What the toad saw
Jiraiya loved Leaf Village more than he could describe - even with his extremely rich vocabulary. Especially on days like this one, when he was ecstatic that someone thought and let him and many others come back from the front lines.
Earlier, through the fall, the only problem with weather was the omnipresent dampness and impenetrable layer of clouds. Sometimes, even for weeks the sun was completely hidden behind their gray, ominous wall. As time moved on to winter, nights stretched – keen to arrive but unwilling to pass. Leaf-nins couldn't sleep any longer in the open only with their shinobi uniforms for cover and each other for warmth. The nights were as vicious as a bath in a frozen pond would be, taking away their body heat until their lips turned blue and teeth chattered. Making a camp or using chakra to warm up was rarely possible in the middle of this hostile territory. There were times even the Toad Sage began to tremble, then finding natural shelter was a matter of life and death.
The grey-haired man fumbled with his fingers, savoring the warmth radiating throughout his body from his chakra coils. The temperature was dropping with every hour, he wasn't so much feeling it as seeing in his own condensing breath. However, the cold (nor anything else for the matter) wasn't able to stop kids from being kids. A playground he was passing was pure chaos at recess; busy with sprinters, chasers and all kind of games. There was something in this mayhem that brought him more peace than anything else. He could sink back to different times even if only for a moment; and forget the present, future and everyone who demanded something from him. Sarutobi sensei, Minato, Orochimaru and many others – he wanted to make them happy, truly he did, but contrary to his willingness to please them, if he told them what he wanted, no, what he needed to stay sane, they would never understand.
Jiraiya's growing solemn mood was forgotten in the first millisecond as something dropped on his head, only to be joined by hundreds of similar somethings. It wasn't snow but driving, freezing rain. Fortunately, the man was separated from his destination only by a few more steps.
When he reached it, he couldn't stop the corners of his mouth from rising. Shinobi truly were creatures of habit. They had to have everything under control and subjected to appropriate procedures, whenever it was possible. That's why Sensei was always smoking his pipe for ten minutes after every even hour; Minato was making pro and con lists in his mind to solve every problem; Tsunade had to drink three and a half cups of sake before she started gambling; and why every Thursday Orochimaru was sitting at the same table in the same restaurant reading a book and gallantly eating sukiyaki hot pot* for hours – just like right now.
The Toad Sage looked around at the busy tables. The restaurant was full. He passed an old couple eating side by side, sharing one sake bottle, studiously fixed on their meals. However, the second his ears caught a sound of chuckle among the bustle, he changed his route. As could be predicted, a group of young women in their thirties that were collapsing with helpless giggles became his next target. Just when he was going to dazzle them with his charm, a stern woman dining alone nearby looked on, frowned and spat in his direction. Ok, maybe he would reschedule all that dazzling for another time, his male teammate for sure was missing him through these six months.
And so Jiraiya came back to his original track and a minute later with an enormous smile, meaning better be delighted to see me, plopped on a cushion across Orochimaru's kotatsu**. Nonetheless, the dark-haired man clearly wasn't speaking the same non-verbal language as he wasn't even bothered to rise his eyes, and just turned a page in one of his boring books. As always with those two, it came back to the same old argument: which one of them was going to have his way and in good humor piss of the other? And hardly anyone was known to be more determined than Jiraiya.
"Look who is here!" the Toad Sage announced once more, grinning like a fool.
"I'm far too well familiar with your current whereabouts, Jiraiya. Thank you." The serpent man's monotonous voice droned, while he still couldn't be troubled to glance up. "Maybe you should rather focus on restraining your impulsive advances directed to everything on two legs what relatively resembles a young humanoid female."
"Oh, come on and shut it already!" How on earth could that pale buffoon piss him off within a minute after such long separation? It was Jiraiya who should irritate him and not vice versa, damn it! "It was just once! Once, you hear me?! And that guy really looked like a lady. He had almost as pretty hair as you. It wasn't my fault."
"No, it wasn't." Agreed the Snake Sannin, surprising the other man. "I suppose at fault were hectoliters of sake Tsunade and you drank the previous night."
"Exactly!"
"I just don't understand how you didn't notice it through the night? There are some relatively obvious differences in human anatomy between opposite genders. I can present you with a few medical diagrams, if you like?"
A loads of profanities didn't fly out of Jiraiya's mouth only because of the melodious giggle of an attractive waitress, who had just come to take the latest client's order. The gray-haired man sporting a fake smile, hoped that the discomfort that bathed the moment would be short-lived. He staggered, breathing heavily, unable to digest the defeat from the hands of his teammate in front of the green-eyed beauty.
"Can I get you something, gentlemen?"
Orochimaru again butted in before Jiraiya had a chance to open his mouth.
"No, thank you. My… acquaintance was just leaving."
"Orochimaru, you…"
The words bogged down in Toad Sage's throat, when his teammate instead accepting insults like a true man would, seemed to focus on something under the kotatsu and then took a shirataki noodle from the pot with his chopsticks, only to pull it under the table. Immediately, some invisible force began to tug the noodle with a slurping sound.
Jiraiya blinked. He still was sober, right? Right. And Orochimaru never was someone prone to pamper those ugly reptiles of his, right? Right. Furthermore, a hooker wouldn't fit under there; he already tried it some time ago, right? Right. Then what, in the seven hells, was that?
Set in hard resolve to slay whatever mutated monstrosity Orochimaru hid there, Jiraiya plunged under the table. What he encountered was far from anything he anticipated. There was something like a tiny bum, clad in blue fabric; tiny, red bag; and two equally tiny feet. And all of that in a second disappeared on the surface.
The man cautiously leaned out from under the material, zeroing his eyes on quite a familiar pintsize gremlin, who was sucking in another noodle. Ok, Jiraiya knew that kid had to be the reincarnation of Satan himself, but the last time he checked any kind of visible evidence of his knowledge was absent. However now two red, pointy horns proudly grew from the girl's head. Was she finally openly admitting her true nature or did Orochimaru perform some experiments on her and thought an addition like that would be the best fitting?
After closer scrutiny, it turned out that the horns were fake, being nothing more than plastic hair ornament. So, the devil still was hiding in a box; but forgetting about the conspiracy level of infernal powers, something else was more important.
"What is this thing doing here?" Asked the flabbergasted Sannin.
Orochimaru glanced at the child.
"Apparently sitting and nourishing herself."
"You know it isn't what I mean!"
"Minato-kun left her here." answered the yellow-eyed man tediously, putting food from the pot into his bowl.
"And you what? Just sat here and didn't protest or anything?" In that Jiraiya simply couldn't believe. Orochimaru wasn't exactly a babysitter type; no matter from which side you looked at him.
"Agreeing to it consumed less time and energy than opposition would. Besides she is potty-trained and mostly silent."
"And what with the… you know, the horns?"
Shiori mumbled something but with full mouth it sounded like: ikrusgveme, degowndrk.
"What?"
"Kushina gave them to her. And apparently, they glow in the dark." Orochimaru mercifully translated.
"Horns or not that brat is evil." Announced the Toad Sage with full conviction.
"It's a five-year-old human child. It's enough to keep her well-fed and warm to deal with her."
As if to illustrate his words, Orochimaru threw a piece of beef in the air that Shiori caught with her teeth with impressive skill. The Snake Sanin acknowledging that the case was closed, returned to his book and full bowl, while Jiraiya shifted his attention to the munching child.
Was it so simple?
Jiraiya always was someone who had to check everything on his own skin, and so he took the next slice of meat and threw it just like Orochimaru did a minute ago. However, unlike his teammate's, his beef's piece didn't land in the girl's mouth but on an elderly woman sitting nearby.
That little shit didn't even stir from her place on purpose!
The assaulted woman slowly picked up the offensive meat from her hair and narrowing her hawkish eyes to crinkled slits pursued the room, until her gaze stopped on their table. The Toad Sannin wearing his most dashing smile accusingly pointed at the five-year-old. However, for someone so long living in the ninja world, Jiraiya wasn't too good in choosing his battles because against Shiori dimples and crooked smile (that seemed so genuinely sweet with just the right touch of shyness) he was hopeless. An unexpected warmth rushed through the angry woman, who again focused all her mentioned anger on the bulky man and muttered something under her breath, but then did nothing more and just pick up eating - dissolving the situation.
"You little…" The grey-haired nin's words hit the empty air since Shiori once again climbed under the table. Jiraiya wanted to dive after her but fate apparently had other plans.
"Jiraiya-sama, you're back! Minato is going to be so happy, dattebane!"
No one other than Kushina was beaming standing over him, practically vibrating with energy.
"Kushina-chan beautiful as always." Joked the man, but the ginger kunoichi took it in a different way.
"How many times do I need to tell you to stop bullshitting me?" The woman's knuckles cracked ominously, sending shivers down his spine. When she decided that she raised sufficiently severe terror, her demeanor completely changed turning to the other man. "I'm sorry, Orochimaru-sama. It took me more time than I've thought."
The Snake Sannin dismissively shook his hand.
"It was no problem. Shiori-chan as always was an interesting company."
"Great. Then it's time to go, shrimp" Kushina ducked under the table and after a minute of turmoil successfully pulled out the demon-child and an enormously thick book. The older Uzumaki eyed it suspiciously. "That brick isn't yours. Shiori-chan, where is your book? The pretty one you got from Hokage-sama? That about those blue ninja monkeys?"
The child's face broke into a broad smile of complacency – not unlike one belonging to someone, who intended to change her converser's life in a small pot of bubbling horror.
"I traded it."
"You did what, dattebane?"
"I exchanged it for other goodies." Explained the girl; her mirth only growing. "It was a great deal. That book was silly, but I got a bag of chocolate cookies and a lollipop. Really yummy lollipop."
Kushina didn't even blink. It was a matter of dignity.
"Yummy lollipop, sure, I understand. And the new book?"
"Orochimaru-sama" That proud tone clearly meant that from now it was one of her most valuable possessions.
"And how will Hokage-sama feel if he finds out that you exchanged his gift?"
"Don't care."
The woman sighed and took Shiori with all her belongings under one arm.
"Ok, now, if we have everything under control I'm taking the brat. Once more; thanks, Orochimaru-sama. It was nice meeting you, Jiraiya-sama. Ta-ta." And the woman marched away from their table, taking with her the waving child. At the door Kushina halted remembering something and called.
"Dinner is at five - please come!"
Jiraiya grinned. One more reason he loved Konoha – Kushina's cooking.
Ω
Minato was clearly surprised seeing the man at his doorstep.
"Sensei, what are you doing here?"
"What are you talking about, kid? Your girlfriend invited me." Announced Jiraiya, pushing a bottle of sake into the blond man's hands and stepped inside.
"She did?"
"Oh, then I'm the big surprise, eh? So, better be grateful that my magnificent-self, the famous Sannin and the greatest connoisseur of feminine charms honored you with my presence."
Unfortunately, not everyone was so honored with his presence.
"Oh, it's only you." Mumbled Shiori disappointed, leaning out from behind Minato's legs.
"Only me? Were you waiting for someone else, brat?"
As if to answer his question someone knocked at the door, making Shiori completely forget the Sannin and with a delighted squeal let in the new guest; who apparently not only was anticipated but also ready for such welcome, bravely enduring the overjoyed child.
When Jiraiya was able to register what he was seeing, and that he was seeing no one else but Orochimaru, his mind switched on a turbo mode using emergency stashes of common sense - as any other human mind would do, trying to construct a solid anchor to normality and prove to itself that what happened didn't happen, and even if it happened, it wasn't so damn important.
Besides, his teammate (or whatever imposter, genjutsu or other nightmare it was) that not counting a nod of greetings wasn't paying any attention to them, was fully focused on the young girl who very adamantly dragged him to her room; or at least tried to do it.
"What's the matter, child?" asked the Snake Sannin calmly.
"Something horrifying happened and you need to help me." With every unsuccessful pull Shiori was getting more flushed.
Orochimaru glanced questioningly at Minato but seeing the bemused smile on the blonde's face his concern turned into curiosity.
"What might be so disturbing that it requires my immediate aid?" Now Shiori was more crimson than red and her pout was so extreme that nothing more than a quiet mumble escaped from her mouth. "Speak louder, Shiori-chan. We all know you are capable to do it."
The girl's cheeks puffed, resembling something akin of a vengeful canary.
"I don't understand that stupid book! It's just so grrrrrrrr! What moron wrote it?"
Jiraiya tried to remember the said book. When he succeeded, and recalled it from his memory, he could only connect in pain with the rage-possessed demon-kid. He doubted that the girl could even correctly read the title; not even speaking about a thousand remaining pages. Reflections on the soul nature and their specification in the context of simultaneous yin-yang energy feedback with emphasis on yin-release technical usage – he got a headache just thinking about reading it. Actually, did the little gremlin even could read?
"That journal was written by Senju Tobirama - second Hokage." Answered the black-haired Sannin. "Doesn't it occur to you that maybe the problem isn't the book itself but the person reading it?"
"NO! The book is simply stupid!" And with that Shiori dragged her mentor to her room and with a loud bang slammed the door.
"Ok…" Jiraiya took a deep breath and looked at his pupil with a gaze he nearly never used in relation to him - that is, as to a complete idiot. "One time I can understand, really. I thought it was momentary lapse of judgment. But twice in the same day? Have you gone totally bonkers when I wasn't around, Minato? Leaving Orochimaru and a kid in the same space for more than five minutes? It's crazy!"
"You were the first one that left her with him." The jonin reminded him.
"Exactly! And I'm not the most sensible person – ask anybody you want. Besides, it was my last day in the Leaf, I needed to find some fine birdy or two for a night. I wasn't in the right mind then." He ended in a whisper.
"Sensei…" Minato wanted to explain but resigned in the last moment and just took his teacher to the dining room. "Do you trust me, sensei?"
"Sort of."
"Then believe me. They are good for each other."
Jiraiya couldn't imagine what the scientist could gain from the girl (besides a headache) but he decided to focus on the heavenly aromas emanating from the kitchen.
"Oi, Kushina, Jiraiya-sama just came for dinner." Said Minato.
"Oh?" The ginger woman peered into the room. "Hello again, Jiraiya-sama. What a surprise!"
The tiny nagging he felt from the doorstep evolved into an elephant that on the rump had painted: you weren't invited, you sucker. Orochimaru was!
"Are you back for long, sensei?" Asked the blond adding another plate to the circular table and snatching the Sannin from his gloomy thoughts.
"No one knows a thing. For now, Yuhi-san commands the remaining army on the northern borders while Shikaku and Sand's troops are watching the west. Mizu is silent for now. Too silent if you ask me, but hey; we must be thankful for small miracles, right?"
"You think that the truce is really possible?" Enquired Kushina, placing tureen of soup on the table.
"Tsuchikage and Raikage aren't too pleased with it. Hell, Onoki probably would rather eat his own hat than admit the Rock couldn't dominate us; but in truth every Village is exhausted. Thousands lost lives, ending supplies and growing unrest among the civilians." Jiraiya uncorked the sake and sighed. "It isn't that there is a choice – the war has to end."
"Good." Summarized the woman. "Dinner's ready!"
Minato braced himself for the coming avalanche but this time the girl slipped into the room silently but at the same time grumpily like a surging thundercloud; and plumped into her chair with a disgruntled huff.
"Shiori-chan?" Minato worriedly touched her arm.
"She is just angry because she can't understand the soul's topic." Explained Orochimaru sitting on the other side of the girl.
"Because I refuse to accept that some things are, simply because they are. There must be some rules governing this whole spiritual world. Otherwise it's just stupid."
"The Spiritual world belongs to the issue of faith. And believing is as important as seeing, feeling or thinking." Minato soothingly stroked her red locks. "You believe in your own soul and in the Gods, right Shiori-chan?"
"I guess." Mumbled the reborn woman. The problem wasn't in her lack of believe. How could she not believe in these things when she knew them to be true? She was there. She passed it. You could say she even bought a t-shirt! "But I want to know how it all works."
Her pleading eyes landed on Orochimaru.
"Researching such things could be interesting but it's hard to see a practical application of the subject, Shiori-chan."
"And how exactly you two want to research it?" Kushina wasn't sure it was the best idea. Shiori could come up with the idea of experimenting on the Uchiha boys. Gods knew Itachi would be more than willing to help his senpai with everything. That boy was too sweet for his own good. "You can't put a soul under a microscope, shrimp."
"I know that! It's just… it's stupid but I won't give up. I'll understand it – somehow." And to emphasize her resolve she threw herself on the food.
Jiraiya's eyes were jumping from his friend to the child like a ping-pong ball, when his brain analyzed the data, he leaned to the man and whispered.
"Are you sure you never fooled around with some Uzumaki woman? That brat must be yours. Otherwise it would be too creepy."
Orochimaru regarded his teammate with eyes heralding the imminent end of his life.
"I'm not you, Jiraiya. I do not fool around."
"I was just joking, geez." Exhaled the Toad Sage, even if he wasn't joking. "Why you always have to be so touchy?"
"Because I have to put up with you." Responded the serpent man, murderously biting a slice of tofu.
"How is your book, sensei?" Minato threw in, wishing to avoid the disaster hanging on the horizon. Without Tsunade the other two Sannins weren't so prone to direct bickering but he wasn't willing to risk it. Especially so close to Kushina and her new tableware.
"Actually…" The man smirked and dug a pile of papers out from an inside pocket of his coat. "I'm done. It still doesn't have a title but I'm sure something will come to me in time."
"That's great, Jiraiya-sama." Beamed the blonde and took the papers to admire the finally completed work of his teacher.
"It still needs a beta-reading and some amendments. I hoped that you would…"
"You heard it, Shiori-chan? Work just right for you." Minato threw the pile right under the nose of the girl who carelessly flipped through it.
The reborn woman wanted to tell him she wouldn't do it - it would be an unnecessary effort and she had more important things to worry about – but Jiraiya's shriek interrupted her.
"Carefully, Minato! This is my only manuscript! If she'll damage it, I can't vouch for myself." The Toad Sage paled seeing the dangerous gleam in those golden pools. "Come on, brat, it isn't a toy. You can't even read properly so you can't play with it. Now, be a good kid and give it back to uncle Jiraiya."
Shiori blinked the sudden urge to blow something up away, preferably something huge and ugly.
"Me? illiterate?" Her calm rage could freeze over a volcano. "I'll show you, just wait."
She grabbed the manuscript and fled to her room in a rush. The banging door was the last noise that reached their ears.
Orochimaru smiled radiantly, and when the Snake Sannin was smiling like that it meant someone was in a big shit. He slurped in a noodle.
"I hope that book of yours is a true piece of art."
"Shiori-chan won't do anything to it." Minato tried to calm down his teacher, who by now was ready to stand up and break into the child's room to save his life's work.
"But Orochimaru…"
"You don't need to worry." Assured the black-haired man. "The child won't harm your precious book. However, I can't say the same about your self-esteem and future of your writing career."
"Yeap, Shiori-chan can be merciless." Admitted Kushina, having a great time observing the misfortune of the old rascal. "Most of the time I don't know half of the words she uses. You need to be brave, Jiraiya-sama."
"Stop bullshitting me. They are bullshitting me, right, kid?"
Unfortunately for the Toad Sannin Minato couldn't muster anything more than a lame smile.
"I'm sure it won't be so bad, sensei."
OMAKE
Two hours later, when their guests left, Shiori was sitting on the sofa in the living room with a bowl of chips, a box of highlighters and the infamous manuscript. She was so immersed in proving how far away she was from being an uneducated, normal five-year-old brat; that she missed the imminent danger, despite heralding it sounds of running paws.
Underlining a whole paragraph and writing WTF under it, she had enough time to hear her name clumsily pronounced by a few unfamiliar barky voices, before she was knocked over by a familiar pack of mutts.
"Mini-nii, we're being under attack! Don't you ever dare to put those tongues near me, you four-legged bug vessels."
The dogs started to bark happily but the smallest pup just lowered his snout almost touching the girl's nose and woofed.
"Shi-ior-ii-chan pla-lay!"
As it isn't so difficult to guess, the reborn woman like any other grown up soul from our dimension meeting a talking dog had done the single possible thing - she screamed.
"What the hell?! That thing talks!"
"They all are talking. Well, they're trying." Clarified Kakashi removing Pakkun from her body. "Teaching them human language isn't so simple."
"Can you teach them to stop harassing me?" Asked the girl fixing her rose tresses, before her scientist-part awoke in her mind. "How it's even possible? Doggies can't talk, right?"
The young jonin unconsciously rubbed a bandage on his eye and sat next to her.
"Normal dogs can't talk but like I already have told you, they are ninkens. Many ninja animals can talk and have other human qualities thanks to blood-contracts shinobis sign with them. Minato sensei never showed you his toads?"
"Nope." Shiori cautiously patted the pug, whose tail began to wag happily. After a second the other seven tails joined the rhythm.
"Shi-ior-ii-chan pla-lay." Repeated Pakkun.
"I'm busy…" whatever she wanted to tell next was drowned in pitiful wails. "Ok! Ok you freaky mongrels, when I'll finish the chapter I can throw you a ball or something… But remember! One lick, just one and you can forget playing with me ever again."
The dogs apparently were satisfied with the proposal as they laid down around the sofa.
Kakashi looked quizzically at the miniature Uzumaki.
"You're more friendly to them than before, why? I didn't think you would play with them, ever."
"If they can talk, it means they're sentient beings and that means correct communication is possible." Mumbled Shiori writing the next unpleasant comment.
"They were sentient before." Deadpanned the teenager, not knowing if he should feel aggrieved or flattered on behalf of his pack.
"But now I can negotiate with them and in this lays the whole difference."
The boy wouldn't even begin to consider what she was talking about. Obito was right; that devious brat sometimes could be scary. Once again, he rubbed the covered eye. Why couldn't he stop thinking about him? Obito was gone. It was pointless. He had come here to stop torturing himself with memories of Kanabi so he should think about something else. The silver-haired lad glanced sideways at the scribbling child.
"What are you doing?"
"Turning the dream of an old man into ashes."
See? Scaaaary… sounded Obito's voice in his mind and Kakashi couldn't disagree with him.
"Stop it."
One single visible onyx eye blinked.
"Stop what?"
"Whatever you are doing." Clarified the girl with a huff, but for him she didn't make it clear enough. She had to notice it since she continued. "You're hurting yourself. I can't focus on my work when you're wincing repeatedly."
"It's good to know your priorities."
Those golden pools sharpened, inspecting his figure with unnerving thoroughness.
"You came out of the hospital less than a week ago, after a major, innovative surgery. You should be careful, otherwise Orochimaru-sama's hard work will go to waste. When was the last time you ate, Hatake-san?
"Ka-shi no fo-od day." Barked Pakkun jumping on the couch.
The boy wanted to scold the pug (he never thought their ability to speak would turn against him) but Shiori was faster.
"Doggies… hold him."
In the next moment Kakashi felt several jaws gently but firmly clenched around his arms and legs; and a few pairs of paws restraining the rest of his body. He couldn't release himself without harming his pups so he remained in place, shooting the red-head and his disloyal pack an annoyed glare.
"Little traitors. Shiori-san, what are you…?"
He couldn't finish. The girl pulled off his mask and shoved a handful of chips into his mouth.
"Good puppies." Shiori patted the nearest dogs. "And that, Hatake-san, is fruit of proper communication and speaking about proper... Kushina-san, Hatake-san needs a proper nourishment!"
Not understanding what was all the screaming about the older Uzumaki entered the room.
"What now, shrim…" Her tongue went on strike. It was something new, even for her devious cousin, who pointed at her prisoner.
"We need to feed that moron. But first, Kushina-san, you have to stop cackling and stand up from the floor."
Auntie Wikipedia explains:
*Sukiyaki (鋤焼?, or more commonly すき焼き) is a Japanese dish that is prepared and served in the nabemono (Japanese hot pot) style. It consists of meat (usually thinly sliced beef) which is slowly cooked or simmered at the table, alongside vegetables and other ingredients, in a shallow iron pot in a mixture of soy sauce, sugar, and mirin. The ingredients are usually dipped in a small bowl of raw, beaten eggs after being cooked in the pot, and then eaten. Generally, sukiyaki is a winter dish and it is commonly found at bōnenkai, Japanese year-end parties.
** Kotatsu (炬燵?) is a low, wooden table frame covered by a futon, or heavy blanket, upon which a table top sits. Underneath is a heat source, formerly a charcoal brazier but now electric, often built into the table itself.
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