His Biwako had been there. She'd been the first to hold the crying baby boy in her arms. She'd been the one to hear the mother, a trembling, terrified waif of fifteen, whisper, "Get rid of it, get rid of it, getridofit" over and over until the words bled together into one endless, unintelligible moan of agony.
She'd told him after, tears in her eyes, and she'd never been the crying kind – only tears of fury.
He still remembers the look she gave him back then, as she stood in front of him, cradling Asuma in her arms.
"Do something, Hiruzen."
The second time, thirteen years later, she was there as well.
The Kunoichi, Biwako told him afterwards, had not screamed once during birth. She'd hardly made a sound. She wouldn't look at the baby when it was there. Another boy. If it had been a girl, Biwako said, maybe…
He put his arms around her – he still remembers the way she leaned into his embrace, the way her body felt against his.
"I will find whoever did this, Biwako, I swear."
By the time sightings of a certain missing nin are reported to him, Biwako is gone.
Her scent has long since faded from their bed sheets, her clothes are feeding the moths in their closet. It's been almost twenty years since the first.
Still, Hiruzen is aware of his duty.
It is the same man. The man whose file is on his desk. Descriptions Biwako herself coaxed out of the two victims, scrawls on yellowed paper, and now, finally, a photo to go with them.
He has black hair and black eyes, sharp teeth. He is a beast dressed up in human skin.
And his sons are the spitting image of him.
Hiruzen gave a promise. All he wants is to go himself and fulfill it, however, he is here, in Konoha, miles away from the monster and by the time he gets to the Land of Rivers the man might already be gone again and not surface for the next seven years. He can't have that. There is an ANBU squad in the vicinity – they might not have been his first choice – but they're closest and experienced enough to handle it.
He sends a bird with his orders.
Three days later the ANBU Captain is in his office.
"It's done, Hokage-sama," he says. "The body is at the morgue."
Hiruzen can feel the inquisitive stare coming from behind that expressionless dog mask.
This one might have figured it out already– they don't call him a genius for nothing – but either way there is no undoing it now.
So Hiruzen just nods. "That will be all."
When he burns the file in front of the picture of his Biwako, he looks at her smiling eyes through the thin wisps of smoke and drops the ashes at her feet.