Present
Chapter Two: Another One
Rotation day always had a special meaning for her. But today, rotation day meant three things for her.
One, the hospital would be packed with returning shinobis to get their check up. More likely than not, that always meant Rin had to pull double shifts, maybe even triple shifts. It didn't help that the majority of the shinobis tended to avoid the hospital like the plague, so having to track down those who didn't willingly come to the hospital made their jobs infinitely harder.
Two, her roommate, Akiara Hyuga, was set to be sent out on this particular rotation.
Three, her best friend, Obito Uchiha, was coming back.
And that made her day infinitely brighter. For once, Rin was actually excited to go to work, so elated that Akiara had spotted her weird behavior.
"Don't tell me you're in that mood cause you're so happy that I'm going to be gone for three months," Akiara commented drily as she sealed the last of her gear into a scroll. Tucking the scroll into one of the many pockets on her backpack, she zipped it up, swinging it onto her back.
"No, my friend is coming back today," Rin corrected, tossing another scroll at Akiara. "Here, some extra medical supplies since you're so reckless."
Akiara had the nerve to roll her eyes, but accepted the scroll nonetheless, slipping it into her pocket. "Lover boy?"
"We're just friends," Rin insisted.
"Sure doesn't seem like it," Akiara commented. "I see him around more often than I see my brother and that's saying a lot."
"He was the first person that was nice to me when I first came here, that's all."
"If you say so," Akiara said. "Look, I gotta go before my brother gets onto me again for being late. See you in three months!"
Rin was barely able to say goodbye before Akiara rushed out of the apartment, backpack bouncing up and down her back as she descended down the stairs and onto the street, running at full speed to get to the front gates of the village. Rin smothered her laugh; Akiara's habit of always arriving right on time was still amusing to her. Especially the fact that Akiara always resolved to get there early, but somehow always ended up being almost late every single time.
Sparing a glance at the clock on the wall, Rin noted that it was time that she left as well, lest she ended up following Akiara's footsteps.
At the hospital, the gossip had already started. Although Rin normally didn't condone gossiping as it may potentially violate a patient's privacy, she did have to admit that gossip made her shift a bit more bearable.
Today's topic of discussion happened to be one of her favorites: battlefield stories. Having never been on the battlefield, all that she knew of the battlefield was through stories from her patients and Obito, although the latter hardly enjoyed discussing it and tended to stray away from the topic when he could.
The first platoon had already arrived, Rin gathered within the first five minutes of eavesdropping, and a group of nurses was already engaged in a heated debate of whether or not the Uchiha side was winning the war.
"Of course they are!" the girl with short, black hair insisted. "It's Obito Uchiha's platoon; he's one of Itachi sama's most trusted generals, so he must be very talented." Rin's interest piqued upon hearing her friend's name. Did that mean he was already here or was he doing his best to avoid coming to the hospital like usual?
"If that was the case, then why did a shinobi tell me that they had lost half of their unit in an ambush by the Yellow Flash?" an older girl shot back, irritation written all over her face. "I know you're infatuated with Obito, but that doesn't mean he's infallible."
"That's an exception," the younger girl proceeded to argue back. "No platoon would be able to effectively counter an ambush from the Yellow Flash, so you can't base it off of that. Aside from that, we're holding strong on that front."
"Until the Yellow Flash comes through and actually decimates the entire unit," the older girl stated wryly. "Stop being so naive. Don't you understand the ambush was just a warning? And Sora Uchiha has such a massive ego that he won't take the warning seriously. Just you wait, soon you'll see the entire platoon carted through the door in body bags."
The younger girl gasped. Rin decided that the argument had gone far enough, and wedged her body between the two girls. The other medics that had crowded around the two had wisely chosen to back off.
"Instead of arguing over something that isn't even within our control, the two of you could be tending to patients," Rin stated. Placing a hand on the older girl's shoulder, she gently pushed her in the direction of the ICU wards. "I'm sure Takahiro san would appreciate your assistance in his rounds."
A frown was etched over the girl's face, but one glance at the medical insignia on Rin's medical coat, signifying her status as the head medic, the girl shrugged off Rin's hand and headed towards the ICU ward. One look from Rin and the rest of the observers wisely scattered, pretending to be busy even if there was nothing to do.
All that was left was the younger girl, who refused to meet Rin's eyes no matter how many times Rin tried to make eye contact with her. She wrung her hands nervously, before placing her hands rigidly by her side. When Rin inched closer, the girl took a nervous step backwards before hesitantly taking a step forward to retain her former position.
A beat of sweat rolled down from her forehead, trickling down to the side of her face, to her chin…
"She was the one who started it!" the girl exclaimed, finally unable to take the pressure any longer. In her outburst, the girl made eye contact with Rin, but she quickly averted her eyes as if she was reminded again that she was supposed to avoid looking at her.
"It won't happen again," the girl added, so quietly that Rin almost missed it.
"What's your name?"
The girl jerked her head up in alarm, eyes meeting Rin's for a brief second before she ducked her head once more. "Emi. Please don't kick me out, I really need this job so I can support the rest of my family. My mom is sick and I have a ten year old sister at home and I-"
"Who said anything about kicking you out?" Rin interjected, cutting off the girl's monologue. "You're going to be my assistant today and if you can't keep up, then you can go home."
Emi nodded vigorously, eagering following RIn to the section of the hospital reserved for medical check ups. There, she spotted at least fifteen shinobis lounging in the waiting area, chatting quietly amongst themselves. One of the men was standing up, pacing aimlessly in front of one of the rooms.
That man turned, pacing back in her direction when his head looked up from the floor. Recognition flooded his features.
"Rin," Obito called. Fifteen pairs of eyes landed on her. Emi maneuvered herself so that Rin's body completely shielded her from view. Rin wasn't sure if it was due to all of the attention or because her idol, Obito, was present.
"Why is everyone here so incompetent?" Obito whined as he walked up to her. "Toshiro was injured and the field medic already treated him. He seemed to be getting better until a couple hours before we got back; his condition has been worsening. Three medics have already looked at him, but couldn't figure out what's wrong."
"Was he poisoned?"
"Yes, but the field medic already took care of it."
"Maybe the antidote isn't as effective as it's supposed to be," Rin responded. "Where is he?"
Obito pointed at a room, the one where he had been pacing in front of before. Rin nodded, motioning Emi to follow her.
"Get his file," Rin instructed before stepping inside of the room. Upon first glance, everything seemed to be normal: breathing patterns, complexion. Rin began to take Toshiro's vitals, calling out the numbers for Emi to jot down on the clipboard. Everything seemed perfectly fine, but the nagging feeling persisted in the back of her mind.
Rin gently shook his shoulders, coaxing him to wake up. With an excruciating amount of effort, Toshiro eventually opened his eyes, looking extremely disorientated.
"Where am I?" he murmured, his eyes unable to focus on anything in particular.
"The hospital. Can you tell me where you feel uncomfortable?"
"Hospital? Aren't I supposed to be on the battlefield? I'm supposed to be there for another month."
Confusion. Possibly delirium.
"Can you tell me where you feel uncomfortable?" Rin repeated.
"I don't know, I feel really sleepy. Can you let me sleep?" When Rin saw Toshiro's eyes begin to glaze over, she snapped her fingers, jerking him awake once more.
"I need you to tell me more than that; otherwise, I won't be able to help you."
Toshiro frowned. "It hurts to breathe; there's pain in my chest. I feel really dizzy too, why is the room spinning? Don't make me get up, I feel like I'll throw up if you do."
With that, Toshiro's eyes closed once more, head lolling off to the side. Rin motioned for Emi to come to her side and she did, standing rigidly next to Rin. Grabbing the clipboard and pen out of Emi's hand, Rin began to scribble down his symptoms below his vitals.
Confusion. Nausea. Chest pain. Hurts to breathe.
It hurts to breathe? Then why were his breathing patterns normal? Unless...his body was forcing him to breath despite the pain associated with it.
Rin flipped back to the previous page, page filled with notes from the field medic who first tended him. Broken ribs, heavy blood loss, deep gash in the stomach, various scrapes and bruises, poison. A metal based poison that attacked the lungs, created by Tsunade three months ago. That might explain the chest pain, but why did the field medic's notes indicate that Toshiro's condition was getting better?
Surely by now, the Senjus would have figured out that Rin had already created an antidote for it, so why were they still using the same poison?
Stuffing the clipboard back into Emi's hands, Rin hastily tied her long, brown hair into a ponytail, tucking the stray pieces of hair behind her ears. Her hands glowed green, hovering around his chest area.
His lungs were completely normal, except for minimal scarring of the tissue from the original poison. The scarring wouldn't explain the chest pain nor any of his other symptoms, so it had to be something else.
Her hands moved down his body, stopping at his ribcage to confirm that his ribs had already been mended. Then it hit her, Rin exactly what those symptoms sounded like.
Kidney failure. Her hands hovered around his kidneys. Just as she thought, a corrosive toxin was eating away at his kidneys, slowly and practically invisible. So slow that by the time symptoms started to show, it would be almost too late to save him. And to mix it with another poison to give them a sense of safety once the patient was cured of the other poison and would exhibit signs of recovery...Rin had underestimated Tsunade.
Then again, Tsunade had underestimated her too. Rin had approximately twelve hours between the symptoms showing and before the damage was beyond repair to find an antidote. Judging the extent of the damage, Rin had about four hours left.
Hardly enough time, but Rin would make it work. She wasn't about to lose to Tsunade now.
Turning to Emi, Rin began to rattle off a list of things that she needed. Emi wore a panicked look on her face, hastily scribbling down the items as it left Rin's mouth. While Emi ran off to collect the items, Rin stuck her head outside, motioning for Obito to come.
"I need you to gather everyone who may have been injured in that attack."
"What, why?"
"Slow acting poison," Rin stated. "Depending on the person, symptoms can start showing earlier or later, so I need you to get them here. Even if they feel fine."
Obito nodded, turning away to relay her orders to his group, right as Emi came running back, with all of the items in her arms. Grabbing the bucket of water, Rin poured a bit in the pan while Emi set down the rest of the supplies onto the counter.
"Watch what I am doing," Rin instructed. "I'll need you to keep making this while I forcibly extract the poison out of his body." Emi nodded, eyes wide as she watched every step to make the mixture. Rin left Emi to stir the mixture, ducking her head outside once more two soliciting the help from two shinobis.
"Hold him down. Don't let him move."
Nodding at Emi to continue making the mixture, Rin channeled chakra to her palm, making the glob stick to her palm. Her forearm pressed down on Toshiro's chest; one shinobi pinned down his legs while the other held down his arms. After receiving confirmation from both shinobis that they were ready to go, Rin made a small cut in Toshiro's body and pushed the mixture through.
The reaction was instantaneous. Toshiro thrashed about, but the two shinobis kept his limbs pinned to the bed. Pushing a bit of chakra to her forearm, Rin strengthened her hold on Toshiro.
Just hold on, it'll be painful, but it'll be over soon.
Rin extracted the glob from Toshiro's torso, staring at the hardly visible traces of poison. It was translucent; the only sign that it was there at all was the faint outline of the substance due to the differences in density and viscosity. Rin released the mixture, letting it slosh into the pan. Emi grabbed the pan, replacing it with another as Rin repeated the procedure all over again.
At some point through the process, Obito returned, giving her an update. There were five other shinobis that had been injured during that ambush. Four felt no symptoms while one felt the beginnings of discomfort in his chest, but hadn't been serious enough to warrant attention.
"Okay, tell everyone that check ups will be postponed until after I figure out an antidote for this. Keep those five shinobis here. Emi, clean up the area and go take their vitals." Grabbing one of the pans, Rin exited the room, heading straight for the labs.
After entering the passcode, the doors swung open and Rin stepped inside, moving towards her favorite corner in the testing area. Setting down the pan on the countertop, she put on her goggles and gloves. She pulled out large notebooks containing all of her notes from the drawers attached to the underside of the counters. Flipping through the yellowing and brittle pages, she perused through her own messy handwriting, coming across to the information that she had gathered about the plants that flourished near Senju territory.
Three of the components in the poison Rin was already certain of, the creator was Tsunade after all. Even the best poisons experts had their own signature in regards to making poison, and for Tsunade, that always seemed to be keeping the base of the poison the same, while tweaking the other components to have different effects. And for Rin, that always made her job so much easier, as she already could easily narrow down the ingredients needed for the antidote.
The fourth component was no trouble either, there weren't many things that could make the poison completely translucent.
The problem always laid with the last component, the mysterious one. The first couple of times, Tsunade had been predictable, using plants commonly found near or on the Senju lands. Yet last time, it had taken Rin sixteen hours to crack the metal based poison because she would have never thought that Tsunade would manage to acquire a plant commonly found in the desert, the track of land that was typically known to be "no man's land." After that time, Rin didn't rule out a single possibility.
Flipping through a notebook dedicated to all of the formulas for antidotes specifically to counter Tsunade's poison, Rin flipped to an empty page and began to scribble down the newest formula. It would take a lot of scratching out and backtracking, three sheets of paper, before the formula was finalized.
Extracting a bit of poison from the sample, Rin unraveled a scroll, dripping a bit of the poison in the center of the scroll. With her other hand, Rin tipped over the contents in the beaker, letting a droplet splash onto the scroll.
Rin grinned in satisfaction when she watched the drop of poison on the scroll fizzle out of appearance completely. And just in a little under four hours, her fastest record at cracking one of Tsunade's poisons. She could already imagine the look of fury on Tsunade's face, when someone inevitably delivered the news to her.
When Rin returned to Toshiro's medical room, Obito was still there. He shot out of his seat upon her entrance and watched her intently as she administered the antidote, injecting it into Toshiro's bloodstream.
"He should be good now," Rin announced. "I'm going to go make another batch for the rest of your platoon."
Obito nodded numbly, letting out a relieved sigh. Rin rounded the hospital bed, reaching over to pull Obito into a hug.
"What would I have done without you?" Obito murmured.
Rin chuckled. "Now you understand the awesomeness of medics. Shinobis don't know how to appreciate us until they get injured." Rin pulled away, stepping out of Obito's arms.
"I'm going to make another batch. Inform Uchiha sama for me, will you?"
Obito gave her an affirmative and watched her leave the room. Obito's gut instinct was to inform Kakashi of Toshiro's condition, but he had been forced to stay behind at the post, so it would be a few more days until Kakashi returned.
Instead, Obito settled for sitting by Toshiro's bedside, wishing his cousin for a quick recovery.
Itachi felt an impending headache coming. There seemed to be a lot of those lately, literally and figuratively, as the war began to reach new heights. There always seemed to be something that warranted his attention, day and night. With every new update, Itachi was always reminded again why he never wanted to become clan leader.
All of the burden and pressure fell onto his shoulders.
Documents were splayed out on his desk. Two off of the right were updates from his commanders at two outposts, luckily containing nothing of importance. The paper in the center of the desk belonged to Obito, detailing the ambush on their outpost by a team led by the Yellow Flash.
And today, another shinobi informed him that his childhood friend, Toshiro, had been poisoned. Another one of Tsunade's creations, he was told.
The fourth document on his desk contained a list of potential matches for marriage, courtesy of the Uchiha elders. Itachi had to resist the urge to rip the paper to shreds when he first received it earlier that day and now it laid on his desk, seemingly mocking him.
Itachi already had his hands full with the war; he didn't need another one.
For the umpteenth time, Itachi longed for the freedom of simply being a soldier, to be able to fight on the frontlines. To not have to worry about the ever lasting tensions between the Uchiha and Hyuga, to not have to deal with the Uchiha elders breathing down his neck about every little thing, to not have to be in control of every decision that could cost someone their life.
But if he was simply a soldier, then the war would never end.
The fifth document was the outline of a tentative peace treaty, written with his impeccable handwriting. Despite that, the entire document was a mess, full of crossed out lines and added notes to the side. Itachi couldn't come up with a peace treaty that was acceptable to the Uchiha clan without proposing terms that the Senjus would certainly scoff at.
That, and Itachi had no idea what was acceptable for the Senjus either. The Senjus had nominated a fourth leader, a man by the name of Minato Namikaze, or more famously known as the Yellow Flash. While Itachi had an inkling of an idea that the third leader, Hiruzen Sarutobi, had somewhat of a soft heart based on overheard conversations in the past with his father, Itachi didn't know if Minato was the same. From the accounts received from other shinobis, Minato was ruthless in the battlefield and that made him wonder if that translated into his view on peace.
Shisui teleported into the room, plopping down into a nearby chair, looking as worn out as Itachi was. Yet both of them were too stubborn to admit that they needed a break.
"Anything?"
Shisui shook his head. "The only intel that I found solidified the fact that we have a mole, but it doesn't narrow down the list. Could be anyone."
"No guesses?"
"The Senju are very careful about the intel that they receive, which doesn't really reveal to us how much info the mole knows. I suspect they are indulging us for now, but are planning something huge."
"I don't suppose we can just throw this war, can we?" Itachi murmured.
"Well if it's any consolation, I don't think the Senju want any part in the war either. After all, we were the ones who incited it."
"They also haven't reached out to discuss the idea of peace like they have in the past."
"Neither have we," Shisui countered. "Perhaps we should be the first to show a sign of good faith this time around."
"The clan would never approve; they're the ones who wanted this war. Even if we reach a forced peace, war will inevitably break out again in the future. It's an endless cycle."
"We'll find a way," Shisui assured him. "Don't forget the resolve you made all those years ago."
"I won't."
"Good, now go and get some rest. You look like you're about to topple over."
Itachi scoffed. "Speak for yourself."
"Yeah, yeah. I'll let you know if I find anything new." With that, Shisui left as quickly as he came.
Itachi leaned back in his seat, staring blankly up at the ceiling.
When will this all be over?
A/N: Hi again!
Itachi makes a cameo here. Although he's not the main character, I think he's a very crucial supporting character which means that his past will be explored in the next chapter! Sorry if this chapter seems kind of slow. The first few chapters are pretty slow and it's to lay out the foundation for the story, but don't worry, the story will ramp up towards the second half and you'll hate me for all the cliffhangers I leave. :)
Someone asked about ages (for present time):
Kakashi/Obito/Rin: 24
Itachi: 18-19 (and Shisui is roughly 2 years older than him)
Well that's it for now. Thank you for reading/reviewing. All feedback is appreciated since I'm not too sure how the general ffn reader feels about this type of AU story. Until next time!
-MM