Asano Kazuhiro had lost more than he ever thought he could. His parents were both shinobi, career chunin as he was himself. Only, they were among the first casualties in the Second Shinobi War, their bodies unrecoverable, and he continued to stumble his way through battlefield after battlefield, surviving more so than fighting.
He hadn't passed the rigorous graduation exam in the academy, and thus didn't get assigned to a team with a jonin sensei. Instead, he was tossed into the cesspool that was the genin corps to die taking a kunai in the place of more valuable shinobi. It was a miracle that pulled him out of what was a dead end for most, earning him a field promotion for outliving the rest of his squadron and striking a killing blow on a ranked enemy, one he could never hope to match without seven other corpses behind him.
With his parents and peers in the ground, he had only one important person left. His godfather, Imai Hisashi, had, well, not exactly raised him as he was a Jonin and far too busy with the war, but he had done what he could for Kazuhiro. The few times he had been able to drop by, after the death of Kazuhiro's parents, he took him out to eat, spoke with him, took him to the Monument to the Fallen, and even taught him jutsu.
Then, Hisashi had lost his arm, and Kazuhiro had been disgusted with himself for how ecstatic that made him. A shinobi who couldn't form hand signs was all but useless on the battlefront, where mid to long-range ninjutsu reigned supreme, so he had been forced into retirement. After a fashion. The Sandaime Tsuchikage had stationed him in Fugatoro, a small village well behind their line, as a middling defense between the lands of grass and earth.
Now, Kazuhiro was able to visit him much more frequently, as he barely had to alter his course to pass through Fugatoro on his way back from courier missions, which was all he seemed to be sent on nowadays. The injury had initially sent Hisashi into a depression, but after a year he seemed to come to peace with it.
No doubt his new wife had something to do with that. Mana was in much the same position, though Hisashi had confided to him that her career ending injury had been internal. Kazuhiro had never felt comfortable inquiring further, even though both of them had insisted, despite their lack of shared blood, that they were all family. One that would have a new addition soon, as Mana became pregnant soon after they met.
That would have gotten most kunoichi in serious trouble, so Kazuhiro kept it a secret, despite never asking his godfather if it truly needed to be. They might have gotten permission for all he knew; with Mana's disability, this might have been the best way she could contribute to the future of Iwagakure.
It didn't really matter in the end because, on his return trip to Iwagakure with messages from the front, he found Fugatoro burned to the ground, with four genin barely out of the academy digging mass graves.
"What happened here?" he asked hoarsely as one softened the earth with a jutsu, seemingly not proficient enough to fully excavate the dirt.
"Leaf attack," a girl said shortly, a pitying glance given as she correctly interpreted his loss. "Our contingency was caught off guard and overwhelmed by the strike force. There must have been ranked threats."
"Any survivors?" he whispered numbly.
"A couple," the girl said, and a spark of hope ignited within him. "They've all been taken back to Iwa."
Without another word, he took off in a dead sprint.
- - - { ワナビー } - - -
Nagai Tsuneo stepped into a room filled with scrubs and labcoats and left a completely different person. It was a cruel and depressing irony that the Henge was his most commonly used jutsu these days, despite his profession.
Any witnesses would have assumed that Tsuneo was an infiltrator, and would have attempted to either kill him or rat him out to someone who could. However, a spy or traitor he was not. He was supposed to be here, in this hospital, Henge and all.
The deception was a necessary step to hide the fact that Migaki-sho only had one medic-nin: him. The rest were false identities, created at the Tsuchikage's behest and regarded as an A-Rank secret.
Iwagakure wasn't like Konoha, who seemed to have enough medic-nin to staff every contingent. Even Tsuneo, who was the hospital's director, didn't know the real number, but he had trained half of them and doubted Iwa had more than fifty in total. All of which—aside from him—were stationed near the front lines. It was an unsustainable and dangerous practice, and Tsuneo dreaded the almost inevitable day they would lose even more and he was sent out as well. He just knew that would be the same day some disaster struck the village itself, and there would be no one left to pick up the pieces.
For now, he would continue to live this lie, taking solace in the knowledge that, for now, he was spared from attending to the most gruesome of cases.
With some exceptions. Late last night, he was roused from his bed (still in the hospital itself, as he would by necessity often go days without leaving the building entirely) to attend to an influx of burn victims from a now obliterated village to the south of Iwagakure. Only five had survived the night, and one of those would likely die in the next couple of hours. He hadn't tried his hardest to save the patient, as her chances were slim regardless and he had to conserve his chakra.
Late at night, he often wondered how many more lives he'd be able to save if he wasn't forced to maintain his Henge—low as it was, its chakra cost wasn't negligible. But he could easily guess the Sandaime's response if he were to broach the subject.
Not enough to be worth the risk.
"Goya Sensei!" a voice called out, breaking him from his reverie. He turned his head to see a panting nurse, if she could be called that. The girl was only thirteen, and Tsuneo doubted she would last another month in his hospital. Too naive, too squeamish.
"Yes?" he snapped.
"There's a man here, inquiring about the child."
Ah, yes. The child.
"A relative?" he questioned.
"Possibly," she said quickly. "We're not sure yet, with all the confusion, he is asking to see her to be sure."
"Excellent. I was just heading to the burn unit now. Bring him there," he instructed.
A minute later, he was running diagnostics over the melted face of a middle aged man he was keeping in a chakra induced coma, when the door opened noisily. The nurse—he didn't quite remember her name—led in a young man in a chunin vest, eyes red-rimmed and shoulders slumped with grief.
"Please apply salve B-6 to this patient's burns," he told the nurse, and she scampered off to obey his directives as he turned his attention to the new arrival.
"Good afternoon," Tsuneo said softly, adopting a tone more appropriate to the circumstances.
The visitor gave a short, bitter laugh. "No. No, it's not."
Tsuneo nodded in acknowledgement. "It's not," he agreed. "I'm sorry for your loss. I heard you might have ties to one of our patients."
"Maybe," the youth said roughly, swaying on his feet. "My godfather and his wife were…killed, murdered in the attack. His wife was due around a month ago, while I was away on an extended assignment. I was on my way to meet my god-sibling when…"
He trailed off with a shuddering breath, and while Tsueno wasn't cruel enough to make him finish. "We don't have any identification," he said. "The ones who received her at this facility kept her original garments, but none of them are especially unique. You're more than welcome to see them, if you think it might help.
He shook his head. "Can I just…see her?"
Tsuneo nodded, pushing him towards the back corner of the room. While the other beds were closely crammed together, separated by pipe and white drapes that smelled strongly of bleach, this incubator sat apart with as much space as possible between it and the rest. Inside, the newborn lay perfectly still, so still that, if not for the steady blip of the heart monitor, Tsuneo would have thought she was dead. On her face was a tiny breathing mask hooked up to a crinkled tube.
"She escaped the fire herself, but she must have inhaled some smoke. SIDS is not out of the question," he warned. "Fortunately, she has responded well to my medical ninjutsu, and I've cleared out her lungs. But there is already internal scarring, and it's too risky and not urgent enough to try and fix it at this stage. Her voice will likely never develop properly."
"I'm not certain I care yet," the young man responded, and Tsuneo couldn't blame him for the bluntness. If he had suffered such a loss, and if it wasn't his job, he probably wouldn't care about a random infant either.
"Do you see any defining similarities?" he asked, knowing it didn't really matter. If the young man wanted to take the kid, he would, and if he didn't, he wouldn't. As a medic-nin, he knew better than most that the brain would show a person whatever similarities or dissimilarities they wanted to see.
Then, the child's eyes snapped open, a perfectly ordinary brown, and the young man sighed.
"She's Hisashi's. She has his eyes."
Tsuneo, if he weren't a better ninja, would have sighed in relief. He was well acquainted with the orphanage matron, and he knew what dire straits the facility was in. No pleasant future would await the child there.
"Excellent. Now the question is, what now?"
"I owe it to my godfather to care for her, but I don't know if I have the means," he said. "I'm not even sure they'll wait for tomorrow to reassign me."
"Were her parents shinobi?" Tsuneo asked, receiving a nod in response. "I have the authority to write birth certificates. I'm sure no one would take issue with me officially recognizing her surname despite not being present for her birth, making her the heir to her parent's accounts."
Shinobi's wages were delivered through a centralized bank, which meant all of them were required to have accounts. If the young man before him was lucky, they'd have some funds saved up to help provide for their daughter.
"It will be a simple matter for you to adopt her, giving you full access to them." Taking into account Iwa's current priorities, the process wasn't nearly as thorough as it ought to have been.
"And regarding your reassignment…hmm. Unfortunately, I do believe you've come down with a case of chakra poisoning. I apologize, but given the current occupancy of this hospital and your rank, I cannot authorize the use of medical chakra to clear out your pathways. Luckily for you, your variant will clear up in around a month on its own. During that time, I must insist that you stay within the village to rest, and you are forbidden from any usage of chakra until you have fully recovered. I'm sorry, but my verdict is final, and a report will find its way to the…" he spied an identifying patch on his vest, "seventh division commander's desk."
"I…thank you. Thank you, sensei."
"I have done nothing for which you should be thankful for," Tsuneo said smoothly. "We are each doing our solemn duty to Iwa and her future. On that note, I need to collect some information in order to draft her birth certificate."
He pulled out a pencil and pad of paper. "Father?"
"Imai Hisashi," he said, voice thick.
"Mother?"
"Omori Mana."
"Date of birth…well. She's clearly only a month old, so we'll say…November 2nd. How does that sound?" he received a nod of agreement. "Then finally, we need a name. Had your godfather shared any prospective names with you?"
"No," was the short response.
"Then you must come up with one."
It was a bit unfair to force the young man to name a human on the spot—parents would agonize for months or even years over the task—but there wasn't much of an alternative. It seemed, however, that the child's new guardian had an idea.
As he looked up from the ground, Tsuneo could see the hate in his eyes.
"Kasaiki," he whispered, visibly shuddering in fury as the name left his lips. The sound gave Tsuneo goosebumps.
"Are you sure that's the future you want for her?" he attempted. "A name is a powerful thing. I do not say this as a reproach or with judgment. But such a name cannot be misinterpreted. People will treat her differently."
"She deserves to be treated differently," the young man said stiffly. "She is the daughter of two disabled and retired jonin, murdered just one month after her birth by Konoha shinobi. Kasaiki is her past and her future."
Tsuneo sighed heavily, knowing what challenges such a name would bring. A part of him hoped she wouldn't make it into the bingo book, but a bigger part suspected it was unavoidable.
"Kasaiki, then," the medic-nin finally said, writing down the kanji. "And the last name?"
"Imai."
"Imai Kasaiki," Tsuneo murmured. "It will certainly turn heads."
He eyed the child in question, who continued to stare at them with a frankly unnatural level of comprehension. She remained completely motionless like she always had, blinking lazily at them. She was, unfortunately, not the first or even second baby he had treated for smoke inhalation, but was, also unfortunately, the first to live. The others cried their heads off, choking on their own blood until their tiny lungs collapsed. But Kasaiki never made a peep, even after he rinsed her entire respiratory system out with a delicate application of water-natured chakra. He knew from people with the ability to speak that the process was incredibly uncomfortable, but all this child did was clench her fists.
"See me for a checkup in a month's time," he said to the little monster's new guardian. "Regarding your case of chakra poisoning. Some symptoms you might experience are shortness of breath, bouts of dizziness, fatigue pain in one or more of the gates. Everyone heals at a different rate, and it is possible you might need more time than I projected to fully recover."
His gaze flitted back to the incubator. "Imai-chan will have to stay for a couple more days. Use that time to secure her adoption and purchase the necessary supplies. Stop by the front desk, and we can share some literature with you. Now, if you'll excuse me."
Goya Sensei had to make a house call. And while he was away, Higa Sensei had more work to do. If anyone noticed that they, along with the other four medic-nin attending Migaki-sho, were never in the same room together, they had the good sense to keep their mouths shut.
- - - { ワナビー } - - -
The land of Frost wasn't nearly as inhospitable as its name suggested, something that should have been obvious to anyone who could read a map. It was right next to the Land of Hot Springs, after all, the country known for its year long summers. The Land of Frost was mostly named after the snow-capped mountains that ran up the coast and deep into the Land of Lightning, and after the early morning dew that froze into intricate patterns before being melted away by the midday sun.
Being right at Kumogakure's doorstep, the country had been heavily occupied for the duration of the second shinobi war. Now, at a particularly unassuming inlet off the eastern coast, it would host possibly the most unusual meeting the elemental nations had seen since the last five kage summit.
"I feel I should be insulted," the much larger of the two growled, baring teeth filed into points. He had auburn hair styled into two buns, possessed green, triangular markings along his cheeks and carried a sword as impressively massive as he was on his back, secured with leather straps.
"And why is that?" the much more normal looking of the two asked.
"We are at the Raikage's doorstep, and yet he sends a child to speak on his behalf."
"It speaks more to the Raikage's trust in me than any disrespect towards you, Kenshi-san," he quickly assured. "I may be younger than you, but I am a jonin, and the Raikage's personal attendant and advisor. I already act on his behalf much of the time, and with a topic as urgent as this, I am the only one who can negotiate in his stead. The Raikage, see, does not believe in giving orders from his office in Kumo. No, he is a man of action, no doubt on the front lines as we speak."
The giant scoffed, but his body language grew a touch less hostile. "Fine then. Where's the other one?"
"How should I know? I don't—"
"Need to worry," a new voice cut in, and they both looked up to see a woman hovering above them, arms splayed to each side. Hoisting her into the air were hundreds of wasps, and though there were so many of them, neither of the others could so much as hear a trace of buzzing from insect's wingbeats.
"The Sandaime was most curious about the subject of this meeting," the woman stated as the insects deposited her to the ground. The Kumo delegate nearly shuddered as the creatures all crawled under her sleeves. "So he sent me to hear you out."
"Kamizuru Kimiko," the giant man identified. "That's more like it."
The Kumo representative rolled his eyes. "Then we best begin our discussion. The Raikage would like to propose a temporary alliance, centered around the fulfillment of a certain goal."
"A certain goal?" the woman mused. "One certain goal?"
"One goal, but not a simple one. Iwagakure, Kirigakure, Kumogakure. We are all mighty, but still we are forced to the outskirts of the continent. Meanwhile, the central east—some of the most fertile and wealthy land to exist—is controlled by an alliance consisting of Takigakure, Kusagakure, and of course, Konohagakure. Their armies are mainly contending with Suna for now, though I believe they are acting out against Iwa as well, is that correct Kamizuru-san?"
"Don't ask questions you already know the answer to," she said, unimpressed.
"Of course, of course. Well, Konoha will win against Suna—the sandmen put up a better fight than I expected, but their defeat was always a foregone conclusion. However, it gives us an opportunity, one to finally crack the lock they have over this region. It's not something Kumo can do alone."
"Kiri has stayed out of this war, so far," the giant said. "It suits us to grow in strength as our rivals weaken each other."
"Oh, but Kiri is the hidden village that stands to gain the most from this venture," the Kumo delegate proclaimed, and the giant regarded him for a moment before waving his hand testilly.
"Spit it out then," he rumbled. "I have no patience for these games."
"There is one unifying link between these allied countries we have discovered," the delegate revealed. "You both know it well, I'm sure. A not so little island off the eastern coast of the land of fire. Right between it and Kiri, as a matter of fact."
"Uzushio," the giant identified immediately. "They've been a pain in our ass for decades. But why would Kumo or Iwa care about it?"
"Because their export, seals, are what unites Konoha, Taki and Kusa. And although not militarily aligned, they play a big role in Konoha's trade with the Land of Tea as well. If we can get rid of their seal masters, they will turn on one another like dogs fighting over scraps."
"That seems like a stretch," Kimiko stated. "I would think it would be more likely for them to take revenge at any cost."
"How would they?" he countered. "Our proposed plan is for you, Iwa, to engage the Konoha army as soon as they defeat Suna, before they retreat from their western front. Meanwhile, Kumo will rendezvous with Kiri on the islands, and they will provide us transportation over the treacherous waters surrounding Uzu. We will do the dirty work of taking the village. Konoha won't have time to react, and they'll be so beaten by the end of it they won't be able to retaliate."
"It still seems like a lot of work for an ambiguous payout," Kimiko stated.
"The broken alliance is only the greatest short-term benefit," he said. "There are more to consider. Uzu and Konoha are basically sisters—if we take either out, the other might never recover. Then there is the matter of their seals. They pose a great threat to us, and have reaped devastation on all of our armies. And finally, there are the biju to consider. The Shodaime Hokage distributed them to us, but do you truly think it was as a gesture of good will as he claimed? When the only ones who can truly control the beasts reside in Konoha and Uzushio? The Mokuton may have been lost with the first, but they still have plenty of Uchiha and, along with Uzumaki. Our Jinchuriki are time bombs, ones we welcomed into the hearts of our villages, that Konoha can detonate almost at will. They may be powerful assets, but how long will it be until they're turned against us?"
"Speak for yourself," Kimiko said. "We of Iwa are not so naive—we've known this all along. That is why we don't allow our jinchuriki to set foot in the village proper."
"But wouldn't you rather not worry about it at all?" he pressed. "Wouldn't you like to be able to deploy one of your greatest military assets without having to worry about them being constrained and corrupted by the Uzumaki's Adamantine Chains and seals?"
"I see through your flowery words," the Kiri delegate spoke up. "You don't simply want to remove a threat. You also want to take their power for your own. The Raikage isn't gracious enough to do the dirty work," he scoffed, "himself. He wants to steal all of their sealing knowledge for Kumo."
"And maybe some of their bloodline as well," Kimiko said, wrinkling her nose. "It certainly wouldn't be the first time. I do recognize you by the way, mister advisor. I've seen your bingo book entry. How did the lava release end up in the Land of Lightning, I wonder? It is native to Iwa, you know. Anything you'd like to share?"
"Elemental bloodlines arise on occasion as a result of random mutation," he said stiffly. "I have a friend with the magnet release as well, which had previously only been seen in Suna."
"Funny," she said without humor. "Funny how these random mutations only ever seem to pop up in Kumo. We in Iwa have never benefited from a random mutation, have any in your village, Fuguki-san?"
"None that I'm aware of," the swordsman answered.
"I thought not." She shifted her posture, and the Kumo nin stiffened as killing intent began to trickle out of her like melted snow from atop Frost's mountains after the first caress of the morning sun. "If you're going to plunder Uzu, leaving us to shoulder the burden of distracting Konoha and all of their outrageous clans, then we will get some of the reward."
"Kiri as well," the other cut in. "It's called the Whirling Tides for a reason—do you think you can navigate them yourselves?"
The Kumo delegate sighed. "This is something our kage will have to hash out amongst themselves, I believe. Aside from that small objection, what do you think?"
"I'm sure the Mizukage will be interested," the Kiri nin responded after a moment's thought. "As I said, Uzushio has been a thorn in our side for decades."
"I will relay the message to the Sandaime," Kimiko allowed. "After recent events, he wants his pound of flesh from Konoha."
"Excellent," the Kumo delegate said. "The Raikage eagerly awaits their formal replies."
- - - { ワナビー } - - -
AN: To be clear, Tsuneo wouldn't falsely diagnose just anyone for such a reason. Kazuhiro is a nobody courier chunin—the hospital director can tell he's unimportant from a glance at the 7th division badge. Even with the war ramping up, Iwa can survive without him for a month or longer. Tsuneo knows the war will end eventually for better or for worse, and when that happens, Iwa will need some marginally stable members of the next generation to pick up the pieces. The fact that Kasaiki's birth parents were both retired jonin, which bodes well for her future potential, was just icing on the cake
Also—I did thorough research on the second shinobi war, and it doesn't make any sense. Much of the fighting took place in the land of Mountains? Who was allied with Konoha? Why? It's so far out of the way—Iwa is between them. And Kumo tried to invade Ame? They aren't nearly next to each other either. I've decided to simply scrap canon when it came to the specifics of this war, not that there was much information to begin with.
I am not a Japanese speaker in any sense of the word, but I tried to do a considerable amount of research when coming up with names. Most were chosen with purpose, and I encourage you to look up their meanings. My greatest challenge was Kasaiki, which is derived from Kasai, meaning fire, and Ki, which means tree. From my understanding, many Japanese names (and this holds true in all cultures around the world as well) are centered around the parent's hopes for the child's future. Kazuhiro, furious and grieving, is hoping that Kasaiki will grow up to burn Konoha to the ground. Basically, he's swearing vengeance upon them, and stating that his grudge will be passed on to the child under his care.
My headcanon is that Kushina isn't nearly the strongest Adamantine Chain wielder, and she was able to hold back the Kyuubi no problem. If a stronger Uzumaki is on the battlefield, I would consider it absolutely pointless or even dangerous to bring out a biju.