Disclaimer: Still don't own it, Kishimoto can keep it.
Jagged Pieces
Apparently, punching a kid through a table was a good way to introduce one's self, Naruto discovered. The girl, Rin, had been suitably cowed into never angering Naruto while Obito had been so impressed by her raw strength ("Sensei, your wife is so badass! She didn't even use chakra!") that she could practically see stars dancing in his eyes as he kept begging her to punch Kakashi again. It was odd to see the cheerful kid her sensei had talked about when all she could associate him with was a jaded man ready to tear the world asunder.
They were now all sitting in the living-room, Kakashi nursing a swollen jaw with cold compresses as Rin had categorically refused to heal anyone who was dumb enough to insult their host. "And stop laughing, Obito-kun! There's nothing funny in seeing your teammate injured!" she scolded the black-haired boy as she yet again apologized for her team's antics to a miffed Naruto.
After serving herself a cup of green tea, she turned towards Minato who was holding Hajime on his knee, gently bouncing him up and down. The baby boy had stopped crying, tears still glistening in his large blue-grey eyes as he sucked on a pacifier and clung tightly to his father's shirt. Sometimes, Naruto wondered if she was just that bad of a mother that she couldn't even soothe her own son while Minato barely tried and had Hajime quiet down in mere seconds. She cleared her throat out and took a sip of her tea.
"My apologies too, I wasn't expecting a visit so early in the morning."
Her glare didn't go unnoticed and Minato shrugged, a bit sheepish. "It wasn't planned. We were hunkering at the Ninja Archives to study some scrolls for our next mission but we got kicked out after Kakashi-kun and Obito-kun started a row and destroyed some shelves."
Sensing the woman's foul mood, Rin jumped to her sensei's defence. "I'm from a civilian household; we aren't allowed to bring scrolls from the Ninja Archives into a civilian abode in case we end up accidentally divulging classified information. As for the other two…" She shot a glance at Kakashi who was still refusing to partake in the conversation and she squirmed in her seat, wringing her hands before stuffing them under her thighs. "Um, the Hatake compound is off-limit and Obito-kun's family doesn't like when the team meets up in their home. So sensei was kind enough to just bring us here."
This got a scoff from the grey-haired Genin and Naruto arched an eyebrow as she heard some nasty mutterings coming from under the mask. That at least hasn't changed, the woman idly thought. She fought down some amusement and said, pointing her cup at the teenager, "Someone needs to take a chill pill. Is he always a grump?"
"Aha! Called it!" Obito suddenly screamed, fists pumped in the air. "You owe me a hundred ryo!"
Kakashi frowned. "I owe you nothing, dumbass. You bet on a whole day, it's been less than an hour."
"Obito-kun! I can't believe you made a bet about Kakashi-san! Again."
The boy sulked for a second, crossing his arms. "Kujin-sensei started it, to be fair. He said it'd be funny, it's not every day that our team meets someone new and we can bet about Bakashi…"
Minato heaved a long, suffering sigh and closed his eyes, warding off a headache. Sometimes, he truly wondered why he accepted to take on a full team. He missed the old days when he was a simple ANBU deemed not fit enough to teach. He should've just botched his psych evaluation like Kujin did, the cunning asshole. Speaking of… "I can't believe I need to say it again, but please: stop listening to Kujin outside of training. He's an idiot, and I taught you all better than to talk to idiots."
"You talk to him," Kakashi pointed out, slapping Obito's hand away as he tried to poke the swollen cheek. "What does that make you?"
"A massive loser," Naruto cut in before the team leader could answer, earning a glare from both the Hatake and the Namikaze for the uncalled insult. "What's this bet about? I feel out of the loop, here."
Rin flushed and ducked her head down as Kakashi blinked owlishly. It was Obito who gave her the answer she was seeking. "Whether or not you'd see underneath the underneath. Bakashi is a girl, though she doesn't act like one at all," he said as he stuck his tongue out. "I think everyone outside of the team actually forgot!"
A cup broke and tepid liquid splashed on Naruto's feet.
For fuck's sake.
Was everything always going to be this weird in this dimension? What was next; Madara Uchiha happily married to the Shodaime? Mortified and putting a screeching halt to her mad thoughts, Naruto bowed several times towards the kid. "I'm so sorry, I just made assumptions based on the way you present yourself…! And since Minato is so tight-lipped about his team…"
Kakashi shrugged, half-lidded eyes conveying how bored she was and how little she thought of her sensei's wife's deduction skills. "I really don't care. It's just that this moron," here, she pointed with barely hidden disgust at her male teammate, "and Uzumaki-san like to make money out of these stupid bets. As long as I'm not sent on useless kunoichi missions, I don't mind if the village thinks I'm a man."
"Useless kunoichi missions?" Naruto parroted with incomprehension as Rin sent a glare at her teammate and retorted with quite a bite, "It's not useless!"
"There's no glory in spreading your legs to get information out of a target," the other girl spat with venom. "Hadn't we been on Minato-sensei's team, I'm sure the both of us would've been sent on quite a few of them... Just look at Kurenai!"
"She's doing her duty to the village—"
"Well, fuck the village!"
A tensed silence followed Kakashi's words as she stood up, threw the now tepid compresses on the used chabudai Minato had yet to change, and leapt out of the window. It didn't take a second for Obito to rise from his seat, concern and anger battling on his face as he immediately followed after her, yelling "Oi, asshole, wait up!" leaving behind him his last teammate who had teary eyes. The girl sniffled, slapped her cheeks twice as she silently berated herself and quickly bowed in apology towards her sensei and his wife. "I'm sorry about all that, it wasn't a very good first impression Namikaze-san. And, um, Sensei, I'll bring them back so we can finish with the scrolls…!"
"No need, Rin-kun. There's not much left to look over, I'll send my summons over with a recap. Just make sure these two don't wreak the village in the meantime."
"Thank you, Sensei!" and with that, she jumped out of the window in a burst of chakra, trying to follow her teammates' path.
Once again, silence befell the room. Hajime was dozing in and out of sleep, his head heavily leaning to one side before waking up in a start, almost losing his balance on his father's lap. Minato was petting his fluffy hair, encouraging the baby to just lean on his torso as he started to read a new scroll, completely oblivious to his wife's heavy stare. After a long minute spent like this, Naruto's glare unrelenting, he eventually got the message and put his scroll down and turned towards her, giving his full attention.
"Alright, spit it out."
"Why didn't you say something and let them go at each other's throats like that?"
The man shrugged, unconcerned. "They're ninja. If they couldn't resolve their differences by themselves, I would've sent them straight back to the Academy a long time ago."
This surprised her. Jiraiya had been a bit of a lousy sensei, letting her do whatever she pleased but still making sure she never got out of line. Kakashi-sensei had been the same, supervising his team as much as he could, perhaps even babying them when he should've made sure they were killing-machines ready for use. And so she made her thoughts heard. "You have a responsibility towards them, though!"
"Yes, as their martial instructor," he said slowly as if explaining something to a particularly daft child. Naruto didn't even have it in her to get angry, appalled by his coldness towards his team.
"Minato," she started with seldom seen seriousness, and he straightened his back in surprise at hearing his name. "They're kids. They need your guidance, not just someone to teach them how not to die."
And Minato finally got it. His eyes widened in surprise, not truly believing what was spouting out of the woman's mouth. It was truly ironic to see someone as reckless as her talk about kids needing guidance and safety. The real wonder was that Naruto actually believed what she was saying; as if it was a given and young shinobi could truly afford to be pampered.
Minato sighed and, mindful of Hajime, leant towards Naruto to take her right hand in his, fingers curling loosely around her palm. "That is a nice sentiment, Naruto-san, truly, but this is not how a ninja village works." Almost absentmindedly, he started to stroke his thumb on the back of her hand, making her flinch in surprise before she accommodated to his touch. "My job is to make sure they're serving their village well, not to babysit a bunch of hormonal kids who can't sort themselves out."
She didn't say anything, staring at her laps where their hands were intertwined. Her cheeks had a faint flush to them, and he didn't know if it was born from anger or something else. When she made to take her hand back, he let her go and leant back on his side of the couch watching as his wife clenched her fists hard enough for her knuckles to whiten, lips pinched as if she was keeping herself from spitting fire.
Anger it was, then.
The moment was gone, and so was Minato's good mood. He cleared his throat out and said, "Anymore concerns about how I treat my subordinates, Naruto-san?"
Silence answered him, and he chose to not press the issue, returning gladly to his scroll and a now cold cup of tea…
… only for his eyebrows to twitch when a small blue bird sored through the open window and flew circles around his head until he angrily snatched the missive it was holding between its claws. Minato motioned for the bird to go, but the fluffy blue creature just stared at him with beady black eyes, beak picking at some feathers as it waited for the blond man to open the sealed scroll.
"Is that a summon?" Naruto asked, reaching a curious finger towards the bird who pecked at it before looking away in disinterest when she offered no food.
"No," was the short reply she got.
Minato read through the scroll, scoffed, and as he locked eyes with the bird, burnt the scroll to ashes. The bird squawked and flapped its wings. "Go back to your master, Mochi."
Mochi puffed its chest and with one last screech flew out of the Namikaze abode. Naruto frowned, worried. "What was that about?"
"Just some idiot trying to get my attention. Here, take Hajime, I think he's tired of daddy."
True enough, the baby was fussing around, pushing away from Minato and whimpering as he turned his head left and right for something. When Naruto took him in her arms and settled his face against her neck, his palms smacked her chest and he burrowed deeper in the comforting scent. The mother smiled at her son, humming softly under her breath as she wandered aimlessly around the room before settling down to feed the fussy child.
All the while, scrolls and tea forgotten, Minato watched them, fingers still stained from the ashes of the letter he burnt, and the desire he had been struggling to smother just hit him. Like that, their baby boy cocooned in her strong arms, singing a meaningless lullaby off-key as Hajime suckled away, Naruto was breathtaking. No matter how uncouth she was, how crass she sounded, how dumb she could act, Minato wanted her. He wanted her like he had never wanted anything else before. He wanted everything she could give and more. He wanted to fight with her, he wanted to laugh with her, he wanted to burn with her.
It hit him hard, this desire; like a punch to the belly, a fist to the face. How he longed to run those tainted fingers through Naruto's long, unbound hair… let them glide down her nape, her back. Let them bury in her flesh, and let her bury under his skin in turn. How he yearned to stand up and embrace his wife and son, blanketing them with his body, hiding them away from the cruel world waiting outside.
His fingers curled around nothing, the warmth of Naruto's palm still carved in his flesh, the flames of the burnt paper still licking at his skin. The ashes had spread to his whole hand, smearing the white with black. Minato tightened his hand into a fist.
It hit him hard that he couldn't have her, the stubborn woman.
Time will tell, he repeated to himself the words he once told Naruto. Time would tell, and if there was one thing Minato was a master at, it was bending time to his will.
The day for Naruto's audience with the Hokage came pretty quickly. In the weeks leading to it, she hadn't seen much of Team Minato, catching glimpses of the Chunin ("Really dude, you could've told me they already got their promotion!" The blond man had been unapologetic, trying to wipe off Hajime's vomit on his last clean shirt. "I'm just used to calling them Genin.") here and there around the village as she went in and out of the forest to up her training or when they babysat her son.
It was going so well that she had actually started to brush up some of her Ninjutsu in the hope of not relying so much on her heavy techniques that were now off limit – that is to say, the Rasengan and the Shadow Clones. Having to give up on the first one for the time being was a bummer, but relinquishing the Shadow Clones was a bit heartbreaking. This had been the first real jutsu she had mastered, all on her own. Most of the kunoichi's battle techniques were based on her capacity to make dozen of clones in the blink of an eye, the melee style being the most suited form of combat she found for herself.
Fortunately, Naruto had not been idle since the end of the war. She had honed her wind affinity to such an extent that she had managed the impossible – creating clones that would explode in razor-sharp bursts of wind if eliminated. Naruto had never been so proud to see one of her techniques added to the Forbidden Scroll residing in the Hokage's personal library.
Thus, when she was finally allowed to speak with the Sandaime about joining the ninja ranks, Naruto didn't lose time in dutifully listing all the jutsu she knew to prove how lethal of a kunoichi she was. Suitably impressed, the old man read through her exam papers and physical evaluation.
"You seem to be a good candidate, Naruto-san."
The compliment made something loosen in her chest and she fought back a grin. It hadn't hurt as much to see the old man as she thought it would. Time had dulled her sorrow, and Naruto had long since made peace with the Sarutobi's death. All she felt when she looked at him was fondness and nostalgia for the good old times, but this Hiruzen was so much younger than the one she grew to see as a grandfather that she struggled to reconcile the two images.
"Thank you, Hokage-sama," Naruto said with ill-contained glee when she chanced a look at Minato's sullen expression.
"Which corps do you believe would suit you the most?"
Finally, Naruto wanted to scream. Finally, she could be something else than a Genin! Steeling her resolve, the woman proudly straightened up and said with the utmost confidence, "I'd like to apply for the Jounin rank, sir."
"Denied," Minato immediately said. He stood up from his seat next to the Hokage to better look at her from head to toe and started a list of all the things he found lacking. "You don't have a proper posture, your hair is too long and not bound properly which would make it a hindrance in battle unless you're a suicidal, reckless ninja, your threat response is not good enough – what are your hands doing behind your back when they should be at your sides, ready to perform hand seals or grab a weapon? You've been gaining back your muscle mass for barely a month, and," at that, he sent a sharp glare at his wife who was ready to yell in outrage, daring her to contradict him on his next words, "you clearly have a problem with authority."
Silence followed his tirade and he planted his hands on the desk, making an imposing figure. "So, your request is denied."
Naruto gaped for a second or two at his audacity before snorting, amazed. Cocky bastard, she thought to herself. "Did I miss the passing of the hat or something? I could've sworn I was petitioning the Hokage, not my husband." She then turned to the old man who was just sitting there, looking at Minato with amusement. "Sir?"
Gaze still pointed on his successor for a few seconds before turning away to read through Naruto's papers once again, Hiruzen said, "I accept your request, Naruto-san. I'll even have you pass your evaluation today."
Clenching his jaw to stop himself from saying something he'd regret, Minato took a deep breath before stating with authority, "Then I'll do the assessment."
"Minato-kun," the Sandaime said, not once looking from the papers he was perusing. "Sit down." Though the old man's voice was quite cordial, the amount of chakra leaking from him was enough to make all the people standing in the room understand how pissed off Hiruzen was at the growing insubordination showed by his disciple.
Swallowing his vitriol, Minato quietly sat back down, biting hard on the inside of his cheek to keep his cool. Satisfied, the Hokage signed a paper and pushed it back towards Naruto, gesturing for her to pick it up. "Obviously, Minato-kun will not be the one assessing you as there would be a conflict of interest. Would you be made a kunoichi of Konoha, know that you'll never be allowed on a mission with your husband or, later on, your son."
"It's perfectly understandable, Hokage-sama."
"Good, it would seem that at least someone here is still able to think."
Minato bristled but said nothing at the blatant critic. Soon, Naruto was shown out of the office to be evaluated by some Jounin he never heard about – surely a low-levelled nobody who never shone for their combative skills. As soon as she was out the door, Hiruzen turned towards his prospective successor, a stern look on his withered face. Minato matched his glare, refusing to bow down a second time now that they were alone apart from the ANBU guards. His senses told him those were part of a team he had once captained over. They were well-acquainted with his temper, then.
"I heard what happened with the Jounin Commander."
"You'll have to be more precise, Sandaime-sama."
Hiruzen retrieved his pipe from a drawer and began to stuff it, the crinkle of dried leaves the only noise heard in the quiet office. He then held it between his lips and rubbed two fingers together until a flame burst from the calloused digits, setting the tobacco alight.
"You threatened my Jounin Commander." Hiruzen puffed on his pipe, clouds of smoke swirling around his head. "Though I have to thank you for that, it proved once and for all that Azegawa-san was unfit for the role if someone under his own command managed to cow him into doing their bidding. Thus he was replaced three weeks ago by Shikaku Nara who, I'm sure you know, will be less easily swayed. "
Wisely, the blond man said nothing to further incriminate himself, though he looked completely unrepentant. Good. It wouldn't have done any good for his successor to apologize for his actions, it would set for a bad precedent and Konoha was in no need of a meek, remorseful leader. However, Hiruzen was still the Hokage, and as such, this little brat owed him some respect.
"Do not forget however who is wearing the hat yet, Minato. You do not get to command my shinobi for your own benefits, and you do not get to make decisions in this office while I'm still sitting here. Is that understood?"
His voice had been like a whip, hard and swift in its order. The young Jounin acquiesced and Hiruzen finally slumped back into his seat, feet crossed under the desk and hands passively held together over his belly. He nodded at the paperwork.
"Now, let's go back to business. We still have some reports to read over and letters to answer to. Go on, pick one."
And just like that, the tension melted from Minato's bones as he went back to work, Naruto's evaluation still stuck in the back of his mind. He had seen her trained in the little clearing she had claimed as her own when he came around with Hajime so that the baby could spend some time with his mother. She was lethal, which he had never doubted. And that was the core of the problem… Strong shinobi were not to be confined to the safety of the village. They were meant to represent Konoha and strike fear in their opponents. And strong shinobi didn't have long lives; they lived fast and died young. There was no doubt in his mind that Naruto would ace her evaluation and be made to join the ranks, and that was something that Minato couldn't stop.
Pulling back his attention to the task at hand, he quickly read through a scroll and just as he was about to approve a demand for medical aid in a nearby village, Hiruzen perked up and pointed his pipe at the younger shinobi. "Oh, and before I forget: I transferred the medical bill of the Chunin whose shoulder you dislocated to your account."
Minato gaped, shocked. "Wha-but! He traumatized my son!"
The Hokage stared at him, deadpan. The thought 'moron' was plainly written on his face and Minato took offence. Hiruzen sighed, really not impressed with his successor. "I'd wager that 'traumatized' is a bit of an exaggeration from the accounts I got, Minato-kun. I shudder to think what you'll do to the poor girl who'll one day break his heart…"
Minato's pen broke in his grip, ink staining his hand and the paper he was working on.
Hiruzen huffed and rolled his eyes at the ceiling. Young shinobi parents were really the worst.
"Bend it. Again. And again."
Kujin did the motion with his arm until Orochimaru told him to hold the position. Then he let him release the tension in his arm and made him stand up. They went through a few more flexibility exercises and tested his reflexes before the medic deemed him fit for duty. Readjusting his glasses, the man with long brown hair held in a tight braid jotted some notes in his pad.
"When is your psych eval?" he asked as an afterthought.
Deciding to not bother with zipping up his flak vest, unashamed of his bare torso, Kujin hummed under his breath. "Um… In three months, I think. Then I'll be done for the year."
This made Orochimaru smile as he signed the paper with a flourish and handed it back to his assistant for filing. "Nana will be the one doing it, then. Are you going to lie again to get out of taking a Genin team?"
"Meh, Chichi-sensei, you know me too well!" They started walking together out of the examination room. "My hands are full with Minato's brats anyway, they keep pestering me when Mina-chan is busy with his Hokage tuition or ANBU missions."
This made the older man sigh in resignation. "You two are so codependent, I swear… I can't believe Jiraiya and I failed to train that bad habit out of you both. How does the new wife fit in, by the way?"
He chanced a glance at his former student and smirked at the frown marring the Jounin's usually handsome and jovial face. It was a secret for no one that Kujin and Minato could always be found attached at the hip, and that the redhead had always been protective of his best friend. Orochimaru remembered how despondent the Uzumaki had been when Minato had been taken into Jiraiya's team. The redhead had sought Orochimaru on his own and demanded – not begged – to be taken under his wing, refusing to be left in the dust and striving to become stronger and stronger to stand equal with his friend. Minato respected strength more than anything else, and Kujin had known that pretty well. He had worked so hard to be at the blonde's sides, taking pride in stealing his attention for himself. It must have been a harsh realization to see Minato come back with a woman he had no knowledge of, dotting on his new family in which the Uzumaki had no place.
"Minato is completely besotted," Kujin said in a drawl. "Frankly, I don't see why. If only you had seen her, Sensei… I always thought that Minato would've gone for a kunoichi like Nana-chan, but here we are," he finished bitterly.
"You're angry."
"Of course I am. My best friend lied to me."
Orochimaru shook a hand as if to bat an annoying fly away. "You're so dramatic, Kujin. Hiding a wife is a smart move when you're a high-profile shinobi like him, don't take it to heart. And don't be so quick to judge, you of all people should know that this stubborn boy wouldn't look twice at a woman who couldn't break his nose."
He would know; Jiraiya had always been proud of his student's sensor abilities and kept bragging about the blonde kid every time they met up. He was like a hound sniffing fresh blood, being able to gauge his foes' power in a matter of seconds, reacting to strength as if he'd been directly challenged and taking offence at anyone who would refuse to fight him and bow under his might. Orochimaru's own student was similar, fluttering like a moth around the Namikaze boy, thirsting after his power and wanting to prove to himself he was as strong – if not better – than the blonde ninja. These two were a headache…
Kujin pouted. "I guess their baby is cute, though. Imma steal him and raise him as mine. That'll teach 'em, assholes."
"We already went over this, brat: no stealing kids—"
"—that already have parents I'm unwilling to kill, I know, I know."
During their conversation, they had walked past Orochimaru's office and were now in front of the hospital's main entrance. Looking at the hour, the medic made his farewells and promised to catch up soon with his student. "Come at the house tomorrow night, Nana has been nagging me about you not visiting in a while and Kinoe has been asking after you."
"Will do, Chichi-sensei!"
They parted ways and as Kujin was about to track down the nearest bakery, someone called out his name. A mission scroll was passed to him and he groaned. "Really? Proctor for a Jounin eval? Ugh, fuck my life…"
Glancing mournfully in the direction of the shop that sold his favourite sweet buns, Kujin sighed and reluctantly jumped towards training ground 37. It didn't take long for him to arrive, leaping down from a tree branch to grouch at the unfortunate people who disturbed his day off.
"Alright suckers, who's getting their ass beat?"
He looked around the training ground, eyes falling on a blond woman who smirked at him as she raised her hand. "I'll probably do the beating, to be honest."
Gone was the frail pregnant girl who waddled around and had barely enough strength to deliver her child, crying in panic. In her stand was a kunoichi proudly showing off her defined abs, flexing the corded muscles of her arms as she waited for her opponent to finish his stretches. Her crop top was skin-tight and an unsightly orange and her dark blue baggy pants were tucked in her high sandals, a weapon pouch sitting on both legs.
Naruto was ready for battle, and Kujin felt his lips stretched in a bloodthirsty grin.
It looked like Minato ended up finding quite the challenge, in the end. When he saw the other Jounin give a sign of the head to show his readiness, Kujin jumped back from the two fighters and rose a hand in the air.
"Let's see what you're made of, wifey-chan. Begin!"
His hand slashed the air down, and the two opponents lunged at each other. If the Uzumaki was honest, he witnessed a thrashing more than an evaluation. The battle was one-sided, the kunoichi showing no mercy as she picked the Jounin by the collar and sent her adversary waltzing towards a tree trunk only to appear behind him in a flicker of chakra to axe-kick him in the head, sending the man straight into the ground so violently that his body left an indentation. She didn't give him a chance to retaliate when he stood up with disoriented eyes and a bleeding nose, kneeing him in the stomach hard enough to make him bend in two and cough up some more blood, leaving his defences open as Naruto joined both hands together to ruthlessly smash them onto his back.
The man collapsed to the floor, less than a minute into the fight, unable to stand back up as she put her foot on his nape and started to apply pressure.
"Yield?" she asked with a confident smile.
A grunt was his only answer and Kujin quickly made his way over to assess the damage. He healed the cracked ribs and vertebrae, all the while staring at Naruto with a mix of amazement and satisfaction. Once he was done with healing the poor sod, he sent him to the hospital with clear orders to get his back checked.
"Not bad, wifey-chan. Not bad at all."
Naruto only stared at her nails, feigning indifference, but he could see how proud she was of herself in the way she puffed up her chest and smirked. Chichi-sensei had been right… Kujin was always quick to dish out his judgment, often finding people to be lacking compared to the wonder duo he made with Minato. He was still pissed off at his friend for lying for so many years about this girl, and he was mad at her for barging into his orderly life and taking away his best friend, but he could admit that at least she seemed to be worthy of Minato.
He smiled, full of mischief and bloodlust as he cracked his hands and neck, feeling the need to fight someone. "We're gonna have so much fun, I can already tell."
The kunoichi scoffed and tilted her head in challenge. "I can take you whenever, wherever."
"Oh yeah? Don't get me all riled up only to puss out, girly."
They were now nose to nose, ready to punch each other in the teeth, mirror savage grins stretching their mouth. They seemed to read each other pretty well as they both jumped back at the same time, entering into new battle stances. Naruto's hair was completely unbound, just like Kujin, and he smirked at the open challenge to grab it and make her kneel. They waited for a beat. Two beats. Their feet shifted, their muscles tensed.
And a village-wide alarm rang out.
Chunin Hitoshi had been having an exceptionally good day. His girlfriend had become his fiancée, the bid he had made on a cosy new flat in the nicer districts had been accepted, and instead of being sent on a muddy mission on the outskirts of Kiri, he got gate guarding duty.
All in all, Hitoshi was one lucky ninja. It had been a slow day, only two teams coming back from a mission and three more going out. There had been no merchants or visitors, which meant that Hitoshi had just spent the whole morning sitting on his butt doing nothing apart from waving at the departing teams and quickly checking the ID numbers of the teams going in, a lonely bird keeping him company as he fed it some crumbs of his lunch.
So you could well imagine his surprise when he felt fast approaching chakra signatures that held the distinct sign of lightning users. Hitoshi knew for a fact that the only shinobi in their midst who held such a similar chakra signature was currently sitting in the Hokage Tower with the Sandaime, going over missions and bills.
He sprung up to his feet, anxious, left hand already drifting towards the seal hidden in the walls surrounding the village. Surely it was nothing and he was getting riled up for nothing, perhaps it was a foreign ninja team accompanying some merchants. The bird that had been sitting so quietly suddenly chirped, fluttering its wings before flying away in the trees.
A shadow dropped before Hitoshi, startling him.
"Yo."
He froze as he took notice of the pale blond hair, dark skin and eyes hidden behind shades as more shadows dropped from the trees, circling around one tall man. Hitoshi could feel the blood draining from his face, leaving him dizzy as the Raikage stepped forward, standing next to his infamous brother Bee.
Hitoshi stumbled, back to the wall, hand scrambling for the seal.
Ay looked around him, stone-faced. "Konoha," he started in a deep, scratchy voice. "I'm here for my brother."
Trembling fingers finally activated the seal.
A bell rang, the alert was given: Konoha was under attack.
To be continued…
A/N: I swear to God, Orochimaru just came out of left field. I was not expecting him at all in this story, but then he came knocking and I was like, "ok bro, go ahead, could be fun." And then he became Kujin's sensei and I was like, "Oh. OH. OKAY. WHY NOT. THIS COULD ACTUALLY BE GREAT." So yeah. Enjoy my weird useless plot twists that bring nothing of substance to the story but feed my random cravings. I don't know if he'll get to appear again, so just FYI: in this verse, Orochimaru is married to Tsunade (who was a really good influence on him and kicked his ass into being a Good Human Being) and they adopted Tenzou/Kinoe. He's the Head of Neurosurgery at the hospital (whose director is Tsunade, who is also is the Head of Trauma) and wouldn't usually bother with routine physical exams, but his student only deserves the best, and Orochimaru is the best. He's also a praised and prized researcher for Konoha's scientific department. He still is a fucking weirdo with weird (but harmless) ethics and poor understanding of social cues and that's why it makes absolute sense that he would've been Kujin's sensei. I will totally make a snippet or two about him and Jiraiya bitching about their brats in Wreaking Havoc, so keep an eye out if you're interested in knowing more about Chichi-sensei!
Also, yaaaay! Bee is back and brought big bro Ay to the game! Hahahahaha, I've waited FOUR FUCKING YEARS for this moment, I'm so happy.
Congrats to the readers who guessed forever ago that Kakashi would be a girl! I toyed with the idea of letting the gender go unchanged just to spite y'all but then it would've hindered my plot! (Because yeah, I don't actually genderswap random people for shit and giggles, I promise there is a reason to that.)
Please, DO NOT ASK when I'll update, I'M AS CLUELESS AS YOU!
Questions? Thoughts? Praises? Feel free to drop a word on my tumblr!
Thanks for all the kind words (and even the random flames: I knew I was hot), I'm ever so glad to see you all enjoying this ride! See you around, lil' peaches!