So out of 12 people that talked about it, only 1 person admitted to being fully surprised by Haku having a scheme. A few just had a feeling or varying levels of suspicion. I had given the whole 'she didn't take the chance to kill him' and 'she's just trying to get back to Zabuza, so she needs Naruto' and the time lag, and the different situation, and people still didn't go for it. I guess the Haku-agenda thing is pretty entrenched.
This one goes out to all the university students that are working on thier final projects. Banzai you poor bastards. Try not to kill your group members. You need them for the peer evals.
Chapter 29
Underneath the Surface
I have Furyuu Toppa gently take us for a ride in a wide, lazy circle. Furyuu Toppa had to move. If it stopped then it stopped existing.
"What sparked all this anyway?" I asked in a huff.
…It was nice to have someone like Shizuka back me up.
It was nice to have backup period.
But it felt like I was taking advantage, somehow, of this older woman… because, after all, she had been brainwashed.
But she wasn't exactly giving me a lot of options.
And it was nice to have backup.
"I was talking with Haku." She tells me sheepishly as she looks up from where she kneels upon jaws of ephemeral wind.
"It's just 'Haku' now?" I ask, looking slightly down at her from where I stand, arms crossed.
That familiar tone is intruiging.
"Yes. I think we're friends."
Holly shit! Really? "That's good!" I encourage enthusiastically. "That's healthy."
Or, wait, Haku had a 'master'.
…well Shizuka had to start somewhere, right? Maybe she could get friends less likely to be enablers in the future.
"She is very wise, Master. And good with a needle as well. No surprise I suppose, since we're both similar. I do find her wardrobe drab but that may be on purpose since her Master is not here."
…Hey, if I could maybe get Haku to translate Shizuka's 'master-speak' for me, that'd be amazing.
A thought strikes me. "Good with a needle? Apothecary don't sew people up. Well, not generally."
"No Master." Shizuka shakes her head. "Do you always think about medicine first? She repaired my kimono."
…She what? But Shizuka never let anyone else touch any kimono she wore. I remember, she insisted on doing her own laundry by hand even in jail. And though she would wear the prison garb she would keep her kimono under her pillow and otherwise always in sight. It used to cause me all kinds of problems with the wardens.
So when…
Oh. That night. Things were all headaches and hurricanes back then, so I had glossed over some things. The memory comes back of that morning where I woke up to find Shizuka naked under my – our I suppose – covers. She had… left her kimono downstairs to dry. That's right.
Surely she wouldn't have left it all by itself.
…huh.
So she had trusted Haku from back then, and had her protect it…
…And that's why Haku brought it up the next day.
That's kind of…
….huh.
…
…
…
I'm an idiot.
"Take it off." I demand. "Everything."
I'd better be wrong about this. Haku had a chance to take me out when she was taking the serum before. But maybe she wasn't after my life.
Or, most likely, I'm just being paranoid.
"Master?" Shizuka asks, alarmed. "Here? This is so sudden!" She exclaimed and reached up slowly. "Only, my body is yours exclusively... Considering that, this environment is rather open?"
"Shizuka. We're really freaking high up and directly over the roof of the bar. No one can see you and I'll turn away."
Two slender hands hold the sides of my chin. Her right is callused from practicing her Ninja-to skills so diligently. Her left is softer and gentler than satin.
"You don't have to, Master. Only you don't." She whispers to me. "That's what I was trying to say." Her gaze is more steady than it has a right to be, considering what she had just said.
"C-Cut it out." I pull away and turn around.
She's so embarrassing.
Finally, though, she hands me her kimono over my shoulder.
"Um, Master? What next? Would you like to begin with a–"
"No."
"…Oh." Don't sound so disappointed. You're confusing enough as it is.
Still, I regard the kimono.
I'm being paranoid, right?
That's what I keep repeating to myself as I feel carefully around.
There were specific parts to check. We learned that in the academy.
The furls of the sleeves. Where the obi was tied. Between the layers around the neck.
Was that part of the floral pattern or a… no, that's all decoration.
Was that a crease or a… no. that's a crease.
Ah.
…Damnit.
I reach for my kunai pouch. I cut Shizuka's kimono by the multiple layers near the neck.
She gasps in horror from behind me.
I promise I'll buy her a new one and move on.
God-f*cking-damnit I found one.
This thing is tiny. They make them this small? Which ruin is it from? Did I take us high enough to keep us from effective range? It's deactivated. I can tell by feeling for the presence of lightning – or, rather, electricity – under my fingers and finding none. That's good, right? Does that mean it got knocked out by the storm? By Toppa? How recently did it die. What, all together, has it compromised?
Was anything overheard at all?
Did it matter in the short run?
After all, either way, I have an urgent requirement to go rat hunting.
"Master, what's that?" Shizuka asks over my shoulder.
"Trouble." I tell her.
The high and violent waves mean nothing to me. Water is my blood. Violence is my soul.
That's why this rough storm doesn't scare me.
I have hijacked a small vessel, forced those onboard to sail me into the middle of this, and when they faltered through fatigue or fear? I killed them. They cursed me as Kubikiribōchō drank of their blood.
Monster! They screamed. Demon!
Demon?
I laughed. I laugh a lot when I kill. It's a bad habit. People think I laugh because I'm a Demon. They're wrong. I laugh because other people are not Demons.
And in this dog-eat-dog world, that makes every one of them fools. Fools that curse me for playing by the cruel rules that nature would force on us.
Isn't that just goddamn hilarious?
My ship is destroyed. Doesn't matter. I could navigate this ocean in my sleep. I could walk these towering swells of water for weeks. I am Mist born and raised.
All that matters is keeping vigilantly to the distance and locations that my tool has set up for me.
Ah. I see it through the swells of the ocean. A beacon in the storm. A large beacon of ice, held immaculately over a reef well known to me.
There is a scroll inside. I cleave it free and read it.
Ah. My tool. My weapon. More flexible than a kunai. More powerful than Kubikiribōchō.
Empty of feeling, but full of potential.
And so very deceptive.
Well done, Haku. What a true blade you are.
Then, it is time.
"Master," Shizuka begins, worriedly, "what is it?"
I don't know if I should tell her. Haku's her friend. Don't know if she's had many, or any at all, before.
And was it Haku?
She had the means to plant the bug. She was the obvious choice – and that itself was a problem.
I must keep the obvious in mind, but never at the exclusion of the unlikely.
Because, frankly, that's where we shinobi liked to hide our junk.
Underneath the underneath.
Kenta? Was Kenta all an act? He turned around quickly after I saved his life. How much of that was the sobriety gained from a near-death experience, how much was courage he had finally found again, and how much was all an act…
No. He had been fully poisoned. I had diagnosed him properly. That would have been going too far for cover.
Or would it?
And what about Barkeep?
Did I know anything about Barkeep, really, other than he was just a barkeep?
When a shinobi went to town for info, they went to one of three places: the bars, the brothels, or the yakuza.
Barkeep had been in business for a long time – didn't he say he had seen all manner of people walk through his bar? Some of which were shinobi? How connected was he to the underground information network? Well enough to guess the presence of Leviathan, and know the going rate for what any additional information on the mythical creature was worth?
He had given me that sake-jug of knock-out level alcohol content. It was almost sure to have created the opportunity. And why the whole jug, when one saucer was meant to knock out the rowdiest customers?
If Haku had the opportunity, then Barkeep had created that opportunity.
Were they in cahoots? Had Haku's watch really been vigilant, or had she been a reasonable individual that just left it by the fireplace and went to bed? It would take moments to plant the device.
Could Haku be framed?
Just five minutes ago I had felt so secure in the comradrie of the people in this bar. How quickly a little black complication changes things.
And Shizuka.
I look at her, so adult in body, so young in mind. She stares back innocently with a crease of worry on her brow.
I love you. I love you. I love you!
I don't really believe those words. I don't know too much about love, but I'd like to believe that a reasonable amount of free will is a prerequisite. And I don't think Shizuka has that. Still, I believe that Shizuka believes it. And she wants to help me. She won't let me not let her help me. I believe that too. After our little fight I'm starting to get that, at least for now, I serve as some kind of emotional crutch for her. Some kind of prosthetic for her heart.
But she had a certain history with love. She hadn't meant to kill Todai, but she had meant every second of poisoning his wife. To her, that had been in her and Todai's best interests.
Just what did she consider my best interests, anyways? Just what could she justify if she really put her mind to it? What couldn't she?
Worse, me and her had a long and publicly known history.
A little bit of digging would have told anyone that wanted to know that she had a funny way of tracking me down, and I had a funny way of not killing her. A little digging more would tell them that she had a weak mentality. She simply couldn't handle certain concepts. I don't think she has the base… the sensation of security in her life that acts as a buffer for the rest of us. She could be manipulated by old-school genjutsu. The kinds of insidious illusions that didn't need chakra or seals, but just the right words at the right time.
Would my enemies know her as an 'in'? Who's to say the bug wasn't planted weeks or months ago?
Who's to say she hadn't been convinced it was in my best interests, somehow?
No. I consider Shizuka at length. She stares back, concerned and tentative.
No, she's up front with me. She knows me well enough that she knows better than to try going behind my back. If I found her out, she would lose everything that she wants.
Too much. There's just too much to consider. Anyone could be against me. Maybe everyone is. Maybe no one. Maybe they're together. Maybe they're working for different parties, all lured by the Leviathan. Imagine that, if everyone here were so secretly undercover that no one knew anyone else was after the same thing.
But whether everyone is really against me or not, I only have a problem with whichever side planted the bug. I can run everything without involving them at all in anything secretive, and the only time I let information about Leviathan out of my head was up in Toppa where only this sideways, slippery blindside could compromise me. So one way or another, I have one side to deal with.
I need to narrow things down.
What concrete leads did I have, other than conjecture? The Demon Brothers which had attacked me… I should consider them. They had actually come out. They were of a side that was confirmed. Were they comrades of someone on the boat? They weren't all that competent. They could have been opportunists after a pot-shot after the price on my head. But in light of recent events, they seemed more like the small fish that the big fish conned into testing the waters.
"M...Master?" Shizuka asks, haltingly. "Would you like some tea?"
Tea? Now?
"Haku has a nice set downstairs, Master. I can –"
"Now's not the time for tea, Shizuka."
"O-Okay. Okay Master. Can I do anything for you? Would you like me to take my kimono off again? I'll do anything. So… So please don't look at me like that?"
I snap my eyes shut. "I didn't mean to." I tell her honestly.
She seems so sensitive all a sudden.
"…Tea, you said?" ...Tea.
...huh.
"Yes Master. I drank tea with Haku by the bar doors. Would you like some?" She asks, excited, yet still flighty. "I – I'll go and –"
"No. I'll go." I open my eyes. I feel through my inner jacket pocket for what I need.
A vial and its contents- so inconspicuous. So rare. So potent.
So deadly in its obscurity.
And right now, it would be my key to the future. It would resolve everything.
"Master? What's that?"
"Poison." I tell her. "A vial used to inject the claws of one of the demon brothers of the mist. I looted it before hiding them in the forest, broken." I hadn't wanted to carry their dead weight with us for our sailing trip.
And without their gear, they were nothing of note. So I wasn't all too concerned.
But of all their gear, the poison had been the most exotic. It needed to be, to have any effectiveness against the shinobi forces. We, generally, are an aggregation of a shitload of immunities.
But they really got their hands on something good. I red it up in my notes after the fact. A beautiful, sinful poison, Butterfly Dew is both obscure effective, having no more taste than a drop of dew rollong off a butterfly's wings - and being just as difficult to harvest.
And I have a whole vial.
"What are you going to do with it?" Shizuka asks me tentatively.
"I'm going to go spike Haku's tea."
"Master?" Shizuka gasps in alarm. "I – I don't understand."
I know Shizuka. Of course you don't.
I keep forgetting, since you fight and track like us, that you're not actually a shinobi.
But I am.
Your noble master? I'm sorry, that's another misconception on your part.
I try to be noble when I can afford to be. And most of the time, I really can afford it. I do my damn level best to afford it.
But when the chips come down at the end of the day and the game is so rigged that the only way I can come out ahead is to cheat like a punk, I go to work.
Noble ends, maybe. Noble means?
Not so much. Not right now.
I bring us down to my room, hopping through the window.
I reach for the door handle and in a flash I find Shizuka in my way.
"I told you not to do that speed thing." Going to stop me, Shizuka? Going to try and keep me from your friend using non-lethal force? I see the confusion in your face. The internal strife and torture.
You and I, we have such a funny relationship. I used to wish I could do anything to stop you trying to kill me. These days, it seems like you're clinging to an almost desperate level.
And if you try to go against me again… if you were to try to attack me again, for the sake of your friend, I would be so happy for you.
There's irony there, somewhere.
"If I'm going to fight by your side, Master," she tells me after taking a deep, resolving breath, "I'm going to need to use this speed. And … you will have to tell me how I must support you."
One day, somewhere, she really will choose something over me. At that time, I now realize, she'll be free of everything Todai did to her.
One day.
Just not today.
And despite myself I'm kind of relieved.
Because, again, backup is always nice.
I won't tell you not to regret standing with me later, Shizuka. Regret it all you want. Regret it like an average, regular member of society.
"Here's what I need you to do."
I walk down the stairs into the common area, Shizuka trialing behind me. Barkeep is busying himself cleaning up some glass that broke when one of the cupboards unbattened in the course of our trip.
I'll get to him later. He's not going anywhere.
The first order I had given Shizuka was: no one leaves the bar.
She goes up to the counter and orders a drink. Of course, she orders it to go. And if there was one thing beautiful women were universally good at, I would have to say it was at getting men to carry their stuff for them. Barkeep found himself carrying the jug upstairs without even a tip.
And now I have the bottom floor to myself and Haku.
Haku's at the bar double doors, just like Shizuka had said. She's sitting with her legs folded passively.
I sit down by her, hanging my feet over the lip of the bar porch and kicking idly back and forth in the steady water.
"Haku-san?" I ask, looking at her. "I'm going to be away from the Bar for a while."
"I see." She nods. "Where are you going?"
"Just for a walk." I shrug. "You know, out into the ocean. Us Shinobi can do that, by the way."
"Oh, I was aware." Haku replies. "I have seen such in my travels. I'm originally from Water Country, after all. Our Shinobi all seem to be able to do that. But what is out there for you to see, Naruto-san? It is all wind, lightning, and waves beyond this tornado. And within the tornado… well, within it is nothing. I hope you aren't going past the tornado's walls by yourself. Shizuka would be distraught if anything happened to you."
"I know." Outwardly, I give a weak smile to convey my mixed stance on that. Inwardly, I sigh. She hasn't really said anything out of place so far. It would have been strange if she had played ignorant of the water-walking. In Fire Country, it was generally a post-genin exercise. In Water Country, every kid that dropped out of ninja academy (and survived) could do it. So could monks. So could some farmers. Not that her verbal believability mattered too much, I suppose. I'm going to test her in a more robust way soon enough. Still, if she was more suspicious, I'd feel better about what I have to do. "But I do have to leave. I just thought you should know, since you'll be without my protection for a while. I won't be gone long and I can't get into the specifics. It's pretty heavy and dangerous stuff."
"Oh dear." She looks worried.
I grin and say: "Don't worry! I'm strong!" And, demonstrating this, I kick one submerged leg with force.
The water obediently explodes in front of me, splashing us and the tea set.
Haku blinks. "You are very strong," She says quietly, "aren't you?" Her brows crease ever so slightly. "Phenomenally so…"
"Yeah. But I get carried away sometimes. Sorry I got you wet." I say 'sheepishly'. "Here, I'll clean it up"
And, producing my handkerchief from a jacket breast inner pocket, I proceed to throw out the saltwater contaminated tea from our teacups, and wipe them clean with my poison coated handkerchief.
I regard Haku. "As strong as I am, I might get into trouble out there anyways." I tell Haku. "I might not make it back alive. It's a part of the job. So… I was hoping… how about a toast?"
"With tea?" She asks, amused. "Very well."
"To coming back alive." I say.
We clink.
"To coming back alive." She repeats.
And we drink from the poisoned cups.
One locomotive.
If you collapse from this poison Haku, I promise I'll get you the antidote. The immunity runs through my veins.
Two locomotive.
Please collapse Haku. I'll still interrogate you, ill and incapacitated from poison even as I try to cure you, but I hope you'll be innocent. I hope everyone in this bar is innocent and the bug device is old and died simply by running out of battery power.
Shizuka can still have her friend. We can still have an ally other than myself that is familiar with medicine. How nice that would be.
But every second that ticks by with you vertical seems to make that gentle future dimmer.
Three locomotive.
"Well," I say aloud, shrug, and proffer my hand, "in case I never see you again, it was nice knowing you Haku-san."
"The honor is mine, Naruto-san."
We shake hands. I don't let go.
Four locomotive.
Five locomotive.
We're both still upright, but I'm immune to this poison.
What's your excuse, Haku?
Are you immune too? Because when I had asked you, that night Kenta was poisoned, you had told me you weren't.
You know, the Demon Brothers told me they'd gotten their poison from an 'associate'. They themselves were not immune.
But the associate that had provided the poison probably was.
Six locomotive.
Seven locomotive.
The poison would have entered the bloodstream very quickly. And from there, it would do its role as a powerful shinobi-grade paralytic.
Eight locomotive.
How many heartbeats was that? Surely it's enough. Her pulse has not changed. From the pulse I feel through her hand it seems that her heart has not slowed, much less frozen in full paralysis.
And my own heart drops. Oh Haku.
And we've been through so much together.
"Naruto…san?" Haku asks. "Could you let go, perhaps?" She pulls tentatively. "This is awkward."
…No. Sorry.
But I'm going to try to keep you alive, Haku. I need information from you, and I just don't ever kill unless I have to.
But as I said, Haku…
In case I never see you again, it was nice knowing you.
"Naruto-san?" She asks, with a bit more insistency. She uses her other hand to try and pry my hand away. " I'm very uncomfortable right now." She tells me.
Huh, she tries to lever my grip away by my thumb, a theoretical weak point of all hand-based grapples and holds.
Not bad.
For an 'apothecary'.
With no warning and barely any beginning action, I crush her entire hand in my grip. She doesn't scream, but looks at me with wide eyes.
Haku… Almost all nin and genjutsu require both hands. And in taijutsu, with a hold on you that you can't shake, you know I'll win. I just showed you what kind of power I can leverage. I have initiative. I have first incapacitating strike. I'm 70% sure that you're who I'm after, and there's very little chance you could talk me down.
Please Haku. Please let us just do this the easy way.
A/N: If you really don't know what to say in your review I propose you answer one of these questions: " Was the intruige intruiging? Do you think that anyone other than Haku has an agenda?"
You know I had almost gone for a triple-feint and have everyone be friends, battling a rampaging Leviathan instead. As usual, I place the blame for shooting that idea down squarely on my skapegoa - BETA's - shoulders. Ahem. He got me thinking about intrigue or whatever and I was like: huh. Intrigue is intriguing. I guess a team-up would have been more surprising though, but again I think we'd have a lot of people that, being partially inclined both ways, would not be fully surprised at anything. I mean, it's not like the Naruto-mist nin team-up hasn't been done before either.
Man, I got some reviews that hurt. Not terribly bad. Part of being a good fanfiction writer is taking constructive criticism with a grain of salt. Even if it's salt on your wound. But yeah, there's times when you just have to take it Like a Boss.
Some people saw Shizuka as super ultra crazy last chapter. That's because perception of craziness concerning Shizuka is directly inversely proportional to the amount of context given to her because she expresses herself in a weird way – cuz, she was adopted by an asshole. It's a whole poofy artsy thing where you're supposed to learn about mankind's tendency to judge a book by its cover through me repeatedly throwing her at you with and without context. There. I said it. Can't say how well it works/will work. It's an experiment. I like to push boundaries like that. I like to try different techs, and one day I hope to be a published author of moderate repute.
Review if you ever wanted to throttle a group member, regardless of peer evals.
