Forest Bells - Intermission

Danzo Shimura

Yumika was a problem.

That had been Danzo's conclusion upon reading the summary of the initial interrogation. As a genin she wasn't expected to know much. The hidden leaf couldn't officially condone a proper interrogation without cause, especially since she seemed cooperative.

The lack of intel was expected, intelligence about the hidden sound village was inconsistent at best. It couldn't even be confirmed that Orochimaru had any connection to the village at all. Intel on the matter varied from him being in charge, to being a hired mercenary, to being in outright conflict with them. It didn't help that the hidden sand had reported sightings of the snake sage that conflicted further with his supposed location.

To fool your enemies, you must first fool your allies.

Nothing coming from Yumika could be trusted, but that was not the problem.

"The village does have its snakes and the occasional rot in its roots."

Hiruzen had been just as alarmed by her specific choice of wording as Danzo, but did not think it was enough to take the next step. He called it a 'coincidence'.

Unlikely.

Danzo suspected that her knowledge of the leaf came from Orochimaru. If that were the case, then there was a chance his own dealings with the man could come to light.

Irritatingly enough, Hayama Shirakumo did a good job keeping an eye on her so there hadn't been any room for ROOT to take executive action. Neither had she acted beyond reason, even during her various 'escape' attempts.

Fortunately, an opportunity presented itself thanks to the world's worst kept S-rank secret.

…

The second interrogation had been going so well. At Danzo's request, the interrogator had successfully provoked the girl. A little more and she would have likely given them ample reason to deal with her permanently.

…but Hiruzen failed to control his own temper.

That or he was saving face.

Danzo could admit that there was an elegance to Hiruzen's solution. The silence and confidentiality elements alone would be effective, but Danzo could recognise the hidden kill switch within the seal personalised to respond to Hiruzen's chakra.

Perhaps if she hadn't recognised him, Danzo would have left her alone with that.

…

She survived the attack.

The three agents had been rookies, but even so, it was an impressive feat for a mere genin.

There was something else…

…

She knew it was him.

She knew about ROOT.

She knew his intentions.

Her excuses were well constructed, and her arguments well put together.

Danzo came to a decision and the mangekyo sharingan in his right eye flared to life.

Act in my best interest.

Kotoamatsukami, the ultimate genjutsu.

He didn't need to do any more, she would serve him on her own.

"...I hope you'll find the time to talk again."

It seemed that she thought she could be of use… interesting.

…

She exceeded all expectations.

At best, Danzo had expected a potential turncoat. Instead, he'd gotten a crucial spy who had the potential to overthrow Orochimaru and maybe even replace him.

For that though, she couldn't be second in command..

So Danzo used his agents to influence the rebel force, a trivial task with Yumika's information. Isoaki would fail or he would run, and when he did, Yumika would be there to see it.

It was an unfortunate shame though. Danzo really did consider their debates enlightening.

Waho

"Nichio Hyuga, Beniyo, Asuri. You three form team…"

The team made sense. Nichio was top of their class, which balanced out Beniyo's dead last score. At the same time he and Asuri had similar fighting styles so they could learn from each other.

Not that she'd ever admit it.

The two were the most outwardly subdued rivals Waho had ever seen, but if you read between the lines you could tell that they were constantly at each other's throats.

"...and Waho, you three will form team 7 led by Kakashi Hatake."

She had a bad feeling about this.

…

They stood no chance.

The three of them had tried fighting him individually to no effect. Kakashi hadn't even bothered to take his hands out of his pockets. Their sensei had two bells, whoever managed to get a bell would become a full genin, and whoever didn't would be sent back to the academy.

At this rate none of them would get them.

"Guys, we-"

Waho was interrupted.

"I can't believe that I was put on a team with you two weaklings."

Her other teammate scoffed.

"Don't be ridiculous, you two are holding me back."

They faced each other, and started to argue.

This isn't the time!

"...we'll decide who drops between us, here and now!"

"If you keep that up all of us will!" She shouted back at them, her eyes still on Kakashi. "We need to work together. Let's try-"

"Like we'd willingly work with you, snake."

"Yeah. Oh!" Her teammate agreed. "Two of us get to pass right? So if we take out Waho…"

You can't be serious.

"I get what you're saying."

Waho had to turn away from Kakashi to face the two teammates turned enemies.

Before she knew it, she saw the back of a hidden leaf flak jacket and felt an oppressive aura.

"You are going back to the academy."

…

"Hey, I heard about what happened. How're you holding up?"

Waho looked up from the book she was reading in the Academy library to see Iruka carrying a pile of papers. He was her main academy teacher, and probably the only one to actually bother with her.

"Fine. It wasn't much of a surprise."

It wouldn't be the last time either. Despite her efforts to hide her scales, slit eyes, and fangs, the rumour mill had probably made sure the next two graduating classes were already in the know.

"Hm." He sat across from her, placing the papers on the table between them. "Want to help me grade these tests?"

Waho wordlessly grabbed a test from the top of the pile and began looking through. It was a strange habit the two had gotten into. Beniyo had lots of other friends and Asuri had her rivalry with Nichio, but Waho spent most of her time around books. Iruka had noticed and tried to get her to open up, bringing his work to the library to do there, and somewhere along the way she started helping. Her strength had always laid in academics, so it was… nice.

"You know. Kakashi hasn't failed you yet."

"He might as well have. All the other teams either passed or failed so there's no one else to form a team with. I'm going to fail by default."

"You could make an appeal to one of the in-village divisions. Intelligence, cryptology, and the hospital all take on members outside the team structure. There might be an opening somewhere."

Waho didn't dignify the suggestion with an answer. That kind of thing only worked when you could convince the division leader to pull a few strings and she didn't have those kinds of connections.

"...like an assistant teaching position."

Her gaze shot up in surprise.

"Most of what you'd be doing is help behind the scenes. File management, test grading, cleaning, lesson planning, study supply management, that sort of thing. The stuff you've been helping me with the last 2 years."

Waho squinted in mock suspicion.

"...you just don't want your old workload back."

…

"...so that's that." Waho finished explaining to her two friends.

"That's great! So we're all ninja now, woo!" Beniyo exclaimed.

"Hardly, you're only good as a distraction." Nichio said. As her new teammate, Beniyo had practically forced him to hang around them.

Despite the harsh critique Beniyo's eyes lit up, and she bounced to her feet. Something which prompted Waho to look over at the resigned Asuri with confusion.

"Aha! I knew it!" Beniyo then pointed at Nichio victoriously. "You finally admitted I'm good for something."

Nichio's face scrunched up a bit.

"That's not-"

"Then you know what? I'm going to become the best distraction you've ever seen! No, the best distraction in the world!"

"This is your fault." Asuri said to Nichio plainly.

Kabuto Yakushi

Kabuto fixed his disguise and jumped down to join the team of 5 supposedly regular konoha ninja, who all went on guard at his arrival.

"Identify yourself."

"I'm the medic assigned to your team, last minute arrangement." Kabuto lied.

He made sure to keep track of any notable in-village ROOT movements. The sudden assembly of a team of 5 to operate as regular hidden leaf shinobi was definitely suspect.

The leader of the group nodded and continued his briefing.

"We have reason to believe that Yumika Nogawa will attempt an escape today. If the official pursuit team fails, we are to execute the target."

A file was passed around, ending in Kabuto's hands. He'd seen Orochimaru's own file on the girl, so he didn't need to look, but it was good to compare.

Image. Name and other personal details. Personality assessment..?

"Yumika Nogawa acts the part of a naively optimistic empath as a cover to disguise a mind that operates rationally in strict adherence to a set of arbitrary moral rules of unknown origin. She has an aversion to doing harm without cause, and a refusal to kill.

She has been witnessed expressing 'thrill-seeking' behaviour and has a tendency to emotionally shut off during combat.

Her ability to socialise is deficient, and she appears to idolise the hidden leaf village."

Other than her supposed idolisation of the hidden leaf, nothing new, though they hadn't picked up on her complete lack of self-worth.

Medical records, as expected. Abilities…

"Yumika Nogawa is specialised in stealth and infiltration-"

That was incorrect. Yumika didn't have a specialisation yet. It would be more accurate to say she was specialised in supply running if anything.

"-. She is physically weak due to her health, has a poor constitution, and her chakra capacity is average. Her chakra control appears to be excellent. She has been observed both tree and water walking.

She is highly skilled in taijutsu, but cannot seem to compensate for her weak physicality and is forced to rely on her less impressive staffmanship-"

More missing intel. Yumika could use the variant of tree walking for speed and could boost her strength in a similar way to Tsunade.

"-. Her fighting style revolves around using tools, clones, and transformations to create openings for swift takedowns. She will commonly use smoke and other vision obscuring methods including an unknown device that is similar to flashpaper.

She is highly skilled with a bow, but does not appear to use it."

False, must be another thing she's held back with while in the village.

"She has a set of storage seals covering her entire body. She could be carrying any number of tools at all times, and can summon a set of armour to defend against attacks."

That was the end of the report. The armour was a new addition, but it completely failed to mention her use of poisons and explosive tags. Those were the most notable factors in her takedown of Mitsutada.

"Has everyone finished reading? Good. The plan is simple, box in the target and harass them until they are dealt with. Cover each other's backs, she may be averse to killing, but she's not above immobilising injuries or knockouts. We're all trained in blindfighting so that shouldn't be a problem. We'll keep her up in the treeline to limit what tools she can use."

He crossed his arms.

"If anyone sustains any injuries, no matter how minor, report to the medic. Let's go."

…

Team Hayama reported that they'd lost her and which way they'd seen her leave. It was not the way the ROOT team knew she would be heading.

How did they know that?

…

Yumika hadn't covered her tracks so it was easy enough to follow. So…

"Have any of you seen a girl pass through the area?"

…why were they questioning the three genin on border patrol?

Admittedly, the tracks had faded as they'd approached this area, but it shouldn't have been enough for the ROOT agents to lose the trail.

"...we haven't seen anything."

The lead agent who was acting as team leader nodded with a manufactured frown.

"Very well. Be warned, she is highly dangerous so you need to keep your distance."

Ah, much clearer.

They didn't need to know where she was. They needed to know if she'd told them anything, and to make sure that they kept their distance when they confronted her. Which meant…

Danzo messed up, so we're covering his tracks.

Patrol routes, construction schedules, and etc… there was a lot of information that someone in contact with Danzo could accidentally get their hands on. It would explain how the team had known her escape route, it was their intel.

It wasn't the first time, and it wouldn't be the last. Though this could still all be a ploy. Kabuto knew that Yumika had met with Danzo consistently over the last year. He would continue to observe.

…

Would have been far more effective if built with lethal intent.

Two of the ninja got caught in a wire trap and Yumika had used the opportunity to bombard them with what he could tell were poisoned arrows.

None of his 'teammates' had noticed, so he wouldn't do anything. Kabuto had no stake in this mission's success. His main goal was to remain unremarkable so he could disappear afterwards without raising suspicion. He'd do as told and as expected, but nothing more.

…

There were some that said a person was only truly honest when faced with death.

The sadistic plan had been working until the beautiful moment Yumika snapped and discarded her human skin. She revealed herself to be a coward, too weak willed to commit to the ideals she held close to her heart.

Excellent.

It was that very cowardice that kept her submissive to Orochimaru's will. Danzo had made an attempt to poach their supply runner, but a man without feeling couldn't understand fear the way Lord Orochimaru did.

He wasn't sure what it was that compelled him to save her. Perhaps it was an acknowledgement that she would be more useful alive. Perhaps it was simply bloodlust. Either way, all of Danzo's agents were dead, and it would have been a waste to let the girl die after such a showing.

"Wha-what the hell happened here?!"

Tsk, tsk, little genin should listen to their betters.

Kabuto adjusted his glasses without turning around.

"I thought the captain was quite clear, the girl is quite dangerous. Even now it seems…"

Kabuto stood up. Perhaps it was to remove the witnesses. Perhaps it was bloodlust.

"...she is about to kill three careless genin."

Jun'You

Stuff happens, life sucks.

Jun'You grew up in a small silk farming settlement near the border in the land of fire. Insignificant enough that it wasn't marked on any maps.

It happened when she was 12, a moment burned into her mind and haunted every waking moment. The large three armed man standing over her illuminated by the flames of her burning home. His face was shadowed, but the facetearingly wide grin was visible through the darkness. Yosuru was his name.

Overnight her worries went from which dress she would wear to whether she would survive to see tomorrow.

The kids younger than 10 were separated first. That was how she lost contact with her younger brother.

The rest of them were left to rot in a prison. Jun'You's father starved to death trying to keep her and her mother fed. Her mother was taken out of the cell by one of the damn sound ninja and never returned.

The last Jun'You saw of her extended family and friends from home was the resigned look on their face as Jun'You was selected by one of the 'scientists'.

She wasn't the only test subject, there were twelve of them in his private lab.

Why? Why so many?

He had developed some sort of explosive chemical substance and was trying to perfect the 'delivery method'. Each of them were given a weapon, Jun'You received the claw. Then he left them paired up in six different rooms with only one meal per room.

Death's hand grasped at her, but she broke free.

2 days later he asked for 'feedback' and Jun'You swallowed her anger to cooperate. She could see where this was heading, and she couldn't give up the advantage.

They were paired up again, and 2 days later: six became three.

Finally they were all left alone and Jun'You was the last one standing.

He showed her off to his coworkers like some sort of prized hen, and it took all her willpower to smile and act thankful instead of tearing his throat out.

Then he was done with her and she was handed off to do work.

…

"Um… I'm Yumika, nice to meet you."

"Piss off."

She didn't know what the girl was playing at, but she wasn't going to be game. She had other goals, freedom.

…

She's too strong.

The 10 year old girl had completely destroyed her.

"You have places you want to be…"

Jun'You mind jumped to the burning wreckage of her home.

"...Things you want to do…"

She imagined the scientist dead with his prized weapon sticking out of his gut.

"...and none of the strength to do it yourself."

The cold edge of the blade touched her throat. She was going to die-!

"So let me help you."

She felt death release its grasp.

"Hi, I'm Yumika. I'm a simple messenger. What's your name?"

For the first time in years, she saw clearly. Free from the crimson haze of rage, she saw a kind girl offering a hand.

"Jun'You. My name's Jun'You."

…

It was the highlight of the month whenever Yumika showed up. A consequence of her not being a piece of garbage like everyone else. Jun'You didn't really have an opinion on Isoaki. Yumika trusted him and his orders weren't stupid.

"The base commander you're being assigned to is loose lipped, report any intel he leaks."

"You're going to be approached by a ninja with a yellow sash, he's with us, he's going to teach you some of what he knows. Make sure to keep it subtle."

"We need medicine and your base is overstocked, they won't notice if you hand some off to Yumika when she stops by."

"You're being put on a mission with someone of importance. Play nice, if you make a good showing he might get more people out of cages and into the field where we can reach them."

"Careful, we think someone's onto us. He's in your area so lay low."

She crumpled the blood stained letter.

Too late for that.

He was an arrogant shit like the rest and didn't have half the strength to back it up, the corpse had actually been more trouble.

So how do I hide the body?

There was a group of bandits nearby, they would serve as a decent excuse.

…

Yumika was dead.

Isoaki had tried to convince Jun'You otherwise, but she wasn't buying it.

There was something else she'd noticed. As time passed on there was less talk of winning and more talk of running. Most of them thought it was a way to deal with how everything was falling apart without Yumika.

Jun'You blamed the shadows.

She knew they were there, she couldn't explain how, but she knew.

…

Idiots.

Jun'You withdrew her claw from the faker. A transformation and a little sweet talking was all it took to fool everyone else, but not her.

There wasn't a headband to identify the faker with, but based on his ethnicity, he wasn't from the same place as the last guy.

A lot of eyes on the hidden sound and no one willing to step in to help.

Bastards the lot of them.

…

That's weird.

It had been a complete accident. An argument with one of the official ninja that escalated first to threats and then to violence. She hadn't even noticed that the man she killed had been a fake until he changed back.

Why the hell is he white?

It was some sort of plant man thing.

She shrugged it off and didn't bother reporting any details beyond there being another faker. It was probably just another experiment.

…

Yumika was dead, but Yumika was here.

…but Yumika was dead.

…but she was here.

Jun'You's 'instinct' was silent, but the white thing had taught her that her 'instinct' was imperfect. It was too good to be true, so she looked for anything that could reveal this to be a fake.

Got you!

…

Yumika stood down with a smile.

It's a bluff.

Jun'You wasn't going to fall for it.

It's a fake.

Jun'You wasn't going to let the opportunity slip by.

It's-

Jun'You's blade drew blood.

-her!

The purple haze of paranoia fell too late.

What have I done?!

…

Yumika forgave her. Which just made it worse.

In truth, the reason Jun'You offered to carry the girl was so she wouldn't see the scar.

It was when Yumika fell asleep that Jun'You realised something.

She's a child…

No matter how mature she acted, no matter how important she'd been to the operation. Jun'You, Isoaki, everyone else… had been relying on a child.

No one else had been doing anything. Isoaki only acted because of the position Yumika put him in. Jun'You had only been looking out for her own interests, and she knew everyone else would say the same.

It was pathetic.

It was sickening.

Everyone was trash, and Jun'You was no exception.

…

Hypocrites.

Jun'You had picked up on the mood once word got out that Yumika was back. No one actually cared about her, they were looking forward to what she could do for them. Then they all had the gall to look betrayed when she decided to walk away.

'Oh no, the 13 year old isn't going to help us solve our problems! How dare they?!' urgh.

"You suicidal idiot!"

…well, almost everyone. Isoaki was a bit confused, but his heart was in the right place.

Crack, shatter.

No one expected Yumika to be effortlessly packing that kind of firepower, and everyone stepped aside to avoid being targets. Cowards.

"Enjoy your lives, you shitheads."

The lot of them were trash, and the sight of them was pissing her off. She was clearly not the only one who thought so, because she wasn't alone when she caught up to the fainting Yumika.

Knew it.

The 'effortlessness' had been an act to fool the cowards. It didn't get past Jun'You's 'instinct' though.

"...Let us take care of it. Get some rest."

Jun'You adjusted her grip and turned to the rest with a frown.

"Listen up. We're going to be doing things a little differently from here on out. If you think we're just going to hang on while Yumika does all the work then you can run back and join the rest of the cowards who are running away. Carry your own damn weight. If you can't keep up, that's on you. If you get caught, that's on you. If you die, that's on you. More likely than not, we'll all be dead before this is you're still here..?"

Her eyes filled with a malicious shine and her visage twisted into a malevolent cheshire grin.

"Let's see how much blood it takes to drown a snake."

Author Note: This marks 50 chapters with 150000+ words! Woot!