AN: Writer's block sucks. Eliminate it from your life and enjoy some more slice of life from "The Tale of a Cute Lil' Uchiha Bastard", which was totally this story's working title. Oh, and check my fanfiction tumblr Baezetsu if you wanna see some pictures of Heiwa and her family (tag: seeking peace). Thanks for all your reviews, they all help me get up in the morning and write.
Seeking Peace
Chapter IV
The mysteries of the dream I had the night before were troubling, but I decided not to voice them, instead focusing on the face of the boy I had seen in them, the one with black hair. I remembered I had seen him before, back when I saw him near some trees with a blonde boy and a girl with hair the color of Rei's rose perfume.
There was something that perplexed me when I woke. His facial features were clear in my mind and if I added freckles, rounded the face and lengthened the hair, it would basically be my face. Not to mention that the red-haired boy with the frightening eyes and voice, he had called the boy Uchiha.
Uchiha.
That was the name Kojiro had given me as my last name, the name I privately called myself in my mind. Uchiha Heiwa. Somewhere there was another Uchiha, perhaps, or I was seeing what had been. Maybe I was just imagining things. But it lit a small spark of hope inside of me that maybe one day I'll meet these Uchiha, these clan members. Clans, according to Kojiro, were actually very large families, so for all I knew, this boy, if real, could be a cousin.
I knew he was a ninja.
During the boring parts of the trip, when I tired from reading, I would imagine future meetings between this cousin and I. I would love to be real shinobi by then and show how proficient I was with seals. Would he be impressed? Would this cousin care about me?
Kojiro was tight-lipped about the Uchiha, but I knew he called them 'wretched', and that white-haired red-striped man from an early vision referred to them as cursed. I could guess that they were probably infamous and strong warriors owing to the man Kojiro mentioned being able to reshape the land. Would this cousin in my dreams be fierce as well? Would the rest of the clan?
Would they like my mother? Would they hate me for not being born to them? For not being able to talk?
During our travel to Saboten, my mother would talk to me to pass the time, sometimes brushing my hair, or while planning our time in the city.
"We're going to an inn, Heiwa, a place where travelers stay for a little while." She sighed as she spoke, almost dreamily. I leaned into my mother's hold and she wrapped thin arms around me.
"It'll be pretty and near the Flower district too. At noon we can see the maiko perform for tourists. And after we go to the doctor, we'll be able to explore the city together. We can go see a movie, you've never seen one of those. Something bright and colorful. And we'll have ice cream – oh, ice cream! You've never had that either, Heiwa, it tastes like heaven. I'll do your hair in little ribbons to match your new dress and you'll be the prettiest thing anyone's ever seen."
My mother's babbling definitely brightened up the cramped, horse dung-smelling little wagon with stuff boxes arranged around the blankets we slept on, using bags as pillows. Through the slits in the wood, I could see that it was dark outside and the second night since we left the Hovel. My mother pulled us both down to the floor but didn't cover us in blankets, with the dry heat getting worse the closer we got to Saboten.
"You'll love the city, I did when I came from Lake Omi during the war. It was always raining back there and here the sun always shines and bakes the earth. And there's always flowers for such a dry place."
Though often called Ame because most of the country, except our desolate area, was rainy, the actual name of the country I was born in Mizumi no Kuni, the Land of Lakes. But there was one lake that everyone referred to when talking of my country. On the other side of the mountain was the rainy part of the country, with one huge lake down in the valley. Many referred to it is as the Freshwater Sea, or Awaumi, or Omi. On the shores of Lake Omi, villages dotted the countryside, with farmers using the water for their crops like my mother's family did. The land around Omi was fertile, and farmers had been cultivating the land before shinobi started roaming it. And in the center of this huge lake lay Amegakure, the village of Rain, where it rained perpetually. People from the valley, from the lake, were called mizuno in jest and Rei would use this as a nickname for my mother, though my mother's actual name was Suiren.
Rei was from the rocky, dry part of our country with the border of Wind in sight most of her life, as was a great deal of the Hovel. She swore she had a Kaze nomad grandmother, which was why she was tanned and almost beige-haired, but most of the people on this side of Mizumi looked like her. The people of the lake had more variety in hair color and paler skin.
Kojiro's red beard (and remains of red hair) was commonly believed to be indication of deep Kaze roots, since they had frequent redheads, though Kojiro laughed to me and said that he'd never as far been as Saboten and everyone had red hair back on his island home.
When I closed my eyes I could still see the boy with hair the same texture and color as mine.
"…but I've seen looks like that of yours' on the battlefield."
I felt fingers running through my slightly damp hair and paused in my musing to give my mother her attention.
"Listen, Heiwa, during our trip..." I cocked my head at my mother's pausing. She looked mildly uncomfortable all of a sudden.
"Well, I'm going to just talk with the lady I used to work for and I rather not bring you with me. It shouldn't take long, so..."
My mother broke off again, looking around rather awkwardly. It struck me that Kojiro had predicted that my mother would leave me alone for a while during our trip, and not in our inn room, strangely enough since I was to be alone in an unfamiliar city, and so I wondered why exactly my mother was to be doing that she looked like she felt so bad about leaving me on my own. Personally, I was eager to explore and visit the store Kojiro had told me to.
I raised my thumb up in our sign for 'ok'. My mother smiled uneasily and pulled me a little closer to her.
"Alright. I'll see if I can leave you in a library or a park." Kaa-san said, sighing to herself.
"Let's sleep now, darling, and you wake, you'll be in Saboten."
The boy was running circles around the redheaded one, who retreated into some light brown dome. His black eyes, my black eyes, melted into crimson. Another second and the sound of a thousand chirping birds filled the stadium, causing gasps as the black-eyed boy raised a fistful of lightening. The lightening grows so loud and overshadows the vision and all I can hear is the chirping of birds as my vision fades to white.
"-N-H-RVE-E-NA-C"
The strange noise infiltrates my dreams again, this time cutting through the chirping with its ruffling sound. And then those snippets of words whispered to me caress my ears right before everything bleeds into another vision.
The redhead boy has turned into something monstrous, something grotesque. His face is warped and snarling, his eyes wild and mismatch. The black-haired boy's skin is dotted with black shapes and he charges, screaming, and flings a fistful of lightening at the boy.
"GN-T-R-E-E-N-H"
"HEIWA!"
"Heiwa!"
"Heiwa!"
I wake up to my mother loudly calling out my name, tugging on sleeve to help rouse me from my rest. I blinked sleepily, still processing the visions I just saw a moment ago. I realized that sunlight is streaming through the cracks in the wood and that we have stopped moving.
"Come on!" She says, dragging me out. We climb out of the cart and I shielded myself from the very bright sunlight that blinded me from seeing what exactly was around me.
Now, given that small children are generally prone to exaggeration and I was still very much a four-year-old, odd as I was, the sight of Saboten was the most awe-inspiring I had ever seen, and still to this day nothing has ever impressed me in regards to cities as Saboten. Coming from a tiny place consisting of dry fields and a mere seven houses, the beige, pagoda-topped buildings and cobblestone streets of Saboten were more impressive than the canyons of Lake and Wind, or of the Suna's army.
My mouth dropped as I spun around to take everything in me. The flowerboxes, the mudbrick and sandstone buildings with pagodas, the huge buzzing of people – I had never ever seen so many people before and they were all so different looking. Then the smell hit me. Besides perfumes and flowers, I could smell cooking meat everywhere and out of the corner of my eye I could see little food stands with meat grilling.
A hand landed on my shoulder and I looked up at my beaming mother.
"Like it?"
I nodded vehemently, which was followed by my stomach growling. My mother threw her head back and laughed, a tinkling sound followed by the shake of her pretty hair.
"And I see someone's hungry. Well, we can probably indulge before we head off to our inn. What do you say?" She winked at me. I nodded and held out my hand for her to take as we grabbed our things and bid our driver goodbye. She led me to the first stand we came upon and I wait patiently for our food, taking the time to observe the people of Saboten.
Another family catches my eye, much larger than my mother and I. Dressed in heavy cloaked and with their faces shielded, I guess from the description that they are Yuubokumin, or part of the nomadic tribes that populate Kaze no Kuni. My mother noticed my curiosity and bent down to whisper in my ear.
"Those are definitely nomads from Wind, Heiwa. They like this part of border as it's really good for trade. They travel place to place, never really settling anywhere. The people of the desert used to be all like that, living in tribes unless they could afford to settle near water, but with the shinobi villages, lots of the old tribes gave up their ways. These people are living a very ancient way of life."
One of the nomads was very short and I could see from his hood falling off that he was a young boy, around my age, playing around with a little ball. He noticed my staring at him and I jerked my head away, embarrassed at being caught observing a stranger.
Thankfully I was saved further embarrassment by my mother handing me a stick of tsukune and then quickly dragging me through the streets. The spiced treat was a perfect complement to the colorful streets of Saboten. My eye started to be drawn to small crowds of people dispersed throughout the square, crowding newspaper stands. They weren't very loud but I could hear lots of talking. As we passed on of these stands, my ears caught a snippet of what they were discussing.
"Konohagakure, yes…"
"That explains the Suna-nin last week."
I tried to hear more, but my mother pulled me along quickly. She led us to a pleasant-looking building in front of a very busy square. There were many signs strung throughout the square, each pointing to a district. The buildings were what my mother pointed to as distinctly Saboten-like building with a tall pagoda painted a faded cornflower color.
"There it is, Heiwa. Where we'll be staying." We entered quickly and felt cool air rush around us as we set in, a feeling I'd never experienced before. The lobby inside was clean and spacious. Nothing looked remotely as worn as it did back in the Hovel. As my mother got closer to a desk with a stern-looking woman sitting behind it, I heard a noise emanating from a device on the desk.
"Back to our report on the Invasion, we have official confirmation from the administration of Konohagakure."
I recognized the device as a radio and began listening to the slightly scratchy sound while my mother was busy paying attention the woman.
"Due to the unprovoked and underhanded actions of the ninja villages Suna and Otogakure with their illegal invasion of Konoha, it is our regret to inform the people of the Leaf Village, citizens of the Land of Fire, and those listening throughout the continent of the murder of Sarutobi Hiruzen, the Third Hokage by Orochimaru, formerly of the Densetsu no Sannin, and now the leader of the Village of Sound in the Land of Rice, and traitor to Konoha."
The woman began shaking her head and sucking her teeth.
"Dreadful, simply dreadful business in Hi no Kuni, isn't it, ma'am? Interrupting a tournament to invade during a peacetime, with civilians in attendance, too! Of course, this is Sunagakure, so such things are expected of shinobi of that village. Not that the Leaves are any better, of course." She added, bitterly.
My mother nervously stared at the radio before slightly nodding.
"Forgive me, I haven't been keeping with current events much, but it does sound awful."
"Oh, yes, you would have been traveling along the border, yes? News hardly ever gets there."
"The advisors' of the late Hokage have produced statements blaming Otogakure and Sunagakure for the invasion and as of yet, most of the invading forces have been repelled and subdued, leading Konohagakure to demand surrender from both villages. Due to the disappearance of the Yondaime Kazekage, Rasa, Sunagakure is expected to order the full retreat of all units still in Hi no Kuni. The two villages attacked yesterday during the Chunin Exams, during the battle between the Yondaime Kazekage's son Gaara of the Sand and Uchiha Sasuke of the Leaf."
My mother gasps loudly, dropping the pen she was writing with. I looked up to see her with an expression I'd never really seen on her face before. I'd seen her in pain before, during one of her fits, but this looked nowhere near that. Her eyes were wide and small and I could see a trickle of sweat trickle down her face, her mouth downcast as she picked up the pen from the ground.
I'd seen similar looks from other people. Kojiro, when looking at the invading shinobi. Rei when my mother fell down and hit her head while doing the washing.
Fear.
My mother was frightened. But the question was, of what?
"Open your mouth please."
I did as I was told, snapping my mouth open for the strange man in a smooth white coat in front of me. My mother was sitting on the other side of this small examination room, smiling at me. I could see nervousness in her expression, however, but I was unsure if it was due to the doctor examining me or the news we came across a few hours ago. Certainly I noted that the invasion of Konohagakure by shinobi from Sunagakure unnerved her, but maybe it was also due to the radio announcing it was during the fight of the boy, Uchiha Sasuke.
I myself had been pouring over the visions in my head with the news brought by the radio. The redheaded boy with the menacing look in his eyes, yes, that must have been the son of the Kazekage, which according to Kojiro were the leaders of really big ninja villages. Like a daimyo except they were chosen.
The white-haired man in the earlier vision had called my 'cousin' Sasuke, confirmed by the man on the radio. I guess he was a genin-class shinobi then, by the fact he was competing in the Chunin Exams, something Kojiro explained was a way of some villages to get promotions. The shinobi village in our own country, Amegakure, participated in these too. All this confirmed that what I was seeing was real. What I couldn't tell was if I was seeing it before it happened, or after. And the best question: why?
"Has she made any sound?" The doctor said, peering into my mouth with a very small flashlight.
"I'm afraid she still hasn't been able to make a sound since she was born."
"Then my diagnosis of congenital aphonia still stands."
"Then there's no hope, Ueno-sensei?" I shift my eyes towards my mother, whose hands were clenched on her lap. Had she been hoping I'd be able to talk some day?
"I'm sorry, but Heiwa's recurrent laryngeal nerves were malformed from birth. It is remarkable she's not yet shown any problems besides aphonia. In fact, besides being unable to phonate, she's remarkably lucky that respiratory problems have avoided her. However, I'll need to make certain of this." He turned the flash light off and leaned away, reaching for his stethoscope as he did so. I closed my mouth, unsure of breaking his concentration to attempt to ask him about the meaning of all these terms he was saying.
"And really," I thought to myself as he leaned in again, making me even more uncomfortable with how close everything was. "The effort I go through to talk to people sometimes isn't worth it when I can just put things aside for later."
I felt cold metal touch my chest and a hand on my shoulder. The contact with a stranger was a prickly, uneasy feeling to me. I guess I was slightly overwhelmed by how new everything was to me.
Or I just hated doctors.
"Now, breathe." I gulped in air and then exhaled, feeling the stethoscope rise and fall with my chest. We spent a minute like that, the doctor listening to my breathing while I was growing steadily more and more aware that I really didn't like my personal space encroached upon by people I didn't know. I suppose if I had been a less behaved and impulsive child, I would have been fussing.
Finally, he leaned away. I almost breathed a sigh of relief before noticing a curious expression on his face. The doctor turned to my mother.
"Suiren-san, I'm wondering, do you have her do field work?"
I cocked my head in confusion, which was mirrored by mother's expression. She shook her head.
"No, I don't. She helps with some light chores and goes to pick some medicinal herbs for me once in a while with my friend, but nothing else. Is…-Is something the matter, Ueno-sensei?"
I bit my lip, suddenly aware that this line of questioning should make me nervous.
"No, not exactly. I'm just asking because I see that she appears to be fairly active for a child her age. Now, I will admit that most four year-olds are generally prone to lots of physical activity but in examination it looks like it's more a deliberate kind of physical activity."
I willed my face to remain as blank as possible. Besides the bruises and the scrapes from Shishou's training, there weren't supposed to be signs of our little routines, which Shishou said weren't that far from what he or his father had to go through as little kids (I could scarcely imagine such a time). The fact that the 'game' was up terrified me. Imagining the days pass just folding the laundry or attempt to stitch with Rei instead of learning about ninja or running around as a shinobi-in-training felt like torture. Especially after seeing Saboten this morning, it struck me how boring the Hovel was. I loved it, but there was little to do.
My mother gave a shaky smile to the doctor.
"She's always climbing the few trees or chasing the neighbor's chickens? Maybe that could be it. She's a very precocious child, you see, and I wouldn't be surprised if she had worked out some routine for herself, it sounds just like her." She gave a wide, lipless smile that I could see strained her face. Apparently my mother was as nervous about this line of questioning as I was, though I couldn't think of a reason why she would be. It was just one of the many mysteries that the trip had revealed to me. My sweet, gentle mother had secrets.
The doctor wrote something on a pad, and though I craned my neck to see what it was, his handwriting was kind of really ugly and messy, as bad as Rei's, and I gave up trying to decipher just what he was writing.
"Should I stop it?" My mom asked, her voice full of uncertainty.
The doctor looked up from his chicken scratch and shook his head.
"Oh no, it doesn't seem to be doing any harm. You might have a very good athlete on your hands, Suiren-san. Just make sure she doesn't exert herself and if she develops any trouble breathing, you must bring her here to see what has changed with her condition." The tone of his voice made it sound like he was wrapping up our appointment so I slid myself off the examination table-bench thing and plopped to my feet. My mother beckoned me to take her hand and she rose and we both faced the doctor.
"Thank you so much, Ueno-sensei. I'll leave the fee with your receptionist, is that alright?" She asked, her hand gripping my hand tightly. The doctor nodded, gathering his tools before making a motion to leave the room. Just as he was about to, he stopped and turned.
"Oh, and Suiren-san? Please don't take four years to schedule another appointment."
My mother turned red.
The overbearing uneasiness that had settled over us during the duration of the appointment had cleared once we went through the Saboten streets. I could tell that there was still too much on my mother's mind, particularly when I skipped in front of her or she saw newspaper stands with most of the newspapers carrying the invasion as cover page news.
There was lots on my mind too, but I was also distracted by the newness of everything. The throngs of people, the smells. The way the setting summer sun reflected off the pagodas. It was beautiful. Of course, the streets here were less taken care of than the main ones my mother and I had originally traveled, and the people were not as well-dressed, but it still impressed the heck out of me.
"Don't run too far ahead, Heiwa. We'll miss the turn for the café." My mother said behind me, not at all stern as she lectured me. I turned back to run back to her, but caught one of those rather sad looks she gave me once in a while, like when I was climbing trees and had no trouble. Or when I decided to read an 'adult' book, rather than the picture-filled ones my mother gave me.
My mother took advantage of me pausing to scoop up my hand and keep a tighter grip on me as we walked through the streets.
"Ueno-sensei was right, you are pretty lively for your age." She muttered, before looking down at me. Our eyes met; black and brown.
"Not that I can ask you to settle down. He didn't want to at your age, either." She mumbled. I waited for my mother to elaborate who this 'he' was. Was it my father? Someone else?
It never came as suddenly my mother's name was called out by someone on the other side of the street. I realized that we were walking through another busy square, with large signs pointing to all the connecting district, one of them being the Hanamachi, the flower district, which was the local entertainment district. It was also where the smaller pleasure district, or the Yukaku was located. It was from this direction my mother's name was called.
"Suuuuuuuiren~!" A high-pitched feminine voice called across the square. My mother stopped, startled, and spun around to find the speaker. We didn't have to look long; the speaker herself practically skipped over. The woman seemed familiar to my mother, since I noticed her relaxing.
The speaker was a young woman of my mother's age and almost of the same complexion. She was pretty, but the thing that startled me most was her hair color. I'd never seen (or thought possible) hair of that color, one I'd only seen in fabrics. A rich navy, it lay lank on her yukata. She bounced up to us, smiling from ear to ear.
"Oh, Suiren! You're back! I'm so happy to see you again!" And then she practically grabbed on to my mother's free arm, all but nuzzling her.
"Hey, Amaya." My mother said, sounding slightly exasperated but not uncomfortable. I looked up at the strange navy-haired woman. How did she know my mother?
"Are you working tonight? Why didn't you let us know, we could go out tonight to welcome you back to the district? You should really go talk to Miyu-oba-chan! Waaaaait." And amidst all the questions, the women's eyes finally slid down to me.
"Hey, is that? It is! You came with little Heiwa?" The women jumped up and landed in a crouch to look at me at eye level. My eyes met warm hazel ones, and I blinked, unsure of how to react to her.
"AAAAAAAAAH! She's so cute~!" Amaya straightened herself and smiled at my mother, raising a thumb up.
"Great job, Suiren! There's nothing worthier than contributing to population of cute girls in this world! The world needs cute girls like you, Heiwa-chan." She plopped a hand on my head.
"Amaya, what were you saying about Miyu-oba-san?" asked my mother. Amaya's attention was gained and she launch in explanation of a sort of 'promotion' the establishments of the yukaku had decided to hold. My mother, it seems, had come at a good time for business. Not so much for a family vacation. I could see worry seep into her face as Amaya kept talking, both casting brief glances at me.
"Just go talk to her, Suiren. We could take Heiwa with us, and-"
"No. Heiwa isn't crossing the akasen." My mother said harshly.
The akasen, or red line, was the line that separated the pleasure quarters and red district from the rest of the Hanamachi. A kind of border of 'sin'.
Amaya pouted.
I looked up at mother, and then upwards at the pagodas. Perhaps I could work this into my favor, as I did need to find that store Kojiro slipped me the address of. I could hide whatever was waiting for me there in my bag. However getting out of my mother's grasp was hard, so I had to treat this like a mission.
A real mission any shinobi would undertake. And sometimes that meant subterfuge.
I pulled on my mother's sleeve, pointing to a pagoda roof I knew as belonging to our inn. I gestured to myself and mimed walking back to show that perhaps she could go off with Amaya while I attempted to get back to the inn. My mother began shaking her head.
"No, Heiwa, you can't – you're only four! And, I wanted to go show you that little café before it closes."
I shrugged and pointed at the sign towards the Hanamachi.
"Ah, come on, Suiren. There's like a hundred four year-olds running around without supervision in this town, the inn's close by, and Heiwa-chan's worth like ten four year-olds, so she should be able to get there herself. Trust in the cute!" Amaya intervened, under lip sticking out and eyes widening at my mother. I decided to copy her and sent pleading eyes at my mother.
My mother's lips twisted.
"Oh, but she can't…Oh, alright. I'll bring food home for us then. But you'll have to go straight to the inn Heiwa. I can't search for you!"
"Yay~! Don't worry, Suiren, we can see the inn from here, right? She's good to go, now let's get to Miyu-oba-san before it's too late!" Amaya started immediately pulling my mother away, the latter looking at me anxiously.
"Oh, you have no idea how much it sucks without you, Suiren. I'm the only mizuno at the ageya amongst all these dusty people, it's really hard."
My mother responded, but I couldn't discern what she said as they disappeared in the road leading to the Hanamachi. I waited a moment before pulling out the slip of paper Kojiro had slipped me and sped off to the road written on the paper, having noticed it earlier. There were even more people out this afternoon and the squares I passed were filled with nomads, though as I got closer to my destination, the number of people got thinner and thinner, along with a noticeable change in the town itself. The sandstone buildings grew less tall, less well-taken care of, and became replaced with mudbrick. The people started looking like the folks back home, in the Hovel.
And I began seeing residents of a different kind. They came, without rebreathers or raincoats that marked the standard uniform. Instead they wore a cream or beige colored suit stitched up and down the middle, making them blend into the walls. They paid me no mind as I passed them, the sun glinting off their forehead protectors, with four long vertical grooves indented into them.
Ame-nin. The first time I ever saw any.
I could see by their faces that the majority were from the lakes and rainy forests of Mizumi no Kuni, or mizuno. Occasionally I'd spot the darker complexion and dusty hair colors of home among them, but I saw hair colors I'd never spotted in my life; vivid blond or hair that looked orange, a deep, muddy green or navy, and the dark chestnut of my mother.
I kept passing more and more of them as I looked for the store Kojiro pointed out to me. They were less impressive than I thought, considering some looked very bothered than the heat. It felt strange that one day, perhaps, I would be part of them. After all, I knew that eventually my mother would try to send to me to Saboten to learn a trade and apprentice to someone. If Kojiro and I kept making progress, perhaps we would break my kunoichi aspirations to her gently soon, so by the time I was six I could go and try to enter the Academy for shinobi in Amegakure. I tried to imagine myself older, attired in that same cream-colored suit, strolling down Saboten with holsters strapped to my leg. At least I'd be able to stand the heat.
Unfortunately my daydream of being a kunoichi were interrupted by the fact I couldn't find the store. I wasn't lost, amazingly, but I just couldn't find it. There was an address but no place to go. Logically, the doorway after the one I was facing should have been the one for the store, but there was no door there. And the next building over skipped over to the next number. I wondered if knocking on the other door would work, but the thought of trying to explain to someone what I was looking for was a bit nerve-racking. The niggling thought that all strangers were like that mean old woman in the caravan had entered my head and never left.
I wondered if I'd still beat mother home to the inn. Considering Amaya was such a chatterbox, it was likely I still had time. Luckily, I noticed a stray dog coming of an alley way in the next building over and decided to see if there was something there, behind the other buildings.
In a plain wall made of mudbrick I could see a tiny opening that looked like it was covered up on the inside. It was pretty sketchy. But, I guess shinobi were.
My fist pounded the wall causing some of the dust to spill off. After a second I heard footsteps and a voice speak through the little slit.
"Password?"
I looked down to the paper I had and rolled my eyes. Figures shishou would forget that I had to say some password. And I was way too short to jump even halfway to the slit.
"Musta' been a dog." I heard the voice say as I tried to figure out how to make him open it. I pounded the door again, longer.
"Alright, alright, I'll open the door! I swear if this is a pran-"
The wall moved to show a balding man around Kojiro's age with faded red whiskers and a stained tank barely covering the man's potbelly.
"Ugh, just a kid! Listen, this ain't no charity, and I don't know how you found this place but-"
I raised the paper to him and he snatched it, eyeing the writing.
"Hey, this is Kojiro's writi-.." He straightened up before looking left and right before walking backwards, motioning for me to follow him. I entered into what seems to be a store room, with many weapons and other curiosities displayed.
The man slid the wall into place and covered up the peephole.
"Sorry about that, kid. All these bleedin' ame-nin swarming Saboten has got me on edge. You ain't a plant, right? Of course not, you're Kojiro's new kid, right? He told me he found a girl with talent out on the border. No offense, you look pretty young to enter this lifestyle." He eyed me suspiciously. I said nothing.
"Oh, and weren't you supposed to be deaf or something? Oh wait, you wouldn't understand, so that's not right, uh, what's the word? Mute, yeah." He snapped his fingers while turning and walking over to a desk covered in scatted paperwork, discarded wrappers, and a mug proclaiming him the world's best Daichi.
"Let's see, Kojiro's orders."
I decided to look at the little store while waiting. I could see scrolls hanging up from the ceiling, one open with a red spiral drawn on it. A sign assured me that all the merchandise was thoroughly vetted and no previous owner was coming back for it. I had made way to look at the maps of palaces and universal lock breakers before the man finally called for me.
"Eh, girl, I got it. Kojiro's stuff shoulda been here by now, but my suppliers are having a little trouble getting me the goods, because of all the trouble in Konoha. Amegakure's paranoid enough as it is, but that invasion yesterday made the brass back in Rain send a whole platoon to secure the border with Suna. This whole region's a big weak spot for those rainy folk, see?"
I frowned, shrugging.
"Can you come back in a couple days? I'm sure to get some of what he wanted, and I'll dig it up from the official stores if I have to. Can't let Kojiro down, yeah?"
I nodded, unsure what to say. The man rose and led me to the secret door.
"Be careful out there. Lots' of tensions and tempers you don't wanna stir up, kid."
I bowed to him and skipped off, not looking back or paying much attention as I rejoined the roads with shinobi walking them. I waited till the amount of shinobi thinned out and then sped off again, chakra in my legs, back to the cluster of pagodas I knew our inn was at, almost knocking down a Sand nomad boy in the process. I must have looked like a blur as I reached the inn and made my way up and began pretending to read.
Not five minutes later, my mother returned, oblivious to what had really transpired. I just smiled.
Notes for attentive or confused readers:
Amegakure's country has no official country name, but it does happen to be surrounded by a huge ass lake - so you get Mizumi no Kuni, land of lakes. My world-building will probably always focus on cultural makeup of the Elemental nations, so you get a bit of insight to how Mizumi no Kuni works. The 'dusty' region (a proposed name for this region, if it ever gained independence, would be the Land of Dust) was constantly being warred over for some mineral deposits in the canyons and trade routes. Culturally, it's neither like the people of the wet part of Mizumi no Kuni, nor is it truly like Kaze no Kuni. And because Sand invaded and occupied the region during the Second War, the people of the area ain't too friendly towards Suna-nin.
Saboten has no exact real life counterpart, but architecturally it would be a cross between the Pagodas of Bagan in Myanmar and the overall look of Kashgar in Western China (along with other Central Asian towns like Bukhara or old school Samarkand). Just an oasis city on the Narutoverse equivalent of the Silk Road.
Heiwa was born with damaged laryngeal nerves; hence the congenital aphonia. I'm no pre-med student, so please understand I'm generally skimming articles on google scholar and pulling crap out of nowhere.
An ageya was a place where (mostly high class) prostitutes would meet clients, a kind of selection place. The Narutoverse can be so modern and yet so not, so i have little idea what the sex industry would be like, but I'm incorporating parts from the Edo period of Japan and modern day stuff. So, it's run by a yarite but unlike the Edo period, the sex industry in Saboten isn't as rigidly class-fixated. I really wanna write drabbles of how Rei and Suiren met now, along with how Suiren met Heiwa's dad.
So, is this story ever going to stop being so slice of life? Is Amaya on happy pills and does anyone else think she'd be a good ship for Gai, or just me? And is there a cabal of old Uzumaki men who run sketchy black market shinobi supply stores and train little girls to be killers in the middle of nowhere? You will probably find out in the next chapter! Or you could review plox.