Crime management in Konoha is admittedly pathetic. The KKB exists to keep the peace on the streets, not to investigate what civilians do in the privacy of their own homes. Even if a murder committed by a civilian, a civilian jury will either proclaim the assumed murderer guilty or not. The penalty is usually exile or suicide, and the choice is up to the accused.
For shinobi it's much different. The daimyō of the Land of Fire has given Konoha's KKB the full authority to deal with crime within shinobi ranks. They can thank the Second Hokage for that.
Naturally, the crime rate amongst the shinobi population is much lower—or it appears to be. It's possible that many crimes committed by shinobi are simply better hidden. They are, after all, ninja.
So, while he waits for Tsunade to bat her pretty Senju eyes at the daimyō and secure permission to try Honōka's father under shinobi law, he'll be doing his own sleuthing for the case. Unofficially, and with the help of the Uchiha. They're notoriously 'strict' with their own children, but draw the line at torture—in blood.
He sends his student off to find her new apartment, hopefully without getting too distracted on the way, and sets off to interview the first witness.
Tsunemori Sachiko; Honōka's eldest sister. She no longer lives with the family. His plan is to have her provide details about Honōka's early life that will only confirm that the abuse has been going on for longer than the few months he's known his student.
Ironically, she's married into the non-shinobi branch of the Akimichi Clan. She even lives in Akimichi-chō, in a modest (by Akimichi standards) family home. He rings the bell and waits.
There's a pitter-patter of small, heavy feet, and the sliding door snaps open.
"Hello! Welcome!" a small child greets.
"Kō-chan—please!—wait for Mommy." The child's mother catches up, eyes honing in on his hitai-ate. "Oh, my. Welcome, Shinobi-san. Is… is there anything I can help you with today?"
Akimichi Sachiko is shorter than the average woman with wavy honey colored hair and blue eyes. The same blue as Honōka's, without the glaringly red pupils and dark border. She's also very pregnant. He almost sighs aloud.
He'd rather not acquire a reputation for harassing pregnant women today, on top of everything else.
"Indeed, there is. I am here to ask questions about your youngest sister, Tsunemori Honōka."
The woman freezes, then takes a deep, steadying breath.
"Kōen, head on over to Granny's house," she ruffles his wild, choppy hair, so much like his student's. Wrong color, but so similar. "Straight to Granny's, you hear?"
"Yes, Kā-chan."
He runs off, then runs back, smooching his mother's knees before running off again.
"Please, come in, and please excuse the mess. We were in the middle of an art project." A project that apparently involved dry soba noodles and marshmallows.
She eases herself down onto a cushion and he takes the one across from her after flicking a squashed marshmallow off it.
"Is… is my little sister… dead?"
"Now, why would you jump to that conclusion?"
She grimaces.
"Mikumo—my younger brother, told me Honōka-chan became a shinobi." She takes another deep breath, resting her hand on the top of her protruding belly. "My husband tells me that even children are dying in this war."
"And do you believe battle is the only thing that might cause your little sister harm?"
A shudder. She says nothing for a long moment. Then she shakes her head.
"Would you care to elaborate?"
"Excuse me, Shinobi-san, but you still haven't answered me. Is my little sister dead?"
She has some spine then. Good.
"No."
She lets out an enormous sigh of relief and dabs at her eyes with her sleeve. He waits for her to collect herself.
"O-Otō-sama… can… is… sometimes—sometimes his punishments are… No. I'm saying this all wrong."
She sits up and squares her shoulders.
"Tsunemori Keisuke is a terrible, violent, man."
He was expecting to have to work for such an admission, but he supposes Sachiko has been away from the abuse and in a safe environment for several years now. Time has closed the raw edges of her own wounds.
"When did the violence begin?" he asks.
"A-always. Before I was born, at least."
"I see. Would your other siblings share your opinion?"
"I… I don't know about Ichimaru-nī-san. After… after Honōka-chan was born, he started agreeing with our father's treatment of Okā-san. Honōka-chan doesn't look like the rest of us. Father and Ichimaru think Honōka-chan is not Father's child at all."
"And do you believe that?"
"Okā-san insists she was not unfaithful. I believe her."
"Are you familiar with blood-based paternity testing?"
A slow, uncertain nod. She does not gesture 'so-so', thankfully. His sanity takes a hit every time Honōka uses the gesture with him.
"There is little doubt that they are indeed parent and child, unfortunately."
"…"
"Would you say Tsunemori Keisuke was more inclined to violence with Honōka because of this belief?"
"Not… not at first. There were other things, about Honōka-chan, that drew his… attention."
He finds himself morbidly curious, a character flaw he is admittedly prone to. He shouldn't be surprised that he's not the first person to find his student positively odd.
"Honōka-chan was very sensitive as a baby. Nobody could pick her up for long, if at all. She cried a lot. But when she started crying, all we had to do was put her down and leave the room. That was… weird. Babies are normally the opposite way, right?
"Okā-san was—probably still is—convinced Honōka-chan only tolerated her when she was hungry. She was deeply depressed by that—we had to find a nanny goat to feed Honōka-chan when Okā-san's health deteriorated. Postpartum depression, I guess… I didn't even know such a thing existed until I came here. And, I think what caused it—on top of father believing the baby was not his—was that Okā-san also felt as though Honōka-chan wasn't hers…
"…Then one day she started walking all on her own. No one taught her—nobody could teach her. She was barely six months old, and I swear she was more coordinated than Kō-chan is now. He's three, in case you were wondering.
"Manaka-chan, our other sister, thought that meant it was time to teach Honōka-chan how to speak. Her first words were to tell Manaka-chan that she knew how already. It frightened Manaka. She told all her friends her little sister was possessed by a fox spirit afterward."
"And what did your parents think of her accelerated development?" He's not sure what he would have thought himself. Shinobi-born children have more robust chakra systems, and therefore stronger bodies—but even they won't spontaneously learn how to walk or talk on their own. Some guidance is still required.
"I don't think they believed us. They were both very hands off with Honōka-chan, and busy with the bathhouse. It was only us siblings that were around to witness it, and even then, sometimes we were too caught up in our own lives to take notice. Honōka-chan was also uncannily good at getting out of the way when a situation turned… violent.
"…There was a family discussion, around the time I was preparing to marry Nagihiko. I don't remember what it was about anymore—our father sprang so many 'family discussions' on us—I just remember that it was… bad. Honōka-chan got up to slip away, but Manaka noticed and she made her sit down." Here, she ducks her head, ashamed on her sister's behalf. "Father noticed. He slammed her head down onto the table and held it there, screaming at her. She didn't make a sound in complaint and I thought, maybe, he had killed her. There was so much blood; from her nose, I think.
"He told her to apologize—something long and so, so convoluted…! It was disgusting. A child couldn't possibly have hoped to follow and repeat his demand… and he knew it. But, when he pulled her upright by the hair, she repeated the apology word for word… I don't think he expected that. I think it made him angrier if anything… and…!"
She holds her face in her sleeves, biting back a sob.
"I am… I am so ashamed of myself…! Soon after that, I married and left the house and I—I just pretended none of it ever happened! I did nothing for my little sister, I said nothing…! When all I ever wanted was for someone to notice what was happening to me and say something!"
He offers her no sympathy. It is as his student pointed out to him—turning a blind eye enables criminals and their crimes.
"Shinobi-san… if you see Honōka-chan, can you tell her that her big sister named her son after her? Kōen, like the color of her eyes? That her onē-chan doesn't think her eyes are ugly or scary, and certainly not oni eyes, please…!"
Orochimaru arrives at the genin apartments amid absolute chaos. He'd be delighted if it weren't the sort of chaos that only children seem to be capable of.
The shared courtyard has a large celebratory banner tethered to the rails between two buildings—sturdy enough that an adventurous few are attempting to walk across it, unaided by chakra. Confetti is everywhere and children are running around with sparklers held between their greasy little fingers like senbon, screaming shrilly. Both Eternal Genin, Might Duy and Maruboshi Kosuke, man a large grill and deep wok over an open fire pit made from a metal washing drum and broken bricks. Minato—Minato—is altering flashbangs into firecrackers.
"…" he does not ask himself aloud, "what in Sage's name is going on here…?"
A random child runs past him, stops, and hands him a stick of roasted corn on the cob. He hates being handed things—but let it be known that Orochimaru does not waste food.
He approaches Minato, who is indeed modifying military grade flashbangs into firecrackers—with a party horn nipped between his lips in a concentrated effort to make even more noise. Honestly, Fūinjutsu-shi.
"Minato, what on earth are you doing?"
The Namikaze brat almost chokes on the noisemaker.
"O-Orochimaru-san, nice evening, yeah?"
Dare he sigh?
He casts a cautious eye about. His student should be somewhere in this mess. Assuming the whole thing isn't a genjutsu… It is not.
He finds Uchiha Obito and Nohara Rin first, playing hanetsuki badminton. Sarutobi Asuma is holding a pot of ink and a brush—both players evidently inked by his hand. He's written Tsunade's epithet, The Legendary Sucker, on the Uchiha boy's bare chest. Sarutobi-sensei has been telling tales. And who taught these kids the strip-punishment rule? No class, honestly. And terrible handwriting.
A few meters away, the older genin have set up a gambling table and are playing Koi-Koi. He wonders if the amount of ryō and personal-belongings-as-collateral changing hands should alarm him. Should he not also feel obligated to report the (very) illegal gambling? Probably. Will he? Not likely.
And there's his student—thankfully not at the gambling table. He did not survive his genin, chūnin, and jōnin years just to have to deal with another gambling addict.
Someone has painted large mismatched circles around her eyes and whiskers on her chin, so she likely had a go at playing badminton already. Now, she's playing uta-garuta and seems to have roped Minato's student into being her opponent. A boy with dark shades (who is not an Aburame) reads the cards.
The squinting is almost pitiable—if he were given to feeling such things. No, he's more likely to find the whole charade a juvenile waste of time. But his student often does such things with a specific goal in mind.
For instance, Orochimaru doesn't think he's ever seen two shinobi play uta-garuta. It's a game that requires the memorization of one hundred, thirty-one syllable poems, quick reactions, and hand-eye coordination.
Ah—there it is. Hand-eye coordination. His precocious little student is already attempting to retrain herself. Which also explains why Minato's student is winning by a considerable margin. It would appear most of his cards are now in Honōka's territory.
The boy in the glasses reads another poem—he has a lovely reading voice—and Honōka swipes. She gets the three cards next to the one she was aiming for, and in the wrong territory.
"Penalty."
Minato's student places another card in her territory and she rubs her good eye, blinking after. The boy begins reading again.
The match continues in her opponent's favor, but even he can see that his student is making micro adjustments after every failed attempt, and using only her non-dominant left hand. He must ask her about that later. Tsunade reported an all clear on that particular injury.
In the meantime, he's content to watch the match to the end, nibbling on his roasted corn.