Unsung Story of the Inconspicuous
A/N: I LIVE! And this took forever, but life sort of exploded. Yet again. Every time I so much as look at this, something terrible happens. But by god I have PERSEVERED. YEAH. Thanks for waiting, I have come through! I swear the wait for this is not indicative of my usual speed!
I own nothing but OCs and the plot. The Plot, even.
Dear Raiku,
I'm doing well. I'm sorry you've been sick. Everything has been fine, mostly, but my team has been having trouble adjusting to our new teacher. You saw him the day we were going through the selection, his name is Hijino. He's blond and young, younger than we expected, but he knows what he's doing. The twins are the problem. Akihito doesn't like him but Akihiro does, so they're using it as an excuse to fight. More than usual. Akihito almost got Akihiro's hands cut off yesterday. Usually he tries to do it himself, but it was because they got sloppy this time. I like Hijino. He says what he thinks. One of the twins was always going to kill the other anyway, so it's not worth changing captains for.
We can write to each other if you want.
Iwao
"Alright you pathetic little bastards!" Yamada grinned, set in his trademark pose of feet apart and arms folded. "You're back in my hands! Aren't we all just full of joy!?"
Ryuu sighed and rolled his eyes, his yellow stare coming to rest on Raiku. 'So you're still alive,' he observed, ignoring Yamada entirely.
Raiku blinked in surprise. 'Yes, I… am?' she said hesitantly.
'But you seem fine,' Daisukenojo pointed out, pulling on some of her hair and quickly drawing his hand back to avoid the sparks. 'Totally the same.'
She leaned away from him. 'Yes… I am. What's wrong with you?'
'Excuse us for being a little wary, given what happened,' Ryuu said from far too close by.
Raiku recoiled and slipped around to stand on the other side of Daisukenojo, using him as a diminutive, red-haired meat shield. Just like old times. Or every time. 'What are you talking about?' she asked, trying to pretend that it was normal for people to run away from the other people they were talking to. She was failing to pull it off, but the attempt had to count for something.
Ryuu just stared at her intently, as if he was waiting for her to figure it out.
Raiku stared back. After a moment, she broke into a nervous sweat.
Oh god. He knew something too. He knew, Tsunade knew, Daisukenojo clearly knew—who, exactly, was not clued in here!? Oh yes, Raiku! Raiku wasn't clued in! Raiku was left to flail around!
Yamada powered through. "Given our recent drama, not that I am mentioning any names-,"
'Raiku.'
'Shut up!'
"- I've decided!" Yamada continued, raising his voice until he drowned out the burgeoning squabble. "I've decided that we need someone to learn about field medicine, get me!?" They hadn't met as a team for months, not since before the disastrous trip to Sand, but he'd finally herded the prepubescent menaces into one place and it was time to get things back on track.
There was a chorus of sudden, understanding sounds. Then Raiku and Ryuu both turned and looked at Daisukenojo expectantly.
He glowered. 'What!? Why me!?'
'Well,' Raiku hedged. 'You've… sort of already started, and…'
'I wouldn't trust Raiku to heal me if she had a Tsunade stapled to each hand,' Ryuu said rather more bluntly.
Raiku gaped at him.
He met her gaze evenly, face blank.
Raiku, predictably, gave in after a few seconds of eye contact. 'He's right, I can't do it.'
Daisukenojo recognized a good point when he heard one, but that still left him with one way out, even if it was spectacularly unattractive. 'Why not you, asshole!?'
Ryuu raised his eyebrows. Raiku gasped. 'Not Ryuu!' she exclaimed. 'Anyone but Ryuu!'
'No offense,' Ryuu added to her statement testily, but she shook her head.
'Offense! Offense! I absolutely meant offense!'
Ryuu's eyes narrowed. 'Excuse me?'
'Oh, like you wouldn't just "accidentally" poison me every time I needed healing! You can't threaten to kill me over this! If you're the medic, I'm already dead!'
Ryuu seemed torn between tearing her to pieces or taking the way out she was so gracelessly trying to thrust upon him. Either he attacked Raiku and thoroughly undermined her point, her intelligence and her status as a sentient being, somehow, or he got out of learning something that probably wouldn't let him hurt someone.
Raiku watched with real interest as Ryuu wavered between his two favorite things. Daisukenojo frowned, feeling his fate hang in the balance.
Suddenly, Ryuu smiled.
Yamada jerked back slightly despite himself. Raiku shuddered. Daisukenojo was a little more vocal. 'What is that, what is that!?' Daisukenojo demanded, pointing at Ryuu. 'What is that face?!'
'I'll do it,' Ryuu said, turning to face Yamada, 'as long as I can keep up with the rest of my training too. I don't want to be a medic, so I need to keep working on offense and defense.'
Yamada eyed him like he would a coiled snake. "That won't leave you with a lot of free time, Sullen."
'Well, that's it then. He's going to kill us,' Raiku lamented. 'He's going to kill us all.'
'Oh, I can manage,' Ryuu said.
'I'm sure you can,' Raiku agreed sadly.
'I can manage the training for both,' Ryuu corrected, not even dignifying Raiku's histrionics with a response.
Yamada, after a long and deeply reluctant silence, nodded. "I'll set it up. You're not going all the way to medic, so it should be enough to stick you with one for a while. A few years. Just basic stuff, but it'll be a lot of study, get me?"
Ryuu's smile got even wider. 'I got you.'
Dear Gaara no no no no no
Ryuu read what she was writing from over her shoulder, and then ripped the paper out from under her pen. 'For the love of god! It's just a letter!'
Raiku let out a low, long keening sound from where her face was pressed against the desk.
Ryuu crumpled it and threw it across the room to a bin already full of scrunched up paper. 'Start again! You think I want to be wasting my time on this!?'
'You got me into this mess!' she accused, voice high with hysteria. 'You did this to me! You don't get to leave until I'm done!'
Ryuu rolled his eyes. 'Yes,' he said dryly, 'I mercilessly coerced you into exchanging written correspondence. I'm a monster. The world quakes beneath my feet and the people shudder at my name.'
Raiku leaned back in her chair and eyed him warily. 'That last bit sounded a little wistful.'
Ryuu smirked unpleasantly.
Raiku whimpered.
Dear Iwao,
Hello again! How are you? It's getting a bit colder here. How is the weather over there? That was a really stupid question. Or was it? Do you have actual seasons? Wait, you live in a desert. I'm sorry. I'm also sorry to hear that your team isn't getting along so well. I remember Hijino, a bit, and he did seem a bit young, but I didn't think Akihito and Akihiro hated each other? Aren't they twins? Shouldn't they be all weirdly close? Please don't tell them I said that. I want to keep my hands.
My team is doing pretty well, still! Yamada is trying to make Daisukenojo specialize as a medic, but he's refused. He's tired of being shoehorned into that role (his words) and now wants to focus on offense and since I can't do that sort of thing, it looks like Ryuu might have to learn some field medic techniques. My feelings about that are. Sort of mixed? He is very good at techniques. He is also Ryuu. Still, anyone's better than me!
Actually no, my feelings are still mixed, they're very mixed.
Raiku
Raiku could probably be forgiven for being lulled into a false sense of security when everything seemed to have blown over so nicely. So she was content and relaxed when she walked into the kitchen one fine and unremarkable day, yawning widely. 'Good morning-,'
Raiku cut herself off so fast that it almost hurt.
Tsunade regarded her over the top of her teacup, one eyebrow raised slightly. Their cups were usually chipped and none of them matched, entirely because of Raiku, and the Hokage was sitting in their kitchen like it was normal for her sit there and drink out of them, probably also because of Raiku.
Raiku tried to speak, but instead came out with a sound like a small, dying animal.
Tsunade sipped daintily at her tea, not breaking eye contact.
'Raiku, you're up!' her father greeted cheerfully from behind the kitchen island. 'Do you remember the Hokage? You were a bit sick when you met her the first time.'
Raiku knew from experience that she wasn't capable of casually sidling out of a room, somehow not even the ones she was merely adjacent to, but she was still tempted to try.
The silence stretched on.
'Raiku, say good morning to the Hokage,' her father prompted after it began to get awkward.
Raiku swallowed nervously, kept in place by Tsunade's even stare. '… Good morning.'
Her father helped her along. '…Hokage.'
'Good morning, Hokage. Miss Hokage!' she added hastily, only to realize that made no sense.
Thinking on it, it was obvious what had happened. She was dead, and this was hell. All she needed to do now was wait for Ryuu to show up to make the experience complete.
'Are you going to sit down?' Tsunade asked, eyebrows raised.
Raiku found herself pulling up a chair and collapsing into it immediately.
Tsunade put her cup down. It wasn't logical—it was only a cup, after all—but not having something between the two of them suddenly made Raiku feel a bit queasy. The table didn't count, since it didn't obscure the older woman's face at all.
'So, we've been catching up the Hokage on your condition,' her father said, putting a cup of tea in front of her before he sat at the place on her left. 'Or, Yamada has.'
He smiled vaguely, but Raiku knew him well enough to know he wasn't nearly as unaffected as he was making out. Even if she hadn't been able to recognize it, he couldn't have been. She could still feel electricity humming through her system, which she didn't fully understand, and that was bad enough. Having Tsunade find out about it was even worse.
How could Yamada have just… told her? She stared at the table, her feelings of betrayal written all over her face.
'This could all have been very easy if I had been told at the beginning,' Tsunade said. Luckily, she seemed to be directing her irritation at Raiku's father, who could at least handle it. She smiled thinly. 'Which I should have been. Ethically. And legally.'
'Well, you can't blame us for wanting to keep it quiet,' Gairano shrugged. Raiku noticed he was using the royal "we", which wasn't a good idea if he wasn't trying to make them seem all… clan-like. 'We aren't exactly a powerful family, and it's not like unusual children haven't gone missing in the past.'
Ouch. Raiku couldn't restrain her flinch, but did manage to keep her horror off her face. What was he doing!? This was surely not the time to remind the Hokage of a grand tradition of gene theft and child exploitation!
'If your unusual child had been even slightly less lucky, she'd be gone. Period,' Tsunade replied mildly.
Gairano smiled pleasantly. Tsunade smiled back. Raiku cast her eyes heavenward and prayed for death. The silence stretched on, full of murderous intent and forced social courtesies.
'Well!' Tsunade said eventually, turning her gaze onto Raiku. Raiku obligingly died inside, just a bit. 'That leaves us the question of what to do with you.'
'It does?' Raiku squeaked.
Tsunade smiled like a shark. 'It does.'
'Uh. Um. I was. Going to go and train with my team,' Raiku said hesitantly, eyes flicking from Tsunade's face, to the table, to the floor and then back again on an endless loop.
'I don't think that's going to do it. Do you?' Tsunade asked her.
Raiku was honestly not sure what the right answer was, but she was utterly certain that there was one. She was equally positive that it was statistically impossible for her to get it, so she just fidgeted unhappily.
Tsunade allowed her to do so for a few minutes, looking amused, before she sat back. 'Yamada is an excellent Jounin, but he doesn't know anything about electricity. You'll need supplementary training. Unless someone in your family can provide it?' she asked Gairano.
Raiku's father shook his head. 'Nobody else has this ability. It came out of nowhere.'
Tsunade looked back to Raiku without bothering to speak to him further. 'Then we'll see what we can find out.'
Raiku paled. 'I don't think-,'
'No,' Tsunade agreed, 'but I'm the Hokage, it's my job to think.' She took another sip of her tea and stood, inclining her head ever so slightly at Raiku's father. He responded by standing and bowing, as was only appropriate. She glanced at Raiku, who hastily did the same. 'I'll arrange what needs to be done and tell you when to be there. Good luck with your training,' she added to Raiku, who stared at her, mute with horror.
When Tsunade left, her father going with her to see her to the door, Raiku collapsed backwards into her chair.
She wasn't sure what had just happened. She was sure it wasn't good.
She was brooding by the time her father came back. He was laughing to himself when he re-entered the room. 'I think that went well!' he told her cheerfully.
Raiku glared at him.
'Well,' he allowed. 'Maybe not really well.'
Dear Gaara,
Oh god I am going to die no matter how this goes I'm gonna die and you're so scary no no no no
'What!?' Raiku demanded when Ryuu once again snatched the paper out of her hands. 'I thought I was doing better that time!'
Dear Raiku,
I'm fine. I hope everything is still going well. The weather here does get cold at night, all year round, but even in winter it gets hot around midday. Just slightly less, and it gets much, much colder when it gets dark. We also get a lot of frost. We do have seasons, but many shinobi from other villages recognize that we live in a desert and so assume that we can only deal with high temperatures. It's a stupid mistake. Please do not make it if it comes up. It's a very stupid mistake. What are the seasons like in Konoha? The weather seemed very mild when I was there.
My team is adapting to our new leader, slowly. Hijino eventually decided to solve the problem of the twin's disrespect by letting one of them walk into a trap instead of pulling them out when they disobeyed him, so they listen a lot more carefully now. Akihito ended up with a long scar across his chest, which made it a lot easier for people to tell them apart, right up until Akihiro gave himself one that's basically identical. Having two people that can't be identified separately is a huge advantage for stealth work, so it made a lot of sense.
They are not close, no.
I remember Ryuu as being quiet. He also seemed to have good chakra control. I'm sure that he'll be a good medic, technically speaking. You can always separate from that team once you become Chuunin anyway, but I hope medic-training calms him down.
Good luck,
Iwao
"Eighty!" Yamada boomed.
Raiku held herself in the press-up position just centimeters off the ground, red-faced and breathing heavily. 'Is that... enough?' she forced out, feeling like the muscles of her upper body were trying to crush the words before they came out. Her muscles were emitting a faint hum from the strain, since she'd started accidentally conducting more power to them around fifty. It had worked to stave off the pain for the next twenty, but now she was out of options.
'I can do more!' Daisukenojo said from somewhere on her right, sounding enragingly determined.
'Bring it on.' Ryuu immediately rose to meet Daisukenojo's implied challenge.
Raiku tried to focus on how she was losing feeling in her hands and toes rather than the burn in her arm and back muscles, or the similar feeling in her abdomen for keeping her body straight for god knew how long. It didn't work; it only made her more aware of how she'd stopped blinking a while back because of how hard she'd been concentrating on not collapsing.
Yamada was always on board for some extra suffering, unfortunately for her scrawny arms. "Eighty-one!"
'Can I ... tap out?' Raiku wheezed.
"Nope!" Yamada seemed cheerful. Probably because there was now no upper limit on the amount they were going to do, so he could work them until they dropped, again. If they had asked to be trained harder, he probably couldn't get in trouble for inhumane treatment of minors. Again.
'I'm a... girl!'
The weight of Yamada's profound feminist disappointment provided some valuable resistance for her to press up against. "Don't be sexist, Speedy. Eighty-one! I can wait all day, get me!?"
Raiku's arms felt very hot and were also shaking so badly they almost made her teeth rattle. She gritted said teeth together and strained to push herself up.
Yamada approved. "There we go! And after this, we're going to do some sparring!"
Raiku collapsed face-first into the grass.
"But not until you sad sacks do another eighty, since your teammate here is falling behind, get me!?"
A chorus of groans from either side of her. Well, Daisukenojo groaned, Ryuu seemed to be making a low hissing sound, like his inner rage-kettle was boiling over.
Yamada's smile was so wide it could actually be felt as a physical fifth member of their team. "I am gonna work you little bastards like dogs this year! It's gonna be great, get me!?"
'Raiku.' Ryuu sounded strained. And angry. Always angry. 'You are dead to me.'
Raiku clung desperately to the ground. Any time now, time-skip. Any time-
Dear Iwao,
Hello again! Everything here is still the same. You were right, the weather here is typically pretty mild. It does get a bit cold, but luckily the autumn rainy weather is over. We do get a lot of fog? Only in the early mornings. It's actually pretty cool, since my family's land is elevated, so when it's really foggy I can go outside and it looks like the whole valley is made of mist. Except for the tall buildings. Thank you for letting me know! I will not make that mistake. I cannot stand high temperatures. I wear a lot of clothes. None of them are fashionable, one of the other Genin told me the other day. Her name is Ino and we had not spoken before then, it was pretty weird. She just sort of came over and told me I was an embarrassment. In a strangely friendly way. A friendly and highly aggressive way.
Training! Well, we've now learned that I will never be a heavyweight. I would have thought that that would go without saying, but there you go. But! I am much faster than most people, and I can still hit pretty hard! I mean, f equals ma, right, a has to count for something. Though not if m is 0, so I should maybe try harder not to lose any more weight. I got taller again but didn't get any heavier? My father makes me eat a lot. So does my teacher. How is your teacher going? Sorry about the weird formula; I hate math, but I am actually enjoying shinobi-technique physics! So now I want to tell people all about it all the time because I'm learning it so it's new and cool but of course you already know all that because you are much more advanced than I am so I shouldn't talk about it anymoreoh godRaiku stop
Anyway! I can hit a kunai out of the way with another kunai! I have been able to do that for ages. What I meant is that I can now do it so that the first kunai goes where I want! An easy twenty percent of the time. The rest of the time I just pretend it went to the right place. We all have our strengths. Mine is also a weakness. I am not the greatest shinobi ever. But I am improving! I can beat Ryuu in hand-to-hand most of the time now, as long as no one is using techniques. He always beats me at techniques, since wind trumps lightning,everyone knows that. Especially Ryuu. But Daisukenojo is stronger than me. As in, much stronger. He is the strongest physical taijutsu user in our group. Not the most proficient, I mean he is just really physically strong. He shattered Ryuu's eye socket the other day! Ryuu is fine. Now. But really angry. I have been hiding since then, is what I'm saying.
Hope everything's good with you!
Raiku
'Stay still,' Ryuu instructed.
"I'm not sure I'm on board with this, get me?" Yamada asked slowly, staring at the grip Ryuu had around Daisukenojo's bare elbow. Raiku hovered anxiously over Ryuu's shoulder, almost audibly fretting.
Ryuu just glared. He'd taken to speaking only in short sentences since his voice had started to break almost three weeks earlier. He seemed to feel that the indignity of a voice that cracked on every other syllable was one he could manage only by ensuring nobody ever found out about it. He had very little success until he'd implemented a controversial but undeniably effective policy of mutilating Daisukenojo whenever the redhead tried to bring it up. Raiku only wished that his sudden stoicism had made him less threatening, but he had only taken the opportunity to hone his ability to savagely deride and intimidate into a more compact form. He would have to keep this up for quite a while, after all, and wouldn't it be terrible if he couldn't make people cry on a daily basis?
'I'm pretty sure you're supposed to practice this on yourself,' Daisukenojo said uncertainly, leaning as far back as he could without trying to pull his arm free.
Ryuu made a noncommittal sound and pulled the plastic cap off a small, sterilized needle. He gripped Daisukenojo's upper arm tightly and watched the skin beneath it like a hawk.
'Also, I don't think field medics are allowed to administer intravenous medication!' Daisukenojo added in a much higher pitch.
Ryuu smirked. 'Ah. Injections.'
'He's... he's got you there,' Raiku admitted with some reluctance.
Daisukenojo glowered at her. 'Shut up, Gairano, or I swear...'
'Done,' Ryuu announced, sealing both needle and cap inside a small disposal bag and pressing a cotton ball to the puncture site with a thumb. Daisukenojo blinked and tilted his head as though that would help him see under the white fluff.
"Good job," Yamada said with some surprise.
Ryuu smiled pleasantly. Raiku patted Daisukenojo on the shoulder. 'Hey! You didn't even feel it! Good job, Ryuu!'
"Exactly," Yamada agreed. "Speedy next."
Raiku took an immediate step back, almost tripping over Yamada's living room ottoman. 'What? No. No, never, no.'
Ryuu turned and looked at her. He managed to communicate clearly that she was being unreasonable, because he was just trying to be responsible and practice finding and infiltrating her venal system.
Raiku knew better. 'I have a thing.'
'Liar,' Ryuu responded, still sounding terrifyingly sweet.
'You've only been doing this for a few weeks!'
'A month and a half,' Daisukenojo corrected, suddenly all for team spirit now that his part was over.
'Irrelevant! Studying for ... for a little while does not qualify you to stick needles in me! They conduct!' Raiku protested.
Yamada firmly gripped her shoulder and pressed down. Feeling the end growing near, Raiku slumped down onto the ottoman. "Take one for the team, Speedy," he advised.
Ryuu reached into his small practice supply bag and pulled out another sealed needle.
Raiku cringed and began to glow slightly. Oh god.
Ryuu pulled the seal open and put the packet aside.
Oh god.
Ryuu uncapped the needle and turned to look at her expectantly.
Oh god oh god oh god oh god—
[Front of card]
Happy 14th Birthday!
[Inside of card]
Happy birthday, Ryuusuke. You are studying to be a medic, or so I hear? An interesting choice. It isn't something that most of us would go for, since we all have such a specific natural advantage. We have faith in you, and will keep watching over your progress. I hope your parents are doing well.
From,
Your family.
Raiku waved awkwardly. It wasn't hard. She'd recently had another growth spurt and was scrambling to gain enough weight to catch up, so she gave off the distinct impression of being simultaneously two sizes too large and two sizes too small. Her every action was awkward.
Well. More awkward than usual. Which was something of an accomplishment.
The strikingly masculine woman across from her narrowed her eyes in response.
'This is Takano,' Shizune introduced from where she stood next to the other woman. 'She's going to be helping you hone your abilities.'
Takano didn't have a glare as effective as Ryuu's, but it still made it clear that she was not a happy participant of Tsunade's plan to make Raiku a useful member of society. Her eyes were a clear green and her very short brown hair actually had some lovely copper highlights, but this wasn't going to last. She just wasn't photogenic enough. Raiku remembered with real longing the days when she knew plain people. Most of her family had actually gotten better looking, such was the Drama that she'd caused. None of them were happy about it. The Genematrix was even less happy about the gap where Raiku and her father had been, so it had only been a matter of time before this came up. It had only been a matter of time before it took another crack at her, and this was the warm-up round. Goddamn.
Takano was a normal Jounin.
This was going to go badly.
'You've been briefed, so I think I'll leave you two to it,' Shizune said to Takano, dusting her hands off before she stuck them in her pocket and made her way off the bridge.
Raiku and Takano just looked at each other for a long time. The wind rustled Takano's short hair, and made a solid effort at Raiku's.
'So-o,' Raiku drew out, rocking her weight back and forth from heel to toe.
'Stop fidgeting,' Takano immediately ordered.
Raiku froze.
'The Hokage has briefed me about your situation,' Takano informed her. She folded her arms across her chest. 'You've been given no training, and you've made absolutely no effort to control your ability on your own.'
Raiku felt this was unfair. Sure, Takano was meeting her purely to buy time until the Genematrix shoved someone more likely to get her into trouble her way, but Raiku had tried. Her and Yamada had tried really hard, and made pretty significant headway for a while. Before her abilities destabilized and made her insane for a month, but the point remained that they had been doing well up until that point!
She felt compelled to protest. 'I have! Yamada and I actually made some exercises to deal with it, and it's not like it's a technique that I can just...'
Takano sighed with enough irritation that Raiku trailed off. 'I meant any significant training or effort.'
That was actually a little offensive. Yamada had no background in electrical techniques, like only ninety-nine percent of Konoha-nin, and he'd done well, considering. Raiku realized that her forehead was aching from a tension that it was unused to dealing with, given her usual expressions of terror or cheer. She was frowning. She cast a worried look at the ground, but found no ink-black Plots attached. So she was frowning because Takano was being presumptuous.
Great.
Takano began to walk, indicating that Raiku should follow. 'Our first step will be to establish the proper boundaries for your training.'
'Um, about those boundaries,' Raiku began, scrambling to catch up.
'And then,' Takano continued, shooting her a sharp look for butting in. 'We will be able to work backwards into the finer aspects of control.'
'We already tried that,' Raiku tried again, 'and it went really really badly.'
Takano cut her off yet again with a decisive hand motion. 'I'm one of Konoha's most qualified electricity users. I can handle whatever you have going on.'
Raiku frowned again but recognized the futility of speaking up.
Wasn't this going to be fun?
Dear Raiku,
I'm glad everything is going well. I recently spent some time in hospital. I had appendicitis. Rather, that is what the doctors thought until they actually opened me up and it wasn't inflamed, but they took it out anyway. It turned out that I'd been poisoned by a girl from another team, who was trying to get my attention. I don't think I'll date her, all things considered. She overdid the quantity and that was sloppy. So I guess I can relate when it comes to aggressive/friendly girls. The hospital has better heating than my house, though, so it isn't bad to be there at this time of year. I prefer frost to fog, but that does sound like an interesting view.
I have never really liked physics. I learn better with a hands-on approach, rather than a more direct academic one. I don't mind if you talk about it. It does not surprise me that the short one is the strongest. Hijino says that short males tend to train harder at physical aspects of shinobi life in order to compensate for their height. I have always been the strongest member of my team, but I am no longer considered short. You may still be taller than me, though.
I learned an interesting technique recently. I was offered the chance to study puppetry when one of the teachers lost their student, but said no. I like chakra strings, but I find puppets creepy. Also puppeteers are often creepy. Everything about it is creepy. Hijino offered me an alternative and I have taken it. I am enjoying it a lot. I think one of the twins is studying part-time with that puppet technique user. Or maybe both. They have been very secretive recently. I think they are either conspiring or they have girlfriends. Boyfriends. Whichever.
I am still training hard. I am entering the Chuunin Exam next week. It got pushed up because of the conflict, and I think my team stands a good chance. I will try to write afterwards. If I don't die.
Iwao
'So. Let's talk about sex.'
Raiku tried very hard to make herself invisible. Since she was naturally conspicuous, it did her no good.
Mayuko whipped a pointer around to point at some terrifyingly detailed diagrams on their blackboard. 'Sex is something you can never do, ever,' she informed Raiku, her expression deeply displeased. Probably because Raiku's father had conveniently been sent out of town on a mission, choosing to outsource the first of Raiku's major puberty milestones to a reliable cousin. 'It is far beyond your capabilities and that is basically the end of it.'
Raiku raised her hand slowly.
'Questions after the class!' Mayuko snapped.
'But you said that it was the end of-,'
'Questions after the class!' Mayuko repeated.
Raiku slunk down in her chair unhappily.
Mayuko pointed at the board again. 'Anyway. What you ran screaming to me about this morning is called menstruation-,'
Raiku clapped her hands over her ears, going bright red. 'I know what it is! I just wasn't thinking!'
'And it will happen once a month from now until you've spent so long hating it so much that your body finally gives up and stops under the weight of your accumulated rage-,'
'I don't think that's what menopause is-,'
'You wait until this has been happening for a few years, then you tell me about it,' Mayuko said with a frightening glint in her eye. 'Now, the mechanics of this are as follows...'
'If I can't do it, why do I need to know!?' Raiku was coming perilously close to begging. Well, in all honesty, she was begging. 'Doesn't this then fall into the category of "things I don't need to know"!?'
'Because everybody needs to know these things. Besides,' Mayuko added, with a sudden overwhelming reluctance, 'it's possible that you can later, if you so choose, have some ... more unorthodox types. Of sex.'
Raiku's facial muscles seemed to be frozen into an expression of utter horror. But that was fine, that was probably the only expression she'd need. Ever again. Oh god, her father had asked Mayuko to do this. Her father.
Dear god.
She existed.
Her father had had sex at least once.
Raiku pulled on her hair and shook her head in silent dismay.
Dear Gaara,
How are you? I am Raiku, if you forgot. You tried to kill me in a stairwell that one time. I am writing! Like I said I would. Because I want to and definitely for no other reason. I hope you're doing well! It took me a long time to recover after I got back from Sand, but I am better now! Yes. I am. I am training very hard, but I don't think I will enter the Chuunin Exam this year, so I won't be coming to Sand. Which is a shame. But oh well! I can always enter it next year, but I think Ryuu wants to enter it this year? He is very impatient. How are your siblings? I am frightened of them, a little bit, but not in a bad way! Shinobi are supposed to be scary! So it's really just a testament to their skill and yours because I am super intimidated by you most of the time which is not to say that you aren't nice or anything even though you tried to kill me that one time but hey no hard feelings
'Oh fuck it, I'm sending this one,' Ryuu growled, pulling the unfinished letter away before she realized what was happening.
'What?' she blinked. It took her a moment, but reality did strike. 'No!' she wailed, immediately lunging for it. 'Ryuu, you can't! Ryuu! Ryuu, no!'
'This has gone on long enough! It's taken months!'
'Ryuu, come back! No!'
'This is Gairano Raiku. Raiku, this is Konada,' Shizune said shortly, gesturing between them.
The gangly young man standing beside her waved.
Raiku waved back a little more warily. He looked really, really young. He was dressed like a Jounin, sure, but he had green hair! And... actually, his eyes were almost as bright a blue as hers, and he was pretty... pretty.
Very pretty.
She smiled, feeling the cautious beginnings of optimism.
Shizune didn't look nearly as cheerful. 'After what happened with Takano-,'
'I said I was sorry!'
'After what happened with Takano,' she continued, 'Konada seemed the next best choice.'
He smiled impishly. His right cheek dimpled. 'I'm sure we'll get along great!'
Raiku considered. He was already contrasting pretty sharply against Takano. They also had similar names. Maybe she'd been too hasty in thinking this would go better.
'And I cannot stress this enough: there will be no explosions!' Shizune added sharply.
Raiku winced. 'It was an accident! She's even mostly okay now!'
'She's even—no. No, we are not going to argue about this,' Shizune told her, giving her a stern look. 'Takano isn't being discharged until the end of the week, and she's refused to even consider trying again. She flinches every time there's a loud noise.'
Raiku scuffed the ground with her foot. 'It wasn't even my fault,' she muttered. 'I did say it was a bad idea...'
Shizune waved her hand, refusing to brook even that pathetic protest. 'Just don't do it. I expect a report afterwards,' she added to Konada, clasping his shoulder briefly before she sent Raiku another warning look and vanished into a swirl of leaves.
Konada rubbed his hands together, taking a few jogging paces to draw even with Raiku before jerking his head to indicate they should walk together. 'So! I heard all about what happened with Takano, and I agree. We should definitely stay away from the really potent stuff for now, mmkay?'
He was immediately going for the total opposite of Takano, instead of just dialing it back. It was official. He was yet another filler.
'Raiku?' he prompted when she began to lag behind. She made a distracted noise of agreement, well into her brooding rambles.
She was even slightly taller than him, Raiku noted sadly. He was perky and he had beautiful skin and he dimpled asymmetrically and she was going to crush him. She could see it now. Hordes of wailing female Chuunin from his class would mob her.
Konada slung a friendly arm around her shoulders. 'Let's do this, then!'
Dear Iwao,
I'm sorry to hear that you were sick. Poisoned. Sick because you got poisoned. I think that not dating that girl would be wise. Yes. How did you do on the Chuunin Exams?! Did you pass? I bet you passed! Unless you didn't, in which case you were absolutely not ready and you should wait longer because of that. Never mind. You probably passed. We almost ended up entering after all, but I basically cried until they said that I didn't have to. Ryuu was really angry. He's been working like a slave for months to keep up his training alongside his studying, so finding out that he couldn't try for Chuunin basically made him incoherent with rage. I would have been squished like a bug. I mean, my taijutsu is improving, but I can't use anything else really, and I haven't found anyone to help me with that other thing that I can do, so … there's that. But! I can now use chakra on my feet! And sometimes my hands! Consistently, but only for the feet, the hands are still touch and go. Ha! "Touch and go", because they're… hands. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry.
I also think puppeteers are creepy. I am glad you won't be one.
But seriously, please write soon so that I know you're still alive.
Raiku
'Happy birthday!'
Raiku groaned and rolled over in bed, pressing her face into her pillow to try and block out the light. She'd been a much dreaded Morning Person her whole life,but she'd started finding sleep more and more addictive, which could probably be attributed to her more intensive training. Or possibly her slow spiral into teenagedom, which her father had been watching with extremely vocal horror. She could probably get away with sleeping in on her birthday, she thought. Probably. If she could ignore him for long enough.
It was no use. Her father grabbed her shoulder and pulled until she was on her back, sitting on the bed next to her. He smiled at her and held out a small, shiny bag.
Raiku eyed it blearily.
He shook it.
She dragged an arm out from under the blankets and took hold of the little string handle, her sleep-weak hand almost dropping it immediately. 'Thanks,' she yawned, pulling herself into a sitting position. She stared at the bag, noting that it was quite pretty. It had little shinobi frogs on it, which was pretty cute. Not a bad gift. Did seem rather odd, given she had some bags already.
Her father waited for a few seconds, then sighed slightly. 'Raiku. The present is inside.'
Raiku yawned again, mostly to cover her sudden embarrassment. 'Of course it is. I was... just admiring the bag. Was what I was doing,' she grumbled. He clearly didn't believe her, but he had woken her up, so. There.
She fished around inside it and her fingers closed around something rectangular, which revealed itself as a book when she pulled it out. She squinted through her hair at the title.
'"Everybody Understands You (Let's Not Get All Teen-Angst About This)",' she read aloud.
Her father beamed. 'Served our family well for generations now! We give a new copy to all our young teens. It was written by an Uchiha,' he pointed out, tapping the author's name near the bottom. 'Just for some interesting trivia. I guess they'd have dealt with the angst a lot more than us. It has their trademark ... omnipresent rage. And snide remarks.'
Raiku stared at him.
He tapped her forehead. 'You should get reading.'
Raiku continued to stare.
'Chapter three is my favorite,' he added. He dusted off his hands and sauntered out, calling, 'pancakes in five!' as he left.
Raiku blinked, unable to wrap her sleep-addled mind around what was going on for a few minutes.
Eventually, she flipped through to chapter three.
'"We All Remember What It Was Like To Be Your Age (This Doesn't Need To Be Hard)"?' she read.
Raiku
I am still alive but really busy I did pass the Exam I will write again soon
'So.' Ino threw herself onto the stool beside Raiku with a complete lack of warning. 'Your teammate, Rui, he's getting pretty hot.'
Raiku choked on her udon.
The shorter, but infinitely better looking blonde continued on as though Raiku wasn't experiencing death-by-noodle right next to her. 'So what's going on there, is he dating the other guy, or... or what, what's the deal there,' she asked, fixing Raiku with a pale blue stare.
Raiku finally gasped in a full breath, flushed and panting. 'Excuse me?' she rasped.
Ino sighed impatiently. 'Your teammate, Rui-,'
'Ryuu?!'
'That's the one, Ryuu. Is he dating anyone?'
This couldn't be happening. Raiku thought that she would have time to prepare for this, time to assemble flashcards and presentations on why dating Ryuu was a Bad Idea. Logically, she did know that for him to date someone would be a good idea, Drama-wise, but ... something in her balked at the idea of willingly and knowingly inflicting him upon another human being. With his... being Ryuu. And his personality. And also that sociopathic disorder of his that had been coming along so nicely. But for all of her brooding and speech-writing, she had never thought she'd be ambushed with it in the middle of lunch. She quickly glanced down at her noodles. Maybe she could assemble them into a small sign, or a diagram or something, maybe she could-
Ino snapped her fingers in front of Raiku's face. 'Hey. Hey! Focus.'
Raiku jerked back. 'He's a sadistic maniac!' she blurted out. 'That's his deal!'
She expected some sort of denial, but Ino just rolled her eyes. 'Yes, we're all insane. We know this. But is he gay, is what I'm asking.'
Raiku gaped. 'No! You don't understand! He's a psychopath!'
Ino gave her a patronizing look. 'I was the head of the Sasuke fanclub for years, okay. I can do psychopath.'
Dark spots were starting to appear in Raiku's vision. She realized that she had stopped breathing, possibly to make sure that Ino's particular brand of crazy couldn't get into her airways. 'No?' she squeaked out.
Ino sent her a dazzling smile. 'Great! Thanks. I'll look into this, maybe. I don't know, there are a few promising guys.' She patted Raiku's head and put a note down on the table. 'Lunch is on me! See you, Gairaki.'
'Gairano?' Raiku offered faintly.
'Right, right.'
Raiku stared after Ino as she left, still left reeling from the whirlwind of horror that her lunch had turned into.
Across the table, Daisukenojo's chopsticks dropped from his numb fingers, his face still frozen in horror and shock.
'Thanks for all your help with that, Daisukenojo!' Raiku exclaimed shrilly.
[back of desk drawer in Sand office, crumpled blank page: front]
[back]
From Gaara
Shizune massaged her temples and closed her eyes, counting out a slow breath.
Raiku hovered nearby. After a prolonged period spent writhing in social agony, she opened her mouth.
'Don't speak,' Shizune immediately instructed.
Raiku closed it, but she shifted on the spot. The need to apologize, yet again, for the whole Konada thing was becoming ever stronger. It was very nearly a compulsion by that point.
After a very long silence, Shizune dropped her hands and opened her eyes.
'I'm sorry!' Raiku blurted out. 'I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm so so sorry-!'
Shizune imitated talking with her hand and then sealed her fingers together. 'Be quiet!'
Raiku closed her mouth again, looking pitiful. In the visible part of her face, anyway.
Shizune sighed heavily. 'What are you going to do?'
'Nothing?' Raiku squeaked.
'And what are you not going to do?'
'Explode?'
'Or?'
'...Implode?' Raiku attempted, trying to sum up the post-Konada rule in one word and not quite getting there.
'And what your new teacher is going to do is...?'
'Read the file!' Raiku supplied, holding up a thick envelope.
Shizune nodded, but still didn't look pleased. 'We had trouble getting him to agree to this, so you need to take it easy for at least the first day.'
'Okay! I can do that!' Raiku would have agreed to anything to make Shizune less angry with her.
Another sigh. '... He's not from Konoha. Originally.'
Raiku blinked. 'Okay?'
'... He's...' Shizune seemed to be struggling with something.
'He's...?'
'Here. Hello,' a slightly husky male voice interjected. Raiku almost jumped out of her skin but was by now so used to it that it was restrained to a significant twitch. An older shinobi in casual clothing leaned forward from the other side of the railing, balanced on the thin edge between rail and the edge of the bridge. He smiled at her. His teeth were perfect, she noted with no small amount of awe.
'Murasaki,' he introduced, holding out one broad hand. She took it and didn't so much shake it as was shaken by it, mostly because she was too caught up in staring.
Murasaki was absolutely gorgeous.
'This is Raiku,' Shizune cut in when it became clear Raiku was either frozen with terror or awe. It must have been hard to tell on someone so heavily obscured.
Murasaki's smile grew even wide, making laugh lines around his eyes crease. How old was he? Raiku didn't have an accurate gauge of human progression through time, but he had to be as old as her dad. His hair was much darker, except for grey at the temples, and his tan much more pronounced, and he was absolutely gorgeous.
'...Murasaki's'a name,' she managed to mumble.
That had not been what she had meant to say. She had meant to say that it was a weird name. How would you even write that name? Would it have "mura" and then another one, or...? Not that Raiku would need to write his name all over everything or anything ridiculous like that, because that would be ridiculous and also—
Oh.
Murasaki was smiling at her again, and his bright purple eyes were lit up with amusement.
Well. Just the character for "purple" then. That was a little on the nose.
'I think we can take it from here,' he said to Shizune over Raiku's shoulder. Shizune nodded but just looked at him for a while before she set off for the village again.
Raiku raised the envelope slowly, still staring at Murasaki's improbably windswept hair. The name thing didn't mean anything. Sure, names based on obvious physical attributes were a sure sign of a filler character, but not always!Kurenai wasn't a filler character! Wait, was she a filler character- there was no time to deconstruct character construction here. No, wait, Raiku was a good example! She'd had a whole Plot and her name was literally her thing! Murasaki was way too much of a silver fox to just ... not come back and spend time with her forever!
Murasaki accepted the envelope and gave the contents a cursory once-over while Raiku prayed that this wouldn't go any further. Any better looking than Murasaki would have to be a Character of some kind, and most Characters were not this magnetic!
Murasaki made the envelope vanish in a puff of smoke and smiled at her.
Inside, deep, deep inside, Raiku began to cry.
'Let's just see what happens, yeah?' he suggested.
Raiku nodded and braced herself, staring with extra intensity to make sure she could remember him in the years to come.
If this was the warm-up, things were looking increasingly dire.
Dear Raiku,
I passed the Exam. I am now a Chuunin. So are both of my teammates. I am sorry my last message was very short; there were a lot of things to get organized. Qualifying to be a Chuunin means you have to officially register as one and the Exam and registration date were both pushed back, but the deadline for registration was pushed back too far and had to be done before I even went to a doctor. I am still alive. I am not hurt. I was hurt, but it was very minor. I saw some shinobi from your village and was going to ask about your team but decided not to.
I would write more, but I am very tired still. I hope you're well.
Iwao
'Wait. Wait.'
Raiku complied and stopped to let Daisukenojo catch up, shooting him a curious look. 'Something wrong?'
He looked between her and Ryuu quickly, before reaching up. Raiku flinched back instinctively. 'Hey! No touching!'
He shushed her impatiently, hand flattening horizontally somewhere around the top of her head. Silently and carefully maintaining that exact height, he drew that hand across to Ryuu, where it bumped into his hairline.
'Holy shit,' Daisukenojo breathed. Ryuu's eyes lifted to look at the hand, then flicked back to Raiku.
'What?!' she demanded, instantly on guard in the ensuing silence. 'What!?'
'… I'm bigger than you,' Ryuu told her, an odd glint in his eye. Especially since this wasn't the first time this had been true; Raiku had been outgrown a few times by now, and it only ever lasted a month, or two at the most. She grew like a weed, a particularly unfeminine weed that kept outgrowing her teammates. Sure, it hadn't happened since Ryuu had gotten all... teenage-y, but that couldn't make that much of a difference.
Though this did seem to be being taken rather differently. Ryuu's expression was a strange one. With a sense of horror that grew only stronger the more his lips curved upwards, Raiku realized that she could see his teeth.
She paled and waited for the end.
But it didn't come. After a moment in which Ryuu looked at her with that strange, intent expression and she looked mostly with terror at the strange, fierce curve of his mouth, Daisukenojo abruptly shoved them apart. 'You two are such freaks!' he said with a complete lack of ceremony. 'Stop staring at each other's horrible faces and get walking. My mother'll be pissed if we're late.'
Raiku tried to turn her head back to make sure Ryuu wasn't baring his teeth at her still, but Daisukenojo gripped her masked jaw and turned her forcefully back. 'Now, psycho!' he exclaimed in an unexpectedly high pitch. 'March!'
Disturbed by Daisukenojo's sudden urgency, Raiku reluctantly complied. It had been his idea to stop, she mentally grumbled to herself.
It didn't stop him, for the rest of the trip, from smacking either of them if they so much as glanced at each other. But she had long given up understanding her teammates anyway.
Dear Iwao,
Congratulations! ! ! ! I am not sure how many exclamation points are right there I sort of got carried away but CONGRATULATIONS! ! ! Good job! You are now a Chuunin! And too cool to be my friend. Penpal. It's presumptuous to call you my friend and I shouldn't do that but yay! I didn't pay attention to who was going to the Exams this year, so I maybe didn't even know them, so it doesn't matter that you chickened out of asking them. Plus, my team is still working hard. We've been taking low-level missions to get money for new equipment, and since Yamada is picking, they are all horrible. But I've been working on some specific type of training on my own and I think it's helping? A bit? It may also be making it worse. But I'm already really awkward-lookingso I don't want to be all awkward as a shinobi as well? I don't know why it bothers me so much, I have always been an impossible dork.
Oh god I just used the work dork I am a teenager no no
Raiku sighed and let her head fall back to rest against the wooden side of the bridge, tapping her bare fingers together to make amusing little snatches of light.
Shizune was seething. 'I swear, if I have to wait here for five more minutes...'
'We've been here for ages; is this the right day?' Raiku groaned, legs splayed out in front of her. She was just about ready to melt into the concrete, and the heat was making her sleepy and grumbly. To her great displeasure, Konoha was getting warm again, signaling the onset of her absolute favorite time of year. To top it off, they'd been out in the sun for over an hour. Shizune had come to collect her, which had been interesting to see in its own right, but then the new teacher had been... nonexistent.
Raiku smiled despite herself, feeling the light breeze cool the sweat on her forehead. Shizune hated coming to her house. She was a highly competent medic, attached to the Hokage but with almost no Drama rating of her own, and was really very attractive. Almost every Gairano shinobi under the age of thirty was dying to get her attention, as Shizune had found out the hard way the first time she'd shown up. Unfortunately, since Gairano weren't particularly significant as individuals (or a family), Shizune had no reason to trade her current boyfriend for one of them, even if she decided to break it off independently.
Man, Raiku marveled. There were going to be some broken hearts when Shizune got married. She was going to have to start making consolation cards, if her dad hadn't started already. Had her dad started already? He was pretty good at predicting this sort of thing, but it was still pretty—
Her thoughts were interrupted by Shizune's muffled scream of frustration. Raiku inched away along the concrete, the skin of her palms leaving black marks where she used them to push her along. That seemed an oddly intense response for an hour of waiting.
Raiku eyed the older woman warily. Something was starting to seem off, here.
'Maybe we should just pick someone else?' she offered tentatively. Shizune shot her a dark look, but reined it in slightly when she saw how Raiku leaned away. She took a few deep breaths before she answered Raiku's question.
'Konoha does not specialize in electrical techniques.'
'I... I know that,' Raiku said slowly, shuffling even further away. 'But there has to be somebody who's willing to show up.'
A muscle in Shizune's jaw twitched. 'Not as many as you'd think. Everybody's caught wind of what's happened to the last few, and now we're on to our last resort before we jump down to Chuunin.'
A cold chill ran down Raiku's spine. Last resort. Dramatic phrasing. Oh no. Oh no, that was such a bad sign. 'I'm happy with a Chuunin!' she assured Shizune brightly, yanking her gloves back on as though that would help. 'Really, I just need to learn how to-,'
Shizune held up a hand to stop her, some of the tension bleeding out of her. 'Raiku, I'm not mad at you, you can stop babbling,' she said shortly. 'This is just a frustrating assignment. We need this done, or another disaster might happen.'
'That was one time.'
Shizune just looked at Raiku until Raiku slumped. That had been a weak point and she knew it.
'I'm grateful you're trying so hard,' Raiku mumbled, unable to meet Shizune's gaze as she admitted to having any kind of feelings. Sure, Shizune was abrupt and horrifyingly efficient, things any Gairano appreciated, but she was also a woman, and Raiku had no idea how to talk to women.
'It's my job; you don't have to—finally!' Shizune broke off abruptly to note, once again infuriated. Raiku looked around, but didn't see anyone nearing the bridge from either direction. 'Do you have any idea how long we've been waiting for you!?' the medic demanded of seemingly no one.
It was entirely possible that she had heatstroke, Raiku worried. How long had they been out there? Maybe it had been longer than an hour; maybe Shizune was under a lot of stress or something?
What she heard next made her wish that she'd gotten heatstroke, or been struck down by a meteorite on the way to the bridge, or had literally anything but this happen to her.
'Yo. Sorry I'm late; I had to save an orphan from an avalanche,' a deep male voice said slowly from somewhere above her.
Slowly, Raiku tilted her head back to look at the enormous red gate immediately to her right.
One dark eye creased at her, indicating that the masked Hatake Kakashi was smiling, or at least faking it for appearance's sake. 'Gairano, yeah?'
Raiku swallowed dryly, unable to take her terrified eyes off the Copy-nin.
Oh no.
A/N: There we go. Finally! It... got out of hand. Still, first installment of the time skip is over! Thanks to Shana and her frankly impressive patience.
