Fated to Meet You
Author's Note:
Disclaimer: I do not own anything, character or plot, from Masashi Kishimoto's Naruto.
Chapter Twenty-Three: Feeling Human, Alive
Senju Tobirama couldn't say if he was relieved or not when Uchiha Mai set her letter of resignation in front of him.
He had done everything to push her away and to keep her close. And he guessed that this was what he deserved for not choosing what he wanted a second time. But this time, he noted, it was much harder to decide to keep Uchiha Mai close than to keep her far.
For she was an Uchiha.
Senju Tobirama had a difficult relationship with his feelings for the Uchiha Clan. And it portrayed much different than what he truly felt about the Uchiha Clan. As a child, they killed his brothers and clan members. As an adult, he killed them. And now, as the Hokage Advisor, he fought with them. What truly felt about the Uchiha Clan was that they could be so much of a vital piece to Konoha than he could ever be.
Unlike his brother, he was not passionate enough to portray these thoughts. He was reserved and realistic, because such vitality the Uchiha Clan possessed came with equal amounts of fatality. And who he was and wanted to be, was the halfway mark between such extremes. Something he preferred Konoha to have.
So all in all, Senju Tobirama reasoned to believe that he was relieved to have let Uchiha Mai go. Had she stayed longer, she would have been too vital but also too fatal. Not for Konoha. But for him
"I heard you quit." Kosei pulled up a chair and sat at the table where his female friend was.
Mai's head was buried in between her arms. She exhaled. "How did you find me?" Her head still down.
"There are only three places you would be at if you weren't the Hokage Advisor's Second." Kosei examined the Konoha Library's architecture. "And Sumiko sent me looking for you."
"Aren't you supposed to be on a mission right now?" Mai popped her head up.
Technically, he was, but the mission this time was within the village. "Extended break." Kosei lied. Only a handful of people including Team Takeshi knew about the mole. Mai was kept out.
"What does Sumiko-san want?" Mai gathered the scrolls on the table.
"She wants to have lunch with you." Kosei read the title of the scrolls as they disappeared from vision. "Does Elder Mio not have the information you need?" He asked referring to the scrolls.
Uchiha Elders kept their own version of scrolls pertaining significant events or Uchiha techniques special to them, while the original scrolls were in possession of the Uchiha Clan Leader. Even his teacher kept scrolls, but most were of kenjutsu (sword technique).
"No," Mai answered and looked around her for people. "Elder Mio wasn't too interested in the Mangekyō Sharingan."
"And you think books about the human anatomy might help you with the Sharingan?" Kosei questioned sarcastically.
Mai glared at her friend. "Funny." She sat back down. "Lord Hikaku won't let me have access to the clan's scrolls."
Kosei watched his friend carefully. Her facial gestures and body movements imitated that of Senju Tobirama, all centered around the man's red glare reflecting in hers. "Well, maybe you should tell him why you quit."
"I'm not telling you either." Mai rolled her eyes over to her friend and flatly responded.
"You don't have to." Kosei lifted himself up off the chair. "You have yet to need something from me."
Her mouth fell slightly open at her friend's response as she watched her friend walk away. His feet tapping on the wooden floors of the library.
"By the way," Kosei stopped and turned back. "I'm getting married. So, you should hurry and come to lunch with Sumiko and I if you want to know more."
Mai's mouth fell further before quickly rising and walked over to match up with her friend's footsteps. "What?!" She said as she quickly sped up to catch up with her friend. "How?"
. . .
Mai's hand's were cradling her face as she stared at her male friend, still shocked at the news. "Who is she?"
Sumiko laughed at the sight of her friend. Sakiko was beside her and the mother continued to feed her daughter. News about the Elder Apprentice Uchiha Kosei courting spread like wildfire. Most Elder Apprentices had already made families of their own. And the Uchiha Clan women were curious when the clan's best shinobi will have children. Sumiko was one of them.
"Is this something you need from me?" Kosei responded back and raised a black brow but didn't break the normal Uchiha male exterior.
Mai glared at her friend. Kosei and Hikaku had been pestering her as to why she quit since word spread that Senju Tobirama had no second anymore. And the two shinobi stooped as low as to create trade-offs with Mai to make her answer their questions and fulfill their curious needs. The kunoichi turned to her female friend. "Sumiko-san, I know you know who he's marrying."
"Well," Sumiko set the chopsticks she used to feed her daughter down. "If you hadn't been so busy as the Hokage Advisor's second, you may have known."
The Uchiha mother was not close to the male Uchiha Apprentice at the table. However, the man came to her asking if she would join him and Mai for lunch. Since Mai had quit her position as the Hokage Advisor's Second, the kunoichi had much more free time, and she spent it with her and Sakiko.
Among the many conversations they had together, which Sumiko had never had such long conversations with the used-to-be reserved female kunoichi, Mai noted on a number of occasions on how Kosei and Hikaku bothered her too much over wanting to know why she had quit her position. Sumiko quickly caught on as to why Uchiha Kosei wanted her to join them for lunch. Because Uchiha Mai would not have accepted without her.
"Then I guess I'll just wait until the wedding day to see who." Mai forgot to add. Sumiko was also curious why she quit as well, and she stubbornly leaned back and told the group. "I mean it's gonna be at the Nara shrine anyway."
Kosei internally scoffed at Mai's behavior. He had known her for a long time, but this Mai was someone new. He didn't mean to say this in a bad way, but she was more human. During Elder Mio's tutelage, Mai was very reserved and the emotions she did reveal were little. She was, and Kosei didn't mean to say this in a bad way, lacking in human emotions. And it wasn't hard for him to put two and two together. Kosei believed for the time with Senju Tobirama changed her. She became more like him but also more herself at the same time. "Her name is Uchiha Reina."
It was Mai's turn again for her mouth to drop open and she covered it with her hand. The kunoichi looked over to the other adult female at the table. "Isn't she…"
Sumiko smirked proudly and nodded. Uchiha Reina was known to be an Uchiha beauty. She was about Sumiko's age. Most thought that she would wed when she reached eighteen years of her life. But the beauty remained single until now. When the entire clan heard news that the Elder Apprentice Uchiha Kosei was courting Uchiha Reina, all the Uchiha women buzzed about it.
"Woooow." Mai lengthened the word. Kosei wasn't a bad looking man. In fact, he was, like many Uchiha's, physically handsome. His short dark hair fell on his tanned skin. And Mai was always curious as to why he never courted anyone.
Sumiko looked from Mai to Kosei at their interaction before stopping at Mai. Uchiha Mai was also considered an Uchiha beauty. As she grew under Elder Mio's apprenticeship, the Uchiha Clan gossiped about her and related the child's beauty to her mother's. Sumiko, like the rest of the women in the clan, wondered whether her friend would marry or follow the path of Elder Mio.
. . .
Mai accompanied Sumiko and her daughter to pick up Kagami. The Academy, Mai loathed, was located right beside the red Hokage Building, and Mai sneaked a glance to the window she knew was the Hokage Advisor's Office.
Resigning wasn't hard. She'd had more difficult conversations. It was the avoiding part that she had a hard time with. In the morning, she still expected the black falcon to be at her windowsill. When dusk was approaching, her body itched to walk to the usual bench. Every hour of the day, she either thought about Senju Tobirama or something in her vicinity made her think about Senju Tobirama. Worst of all, Senju Tobirama plagued her in her sleep.
Mai kept herself busy during the day, and at night, her dreams kept her busy.
"Mai!" Kagami ran from the entrance of the Academy.
. . .
"I figured that not having a second would make you more busy." Senju Hashirama said as he continued to stamp sheets of paper with the official Hokage seal.
"I'm just fast at what I do, I guess." Tobirama walked over to the edge of the long line of windows.
The Hokage stamped another sheet of paper with a thud. "Well, maybe you could do some stamping for me."
"That's the Hokage's job." Tobirama teased before leaning on the windowsill and peered outside. He liked to watch the Academy's dismissal from the Hokage's Office. The Academy was his work. Something Senju Tobirama could call his own, and he was proud of it.
His red eyes gravitated to a familiar female figure in the distance, and they remained on her.
Tobirama tried very hard to keep himself busy, and he thought he would be busy without a second. But the more he wanted to avoid thinking about Mai or sending Mai a falcon in the morning, the faster he finished work. He wanted her by his side but also didn't want her there.
It wasn't professionality stopping him from pursuing Uchiha Mai romantically. It was easy to release a subordinate to then be able to court them. But it was much harder to pursue an Uchiha for someone like Senju Tobirama. He, of all people, never thought he would feel this way for an Uchiha.
"-wants us to meet with us a week from today." The Hokage's voice cut through Tobirama's thoughts.
"Who?" Tobirama turned back to face his brother.
"The Fire Daimyō." Senju Hashirama said followed by another thud.
Tobirama turned back to the window. A young boy ran up to Uchiha Mai. Another familiar person. "I'll get the preparations completed then." was all he said before leaving the office.
The Hokage was to meet with the Fire Daimyō and Senju Tobirama was to go with, leaving Konoha with no Hokage and Hokage Advisor. The meeting and trek combined was to take four days. None of them liked the idea of leaving the village knowing there was a mole somewhere. But they had to act as if they knew nothing. A missing spy messenger was already suspicious enough on their part.
Team Takeshi was getting close to determining who the spy was. They narrowed it down to two men.
Kosei was paired with Jun to investigate one of the potential spies. They trapped the man, and Kosei immediately casted a genjutsu on the man.
"Kosei, look at this." Jun picked up a picture of the man with a woman and three children.
"Could be a cover." Kosei noted and looked around, there was no sign of children or a woman in this home. Only the man occupied this home.
"I don't think so." Jun countered. He too looked around. "Everything this man has is from the Land of Birds." The Land of Birds is well known for their distinct tapestry. "And they don't come cheap. Most natives to the Land of Birds pass them down from generation to generation. The ones he has look worn from age." Jun picked up a tapestry. "And the Land of Birds is currently in a civil war right now, which could explain why he has no family here."
"You can't fake that." Kosei agreed. "Let's go back up Takeshi and Kaito." They cleared their suspect.
Jun nodded. The two of them rushed out of the man's home only to meet with a firecracker being blown to the sky.
A/N (again)
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