How in the Nine Hells is he moving like that?
Neji takes another deep breath, trying to calm his temper before Shikamaru manages to trip it again .
More than thirty minutes into the match, and Neji still hasn't managed to land a single blow .
Shikamaru is the definition of a slippery bastard; he's fast and he knows it, but he doesn't settle for simply ducking Neji's attacks. Sometimes he'll counter them or simply bat them aside, each time with such a minimal exertion of energy and efficiency of movement that Neji doesn't actually know how he's doing it.
The arena is a mess of broken stone tile thrown up by Neji's Palm Rotation and Heavy Palm strikes, not a single one of which has made any kind of contact. Shikamaru obviously isn't stupid enough to get within the range of his Sixty-Four Palms , outside of that first few minutes meant to rattle Neji's equilibrium, and his shadows make him extremely evasive at long range.
"What's the matter?" Shikamaru taunts from the periphery of Neji's striking distance. "Getting a little winded there?"
Neji grits his teeth, gripping hard to his composure. It's a false facade though– for all the wide range and obvious power of his jutsu, the Gentle Fist taijutsu demands a great deal of chakra to preform.
"Now who's running their mouth?" He returns, throwing Shikamaru's earlier words back at him, in an attempt to regain some mental ground.
But the words garner a response opposite to their intended purpose; the Nara smirks , a cut of a smile that only pulls at one side of his mouth, that flash of challenge firing off in his dark eyes again.
"Gotta catch me to shut me up, Hyuuga," the Nara goads, cocking his head to the side, "And you haven't managed that yet."
Neji lunges sharply forward again, leading with a heavy palm that again cleaves through nothing but air as the Nara ducks it sideways and leaps, tucks his body into a neat whirl and lands nimbly at Neji's 4 o'clock, fingers flicking through signs.
The Nara spins and kicks out and a wave of fire follows the movement, dark violet and searing hot, arcing out in a roaring flood; Katon: Black Fire Surge.
Neji has no choice but to counter with the full defence of his Palm Rotation, twisting his body and his chakra into the complex defensive technique to counter the rush of flame. The fire parts around him, crashing against the walls and breaking on the stone tiles, but the flames stick, linger in patches on the ground around them like napalm, even as the main body of the jutsu dissipates.
Neji doesn't rest on his laurels; he can't if he wants to have any chance in hell of catching his slippery bastard of an opponent, honing in on Shikamaru only to have him leap away again, dodging his advances with enviable agility and a careless sort of grace that is really starting to piss Neji off .
"Will you just stand still ?" He snarls in frustration, and much to Neji's supreme surprise, Shikamaru does.
The problem is that so does Neji.
Neji freezes face to face with Shikamaru, immobilized at a crouch, mirroring the Nara's own posture. Shikamaru's fingers are curled into an unfamiliar hand sign, and when the Nara straightens, Neji is forced to mimic the movement.
Neji fights the phantom hold, outrage mixed with the faintest edge of panic as his normally formidable strength does nothing against the strange power controlling his movements. Shadow Possession.
Neji kicks himself for not noticing the set up for what it was– the scattering of still flickering fires around the arena are more than enough to cast thick, heavy shadows and bolster the presence of Shikamaru's own.
The Nara shifts a little, stretching out his back and humming thoughtfully. Neji feels his spine straighten against his will, despite how much his every muscle is tensed against it.
"Ouch. I'm sensing some control issues here, Hyuuga." Shikamaru drawles.
Neji decides to indulge in the direct approach. "The second I'm free Nara, you're dead ."
Shikamaru just snorts. "Empty threats now, Neji? 'Cuz this looks like game over to me."
" What? "
Shikamaru just smiles, lazy and slow with a confidence edging in on smug. "Time's up, Hyuuga. Checkmate."
Before Neji can even begin to try and contemplate what that means Aoba's voice cuts his thoughts short.
"Time Call! Tie; dual victory! Favor; Nara Shikamaru!"
Neji's eyes flare wide, realization striking, and he grinds his teeth hard. You've got to be kidding me.
Shikamaru shifts and releases his hand sign, the unnatural force of control sliding away like the slink of Shikamaru's shadow back towards its master.
The Nara steps out of the conflict with the same ease as he's done everything else, words coasting over the air between them so quietly Neji almost misses them.
"That tunnel vision of yours is gonna get you killed at some point." He murmurs neutrally as he turns away, and it doesn't sound like the threat it implies, or even a warning; almost like they haven't spent the last hour fighting at all. "Might want to broaden your view before someone does it for you."
He's gone before Neji can even think to contemplate a response.
"Why the heck do you have to have first patrol?" Naruto complains.
"It's stupid." Sasuke agrees. "You're our teacher right? The Jounin-sensei's are considered off duty."
"Village alert status. All Jounin and Tokujou have been placed on emergency rosters tonight, barring extenuating circumstances." Kakashi explains, slipping freshly sharpened kunai into his thigh pouches. Sakura had given them to him, having claimed she sharpened too many during the exams out of boredom anyway. "I'll be back before midnight. Naruto; don't forget to feed the pack, and make sure they stay home and guard the house unless I call them. Sakura; make sure Sasuke remembers to take his restorative and that you have everything Ryouta gave you for emergencies on hand. Sasuke; your only job is to rest and keep off your chakra.
"Don't need to tell me twice, sensei." Sasuke mutters.
Kakashi nods. "You three know what to do in case of trouble?"
"Head straight for Iruka's." Sakura recites diligently. "We know, sensei."
Kakashi takes an audible breath and settles down on his haunches, resting a hand on Sakura's shoulder and rubbing his knuckles through Naruto's golden hair fondly. "I know you do, brats." He assures and then stands again, adjusting the shuriken net tucked in neat spirals around his arm beneath his long-sleeve shinobi top, one rigged with some of Naruto's favorite elemental exploding tags. "Stay in and stay safe."
"We will." Sakura assures.
"Hurry back!" Naruto calls as he disappears into the Jounin standby station, and Kakashi flips them a lazy salute, a gesture that to them serves as well and a wholehearted agreement. Sakura watches him go and finds herself wishing they could go with him. She doesn't like sitting still when there's a crisis going on, likes far it less so when there's a bastard out there gunning for Sasuke.
They start off for home at a civilian pace, which quickly irritates Sasuke– who starts to vehemently curse the stupid seal under his breath. She and Naruto know it's because he doesn't like feeling weak, feeling vulnerable , and so Naruto distracts him with theories about how the thing might work and how the way Sasuke's chakra is reacting to it is a good sign, and Sakura absently takes his vitals with a loose hand around his wrist.
Naruto stalls as they turn a corner towards the compound, obviously sensing something. His eyes land on a familiar figure outside the dango stand down the street. "Hey, Hinata!"
The Hyuuga looks up, blinking moonstone eyes, and smiles brightly. "Naruto! Are guys heading home?" She asks kindly, jogging towards them. Her white clan robes are still absent, making the embroidery on her obi stand out all the more against her armour silk.
"Self imposed curfew," Sakura explains, "Since that snake bastard might still be lurking somewhere in the village."
"Going somewhere?" Sasuke asks, noting the duffle slung across her shoulder.
Hinata smiles sheepishly, embarrassed. "I'm uh, staying at the inn tonight." She admits. "For the sake of my sister and Neji both, it's best I'm not home right now."
"Then inn? That's not exactly safe on a night like this." Sasuke says sternly.
Hinata shrugs. "It's my only option at the moment, and I brought all the proper barrier seals and alarm tags. Normally I'd ask Kiba if I could stay with him, but his mother and my father were on the same genin team." She smiles again, a little wry. "I won't put him in a position like that."
Sakura hums in understanding, giving her arm a squeeze. Hinata leans into it a little, which is quite a step up for her– touch based comfort is not something common in the harsh social structure of her clan, and it had taken her a while to warm up to the idea.
"Yeaaaah, nope." Naruto says suddenly, a declaration completely without context, and Hinata blinks at him.
"What?"
Sakura laughs and sidles up to her, swiping her duffle and draping an arm across her shoulders in a gesture of support. She knows the decision behind the grin on Naruto's face, agrees without even needing to say so out loud. Sasuke is the same of course; even exhausted as he is the two still exist in terrifying tune with one another, thoughts obvious even when they remain unspoken.
"You'll stay with us then." Sasuke clarifies. "It only makes sense."
Hinata looks both floored and flustered by the statement, like she hadn't really thought of it but recognises that she probably should have. "A-are you sure? I wouldn't want to impose…"
"You kidding? We have more space than we really know what to do with anyway." Naruto insists. "And we'd way rather you stay with us than an inn, so long as you don't mind ninken fur everywhere."
"She's on a team with Kiba, idiot." Sasuke points out.
Naruto sticks his tongue out at him. "At least I'm not the one who has to clean all the beds as soon as I can lift a brush again."
Sasuke bristles. "We were attacked by an S-class missing nin . That doesn't count ."
"Bet's a bet, jerk. It totally counts."
The two dissolve into bickering, as is par for the course, and Hinata giggles.
"Thanks, you guys." Hinata says again, because she feels it's worth repeating as she crosses the threshold of the Hatake main house. "You didn't have to do this."
"We said it's no trouble and it's not." Sasuke reminds her plainly, dropping immediately onto the couch in the living room and shutting his eyes, listing sideways until he's lying on his back.
Hinata eyes him worriedly, but Naruto assuages her anxiety with a toothy smile as he sets his scrolls down on the table. "He's alright, just needs some shut-eye."
And she'd expected this to be awkward, even if only a little; she's usually only in the Hatake main house when it's filled with people, with friends and senseis and the assorted Tokujo and Jounin they can bully training tips out of with subtle threats, puppy eyes, and the promise of good food.
But it still feels like home in a way she's never been able to equate to the cool sterile halls of the Hyuuga compound; the air holds a warmth to it that seeps in through the skin, the fur rugs and carvings adding character and softness to the efficient corners, the broad windows and wide clear doors bringing in the beauty of the nature around them to blend with the natural browns and greys and whites of wood and stone and paper.
It's radiant with the energy and personality of team 7– she sees Naruto in unfurled scrolls spiderwebbed with annotations and notes, in the handful of empty ramen bowls scattered on the counter and left abandoned on the sink, in the array of odd artifacts and books in every nook. She sees Sasuke in the assorted weapons leaning against the walls or laid out amongst jars of metal oil and whetstones, in the kata and design scrolls rolled out over the coffee table, in the colourful feathers she spies peeking out of the edges of well worn historical accounts. She sees Sakura in rolls of salve-layered gauze and jars of medicine, in chakra point diagrams what would look at home in the Hyuuga archives, in the hairline fractures in the edges of the tables from the tap of too-strong fingers.
She's worried about it being awkward for the first few minutes after Sakura sets her up in the guest room and shows her where she can find a bath and a snack and a quiet place for her evening exercises, stepping over ninken darting through the halls as they get ready to change house patrols.
But the nervous energy and strange social hiccups she expects never come. Team 7 fold her into their nightly routine with an ease she doesn't quite understand, and they spend over an hour sitting around Sasuke in the living room and talking over strategy for the exam between conversation about favorite foods or places to train and interesting ninjutsu. And the more they talk, the more relieved she is that she doesn't have to face any of them in the first round of the exam tournament.
A soft rap on the door causes one of the ninken to bark an alert.
"I got it." Naruto calls, hopping nimbly to his feet and heading for the door to undo the traps. Hinata looks up from her absent game of Shogi to follow his progress, but turns back to the board at Sasuke's insistence, so that she won't miss the move he makes. Sakura has dibs on the winner, watching the proceedings as she brushes out the fur of the smallest of their sensei's ninken.
"Iruka-sensei!"
The declaration brings around the attention of every head in the living room this time, and Hinata beams when she sees her favorite teacher– after Kurenai-sensei– step into the room, Naruto hanging happily off his shoulder.
Iruka's smile is bright and indulgent, and he bears the extra weight of the Genin with good grace despite the plethora of bags draped over his arms.
"I came to make sure everyone was doing alright." He says as he adjusts the bags on his arms. "Sakura, sweetheart, could you come help me with this?"
"Of course!" Sakra chirps immediately, depositing Bisque under Sasuke's arm and darting to Iruka-sensei's side.
Iruka hands them all over to her without hesitation, and Sakura holds them one handed while she uses the other to peak at what's inside. Whatever the contents are make her squeal with delight, and she darts off into the kitchen. Iruka laughs, lifting his eyes, and spots Hinata by the coffee table.
"Oh, Hinata! Are you spending the night here this evening, my dear?"
She nods, a reflexive flush dusting her cheeks.
Iruka inclines his head back. "Wise, I think."
He stoops to kneel down next to Sasuke and Naruto drops off his shoulder, skirting sideways as Iruka-sensei presses the back of his hand to Sasuke's forehead. He hisses a breath through his teeth at the temperature, and Hinata sees Naruto suppress a flinch.
"Ryouta said you might have a fever." Naruto hops up to sit on the back of the couch as Sasuke sits up to lean against the armrest.
"I'm fine." The Uchiha grumbles crossly, obviously uncomfortable with all the attention, and Hinata figures an audience probably isn't helping things.
"I'll go make a cool compress." She declares, and eases to her feet. She thinks she recalls seeing some hand towels in the linen closet down the hall when Sakura had gotten her a spare fuuton.
To her surprise, Naruto hops into motion when she does. "Lemme help."
It takes her aback mostly because Naruto's spent the whole of his time since the incident with the strange snake shinobi hovering over his teammate's shoulder, irritation and concern practically coming off him in waves.
She nods, trying to keep her flush down. A crush several years in length is a hard thing to completely shake, and sometimes it still creeps up on her; like right now, watching the Uzumaki's golden hair fall a little in his eyes, bright things that still retain their sapphiric luster despite the weights behind them. His heart is in them like always, concern and faith chasing circles, but stirring behind them is a drop of cold and genuine fear , something that Hinata can't ever recall having seen there.
They retrieve the towels and the bowl for the compress in relative silence, and while they're testing the water temperature in one of the bathroom sinks, Hinata works up the nerve to speak first.
"He's not just sick, is he?" She murmurs.
Naruto blinks, but doesn't do her the disservice of asking what she's talking about. He doesn't respond right away either, chewing his lip as he turns his hand back and forth under the streaming faucet.
"What he has? I've uh, seen it before." Naruto says quietly, pausing to worry his lip again. "And last time I saw this kinda thing happen, it almost ended really badly."
"What is it exactly?" Hinata asks. "What's happening to him?"
Naruto takes a deep steadying breath before he responds. "The seal on him is some sort of… augmentation construct. It's trying to feed a some weird kind of chakra into his system, and he's rejecting it."
"Isn't that a good thing though?" Hinata wonders. "That his body is fighting it?"
"Well yeah, sort of." Naruto grumbles, upset frown still pulling on the lines sweeping his cheeks. "But it's not just his body fighting it, it's his chakra , and the fight is what's making him sick."
"You're talking about chakra corruption." Hinata murmurs, hand coming up to her mouth.
Naruto nods, flexing his fingers and pulling them out from under the stream of water. "It's not usually something super serious for regular ninja, and it's easy enough to get over with rest and stuff, but that thing on him is pumping chakra as fast as he can fight it off, and–"
"And the more he fights it the more corruption there is, and the more it clogs up his system." Hinata interrupts gently, before he can get too worked up.
Naruto deflates visibly, shoulders hunching. "Yeah."
Hinata smiles kindly and takes his hand– cold from too long under the chill water of the faucet– and rubs it between both of hers, chafing the skin warm again. "So, what all do we know about it? Besides the fact that it's feeding in foreign chakra?"
Naruto hums as he thinks, gears working. Hinata waits patiently.
"Shikamaru thinks it was probably designed to overwhelm his system; flood over into his main chakra veins and root in from there."
"Why didn't it?" Hinata asks, leaning over to fill the bowl with cold water and the shutting off the faucet. She doesn't move after that though, waiting for Naruto to finish out his thoughts.
"It's only half a seal for starters," he murmurs, "I think the armour silk protected him some. The bastard also underestimated the shit out of us."
"Sasuke's stronger than he was expecting." Hinata agrees.
Naruto goes back to chewing his lip, sharp teeth drawing red. He licks the blood away absently, and the wound is gone as soon as it appeared. "He can't fight it forever. I need to pry it off somehow."
"Then you will." Hinata declares, putting all her newfound confidence behind the words, thumping a loose fist into the front of his shoulder. "If anyone can figure this out, it's you. I know that, and more importantly, so does he."
She gives him her brightest smile, and he takes a deep, steadying breath, and smiles back.
Iruka steps away from the kitchen counter when Akino barks for his attention, leaving the rest of dinner in Naruto and Hinata's capable hands. Sakura's gone back into the living room to keep an eye on Sasuke and prevent him from getting too bored, but Iruka is confident he can duck out for a bit without anything exploding. Hinata tends to be a steadying influence still, despite her newfound rebellion.
"Door." Akino clarifies once he's closer, and Iruka gives the ninken a nod of thanks before heading over to undo the locks and traps.
He should probably be more surprised than he is when he cracks the door open to find a pair of Genin on the doorstep, overnight bags slung over their shoulders.
"Good evening Iruka-sensei." Shino says politely, adjusting his duffle strap. "I hope we're not interrupting anything."
"Heya teach!" Kiba barks cheerily, echoed by Akamaru's yip of greeting from his sweatshirt. "We hear this is where the party's at."
Iruka swings the door wide and turns immediately back into the house. "Hinata! Your team is here!"
He hears a squeak and a clatter as something hits the floor, and Naruto's laughter follows Hinata out of the kitchen as she runs for the entryway. Kiba and Shino duck immediately in to greet her, dropping their bags by the door.
"What are you two doing here? Shouldn't you be in for the night?" Hinata frets, but Shino only smiles and Kiba laughs, and Akamaru licks what looks like a smudge of rice porridge off their Hyuuga teammate's chin.
"A little bird told us you were staying the night here, so we're crashin' here too." Kiba informs her as he unzips his jacket, freeing Akamaru to leap free and speed off into the house, Urushi hot on his heels and then Uhei as an impromptu game on ninken tag kicks off in the hallways.
"A little bird?" Hinata repeats, temporarily confused, and then she flushes red with indignation and turns toward the living room. "Sasuke!"
"I regret nothing." The Uchiha's disembodied voice sounds from inside, followed by the bright cackle of Sakura's laughter.
Naruto's head peeks in from the kitchen. "Oh, hey guys! Iruka-sensei, the porridge is done."
Iruka snorts, nudging the Genin further into the house. "Alright. Best open everything I brought for hot pot as well. I have a feeling we're going to need it."
Sure enough, team 10 shows up at the door less than an hour later, like some universal law that needed correcting.
"Hi, Sensei!" Ino says happily, holding out a takeaway bag decorated with colorful flower patterns and stylized shuriken. "We brought green tea cakes."
"Dinner first," Iruka says without thinking, "We're having hot pot."
He's never seen Choji move so fast in his life.
He's expecting far more chaos that what actually occurs– he was anticipating one broken wall at least– but the Rookie Nine are unusually sedate tonight, all quiet conversations and steady arguments and thought out discussions. They devour most of his hot pot within the first half hour of sitting down, which Iruka had expected. He'd eaten himself into a coma on ramen after his own exam, so he'd been fully prepared for nine furious appetites with an array of meats and vegetables and rice.
Iruka's no babysitter, so he leaves the kids to their late night antics and curls up on the couch to grade papers with Pakkun and Uhei, both of whom offer sound advice on his markings in exchange for ear scratches and his body warmth.
Kakashi comes home tired and paranoid, instincts running him wired, to Iruka tucked into the corner of his couch, marking quizzes.
Apparently the Genin have multiplied while he wasn't looking, because of the four warm bodies on the couch with him, two of them are human and only one of them is his.
Iruka looks up as he approaches but doesn't speak, his eyes tracking back down to his papers as Kakashi pulls his Jounin vest off his shoulders and unclips his scroll belt. Bull lifts his big head and snorts greeting from the foot of the couch, but he's obviously on watch because the rest of his dogs are very clearly asleep.
Sasuke's head is pillowed on the crook of Iruka's knee, Hinata curled up with Urishi on the couch's opposite end. Shino sleeps sitting up against Bull, Kiba snoring on the floor to his right in even pace with Akamaru and Shiba both. Naruto is passed out against the base of the couch, Sakura dozing sprawled over his legs parallel with a dreaming Ino. Shikamaru naps leaning against Choji's unconscious side, supported by a mountainous pile of what looks like every one of Kakashi's throw pillows.
Once Kakashi has finally divested himself of most of his active-duty gear, Iruka puts down his pen and waves subtly for his attention, fingers curling around the gestures of shinobi sign.
Leftovers in the refrigerator.
Kakashi nods, bringing his own hands up to sign back.
Thank you. You didn't have to do this .
He ends the gestures with a sweeping hand to indicate the state of his livingroom as a whole, nine Genin and eight ninken well fed and sleeping soundly, most of the house miraculously still standing.
Iruka rolls his eyes, his returning signs a little fiercer, the gestures sharper.
Don't be stupid .
Kakashi throws his hands up in surrender and treads into the kitchen to reheat his leftovers.
When he returns Iruka is in the process of tucking away his grading materials and nudging Pakkun awake, giving him a few quick signs. The pug yawns widely and scrabbles out from his comfortable slot beneath Iruka's arm, leaping off the couch to tread out of the room and down the hallway.
Kakashi steps over the still slumbering bodies and gives Bull's head a rub as he passes, before perching carefully at the edge of the couch. The shift in weight stirs Sasuke slightly, but the Genin just rolls over and settles again, uncaring of the change in surroundings.
Something pangs beneath Kakashi's lungs at the display of trust, at the fact that the orphaned Uchiha feels safe enough here, in his home, to discount the world and rest despite recent events bearing down on the entire village.
He looks from the young Uchiha to Naruto and Sakura curled not far off, perfectly within reaching distance, which is no accident. It's hard to remember sometimes that with all their strength and intelligence and diligence, they are still only kids.
Protective instinct is a high-riding Hatake-bred trait, something so intrinsic to the clan blood that it even-paces the Inuzuka's pack-based mentality, and even goes a step further into animal territory. And it's almost alarming how quickly these three kids have become his entire world, because he aches with that instinct, feels it down to the marrow of his bones, and never more potently than right here in this moment.
The missions over the last few months, long and short, from border patrols to smash-and-grabs, have brought them all together as a team; but it's all the little spaces in between that brought them together as a family , and for this little mismatched pack of his, there is nothing he wouldn't do.
It scares him sometimes, just how far he knows he would go to protect them.
He's pulled from his thoughts when Pakkun trots back into the room, dragging with him and entire pile of blankets several times larger than he is. Kakashi waits for him to yip for the assistance of someone with opposable thumbs, but he doesn't, instead half-climbing the blanket hill to grip the top one in his teeth and dragging it down, pulling it carefully through the maze of bodies too Shikamaru and Choji, where he proceeds to very carefully settle it around both boys.
Movement on the couch alerts Kakashi to Urushi's wakefulness, and the gold-furred ninken hops primly off the couch to select a blanket from the pile, dragging it slowly back onto the couch and tucking it carefully around Hinata and Sasuke before curling back up against the Hyuuga.
Uhei hops up to pull a comforter around Shino and Kiba, Shiba and Akino together tuck several blankets around Naruto and the girls, and Guruko tiptoes over to present a still mostly folded blanket to Iruka with a tail wag. Iruka accepts with a signed thank you , a head scratch and a grateful smile, but doesn't unfold it.
I'll keep watch. Kakashi signs, and starts to stand.
But Iruka's puts a hand on his shoulder, easy and without pressure, and Kakashi sits down again.
I'm keeping watch. Iruka counters, and even the way he signs it leaves no room for argument. Be with your Genin. You've done enough tonight.
Without another gesture Iruka stands, stepping carefully out of the room with Guruko on his heels. Within minutes his ninken are all back to snoring, and the room is still once more. Kakashi allows himself another moment before he settles into Iruka's vacated spot, pulling one knee up on the couch at Sasuke's back, a protective tick he indulges in.
Against all odds, shoulders braced between the back of the couch and the arm, he falls asleep.
When he wakes up again, with a crick in his neck just shy of dawn, all three of his Genin have somehow migrated on top of him, Naruto and Sasuke unconscious and curled up into his sides, Sakura slumbering happily away on his chest with no care for any kind of personal space. One of his largest comforters has been dragged up over the pile of bodies, likely by one of his ninken, or maybe Iruka.
Kakashi just moves Sakura's head to his not-so-dead arm and goes back to sleep.
Sasuke wakes unhappily to soft but urgent nudging, pulling hazy consciousness together from what must have been sleep of the goddamn dead. He groans and rolls over, trying to bury his head in the back of the couch.
His attempt is met with a rusty laugh. "Oh I don't think so, cub. Time for breakfast."
And that's Kakashi-sensei, so that means he has to get up, which sucks. He could have told anyone else to fuck off, or at least jabbed Naruto or Sakura in the ribs in vengeance.
He growls a little more, just to make his displeasure clear, but sits up, digging his palms into his eyes in an attempt to get them to actually function. Now that he's awake he can hear voices coming from the kitchen, hushed in respect for the still mostly slumbering room. Naruto is still asleep next to him, on the other side of their sensei's legs.
Sakura is already awake though, and because she is a horrible person she takes the comforter with her when she slides off Kakashi-sensei's chest with a yawn, dragging the thing like a cape.
" Rude ." He hisses after her, and she sticks her tongue out at him from where she stands on the other side of Ino, splaying the comforter out over her arms like a royal mantle and bowing cheekily.
Sasuke looks down at their still slumbering teammate, smirks, and pushes Naruto off the couch straight into Ino.
The resulting ball of mayhem smacks into Sakura's shins and sends her off kilter, and because Sasuke is also a horrible person, ensures that she lands square on top of the blonde Yamanaka.
The shrieks wake the whole living room.
Kakashi rolls his eyes at the lot of them, but it's worth it for the way Sakura swears and Ino steams red for a whole fifteen minutes.
"That was a jerk move even for you." Naruto informs him once he's back on the couch, after Kakashi leaves to assist whoever's talking with Iruka in the kitchen.
"Hn." he responds, stretching into his bond teammate without care. Naruto doesn't mind, he never does, even when Sasuke drops back over his legs to stretch out his spine.
"So." Naruto starts, nonchalant. "I figured out how to get the damn thing off."
Sasuke blinks, sleep addled mind needing handful of seconds to catch up. "Yeah?"
Naruto nods, tilts his head. "You're not gonna like it though."
"How did you figure it out?" He asks, because the seal needs to come off whether he likes it or not, so that doesn't really matter.
"Kurama helped walk me through it backwards. I can only take it off the same way it was applied."
Sasuke freezes mid-stretch. "You're joking."
"Nope." Naruto states, popping the 'p' wryly, and gnashes his teeth to emphasize his point.
"Ugh."
They decide without words that breakfast comes before anything else, so they trail in after the tail end of the rookie nine to find the kitchen jam-packed with people. On top of Sakura and Kakashi-sensei and teams 8 and 10 are Kurenai and Asuma-sensei sitting side by side at the table, Iruka and Genma cooking away at the stove top, and Ikari-sensei flipping through files at the breakfast counter.
Sasuke pushes in to sit next to Sakura at the breakfast bar– who's peeking sideways unrepentantly at Ikari-sensei's files and notes– and Naruto squeezes in on his other side next to Kiba.
Breakfast quickly gets loudly out of hand, resulting in a total of two food fights, with an attempt to start a third that is thwarted by Iruka-sensei's suggestion that they knock it off before they spend the rest of the day cleaning the kitchen top to bottom chakraless.
"You kids remember that the third portion of the exam has some extra rules and regulations, right?" Asuma-sensei says once they're all settled down and digging into seared salmon and miso soup and furikake rice.
"We need mentors or something, right?" Shikamaru says absently, picking the eggs out of his rice and depositing them in Choji's bowl.
"They're not required, exactly, more like suggested." Genma drawls with a wave of his chopsticks, mouth half full. "Even with the respite period cut down to two weeks instead of three, that's a lot of time that can be used to hone skills you might need for the finals."
"Who are you up against?" Kurenai asks team 8, and Kiba immediately blanches, casting a nervous glance at Sakura sitting down the breakfast bar. She smiles sweetly back, and the Inuzuka abruptly turns the colour of curdled milk.
Kurenai laughs. "Well that answers that question. Shino?"
The Aburame looks up from where he's allowing his beatles to indulge in a dish full of sugar solution. "Ino and I will be competing in the finals, sensei. It should be very interesting and I find myself looking forward to it."
Ino smiles and blushes a little at the unintended compliment. "Right back at ya, bug-boy."
Kurenai looks between them with interest and nods approvingly, then turns to their Hyuuga, lacing her fingers underneath her chin. "Hinata?"
The young clan heir has to finish chewing a too-large bite of her cinnamon roll before she responds. "I'm fighting with Choji!" She says brightly, obviously pleased about it, and Choji grins, throwing a palm her way. Hinata beams and smacks it hard enough with her own that the sound rings through the kitchen, but Choji doesn't even flinch.
Asuma chuckles. "Better bring your A-game to that fight, big guy."
Choki fist pumps the air, giant grin unrepentant across his face. "You know it!"
"Sasuke and Shika have the Suna kids." Kiba informs the table. "That creepy Gaara guy and that Temari chick."
Shikamaru shrugs and Sasuke doesn't look up from his food, too engrossed in draining his miso soup to care much about restating the obvious.
"Naruto gets to duke it out with Neji." Sakura points out, and their teammate's only response is to stick out his tongue at her and eat half his salmon filet in one bite.
Iruka ruffles his hair as he as he walks by, having finally put together his own plate, and rubs his knuckles over the Genin's head in light admonishment.
"Anyway, we're not here just for Iruka's cooking, you know." Genma adds. "We've all agreed to train at least one of you little hellions."
"Really? Like full combat training?" Sakura asks, voice going up a full octave as she stares hopefully in Ikari-sensei's direction.
The surgeon rolls his eyes. "Yeah yeah, firecracker, you and the Nara are with me." He grumbles, reaching for his coffee cup and taking a long draw. His gunmetal eyes are drawn from what was likely another in a line of sleepless nights.
Shikamaru perks up at that, looking a little more awake and casting an interested glance the surgeon's way.
"Hinata? You're with me kiddo." Asuma rumbles kindly.
Their Hyuuga nods and dips her head in a polite little bow. "I look forward to it!"
"Sasuke," Kurenai says, and he looks up from his food at the sounds of his name. "I thought you could train with me, how does that sound?"
Sasuke only needs to think about it for a quarter of a second before he nods firmly. "I'd be an honor to learn the Demonic Illusions from a true master."
Kurenai smiles, and for a second the pleasant expression wavers, transforms, and in its place is the terrifying face of a Noh– with a mouthful of grinning fangs and tangled dark ropes of hair and black pits for eyes. Another flash and the mask of illusion is gone again, Kurenai's graceful features back in place just like that.
Sasuke is very much looking forward to training with her now.
She turns to Ino as well, setting her chopsticks across her bowl. "Ino honey, Hayate wanted to teach you, but he doesn't think he'll be well enough in time, so he gave me some regimens to add to your training with me."
"Aw, he didn't have to do that!" Ino exclaims.
"You can go visit him and thank him in person, then." Asuma tells her.
"He's in the special treatments wing, room 431." Ryouta-sensei informs absently. "Don't bother the nurses or the other patients and you can visit anytime before 9pm."
"Yessir." is Ino's chipper response, directed at both senseis.
Genma reaches over and taps Choji on the head with his knuckles. "I've got you and the blonde terror over there." He announces, gesturing towards Naruto, who grins.
"Sweet!"
Genma turns to Shino then. "Rai ain't here, but he says you two talked about learning from him?"
Shino nods, his shades flashing in the morning light. "I expressed interest in his poison weapon techniques and specialty jutsu after seeing him perform some in a squad demonstration."
Genma nods. "He'll be here around noon, he's just been dealing with a Shinobi's Worst Enemy all morning.
"Paperwork?" Sakura wonders.
"Politics." Iruka-sensei corrects. "But very good guess."
Kiba looks around, obviously confused about being the only one left out, but his worry is assuaged when Kakashi-sensei sets a hand on his head to ruffle his fluffy hair. "You're running with me, kid."
Kiba's relief is visible, followed by poorly concealed excitement. "Well my chances of not getting completely trashed went up from zero."
Sakura gives a catlike stretch and grins, cheshire. "You better put up a good fight with our sensei at your back, Inuzuka."
Kiba doesn't balk, returning the animal smile with one of his own. "Hell yeah! You better be ready for it!"
Half an hour after breakfast, Sasuke's shoulder is seal-less and Kurama is laughing at him.
Naruto is off washing his mouth out with a fire treated chakra solution, and Sakura is taping a gauze pad over the bite mark.
"I'd heal it with chakra, but Ikari-sensei says you shouldn't have too much foreign stuff in your system until the corruption has run its course." She explains sympathetically.
He nods, waving off her apology. "I know. Thank you."
Kurama's shade is still curled around them, despite his jinchuuriki being in the next room over.
~I don't know why you got so flustered over it.~ The beast chuckles, tails rustling behind him. ~You humans and your social constructs.~
"Oh shut up. " He snarls, but the tailed beast just snickers some more at his expense.
Sakura laughs a little herself as she finishes up with his shoulder and moves over to the little bowl filled with dark purplish condensed chakra; the deconstructed remains of the botched seal, where Naruto had spat out the chakra and writhing constructs he'd sucked from Sasuke's skin like poison. "That shit put up a fight." she muses. "Who the hell knew seals could move on their own like that?"
"It just means it was a living seal, like Naruto's. Meant to be permanent." Sasuke explains. "They can react and respond to chakra impulses and stimuli."
"Ooh, so like how Naruto's seal turns invisible without your chakra, Kurama?"
~In a sense.~ The great beast rumbles, ~This half-done curse seal was only aware enough to be reactive, incapable of complex responses to input. It was hardly a true living seal, and certainly not to the extent of our altered eight trigrams.~
"Nifty." Sakura muses, holding the bowl out towards Sasuke. "Care to do the honors?"
He gladly sets the bowl on fire.
Kurama absently fans the flames with a breath of wind chakra, and Naruto comes back to the tailed beast batting the flaming bowl between two of his tails out of boredom as it burns down.
"That was the nastiest thing I've ever tasted in my life ." He mutters, still running his tongue around his mouth like he's trying to chase the taste out with it.
"Don't be a baby." Sakura teases, but hands him her open can of black tea.
Naruto takes a drink, swishing the liquid around his mouth before he swallows, and then hands back the can. "Thanks."
He sits down with them and Kurama moves to include him in the circle of his shade-body, letting loose a yawn. Even though most everyone in the house knows about Kurama and his closeness with his jinchuuriki, Kurama doesn't tend to show his larger shades much around anyone but the three of them, and only when behind the relative privacy of a closed door or a sheltered glade.
"You know how you're going to go about your fight with Neji?" Sasuke asks. The fights are a ways off, but Naruto still has yet to meet Kakashi-sensei's qualifications for passing, same as Sasuke.
"I've got a pretty good idea." The blond says, bright and easy, leaning back on his arms.
Sasuke doesn't ask. He doesn't want to hear what Naruto plans to do, he wants to see it, so he nods instead of voicing a question. "Ikari-sensei says I might have only one hard fight in me, given the limited recovery time I've got to get over this shit." He gestures grumpily at his shoulder, and Kurama huffs.
~Don't push it too hard. 'That shit' can be deadly if you don't take it seriously. If you get drained too low, back out. No excuses.~
"Yeah yeah." Sasuke grumps.
"Be careful with that Gaara guy too." Sakura adds. "He's that kind of crazy that makes him really unpredictable. Lee's fight almost got nasty."
"He's hiding something, too." Naruto adds, a bit unexpectedly, looking up to meet Sasuke's dark eyes with his bright ones. "I've been getting… unnerving feelings from him."
Naruto immediately has the whole of his attention. "Unnerving how?"
He tips his golden head side to side, searching for words. "Unstable." he decides. "Dark. Cruel. He's also jamming my senses somehow, but I don't think that part is on purpose."
Sakura's eyes go a little wide. "Jamming them? Jamming them how?"
Kurama rumbles unhappily. ~We're unsure. We cannot get a read on his deeper chakric energies. I don't like it.~
Naruto nods, running a hand through his hair. "One thing I can tell for sure though? Dude's in a lot of pain."
Sasuke hums, pulls a curled flower shuriken from his sleeve with two fingers and begins to play it over his knuckles. Naruto catches his eyes again though, before he can get to deep into strategizing, head tipped to the side, blue eyes flickering. He doesn't say be careful out loud. He doesn't have to.
"I know, idiot," is his low response, but as always the last word is too soft to carry any real heat, too fond to be an insult at all.
Sakura hums around an easy smile and steals his shuriken, spinning it around her pinky finger. "So…" she digresses, giving Kurama's nose a scritch as the big beast begins to doze off. "We'll be training apart for a while."
Naruto nods, familiar determination hardening the blue of his eyes into sapphires. "Genma-san says that if I can keep up with it, he'll teach me Ryuu no Ibuki taijutsu."
And just like that it's contagious, the atmosphere shifts, and where once was uncertainty, solid drive takes its place. Sakura straightens and nods minutely, showing off the proud shelf of her shoulders and steel in her spine. "I'll learn those disruption and resonance jutsu straight from the horse's mouth."
Sasuke shifts, lets out a breath and nods in turn. "Those somatic illusions are as good as mastered."
And there's that grin of Naruto's, self sure and confident, like he's convinced the world would shift to make it true. Knowing him? It might.
He sticks an arm out, fingers splayed. "Better believe it."
Sasuke reaches out first, grips Naruto's arm behind the wrist. Sakura completes the triangle, gripping Sasuke's wrist as Naruto shifts to grip hers in turn. It's a promise, something Naruto and Sasuke started but was always Sakura's too, a vow and an oath that they no longer need to speak aloud to reaffirm.
Like none before.
And unbeknownst to the three Genin sheltered in the circle of his tails, Kurama makes a vow of his own.
This I protect . He swears, feeling the promise settle into the fabric of his chakra, ripple along his tails and make its home between his teeth and in his marrow.
The world may break and eternity may shatter, the sky may crack open and the oceans may blaze, and I will protect them still.
He smiles to himself on the outside of their moment of strength and promise, fangless and soft. The kit really is wearing off on me. He decides. Sage help the sorry fools that try to stand in their way.
Shikamaru knocks on the door a little later, and Naruto shouts for him to come in. They've been sorting through seals from the library of them Naruto has been creating; of the ones he's mastered and understands enough to use in combat without fear of instability or rebound. Sakura's forearms are a new map of curling augmentation lines and tiny complex mandalas of concentration seals. The tops of her shoulders are painted with defensive chakra blocks and genjutsu traps, and the base of her neck where the vertebra jut out bears the latest edition of one of his sensory enhancers.
Sasuke's shirt is off, revealing the broad winding configurations of a chakra filtration seal that will hopefully help speed up his corruption recovery. Sakura is currently pouring over a copy of it while Naruto finishes the intricate sweeps of the chakra network, working the edges into the periphery of the chakra vessels at as many small points as he can. Sasuke's eyes are closed while he works, body relaxed in light meditation while Naruto pushes and pulls patterns of chakra over and under his skin.
He comes out of it though when Shikamaru walks in, straightening his shoulders and blinking his dark eyes open. Naruto doesn't stop what he's doing though, too engrossed in weaving together the patterns of the seal to even look up, and knowing Sasuke will speak for him if he needs to. The Nara has an armful of familiar looking scrolls, dark grey and framed with silvery metal, the Ido-senshi clan symbol peeking out from between them.
"Yo," he begins, addressing them, and then to the big shade of the tailed beast, "I'm not interrupting nap time, am I?"
Kurama flicks an ear and snorts, but doesn't answer, so Naruto does it for him, eyes still fixed on the spread of black over Sasuke's skin. "Naw, he's just dozing. If he actually wanted to sleep he'd do it in the seal space."
Shika nods easily, striding to stand over Sakura's shoulder and scan his sharp eyes along her new seals. Sakura grins and lifts one arm to show them off.
"Nice…" he murmurs approvingly, reaching out to tap the one on the back of her wrist, the fan-like points of it spreading out where it meets the back of her hand. "That's the channeling complex?"
"Yep." Sakura agrees. "Means I can skip a step with most of the prominent healing jutsu, makes them work a hell of a lot faster."
"Seconds can make all the difference," he agrees, tracing the outside edge of the seal with a fingernail. "Looks kind of like a lotus flower."
Sakura blinks, retracing her eyes over the seal, head tipped to look at it from another angle. "You're right, it totally does!"
Shikamaru shrugs, his smile a slim curve. "Spend enough time with Ino and you start to see flowers in everything."
"You want a set?" Naruto asks as he finishes up Sasuke's seal and sits back a little, letting him shift and get a feel for the mechanisms. "Won't take me ten minutes."
"You don't mind?" he asks. "I could use them, given I'm training under Shiranui's worst nightmare."
Sakura snorts a laugh at that.
Like some kind of gate guardian Kurama sweeps his tails out to the side to allow Shikamaru into their little circle.
Sasuke eyes the scrolls in his arms. "Those the weird katas you were working through?"
"Yeah, figured out why they were bugging me." Shika answers, setting them down in a stack between Sasuke's hip and Sakura's knee as he sits next to Naruto. "They're types of Nagareru taijutsu."
Sasuke tips his head. "'Flow'? I've never heard of that."
"It's not a very common practice." Shikamaru explains, rubbing the back of his neck. "I only even recognised what it was because my clan uses a version of it. I've been learning it secondhand from my father since I could walk."
Sakura's expression twists in confusion. "That long? How long can it take to learn a taijutsu?"
"It's not exactly a normal taijutsu." The Nara says as he reaches for the scroll nearest him and unfurls it.
"You said 'practice'." Sasuke points out. "Like a lifestyle."
"Because that's kinda of how it applies." Shikamaru informs them, pointing out parts of the kata while he speaks. "It's not a taijutsu in the sense of moves and fighting styles, though it does have a potent effect on how you move when you execute any kind of taijutsu, especially combinations. 'Flow' in this case refers to the progression of one movement to the next, from one state to another."
"Like a taijutsu within taijutsu?" Naruto wonders, leaning over to follow Shikamaru's finger as it traces over the Kata's script
"Sort of." He allows. "But it's not just something that you do in combat. It's more like a state of being, so intrinsic to motion that once it's mastered you don't even consciously recognise that you're doing it. My clan's version of it is Kuro Nabiku , Black Flutter."
Understanding dawns behind Sasuke's dark eyes. "So the way Nara move isn't just genetic." he surmises.
Shikamaru shrugs. "It's kind of a combo of natural predisposition and mimicking the older members of the clan growing up. It's not so much taught as it is absorbed."
"How very Nara-like." Sakura decides.
Shikamaru huffs and redirects attention away from himself. "Anyway, even though the type is the same, these scrolls are from a different level entirely. These are for Sōjō Kōka Nagareru, Synergistic Flow." Shikamaru rolls the scroll open to a different portion, from descriptions to diagrams of the heart and breathing exercises that look to work into some kind of fine motor control motion. "These scrolls are introductory versions of the techniques, and start at the bottommost tier of mastery. They're extremely valuable, and would take a long time to master. Years even."
Sakura straightens eagerly at the idea of a challenge, and Naruto and Sasuke both lean in around the Nara for a better view of the scroll.
"They're that high of a level?" Sakura asks, but her voice is too high to convey anything other than riveted interest in the idea.
Shikamaru's interest too is evident, his shoulders forward, his eyes bright and attentive as he nods and speaks. "I haven't brought it up with anyone other than Shino yet, but I think all of us should look over and chose a version to start training. Choji, Ino and I can make copies of the originals, depending on who chooses what."
"But don't you have your own version of it mastered already?" Sasuke asks. "Not that I'm opposed or anything."
Shikamaru digs a hand through the other scrolls instead of answering immediately, selecting one by memory and unfurling it to show a handspan worth of reinforced paper. "Like I said, these are way more advanced than even my clan's Nagareru . I have my eye on one already, so long as all of this is cool with you three."
"Duh." Naruto say with a grin, Sasuke's grunt of assent following right after. "Whats ours is yours."
"Come on, Shika." Sakura teases, tucking a friendly arm over his shoulder. "Smart guy like you should know that by now."
Shikamaru rolls his eyes, but there's a smile fighting for control over his mouth.
The sun pulls strange and heavy through the clouds as Baki watches it set over this foreign land, over the tops of alien trees through heavy air too humid for his tan, leathery skin. He doesn't like how clammy it makes his usually dry palms, or how much extra oil he needs to protect the bits of iron in his poison weapons from rust.
"Hey, Baki-sensei?"
He turns to face his young Kunoichi charge, standing in the doorway to his room, framed by unfamiliar light. "Yes, Temari?"
"I don't like it here."
Baki smiles wryly, a slim slope of his mouth that pulls at the lines beginning to etch age into his face. "I know."
She steps into the room, casting a glance out the same window Baki had been gazing through. "Where is Gaara?"
"Roof." Baki answers as she comes to stand beside him. "I don't recommend disturbing him at the moment. Kankuro?"
"Out like a goddamn light. I don't get how he can sleep in this shit." She grumbles, tugging at the collar of her mesh shirt, the only thing besides her thigh wraps and shorts that she's still wearing over her dress basics. The rest she's surrendered to the heat and humidity, her thick sandy hair pulled from its usual four tails into a single bun.
"Moon country is worse. Demon country more humid still. You'll get used to it."
"Yes sensei." She replies, cocking a hip against the windowsill, a grumble still crouched behind the affirmation.
They stay like that for a while, staring out the window at the horizon, until the reds and golds fade into the navy and purple of dusk.
"I'm thinking of pulling the mission." Baki murmurs, breaking the silence softly.
Temari's eyes blow wide as saucers. "What? But what about the invasion, the Kazekage's orders? What–"
Baki cuts her off with a soft hand to her shoulder before her volume reaches levels high enough to disturb her brothers. Gaara in particular needs all the rest he can come by, in whatever form that takes. His eldest charge stills, drops back into silence, and looks to him expectantly.
"It has become too dangerous to proceed. And Raza's orders have become… inconsistent." Baki drops his hand form her shoulder when she relaxes minutely.
"That old bastard has never been consistent ." She snarls lowly.
"I've worked under your father for most of my life, and I know that for all his unpredictability, the man is not reckless . Continuing now, in an enemy village on high alert with unknown cause, would be."
"He's no father of mine." Temari snaps reflexively.
"He is your Kage nonetheless." Baki reminds her patiently, and again she deflates.
"Yeah." She mutters. "I know." She fiddles with the sleeve of her shirt for a moment, thinking. "I thought that Kabuto guy seemed shifty about the whole thing."
"You have good instincts for people." Baki observes. "And I agree with you. Things were already complicated with Hatake involved, but now…"
Temari blinks at him, not recognising the name. "Who now?"
Baki doesn't respond right away, eyes trained on the still darkening sky. "Do you remember, during the preliminaries, seeing a masked Jounin with silver hair?"
Temari nods immediately. "Yeah, he was one of the senseis for the Leaf Genin."
"He's an old enemy." Baki explains. "And not someone I'd like to cross given a choice in the matter."
"He's better than you ?" Temari asks disbelievingly. "No way."
Baki blinks, feeling inordinately flattered and needing a moment before he actually answers her implied question. "We've never actually fought each other in one-on-one combat, so I am unsure, though we did speak briefly during the peace negotiations." Baki chuckles wryly, remembering. "He's quite possibly the biggest pain in the ass to deal with on an open battlefield that I've personally ever seen, and I was in the squad that had to face down Ino-Shika-Cho during the war."
And he knows that light of interest that fires off behind Temari's eyes, knows what she's going to ask before she does when she hops to sit up on the window sill, one foot swinging idly like the child she's never been. "Have you told us that one?"
Baki hums, pretending to think it over. "You know what? I don't believe I have."
He loses himself in the tale, careful not to embellish or undermine, and Temari listens raptly, analysing every tactic he mentions, imagining every move and jutsu. She's captivated until the moment she isn't, and Baki smiles privately as her eyes drift shut and she dozes off, temple pressed against the window pane. He keeps talking softly, gently lowering his tone until he trails off, and the only sound left is Temari's steady breathing. He waits a while longer, watching the moonrise over the thick canopy of the fire country trees, tracing the bars of light it's shine washes across the walls.
He then shifts upright and tucks an arm around his eldest charge, pressing her to his chest as he lifts her gently from her resting place. She's very nearly too big for it at fifteen, all strong bones and lean muscle and long limbs. He remembers when this was easy, when she was hardly six and already had the determination and drive of a seasoned warrior, her eyes as bright and sharp as badland stars, a heart as unrelenting as the harsh heat and shine of the desert sun. She used to love 'scouting' sitting astride his shoulders and seeing as far as she could, pointing out anything and everything of interest to her young mind.
Kankuro had been calm even as a child, with none of his sister's fiery temper, fluid where Temari was firm, a cool oasai of clear-headedness and open focus. Baki had pegged him as a puppeteer from the start and he'd been right; from the time he was nine he'd proved capable of prodigal battlefield awareness and the ability to split his wide focus between many subjects.
And Gaara…
He lays Temari down beside her brother and leaves a blanket within reach in the unlikely case she will grab for one, and makes his way to the roof.
His youngest charge sits at the edge, legs crossed, sand whirling around him in soft circles. Over the years Baki has developed the ability to judge Gaara's mental state at a glance, can tell through body language and the temperment of the chakra sand just how much of who he's speaking to is Gaara, and how much is Shukaku.
Gaara is almost alarmingly himself at the moment, the madness of the tailed beast only a lingering baseline. Shukaku has been… not calm exactly, but hesitant to show itself; almost as if the beast is wary of something.
"Baki-sensei." Gaara says quietly, emotionless. "Are you going somewhere?"
"Yes, gathering information." He replies. "I'll be back before sunrise"
Gaara nods slowly.
Baki inclines his head in turn. "Your siblings are asleep. Will you keep watch?"
The sand around him ripples protectively in response to Gaara's nod of assent "I will."
The 'I' is a comfort over the usual 'we', another sign that Gaara is more himself than usual, that the madness is being uncharacteristically kind tonight.
Baki doesn't linger any longer, body flickering from the roof into the shelter of the nearby trees. He finds a perch midway up a hickory and brings one hand up in a concentration sign, stretching his senses across the unfamiliar village. The chakra signature he's searching for is distinct, and even though it's been years since he last sensed it he remembers it with blinding clarity; the tingle of threat over the ends of his nerves, the taste of ozone on the back of his tongue, the bite of danger that jolts down his spine like the weight of a predator's gaze.
He hones in on it, tracking it through the streets and into the dark of the surrounding forests, and hopes he isn't making a fatal mistake.
Baki does not step foot on the Hatake property.
He sees the edges of the boundry and toes the lines, stays well clear of the sprawling building cradled in lush waving grass. He is not here to trespass or infringe, so he parks himself on a boulder a good twenty meters from the property line on the far side, and waits.
He's hardly been meditating ten minutes when he hears a rustle in some nearby shrubs. He pointedly doesn't tense, keeping his posture loose and relaxed, forearms resting on his knees, legs crossed over the mossy stone.
A ninken trots unbothered from the undergrowth, a dark brown pug with droopy eyes and a flat face, with a blue vest and a Konoha hitai-ate. It stops short of the boulder to shake a few dead leaves from its short coat and then hops up onto it, sitting down opposite him and scratching carelessly at an ear with a back leg.
"Apologies," the pug says drolly, "But the boss is gonna be a minute. You mind waiting on him? The pups aren't quite asleep yet."
Baki shakes his head and relaxes minutely. "Not at all. I have all night if necessary."
"Good to hear." The pug agrees in monotone. "Are your own pups asleep?"
Baki blinks, taken aback a little before he realizes that the ninken is attempting to make small talk.
"Two out of three." Baki says slowly, not really seeing the point but having nothing else to do while he waits. "One on watch."
He feels comfortable enough letting that kind of information leave his mouth, since there is very little that can truly threaten Gaara, even in enemy territory.
The pug nods. "Can't be easy here, what with all the water in the air."
"My eldest agrees with you." Baki says without thinking, forgetting how it sounds, but he's been teaching the three of them for so long that sometimes he forgets that they aren't actually his.
The pug just nods again, either misunderstanding the slip or simply choosing not to draw attention to it, and the rumble the ninken gives off sounds like something just to the left of approval. "We got one that can't stand it either, hates the rainy season something fierce. Bit of a temper about it too."
"That certainly sounds familiar." Baki agrees and then continues, seeing an opportunity; "I have to admit, I didn't take your 'boss' for much of a teacher."
"Neither did he, being honest." the pug grumbles.
Baki nods again, allowing a slip of a smile. "That too, sounds familiar."
Again that grumble of almost approval, and the pug trots forward and sits just shy of Baki's knees. He lifts a paw. "Pakkun."
He takes the paw and shakes once. "Baki."
Baki holds idle conversation with Pakkun for another half an hour, discussing nothing of consequence, until the pug suddenly stops, floppy ears twitching. "Alright, that's my cue. Don't fight or nothing alright? You'll wake the pups right-quick."
Baki nods. "That is not my intent."
Pakkun snorts, satisfied, and disappears in a puff of smoke.
The air is silent for a long moment, and then Hatake Kakashi steps out from the shelter of the trees.
He's not dressed the way Baki saw him at the preliminaries; he's mostly in shinobi basic wear, a black high-necked sleeveless shirt and pants, hands stuffed into his pockets. Despite his relaxed posture Baki isn't stupid enough to think the man can't shift from civil to deadly in the space of a blink.
"Well…" Hatake drawls. "This is a bit unexpected."
For a moment adrenaline rides high in Baki's blood– the last time they'd crossed paths in a less than friendly manner he's just watched the man turn the entirety of a battlefield into nothing more than a smoking staticy crater. And to make matters worse he's a Hatake , and the last time Baki had seen him he'd been alone with nothing to lose; reckless, aggressive, a true berserker in the classical sense.
If what Baki witnessed during the preliminaries is any indication, if the body language and protective drive in his eyes was genuine, he does have something to lose now, and that makes crossing him more treacherous, not less.
After all, a wolf is far more dangerous when it has something to protect.
Baki has to remind himself that it is exactly that protective instinct that drove him here in the first place, in the hopes that the two of them just might have some common ground to stand on.
He would not have come here if he did not fear for the wellbeing of his charges.
"I apologise for the intrusion." He says neutrally.
"There wasn't one." Hatake counters, his voice low and inflectionless. "If you had trespassed on my home in the middle of the night with with the village in the state it's in, we wouldn't be having this conversation."
The words are stated more like idle fact than actual threat, but Baki reads them as such anyway; he expected nothing less given the circumstances. He nods.
"So…" The Konoha Jounin says slowly. "I assume you didn't come all this way for conversation with my ninken, riveting as it must have been."
"I came here hoping for an exchange of information." Baki says immediately, not bothering to parse words. "My Kage has been acting… uncharacteristic, and reports have been vague."
There's a long drawn out moment of silence where Baki is prepared for Kakashi to leave, to take this potentially critical information straight to his Kage, but it appears Baki judged him correctly; after a moment the Konoha Jounin hums turning over the information, and then returns in kind.
"Rasa hasn't been seen outside of his rooms since the start of the second portion of the exam." Kakashi allows. "His guard, too, have been uncooperative."
Baki swallows, chewing over the critical words he's about to speak. The next few moments hold Baki's future suspended between them. If he's made the correct choice, if he can garner this once-enemy Jounin's understanding and cooperation, he will have fulfilled his duty as a teacher. If he's made the wrong one, he will have failed in his duty as a Ninja. It goes against every teaching the Sand has ever pressed upon him, in village over self, in mission over comrades.
But his students are his village, their well being his mission , and if he fails the Sand as a ninja, then at least he will not have failed them as a teacher.
"I have reason to believe that the man wearing the garments of the Sand Shadow may not actually be Rasa at all."
The Jounin's eye flickers, not suspicious but interested, and in an oddly forward display of nonexistent camaraderie Hatake moves to sit on the boulder across from him, bare feet crossed over stone.
"I doubt you would have come to a foreign ninja for information unless the reports you've been getting have been… disturbing. I assume you want information on the reason for the village's current state of alert in exchange for the details of whatever orders have made you so suspicious."
"I don't recall mentioning any orders." Baki says carefully, not denying the assumption, which is as good as affirmation.
Hatake hums. "No, I suppose you didn't."
There a long moment of silence after that as the silver eyed man seems to think over another response. Baki waits instead of posing one of his own questions, resisting the urge to chew at his cheek as the silence stretches on.
"Your eldest." Hatake asks suddenly. "The one that hates the fire country humidity. What was her name?"
For a moment Baki is too baffled by the strange question to speak, but there's something behind the careful blankness of the Jounin's eyes that he recognises, that strange glint a half step away from approval.
"Temari." He answers.
Hatake nods. "She and Sasuke do have that in common." He muses.
And just like that, they step onto common ground.