Ponchoninjax3 here again. Thank you for reading my story up to this point, and please check back often as I have a good chunk (like, 70 pages. I have no life) of this story already written and in the editing phase. This means that chapters get posted more often , but in like a month and half I'm gonna hit a brick wall and you all will have to wait. It's kind of like when you stumble across an anime you didn't about on Crunchyroll or you binge watch a show on Netflix that has like, three seasons up. Three days of your life are gone forever and you have to go back to waiting for weekly updates like the chumps who were with the show from the start. Unlike most anime, however, I don't intend to leave you with an empty void in your heart when you find out the first season was completed in 2013 and at this point, you will never get a second one (I'm looking at you, My Little Monster. You know what you did.) Don't even get me started on High School of the Dead. Okay. Okay. Rant over. If you have any comments or questions, feel free to PM me. As I am new, I really appreciate you taking the time to send me a review. It helps. I'm new to publishing this stuff, after all. If you're curious about my other work, I have a dA . My deviant ID is the same as here, ponchoninjax3. Check it out. Maybe I'll start updating that stuff, too.
Beki's eyes lit up at the sight of the gates of the Hidden Leaf. They were the biggest gates she had ever seen, and when she looked through them she caught glimpses of the legendary mountain with the faces of the previous Hokage carved into it. She was almost dancing with excitement and her father rolled his eyes. No leader ever took a man seriously if he had a flighty daughter like Beki. It was amazing his career hadn't fallen apart yet.
Seiichiro approached the guards at the station outside the gates and presented his papers.
"Welcome, Ambassador Tsukimori," They bowed respectfully.
He bowed in return.
"Thank you, gentlemen. If you wouldn't mind sending word to the Hokage we have arrived, I'm going to get us checked in at the inn."
He looked over at his daughter, who was staring intently at the headband of one of the guards.
"Uh, can I help you miss?" He asked, flushing slightly.
"Sorry, I'm just trying to figure out the symbol. Is it a big swirly leaf or-?" Beki asked.
The guard chuckled good-naturedly and took it off to show her. Seiichiro was mortified to silence by his daughter's simple minded assumptions.
"This part, the curly part, is the wind. This little triangle bit is the leaf." The guard explained.
"Oh, so you're like a leaf on the wind. Catchy." She smiled.
"Excuse my daughter's curiosity. It's her first time out this far west," Seiichiro smiled, giving Beki the side eye that indicated she was to shut her mouth, promptly.
She smiled obliviously.
"I love getting to see the big villages."
The guards shared a subtle look, as though this blonde ambassador's daughter was about to become the butt of an inside joke.
"You'll see more of it once we're in the gates," Seiichiro sighed. "Come on, Beki."
She followed her father obediently, but her head snapped back and forth so often as she took in the sights her neck cramped. He checked them into a simple unassuming inn. Once inside, he told Beki to stay put until he sent word for her.
"Come on, Dad, it's just the Leaf Village! Let me explore a little!," She pleaded.
"So we'll have to send Leaf nin looking for you? I think not." He said.
"I'll just hang out on this street, I swear," She begged.
He sighed.
"Fine. Ask the innkeeper what shops are nearby. Make up your decision and tell them which one you are going to. If we send for you they'll know where to find you."
"Thanks, dad!" She yelled over her shoulder as she hurried out the door.
"If you get kidnapped by Orochimaru, I won't feel sorry for you!" He yelled out after her. In their family, Orochimaru was the boogeyman. He was the cause of Yukihana's death, and the threat of his reappearance in a closet or under a bed was something both Beki and Seiichiro quietly feared.
As he walked out of the room toward the entrance of the inn, he saw his daughter talking to the inn keeper. She was a kindly older woman and she was dressed as traditionally as her inn. She was laughing behind her hand at something Beki had said. Beki looked as excited as always as she listened to the innkeeper explain the surrounding area and all the treasures it held.
Maybe she'll be okay here, Seiichiro thought.
…
Tsunade was speaking with Hyuga Hiashi when word reached her of Tsukimori Seiichiro's arrival.
"If he arrives at the mansion before we are done here, let him know I will be with him shortly," Tsunade waved her hand dismissively.
Hiashi waited until the nin had left before he continued.
"As I said, she's been listless lately. After coming home prematurely from training to find her team out on a long term mission," Hiashi paused, trying to find the words to convey the situation. "I'm afraid she lacks a sense of purpose."
"Then we will assign her some missions here in town," Tsunade said as she reached for her log of available missions.
"She is no fool, Tsunade" Hiashi frowned. "She will know we are giving her busy work."
"Then it needs to be a long term assignment," She thought aloud. "I don't know what I have that would work, not a lot of visiting dignitaries-"
Her eyes lit up and a smile cracked her lips.
"What is it, Lady Hokage?" Hiashi asked, however his voice stayed flat, so it came out more like a statement.
"The ambassador from Getsugakure just arrived," Tsunade explained. "I know you are a busy man, Hiashi, but if you wouldn't mind sticking around for after my meeting with him I may have an assignment for your daughter."
"As his bodyguard during his stay." Hiashi made the same sort of statement/question.
"Perhaps," She tapped her desk with her capped pen absently. "Tsukimori has visited the Leaf enough and is far too clever a shinobi to need an escort of his own. However, he's also played the political game too long to refuse one if assigned to him."
Hiashi considered the proposal and after a moment replied:
"Alright. I will attend to an important matter and return shortly."
"That should work, Hiashi." Tsunade stood to see him out. "Tsukimori probably won't be here for another half hour or so."
"Until then, Tsunade-sama," Hiashi bowed and took his leave.
Please Tsukimori, Tsunade thought. Have some important sounding busy work for me.
…
Seiichiro drew attention walking through town in his great ancestral armor. When it was new, it would have gleamed silver and gold like moonbeams. The tales of his predecessors said that it had originally belonged to the first Tsukimori, Haruka, the Burned Maiden. Seven generations later, it had a dull greenish-black patina. The patterns inlaid into the metal had long since faded. The swirling shapes of their ghosts occasionally caught the light and gave the haunting impression of faces of lost souls trapped in the plates. It had black splatter stains of questionable origin that no amount of polishing could remove. It was almost a living thing, having absorbed the chakra of the great clansmen before him wearing it from their youth to their death. Legend had it more than once its wearer had fallen on the battlefield only to be immediately donned by their sons; the armor would mold itself to the new body instantly having felt its previous owner's passing. Seiichiro's donning of the armor had been less noble, but that wasn't a story he wanted to reflect on before asking a favor of the hokage.
The guards eyed him long and hard as he approached. He had kept his oni mask off so he met the physical description the guards before had passed along. They let him up the stairs, but he felt their eyes on his back the whole time.
Tsunade's assistant, Shizune, announced him.
"Lady Tsunade, Tsukimori Seiichiro of Getsugakure is here to see you," Shizune said with a bow.
"Long time no see, Tsunade-hime," Seiichiro said staring her down. "Surprised they could pry you out of the gambling hall to take this job,"
"I've heard you died in battle about a half dozen times in the last two years," Tsunade stared right back. "I see they were right. You look like a dead man walking."
Seiichiro liked Tsunade. She wasn't anything like the old windbag the 3rd Hokage had been. That man stank of all the sins of the old world. For years Seiichiro had avoided doing business with the Leaf because the 3rd had resumed his duties as Hokage. When word of his death at the hand of his old student reached Getsugakure, Seiichiro found himself thinking the old man deserved it. If he had stopped Orochimaru years before, lots of families would have been spared death and suffering. Tsunade had been just as screwed over by all that old world thinking, so Seiichiro didn't mind working with her. In a village where generations had been trying to hide the fact they were screw ups, Tsunade embraced her dysfunction. She was a drinker and a gambler, she was vain and she was proud. It was easy doing business with someone who kept all their cards on the table.
"Take a seat old man," Tsunade waved a lacquered hand at the seat across from her.
"That's funny coming from someone old enough to be my mother," He spat, taking the offered seat.
"So you're the man they sent to speak for the king?" Tsunade asked.
"I'm the only one who won't warp the message," He adjusted in the seat. Something could be said of heads of state keeping uncomfortable chairs in their office. Tsunade apparently didn't like people settling in and making themselves at home. "I'm not clever enough to look out for my own interests."
"So he is insisting you bring this information back and forth in person?" Tsunade asked.
"All the juicy stuff that shouldn't be in writing," Seiichiro explained. "No one usually bothers me on the road. I've been told it's my winning smile."
"So who's the pretty girl you brought into town with you?" Tsunade's informers had been hard at work.
"My daughter, Beki," he said. "I actually need to talk to you about her."
"She isn't a jinchuriki with supernatural powers and a hunger for blood, is she?" Tsunade smiled.
"No, just your typical teenage energy and idiocy," He replied. "But that's not the issue at hand. To prove we are acting in earnest through these negotiations, I am to offer my daughter as collateral."
"So a non-hostile hostage arrangement," Tsunade clacked her nails on the desk. "And why would we be interested in babysitting your kid?"
"It's both for you and for the king," Seiichiro explained. "If the facts don't match up I can't run off."
"Not that the thought would ever cross your mind," Tsunade eyed him coyly.
"Never," Seiichiro shook his head. "So the king has offered to pay for her living expenses in a location of your choosing. I am not supposed to put my two ryo into this but I would prefer it if she was not placed anywhere with bars and communal toilets."
"Of course not, don't be obtuse," Tsunade smirked. "I actually think I have something that would work perfectly. Shizune, bring in Hyuga Hiashi."
"A Hyuga?" Seiichiro asked.
"The Hyuga," Tsunade corrected.
Hiashi entered the room and the two men sized each other up. Tsuande stepped in to make the introductions.
"Hyuga Hiashi, this is Tsukimori Seiichiro, the ambassador for Getsugakure. He will be representing the interests of the king in some upcoming negotiations. In an act of good faith to our village, his daughter will remain here in Konoha for the duration of the talks," Tsunade explained. "Hyuga Hiashi's daughter, Hinata, was recently sent away on a special mission. Between then and her return, the rest of her squad was deployed on a long term mission. We have been looking for a longer term local assignment worthy of her skills and status as heiress of the Hyuga clan."
"Escort and bodyguard to the daughter of an ambassador would be a perfect fit," Seiichiro said, slightly impressed.
"It would be unbecoming for the daughter of an ambassador to be hosted somewhere unfitting of her status," Tsunade nodded. "There is no private residence more secure and prestigious than that of the Hyuga clan."
Seiichiro couldn't believe his luck. His daughter would be kept in a compound with the most prominent family in Konoha.
"My daughter, Beki, is fifteen," Seiichiro's mind was blank. He was still trying to process his good luck.
"The same age as Hinata," Hiashi seemed unphased, as if this deal had been a long time coming.
This just keeps getting better and better, Seiichiro thought.
"The king of Getsugakure has offered to pay for Beki's living expenses," Tsunade explain. "We can come up with an itemized list of her monthly needs and-"
"I won't hear of it," Hiashi shook his head. "It would be the honor and the privilege of the Hyuga family to host Tsukimori Beki."
"Hyuga Hiashi, I must insist-" Seiichiro interrupted.
"If you would like to provide your daughter with an allowance, I would take no offense," Hiashi stopped him. "Your daughter will be a guest in our house and shall be treated as such."
"Thank you for your hospitality," Seiichiro bowed, and Hiashi bowed in return.
"I guess all that's left is for us to bring in the girls," Tsunade smiled.