Iteration

‘Iteration’ is part of the space saga that began with ‘In the cold of space you find the heat of suns’ and continues in ‘Tales in Tarrasade’. There is also a one-shot ‘Silver Leaf Tales: Tying the knot’.

This is posted in the Naruto/Sasuke section because it is part of a Naru/Sasu/Naru space saga. However, it does feature many other pairings (and a few threesomes). Apologies to those who are expecting Naruto/Sasuke or Sasuke/Naruto every chapter.

Apologies if the characters have grown differently in their new environment.

Thanks to Small Fox for being my beta. For this story he has also been my muse, suggesting a number of the ideas that have evolved to create this arc.

Author’s note
Thank you to those readers who have written a review and particular thanks to those who review regularly. I spend almost all my free time writing this story (6000+ words a week with a full time job is a lot). Reading the reviews, however short and whatever they say, reassures me that it is worth it. Hits have been falling away and I need to know that people are still reading and enjoying.

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Chapter twenty: Caring

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Ranmaru woke at his usual, early time. He wriggled out from under Konohamaru’s arm, pulled on some pyjama pants and silently slipped out of Konohamaru’s room and into his own. Once his door was shut there was no longer any need to be quiet, so he turned on some music and danced and sang his way though his morning routine of washing and dressing.

He was first to the galley, so he filled the kettle and made up Iruka-san’s tea tray. He set up the larger teapot and prepared a pot of what some of the crew, but not all, thought of as coffee. He found the fresh bread that Choza had made the day before and put it on the side with a board and a knife. He found all the ingredients Moegi would require to cook breakfast and set them out by the stove. Then he started setting up the table for the children’s breakfast.

He hoped that Moegi would not be too late. If she timed it correctly she could take the credit for Ranmaru setting out her ingredients. If she arrived after Iruka-san, he would realise that Ranmaru had done it for her.

She just made it. Ranmaru could hear Iruka-san in the crew room before she shot into the galley and looked busy. Ranmaru poured a cup of almost-coffee for her and started the kettle for Iruka-san’s tea.

Moegi was in a good mood. Ranmaru was grateful for that. He had made little progress determining what made Moegi more or less discontented. He knew she wished he had never joined the crew.

Iruka-san came into the galley and there was the usual round of greetings. Ranmaru poured the just boiling water onto the tea leaves in the small pot on the tea tray. Moegi politely asked what Iruka-san would like for breakfast and was told, as happened nine times out of ten, that he would like toast. Ranmaru went back to his task of preparing the children’s breakfast.

Sumaru arrived, set the table and then settled down to eat. Haku-san arrived, followed by Naruto-san and then Ibiki-san. Ranmaru began listening out for the five minute warning from Kiba.

It did not happen, which was very strange.

He could see that Naruto-san was thinking the same; he was looking at the speaker with a slight frown on his face. His whiskers twitched once and then again.

“Shall I go and find out what is delaying them, Naruto-san?” Ranmaru offered.

Naruto looked at his half-eaten meal. “It is kind of you to offer, Ranmaru-kun,” he acknowledged. “If you would.”


Ranmaru slid open the door between the crew room and the nursery. He was expecting an annoyed Kiba and a roomful of children, some of whom were being less than well-behaved.

Instead he found a roomful of children and no Kiba at all. Haru was still in his bunk sleeping. Hikaru and Ryuu were fully dressed and sitting patiently on Hikaru’s bunk. Hoshi and Yuki were in their pyjamas, playing. Yasushi, Yoshimi, Keizo, Kuuya and Kazuki were naked and playing chase across the top three bunks; Kazuki chose the moment of Ranmaru’s entrance to take a shortcut that involved swinging from the mobile, which could not take his weight.

Ranmaru caught him as he fell. Kazuki just laughed and hugged him, which inspired the other kits to jump on him from the top bunks. Ranmaru found himself on the ground covered by over-excited kits.

Their love and affection for him was overwhelming.

He managed to sit up. “Where is Kiba-san?” he asked.

The look on the children’s faces told him that they had no idea.

Ranmaru hesitated. He could knock on Kiba’s door but it seemed an imposition. Kiba was close to Naruto and Choza and the children; otherwise he was an intensely private person. He had been stressed and unhappy recently due to Gaara-san being unwell. Ranmaru assumed he was still sleeping or, possibly, that he was with Choza.

He was about to begin getting the children ready when he door behind him slid open to reveal Naruto-san.

The children froze. They watched as his gaze went from the naked kits to the dishevelled top bunks and the destroyed mobile.

“Well done, Hi-chan and Ry-chan,” he said quietly. “Why don’t the two of you go through and start breakfast? Ho-chan and Yu-chan, you should be dressed by now, hurry up.” He picked up Kazuki and sat him on the edge of one of the top bunks. “Ranmaru-kun, could you wake Haru-chan, please?”

Ranmaru complied as Naruto-san sat each of the naked kits on the edge of one of the top bunks.

Once Haru was awake he was quick to realise that his To-chan was about to administer a scolding. He hurried to catch up with Hoshi and Yuki. The three of them preceded Ranmaru from the room and Ranmaru slid the door shut behind him.


Haku had taken one of the adult places at the sides of the table. He raised a brow as Ranmaru took the other.

“Kiba-san slept in?” he queried.

“I do not know, Haku-san,” Ranmaru admitted.

Hikaru and Ryuu had almost finished eating when five chastened kits filed into the room followed by Sasuke. Sasuke-sama sat at the head of the table and they belatedly went through the pre-breakfast ritual.


The children began worrying when Sasuke-sama asked Sumaru to clear away the children’s breakfast while Ranmaru accompanied him and the children to the playroom.

They milled about. Ranmaru supervised them washing their hands and cleaning their teeth. Sasuke-sama stood for a short time frowning, then found a book and settled into one of the rocking chairs. He started to read and, one by one, the children went to sit around him and listen to the story.

Ranmaru was impressed; it was a good way of keeping the children calm and stopping them from asking questions. However, even their Papa reading them a story could not forestall the inevitable forever. As Sasuke closed the book Haru piped up.

“Has Kiba-san left because we were too naughty?” he asked.

Ranmaru briefly shut his eyes. It was difficult to imagine a question that would spark off a worse response. Sure enough, he could feel a surge of horror from the four kits sitting with him.

The ones who were not whimpering or crying immediately started soon afterwards.

Sasuke-sama did not say that Kiba-san was sleeping, or that he was with Gaara-san, or even that they had decided that Kiba needed a day off. That meant Sasuke-sama did not know where Kiba was or what was happening.

Sasuke put the book down, rose from the rocking chair and went over to the intercom.

“Naruto, unless you really cannot come you are needed in the playroom,” he admitted.

---

Naruto had been shocked when Kiba did not bring the children to breakfast on time. Kiba always got the children up and dressed, even on his few and far between days off.

By the time he had established that Kiba was not in his room, nor in Choza’s room, nor in the infirmary with Gaara, Naruto was close to panic. He imagined Kiba lying unconscious somewhere. He even checked the shower in his room and the bathroom, in case he had slipped and hit his head.

“He probably needed some time alone, Naru-kun,” Iruka suggested.

Naruto knew it was not as simple as that. It would take something dire for Kiba to ignore his duties with the children.

“He has been struggling,” Choza admitted. “The situation with Gaara-san is very hard on him.”

There was silence. Gaara had been out of the tank and in a room off the infirmary for eight days. Naruto knew that Kiba visited Gaara during the afternoons and that Rin had said that, for now, it was best that Gaara did not have other visitors.

He should have been asking more questions.

“Kiba spends every moment he can find with Gaara-san,” Choza was saying. “Every afternoon and every evening. I told him he should talk to you but he won’t. He’s scared you’ll decide that there is no one else who can look after Gaara and you’ll ask him to do that rather than looking after the children. You know how much he loves looking after the children.”

Naruto stared at Choza. How bad was it? How could Kiba think, even for a moment, that Naruto would separate him from the children?

Choza was obviously flustered. “You see, he would have to say yes, because Gaara-san is his littermate, even though it would break his heart to be away from the children.”

“You should have said something, Choza-san,” Iruka chided gently.

Choza flushed. “He made me promise not to,” he admitted. “He only told me because we haven’t been able to spend any time together and he did not want me thinking it was because he did not like me.” He hung his head. “I know I should have said something. I knew he wasn’t coping.”

Naruto had to tell himself to breathe. What did Kiba do when he could not cope? Naruto had no idea. What in known space was he going to tell the children?

The intercom clicked. Naruto experienced a burst of hope before it was dashed by the sound of Sasuke’s voice asking him to come to the playroom. He could hear sounds of the children’s distress in the background.

Haku’s hand was on his arm.

“Itachi will find Kiba,” he assured him. “You go to the playroom. I will get Shikamaru out of bed and send him along. He will keep Haru from asking awkward questions while you look after the others.”

---

Itachi had been ordered away from the crew room by Haku and told not to come back until he had found Kiba. Haku had given him one of his looks. This one said, “You owe Kiba for what he did for you on Jewel, it is time you paid back some of what you owe him.”

It was amazing how much Haku could squeeze into a single look.

It was true though.

Itachi started by assuming Kiba was alive and still on the ship because neither of the other options led anywhere good. He went up to the Control Room, which was empty as was usual when they were in orbit or cruising, and ran the ships’ internal scanners to pick up anything generating infrared. Next he filtered out any of the signals that would be produced by the ship’s machinery.

It would work provided Kiba was not adjacent to something hot, like the power plant or the drive.

He then downloaded the output of the scanner to a tablet before heading towards the infrared signal furthest from the crew rooms.


Itachi stood in front of a storage cupboard that was under one of the stairways on one of the many decks they did not use. Either Kiba or a stowaway was in the cupboard. The door had a small grill. Itachi could hear snoring.

After some thought, Itachi went to a nearby room. He opened and closed the door with no attempt to be quiet. Then he repeated the process so that he ended up inside the room with the door closed.

He waited ten minutes.

When he came out there was no sound of snoring from the cupboard.

He knocked on the cupboard door and opened it. Kiba was not inside. Inside were a couple of old, worn blankets, a cushion and some objects that Itachi suspected were very battered toys. On one wall of the cupboard there was tacked a picture of a man with grey hair and large, slanting eyes.

Itachi remembered that Kiba called the room he had slept in on Jewel his kennel. He wondered how bad Kiba had to be feeling if sleeping in a reproduction of his kennel was comforting.


When Itachi returned to the crew room he could see Kiba sitting at the galley table with Choza and Iruka. Iruka was assuring him that it was not at all odd to want some time away and that they understood that he had not meant to fall asleep.

Haku dragged him into their shared sitting room and shut the door, mindful of Kiba’s acute hearing.

“Did he come back on his own?” he asked.

“I found him,” Itachi admitted. “He was asleep. I managed to wake him without him realising anyone was there. Once he was awake he came back.”

“Good,” Haku replied. “Is there anything else?” he demanded, studying Itachi’s face.

“No,” Itachi lied. He knew that Haku could tell he was lying but Haku merely nodded.

---

Kiba had wanted be present when Gaara was taken from the tank. Then they had discovered that Gaara could not tolerate anyone other than Kiba was in the room with him.

Kiba had seen the look on Lee’s face; his hopeless despair. Lee, who desperately wanted to dedicate every moment to caring for Gaara, could not get close to him; Kiba, who did not, could.

After two days of visiting Gaara, Kiba had found himself looking for a place to be alone. He had found a very small room on one of the unoccupied levels. Nights when he was not on call for the nursery Kiba would go there after leaving Gaara. He tried not to think why he did so.


Each time he arrived in the infirmary Rin would immediately start telling him what had happened in his absence; whether Gaara had slept, how many outbreaks of violence or uncontrollable sobbing there had been and whether they had resorted to dropping the temperature in the room to send him into hibernation.

None of those things happened when Kiba was there. Gaara was calmer. He could sleep. He made small amounts of progress.

Kiba had found more time to spend with Gaara. His life became divided into three: looking after the children, looking after Gaara and sleeping. He had explained to Choza why he could not spend time with him.


Then Rin’s hints that Kiba should give up looking after the children had become a suggestion. One div, she had said, perhaps two; just long enough to get Gaara into a better place where he could accept other people.

One div was an incredibly long time in the life of a small child.

Perhaps Rin would go to Sasuke-sama soon. He would go to Naruto and Naruto would decide that Ranmaru and Biwako-san could look after the children but only Kiba could look after Gaara.

The day that Rin’s hints had hardened into a suggestion, Kiba had taken the box from the back of his locker. He had carried it to the very small room on the unoccupied level and unpacked it.


Kiba sat in the galley with Choza and Iruka-san and drank tea. It could be worse. At least he had woken up; he had not had the humiliation of someone finding him sleeping in his kennel.


Fortified by the tea and some of Choza’s special biscuits, Kiba took a deep breath and opened the door of the playroom. Kazuki was on his back with his arms wound tight about Kiba’s neck before Kiba could get the door shut. Seconds later there were two kits on each leg and Yuki was in front of him, bouncing up and down on his toes, yipping to be lifted up.

Kiba picked Yuki up and hugged him.

“We will be good,” Yuki promised with huge, sorrowful blue eyes and drooping whiskers. “Please stay.”

“Please stay,” the others echoed.

“Let Kiba-san move,” Naruto told them, taking Yuki from him and picking up Kuuya.

Kiba lifted up Keizo. That left Yasushi and Yoshimi clinging each to a leg, which meant he could just about walk.

Naruto was looking at him with eyes and whiskers that mirrored Yuki’s. Kiba gave what he hoped was a reassuring smile and managed to walk as far as one of the rocking chairs. Once there, Naruto plucked the kits off one by one so that Kiba could sit down.

Ryuu was in his lap before he could lean back in the chair. Kiba felt even more guilty; none of the children needed consistency more than Ryuu. Kiba held him close.

Sasuke-sama was there as well as Shika-san and Ranmaru; Kiba was deeply embarrassed.

“Shika-san and I will be going now,” Sasuke-sama said. “It is good to see that you are well, Kiba-san.”

Kiba managed a polite nod but decided not to get up because it would disturb Ryuu.


Naruto sat in the other rocking chair while Ranmaru began one of Biwako-san’s games with the children who were interested.

“I apologise, Naruto-san,” Kiba began.

Naruto held up a hand. “If there is anyone who should be apologising it is me. We will talk later. I will stay a little while and Ranmaru can stay for the rest of the morning.”


Kiba felt a little better once Naruto had left and Ryuu decided that he would like to join in the game. Kiba was about to get up and do something useful, like tidy the toys, when Haru came over and leaned against his leg. Kiba leaned back and pattered his knee.

Haru climbed up and settled into Kiba’s lap. He regarded Kiba with solemn eyes.

“Why were you late?” he asked.

Kiba suppressed a sigh. He knew that a cuddle and a few reassuring words would not be enough for Haru.

“I went somewhere to be alone and I fell asleep,” Kiba explained. “I didn’t have an alarm because I did not expect to be asleep there. No one knew I was there so no one woke me up.”

Haru considered. “Why did you want to be alone?”

Kiba recognised a loaded question when he heard one. ‘Why did you want to be alone?’ was really ‘Have you had enough of us or, specifically, me?’ He decided that only the truth would do.

“I have a littermate,” he began.

“Gaara-san,” Haru agreed.

“Some people hurt him very badly,” Kiba told him. “Now he only trusts me. He needs someone to look after him all the time but I cannot do that, because I...” He hesitated, determined to get the words right. “...I want to be with you children.”

Haru considered. “You have no other littermates?” he queried.

Kiba shook his head.

“Could Lee-san look after Gaara-san?” Haru suggested.

Kiba sighed. “I think Lee-san would like that very much, but Gaara-san...” Kiba struggled to find words that Haru would understand. “...Gaara-san is so hurt he only trusts me.”

Haru nodded. “It is a hybrid thing,” he decided. “Ka-chan doesn’t trust people who don’t smell of litter. That’s why we use the spray on new people. Could you make Lee-san smell of your litter?”

Kiba stared at him. Maybe, just maybe, it would work.

---

Lee did hesitate. He knew that Gaara had never considered Kiba as a mate because they were littermates. If Gaara came to see Lee as a littermate it would be the end of his dream of becoming Gaara’s lover.

But it was only for a moment.

“How long will it take to synthesise the pheromone mix?” he asked.

“It was Haru’s idea?” Rin asked again. “He’s three.”

“Don’t be ageist,” Shikamaru chided her. “This is the profile of the pheromone mix we use with Naruto’s litter. Based on what we learned synthesising that I suggest six components: human, dog, tanuki, Kiba-specific and Gaara-specific.” He built up the new profile. “I suggest we concoct a prototype and then spray it on specific parts of the soft furnishings in Gaara’s room. We can then observe any reaction.”


The trial was extremely hopeful. In Kiba’s absence, Gaara hugged the pillow that they had sprayed. He was calmer. He even slept.

Two days later Lee rotated as they sprayed him.

“Even if this doesn’t work, the pheromones have helped enormously,” Rin reminded him.

Lee desperately wanted it to work.


He edged into the room. Gaara looked at him warily. At least he did not cower before his eyes flashed with berserker rage and his controller knocked him unconscious, which was what had happened on the other two occasions Lee had tried entering the room.

Gaara sniffed.

Lee took a few steps and, when there was no adverse reaction, began setting the food he had brought for them to share out on the table.

He took one seat and started eating.

Gaara warily sat in the other chair. After a while he took a piece of cheese and nibbled it.

“Things are going well at The Sanctuary,” Lee told him. “But everyone misses you. Each time I go down there they ask about you.” He began telling Gaara about the landing pad and the new fence and the improved power plant. Then he went onto the small stuff; who had made what and what one person had said to another.

Gaara cleared his plate and reached for some fruit from the basket.

Once he stopped eating, Lee packed the remains and the dirty dishes into the basket and headed towards the door.

“Stay,” Gaara said.

Lee stopped. He put down the basket by the door. After a few moments of thought he went to sit on the couch.

Gaara sat beside him. Not on the couch with him but actually so close to him that their legs were touching. He was leaning towards Lee, Lee was sure of it.

Lee took a risk. He put an arm around Gaara’s shoulders.

Gaara leaned against him.

“I have missed you, Lee-chan,” he whispered.

---