July 30, 13 AK
Sasuke had been a very tiny bit aggrieved to have been passed over when Sensei had chosen who would lead their first C-rank. It was a small thing, really. He didn't doubt Sakura's competence anymore, least of all in a position that called for intelligence, but he did feel that it might make more sense to have the strongest team member take charge for their first mission outside of the safety of the village.
Admittedly the gap in skill was closing at a fairly steady pace, what with Sakura's nearly ludicrous chakra control and Naruto's genuinely ludicrous capacity to spam clones, but still. She had a good head on her shoulder's at least, though he sometimes still got the unnerving feeling that she was staring at him whenever she had the night watch. And once he had found her collecting bits of his torn clothing after practice. But really she had gotten loads better about being a pathetic fangirl.
When their first mission had gone wrong it certainly hadn't been Sakura's fault; how could she have known that crazy missing-nin and his partner would ambush them before they had even boarded the boat to Wave? Thinking rationally about it, there hadn't really been a better way to handle the screw up either. Some Chunin in the Missions Approval department was likely short a few limbs once Sensei got back to Konoha, but there hadn't been a better option during the mission. They would just have to do more thorough fact checking in future.
And they had. When Sensei had chosen him as the next mission lead they had gone over everything twice, down to the second generation of their client's relatives even, making absolutely sure that there wouldn't be any surprises or 'accidentally omitted details'; that they weren't stepping into the middle of some ancient blood-feud or secretly carrying papers that would change the inheritance of a multi-million ryo corporation or… anything so stupid.
There was nothing. It was an entirely standard courier mission; the contract wasn't for a huge amount of money and their client didn't have any significant competitors or credible enemies, the route would only take them out of Fire Country for 3 days out of the total week of travel time, the area was peaceful with no meaningful bandit presence- the contract wasn't even for weapons, just bulk metals for common household uses! The client just wanted speedy, reliable delivery of a contract which was really only important to him and the mine he was purchasing from.
He would later emphasize to his teammates (who didn't really seem to care too much, but it was the principle of the thing) that they had technically completed the mission by the time things went horribly wrong. As soon as they had dropped off the scroll they were done, and since the mission was over, it wasn't even really Sasuke in charge when the Iwa-nin had dropped out of the sky and completely ruined everything.
As he stared at the twisted wreckage that was all that remained of one of his few still living relatives, Sasuke wasn't sure what to feel. He didn't like Hiroki-sensei, per-se; he valued the Jounin's teachings, and he didn't have any particular animosity left over from the… period of distance after the Massacre but… They hadn't quite built anything closer over the past months. It was more that they had settled back to what they had always been: somewhat distant relatives.
Seeing the teen pop back up and return the total annihilation with interest was… ugh. So many feelings; he understood why Hiroki wore a mask. Maybe he should consider something like that when they got back to Konoha. Maybe even just a simple grey scarf...
The weight of the insensate Jounin on his back shifted slightly as he landed on the next branch and he adjusted his arms to keep the still faintly twitching body steady.
"Naruto, anything?"
The blond glanced at him before generating a single clone and dispelling it with a swift chop. After another second the orange ninja gained a distracted look from the newly relayed information before shaking his head in the negative.
"Nothing within ten klicks. We passed a little farmstead five minutes ago; judging by the distance between them there's probably another one coming up in half an hour maybe."
Sasuke glanced up at the sun, before glancing down and around to check the position of the shadows. They had been running flat out for nearly 6 hours already; 30 minutes was a little early for a break, but he was still a tad wary of moving Sensei so much while in such an unstable condition. He paused on the next branch, joined a moment later by his pink teammate, the only one who had achieved a reasonable measure of success with medical jutsu.
"Sakura, how's Sensei?"
The kunoichi reached out a hand and placed it on the back of Hiroki's neck. He could feel the faint tingle in his hair as she used some sort of diagnostic technique, and hear the small sigh as she finished scanning.
"Unchanged. I don't understand what's happening. It feels like his coils are… writhing; realigning themselves. I don't know what could cause something like that, but it must have had something to do with that sealing thing he did."
He could see Naruto shift slightly at her words, and came to a decision.
"We'll stop when we hit the next town. If we get a good rest tonight we can push a little longer tomorrow and get to the Konoha outpost near Misuzu-gai by evening. Thoughts?"
His teammates shook their heads and they set off again through the fading light of the afternoon.
. . .
Once they had settled into a farmer's spare room Sasuke turned to Naruto, face determined.
"You know something. What happened to Sensei?"
The blond chewed on his lower lip nervously, glancing between the raven haired Uchiha, Sakura, and the still unconscious form of their teacher.
"I… I'm not really… supposed to say."
Sasuke scowled, eliciting a reciprocal fluff of anger from his erstwhile rival, who folded his arms defiantly.
"I'm not! I can, but… it's an S-rank secret…"
His frown softened slightly as he noted the tone of Naruto's voice. Uncertainty? Naruto was many things (many annoying things), but timid was not one of them. Sakura seemed to be picking up some of the same vibe, for she scooted a little closer and placed a hand on the blond's shoulder reassuringly.
"It's okay Naruto. We need to know."
The other boy fiddled with the sleeves of his hoodie for a second before nodding gingerly.
"Okay, so… you know how the Yondaime killed the Kyuubi?" -he glanced at them to make sure they were paying attention- "Well, the thing is, he kind of… couldn't, actually? You can't kill the Biju, they're made of chakra, they can't die; if you disrupt them enough they dissipate but they'll reform eventually and…"
"And you'd just have to do it again."
Naruto nodded at Sasuke's comment, fingers still worrying at the seam of his sleeve.
"Yeah. So, the best way to deal with them is to, well, Seal them. But they're so powerful they'll corrode an inanimate container so-"
"They seal them in living things. They seal them in people, don't they?"
They both glanced at Sakura in surprise and Naruto nodded again, running a hand through his shaggy hair. Sasuke noted absently that the blond mop had been getting a little longer recently, and now had enough weight to it to hang slightly, like a mane. He blinked at that thought, and the tiny frown he usually wore deepened fractionally. Why was he getting distracted by Naruto's hair?
He blinked again as the object of his focus spoke.
"Yeah."
Sasuke stared at the single flickering lamp which lit the room and thought for a moment. Somewhere in Konoha there was a ninja walking around with the Kyuubi in his gut. What would that be like? So much power running just underneath your skin; the stories said that the Demon Fox could reshape the landscape with a single sweep of its tails, causing tsunamis and hurricanes with the force of its roar. And now all of that fury was bottled up within a few lines of ink and a shell of fragile meat.
"Anyway, the Kyuubi is the strongest of the Nine, but, well, there are Nine. That guy Sensei fought, Han, he was the holder of the Five Tailed Dolphin-Horse, Kokuo. I'm pretty sure Sensei sealed the Gobi inside himself okay but… something might have gone wrong or… Usually they choose kids to be Jinchuriki, because your coils don't really start to settle until you're like 6; it makes it easier for the host to adapt to the chakra. I don't know what exactly is happening to Sensei, but it's probably something to try and make it so Kokuo's chakra can fit into his system better."
Sakura stared between Naruto and Sensei for a long moment, a wary look on her face, and Sasuke frowned a little harder as he thought about the blond's words.
"Naruto, how do you know about all of that?"
Sasuke shook his head and sighed in mild irritation slumping into a more comfortable position against the rough wooden walls of the farmhouse. He wanted to punch himself, it was so transparently obvious. There was a freaking nine on his shirt for kami's sake.
"He's the Kyuubi Jinchuriki, obviously."
The other boy flinched a little and shot him a nervous look, making Sasuke roll his eyes in exasperation and huff an irritated breath.
"Oh don't cringe. Honestly, I feel like enough of an idiot for not figuring it out sooner."
His female teammate blinked in sudden realization as she looked at Naruto again in a new light, visibly assessing what she had previously believed about the Uzumaki.
"Oh! Because you're an orphan, right Naruto? That makes so much sense; they wouldn't have wanted any one of the clans to get so much power all at once, so they'd choose someone no one would miss who didn't have any previous attachments. Uzumaki might not even be your parent's name; it was probably a tribute to Uzushio."
The blond had retracted into his jacket a little, but at their lack of anger or offense he began to emerge like an optimistic turtle, an expression of tentative hope on his face.
"You're- you're not mad?"
Sakura sent the boy a withering look at the temerity to even ask such a question, while Sasuke snorted quietly in derisive amusement.
"Of course not Naruto! I mean, it's not like you're the Fox! A little jealous maybe, because it means there really isn't anyway Sasuke or I could catch up to you in the chakra department; but it's not as if you're one second away from going crazy and eating our livers or something, right?"
Naruto coughed slightly and ran a hand over his head, chuckling nervously.
"Ahh, well, some Jinchuriki have a little trouble with that, but- but-" -he waved his hands frantically at their disturbed looks- "the Yondaime was like, really good at sealing; I never even knew the fuzzball was in my gut until the last day of the academy, and it was actually really hard learning how to enter the seal and talk to him."
Sasuke's brows pinched together as Sakura voiced what he had been thinking, tidily freeing him from the obligation of speech. Good kunoichi. Best teammate.
"Why would you want to talk to a demon?"
Naruto puffed up again, this time with a look of determined affront in his baby blue eyes.
"He's not a demon! We're almost related, sort of. "
At his team's looks of flat incomprehension Naruto rolled his eyes and scratched his hair roughly grimacing vaguely in frustration.
"Well, the Sage of Six Paths had two sons who went on to create the Uchiha, Senju, and Uzumaki, but he also kind of treated the Bijuu he made like kids, so Kyu-ji is sort of my uncle? Like, a bajillion times removed, obviously, but, you know… yours too Sasuke, so. Well. And I mean-" -the blond waved his hands in a vague grasping motion- "He's actually- well, he isn't nice, but he isn't any meaner than a regular person. How would you like it if someone stuffed you in a box for fifty years? But, anyway, I've been talking to him sometimes and… I think he's been getting… a little better?"
Naruto held his fingers about a millimeter apart to indicate just how little, causing Sakura to smother a snort of laughter. The orange Jinchuriki pouted cutely at her but was kind enough to ignore the slight.
"He doesn't just yell about ripping out my intestines and strangling me with them or burning down the village and salting the earth it was built on or… well most of the time he just naps, actually. And he keeps telling me about how much of an asshole everyone we meet is, but I know everyone has good and bad parts, and just because he can only sense the bad parts doesn't mean the good parts aren't there, and even if they weren't we just have to make those people better anyway because if we just focused on the bad stuff all the time then where would we be? Huh?! You hear me fluffbutt?! Feh, he's asleep again. Or pretending to sleep. Dick."
Sasuke stared at his teammate for a long second before closing his eyes and taking a deep and steadying breath. He turned to Sakura and shared a solemn look with the kunoichi.
"Well, it's obvious he's caught Sensei's crazy. We'll have to put him down, for the good of the village."
The pinkette's laughter was almost loud enough to cover Naruto's scream of offense.
. . .
A/N: Naruto is such a silly billy, worrying about his team's reaction. He should know better by now.
Supposedly Isobu and Yagura meshed because they had highly compatible chakra frequencies or something; and it would be remiss of a skilled medic to not be as accommodating as possible to an internal guest. I imagine Kokuo's seal looks something like an infinite labyrinth of twisting stone tunnels, like a piece of swiss cheese with occasional skylights and little pockets of mossy growth, wiffs of steam floating through from the gobi to keep everything moist and lush.
