Right after Tsunade put you to sleep, you woke up in a small lake.
"Long time no see," Matatabi greeted you. "I can't tell if you're incredibly stupid or incredibly unlucky at this point."
"Maybe both?" You replied.
"At least this wasn't completely your fault. If you had asked me instead of your sensei stealing my power, I might have been able to fix your leg. Tell him to apologize!" She growled.
"I will," you replied. "Do you think you could teach me to use your fire? I don't have any offensive Jutsu and I cannot always rely on explosive tags."
"You would just get hurt. Normally I would find that quite funny, but now it is just sad. My fire is much hotter than what of your friends, so without a lot of experience with fire, it will do more harm to you than it is worth," she said before going back to sneering at you. "And forget about me helping you before your sensei apologize. He should feel himself how it feels to have your chakra forcefully dragged out like that."
"Did it hurt?" You asked her.
"Of course it hurts! Now don't' talk to me before he admits his mistake, I will be watching, so don't lie to me!" She yelled.
"I will," you replied.
"I said stop talking to me. Now let me sleep," Matatabi said and got into a more comfortable position.
-x-
You woke up from the mind space by Tsunade touching your forehead.
"Good news, everything went well," Tsunade told you.
"So my leg is back?" You asked.
"No, it will probably take a few months for you to recover properly, but at least it will start to grow now," she was pretty red in her face now. How much had she drunk?
"Oh," you replied.
"I think you should lay down now Tsunade," Shizune told her.
"I'm fine, I've not drunk that much," she said swatting her apprentice away with her hand.
Looking at the table beside her you could see that the bottle of sake was still more than half full so it might not be much for her. At least that was before you saw the empty bottle laying on the floor. It was a miracle that she hadn't seriously messed up something.
"I'm going to fit you with a prosthetic leg. It will need some adjusting as your leg grows and it won't be perfect, but with a bit of training you might be able to go on some easy missions," she explained.
She brought out a quite crude looking leg and began fastening it to the stump of your real leg that had somehow gotten even shorter during the procedure.
"Step down so I can adjust it properly," she said and you did as you were told. She adjusted some screws so each leg was equally long.
"Try to walk a few steps," she said.
It was quite a strange experience. The knee was quite stiff and you had to put a lot of pressure on it for it to bend as it was held back by a spring.
"Hmm, I need to adjust it a bit," she said and loosened a screw in your new knee. "Try now."
It was a bit easier, but still far from real walking and you were a bit afraid you'd slip as the end fo the leg was just a rounded metal rod.
"You will need to reapply the medicine in the coming months. Danzo has gotten all the instructions you need so don't have to worry about anything. I recommend that you start training with your team again, but stop if your leg starts to hurt too much or else you risk doing damage to your leg. Got it?"
"Got it," you said. "Thanks for your help."
Without warning, Tsunade dropped to the floor.
"Tsunade!" Shizune called out and went down to check on her.
"Let's go," Danzo said and left the room before you.
You were allowed to walk on your own to the tunnels, but from there it was back on the Root agent's back and on with the blindfold.
-x-
The next day you were walking around the village to get used to your leg. Your team was out on a mission so you weren't able to rejoin them for some days.
One thing that took a bit to get used to was how the leg stuck different surfaces. Walking on grass was terrible as it dug into the ground, but roads were okay.
Tree walking was impossible and you weren't sure why you even tried that one. There was no grip at all as you couldn't channel chakra through the rod, all you managed was a single step.
So you stuck to just walking on solid ground for the rest of the week.
-x-
You woke up to someone knocking on the door. You hurried to open the door as you were tired of people just barging in on their own.
You took a few steps backwards when you saw Danzo in the doorway.
"What do you want?" You asked him.
"Your weekly check-up is due. Your team is back, so come down after you're done," he exclaimed.
"Okay," you replied.
Danzo walked into your apartment and ripped off the paper with Hiruzen's face that you had used for target practice.
"I didn't know you had that kind of traitorous views towards our Hokage," he said.
"I was bored as the ANBU forgot to bring my crutches" you replied.
"Forgot? How do you know its not intentional?" Danzo asked.
"I don't see why he should have done it on purpose, he must just have missed it," you said.
"The ANBU who were watching your apartment and saw you leave with your crutches somehow just forgot?" he asked.
"They seemed nice and helped me out, so why would I suspect them?" You asked.
"There is no contradiction between making this place nice so you want to stay here and take away the tools you need to move around. You already know that Hiruzen doesn't like our contact," Danzo said and moved to look at the other drawing, the on of himself. Without warning, he threw a kunai at you that graced your cheek.
"What did you do that for?" You asked.
"You seemed to have fun throwing kunai at my face," he said.
"That doesn't give you the right to throw them at me!" You yelled at him.
He threw another one too fast for you to react, hitting your forehead with its blunt end. "Ouch," you said and clutched your head and you could feel the blood flowing from the wound.
"Know your place genin. If you had worn your forehead protector, that wouldn't have happened. And if you had worn your new seal you wouldn't have to worry about any kunai hitting your face."
"But I was sleeping, you just woke me up," you argued.
"The enemy isn't going to wait for you to wake up and get ready before they attack. From now on make sure to put on your headband before you open the door and keep the seal on you at all times. I'll send someone to check," Danzo said.
"You're not going to throw kunai at me while I'm asleep, right?" You asked.
Danzo didn't say anything and his facial expression was his old stoic one.
That was exactly what he meant. "Leave me alone, please," you pleaded. Why did he have to fuck with you at every opportunity? You were making that seal to protect yourself, not to invite Danzo to stab you while you were sleeping.
"If you don't want your leg back, you are free to not come back down. I'll inform Hiruzen that you won't return to service again due to permanent injury," Danzo said and turned around to leave.
"Wait, I'll come tonight, so no need to talk to the Hokage."
"I'm getting tired of your indecisiveness, but I will give you another chance," Danzo said and left.
-x-
After getting dressed and making sure you had that damn seal in your pocket, you left for the training ground.
"Welcome back Sota," Raidou greeted you as you arrived.
"Thanks, I'm glad to see you guys again too," you said.
"Before we start, I want a few words in private with you," he said.
You walked with him to a more isolated area.
"I know what's going on with you and Danzo, but I'm not going to hold that against you. I can see that you don't like the situation. Torune's father has been spreading rumours about you and has tried to have you removed from the team. But unless the Hokage is telling me to remove you, you're staying. You will not be allowed to be alone with Torune. I don't think Danzo has any motives with you on this team and the Hokage has ensured me that Danzo had nothing to do with your team placement, so Shibi's worries are unfounded. But still, he has a bit of influence I cannot go against. So keep your distance to Torune," Raidou said.
"I get it. I want to get away too, but I can't," you replied.
"Let us go back so they don't start to eavesdrop on us," he said.
"One more thing please," you said.
"Alright, what is it?" He asked.
"The Two-tails want you to apologize for forcefully using her chakra," you said.
"I did what I had to do, I will not apologize for that," he said.
"I know that, but it still hurt her," you said.
"I don't know why this is so important for you, but okay, I apologize for using her chakra without asking. No, let us go back," he said.
-x-
"Today we will be doing some training reaction exercises," Raidou said and pointed to a weird looking box he had placed on a table. "Have you ever used this in training before Sota?" he asked you.
"No," you replied. You had no idea at all what is what. For all you knew, it could be a bomb that you had to defuse.
"It''s not hard. When I click this button, a coloured box will come up. Your task is to react to it properly before the bell rings," he said and demonstrated it. "I'm going to change the colours around every day we're using it, so don't get too used to the colours. For today, blue means don't move, yellow drop to the ground, green move backwards and red forwards. You will have to continue this till you get it right enough times in a row, so take this as a motivation to take it seriously. The more you improve the better performance I will demand out of you. Do you understand Sota?"
You nodded.
"Alright, let us started," he said.
After a minute or so of waiting, a green box appeared. You tried recalling what green meant, backwards, but before you could move, the bell rang.
It would maybe be easier to watch what they were doing, but that would be cheating and Raidou would probably find a way to trip you up if you did that.
The next one was yellow, dropping down, you could remember that. But your leg wouldn't cooperate properly.
"Just drop to the ground Sota and catch your fall with your hands, don't worry about your knees. I'll wait till you get it," Raidou said.
You tried and the body kind of resisted, it didn't want to just fall. You tried lifting your real leg so you could pivot on your fake leg and soon after you were on the ground. Not the best landing, but you could work on it.
Now how to get up again?
It continued like this for a while, some successes, some late attempts and some failed where you either reacted wrong or simply didn't manage the movement with your prosthetic leg.
Kabuto was really good at this, at worst he showed some hesitation but for the most time quicker than both you and Torune. He was the oldest and possible Orochimaru spy, so it would only make sense that his reactions were pretty good.
"Alright Kabuto, thirty in the row is good enough. I want you to work on your stamina while we're continuing," Raidou said after a while.
Torune wasn't bad either, a few mistakes, mostly mixing up his reactions, especially if you were to stand still. But it was miles better than you, Raidou's definition of standing still made you fail every attempt when the blue box appeared.
How many in a row had you managed so far? At your best, three or four maybe. And Torune was on a pretty good streak now.
The next one went horrible as you lost your balance and fell backwards.
"Everything okay Sota?" Raidou asked you.
"I'm fine," you replied.
"Good. Torune, you can join Kabuto now," Raidou said.
"Good luck Sota," Torune said and left.
"How long are we going to do this?" You asked.
"Till you manage ten in a row. Your best is five so far, so don't lose hope," he said.
Attempt after attempt you failed. There was no rhyme or reason to any of it. It was not like reacting to someone in real life wherein a fight you would dodge when the opponent was striking. How many times had you reacted to that stupid box by now? 100, 200? You had no idea. You were half tempted to check if this wasn't some cruel genjutsu someone had put on you.
It was not even hard. Just the same four things over and over again.
"Sota, focus," Raidou said.
"I'm trying to focus, but I cannot get it."
"You're mostly messing up when you're supposed to stand still, so focus on that," he said.
"I'm focusing on everything," you said.
"You don't get it, do you. Instead of trying to succeed on every box, make sure you succeed on the blue boxes," he said.
"If I only focus on standing still when I have to, I will fail all the others and never be done with this."
"So what? You're not getting anyway with what you're doing now. When it is blue, stand still, and when it's not, move around. When you get that right, you can do the real task again."
"I'll try," you said.
It was kind of easier, but also frustrating as you weren't getting closer to completing this stupid task and your stomach was starting to rumble.
And you weren't the only one getting hungry as Kabuto and Torune were getting back from whatever exercise they had been doing.
"You two can start eating," Raidou said.
"Shouldn't we eat together?" Torune asked.
"Sota her is getting lunch when he has finished the exercise," Raidou said.
He wasn't one of Kakashi's old classmate at the 'Academy of Not giving your genin food' right?
But you weren't physically tired, just hungry so you could go on.
"He's just seven, cut him some slack Sensei, he will focus better on a full stomach," Kabuto argued.
"I'm not underestimating him due to his age, he can keep going. And there is no point to this exercise if there are no stakes involved. I'll be doing him a disservice on our next mission if I let him get hurt again just because he hadn't trained properly."
"Now let us continue Sota, you're getting better even if it doesn't feel like it."
You were suspicious about Kabuto, but you weren't going to think he was sabotaging you by suggesting a lunch break. But Raidou had a point, the fact that he withheld lunch from you helped your motivation. So you just waited for it to activate again. Another blue and you got it. It was time to build a streak again. Forward, down, down, back, down, forward, still, still. You were at nine, just one more and you had it. The last one was green. That was back, but you put your weight on the wrong leg and fell over.
You almost had it and you ruined it.
"Please let me stop now, I almost got it," you said.
"Torune and Kabuto managed a lot more than that. Does your leg hurt too much?" He asked.
"No, it's fine," you replied.
"Then there is no reason to stop, you just need to keep trying till you get it. A ninja doesn't give up this easily. If you're hungry, just do it right and you can eat."
Your brain felt more and more sluggish. You were not going to get any better without food, but you were not going to get food from Catch-22-sensei before you managed it.
You got up again and waited for it to activate another time. And the cycle repeated itself, a good chunk right before you failed somehow. As the hours flew by and it started to get darker, you were more and more tempted to claim that your leg was going to hurt.
The sun was gone when you reached a streak of nine again.
"Good work Sota. We're done now," Raidou said.
"Isn't there one more?" You asked. He didn't say it just so you could stop, right?
"You must have counted wrong," Raidou said. "Let me buy you some food. I don't think the lunch I brought is any good now and I've not eaten in a while either."
"Thanks," you said. "I hope this has been useful because I never want to do it again."
"I'm sorry, but we're going to do it again and much harder. But we'll switch it around a bit. My goal is to make you better, not make you dread the team exercises."
-x-
You followed him to a food stand and he ordered chicken wok and rice for you two. And as soon as the plate was in front of you, you grabbed the chopsticks and stuffed your mouth with food and paid Raidou no attention. After the first few mouthfuls, you slowed down a bit again as your stomach didn't feel that empty anymore."
"Is there something you want to talk about?" He asked you.
"I'm not sure if I can," you replied.
"Danzo?"
You nodded.
"You should talk to the Hokage about him," Raidou suggested.
"He knows. But he and Danzo have something going on and if I say the wrong things my tongue will just lock up," you said.
"I'll go talk to him right now, let me just pay for the food first."
"I wouldn't do that if I were you," Danzo said behind you.
"Councilman Shimura, what do you I owe you the pleasure here?" Raidou said, changing up his tone completely.
"I'm just here to retrieve Sota, we had an appointment but you kept him for the entire day. And don't stick your nose where it doesn't belong, it will only bring you bad luck," Danzo said.
"Are you threatening me?" Raidou asked.
"I've not forced Sota to do anything, so if you're going to claim otherwise to Hiruzen, I will have to take action. Follow me Sota or our deal is over," he said.
"Good night," you told Raidou before taking one more bite of the food jumped off your stool.
Would you ever get rid of him? There was nothing you could do before your leg was healed. But after that, could you do anything then? Danzo was a threat to anyone who would try to help you. You wanted to discuss this with Shisui and Itachi, but you weren't sure how permitting the seal was. You should get rid of it. But that would require Danzo teaching you how and he was for sure not give you anything that could help. You could maybe get some help from Hizashi, but that was probably a bad idea and it didn't seem like he had any idea either. And you were for sure not going to experiment on your tongue, who knows what would happen if you meddled with it.
"Lay down on your bed, my medics will take care of everything," Danzo said.
One of his masked agents put a hand to your forehead and you fell asleep.
-x-
When you woke up again, it felt like almost no time has passed, but the medic was gone and Danzo was still sitting there. Why hadn't you visited Matatabi this time? Did Tsunade put you to deeper sleep?
"We've adjusted your leg again and it's growing fine," Danzo said. "If you want this to continue, you should come back regularly and study."
"How often is regularly? Once a week, more, less?" You asked.
"You can consider yourself how much you want to risk it by not coming down here," he said.
"That doesn't tell me anything," you complained.
"It does tell you to not slack off," Danzo said. "And don't you want to improve your seals anyway?"
"I don't know what I want," you replied.
"It's your choice whatever you do," he said.
"But you're punishing me for not coming here, how is that a free choice?" You asked.
"You cannot demand favours without giving anything back. I help you because Konoha needs strong ninja. If you don't care anymore I don't care either. I won't waste lots of resources on helping a mediocre ninja. Most with your kind of injury would have retired as a ninja now. You owe your future ninja career to my effort. You act like I'm the bad guy here while you're acting like a spoiled brat. It's me that should quit helping you."
"Go away, I want to sleep," you said.
"Don't forget your seal. I don't want to find a bloody bed here tomorrow," Danzo said and left.
You took a look in your pocket and it seemed like you had enough charges left in the seal, so you were in the clear for now.
-x-
Next morning your priority was to get away from this place. As you changed your clothes, you could see a new cut in your pyjamas. Danzo had been serious about checking your kunai seal.
On the way to the training ground, you saw Shisui. "Good morning Sota, do you have time to talk a bit?"
"Good morning Shisui, its some time to meeting start so it's okay," you replied.
"I got a mission for us, I don't know much details yet but we're leaving tomorrow," he said.
"Sounds good, but I'm not sure how much I can tell you about you know what, Danzo got my tongue," you explained.
"Oh... shit," Shisui mumbled, not being able to hide it from you. "We'll figure something out. Can I follow? I should probably speak to your sensei when I take you out on a mission like this."
"Sure," you replied and began to walk to the training ground. "Is Itachi back?"
"Yes, he seemed to be better now, but I don't want to jinx it by mentioning Sasuke."
"Probably for the best, do you see any sign that things will better between them, is Sasuke still as mad at him?"
"I don't know, Naruto hasn't mentioned anything. I want to just give them some time, it will be better soon. Sasuke will probably give up being grumpy and wish Itachi back," Shisui said.
"Hi there Sota, and you are Uchiha Shisui right?" Raidou asked as you arrived at the training ground.
"Hi there Raidou, I want a few words with you about Sota," Shisui said.
"Should we find another place to talk?" Raidou asked.
"No need. I'm just informing you that we're going out on a mission tomorrow and I hope that's fine with you?" Shisui asked.
"What need to you have for him? It's quite unusual to grab a fresh genin like this for a non-team mission, I want a reason," Raidou demanded.
"Oh, he's just a friend and I want to take him along, I hope it's not too big of a problem, I'll take good care of him," Shisui said.
"Is it just you two?" He asked.
"That's the plan yes. I'm sorry I cannot tell you more as I don't know everything myself yet. All I know is that its safe to take him along," Shisui said.
"Alright. I don't plan to bring him on any mission anytime soon and he cannot have any worse luck than at his first mission. But now I think we should start the training for today, so I'll ask you to leave."
"That's fine," Shisui said. "Bye Sota"
"Bye," you replied.
"He's not causing you any issues right?" Raidou asked after he had left.
"He's fine, he has helped me before when I was in trouble and is a good friend," you said.
You walked up to the others.
"There will be no missions today either, so we'll focus on training. Do anyone have any wishes for the day?" He asked.
You raised your hand. "Do you think you can teach me nature transformation?"
"I'm not sure if that's a valuable use of your time right now," Raidou said.
"Why not?" You asked.
"You're not lacking in offensive capabilities, you've practically an unlimited amount of explosive tags at the moment. What you lack is in defence, reaction and speed," Raidou explained. "Is there any reason you think you would need to learn new Jutsu at the moment?"
"What if I lose my explosive tags somehow or if I want something less destructive? It's not like I can train my physical strength fully till my leg recovers. Besides, it would be something more fun for me to do in between all the tedious exercises," you argued.
"Alright Sota, I'll get you some chakra paper next time and we'll work on your nature then. For today I suggest that you work on your speed. I want you to run on intervals of ten minutes on and ten minutes off to not put too much strain on your leg.
"Torune, do you want to join Sota or do you have anything else you want to work on?" Raidou asked.
"I could work on my speed too," Torune replied.
"You really need to work on your offence one day," Raidou said.
"But I don't want to hurt anyone," Torune replied.
"Alright, we take that another day. Kabuto, they've time for you at the hospital if you want to learn more there, or you can join us."
"I think I'll go to the hospital. My speed isn't what holding me back."
"Alright, you can decide yourself if you want to join us for lunch or not," Raidou said. "Now I will count how many rounds you can do in ten minutes. Torune, run as fast as you can. If you don't manage ten minutes you'll just take a break," Raidou explained.
He couldn't be expected to keep up with your near-unlimited stamina.
-x-
After training for the day was over you went back to Danzo's hideout. Since you were going away from some days, you better fill your quota so he didn't get too mad. You doubted that he'd actually follow up on his threat if didn't study enough, but there would be a cost to continue that you didn't want to pay. So you had to do your best now and see later how much you could get away with without complaints. Danzo wasn't stupid, so he would know to strike a balance to not scare you off completely.
You brought out your clone again as you needed someone who could help you test your seals. But as you tried summoning him, he just poofed away. What was wrong? You tried again and again, but the same result as the last time. what had changed?
Your fake leg, it was in the way for the clone. And you had no idea how to even detach the prosthetic limb and if you messed it up, Danzo would for sure punish you for it. Not all hope was gone, but the clone would probably hate you for not summoning him for several months.
You should improve your kunai defence seal. It was kind of useful now, but it had its limitations. The biggest problem was that kunai had to make real contact with your body so your clothes were in danger, but you still had no idea how to fix that. A much easier problem to solve was to stash more kunai into one seal so you should start there.
Storing explosions and storing kunai were completely different, one was energy and the other was matter, but should you at least try to replicate what you did with your upgraded explosion absorption seal? What would happen if the seal failed? If it just shot out the kunai, it wasn't bad, you could defend yourself from that. If it somehow made a giant kunai, which were quite unlikely, your seals might not be enough. You had no idea how flexible your seals were as you'd only tested with standard-issue kunai, but your intent when making it could have affected its performance. The third option was that it simply exploded, and you had no idea how to estimate that.
You could make it just to see if you sensed something from it. But you had no idea how to safely test it without getting in trouble. And you were definitely not going to ask Danzo for any more help. If you learnt how to protect yourself against explosions automatically, then the risk of getting blown up by a faulty seal would drop. It could even be part of your future fighting style. Blow up explosive seals at close range and have it only affect the attacker and not yourself. An anti-Taijutsu defence would be incredibly useful since you were going to be small and weak for a long time.
Thanks to your clone's reckless testing, you knew how to safely test the limits of your previous explosion absorption seal as it glowed a fair bit before it failed. And that was with your clone trying to push its limits.
But how could make it activate on explosions? Detecting the heat was one way, but then you risk it would go amock just by standing in the sun. The heat from an explosion and the sun was different, but still, it just felt like the wrong track to go down. And if you were going to make different ones for fire and explosions you needed something a bit more reliable. While you were waiting for divine inspiration, you started to create a solid stack of single-use kunai absorbers.
The sealing voices in your head were completely silent. It made sense, it didn't allow you to make seals out of nothing, you had to figure out the necessary piece first and you had non. Wait, could you use a stored explosion to compare against. No, that was the same as just using the kanji for explosion, it wouldn't help any. But maybe there could be something to it.
Shockwaves? No that was not specific enough as sound also counted as shockwaves, so it would activate when someone was talking to you and somehow record sound? That seemed a bit farfetched that it would only preserve the frequencies.
Maybe you should just go to bed? You had a mission the next so you should prioritize getting well-rested. You were at least not going to sleep here for the night, so you packed up what you needed and went back home.
-x-
The first thing you did in the morning was to check for kunai holes in your pyjama. A lot more holes than you had expected. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, and you might even have missed some. If he was going to be that active, your stock would run out much quicker than expected and you would need a new PJ. But at least you could feel safe in case an assassin only armed with a handful of kunai were to attack.
You heard knocking on the door. Before opening, you made sure to put on your forehead protector in case Danzo had plans to hit you in the forehead again.
When it was safely tied to your head, you opened the door. And you were happy to see that it was Shisui.
"Good morning Sota, why are your clothes full of holes?" he asked.
"D...," you tried saying but your tongue locked itself up. The seal didn't seem to activate on every mention of Danzo, but was this different as you tried to blame him for something? In the lack of words, you just put a hand over your right eye to imitate Danzo.
"Oh, I see, I still don't understand why, but I'm sure Danzo has a terrible reason for what he's doing," he replied. "Get dressed, get something to eat and meet up at the gates in an hour, it's time for our mission. I'll bring some food and water for the journey."
"Okay, I see you in an hour then," you replied.
-x-
An hour later and you arrived at the gate.
"Hi Shisui, what's wrong?" You asked, looking at him, something had to have changed the last hour.
"I think I seriously messed up on here. I'm sorry, we will not be alone after all." Shisui.
In front of you dropped an ANBU agent. White mask and dressed exactly like Shisui for some reason.
"Who are you?" Shisui asked.
"You can call me Crow, I will be leading this mission. Take this," he said and threw an identical mask to Shisui. "Put it on."
Shisui obeyed and they were quite similar. They didn't have the exact same build and this ANBU was a bit larger, but if you didn't see them side by side it would be quite hard to tell them apart.
"Your name for this mission will be Dove," Crow explained.
"What about Sota?" Shisui asked.
"He will be Sota," Crow said.
"Tell me what is going on here? This was not part of the plan. Do you have any paper on you proving your authority here?" Shisui asked.
Crow retrieved a scroll from his uniform and handed it to Shisui.
Shisui stopped to read it. "Danzo signed this and he got the mission from the Hokage. I've no idea what is going on here, I didn't think the Hokage would approve on Danzo sending Sota out on a mission."
"Who says that he knows?" Crow asked.
"I'm going to stop this right here," Shisui said.
"Are you sure?" Crow asked.
"What is it to not be sure about?" Shisui asked.
"I cannot guarantee for Sota's safety while you talk to the Hokage. He might get attacked and I'm not sure if I can defend him."
Shisui's eye turned red. No don't Shisui, don't reveal your Mangekyuu powers! But it stayed in its basic form.
"What is your plan? Kill me and run away with Sota?" Crow asked.
"I...," Shisui was lost for words.
"I hope the rest of your clan aren't that rebellious. You don't have to come, I and Sota can solve this mission alone," Crow said.
Shisui dropped to the ground and clutched his head.
"We'll be leaving now. Bye, Dove," Crow said and grabbed your hand and started to run. It was a bit hard to follow suit, but it was not faster than what was manageable. It was a miracle that your leg cooperated as well.
After just ten seconds, Shisui ran up along your side.
"You made the right decision Dove," Crow said.
"It's the best I can do to protect Sota," Shisui said.
"Why do you think Sota needs protection? The attack I talked about was just a joke, I can handle any threat on the way," Crow said.
"Can you at least tell us where we're going? I got no mission info," Shisui asked.
"Stop acting like a child and ask so many question Dove. But if you somehow get lost, you'll find us in Wave," Crow said.
"Why are Danzo sending ANBU to Wave?" Shisui asked.
"You don't need to know right now. I think you should take inspiration from Sota here and not ask so many questions."
-x-
A few hours later Crow stopped.
"We should take a break and get something to eat before we continue," Crow said. "Come with me Dove, I've something I need to take care of and I don't want you to be alone with Sota. Just in case you decide to run away with him."
Despite not being able to see Shisui's face, you could easily tell by the rest of his body language that he was not happy about it.
You really hoped Crow was just going to use the facilities, and not take him deeper into the woods to kill him. What were you going to do if he showed up alone? What could you about someone capable of killing Shisui? You had your explosive tags, but you had never tried them in actual combat yet and you had no idea how real ninja would deal with them. Most likely he would dodge and easily strike you back with his sword.
A few minutes later both of them showed up, so no need to worry about Shisui dying.
Shisui handed you a bento box and you began to eat. When Crow saw that you and Shisui were done eating, he got up again. "It's time to get going again."
He didn't grab your hand this time, so you were allowed to run for your own machine. But after just a few minutes it seemed like Crow was getting impatient and grabbed your hand again so he could speed up.
-x-
It was getting quite dark when Crow slowed down again and you could see an illuminated bridge in the distance. The Great Naruto Bridge. Or it wouldn't be called that for a few years, or rather this was an entirely different bridge.
"We'll make camp here for the night," Crow said.
"What are we doing here?" Shisui asked.
"Stop acting like a child Dove," Crow replied. "Be patient. You don't see Sota here complaining."
"Let us eat," Crow contiued.
Shisui handed you another box and you sat down to eat.
No one said much during the meal and when you were done, Crow rolled out a sleeping matt in front of you.
"I and Dove will take the first watch. Sleep so you'll be ready for your watch and not be too useless tomorrow."
You laid down trying to sleep, but it wasn't easy. Sleeping was a ninja skill you weren't that good at yet. Though you were not sure if you actually wanted to sleep now. You didn't like Crow at all and you would be up watching him if it was up to you.
After maybe an hour, you were still not able to sleep, but Crow and Shisui had started to talk.
"What is up with the masks?" Shisui asked.
"I don't see any problem with them?" Crow answered.
"Why isn't Sota wearing one?"
"Do you know why ANBU wear masks?"
"Do hide their identity?" Shisui asked.
"Wrong. It is to put a wall between their ANBU self and their normal self. Here you're Dove and any crimes you do on behalf of Konoha rests on the mask. But when you get home you're Shisui who has done nothing wrong and can sleep well at night."
"I don't see where you are going with this," Shisui said.
"Sota can't quit, he is a weapon for Konoha 24/7. His purpose is to do what's best for Konoha. Not to follow his own dreams, values or goals. It's time you and Itachi realize that he is not a normal kid," Crow said.
"I'm stopping this mission here, I've had enough of this," Shisui.
"Are you sure about that, you keep threatening that but you never follow through," Crow said and you could hear his muffled steps moving towards you.
You were glad that pretending to sleep was something you learnt in the academy. They rightfully assumed that academy students were too weak to make any opposition if any dangerous situation were to occur, so it was best to just pretend to sleep and listen in on what happened around you.
You focused on your breathing, making sure you didn't react to anything being said and move your eyes around to imitate dreaming.
You could feel the hot air coming from Crow as he was right in your face. But you just continued breathing at a steady pace.
"He's sleeping, so don't wake up him," Shisui said. "I can see his chakra with my Sharingan."
He got out of your face, but then your shirt was being pulled up and cold metal was brushing your stomach.
"I had quite fun with my sword last time. I'm sure you saw the damages and yet he keeps coming back. Maybe I should give him another lesson when we come back? Though I won't go easy on him this time," Crow said.
"I will not let you do that again?" Shisui said.
"What are you going to do about that Dove? If you come back alone everyone would know that you killed me. And when we're back in the village, I'm no longer Crow so there is nothing you can do to me."
"If you fail this mission, you will get in trouble with Danzo," Shisui argued.
"If I come back without you, I'll get away with it. Sure the boy might become more uncooperative if I kill you, but we can work on that."
Time to wake up to prevent Shisui from escalating the situation. He could solve this by using his Mangekyuu, but that would reveal the secret to Danzo and you could not let that happen.
You slowly broke your act and sat up, still keeping your eyes mostly shut. "Is it my turn already?" you mumbled.
"Yes," Dove said.
"I can take the next watch with him if you want," Shisui said.
"That won't be necessary, go to sleep, we can handle it," Crow said and turn to you. "Watch the bridge and the island and report back to me if you see someone heading towards us."
It was quite boring and you rather not piss off Crow by falling asleep. Wave itself was quite dark so there was nothing to see there. For the next hours, the best you could see was some cats wandering about on the bridge but no people.
"Sota, Crow is sleeping now so we can talk in private," Shisui said and sat down beside you.
"Are you sure he is sleeping?" You asked. "Crow didn't seem to notice that I was not really sleeping earlier, and I bet he's better at pretending than me."
"His chakra is too calm for him to be awake, but we can walk somewhere more private if you are afraid he'll wake up," Shisui suggested.
You took one look back at Crow just to make sure he was sleeping and not dropping his pretend as soon as you moved away.
"Alright, let's go," you said and followed Shisui.
"Should we really go this far away, we are kind of supposed to keep watch?" You asked him.
"Keeping watch here is just a formality, and I don't know about you, but I wouldn't mind him getting attacked in his sleep," Shisui said.
"And having you get in trouble for letting him die?"
"Don't worry Sota, Crow will be able to react to any potential threat we face here. It's not like missing-nin attack random ANBU for fun."
You had walked for perhaps five minutes when Shisui decided to stop.
"We should be safe here. Tell me everything Danzo is planning to do."
"Alright, some things might have changed since I got my vision but I'll tell you what I got initially. When Sasuke is eight, your clan will be planning a coup and Itachi were supposed to spy for the village on your clan. But it's not like Itachi would be spilling any information now that he would know what it's going to be used for. I don't know the timeline of everything or if Itachi has already hinted towards a coup," you explained. "For all I know, someone else might have taken up the task instead."
Not once did your seal lock up, was the seal limited to stopping you from saying things Danzo knew you knew?
"I'll ask Itachi about it next time we're alone," Shisui said.
"Good. But it's not enough to prevent the village from knowing what your clan is up to. If the coup happens your family will be in danger as there is no way you can win. And even if you win, it's not an outcome we can stand behind. A civil war might lead to the destruction of the village."
"So what can we do?" Shisui asked.
"I don't know. I fear if you tell Fugaku what Danzo is planning to do, he would just be even more secretly about everything and be more motivated to engage in a coup.
"You and Itachi need to convince him to make peace with the village somehow without telling him what will happen if you don't. But that's not all of our problems," you said.
"Something worse than my clan planning a coup and Danzo planning to kill us all?" Shisui asked.
"Uchiha Madara, or Uchiha Obito which is his real name. He was Kakashi's old teammate and was presumed dead during the war, but was somehow rescued and brainwashed by Madara. He might want your clan dead too, I don't know what he wants. All I know is that he will force Itachi to let him help if Itachi were to accept the mission. So if you wondered how Itachi would be able to take out your clan, that's the answer, he won't be alone."
"Can you tell me more about Obito?"
"I don't know everything you know," you said as you felt a bit uneasy telling Shisui too much. But at the same time, Itachi and Shisui had to be prepared for him.
"Could I and Itachi beat him if we were to find him?" he asked.
"No, not even the Fourth could beat him," you said.
"What does this Obito have to do with the Fourth?" He asked.
"Obito killed him. So when people blamed your clan for what happened during the Kyuubi attack, they weren't that far off," you explained.
"He can turn himself intangible passing through anything and disappear and appear from nowhere. If he wanted to, he could probably assassinate anyone he wanted to. He's dangerous and needs to be defeated. If you ever fight him, watch out for his chains and be aware that he can use his Sharingan to survive death for a limited amount of time," you continued.
"It sounds like your future vision is stronger than what you have shown earlier. Are you sure you're not dreaming it all up?"
"I cannot be completely sure. Somethings I get completely wrong. For all I know, there are no plans of a coup or Danzo isn't planning to kill you all. But should we really risk that?" You asked.
"You have shown that there is some truth to your powers in the past so I guess you're right," Shisui said.
"I'm just not sure if acting on any of this is smart or if I should just keep it to myself. Killing Danzo would be one way to prevent a lot of this. But with Danzo dead and Root dismantled, your clan might be encouraged to go ahead with the coup as the village won't be able to put up as much resistance without Root.
"You and Itachi just need to figure something out. Just know that I might be wrong. But the safest bet would be to make peace and not let Danzo know what you're doing. I don't want you to die," you told him.
"I won't die Sota," Shisui replied. "Is there anything else I should know?"
"Not really,"
"Alright, let's go back and hope that Crow hasn't woken up," Shisui said. "And let's pretend this didn't happen, we don't Crow to be suspicious."
"Wait, one more thing. I think Danzo has a Sharingan hidden under his bandages. I have no idea where he got it, but he might be able to cheat death with it too. If you ever are back into a corner, don't expect Danzo to stay dead. When it is over, he'll blow himself up and try to take you with him," Shisui.
"Thanks for the warning, we will manage this, don't worry," Shisui said. "But now we really need to get back now."
When you got back, you could see that Crow was still sleeping.
"You can go back to sleep if you want, you look tired," Shisui said.
"Thanks," you said and yawned. It was much easier to get to sleep now than earlier.
-x-
Next morning you woke up by Crow's kicking foot in your side. "Wake up."
You still felt like you hadn't got enough sleep, but you got up to avoid his wrath.
"We don't have any more food, so I want you to go into the village and buy some stuff for us. Here is a list of what we need and money to pay with," Crow said. "And watch out for anything suspicious or any foreign ninja. Don't engage them, just report back to us afterwards."
Wouldn't Itachi and Kakashi have caught that when they were in the village? Or were any enemy ninja more likely to hide from them than you?
"Alright," you replied and began walking towards the bridge, it would be easier if you could walk on the water, but that wasn't going to happen without your real leg.
"Wait for a second, I want you to give me your headband, I don't want them to see that you're a ninja. And ask around about the village and try to learn something about their success." Crow said.
You turned back and gave it to him before heading towards the village again.
You got into a steady tempo though far slower than what Crow had dragged you at the day before.
The bridge was already buzzing with activity when you got there and you needed to be careful to not get hit by any of the carts that were going around there.
You took it slow as you crossed the bridge to not upset anyone else there.
First on the list was some bread. So you had to try to find a bakery.
"Excuse me, do you know where I can buy bread," you asked a random bypasser.
"Over there," she said and pointed to a building on the other side of the street.
"Thanks."
Inside you could see an abundance of different bakery goods. It was amazing to see how well the place was doing before it all went to hell and Gato took over.
"Hi, can you help me. I've got a list of what I need here," you said and handed them the list you got from Crow.
"Let me see," she said and grabbed a paper bag and began filling it." That will be 300 Ryo."
You handed her the money and she gave you the bag.
"Thanks."
"It's my pleasure," she said. "You'll find the fish you need down at the harbour. Just follow the road to the right and the smell of fish should guide you the rest of the way. "
You followed their direction and saw some ships being loaded with goods. Along the pier was multiple fish stands. Some dealing with customers and other retrieving more goods from the ships docking next to them.
You walked past several of them to see if there was any difference in price, but they were all the same. Made sense, the competition would just match your prices if you went too low and everyone would lose money. So all that mattered was the amount they could sell. So you just went to a random man and did the same as you did at the bakery.
"That will be 600 Ryo," he said.
Looking through the pouch of money you had gotten. "Umm, I don't have enough," you said.
"Oh, how much do you have?" He asked.
"500 Ryo," you replied.
"Hmm. You know what, I'll cover the rest so don't have to get in trouble with your parents. You didn't buy sweats for them did you?" He asked.
"No," you replied.
"It's okay, let us be a secret between us two," he said.
"I just weren't given enough money," you said and handed him your remaining money."
"Here you go," he said.
"I am not from here, so can I ask you about the village?" You asked.
"Go ahead," he said.
"What makes this place so rich?"
"The import of crops from the land of fire helps a lot and the bridge makes it easier to transport goods to the village. Things were much worse before it came. We offer quite competitive prices, so most farmers prefer to sell it to us. Then we process it and ship it out of here for a higher price. And ships that come to buy our stuff also come with goods we can buy for a reasonable price. One good factor builds upon another and we've grown to be a decent trading hub. Konoha isn't too happy that we're taking so many resources out of the country, but what can they do about that?" he laughed.
"Thanks," you said and left the stand.
Was there anything else you wanted to see here? You didn't remember anything about the layout of this place. And you couldn't just go up to the bridge builder and act like an infrastructural fanboy.
So you headed back to Crow and Shisui before Crow got too impatient and you were a bit hungry now so breakfast was nice.
As you arrived back, they were already ready with a fire to cook the fish.
Who was who again?
"Crow here is the food," you said to make him reveal himself. "And you didn't give me enough money."
"And how did you handle that?" He asked.
"The fishmonger was nice and gave me the last fish for free."
"I hope you were ready to steal it from him if not," Crow said.
"I wouldn't abuse their hospitality like that," you said.
"Did you see anything?" He asked.
"Nothing," you replied.
"How do you know?" He asked.
"How do I know if I saw something or not? I didn't see anyone dressing up as a ninja," you said.
"You weren't dressed up like a ninja either. Does that makes you not a ninja?" He asked. "Next time look closer. Look for body language, how people walk or if they seem to take too much interest in something or paying too much attention to people around them," Crow said. "I will write it down in the report that you failed your task. But there is no reason to go back, you will look too suspicious now," Crow said.
"Thanks, I guess," you said. Spying was not for you.
"I'm not saying it won't be any consequences for you, but that is not up to me," he said.
Always keeping you on eggshells.
"So what are we going to do now?" You asked. It wasn't just a trip so you could buy Crow breakfast.
"We'll wait till nightfall again," he said.
More waiting. Was there something you could fill your time with?
"Shi…" you tried to say.
"It's Dove," Crow corrected you.
"Dove, do you think you could teach me the Body Flicker while we're waiting?"
"I'm not sure if you can use it effectively at the moment," Shisui replied.
"Can we at least try, I wouldn't be able to master it in a few hours anyway," you argued. "Sensei wants me to become faster and I should try to take advantage of my chakra as my short legs are of little use on their own," you argued.
"Alright, just don't tell Naruto anything, he might make me teach it to him too and I doubt he'll be capable of it at the moment. It will either be a headache to try to teach him something he's not ready to learn and if he should be able to do it anyway, I'll probably get visited by lots of angry ANBU blaming me for not being able to catch Naruto after his pranks."
"I won't tell him and I promise I won't use it to prank people," you said.
"I will be keeping watch on you two," Crow said behind you.
"Without the Sharingan, you will be limited in your use of the body flicker for a long time as your eyes cannot keep up with the increased speed. But what you can expect to be able to dash forward at a much greater speed than your running, but at the cost of chakra. So let us get started," he said.
Hours after hours went past with just small breaks in between. In the end, you only managed a short dash that not useful for much as you were too disoriented to act afterwards and you were not able to chain it.
Crow had just finished cooking up some more fish when he called for you to stop.
"Let's eat and then we can finish the mission," he said.
After you were done, Crow revealed the content of a bag that he had kept hidden. It was full of the explosives tags you had made for Danzo and you didn't need to be told why he brought them with him.
"Since you're not able to walk on walls, you'll be staying here. But you've already done most of the job by making the explosive tags so don't worry about not contributing," Crow wait.
Did Danzo bring you here just to see you ruin the economy of Wave? Why?
Crow and Shisui walked on the water towards the bridge and it was quite hard to see them in the dark if you didn't know they were there. You could see them climbing up each the columns one by one and slowly covered them with explosives. After a while, they got back.
"Now all that remains is that you set them off. Use as much chakra as you can," Crow said.
Why did it have to be you? But there was no point in protesting. You formed a snake seal and focused all your chakra into it.
The bridge lit up and a fraction of a second later a loud blast reached your ears. Small pieces were flying everywhere with some flying into the village. The entire construction fell into the water creating a big splash and sending out large waves in every direction.
"It's time for us to leave. I'll put in a good word for you, you've done a great job," Crow said.