A/N:

sorry for the late post, i straight up forgot to write/edit a chapter, LOL

hopefully this is okay ;,D

It's interesting, Akira thinks, just how mundane shinobi missions are, especially in the beginning stages. One would expect action and adventure straight from the get-go, but no, it mostly consists of running and idle chatter, and usually ends similarly if nothing goes horribly wrong in the end.

(Which… Maybe he shouldn't be thinking about if he doesn't want to tempt the fates.

…Whoops.)

It's not that he minds all that much - he'd rather be playing Go Fish than fighting tooth and nail to survive, and he's sure even most shinobi would agree - but it can get repetitive after some time. Only three hours in, and Akira can tell that his teammates are already a little bored.

That, at least, is something he can remedy.

"So!" he asks during a lull in conversation, "What's the Land of Noodles like, sensei?"

The silver-haired man looks briefly surprised at being addressed, which… is rather concerning, if Akira is being honest. He hasn't really added to the conversation so far, aside from a few absent comments, and although he's not a chatterbox or anything, he can usually be counted upon to make a few teasing remarks every now and then. He does have his suspicions, though, thanks to Kakashi's odd reaction while they'd been receiving the mission. He'd been harder to read than normal, and that's saying something given his aloof nature.

His annoyance (or maybe frustration?), however, couldn't be entirely masked. There's something off about this whole situation, but Akira can't tell if it's because of the mission itself or something related to it.

"Maa…," Kakashi lets out after a small stretch of silence, "It's nothing special, really. The name tells you all you need to know about it."

And that response, Akira thinks, is rather odd. Not because the man is lying or even leaving anything out, but because he doesn't take the chance to offer up anything else when he might have otherwise.

"Does it have a ninja village?" Akira presses, despite already knowing the answer. "Who's the leader?"

Kakashi glances at him again, blinking. "It doesn't. Have a ninja village, that is. The daimyo is a man named Chikara."

"Is he the guy we're meeting?" Kaho asks.

"Hm? No. We're handing the scroll to one of his men." After a moment, he adds, "Though I wouldn't be surprised if we ran into him. He's known for being rather… flamboyant."

Hotaru's eyes flick towards Kakashi. "Have you met him before?"

The man pauses, briefly. "Not directly, no. I've heard about him before, and I've seen him once or twice."

ANBU, then? Akira suspects. It wouldn't surprise him - not entirely, at least. Kakashi's pause, plus his mention of having seen but not met him before, was also pretty telling.

"Speaking of," he eventually says, "Do avoid making any comments about his appearance. I hear he can get rather sensitive about that whole thing."

"Wow, warning us before a mission?" Kaho asks, turning towards Kakashi with artificially widened eyes, "Who are you and what have you done with sensei?"

The man eyes her, deadpan. "Ha, ha. Normally, I'd have let you fly in blind—" "Wow, you're so good at this teaching thing." "—as a teaching experience —" "Yes, definitely not because you're a sadist or anything." "— but considering this mission is vaguely political in nature, it's best if we don't cause any issues, hm?" His pointed gaze slides towards Kaho. "Which means," he says a little too sweetly, "That you will have to watch that mouth of yours, my cute little genin." He blinks, as if surprised when her expression falls flat. "Oh, that goes for all of you, of course."

"Asshole," Kaho grumbles, which Kakashi easily ignores.

"On that same note, as I said before, avoid saying anything about the political climate anywhere . It's best to keep to yourself outside of the village in general, but especially on missions like these."

"What if they ask?"

Kakashi glances at Hotaru. "Maa… unless it's someone important, avoid answering if you can. Otherwise, be very careful with your words. I'm sure you can all handle that, yes?"

"Sure can!" Akira agrees cheerfully, which makes Hotaru look at him slightly disbelievingly. Which, he thinks, it's totally unfair. He may be talkative, but he's not an idiot .

He does admit, though, that Hotaru will probably be the best at polite conversation, though even he's a little iffy considering his vague social incompetence (as in: he's horribly awkward and, from what he's seen, tends to be a little too blunt). Really, he wonders if either of his teammates have ever had friends before - and that goes for either life.

He thinks it's probably concerning that he's the most well-adapted person in the group - at least when it comes to social conventions and general conversation.

Ironically, the conversation nearly dies out after that, only to be revived by Akira's comments, questions, and suggestions for road trip games. He and Kaho are locked in a fierce game of rock-paper-scissors when dusk falls, and Kakashi calls them all to a stop before leading them to the forest floor to make camp.

"I'm sure I don't need to tell you what to do," Kakashi says, "But I'll run this through with you just in case." He turns, pointing towards each of them when he says their names. "Hotaru, you work on getting a fire going. Kaho, start setting up the camp. Akira, grab some dinner for us. None of you wander out too far; if you can help it, don't go further than 50 meters away from the center of the site at all times. Otherwise, ensure that I can track you. Got that?"

"Yes sir," Kaho replies in a drawling tone, offering a lazy salute.

"Are you going to be doing something too?"

Kakashi glances at Akira. "I'll be setting up a perimeter. So be careful if you're coming back; I'll let you know where the traps are once we're all settled."

"Alrighty," Akira agrees easily, then pauses, wearing a sheepish smile as he turns towards his other teammates. "Ah… do either of you happen to know what animals are native to this area?"

There's a brief pause before Kakashi speaks up. "Scratch that," he drawls, "Akira, switch roles with Hotaru."

"Wh— hey, I can do it!" Akira protests, slightly embarrassed.

"I'm sure you can," Kakashi says in a voice that says he isn't . "It'll be faster this way. I do expect that you'll do more research prior to a mission in the future, though we'll go over whatever we need to after dinner."

Akira's ears grow hot. He'd intended to do more than just scan a map of the general area, but he ended up falling asleep the moment he sat down. It wasn't his fault, really; he hadn't gotten much sleep throughout the entire week, and he didn't even get home until it was already dark out the night before the mission. "Alright, sensei…"

Kaho smirks at him as he walks by, and he responds maturely by sticking out his tongue at her. Unfortunately, it only serves to make her look amused, and Hotaru vaguely exasperated.

At least it doesn't take long to clear out the area, or even to gather firewood. It hadn't rained in a while, so everything was perfectly dry, too. The hardest part was digging the pit, which he had to do by hand, not knowing any jutsu to do the job for him.

Kaho manages to finish up her work a little before he does, and a few minutes after they've both sat down onto the logs he'd dragged over to place near the fire, Hotaru comes back with a bucket full of fish.

Akira blinks. "Where in the world did you get that from?"

"Brought it just in case," Hotaru says with a half-shrug, like that's normal at all, then frowns a little when he looks inside.

"I thought you hated fish," Kaho points out, raising a brow.

Hotaru grimaces, briefly, before he takes a breath. "It's fine. I'll deal with it."

"Could you not find a rabbit or a bird or something?" Akira asks.

This time, the look on Hotaru's face is a little more clear. He looks almost queasy for all of a moment before he smooths out his expression, and oh .

"I'll be right back," Akira says, pushing himself upwards.

"What?" Hotaru lets out, frowning as he walks past. "Why?"

Akira pauses, turning his head to offer his teammate a smile. "We can't let our medic go hungry, can we?" he asks. "And I doubt you'll eat as much as you need to if you don't like it."

Hotaru furrows his brows before his eyes light up with realization, then shame. "I can just eat a rations bar later or something."

"We're not supposed to waste those things," Kaho comments, leaning forwards to eye the two of them. "Just let him get you something, yeah? Kakashi's not even back yet, so it should be fine. And I'm sure that even he can manage to find a rabbit or two."

"What's that supposed to mean?!" Akira squawks.

"Fine," Hotaru says as Kaho's lips curl up smugly. "But if you can't find anything in fifteen minutes, just come back."

"You got it, captain," Akira replies with finger guns, laughing when Hotaru deadpans. "I'll be back in five minutes tops."

"This isn't a race," Hotaru says with something softer than annoyance coloring his tone, but Akira is already off and searching.

He honestly half-expects something to go terribly wrong, but nothing does. He finds a brown rabbit and deals with it swiftly to spare it some pain, then heads back to the campsite.

"Six minutes," Kaho calls out to him as he steps into the clearing before he can say a word.

"You're so mean to me all the time," Akira complains, good mood ruined. Kaho flashes him a winning smile, and he huffs, sitting down to start skinning the rabbit. When he catches a glimpse of Hotaru's slightly queasy expression, he angles his body so the rabbit is out of his direct line of sight. "Where's Kakashi?"

"Right here," the man says from behind him before Kaho can do more than open her mouth. Akira resolutely does not startle, though does take a moment before turning towards him.

"What took you so long?" Kaho asks, skewering the fish from earlier.

"Such a rude tone," Kakashi huffs like an offended housewife, causing Kaho to raise a brow. "Like I said before, I was putting down traps. And, of course, I checked out the perimeter."

"Notice anything interesting?" Akira asks, ridding the rabbit of its fur.

Kakashi hums, moving towards the logs. "Nothing special. There hasn't been much activity around here lately, it seems."

"Well," Kaho points out, "We are out in the middle of a pathless forest."

"Not to mention a little ways away from most villages," Hotaru adds absently, having finally taken a seat.

"Good observations," Kakashi says, and Akira eyes him briefly, unsure of whether he's being sarcastic or not. His expression, as usual, reveals nothing. "Nice catches, too. For your first time, anyway."

Akira would wonder why his compliments are always so backhanded or immediately followed by an insult, though he's fairly certain that can be attributed to the fact that the silver-haired man has probably never so much as seen a therapist in his life, outside of mental evaluations.

Which, by the way, he doubts Kakashi should be able to pass without intervention or a skewing of the results. But the village will do what it must in order to keep one of its top shinobi around. He hates that it has to come at the expense of his - and any other shinobi's - mental health, though.

"While we're waiting," Akira eventually says, already having started to cut into the rabbit, "Is there anything else we need to know?"

"Well you will need to do some studying," Kakashi replies easily.

Akira's shoulders slump before he eyes the man curiously. "With you?"

"Hm? Of course not. Hotaru, you wouldn't mind helping out your teammate, would you?"

Hotaru looks distinctly unimpressed, but forces out an unenthusiastic "Sure" anyway. Akira finds that he's not surprised in the least.

"And as for tonight… Each of you will have to practice being on lookout. Akira, you have the first shift. Hotaru on third. Kaho on last. I'll take the second shift. Tomorrow, you'll swap with one another, but I'll take the second watch both nights. Good?" Without waiting for a response, he claps his hands together. "Great. Now let's get all of this cooking, hm?"

Akira and his teammates all share a look, but they get started putting everything over the fire nonetheless. In the end, none of it tastes particularly good - they don't have any seasoning or anything, after all - but it's not awful, and it's certainly better than the chalky taste of ration bars, so he can't complain too much.

Afterwards, Kakashi takes them around the campsite to look over all the traps. Kaho offers a mumbled "Troublesome" at the idea of having to clean everything up in the morning, which is fair enough, since the man was thorough . He's fairly certain that nothing short of an A-Rank ninja would be able to get in without getting hit by something at least once.

Things slow down as the sky grows darker, and after an hour or two where Hotaru and Akira spend their time looking over a map while Kaho provides commentary from beside them, Kakashi sends Hotaru and Kaho off to bed.

To his surprise, Kakashi tells him that he'll be staying up along with him, though he'll be further out. He supposes he shouldn't be, though, since the man has no regard for his own health or safety. He wants to shoo him off so he can sleep, but he spirits away before he can get out a word, and Akira is left staring at the pile of leaves he leaves (hah) behind.

His watch goes as expected; absolutely nothing happens, aside from a few animals skittering about in the middle of the night. Just as he feels drowsiness creeping up on him, Kakashi reappears and tells him to head off to sleep.

Akira considers wishing him luck, but doubts that someone like Kakashi would care for such a thing. And, even if he does, he doesn't want to end up jinxing the guy.

Instead he offers a quiet goodnight, which is echoed in kind, and goes to join his teammates. The moment his head touches cloth, he's out like a light.

"Dear god," Kaho whispers in horrified awe, "He talks just like Elvis."

Looks just like a blond version of him too, Akira almost replies, but instead plasters on a winning smile upon noticing the man's curious - but suspicious - gaze sweep across their group.

Just like Kakashi said he might, Chikara ends up finding them after they hand off the scroll to one of his men, and is quick to greet them with enthusiasm. He also makes a flirty comment towards Kakashi, though he obviously doesn't mean anything by it, and even mentions immediately afterwards that he's not really into the 'mysterious type.'

Then, after Chikara suggests that Kakashi 'fill out a little more' - which forces him to hold back a laugh, if only because of the way Kakashi's attempt at a smile looks more like a grimace - he ends up roping them into having dinner.

There's not much to be said about that, except that he's never eaten so much in either life, and Chikara is almost as talented as Kakashi at making backhanded compliments (though points are taken off since the blond's aren't even on purpose ).

And after that… there's nothing. Absolutely nothing goes wrong, aside from a brief detour due to blocked roads that have them cutting through the east, and it leaves his teammates on edge. Not that he can blame them; he, too, is horribly suspicious as to why they haven't been attacked by an A-Rank missing nin, or were forced to save a country, or something equally dangerous.

But he must grow too relaxed, because eventually, their luck catches up with them.

And it's all his fault.

A/N:

what an ominous (cringey) ending, amirite?

anyway
Thanks for reading!