"Hurry up," Tsume tossed over her shoulder. "I don't have all night."
I pursed my lips but pushed my tentative crawl into a lurching shuffle. Tasked with the escort, the abrasive kunoichi had been marching forward, her movements as forceful and direct as possible. If punching through walls was allowed, I believed she'd have done it to speed up the process. My gaze was trained to the backs of her and the ninken, watching every twitch of their muscles, ready for when they would turn and spring at me. Even the dog's yawning grouch about the night being too long didn't put me at ease.
I suppose that's why it took me so long to realize that Rin was watching me just as intently. Well, analyzing might be the better term – her eyes were as sharp as a hawk's. I glanced around to see if there was something amiss behind me only to confirm that her focus was honed on my face. I rubbed at my forehead to see if there was anything there – there wasn't – and murmured, "Um, Rin, why are you staring at me?"
Her gaze only sharpened as her brow lowered. She leaned forward, and I could see our actions garnering Tsume's attention from up ahead.
"Have you ever had vaccines?" Rin asked, her tone as close to accusatory as it had ever gotten.
"Vac-Vac-What?" I stammered, leaning away.
"Vaccines." She wagged a finger in the air. "You know, shots that help you keep from getting sick?"
I cast my mind back, remembering how Yori used to throw the word around to jab at Azūmi's cooking. "Better than getting a vaccine at least!" he'd say only to get smacked on the knuckles. I stopped that train of thought, gulped, and muttered, "No, but I've never really gotten sick."
I fidgeted as Rin pulled away, deep in thought. She shook her head. "Well, if you want to keep it that way, you need them otherwise your first months in Konoha will be pretty rough. Something else for the check-up I guess."
Check-up? I let the word slosh around my mind as she chittered on about the other things I'd need: scans, shots, physical therapy, and the rest that I'd only known through Yori's complaints. My nose wrinkled as my earlier suspicions resurfaced. The Hokage seemed willing enough to take me in, but he didn't say exactly what he planned to do with me. Will he decide once he knows the results?
I wrinkled my nose as I glared down at the cause of all this. Izanagi, I growled. I wasn't sure how, but the prayer beads were the only thing keeping me from the Pitch and Izanagi's journey back hadn't been too kind on them. Coated in mud, scuffed, and string frayed further, the prayer beads were now tarnished by smoke, their surface webbed in cracks. Though the prayer beads were protecting me, I'd have felt more gratitude towards them if they weren't cutting off the circulation in my ankle.
But how? I stared at the fragile thing that somehow contained one of the foremost amatsukami. How could've they possibly have made it? I pursed my lips, considering once again the gashes in the Sapling's side – ones that perfectly matched the beads shackling my swollen ankle. The priests must've known about Izanagi, but did they realize how crazy he was? That he's willing to slaughter anything in his path? Or was that the point of the prayer beads to begin with? To stop him? Was that the reason the shrines were destroyed?
My brow knitted as the dark possibilities circled me like vultures. Or what if the beads formed a connection – a contract – between the kami and me? That could explain the weird way the necklace seemed to stitch into my musubi and why I couldn't take them off. It'd also explain why I didn't need to do the Kagura the second time. Anger bubbled in my gut at the likelier possibility. Did Master Yūta not know any of this? Did anyone at the shrine? Or was that knowledge destroyed with the fire?
Gaunt theories though they were, they settled on the creases of my mind – vultures waiting for an opportunity, for weakness. I muddled through what little I'd been able to understand from all the past interactions between Izanagi and myself: his primacy at the shrine to which I was sent, his position as creator and mine as his miko, and my unwavering hatred of Habu and His savagery towards Izanami. Maybe that's why I hated Habu the moment I saw her. I cocked my chin. Maybe our connection is also the reason I'm so flighty around fire.
I rubbed my temple as a sigh flopped from my lips. All I seemed to have were questions, and now I now had no one to turn to for answers. Maybe the shinobi will help me figure out something.
"Left!" Tsume snapped.
My eyes deadened. Even if they don't believe in the kamigami.
Reluctant yet obedient, the rest of us followed the kunoichi down yet another hallway. I pursed my lips as the path narrowed and the air turned staler. While there had already been few, slit windows in this building, I noted that I hadn't seen one for the past several minutes. Nor doors. If I had to guess, I'd assume we were travelling underground, but I had no idea where we were nor where we'd be going.
It seemed that Rin was curious as well. Her lips were pursed as she glanced around, but she appeared more curious than spooked. I tried to remain calm by interpreting that as optimistically as I could, but still, I found my inner cheeks crunched between molars.
"All of Konoha is connected by tunnels," she offered. "It helps us get around quicker, and civilians come down here if there's ever an evacuation. I haven't been down here since I was in the Academy though. We were tested on whether we'd memorized the layout." Her cheeks puffed up in a smile. "I was on Kakashi's team, so we got first. No one could stop us getting' their flags with his Earth Style jutsu."
I gave a meek smile back but couldn't help as anxiety took up its usual metal-heeled stroll through my chest. I hope the wolves are all right, I thought. The situation being what it was, I had little idea how to improve it. Still, I had to try. Rubbing the few bug bites on the back of my neck, I worked my mouth open. "Tsume?"
"Hm?" she grunted back as her ninken glanced over its shoulder.
"Th-" I coughed and cleared my throat to lob out, "I want to thank you." I dropped my hand to my side to stop the nervous scratching. "F-for the wolves I mean." My tone sounded sharper than I wanted.
I saw the red mark on her cheek as she cast a thin glance over her shoulder. It seemed that'd be the only acknowledgment I'd get as she faced forward and stated, "We want the wolves in our compound sooner than later. Since you're going to be in the hospital, we wanted your-" She paused, the word rolling around in her mouth before she dropped it like a coveted bone. "-permission to go and get'em."
I pursed my lips but understood the line we were toeing here. An alpha never sought 'permission' for their actions even within the pack. Much less from outsiders. The least from outsiders who were seeking the alpha's favor. Still, at least our dealings were a bit more direct than what I'd come to expect from the shinobi. Her liberal use of 'we' comforted me strangely – the kunoichi had the sense of pack in her.
Still… I imagined Teru's face as he was confronted by even more dogs and shinobi.
I rubbed my thumb against my cane's worn handle. "That'd be for the best. They'd need the food, but they were waiting for me to return. Pakkun – er, Kakashi's ninken-"
"I know Pakkun."
"P-perfect," I shoved out. "Knowing Teru though, I would be caref-"
She snapped a glare at me.
"Well, I mean he won't come." I yanked my eyes to the floor. Not questioning your authority. Not questioning your authority. Not questioning your authority. "Not unless he knows that I'm okay and the pups will be too."
She arched a brow at me as the ninken perked its ears. 'He might be a bit difficult to deal with, Boss,' the dog growled. 'The ninken warned to watch out for him even if he is blind. You still sure you don't want to use force?'
Tsume turned to her partner, her answer set in her stubborn lips.
While I wasn't sure if either of them knew I could understand the canine tongue, I had assumed they did. That's why I was wondering if this was another sort of ploy: with such a heavy reliance on subtle body cues, it was much harder to lie in that language. Despite knowing these two were still professionals, I still couldn't sense any trickery or viciousness in their words. Strangely, it all rang of actual concern.
Even so, I knew my brother.
"Tsume," I began with gratitude dulling the edge in my words. "I'm not sure if it'll work, but my brother might be willing to come with you if you tell him-" I paused myself to cast about for any magic words that might let them know I'd given my permission. Fuzzy memories from childhood wafted back to me. Of us tussling in the meadow, racing through the woods, sneaking underneath the shrine's walls to scavenge the delicacies waiting in-
"The food place," I said. "Tell Teru that I'm going to eat all the smoked meat if he doesn't hurry up. He'll understand that." Maybe.
Her nose wrinkled. "The food place?" She gave a sharp dip of the chin that could've just been her twisting to a stop. Apparently, we had reached our destination.
The kunoichi jerked around to face a metal door recessed into the wall and glared at us to approach. Rin and I stepped forward, and I glanced at the thick steel that slid out from walls that had somewhere shifted into solid stone. Though the metal door was thick at over three feet wide, the rock on either of its sides was twice that. Yet what the door lacked in width, the amount of kanji scribbled over every available inch of space impressed a more imposing sense. It appeared the metal barrier must've continued further into the stone as I could see where the formulae had been cut off by the covering.
I cocked a brow at Rin whose own eyes were wide. Still, she managed to scrape together a smile. "They line seals on everything around here for protection from attacks and eavesdropping. Even my bedroom has a bunch for privacy. I suppose it's just a precaution, y'know?"
"Yeah." I kept my expression clear. "Precaution."
The door was fully ajar, so I peered inside to find a relatively non-descript room. It wasn't overly large, and it was paneled with slabs of brownstone. Unsurprisingly, it too didn't have windows. In the center of it, a metal bed had been set up with various instruments lying on wheeled tables beside it. Similarly wheeled cabinets lined the back walls, their metal glinting in the dozens of candles brightly lighting the room. This wasn't how the books described a hospital. It looks more like a prison.
"From what I gather," Tsume deigned to explain, "this room is strong enough to contain a loose Kyūbi. If the jinchūriki needed to have an operation or something', they'd bring them here in case anything went wrong." She eyed me. "You understand that trusting us here will help us trust you."
I nodded. I wanted to run, but I was already in too far – and too lost – to be able to do anything. I'd already committed myself to this plan. Keeping my eyes from flicking towards the hallway, I said, "I guess I'd do the same if I were you," and teetered into the room.
I heard the others follow me in as I caught a rustle of movement. A handful of masked shinobi made themselves known. My steps stuttered but an audible sniff from Tsume kept me moving towards the bed.
"Oh?" Green curls bounced into view as an older woman poked her head out from a cabinet. "About time!" She stepped out holding bandages so thick they nearly topped her already short stature. "They dragged me out from the hospital twenty minutes ago. They tried taking Goro and Michi too, but I think with a war going on they have better things to do then attend to a single person. Now sit!"
Assuming that's where I was being directed, I yanked myself onto the bed – a strange paper crackling beneath me.
The woman marched over – her gait steady but not even. My eyes drifted down a pant-leg that suddenly became too loose beneath her knee. Before I could react, the bandages were plopped down beside me, and I was blinded by a blast of green light.
I jerked back with a yelp, but the woman swatted my knee and said, "Hush, girl," before moving her palm and checking the other eye.
When she was done, I blinked back my vision, but the woman had already turned around and was rummaging in another cabinet.
"Sensei," Rin greeted, yanking herself up straight and folding her arms behind her back.
"Rin," the doctor acknowledged as she flipped through a chart. "Getting the hands-on experience you wanted?"
The girl blushed.
"Well, make yourself useful and act as my assistant for now," the apparent doctor continued. "I've just read Minato's report, but it's typical of a non-medical-nin's assessment. Doesn't have half the information I need. You've been working on her, I assume. Give me your analysis."
Rin immediately began listing off scientific names that I had no hope of following. Still rubbing my eyes, I glared at the bouncing green curls only to draw back as her dainty hand held up a cylindrical needle and placed it on the counter beside her.
The bed creaked as Tsume leaned on it behind me and nearly yawned. "Where's Tsunade? Ain't she supposed to be here?"
Both the woman and Rin stiffened. The younger kunoichi glanced at the doctor as the woman turned on a heel and walked up to the bed. Nose to nose with the kunoichi, the doctor said, "What? You think I can't handle it?"
Tsume leaned off the bed and straightened. "No, Sensei. I just knew she was supposed to be back and-"
"Not yet," the doctor said as she snatched at my hand and began twisting my arm this way and that. My wincing brought a "hm" from her, and she poked at my sore shoulder – all the while still meeting Tsume's gaze. "People," she stated, now lifting my arm and jabbing at my armpit, "seem to forget that I taught Tsunade everything she knows. Just because I can't be on the battlefield, doesn't mean I've gone soft."
"Of course not." Tsume took another few steps back and glanced down at her ninken. "Well, my job is done here." She looked at me. "I'll be off getting the rest of your pack now. I'll send a ninken by to let you know when they've settled in." She glanced at the doctor, but the woman had already dismissed her. Frowning, the kunoichi turned on her heel and left the room, muttering something under her breath.
Behind her, a masked shinobi swung the door shut. Two thunks of metal and against metal told me the door had been locked.
"And she'll need the typical assortment of vaccines," Rin finished her assessment of me.
"Yes, yes," Koko agreed but her attention was on my bulging ankle. She clicked her tongue. "Nope, nope," she said shaking her head. "The limb won't have to be removed yet, but if we don't improve the circulation, it'll fully die."
Yet? I gulped.
The woman quirked her lips and glided a fingertip across the top of my foot. "Feel that?"
I shrugged. "A little bit."
She did the same to the underside of my foot. "Anything?"
"N-no, Sensei."
"Hm, the nerves are on their way out, eh?" She hovered her palms over my ankle and there was another blast of green light. After I blinked away the glare, I watched her tapping her chin. "You did a nice job mending the bones, Rin. You've always excelled in those lessons. The ankle won't have to be rebroken and set, but the area still hasn't properly healed. Seems like still a dozen or so shards of loose bone wrenched between the ligaments. I'll need to remove them."
"R-remove them?" I asked. "Will it be healed after?"
The doctor's blue eyes met mine. "I can't work miracles, girl, but something close enough. It won't be anything like you were, but the worst of the pain will be gone. After retraining the muscles, perhaps you'll be able to do more than hobble. Still, it'll have to wait." She leaned forward and peered at the prayer beads. "I've been told to leave that alone until someone can analyze it. I wanted that Uzumaki girl, but she was apparently sent off on a mission a few hours ago." She shrugged. "Oh well. I'm not gonna complain since I got that hunky hunk coming in."
Rin blinked. "Uh? Are you talking about Jiraiya?"
Koko had already whipped around the table to begin poking at my other leg. "He's one of the best scholars on fūinjutsu. If someone has a guess as to that anklet, he would." There was almost a giggle to the way she was talking. "Ah, well. If I was twenty years younger."
"They're prayer beads," I muttered under my breath, but the doctor continued her work on me. She twisted my body this way and that. She jabbed me in areas I hadn't even realized could be so sore and kneaded muscles I hadn't realized were there. All the while she was talking under her breath, keeping up a list of whatever she saw with Rin jotting notes as fast as she could. When Koko switched to chakra-driven analysis, she turned to Rin – who was still jotting down what she could – and ordered, "Don't forget the patient. Building up a rapport and sense of comfort is half our job."
Rin blinked. "Oh, right, right." She turned to me, eyeing my nervously strumming fingers and explained, "We are just checking off the preliminaries right now. Figuring out what you need. Do you have any questions?"
I nodded. "Yeah, um, what're those?" I motioned towards the table next to me at the instruments of varying sharpness.
"Oh, right. Well, some syringes, lancets, a stethoscope, otoscope, thermometer, ophthalmoscope, and this is what I practiced with a few months ago!" she exclaimed, holding up a strange looking utensil. "It measures chakra levels."
Seeing the tempo of my fingers increasing, she started to explain their uses in greater detail. She pointed towards other bits of equipment in the room as I nodded vigorously, swinging my legs in time and making the paper crackle under my shifting weight. I felt I could recognize some of the objects dimly. While I had never seen them before, for some reason I had this notion that I had read about them in my books, but the scenes I was thinking of were when interrogators forcibly extracted secrets from enemy shinobi in the most gruesome manner possible.
But you're not in a dimly lit cavern, I told myself. You may be locked in, but you're not strapped down at least. And Rin is here.
Koko had whipped around the table, and I felt her hand yank me back. I thudded onto my back as she raked the shirt up from my stomach. I was about to scramble away when she ordered, "Stay still!" She rolled her eyes and held her glowing palms over my stomach. "Honestly, it's not like I'm going to hurt y-"
After a pause, Rin shook her head at my questioning eyes and raised a finger. After a few minutes, she asked, "Sensei?"
The woman cussed. "What'd you get yourself into, girl? They're practically obliterated." She lifted her gaze and poked, "Rin, did you perform an emergency chakra injection on her?"
Rin shook her head. "No. I- Well, there was this mist that came out of nowhere and saved her in time. It healed up the others' wound as well. I don't know exactly what it was, but it saved her tenketsu from completely collapsing."
"Mist?" I asked as my heart rate climbed.
Rin looked down at her clipboard and nodded. "It was after everything had happened, and, well, you were unconscious."
"Well whatever happened," Koko cut in, her voice suddenly tired, "her chakra pathways are practically gone. I've only seen this amount of damage on those who got on the bad side of a Hyūga! If she hadn't gotten that chakra infusion, she'd have died." She shook her head and dropped her hands. "It's no use."
Rin frowned. "Isn't there something you can do?"
The woman shrugged. "You only get one chakra system, Rin. Like any muscle, you can train it to be stronger, but if you shred it beyond recognition?" She shrugged. "If she was used to stressing her system through training, there might be a chance to recover some chakra control but even then, recovery would be minimal. Likely, there wouldn't be enough chakra produced to even practice tree climbing."
"What?" It took me a second to realize I had spoken. The two medics stared at me as I floundered for something else to say, to ask, but some part of me must've understood all along. That explains it, I thought as I pushed myself up. Why the world feels so cold now. A selfish part of me had hoped it was only a result of my depression or maybe something to do with the damaged prayer beads. I had never allowed myself to give in to the increasingly worried tones Rin had used when assessing me. That something was seriously wrong with my ability over musubi. Something irreversible.
I watched the two medical-nin discuss my dwindling options, describe the whys and hows to my condition, but I didn't listen. I pulled my knees to my chest and sunk my chin between them. When will this stop? When will things at least get a little bit easier? I bit my lip. What am I supposed to do now? How am I going to stop Izanagi?
I felt a hand on my shoulder and looked up to see Koko. She was short enough that I met her gaze squarely. "Cheer up, girl," she comforted, her voice still hard from what she'd seen. "You strike me as a good kid. I've seen too many like you to even remember their names anymore. While I don't know what you got yourself into, I've learned that sometimes-" Her eyes flicked to the surrounding room. "-these things are for the best."
I followed her gaze and caught sight of the armed guards, the deadbolted door, and I understood what she was really saying. 'If you're not a threat to the Village, you'll be free to live a normal life.' I looked back at her as she squeezed my shoulder and withdrew her hand. I couldn't bring myself to smile, but I hope she heard the gratitude in my voice. "Yeah."
The exam continued. After a dozen more pokes and prods and measurements, the doctor pronounced a prognosis of overall recovery – after my ankle was attended to, of course. I took as much solace as I could in that. "One last thing. Your fever is pretty high," Koko continued. "Do you feel sluggish? Sore? Stiff? Especially where your lymph nodes are?"
I didn't know what she was talking about so I nodded. "Here." I pointed towards the sides of my neck and my armpits. "That's where it feels the worst."
"Well," she said, pushing up her sleeves, "that's the chakra system trying to patch itself back together. What little chakra is left is leaking and inflaming the rest of your body." She began stretching her fingers. "It'll be tricky, but I can patch up the network – or what remains of it at least – to get those symptoms down. It won't fix the main issue though which is your limited production of chakra. Nothing will be able to fix that, however, but you're still making enough to survive." She shrugged. "Count your blessings where you find them."
I nodded as Koko moved towards another set of drawers and began lifting out bottles and needles. "We'll need to put you under for this next part. I think you've been through enough pain."
Rin sidled up next to me and patted my hand. "I'm sorry I couldn't do more," Rin said.
I looked at her. "What for? You did everything you could."
She gave a tired sort of smile and explained the procedure. "Go on and lay back. We're just going to put you to sleep for a little while."
"Sleep?" I protested, rising once more.
She put a hand on my shoulder and pushed me back down. "An operation on tenketsu is considered the second most painful procedure behind childbirth but demands a lot more skill. Usually, you'd need about three doctors operating at once, but Koko can do something like this in her sleep. Still, it's best for both you and her if you weren't writhing around."
"I'd deny such flattery," Koko said over her shoulder, "if it weren't true."
I squirmed but didn't relish the idea of being forced to sleep. True, I was exhausted. True, I didn't want to experience further agony. But still, what if- I clenched my teeth. They could've done anything they wanted to me at this point. Why go through all this trouble if they just wanted to hurt me?
I did my best to let logic stifle my emotion, but when the doctor shuffled back over, a gleaming needle in hand, I felt the panic rising again. My focus homed in on what appeared to be water dripped off its sharp, thin tip. Calm down. Calm down. Calm down.
"You're going to feel a little pinch, Mira. You'll wake up tomorrow morning and you'll feel a lot better. Just rest for now and leave it up to us."
I took a breath and shut my eyes. I flinched as what felt like a tick bite on my forearm but knew a needle of that size would hurt a lot more. I waited for the true pain – for the wooziness or dizziness to take hold – but when it didn't come, I tried to open my eyes. Instead, they felt heavy. Too heavy. I felt my consciousness slip into the darkness, but it was only that of sleep, not the Pitch.
The thing was I didn't expect to dream. I didn't expect to find myself back home on my branch, my toe dipped into the pond at the shrine. I didn't expect to hear an unfamiliar voice call out my name. And the thing was, I wouldn't remember. Not then at least. But when I did – years later when I found myself once again scrabbling against forces and machinations beyond my control – I could only sit back and laugh. How ridiculous the end of it all started with a 'dream'.
"Mira," a voice said, low and cold.
I turned and saw a man with amber eyes and a short auburn ponytail. He stood by the door to the shrine, his arms crossed, his jaw clenched. Unsure what to do, I slid from my branch and cocked my head at him. My temple began to throb, and I shook my head to throw off the ache. I took a step back.
"I have a few questions," he said, "and it'd be in your best interest to answer."
Bonus Easter Egg: Did you catch who it was in the 'dream'? Leave your guesses in a review!
As with every author, I love love LOVE reviews so please leave them whether they be ConCrit or general feels!
