Broken Hearts, Shattered Dreams

[20]

Naruto, in the past few months, had become very paranoid. Ino and the children had begun their missions and he dreaded the day that Sasuke would choose them for a C-rank. That would put them outside the village and in harm's way. He couldn't be there all the time and, while Ino was very powerful in her own right, she couldn't watch them all the time either. This created quite the dilemma for him, especially since he had threatened Sasuke and the Uchiha never took a slight to his minimal honor very well or with a grain of salt. He would use the children to get back at Naruto, one way or the other.

What Naruto feared the most was Sasuke using missing nins to either kidnap the children or to kill them. Not that the bastard would kill his own children, they were the last true Uchiha left. No, he would have them kill Hikaru, that way the Uzumaki blood died with the boy. Hikaru was the last living mortal Uzumaki and it would be on his shoulders to carry out the family in the future. He'd have to keep a close eye on them in the future.

Naruto looked down at his daughter as she slept soundly in his arms. He didn't want her brought up in a world where you couldn't trust those with power, where everyone was a potential enemy. He wanted her to be happy and carefree. He wasn't naïve enough to believe that that was what would happen, but that's what he wanted. Hikaru was already too jaded from all his dealings with the Uchiha and those who still hated Naruto. His daughter would probably have it more so thanks to her demon blood.

He absolutely hated the though of his children having to go through what he went through when he was younger. But reality sets in hard when you least want it to.

Naruto looked up when he heard Ino and the kids come in and his nerves weren't settled in the slightest by the look on her face.

Something was wrong…

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Ino's morning had started off great. She'd woken up Hikaru, fed Mikomi, and eaten breakfast with Naruto before taking the kids through their morning exercises. At the usual time of ten o'clock, they'd gone to the Hokage tower to receive their mission. As they stood in line, the children all talked about how cool it would be to get a C-rank. Ino agreed on the outside, but on the inside she was terrified of a C-rank. Not that the kids couldn't handle it, but she was afraid, like Naruto, of the underlying motives that such a mission might entail. Sasuke was devious and might use a mission away from the village as a means to strike.

Her anxiety higher grew the closer to the desk they got. It was like this every time they came to get a mission and she wondered why they did this at all. It wasn't like the Uzumakis needed the money. Oh yeah, it was because the kids had to have a minimum amount of missions to become chuunin, not that Ino and Naruto were going to let them try until they all were at least twelve. Children needed to be children after all, and in the demon's opinions, they were growing up too fast already. Of course, having an immortal lifespan would make anyone think the earth spins too fast.

Ino took a deep breath as she stepped up to the table with her team to receive their first mission of the day. Luckily, Iruka was on duty and he always made sure that she had a steady supply of D-ranks to keep the kids occupied. Upon seeing his favorite demoness, he smiled and pulled a random mission out of the pile, before a pale hand pushed it away. Ino nearly growled at the smug look on the Uchiha's face as he pulled a scroll out of the C-rank pile.

"I believe that your team is more than ready for a C-rank mission Ino. They have more than three times the allotted amount of D-ranks to qualify for it and quite frankly, I believe that you are holding them back purposely. You held them back from the chuunin exams last time they came around and you simply won't allow them a C-rank. I say it's time."

Ino narrowed her eyes and lifted her upper lift, exposing a canine. She'd been dreading this day. The kids, seeing the look on her face, thankfully stayed quiet.