Disclaimer: Still don't own Naruto. But Matsuda, nasty person that he is, is all mine.
Raidou was still officially on a mission. But as his mission was currently tagging along behind him, Raidou was a little at a loss for what to do. As hunter in a numbered ANBU squad, Raidou's life usually consisted of: leave Konoha on a mission, complete mission, return to Konoha, recover, leave again. Recovery actually was a larger percentage of time for his squad than usual, because the Head seemed to think that having the genius Hatake on the team meant they should be given every potential suicide mission, and every thrice-damned S-class no one else would willingly take. And Hatake being Hatake, he accepted them all.
It was because of one of these that Raidou had found himself baby-sitting a five-year-old. ANBU squads consisted of five members, and an incomplete squad would not be deployed. Floaters kept squads at full strength if a member was injured. But Kakashi refused to work with them. He had an obsession with teamwork and perfect cooperation, and insisted that floaters were a hazard to his team. Some of said floaters took his judgment with a grin and a shake of the head, but a few saw it as unforgivable arrogance.
Masaru had died two months ago on an A-class gone south, and with the squad below full strength, no suitable replacements available, and Kakashi obstinately refusing to work with anyone other than a permanent replacement, the Head of ANBU suspended Squad 14 for an indefinite period of time. At that time, Hayate was still confined to bed in the hospital, but the Head was not about to let the rest of the team laze around. A replacement was needed for Squad 19, so Genma spent the first month slogging through mud in Wind Country—who knew that desert area had so much slime? Raidou was handed a blue tagged, in-village surveillance scroll, and spent the first month silently watching a tiny boy get live hell every day of his life.
Kakashi, being the genius Copy-nin, ended up with what was arguably the worst assignment of the three. The Head had decided to clean up a few outstanding commitments.
It was one of the many times Raidou was deeply grateful he wasn't an assassination specialist. Intel had handed the twenty-year-old an armful of files, and told him to come back if he got injured. The squad hadn't seen their captain for about a month, until finally he came back one day around noon, his armor dark brown, his hair a similar shade of mud, and simply stood in the center of the foyer, staring at the desk attendant.
Even coated in grime he was instantly recognizable. And perhaps it was the uncovered sharingan, whirling slowly, fixed on his face, but the rookie saddled with desk duty panicked. Medics were called, and in the commotion Hayate stumbled over with his arm hanging out of its sling to rescue Kakashi before Intel and their psychiatric evaluators could get their hands on him.
Hayate had gotten his unresponsive commander upstairs and into the showers, rinsing weeks of grit and blood from his silver hair. Hatake had killed every one of the twenty or so targets assigned, and the only injuries he had to show were a swollen left eye and a glassy right. When Raidou came back that night, leaving Uzumaki to his replacement, he forced his captain to talk. Kakashi ended that night retching into the toilet, Raidou's hand on his back, choking on bile and disgust. It was ANBU's way of crying, and it was a type of healing the medics couldn't provide.
Kakashi was gone again in two days, because the Head insisted he couldn't be spared. He wasn't back yet. And now, Genma was gone again as well. Masaru was dead. Of all of Squad 14, only Hayate—recovered now—and Raidou were in Konoha. So, with no orders or pressing engagements, Raidou turned to training.
Currently, Naruto was perched on a rock at the edge of one of ANBU's private training grounds, watching Raidou train. Or rather, Naruto was trying to count the blades of grass underneath his feet, because it was more interesting than watching his guardian.
Raidou was a solidly built man, not wispy and delicate like Kakashi always seemed. Perhaps his most notable physical characteristic was the mess of scar tissue warping the left side of his face. Most people expected him to be a taijutsu type, with the power his heavy body obviously held. It was an advantage for him, because sometimes enemies wouldn't be guarding against genjutsu. And once he caught them, very few people could escape. Not because his genjutsu had many layers or were particularly well-crafted, but because it's hard to break a genjutsu when all the neurons in your brain can only register pain.
Classifying genjutsu was, to Raidou, a waste of time. In general, there were offensive and defensive genjutsu, though any good shinobi could use either type in any situation. Offensive genjutsu consisted of, for example, Yuuhi Kurenai's plant-based illusions, or the standard disintegration and pain visions. Defensive would be disappearing into mist, changing perception, or hiding. Some ninja preferred to separate the types by how the affected the victim, either creating a distorted world visible to anyone in the area, or directly altering an individual's brain. However, that method broke down with looping jutsu, when both mind and location were involved.
Raidou, though proficient in most types of genjutsu, preferred the ones he developed himself. Jutsu cast from a distance tended to expand like light, losing intensity to the square of the gap. However, most genjutsu users tried to avoid close combat; one cannot form seals while blocking weapons. They solved the problem by using more chakra the farther they were from the target. Raidou had overcome the issue by not using seals.
Hand seals are nothing but a way to mold and move chakra. Any good ninja can learn to use a few jutsu with abbreviated seals, or none at all, simply with years of practice. Forming his personal genjutsu without seals was second nature to Raidou by now. He could get close to his victim, block his attacks, and transfer the chakra with a brush of skin on skin.
Training today was building up his speed: going from latent chakra to a spark of disruptive energy concentrated in his fingertips in less than a blink of an eye, sans seals. To Naruto, it looked like Raidou was just standing in the center of the field. He yawned. "Hey, Raidou-nii-san, when are you going to train?" he shouted.
The jutsu fizzled out, leaving Raidou's fingers tingling and a faint impression of burning in the back of his mind. He shook his head violently to clear away the illusionary sensations. Genjutsu rarely ended cleanly, especially if the caster lost control involuntarily, and even more if the chakra was still in his own body when he did. Raidou turned to look at Naruto, who was kicking his feet against the rock and scowling.
"Aren't you going to do anything?" Naruto demanded again.
Raidou considered explaining—again—that this was genjutsu training, and that if Naruto wanted to do something else, Quartermaster was quite willing to have him come help clean shuriken. But that was too much work. Instead he shrugged, and rubbed his smarting fingers against his shirt. "You want to train, Naruto?" he asked.
The boy's blue eyes lit up. "Yeah!" Then, more warily, he added, "Not just standing around, right?"
Raidou laughed out loud. "No. You're not ready for advanced training like that, yet."
Naruto's brow furrowed, as he tried to work out just what was so advanced about doing nothing. He gave up. "Teach me to fight," he suggested brightly, retreating into territory he knew. Fighting was important to him: if he could fight, then he could stop the people who tried to hurt him. And he'd need to fight well if he wanted to be a ninja, which was all he wanted to do.
Raidou pulled the last traces of chakra from his hands. It would not do for the kid to catch shreds of lingering genjutsu. Especially not when Raidou had been practicing with the one Nara Shikaku had helped him with. Now, that man is something, Raidou thought with pride in his comrade. Shikaku took a poisoned blade to the belly, and had offered—offered, without Raidou even asking—to re-experience the pain for Raidou's genjutsu. But Naruto didn't need to know what it felt like to have his insides ripped out while acid ate his flesh away from the inside, multiplied by a hundredfold.
Actually, Raidou was particularly proud of that illusion. He had managed to defeat Kurenai with it, who, even at only twenty, was one of the most skilled illusion masters in Konoha. Of course, practicing with fellow Leaf-nin, the genjutsu experts tended to tone down their nastier jutsus, but even so, Kurenai hadn't been able to move after she escaped. Raidou thought it might have something to do with the vivid sensation Shikaku had shared with him, through Shikaku's own genjutsu, of intestines spilling down his abdomen, the tickling slide of living organs somehow intensifying the horror.
Kurenai, still pale and shivering, a hand pressed flat against her belly, had asked with a shaky grin if he minded if she borrowed the image. And that was one of the greatest compliments one genjutsu user could pay to another.
But now Naruto was tugging at his sleeve, bouncing up and down, clenching his hands into fists. "Let's fight, Raidou-nii-san!"
Raidou cast a critical eye over his stance. "Foot there," he ordered, nudging the offending limb with a sandal. "Move the other one back." Naruto shifted awkwardly, sliding his foot back while trying to keep the first one where Raidou had shoved it. "Bend your knees. Hands up, tuck your thumbs down or you'll break them." The boy really had an atrocious stance.
By the end of the morning, Raidou was starting to warm up, and Naruto was gasping heavily, his T-shirt soaked in sweat.
Hayate poked his head a little forlornly into the clearing while Naruto was splayed out on the ground, limbs spread wide, trying to catch his breath.
Raidou waved at him, and Hayate stepped more confidently towards them. "I didn't want to disturb you two," he explained. He had double katana strapped to his back, the hilts poking up above his shoulders.
"It's fine," Raidou assured him. "We were just doing some light warm-ups." He grinned wickedly at Naruto, whose breathing had not slowed at all.
His eyes caught the flicker of porcelain-white at his waist as Hayate crouched beside Naruto and stuck out a hand. "I'm Gekkou Hayate," he said. "Raidou's friend."
"The one who kisses Yuugao," Naruto said brightly, in a single rush of air.
Hayate was taken aback. Then he glared at Raidou. "Why is that the first thing he knows about me?"
Raidou did not laugh. He did not laugh. Well, maybe he snickered a little. "It's not like you keep it a secret, Hayate-kun."
He sniffed, and turned back to the blond haired boy. "Nice to meet you, Naruto."
"Yuh-huh!"
"The correct response to that, Naruto, is 'nice to meet you too," Raidou informed him.
"Nice to meet you too."
Raidou nodded in confirmation. "Good work." Then he spoke to Hayate, gesturing at the mask clipped to his belt. "Mission?"
"Kind of. Escort thing for one of the councilors. Look pretty and come back by this evening."
The older man snorted. "Waste of time, if you ask me."
"Yeah, but that's all I'm going to get until the squad is back." His smile dropped away. Hayate never got solo missions, and it chafed. Now, and most of the time, he looked perfectly healthy. The medics had the effects mostly under control, and it was only rarely that chakra reacted badly to the latent jutsu in his system. Squad 14 just dealt with it. But the Intel branch didn't know enough about the jutsu eating Hayate away from the inside to trust him with solo missions. "Well, have fun," Hayate told his friend and the jinchuuriki. "I got to go, or I'll be late, and the stuffy old guy will complain." Naruto giggled.
From the trees, Matsuda watched Hayate walk away.