Tale of the Setting Sun
Chapter 20: "Foreboding Skies"
He plodded down the path, looking with some disbelief at the hand that was pulling him along. It was warm and felt nothing like anything else he'd ever held before, but it was...it was nice, he supposed.
"What's wrong?" The girl stopped to look down at him, but the sun was high in the sky and shone too brightly down on them for him to make out her face.
"N-nothing," he said quietly. "Where are we...we going?"
The word 'we' felt alien to him, and he had to say it twice to confirm to his brain that it was indeed, the word he was looking for.
"You said you've never played hide-and-seek before, right?" she said, tucking a length of hair behind her ear. "I found a fun place to play it, and thought you might like it too!"
"Play?" he asked shyly. "I've never done that before...with, with someone else I mean."
She laughed. "You're so weird! Who's never played with someone else before?"
When he didn't respond, her smile slowly faded from her face. An odd look flashed across her face. Her mouth began to open, and he squeezed his eyes shut, afraid that she'd say something awful and leave him there like everyone else, when suddenly, another voice called out to them.
"What're you doing? And who's that?"
He opened his eyes and saw an older boy walking across the street towards them. He had a curious look on his tanned face.
"This is the boy my mom's taking care of," said the girl, raising a hand in greeting. She gestured back to him with her other hand. "Come on, say hello."
"H-hello..." he murmured nervously.
"Hold on, I know him..." said the boy, leaning right down to stare at his face. He shrunk back. "Yeah...he's the one Kayumo's mom told us to stay away from."
"Really? Why?"
"I dunno," the boy shrugged, crossing his arms behind his head. "She got mad at Kayumo for letting him join our game of tag."
"Why would she? He's just a kid like us." The girl smiled down at him again. "Right, Naruto?"
Naruto's eyes flew open.
Faint motes of light was streaming through the half-open window and for a long minute, he looked up at the ceiling. A tattered string dangled from the lone light fixture, and as he watched, it swayed in an invisible breeze.
Only when his heartbeat had slowed down, did he get up; as Naruto got to his feet, the thin blanket he'd been sleeping under fell off, and at the soft sound, the others in the room began to stir.
Stretching his arms, he silently walked to the window and pushed it open the rest of the way. They had spent the night at Tazuna's seaside house, and from the window, Naruto could see the waves jostling gently against the dock. And just barely, he could hear the sound of seagulls.
The first time he'd visited the sea on one of his missions several months back, he had been taken aback at the high-pitched wailing sound. It sounded nothing like the birds around Konoha, and even more startlingly, it was accompanied by the underlying deep crashing noise of the waves as they pounded down on shore. But he'd quickly come to enjoy it: despite the cacophony of each separate sound, together, they melded together and somehow soothed him. Being near the sea was an experience completely alien to Naruto, having grown up in a landlocked village like Konoha, but somehow, it felt familiar to him, as if he were meeting an old friend.
As he stood there now, however, it had the opposite effect. The seagulls calling back and forth to each other sounded like a warning; it made him uneasy and restless. It was a strange and uncomfortable feeling that tingled almost unbearably across the surface of his skin.
We need to get out of here, he thought to himself.
Sakura's team leader Shirakumo, a stern-faced jōnin with dark hair pulled back in a ponytail, had turned out to be recovering from a deep leg wound. However, it was healing well, and the jōnin would likely be able to move around freely with just a few more days of rest. With that out of the way, there was no real reason for them to stay behind in this country...and after the night's rest, Naruto's mind felt clearer. His worries about Mayu resenting him for ordering her back to Konoha seemed silly to him now; she was not so unreasonable as to completely ignore the voice of reason. Surely she would listen to him with just a little more prodding?
"Naruto?" called out a drowsed voice. He turned around to see Rai getting to his feet with half-lidded eyes, audibly cracking his neck. Sai was already up, and was leaning against the wall with his futon neatly folded beside him while Sasuke was just beginning to put away his. Next to them was Menma, who seemed to have made it halfway out of his futon before falling asleep again, snoozing lightly as a trickle of drool dribbled down across his chin.
As Naruto walked back across the wooden floor to fold his own futon, he suddenly wondered about the fleeting dream he had had. But even as he thought about it, like a receding tide, the details slipped further and further back from his memory, and after a while, he stopped thinking about it at all.
Tazuna's daughter, a willowy woman with a heart-shaped face named Tsunami, prepared breakfast with Sakura while Naruto and the other boys took their turns in the small washroom. Mayu had gone back to Kaine's home for the night; Kaine's head wound, while not overtly serious, was still affecting her, and they had agreed it would be better for at least one person to always be with her.
The breakfast, while predictably involving fish in almost every dish, was delicious, and it was at the breakfast table (two separate tables had to be pushed together to make enough room for all of them) that they met Tazuna's grandson Inari, who turned out to be a gloomy young boy in a dull green jumpsuit.
"Isn't he cute?" Tazuna said with a fond look down at the boy, who continued to mechanically spoon fish stew into his mouth. Sitting across the table, Naruto silently paralleled him.
"He said we're all going to die," said Menma sourly. Sakura nodded in indignant affirmation beside him.
"From what you guys were saying about Zabuza, it doesn't sound too far off," said Rai, as he picked at his plate (he hated fish). "How did you guys escape anyways?"
Menma pulled back in his chair with a proud look. "We didn't escape. I almost got him, but some hunter-nin finished him off instead."
"You almost got him? It was all sensei!" Sakura scoffed.
"And what held Zabuza in place for him?" Menma jabbed a finger at himself, leaving no room for question. "That's right, my Mind Transfer Jutsu."
"Oh is that what it was? I just thought he'd paused to scratch his butt."
"Nope, that was me. Butt scratch and all."
It was hard for Naruto to imagine anyone looking as proud as Menma did at that moment.
"Are they always like this?" Rai asked Sasuke, who grunted noncommittally into his stew.
Suddenly, there was a thumping sound as Inari forcibly put down his utensils. The scattered conversations around the table skidded to a stop, and sliding his chair back, Inari dropped to the floor.
Tazuna turned around in his chair. "Where are you going, Inari?"
"To look at the ocean from my room."
Tsunami wiped her hands on her apron. "What about the rest of your breakfast? You skipped dinner yesterday too."
"I'm full." Inari slid the door open and left. Menma and Sakura shared guilty glances while everyone else – except Sai, as usual – averted their gazes.
"I'm sorry," said Tazuna after a short silence. He took a heavy sip from his cup. "He's been like that since Kaiza died."
With the mood in the room having rapidly plummeted, the rest of the breakfast was quiet. To most everyone's relief, soon after breakfast had ended, Mayu and Kaine arrived. While Kaine and her estranged in-laws began to awkwardly exchange greetings, Naruto discretely pulled Mayu away from the bemused spectator crowd.
Sliding the door shut behind them, Naruto turned around to see Mayu looking a bit pale. She was playing with her hair again, as she always did when she was nervous. "What's wrong?"
"Nothing," she said, though her eyes darted to the closed door.
"You don't look well. Did something happen?" Naruto critically looked her up and down, but besides the pallor, she seemed fine.
"No, I'm fine," Mayu insisted. As if to prove her point, she let go of her hair and crossed her arms across her chest. "What'd you want to talk about?"
"Mayu – we're going to head back to Konoha today," said Naruto, thinking it'd be best to get straight to the point. Mayu's face fell, but ignoring this, he forged forward. "Sakura's team already dealt with the missing-nin that attacked, and now that Kaine is here with Tazuna and the others, Team Shirakumo can protect her too. There's no reason for us to be here."
"Kaine-san only agreed to come here because you guys were here," Mayu said quietly. "And they can't always be watching over everyone, they've got their hands full with Tazuna-san's family – "
"What do you plan to do, then? Protect Kaine for the rest of her life?" Naruto interrupted her. Taking a step closer to her, his voice dropped in volume. "Or are you going to kill Gatō?"
To her credit, even as her entire face reddened, Mayu did not take a step back, choosing instead to look firmly back at him. "What's the point of escorting someone to their village, only for them to be killed as soon as we leave them? I don't want to just follow the mission details to a T, collect the money, and go back home. I want to do it properly."
"And I want to do my duty as team leader properly," said Naruto, letting some of the frustration he felt seep into his voice. "You do realize you're putting us all in danger here?"
"We're - we're always in danger," Mayu said hesitantly.
"You're right. But you're asking to risk the lives of our teammates just so you can feel better about yourself," said Naruto harshly, and as soon as the words had left his mouth, he regretted them. Mayu flinched backwards and her gaze dropped to the floor. As the seconds silently ticked by, he rapidly searched through his experiences for words to alleviate the situation – and found nothing. Finally, he added lamely, "It's not like they don't have money. If Kaine-san really wanted better bodyguards, she could have paid for a higher-level mission."
When Mayu didn't respond, Naruto sighed.
That could have gone better, he thought to himself. Not wanting to look at Mayu's bowed head, he looked around the room instead, and almost immediately, his gaze landed on the sliding door. His eyes narrowed. He took a silent step forward – and in one quick motion, slid it open.
A streak of black flashed out of sight, leaving behind only one lone blonde figure standing awkwardly by the door.
"Ehe...he..." Menma laughed uncomfortably, his eyes rapidly flicking from Mayu's downcast figure to Naruto's blank face. "I was just - uh...looking for the bathroom. You wouldn't happen to know where it is?"
Deciding that confrontation wouldn't be worth the time, Naruto pointed a finger in the opposite direction. As he watched the boy scamper away, Naruto considered the streak of black he'd seen: obviously, someone else had been with Menma, and he was willing to bet his tantō that it'd been Rai. But why hadn't he come in and said something?
Several seconds passed as Naruto stood still in silent contemplation, and soon, from the other end of the hallway, a pink head popped out.
"Naruto?" Sakura sounded suspicious. "What're you doing? Everyone's waiting."
"Sorry," he said. Looking back at Mayu, he gestured toward her. "Come on."
Mayu mutely bobbed her head and followed him back to the room where everyone else (except Menma) was gathered. Some of the ice seemed to have been broken, though Kaine had made a point of sitting on the opposite side of the room from Tazuna.
Naruto caught Rai's gaze, but the other boy only flashed him a grin before returning to his apparently all-consuming task of flattening out the creases of his pants.
"How are you feeling, Kaine-san?" Sakura asked, as everyone settled into their cushions. "You look better than you did yesterday, but..."
Kaine slightly bowed her head. "It was a slight concussion. I just needed some bed rest. I'm fine now, thank you."
"Quite the luck she's got there," said Sai, a small smile playing at his lips. "Although judging by how they attacked, I don't think the assailants were trying to kill her."
"No...they were only warning me," Kaine said in an odd voice. Her eyes hardened as she looked around at the room's occupants, before coming to a rest on Naruto. "Now, getting to the matter of business today – Naruto, have you reached a decision as to your team's next action?"
Naruto paused, quickly looking at each of his teammates in turn. Sitting nearby, Sai looked neutrally back; farther away, Rai, with an unusually serious look on his face, looked down at the ground; and Mayu, on the opposite end of the room, looked straight at him with a creased brow.
"Before that, I'd like to hear what Team Shirakumo intends on doing," he said. With that, everyone looked at the jōnin, who was currently resting his splinted leg across two cushions.
As Shirakumo opened his mouth to speak, a conflicted expression quickly flitted across his face. "Three days ago, I sent a missive to the Hokage explaining the current situation, and requesting further orders. While I await his reply, we are on standby." Noticing Tazuna's downcast expression, he hastened to add, "Personally, I feel that it is our duty as ninja to deal with any immediate dangers that risk the safety of our client...however, the ultimate decision is in the hands of our village. That is the best I can offer you."
"That's already more than enough," Tazuna grunted.
"...what I don't understand is why you need our help," Sasuke suddenly spoke up, surprising Naruto. The Uchiha boy, while not exactly taciturn, had not struck him as the type to take initiative unless the situation absolutely called for it.
Kaine turned coolly towards him. "What do you mean?"
"You clearly have at least some money, as you've been funding the bridge's construction. Why rely on us, instead of properly hiring ninja to deal with the matters here? Or are your pockets not deep enough?"
Kaine opened her mouth, and then closed it. Her hesitation was painfully obvious. However –
"In gratitude for saving my life, I do owe you all some answers," she said slowly. "And even if you cannot help us, I have confidence...or hope, that you will not turn on us." Kaine closed her eyes. "The Wave country's daimyō is in Gatō's hands. We cannot raise any form of direct rebellion against Gatō, and hiring any ninja above chūnin level would be received as such."
At her words, Tazuna's face went taut with surprise.
"What do you mean 'in Gatō's hands'? Is he being kept physically captive?" Naruto asked, intrigued against his will.
"From what we know of our last reports, the daimyō and his immediate family are all being kept in house arrest inside their main residence," Kaine confirmed.
"And you can't just assassinate Gatō?" Rai piped up, looking confused.
"Oh we've tried," said Kaine bitterly. "But the assassination attempt failed, and Gatō killed Lady Awa - the daimyō's wife - in retaliation. The daimyō then made a public renunciation, labeling the actions of any who dared to defy Gatō as mutiny."
"Who is this 'we' you're talking about?" Sasuke pressed, and then looked meaningfully at Tazuna, who seemed to now be making a passable imitation of a guppy. "It can't be the bridge builders."
"Just a group of the last couple of stragglers with a backbone left in this country," said Kaine with a venomous look.
Rai scratched his chin. "But you haven't tried again since your first failure? Don't you think you gave up too soon?"
Kaine shook her head. "You don't understand. Why do you think I was in Konoha? Why do you think I've been traveling around the nations?"
"...to sell things?"
"I've been arranging meetings with the Kage of various hidden villages with the aim of making an alliance between theirs and Wave country. But almost every nation has turned me down...including Fire country."
"Really?" Sakura looked perplexed. "But wouldn't an alliance benefit us? It'd bring more trade into our country."
"Not necessarily..." said Shirakumo gravely, his arms crossed across his chest. Until now, he had remained silent with a neutral expression fixed on his face, but it seemed he had reached some sort of decision. "As it stands now, Gatō's shipping ventures benefit all of the neighboring countries. There are no tariffs or regulations in place along the coastline, making it an excellent waypoint for maritime trade with farther and wealthier nations such as Water and Tea country...and Gatō is making this possible by taking the money directly out of the citizens' taxes."
"Yes, Gatō knows what he's doing." Kaine nodded. "He's a parasite, and so long as his actions don't harm the other nations, nobody will lift a finger – because ultimately, Wave country was never powerful or unified to begin with. If Gatō were removed from power, there would be an economic vacuum...the few markets that exist would fall into chaos, and none of the other nations want to risk that. The only nation that would pay attention to my proposals was Lightning country, and their condition was that they be granted complete control over Wave country's economy."
"And what did you say in response?" Naruto asked.
Kaine gave him a thin smile. "That I did not have the authority to make such a decision."
Despite himself, Naruto felt respect for the sharp-tongued woman burgeon inside him. She was clearly doing everything within her power – and beyond – for the sake of a country that she hadn't even been born to. For a moment, he wondered if it was revenge for her brother that pushed her, but immediately dismissed it. If retribution had been her sole aim, Kaine would have arranged for Gatō's assassination, damn all the consequences. Instead, she was clearly thinking for the benefit of the nation rather than her own gratification, even at the risk of her own life.
However, no matter how pretty her goals were, in the end, they weren't his business – nor was he interested in making them his.
Tsunami was refilling everyone's teacups, and as he politely declined his cup, Naruto looked directly at Mayu. Surely she would understand? They were ninjas. They weren't heroes. At his pointed stare, Mayu turned pink, and she opened her mouth – when with a loud bang, the door slid open to reveal a blonde figure.
"Menma! Where've you been?" Sakura asked in a scolding tone as she got to her feet.
Ignoring her, Menma brandished a sealed scroll in his hand. "I've got it - the Hokage's response to Shirakumo-sensei's missive. A messenger jōnin found me at the docks."
Immediately, Shirakumo raised his hand, and Menma handed it to him. With bated breaths, everyone watched as he unfurled the scroll. For several minutes, it was quiet; Naruto closely observed Shirakumo's face as his eyes rapidly moved across the scroll paper, but as expected of the jōnin, his expression gave nothing away.
When Shirakumo finally spoke, however, the note of disbelief in his voice was clear. "My team and any other Leaf teams in the vicinity have been ordered by the Hokage to remain in Wave country and to do whatever is necessary to guarantee the safety of our clients," he said slowly, and Naruto felt his eyes widen. The uneasy buzzing tension was back, sending alarms ringing in his head. Looking up from the scroll, Shirakumo locked gazes with him. "The Hokage's seal is on it."
"So?" Kaine said softly. "What will your team be doing, Naruto?"
"Look, I've really gotta make my next delivery," said the tokubetsu jōnin, scowling back at Kakashi.
While messenger birds were commonly used within the village walls and on occasion by mobilized teams to send messages back to the village, tokubetsu jōnin specializing as messengers were used to deliver important and direct missives from the Hokage to teams stationed in faraway regions. Kakashi had spotted the messenger slipping away from the house that Naruto and the others were currently in, and feeling in his gut that something was off, immediately pounced on him in the neighboring forest.
"What was that message you delivered?" Kakashi pressed, shoving the jōnin more roughly against the tree.
"I told you, I don't know. I'm just the messenger!" the jōnin protested, putting his hands up. Kakashi noticed that he was young, for a messenger jōnin. He didn't recall seeing him around the village either, but that was becoming more and more common these days, as he spent so much time outside the village walls on extended missions. "It was from the Hokage!"
"That's funny," said Kakashi, with a look that suggested he found it anything but. "I just exchanged messages with him several days ago. You'd think he'd tell me about such a thing."
The jōnin shrugged. "Kages' minds work differently from ours. Mere ninja like us can't hope to understand them," he said sagely. "And anyways, the Hokage's seal was on it."
Kakashi paused. "Did you receive it directly from the Hokage himself?"
"No, I picked it up in Water country at the waypoint," said the jōnin, still struggling to free himself. "Look, I'm behind in my deliveries as it is and I kinda wanna get back home by the end of this week..."
Reaching a decision, Kakashi let him go, and the jōnin straightened. Muttering darkly to himself, the jōnin stretched back his shoulders before leaping nimbly away and disappearing from sight.
He didn't like this – why would the Hokage send a separate message to Naruto and the others, while neglecting to tell him? And why send it all the way to Water country first, instead of sending a direct messenger? Sure, there were many more messengers going between Water and Fire countries, but still – either the Hokage was up to something, or...
It was extremely unlikely, but even the Hokage's seal could be faked by a powerful fūinjutsu master.
Now, Kakashi found himself with a dilemma. He had to know what that message had said – but at the same time, he couldn't get any closer to the house, or he would be detected. And if it turned out to really be from the Hokage, then he'd have effectively failed his own mission of observing Naruto from afar for nothing.
Uncomfortably, Kakashi folded his arms across his chest. He'd give it a day to see what happened. Knowing Naruto, he and the rest of the team would be leaving Wave country soon and heading back to Konoha. In fact, he was surprised they'd stayed as long as they had. Wanting to avoid running into them on their way back, Kakashi had stayed along the borders of the country until nightfall – and then found, to his surprise, that they had decided to spend the night.
However, Naruto was the practical type, and Kakashi fully expected the boy to try and go back to Konoha as soon as possible. But of course now, the Hokage's missive changed things, and Kakashi felt himself growing worried. He wondered if it was just his nerves as team leader, and being unable to actually do anything. Regardless, if Naruto and the others didn't start going back home soon, or if they started acting strangely on the way back – if things came to it, he'd make a new decision then. Kakashi supposed that if he found himself cornered, he could find a way to get Shirakumo alone and have a talk with the other jōnin.
But for now, as promised, he would keep watching.
It was only after the inn's okami threatened to have a restraining order placed on him that, with great reluctance, Jiraiya the legendary Sannin, the great Toad Sage, and bestselling author of the hugely popular Icha Icha series removed himself from its premises.
It wasn't that he was afraid of the local police – not by a long shot – but if his dashing mug were to be plastered on posters all around the nation's bathhouses, his research would sadly come to a screeching halt, and then what would he say to his adoring fans?
Hitting the road again, Jiraiya tactfully thought to make himself scarce from that area (for a few months) and mulling over his well-worn map, decided to head north to Snow country. He'd heard that the women there had the most beautiful pearly white skin, and that the hot springs there were medicinal...and indeed, Jiraiya thought that he deserved some time spent healing, with the heartache he now nursed at the thought of his self-imposed banishment from his own country.
Instead of heading directly by a land route, which would lead him on a cumbersome path straight through the borders of several nations, Jiraiya decided to board a ship, as a sea route would both be faster, and make for a nice change in pace. In fact, for the next installment of Icha Icha, he had been thinking of having his main character engage in a whirlwind romance at sea with the beautiful maiden daughter of a ship's captain (which would of course have to end tragically so that he could write a sequel).
The journey was cut short however as it seemed that, despite the thick fog surrounding the Land of Waves, most ships stopped at its main port city to refuel, as well as to load and unload goods.
Hearing from the captain (who, to Jiraiya's great disappointment, had never married nor fathered any daughters) that the ship would be docked for several hours, he went ashore with the intention of stretching his land legs. And for the first time in many years, he found himself speechless with shock.
Jiraiya had been walking past a row of disheveled buildings near the port's center, when he saw what looked like a small child crawling on the ground. His lower body was covered by a black rubber tarp and it was only after Jiraiya gave the boy a second glance that he realized that the boy didn't have any legs. The child's face was bony and drawn, and the only signs of life were his hands, which relentlessly slapped down on the ground before him and pushed his body up just a few inches at a time.
"Where are you going, child?" Jiraiya asked softly, kneeling beside him. However, the boy didn't seem to hear him; instead, silently, he kept pushing himself forward.
"If he makes it to the other side of the city by tonight, he'll get fed," said a young girl, who'd been poking lethargically at the ground with a stick.
Jiraiya paused. "Fed? By who?"
"People who think it's funny," said the girl with a shrug.
Something hard clenched in Jiraiya's stomach, and he got up. He looked around, and as if seeing for the first time, finally noticed the hard gazes of the passing people and the listless children gathered at every corner.
Jiraiya had heard the rumors, of course, about how a man named Gatō had managed to get his claws on a small island nation and sucked the very life out of its people. At the time, he'd merely thought that it wasn't any of his business and had passed it over. But hearing was not the same as seeing, and the mild discomfort he had felt then now turned into full-blown sorrow.
It had been a long time since he had seen people brought down to such low levels. It had been bad in Konoha for a while following the Nine-Tails' attack, but nowhere near what he saw here. No, the last time Jiraiya had seen such a bleak setting had been during the Second Shinobi World War, when orphans on war-torn battlefields had been like particles of sand on a beach.
When he returned to the dock, his mind was a storm of roiling thoughts, but one made itself the clear winner.
"We're leaving in ten minutes, you'd better return to your cabin," said the captain, leaning over the railing of the ship.
Jiraiya rummaged in his pocket, and finding a coin, he flipped it up to the man, who caught it with an adept grab.
"I'll be staying here for just a bit longer," he called up to him. "You can keep the change."
Waving his hand, letting the captain's farewell wash over him ("Hold on a - hey, come back here! This isn't the full fare!"), Jiraiya began to head for the nearest bar, where he would hopefully be able to pry from the loose lips of a drunken sailor the full story of the country's current sorry state of affairs.
The sun was low in the sky when they reached the dock; the fog for once was gone, leaving behind a gradient of purple to orange that then dissolved into murky water. There were only two boats there: one was a battered-looking fishing boat that had likely seen much better days. The other was a cargo ship, with black steam belching obnoxiously from a smokestack – it was on this ship that they'd be getting on.
Before boarding, Naruto and the others exchanged farewells with their benefactor.
"I appreciated your escorting me here," Kaine said with a gracious smile, dabbing at something in her eyes with her sleeve. "I'll never forget you all...and I hope you won't forget me, either."
"Oh we will," Sai promised pleasantly.
Mayu smiled tremulously. "Goodbye Kaine-san..."
"You have to be brave, Mayu," said Rai, putting a comforting hand on her shoulder.
"I know..."
"Well let's get going then," said Naruto a tad impatiently.
With a final wave, Naruto and the others boarded the ship, which they found themselves fortunate to have caught. It would have been tough to find one leaving Wave country on such short notice, but with Kaine backing them, money had exchanged hands and the ship's captain had agreed to make a short detour back to Fire country.
"You kids are ninja?" The captain, a gruff-looking man with a thick black mustache, eyed their hitai-ate suspiciously. "Awfully young, aren't you?"
"Actually, our growths got stunted by our training. We're probably around your age...assuming you're sixty or so." The captain couldn't have been a day over fifty, but with his usual placid smile, Sai displayed his remarkable aptitude for lying through his teeth. Naruto privately thought to himself that the boy could probably do quite well for himself in the chūnin betting games.
"We appreciate you going out of your way to take us back to our country," said Mayu earnestly.
Leaning over the side of his ship, the captain spat out a wad of something black and slimy into the ocean, giving Naruto an unwelcome inkling of what the murk in the water could be. "Before that though, we'll be making a pit stop at a port town farther up north."
"That'll be just fine," said Naruto. "Now, if you'll excuse us...we'll be resting in our cabin."
"We're tired and we have our own food, so unless the ship catches on fire or something, you don't have to bother with us," Rai added helpfully.
"Your own food, eh? Well I'm not complaining," said the captain. Then with a grunt of dismissal, he turned around to shout something at a passing crewmember.
Naruto and the rest of his team slipped into their cabin, where for about an hour, they rested on rotting bunk beds that creaked with every slosh of a wave against the ship's hull. When they felt the ship still and footsteps increased in volume around them, they each removed their hitai-ate and pulled on a nondescript cloak. Making sure that their faces were hidden below the hoods, they crept out onto the boat's deck one by one, being careful to mingle with the small crowd of people who were getting off the ship. It had grown dark and damp, and their cloaked figures did not stand out from the others, who were similarly dressed.
Just as Naruto stepped foot on the gangplank, however –
"Hey, you lot!" A crewmember hollered down at them, and they froze, wondering if they'd been caught.
"Yes?" Mayu asked, shuffling around. The man – or rather, boy – looked down at them imperiously through beady eyes, and in that split second, Naruto began to reach for the kunai strapped to his thigh.
But then, the boy's expression caved in, and leaning forward, he lowered his voice. "It's my turn to peel the potatoes so I can't go on land but...get me something I can chew on for a bit? I'm feeling queasy. Here...I'll even give you a coin for it."
He flipped something toward them that glinted under the dim dock lights as it spun, and with a practiced hand, Rai grabbed it smoothly out of the air.
"Of course," Rai answered, looking down at the coin, and then back up at the boy with a predator-like smile.
"I owe you," said the boy gratefully with a queasy smile. However, as soon as the boy had disappeared from sight, Rai pocketed the coin with a whistle.
"Rai!" Mayu hissed.
"What?" Rai said defensively. "He had to learn his lesson sooner or later."
As they exchanged small talk, the four casually separated from the rest of the group, and once Mayu had indicated that the coast was clear, they slipped down the wall to the river that spanned the town. The darkness of the night and the shadows of the overhanging bridges and walls hid them; directing their chakra to their feet, they began to run across the water's surface as silently as they could.
Only when they had left behind the last building of the port city, did Naruto allow himself to even slightly relax.
"Think that was good enough?" Rai muttered. Naruto glanced around, straining to extend his senses as far as he could. They were now in marshland, and with the moon almost completely blocked out by clouds that evening, even their trained eyes found it hard to make out anything in the horizon.
"The most obvious presences are gone now...but to be sure, I'll keep the clones around for as long as I can," he said quietly.
It had been Kaine's idea.
While they hadn't exactly announced themselves to Wave country, Naruto and his team hadn't bothered to hide their presence or their identities. That was the point of their hitai-ate after all, to identify them as ninja of their villages. Anyone who dared to trifle with someone wearing the Leaf hitai-ate would be responded to in kind by the full might of Konoha, and Konoha was one of the most powerful hidden villages.
However, Kaine had suggested that Naruto and his team should pretend to leave Wave country, so that her and Tazuna's enemies would relax their guard and underestimate them. Shirakumo had liked the plan, agreeing that eight Leaf nin gathered in one place was too obvious of a confrontation and would likely provoke unwanted attention.
Giving Shirakumo his due respect as the most senior ninja in the vicinity, Naruto had bowed to his suggestion. His shadow clones, disguised as each member of his team, were still in the ship's cabin while he and his real team were to return under cover of darkness to Tazuna's town. They would have to lie low for a while of course, but the gnawing sense that he was being constantly watched had disappeared, and Naruto suspected their plan had went off without a hitch.
As Naruto continued to run in the deep darkness, his thoughts turned to the clones he'd left behind on the ship. He'd told the others – mostly for Sai's sake – that he would dismiss them as soon as the ship reached Fire country, but it'd been partially a lie.
Everything about the Hokage's 'missive' had seemed fishy to him, and it hadn't been the fish stew. Why had the messenger given the message to Menma, instead of Shirakumo, for whom it had been intended? Normally, messengers were under strict orders to deliver their message to a specific recipient, and depending on the importance of the message, had to go through several stringent procedures to verify the recipient's identity. And even if the message really had been from the Hokage, why were they being told to stay in Wave country, effectively interfering with the affairs of another nation?
At least another dozen questions raged inside his mind, but Naruto suppressed them. One of his clones had left the ship with them at the pit stop, and would make his way back to Konoha. Once there, he'd be able to get a direct explanation from the Hokage about what was going on. Until then, he would obey the Hokage's mandate. And while he didn't like it, he would go along with Kaine's fantasies of freedom and Mayu's illusions of playing hero.
At the moment, Naruto couldn't see his teammates, but he could sense them running beside him, and he felt something hard clench in his stomach. It was dangerous out here in Wave country...and he'd do whatever it took to protect his team.
Whatever it took.
But suddenly – his eyes widened and Naruto came to a screeching stop, as with zero warning – almost as if slamming headfirst into an invisible wall – he felt a horrifyingly familiar aura of cold blood lust surge up out of seemingly nowhere. A cry of alarm rising belatedly to his lips, he immediately fell into a defensive stance. Hearing Rai swear beside him, he felt the others do the same.
"Well, well, what do we have here?" A gloating man's voice rung out from the darkness several meters in front of them. "New heathens to offer up for divine judgment, that's what."
"Shut up and do your job, newbie."
"Stop calling me a newbie!"
A/N: Thank you for the reviews, as always.