Title: Konoha's Tracking Hound
Author: Greygryph
Rating: PG-13 (for now)
Summary: Inuzuka Moriko was just another Konoha kunoichi. Nobody ever said that Konoha's shinobi population was normal though.
Notes: My NaNoWriMo project for the month, so obviously a work in progress and completely and utterly unedited. Based off of one of my original characters in an RPG amongst my close friends. My plan to fend off summer break boredom spawned into a monster beyond my control and I decided it was time some of the back story was written. Cannon is followed as much as possible, but this is obviously AU.
Warnings: SPOILERS and VERY AU
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Chapter 1
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Something was wrong. Every single instinct, honed over the years in training told her that much. She could feel the wrongness slinking towards her. It made her stomach feel like it was being tied in knots. Very, very complicated knots. There was nothing around her. No comforting presences for her to lean against as the wrongness drew nearer and nearer.
Her father wasn't hovering somewhere nearby, like he always seemed to be when things got bad. He'd been there during her first chunnin exam when she and her team had gone into the second exam and found themselves pitted against a team that wasn't afraid to kill anyone who stood in their way. She and her teammates had survived the encounter, by the skin of their teeth. They'd been bruised and bloodied and her arm was broken, but they were alive, and what's more, they had actually beaten the other team. The night after the exam ended, the day before the third part, she had broken down and her father had been there, all comforting smiles and warm hugs. She'd confessed that she'd killed one of the other shinobi and her father had been quiet for a moment. Then he told her of his first kill, and how he had been a wreck for a month afterwards.
She wanted her father now. The wrongness was there, looming in the distance and she craved her father's warm presence and barking laugh. She didn't care anymore that they had fought the night before. That they'd gone to bed angry after a screaming fight.
She wanted her mother as well, even though she'd always been somewhat distant since her only daughter and child had joined the academy as a child and decided she wanted to be a kunoichi. Her mother had still always been there, with a smile as she tried to find a way to relate with her warrior daughter who took after her father all too much.
She wanted her sensei, the man who'd become another uncle to her as he guided her and her teammates through their early years of their careers as shinobi. He had always been a silent support to her, with words of guidance and a quiet laugh. Sensei was always there to watch her back if she and her team got in over their heads and she knew he always hated putting them in any dangerous position. His specialization at being a bodyguard becoming blatantly obvious when the danger levels got too high for her and her teammates. He'd appear before them, sword drawn, throwing an apologetic smile over his shoulder. He was a protector, he couldn't help it.
She wanted her teammates, even if they did act like idiots half of the time. There was no trouble the three of them could face and fail against. The two boys who'd become closer than brothers, her very closest friends who she trusted with all her mind to keep her safe. She craved for their strong, confident presences to appear on either side of her, silently lending strength to stand against this approaching evil. She could almost hear them, cracking jokes and trying to cheer her up even as death and destruction rained down upon them. She could hear them teasing her into moving. She could hear them making no noise at all, simply standing on either side of her, close enough that their shoulder's touched.
She wanted to feel the comforting warmth of her partner for so many years now. The massive charcoal canine who was always by her side. His silent skepticism at the hair brained plans her teammates came up with. His wide canine grin and off hand comments proving his intelligence to be on par with a human, and his insulted expression when someone made that particular comparison. His pack driven mind and odd way of combining human intelligence with canine-understanding, where there was no team, only pack, and an unspoken hierarchy too complicated to be put to words.
She was all alone in the darkness as the wrongness approached. She could already feel the heat of the fires that would follow in its wake and smell the blood in the air. Disaster was approaching and she was all alone. The feeling of solitude made her more scared than the sinister feeling approaching. She was a pack-animal.
"Moriko!" someone was calling her, their deep voice so familiar her heart leapt for joy. She wasn't alone!
"Moriko! Wake up! There's an emergency!" Moriko's eyes snapped open and she saw her father stick his head in her room. He was wearing a grim expression and he was already wearing his jounin uniform. His vest was still unzipped but he was quickly tying his forehead protector on securely. At his side, Naito, his own canine partner stood, black fur making him look like nothing more than a shadow beside her father. "The Kyuubi no Youko is on its way here. Hokage-sama is calling for all shinobi to meet at the Hokage tower." Inuzuka Hige said, face grim.
Moriko swallowed. The feeling of wrongness hadn't vanished with her dream. It was still there looming in the distance. She nodded to her father, not trusting her own voice. Hige nodded back and vanished from her door frame closing the door as he left.
Moriko rolled out of bed and grabbed her nearest set of combat clothes. A pair of thick kaki Capri's with enough room to allow for easy movement, lined with wire mesh for added protection. A specialty fishnet, wire mesh shirt went on over her sports bra and a black tank top on top of that. Finally she strapped on the arm bracers her father had given her for her birthday the year after she'd broken her arm in her first chunnin exam. She shrugged into her jacket to ward off some of the early October chill that had covered Konohagakure.
As she grabbed her own forehead protector and tied it around her neck she glanced at her disheveled bed where Kumori, her half-grown charcoal hybrid partner lay, watching her intently.
"You ready to go Kumori?" She asked quietly. The dog regarded her for a moment and nodded his head.
"I'm ready. Lets go find the pack and hear what the plan is." He said, using canine language—barks, growls, and yips that the Inuzuka clan had learned to distinguish long ago as a spoken tongue. It was as familiar to Moriko after years of hearing it, as the plain spoken tongue of human beings. Unlike her Father's hound Naito and her Aunt Tsume's Kuromaru, Kumori couldn't speak in the human language.
Moriko and Kumori headed downstairs to grab a quick bite to eat before they set off. Hige was standing by the door next to his wife, Moriko's mother, Kyoko speaking quietly. As Moriko neared them Hige gave her mother a kiss and a soft smile before turning to Moriko he offered her a napkin full of rice balls.
"You can eat as we go, we need to get to the Hokage tower quickly." He said simply.
Moriko nodded and accepted the napkin, following her father from the house. Moriko felt her stomach try to tie itself into a knot even as she took a bite of a rice ball. At least the steady churning of her legs was comforting. The route to the Hokage tower from their house near the Inuzuka compound was second nature to Moriko now, although she couldn't remember ever seeing so many other shinobi moving as one towards the tower.
Moriko glanced a second towards where the wrongness of the approaching demon was growing in the distance. An eerie reddish glow had started to appear on the horizon, despite the fact that the sun was not anywhere near rising yet.
As Hige and Moriko met the sea of gathering shinobi Moriko saw her father vanish in amongst the other jounins of the village. Moriko glanced around and caught sight of several of her fellow chunnin and eventually spotted her teammates.
Apparently Izumo and Kotetsu had spotted her at the same time because they appeared beside her a second later. There were no words exchanged, even when Raidou-sensei appeared nearby and they followed him to where the Hokage would be speaking and assigning orders for all the shinobi in Konoha.
Moriko reveled in the quiet moment then. Her standing with her team as if it was just another mission they were waiting to be assigned. It was strangely surreal and Moriko found herself half zoning out as she leaned against her teammates.
Kotetsu had stolen her napkin of rice balls and was eating one as he eyed the one with a single bite in it.
"You should finish that off, Moriko-chan." He said as he swallowed, he offered her the napkin but Moriko didn't move to take it.
"I don't think I can keep it down if I eat it, Kotetsu. Go ahead. Share with Izumo and Raidou-sensei too if they want it." Moriko said quietly.
Izumo took one but Raidou-sensei shook his head when offered. "I already ate this morning. Moriko, you really should eat it. You'll need it today." He said and gazed out over the almost sea of shinobi and kunoichi that had gathered.
Moriko reluctantly picked up the rice ball and slowly ate it in small bites, forcing it down and commanding her stomach to keep it there, her sensei's words were echoing in her mind 'You'll need it today.' Kami-sama. This felt so horribly like the war that had just ended against Iwagakure. She hadn't been anywhere near the front lines there, but she had still felt the tension and exhaustion that followed every shinobi involved.
The horrible nervous tension that filled the space was accompanied by almost perfect silence. Nobody seemed able to speak over an almost whisper and Moriko found it somewhat eerie when, as one, the entire crowd of shinobi and kunoichi, all trained assassins and warriors, fell silent as a figure exited the Hokage tower.
Clad in his standard jounin uniform, flap jacket, and long flame hemmed overcoat, Namikaze Minato, the Yondaime Hokage, exited the Hokage tower, his face grim and void of any of the normal smile he always seemed to wear. His blonde hair and startlingly blue eyes made him stand out starkly against the standard dark hair and eyes prominent in Konoha.
Moriko felt a small flicker of relief fill her chest as the Hokage gazed out over the entirety of Konoha's forces. Finally the man seemed satisfied with something and nodded slightly to himself.
"As I'm sure all of you are already aware, the demon Kyuubi no Youko is heading straight for us and wiping out anything that stands in its way. We don't know exactly why its heading towards us or what we may have done to anger if, or even if we have angered it at all. All we know is that it is coming to destroy us, and we need to stop it before it reaches the city. We have the day to prepare for the attack as all of our scouts' estimates put the biju here at nightfall. We're lucky we have this long to prepare. All shinobi will be needed to defend the village, but obviously we aren't sticking our genin and green chunnin out on the front line, so we've broken down our defense strategy b y ranks.
"Our ANBU and Jounin will be at the front. Tokubetsu jounin and seasoned chunnin behind them and newly promoted chunnin and genin in the back. Now, the First and second rows will be the only attacking forces in the village, and the second row is also in charge of keeping an eye out for the back row, which will be evacuating the civilians into the Hokage Monument and taking up defensive positions there.
"I have a plan to stop the Kyuubi, but it will take several hours of preparation and may not be ready until after the biju has begun its attack on us." The Yondaime grimaced a bit and Moriko found herself wondering why he wouldn't go into more detail on his plan. The blonde haired Hokage regained composure and began issuing orders for stockpiles of supplies be moved to the Monument and evacuation of civilians to begin immediately. Before the village's shinobi dispersed to begin preparations for the attack, the Hokage looked down at all of his shinobi and kunoichi—his loyal soldiers—and gave them a proud smile, "Let us all prove to the stupid fox why he should have thought twice about attacking Konoha and it's Will of Fire." He said, giving them all the determined grin they knew so well.
Moriko felt a weight get lifted from her shoulders as he said so. A cheer went up in the crowd and Moriko found herself among those cheering. Here was her leader, the alpha of the village, whom she would follow to death if he asked her to.
Moriko felt pride and adoration fill the space where her nervous butterflies had abandoned. She always envied the Hokage's easy leadership and his way of ensuring loyalty. He oozed confidence and power from ever fibre of his being and, despite that, didn't use it to force loyalty onto his subjects. Instead, he befriended them all. He learned all their names and spoke to them earnestly when he met them on the street. He fought alongside them in war and cried alongside them when their comrades died. He made sure to show them all that he was a soldier too, and, above all that he was human.
He made no effort to hide his flaws from his fellow soldiers. It was no secret how much he loathed paperwork, and almost every shinobi in the village had an origami piece of some sort that had once been a draft of a mission or a law. Moriko herself had a small origami dog that had once been a draft of a law concerning early admittance into the academy. The Hokage had given it to her as he gave her teammates each their own pieces when they'd completed an important mission delivering a scroll to Kumogakure.
Moriko drifted out of her memories as her teammates turned in to face each other, they turned as one to form a triangle, with all three of them facing each other. Izumo and Kotetsu grinned at each other and stuck their hands out in the center. Moriko's hand automatically followed suit
"Lets all promise that we'll all meet up here again when this is all over." Izumo said.
Kotetsu nodded determinedly, "We'll all be here and we'll always watch out for each other."
"And we'll work together as one." Moriko agreed, the three of them all turned and looked up at Raidou-sensei, who was still standing nearby, a smile on his face.
"And you'd better be here too, Raidou-sensei." Kotetsu said, crossing his arms across his chest, "Or we're going to have to go find you and yell at you for forgetting the plan again."
Raidou rubbed the back of his head sheepishly. "I already apologized for that." He said, "And besides, I won't forget this plan. I've still got too much to teach you brats." He finished fondly and turned away, calling back over his shoulder as he left to begin his assigned preparations, "I'll see you three when this is done."
Moriko, Izumo, and Kotetsu all grinned at their sensei as he left then turned to face one another. "Lets get started then." Moriko said, slipping into the leadership role somewhat reluctantly. She did, however, outrank her teammates, whom hadn't yet gotten promoted to chunnin. The three of them headed off to their assigned district to begin waking the civilians and warning them of the evacuation.
That day, the whole of Konoha was milling anxiously as civilians gathered their necessities and headed towards the Hokage monument directed along by the chunnin and genin teams of Konoha. Moriko, Izumo, and Kotetsu all had their hands full helping some of the richer merchants leave behind frivolous things until A distant roar caused everyone in the village to freeze and shiver, then continue their work at a brisker pace.
The sun was sinking steadily towards the horizon and the eerie red glow on the horizon was getting brighter and more distinct. As the sun finally disappeared behind the horizon, the last of the civilians where lead into the deep tunnels hidden in the Monument.
The young chunnin and genin population of Konoha set themselves up in defensive positions around the Monument. Moriko felt her stomach get doused in ice when, in the distance, the eerily glowing body of Kyuubi no Kitsune appeared from behind the distant mountains.
It was huge. Towering over the ancient forest of massive trees Konoha was known for as if it was standing on someone's front lawn of neatly trimmed grass.
It's massive face was turned towards Konoha and with an earth shaking roar it charged towards the village.
As the biju's killing intent washed over the village Moriko felt her body shake in fear. This was her death approaching. There was no way she could avoid it, she should just stand there and wait for the end. It had completely overwhelmed her fight or flight instinct and left her paralyzed.
Her enhanced hearing picked up the screams of terror from the civilians even from deep within the monument and Moriko's mind instantly shut off the fear receptors and flipped into protect mode. This was her village and she was to protect it with her life. Fear was a silly thing anyways. If she was going to die, she was going to die and not much could stop that. All she could do was try her hardest to make her killer die alongside her.
"Izumo! Kotetsu!" She barked at her teammates, feeling determination fill her mind. The two boys looked at Moriko, eyes wide. When they took in Moriko's composed face they instantly snapped to attention. "We're shinobi of Konhagakure. We don't stop and lie down for anyone. We fight with all we have and then we pull strength from our friends and we fights some more. We take down the stupid bastards who try and kill us, or at the very least we make them die for killing us." She said, voice low. The boys nodded, regaining control of their bodies and turning to their fellow gennin and chunnin.
"You all heard her! We lie down for nobody, and nothing!" Kotetsu said, catching the attention of the other Monument defenders.
"Hokage-sama entrusted us with the lives of the civilians," Another of the chunnin present, whom Moriko recognized as Mitarashi Anko said. The girl had a fierce grin on her face, "I don't know about you, but I ain't letting the Hokage down."
Moriko glanced at Anko and gave the other chunnin a grateful smile as the rest of the chunnin and genin composed themselves.
The Kyuubi roared and the earth shook. The attack had begun.
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End Note: My whole reason for posting this is for easy access for friends and for pure fun.
Constructive criticism is welcome as are reviews (I won't deny they make me feel all warm and fuzzy inside), but I won't beg for them.
Please, if you don't like it, just stop reading it, I may not be your favorite writer and you may not agree with how I write people, but there is no need to write nasty notes and tell me that I'm wrong.
This is a work of fanfiction, pure and simple, and I'm not looking to impress anyone, but I am proud of this (as raw and unrefined as it is and how I haven't even re-read it yet) and my friend wanted to read it (and my e-mail doesn't seem to want to send attachements).
Thank you for reading, I hope you enjoyed, and I hope to see this through to 50,000 words.
-Greygryph
