A/N:
soapsopas
Thanks. I think you're plenty articulate. And yes, there is more, we still have all of Shippuden to get through after all.
Elise142 & cassianaswindell123
Thank you both. There isn't much happening in this one, the prologue to the second half if you will, but I hope you'll like it anyway.
Kragh50
It's more like Kisame is doing Itachi a favor. In canon Zetsu actually speculates whether Kisame would leave Akatsuki after Itachi's death, so I don't think him leaving the organization last chapter is too much of a stretch.
Don't take that S-rank listing from River too seriously. At that point there were mostly just rumors about Wraith with barely any facts to back them up. The only major thing she'd done was help Suna during the invasion of Wind and her involvement in that isn't common knowledge. Of course things are a little different now, after the Kiri coup, but we'll get to that later.
Guest
Thank you.
sarahmchugs
Thanks. You know I'm surprised how much I write as well. It's kinda getting in the way of my reading, but I guess that doesn't matter as long as it's fun.
Adam218
Welcome and thank you very much for picking up this story and sharing your thoughts on it. It's always nice to read which parts people especially liked/disliked so I know what to improve and which areas of storytelling/writing to focus on.
. . .
XII - Chigiri no Sato
Chikako sat atop a cliff, looking out at the sea. A mild wind blew the briny scent of the water in her face. It was still early morning, so the sun bathed the sky and the rolling waves in hues of red, purple and gold.
It made for a pretty picture if one ignored the fighting children on the shore. This was the first group of new graduates that had decided to take the exam. At least the ones that had made it to the final round, a simple knockout tournament. Their ages ranged from eight to seventeen. The oldest, Azusa - the Watari assassin with the coppery hair and green eyes, had been offered a field promotion to chunin after the coup. She'd insisted that she wanted to earn her rank like anyone else did though. It seemed silly to Chikako, but most of the Watari shared the girl's opinion.
Old or young, they'd all gone to the academy and chosen as many courses as their time allowed. Unlike Azusa, the other ones that were clearly of chunin level or above, had taken a separate test instead of graduating with the new genin though.
A test that Zabuza had forced Chikako to participate in, as punishment for telling the Hunter-nin to kill her. At least that had been his intention. She obviously hadn't gotten a rank, seeing as she wasn't a Kiri nin, but he'd made her fight just about anyone. As far as she could tell the point of that had been to show her how easily she could have died. What he hadn't anticipated was that Chikako had already seen every last one of the Watari in combat and knew their techniques.
Unlike with the Hunter-nin or that demonstration in Bird, she hadn't gotten out unscathed, but she'd won all of her fights. By the end she was covered in blood and grime, with several broken bones, but grinning from ear to ear. He hadn't expected her to. That disgruntled expression when he had to congratulate her in front of the whole village, paired with the right to gloat, were worth the nearly three weeks she had to spend in bed recovering afterwards.
If Zabuza pitted her against the same people today she might even beat them without receiving so much as a scratch. Maybe.
That little, almost illegible comment Jiraiya had left in the margins of the first set of notes he'd sent her? The one about adapting a seal to use natural chakra? It had to be the most brilliant thing Chikako had ever read.
As far as she knew the Sannin had never done anything with that idea, but she had.
Chikako wasn't a sealing master by any means. Just as with her fighting style, she'd opted to become a specialist rather than a jack of all trades. In the case of juinjutsu that mean barrier seals. She could slap them in place with a touch and they were entirely fueled by natural energy, meaning she only lost as much chakra as creating the initial seal took.
The whole process was a little tricky. Most seals required a minimum of three corners to form a barrier, and both keeping them stable until then and forming the next seal required a lot of concentration. It was also best if the properties of the barrier were tailored to what it was supposed to block. A process that took more time and, while considerably stronger, was more prone to leaving loopholes. Of course in the case of an emergency she could always just slap a very generic seal onto her regular chakra barriers to strengthen them.
Something that became necessary only a few seconds after she'd though about it.
Chikako body flickered to the beach below, placing herself right in the path of a massive wave and using a barrier to shield the children. The water smashed into her shield with enough force that it would have broken bones. The barrier merely glowed pale blue though, as the energy spread out across it's surface.
"Really?" She asked, raising an eyebrow. Kisame grinned at her. He stood waist deep in the water, already forming the seals for another wave.
He'd been supposed to provide distractions while the kids fought, not kill them. The sharkman tended to be a little overenthusiastic with his help these days. Staying in Kiri bored him to no end, because since Chikako had proven that she wasn't just some kid, there hadn't been a lot of trouble for her, and thus no excitement for him.
That Zabuza still might be assassinated any day was apparently not relevant at all to the other swordsman. She wasn't even sure that the two had spoken a single word to each other during the past two months. The Mizukage mostly ignored Chikako's self proclaimed bodyguard and Kisame only talked to her, her summons, the pretty, blond woman that owned his favorite bar and the rowdy customers he threw out on their asses night after night.
So far he'd left the village three times on his own to meet with Itachi, but otherwise he mostly just trained, drank and read books. If anything official or potentially dangerous was going on Kisame was usually somewhere close to Chikako, but he'd given up following her around like a lost puppy. It wasn't particularly interesting and she clearly didn't need the protection.
After she'd beaten the Hunter-nin in private and then the Watari in public most people had accepted her as a sort of honorary Kiri shinobi. That didn't mean they all liked her, but her orders were followed and nobody tried to give her shit just because they were bored.
Kisame and her did still share that same tiny room though. Not that it felt like it. Most days he only got back from the bar when it was almost time for her to get up again. She'd never seen him drunk, but he usually smelled as if he'd bathed in booze. Chikako rather suspected he'd picked up people watching as a hobby due to general boredom.
She was busy most days and even though they spent at least an hour together every day, she didn't have much time for Kisame otherwise. He also had the tendency of scaring people off with his special brand of friendliness, that involved too many sharp teeth and hard truths for most. He wasn't an outcast by any means, but one could easily become lonely if everyone kept a respectful distance.
Which was why Chikako made sure Jiro and Sune were around to be brats and keep the sharkman entertained. That also had the, completely coincidental, side effect of keeping them out of her hair while she worked.
Saizo, the oldest of the Hunter-nin, had asked her to train with them a while back. Almost half a year now. A week after that Chikako had introduced a little game. The Game, thanks to Jiro's and Sune's propaganda.
Every Monday morning each of the Hunter-nin present in the village received a token in the form of a flat, white stone. On it was the name of another Hunter-nin. Their goal was to mock assassinate their target and steal their token without getting noticed by Jiro or Sune. Then they went after the next target and so on until only one was left.
Points were awarded for speed, number of kills and detecting the two summons. Besides the Hunter-nin any shinobi was allowed to join the game, but they didn't have to follow any of the rules. That way, there was always room for something unexpected to happen. Then at the end of the month it was everyone against Chikako for one full day.
Kisame usually used that last game as an excuse to flood the streets, or more specifically Zabuza's office. Chikako was pretty sure he only did that because it gave him a reason to fight Momochi. Except for her, the Mizukage was the only person in the whole village that was willing to spar with him. Well, and Mei, but he avoided her like the plague, because the woman kept trying to convince him that he should track down the rest of Kiri's legendary swords.
One of her people, Chojuro, had the Hiramekarei. That meant three of the blades were in Kiri and four were still missing. Mei wanted to get them by whatever means necessary, whereas Zabuza was still waiting for the other swordsmen to come home on their own and Kisame wanted nothing to do with the whole thing.
For her part Chikako still acted chilly whenever she came in contact with Terumi, but she didn't distrust her anymore, at least not when it came to the woman's ambition to become Mizukage. Mei was genuinely sorry for how Haku had gotten hurt and the two of them had actually become good friends over time.
By now Chikako's behavior towards the other kunoichi was more habit than anything else. Sometimes the only reason they argued during meetings with Zabuza was because it drove the man nuts. He'd ask something really inane, like would they rather something start at seven or eight in the morning. Mei would chose one option, Chikako the other and then they'd come up with the most ridiculous reasons for why their completely arbitrary choice was obviously superior. If he felt especially bored Kisame - who wasn't actually allowed in those meetings, but just like Chikako and Mei, never got thrown out - joined in as well.
At one point Zabuza had left his own office, declaring that Haku was in charge for the rest of the day. It had been surprisingly interesting to see which people thought they could bully the quiet boy into agreeing with them, only to receive a very polite, very sharply worded verbal beating. Haku would never, ever knowingly do anything that went against his master's wishes, unless it was to protect Zabuza from himself.
Something Kisame knew very well, but the rest of Kiri was apparently ignorant of. Or rather had been. The sharkman had lured dozens of people into the Mizukage's office to talk to Haku that day. Right up until he himself had received a lecture about disrupting the government, at which point he'd decided it was safer to hide in the room he shared with Chikako.
Life in Kiri wasn't always fun and games though. There had been four attempts to assassinate Zabuza. None came even close to succeeding, but that several people had tried was worrisome enough.
The man was a good leader. Rough around the edges, but fair and down to earth. He'd gone through the whole system, from student to ANBU, to missing-nin to kage. He'd seen the best and worst of his village and genuinely cared about all of it's people.
There were some though to whom none of these things mattered. They saw a village weakened by tyranny, then a coup, and divided by clashing opinions. They saw their chance to grab power.
The quality of Kiri's shinobi had gone up quite a bit since Zabuza had taken over, but less than six months wasn't enough time to undo years worth of damage. Even now there were still people coming back, alone or in small groups, which made keeping an eye on everyone especially difficult. Every newcomer was potentially a threat, which was why either Chikako or Kisame had remained in the village at all times.
His trips to meet up with Itachi took a minimum of two weeks each, so he'd only gone out three times while she'd stayed back. She would have liked to see the Uchiha again, but didn't feel comfortable leaving for so long. Kisame was a lot stronger than her, but that wouldn't mean shit if he didn't know that Zabuza needed his help because an assassin had snuck past him.
So, instead of personally meeting with her friend, she used Yatagarasu like a messenger hawk. The crow seemed to enjoy his little trips, but he still made a fuss every time she gave him a letter. Apparently being a messenger was beneath him and before he could agree to do such menial work his ego needed stroking.
Chikako usually obliged the bird, more than used to difficult summons. Kisame on the other hand tended to just chase Yata down, wrap him in bandages and refuse to let him go until he complied. Likely the reason the swordsman now had to ask Chikako to send his letters for him.
In any case, the graduation exam was going well so far. Baring any last minute disasters, two thirds of the children that had entered would be promoted to genin today.
The exam wasn't exactly safe, which was by design, but that didn't mean Zabuza wanted unnecessary deaths. Chikako's job was mostly to make sure nobody died. She was pretty sure that not a single one of the participants had remained uninjured, but they were all still alive and in comparatively good condition.
There weren't any rules on how they had to fight their matches, but since examiners would call a fight as soon as one participant was in a situation they couldn't get out of, there was no need for lethal force. It certainly wasn't rewarded. In addition any and all poisons that might be used had to be registered beforehand, so that an antidote was on hand.
One kid had failed to follow that rule and been disqualified. The girl he had fought had only survived because Chikako had managed to burn the chakra out of her system before it could do too much damage, she'd be out of commission for weeks though. The boy would make a good poisoneer one day, provided Zabuza deemed he'd learned his lesson and let him out of the holding cell he currently resided in.
Other than that there hadn't been any problems though. Well, almost.
One of the examiners for this last tournament had fallen ill on short notice. So Chikako had asked Kisame to lend a hand. Something she'd regretted the second they'd reached the beach and he'd drenched everyone in sea water for no reason whatsoever.
Now he was just being ridiculous though.
Chikako moved her chakra barrier and angled it so that the next monster wave would roll over it, rather than smashing right into the thing. That way it wouldn't endanger anyone, but could still serve as a distraction when the mass of water flowed back into the ocean.
"Killjoy!" Kisame shouted, but even without turning back to him Chikako could hear the grin in his voice. He wouldn't back off until he'd torn her barrier down. It was always the same.
The bastard was cheating too. Instead of trying to overpower her shield with stronger attacks or finding a loophole in the seal to get through, he simply walked up and leaned his sword against the glowing barrier. Samehada made these odd purring sounds as it slurped down the chakra. The shield flickered out of existence a moment later and Chikako barely managed to throw up another one before the next wave hit.
There were still some definitive flaws with her design. Rather, she had some really good designs that specialized on certain aspects, but they just wouldn't work well together. For example the single seal she used to strengthen her regular chakra barrier was very fast and worked well against brute force, but as soon as the chakra got disrupted the thing became useless. Then there was the seal she'd specifically created to counter Samehada's chakra leeching. That one couldn't handle nearly as much force, but it regenerated very fast. The other problem was that setting it up required five seals and took ages.
Layering them was a nightmare as well, because if she used the minimum number of seals for each barrier they all had different shapes and sizes. Then there was the fact that she had to either draw the actual seals or hold her chakra in the correct shape for each one. Not to mention that some of the barriers interacted with each other, which could have interesting results.
By which she meant the only reason she hadn't suffocated herself when she'd noticed the effect for the first time, was that she'd passed out from the lack of oxygen, which had caused her chakra seals to dissolve, thereby destroying the barriers and allowing fresh air to reach her again.
It was Kisame's go to argument whenever anyone called him lazy. He figured the only reason she hadn't died was that she was too lazy to actually draw the seals in ink. That line of reasoning incidentally also worked really well to distract Zabuza.
Every time someone, meaning Kisame, brought it up Chikako could practically hear him think about supervised training. Of course the Mizukage knew better than to suggest she reveal her seals to anyone, so instead he clamped his mouth shut and glared at her.
"Try not to kill anyone," Chikako told Kisame when she felt Saizo approaching from the village. She poked the swordsman in the chest for good measure and he went to his knees with a dramatic gasp.
"How could you?" He whined. "I though we were friends. Friends!"
"I think you missed your calling," Saizo told him, appearing out of thin air at her side. His Body Flicker range was impressive, but he lacked the chakra control to perform the technique completely without waste. It didn't much matter in this particular case, seeing as he used the resulting chakra smoke to obscure his movements, but he still spent an hour every day, trying to perfect his Body Flicker.
"Did something happen?" Chikako asked. Outside of training Saizo usually didn't seek her out, unless he had orders to do so that was. He seemed to respect her a great deal, but they weren't friends.
"Mizukage-sama would like to see you after the exam has concluded Wraith-sama."
"Okay," she said, drawing the word out and raising an eyebrow. Saizo waited for a heartbeat, but when she didn't ask a question or gave him any orders he vanished again.
"What was that?" Kisame asked, still on his knees. "Weren't you supposed to give a report anyway?"
"Everyone who was involved, that means you too," she glared at him. "And don't think I can't sense the whirlpool you're creating underwater."
He grinned at her.
She was never again asking Kisame to help out when fragile rookies were involved. Ever.
. . .
Chikako and the other examiner's walked out of Zabuza's office an hour later. She wasn't surprised when he called her back. It got her attention though, when he waved for Kisame to stay behind as well.
"There have been rumors that Akatsuki has started to move," the Mizukage informed them. He never wore the robes or the hat, but they were always on display in his office. Haku had tried to convince him that he should carry something that symbolized his status. He'd disagreed of course, so the boy had made sure that the symbol for water just so happened to be on the back of every single shirt he owned.
"How sure are we about that?" Chikako asked, crossing her arms. Last they'd heard from Itachi there had been no plans to actively hunt any of the jinchuriki, but that had been a few weeks ago now.
"The information comes directly from your spy friend in Frost. According to him Iwa's Han and Taki's Fu have both gone missing. There is no official word on the matter, but it seems suspicious that the jinchuriki of two neighboring countries would just so happen to vanish from the public eye within days of each other."
"And he sent those notes directly to you?"
"That a problem?"
"I don't know," Chikako shrugged, which had Zabuza raising an eyebrow. "Gatsu wouldn't have done that unless it was on orders. I'm wondering what game Jiraiya is playing."
"Lets assume it's a warning given in good faith, for now."
"Why though?" Kisame piped in. He was leaning against the wall by the window, playing with the petals of a flower. A pretty indigo plant that had no doubt been placed there and was cared for by Haku. "Kiri doesn't have a jinchuriki anymore."
"Utakata," Chikako said, making Zabuza lean forward in interest.
"You found him?"
"Saburo did. He isn't ready to come in, but with the threat of Akatsuki hanging over his head he might change his mind. Question is if you want that kind of heat."
"He is one of ours," Zabuza said with a glare. "If he chooses to come home we will defend him."
Chikako gave him another shrug. It was his call and she didn't care either way. Whatever Akatsuki planned to do with all the Tailed Beasts, would have to wait until after the Sanbi resurrected, which could take years. So keeping Utakata out of their hands, while important, wasn't one of the concerns at the forefront of her mind at the moment.
There was also the matter of Kisame's ring. From what he'd told her, the thing played some role in the extraction of bijuu, but it wasn't actually necessary. There was, however, the fact to consider that Orochimaru had kept his ring after defecting and had never been replaced because of that, meaning Akatsuki now had only eight official members.
Kakuzu and Hidan - the Zombie Twins as Kisame liked to call them - the leader, who went by Pain, and his partner Konan as well as Deidara and Sasori - two people who apparently constantly argued about art - some odd plant-creature called Zetsu and of course Itachi.
Kisame didn't know a lot about the other members. Unsurprisingly they weren't exactly the sort of people that liked to share their backstories and reasons for joining an organization of S-ranked criminals. Well, except for Kakuzu and Hidan, whose motives were money and the opportunity to kill strong opponents, respectively. Deidara on the other hand seemed to have been forced into joining but Kisame had no idea why he stayed.
Thanks to the swordsman Kiri now had all of their descriptions and whatever he knew about their respective fighting styles. They also knew that Pain was the leader of Amegakure, where people referred to him as a god, and that that was Akatsuki's base of operations, but that the individual members also tended to have their own contacts and spies. Especially Kakuzu and Sasori. Kisame had never been particularly interested in these things though, so he couldn't share much more on the topic, other than that the organization as a whole barely ever met up and that members were mostly just in contact with their partner and the leader.
Itachi may or may not have given Konoha other details, Chikako still didn't know whose side he was on because he refused to talk about it, but she was pretty sure that no other village had more information on Akatsuki.
Which made it especially silly that some of them seemed to think the organization was operating out of Kiri. Not to mention that Kisame's presence in Mist wasn't even common knowledge. He wasn't hiding, but he barely left. The shinobi wouldn't give information like that away and the only civilians allowed inside the walls were those that lived in Kiri, everyone else had to conduct their business outside. They too knew better than to spread rumors about the ninja that protected them and Chikako wasn't even convinced that all of them knew who the sharkman was.
Either there were no spies in Mist, they were exceptionally bad at their job or the other villages simply picked the easiest target to blame. The fact that Zabuza had opted to keep the moniker Chigiri probably didn't help in that respect either. Not that Chikako thought he was wrong. In fact she'd advised him to do exactly that.
Kiri needed strength and the name Bloody Mist, despite it's negative connotations, spoke of exceptionally powerful shinobi. The village had received it because of Yagura's reign, but thanks to the leeway Zabuza had allowed her, Chikako, the Hunter-nin and a bunch of regular ANBU and jonin volunteers had given it new meaning.
Instead of going out and killing their own people, they had picked up bounties. About half of them for Lightning, because of how well they paid. The hunters appeared out of nowhere to deliver heads and carefully crafted reports, that were useful but left out any details Kiri would rather keep for later use.
Instead of going out on their own, as had been the norm, Chikako made sure that there were at least two people to every team. Sometimes it was because one was deadly and the other could track, or one was backup because the other was a good assassin, yet bad in open combat. There were plenty more reasons, but in the end they all came down to the fact that no single shinobi was perfect and having someone at your back just in case was always a strength.
One they made sure to keep a secret. When the heads were delivered it was, without fail, by a single ninja. Just because Kiri had discovered value in teamwork, didn't mean the rest of the world needed to be informed of that fact. After all, the only thing better than having an ally at your back, was having an ally at the opponents back.
They'd argued with her at first. Too inefficient, they didn't have the numbers to send two or three people after nukenin that weren't even necessarily jonin. They also quickly changed their tune when the first few groups got attacked and managed to eliminate their opponents without casualties or downtime due to injury.
Nukenin rarely ever went down quietly, but in addition to that Kiri had been perceived as unstable and weak right after the coup. It had made both the other villages and the missing-nin eager to test the waters. Having backup on bounty missions, even though they were often easily completed by a single person, had proved invaluable.
'With regards from Wraith,' had become their hunters greeting, seeing as it afforded them preferential treatment in several countries. The phrase had become so common in fact, that, even though she hadn't been to Lighting herself since handing in the Widowmaker's head, Kumo had added a Bingo Book entry for her that named her as and officially recognized bounty hunter.
By now Chigiri didn't mean that they slaughtered their own people until only the most powerful were left. It meant trackers and assassins second to none. Where Mist's executioners went blood flowed and the dusty stories of legendary hunters had once again started to circulate in the Elemental Nations. Something that made it incredibly hard for anyone to gauge Kiri's effective military strength.
The other villages might not trust them, but at least they saw Kiri as strong. Not to mention that the connection to Chikako, or rather Wraith, muddied the waters further. Mist had no official alliances, but Wraith was recognized by several nations and an ally of both Kiri and Suna.
Speaking of.
"How are negotiations with Gaara going?"
"That's the other reason I called you back," Zabuza said with a sour look on his face. "Sand's council is apparently vehemently against an alliance, but the Kazekage is willing to consider it. Provided you head to Suna as Kiri's ambassador."
"Sure," Kisame snickered. "Send the one shinobi that is not and has never been part of the village."
"That's not what bothers me," Zabuza growled at him, rubbing his forehead as if to ward off a headache. "As far as I'm concerned Chikako is a Kiri shinobi. The problem is that it paints a target on her back."
"You think the elders will come after me?"
"Or anyone else who doesn't want this alliance to happen."
"So what?" Kisame piped in again. "Kid can handle herself and I'll be there to-"
"No," Chikako cut him off. "One of us has to stay here."
"Aw, c'mon," he whined. "I'm getting cabin fever and nobody has tried to kill Momochi in almost two months now."
"Yeah, and me leaving for weeks will be a perfect opportunity. The Hunter-nin are almost back to their old glory, but with the strong focus we put on offense for all those bounty hunting missions, there wasn't a lot of time to teach them how to prevent assassinations.
"I mean seriously, I can't teach them most of the things that make it easy for me, because they simply don't have the ability to sense or control chakra well enough. And it's not like we can suddenly put a ten man personal guard on Zabuza."
"Sure we could," Kisame grinned. "It'll make him look like a pussy, but he'll be alive so who cares."
"Don't even start-"
"Shut it!" Zabuza cut both of them off before the argument could really start. "I'm the fucking Mizukage and this is my goddamned office, at least pretend you're listening to me once in a while."
. . .
"You're staying." Chikako glared at Kisame as soon as the the door to Zabuza's office closed behind them. He sighed, but didn't argue, merely complained a lot about how bossy she was. It wasn't like she could actually make him do anything though. No matter what he said about Zabuza or how much fun he had riling the other swordsman up, in the end he cared for his village and the new Mizukage was the best thing that had happened to Kiri since before Yagura had worn the hat. Maybe longer.
"I'll be fine," Chikako told him that evening, when for once they both went to bed at the same time. "I'll take Azusa and Saizo with me and it's not like I'm helpless."
"Yeah, I know. I'm just afraid Itachi will give me that disappointed look if you manage to get yourself killed after all."
He was only half-joking and Chikako knew exactly what he meant.
"The one where he doesn't say anything and just keeps looking at you as if he'd expected better, but isn't even angry that you couldn't live up to his expectations?"
"Yeah, that one," the sharkman agreed with a shudder that made his bed creak ominously.
She didn't sleep well that night, too busy dreaming up horror scenarios of what might happen in Kiri while she was gone. It was silly, really. She was just one shinobi among hundreds and her absence wouldn't herald the end of the world, but she couldn't help that feeling of dread in her stomach.
