Chapter Two: the Smiling Man

As she raced through the maze of corridors that led out to the village proper, Bara Furano knew she had fucked up. She'd known from the moment she'd cracked under the pressure and opened her mouth; Captain Hanami only asked for one thing from her subordinates, and that was loyalty. Bara had seen her kill for lesser discretions.

I'm not afraid of her, she told herself firmly, despite the tight know of adrenaline surging through her gut, I did nothing wrong. She turned the final corner, the exit ahead providing her with a comfort of sorts, perhaps the idea of a building of five between herself and the captain seemed safer. She reached out to push the door, but then lurched backwards, tripping on her heels and tumbling to the ground, because where there had been empty space less than a second before, the captain herself now stood.

"A word."

Bara rose to her feet slowly, her heart thudding against her ribcage, beads of sweat forming on her brow as she tried to fight off the wave of nausea building inside. She hadn't expected the captain's retribution so soon, nor for it to take place in a dark hallway with nobody else around. She swallowed, and tried to lift her chin defiantly,

"Y-yes, captain?" Damn the tremor in her voice.

The scarred face of her superior was blank, devoid of any emotion whatsoever as she stared directly into Bara's eyes. The taijutsu expert found she was unable to move, the walls and ceiling pressing down on her like a prison cell. She found herself reaching for the neckline of her uniform, running a finger around the fabric to loosen it from her throat, where her breath seemed stuck.

"My leadership is no infallible," The captain said, her voice so soft it was barely a whisper, "And I encourage my subordinates to question the choices I make, if they disagree with them. However…" She closed the distance between them, leaning in close enough that her lips brushed Bara's ear, "If you ever undermine me again… I will kill you." The words were like ice, said so easily they could have been part of an ordinary conversation, "And I will not lose any sleep over your death."

Something warm and wet was strickling down Bara's side. When she looked down, a senbon needle protruded from the front of her armour, embedded deep into the side of her body. She gasped, her hand darting up to cover the injury. She hadn't even felt it go in. The captain placed a finger under her chin and brought her face level with hers. An even greater terror rushed through her; the captain's right eye had transformed, glowing crimson red with three black tomoe around the pupil. The Sharingan. So it was true.

"Do you understand me?"

Blood wasn't the only thing beginning to trickle down Bara's legs. Unable to speak, fearing she would scream, cry, or both if she tried, she nodded, face pale with pain as the senbon finally began to make itself known. She stumbled forward, attempting to push past the captain and out into the village, but to her dismay, her hand went straight through her body. Before her eyes, the captain vanished, dissipating into the air like smoke. The hand clasped over her wounded abdomen also closed over nothing, and when she looked down, there was no senbon, no wound, and no blood.

It was just genjutsu…

She turned slowly. The Captain was standing some way behind her, watching her from the shadows, her eye glowing in the dimness.

You… you're insane! Bara thought, and then fled out into the open, eager to put as much space between them as possible.

The Village Hidden in the Leaves was an easy place to get lost in, but an even easier place to hide. It had started as a collection of homes belonging to the legendary Senju and Uchiha clans, the leaders of which had a dream to end the period of permanent war that had raged for centuries between the various ninja clans. The village had grown so quickly that little thought had been given to the layout. Outside of the main streets, which ran from each of the gates to the centre of the village, roads and pathways zigzagged into one another, houses built at random forming numerous cut-throughs and alleyways. Erected in the middle of the Land of Fire's thick forests, the village had received its name from the trees that grew plentifully both within and outside of the high walls that circumvented the perimeter, a preliminary safeguard against attack. The borders of the village stretched far beyond the most populated areas; miles of rural land surrounding the village proper, a mix of farmland, training grounds and the compounds belonging to the noble families who resided there.

It had been founded by Hashirama Senju and Madara Uchiha, the former of which was revered in an almost god-like manner by the current generations. Before the formation of the ninja villages, of which there were now many, there existed an era known as the Warring States, where there had been no comradeship amongst shinobi, and the ninja clans fought constantly for control of non-existent borders. The Senju and Uchiha clans were the bitterest of enemies, but the joint efforts of Hashirama, his brother Tobirama, and Madara saw an end to the fighting, and other clans began to follow suite. The Leaf Village was now a thriving hub of ninja strength, following the Will of Fire that Hashirama, who became its first hokage, preached. On the surface, there was currently an era of unsteady world peace, which had existed since the end of the Third Ninja World War thirteen years ago, but as with all powers that relied solely on military strength for stability, this peace was only skin deep. Many of those who performed the darkest of deeds to maintain the appearance of peace knew that it would only take a thrust of the wrong blade and the wrong throat, and the entire illusion would come crashing down.

The best place to overlook the village in its entirety was from the highest vantage point; the top of the Third Hokage's stone head where his hair had been carved beyond the height of the cliff itself, however Hanami had always favoured the head of the Second Hokage. Where his happuri had been hewn into the rock, there was a relatively wide ledge, and it served as the perfect place to observe the vast majority of the village.

As soon as she had learned about Tobirama Senju, the younger brother of Hashirama, Hanami had been drawn to him, spending hours in the libraries of the Academy reading everything she could find. His pragmatic approach had led to the creation of many fundamental aspects of the Leaf's culture; the training academy, the police force, even the Anbu to which she had dedicated almost her entire career so far. Of the five nature chakras, at least one of which almost every ninja had an affinity to, he had been a master of water, the same as her, and his extensive writing on the many jutsu he had created had taught her well, years after his death in the First Ninja World War.

She was crouched on the very tip of the rocky ledge now, ignoring the wind that howled straight into her face, blowing her plait out behind her like a whip. The hood of her black cloak was down around her shoulders, and the porcelain mask she wore to hide her face, shaped, and painted to resemble the head of an ermine, hid the wild-eyed fury emanating from her.

Back in the debriefing room… it had been close, too close. Tenzō had been right to admonish her; what had she been thinking? She had let herself become so angry so quickly and had lost for a moment the already-delicate control she had on her emotions. She should have removed herself from the situation the moment she realised her raging chakra was making the water in the glasses boil, but instead she had allowed herself to be drawn into a mindless attack, which was exactly what the Chief had wanted. He'd been desperate to get rid of her for years, since the incident in the Land of Peaches…

She sucked on her sore tongue; the taste unpleasant and metallic. In the moments after the Chief had tugged himself out from her grasp, she had been forced to resort to one of the most base methods of regaining composure; causing pain. She'd nearly bitten through her tongue before, and the experience had not been amongst her favourites. She stared at her open palms, sticky with congealing blood and stinging from the cuts made by her nails. A ninja was supposed to remain calm in all situations. With a curl of her lip, she pulled her gloves back on forcibly, every movement betraying her frustration and self-hatred. Even now, after everything, she was still nothing but an undisciplined, angry child.

In the last year, she had discovered a new, more enjoyable way of working out her anger, but he was currently out of the village on a mission, and it would likely be a while before she could feel him use every part of his body to remove her rage, one delicious thrust at a time. That thought, at least, brought a smile to her face.

Far below, she could hear the voices of those out searching for the Uzumaki boy, their numerous black shapes flitting like shadows back and forth across the length of the village's urban area. Naruto Uzumaki was a name everybody in the Leaf Village knew, and it was usual spoken with a sneer of disgust. Twelve years previously, the village had been attacked by a vile demon known as the Nine-Tailed Fox, one of the nine infamous tailed beats that had run rampage across the world. Even now, there were few in the village who did not know someone who had died in the attempt to defeat the creature. Amongst the dead had been the legendary Minato Namikaze, the Yellow Flash of the Leaf, and its Fourth Hokage. His last act had been to seal the fox demon away inside the body of a new-born child, and that unfortunate soul had been Naruto. The truth of what lay inside him was supposed to have been a secret, but most adults in the village knew, and the boy had not been treated kindly. Hanami hadn't been living in the village when this happened and had only been a child of seven at the time, so the significance was somewhat lost on her. She had first heard of Naruto much later, upon learning that a small boy under the care of the Third Hokage (if you could call it that), had an anbu operative assigned to watch him from afar at all times, without his knowledge. She had even taken the watch herself a few times, although her penchant for the kill had often seen her sent on missions of a darker objective.

She stood up, her cloak billowing out behind her. It had been a long time since she had been assigned to a search mission, but she could remember the protocol well enough. Lesson one in finding a missing individual: start at the source. If it really was one of the Forbidden Scrolls Naruto had taken, then he would have to have broken into the only place something that valuable was kept; the village archives. The archives were situated in the hokage residence itself, for the hokage, as well as being the leader of the village, was the custodian of all the ancient and forbidden texts in its possession. Lord Third had been somewhat laxer on this than others, Hanami had managed to sneak in herself on a few occasions when she was younger, and even when he had caught her, she had not been punished. The residence was on the same site as the Academy and administration buildings, almost directly below her by a few hundred feet, bearing the symbol for "fire" on its roof. Using the symbol as her marker, she jumped.

It was hardly an amazing feat for a ninja to survive a fall from height, up to a point, of course. All it took was to send chakra to the point of the body where impact would be made, cushioning it from injury and dissipating the force of the touchdown. It was not at all uncommon for ninja to be seen leaping up and down from heights that would have been beyond the physicality of an ordinary person. It would have been quicker for Hanami to use the Body Flicker jutsu, more commonly known as the Transportation technique, a skill that enabled the user to propel themselves forward at great speed, but the feel of the air rushing past her, the beating of her heart quickening as the ground drew nearer… The wonderful thought that all it would take would be for her to shut her eyes and let the ground release her from the torture of life… it made her feel, in a cruel twist of irony, alive.

She landed without a sound on the roof of the hokage residence, and paused, listening for any tell-tale sounds. The voices of the searchers were getting further away as the search drew them into the rural areas of the village, and she hoped Team Ro had had more sense than to follow the crowd. Glancing up at the enormous, red administration building, she could see that the light was on in Lord Third's office, indicating, although not confirming, that he was up there.

The archives were in the basement of the hokage residence. It had been a while since her last duty there- when she had been bodyguard to the Third during the diplomatic visit of another shinobi leader. Now that she thought about it, that might have been one of the ones whose throats he'd asked her to slit, but there had been so many of them that they all faded into one. The archives could only be accessed via a single entryway on the ground floor, so she summoned chakra to her feet and ran down the side of the mansion until she found an open window on the first floor. Checking that nobody was on the other side, she slipped through, carefully memorising its location in case an alternative exit wasn't possible.

She found herself in a room filled with what appeared to be calligraphy supplies, and a large cushion sat in the centre of the floor with a thick roll of parchment in front of it. The ink on the paper was still wet; clearly Lord Hokage had been practicing his calligraphy when the alarm was sounded. Listening at every second for the hint of others present, she moved out into the hallway, following the curve of the building round until she found the stairs. The residence seemed completely deserted, dark throughout and utterly silent. It wasn't until she passed the ground floor and was halfway down to the basement, that she began to notice things that weren't right. The archives were usually filled with safeguards, motion sensors to detect movement, cameras, alarms, traps, just about anything possible to deter thieves. None of them had been set off, and it was highly unlikely that, if they had been, somebody would have wasted time resetting them all whilst the culprit was still on the run. Naruto would have had to have known about all the traps before he entered the building, but surely…? She frowned, crouching to duck under a wire pulled tight across the stairway. There was no way a mere academy student could have got past all this without help, and even if he'd gone in alone, somebody must have told him about the safeguards. Had there been somebody else with him?

When she reached the bottom of the stairs, she froze, her senses sending the hairs on her arms pricking upright. There was somebody else in the archives. Her sensory capabilities were not as fine-tuned as some of her other skills, and whilst she could sense the presence of chakra, and see it when her Sharingan was activated, she could not yet identify the individual. There had only been two people with whom she was attuned enough to recognise their chakra. One was Kakashi Hatake, her old captain, and the other was Itachi,

Focus, She told herself firmly, refusing to allow herself to be drawn into that rabbit hole of pain. Once again pulling chakra to her feet, she crept up the wall and onto the ceiling so that she could approach from above. Tucking her hair down the back of her armour, she drew closer to the open door to the archive, concentrating hard on suppressing her own chakra to avoid detection. Activating her Sharingan, turning the word crimson, she peered through the door.

Adrenaline rocketed through her body like wildfire. There was a man bending over one of the tables, rifling through pages and pages of the secret documents he had pulled from one of the open filing cabinets lining the walls. There was a bandage round his head, concealing his right eye, although she could not yet see his face. His aging body was dressed in a white shirt and dark grey robe, his right arm trussed up in a sling inside due to some old injury that left it lame. A cane rested against the table at his side, but she knew full well he didn't need it.

His name was Danzō Shimura.

Not all that long ago, he had been somebody she respected. Perhaps there had even been a time when she loved him, in the way a dog mindlessly adored its owner. Deeply ambitious, and willing to do anything to protect the village, Danzō had been deeply involved in the dark side of the ninja world in a way nobody else had. Where the Third Hokage was sometimes too soft, too hesitant to act, Danzō was like iron, stopping at nothing to ensure his vision of a completely protected Leaf Village was realised. In title alone, he was no different to Homura Mitokado and Koharu Utatane, the three of them elders who sat on the council alongside Lord Third, but the reality was that he wielded almost as much power in the underground as the Hokage himself. In the past, he had been intricately involved with the Anbu, and whilst never directly in charge, had been responsible for much of its successes in the earlier days. When he'd realised he would bever be able to completely mould it into the force he desired, that his old rival Hiruzen Sarutobi would always be in the way, he had taken a step back and created the Foundation, a breakoff faction of the anbu who worked entirely under his control and autonomously to the rest of the village. He had been grooming Hanami for the Foundation for years, and when the Third had put a stop to it, she had been devastated. Then, four years ago, Danzō had gone too far, committed an act so atrocious she had been unable to forgive.

He barely reacted when her kunai knife found his throat, but his bodyguards did. Two members of the Foundation burst out of the darkness on either side of her, and there was no mistaking their killing intent as they raised their tantos to plunge between her ribs.

"Fools!" Danzō's snarl of frustration came too late, "This isn't the real one!"

His men stopped in their tracks, but the error was already made. The Hanami standing between them vanished in a small puff of smoke, the kunai in her hand embedding itself in the table, and the real Hanami, who had sent in a clone to lure out any surprised, had already slammed her hand to the floor-

"Temporary Paralysis!"

The guards went rigid as she manipulated the gravity around them and crumpled to the floor as a heavy weight was pressing down on top of their bodies. It was an anbu-specific move, perfect for immobilising an enemy at short-range, just as long as the user could maintain the chakra control needed to hold it. She didn't have time for that. It only took a fraction of a second to increase the pressure enough to snap their spines. One died instantly, but the other's eyes bulged out of his sockets as his mask slid off, his mouth working silently for a few moments before he succumbed.

If he was disturbed by the death of two of his own, Danzō did not show it. He turned to look at her slowly, and merely smiled, his visible left eye creasing almost shut.

"Ah. My little Dragon Princess. I am truly honoured."

She drew her sword slowly and pointed it at him. Even now, despite all he had done, the action still hurt her,

"You were sentenced to house arrest. I see you've made the most out of the distraction?" It was a strange thing, to be torn between killing a person and kneeling before them. She ached with the yearning to bring her blade down across his head, the desire for revenge coiled up inside her like a snake, but deep down, like a vice on her heart, there was still loyalty, "I'm struggling to see where the Uzumaki boy falls in all this? Surely it would have been quieter not to involve him at all?"

The smile never left his face, "Your desire to kill me is almost perverse, and yet you stay your hand? Your better judgement is as clouded as ever, I see," He turned his back on her, and resumed his sifting through the piles of unopened scrolls, "It was foolish of you to attack Zō, my girl."

She didn't bother to ask him how he knew about that; he knew about everything that happened in the Hokage's office. It meant that the chief had already reported her. So be it.

"That was one of your lessons," She told him drily, "To eliminate a threat before it eliminates you."

Danzō snorted in disgust, "And is Zō Tanuki really that much of a threat to somebody with your talent?"

She said nothing. Danzō continued,

"Regardless, your suspicions are wrong. I had no part in whatever game is being played here, neither is it a game I am particularly interested in. I merely saw this as an opportunity, and took it, as would anyone." His hand hovered over a small scroll, and Hanami watched as he unlatched it, taking in its contents, "Ah. Perfect." He tucked it into the front of his robe, "All the knowledge of the Leaf Village is here, at your fingertips, and you have no desire to take it?"

"I have no interest in learning secrets," She closed the distance between them a fraction, enough so that the point of her sword touched his back, "Just ensuring they remain in the correct hands. Put that scroll back."

"Your lack of ambition disappoints me," He ignored her request, "I had such high hopes for you once. There are those amongst us who do not deserve the fate of puppetry to an old man who refused to act." He was referring to the Hokage. She tightened her grip on her sword, eyes narrowing with anger,

"Better a puppet of somebody who hesitates, than a puppet of a traitor."

His chuckle was low, but the words that came after had nothing akin to amusement in them. They were pure poison, disguised behind a smile,

"You truly are a loyal dog. If only you weren't rabid, and of the wrong pedigree. If I had caught you sooner, there may have been a cure, but I fear euthanasia is all that awaits you." He finally bothered to look down at his fallen men, "Loyalty will get you nowhere if you are loyal to the wrong people. Your cousin Itachi was loyal, wasn't he?"

It took everything she had not to drive her blade through his heart. The fact that he, of all people, had dared to mention Itachi's name… she felt her blood rushing to her head, and the familiar roaring of fury in her ears. All she had to do was one, quick thrust, and he would be dead, nothing more than the shell of a decrepit old man. Her arm began to shake with the desire.

He didn't even turn to face her,

"You can't do it, can you? You want so badly to kill me, but you still agree with my goals, don't you? If you killed me, nobody would have the ambition to do what is truly needed to keep this village safe."

She cursed and lowered the sword. He was right. He knew the workings of her mind as well as she did. He probably knew them better; he had cultivated many of them, after all. His lined face came into view as he left his position as the table, turning towards her slowly. He raised his hand, and for a moment she thought he would strike her, but he placed a hand on her head instead,

"Keep away from those who try to belittle your ambitions, my little Dragon," He said, and it hit her hard, because it was the same line he'd fed her when she was a child, desperately seeking his approval, "You are worth more than they will let you be."

She killed the emotion that crept up from somewhere deep,

"Very apt, my Lord. But you still need to return that scroll." She would have loved nothing more than to fight him, but she knew next to nothing of his power, and any combat between them was unlikely to be small-scale. For as long as she had known him, he'd employed other people to do his dirty work, to fight his battles, and to clash now would likely not be in his best interests either; at the very least it would draw attention to the fact he was not under house arrest. She held out her hand expectantly.

Thankfully, he conceded, drawing the scroll out of his robe, and placing it in her open palm, "It is of little consequence. There is little in there that I did not already know, and in this moment, there is little either of us can do to the other without drawing unwanted attention," He gestured to the bodies on the floor, "You made this mess. You can clear it up. I trust you will allow me to leave?"

There was little else she could do at that point. She had a mission to complete. She stood aside,

"Lord Hokage will be informed about this."

Danzō already had his foot on the first step, but at her words he paused, and gave her look she wished she didn't understand,

"Oh? And what exactly do you think he will do about it?"

He vanished before she could answer, leaving her alone in the archives with the sinking, unavoidable feeling that he wad completely, and utterly correct.