IV.
"Nohara?" Captain Ibiki prompted, as soon as it became clear that Rin was back. Behind him, Ino, Aoba and several other fellow Intelligence Division ninjas anxiously waited for her to tell them how everything had gone. The novelty of the long-range medical assistance type of mission coupled with Ibiki's presence ensured that many put their duties on hold to satisfy their curiosity.
"Mission failed, sir," she said, crestfallen, doing her best not to think of the ongoing battle back in Whirlpool. She hoped that her host managed to stay safe. "I was unable to save the patient."
Rin gave everyone a second to absorb the news. There were many disappointed faces, in particular that of the ninja who had been assigned to that team and therefore knew them better.
The pause also gave her a moment to regain her bearings. She was always a little lightheaded when she returned to her body and the fact that she had been tired even before initiating the Mind Body Switch was not helping. Rather than the slight disorientation that she was used to, Rin was caught in a full blown dizzy spell, complete with cloudy vision and muddled hearing. It soon passed, however. Rin would not be a very good medical ninja if she did not know how to do a few breathing exercises to help her recover.
Once she was feeling more like herself, she realized that perhaps she should have waited to speak to Ibiki in private, rather than in front of all the people who had gathered in the Communications Room. That they had lost an operative was the kind of news that would spread on its own fast enough, but what she had to tell Ibiki next was sensitive information that could cause panic. Not that she did not trust her coworkers to keep their mouths shut when ordered to.
"Captain," she began, "I also have disturbing news. May we speak in your office, perhaps?"
Ibiki looked surprised at the unusual request for privacy, but he could read people easily enough that he surely saw some warning sign in Rin's countenance. He had been a man of few words even in his Academy days, so he just nodded and told her to follow him as he led the way to a secluded office.
Grateful that he agreed without openly questioning the why, Rin stood from her seat without thinking. Immediately, she regretted the decision, as a fresh wave of dizziness almost brought her to her knees. She held her head, willing herself not to empty her stomach on the spot. By itself, the Mind Body Switch technique was costly in terms of chakra, but distance always aggravated it. The energy she had used trying to heal that poor ANBU was not negligible, either.
She would have reached into the supply pouch hooked to her belt to pull out another Food Pill had Ino not grabbed her hand to stop her, pulling her arm over her shoulder to support her weight.
"You already ate two of those before," the young Yamanaka muttered angrily at her, so no one overheard. "Any more and you're the one who will need medical assistance!"
"Sorry..." Rin said, feeling a little ashamed. She pushed herself to the limit in the fulfillment of her duty so often that even Ino had seemingly noticed her unhealthy dependence on the pills.
"Are you all right there, Nohara?" Ibiki asked, looking back.
"She's fine, Captain," Ino was the one who answered with a bright smile. "The switching technique just takes a lot out of a person. I've got her."
If Ibiki was reassured, Rin was thankful that her friend had covered for her. As a medic, Rin may have had the respect of her fellow ninjas during times of crisis, but that did not mean that she did not feel the pressure to never ever let herself be thought of as frail or unable to rise up to the challenge at any time in the same way as her other coworkers. The Nohara were not a notable clan in the Leaf and she had earned her position in the Intelligence Division through merit alone. Her pride would not let her risk the image of competence she had built up for herself because of an overly long shift and a poorly-timed emergency.
The three of them made their way to the nearest unused office without further interruption. As soon as the door was closed behind them, the privacy seals inscribed into the walls activated on their own. Meanwhile, Ibiki pointed out a chair for Rin and settled himself against the table, arms crossed. After helping Rin to sit down, Ino took a step back to remove herself from the center of attention.
"All right, Nohara. No one else can hear us in here," Ibiki explained. "What was it that you wanted to say?"
Rin nodded, mentally bracing herself.
"As you know, when I got to Whirlpool, there was an ongoing fight. Two of our ninjas, Boar and Monkey, were engaging the enemy, while the one who served as my host, Raven, had taken their injured teammate to a secluded place out of harm's way, where I would be able to administer treatment."
She went on to describe the location and narrate the extent of the injuries. She told them about how she had almost managed to stabilize her patient, when the unthinkable occurred.
"We could be wrong, of course, but all the evidence pointed towards the same conclusion. That man, Shigeki's associate, he somehow got inside Boar and Monkey's heads and made them turn against their teammates."
"No way, that's impossible!" Ino exclaimed. Only belatedly did she realize that she had spoken out of turn and interrupted her friend's report, but by then what was done was done and Ibiki actually seemed interested in what she might have to add to the discussion.
"What makes you say that?" Ibiki asked. He had worked closely with Ino's father for years before the Fourth Great War and so knew that the Yamanaka clan had developed a technique that caused much the same effect that Rin had described.
"That sounded almost exactly like my clan's Mind Body Disturbance technique, but there's no way that any Yamanaka would be working for that guy!"
Ibiki thought it over for a few moments, but he obviously did not have as much faith in the infallibility of people as Ino, since he proceeded to ask Rin if there was anything else she could remember that would shed some light on the subject. Undeterred, however, the young Yamanaka interrupted a second time.
"Rin! You said that Boar and Monkey did not react when that guy came close, right?" Rin confirmed it with a nod of the head. Ibiki frowned, but allowed Ino to continue. "Was the enemy making any kind of special hand seals at the time?" This time, the medical ninja shook her head in a negative. "Then something else had to have happened! Any technique that takes control of people's bodies like that requires the wielder to hold the hand seal to keep the targets under their influence!"
"Then perhaps it was not just their bodies that that man was controlling," Rin pondered. "I know a little about your clan's other techniques too, Ino, and neither Boar nor Monkey looked like they were acting against their will. I think it's possible that, whoever that man was, he did something to their minds..."
"Regardless of what that technique did," Ibiki cut in, "we have to assume the worst. We now have two, possibly three, of our ANBU working for the enemy, if he managed to influence Raven the same way as the other two. We have to alert the rest of our ninjas out there to what this man can do, so they can keep an eye out for Boar's team and so that the same thing does not happen to them. Yamanaka, get to work on that! And compile a brief on this guy for the Hokage and our allies in the other nations."
Ino nodded, no doubt already composing the missive in her head and figuring out how many people would have to be contacted. She was well-respected in the Intelligence Division and knew most people who worked there. The task would give her no trouble to complete. In the months since the Fourth War, people had naturally come to rely on her as much as they once had relied on her father.
Ibiki then turned towards Rin.
"Nohara, get home. Get some rest, you've earned it. Good job."
His praise was always welcome, but this time it failed to lift her spirits as it would on any other day. The fact remained that she had actually let someone die and left a teammate alone face to an uncertain fate. Inoichi had once told her that she was a different person in and out of a mission. In the field, she never let a hard decision get in the way of her duty to her friends and village. To a medic, a second's hesitation could mean the difference between life and death, after all. Out of the field, though, the record changed.
Now that she had the time and headspace, she could not stop thinking about everything that had happened, second guessing her every decision. She had never been very good at letting go of those she had failed to help. If she were not so tired, she might have been able to tell herself that there was nothing more she could have done. As it was, however, she was feeling the failure ten times more intensely than usual.
By the time Rin finally found herself home, she felt like she had lived the events of a full week over the course of that single night. Her one consolation was that she had no idea what her host had looked like, or he might have been making an appearance in her nightmares too.
I'm sorry this is not a very interesting chapter. I realized as I wrote it that it actually worked better as a part of chapter 3 rather than on its own. One of many things to fix at a later date, I suppose. :)