Disclaimer: All HP characters are the property of JKR, the WB, and respective publishing companies and all Naruto characters are the property of Masashi Kishimoto. This is nothing more than a simple FanFiction that I have written. I have made no money from this or any of the other stories I have posted on this or other sites.
Warnings: Mild to moderate violence, character death, alternate universe (i.e. kiss canon goodbye), OCC behaviors and personalities, a number of original characters and obscure canon characters to flesh out family trees, random chosen last names to give a number of characters surnames, and who knows what else.
AN: This story is self-beta'd; so there may be occasional grammatical or spelling errors that crop up every now and then and for those I apologize in advance.
Chapter Seven: The Pact
July 21, 0284 AtD, 12:15 PM
Konohagakure no Sato, Hi no Kuni
Kojimaru sighed and took another measured sip of tea from his canteen as he sat curled up in a nest of branches in an old acacia tree that grew on the Academy grounds. Unseen by those on the ground, a thin offshoot from one of the branches that made up the unnatural nest of living branches was gently petting the artificial redhead's back; Kojimaru's implanted Mokuton allowing him to give any tree he approached a degree of near sentience and mobility. It was an ability that had manifested the day he'd been attacked by the wild cat and he still could not control the ability when near any living plant but most especially when he was near any tree or in direct contact with a tree.
He had a similar but completely different problem with his Hyouton when it came to water and air; his Hyouton constantly dropped the temperature around him whenever he became uncomfortably warm. It didn't help that his body temperature had permanently dropped to around ninety-degrees Fahrenheit after that fateful encounter with the wild cat and he would quickly overheat the moment that his temperature rose above ninety-two degrees Fahrenheit. In the event that his temperature exceeded ninety-four degrees Fahrenheit, he would display all of the symptoms of any other child suffering from a severe fever.
The soon-to-be four year old gave out another weary sigh as he absently petted a newly unfurled leaf on a branch that had just slithered up onto his leg. It had been six days since his godfather had left the village on a mission and while he didn't mind staying with Shikaku and his mother or spending time with the deer each afternoon, he missed Kosuke and their nightly cooking lessons. It didn't help that the Nara Clan as a whole tended to be rather lazy and uninterested in extra lessons, extra training, or any other movement that they deemed was unnecessary (such as playing tag with the deer or climbing trees).
Kojimaru was drawn out of his brooding by the sound of someone hailing him from the foot of the tree that he was hiding in. Curious as to who was looking for him, Kojimaru shifted up onto his knees and leaned over the side of the nest the tree had grown for him the first time he had climbed up into its branches. His eyes soon landed on a boy about his age with dirty-blond hair and light brown eyes waving up at him from the base of the tree. Kojimaru recognized the kid from his class; though he had never sat near him during their lessons or even talked to the boy.
"Can I come up?"
Kojimaru bit his lip as he sat back and glanced about his little nest; he'd be in trouble if someone saw the nest because he wasn't supposed to let anyone see what he can make the trees (or the ice) do. Glancing back down at the other boy, he shook his head no and hesitantly replied, "There isn't enough room."
"Oh. Will you come down here instead then?"
Letting out yet another sigh, this time over having his tea-time interrupted, Kojimaru grabbed his things (in case he didn't have time to fetch them before the bell signaled it was time to return to class) and reluctantly climbed down to see what the boy wanted.
"What did you want?" Kojimaru asked a bit nervously once he reached the ground before he cast a worried glance up at the tree to make certain that none of the branches had moved to follow him like they usually did.
"Do you remember me?" the boy asked as he glanced around at the other children that were either playing around or eating their lunches in small groups; as if worried someone might hear him.
"Yeah, you're in my class. You always sit at the back of the room."
"I know that… but do you remember me?"
"No, should I?"
The boy turned to look Kojimaru right in the eye and bluntly replied, "I remember you; you're subject one-thirty-eight."
Kojimaru couldn't help but flinch in response to hearing that horrible number once more. He began hyperventilating as he backed away from the other boy; his eyes widening in fright as he began to fear that Orochimaru and the others had found him once again. He let out a soft whimper as he recalled that Kosuke wasn't here and wouldn't be able to protect him from Orochimaru like he had promised that he would. He would have bolted at that point if not for the other boy reaching out to grab hold of his wrist.
"Don't be scared," the boy whispered urgently as he eyed Kojimaru with concern. "I won't hurt you. I'm subject one-eighty-one."
Kojimaru started in surprise before he frowned and glanced around the yard at the other children much as the other boy had just a minute ago. He then broke free of the other boy's grasp and latched onto his wrist instead as he began climbing back up the tree while dragging the other boy along behind him.
Once they were inside of the small nest, Kojimaru let the other boy go and hissed out a harsh, "Don't you know we're not supposed to talk about that?"
"Do you remember me now?" the boy formerly known as subject one-eighty-one demanded instead of acknowledging Kojimaru's question.
"Sort of; you look different. I look different too. How did you know it was me?"
"I didn't know it was you at first. Not until I saw the way you drink your tea. Did the masked man find you a home and a family too? Did they give you a proper name? My new family named me Tenzou."
"Ojisan named me Kojimaru."
"You have a new uncle too?"
"Not really. Kosuke-oji tells everyone I'm his godson but he's sorta like an uncle and he takes care of me. Did they send you to live with a shinobi too?"
"Hai, Kisuke took me home and he tells everyone I'm his nephew. Emiko is really nice too. She's Kisuke's wife and she lets me call her obasan. Do you have a godmother too?"
"No. Kosuke and I live alone. He has pictures of a pretty woman that he talks to all the time when we're home and he doesn't think I'm listening but he said she died a long time ago the one time I asked him about her. How come you didn't go to the Civilian Academy last term?"
"Kisuke-oji didn't think I was ready. Something about giving me time to settle in or something like that. Emiko gave me all kinds of lessons at home instead. I thought you said there wasn't enough room for both of up here?"
"I kinda lied about that. I'm not supposed to let any one see the way that the trees act all funny and come alive when I'm near them or when I'm touching them," Kojimaru sheepishly answered as he gestured to the branch that was currently petting his hair. "Don't the trees act weird around you as well? Can you make ice grow too?"
"No, I can't do anything like that. I did hear Kisuke say something about me being able to make trees grow when I am older, though. I think that would be kind of cool because I like trees. I especially like the way freshly cut wood smells. Do you like the dirt? I do. I'm always getting in trouble for getting dirty because I like to dig and play in the ground."
"Dirt is okay. I prefer to play in the leaves, splash in puddles, and climb trees. I like the wind a lot too. I like the way it tugs my hair when ojisan runs and jumps across the rooftops while he is carrying me."
The two boys fell silent at that point as they both got lost in their thoughts. Kojimaru was just taking another sip from his canteen when Tenzou spoke up once more to ask, "Do you still remember…?"
"Sometimes, but I try not to," Kojimaru replied as he shuddered in response to the question and the memories that the questioned had stirred; the artificial redhead immediately knowing that the other boy was referring to the things that Orochimaru had done to them. "I don't like remembering."
"I don't either. Do you ever wish you could forget?"
"No."
"Why not?" Tenzou asked in surprise as he twisted around to stare at Kojimaru in shock.
"If I forget, then I will not remember how mean adults can be. I don't like the memories but I don't want to forget them. I already forgot most everything from before he found me; I can't even remember my otousan and my okaasan properly anymore and I don't ever want to forget any thing again. I don't like not knowing when I know I'm supposed to know; even if all I can remember is pain and broken fragments."
"You forgot me."
"No, I didn't, not really; you look different now, so I didn't see you when I looked at you. Just like the old man in the hat didn't see me when he looked at me after ojisan brought me home. I don't think we were supposed to remember each other. The masked man moved us apart that night and then he gave us to different people. We're supposed to be secrets, I think. So they can hide us better from him."
"Do you think he's looking for us?"
"I don't know. I don't want him to look for us. I want him to forget about us."
"Are you afraid that he will find you?"
"No, ojisan promised me that he'd protect me."
"But you were scared earlier. When I told you I knew who you were."
"I was only scared because Kosuke-oji is not here. He went on a mission. I was also scared because I didn't think any one would recognize me. No one else recognized me and when you said you did, it startled me and I thought he had found me."
"Oh, I'm sorry I frightened you like that. I just wanted to know if you remembered me like I remembered you. Does your godfather go on lots of missions?"
"Not at first. This is the first time he's left me alone since he took me home."
"He left you all alone? Why would he do that? Aren't you scared?"
"No, I'm staying with Shikaku-san and the deer. And I'm not scared. It just feels weird to not have oji near. Do the people you live with go on missions and leave you too?"
"Not really. Kisuke goes on missions sometimes but he mostly just stays in the village. Emiko never goes on missions; she's a civilian. She takes care of me when Kisuke is not home."
"What's it like having an aunt?"
"I don't know. I guess it's not much different than having a mother."
"Oh," Kojimaru murmured in confusion and discomfort as he desperately tried and failed to recall what it was like to have a mother. After a moment, he asked, "What's it like to have a mother?"
"It's nice, I think."
"What does a mother do?"
"Well, they cook all the time and clean the house. They smile and cry lots too. They also give you hugs to make you feel better. Don't you remember anything about your mother?"
"I remember the color red," Kojimaru whispered; his eyes growing unfocused as he turned his mind inwards. "A dark red that was the color of freshly spilled blood and an acid green light. And I know that she's dead." He then refocused on the other boy as he shook off the fragments of his old memories. "I guess ojisan is like my mother too. He cooks and cleans too. He's teaching me how to cook and how to take care of the garden."
"He's teaching you to cook like a girl?"
"No! Boys can cook too! Lots of boys cook in the restaurants. Besides, who would cook for those grown-ups that don't have mothers to take care of them? They can't all eat at restaurants all the time. Ojisan is the best cook of all."
"How do you know? Has any one else ever cooked for you?"
"Hai, Shikaku-san's okaasan makes supper every night. I like what she makes but I like what Kosuke makes better. He uses all kinds of different herbs and spices that he grows in our garden. He can even make asparagus taste good."
"No way! Asparagus is gross."
"Not the way Kosuke cooks it!"
Before Tenzou could argue back again, the bell signaling the end of the lunch period rang and both boys jumped in surprise at the sound before snickering at one another. The two of them then shimmied down out of the tree as fast as they could so they wouldn't get in trouble for being late to their next lesson. They reached the classroom out of breath and still grinning like loons before they both headed to their seats.
"Will you wait for me after our lesson?" Tenzou asked as he paused halfway back to his seat.
"Okay," Kojimaru agreed with a nod as he too briefly stopped moving to glance back at the other boy.
The two boys shared another grin before they hurried to their seats and sat down as their sensei entered the room just as the final bell rang. All through the history lesson on the First Great Shinobi War, Kojimaru fidgeted in his seat and snuck glances towards the back of the room where the other boy sat. He felt kind of weird; all excited and worried at the same time. None of the other children he'd been around made him feel that way. None of the other children he had played with had ever known what it was like to be an experiment either. Not like him. And not like Tenzou.
After their history lesson, the class was sent back outside for their taijutsu lessons. Kojimaru gravitated towards Tenzou this time; instead of hanging back on the fringe of the group like he had during the past five days. The two not quite four year olds then whispered to one another as they practiced the taijutsu stances that their instructor was teaching them. The topics of their hushed conversation included continuing their boys versus girls cooking argument, training they had been given by their respective guardians, their favorite hobbies, and tea. It was the most fun that Kojimaru had had over the course of his first week at the Shinobi Academy and by the time the lesson had ended, Kojimaru had forgotten all about being depressed over Kosuke's continued absence.
The two of them then waited together in the lobby of the Academy for their respective minders to fetch them after their final class of the day. Just before they parted ways, they agreed to sit together during their indoor classes and to eat lunch together in Kojimaru's hidden nest up in the acacia tree on Monday.
Kojimaru's good mood would last for the rest of the weekend and Shikaku would be worn ragged by the extra energy that the almost four year old had generated in his excitement. When Wakana had asked him why he was so wound up at one point; Kojimaru had grinned at Shikaku's mother and proudly proclaimed that he'd made another friend. That had Shikaku asking him who his other friends were (since the Nara heir had easily deduced who his new friend was given who the soon to be four year old had been hanging around with after classes). Kojimaru had happily answered that his first friends were the trees and the deer; the child never noticing the sorrow his answer invoked in both mother and son.
Monday morning couldn't come soon enough for Kojimaru and once Monday did arrive, Kojimaru was up at the crack of dawn and impatient to leave for once. He'd somehow managed to sweet talk Wakana into making him a special batch of cherry blossom wagashi and preparing a small packet of powdered green tea (the type that is used for tea ceremonies) on Sunday evening when she'd made his bento for the next day. Kojimaru had wanted to do something special to mark his new friendship and so decided that he'd host a special tea ceremony for Tenzou.
He'd even managed to drag Shikaku out of bed an hour early that morning; much to the teen's disgruntlement and his mother's amusement. Kojimaru would then drag Shikaku out the door a full half an hour earlier than they usually left for the Academy so that he could have time to set things up for the tea ceremony and so that he could spend more time with Tenzou before their first lesson started. Shikaku complained the entire way to the Academy while Kojimaru ignored him and pulled him along at a near run so that the Nara wouldn't waist any time.
Kojimaru dropped Shikaku's arm the moment they stepped onto the Academy grounds and darted off towards the acacia tree that he'd claimed for himself as he hastily called a quick goodbye over his shoulder to his disgruntled babysitter. He quickly scrambled up the trunk of the tree in the blink of an eye and disappeared into the hidden nest where he spent the next ten minutes making his secret fort a little bigger and coaxing the tree into growing a small table in the very center of the nest. Once that was done, he covered the table with a white handkerchief before he carefully set out the ceremonial tea bowl, packet of powdered tea, a canteen of hot water, a tea whisk, a bamboo ladle, a ceremonial tea bowl, a pair of small plates, and the covered boxes holding his bento and the wagashi.
He then scampered back down the tree trunk and rushed back around to the front of the Academy to look for Tenzou. It didn't take him long to find his new friend and Kojimaru whooped gleefully the moment his eyes fell upon the other boy; startling more than a few teachers and students since he was usually rather quiet. Tenzou's eyes had lit up the moment he saw Kojimaru in turn and they grinned at one another before they darted off to play a game of tag while they waited for class to start. Several of the other children would join them in their game not long after that.
When the bell rang some fifteen minutes later, the two boys were flushed from excitement and giggling as they followed the rest of the class into the room. The moment they stepped inside of the room, Tenzou would drag Kojimaru to the back of the classroom where the two of them claimed a pair of desks side by side in the very last row. The first half of the morning would pass by with agonizing slowness as they spent an hour learning how to find their chakra through meditation and another hour going through chapter two of the Shinobi Handbook.
During the second half of the morning, Kojimaru and Tenzou would huddle together and whisper back and forth as they performed their daily exercises and took turns practicing shurikenjutsu. As soon as their class was released for lunch, both boys ran back to the classroom so that Tenzou could grab his lunch before Kojimaru eagerly hauled Tenzou up into the acacia tree once more. Tenzou was rather surprised at the appearance of the somewhat lopsided table that had been set for tea but he only grinned in excitement when Kojimaru shyly explained what he had planned.
Kojimaru started the tea ceremony by carefully emptying the packet of powdered tea into the ceremonial bowl before pouring in the still hot (but no longer boiling) water from the canteen. He then carefully used the tea whisk to stir the mixture until the last of the powder dissolved. Finally, he opened up the box of wagashi and carefully served them each two pieces of the blossom shaped confections; making it a point to serve Tenzou first.
Once he had finished serving them both, Kojimaru solemnly declared Tenzou his friend as he carefully passed the bowl of tea to him. He watched Tenzou slowly turn the bowl three times and drink half of the tea before he proclaimed Kojimaru his friend in turn as he passed the bowl back to him. Kojimaru beamed at the slightly taller boy as he turned the bowl in his hands three times before he drank the rest of the tea; Kojimaru for once not making an attempt to drag out the drinking of the tea due to the importance of the ceremony in his mind. Silence then filled the hidden fort as the boys ate their wagashi.
After the ceremony was deemed complete, Kojimaru traded the bowl for his bamboo canteen (filled with orange tea this time) while Tenzou removed the lids from their bento boxes. The seriousness of the ceremony was then broken as the individual meals were freely shared while the pair chatted about all of the things that they'd experienced since being separated. They also talked about the things that they wanted to do. By the time they finished the last morsel of their small feast, the two boys were feeling far more comfortable around one another; their friendship fully acknowledged and accepted.
Just before they climbed down out of the tree in order to wash their dishes, the two boys made a solemn vow to never forget each other, to always be friends, to look out for one another, and to keep each other's secrets. The lingering traces of Kojimaru's magic that unknowingly lived on in both boys (little though there was in Tenzou) insured that their pact would hold fast for the rest of their lives.
The two boys were inseparable from that point forward. They studied, trained, played, pranked, and ate together every single chance they got; much to the exasperation of a certain masked ANBU Commander who had split the two of them up for a reason. Their respective guardians encouraged the friendship; neither of their assigned caregivers aware of the fact that the child of the other was another survivor of Orochimaru's experiments. A fact that further drove Torifu up the wall because he couldn't exactly tell either man why he didn't want their wards associating with one another since it would defeat the purpose of splitting them up and hiding their identities.
It didn't help that any attempts to separate the two of them were met with open hostility from both boys. Those that didn't heed their verbal protests over any temporary separations were promptly and publicly pranked; repeatedly and with careful planning for optimum humiliation. Would be bullies that attempted to pick on the pair were given the same treatment. Few bullies were brave enough to suffer through the humiliation more than once or twice before they learned to avoid and ignore the two friends.
Throughout the next two years, Kojimaru and Tenzou would grow by leaps and bounds physically, emotionally, socially, and academically. The time that they spent training together saw the two of them unconsciously adopting skill sets that complimented each other's strengths and covered their weaknesses. That was most especially true when it came to their taijutsu; Tenzou leaning towards becoming a heavy hitting offensive fighter while Kojimaru was a fluid and fast moving defensive fighter that would eventually become near impossible to catch. The same was fairly true of their throwing skills; Kojimaru being able to flood an area with shuriken and kunai in the blink of an eye while Tenzou threw slower with greater accuracy and strength – making their combined attacks far more dangerous.
When it came to the low level ninjutsu that were taught at the Academy, Tenzou picked up each new jutsu fairly easily due to his having good chakra control and only slightly larger than average chakra reserves. Kojimaru, on the other hand, struggled with each jutsu due to his far larger reserves and rather poor chakra control. However, once he did manage to learn a jutsu, Kojimaru could repeatedly use it without worrying about chakra exhaustion because of his chakra reserves were so large.
Their survival skills were well above average for their age and class level due to the countless weekends and vacations spent camping outside of Konoha with Kosuke (Tenzou invited to join them on occasion after the two boys had become friends). Kisuke, in turn, had taught the boys stealth, evasion, escape tactics, and how to hide in plain sight on the nights when Kojimaru spent the night at Tenzou's home. Nara Shikaku, who had somehow ended up as the official babysitter of both boys despite his protests, ended up teaching the pair basic strategy (using games like Go and Shogi), how to read body language, how to deceive someone using body language, and helped them improve their meditation (in order to make them to sit still for a half an hour so he could get a break from their rambunctiousness).
As much as the two boys had in common, most of their chosen hobbies were actually very different. Kojimaru enjoyed cooking, gardening, tea ceremonies, and bird watching while Tenzou preferred carpentry, wood working and carving, and studying architecture. The hobbies that they had in common were camping, pranking, and telling ghost stories – the scarier, the better. They also had a few different likes and dislikes, different fears (as well as a few shared fears), and slightly different dreams for the future.
In addition to his Academy lessons and the extracurricular training sessions, Kosuke spent a considerable amount of time helping Kojimaru learn how to control his implanted Kekkei Genkai. Those training sessions mainly focused on getting Kojimaru to recognize the dropping temperature as an activation of his Hyouton and keeping a tight reign on his chakra when around trees. On top of that, Kosuke was teaching Kojimaru to change the nature of his chakra into each of his individual affinities; wind, water, and earth. The reason for those lessons was to give the child a better understanding of his chakra in order to further improve his control over both elemental Kekkei Genkai.
Changing his chakra to water was fairly easy as all he had to do was draw the moisture from the air to soak a piece of paper (or cloth if he didn't have any paper on hand). It was changing his chakra into wind and earth that gave him trouble because of the way plant matter tended to react to his chakra (leaves or sticks automatically growing into new trees even if they had been completely dried out). So, instead of crumbling a leaf (for earth) or cutting a leaf (for wind), Kojimaru was forced to skip straight to the second level; crumbling rocks and cutting senbon. Tenzou was receiving similar training from Kisuke and, unbeknownst to both of their guardians, the two boys would practice the exercises together and help one another on the sly.
At the end of their second year at the Shinobi Academy, just over a month before their sixth birthdays, the inseparable pair of troublemakers would take and pass the Genin Exam. Their early graduation, while not exactly unexpected and mostly encouraged, was not exactly a welcomed development in the eyes of their guardians. The reason for that was entirely due to the war that had broken out between Konoha and Iwa in October of two hundred eighty-five when the rising tensions between the two villages came to a head in the aftermath of a botched mission that had ultimately resulted in the death of the Tsuchikage's wife and his newborn daughter.
The team that had been assigned that particular mission bore the blame for the war (due to that being the final straw that sparked the current hostilities) but none more so than Hatake Sakumo aka Konoha no Shiroi Kiba. It had been Sakumo's decision to delay the mission in order to save the lives of his injured teammates after their team had been attacked by a high level rogue shinobi from Kirigakure no Sato. By the time he'd gotten the other three shinobi to safety and resumed the mission, the damage had already been done for his delay would ultimately result in the death of the Tsuchikage's wife and daughter.
Sakumo would break in less than two weeks under the disdain and in some cases outright hostility that was directed at him and tragically committed seppuku to atone for his mistakes. Hatake Kakashi, Sakumo's seven year old son, was the one that found his father's still warm body just minutes after he had died. The seven year old Chuunin would be made a ward of the Sarutobi Clan the day after his father's death in order to protect the child from hostile civilians and shinobi that still blamed his father for the war and saw Kakashi as a scapegoat for their anger due to his relation to the dead Sakumo.
Kakashi would be traumatized by the discovery but soon strove to put the stigma of being his father's son behind him by religiously adhering to the shinobi code of conduct. He also began covering half of his face with a cloth mask to hide his resemblance to his deceased father and to hide his emotions. The young Hatake prodigy would fade into near obscurity within a few months as the war quickly began heating up with skirmishes taking place nearly every time a Konoha team left the borders of Hi no Kuni.
As a result of the war, the age and skill requirements for graduation from the Academy had been lowered in order to boost the number of shinobi on the force. The influx of new Genin would then allow the more experienced shinobi to be deployed on those missions with a higher chance of facing off against Iwa shinobi. It also allowed them to build up the size of their force. Unlike peace time graduates, those who graduated after the declaration of war were not tested by their assigned Jounin instructor to discover whether or not they could work together as a team; Konoha couldn't afford to send half trained soldiers back to the academy because of petty differences when the war was escalating quickly.
The newly made teams would also not be overly specialized teams like those that were formed during peace time; where the Hokage arranged the teams based upon clan heritage, test scores, and potential. Instead, the teams were formed by the Academy instructors that had taught the most recent term for the graduates and strictly based upon age first and then by skill in an effort to create generic teams that could be sent on any mission. The teams would then be put through a month's worth of intense training by their Jounin sensei before they began taking high D and low C ranked missions (the low ranked D missions that were nothing more than glorified chores going to the injured and retired shinobi instead of bogging down the more able bodied shinobi on the mindless chores).
As the only two six year olds in the current batch of graduates, Kojimaru and Tenzou were promptly placed on the same team by their Chuunin instructor along with the next youngest boy who'd not yet been assigned a team. That was how the two of them ended up on Team Fourteen with the soon to be nine year old Yamashiro Aoba under a twenty year old Jounin by the name of Shirakumo Hayama.
By the time Kasai learned that both survivors had graduated and that they had been mistakenly placed on the same team, it was too late to do anything about it because ordering them to be separated at that point would draw far too much attention to the pair. The reason he had not learned about their placement sooner was because the ANBU Squad that had been selected to watch over both boys during the first twelve months after they had been released from the hospital had been pulled from their watch duty around the same time that Iwa had declared war on Konoha (their memories of their former charges sealed to protect their identities).
Needless to day, Kasai was more than a little displeased that his plans to once again separate the two children had failed while his attention was focused upon the war.
That didn't stop the man from pulling Hayama into his office without any warning and giving the man very specific instructions about what he was and was not allowed write down in any mission report. Specifically, the Jounin was ordered (under penalty of death) to never make any allusions to either child's Kekkei Genkai. That would make Hayama one of four people that knew the identities and capabilities of both boys; the other three people being Kasai, Tsunade, and Jiraiya. The Hokage was fully aware that both boys were still alive but the Hokage had chosen to exclude himself from the list of individuals that were given that information.
In addition to those four people, there were another four people that knew the truth about Kojimaru's identity. One of those four was Maruboshi Kosuke, who had been told the same day that he'd taken custody of the child. The other three individuals had all stumbled upon the truth on accident. Nara Shikaku had witnessed the reawakening of Kojimaru's abilities and recognized him as one of the two survivors. Akimichi Chouza and Yamanaka Inoichi would both learn the truth when Kojimaru saw Inoichi for the first time after he'd been taken in by Kosuke; the then four year old had yelled at the blond for lying to him about the extra cup of tea that Inoichi had promised him.
There was only one additional person that was fully aware that Tenzou was one of the two survivors that had been found within Orochimaru's underground labs and that was his guardian, Maboroshi Kisuke. The reason why so few people had managed to discover the truth about the second child was mostly due to the fact that his implanted Kekkei Genkai had not yet been activated and because he'd not accidentally ousted himself to anyone over a grudge.
Translations: Japanese to English
Bunshin no Jutsu – Clone technique
Henge no Jutsu – Transformation technique
Kawarimi no Jutsu – Substitution technique
Kinobori no Waza – Tree climbing
Konoha no Shiroi Kiba – Konoha's White Fang
Meisai Gakure no Jutsu – Camouflage Concealment Technique
Seppuku – ritual suicide by disembowelment (originally used by samurai)
Shurikenjutsu – weapon throwing techniques
Notes:
Tea Ceremony – okay, as someone who has never participated in a tea ceremony before, I realize that my version is far less accurate than a true tea ceremony. I did read up on tea ceremonies prior to writing this chapter but a description of what takes place during a ceremony isn't exactly the same as being a part of one. So, any glaring mistakes are accidental and not meant to offend and at the same time intentional since I imagine a four year old child's version of a tea ceremony would be less than perfect in any case. That is also one of the reasons why I sort of skimmed over the ceremonial parts as well.
Kakashi's father – while I know the reason that Sakumo killed himself is canon, the mission that I had him on is not; as that is one that I came up with to account for why an abandoned mission could potentially trigger a war. I figured the loss of his wife and daughter would be one potential scenario and I wanted this war to be personal for Oonoki since it would explain why the old man was so bitter even long after the war ended.
11-14-15: Minor edits made to chapter to fix spelling/grammar mistakes and removed unnecessary author's notes.
