Reckoning Arc: Achievements

"Are you still playing the same song?" Kakashi entered the house with Pakkun at his heel.

"You know that's how practice works." For someone who lived by repetition, Kakashi got annoyed by it quite easily. To be fair, it was a lot more intrusive than training. The cranes had been littered everywhere until she dumped them in a pile in her room. She was still a long way from having 10,000. Music could be heard through walls, and if it had been someone else she would be irritated too. Especially when the music wasn't refined, had many mistakes, and wasn't played at a consistent tempo. "I need to practice while Tou-chan is at the Jonin Council."

Yuina looked out the window at the sun's position. If everything had stuck to schedule, Sakumo would be done soon.

Pakkun walked over to her and she gave him all the pats and rubs who openly basks in having open affection. "Besides, Pakkun doesn't mind. Isn't that right?" Her infliction heighten slightly at the end.

"Play all you want."

Kakashi felt betrayed.

"You know, I saw Gai the other day. I didn't talk to him, but it seems he's become a genin." Yuina began rubbing around Pakkun's ears which he leaned into.

"I know." Gai had hunted Kakashi down to tell him the news as soon as he did.

"Hey! I didn't say stop," said Pakkun. Only then did Yuina realized she stopped petting him.

She gave a few more pats before standing. "I'm sure Kakashi is willing to coddle you. I should go, though. I have an appointment." She stretched. "I'll be back in time for dinner."

Yuina left and walked down the familiar streets before entering a building.

"Yuina-sensei!" Rika elbowed her husband awake from his mid-afternoon nap.

Yuina was weirded out with the suffix. Every time she had visited Rika had been insistent on using -chan. "Hakase?" Ren rubbed his eyes.

"Sensei?"

"Thanks to you we don't have to move. Sachiko's been a lot better! There hasn't been any signs of consumption for weeks." Their daughter had tuberculosis. It was easy enough to treat. Thanks to chakra there were some methods of suppression, but nothing to fully heal and the mortality rate was high, so the recommendation was usually to live in the country side with lots of fresh air. It was tragic when the solution was easy enough to make.

Ren placed a hand on Rika's shoulder. "We also think we finally figured it out."

Yuina's heart fluttered with joy before the irony sunk it. "Really?"

It had been about a ten months. She knew development could take time, but the process left her wondering if it would ever happen.

Rika clapped her hands. "I think they're tight, but they're just as you wanted." She took out a box under the counter. There was a neat stack of rubber gloves. She picked one up. Rubber was something available, though buying large quantities was much harder. There were other materials she would have preferred, nitrile, latex, or vinyl for example, but she didn't have time to synthesize everything she wanted to achieve so rubber would have to suffice. She gripped the edge and slide her hand in. It was a little large on her hand but adjusting size shouldn't be too hard to do.

"It's great." Yuina spread her fingers "How much do I owe you this time?"

"Nothing," said Ren.

"Nothing?"

"Consider it a thank you for helping our daughter."

Rika tried to lighten the tone. "Plus, you'll keep buying from us in the future, won't you?"

Yes, but it would likely be a while before they broke even on that. Especially considering her own reduction of lab hours. Maybe she should place and order and donate some to the hospital. Or gift some to Orochimaru. That would help them recoup costs. "Of course. I didn't ask you to make them just to not put them to use." To some it might seem like a wasteful practice, but she got a small chemical burn once. She didn't want another one. "Can I buy these ones now?"

She paid for the gloves before heading to the lab.

"Did the meeting finish early?" Yuina didn't expect to arrive after Orochimaru. She assumed they would still be wrapping up their meeting.

"Something like that." In truth, they ended early because they were waiting on some information to finish some of the discussions that had been on the agenda. "What was that you brought?"

Yuina looked over her shoulder where she set the gloves down. "Rubber gloves. Use them if you want to. It's a hazard prevention. Except against things that are reactants to rubber." There were reasons beyond allergies why different types of gloves existed. Some substances will eat through certain types. "Obviously."

Orochimaru began to inspect her recovering wounds. He may have been limited to what he could do when she was in imminent peril, but now that she was stabilized his biological knowledge was useful in speeding up the healing process. The first time she asked questions throughout the whole process and now she trusted him to do whatever he needed. There were parts she couldn't follow along well enough and she decided that it didn't matter as long as she felt even marginally better.

She didn't mind the hospital but she hated the beds. They were miserable excuses of a bed. Yuina didn't mind firm but they were beyond firm.

She felt her whole body relax as a nice cooling sensation spread from the area Orochimaru tended to. "Thank you, for all this— Is that my UV light?" It was small and DIY style but it was functional.

"I copied the directions you outlined from the notebook you gave me."

Right. That. The healers said she didn't have a concussion but the headaches have been frequent.

The book was half-filled with forensic-related materials. DNA phenotyping was pretty useless. There was no way to memorize every genome and factor. That's what software and databases were for. A database could be made but that was easily a long-term even if she had a whole team dedicated to it. Immunochromatography could be useful, but it would be best for someone who worked with disease control. Was that even a thing here? Her notes on proteomes were incomplete. Carbon dot powder was an interesting experiment. Finger prints were unique, but when using the Transformation Jutsu it distorts. It was interesting to see the commonalities and how they changed. She tested it herself. One could change their fingerprints under the jutsu, but the user had to know what they were transforming into so things like fingerprints were easy to forget.

Not that she believed most people knew the potential for forensics. These were the same people who would purposely design squeaky floors to alert people of intruders. They were uncommon in Konoha.

The ultraviolet light wasn't hard to make. It was easy to make a cheap version with cellophane, except cellophane was new and therefore costly here.

"I'm more interested in your wood jutsu."

Yuina couldn't remember if that was in that notebook. She had too many. "Wood chakra not jutsu." Chakra was her point of interest as it was like examining physical chemistry in a distorted pure form. She had worked on it's manipulation, but that didn't mean she knew a way to externalize it into jutsu. Probably similar to other jutsu but she had a limited knowledge pool of jutsu and her chakra was still adjusting as she grew. "I was trying to understand what the big deal is. I don't get it."

Was it because it was tied to the First Hokage? The rarity? It could be good for building home, but they already had plenty of trees and wood. Stone would be better and insulates better and is less fire prone. Wood had a fairly simple molecular composition even if those compositions were polymetric.

"The First Hokage was able to use it to such a degree that he could sprout vegetation and make complex objects. It could manipulate, suppress, and absorb chakra." Her ears peaked at the point on chakra absorption. "It was how he suppressed the tailed beasts." That was the more impressive point considering their notoriety."

"Are we sure wood release and those other abilities aren't separate? They say it's a bloodline limit, so couldn't it have been used through wood style?"

Yuina tried to hold back a wince as Orochimaru poked the area he was finishing up. "Could that not be said about all bloodline limits then?"

Yuina didn't know. It was easy enough to achieve similar outcomes when it related to an element, but what was her explanation for something like the byakugan. It's a genetic manipulation so she wanted to still say yes, but that knowledge was currently out of her grasp.

"It's less about where it comes from or how it was formed. If it's possible I want to achieve it." His thirst for knowledge was as insatiable as always.

"Spoken like a true scientist."

He stuck many needles in her. They didn't hurt and she tried to think of it like acupuncture, but it was weird to see like a hundred needles stick out of her in an isolated area. Makes her think if this is what a porcupine attack would be like.

Yuina wanted to ask a question. Things have been going well the past few weeks, but she still had a nagging feeling. She opened her mouth to speak before closing. Even if he had the answer, she didn't want to know while she was still injured.

It could wait.