carry his child." She laughed quietly, without much humor. "It sounds insane when I say it out loud."

"Most great things do." Kurama's voice was thoughtful. "The first Sage of Six Paths sounded insane when he talked about chakra. The founders of the hidden villages sounded insane when they proposed peace between warring clans. To accomplish anything, you have to push boundaries."

"Is that supposed to be comforting?"

"It's supposed to be true."

They sat in silence for a while, watching the strange lights of Mount Myōboku shift and dance below them. A toad the size of a horse hopped across the distant landscape, its passage barely audible at this distance.

"What happens after?" Kushina asked. "After Madara, I mean. Assuming we win."

"We build. Find a new home, somewhere hidden. Raise the child. Let the Uzumaki grow." Kurama's tails swayed slowly behind him. "The world will move on without us. Villages will rebuild, new Kages will rise, the same old conflicts will continue. We'll watch from a distance and intervene only if we desire."

"That simple?"

"Why complicate it? You've spent your entire life fighting- for survival, for your clan, for revenge. At some point, you're allowed to stop. Otherwise, you'd just fall into the cycle of hatred." He turned to look at her directly. "Unless you don't want to stop. Unless you'd rather keep conquering, and keep killing, until there's nothing left to fight."

Kushina thought about it seriously, because he deserved a serious answer. Was that what she wanted? More war, more blood, and more enemies to crush?

"No," she said. "I'm tired. I've been tired for years, I think, but there was never time to feel it. There was always another threat, another problem, or another reason to keep moving." She pressed her hand against her stomach again. "I want to see him grow up. I want to teach him sealing and watch him make friends and yell at him when he does something stupid. I want... normal things. Or as close to normal as we can manage."

"Then that's what we'll do."

"You say that like it's easy."

"Nothing about this has been easy." Kurama's hand found hers, his clawed fingers intertwining with her smaller ones. "But we've survived worse than peace. We'll figure it out."

"You've never had to raise a child."

"Neither have you."

"I at least have some idea of what's involved. You've spent a thousand years destroying things and then got sealed. That's not exactly preparation for fatherhood."

Kurama was quiet for a moment. "No," he admitted. "It isn't. But I've watched humans raise children, even if I never understood why they bothered. I'll learn what I need to learn."

She leaned into him, letting her head rest against his shoulder. His arm came around her automatically, tails curling to create a warm barrier against the night air. The baby kicked again, and she felt Kurama's attention shift to the movement.

"He's active tonight," Kurama said.

"He's been restless all day. I think he knows something's happening."

"Can he sense that much already? He's not even born yet."

"I don't know what he can sense. I don't know what he'll be able to do when he comes out." Kushina's voice was matter-of-fact, not worried. Whatever their child became, she would deal with it. "We might be raising something unprecedented. A new kind of being."

"We are unprecedented. Why should our offspring be any different?"

Kurama's free hand moved to rest on her belly, palm flat against the curve. She felt his chakra reach out, gentle and probing, and the baby responded with a pulse of its own energy- something that felt like recognition.

"He knows me," Kurama said, softer than she's ever heard him.

"Of course he knows you. Your chakra's been wrapped around him since conception. You're as much a part of this pregnancy as I am."

"That's not what I mean." Kurama was quiet for a moment, his attention focused inward. "When I touch him like this, when I feel his chakra responding to mine- there's something there- a connection. Not like the seal that binds us, nor any bond I've had with a jinchūriki before. Something new."

"What kind of connection?"

"I'm not sure. It's like..." He trailed off, searching for words. "When I was young- truly young, before humans existed- I could sense my siblings across any distance. We were all born from the same source, fragments of the same original being. The connection between us was fundamental, and inescapable. This feels similar to that. Like he's part of me in a way that goes beyond biology."

Kushina absorbed that information. The idea that her son might share some essential connection with the tailed beasts, a link to an ancient lineage of power, was both thrilling and terrifying.

"Is that dangerous?" she asked.

"I don't know. Nothing like this has ever happened before." Kurama's hand pressed more firmly against her stomach. "But whatever he becomes, I'll protect him."

His simple declaration soothed her mind. She had known he would anyway, but hearing it said aloud was different.

"I know," she said quietly.

They sat in silence for a while longer, his tails wrapped around her against the cool night air. The baby's chakra pulsed steadily against her palm, strong and strange and theirs.

"We should go back," Kushina said eventually. "I'm getting married tomorrow."

She stood, stretching muscles that had grown stiff from sitting. Kurama rose beside her, and she took his hand again without thinking about it. "Walk me back?"

He didn't answer, just fell into step beside her as they made their way down the winding path toward the clan's settlement. The strange lights of Mount Myōboku shifted around them, and somewhere in the distance a toad was singing- if that's what the deep, rhythmic croaking could be called.