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, some mild to moderate character bashing where unavoidable (mostly Dumbledore & Danzou with some Sakura & potentially lots of Sasuke), 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.
AN1: Partial credit for the Story Prompt/Challenge used to create this story goes to the Guru of Challenges; Challenge King. For details, see the first author's note at the top of the first chapter.
AN2: 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 Thirty-Six: The Diagnosis
May 21, 1990, 9:13 AM
Konohagakure no Sato, Hi no Kuni
Elemental Nations
Once order had been mostly restored and all of the messes had been cleaned up (bar Black; the poor man would be stuck as a walking orange for a while longer yet), the group had been seated on a couple of comfortable couches that had been conjured from thin air to replace the no longer needed table and chairs by Lupin. Black was grumpily sprawled in the corner of one couch with Lupin sitting on the other end while Naruto and Haruo had lumped themselves together in the middle of the other couch; leaving Tenzou to perch himself on the arm of the boys' couch.
The mature Mokuton user kept his gaze focused on the two adults while he silently monitored the minor fluctuations in his son's chakra as the nine year old's earlier nervousness returned two-fold. According to the clone he'd had keeping an eye on the two wizards from the moment they'd taken up residence in the hotel room (a failsafe he'd put in place to ensure that the two were not plotting to kidnap Haruo while his squad monitored the hotel itself for threats), Haruo's eyes were currently zeroed in on Lupin's wand; which the wizard was still loosely holding in his hand.
"Harry…" Lupin began only for him to be interrupted the second the nickname had left his mouth.
"Haruo," Haruo firmly corrected and Tenzou felt a brief surge of parental satisfaction over his son preferring to be called by his full name instead of the westernized nickname that Lupin and Black had been calling him all this time.
"Erm, right; Haruo. That's not going to get confusing for you, is it? I mean, with your father here…"
"No one calls sensei-nii 'Haruo'. Kasai-sama still insists on calling him Kuma but I still don't see why you'd call a man who wears a cat-mask 'Bear'," Haruo retorted in an offended tone and Tenzou's earlier sense of satisfaction withered away to practically nothing in the face of son's comment about his mask.
"Sensei-nii? I'm sorry, but aren't those both types of honorifics used to address a person?" Lupin inquired with a trace of confusion and the small spike in Haruo's chakra was a clear indication that his son was blushing.
"I was three and still learning Japanese when I started calling him that," Haruo admitted in an embarrassed tone.
"Why not just call him your father?" Black asked with a slight frown as he glanced back and forth between the masked Tenzou and Haruo.
"That would defeat the purpose of keeping our relationship secret," Tenzou dryly pointed out before Haruo could answer the question.
"Yeah, but what's to stop him from calling you that in private?"
"Habit," Haruo answered at the same time as Tenzou replied, "Consistency."
Naruto snickered in response to the dual reply and his mirth soon set Haruo to giggling as both pre-teens snuck a glance at the orange colored wizard sulking on the other couch. Tenzou would have rolled his eyes if it wouldn't have detracted from the professional (and slightly intimidating) aura he was currently presenting in order to keep both the children and the two adult Trueborns in line. The last thing he needed was to get caught up in a full out prank war between the sulking wizard and the two children.
"So, that's it? You're just going to hold him at arm's length and never allow him to form a proper connection with his father?" Black demanded as he dropped his sulking act and scowled at Tenzou while completely ignoring the antics of the two Genin.
"You don't get to pick on sensei-nii," Haruo growled before he bounced one of the glass disks that Tenzou had had made for his son's chakra control lessons off of Black's forehead; all traces of his earlier amusement gone.
"Ow!" Black yelped when the flat side of the disk made contact with his skull.
"As you can see, we've cultivated a satisfactory bond over the past six years," Tenzou blandly pointed out as he reached out and dropped his hand on Haruo's head in order to keep his son from attempting to prank or hit the man again.
"Padfoot!" Lupin chided in an exasperated tone a heartbeat later.
"Right, shutting up now."
"Idiot," Lupin huffed in English before the werewolf cleared his throat and returned his gaze to Haruo. "Now, Harry… erm, Haruo, as I was going to say before we got side tracked; Kuma-san had informed me about the chest pains that you experienced when you performed your most recent bout of accidental magic and he asked me to scan your magical core to check your core's current health. Before I actually cast the spell though, I'd like for you to describe for me exactly what you felt just before and just after your outburst."`
Tenzou didn't need the prompt from his clone to know his son had immediately glanced at him in response to Lupin's question. Nor did he need for his son to voice the question that was so obviously on the tip of his tongue and rather than wait for Haruo to speak up, he kept his eyes on the other two adults as he answered Haruo's unspoken question in ANBU Sign Code.
'Go ahead and tell him what you experienced; just don't speak about what you were doing at the time or offer up any mission details. And no cussing!'
Haruo voiced a soft huff that Tenzou only heard because he was perched just a short distance away from his son. The nine year old then pressed himself closer to Naruto (in search of comfort) as he quietly stated, "It hurt. The world went dark when I thought Naruto had been killed after he saved me from the stupid girly ice-teme and everything was so cold it burned before it felt like something inside of me snapped. I don't really remember anything else after that. But when I woke up again a few days later, my chest ached and I couldn't sense anything."
"You couldn't sense anything? Do you mean that you felt numb?" Lupin inquired with a slight frown.
"My son inherited the ability to sense chakra from me; meaning that he's capable of sensing chakra and recognizing chakra signatures," Tenzou explained in his son's place in order to allow Haruo a little time to collect himself after speaking about one of his worst memories. "When Haruo spoke of being unable to sense anything, he was referring to the temporary loss of his ability to sense the chakra of others either due to his exhausted state at the time or because of a temporary Chakra Disruption Seal that had been placed on him for his protection."
"What exactly is chakra? Is that the word you use to refer to your magic?"
"No, chakra is an internal power that all shinobi are taught to harness and it's made up of a person's mental and physical energies while I was told that mahou is made up of a person's spiritual energy and the nature energy that a Trueborn absorbs from the world around them."
"Oh, what you call chakra we call our life force," Lupin murmured in response to Tenzou's explanation. "And shinobi have truly learned how to harness the energy of their life force?"
"Ah, you saw a demonstration of one way we can manipulate our chakra when Whiskers created clones of himself."
"Is it possible for anyone to learn how to use their chakra in such a way?"
Tenzou shook his head even as he answered, "Yes and no; every person is born with the potential but there are several factors that determine if a person is capable of molding their chakra. The main factor is a person's age; the older a person is, the less of a chance there is that they can learn to mold their chakra with any chance of doing so ending once a person has finished going through puberty. Additionally, there are a handful of childhood illnesses that can have an adverse affect on the development of a person's chakra network; deforming their coils, restricting their pathways, or blocking the chakra nodes spread throughout their body."
"Another factor is a person's ancestry; the child from a long line of active chakra users will find it far easier to use their chakra and will usually end up with larger than average chakra reserves while a child born to a long line of civilians will often struggle to mold their chakra and potentially have smaller than average reserves. On top of that, a person's health, physical fitness, and intellectual acuity will directly affect a person's chakra network, reserves, and control. An example would be a sickly child being incapable of producing enough physical energy for them to use their chakra without killing themselves."
"I guess that means you're far too old to learn a new trick, Moony," Black barked with a soft snigger before an annoyed look from Lupin shut him up.
"And Har… Haruo has the ability to sense a person's life force?"
"Yes."
"Fascinating, I wonder if that ability includes the capacity to allow him to sense a person's magic as well," Lupin mused as his gaze returned to the nine year old on the couch. The scarred Trueborn then shook his head and stated, "That's something we can to look into later. For now, Haruo; has there ever been another time when you felt any chest pains at all or even just a tightness in your chest either just before or just after an outburst of accidental magic?"
"No."
"That's good news, at least. Now, according to what Kuma told us, you'd exhausted yourself twice while you were gone; were those the only two times you had an outburst of accidental magic while you were out of the village or did you have a bunch of little outbursts before or in between the two that had exhausted you?"
"I only had one little one when our jerk-faced teammate made me mad and that was before I exhausted myself the first time," Haruo admitted in a contrite tone that Tenzou knew was for his sake; that particular outburst against his teammate (and the little squabble that had preceded it) was the main reason that Haruo was currently grounded, after all.
"And did you have a lot of outbursts growing up?"
"Not really, not after sensei-nii brought me home anyway. I used to have lots when I was still living with them."
"Them? Are you referring to the Dursleys? Or are you referring to the orphanage you lived in?"
"The Dursleys," Haruo replied in a clipped voice that held a trace of distaste that Tenzou knew was entirely due to his former guardians being brought up.
"Stupid muggle trash," Black grumpily groused in English.
"Behave, Padfoot," Lupin reflexively ordered without even looking in the other man's direction. "Haruo, thank you for answering my questions. I only have one more I need to ask before I scan your core. Can you tell me what you have been taught about a wizard's, or as you know it, a Trueborn Sage's magical core?"
"The toads said that a Trueborn's core is located in their heart and that it holds their 'mahou'."
"That's essentially correct even if it is a rather simplistic description. Still, that you are aware of the basic location and function of a magical core makes it much easier for me to explain the spells that I'll be casting on you. But first, I think it would be best to explain why I need to cast those spells on you. You see, until a wizard reaches their eleventh birthday, their magical core is rather… delicate because it's still developing and it's very easy to stress a developing core to the point where the core is permanently damaged."
"The most common way a young wizard can stress their magical core, aside from trying to cast spells when they're too young, is through a large number of large-scale outbursts of accidental magic brought on by extreme emotions; usually when they're frightened or angry. And the more magic that the child expends during each outburst, the greater the chance that they'll stress their core; that's especially true when they have many such outburst over a short period of time. When a child's core is under enough stress, then his or her core could potentially collapse or rupture."
"What does it mean for a Trueborn's core to collapse or rupture?" Haruo asked when Lupin stopped speaking in order to take a drink of water.
"A collapsed core means they lose their magic and a ruptured core is certain death," Black bluntly answered in Lupin's place and Tenzou wasn't certain if he should be annoyed with the man for his candidness or appreciate the fact that he hadn't tried to sugarcoat his explanation. "And one of the most common symptoms of a core that is on the verge of collapsing or rupturing is severe chest pain just before or just after an outburst of accidental magic."
"Does that mean I destroyed my core when I got angry after I thought the ice-teme killed Naruto? Does that mean I'm going to die soon?" Haruo asked in a quiet voice that cracked with emotion.
Naruto voiced a wordless protest as soon as the word 'die' had passed through Haruo's lips and clutched Haruo close as if he could prevent the younger boy's death by touch alone. Black gave a sort of pained whimper and transformed into his dog form in response to Haruo's rather unsettling question regarding his own death. Tenzou knew his face was probably more than a little pale beneath his mask; the idea that his son might be dying more than a little unpleasant due to how close his son had been to death on at least two occasions since he'd graduated from the Academy.
"No, but we are very concerned that you might have stressed your core after you exhausted your core twice in such a short period of time," Lupin hurriedly countered as he too looked a little troubled by Haruo's automatic assumption that the worst had happened. "If your core had ruptured, you would not have survived more than a week. So, it's safe to say that you aren't dying from a ruptured core."
"Yokatta," Naruto breathed out with obvious relief as he slumped against Haruo.
"Okay. Does that mean we're done here and we can go now?"
"No, I still have to check the current state of your magical core," Lupin replied as he climbed to his feet. "If I can get you to come here, I'll do that now."
Haruo grumbled under his breath as he reluctantly untangled himself from Naruto's arms and Tenzou would have found his son's antics amusing if the situation hadn't been so serious. The nine year old was standing just within arm's reach of Lupin just seconds later and it took a considerable amount of willpower for Tenzou not to tense his muscles when Lupin raised his wand until it was pointing directly at Haruo's heart. Haruo was far less disciplined though and his son shifted nervously on his feet while trying to subtly lean away from the carved stick.
"Please try to relax, Haruo; you have my word that I will not harm you," Lupin murmured in what most people would classify as a reassuring tone. "Once I start, I'm also going to need you to hold still until I tell you your free to move or else the spell won't work properly."
Haruo twitched uncomfortably a couple of times before he settled down and held himself still as requested. Tenzou felt rather proud of his son's ability to push passed his fear on request like that but wished it hadn't been necessary to teach his son to control his emotions like that. The Tokubetsu Jounin pushed the guilt he felt for basically raising his son as a child soldier to the back of his mind as Lupin began chanting under his breath as he occasionally flicked and twirled his wand as the tip of the magical focus began to glow a faint pinkish-red in color.
Haruo's shoulders briefly tensed in response to the upsurge of energy around him but otherwise held himself in place instead of reflexively trying to dodge the spell. At the end of the little ritual, a beam of pinkish-red light erupted from the wand and struck Haruo in the heart. The nine year old twitched once in response to being hit by the light before he stood still once more. A moment later, a cloud of pinkish-red mist poured out of Haruo's chest to hang in front of the Genin as it formed into a perfect replica of a child-sized human heart.
Lupin then began muttering incantations under his breath as his wand danced through the air and bounced between pointing at Haruo and pointing at the pinkish-red cloud in front of the child. Each successive spell cast on Haruo caused a series of small changes in the mist in front of him and by the time Lupin stopped casting, the mist-cloud looked much different that it had when it had first formed; the color had darkened to a murky maroon, the shape had shifted into something vaguely cylindrical, and it was covered in a web of pale blue threads that was broken in places.
The moment Black saw the end results of the spell, he began growling in obvious anger and Tenzou's clone didn't hesitate to wrap the man-turned-dog up in a beam of wood to prevent him from attacking. The large orange dog (his fur still died from earlier) snarled and gnawed at the beam binding him but Tenzou ignored the Trueborn's attempts to break free as he focused on Lupin instead; the ANBU-teichou noting the pinched look on the man's face and the slight pallor to his skin – a clear indication that he was unhappy with the results.
"Padfoot, knock it off and calm down!" Lupin sharply ordered in English as he briefly pulled his eyes away from the mist shape hovering in front of Haruo in order to meet the dog's gaze. The werewolf than turned back to Tenzou and switched back to Japanese as he stated, "You can let him go now; he'll behave himself. He's just upset by the results."
Tenzou ignored the comment about releasing Black (he wasn't about to risk the man losing further control of himself with Haruo in the room) and asked, "What did you learn that has the two of you so upset?"
"Is there something wrong with Haruo?" Naruto demanded immediately on the heels of Tenzou's question.
"Haruo is fine," Lupin stated as he wearily ran his left hand over his face while keeping his wand pointed at the mist-cloud hovering in front of Haruo. "However, there are a couple of unexpected… complications that were revealed by the diagnostic charm I cast."
"What kind of complications?" Tenzou demanded as he snapped his hand out to grab hold of Naruto's shoulder in order to prevent the blond from tackling Haruo when Lupin had yet to give his son permission to move again; meaning the man's spell was still active.
"Someone bound aspects of Harry's… sorry, Haruo's magical core," Lupin revealed and Tenzou scowled beneath his mask over the faint implication that anyone in Konoha could have done such a thing. "And since he's been here with you for the last six, almost seven, years it means that his core had been bound when he was still a baby."
Okay, that made a little more sense but that still didn't make him any happier about learning that another Trueborn had bound Haruo's core when they'd been explicitly warned not to do so. Then again, it was possible that additional bindings could have exacerbated the problem and that that was why they had been given the warning. Pushing his agitation aside for the moment, Tenzou refocused on the matter at hand and fished for more information as he commented, "It was my understanding that binding a Trueborn's core was fatal."
"It can be, yes; if the core is fully bound. The bindings that were placed on Harr… Haruo's core were intended to lock away specific abilities and reduce the amount of magic he could access; not seal his core completely. Even placing a partial binding on the magical core of a child can cause undue stress to the child's developing core though; especially if they are placed in a caustic environment where they experience high levels of emotional distress. In Haruo's case, the stress of the partial binding destabilized and warped his core."
Haruo twitched in response to Lupin's answer and the mist construct hovering in front of him rippled a couple of times in response to the movement before it settled the moment Haruo stilled once more. Tenzou eyed his son in concern for a moment before he returned his gaze to Lupin and asked, "Was the damage done to his core permanent? And if so, what will that mean for my son?"
"No, the damage isn't permanent. Had the bindings remained intact until his eleventh birthday, then the damage would have been irreversible. The bindings on his core were broken fairly recently though. In fact, I'd go so far as to say that the 'snapping' feeling Haruo felt in his chest during his mission was the feel of the bindings being broken and the chest pain he felt in the wake of the bindings breaking would have been caused by his core flexing and stretching for the first time in years."
"How do you know all that, old man?" Naruto inquired as he tried to wriggle free of Tenzou's hold.
"The spell I cast on Har… Haruo created an exact replica of what his core currently looks like and the appearance of his core tells me what is wrong with it. For example, I know that Haruo's core was warped because it has a cylindrical shape instead of a more natural spherical shape. The color of his core tells me that his core is still fairly stressed out while the dimness of the color tells me that his core is slightly unstable and having difficulties drawing in magic. And lastly, the broken webbing of lines represents the broken bindings on his core."
"But you can fix all of that, right?"
"No, I can't," Lupin answered with a shake of his head. "However, Haruo's core can and will fix itself in time now that the bindings have been broken."
"What of the remnants of the binding that are still present on Haruo's core? Are those going to be a problem?" Tenzou asked as he relaxed slightly upon learning that Haruo's core was capable of healing itself with time.
"Yes, they could be a potential problem; since the bindings can be repaired so long as those exist. However, if you could see fit to finally release Sirius, then he can come over here and remove them to prevent that from happening. And before you ask, no; I can't maintain my spell and remove them at the same time and if I drop the diagnostic spell, then it would be far more difficult to remove the remnants because I'd no longer be able to see them."
Tenzou grimaced beneath his mask in response to that even as he signaled for his clone to let the dog go. Black shook himself out as soon as he was free before he transformed back to his human self and shot dirty looks at both Tenzou and his clone before he drew his wand and gingerly approached Haruo with his wand carefully pointed at the floor.
"Try to hold still, kiddo; this is going to feel rather weird," Black instructed in English as he set the tip of his wand against Haruo's heart.
Tenzou had squash the urge he felt to put a kunai through Black's heart in response to the clear danger presented by the weapon lightly resting against his son's heart. He knew the man was supposed to be helping Haruo but that didn't mean he liked seeing his son in such a vulnerable position. Naruto was also less than pleased with the new development if the way he'd clenched his fists and strained against Tenzou's hand was any indication. And the brief spike in Haruo's chakra clearly said his son felt as vulnerable as he looked.
That Haruo didn't so much as flinch in response to said vulnerability spoke volumes for his son's self-control though and Tenzou was rather proud of him for not panicking.
The moment Black began his spell casting, Tenzou pushed his desire to maim and kill to the back of his mind as he carefully observed the process Black used to remove the remnants of the bindings on Haruo's magical core. If it wasn't for the visual that Lupin was still providing, Tenzou would not believe that the little twirls and sharp flicks of the man's wand between each tap of the wand's tip against Haruo's heart was doing anything. The mist-cloud in front of Haruo allowed him to see the way each twirl collected a strand of the binding and each flick pulled it free of Haruo's core.
It also didn't escape his notice that the process of removing the remnants was causing his son no little discomfort; his son had grown tense, his breathing had turned shallow and jagged, and his clone could clearly see the sweat beading on Haruo's brow. The fact that Haruo hadn't made even a token attempt to squirm away from Black to escape the discomfort he felt was more than a little surprising. Then again, Haruo was used to holding himself still in the face of pain whenever he had an injury that Tokage had needed to heal.
And wasn't that just a depressing thought? His son's current self-discipline had been forged through pain.
The only consolation Tenzou could take from that knowledge was the fact that most of Haruo's injuries over the past six years had been fairly minor bar the ones he'd gained during the Mizuki Incident. Still, scraps, bruises, minor burns, and hairline fractures didn't exactly tickle and Haruo had always been the adventurous sort; his son constantly chasing after Naruto no matter where he went. Of course, it hadn't been the chasing so much as the climbing that had led to most of Haruo's childhood injuries; or rather the falling when his little hands had slipped while he was climbing.
It would take Black roughly twelve minutes to remove every single strand of the bindings on Haruo's core and by the time he was finished, all three Trueborns looked rather exhausted. Black still had more than enough energy to turn Haruo and his clothes bright pink in retaliation for the orange treatment that the two boys had given him earlier. Tenzou didn't know if he should applaud the man for sneaking that in or if he should whap him upside the head for it since the return prank was bound to motivate his son into finding a way to get the man back.
"You're free to move now, Harry," Lupin tiredly informed the nine year old as he finally lowered his wand before he shuffled backwards to drop down onto the couch while Black just flopped down on the floor where he'd been standing.
Haruo let out a sigh of relief and immediately bounded back over to the couch Tenzou was still half perched on so he could bury himself into Naruto's side. The blond automatically latched onto the younger boy while he inspected Haruo's bright pink hair before he commented, "Nice color change, fleabag; but orange would have looked better."
"Nuh-uh; green's the best!" Haruo protested from Naruto's side; his voice muffled due to the way his face was pressed up against the older boy's ribs. "Being pink sucks though!"
"Yeah, well, I would have preferred red myself but I'm stuck as a walking orange; so deal," Black snarked back as he picked at his died clothes with distaste.
"Well, at least you can pass as Sakura's little brother now," Naruto consolingly informed Haruo as he patted him on the back. "You know, if she had pink skin and wore pink clothes all the time."
"Ne, ne; can one of you old men turn Naruto purple?" Haruo inquired as he peeled his face off of his friend and sent a hopeful look at the two tuckered out Trueborns; his question drawing a wordless protest from the blond.
"Let me catch my breath and I'd be happy to take care of that for you, pup," Black promised around a bark of laughter.
Tenzou briefly wondered if he should step in and stop any future shenanigans that the children might come up with if given half a chance (and yes, he was including Black as one of the immature) before he decided against it. His son was still obviously nervous and unsettled by what had just happened and it wasn't like either of the boys were doing anything they'd been forbidden from doing while they were grounded. And allowing them to prank their current target meant there was less of a chance of them plotting something big once they were off of restriction.
And no, it had nothing to do with the fact that Tenzou enjoyed watching the boys prank Mr. Black or each other.
Honestly.
Once he'd made the decision not to nip the promised prank in the bud, Tenzou directed the conversation back to the original topic when he asked, "How will the removal of the binding remnants affect Haruo and his core?"
"His chest will probably ache for a day or two and he'll feel rather tired due to the process siphoning off a significant amount of his magic as each thread of the binding was pulled free of his core due to the way the bindings had been tied to his magic in order to fuel the bindings," Lupin answered as he shifted into a more comfortable position. "He'll also need to avoid having any accidental outbursts during the recovery period as any new outbursts could further stress his core and drag his recovery out needlessly."
"Will physical exertion affect his recovery?"
"It could; if he were to push himself too hard and since it could potentially trigger an internalized burst of magic to heal the physical stress he incurred. It would probably be best if he limits himself to light exercise for the next two days."
"Did you hear that, Haruo?"
"Aa, sensei-nii," Haruo automatically replied before he asked, "Ano… what am I supposed to tell Iruka-sensei? He's been having us spar against his students every afternoon."
"I will inform him of your new medical restrictions when I escort the two of you to the Academy this afternoon."
"Whoa, hold on a minute; why are you going to be escorting my godson anywhere?" Sirius demanded as he shoved himself up from the undignified puddle he'd collapsed into earlier. "You promised me a full twenty-four hours with him!"
"I did no such thing, Black-san," Tenzou corrected as he sent the man an unimpressed look. "I flat out told you that Haruo would be performing a stint of community service in the afternoons all week long. I also told you that it was up to Haruo to decide whether or not he would make any changes to his previous plans in order to make time to visit with you. The only reason I didn't allow him to put off meeting with you today was due to my concerns about his core; concerns, I might add, that were valid given what Lupin-san discovered."
"I was still promised twenty-four hours with him before Scar-Face cornered him with his blasted offer!"
"True; but it was never specified that those twenty-four hours had to be consecutive," Tenzou pointedly drawled and he couldn't help but feel rather smug when Black spluttered incoherently in response to his taunt.
"You know, I get that you don't particularly like us and I'm sure you have a valid reason for said dislike but could you please refrain from riling Padfoot up?" Lupin requested in a slightly annoyed tone. "You're not the one that's going to have to sit and listen to his bitching later."
"S'not very professional of you to taunt your clients, Koneko-chan," Naruto chided with obvious amusement and Tenzou had to repress the urge he felt to palm his face in response to the two boys witnessing his unprofessional behavior but damn if he hadn't enjoyed tweaking the childish Trueborn's nose.
"What other complications can Haruo expect to face as a result of his core being partially bound for a minimum of between six and seven years?" Tenzou inquired instead of acknowledging Naruto's teasing chastisement or Lupin's annoyed rebuke.
The werewolf shot him an annoyed look in response to the obvious evasion before he rolled his eyes and replied, "His core will be easily stressed if he has a high number of accidental outbursts or if he manages to exhaust himself with a large enough outburst. Aside from that, I expect he'll experience mild discomfort from time to time as his core slowly shifts back into its natural shape; that would be especially true in the wake of an accidental outburst."
"How long will it take for his core to reshape itself?"
"Weeks, possibly months but I expect that his core will fully heal itself by the time he reaches his eleventh birthday so long as he doesn't do anything to stress it further between now and then. I'd need to scan his core at least once a week for at least two months to chart the changes in his core before I can say with any certainty how long it will take for it to fully heal though."
Tenzou let out a noncommittal hum in response to the werewolf's claim; he suspected that the biggest reason for the proposed weekly meetings had more to do with forcing Haruo into contact with the two men than it did with the necessity for Lupin to chart the recovery of Haruo's core. He contemplated calling the man out but decided that it would serve no point aside from potentially alienating the two men and weekly checkups to make certain that Haruo's core was actually healing wasn't a bad idea.
Besides, there were more important things he needed to know and with that in mind, he asked, "Do you know who placed the bindings on his core and when it might have been done aside from sometime before I collected him from England?"
"The bindings would have been placed at some point after Lily and James had been killed but prior to his placement with the Dursleys," Lupin informed him after thinking about the questions for a moment. "Unfortunately, it's been far too long since the bindings were cast to tell who it was who had cast them; their signature had been far too entangled with Haruo's magical signature after his core had powered the bindings for so long. My best guess though would be that the binder had been Albus Dumbledore or Madam Pomfrey, the dedicated healer for Hogwarts."
"And do you have an idea as to why either of those individuals would have done so?"
"I have no idea what might have motivated Dumbledore, if he had been the one to place the bindings, but if it had been Madam Pomfrey who had partially bound his core, then she would have only done it to protect Haruo. As a certified Healer, Madam Pomfrey took oaths that would have prevented her from causing intentional harm to any patient and you can not bind a wizard's core accidentally."
"Under what circumstances would the potential hazards involved in the binding of a Trueborn's core be considered an acceptable level of risk for the sake of treatment?" Tenzou inquired with an unseen frown.
"If the child's life was in danger from an inherited ability that they were far too young to control, then the ability would be sealed until the child was old enough to consciously control it in order to prevent them from over-stressing their core or dying of magical exhaustion. Another possibility would be if the child's ability poses a clear threat to others or if the child's ability could potentially break the Statute of Secrecy in the event that a non-magical witnessed the child using the ability and Haruo was placed with non-magicals at the time of his parents' deaths."
"What abilities of Haruo's were you aware of back then that might have been the target of the bindings?"
"The only one I can think of would have been his ability to tame almost any animal he came into contact with. Another potential reason for the bindings could have been an injury that Haruo had obtained on the night that James and Lily died. I was never given an opportunity to read any medical reports generated from that night so I don't know if he had been injured or how those injuries might have been treated. There's also the report of him being hit by the Killing Curse to consider since such dark magic would have had a negative impact upon his core."
"Is it possible for the bindings to have affected Haruo's chakra coils? Or as you'd referred to it earlier, his life force coils; basically the source of a person's life force?"
"Actually, we call the source of our life force a wellspring, not coils," Lupin absently corrected as he leaned back to against the back of the couch while he thought about the question for a moment. He then replied, "To answer your question; yes, some bindings can affect a person's wellspring of life force. That's especially true in the cases where the ability that's being locked away is partially linked to a person's life force; such as with the animagus transformation."
Tenzou nodded in response as he immediately drew the conclusion that the bindings on Haruo's core had potentially been aimed towards his Mokuton due to the fact that some aspects of his son's Mokuton had been sealed; such as his ability to grow beams of pure chakra. And he could easily imagine that the wizards would not want his son walking around with a bunch of beams growing out of his various body parts. They had not been able to seal away his Mokuton entirely though.
He also suspected that the constant use of the aspects of his Mokuton not affected by the bindings on his core had weakened the bindings since Haruo could grow clones and puppets in addition to manipulating plant matter. And his son had struggled when he first learned how to make clones. At the time, he'd attributed it to the fact that growing clones was actually meant to be harder than growing beams of wood. However, if the bindings specifically targeted the ability to grow beams, then it stood to reason that any aspect of the Mokuton that involved turning chakra into wood would've been greatly affected by the bindings.
He also knew the potential reason why Haruo's ability to grow wooden clones hadn't been completely cut off was due to the fact that the process to grow clones, while similar to the process of growing beams, was different and required the user to mold their chakra differently than they would mold it to produce the wood. So, any bindings that specifically suppressed the ability to grow 'beams' would've been less effective on suppressing the ability to grow 'clones'. The fact that wizards apparently knew very little about chakra and ninjutsu would've also meant that they would've overlooked the possibility that growing 'beams' wasn't the only aspect of that ability.
Pleased to have that particular mystery cleared up, Tenzou redirected his thoughts once more and inquired, "Earlier, when you first announced the results of your technique, you said that Haruo's core had been destabilized on top of being warped by the bindings. Can you please explain what that means for my son and what kind of affect it will have on his recovery?"
Surprisingly, it wasn't Lupin who answered this time but Black; who'd once again lapsed into his native English.
"It basically means that his core is struggling to produce magic and the magic is does produce can be imbalanced. So, you can expect him to have extreme mood swings and a few lapses in judgment since the imbalance screws with your perception of right and wrong. Unless he finds a suitable anchor with a large pool of wild energy to latch onto, that is. Of course, if he were to find such an anchor, pulling him away from it would be nigh on impossible since he'd fight the separation to the bitter end because we don't like feeling off-balance and out of sorts."
"What exactly is an anchor and what is it that an anchor does to balance a Trueborn's destabilized core?" Tenzou demanded as he straightened up and snapped his head to the side where his son was currently half-dozing, as he snuggled into Naruto's side while he recalled just how tightly Haruo had clung to Naruto through the years.
"An anchor is anything that 'grounds' a wizard when their magic is unbalanced; it gives them something to focus on outside of the vague sense of wrongness they instinctively feel in their magic while it is out of balance. The ideal anchor for each person varies but it's usually a person, place, or thing that has an overabundance of wild energy since it's the absorption of that energy that helps balance their magic until their core stabilizes. My anchor was always Prongs and it was his larger than average wellspring of life force that grounded me right up until he died."
That confession regarding Haruo's stepfather explained much about Black's current state of mind and Tenzou made a mental note to pass that information on to Inoichi just in case Black hadn't mentioned it to the Yamanaka during one of their therapy sessions. On top of that, it finally allowed him to understand just why Haruo had clung to Naruto so tightly over the past six years and why he'd 'snapped' when that 'anchor' had disappeared from his senses. Lily had probably known that Haruo's first friend would be his anchor; hence the reason for the warning her spirit had given Inoichi.
"Is there a way you can determine just how long Haruo's core has been unstable? And what it was that caused his core to destabilize?" Tenzou asked as he returned his gaze to Black.
"Not with any certainty but based on the color his core appeared during Moony's diagnostic spell, I'd say his core had been unstable for months, at least; if not years since it looked nearly as bad as my core looked when I was still living with my oh-so-loving parents. Why do you ask?"
"Based on your earlier explanation, I suspect that Haruo latched onto Naruto as an anchor within hours of their first meeting and any attempts to separate them saw Haruo lashing out at the ones attempting said separation."
"It wouldn't surprise me if the partial bindings on his core had destabilized his core from the moment they'd been placed on him," Lupin interjected at that point. "The fact that he'd been placed in an unhappy environment immediately after the traumatic events on the night his parents died and most likely after the bindings had been put in place would have exacerbated the imbalance to the point where he desperately latched onto the first potential anchor he encountered. Or he could have sought out the strongest possible anchor; since you would have likely qualified as an anchor as well."
"Even if it wasn't the bindings that destabilized his core; their presence would've prevented his core from restabilizing itself even with a proper anchor to ground him," Black added as soon as Lupin stopped speaking. "The constant pressure of the bindings restricting the amount of magic he could access and suppressing even just one of his abilities would have prevented his core from stabilizing and left his magic unbalanced each time he was separated from his anchor."
There was no doubt in Tenzou's mind now that that was exactly what had happened to his son. Haruo's recent behavior (his absolute refusal to allow Naruto out of his sight when his team had first returned home) strongly supported that conclusion. It also explained why Haruo's personality changed so much after he'd befriended Naruto and why he tended to be rather moody when he spent any time away from his friend. Although, part of him feared that it wasn't actually Naruto that was his son's anchor but the Kyuubi since the bijuu was the strongest source of wild energy in all Konoha.
Oh, Kasai was not going to be happy with him or Haruo once Tenzou gave him a report on everything he learned today.
Translations: English to Japanese
Aa – yes
Ano – um/uh/er
Ne, ne – one way of getting someone's attention, can be a sort of childish way of saying Hey, hey
Yokatta – an expression of relief, usually translates as 'I'm so glad' or 'thank goodness!'
11-03-17: Chapter edited to clear up a plot hole, fix a few spelling/grammar errors, and remove unnecessary author's notes to clean up the word count.