4.16.2008 - Hopefully I can keep up a weekly update. Being able to post this frequent keeps me motivated to keep writing...yay! Just a few notes, I started planning this story 2 years ago, definitely before Naruto II started. I follow the manga religiously, so a lot of things have been revealed since I started writing this...so forgive me if I omit certain details or the timing of events is off. This present end of the story takes place after the death of the 3rd at the chuunin exams, right before Sasuke leaves. Enjoy!
Chapter One
Flying Home
"I never thought I'd be back here after all this time," thought Seika as she dropped the last of her boxes onto the cold tiled floor. "Especially here."
A frown formed on her face as her green eyes scanned the bare room. While the Medical Building of Konohagakure was the best in the Fire Country, one definitely had to work to make it that way. She had been in the village for a few hours, and already Tsunade ordered her to move into the head medic office after a reunion with her grandmother. So, while only two Konoha residents knew she had returned to Leaf Village, Seika decided to move in on her own and keep the situation that way.
Closing the door, the new arrival moved to the windows and opened the wooden pane, allowing a crisp breeze flow through the room. Seika breathed in the faintly familiar scent and exhaled with a smile. Whether she liked it or not, she was home. Her eyes panned along the tall buildings aligning the village's horizon when the great stone monument caught her eye.
The death of the Sandaime Hokage resounded throughout the Fire Country. While she was enlisted and busy as a Lieutenant of the Black Ops hunter-nin, Seika felt the need to go home for the first time in four years. And as if her intuition fabricated itself into reality, an urgent call from the new Hokage came through to where she was stationed in a remote region of Fire Country's borders. Seika needed to go home.
A mission was waiting for her.
As if she didn't have enough on her plate already. Seika worked everyday on the border, commanding teams into the dangerous territory of Otogakure and searching through any and every lead about the Sound Village's notorious founder. She found that new recruits to the elite ANBU units were diminishing slightly each year, which only meant that the current operatives were burdened with enough missions for three-times the man power. There was nothing more Seika could do about it, however; she was a ninja from a different generation than the youth today. In a quick attempt to busy her mind with something else than memories from the past, Seika wrapped her arms around the last batch of scrolls and arranged them on one of the tall shelves as she had been doing before.
Seika exhaled loudly and brushed the back of her hand against her forehead, moving several limp bangs out of her eyes. It took her only two hours to unpack exactly what she needed from the boxes, and despite the soreness in her back, Seika completely finished arranging her office by moving the untouched boxes into a corner. Out of the twelve boxes that were brought to the office, she had only unpacked three, and after completing her immediate task, Seika felt the suffocation of being inside a building all morning. She was used to the open tents and fresh breezes billowing through the always open "doors".
Finally leaving the confines of her new office, Seika walked out into the extensive hallway, ready to explore the rest of the Medical Building. It seemed a lot had changed over the last four years. There was a completely new wing added to the east and updated hospital rooms. Of course, anything was better than the scarce barracks her patients were used to out on the border. At the end of the hall, she encountered grand wooden double doors with the Leaf symbol etched in the polished finish. A smile crossed her face; it was time for a long-awaited reunion.
Grasping the handle, Seika pulled the ornate handle, but the door did not budge. She pulled harder when a voice called out to her.
"Miss! Those doors are off-limits. They can only be opened by the Hokage."
Seika let out a sigh, but then smiled as she recognized the soft, yet stern commands. She turned her head to the side, but not enough to allow full view of her face. "I see you're still a stickler for the rules, Iruka-kun."
Umino Irkua wrinkled his nose. He knew nearly everyone in the village, yet he couldn't recognize the person in front of the Grand Doors.
"I...uh" stuttered Iruka as his eyes took in the sight of the woman before him. She was rather tall with long black hair stopping just below the shoulders. He hoped she wasn't an enemy by the look of the two sai tucked under her belt. He didn't see any clan symbols, but as she turned ever so slightly, the ornate bird-shape made his eyes widen with shock.
"Seika-chan? Is that you?"
A broad smile graced her face, and Seika turned around to see one of her former ANBU operatives and oldest friends. "I wasn't going to do anything, I swear!" she giggled.
Iruka's jaw gaped open as Seika out stretched her arms for a hug. She was almost met with a nose bleed. As he probably remembered her as a tomboy-ish teen at the academy and then faceless assassin in ANBU, Iruka was clearly not accustomed to seeing her in a plain, high-collared top and skirt. Shaking her head, Seika proceeded past the gibbering chuunin and pat him on the back.
"Get some tissues and keep them with you, Iruka-kun," she said with a smirk. "I'll be around for a while."
With that, she left him speechless in the hallway.
"Oh yes, this will be an interesting few days," thought Seika, the smirk still present on her face.
The raven ninja continued her tour back down the hallway, compulsively checking on her office as she passed it once more. While it looked bare compared to the other rooms around it, the temporary arrangement was just fine for her. After all, it was going to be temporary...
Passing several more doors, Seika came to a "T" in the hallway, with one corridor leading even further down and the other, in front of her, led to another pair of ornate wooden doors. However, one of the panels was wide open, and a large voice resounded from within. This one was just as recognizable as Iruka-kun's, and Seika knew exactly how to toy with them as well.
She moved forward, propping herself against the frame of the entranceway. Inside, a small group of young students crowded around a desk, apparently engrossed with whatever was in front of them. On the other side of the desk was a pink-haired kunoichi bent low with an aura of chakra surrounding her body, and behind her, with her back to Seika, stood the new Hokage, the legendary Sannin Tsunade.
"No, Sakura! You need to focus the chakra into the patient, and then seal the wound. If you just leave the chakra at the surface, it won't heal any internal damage," Tsunade instructed the girl. Sakura nodded at the older ninja, but Seika could see the girl's chest heaving under the stress. She remembered the days when she was learning the art of healing and how much more it strains the body than using fighting jutsus.
"Try it again," Tsunade commanded.
The quick sigh released from Sakura's mouth meant she was tired from the focus, and Seika used that moment to barge in, perhaps giving the girl a moment to rest. "Hey, old hag!" she yelled, startling the students around the table and the Sannin as well.
"Who are you calling an old hag?!" Tsunade whipped around, her blonde hair whirling around her angered face. To any ordinary ninja who dared to call the Godaime 'an old hag', they would have wet their pants by the Sannin's glare alone, but Seika did not budge.
The two women faced each other, and several seconds passed through the room without another sound. The students stared with their mouths open either gaping at the sudden fury of chakra pulsating from the Hokage or at the stranger's outright audacity to insult Tsunade.
"Yo, Sensei," Seika winked, the grin on her face countering the ferocity in her voice.
Tsunade blinked several times. She did not recognize her former student at first, especially with the mess of weapons attached around her. They hadn't spoken in years, but Seika had returned, leaning casually against the doorframe and her arms crossed over her ample chest. Jiraiya always used to joke, 'like sensei, like student' before Tsunade would beat him to the ground.
The Godaime looked over her student once more, realizing that the familiarity of Seika's chakra was gone and replaced with the stealthy aura of a veteran Konoha shinobi. And while the meeting was informal, Seika failed to stand without her disciplined posture: her chin raised up proudly, her shoulders straight against the wood of the doorway, and her elbows bent rigidly at 90 degrees. But the biggest difference, as Tsunade noted, was the darkness that shadowed Seika's eyes. It was a darkness that had manifested itself in the green depths of her eyes, but an entity that seemed so foreign and so familiar at the same time. Exactly what had she gone through all this time she was away from Konoha?
Tsunade reached out and hugged Seika, who breathed in the thick scent of Konoha tobacco in her sensei's hair. Then she pulled away and smiled at the crowd of students in the room. "Sorry for interrupting your lesson guys," Seika apologized. She nodded to the pink-haired girl in the middle. "Continue on."
The students turned back to the table, where a medium-sized snail sat in the middle. It was one of the snail family which Tsunade had her summoning contract with, and the snail looked absolutely bored of the failed jutsu execution, but remained still for the lesson. Seika moved closer to get a better view of the girl's execution, and she and Tsunade leaned against the teacher desk on the room.
"That's Haruno Sakura," the Sannin said, nodding her head at her student. "She has the most potential in this entire class as she has vast amounts of chakra in her body"
Suddenly, a loud fizzle and hiss of dispersing chakra interrupted Tsunade. The two women looked at Sakura, who held her wrist with her other hand. From the table, a tiny, but fully-angry, voice of the little slug yelled at the frustrated student.
"Never in all of my life have I met such an incompetent ninja! How are you ever going to be a medic-nin if all you do is hurt your patients?! I'm not even a patient, I'm completely healthy, and I could be relaxing outside under the sun but noI have a blood contract with the Legendary Sucker with her legendary sucky students! I'd rather roll around in a mountain of salt than sit through another pointless lesson with you hopeless little runts-"
"That is enough!" snapped Tsunade as she hastily sealed the Summoning scroll shut, stopping the barrage of boisterous insults.
"Legendary Sucky Students?! Forget molding my chakra, I'll shove it down that little slug's throat along with that mountain of salt! Cha!" Inner Sakura screeched.
"I don't know what happened that time, Godaime-sensei. I'm so sorry!" Sakura said quickly, bowing her head low.
"That's alright Sakura, take a break because everyone is in for a treat," Tsunade replied. She placed a hand on Seika's back, and then hit her with a smack hard enough to push her several feet forward. "This is the only student I was actually able to teach a thing or two to, and Seika herself will show you some healing jutsus."
Seika's eyes suddenly grew wide with shock, but Tsunade continued to smile as if nothing was amiss. "This is thoroughly embarassing!" thought Seika as she tried her hardest to suppress her own nervousness under the stare of young eyes.
Amidst the students, Sakura rubbed her sensitive palms, knowing that her own capacity was almost reached while trying to execute the healing jutsu. Today, Tsunade wanted the class to learn the advanced technique of healing internal injuries by repairing a broken shell on that boisterous slug and then healing its body through the shell, but for some reason, Sakura couldn't successfully complete the process. It also didn't help that with each try, it seemed to get worse, but she just couldn't concentrate with Sasuke in the hospital...
A brunette girl nudged Sakura with her elbow. She leaned in close without turning her head all the way and whispered, "Hey Sakura! Do you see the emblem on Seika-sensei's shirt? Do you know who she is?"
Emerald eyes scanned the black material of Seika's shirt until she saw what might be her clan's symbol on her sleeve. It was an intricate bird stitched in gold, and while Sakura admired the symbol, she didn't exactly know what it meant. "By the looks of all those weapons, I'd say she's probably really dangerous. Why, should I know who she is?"
"She's probably just some show-off who has to prove herself to a bunch of kids, sheesh!" bellowed Inner Sakura.
"She's part of the Kazemi clan, some ancient lineage most notable for its women," replied the girl. Her eyes sparkled with admiration, as if a celebrity sauntered through their classroom doors.
"Kazemi clan? I've never heard of them. Does she have some kekkei genkai or something?"
The girl laughed, but her face turned serious very quickly. "The Kazemi clan runs the Fire Temple at the top of the hill near the Hokage monument. The only Kazemi running the place is the old woman Kizuna-san, but my mother says she's a witch."
"Oh," breathed Sakura. Her eyes returned to looking at the nervous woman at the front of the class. While she did have two swords and a pair of sai strapped to her body, Seika didn't look anything like a witch. In fact, Sakura could admit she was rather pretty, in a wild-looking way. While Sakura continued to stare at Seika, their eyes met each other, and an embarrassed flush crept onto Sakura's face.
"Ah yes, Sakura right?" asked Seika. The genin nodded. "Please come up to the front again."
Although she dreaded trying the jutsu again, Sakura suddenly felt insecure as she slowly approached the older woman and quickly glanced back at the brunette classmate. "Be careful or else she'll turn you into the slug!" she snickered.
Sakura gulped in a breath harshly as she reached her spot by the table, and Seika put a firm hand on her shoulder. "This is a rather simple jutsu, so I assume it's just nerves that are getting the better of you. There shouldn't be any reason why you're not getting it..."
"Oh, this is a group of genin," interrupted Tsunade.
"Ah," mumbled Seika. She took a look around the room before her eyes rested on Sakura. She moved her hand from Sakura's shoulder to the top of her head and laughed off-handedly. "I'm sorry, that's my mistake. No wonder why you'd be having trouble."
"Yeah, makes it all better huh?" Sakura gritted between her teeth.
"What did you say?"
"Ah nothing! Please continue with the lesson, Seika-sama, it was just a simple mistake!" Sakura replied quickly with a very broad smile.
"I just assumed you were all chuunin, but now that I'm looking at you, everyone appears to look so young. I mean, I was a chuunin at your age, but I suppose times are different."
"Grrrr, times may be different, but it's still inappropriate to hit someone older than you!" growled Inner Sakura.
Seika laughed at her mistake, but mostly out of awkwardness. The little beady eyes continued to state at her, still unamused, so she grabbed Tsunade's summoning scroll and called a medium sized-snail to the table. Then Seika tapped its shell with her finger, which made it crumble to pieces around the snail.
"Hey!" it protested.
The rest of the class stared as they watched Seika put the snail back together just as fast as she summoned it. She cupped the top of the snail with one hand, and with her right hand, Seika formed several swift seals: bird, hare, ox. Tsunade watched intently as Seika put her second hand on top of the patient, closed her eyes, and silently moved her lips as if verbally guiding the chakra pulsing through the body. The dark-haired ninja lifted her hands to reveal the snail put together in its original form and with a brighter, more vibrant shell.
"Thanks," it said before disappearing in a puff of smoke.
"There it is," Seika announced to the stunned class. "Any questions?"
There was no reply. All of the students stared with their mouths open, all except for Sakura, who only stood there with her arms crossed across her chest.
"I think if there are no questions, then class is dismissed," Tsunade announced to the joy of the genin. After a stampede through the door, and a sulky Sakura trudging behind her classmates, a welcoming silence filled the room.
"That was kind of intense," quipped Seika.
"Oh you did fine...except for the rushing through the technique. I think you might have lost them there, and around where you broke out with the one-handed seals. Other than that, you were great!"
"You always were terrible at lying."
Tsunade laughed and placed her hand on Seika's shoulder. "Thank you for coming back. I truly do feel more relaxed with you here, but are you going to be alright?"
The darkness returned to Seika's eyes, and she averted her gaze past her sensei. A sad smile crossed her face, but she followed it with a short laugh. "I don't really have a choice, now do I?"
"You do!" laughed Tsunade. She threw her hair back in a very purposeful gesture. "I mean, just because the Hokage requests your presence back in the village which you serve, you still have a choice."
Seika couldn't hold back the rolling of her eyes. "Well since you put it that way..."
The two shared a genuine laugh that relieved the women's uneasiness for the time being. Even after four years, it was easy for Seika to feel comfortable around the Sannin, and it helped the beginning of her transition back to the routine of her old life.
"Do you want to join me for lunch now? There's a great new sushi place you have to try!" asked Tsunade.
The dark-haired ninja shook her head. "Maybe some other time, sensei. It's my first day back, and I have some things to have to do first."
Tsunade nodded and headed towards the classroom door. "I understand. Tell Kizuna-san that I say hello please and take care of yourself Seika. I expect to see you tomorrow, yes?"
Seika nodded her head and bowed slightly in respect to her elder. That was just how she was used to things back on the border, back where things weren't complicated, no matter how hard one tried to complicate things. Back in Konoha, however, Seika knew she had her mission, and like she told Iruka, she knew things were going to get complicated or in the least, interesting.
The wind rustled loudly through the trees. Almost a century ago, the Fire Shrine was founded with the blessing of the First and Second Hokages, but it wasn't until it was under the priestess Kazemi Kizuna's nurturing hand that the people of Konohagakure found it as a refuge from the turmoil of life for their soul. Everyday, nearly a hundred citizens sent their prayers Heaven-bound, rang the bell, or lit candles in a spiritual tradition that Kizuna continued in the same way her ancestors guided their people. And everyday, nearly a hundred more visitors to the shrine came to ask for Kizuna's healing hands. Whether truly in need of help or curious to find out if the renowned priestess is truly some kind of witch, many paid a visit to the Fire Shrine, but today, a special visitor came to see one of the remaining descendants of the Kazemi clan residing in Fire Country.
The wind continued its blusterous path through the trees as a tiny figure clad in black raised her head to meet the gaze of a stranger making her way up the stone steps to the main temple. While her presence was not unknown to the priestess, it was certainly unexpected. As she dropped her oversized duffel bag on the ground, the visitor continued her way to the steps leading up to the porch of the building, where the much smaller figure stood waiting. Silently, and with a bowed head, she knelt down in humility.
"What can I help you with child?" Kizuna asked quietly, her voice soft with age and wisdom.
"Obaa-san," the visitor replied in a wavering voice. She look up, her emerald gaze meeting the same familiar green in her grandmother. "I'm home."
Obaa-san Kizuna's lips parted slightly, her breath caught in the hallows of her throat. She raised a wrinkled hand to her heart to feel the steadily-increasing heartbeats and blinked rapidly to take in the sight of her missing granddaughter as if she would disappear again. A clear dampness began to form in the corners of Kizuna's eyes.
"Please don't cry, Obaa-san," she wispered, rising to her feet and feeling the same waters pooling at her eyes. She took several steps forward when Kizuna's right hand cupped her face and her left rested on her hip.
"Welcome home, my child," she whispered, a crystal tear falling down her cheek. Kizuna hugged her visitor closely as she placed her hand on top of her head. "Welcome home, Seika-chan."
Seika smiled as her own tears rushed down her own cheeks. "Grandma, I'm sorry I've been away for so long," she choked out, her voice failing her as the sobs escaped her lips.
Coming home was definitely harder than coming back.