As the Yamanaka clan head, village tradition dictated that Ino stay in the village to run the Investigation and Torture Department. As such, Ino rarely got missions that sent her away. Very rarely, and only ones that specifically required her clan's special ninjutsus, as well as her expertise as a clan head. Unfortunately, these missions often shared a category with the 'tough' and 'long-term'. So as excited as she had been to leave the village and have a change of pace a few weeks ago, now she was just ready to collapse in her own bed, and more importantly, see her lovely family again.
After convincing one of her teammates to complete her report for her, she stepped into her home sweet-home and called out, "I'm home~." Before stopping abruptly in her living room at an unexpected sight.
The strange young girl on her couch whipped her head towards her, wide-eyed. She was about Inojin's age. After a moment she jumped up and bowed. "Mrs. Yamanaka! Welcome to meet you!"
Huh? Ino merely stood still in confusion, a smile frozen in place. At first, Ino assumed she was just a classmate visiting her dear son… if not for the soft-lilac pajamas she was sporting. Along with the very familiar blanket on her shoulders. Not to mention the way she had been lounging half asleep with the TV droning on in the background, her purple hair uncombed and sticking out in several places.
Meanwhile, the girl gasped and turned red, realizing that what she said didn't quite make sense. "I mean, I'm…" She waved her hands around as if trying to grasp at words. "Uhhhhh-"
"Mom!" The girl's salvation came in the form of Inojin, cheerfully running down the stairs. "You're finally back!"
She chuckled as Inojin threw himself into her embrace. "Did you miss me?"
"Ino," Her husband suddenly appeared, right behind her, wrapping his arms around her waist. Inojin and the girl both jumped up in shock. "I missed you," he whispered in her ear before kissing it.
"Gross!" Inojin made a face. The girl blushed scarlet red.
She leaned into his arms, but only for a moment. "Now, not in front of the guest!" She smacked his arm.
"A lot happened while you were gone," he said, looking at the girl. "This is Sumire-chan!"
"Your classmate right, Inojin?" A sleep-over, perhaps? But she couldn't feel the presence of anyone else in the house - it was a bit strange to invite only this one girl. Not to mention, she didn't think Sai would have felt comfortable hosting such a social event by himself.
"Yup! The class representative."
"Well then, nice to meet you, Sumire-chan. I'm Inojin's mother, Yamanaka Ino." The two bowed in greeting to each other.
"Ni-nice to meet you Yamanaka-san. Um, Inojin-kun and Yama- er I mean, Sai-san have been taking care of me for the last few days," Sumire stumbled through her words.
Few days? "Is that so? I hope they've been treating you well. I know my boys can be rather obtuse sometimes." Sai, Inojin, you two have a lot of explaining to do.
"Not at all!" Sumire bowed again, her purple hair swaying about. She was absolutely adorable. And a bit frail. Funny, Ino was the one that just got back from a long and arduous mission, but it was the girl that had just woken up that looked the most tired out of everyone there. "Your family has been nothing but generous!"
"Speaking of my family, I'd like to talk to them alone for a second. Perhaps up stairs?" She directed that last part to her two boys.
In unison, they grimaced and slowly slunk away towards the stairs. Sumire watched them go while biting her lips.
"It's alright sweetie. You can just keep watching your show, alright." With a dark look on her face, Ino followed them up.
They were in the master bedroom, which she gently shut and locked before turning to them. "Well?"
"Remember that strange group I was talking about — "
"So Sumire-chan is in my class and — "
They both started at the same time. She stopped them both with a single raise of the hand.
She sighed and massaged her temples. "Alright… Inojin first."
Inojin took a deep breath, and then blurted out, "It was all dad!"
Both parents glared at him.
"It was! You're the one that took her home!"
She turned to her husband with a glare.
"I was merely stopping by before taking her to interrogation. Inojin was the one awake way past his bed time and asked me to just let her stay here."
"I thought you were going to say no! I was just being polite!"
"You do know that I don't know enough about conventions to realize that," Sai said, a bit too innocently. Inojin crossed his arms and tapped his foot.
"Alright," Ino interrupted, before their bickering gave her a headache. "So that's how she first got here. I'm just kinda curious to why she's been here for — how long?"
"Just a couple of days now!" Sai chirped at her.
Oh. Ino was extremely tired from the mission, so she didn't immediately realize it. Sai's voice right now sounded extremely happy. Except, her reserved husband was not the type to show happiness so outwardly. Which meant that he was masking some other emotion.
This wasn't a thing he did often (anymore). And certainly one he normally didn't feel the need to do in front of family. There were only a very few things that made Sai act like this.
In fact, from what she could tell, he only ever put on that disgustingly-sweet fake smile as a Pavlovian response to one specific certain topic.
"She's just sleeping here," Inojin continued, thankfully oblivious to his parents inner turmoil, "Dad takes her with him when he goes to work. She's missed so many days of school already."
"You said you had to take her to Interrogation?" Ino asked Sai. In retrospect, she should have just let Inojin stay with Sumire while the two adults talked. However, she just assumed that Inojin was the one that dragged the girl here and let her stay them while her husband just let him do what he wanted as always. (Did Sai get that it was socially-frowned upon to let a young girl stay in a house of just males? She'd talk to him about that later)
"Yeah, Sumire got caught up with some bad people," Inojin answered for him. There was sadness in his voice, that his school-aged peer, perhaps even someone he could call friend (though Ino had never heard him talk about her before), had become a victim.
"They were aligned with Root," Sai said softly. Ino could now see so clearly the tightness in Sai's jaw. Inojin glanced up at his father, but there was no recognition in the young boy's eyes at the name of the organization. That was another topic their family should probably go over.
Her heart softened. "She must have gone through quite a lot," she murmured.
Inojin nodded. "That's we thought it would be best if she stayed here, rather than in that dingy, cold place." That 'dingy, cold place' referring to the holding cells at Interrogation. Normally, people who were involved in incidences regarding ninja-related criminal activity were required to be held there, but Ino supposed that they let her husband bend the rules a bit on account of (1)being the husband of the chair head, (2) being the Hokage's old teammate, and (3) being distinctly trusted on all matters Root.
"I see." There was a tiniest swell of pride at the kindheartedness that her boys showed. "I hope you made her feel right at home!"
"Of course we did, mom! Dad even bought her pajamas."
"Alright then, she can stay as long as she needs or wants to," Ino finally gave her explicit approval. However, rather than making the two of them relax and ending the conversation, Sai and Inojin just glanced at each other.
"Well," Sai started slowly, "Unfortunately, due to the circumstances, that might take a while, as her former guardians are no longer fit to take care of her."
"She homeless now too!" Inojin pipped in.
"…okay." That seemed fine with Ino. She'd just have to cook larger dinners for a while.
"And since we thought that she would be staying here a while, Inojin and I thought that we might as well make it offical!" Sai snapped his fingers, and Inojin whipped out a set of adoption papers. All perfectly finished except for one signature. She stared at it disbelievingly.
"Ehm." Sai straightened up like he was giving a presentation. "You always wanted a girl."
"And her hair is very pretty… like violet flowers…" Inojin continued.
"And you did just say that you would be okay with her staying…"
"And she's suuuuper smart too!"
"And you can also finally do that Mother-Daughter double-date with Ugly—err—Sakura-chan and Sarada-chan that you've always wanted to do."
"And she can help out with the shop!"
"So what do you think?" Sai finished.
Ino sighed. "Usually, decisions like this take a lot more time and consideration." She sighed again, making sure to drag it out as the two boys winced. Rationally speaking, she should talk about this with her husband. At least hear from him what exactly happened a couple of days ago (and how Sai is holding up about suddenly encountering Root again). Maybe talk to Sumire-chan to see what her personality was like. Preferably during a time she more rested and not-brain-dead from her mission.
But really, how could she leave a poor, homeless, probably traumatized girl alone like this? Besides, Sumire was now under custody of the Investigation Department. That was practically adoption already. "Give it." She snatched the papers and pen from Inojin's hand, signing it against the wall.
Her two boys grinned.
"Great! I guess I can tell Sumire-chan about this now!" Inojin ran out of the room with the papers.
Ino blinked. "You mean you'll tell her that I said yes, right? I didn't just sign this without knowing if Sumire-chan wanted us to adopt her, right?"
Sai merely gave her one last blinding smile, before poof-ing into a splash of ink.
"SAI! INOJIN! Get back here, now!" She sighed yet again. This is definitely the last time I'm taking such a long mission away from home.