Chapter Three

The third time that the voice – Tez, he had to remember that she was a person with a name – came was when Iruka was in the jail. Sasuke had been captured during Pein's attack and was currently waiting for his trial. Until then, he was being stored – kept, whatever – in the maximum security section.

He felt that shuffling feeling in the back of his head as he walked down the hallway towards Sasuke's cell, and this time he was prepared for her to look out through his eyes to see where they were. "We're in a jail," he announced before she could say anything. "Could you please be quiet until this meeting is over?"

Tez thought for a moment before replying. "Is it okay if I try to do something while you're in your meeting?"

"What are you going to try?"

"I don't know yet. I'll have to see where you're going before I can make up my mind. I don't think you'll notice anything, though, so it shouldn't interfere."

Well, he was okay with that, he supposed. He also supposed that there was nothing he could do to stop her. She could cross an impenetrable void whenever she wanted to as it was. He could barely perform a teleportation jutsu.

It didn't matter anyway. He'd reached his destination. Looking into the room he found Sasuke seated at a table with chakra-binding handcuffs locking his hands together. It showed how much Ibiki-san trusted Iruka that he allowed him to see Sasuke in a visitation room. Had it been any other ninja they would have been guided down a dungeon-like hallway and given a stool to sit on outside of a small cell.

The Jounin guard opened the door for Iruka before the teacher was quite ready for him to do so. With a deep breath he entered the room and jumped when the door slammed closed behind him. It was just the surprise from the sudden noise that had Iruka jumping, not the fear of being locked in with an S-ranked criminal. Honest.

"Hello, Sasuke-kun. How have you been this week?" Iruka asked as he took his basket over to the table and set it down.

Sasuke didn't say anything. He never did. He looked up at Iruka with sunken eyes and just watched him, as if waiting for something bad to happen. True to form, though, Iruka refused to actually do anything. He just sat down and pulled a tomato and a rice ball out of the basket to set within Sasuke's reach.

"I added some onigiri today. You like pickled plums, right?" Sasuke didn't answer. "Well, if you don't you can pull them off. I won't mind."

The raven picked up his rice ball and began eating mechanically. As was part of the ritual, Iruka pulled out more food and sorted it out evenly. Then he poured out two cups of green tea and gave one to Sasuke. Then, as Sasuke ate, he started in on the innocuous newsy conversation he always employed on his former student. None of it was important stuff – who cared if he taught another class from hell? He never named any students or their families because that was unprofessional, so no important information ever reached the Uchiha's ears anyway.

As he talked, Sasuke ate. When Sasuke finished eating, he just watched Iruka with those sunken eyes. He could feel Tez watching the whole thing and he sensed her thinking about it. Then, when he temporarily lapsed into silence, she spoke. "I know you want me to keep quiet, but I can tell you aren't reaching him this way anymore."

"I know," Iruka replied. "I'm just here because I want him to know he has a friend, you know, besides Naruto."

"Does that Naruto guy come here often?" Tez asked. Iruka wondered briefly if she was analyzing the situation to help him or if she was just curious. For some strange reason he couldn't tell. She felt a little cut off from him, as if she'd taken a step back and had shielded her emotions.

"Naruto comes to visit every day," Iruka thought softly. "Sasuke doesn't respond to him either."

"Do either of you ask him anything other than how he's doing now?" Tez asked. Clearly, she had a point to these questions. If she didn't, this last one was just weird.

Anyway, Iruka had to think back to the past few visits he'd had with Sasuke. He'd only ever asked the boy how he was, if he was hanging in there, and if he was eating. Honestly, he hadn't wanted to ask anything else. He didn't want to hear about what it was like living with Orochimaru. The torture, the experiments, the sadism… those were bad enough to read about in the reports he was helping Kakashi to go through. He didn't want Sasuke's voice to color it with the perspective of someone who had lived through it. It was painful enough as it was.

Unfortunately, the Uchiha was smart enough to realize that Iruka was afraid. He was pretty sure that's why Sasuke didn't say anything at all. Sasuke had always been a sweet boy, especially the one time he met him before his family's massacre. Sure, he may not have understood common social graces, but he was giving to the people he felt worth it. And Sasuke had always had a place in his heart for his Academy teacher, who always leant an ear when he needed it. Iruka just wished he knew how to get Sasuke talking about something!

"You could always ask him about his nightmares, and how bad they are. Don't bring up anything that you know happened to him, and in fact don't say anything after you ask. Let him decide if he's ready to share."

And there it was: the reason why he couldn't sense anything from his not-so-silent passenger. She was being a therapist. Therapists were trained to stay aloof and emotionally separate from their patients, regardless of whether they were ninjas or civilians. Tez was probably subconsciously closing herself off to him, not even realizing that she was doing it.

Of course, that brought up the thought that maybe she didn't know how accessible her motives and intentions normally were to him. Perhaps she could teach him how to close off his mind to her?

Anyway, he had been silent for too long. Sasuke was watching him very closely, almost defensively, as if waiting for him to say something terrible. Iruka set down the rice ball he hadn't yet bitten into and shifted to get more comfortable in his horrible plastic chair.

"Sasuke, I was wondering how horrible your nightmares are. Quite frankly, it looks like you haven't been sleeping," he said softly.

Sasuke actually jerked his head back as if Iruka had thrown a punch at him. His eyes darted to the side and turned downcast. Iruka did as Tez had told him – he didn't say a thing. In fact, he didn't even move. Clearly Sasuke was thinking it over, so Iruka waited patiently for him. After a good long while Sasuke finally spoke.

"I keep hearing the screams," the boy admitted miserably. His voice was steady and strong as Iruka expected, but his eyes looked tortured as he stared at the floor.

Iruka nodded, briefly catching Sasuke's gaze before it returned to the ground. Then he said, "Based off the reports I've read, that's not very surprising."

"My team – the one I put together in Sound before everything… happened – none of us could sleep at night very well. That's why we pushed ourselves so hard every day to find my brother. If we were exhausted then we could sometimes sleep without dreams."

"Have they been worse since coming here?" Iruka asked. He'd had missions that had left him with screaming nightmares before. He understood the feeling even if it wasn't as bad or as intense as Sasuke's experience.

Sasuke nodded silently with his gaze still locked on the floor. After a moment he said, "Sometimes I think that maybe I should ask the guard to go get me my shrink, but they haven't brought me anything I've asked for yet and I don't want to show them any more weakness."

All ninjas dreaded the post traumatic stress after particularly hard missions, and they all felt it. That's why each ninja was assigned a therapist at the hospital whom they could go to whenever they felt they needed to talk. Most only went to sessions when ordered, but many knew what a benefit it was to have someone safe to talk with to deal with the emotional problems. Sasuke was obviously of the former group, so admitting to Iruka that he may need professional help was a bit worrisome to the teacher. Sasuke never asked for anything. Ever.

"I'll go talk to her after I leave and ask her if she would come by," Iruka offered. Sasuke didn't respond, so Iruka assumed he accepted it. "What else can I get for you?"

Sasuke shrugged, but his eyes finally found Iruka's for the first time since his return. The change was practically invisible, but they looked just a little bit lighter – a little brighter. It was just enough of a change that Iruka felt a light of hope. Maybe Sasuke would start baiting Naruto again. If he did, it would be a sign that he was starting to recover from his traumatic experiences and things were finding a new equilibrium.

"Iruka-sensei, there's something you could tell me," Sasuke said softly.

"What is it, Sasuke-kun?" Iruka asked. There were a lot of things he couldn't tell the Uchiha, but it was crucial he allow the boy to ask.

"Have you taken any time to grieve for the Godaime?" Sasuke asked bluntly. "I understand if you don't want to tell me," he looked up at the security camera in a gentle reminder that their meetings were witnessed, "but you look like shit."

Iruka sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose over his scar. "Everybody's been telling me that," he said with a sigh. "I could really use a couple days off to really rest up after this last month. You know I've been pulling triple duty."

"Hn. Maybe you should ask for some leave?" Sasuke suggested.

Iruka smiled at the boy. He remembered having chats like this when Sasuke was still his student. The boy had needed someone to confide in and trust, so Iruka had gently provided that in the form of a tea outing. Unfortunately, Sasuke had stopped showing up at the teahouse a few months before he defected. Iruka had tried to warn Kakashi that something was up with his student, but Kakashi was still being a bastard after their argument at the Chunin exam.

But, to get back to the present… "I would if I knew we could manage, but we need everyone we can spare right now. I'm not the only one taking on extra shifts." The words sounded hollow even in his ears, and judging by the look Sasuke was giving him, he thought the excuse was crap, too.

They lapsed into silence for a while, each one contemplating their own thoughts. Tez was surprisingly silent, but Iruka could still feel her there. Her attention seemed to be taken up by something else, though. He briefly wondered what could be so fascinating to the voice in his head, but was pulled from his thoughts when Sasuke spoke.

"Could you bring some of that sushi you used to make for me?" the boy asked tentatively. "The kind with the tomatoes on top?"

Iruka beamed. "Of course I can, Sasuke-kun!"

At that point the guard banged on the door, indicating that their time was up. Iruka packed up his basket and said his farewell to the Uchiha. Sasuke stood, too, and bowed back, telling Iruka to take care. Then Iruka tried to leave, but his feet wouldn't move. He looked down and saw that his shoes had been turned into cement.

"Tez, what are you doing?" he demanded of the woman. He felt her shrug before his shoes suddenly melted back to their normal soft material.

"I told you I needed to do something! My assignment was to see if I could use magic from your body. Since you didn't even feel me do it, I guess you can't feel my power at all."

Iruka looked over at Sasuke, who was looking at Iruka's feet in open-eyed wonder. As the Uchiha looked up at Iruka, the older man simply turned around and left the room without so much as an explanation. He had no words.

Sasuke had seen Tez's ability! He'd seen her magic! What was he going to tell him next time? What could he tell him next time? This would ruin all of his credibility with the emotive teen. Sasuke wouldn't trust him anymore! He'd think Iruka was crazy! Anyone would think Iruka was crazy. He sounded crazy when he practiced telling his reflection about his little visitor and thought he sounded like he belonged in a psych ward.

And look at that power Tez had used! Jutsus that transfigured things like that were a particularly difficult specialty that few Jounin had ever been able to master. The girl in his head – who sounded like she was a few years younger than Iruka – was amazingly powerful and particularly skilled if she didn't need to use his hands for any seals at all. He still couldn't wrap his head around the idea that she didn't need hand seals.

"Iruka, where are we going?" Tez asked. She only sounded mildly interested, as if she was that stupid Jounin-turned-Hokage named Kakashi.

"We're going…" but Iruka had to stop. Apparently he'd kept walking while he'd been having his internal freak-out and his feet had led him into the training field. He was on the path right between the clearings where Team Gai and Team Six used to train. "I have no idea where we're going."

"How about we pick a nice clearing and have a seat?" Tez suggested. "This looks like a peaceful section of woods."

"These are the training grounds," Iruka corrected as he made his feet start moving again. "This is the area where Genin teams train between missions for their Chunin exams. A little further down is the area where we Chunin usually train."

"Oh," was all Tez said. She maintained the silence until Iruka had found a nice clearing and settled in a tree branch to sit. Then, out of the blue, she said, "So, show me what you know."

"What?" Iruka demanded.

"My son watches this show on television about ninja, and I know all about the historical ninja from my planet, but I'd like to see the style of fighting that a ninja like you would employ in a fight."

Iruka had to think about this. Should he show her? She wasn't an enemy so far as he could tell, but she was still a stranger. How would he really know if she was actually a friend? She hadn't done anything to him, but who knew how long that would last?

Although, now that he thought about it, he hadn't really trained much lately. True, he didn't normally spend nearly as much time training as, say, Naruto, but he hadn't been working toward his Jounin exam, either. He only trained enough to keep battle-ready in case something happened to the village or he was sent on a mission. Lately, he'd been training even less often going from a few hours every day to a few hours maybe twice a week.

Without thinking about it – he may as well trust her for now since she probably had access to his thoughts anyway – Iruka stood up and started his warm-ups and stretches. Then he started running within the little clearing, slowly building up his speed until he was dodging and diving through trees in basic evasive maneuvering. After half an hour he had run through all of the taijutsu moves he knew and started in on his ninjutsu.

Tez stayed silent as Iruka trained. She saw everything, of that Iruka was certain. She wasn't as easy to sense this time as she had been the previous two times she had visited, but she wasn't as cut off as she had been around Sasuke. After Iruka had run through all of the ninjutsu he knew, he started working on some combinations that he was having a little trouble with.

That's when Tez ended the silence and gave some advice. Iruka listened to it and noticed that the jump side kick with the chakra flare was easier with her advice. He just needed to visualize the chakra coming out of his feet as if it were a solid extension of his foot so that it could more effectively send him flying away from the tree he had chosen as his opponent. Then she suggested that he use the same maneuver when he landed in order to send himself flying into the trees, just in case he needed to escape.

After practicing the new technique a few times he moved onto another move, and Tez gave him some more advice, and each time she would add some little twist or spin on the move so that it became more versatile. Apparently he didn't visualize how he wanted his chakra to work clearly enough. The small words of wisdom worked wonders, and after another half hour of training Iruka took a little break.

"Thank you for the help," he thought at his companion.

"You don't do this very often, do you?" she asked. He could feel the smile on her face that he couldn't see.

Iruka shrugged. "I'm not training for the Jounin exam or anything, so I only have to train enough to maintain the level of skill I have."

"What's the next level?" Tez asked. That's when Iruka realized that she didn't know anything about the ninja ranking system.

He started in on the lecture, but Tez cut him off. "Honestly, Iruka, I don't know how long I've still got to stay here. I'll probably be waking up any minute now. How about you just visualize the knowledge and I'll glean it from your mind?"

With barely a thought Iruka pictured his academy classroom and focused on the memory of the last time he had taught the lesson of shinobi ranks. After a couple of moments Tez indicated that she was finished by thanking him.

"So, now that I understand that a Chunin is a higher rank than a Genin but is a lower rank than a Jounin, and since I now understand that higher ranked ninja bring in more money and attain higher prestige, I am wondering why you decided to remain at your current level?"

Iruka shrugged. "I guess I just never really thought about becoming a Jounin. I got busy with teaching and working the missions' desk, and then my sensei was killed on a mission, so even if I had thought about it I wouldn't have anyone to teach me."

There was a long silence and Tez seemed to mull that over. "You know, Iruka, you pick things up pretty quickly, and you're a good listener. I'll admit I don't know anything about your jutsu and stuff, but I guess it would be a fair trade for me to help you train since you're already loaning me your body for my assignments."

Iruka thought about that for a little bit. Honestly, he didn't know if he wanted to take the test. He knew what was involved in the test, just as he knew that a lot more people died in it than in the Chunin exam. He also couldn't think about how much time he would need every day to train. He barely had enough hours in the day for his desk jobs let alone to add a few hours of training. The pitiful amount of time he could scrounge up wouldn't even be close to enough if he wanted to take the next exam in eight months.

"Hey, Iruka, my time is almost up here. How about you think on it for a few days and I'll leave you with this piece of information: where I'm from I'm the best battle-mage on the planet, all of my private lesson students have reached very high, honorable positions within the magical community, and I specialize in unique magical abilities that often don't fall within the realms of known methodologies. I'm sure that between what you know already and what I know already, you and I will be able to train you up in time for the next Jounin exam."

With that Iruka felt Tez get pulled from his mind and that little door slammed itself shut. Clearly she had woken up and her body had pulled her soul back of its own will.

Iruka suddenly felt a little lonely in his own head, but he shook it off and continued with his training as he started analyzing Tez's offer.