Tsunade looked at them from behind her desk hands folded listening to their report.
"I see." She said. "So that's the situation." She sighed.
"I'd like to leave immediately for the Land of Mountains." Said Nenshō twirling his cigarette in his fingers trying to resist the urge to light the damn thing and inhale it. If he wasn't so sure his intestines would become a set a garters for the old lady in front of him he'd have already broken the rule.
"Denied." She said holding her hand up to silence his protest. "Listen to me you can even smoke that damn thing if it will keep you quiet enough to hear me out." She said cutting him off. Nenshō put the filter to his lips and ignited the end with his finger tip taking in a long draw before exhaling and flinging the ash out the window. "I know you're eager to help your friend and resolve the situation." She explained. "But before I send you two or anyone into a warzone I'm going to need a full squad to send out and right now we're shorthanded, and the people we need should be arriving tomorrow. So take this opportunity to rest up and reequip yourself we can't have anyone going in halfcocked."
Tsunade stopped when the door opened and two shinobi walked it. "Nenshō!" said Tenten rushing through the threshold with Naruto behind her. She tackled in into a hug while he pulled her into a kiss. He rested his hand against the small of her back pressing her into him. She tried to pull away but he kept his hold on her lot letting her escape from him. She gave a little moan half in protest half in delight. Tsunade sighed.
"If you don't let that girl go Nenshō I'll be forced to separate you two for another week." she threatened glaring at the two.
"Welcome back Naruto." Greeted Hinata as he stepped in laughing at Nenshō as he obediently broke the kiss not wanting to invoke the Hokage's wrath.
"Hey Hinata did you just get back from a mission too?" he asked grinning.
"Sort of." Answered Nenshō tossing the cigarette butt out the window.
"What do you mean by sort of?" Asked Tenten watching the smoking cigarette fall to earth.
"If means I'm deploying you four immediately." Said Tsunade. "We have a situation in the Land of Mountains. Kumo and Ino have already been deployed to track and locate a growing rebel force. Hinata and Nenshō were sent on an escort mission, but it seems that the client was involved in arms dealing for the rebels and was conspiring with the Kinzoku clan who seem to be deeply rooted in the rebellion."
"What?" said Tenten turning to Nenshō. "Your clan's involved with this?"
"Yeah." Said Nenshō looking at Tsunade. "That's too much of a coincidence if you ask me. Did you know anything about this?"
A small chuckle sounded from behind the door and Ibiki stepped in. "I told you he'd be smarter to believe in coincidence. I also said he'd react like this."
Nenshō pulled another cigarette from his pack and lit it not caring if Tsunade had a problem with more smoke.
"The counsel wanted me to test your loyalties." She explained staring at the red cherry at the end of his smoke; Ibiki dropped some intelligence files on her desk. "Until recently we were merely observing the Kinzoku's clans activities in the mountains but now we've decided to take a more active role in the Land of Mountains."
"And what?" he asked blowing the smoke over her desk. "You knew that bastard was selling weapons to my clan?"
"We wanted to see how you and Kumo would react to being faced with your former clan." She explained to him.
"You thought I'd try to return to my clan?" he asked his voice heavy with contempt.
"Not exactly" said Ibiki, "When I approved your citizenship my report made some eyebrows rise in the counsel. There were concerns that you and Kumo might go rogue if your clan managed to reveal themselves, which was an inevitability considering the current political situation in the Land of Mountains."
"You were afraid I'd leave to kill my clan." He said flicking the ash off.
"That's right." Said Tsunade. "Under different circumstances wouldn't you have left to hunt them? Ibiki's report stated you harbored violent feeling towards your clan."
Nenshō finished off his smoke and flicked it out the window again. "That depends are you going to stop me now?" he asked.
"I don't see why not. You and Kumo passed by reporting back to me and following protocol." She said. "I'm sending you four to back up Ino and Kumo the mission is the same but the rules of engagement have changed your allowed to engage any rebels you come across. Report back when you've located the bulk force and we can deploy an ANBU team to handle the situation. Is this understood?"
Nenshō smirked. "Perfectly."
Kumo looked at the discarded organs frozen and buried in the snow. "It looks like they don't have proper supplies. They've been hunting for their food as they move through the countryside. They aren't very good at hiding their field dressings either."
Ino nodded. "Maybe they assumed the snow would bury it for them." She said.
"That's still careless." He said standing and trudging through the snow. They had backtracked the movements of the group that had moved through the village trying to map out their route. They had found the remains of a camp about a half days travel from the village they were staying at. Kumo's message to the Hokage was returned ordering them to do whatever they could from their while they waited for backup to arrive. They stopped in their tracked. A wounded doe stood as still as a tree before them its front leg bleeding. A thick steel wire ensnared the creature, the strong metal line cut through the muscle and peeled away the flesh exposing the bone. The snow around the creature was stained with its blood.
"Looks like they forgot to disarm a trap." He said reaching for the compound bow at his back notching an arrow, he activated his Byakugan and let the arrow loose sending it straight through the creature's heart.
"What are you doing?" she asked as he drew the long trench blade strapped to his back.
"The creature was suffering." He explained cutting the wire and kneeling down next to the creature. "It would have simply died of its wound in the wild and we're short on food anyways."
She looked away as he ran the knife from one end of the deer to the other dressing it to drag back to the village.
"I could have healed it with my medical Jutsu." she offered as he pulled opened the deer to remove the organs.
"I doubt it would have let you get that close. And it would have died if I tried to sedate it, it probably would have died anyways it had lost a lot of blood already. I doubt it would live through even the mildest of my drugs. This is the kindest I can do."
Ino nodded knowing he was right. "How long do you think it will take before its ready to cook?" she asked as he picked the carcass up over his shoulder.
"A couple hours." He said. "I need to finish dressing it and bleeding it."
She nodded, "I'll head back and get things ready, and I'd be nice to eat something decent for a change."
He nodded and she took off into the trees heading for the empty village.
He whipped his arrow down and returned it to his scorpion quiver. He summoned one of his puppets to carry the deer. They had been staying at the village for a few days now. He hoped Nenshō would arrive before the platinum wire was too far away. He had tied sever lengths to various carts and weapons. The wire wasn't much use to Nenshō when he was fighting. The pure metal wasn't enough to do a lot of damage but the wire could carry a massive amount of his chakra allowing him to sense and control it from a much greater distance that any steel wire. The metals purity allowed for him to contain more chakra than almost any other kind of metal, though it was almost impossible to accurately shift any kind of metal without visual contact.
The three and a half years in prison allowed him and Nenshō to learn the complete details of their abilities inside and out. There were few things they didn't understand about one another. The Kinzoku clan was one of the moreprominent discussion topics. He had learned about how his own mother tried to kill him shortly after graduation the academy at the age of ten for simply not showing any signs of their fire palm Kekkei Genkai. They had both spent years being hunted for opposite reasons.
He had been cast out and hunted down for his Byakugan his born ability had been his curse for as long as he could remember. Nenshō had been cast out for an ability they believed he lacked and was allowed to hunted down by his own clan and mother. The Kazekage's rule had been cruel to them both. Zabuza had been their only common point between their histories and even back them they had hardly known each other. They had only trained together and joined each other on jobs during rare occasions. And back then they viewed each other as rivals competing for the approval of their master along with Haku and various others. They were distrusting and secretive suspecting each others every move. They had abandoned their distrust when they stood against the traitors only to wind up in the same prison separated by a long hallway and no communication but the small blue chakra string he sent out and vibrated with his voice to make a small whisper to talk to each other.
Things had changed so much for them, and now they would close another chapter in their lives the Kinzoku clan was no longer tied to a village and he would help his friend put an end to them. It was one of their agreements to each other in prison. They'd kill every one of their demons past and present.
Ino brushed the wet hair from her eyes as she sliced up the herbs and vegetables they had managed to scavenge from the village along with plants and mushrooms Kumo had scavenged in the forest. While they stayed in the village they unitized everything it could offer that hadn't been stolen or destroyed including the bathhouse attached to another hot spring. Food was scare but Kumo seemed to find plenty of food on his own. He could even find edible plants in the middle of winter. He had explained that mushrooms and other plants could grow if the snow insulated the ground and kept it from freezing and last through the winter. All he had to do was use his Byakugan to look through the snow and find them. It was impressive how much he could utilize the Hyūga Kekkei Genkai in ways she had never seen Hinata or even Neji use before. She wondered how much things could change if he had become a member of the Hyūga clan. She dismissed the thought. If his mother hadn't fled even less would have changed. He'd have become another sealed member like Neji. She had seen the mark upon the Hyūga members before. She had never seen it used but her farther had told her about its ability to inflict massive pain and kill the victim's brain cells. The idea of being branded was a frightening one; she would have done the same if she was in her mother's position. Kumo opened the door two large venison steaks were stacked on a platter.
"Great." She said looking at the red slabs on the platter. "This restraint has a grill we can use for those."
He nodded and moved over to the kitchen. They were changing the building they slept in as a precaution; they had found themselves in a ransacked teahouse tonight. A few minutes later Kumo came back the smell of cooking venison following close behind him.
"Is that my shirt?" he asked noticing she was wearing one of his black undershirts.
"It's comfy." She retorted flashing a smirk. "And besides my clothes are drying so I needed to borrow this."
"That shirts dirty." He observed raising an eyebrow and taking a seat next to her dumping the mushroom slices into the boiling pot. They'd have to boil them several times before they would be safe to eat.
"I know." She giggled. "But aren't I entitled to wear some of my boyfriend's clothes now and then?"
Her hair wasn't bound in its usual ponytail. The platinum locks hung around her shoulders cloaking her back. Kumo reached out and grabbed one of the white-gold locks feeling the silky texture between his fingers.
"I am your girlfriend." She said raising a threatening eyebrow. "Right?"
Kumo gave her a thin smile. "I guess so."
"Good." She said flashing him a smug smirk. "That means I better not catch you looking at any other girls."
"How would you know of I was?" he asked adjusting his dark tinted goggles, picking up a knife and slicing into a mushroom.
Ino turned and amused look to him. "Did you just make a joke?" she asked. Kumo said nothing and continued to chop the mushroom.
She smiled taking his silence as an embarrassed yes. She went back to her work silently working next to him to finish their dinner.
"By the way?" she asked a sinful look in her eye. "Didn't you say you were going to make up for that night we lost?"
"I did." He answered not looking away from the cutting board.
"And?" she said leaning closer to him.
"I meant when we returned to Konoha." He explained looking into her green eyes.
"That could be awhile." She whispered sliding onto his lap.
"I'm a patent guy." He said leaning back in the chair showing no protest to her actions.
"Well I'm not a patent girl." She said leaning in and brushing his lips. Kumo's hands moved to her waist and up her back till he cradled her scalp and pressed her into him deepening the kiss.
"What smells so good?" they heard Naruto's voice ring out. They pulled away from each other and the door opened.
"What happened to you guys?" asked Ino as she saw the haggard looking Hinata and Naruto enter in followed by Tenten and Nenshō.
"Aside from hauling ass here." Explained Naruto collapsing into one of the chairs. "We were forced to spend the night in the snow."
"That must have been difficult." Said Ino. "Kumo's been finding hot springs to say at so we've been able to keep plenty warm. If you want some food Naruto grab some steaks from the butcher shop down the road Kumo caught some dinner and theirs more than enough. Their stored in a salt lined fridge."
"Sounds great." Said Naruto pulling himself from his chair and stepping outside to find the butcher shop.
"Why'd you sleep in the snow?" Kumo asked Nenshō. "You have a copy of that map I made. There were plenty of caves to sleep in."
Nenshō smirked as he lit a smoke. "Guess it slipped my mind." He said. "Bright side I got enjoy sharing body heat. I think Hinata enjoyed it as well. Guess that knucklehead found a use for that hothead of his."
Hinata blushed and Tenten giggled.
"So what's going on with you and the blond? It looks like she ignored my threat." Nenshō whispered low enough for only Kumo to hear.
"What makes you say that?" Kumo asked pulling his pipe from his coat.
"I don't need a Byakugan to spot this." He chucked pulling a long blond strand of Ino's hair off of his jacket. "Or her wearing your shirt." He added.
"So how much does she know, about you?" he asked voice turning serious again.
"Everything." He said striking the match and bringing it to the bowl of his pipe. "I told her everything."
"And you trust her?" he asked. Kumo nodded.
Nenshō crossed his arms. "Well if you trust her then I guess I don't have to kill her." he stood up and stretched. "Besides now that we're here I should get my fill of killing, a whole clans worth at that."