Dice Are Rolling

"Naru-chan? What are you doing here all alone?" I asked the young blond, sitting at Ichiraku.
"Akira-nee-chan!" Naruto waved enthusiastically at me as I took the seat next to him and ordered a Miso Ramen. "I'm waiting for Kakashi to get signed out of the hospital so we can start training. He said he had a super cool training technique only I can use!"
"Wait what? Kakashi, hospitalized? What on earth do you mean by that?" I questioned confused and thanked Teuchi for the ramen. "He's been sleeping at my place for the past days, so I can't understand why you would think he's hospitalized?"
"WHAT?" Naruto shouted in shook, dropping his bowl of ramen on the ground in surprise. "No! My precious Miso Ramen with extra eggs!"
"Want me to buy you a new one?" I chuckled in amusement at his expression. He was grieving it quite dramatically, with big tears rolling down his cheeks and his arms flailing all over the place to express his distress.
"You will?" he asked, now looking like someone being blessed by Kami. I nodded, still smiling in amusement. "Nee-chan! You're the best! Old man! One Miso Ramen!"
"Coming right up!" Teuchi called out and started preparing.
"So, what're you going to do with Kaka-baka the traitor?" I asked Naruto before he had the chance to start slurping up the ramen.
"Right! I should punish him!" Naruto smiled mischievously.
"Nothing too bad or he won't train you." I reminded him sweetly.
"I'll just punish him after he trains me." Naruto stated happily and started wolfing down his ramen. I laughed softly while watching him. In a matter of seconds, the entire bowl was empty. "Thanks for the food Nee-chan! Now I'll find Kakashi-sensei and force him to start my training."
"Tell him I said hi!" I called after Naruto as he rushed out of Ichiraku. "What a lazy bastard you are, Kakashi."
"Mou how rude." Kakashi said as he sat down next to me. "Sorry I'm late, but I heard this crazy genin was chasing me around, so I had to make a few traps to evade him."
"I'll forgive you if you start training him tomorrow morning and meet him on time." I said in a sickly-sweet tone. "Or, I'll just make a punishment for you instead. You know I hate it when people are late."
"Maa, maa, I'll track him down tonight and start at six tomorrow." Kakashi quickly responded. "If you're not threatening me, Kamiko is. At this rate, I'll die of stress before I even get to propose."
"You're being dramatic." I chuckled and rolled my eyes. "Besides, what do you mean Kamiko threatens you? She's like chocolate! You know, look all dark and gloomy, but is all sweet and good!"
"I think you're the only person to see that good side of her." Kakashi snorted in amusement. "I swear, if Kamiko wasn't in your force, she would do great in the T&I. She has some of the most creative and terrifying threats I've ever heard. You know, she threatened to make rats bite through my chest if I ever hurt you?"
"See! That's sweet! She's being a good friend!" I defended her, while laughing. Kamiko was indeed good at threatening people and I often had to fight Ibiki to keep her in my ANBU force for that reason. Of course, it also helped that she was great at following through with her threats.
"Sometimes, I think you're a bit of a sadistic maniac." Kakashi looked at me in amusement.
"Aw! That's the kindest think you've ever said to me." I said sarcastically and fluttered my eyelashes as if I was receiving a wonderful compliment. "And like you're the one to talk. Remember your habit of breaking into my room in the middle of the night? My wall is all decorated with kunai and shuriken marks from thinking it was an enemy!"
"I choose not to comment on that statement."

I could feel Kamiko's eyes glaring at me through the entire meeting with my fellow Commanders. Shikaku had looked at me in amusement when I explained that I currently had a bit trouble with my sight and therefore had to bring Kamiko along to the meeting so she could take notes and read up from the earlier reports if it should be needed. Kamiko herself had been pissed. Originally, she was supposed to take another solo mission, but I ordered her to leave the next day instead, much to her chagrin.
"Then there's the matter of the Akatsuki." Dragon stated once we finished the normal discussion of the safety of Konoha. "Do we have any new information? I can't send any Hunter nins if they don't know what they're going after and dealing with."
"I have some." I started saying and gestured to Kamiko who gave them one file each. "As you can see, the abilities to each individual is still very uncertain. But I have the names of all of the current members and the abilities we currently know of. In addition, you'll see the number of jinchuriki collected, and which ones are still free. The Akatsuki already have half of the biju, so we should act as soon as possible."
"I agree." Dragon nodded solemnly.
"But there's still the matter of abilities. With the abilities to those we haven't faced practically unknown, it would be hard to send a single team." Shikaku commented lazily. "If we just send random teams, we might very well be sending them straight to their deaths."
"Not to mention that we can't afford to have too many squads out looking for the Akatsuki. We have no means of tracking them down either." I added with a deep sigh.
"I believe our current best bet is to send out our Shinobi when we have a confirmation that the Akatsuki is in the Land of Fire." Shikaku proposed, earning sounds of agreements from all of the other Commanders. "Then I'll report back to Tsunade-sama and ask for her opinions on the matters discussed in the meeting. She wants us to keep everything regarding the Akatsuki out of reach for the Council, so let's keep it solely among us for now."
"That's given." Dragon scoffed and flipped her hair over her shoulder. "No one with a good head on their shoulder trusts the Council with more information than necessary."
"Oi, they're the Council of Konoha, let's not disrespect them." I said half-heartedly. Very few Shinobi had any respect for the Council as they tended to be very selfish with their decisions and rarely had the good of the village in mind when they decided something. "Tanuki will be taking my spot for the meeting next month, I have a mission."
"Ah, so that's why you had her sit in today." Shikaku said, though by the look on his face, he knew fully well that I was just feeling too lazy to do everything by myself.
"Exactly." I said sweetly. "Then, I'll see you all later."

With Kamiko on her solo mission, I had no way of doing the paperwork. At least that was what I told everyone. Really, I could probably read it if I squinted my eyes really hard, but I had no desire to force myself to do so. I got bad enough headaches without my eye-problems and I had no desire to learn how much worse it would get with my bad eyesight.
"Commander, when is Tanuki returning? Your paperwork is piling up!" Wolf, my current guard, said in slight panic. "She'll get mad when she sees how much she'll have to do and then she'll likely kill someone! Or torture them with her rusty senbon and horrible poisons!"
"That is if she comes back. I swear, with her knowing how much she has to do, she won't." Lion, the other guard, scoffed.
"Of course she'll come back!" I insisted brightly.
"Really? Because she has to water her cactuses?" Lion stated in frustration. "You've been using that excuse for years now. Surely, she's grown tired of it?"
"She watered them before she left, so they're good." I said happily, ignoring his frustrated tone. Among the ANBU, one of the greatest, unsolved mysteries were how Kamiko and I always had matching excuses of why she returned to Konoha. The ANBU Agents had only gotten more frustrated at we kept talking about how she had to water her cactuses. "The thing is, I always get nightmares when I don't read a story before bed, and since my eyesight is so bad, she'll have to come back by tonight."
"Commander, that's the most ridiculous excuse I've ever heard." Lion deadpanned.
"No it's not, remember when she said Tanuki would return because she had to pick up the painted feathers in the park?" Wolf recalled earning a snort from Lion.
"And the fact that the first thing she did when she returned was to pick up those feathers…" Lion shook his head in disbelief. "They hadn't even had time to meet up before that!"
"Can you two read each other mind or something?" Wolf asked me curiously.
"I have no idea why you would think so." I said innocently, knowing fully well how our lack of explanation to how it was possible was annoying everyone.
"Commander, when will you tell us the truth behind this?" Lion asked, sounding somewhat desperate.
"Now, now, my minions; a Kunoichi never reveals her secrets."

Much like we had expected, the Akatsuki showed up in the Land of Fire again. After killing the Ninja Monk Chiriku at the Fire Temple, Tsunade had sent all of her available Shinobi outside of the ANBU to track down the missing nins. With the ANBU in Konoha being in charge of guarding the village and the rest being on either missions or leave, the ones Tsunade sent were mostly Chunins with a few Jonins. Unfortunately, much like Shikaku had theorised, our lack of knowledge in the abilities of the Akatsuki led to the team who confronted them being severely overpowered, resulting in the passing of Sarutobi Asuma before backup could arrive. It was with a heavy heart I put on my funeral clothes and walked over to his funeral with Kakashi. I wasn't particularly close with Asume, but with him and Kakashi being friends, we had spent a lot of time together during the past three years. His absent would be greatly noticed and he would be missed. Still, we counted our blessings as everyone else survived, and in addition, got us essential information that would be crucial to beating the Akatsuki.
"I regret not holding back a few squads." I whispered to Kakashi. "Maybe if they had more help…-"
"Don't start with the what-ifs. What happened, happened." Kakashi muttered and laid one arm around my waist, comfortingly. "You did what was right with the information we had."
"I suppose you're right." I sighed deeply. "We do however, have another problem. Team Asuma. They'll want revenge."
"Aa, I think you're right about that." Kakashi agreed.
"I think you should go with them. Naruto is getting close to finish his jutsu, right? Have your team back you up." I proposed the idea with a slight hesitation. Really, Asuma was strong and I had no desire to have Kakashi face the same opponent who defeated him. But, with the ANBU being busy, Kakashi was the best opinion. "Shikamaru should be able to plan a way for you to fit with the team."
"I'm inclined to agree. We'll have to go through Tsunade, though." Kakashi looked somewhat put off by the last part. "She's already mad at me for running away from the hospital…"
"Hn, don't be a coward." I rolled my eyes dramatically at him, letting my inner Itachi out.
"Careful, or you'll sound like an Uchiha." Kakashi teased softly.
"Fuck off."