Chapter Sixteen: The Investigation

With the irrefutable evidence that Rin laid on the table in front of the Third, the Hokage had no choice but to give Team Ro an official investigation warrant. Rin could tell that the Third was slightly disappointed, but she wasn't sure in what way. Disappointed that there was a possible insider job? Or disappointed that she decided to dig for the truth?

Either way, she didn't care. None of them cared because the very least they could do was find the truth for the Fourth.

While the council was embroiled in debate once more on whether or not to keep the Third in the Hokage position or elect a new Hokage, the seat belonging to the head of the Hatake clan was empty. But that was normal as the man had only filled the seat on two different occasions, often citing being too busy on missions to attend the more boring council meetings.

This council should have been one for Kakashi to attend, but he figured the investigation trumped being there and having his opinions constantly shot down by the Elders or Danzo. Besides, Itachi and Shisui were right outside of the council room, eavesdropping on the conversation. After the council, the two of them were to trail after Danzo, while Akemi and Momo, their cats, would follow the two Konoha elders.

On the other side of the village, Kakashi and Rin were trying to track down Orochimaru. It wasn't easy, especially since Rin wasn't familiar with his chakra signature having never met the man in person, while Kakashi's ninken didn't have a scent to follow.

After fishing information out of Jiraiya, who had returned upon hearing the death of his student, they learned Orochimaru hadn't been seen around in the village in a while. Since the Yondaime had taken the position of Fourth Hokage, Orochimaru had requested to be taken off of the active mission roster, claiming that the war took a toll on his mental health. From there, he was never placed back on the mission roster, and no one had really seen him around, save for a few glimpses here and there.

So imagine their surprise, after sneaking into the Hokage's archives once more which the security was much more lax, now the Fourth's seals were ineffective, to find that Orochimaru had taken a genin team. The formation of that genin team was particularly short, just under a year, as two of the members on the team died in an ambush during the war shortly after making it to chunin. The sole surviving student was a woman named Anko Mitarashi.

After scouring through the archives for Anko's files, they eventually found it.

"Average chunin," Kakashi commented. "Known to use jutsus taught by Orochimaru."

While Kakashi had been focused on the words written on the file, Rin was more focused on the picture of a young woman with light brown eyes and dark purple hair.

"She looks familiar. I think she was in the chunin exams when Obito and I took it the second time."

"So Orochimaru would have been at the exams, do you recall anything?"

"I don't remember," Rin admitted, flipping through the next pages of Anko's files that detailed the various missions she had completed. Most of them had been war related, then a couple after the war. The last mission completed was dated to almost four years ago.

"Why isn't she on the active mission roster? For shinobis our age, that is very unusual unless they were taken out of the village for training, but as far as we know, Orochimaru is still in the village."

"You were also taken off the roster," Kakashi pointed out.

"Yeah, but people still saw me around the village. If Anko was training in the village, then we would have seen her at some point, right? Orochimaru too."

"Orochimaru is a hard man to miss," Kakashi agreed. "Perhaps we can ask Shisui. He was in the same academy class as Anko, after all."

When they later met up with Itachi and Shisui to report their findings, Shisui didn't recall much about Anko other than the fact that she existed. That could have also been attributed to the fact that Shisui graduated early, only spending two years at the academy compared to the normal five years.

They dispersed once more, spending the next two weeks following their respective targets. By the end of the two weeks, Akemi and Momo cleared the Konoha elders from suspicion, having done nothing out of the ordinary. From their private conversations that the cats overheard, they were genuinely regretful for the loss of the Fourth. The constant rift between their views and the Fourth could merely be chalked up to generational differences.

Shisui and Itachi continued to follow Danzo, their suspicions of certain activities done by members of the Anbu were growing. The Root members, Kakashi had called it. They continued to dig deeper.

Kakashi managed to find Jiraiya at a bar, on one drunken occasion. Taking advantage of the opportunity, knowing the Sannin hardly remembered anything other than "pretty ladies" the next day, Kakashi tried to grill him on Orochimaru, directly. On numerous occasions, Jiraiya had tried to wave him off, citing that he was here to let loose and not talk about his former teammate.

Rin would never know, but Kakashi eventually sighed in defeat and henged into a woman with long, brown hair, big doe eyes, and a curvy body. That immediately caught Jiraiya's attention and the information slipped easily from his mouth. Never once did the Sannin ever wonder why a civilian woman was fishing shinobi information from him.

By the time that Kakashi left the bar and met up with Rin, he felt the bile rising in his throat. Again and again, Kakashi tried to keep his dinner down, often taking sips of water from his canteen. When Rin saw him, she noted his unusually pale complexion. A simple 'don't ask' had been enough to keep her from prying.

Thank Kami.

Kakashi would never live it down if anyone found out the stunt he had pulled, even if it was for the sake of a mission. Perhaps he should have just retreated after all and let Rin do it.

All of that just to retrieve a special kunai from Jiraiya, who had let it slip it had been the only gift he received from Orochimaru. By now, the scent would have mostly been covered with Jiraiya's, but he hoped that Pakkun's nose would be sharp enough to differentiate.

Slamming his palm to the ground, letting the black marks spread outwards, a puff of smoke appeared. Before him stood Pakkun, looking smaller than he had before. Or perhaps it was Kakashi that had been growing.

"Boss," Pakkun greeted lazily, moving to stand on his four feet. He let out a yawn, blinking a couple of times before he finally registered the two humans that stood in front of him. His eyes flickered from Kakashi to Rin, before back to Kakashi then to Rin again.

"Whoa, you two have grown so much."

The last time Kakashi had summoned him had been about a year ago, on the mission in Iwa. With Kakashi hiding behind his Anbu mask and Rin not present at the time, Pakkun didn't get a good look at that time. Not to mention the dire situation they were in.

But now seeing the five year old kid who signed the summoning contract turn into a teenager was shocking. Even more so to see the small brat now tower over his female teammate with ease.

Rin laughed at Pakkun's comment, reaching out her hands to allow Pakkun to jump on it. He walked all up the length of her arms, before resting himself on her shoulder.

"Tsk, I think I like Rin better than you," Pakkun stated.

"Maa, Pakkun. We have a mission to work on."

Kakashi held out the kunai that he retrieved from Jiraiya. "Can you figure out the scents on here?"

Pakkun took a whiff. "Jiraiya sama? And the other one...smells like dead snakes. It's very faint."

"I see. Can you seek him out? We believe Orochimaru is still somewhere around the village."

"Dead snakes, huh. Call the rest of the pack."

Kakashi agreed, summoning the other seven dogs of his pack. He squatted down onto the ground, extending his hand outward and allowed the dogs to circle around to sniff.

"I want you to find the one that smells like dead snakes," Kakashi instructed. "Don't engage. Report back to Rin if you find anything."

Rin shot him a questioning look. "I have something to do. I'll catch up with you later."

The eight dogs scattered, Kakashi leaving as well. He supposed he should return the kunai before Jiraiya became sober again…

The more that Rin dug, the more worried she had become. Records of missing children, not only from Konoha, but all around the Land of Fire had been reported for many months. The earliest incident to be reported dated back to almost a year and a half ago, but it had been chalked up to an isolated incident.

Yet in the recent months, the incidents were being reported at an alarming rate, in an increasingly large quantity. What were the odds that children went missing, two at a time? Five in a single week?

There didn't seem to be a pattern in the time intervals, except that it was occurring more frequently now. Unless...many went unreported.

The only commonality that Rin was able to find was the victims. All children under the age of twelve. Most of the orphans or had single parent civilians. No one was noted to be from a prominent clan.

Easy to miss, Rin concluded. If it hadn't been the diligence of Konoha's orphanage in doing a roll call every night, Rin suspected about 80% of these cases would go unnoticed. Who would notice a missing child, among the hundreds that became orphans in the aftermath of the war?

An investigation had been conducted a month ago to track down the missing children. The trail went cold and the case was quietly tabled.

None of the children were ever seen again, not even a body was found.

Three days ago, Kakashi's ninken reported back, having found a secret entrance hidden in one of the many corners of the Konoha library. According to them, there was a faint trace of the dead snake's smell, along with the stench of death.

They were ordered to observe the entrance, but three days of taking shifts, the dogs never saw anyone coming out of the entrance. Kakashi suggested the idea of another exit, but the dogs insisted they couldn't find another. Either the exit was too far removed from where the dead snake stayed, if he even was there at all, or it had been a long time since the dead snake used the other exit.

When another child was reported from the orphanage, Rin sent Pakkun to sniff out the area. The scent wasn't the dead snake's, Pakkun had told her, but the person who had done it definitely made contact with the dead snake recently, from the lingering traces of dead snake on his scent.

It was then that Rin decided that they needed to infiltrate the place. Whether or not Orochimaru was connected with the Fourth's death, the high possibility that he was connected with the kidnapping of children couldn't be ignored. Not when some of the children could still be alive.

Itachi and Shisui were preoccupied with clan matters that evening and couldn't join Kakashi and Rin in infiltrating the place, but told them that they would inform the Hokage of the situation.

Dressed in the Anbu uniform, the two of them agreed to meet after the library closed at ten o'clock, to avoid causing panic among the rest of the villagers. The other seven dogs were sent back, while Pakkun stayed, ready to lead the two of them towards the dead snake.

With only a sliver of moonlight spilling into the library from a nearby window, Rin could barely see anything. It had been so dark, her eyes almost missed the signal that Kakashi flashed at her, indicating for her to step back, while he opened the entrance. She did as he asked, her senses highly alert for any other chakra signatures.

There were none from the outside, but she could feel the faint pulse of multiple chakra signatures in the direction of the entrance. Their chakra networks were extremely hard to detect, even harder than an adult civilian's because they were undeveloped.

Common among children.

Upon figuring that out, Rin was itching to head in, but Kakashi was taking his time in making sure that no traps would be triggered upon release. After a thorough inspection, Kakashi was finally satisfied and pulled off a book off the highest shelf, before pulling the lever hidden behind the thick book. The bookshelf groaned, sliding to the right at an agonizing slow pace.

Both Kakashi and Rin backed away from the entrance as the movement of the bookshelf sent dust flying everywhere. Pakkun had scrunched up his nose in discomfort, clearly having taken a big whiff of the dust.

When the dust settled, a dark tunnel was revealed. Pakkun was the first to move, leaping forward to avoid the pile of dust at the entranceway. Kakashi followed, motioning for her to do the same.

It was pitch black. At first, Rin could still see the silver of Kakashi's hair, but the further they got into the tunnel, the less she could see. In the end, Rin resorted to feeling out Kakashi's chakra signature and following it after she ran face first into a wall, missing the fact that there was a turn. The only indication that either of them noticed her blunder was an amused snort from Pakkun.

Fifteen minutes since entering the tunnels, they were still navigating their way through it. No doubt designed to let anyone who didn't know the route to die in one of the many dead ends that the tunnels had to offer.

Kakashi suddenly stopped, leading to Rin almost running into his back. With a snap of his fingers, Kakashi managed to light a small fireball at the tip of his pointer finger, allowing them to see the intricate markings on the door.

"A seal," Rin whispered, running her fingers on the markings. "We need a counter seal to open it. If we try to get through by force, it will explode."

Kakashi nodded as Rin dug through her weapons pouch for a blank tag and a paintbrush. Lighting up the rest of his fingers with tiny fireballs, Kakashi angled it so the light revealed the entirety of the seal.

Definitely the work of a skilled fuinjutsu user, but nowhere near as intricate or as difficult to counter as the Uzumaki's. Still, it would take her a bit of time since she was nowhere near her sensei's level.

While Rin worked on the counter seal, Kakashi peered over her shoulder to see her work, once in a while correcting her minor mistakes. Her sigh of frustration was audible as she pulled out another blank tag and began rewriting the sequence all over again.

Three wasted tags later, Rin finally finished the counter seal and slapped it on the center of the door. Channelling a bit of chakra to the tag, Rin activated the seal, watching the markings on the door light up, before dying down.

The door slid open. Kakashi allowed the fire to fizzle out as he got down on his knees and hands and crawled through the entrance after Pakkun. Rin followed.

The room looked to be a typical laboratory, save for its unusual location. A light layer of dust coated the countertops as well as the cloth that covered some of the equipment. The beakers and test tubes were all cleaned, placed in their respective places in the shelves underneath the countertops. A lone lab coat hung on the coat rack. Outdated medical books filled the bookshelves.

Pakkun busied himself by trotting around the room, sniffing in every corner of the room. He took specific interest in one particular tile in the floor, scratching at it with his paws. Kakashi headed over to him, knelt down beside him and felt the edges of the tile.

A fake tile.

Retrieving two kunais from his holster, Kakashi used the sharp tips of it to slide it underneath the tiles. Pushing down, the force was enough to push the fake tile out of place, swinging it upward.

It was only when they descended down the stairs through the hidden entrance did the smell of death finally hit Rin's less sensitive nose. Pakkun openly grimaced at the stench, using his paw to rub uncomfortably at his nose. Kakashi fared slightly better, only because his mask helped to ease the smell quite a bit.

The last time Rin had smelled anything of this magnitude was on the battlefield, where corpses from both sides littered the field. Bravely, the three of them crossed the room, pushing open the door that was half hidden behind another bookshelf.

The room was dimly lit, the only source of light coming from the containers. The containers...which contained children floating in the unknown liquid. Wires were attached to their bodies, connecting to the edge of the container, which led a sole machine at the very end of the room.

If all of those similarities weren't enough, all of them were dead. Dead for so long that decomposition had already started, leading to some of the faces to be unrecognizable.

A low chuckle echoed throughout the silent room.

"You aren't supposed to be here." Rin could only see the silhouette outline of the man at the doorway, but there was no doubt in her mind that it was Orochimaru. Who knew that his chakra felt this...malicious?

The killing intent coming from Orochimaru's body was so strong that it paralyzed the two of them. Pakkun had poofed out of existence, unable to handle the unrelenting pressure drop in the air. Kakashi's visibly shaking hands moved to grab his sword, successfully unsheathing it. But he couldn't hold the sword steady in front of him, not with every muscle in his arm trembling.

"I suppose I can't ask the two of you to keep quiet about this, can I?" Orochimaru mused, chuckling to himself. "Of course not. Two of the Yellow Flash's students...probably has as much of a bleeding heart as he did. It's a shame that you won't join my research, Rin chan; your medical expertise is practically unrivaled."

A shiver went down her spine as she watched Orochimaru's longer than normal tongue lick his kunai.

"I will never participate in such sickening research."

Orochimaru chuckled. "And with such research, I am able to bring dead people back to life. Don't you want your sensei back? All you have to do is help me find the method to immortality."

"Immortality? That's impossible."

"As was reanimation, but you see that I made it possible. Perhaps, you'll believe me when I show you."

Whatever Orochimaru was doing, it wasn't good. Rin moved to stop him, but found her body frozen still. Damned paralysis. With all of her strength, her trembling hand moved to grab a kunai. Right as Orochimaru finished his sequence of hand seals, slamming the palm of his hand against the ground, Rin fought off the stiffness in her hand and sent the kunai straight into her thigh.

The pain was enough to break the paralysis genjutsu. Rin jumped at Kakashi, pushing her chakra into his body to dispel the genjutsu, before tackling him to the ground as a very familiar three pronged kunai sailed over their heads, embedding itself into the wall behind him.

The two students stared wide eyed at the man who looked just like the Fourth Hokage. Except for the peeling skin, almost like it was paper, and the blackness where the white of the eyes were supposed to be, the figure was a carbon copy of their teacher.

But it wasn't him.

"Rin, Kakashi," the carbon copy murmured, staring regretfully down at his two former students.

"Our sensei is dead," Kakashi hissed. "Don't play games with us." Picking himself up from the ground and dragging Rin along with him, Kakashi held his sword out in front of him, channelling lightning chakra throughout it. This time, the sword stayed steady in his grip.

"Oh, but it's very much real," Orochimaru chuckled. "Say something to convince your students that it is you, Minato kun."

Carbon copy Minato fought back, but eventually Orochimaru's orders overrode his own will and Minato found himself spilling details about Kakashi that Orochimaru wouldn't have known.

Kakashi's jaw clenched.

"Sensei," Rin whispered, taking small steps forward, towards the carbon copy. Kakashi latched onto her arm, pleading at her not to, but Rin merely shrugged his arm off.

Follow my cue. Rin signed behind her back as she continued forward, almost like she was in a trance. Orochimaru's sinister smirk grew larger.

"Are you convinced now?"

The tips of Rin's fingers brushed against carbon copy's hand, before her hand snaked around and weaved her fingers through Minato's hand.

"We'll get revenge for you, don't worry," Rin whispered. A flash of blue chakra emitted from Rin's hands before carbon copy Minato's hand exploded into a million pieces. Rin moved, reaching into her weapons pouch and slapped a movement restricting seal on the carbon copy's forehead. Orochimaru hissed at Rin's deception, sword extending out of his mouth to stab her when Kakashi intercepted him, deftly knocking the sword out of his mouth.

"You're my opponent," Kakashi stated through gritted teeth as he jumped to avoid the snake heads that emerged from Orochimaru's sleeve.

Using a short distance teleportation jutsu, Rin teleported both herself and carbon copy Minato to the corner. The movement restricting seals wouldn't hold long, not if Minato tried to break out of it, so Rin made quick work of emptying Minato's pockets of all of his special kunais. Rin tore the sealing formulas off of all of them, ripping them to pieces thereby rendering them useless, before she unsealed chakra binding ropes from one of her many storage scrolls and binding up the reanimated body.

Minato smiled while he watched his student work. His blown off arm was slowly repairing itself.

"You'll have to seal me away," Minato told her, while he still had control over his own body and mind. Kakashi was doing a good job at keeping Orochimaru occupied, Minato noted.

"How? I don't have any jutsu for that."

"Listen-" Minato clamped his mouth shut as he felt the familiar pull on his body's core as his mind and feelings began to shut down.

All that he could hear in his head were orders to kill the two Anbus before him.

Before Rin could finish the last knot on the rope, Minato broke out, flashing to his last functioning three pronged kunai. The first one that he had thrown after being reanimated.

Yanking the kunai out of the wall, Minato launched it at Rin. Ducking to the side, the kunai narrowly missed her, but she had exactly one second to pull out her kunai to block Minato, who had flashed to her location, picked up his kunai once more, and raised it to slash at her.

The muscles in her arms quivered under the force that Minato was using.

Even if she had gotten rid of most of his kunais, Rin recalled the marking on herself. Once placed, the marking never disappears, according to Minato's instructions in his letter.

As Rin continued to parry every one of her sensei's blows, her mind raced to recall the weaknesses he had written about in his letter. One of them had been the high amount of chakra reserves to be sustainable in battle, but Rin knew her sensei always had a larger chakra reserve. And his reanimation body didn't seem to deplete chakra at all.

It's also possible for the person who is marked to erase my mark with a counterseal.

A counterseal! But Rin didn't have time to figure out a counter seal to rid herself of the marking Minato placed on her long ago, not when Minato relentlessly attacked her.

Spotting one of the containers nearby, Rin allowed herself to be maneuvered until her back hit glass. As expected, Minato formed the Rasengan in hand, raising it to smash it right into her. At the last possible second, Rin ducked out of the way, letting his jutsu smash into the glass. The contents of the container exploded, sending a shower of water and glass everywhere.

Rin had been ready to counter Minato, expecting him to teleport to the seal on her body.

"Kakashi!"

But he didn't, instead teleporting himself to the seal on Kakashi's body and was able to heavily injure Kakashi's left arm, as he had been too slow to react. Blood dripped down the length of his arm, soaking the cloth and stained the metal plate of his arm guard.

Rin summoned a water jutsu, using the contents of the liquid from the container as base, launching it at Orochimaru and Minato. Taking advantage of the momentary cover, Rin jumped in to drag Kakashi away from the two of them.

Of course right as she put some semblance of distance between themselves and Orochimaru, Rin sensed the fluctuation of Minato's chakra. Pushing Kakashi behind her, her body immediately jerked on impact as she felt a kunai jammed into her ribcage. Her left hand grabbed ahold of the three pronged kunai, preventing Minato from dislodging it from her ribs as her right hand, already formed with a chakra scalpel, swung down, cleanly slicing his head off of his body.

The head began to reform instantly, but Rin didn't allow it. Channeling her chakra into Minato's torso once more, she allowed it to spread throughout until it activated Isobu's destructive chakra mix, making the entirety of his body explode. A pile of paper fluttered to the ground. Among it was a kunai with a tag attached to it. Reaching for the kunai, Rin ripped off the tag, tearing it into two.

The reforming instantly stopped. The scraps of paper stayed still.

And Orochimaru was gone.

Pocketing the broken seal, Rin made quick work of healing both her and Kakashi's injuries.

"A highly formidable opponent," Kakashi grunted. "As expected of a Sannin. We're no match for him."

Rin nodded grimly. "We need to inform the Hokage of Orochimaru's escape." Kakashi summoned Pakkun once more, ordering him to pass along the message to the Hokage. Pakkun was gone in a flash.

While they waited for Anbu reinforcements, the two of them took their time to scour through the rest of his hideout. More dead bodies were found, all of them in test tube like containers. From the notes that Orochimaru left behind, Rin concluded all of them were used for his purpose of immortality as Orochimaru studied all of the different children's structural DNA in hopes to find what made some live longer than others.

Of the hundreds of children that were here, there was one alive, but barely.

Kakashi found Anko lying on the floor, her pulse weak. There was a black mark on her neck, in the shape of three commas that pulsed on her neck, greedily sucking away all of the girl's chakra.

"We'll have to perform the Curse Sealing on her to contain it," Rin told him. "I sense the Anbu. Tell them to take her to the hospital." While Kakashi left to do as she asked, Rin continued searching. In the process, she found more dead bodies, thick lab journals that detailed all of the failures in each of his experiments, and so many tubes full of unknown substances. Rin wasn't sure she even wanted to break down the components to figure out what was there.

And finally, Rin found his collection of plants. Next to his collection was a lone pippet, still half full of a clear liquid. Unravelling one of her scrolls, Rin squeezed one drop onto the parchment, followed by one drop of the antidote she made for the poison. The liquid hissed as it mixed together, the droplet fizzling out until the paper was dry again.

It was a match.

Orochimaru murdered the Fourth Hokage.

A/n: Hi again!

It's not Danzo this time, but don't worry, he will appear later on in the story. But I think Orochimaru would have enough motivation to kill Minato; he did want the Fourth Hokage seat after all. And he got to test the very first modeling of the reanimation jutsu.

And well, this concludes the Kyuubi attack/Fourth Hokage death arc. The arc that everyone has been waiting for will be coming up very soon, but I think the next chapter is one of my favorites. You'll see why, soon. :)

The next chapters is called A Fragile Boy.

Thanks for reading! Until next time!

-MM