The three young women sat together enjoying drinks and food in a bar just outside the Uchiha district. Kaeda, who sat in the middle, looked from Kohaku to Yasahashi with pure excitement and awe.
"What are the chances!" she exclaimed, "Meet up with the both of you all on one day!"
"Yeah, what the heck," Yasahashi laughed.
"It does appear that fate has found us," Kohaku added.
They caught up, each giving a brief summary of what their lives had been like in the past 4 years. Yasahashi explained her path into urban planning, and Kaeda apparently had quit being a ninja after the 3rd great war, but still pursued what she called 'freelance' ninja work. And, Kohaku became an officer in the Uchiha Police Department.
"Wow, Kohaku! Between the three of us, you're the only one who ended up going all the way with the ninja path! Good for you!"
Kohaku shrugged, "It was always the plan for me, I suppose."
"And Yasa, it's really cool that you have this super important job for the village!"
Yasa chuckled, "Yeah, I guess it is pretty important, isn't it?"
"I'll say. I wish I did something important. Ah, well. To be honest, I think I want to become a housewife."
"Why would you limit yourself like that?" Kohaku asked.
Kaeda got a stern look on her face, "I'm not! It's simply what I want. Being a mom is important, and it's a lot of work, too! People always underestimate housewives."
"Who are you going to marry?" Yasa asked.
"I'll find someone!"
"Well if it stops you from your illegal unapproved ninja missions…" Kohaku mumbled.
Kaeda looked challenged by that, "What are you talking about?" she said.
Kohaku smirked, "Don't think I haven't seen your record, Morimoto-san."
"Well, I haven't done anything illegal. It's freelance!"
"I beg to differ."
Yasa looked at Kaeda coyly, "Kaeda, are you a criminal now?"
She huffed. "Welll! On paper, I'm just doing really small, low grade jobs that genin often do, and I do them for my own amount, minus the amount that I, of course, pay for taxes to the city! So, teeeechnically.. I'm a small business!" she looked at Kohaku daringly.
The police woman sighed, "If you went to trial, the council wouldn't like it. Trust me, we busted a guy last year who was doing just the same thing."
Kaeda pouted, "Are you talking about Masuko? How dare you compare he and I! That scoundrel was doing actual mercenary work and was casting a bad name on all Konoha ninja! Me, on the other hand- I only do work that helps people," she nodded confidently.
"No matter what you do, you're still a liability to the village."
"Why, Kohaku, I'm offended. We used to be teammates, you know I'm better than that."
Kohaku shrugged, "Just be careful, alright? Or else I'll have to book you myself."
Kaeda stuck her tongue out at the serious-faced Uchiha woman.
Suddenly there was a scuffle in the bar behind them, washing out their laughter. A group of ninja had been playing cards and one of them had stood up and threw a shuriken at the one across from them. She dodged and the shuriken hit the ground behind her.
"You used your sharingan to see my cards!" the shuriken-thrower claimed.
The other ninja stood up, "It's not my fault you didn't conceal them properly," she took out two lances from behind her back and pointed them at the man. The two lunged at one another.
In the blink of an eye, Kohaku was between the two, deflecting their blows.
The two women stared in awe at Kohaku, then they shared these looks with one another.
The bartender, who's face was pale, cried out in relief, "Thank goodness!"
After the fight had been settled diplomatically, Kohaku returned to finish her drink.
"Wow! So cool, Kohaku!" Kaeda cheered, "We should all hang out more often!" Then she muttered to herself, "I could use someone with skills like yours…"
"What's that?" Yasa asked absently, having not understood Kaeda's mumbling. Kaeda seemed to have picked up the habit of talking to herself since the last time Yasahashi had met her.
"Oh, nothing! I was just thinking that maybe the three of us should go on vacation sometime! That sounds like fun, doesn't it?"
Kohaku rose her eyebrows, "That actually does," she looked at Yasahashi unexpectedly, surprising the urban planner with the eye contact.
Yasihashi blushed, "What-" she started, "What is it?" Why was Kohaku looking at her like that?
"What do you think about going on vacation together, Koizuma?"
"T-that sounds good!" she blurted out in response, "I'd like that. Also, you can call me Yasahashi," she blushed.
Keada looked between the two, "Then it's settled! I'll take care of the planning, don't you two worry about a thing!" She paused, wondering why her two companions were staring at eachother still.
Kohaku seemed to be studying Yasahashi's face, noticing the blush on her cheeks. She gestured to the drink infront of Yasahashi, "Is that alcoholic? We're all underage, you know."
Kaeda laughed nervously again.
"Did you look at the candidates for the new teaching positions yet?" asked Daikoku, one of the teachers at the ninja academy.
"I was just about to!" Iruka replied.
It was a late night at the ninja academy and Iruka still had a bit of unfinished paperwork ahead of him.
"Well, take a look and then hurry up and get home to get some rest, it'll be a long day tomorrow." Daikoku headed out for the night, leaving him alone in the teacher's office.
After a yawn, Iruka pulled out the stack of teaching applications and reviewed the candidates who's applications had been pulled by the Hokage. He smiled after reading a name.
"Ah, so you decided to apply, Koizuma! I'm glad." he put the paper off to the side and continued looking through the various candidates.
In another place, on another part of town, and in a weird corner of corners, Yashashi arrived at Hanabis.
It wasn't as full as it usually was tonight. In face, it was so empty, Yasahashi was worried. She set up at the bar and tried to get Tsiro's attention, the man was prattling on about something to another man with a beret who was, to Yasahashi's understanding, very much Tsiro's type. Seeing that it was going well, she didn't try too hard to get his attention, and gazed up at the stage, where Miss Hanabi was playing piano wildly.
Something was troubling the butterfly Queen. It wasn't every night that she went up and tore up the piano keys like that. Yasahashi was so transfixed by the energy that she didn't notice someone coming up next to her.
"That's a weird way to ask someone out."
Yasa looked. It was the purple haired ninja, Anko, as the jonin had called her.
She shrugged, "had to do something to get it through to that guy that he had no chance."
"I was wondering if it was just that," Anko sighed. She banged on the counter, "Hey, bartender, can we get some service over here?" she called, breaking up the two flirtatious men.
"No, don't get me wrong," Yasa looked at her, 'I still wanted to ask you out."
Anko smirked.
"It's Anko."
"Yasahashi."
"Oh, Yasa! I didn't see you there! I'm sooo sorry!" Tsiro arrived accompanied by a rosy tint to his tan skin.
"It's okay- we're not interrupting anything are we?"
"Oh! Lady, you are not interrupting, do not worry about that," he giggled, "Yasa, your usual, and how about you miss?"
"I'll take something fruity," Anko grinned.
"Hey Tsiro, why's it so empty tonight?"
Tsiro fixed their drinks, "Oh? Well…" he glanced up at Miss Hanabi on stage, still slaying the piano, "it's that time of the year, you know- when new ninja squads get formed."
"Oh!" Yasahashi hit her forehead, "How could I forget."
Whenever a class was graduated, a smattering of new teams were formed with jonin in charge, and this often meant these jonin would stop coming to the Hanabis regularly enough to be noticed. Potentially, this made it very likely for their day time identities to be discovered, so it was a casual rule that ninja above genin status stopped coming to the bar around this time.
"Don't you guys usually do a special show for non-ninja?" Anko asked. She looked up on stage, "I was looking forward to finally seeing all you civvies drag us ninja tonight."
Tsiro handed them their drinks, "Yeah, usually that's what we do, but… Well, you heard about that new bar that opened in town?"
Yasahashi nodded, "What's it called, Paradise?"
"Yep. Well," his eyes flitted up to look Yasa in the face, "it was opened by Miss Earth Scroll."
Yasahashi looked surprised. Anko looked between the bartender and her, "Who's that? Another drag queen with something to prove?" she sipped her drink, "Ooo, this is nice! Thank you!"
"You're welcome," Tsiro said, but he didn't smile, "And, Miss Earth Scroll used to be a pretty popular queen here. She was good friends with Miss Hanabi," he looked at Yasahashi again, "She took Miss Heaven Scroll with her."
"That's not good." Yasahashi said, "To lose that kind of talent...:"
"Yeah, so, that's all happening," Tsiro sighed. There was some laughter from the other side of the bar and Tsiro's depression faded, replaced by a wisp of a smile, "If you'll excuse me,"
Yasa lifted her hands and ducked her head, "Get outta here, ya flirt."
Tsiro bounced on his feet excitedly and then zipped away to go speak with the ninja who was probably also an artist and totally his type.
"Wow, I've been coming to Hanabi's for a while, but I didn't realize there was so much interpersonal drama," Anko sipped her drink.
Yasa looked at Anko strangely, "You're out, aren't you?"
"Yep," Anko said pridefully, "Everyone knows I'm bi as hell, and no one gives a shit. Probably because I'm super fucking intimidating." She put her drink down and laughed attractively, she glanced at Yasahashi with a daring grin "It's all about confidence."
"God."
Miss Hanabi finished her song and took a low bow on stage. The handful of people in the center of the bar called her name and whistled. "My Hanabi's" she said, "Sometimes the world is full of back-stabbing bitches."
Yasahashi whistled.
"Sometimes, you are that bitch."
"Amen!" Anko called.
"The ninja world is a tough one, now let's hear it for all our ninja friends who couldn't make it tonight,"
The small crowd hooted a bit and clapped their hands.
Miss Hanabi left the stage through the curtains
Soon, the silence was replaced by a bass beat as a civilian band called the Senbon boys came on. As they were tuning on stage, Yasa finished her drink. She looked at Anko.
She never thought of herself as the type to make out with random people at bars before. But, there was a first for everything, she guessed. And, the Hokage did say that maybe she should consider new things.
She knew folks often went to this alleway around the north end of the bar to do just that. Anko seemed to know the way. They passed by the Uchiha mural, but Yasa didn't notice.
She felt excited, as the purple haired ninja pushed her up against the wall and got close to her face. She could feel her fruity breath on her lips, and when they touched, she felt butterflies in her stomach. Yasa held Anko's head in her hands as they kissed. Anko pressed into her, Yasa's fingers weaving into her mesh top.
They migrated to Anko's apartment. Clothes were discarded on the way to the bed. They rolled around. Anko straddled Yasa and vice versa. Mouths met limbs.
"You might think that because I'm part of the interrogations department, I might be into some kinky stuff. But, I actually like it pretty vanilla, you know."
Yasa had been starting to feel a little off. It didn't have anything to do with what Anko had just said, though.
"Hey can we stop?" she asked.
Anko had been sucking on her collarbone. She sat up and looked at Yasa in the dim light.
"What, do you actually want me to tie you up or something?" she seemed exasperated.
"No, it's not that." Yasa propped herself up. She was lost in thought, or rather, lack thereof. Anko moved off of her and sat next to her on the bed in awkward silence.
"Do you want some water or something?"
"Sure." Yasa said. She put her hand on her forehead. She was a bit dehydrated. Anko stood up and in a moment a light came on across the room where the kitchen was.
Yasa scootched to the edge of the bed. She looked at Anko's butt. She was beautiful. But, she needed to go home.
She stood up and started rummaging around for her clothes in the dark.
"You're just going to leave." Anko said flatly, after returning to see her putting her clothes back on.
"I'm sorry, I thought I was ready, but I'm really not." Yasa didn't look at her.
Anko wrapped herself in a towel and walked Yasa to the door.
"Let's keep in touch, though-" Yasa said. Anko slammed the door on her.
She walked back home in the dark. As her luck would have it, the path between Anko's apartment and her own passed right by the empty (mostly) Uchiha quarters. She held her breath as she passed.
Beep beep! Kakashi's Prius here! Don't forget to wear a condom! Yippee!
