[Five Years Later... On the night of Kyuubi Attack]

"Otousan, let me go to Konoha now! This is worst! That Kyuubi! Minato-niichan needs my help!" Mirai cried out, as she tried to open her door that was locked from the outside by Shiruma.

"No! You're not going anywhere!" Shiruma shouted from the other side of the door.

"But-"

"Minato had told me to keep you here on the birth day of his son. No matter what happened there, you're not going to leave Suna!"

"And let him die? No!" Mirai kept pounding her fists against the wooden door, as if she wanted to break it. "Otousan, open the door please!"

"Whatever. You're not going anywhere! Now go to sleep!" Shiruma's footsteps began to faint, telling her that he was leaving her locked in her bedroom.

"Otousan!" Mirai cried out, giving a last attempt to open the door. She leaned her back against the door and slid down. She began to cry as she put her head in her hands. "Niichan... Are you okay?"

Her eyes gazed out her window, and ran towards it. "Oh my... The sky looked horrible," she murmured, observing the sky that was filled with floating dark orange chakra. Other than that, she had found it weird as she realized that her breathing patterns changed from time to time.

Shaking her head, she plopped herself down onto her bed and covered herself with her blanket, hoping that everything she had felt would gone away. "I can't... sleep. I can't brush off this dark feeling!"

Hugging her stomach, she suddenly jolted up from her bed when she felt a pain through her abdomen, making her to let out a high-pitched scream. With her hands covering her mouth, she coughed of blood. Still holding onto her kunai necklace, she panted heavily with pearls of sweats shining against her forehead, when she had just realized something. "Gomen nee, otousan..."

"Mirai!" Shiruma called out, slamming opened Mirai's door as he heard her scream. "Mirai?!" he called out again as he saw an empty bed, with a bloody hand print on the blanket. "She had used it."

~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Ah!" Mirai gasped, as she fell forward when her foot tripped over some protruded tree roots, and had sprained her ankle. Ignoring the piercing pain, she stood up and ran forward, following her instinct.

She stopped behind a tree as she caught a glance of the most powerful Tailed Beasts. She froze, feeling terror washing over her body. Her eyes were wide opened before she fell to the ground. "Is that... Kyuubi?"

She looked to the front, and through a few trees she could see Minato with a baby in his arms and a red-haired woman on a field. She watched him putting down the baby on a ritual platform. Gathering all her spirit, she stood up and started to speed-walk towards them. "Niichan... wait..."

Suddenly, she fell down again as she felt a piercing, stabbing pain in her abdomen. It was so painful that her tears kept spilling out as she let out a silent scream.

Slowly, she lifted her head up and her vision went blurry for a while. But as she rubbed her eyes and the view became clear, her eyes widened and tears started to run down her face again. "Nii... chan..."

Minato and the red-haired woman were stabbed from behind by one of the Kyuubi's sharp claws, straight through their abdomens. With the pain still pulsating in her, she crawled as she tried to stand herself up.

She could hear mutterings from the red-haired woman were becoming clearer, knowing that she had almost reached them. With her last energy, she pulled herself up and ran towards them. "Minato-niichan!!!"

Minato looked to his left and was shocked to see his cousin was there. He thought that he was being delusional, but the pain in his body had woke him back to the reality. "Mirai-chan?"

"Don't leave me!" she cried, trying to pull the claw off of her cousin with her small hands. Minato could just watch her with a smile across his face. Without wasting any more time, he then started the sealing of Kyuubi immediately. "Shiroi!"

Suddenly, Mirai was instantly covered in blue and with her small hands, the claw was pulled off of Minato and the woman. Quickly, a blue dome-like shield appeared, protecting the four in it.

Minato fell sideways down onto the ground with the woman, heavily panting with his right hand still on the baby's tummy, still sealing the beast. Mirai fell onto her knees in front of them and cried. With his other hand, Minato reached out and weakly patted her head before he started to speak. “Remember… the promise, Mirai-chan?” Minato suddenly muttered, as he weakly moved a bit to introduce the red-haired woman to his little cousin. "Kushina, meet... Mirai."

"Ah... Mi-Mirai-chan? Kushina," the red-haired woman said, with a smile across her face as she cupped Mirai's cheek. "You looked a bit like Minato. Look at that yellow hair."

"Kushina-neechan... Don't leave me, you two! You're my only family left!" Mirai cried out, as she placed her small hand on Kushina's bloody one.

"No. There is... another family. Him," Kushina motioned over to the baby on the platform. Minato pulled her right hand and placed it on top of his, transferring her chakra into the baby. "Naruto."

Mirai scooted closer to Naruto, caressing his little yellow hair. "Mirai," Minato suddenly called out, getting the little girl's attention. "I have something... to tell you..."

"Minato-niichan! Don't talk too much!" Mirai cried out, as she moved closer to him while rubbing her eyes. "You have to live..."

"When we're gone, please... take a good care of... Naruto. When you've grown up though..."

"Why?" Mirai whimpered. With his hand still on Naruto, Minato sat himself up and laid Kushina against his shoulder. Trembling, Mirai gasped when she got the full view of their pierced abdomens.

"Because that's... when you'll be back to Konoha."

"Then who will take care of him now?"

"San... daime will," Minato smiled for a moment, before his expression changed to serious. "Mirai-chan, promise me about something." Without any words, Mirai looked up at him immediately, giving him a full attention. "You're already knew that you're a Namikaze," he paused to see her response and when she nodded, he continued. "So never introduce yourself as a Namikaze."

Mirai was startled to hear it as she stared at him, with widened eyes. "What?"

"It's for your... own good-"

"WHAT?!" Mirai accidentally shrieked, regretting it immediately when she remembered what would happen when she cut her cousin's words. "Ah ah! Ite niichan!"

"I told you... not to cut my words," Minato weakly said with a grin, unclenching his fist and caressed her head weakly. "Remember that..."

"How about Naruto?"

"Uzumaki... He'll use Uzumaki," Kushina muttered as she glanced at Naruto.

"Uzumaki Naruto... Then my name..." Mirai trailed off, waiting for the adults' answer.

"Hishouka Mirai," Minato answered her, making Mirai a bit confused and astonished.

"Hm? Hishouka?"

"Yes. Shiruma-san's... family name..."

Mirai deeply sighed as she looked down at her small hands. “Minato-niichan… I promise that I will protect Naruto, at any cost! Even if it means that I have to die!” she confidently said, placing her fist against her chest. “Like you always said… I'll never take my words back!”

Smiling, Minato motioned Mirai to come over to him. "Thank you," he whispered as he hugged the little girl with his free arm. "Thank you so much, Mirai-chan. For everything. For being my cousin. And I'm sorry, for leaving you at such young age. Thank goodness you already knew how to use Hiraishin now. Shiruma-san had done a good job in locking you in your room."

"So... it was to make me use Hiraishin," she said, finally understanding the reason why Shiruma had locked her. As Minato placed a kiss on her forehead, she glanced at the slow sealing process. "Niichan! Let me help you sealing it! Senkou clan can strengthens any seals too. Also, I want to give a bit of my chakra to him. So that I can feel him anywhere I go. Please, let me help! You have always help me, and now I want to help you!"

When Minato approved, Mirai put both of her hands on top of his. "Eight Trigram Seal." The moment went silence as the sealing continued. She was too focused on the sealing, without realizing Minato's and Kushina's limp bodies were now resting against her sides.

The blue illumination from the seal got brightened up as it came to its end. Mirai turned around, now to realized that both of the adults were not moving. Slowly, she put their bodies down on the ground and cried. "Hold on there! You're going to make it! Don't worry!" she sobbed, shaking both of them weakly. Getting no response from the limp bodies, she covered her face with her hands, crying into it.

"You must be... Mirai-chan," suddenly a husky voice said. She looked up and saw an old man with a long black rod with yellow ends. "I'm the Third Hokage. We'll take Minato and Kushina. And I'll send someone to take you and their son too."

Nodding her head, she leaned down to Minato and kissed his cheek. "Don't leave me, niichan," she sobbed before turning to Kushina and did the same to her.

~~~~~~~~~~~

The refugee tent was filled with sniffing sounds from Mirai. She hugged her legs as she leaned back against one of the wooden crates. When she heard footsteps coming towards her tent, she looked up.

The entrance flaps were pulled to the sides and there was the Third. He walked in towards her and sat down in front of her. "Mirai-chan. Yondaime had told me to tell you," he paused for a moment as the girl glanced up at him. "That he will watch over you."

Mirai paused for a moment, trying to understand what he had told her. "What do you mean?"

"On the day of Shiroi's sealing, he sealed some of his chakra in you." Mirai's eyes widened when she heard it, and she could feel her tears were pooling now, ready to burst. "He was thankful of it, because of what you felt, he got to see you for the last time."

"You mean, every pains that I've felt last night..."

"It was from him." She had reached her limit, and cried. The tent was filled with her non-stop cry, even though the Third was trying to calm her. "Mirai-chan. Remember what Yondaime had told you."

"I'm Hishouka Mirai," she mumbled, wiping away her tears. "Why... Why do I have to be so young to understand and go through all this?"

"That's why Shiroi is in you now. To make you strong from the inside to the outside," the Third explained, patting her head softly. "Come back here when you have finish with your training." As she nodded, he held out a scroll to her. "Here, take this. Yondaime gave it to me before he died, and he wanted you to use it now."

Mirai took it and opened the scroll. Some sort of inscriptions were written on the scroll. "This seal... The Memory Lock seal. It will seal away certain memories that he wanted me to forget for a while. Maybe years. The seal will weaken at the moment I grow up," she explained before her eyes stopped at five small circles at the end of the scroll.

She placed her right hand's fingers on top of each circles and it lit up. She took a quick glance at the Third and smiled. "Ojichan, try to remind me of what Yondaime had told me after this, okay?"

As the Third nodded, Mirai closed her eyes. "Sealing: Memory Lock."