Chapter 1 - These Days
"I washed all of your clothes and got you another three shirts extra, so you should be fine. If you manage to dirty all of your clothes anyway, you can ask Iruka for help. Please don't go to class nasty, okay?" she says, picking up a half empty milk carton to put it in the fridge. "And don't forget to put the milk back in the fridge, because I won't be here to do that for you."
She steps over to the sink and turns on the faucet to wash the few dishes, piled up on the counter. As she continues with her lecture she speaks louder, to be heard over the sound of the running water. "Best would be, if you note the day you open the milk on the carton. And then you throw it away after five days max, just to be safe. If you forget to put it in the fridge then even earlier."
"To be completely safe," she says, turning off the faucet and drying up the now clean plates and cups with a dish towel. "You should drink out of a cup, that way it's easier to see if the milk got bad. If you're not sure about it, just pour it in the sink. I don't want you to get sick, okay?"
There is a pause until a delayed response comes in the form of an absent-minded "Hm".
Assuming her words fell on deaf ears, she stops putting away the dishes to take a look over her shoulder.
Across the room at the coffee table next to the couch sits her 12-year-old nephew, cross-legged and hunched over a wrinkled sheet of paper. He's chewing on the inside of his cheek, his face scrunched up in concentration as he scrawls on the paper in a hurry.
When she asked him last night after dinner if he had finished his homework, he told her he didn't have any and then begged her to teach him sealing jutsu for explosions. Knowing that teaching this kid advanced techniques in explosion sealing would inevitably lead to the destruction of her apartment building - if not the whole village - she instead offered to practice basic genin techniques with him.
Usually, she doesn't nag him about his homework in the evening. Even if that means that he tends to do his homework last minute. Which results in stressing out both of them at least every other morning before school, with him lamenting and nagging her to pester him more to do his homework in the evening, while she argues that she did her own share of homework 14 years ago already and therefore doesn't have to do anything - though she wakes him up extra early, so there's that.
She doesn't mind being the stressed out and nagging auntie for an average half an hour in the morning. That's a price she's gladly willing to pay, if she can spend more quality time with him as his fun big sister.
Not this morning, though.
She can't decide whether to be more annoyed or disappointed about her nephew choosing this to be the appropriate time to start lying to her, but she doesn't have time to ponder about it.
Because in ten minutes she has to leave for a mission and she needs him to pay attention to her instructions for him.
So she stalks towards the coffee table with swift, light steps and stares down at his head full of blond hair, hands on her hips and a (mirror practiced) frown on her face.
"Naruto!"
Startled, he looks up at her and quickly drags his hand over the sheet of paper, smearing black ink on the table top in the process. His blue eyes widen in shock and get a look of exaggerated innocence to them. When he leans over to hide the paper some more, she gets suspicious. This isn't his I-forgot-to-do-my-homework-face.
She snatches the paper out from under his hands and takes a proper look at it.
Instead of formulas, calculating the speed, angle or distance of thrown weapons or an essay on a certain jutsu, she reads about easy calculations regarding money and what seems to be paint. At least she thinks it's paint, if the doodle in the left bottom corner is supposed to be the stone heads of the Hokage decorated in bright colors.
She takes a deep breath.
This kid will be the death of her.
"Say, do you enjoy being scolded, kid?" she asks and tries to look as strict and scary as she remembers her sister to be.
When he adopts a flustered expression instead of a guilty, slightly frightened one, she knows she doesn't look scary at all.
"I would've been out of the door in ten minutes. Why didn't you plan your prank later, so I wouldn't find out about it?" she raises her eyebrow at him. If the kid has to be a prankster, the least thing he can do is to be somewhat clever about it.
His cheeks flush some more and he grins awkardly. At least he feels embarrassed about it.
She sighs and leans down to give the goggles on his forehead a flick with her finger. "Don't, okay?" she says and then repeats more sternly, "Just. Don't."
Still unimpressed by her imitation of parental strictness, his eyes are shining with mischief.
So she adds, "I don't want to be welcomed back by heavy bills and a lecture from Lord Third again. If you must act like a clown, do so without damaging other people's property or endangering the wildlife around the village."
At that he casts his eyes away from her face and down on the coffee table.
And now she feels bad again.
She hates scolding him about his silly pranks. Not even because of the pranks themselves, they are mostly harmless and stupid anyway, and if she's honest, she finds them quite amusing most of the time. It's more about her not being entirely sure what's the best way to react to them.
It's not like she was much of a prankster as a kid, so she can't copy what her sister would have done in such a case. Besides, she also can't imagine Naruto's parents to have been pranksters when they had been kids either. So she doesn't even understand where he got that kind of behaviour from.
Her throat itches just thinking about it.
Maybe she doesn't give him enough attention.
Though it's not like she can do much about it. After all, he saves those pranks for when she's on a mission. It's probably a result of her bad parenting.
After a tense pause she gently pats the top of Naruto's head.
"Did you listen to anything I said earlier?" she asks softly.
He shoots her a quick glance before rolling his eyes, "Don't eat ramen every day, bath, do your homework, drink your milk, blablabla, and so on."
"So you didn't listen at all, because I didn't talk about that yet."
"I heard it hundreds of times already, you don't have to tell me every time you go on a mission," he says annoyed, picking at the stained skin on his hand. Still avoiding to look at her.
"This time it's different," she says urgently, "I'll be away for two weeks, not just a few days. So I need you to listen to my instructions carefully."
Her words seem to bounce right off of him, testing her patience. She watches his fingers brush over the ink stain on the table that he caused earlier, as if he's just now noticing it. It's fascinating to her how this boy gets distracted so easily. She waits a few more seconds for him to snap out of his distraction until a look on the clock at the wall makes her clear her throat.
He looks at her sheepishly. "... I kind of ruined the table."
"Yeah, kind of," she says, crossing her arms in a half-hearted attempt to hide her amusement.
The corners of his lips tug up as well as he murmurs, "Sorry."
"It's just a table," she shrugs, winking at him. "And since I'm living with such a slob, people probably expect a few stains here and there anyway."
"Hey," he protests, sounding offended despite the grin on his lips. She smirks right back at him.
Another look at the clock tells her it's time to get back to business. She clears her throat again. "I need to leave soon, so can I have your attention now?"
He nods his head in agreement and sits up straighter. Kneeling down on the floor across from him so she can be eye to eye with him, she pulls out two small satchels out of her weapon bag and places both on the table in front of him.
"This is your allowance for the next two weeks. Don't spend everything at once and most importantly - don't spend everything on explosives," she explains, pushing one of the satchels over the table towards him.
His face lights up and she wonders if it's a bad idea after all, giving him his allowance for two weeks in advance, instead of asking Iruka to give him the second half in a week. Since she doesn't have time to worry about it now however, she lays her hand on the other satchel in front of her.
"This," she pushes the satchel towards him as well, looking him in the eyes, "is for food and groceries. Only. If you happen to break something, tell them I'll pay for it when I get back. If they pressure you, ask Lord Third to pay for it with my salary. Same goes if you run out of money." She gently places a finger under her nephew's chin, so he can't break eye contact. "I won't be mad. If you need money - especially for food - I want you to ask Lord Third or Iruka, okay? I will pay them back, so no need to worry."
She waits for him to nod in understanding before she continues.
"Now to the rules." She points to Naruto's bedroom door that has a sheet of paper attached on it. There written down in colorful letters is a list of rules she has written down together with Naruto, when he was about seven years old and she had started to go on longer missions again and which got extented over the years, as he grew older and more mischievous.
Then she gave her standard brief that both of them could probably recite in their sleep by now, they had this conversation so often.
"You go to school and do your homework. Listen to your teachers. Listen to Lord Third. Eat something other than ramen once a day at least, preferably fruit or vegetables. Brush your teeth and bathe every day. If you get hurt go to the hospital or ask Iruka for help. No explosive tags in the house. Seriously. No pranks. No blowing up houses, people or trees. No attacking superior shinobi."
She brushes over his hair affectionately, "And don't listen to bullies. They're just idiot brats and you're better than them, don't forget that."
At that he jumps up into a fighting stance, flashing her favourite happy-go-lucky grin of his at her. "Yeah! I'll show them, believe it!"
Laughing, she gets up on her feet as well and cups his face in both of her hands. "I have to go now." She quickly kisses him on the cheek and pulls him into a hug, as she tells him, "Take care."
His warm arms drape around her as well for a moment, until he whines, "You're smothering me!"
She laughs as he tries to squirm out of the hug, squeezes his shoulders one last time and presses a kiss on top of his head before she lets go of him.
"I'll be back in two weeks, maybe a little earlier," she promises, walking backwards towards the window. As she passes the kitchen table she grabs the bagged box on it and tosses it towards Naruto. "Don't forget your lunch. You should leave soon, or you'll be late for class."
"Wait!" he yells, just as she's about to climb out of the window. She turns around wondering what she could have possibly forgotten, as she goes through the checklist in her mind. Filled fridge - check - full pantry - check - closet full of clothes - check - money for kid - check - briefing kid - check - lunch for kid - check.
Nope, she didn't forget anything.
Naruto rummages through his school bag and pulls out a wrinkled sheet of paper. He tries to straighten it, but it doesn't make much of a difference as far as she can tell from the distance, and hurries over to her, handing her the paper. "Can you sign this?" he asks, pressing a pen into her hand in such an urgent manner that it makes her suspicious.
That suspicion really is the only reason why she reads the paper at all; normally when she's in a hurry like that, she doesn't bother to read those papers from school, they are rarely interesting anyway and she trusts Naruto to tell her about the important stuff.
"The genin exam?" she asks incredulously, after reading the headline. Naruto tried to make her sign the registration to the genin exams ever since his second week in the academy; usually lead by a cocky speech on why he should be genin already. This is the first time he's trying to be a little sneaky about it; probably thinking she would mindlessly sign whatever he puts in front of her, like she does most of the time when she's in a hurry to get out of the house on time.
Shuniku hands the paper back to him. "Let's talk about this when I'm back."
He pushes the paper back to her. "That's too late, the exam is next week already!"
"Then we'll talk about it before the exam next quartal."
"But everyone is taking this exam, I'll be the only one who doesn't graduate," he says in a pleading voice.
"That's what you told me the last time," she drawls, unimpressed by his use of puppy-dog eyes.
"Please, Nee-chan," he begs, sounding a little desperate, "it's true this time." Shuniku's gaze flickers between his face and the paper in her hand. "Please!" he says again.
She sighs. "Are you sure you're ready to be a genin yet?"
"Yes!" he shouts out, without a second of hesitation.
"Going on missions isn't a fun game. It's hard and dangerous work. Genin die all the time." He flinches a little at the last part.
"I know. And we've practiced a lot lately, you know I'm ready. I can do it."
It's more the way he says those words, than the actual words themselves that makes her contemplate. He sounds so serious about it, almost mature even. She has never heard him talk like that before.
"Alright," she says and he tackles her into a hug.
"Thank you!" He shoves the registration form and pen into her hands in excitement. When she folds the paper and stuffs it together with the pen into her bag, his face falls, clearly confused. "What -"
"I'll check back with Iruka," she explains to his disappointment.
"But you'll be late," he points out, as if she isn't aware of that. She shrugs him off and ruffles his hair, making him slap her hand away in a hurry. "Go already! Bye!"
She laughs at that, turns around again and leaves through the open window in a blur, calling over her shoulder, "Bye, Kid!"
Jumping over the roofs, Shuniku makes her way in the direction of the academy. She concentrates for a moment, easily identifying Iruka's chakra signature and follows directly towards it. A few minutes later she finds him at the bakery, where he seems to have just bought his breakfast.
When Iruka spots her he waves at her in his typical friendly demeanor. "Morning, Shuniku." Noticing her attire he asks, "Are you going on a mission?"
"Yeah and I'm kind of in a hurry. I just wanted to ask you about this," Shuniku pulls out the wrinkled registration form and shows it to him.
"Naruto tried to make me sign this last minute. Is it true that the whole class is taking the test, or was he trying to fool me?"
"He told you the truth, the class is supposed to graduate. You can sign it this time," Iruka says. Seeing the distressed face Shuniku pulls, he raises his eyebrows and adds, "You don't want to sign?"
Feeling called out by him, her face warms up a little. "Don't you think he's too little to be a genin yet?" When Iruka laughs at that, she can feel her face heat up some more. "Stop laughing, this is serious!"
"Sorry," he says quickly, pretending to cough to hide away the rest of his laughter. "To be honest I think twelve is too young of an age for genin in general, but that's not my decision to make. Or yours."
"So what? You seriously think Naruto is ready to go on missions yet? To kill people? Just because some ancient age restriction deems him to be old enough?"
Iruka sighs, "Listen Shuniku, I know you've graduated in the middle of a war and I have no idea how frightening it was to be sent out on missions during that time. But the war has been over for over a decade and the genins aren't sent out on any missions that are higher than D-Rank, if they can be even considered D-Rank. They are silly errands and light labour at most. Naruto is not going to have to fight anyone anytime soon."
Her first instinct is to argue that, but she knows he's right. And the fact that she's about to run late for her mission, is still looming in the back of her mind. "But do you think he's ready? Honestly ready, Iruka?"
Without hesitation Iruka replies, "He's not worse than the rest of them."
"That's reassuring." Shuniku shoots back, her voice dripping with sarcasm.
Iruka circles back. "I think he needs to show much more discipline and sincerity. And I think the only way for him to achieve that is through the shared experiences only a genin squad can teach." He pauses and then adds solemnly, "So, yes. I think he is ready to be a genin."
That's absolutely not what she wanted to hear. If she's being honest, she hoped Iruka would talk her out of signing that form, because usually she's the one who excuses Naruto's poor behaviour, while Iruka tells her about his lacking skills in whatever the kids were practicing in class. (Naruto isn't exactly what people call a natural, after all.)
She stares at him for a moment, pursing her lips. Then she lets out a defeated sigh, and scribbles a messy signature on the form as she mutters under her breath. When she hands him the paper, she takes a bundle of cash and holds it in front of him as well.
Iruka looks at her confused. "What's this?"
"Money."
"Why do you give me money?" He asks as if the concept of money is completly new to him. "Are you trying to bribe me?"
Shuniku rolls her eyes. Leave it to Iruka to ask stupid and selfless questions like that. "Of course not. It's in case the kid asks you for money, I'll be away for two weeks."
"I don't mind paying for him once in a while, really."
Shuniku is very aware of the fact that Iruka pays for Naruto's expenses whenever she's not around or when he thinks she's not looking. Naruto usually tells her about it (at least she believes he does), so she can pay him the money back. But she's pretty sure that Naruto forgets to tell her about it just as often. Either that or she doesn't give the kid enough credit about his money management.
"But I do." She takes a step closer to Iruka and nonchalantly slips the money and the now neatly folded form into one of the pockets of his flak jacket.
He opens his mouth to protest, but before he can say anything, Shuniku's already flung herself on top of the nearest building.
"Thanks for looking out for Naruto!" she calls out to him, turns around and rushes over the roofs to the village gate, as she chuckles about his appalled calls.
When Shuniku arrives at the village gate a mere minute later, the three members of her "squad" are impatiently waiting for her. Well, one is.
"Wow, you're right on time."
Shuniku looks at Anko, completely unaffected by her sly tone. "What are you doing here? Where's Kurenai?"
Anko shrugs her shoulders, leaning casually against a tree. "She's Jounin now, so I guess she's too expensive for your little missions."
Shuniku frowns. While Kurenai wasn't introduced during the last jounin brief on monday, Shuniku could have figured it was only a matter of time until the woman was appointed Jounin - after all, Asuma asked her to second Kurenai's recommendation a few weeks ago. But even if Kurenai really is a jounin now, it still doesn't explain why The Third would send Anko in her stead; he has never been cheap with her missions demands before - so why now?
"That's bullshit," Shuniku snorts, "Why did The Third really withdraw her?"
"I don't know," Anko drawls, picking the dirt under her fingernails with a kunai. "I heard she wants to lead a genin squad or something like that." That made sense actually; if the latest class is graduating soon, then the squad leaders need to be present for when the new teams are established.
A sliver of hope fills Shuniku; with Kurenai as Naruto's sensei there's a good chance that the team won't take on missions that are too much too handle - Kurenai is responsible like that. And if she isn't, then Shuniku can surely bully her to be more cautious, because that woman has no backbone. Then again, maybe it's not the best idea to get Naruto a squad leader that's easily convincable.
"Why do you ask me anyway? Didn't Lord Third tell you?" Anko asks, pulling Shuniku out of her thoughts.
"No he didn't," Shuniku grumbles, "And you're kind of useless to me. I need a genjutsu specialist."
Shuniku lets her gaze roam to the other two shinobi that complete her squad for the mission.
Two seemingly solid and reliable chunin by the book, but otherwise completly unremarkable - the average chunin.
She's used to working with them on missions, these two specimens especially, since her missions rarely required special abilities or particularly skilled combatants. (That's what she's here for after all.)
Except for this time, because believe it or not but genjutsu can come quite in handy - especially when you want a mission to be finished quickly with the least amount of effort, combat wise.
"...and I know for a fact that none of you are," Shuniku adds dryly.
"Well, too bad for you, you should go to The Third and cry about it if it bothers you," Anko quips, ignoring Shuniku's annoyed glower and turns to the two men. "By the way, don't think I forgot that you owe me money."
One of the guys, who until now was squatting near Anko's tree - not too far as if not to look like he's trying to avoid her, yet also not too close as not to make it seem like he's looking for companionship - gets up, rolling his eyes as he pulls out some cash and tosses it towards Anko.
Anko catches it with ease, very obviously pleased with the situation.
"Thanks for that, Shuniku," he drawls.
The other chunin, the Aburame one she had requested, judging by the amount of bugs crawling over his clothes, utters a few incomprehensible but surely not nice words under his breaths, but hands Anko his money anyway.
"... she made you bet on me?" Shuniku asks, baffled.
"Yes," Anko proclaims proudly, "those two morons thought you'd be either late or early. But I know for a fact that you're way too stubborn to be late, while your time management is too lousy for you to be early either."
"Why, thanks for having such unwavering trust in me and my abilities," Shuniku says flatly, very much annoyed by Anko's smugness.
Anko grins at her triumphantly, making Shuniku pull a face in, "No, thank you and your poor habits for making me a slightly richer woman."
Shuniku grimaces, as realization hits her that the following two weeks will be horrible.
After uselessly blinking at Anko, Shuniku shakes her head, turns around and walks out of the gate as she mock-salutes the two chunin that got stationed at the village gate to let them know they can note their names now. "Whatever, let's go."
From behind her Anko ruft, "What about the mission brief?"
"I'll brief you on the way," Shuniku calls back, increasing her speed.
"Ooh, ignoring compliance requirements," Anko chatters on like a smartass and Shuniku doesn't need to turn around to know about the smug grin on Anko's face. "Such a rebel. We love to see it."
"Shut up," Shuniku cuts her off, rolling her eyes. Then she turns to the two men of the squad who followed her without a fuss so far. "Anyone else got a problem with that?"
One shakes his head, looking as if he's never been more bored in his life.
The other seems equally disinterested but asks, "Just fetching some scrolls, like usual?"
Shuniku nods and he shakes his head, equally as bored as the other. "Then, no."
Anko gives an annoyed moan and laments under her breath about how boring Shuniku is - makig sure she's loud enough so Shuniku can hear. Shuniku ignores her and instead picks up speed as she jumps into the forest that surrounds the village, running east.
Everyone (even Anko) follows suit.
Not far from the village, about half a mile east into the woods, Shuniku motions for her squad to come closer. When they are close enough to her, so she doesn't have to shout in order for them to hear her, she explains, "This mission should be simple enough. So, about the mission. A few weeks ago allegedly someone was selling rare scrolls in Soraku, claiming they are originals from Uzushio. If that's true they must have been stolen, either before the village was destroyed or were purged from the ruins and somehow ended up in the hands of some bandits. Whatever it is, they belong to Konoha, so we'll get them."
"Get them, or steal them?" Anko chimes in.
"Well," Shuniku drawls, "I'm not going to pay for them." Why pay for something she should have a birthright to?
The not Aburame one asks, "Do we know where to steal them?"
"That's what I requested an Aburame for." Shuniku looks over her shoulder at said Aburame. His nod is enough to reassure her plan. "Then, hopefully we can snatch those scrolls away, quick and easy. Don't provoke a fight if possible." After a pause she adds, "No unneccasary drama."
She shoots Anko a meaningful stare, who's raised eyebrows tell her not to expect any promises from her. Shuniku sights. That's exactly why she wanted Kurenai on the squad, with her Genjutsus she's great at avoiding fights, unlike Anko who provokes fights with her just with her face alone.
„What's up with you? Why are you so tense?" Anko asks Shuniku, now running beside her.
"I'm not tense," Shuniku says defensively, trying her hardest to make her body relax but it works the opposite.
Anko stares at her knowingly. "Yes, you are."
Shuniku just huffs and picks up speed, so she has an excuse not to look at Anko anymore.
"Is it because of the brat?" Anko calls from behind Shuniku. When Shuniku doesn't answer, Anko addresses one of the other Shinobi. "You've been on missions with her before, right? Is she always like that? Is it because of the brat?"
"This isn't a Genin Field Trip, stop chatting and start running," Shuniku yells feeling a bit slighted, successfully shutting up her collegues before they could rant about her mission leading abilities.
To make her statement more clear, Shuniku picks up speed to a much less lackadaisical (yet arguably reasonable level.)
The others do as well, and at least for now they keep silent. Except for Anko, of course, who makes it a point to loudly complain about when Shuniku turned into such a bore, if she always had that mean streak and whether or not she encourages it.
It's a curious thing, Shuniku wonders, how Anko is so much more exhausting to put up with than a twelve year old.
A/N: Thank you for all the lovely comments. They made my week each single time!
Merry Christmas y'all!