#ctbmto

It started with one tooth, as one assumes all erupting baby teeth do. But as Kiyo stared into baby Kakashi's drooling maw, opened in constant wailings, she was incredibly confused.

"Why is it....over there?" Kiyo racked her brain, wasn't that usually the place where a person had their canine teeth? What did you call them for humans again? "...cuspid."

And it was a bottom tooth, too. Weren't the first teeth to appear incisors? Babies don't get cuspids until near the end... right?

"What the hell is happening with this kid?" Was everything Kiyo thought she knew about babies wrong?

No, no. She distinctly remembered Gai looking adorable with his little rabbit teeth grin. Why was Kakashi like this? Was he just hell bent on being the exception to every rule Kiyo knew?? And now that she thought about it...

"Aren't you early? Kakashi, you're only 4 months old. We were supposed to have more time before this!"

Kakashi just carried on with his howls of misery and dissatisfaction. Everytime Kiyo would try to wipe away the cascading drool from his chin, his cries would pick back up into the ear piercing range before settling back down into deafening.

"My sweet gremlin, why did you have to start this when you're father AND Hitomi are out of the village? I am severely unprepared here."

Kiyo was so glad when she went looking for infant antiinflammatories in the medicine kit Sakumo had made sure to show her, and found exactly what she needed. The next few days were tough, but with the help of baby ibuprofen, Kiyo and Kakashi managed.

Hitomi was the first Kakashi-Knowledgeable Adult to return to the village, and Kiyo practically jumped her for information.

"I think something is wrong with Kakashi!" Was probably not the gentlest way to start the conversation.

After mild panic and some back and forth, Kiyo somehow relayed her concerns to the Inuzuka, who laughed at her.

"Some pups get those teeth first. It's nothing to freak out about!"

Kiyo almost toppled over as Hitomi slapped at her back.

Sakumo was even less help when she brought it up before leaving them for the evening.

"Babies always get their cuspids in first?" He looked at her like she was joking.

Kiyo hoped that by the offended disbelief on her face, he knew she was not. At least Hitomi had been plausible. This was the Naruto Universe, what did Kiyo know?

The real problem for Kiyo's sanity came months later.

"What the actual fuck??"

How she hadn't noticed until now was beyond her, but as Kakashi had yawned just now, Kiyo glanced at him and saw a MOUTH FULL OF NEEDLE LIKE TEETH. There were only 18 teeth in there, but they looked like they could pierce flesh.

Sakumo had whipped his head around towards her at her exclamation, and caught Kiyo staring at his son's mouth.

"Oh, I had forgotten that Hitomi told me you didn't know anything about how Hatake and Inuzuka teeth...um...work," he finished lamely.

"What is THAT supposed to mean?"

"Ah, that the people in our clans tend to be a little more....dog-like."

Kiyo levelled him with her most unimpressed look, but now all the decimated teething rings and torn up blankets and stuffed animal ears made a lot more sense.

:::

First, Kiyo would be made immediately aware that this child is Sakumo, because Jiraiya has carried the disgruntled child to the front door himself, Minato is there, hiding behind his mentor because- technically- this was entirely his fault and shouldn't have accepted his mentor's offer to find a "willing" test subject. Minato thought it would be Orochimaru, or Jiraiya himself- he had never expected the toad sage to spy a passing jonin (isn't that the White Fang?!), and proceed to ask a favor of a man who apparently had never said no to Jiraiya in his life. So his mentor is at least 50% at fault, actually.

So, here's the thing. You would think Sakumo got physically turned into a child, but is still Adult!Sakumo with all his memories intact inside, right? That is horribly boring, NO. This is in fact 8-year-old (I rolled a ten-sided dice) Sakumo- who would like to know WHY he is with a giant baffoon that assaulted his person by grabbing him and then refused to put him down, and WHY he isn't in Uzushio, there are too many ugly trees here it's nauseating-

Bold take from Narwhal: Kakashi, in fact, got 100% of his childhood personality from his father. Everytime we see Sakumo flounder at Kakashi's sass, is just overwhelming embarrassment that his parents and mentor had been right/possibly cursed him to have a child that would be his exact copy and he would also suffer as they had.

Now, gods help me, let's say Kakashi is in the same age range when this happens, because magic jutsu and fuck the timeline; Kiyo now has 2 smol, grumpy Hatake on her hands- because Jiraiya dropped Child!Sakumo off at home and then ran away with the vague promise that he'd fix "this"

Straight up, Child!Sakumo and Kakashi get along as well as two strange cats thrown together and locked in a box. And Kiyo is not a large person herself, so it's a goddamn STRUGGLE to physically separate the two, who are actually pretty much equal in skill level, but child!Sakumo has a leg up being slightly stockier in build and apparently experience in wrestling Shinobi-style with siblings/clansmen. Child!Sakumo has no clue who Kakashi is and doesn't believe a word these Konoha Tree-Freaks are saying- there's no WAY he lives in this stupid village-

And Kakashi, unfortunately, understands this is his father, and it's making him hesitate at the WORST times and he is LOSING and can this snarky brat REALLY be HIS father???

"Who could even STAND someone like this!?"

Kiyo chokes on her tea when Kakashi exclaims this, it may have squirted out of her nose from shock and laughter.

Kiyo, is at first, completely flabbergasted by child!Sakumo's behavior. She can't seem to connect the man she knows from the series, the man she has grown to know so well, with this perpetually frowning, snippy child. She calls for Hitomi. Hitomi laughs and seems completely unfazed by the moody child's biting words. She gives Kiyo a pat on the back and wishes her good luck, leaving to track down the toad sage and see how far along he is with unfucking this situation.

Pretty soon, though, Kiyo falls into her usual rhythm, except it's Kakashi x2, and finds it's actually pretty simple to organize the two so there's minimal damage to the house. She is EXTREMELY happy that, apparently, for all the metaphorical hissing and spitting that child!Sakumo does, if she grabs him up in a hug, his words are still just as sharp and pointy, but his physical reactions are vaguely ragdoll-y and accepting of any manhandling.

Child!Sakumo spends a majority of his time wrapped in a quilt and sitting in Kiyo's lap because she won't let him go and he never fights it.

Please, if you will, imagine a sulky smol Sakumo, bundled up in a quilt, trapped in Kiyo's lap, because her arms are around him while she knits or crochets. Kakashi can't stop himself from staring VERY INTENSELY, and every now and then Sakumo will catch his gaze and throw his chin up in challenge? defiance?

With Hitomi's nagging/hounding, Jiraiya and Minato figure out how to reverse the jutsu's effect and within 48 hours Sakumo is once again an adult and- does he have any memory of being a child? OF COURSE HE DOES.

“Ah,” Hitomi sent him a smirk, “just thinking about getting my cute Kouhai to do my chores for me.”

“Really,” Sakumo sighed, “that girl is going to be running your clan someday, and you call on her in such a disrespectful way…”

“You Hatake never understand,” Hitomi waved her hand at him flippantly, “Inuzuka are not so formal. You’re in Konoha now, you should be used to it.”

Sakumo gave a much heavier sigh this time, but didn’t argue with her. There was a reason the Inuzuka Clan and the Hatake Clan had feuded during the Warring Clans Era. It was also why they had chosen different allies and villages. It was only just that the Senju Clan and the Uzumaki Clan had ended up choosing each other as fast allies. The Inuzuka and Hatake were fated to work together, and they hated it. And it was Sakumo’s steady nature from even a young age that had made him perfect to send to Konoha from Uzu to integrate into the allied village, his clan had agreed that he would be able to handle the Inuzuka in Konoha without trouble. Well, without too much trouble, anyway.

“Maa, such a heavy sigh!” Hitomi cackled at him, “Relax Sakumo, relax! We’re both alive, and the pup is back with us.”

He watched her eyes land on Kakashi and go a bit soft. He looked down at the infant trying to burrow passed his flank jacket to get closer to his father. It made him happy that Hitomi was so fond of him.

“I would have never left you there to sacrifice yourself.”

His voice was somber as he looked back into her intense, almost golden, eyes.

“Now Sakumo, we are Shinobi! Shinobi! Sacrifice is a way of life! Even you Hatake should understand that! Especially you Hatake, eh? Eh? Right?”

“You are family to Kakashi and myself. We Hatake, as you put it, always protect our family.”

Hitomi hummed, possibly in confirmation, “I thank you for letting me go to him first, before coming here.”

“It was a very unwise decision,” Sakumo pointed out, “but forcibly carrying you to the medics would have been tiring.”

She barked a laugh and only winced a little when it aggravated her wound, “What can I say? Eh? It was our first time leaving him with a stranger. I had to see with my own eyes he was well!”

“Kiyo-san is not really a stranger,” Sakumo protested, “you and I both made sure she was at least theoretically capable.”

“Ah, but with my own eyes, Sakumo, my own EYES!” she said with a grin.

“She has a good, and clean, record,” Sakumo shrugged, “there was little reason to fret.”

“Ah, but you admit there was fretting!” Hitomi smiled at him in a way that displayed her elongated canines, “And not just on our side either, I see. Look at him, falling asleep in your arms. He probably was up the whole night!”

“Eh? No way! He’s been sleeping really well recently,” Sakumo looked down at the drowsy baby in his hold, “That was the only reason I thought leaving him with Kiyo-san was going to be okay. I didn’t want to trouble her unnecessarily…”

“It’s fine, it’s fine,” Hitomi’s hand batted away his words, “Vegetable Girl’s scent is all over him, she obviously kept him close the whole time. And he’s chakra was relaxed when we showed up.”

Sakumo blinked and then took a subtle inhale of Kakashi’s scent. Hitomi was right. Along with the smell of the household and the faint notes of it’s other occupants, Kiyo’s scent was firmly attached to his son, clinging to Kakashi’s hair, neck, and face. She probably held him close all night. The thought warmed him greatly… the problem was the warmth was not just for Kakashi’s sake. Now that he had purposely inhaled her scent, the smell of Kiyo was…strong. It was an appealing human scent that his brain registered as “female,” having a mix of light sweat and a general sense of “clean” he would usually associate with people who didn’t wear artificial scents. He clamped his tongue to the roof of his mouth, embarrassed when he felt his salivary glands activated.

“Maa, Sakumo, are you blushing?” Hitomi’s tone was sly.

Her words made his already flushed face even redder.

“I’m embarrassed I didn’t notice before you. As expected, the Inuzuka nose is keen,” Sakumo muttered.

He wasn’t fooling anybody, but lucky for him, Hitomi was the only witness.

“Vegetable Girl did a good job,” Hitomi kept her sly smile.

“Speaking of, you probably scared her quite a bit,” Sakumo looked back to Hitomi while trying to force the heat out of his face, “You should apologize once you’re able to leave here.”

“Nah.”

Sakumo did the weird anxiously embarrassed bristle that always made her laugh at her rejection.

“Ahaha! What are you, a cat? It’s no good! No good!”

“Hitomi, please, Kiyo-san seemed very worried. It’s only right that you offer your apologies…”

“It’ll take too long. Go apologize for me,” Hitomi allowed herself to fall back against the pillows of the hospital bed.

“F-for you? That’s not…”

“It’s fine, Vegetable Girl will understand. And if she doesn’t…well…” Hitomi looked a little serious as she spoke, “maybe she isn’t fit to be around Shinobi like us.”

Sakumo frowned along with Hitomi.

---

So I really love the concept of self-insert OCs becoming authors by retelling the stories from their world in Naruto!verse !!! Vapors is one of my all time favorite Naruto!fanfics and Aiko (oc) does do this!

That being said; Kiyo has been plopped down in an incredibly difficult time in Naruto!verse history. Not necessarily because times are turbulent or she's in immediate danger; but because she's in the early years of "war time" Konoha.

So in the fic summary, I put down that Kiyo was dropped into pre-3rd war Naruto!verse-- but after creating massive diagrams and overlaying MULTIPLE TIMELINES (Kishimoto you BASTARD, WHY !!!); I've actually been writing with the thought in mind that the 2nd Shinobi War is in it's beginning stages in the current time in CTBMTO-- the small battles that wiped out Kiyo's and her family's villages are basically border scrimmages between the Shinobi villages.

To get into the time line I'm going with; the Great Shinobi War and the 2nd Shinobi War were supposed to reflect the same timelines as WW1 and WW2 of our modern history-- so there's supposed to be about 20 years between the first Shinobi War and the 2nd. After that, the timeline for the 3rd Shinobi War gets fucked (kinda like the timeline of Kakashi's childhood smh); but in order for the Sannin's and the 3rd Hokage's ages to match up-- it could only be a handful of years between the 2nd war and the 3rd.

What does this have to do with being an author? Excellent question, I'm glad you asked!

So Konoha is basically a militant state within the Fire Country. It's got a lot of convoluted problems that, if we the readers look closely, cause a lot of plot problems (I actually like that in some ways, the sequel, Boruto, attempts to tackle them-- poorly, but; shounen ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ ). Going with the fact that Konoha is a military force, training child soldiers, killers, and employees, you have to image that during the build up to the 2nd war and leading all the way through to the end of the 3rd war; they're not very "pleasure" minded. America during the world wars is a great example of the mindset of the general population of Konoha during this time (once America got involved, that is).

Food and goods are being rationed for soldiers and the war effort; civilians are encouraged to take up jobs that can benefit the war effort, ie. weapon and armour manufacturing.

There's no time to "waste" on pleasurable pursuits when hands can be used for needed work. For this, we can look to Japan during WW2. Civilians didn't need to be entertained by women playing baseball because all the abled bodied men were at war-- no, it was a sense of pride and duty to focus all efforts into making sure your country was victorious!

Even if Kiyo wrote down all the stories she could remember, AND find someone who would publish them; the population of Konoha would probably see indulging in fictional reading as "lazy" at best.

Not to mention that Kiyo is technically working full time already-- being at the market stall selling produce, maintaining/managing basically a 3 story townhouse with 6 people living in it (they don't have a washer and dryer, or television, at this point), and has been helping take care of baby Gai.