FROM THE AUTHOR

Minato could see it, could feel it deep with his edo-tensei'd bones that his son's heart was going to break at the hands of the one he called Sakura-Chan. He could also see that the young woman never wanted to hurt the boy either - her heart was just always destined to be given to people who weren't his Naruto. He could also see that the pink haired kunoichi's heart was highly likely to be re-broken by the second person Kami-Sama had chosen to be the recipient of the girl's feelings.

Minato himself had a role to play in why her heart would be broken again - or rather the consequences of his untimely death had, had on said recipient. His death had been the last in a long list of events tightening the deadbolt around the heart of the boy - Ahem man now - and Konoha's Yellow Flash was unsure whether his protégé was even capable of loving anyone anymore, after locking his heart away for so long.

He could see that his silver-haired former student had spent the years since he had died blaming himself for his death, the death of Nohara Rin, and the assumed death of one Uchiha Obito (ironically now the man they were fighting against) and predictably the experience had made Kakashi jaded and weary. He would not be open to unlocking the vault that housed his heart to anyone let alone his own former student. (The former Hokage wondered with a chuckle if Kakashi being his former student, and Sakura being Kakashi's would make the woman his grand-student, before shaking his head at his random, weird thought pattern)

Naruto, Sakura, and even Kakashi had a long road of pain ahead, he knew that and sadly wondered how things could have turned out if things had have been different. If he and Kushina-Chan had have been alive to raise Kakashi alongside Naruto as the half-filled adoption papers that had been left on his kitchen table on the night the Kyuubi had been released from Kushina by a masked Obito had predicted, would Kakashi still be as bitter and broken as he was now, or would he have been able to love the fiery, passionate woman who just so happened to be a bit younger than him?

These thoughts made him think of his beloved Kushina, and how simple their love had been. Even her being a Jinchuuriki had had no bearing on their relationship. They had been free to love, to marry, and to bring a child into this world without the harsh judgment that being a jinchuuriki normally receives and as he stood temporarily reanimated from his afterlife in the midst of this cursed battlefield that was the Fourth Shinobi World War, Namikaze Minato had never been more grateful.

He hoped with all his heart, he was wrong and his protégé could still find the will to unlock his heart and love the young roseate haired nin once the war was past and she had, had more time to come into her own as a woman. He also hoped against all hope his young blonde son could find the one his heart would be able to keep forever. Because if nothing else the Yondaime Hokage Namikaze Minato believed that love was the only way the Shinobi world would truly find peace.