AN: Moi, everyone! Peruna here. So, it's been a while, has it? You can all thank TheCaildron for giving me the kick in the butt I needed to finally finish this. Honestly, I forgot even which Omakes I wanted to write for this chapter, i was so distracted by everything going on right now.
But anyway, once again thank you all for beong a wonderful and supportive audience! I can't believe how lucky I am to have such an active readership. Your reviews are wonderful, I read each and every one of them! And while I try to improve myself, it might take a while for bad habits to die, so bear with me alright? Talking to you Smiling Seshat and Mysana, thank the both of you for your advice on dialogue structure.
To iluvfairytail: Hah, you seem pretty sure that Shiori won't be a long-running character. How come? :P
To Bisque-Ware: Not everyone you don't like is a spy xD Thank you for the sentiment, though.
To Cisk Kazzarch: Weird, what a coincidence! I'm a fan of hard magic, so that's what I want to do in this ff as well. Set up rules and concepts I use later beforehand.
To Bloody-Asphode11: Ahahahaha! The unmother! That is the best descriptor I've seen yet! Ha, thank you for that!
To SamsaraMorningstar: Hm, interesting. Most people seem to like Katai, but you're right in her making Hikari quite uncomfortable.
To BabyFUG: Surprisingly, no. The rats aren't usually hard to write, though I do have to put some thought into what to include and what not.
To The Violet Imagination: Nope, I don't have a thing for rats, but Hikari does and they're kinda useful.
To calcu22: Shiori is actually 14, but Benjiro wooed her with his adult mien and good looks ;) Sadly, she has insecurities like so many teenage girls have. And you know how it is with teenage girls and romance: Drama ahoi!
To hayatin: Thank you, once again, for your kind words. I originally wanted to make this story all about realistic character emotion and development, it's a great compliment for you to pinpoint that exactly.
To Knaruto: Funnily enough a three letter combination might be used in several languages. I, personally, always find it funny to read the Japanese name Kana, because my association with that is a chicken.
To Dalilt: Good questions! First, Rattmann is the offspring of Lizzy and that other lab rat that survived the experiment and escaped. Lizzy herself died after birth which is why Rattmann is the only random giant rat running around. Second, yes a tracking specialized Inuzuka and partner familiar with Kakashi's scent could draw the connection between him and Hikari. Also, your comment sparked an idea that has since grown and been incorporated into my worldbuilding for this fic. Thank you!
To Anja.Nuehm: Well, I hope you'll enjoy this chapter's Omakes again. And I'm afraid Hikari's very own fan club will make a reappearance in future chapters as well.
To Long Road To Nowhere: Hoo, you give some really good points. Alright. I left it intentionally vague whether Hikari feels like a child or not, that's because she doesn't think about it. But to give an answer: No, she feels an adult and sees Benjiro as a friend she depends on, yes, but not a potential lover on account of him still being and acting like a child. On the Genin Corps, there are three usually prominent difficulties that Hikari is on the fast track to skip. One, the matter of mission requirements, because C-ranks pay well and are more prestigeous only older members of the Corps usually get them. A few years of D-ranks are a must. Two, the matter of training, because training on your own to get to Chuunin level is incredibly hard unless you're very talented. Hikari has Gai training her whenever he can and she has a natural affinity towards everything with chakra, so she's got a leg up there. Thirdly, getting a Jounin to risk his own good reputation for a bunch of career Genin he has no connection with. That needs no further explanation, does it?
To Western Bird: Ha! Itachi returning to a hidden rat kingdom would be hilarious, I'm almost tempted to write that xD
To Miguel: I know how you feel, but it woild be a bit boring if everybody interpreted the character in exactly the same way, no?
I do not own Naruto.
20
Blocking the tail whipping towards my head with a kunai, I stagger back from the force behind it. It's like an iron club smashing against the sharpened, but feeble in comparison, edge of the weapon. Pushing against the tail to create an opening, I dart forward, but the lizard has long since wizened up to my tactics and used the momentum to pivot out of my immediate reach.
The tail draws back a second time and I can see the moment Mushu hardens his scales with chakra before he whips the appendage towards my knees. I jump forward, over the attack, ready to land and stab my blade into his back. He's not fast enough to evade but it doesn't matter either way, because the kunai cracks and shatters against his natural, chakra enhanced armour.
"Shit", I curse, ready to jump away, but my summon takes the opportunity to slam his tail into the ground and cause a minor, very localized, earthquake. Instead of leaping to a safe distance, I fall and only manage to slide a couple of metres away. Before I can do much more than put my palms on the ground for better leverage, I feel Mushu's teeth scraping against the skin of my ankle. I look down to the frightening sight of the three-metre long reptile biting my leg.
"I give, you win." My call is a little nervous, but the monitor lizard pulls back immediately. There is a ripping sound when he opens his jaws wide and dislodges serrated teeth from my clothing. I sigh. Not that it's a surprise, really, but sparring and training with Mushu always ends with my equipment getting mangled.
Sitting up, I roll my eyes at his smug grin. "Good job, you've really improved since we first started this." He can't help the satisfied hiss that escapes him even if he never ceases to try. It's like a cat's purring, though Mushu's indignant expression every time it happens is just gold. Makes me smile in return. "I didn't know you could harden your scales enough to shatter metal. Is that a new development or have you been holding back?"
"It's new", he preens, "Making my chakra more like a stone helped a lot."
"Huh." Last time we trained, I had asked Mushu about elemental chakra and whether the clan uses it. He hadn't known anything about it, but was keenly interested in the information. Apparently he's been practising since then. "That's amazing, Mushu! You figured out your affinity all on your own?"
In response he rolls his eyes, a move he most definitely copied from me. "I am of the Rock family, it was obvious that rock would be my element."
"I thought monitors don't care about family."
"We don't care about parents or siblings. But we know our kin. It's how we live. Rocks live on the rocks, Gojiras live in the water, Dragons live in the hills. You have to know your place or you'll be eaten by lizards that know theirs."
"That's... interesting, I guess. So what families do the small monitors have?"
Mushu scoffs, "They have no families, they are too weak to distinguish themselves. They're all either gossips or cowards."
"Think you could get one of them to work with me?" At the incredulous expression on the lizard's face, I sigh. "Mushu, you're turning into a real tank when fighting, but you suck at stealth. You can't climb anything without making a racket and you're too big to easily sneak into secured areas. Not to mention, you're way too gung-ho if there's a fight to be had. I need someone smart, fast and easily overlooked to scout ahead if I ever get a sensitive mission."
"None of these midgets are smart. You've seen that idiot I ate when you first came to our realm. They're all like that!" Mushu sounds incredibly bothered at even the suggestion of me training up another lizard, even if it is for a completely different task. It's kind of ridiculous, really, but then I haven't really come to understand all of his thought processes. Or even half of them.
"I'm sure you will find a way to select someone intelligent enough for my purposes. They will have to be fluent speakers as well, so don't forget. Next time I summon you, there better be someone I can work with tagging along", I order sternly, feeling vaguely like a mother chastising her child, "The deal is the same for them as for you: Food in exchange for service. I'm sure there will be enough volunteers."
Mushu makes a big show of snarling and being upset, but I wait it out until he nods begrudgingly and accept his change of subject when he inquires, "And where's my reward for training today? You said I would get something better than rat today, but that's all I taste!"
Tilting my head, I peer at my summon, "I did get you a cut of pork to celebrate the progress we made. It's sealed away that's why you can't smell it. But you say you can smell rat?"
"Yes, in that bush over there", he grumbles, jerking his head to the edge of the clearing, "I thought you hid it so I won't get distracted, but if it's not yours...?" Suddenly turning, he rushes off in full hunting mode.
"Hey! Wait a second!", I yell and lurch forward to catch him by the tail. Rough as stone skin tears at my palms. With no sign of Mushu stopping his charge, I grit my teeth and fasten my grip with chakra strengthened muscles. There is a moment of tearing pain, my arms screaming and my hands burning as I halt the overgrown lizard in its tracks.
A shudder runs through the reptiles body before a terrifying snarl sounds from the head. Mushu digs his claws into the dirt and tries to pull himself forward, but I can dig my feet in just as well and stop the advance.
"I'm sorry to tell you this", I growl through gritted teeth, "But you have to obey me. When I say "Don't do that", you have to listen to me!"
He only snarls louder, hissing and spitting, before twisting his torso to turn a burning gaze on me. "Humans should not interfere when monitors hunt! Prey cannot stop the predator!"
"I. Am not. Prey!" With a great heave and no little chakra flooding my muscles, I twist around and throw the heavy beast over my shoulder. He lands awkwardly on his back, hissing and flailing his limbs wildly. It only lasts a second before he uses his tail to push himself over again.
My narrowed eyes set on his livid stare, holding his gaze hostage and matching snarl for snarl. Mushu takes a threatening step forward and I do my best to loom over him. When that doesn't work to intimidate him, I flash forward, reducing the distance between us from five metres to two. The sudden movement startles the lizard and he flinches backward, his eyes, one of his few weak points, close on instinct and his head lowers to a position more protective of the throat. His reflexive response leaves him in a submissive position and both of us know it.
"That's right."
He snarls. I take a step forward. He turns his head away, watching me from the corner of his eye.
"If I wanted to, I could beat you", I remind him. Unsurprisingly, he doesn't respond. Heaving a sigh, I step back and force myself to relax. "I won't of course", I admit, ruffling my hair in agitation, "We're partners and I would regret having to hurt you. But there are rules. They're for your benefit, too, you know?"
Mushu hisses quietly, slowly lowering himself to the ground, his head still averted, but gaze locked on me.
"Yeah, they are. Believe it or not, I know my way around the human realm better than you do. Imagine if I had enemies that knew of you and your tendency to chase after and eat everything that moves. They could use that to lay a trap, or poison you, or just to draw you away from me. I have the overview of the whole situation, that's why I call the shots, alright?"
He doesn't respond verbally, but seems to relax a little, letting out a breath he held and shifting his position to get more comfortable. I sit down as well, across from him with some space between us. For a while we are silent, until Mushu breaks it. "There is no trap here, though. Right?"
"Probably not, no."
"Then why did you stop me?"
In response, I look over to the bush he had located initially. "Myy, Nipsu! Come here!"
Somehow, I'm not surprised when the two juvenile rats slink out of the undergrowth and carefully approach me, their gazes wandering to Mushu in a show of nerves. About a month old now, they are large as rabbits and not done growing yet. I have no idea how large they will end up being, but at the rate they are going they might give Pakkun a run for his money. But what is more interesting than their abnormally massive size is their intelligence.
The siblings learn with speed and understanding that is sometimes frightening. Their brains -and, to be fair, the brains of the rest of Haisuli's litter- are not only abnormally large and convoluted, like their mother's, but also differently structured. But here's the really crazy thing: Myy and Nipsu are even weirder when it comes to brain activity. While most of the Cerebellum, Occipital Lobe and Parietal Lobe are almost identical to those of their siblings', areas of the Frontal and Temporal Lobe are just so much more packed with neurons interweaving in a mess of dendrites and synapses. Especially in what I would assume to be Wernicke's Area in a human brain, but that's a comparison I'd rather not draw, especially since I had barely retained my knowledge of the human brain past the exams in the Before and the medical texts in the public library don't go into depth on the topic.
Since the only major difference between them and the rest of the litter is the time I spent with Myy and Nipsu every day, I presume that the anomaly is based around that, which got me thinking that Haisuli's litter is, or was, probably, incredibly sensitive to the experiences they got in the early days of their life. And since I stole Myy and Nipsu away from their mother and siblings for hours on end every day to play and spend time with them -because yes, I am not immune to the appeal of cute baby animals- that must have impacted their development.
They are incredibly smart in ways their littermates can't hold a candle to. They solve complex tasks in a quarter of the time that the other large ratlings need and they don't need to be motivated to do them with food or treats, since they seem to enjoy the exercise itself more than enough. And they are so much faster at understanding new commands, or at learning tricks like walking on their hind legs or balancing a marble on their nose.
And most obvious of all, both Myy and Nipsu are much more responsive to my body language and inflections, which is why they are crawling up to me like chastised children right now. It's freaky sometimes, how many emotions they seem to display. I'm not sure if they actually feel them or if I'm projecting and they learned to push my buttons that well. Like in the Before, where I knew that dogs were unable to feel guilty but still acted in a way humans would interpret as guilty because it would lessen their owners aggression.
When the ratlings come within reach, I flick their ears. "Don't act guilty if you aren't." For a moment, they just look at me with beady black eyes, before they both stand up taller at the same time and look around curiously.
Shaking my head at them, I look over at Mushu who is eyeing the rats and me in turn, confusion plain on his face. "Those are Myy and Nipsu, my pets. I guess they followed me here, somehow..."
Come to think of it, that is weird. I came by way of the rooftops and while I am certain that all of my rats can climb up walls, it's unlikely that the two actually did. They'd be easy pickings for the shinobi running around up there and with Rattmann running around, scaring the civilians, every ninja knew about oversized rats by now. No, Myy and Nipsu must have followed my scent or something, rats have good noses, right?
"Why?", Mushu asks, pulling me out of my contemplations.
"Why what?"
"Why do you keep rats as pets? Do you plan to eat them later, when they are bigger? Is that why they are so large?"
Funnily enough, Myy and Nipsu use that exact moment to start chattering between each other, as if they are protesting the very idea of it. Which they obviously aren't, being rats and, while not normal, still animals. "Just for fun", I answer, reaching over to pet Myy, who preens under the attention.
"Fun?", my summons asks, sounding as if he is questioning my sanity.
"Yeah. I play with them and pet them and teach them how to do tricks. It's fun to see them improve. Look! Nipsu, dance for me."
Immediately, the rat sits up and gives me his full attention. Then, he stands up on his hind legs and starts hopping from one foot to the other while waving about his paws and balancing himself precariously with his tail. I can't help but giggle, when he tilts too far to the side and falls over. "Good job", I praise and give him a pat as well.
"Humans are illogical", Mushu states into the quiet, seemingly sceptical why having a pet would be fun.
"Either way, I'll be pissed if you kill them", I warn before pulling back from the ratlings and reaching into my back pocket for my sealing scroll. "But you don't need to hunt today, anyway, because I brought you something."
All of his previous doubts are forgotten in the face of the half pig I unseal from the scroll. He falls on the meat and starts quite literally tearing into it. Honestly, it's no pretty sight and I back off a couple of metres, the rats following me. I had bought the cut this morning from the butcher, paid a pretty penny for it as well, and since it was a fresh kill, there is still enough blood in the cadaver to make a mess. Mushu doesn't seem to mind, enthusiastically ripping off chunks of flesh to choke down unchewed.
Watching him eat makes me once more aware of his surprising growth ever since we started training regularly. Not just his skills had grown, or his muscles, he had gained almost a metre in length. When asked, he had replied with a verbal shrug, pointing out that he was eating more than he had been. Apparently monitors never cease growing. Or at least "the large ones" never do. Which he seems to be.
It's just another reason why he can't be a scout. If he ends up being as big as the lizards that attacked me, there is no chance any shinobi worth their salt would not spot him without some kind of camouflage abilities that Mushu hasn't shown to have yet.
Turning to the rats that have crawled into my lap and are nuzzling against the fabric of my shirt, I raise an eyebrow and poke Nipsu in the side. He gives a surprised squeak, flinching away and looking up to my face. "And what are you guys doing here? Why aren't you with your mother at the den?"
I look into his furry, little face, tickling his whiskers, and almost miss the moment where he first lifts and then drops his shoulders. Freaked out, I stop my ministrations and stare at the rat. "Did you just shrug?!", I press, thinking that I must have imagined it. My eyes nearly fall out in disbelief, when Nipsu nods his snout up and down. "Do you, uh, do you... understand...?" Again he nods.
Myy, interested by what's going on, looks up to me. I stare at her. "Do you understand me as well?" She tilts her head to the side and I want to give a sigh of relief but then she nods as well!
Freaked out, I flinch back, sending the two ratlings rolling out of my lap. I take a leap back for good measure and then just... stare at them. After rightening themselves, the rats stare right back at me. Several tense moments pass by, before Nipsu breaks our stare-off to look at his sister. Myy nudges him in response before settling her gaze on me. She moves closer.
One part of me wants to run, wants to leave this surreal moment far behind me, but the other, more logical part of me wants to stay and see where this is going. So I remain rooted to the spot, warily watching Myy make her way over.
I tense up when she reaches me. She is tense as well, body coiled into itself as she inches forward. The rat is uncomfortably close to my exposed toes. If she wanted to, she could bite at them and probably do a lot of damage. But if she does that, I'll kill her in an instant. I still have freshly sharpened kunai in my pouch. And if I set Mushu on them, they'll be dead in less than a minute.
But Myy doesn't bite my toe. She slowly climbs onto my foot and then rubs her head all over my ankle before looking up at me with too smart eyes. "You're freaking me out", I tell her and, thankfully, she doesn't open her mouth to respond. Instead she simply repeats the action of rubbing her head affectionately against my leg.
"Heavens", I sigh, looking up at the cloudy sky, hoping for some sort of divine intervention to return everything to normal. It feels like the world has been tilted sideways, leaving me unbalanced. The rats are my pets, they aren't supposed to be... sentient. Aware. Intelligent enough to understand human language. What have I done with my experiments to spawn this kind of intellect? And what should I do with them now? Is it morally wrong to keep them as pets, now that I know how aware they are?
I don't know.
I simply do not know.
But I have to do something. I can't just keep standing here like an idiot.
Forcing myself to look back down at the overgrown rat on my foot, I tap my leg anxiously. "So you understand?"
She nods. I close my eyes and take a deep breath.
"And you are self-aware?"
She tilts her head to the side and doesn't do anything else. Guess she didn't understand that.
"Are you... fine? With how I treat you?"
At that she nods enthusiastically before nuzzling into my leg again. I feel sick. Of course she's fine with it, it's all she's ever known. And all of the sudden, I am very glad for my decision to stop experimenting with the rats.
"Alright", I say, more to myself that to Myy. "Alright", I repeat. "This is fine. This is good. I can make this work." I staunchly ignore Nipsu joining his sister. Instead I watch Mushu eating like the savage he is. At least he seems happy.
After a while, I sit down, reluctantly allowing the ratlings to climb into my lap after I cross my legs. Looking from Mushu to them, I wonder if I should just treat them like I would my summons. They can't talk back to me, but they are intelligent to understand complex demands and can probably be trained well enough, given all their enthusiasm for learning tricks...
Time will tell if that's a good idea or not, but it might help me get over this revelation in time.
-o-
"Hikari-san, you have been requested for a mission. Meet your team at training ground 36."
"What?"
"You are ordered to present yourself to your commanding officer at training ground 36", the desk shinobi repeats, more forcefully this time, "That means now, newbie. Off with you." With that she shoos me energetically towards the exit. "Don't make a bad impression!", she calls after me when I turn to leave. Confused at the order and the mixed signals the kunoichi gave me, I speed over the village rooftops, trying to sort my chaotic thoughts.
I have been requested? By whom? And why? Maybe Gai pulled some strings? But he's not even in the village!
Shaking my head, I push through the mess of my thoughts and find what should be first priority: Training ground 36. I land on a roof and swivel ninety degrees to the right before jumping again. I've never been to that training ground but through my years of wandering the village and listening to the shinobi passing by me from time to time, I have a good idea of where it's located. It takes less than ten minutes for me to find the place and get there, but all the while I agonize over who it might be waiting there for me. There is no sudden realization to be found, though, before reaching my goal.
I leap from the surrounding forests into the clearing and am met with completely unfamiliar faces. The kind that I've never even just seen around before. One shinobi in standard Konoha Chuunin fair and two kunoichi in simple olive drab pants and shirt. All three of them are older individuals, in their late forties maybe, and look on with nothing but indifference as I approach them. Nervously, I orient myself towards the Chuunin who is probably the commanding officer on this team.
"Uh", I swallow and shift my weight, "Genin Hikari, reporting for duty?" It comes out more like an awkward question than a statement, straining my nerves even further when both kunoichi roll their eyes in synch and walk off to the side of the clearing without a word in response. The Chuunin remains, fixing me with an assessing gaze. I wish I had had the chance to change into the new outfit I bought last week.
What use is saving up for presentable clothes when I don't wear them?
I hadn't wanted to dirty them with the meaningless D-ranks I work day in day out, knowing that they would too soon fade in colour with the frequent washing and even sooner be littered with mends from the rips they'd inevitably sustain.
But now I'm regretting my own decision to save them for a special occasion. The Chuunin's gaze catches on all the little signs of mended wear and tear, on the high collar as well as the loose fit both my cut-off pants and oversized shirt are. My thigh pouch bunches up the fabric in an ugly way and the shirt covers my hip pouches in a rather unhandy fashion. It's still the outfit of my days at the Academy, the old Uchiha clothes I'd nicked from the abandoned district and roughly tailored to my needs. I dearly hope he doesn't spot the semblance.
Then his gaze falls to my bandaged left arm and he raises a brow before finally catching my gaze and addressing me. "Genin Hikari-kun, you were requested to join my team on our mission to secure the border between the Land of Fire and the Land of Hot Springs. My name is Kurisu Koji, Chuunin of Konohagakure no Sato, and those kunoichi are Wada Haru-san and Saori-san, both senior Genin. We will leave in three days at sunrise. Until then you will be trained for the mission. Any questions?"
Reeling at the onslaught of information, I do my best to sort through it and find anything I can ask that won't make me look like an idiot. All the effort is in vain when the main question I have slips out. "Who requested me?"
"I did."
Confused, I search the man's face, but I don't recognize him. Certainly we never met before, not even in passing. "Why?"
"As a favour. Anything else?"
Dropping the line of questions, I flounder a bit before deciding on the next piece of information I need. "Uh, yes. How long will the mission be? And what gear should I bring?"
He nods in what appears to be approval. "The mission will last five months, but I'll organize for you to take a break after the first two. As for your equipment: Keep it light unless you have any way to seal your possessions." When I admit to having a sealing scroll at hand, he nods again and launches into an expansive list of what can be useful to have at hand when securing a border. Then he seamlessly switches to protocols and Konoha codes to identify passing shinobi.
The whole morning I spend with Koji-taichou, which is, he explains, the correct address for him in the field. "Shinobi don't call each other by their family names when outside of Konoha walls. No need for any listening enemy to know what to expect or to know our weaknesses. Don't know what the Academy's doing, not teaching simple etiquette like that."
Haru and Saori keep to themselves, not once approaching us as they spar on the other side of the clearing. Even though both are supposedly Genin, they are faster than some of the Chuunin I've seen racing over Konoha's roofs, throwing and parrying kunai, shuriken, senbon and even what looks like hatchets. They are probably weapon specialists, simply going by their tendency to draw a kunai even when engaged in close combat and the lack of ninjutsu I'm seeing.
As they spar, the two dance around each other as if they have been doing it for years and going by Koji-taichou's comment that he has been working border patrol missions with his team for close to three decades, that is probably the case. It's hard to believe that they have survived the shinobi lifestyle for this long, especially with a position that should put them at a higher risk during the Third War, but I doubt he's lying or exaggerating either. Koji-taichou's hair is salt and pepper where it might have been black before and Haru and Saori both have more grey in their hair than they do blonde.
It's amazing to think they've been a team and worked together this long. They must work together incredibly smoothly by now. The thought makes me anxious to see them in action, but it also worries me. If they work so well with each other, I'll stick out like a sore thumb...
Around midday, Haru and Saori disappear into the trees and shortly after, Koji-taichou announces that he'll walk me through the process of securing a stretch of forest adequately. And walk me through it, he does. Or rather, he walks me into it, disappearing from sight after we have left the clearing long behind us.
From one moment to the other, I'm alone in an unknown surrounding. Standing still, I look around me, front, right, back, up, front, left, back, down, but there is nothing to see but trees and their undergrowth. Above me, the tree branches are thick enough to support a human, as is normal in Konoha's forests. The bushes around me are tall enough to hide a crouching ninja. As the wind rustles through the leaves it creates enough noise to hide near-silent footsteps and a body brushing against vegetation.
I know that the forest gives ample opportunity to hide or set up an ambush, but I can't spot it either way. Slowly, I crouch, reducing my exposed surface, before slowly creeping towards the nearest tree. It's luck that reveals the subtle shine of the wire a moment before I touch it. Freezing, I fix my gaze onto the trap I almost sprung, intent on figuring out its extent. My focus turns out to be a mistake and there is only a subtle whistle to warn me before a senbon sinks into my exposed back.
Yelping in pain and concentration thoroughly broken, I stumble forward, straight into the trap. Wire snaps up all around me and in a heartbeat, I'm thoroughly trussed up and dangling a few metres from the ground. I catch sight of a stony face, one of the sisters, Haru or Saori, I'm not sure, before she vanishes into the undergrowth.
Hissing curses under my breath, I wiggle around like a demented caterpillar, trying to loosen the wires, but only manage to tighten them. It takes a chakra-assisted heave to push my arms away from my torso and slip the wires over my head, which then leaves me suddenly falling face-first into the ground thanks to the sudden slack releasing my legs from the trap.
My attempt at a mid-air somersault just barely puts my feet under my body so that I can tuck and roll to bleed off momentum. Half a second later, a good dozen kunai are sailing at my head, released from a spring trap triggered by... fuck if I know!
Dodging under the flying weaponry only causes more traps to go off and I spontaneously decide that the forest floor is not my ally in this game of war. One jump and I'm bouncing between trees to get out of the way from the kunai.
At this point I mostly rely on my instincts to avoid death by air-borne shovel-knives and those instincts are clearly not honed well enough for the job. Not only do I get nicked by more than one razor-sharp edge, I end up running into another wire. This time it doesn't give and feels like I'm running into a steel bar at full speed. The air gets knocked out of my lungs, my momentum carrying me sideways over the taut metal. Desperately I flail and grasp the thing before I can tumble back to the forest floor.
Coughing and wheezing, I hang there and try to come to terms with how deadly that could have been. The wire I'm holding isn't very thin, it's even hilariously clearly visible aside from the dull-green paintjob. Had it been thin and sharp though? I'd have been sliced apart by my own momentum.
With a heavy gulp, I swing and launch myself at the nearest tree, sticking to it with all four limbs.
This is no joke.
I scuttle up the trunk, keeping my body close to the bark and my eyes scanning the immediate surroundings to avoid any sort of trigger or wire. My ears straining for any movements around me, I even take a whiff of the breeze in the vain hope to catch anything out of the ordinary.
My back is wide open and it only takes a few moments for me to catch the subtle creak of a branch behind me. Immediately I turn around, letting my gaze sweep over the estimated area of origin for the sound.
Trees, branches, leaves. Green, brown, darker green and shadows. No, wait! That looks incongruous.
One of the branches carrying leaves repeats the same pattern. It doesn't stand out much, but it's enough of a hint for me to launch a kunai at the spot.
The branch shifts, the pattern smudges into the background colours and my weapon sails through, hitting absolutely nothing until it disappears into the leaf work.
Fuck!
What am I even supposed to do in this exercise? Find them? Escape them? Koji-taichou said he'd show me how to secure a border, but is that it? They'll "show me" by making me run into all of their traps?
Pulling a face at having to spend however long they deem appropriate being hunted through a gauntlet, I think of possible ways out.
If I could pick them out and overwhelm them that might end the exercise, but who am I kidding? That's not going to happen.
I creep along the underside of a branch to the next tree, not wanting to jump and possibly collide with any hidden wires.
Maybe I can hunker down in one location? If I don't move, I can't be lured into any other traps.
That thought gets a very firm and very obvious refusal, when I'm suddenly under attack from all sides again. Kunai rain from above, while senbon seem to simply appear out of thin air from the surrounding foliage. I quickly decide on moving up the tree I'm on, since kunai are easier to see and therefore easier to dodge or deflect than the slim needle-like senbon. In fact...
I snatch one of the knives as it flies by, crouch-running up the trunk instead of spider-scuttling and using the metal edge to keep the other kunai at bay. There is a shape further up in the crown of the tree, I bet that's one of 'em. If I can just-
My attacker vanishes, a flicker to the right the last thing I see of them. I jump to the left and run, pressured on by the rapid-fire of senbon.
-o-
I come down in a small clearing, panting heavily and in the hopes of finally having shaken the others. I land on the forest floor, only to find out that it's fake. Leaf-litter rains down all around me. I tumble into a net that closes as it breaks my fall.
Screaming in frustration, I reach between the knots, keen to cut myself free, and reconsider once I see the cartoonishly sharpened wooden stakes at the bottom of the pit. Grinding my teeth, I grab the supporting rope the net is dangling from with one hand and cut the net with the other. The moment I peek over the edge of the pit, I'm bombarded again. Only now they have downgraded to pebbles. Making fun of me.
-o-
The tree seemed safe about a second ago. A hiss alerts me to the exploding tag on the underside of the branch I'm standing on. My shockwave-fuelled flight is abruptly stopped by the neighbouring oak's trunk. Dazed, I cling onto a branch to avoid falling. Something hits me in the temple. It's a pine cone. I can hear laughter echoing in the forest.
-o-
It only gets worse when night hits.
-o-
I stumble in the dark, loosing grip of the bark and slipping several metres down, before catching myself. It's pitch black. Clouds hide the stars, steal the moonlight. Rough winds whistle through the forest, treetops groaning and shifting. I navigate by the sounds. Touch and sound. I send chakra out with every step, searching for the next wire, the next trap. My nerves are taut like the wires I fear. I am in hell.
-o-
Dawn. I manage until dawn. The first light breaking through the dreary grey of clouded twilight is such a relief that I get distracted. Almost run into another fucking wire Manage to dodge. A metallic click, a snap and then pain.
Doubling over, I clutch at my leg, groaning in exhausted agony. With numb, rubbed raw fingers, I try to pry open the jaws of the bear trap, but it's no use. My concentration is so shot that I can't even manage to find the weak point of the mechanism, instead trying to open it with brute force, which yields no results whatsoever.
I try to shift my leg, get my shin into a better position. Bite my cheek to keep quiet, fail. Growl, then whimper.
Heavens, it hurts! Why'd they use a fucking bear trap?!
The trap doesn't have teeth, but the force of it snapping shut... My leg might be broken. My leg!
I feel sick, like I'm about to keel over. I don't. Can't. Or maybe shouldn't. I don't know anymore.
Looking up and around, I search for the others, for Koji-taichou or Saori or Haru. There is no trace of them. No dark silhouette, no visible irregularities in my surroundings. I can't hear them either, only early birds singing their first morning songs and squirrels scratching against bark during their first outings of the day.
I want to yell for them. Plead, maybe. Give up, possibly, and ask to be let go. But I don't. Instead I grit my teeth and look back to my fingers fighting with the metal contraption on leg.
I pull my foot up, ignoring the lurch in my stomach and the pain setting the limb on fire. I can feel the grind of my bones shifting, but more importantly, I can hear a soft rattle and see the thick chain connecting the trap to its anchor.
Maybe I go a little overboard, trying to break the chain, but who would fault me? Having an outlet for rage and frustration is good for one's psyche. Once freed, I crawl to one of the towering Hashirama trees and take shelter against one of its massive roots.
Then I wait, too exhausted to do anything but. Tiredly I watch the wind move the branches up in the treetops, but I doubt that I would have spotted an enemy if they were dancing on my nose.
Some time later, I don't know when exactly, Koji-sensei materializes in front of me. He crouches there, smiles encouragingly as if he hadn't just orchestrated the worst night of my life since dying slowly at the side of a road.
"You did well", he praises. I nod numbly, not giving a fuck right now. "Did you understand the point of this... exercise?"
For a moment I do nothing but stare at him. Do I understand the point of the exercise? No, I don't. What was the fucking point of that?!
Instead of responding verbally, I shrug, minding the many puncture wounds on my back.
The man keeps smiling, but his eyes harden. Though it's a small change, it shifts the atmosphere and immediately I tense.
"Border patrol is no joke", says the Chuunin that just put me through one of my worst experiences in this life, "It's more dangerous than any other mission Genin Corps members have access to. My team and I know what we are doing. No matter if they are Genin, Chuunin or even Jounin, we can chase all of them in circles."
He's dead serious, but all I can think about is: So what?! Why did you have to prove that to me?! I don't voice my resentment and I don't have to either, because Koji-taichou needs no prompting to go on.
"You will follow our lead. We know what we are doing. I don't know what treatment you are used to, but we don't care about age or genius or anything other than experience and skill. You have absolutely none, so you will follow orders and maybe learn a thing or two, but don't interfere with our work. Do you understand?"
Obviously, the only acceptable answer to that is "Yes, sir" so that's what I give. Koji-taichou pats my head approvingly. I hate the gesture coming from him. It's so fucking condescending.
"Now, let's get you out of that trap and to a mednin, you look a little beat up."
I'm not sure if I hate him or not when he shows me the hidden lever that enables him to open the jaws of the contraption. I despise that he picks me up without permission though, even if it is to carry me to a hospital.
My fibula is broken, but the break is set and healed in less than half an hour, which is hard to believe even while I can feel it happening. The medical chakra moving through my leg is foreign and uncomfortable, even more so is the expression of the Chuunin administering it though. It darkens and then twists in confusion. She asks whether I ever had problems with my chakra coils. I remain silent.
I don't want anybody looking at my messed up pathways. Even if the injuries are still present, I've been told once they're unhealable, I don't need to be told again. Or worse, be declared unfit for duty. So, as soon as the mednin leaves the examination room to consult my medical file, I'm out of the window.
On a tender, but healed, leg I walk the streets back to my flat. About ready to fall into bed and sleep for the rest of the day.
-o-
A few hours and a much too short nap later finds me in front of a door I have no desire to knock on but do so anyway. The wood does little to hide the uneven footsteps behind it as Nara Katai comes to answer the door. She seems surprised to see me. At least that's what I interpret the short twitch in her expression to mean.
"What do you want?", the grouch demands shortly.
"Can I come in?" Being in the Nara's flat never ceases to be uncomfortably, which is why I usually try to avoid her dragging me over for whatever reasons she might think of, but I'd rather not discuss this matter in the open unnecessarily.
"Finally admit that you need some good cooking for once, are you? Sure, I'll make certain you get some nutrition." And even though she says that, putting words in my mouth as she usually does to taunt me, her smirk is more secretive than smug as it should be.
Nevertheless I enter, waiting for the Nara to close the door and lead me to her kitchen where I sit down at a table and she opens the fridge to pull out one of the many pre-cooked meals she keeps there. The plastic box of homemade food is slapped down in front of me cold, the chopsticks I have to snap out of the air because Katai carelessly threw them over her shoulder before starting a water kettle. I roll my eyes at the attitude the grown woman displays, but I've come to expect it from her. Katai has skewed priorities. Obviously there is some sort of interest or affection towards me -a fact I can't deny, no matter how uncomfortable it makes me- but it shows in rather weird displays.
"I'm leaving on a mission the day after tomorrow", I disclose while starting in on the cold meal, never one to deny food.
"Are you now?", my landlady drawls in fake curiosity.
I frown. "How do you already know about that? I was only informed yesterday!" Her horrible innocent expression earns a scoff from me, but I give the inquiry up as a bad job. "Freaking snoop. Fine, don't tell me. Anyway, it'll be several months and I don't have the money to pay the rent in advance."
"Pay me back once you get the mission salary." Katai shrugs, apparently unsurprised. It grates that she is so well informed, but I have to admit that it's convenient as well. At least I don't have to argue or fight with the person that has the power to evict me if she decided I was too much trouble. "How about we play a round of shogi, since I'm doing you a favour."
I groan. Naras and their Shogi, seriously! "Why don't we play jenga instead? Without cheating this time?" The last time I had played the game with Katai thinking I'd have more of a chance to win that than shogi, Katai had used the Shadow Possession jutsu to make me topple the tower.
"You didn't specify ninjutsu to be against the rules", the woman reminds me with a feral grin, "So it's your own fault for falling for it."
"Yeah, sure. Do you want to play or not?"
She watches me stuffing my face with rice, pouting, before taking the whistling kettle off the stove and filling the tea pot with hot water. "No. I would rather engage in something more stimulating than watching you fail at such a childish game."
"Like watching me fail at a strategy game?" I ask sarcastically.
"Exactly", she answers. Because of course she does.
"Not shogi though." Looking around the room, I try to think of a better alternative. "Do you have the stones for go?" See? Better alternative. At least I was better at go than chess in the Before.
Katai eyes me critically. "You know how to play, then?" At my hesitant nod, she furrows her brow, just slightly. "Where did you learn?" Which is a fair question, since she had to explain shogi to me when she first pressured me into playing with her.
"Uhh, I, uhh, picked it up on a D-rank. Saw one of my clients playing when I cleaned their house." The fib is weak, but there's no way for her to check its truth at least. Luckily, she lets it go, instead limping to the living room to get her set.
Four games of Katai absolutely destroying me at go later, I give up. She laughs and calls me a sore loser. "You know my father always said it's better to be a bad winner than a good loser", I loosely translate the communist kangaroo, "You're being the bad winner in this saying."
"Did he now?" Katai leans over the table, clearly interested, and I bite my tongue. Heavens, what kind of idiot am I?!
"No, he didn't. I just made that up."
"I'm not sure you did." She grins. I don't like it. I hate it when people grin like the cat that got the canary. So smug, thinking themselves superior. Narrowing my eyes, I glare at her.
"Thanks for the rent thing." With a scrape, I push my chair back and get up, keeping the glare up for another moment to satisfy the boiling anger in my gut. Then I leave, not looking back and trying to reign in my bubbling rage.
I enter my apartment, slamming the door shut before stalking down the hallway. I'm angry. Glaring at the bare walls of the living room, I kick one of my chairs out of the way. It skids across the room and slams against the wall with a loud thump. I should pack, everything suggested into one of the scrolls, go out, see if I can buy what I don't possess. But I can't. After just a moment of surveying the contents of one of my scrolls has me flinging it across the room as well.
It bounces off the wall harmlessly. Unsatisfactorily.
I hate it.
I'm fucking furious. I can't stand this! I have to get out.
Leaving the apartment through the window, I close the latch and secure the simple wire-trap on it. Then I'm off, dashing along the lesser-used rooftops at speeds so fast that my freshly healed leg screams with pain. So I don't go to the training ground. I go to the alley. Drop down with as much momentum as a miniature bomb. The rats scatter, surprised and afraid, disappearing into the covered cages, who in turn disappear in the cloud of dust my landing throws up.
All the rats scatter and hide. That is, all except for Myy and Nipsu. The two approach me through the choking fog of dirt, showing little hesitation as they come and rub against my legs where I crouch. I tense, furious anger still boiling inside me, not sure if they are safe around me. But then Myy hoists herself onto my knee, sitting up and chittering. Her brother soon joins her on my other knee and all the tension in my body goes toward not toppling over.
I can't help but chuckle at them, before reaching out and scratching them under their pointy chins. "You two, I swear", I murmur, "You have no sense of self-preservation."
Nipsu preens while Myy chitters in what seems to be amusement, maybe even her imitation of laughter, and starts climbing onto my chest. Her long finger-like paws tangle in the tough fabric of my worn shirt, giving her enough purchase to climb up to my shoulder. And from there she sprawls onto my head as she does every time I let her get away with it.
Doing nothing to hide my out-right laughter, I relax and can feel the last of the searing fury calm and settle in my bones.
The two rats haven't stopped growing yet, consuming such massive amounts of garbage for sustenance each day that the dumpster which had been all but overflowing for years now, is almost empty again. Their siblings have slowed their rate of growth, though I guess my two favourites have as well, and it seems they will remain an inch shorter and several pounds leaner than Myy and Nipsu, who have now reached the ridiculous size of the average house cat if that cat were one of those grossly overweight ones old ladies seem to be so fond of.
Having both of them cling onto me like my little cousins did in the Before is a real workout. Myy alone is probably responsible for half the size of my neck musculature. Honestly, who needs training weights if they have grossly oversized pets?
But enough is enough. "Alright, you two, get off." There is some whining, but they oblige, Myy jumping down from my shoulder and Nipsu simply rolling off my leg like the languid cat he would like to be.
Sitting down with my legs crossed, I pre-emtively give an "Ah-ah-ah!" to stop the two clingy rodents to climb into my lap yet again. Or any of the other rats that have come out to greet me now that the dust is settled. Usually, I'd let them occupy me and feed them little snacks I'd come across here and there, but I don't have the nerve nor the treats for their incessant pushing today. Today I just want to deal with those eerily intelligent creatures that seem so keen to follow my directives.
"I'm leaving the village in two days." The rats blink, Nipsu stealing a look over at Myy who tilts her head in question. "I'm going on a mission. I won't be here for a very long time. Do you understand?" Again Nipsu looks over at Myy, he seems a little lost, and going by the shake of her head Myy is as well.
I sigh. "Alright. Do you know the training grounds? Where you always follow me and then I show you new tricks?" They nod. "That's at the edge of the village, right? Beyond all the human houses. Well, beyond the training grounds is a large wall. That is where Konoha ends. Do you understand?" Now both of them nod, seeming excited to have learned something new. As they always are. I stroke both of their heads affectionately, "Very good."
When I pull back, I have both of their full attention once again. "I will be out there for a very long time." A chatter between the two, Myy makes to come closer, to snuggle up to me once more. "No, honey", I say, pushing her back gently and ignoring the puppy eyes she tries to fix on me, "You cannot come. None of you. It's very dangerous out there."
And that's that. I spend the evening and night playing with the rats, going out once it's sufficiently dark to raid some other dumpsters and get back a little more food for all the eager mouths. They'll be fine on their own, all the babies can be considered adults by now, they can take care of themselves. Haisuli's offspring is smart enough to slink out of the alley without being seen and although they can't understand human language like Myy and Nipsu can, they have come to copy their stronger siblings in some terms.
Half a dozen giant rats capable of running up and down walls and chewing through iron left to their own devices surely won't be a problem. Surely.
-o-
Looming over the water's edge, perched on a low-hanging branch, I follow the movement of the fish below surface with my eyes. My weapon of choice is a senbon pieced and attached by a length of wire, currently resting loosely between relaxed fingers. Fishing, or hunting fish, like this is a challenge in itself even if you overlook the difficulties of muddy water and flighty prey, because no matter how sharp your eye is your mind has to be sharper. Predict the target's future position and strike, that sounds easy enough, but I have to constantly remind myself to take the wonky light refraction in water into account.
My eyes narrow, having located my next victim, the grip on my weapon tightens, I imagine the path of movement, then most crucially let experience dictate where to actually aim. With a snap of the wrist, the sharpened needle launches forward with as much speed as I can give it without loosing too much accuracy. Still, the senbon pierces the fish's tail instead of the head as I had planned to do. Luckily the hit is solid if not painlessly deathly. The target struggles against the wire anchoring it to where the senbon has buried itself into the riverbed. The first red clouds begin to colour the pristine water only to be carried downstream by the sleepy current.
I drop from the branch to land on the water's surface, rippling it without care of all the fleeing fish. With one hand I hold the end of my wire, with the other I reach below the surface and grab ahold of the twisting prey. A second and a chakra spike later, I pull out a dead pike. I tie it to the bundle of squirrels and mice I collected all day. With pleasure I'd have taken out one of those blasted doves but I'm under orders to leave the flying rats alone.
After five days of travel at a punishing pace, or at least punishing for me, our squad had arrived at the outpost and tagged in with the relief team that left after a short debrief with Koji-taichou. He and the sisters immediately fell into an easy routine that left me awkwardly on the side-lines, mostly sticking to taichou whenever he goes on patrol.
To be fair, Koji-taichou spends a lot of time working me into the mission skills, taking the time to give one-on-one training as soon as Haru and Saori go out on patrol. He has run me carefully through the whole strip of forest between this river and the border to the Land of Hot Springs more than once to make sure that I can navigate through it without setting off the ridiculous amounts of traps within. On patrols he shows me how to move without being seen, what to look for when trying to identify signs of passing, how to track a lead through solid evidence as well as through vague discrepancies in the eco system.
It's intense, demanding my attention for every waking moment for nearly a week now, with only breaks for nourishment and sleep. Now, though, I am done with the daily ritual of hunting for our dinner about an hour earlier than I had expected. With a surplus of food nonetheless. And it's giving me an idea.
I retreat from the open area of the river, further into the forest that's still trapped but not as intensely as the border strip. I move far enough inland to find the large-ish clearing we've been using as a training site. Upon finding it abandoned for the moment, I grin and take out a kunai to cut my palm. With ease born out of practise, I weave the pattern for the technique before slamming my hand to the ground.
The chakra cost stuns me, being much higher than anticipated, and in the following explosion of white smoke I stagger back a bit, suddenly unsure of what to expect. Sending a small amount of chakra into my tattoo, I can feel it ripped away into nothingness with a greedy impatience that only makes me more nervous.
From the slowly dissipating mist comes the sound of a struggle, hissing, pleading, scratching of claws against hard scales, but it is abruptly cut off with a snap of jaws and a sickening crunch.
"Mushu?", I call cautiously. My answer is a guttural hiss. Pleased. And almost certainly my summon. With a sigh, I wait for the smoke to dissipate and there he is, throwing his head back and in the process of swallowing the limp and bleeding body of a smaller lizard. I groan. "Please tell me that's not supposed to be the specialist I asked you for."
He grins, the bright blue tail of his prey sticking out of the corner of his maw. His entire face is covered in blood, but by the smug expression he wears, none of that is his. "It turns out none of the little cowards were intelligent enough to avoid me." The tail tip disappears with one last swallow. "That last one thought himself so smart to wait until the last moment to jump on." His grin widens.
With a shake of my head I sit down. "How did he know when I called you?"
Mushu rolls his shoulder, a shrug, another one of those expressions he copied of me. "Every monitor feels when you reach for our kind. You could summon every one, so every one feels the connection." Another roll of his shoulder, then he turns his head to survey our surroundings.
"I see. But what exactly do you expect me to do? I need a summon that's more inconspicuous than...", I gesture at Mushu, who sticks out of the landscape like a sore thumb with his yellow patterns, "...that."
"You need?" he questions, head whipping back to face me once again, his tongue almost hitting my cheek when it strikes out to furiously wave through the air. But I'm distracted from his display. On his neck the hexagonal pattern had just shifted before adjusting itself to blend in again.
Slowly reaching out, I ignore Mushu's warning hiss and his jerk to avoid my fingers. "Are you sure", I lean forward, onto my knees, "that nobody else came along for the ride?"
The lizard frowns, but allows me to close the gap and touch his neck. His tongue flicks out in small flickers, the only part of him that moves. My fingers ghost over the hard bumpy scales. Then they encounter a lump. A lump undistinguishable by sight and apparently smell. It keeps impossibly still as I trail my finger over it, but violently twitches out of it's own illusion when I send in a curious tendril of chakra.
With a squeak, a positively tiny dark brown lizard is revealed. It flees from my touch, dashing a few centimetres before freezing and disappearing into the pattern of Mushu's scales once again.
"Hello there", I greet, moving closer to examine the illusion under which the small lizard hides itself. It's seamless. Amazed, I extend my finger toward the spot I last saw the lizard at. "Are you here to become a personal summons for me? I need someone who is good at sneaky stuff."
"Yes", comes a quiet voice from somewhere to my left. I look over and see one dark blue eye staring at me from the empty place between Mushu's shoulders. "He came here for that." After another moment of quiet regard. "And so did I."
"And who might you be?"
Around the eye another lizard fades into existence, brown and tiny like the last one with an iridescent blue pattern along its shoulders that loses brilliance with every detail of the lizard revealed until it's barely distinguishable. The blue eyes turn dull grey.
"We have no name. No one asked for one before."
Slowly I extend my finger until it's directly in front of the lizard's snout. My digit dwarfs its head. The tiny creature examines it thoroughly with both eyes and tongue before cautiously climbing aboard. With a body about the length of my middle finger and a tail the same length again, it seems frail and weak on my palm but I can feel the chakra pulsing through it, brushing against my skin where we touch.
"Do you want to become my summons?"
It hesitates for only a heartbeat, then "yes."
"In exchange for food?"
"And protection."
Raising my eyebrows, I look over at Mushu. Understandable, but it's not like I can... "Sure. You can stick with Mushu when you're in the summon realm."
"What?!" the lizard in question hisses indignantly.
"Sure", I say again, fixing him with a glare, "My summons won't fight or eat each other while I'm not looking. Otherwise I'll drop whoever survives."
"You wouldn't!" he accuses, but I don't even have to repeat the threat before he backs down. Smart.
Turning back to the lizard on my palm, I grin. "So, for food and protection, is that right?"
"Me too, me too!" Its reply is cut off when the other one suddenly materializes on Mushu's neck. With a great leap, it launches itself from my irritable summons's neck and manages to cling onto my hand. It scrambles on top, careless of the other one already occupying it. "Please, I want to be a summons too!" This one is even smaller, if not by much, with a rapidly fading red pattern.
I shrug, "Fine. then I'll take on the two of you. But you need names." Stumped, I regard first the one and then the other. "Uhh, okay, you'll be Red Spy and you'll be Blue Spy." Nobody will know how utterly uncreative I am if I use a language nobody speaks, right?
"Reddo...", the smaller lizard repeats.
"Buruu", the larger one imitates, "Thank you for giving me a name, summoner."
"Uhh", I express eloquently, rubbing the back of my head with my free hand, "Call me Hikari, please. I've, uhh, I've got some food. Though I guess I'll have to cut it into pieces for you guys..."
Instantly Mushu's stony expression lightens and he fixes his eyes on the bundle of dead animals I've been hauling around all day. "Good", he enthuses, "I thought you were going to give me rats again."
"Sure, sure", I agree distractedly, freeing the large pike from the bundle and throwing it into the lizards waiting gullet. Then his words catch up to me. "Wait, rats?!"
The undergrowth rustles in a distinctly sheepish way. I sigh.
-Omake-
During the Third Great Shinobi War
"What's this? Another field promotion coming in to tell us how to do our job?"
She's not sure what she had suspected, surely not a warm welcome, not in times like these, but a modicum of comradery maybe. It's not like she doesn't know that her promotion wasn't based on skill but on the need for more Jounin to take the positions ... vacated by the ones truly deserving of the title. Now she's been thrown into a second-hand flak jacket -its previous owner wouldn't need it anymore and their blood is still speckled in dark dots along the lower rim but she doesn't think about that, she can't think about that- and sent from one front to the other to lead a team that has survived its past three leaders.
But she can't show her nerves, her utter fear of what might happen during this deployment and whether or not she would live to see her sister again.
"Not going to say anything?" sneers the one on the right. "Yeah," the one on the left picks up, "How about you make a remark on our relationship, huh? That always seems to be a conversation starter."
At a loss with how to deal with the young women in front of her, she looks over to the slightly older male in their squad. He seems disinterested, his gaze meeting hers, long enough to acknowledge her silent plea for intervention before turning away and continuing to catalogue his gear and neatly stowing it away again. It's a practised procedure.
With an inward sigh and an outward slump, she regards the twins in turn. They are three years older than her, she remembers them from back in the Academy when they used to be amiable if a little reserved. After the scandal that must have changed and she can understand how being scoffed at and gossiped about could turn one bitter and nasty like this. No promotion for them, while their third teammate became Chuunin after which their Jounin-sensei dropped them and went on with his life. And given the scathing comments she has heard their mistrust in a new superior might be warranted.
It's understandable, yes, but she can't work with that.
"Enough," she dictates, reaching for that steely tone she had admired in her own Sensei, "I don't care about your personal lives. All I care about is your skill and experience. You will follow my lead, that is non-negotiable, but you have more knowledge of this run so I will need your input to make sure we can succeed in our duty. Have I made myself clear?"
The twins carry stony expressions, but they nod. Turning her gaze on the last one, she meets the man's assessing gaze. "Yes Katai-taichou."
"Good," she slumps just that little bit further, relaxing her shoulders that tiny bit more, "Then let's head out."
They stay together in their first run and split up afterwards to take shifts. Katai keeps with the man, Kurisu Koji, which earns her suspicious glances from the twin kunoichi but she thinks that she wouldn't stand to be with one of them for too long.
"What's with the seeds?" she asks when her partner joins her again after spreading seeds over the forest floor in a seemingly random manner.
When all he does is point upwards to where a half-dozen doves have congregated and one by one swoop down to pick at them she lets it go. He does it again and again during their patrol.
"As a covert warning if someone passes?" They are almost back at base now, the twins most likely having left it already.
With a slight smirk, Koji looks over. "We settled them here. Just for that."
It's smart, she has to admit as much. Doves like that aren't uncommon in Fire's forests. They won't take much attention by an invading party and even if they were to, it'd be hard to kill the whole flock without at least one getting away.
And as she sees and hears the frantic flutter of wings and sees a pair of birds break through the canopy, her heart sinks.
Koji has seen it as well and in an instant they are dashing forward. They have to assess the danger before they can send a hawk with a missive and warning.
As shinobi of the Leaf they bounce in the highest, thinnest branches of the treetops. Far above any foreign shinobi would dare. Thus they arrive to have a perfect view of the carnage that is taking place on the forest floor.
A large number of shinobi, Hitai-ate glinting with clouds etched into their surface, are under attack by a veritable hail of weapons. Up ahead Haru and Saori are making it rain, more concerned with quantity over quality. Their attacks have incapacitated only one, who lies bleeding and riddled with kunai, the others are lightly wounded at best and some are already making their way up to their attackers.
"I'll distract them, get Haru and Shiori out of here, they have to send the hawk. Go!" With that order, she drops to a lower branch, taking out the three that are climbing up and preoccupied with the twin's barrage to notice her own kunai before they sink into their throat, leg and temple respectively. As an Academy student she had been proud of her accuracy, now she tries not to think about it.
With that demonstration of skill, attention below shifts toward her. She takes pot-shots at the enemies below, dancing away from their retaliation. The stream of throwing weapons from above stops, but she does her best to cover it with her own before retreating to the shadows.
Another branch lower. She sees one of them drawing a sword. It's too easy. A quick Shadow Possession, she imagines her kunai elongated, draws the imaginary blade through her neck, drops the jutsu before even the first blood gushes. A heavy thump is all the confirmation she needs, already on the next tree.
But they locate her, before she can kill another one as well. She is surrounded, fighting alone, fighting for time, fighting for her life. Until she is not alone anymore. Koji, probably, somewhere around the fringe of the turmoil.
He is but a slight distraction, his help brings little to no relief, but she is glad nonetheless because she is not alone. It gives her strength and lends ferocity to her attacks. It seems good enough. She is managing to hold her ground, whittling away at her opponents, injury by injury while avoiding the worst injuries herself.
It seems well enough. Until she can hear him scream. Agony. He is wounded and badly. And suddenly there is only the urge to move, to protect her subordinate, fulfil her responsibility. She sees red, uncaring of the means, she fights her way through.
She sees him, broken armed and bleeding from a gash on his torso. One of the Cloud bastards is in the process of swinging his battle axe at him, the hideous weapon glinting with the promise of decapitation. She throws her kunai, hits the shoulder, throws her other kunai, hits the axe, knocked off course. He is saved.
"RUN!" she yells and he doesn't hesitate. Unarmed and surrounded by enemies, she stretches her shadow as much as she can. Slamming her hands into the rat seal, then slamming both closed fists against her chest before the jutsu drains her. The last thing she hears is the cries of the enemy before she loses consciousness.
As it later turned out, her contribution had been enough to cripple the invading party to such an extent that the commanding Jounin decided to cut his losses and retreat with the injured back behind their lines. It was unfortunate that they decided to take Katai with them, in the hopes of garnering intelligence or, in the case that she held tight, of exacting revenge. It was her misfortune that she kept the little information she had been entrusted with to herself.
-Second Omake-
October 10th, one year after the Third Great Shinobi War ended
Squirrel flits over the rooftops, she has done her part, has evacuated her allotted estate. She has no further orders, hasn't searched for a superior to get any either. The village is in chaos, but she has done her part. She lifts a crying civilian out of the crumbling building across the street, just carries them to the next shelter entrance along the way. She arrives at the one she is looking for. At the last moment she takes off her mask, seals it into the seal at her waist, then she's in.
She doesn't care about any of the panicking civilians, pushes them out of the way as she moves through the crowded room. Her heart clenches for a moment when she finds who she's looking for. A moment later she is at the woman's side.
"Where is Hikari?" The question is expressed with no emotion, Squirrel feels no emotion, she is a good kunoichi.
The girl turns a fear-stricken face to her, tear tracks clearly visible on dust covered cheeks. "I- I don't," she stammers and Squirrel feels and suppresses the urge to shake the answer out of the civilian herself. They had been childhood friends, but it is obvious how much they've grown apart.
"Where. Is. Your. Daughter?"
"At home! I don't- I was at work when it- I couldn't-"
Squirrel doesn't stay to hear her excuses, she barges through the crowd and outside again into the smoke-choked village. At home, she thinks and searches the hazy outline of the village for the district Keiko's flat resides in. It is on fire. She moves, a shadow in the chaotic night, over rooftops, through crumbling ruins, dodging all those running the other way.
The smoke burns in her lungs, but she pushes through, around the largest fires and then she sees it. The building, the one where Keiko lives with her daughter, and it is wonderfully, miraculously, untouched by the carnage, just off the path of destruction the nine-tailed beast has ripped with the flick of its tail.
She breaks through the window into the small one-room apartment. There she is. Hiding under her blanket, the toddler has both hands pressed over her ears and is singing, like she always is whenever Squirrel checks on her, but it resembles more the child's cry the girl never gave than anything before. She cries for Mama in-between the shaky melody and her own sobs.
Squirrel dashes over, takes her into her arms, flees from the endangered building, not once does the girl look up, keeping her eyes closed and her hands on her ears. It is only when a giant tail descends on them, one that Squirrel can barely dodge before it crashes into the roof she was running along, and the ground shakes with the violent attack that the child throws her arms around Squirrel and buries her face in the crook of her neck.
At that moment Squirrels throws all other contemplation into the wind and makes towards the closest shelter. She cannot risk Hikari just to get her to her mother. The girl wouldn't be comforted by the presence of her mother anyway, no matter what she had cried, Hikari never relaxed around her mother. Squirrel knows why, but she has no right to interfere, more than once did she argue with Keiko about it but in the end Squirrel has no claim to the child.
It only takes another three minutes to locate and make use of a shelter entrance not blocked by fallen rubble, then they are in the dark, in the sparsely populated shelter of a district caught too suddenly for many civilians to evacuate properly. It is quiet, eerily maybe, with quiet crying and no conversation. Squirrel occupies a corner and no other feels the need to come near, which is fine by her.
Lightly she strokes the trembling child's back, pats the feathery blond head of hair, tries to soothe. "It is alright, little one," she whispers, rocks back and forth just slightly, "You are safe and I am here. I will keep you safe." And still the girl merely cries into her shoulder. "It is alright, Hikari-chan. You don't have to be afraid."
A while that is all she does, whispering reassurances that ring with dull certainty and stroking and patting and rocking back and forth. At last Hikari stops crying, merely shivering with the cold dampness of the shelter now. Squirrel has nothing to offer the child but her own body's heat, so she circulates her chakra and raises her temperature before cradling the girl closer.
"Sing something, Hikari, why don't you?" she suggests. Finally, the child looks up at her with wide puffy red eyes.
"Mama?" she asks and again Squirrel feels that squeeze in her heart. How precious is this little girl to her that it only takes one question to do her in?
"Yes," she answers, the lie bittersweet in her mouth, "Sing a little, Hikari-chan, it will soothe you." And she does. In a simple melody, in her childish nonsense, she sings a mantra over and over again.
"Hey, you're okay, you'll be fine, just breathe.
Hey, you're okay, you'll be fine, just breathe.
Hey..."
It takes hours for her to tire and when she does, Squirrel can still hear the melody and the words echoing in her mind.
Years later, she wonders if she shouldn't have quit Anbu then and there, taken the child from Keiko, who so obviously didn't want it, and settled in Konoha. She could have been a mother. She could have provided. When she had learned of Hikari's father, she should have taken the child, cared for it in his stead, like a true sister-in-arms should have done. But she had gone back to her mask, as she had done all the times before. She had passed Hound in the headquarters without a word exchanged.
After a mission failed, she has only the recourse of her mind to escape the loving treatment of her captors. She cannot reveal her secrets, has been trained so much she couldn't even if she wanted to, so while she awaits her eventual demise she thinks of the girl that she could have loved. Who she could have made her own. Mama, Hikari had called her, just once, and it had been the best thing anybody had called her in years. Murderer was the more usual fare, Monster even, but for just that one moment, Squirrel had been Mama.
Absently, she hummed that soothing melody, a faint smile on her lips. Mama. What a sweet memory.
-Third Omake-
Present day
"Please," she begs, "Please just tell me why you are doing this!"
"You have angered the wrong person," her landlord replies before shutting the door of her own apartment in her face. With a frustrated cry, she kicks against that thrice-damned crib that she will have to move once again now. She might as well sell it, if she ever gets another child, she can get a new one. Maybe the next child won't turn out as twisted and unnatural as her first one had.
The thought brings her to a new idea as to who her mysterious malefactor, who hounded her steps, spooked her relations and haunted her dreams, was. It has to be that impossible child!
She swears and yowls at her bad luck to have ever birthed such a horrible daughter. Everything had been so wonderful when that little good-for-nothing had disappeared into the winds, not to be found again. She didn't have the hassle to search for a secure future for a crippled girl, didn't have to share her food and could finally work the more lucrative night shifts without drawing her neighbour's disapproval.
But then suddenly her good luck had just turned, everything she had been able to build for herself in the year's absence of the little blemish on her life crumbling before her very eyes, and all because an unseen someone had threatened everybody she had charmed into dropping all forms of contact. She has been evicted twice now, just set on the street with all her meagre belongings. It drives her absolutely mad.
It has to be that little devil! Ohh, just you wait until I can get my hands on you! You will rue the day you decided to meddle in my life again!