.

"In three words, I can sum up everything

I've learned about life: it goes on."

I was grateful when I woke up.

Really, I was. Deep down. Somewhere.

Waking up again after getting body-checked by a Sannin was a minor miracle, the kind of story I could tell my grandkids one day. Orochimaru could have knocked me into my next life using one-sixtieth of his attention span but he didn't care enough to, I guess, and that was an act worth sending a fucking fruit basket for. And I would have considered doing just that if my attention wasn't already consumed by the dull ache that throbbed through every inch of my body.

It was overwhelming; I felt like a giant bruise. But I was alive to feel that, and that was what mattered.

Distantly, I could hear a monitor beeping—I was in the hospital. Not a surprise. If the sound didn't give it away, the distinctly sterile smell that invaded my nose would have done it. Light shone against my closed eyes, bright, cold, and two familiar signatures grated against my sense, pressing into my awareness with their own brand of brightness.

I forced my eyes open and took in the scene around me, blinking away the bleariness.

Naruto, half in his chair and half on my bed, his face inches away from my hand, was out cold, and Jiraiya sat in the chair beside him.

Jiraiya watched me as I gathered my bearings. "Welcome back to the land of the living," he said. "Took you long enough."

I tried to rub at my eyes and found that my arm refused to cooperate. Thankfully, I was already in a sitting position and didn't have to try and get there myself, because I got the sense that the rest of my body would prove to be as unresponsive if I tried.

"Were you watching me sleep?" I asked. The rough and scratchy sound of it elicited a wince from me. "That's kinda creepy, especially from you of all people."

"You've been awake for less than a minute and you're already giving me attitude?"

"I've got a brand to uphold," I muttered. "How's Sasuke?"

"That brat is doing just fine, thanks to you," he said. "Orochimaru tried to hit him with some nasty shit back there, but 'cause you managed to knock him outta the way, it didn't land properly. It was easy to fix once we got back to the village, so he's home free."

"That's… that's good."

Something went right on that mission. For the first time in what felt like ages, something went right.

The edges of my lips lifted up in a small, rare smile.

"Damn right it is. I get some credit for that, too." He shifted, uncrossing his arms to place his elbows on his knees and lean forward, and he asked, "How 'bout you? How're you feeling?"

That was a good question. I frowned. "Really, really sore, and… kinda dazed?"

It was like how, after sitting for a really long time, you could get a head rush when you stood up again, except it didn't go away after a couple of seconds. My thoughts were stuck running through my head with a metaphorical blur filter over them.

He nods. "Yeah, that's pretty expected. You've been out for nearly a week."

"A week," I echoed. "That's…"

"A long time," he finished.

"Yeah."

Too long. Question upon question piled up in my head. Was Sasuke alright? Did he have the seal on him? What happened to Orochimaru?

My eyes widened. A week. The third part of the exam was supposed to happen the day after we got back from our mission, which would have been tomorrow. That meant the invasion, the whole situation with Gaara, the third dying. On instinct, my chakra sense reached out to feel for Gaara, whose chakra had been a constant black spot on my sense since he first arrived, drowning out the signature of everybody else around him.

Opening up my chakra sense was a bit of a nightmare with how many booming signatures were running around the hospital, but I dug in my heels and kept looking, ignoring the headache that formed right between my eyes.

Gaara's signature wasn't where it was supposed to be. That was true for a few people—where were Maen and Kakashi and was that Karin's chakra signature in the tower where the foreign ninja were staying?—but his was the one that I focused on hunting for. I found it somewhere down, underground if I were to guess, and it was different.

Oh, for fuck's sake.

"… if we hadn't… Hey, kid, are you even listening?"

I blinked. "What?"

"Were you spaced out on me that whole time?"

"Uh… yeah, I think so."

"Jeez."

"Sorry," I said.

I pushed away those thoughts for right now. I'd wait for a better opportunity.

He waved me off. "It's whatever. I was just saying, you're pretty lucky. There were medics who tagged along with us that could treat the worst of your injuries right away before you could start to heal funny or, you know, bleed out internally."

"Oh," I said. "Awesome."

"Right now, your back and neck are pretty messed up still. The most the medics here could do was put things as right as they could—those kinda injuries are too delicate for them to do all the work. Too many little things that can go wrong."

"What exactly do you mean by 'pretty messed up'?"

"You should be able to fight again."

A weight settled over my chest at his words and all of the things they didn't say.

"Your range of movement will probably take a hit," he said. "You might not be able to turn your neck around as much as you used to, and your back might be a bit stiffer."

"And that's…?"

"Best case scenario. Worst case, things don't heal properly and nerves get pinched or whatever, I don't know all this medical nonsense, and it starts to affect your ability to move your other extremities."

My throat went tight and a strangled noise escaped me. I hadn't thought much of how my body felt when I first woke up, but hearing that, my heart started hammering in my chest. "Wait a second—"

Jiraiya shook his head. "What you're feeling right now is intentional. The medics just did some weird chakra thing that put most of your body to sleep, for lack of a better term, to keep you from moving too much and causing more damage to yourself. It's not from the back injury."

That eased my panic to a certain extent, but the whole thing was a hard pill to swallow. It was one thing to lose mobility as a ninja and a whole other to lose mobility as a taijutsu specialist. My mobility was everything; my fighting style thrived on my ability to move faster than my opponent.

"Oh," I mumbled.

"Yeah, you really got yourself into a mess with this one. But like I said, what I gave you was the worst case scenario. The medics were pretty convinced that you'll be just fine in a few weeks, as long as you don't pull any more stupid stunts."

But then I remembered what I did to get here, what I prevented with this injury, and the rest of my panic ebbed away. Regardless of how it impacted me moving forward, I wouldn't regret what I did—this was worth it. I knew that somebody else was better off for what I did.

It surprised me, how effective that was at mollifying me.

I had time to figure out a way around the rest of the consequences. The Sasuke problem, though, was pretty well solved, and that was a victory that I wouldn't let myself forget about.

"No offence, but why're you here?" I asked.

"Putting 'no offence' in front of something doesn't keep it from being rude."

"If you don't tell me I'm gonna keep assuming that you just wanted to watch me sleep."

"I came here out of the goodness of my heart…"

I raised a single, unimpressed eyebrow.

"Tough crowd," he muttered. "Fine. This little idiot," he pointed to Naruto, "and I have an errand to run, but he refused to leave until you woke up, and they figured you'd either wake up today or tomorrow, so…" He shrugged.

What the fuck?

I nodded, not trusting my voice, and turned my head away from him.

Wait, seriously, what the fuck?

Maybe I hadn't actually woken up. Maybe this was all a dream.

To say I was confused would be an understatement. I felt like somebody gave me the pieces to three different puzzles and I was stuck trying to put together a picture that couldn't be made whole no matter what I tried.

Jiraiya and Naruto's errand was to get Tsunade, which meant that Hiruzen was dead. But how did Hiruzen die if the third part of the exam hadn't even happened yet? And why was Gaara in the village? Did any of this have to do with the odd changes in his signature?

How the hell was this going to change Itachi and Kisame's attack on Naruto?

This seemed like the perfect opportunity to start my interrogation.

"So," I croaked. "Any reason why Lord Hokage doesn't seem to be in the village?"

"Probably because he's dead."

There it was. "I'm sorry."

"Me too, kid."

"What happened?"

"Sand invaded while we were out of the village. A bunch of theirs breached the walls, and all of their ninja inside the village started going on a rampage through the streets. But the main problem was their jinchuuriki, from what people have said. He basically blew up in the middle of the village." Jiraiya heaved a sigh, and the exhausted, haggard sound was something I could relate to. "The old man gave his life reseal the beast into its container, something strong enough that it couldn't break out again anytime soon."

That explained the difference in Gaara's signature—without Shukaku's chakra leaking, his signature was more subdued.

"And Konoha's keeping the jinchuuriki as a bargaining chip?" I guessed.

There was a pregnant silence. I turned back to look at Jiraiya and his eyes were sharp.

"How do you even know it's still here? Because you shouldn't know that, by the by. That's definitely an S-rank secret."

"I can sense him?"

Jiraiya pinched the bridge of his nose. "You're a real pain in the ass, you know that?"

"Acquired skill."

"Anyways, after their jinchuuriki went down, the rest of Sand's forces just fell apart, and the rest were cleaned up within a few hours." He grinned, but it was a grim, tight expression. "Shikaku's holding the administration together by sheer force of will, at this point, but overall Konoha came up pretty peachy. Low casualties, minimal damage to the infrastructure."

"Who's going to be the next hokage?"

There was a niggling curiosity as to who he would say. I doubted he'd outright tell me that he was going to look for Tsunade to be the next hokage, but I couldn't help but wonder who else was vying for the hat.

But part of me was also a little terrified that the difference in how things went down might have altered who the next hokage would be.

The last thing I needed was for all of this bullshit to lead to Danzo becoming hokage. I assumed that he must have chosen to set off the invasion early, for whatever reason. I couldn't even begin to guess at that. And as long as it didn't prove to be the key to Danzo's ascension to hokage, I couldn't even begin to care, either, since it seemed to have worked out pretty alright.

"Me, your teacher." For a split second, Jiraiya's expression darkened. Then it was gone and he was back to his cocky default face as if it'd never been there. "Some power-hungry assholes." Yep, that would be Danzo. "Oh, and Shikaku, but he laughed in their faces when the Council presented him as an option, so."

"That sounds like him."

"Speaking of," Jiraiya said. He stood up and groaned, arms stretching above his head, and a few things clicked into place. "Man, these old bones," he muttered. "But that reminded me that Shikaku wanted to know when you woke up, so I might as well go give him a heads up. While I do that, you and Naruto'll get a chance to chat before we head off."

Jiraiya reached down to cuff Naruto upside the head. Naruto jolted, somehow managing to fall between his chair and my bed. He hit the floor with a muted thud.

"Wha—" Naruto glared up at Jiraiya, rubbing at the back of his head. "Hey, that hurt, you old perv! The hell was that for?"

Jiraiya waved a hand in my direction. The second he realized I was awake, Naruto's expression jumped from annoyed to thrilled and he grinned at me, scrambling to his feet. "Kaka! You're awake, hey—"

Naruto tried to launch himself at me but Jiraiya caught him by the back of his sweater and yanked him back into his chair.

"Ah, ah, ah," Jiraiya said. "Remember what the medics told you?"

"No physical contact," Naruto mumbled.

"And?"

"No yelling."

"Good. Right, then, I'll be back in a few minutes. Have fun kiddies!"

Jiraiya mussed Naruto's hair, smirked at me, and then disappeared in a puff of smoke.

Naruto wasted no time in pouncing right back towards me, though he did stop this time before getting too close. He was bouncing up and down in his chair with a goofy grin on his face. I could see a spot of drool on his chin from when he was asleep.

"Man… I've been waiting forever for you to get up!"

And that didn't seem to be much of a exaggeration. Now that I looked, I could see the rumples in his clothes that indicated that he'd slept in them—probably more than once—and the bags under his eyes. He didn't smell, but I also might have just been so used to Naruto's stink that my nose didn't even register when he got stale anymore.

"Have you been eating properly?" I asked.

"Kaka, come on—"

"When was the last time you changed your clothes?"

"Yesterday!"

Lie.

"And have you been sleeping enough?"

Naruto groaned. He collapsed onto the bed, his head hidden in his arms. "Come on," he whined.

A laugh bubbled out of me and man, did it feel good, even through the pain that the movement caused me. When Naruto turned his head to look at me, he was grinning again.

"You missed so much," Naruto said. "There was this huge, like, fight that happened in the village while we were gone! It was all done when we got back but I talked to Kiba and he said that there were people fighting everywhere and all those Sand guys got their asses kicked!" His face fell. "I mean, uh… gramps died, which is, you know, sad." And the grin was back, but I saw the cracks in it this time. "But the Pervy Sage said that it's gonna be fine, so."

"I heard."

"Eh, you talked to him?"

"Yep. He told me that you were gonna go with him on an errand, right?" I asked.

"Oh! Yeah! He said that we need to go find somebody. Some friend of his, or whatever. I didn't wanna go but he said that his friend could help you get better, so I said I'd tag along. And! And he said he'd teach me some cool new tricks! Like how to summon toads!"

So that little branch was sprouting to life, as it was supposed to. Interesting, watching the universe correcting itself.

I wasn't sure whether it was comforting or worrying.

"Toads," I echoed. "That'll be fun."

Naruto made a face. "They're kinda gross, but I guess it's fine. He said they're real strong."

"I bet they are."

"Yeah." Naruto looked towards the window, obscuring his face from my line of sight. "I wanna… I wanna learn anything he can teach me. I wanna get stronger."

I watched, waited, not knowing what to say. The change in his voice didn't escape me, and I wished that I could see what was going on with his expression. Naruto was always an open book and I could tell that there was something to read in him, right then, but without a clear view of his face, I was missing half the words.

I hoped he would keep going. He didn't.

"Oh, man, I almost forgot!" he cried. He jumped in his seat, whatever he was saying before completely forgotten. "You missed the coolest thing!"

"Yeah?"

"A few days after we got back, there were these, like, two dudes who tried to attack the village," Naruto said. "One of them was blue—and he was a shark? Or something? I dunno. He was really ugly. And the other guy was Sasuke's brother!"

And there was the answer to the only question still lingering in the back of my mind.

"And they were all, like, scary. They just came outta nowhere and were gonna attack me, I think, but then the Pervy Sage came in, and Asuma and Kurenai and some other jonin were with him, and all of them like, demolished the two guys! Shark dude's dead. I dunno what happened to Sasuke's brother. But it was awesome!"

"Awesome," I mumbled. I didn't know how an encounter like that could be awesome. Terrifying or horrible came to mind, actually. "Sure."

"You know, Pervy Sage is weird. I know everybody says he's super strong, and stuff, but I thought he was kinda a phoney until I saw him kick their asses."

I snorted. "Did you tell him that?"

"What? No!" Naruto scratched the back of his head. "But I did, uh… ask him to teach me some cool stuff, after that. 'Cause I saw him do cool stuff."

Of course I would miss something like that. But as annoying as it was, that I missed such an important event, I was also glad because I probably would have shit myself if I'd been on the scene when Itachi and Kisame arrived.

"Did he say what he was gonna teach you?" I asked. "Outside of just the toads."

"I asked if he could teach me anything flashy, 'cause Kakashi never teaches us the really cool jutsu, and he said he might. If I'm not too much of a brat."

Was Jiraiya was already planning on taking Naruto away from the village, at this point? He had to know that Naruto wouldn't be able to manage toad summoning and learn the Rasengan in only a few weeks.

The thought of Naruto leaving the village, of Team 7 being broken up, put a bittersweet taste in my mouth—I never thought this far ahead. And now, it's here.

"I'm sure he's got a ton he can teach you," I said, unable to keep all the bitter from my voice.

But Naruto didn't react to it.

"Yeah."

I cleared my throat. "Have you… seen Sasuke at all?"

"Oh, uh… a little. He was his usual assho—" He cut himself off without any intervention from me. "He seemed the same as usual."

"Does he know about—"

And that was the moment Jiraiya decided to pop back into the room.

"Alright, kiddies," he said, startling Naruto so bad that he fell from his chair. Again. "Time's up!"

"Hey, wait—!"

"No can do," Jiraiya said. "We've got a schedule to keep. You already dragged it out long enough, thank you very much."

Jiraiya walked over and hauled Naruto to his feet. He kept his grip even after Naruto was standing again, as if he didn't trust Naruto to not run off or something.

"It's fine, Naruto," I said. "I'll be here when you get back."

"Yes, you will," a new voice drawled from the doorway.

Shikaku slouched into the room looking like he would love to do nothing more than throw himself into the abyss. His hair was messier than usual in its ponytail and there was a distinctly ruffled aura to him, one that I had never seen him wear before.

"See?" Jiraiya said. "C'mon, kid. We gotta go."

Naruto huffed, arms crossed over his chest, but he didn't drag his feet. He let Jiraiya carry him out the window with a call that he'd be back soon, and that they'd be bringing somebody to make me better with them.

It was cute.

While that went on, Shikaku dropped himself in the closest chair and was already half asleep, his eyes closed and his arm laid over his eyes.

"So I hear you've been having fun," I said.

"And you heard this from who?"

"A little birdy told me. A, uh… bath peeping birdy."

Shikaku snorted. "Nice." He groaned and pulled himself upright, letting his arm fall limp in his lap. "Yeah. I've been having plenty of fun wrangling adult-sized toddlers."

"You can take a nap if you want," I said. "I won't tell anybody."

"Thanks, but I can't stay long."

"Sure you can. You're your own boss, now."

He grimaced. "Too soon, kid."

"Oh. Sorry."

He waved me off. "I just figured I'd check in, see how you're doing."

"I mean… I'm alive?"

"That that's even an improvement is saying something," he said dryly. "Seriously? You threw yourself in front of a Sannin?"

"It worked!"

"It should have killed you."

"I know," I said. "But it worked."

"But what if it did kill you?"

"What if I hadn't, and I lost a teammate for it?"

That one stopped him short.

Shikaku sighed. "You three shouldn't have been there in the first place."

"Good to know I'm not the only one who thinks that."

"All of us thought that," he said, levelling me with a stare. Under his breath, he added, "Well, most."

"Most?"

"That's all you get. S-rank levels of secrecy have to count for something."

"Fine," I said. "If you won't answer that, will you at least tell me where Maen and Kakashi are?"

"Out."

"Thank you for that wonderful observation."

"S-rank," Shikaku stressed.

"Jiraiya gave me all the juicy information," I said. "Why can't you be like him?"

"That list of reasons is longer than my arm, Kasumi."

"I feel like I've earned something after all of the shit we went through."

"No, don't think so," he said.

Shikaku peered at his watch and muttered something that I didn't catch. "And it looks like my time's up."

"You weren't even here five minutes?"

"Like I said, toddler wrangling is a time-consuming pastime."

"That nap offer still stands."

He leaned forward and gave my hand a short squeeze. "Thanks, kid, but I gotta get going. I'll send word to Shikamaru that you're up, so he'll probably drop by tonight. If I can I'll come with him, but I probably won't be able to visit again until tomorrow."

"'Kay."

He hesitated, his eyes unfocused, locked on something over my shoulder. They clicked back into place after a second and he said, "It really is good to see you up, kid."

"Good to be up."

He wandered out of the room after that and I was left alone in blissful silence.

All things considered, I saw the results of this whole situation—no matter how unintentional most of it was—to be a net positive.

Hiruzen was dead, but as a result, Konoha had Shukaku at its disposal and it was contained in what would hopefully be a more mentally stable Gaara. Sasuke wasn't stuck with the curse seal, and without being whammied by Itachi's Tsukuyomi and the influence of Orochimaru, his chances of defecting were slim to none. As far as I was aware, nobody from the show was dead. Well, except for Kisame, by the sounds of it, but that was a good thing. Itachi was a bit of a question mark but with Jiraiya in the picture and no partner to back him up, I couldn't see him making any moves anytime soon. Danzo was doing Danzo things, but I couldn't see him getting anywhere with Shikaku on his case and Jiraiya already headed towards Tsunade.

There were no fires to be put out. There was no figurative guillotine hanging over my head, waiting to drop.

Everything was okay; everybody was okay.

For the first time in a long time, when I closed my eyes and went to sleep, no part of me was worried about what the future would hold.

Maen finally dropped by my hospital room four days after I first woke up.

I spent a lot of time sleeping off my injuries, which was fine by me. People dropped by, a few every day, some more surprising than others. Shikamaru was the first and most frequent. He brought Choji and Ino with him, and after the first visit, Ino had taken to stopping by each day to give me a fresh vase of flowers for my bedside. Team Gai even stopped by on the second day and swept through the room in a whirlwind of energy.

Actually, all of the Konoha 11 came by at some point or another. Sakura brought her team and introduced them all to me. Hinata came with Kiba and Shino, bringing flowers with her to add to Ino's vase. Sasuke didn't show his face, but I could feel him hovering near the hospital a few times, only to turn back around and head for the training grounds. I could appreciate the thought, at least.

It was nice. The warm, ooey gooey kind of nice, that clogged up your heart but in a good way.

Still, Maen was the person that I wanted most of all. Each time somebody knocked on the door, glad as I was that anybody bothered to take the time to visit, he was the one I kept hoping to see walk inside.

And when he did, he looked like crap.

Dirt and mud caked his ANBU uniform, which he hadn't bothered to take off, and he smelled like he'd just come from a mission, stale BO and all. Stubble lined his jaw. He was tired, to the point that he didn't even bother to hide it as he walked into the room and settled down at my bedside.

But here he was.

The first thing I blurted out was, "I think I'm mad at you."

He barked out a laugh. "You think?"

"On a scale of one to ten, how involved were you in that plan?"

"Ten."

"Oh, yeah," I said, laughing. "I'm so fucking mad at you."

Now that I was given back some ability to move my arms, I was able to reach out and grab his hand, holding it as tight as I could. He squeezed back.

"That's fair," he said.

"Yeah, it is."

"But I'm mad at you, too."

"For what?"

He scoffed. "'For what' she asks after having thrown herself at Orochimaru."

"Those're literally the exact words Shikaku used."

"I'm glad that I'm not the only one getting on your case for this, then." Maen shook his head. "That should have killed you."

I could see the anger in his eyes, the frustration, but beneath all of it, I knew the emotion that ran the deepest was fear. And at that, all of my anger seeped out of me. The little remark I had ready died on the tip of my tongue.

I nodded and mumbled, "I know."

He reached forward and smoothed my hair away from my face. "I'm an old man, you know that," he said. "You're gonna give me a heart attack one of these days."

"Trying not to."

"Yeah, I know."

He knew better than I did how dangerous this job was. He knew that I wasn't carelessly throwing myself head-first into dangerous situations and that sometimes these things were unavoidable, especially when the situation was far out of my control.

He knew that I wouldn't apologize for it, couldn't make promises to not let it happen again.

So he didn't ask any of that from me.

And like so many other things as of late, I was grateful for it.

"But I am still mad at you."

"Power to you, kiddo."

.

.

Shikaku leafed through the first few mission reports in his stack as he walked, the names on the corner of each registering as he passed them. Maen, Kakashi, Tojiro, Saya. All of their reports said about the same: they trailed Orochimaru up and west through Earth Country, through Waterfall, through Iron, and lost him somewhere in the Land of Rice. No further injuries, no enemy engagements.

But the rest of the reports from that mission weren't anywhere near as comforting. Four total were dead and their families could never know what happened to them. Maen and Kakashi were both injured, though treated intermittently while they trailed Orochimaru. And while the village gained a new lead on Orochimaru, it was costly. Too costly. Especially because the final cost could have been so much higher.

From the start, Shikaku thought that the mission was a ridiculous idea, and he never wavered.

If only he could have convinced Hiruzen.

Shikaku knocked on the office door in front of him and a voice beckoned him inside.

He strode towards the other side of the room, where a man sat behind his desk, his expression unreadable from behind the bandages strewn over the top half of his face.

"Here," Shikaku said. He dropped the stack of reports onto the desk. "I hope you're satisfied."

Danzo didn't even glance at the reports. "I am."

There were a million and one things Shikaku wanted to say. He held his tongue. Giving Danzo an inch was the same as asking him to take a mile, so with that, Shikaku turned on his heel and stalked out of the room.

Danzo may be satisfied, but Shikaku himself wouldn't be satisfied until somebody other than Danzo Shimura next donned the hat.

A/N: Woo! This is the last of the Chunin Exams arc. Man, I honestly didn't expect it to be this long, but here we are.

Heads up: a while back, I started going back and reworking/editing some of the earlier chapters. I wanted to do the whole fic but I really underestimated how much effort that would take, so I only ended up getting to chapter 11. The first... five were the most impacted, I think? The rest just saw quality of life changes. Chapter 3 was almost entirely rewritten. So, yeah.

As usual, thank you all for reading and for the continued support! I know I've gotten hella patchy with my updates but I genuinely want to start doing better with this fic. That anybody still sticks around feels like a minor miracle.

Chapter Questions

1.) What change to canon are you most interested to see play out?

2.) Do you have any characters that you want to see more of moving forward?