A/N - Danzo and Sakumo fluff will always remain close to my heart. For those that don't know, my headcanon is that Sakumo (born around eight years after the Shodaime died) was the unacknowledged child of the Nidaime and Mito, and that Danzo wound up being his sensei.

First Steps

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The childhood shows the man

As morning shows the day.

-John Milton

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Danzo has no doubt that one day Hatake Sakumo will become a truly fearsome shinobi; revered by his friends and feared by his enemies and admired by both. Something legendary, anyway. After all, as the unacknowledged child of the Nidaime Hokage and the most powerful woman that Konohagakure has ever known, he has very little reason not to be exceptional.

He settles himself cross-legged on the floor and shakes his head once to get rid of his frustration. "Come on, Sakumo-chan. Once more. One foot in front of the other."

The tiny white-haired child in front of him frowns stubbornly as he inches his way along the bare wood floor, clinging to the edge of a chair. He lets go to clap his hands and promptly tumbles down onto his behind again, and regards Danzo dolefully from this new position with a look which clearly says this is all his fault. "No walk," he announces with decision, and sticks out his arms demandingly. "Up."

Danzo allows his head to thump down into the triangle of his knees, groaning softly. Repeat the mantra. He has no doubt that one day…

"Up!" Sakumo says again, pounding the floor with one tiny fist. He notices his erstwhile sensei eyeing him with a rather jaundiced air, and immediately decides to put into action the one thing which has never, so far, failed at getting him what he wants. Opening his eyes wide enough to use up his full quota of 'big and sparkling' for the day, he clasps his hands together in front of him and lisps, "Pwease?"

Danzo gives up on the walking lessons for the day with a sigh, and scoops the little boy up in his arms as he gets to his feet. Hopefully, by the time he's old enough to use the tactics against the enemies of Konoha, the old patterns of manipulation will not have completely vanished from his brain. Although by then he might have to come up with a different approach than a pair of shiny eyes and 'Pwease', Danzo still finds himself wishing at odd times that his ANBU could find half the skill and cunning that seem to come to Sakumo naturally when he wants someone to pick him up.

"And how is Sakumo-chan's training coming along?" Mito's lips are quirked in an amused smile as she wipes her hands on a dish-cloth, and if this has to do with taking himself too seriously again, then he's not sure he wants to wait around to hear the lecture.

"We were just going outside," he says with dignity, while Sakumo flops backwards over his arm and contorts his face into something from a Kirigakuren's worst nightmare. "Fresh air."

Mito nods and smiles at them both. "Don't work yourselves too hard," she tells them pleasantly. "It's a beautiful day."

It is a beautiful day, Danzo has to admit, the kind of day that forcefully rams home why any half-way sane person would want to live in Konoha above any other village, all made up of shimmering blue skies and green leaves and shy little breezes that provide a deliciously cool relief from the sun. He prevents Sakumo from stuffing handfuls of grass into his mouth under the vague suspicion that it will give him germs or some such affliction, even though he's fairly certain that he remembers eating cart loads of dirt and grass when he was younger, and its effect on him seems to have been negligible.

Sakumo is far too wily to begin sulking at the lovely clumps of juicy grass being pried from his fingers; he switches plans with the experience of an old campaigner. Crawling over to Danzo's side in a flash, he tugs ingratiatingly at his sensei's tunic and stares up imploringly. "Wind?" he says. "Wind?"

Danzo sternly fights back a smile; if he spoils him now he'll pay for it later, he tells himself, even as his hand reaches out to ruffle the head of white hair. "Wind?"

Sakumo practically bobs up and down with excitement. "Wind! Wind!"

Danzo reaches out and picks up a rock and can't resist bouncing it on the palm of his hand doubtfully for a moment, raising an eyebrow at Sakumo. "Wind?"

"Wind style," Sakumo says clearly, and no, there is absolutely no reason to allow himself to burst with pride just because his little charge has any idea of what a chakra nature is at all, let alone being able to name one, and now if he could only convince him to walk instead of crawling at speeds that put a shunshin user to shame, Danzo might just consider the day a success.

"Wind style," he agrees, and throws the rock high into the air in a lazy arc that takes it maybe twenty feet away before he splits it neatly with a well-placed air bullet.

Sakumo claps and squeals and bounces up and down and Danzo wishes for a moment that it was possible to determine chakra nature at a much earlier age than the fragile paper and certain amount of control required, because he's always liked preparing for disasters before they hit, if possible, and he has the feeling that if Sakumo's nature is anything but wind he'd better get ready for a temper tantrum that'll make a flash flood look like an accidental spill from a kiddy pool.

Sakumo is tugging at him again, eyes bright with excitement. "Wind! More!"

The ground becomes fairly littered with bits of rock and sand after fifteen minutes, and Danzo takes a few minutes to idly rake them together with his hands into a neat pile, the present moment mixing with memories of hunting through the aftermath of battles for precious kunai and shuriken.

Sakumo gives up on throwing bits of rock into the air and blowing at them when it becomes obvious that nothing is happening, and snuggles up to Danzo, remarking "Yum," hopefully as a way of reminding him that Mito had been cooking something when they left the house.

"We should probably be heading back," Danzo agrees absentmindedly, his mind on the problems of getting the boy who had inherited every bit of the Nidaime's stubbornness to walk if he didn't want to.

"Up!" Sakumo says happily, latching his arms around Danzo's neck.

Danzo blinks and decides that there's a fine line between a stroke of genius and something which is bound to end in unmitigated disaster, even if he has a hard time telling between the two sometimes and Hiruzen never can, when it comes to him. "No walk," he says thoughtfully.

Sakumo's face falls and he grabs Danzo's tunic again, pulling sharply. "Up!" he demands, and then, deciding that the problem must be lower down, begins pushing at his sensei's legs, cheeks turning red from exertion. "Sensei walk!"

Danzo shakes his head, discovering an obscure sort of satisfaction in the passive resistance, and wonders whether this is why both Sakumo and Hiruzen practice it so much. "Sensei no walk," he says again, and lies back on the grass to show his complete disinterest in moving, lacing his hands behind his head.

Sakumo glares at him and puffs his cheeks out, obviously coming to the conclusion that his sensei is just being difficult. "Sensei walk!" he commands again, and then, deciding that Danzo obviously needs a visual demonstration, scrambles tottering to his feet and wavers back and forth. "Walk!"

"Walk?" Danzo said with some interest, raising his head slightly.

Sakumo patters forward a few uncertain steps and falls over on top of him, nose to nose. "Ow."

"Sakumo-chan walked, so Sensei will walk," Danzo decides after a moment, and rewards the scowling toddler by picking him up extra-fast and swinging him around in a circle. A warm sense of pride and relief is welling in his chest, and he can't help but smile. "Well done."

Sakumo is not the kind to hold a grudge, and he twines himself firmly around Danzo's arm and waist and sticks out a finger dramatically in the direction of home. "Sensei walk."

"Sensei walk," Danzo agrees, and starts off in the direction indicated, Sakumo still holding his pointing hand out stiff and straight because obviously he's the only one who can be trusted to remember where home is if Sensei even forgets how to walk sometimes.

He can tell Mito that the day has been a success after all.

Now if he can only convince Sakumo in a couple of years that he's forgotten how to direct chakra to the soles of his feet and climb up the side of a tree…

…Some are born reviewing, some achieve reviews, and some have reviews thrust upon them.