Notes: Sorry about the delay. This chapter decided to be difficult.

(Everyone in this chapter probably needs to see a therapist.)

Obito leaned over carefully, as though he had to even bother whispering given all the background noise. It wasn't like anyone was going to read his lips through the blue-streaked ANBU mask. A similar problem was presented by the fact that they stood on a rooftop three blocks away from the crisis management area, using some building with gargoyles on it as a secondary rendezvous point. Still, with the air of someone passing on a secret and not being too careful about it, he said, "I think you're in trouble."

Kei did not elbow him in the face because she was too short for a good angle, and would swing her arm right through him even if she tried. Instead, she just replied, "What brought you to that conclusion?"

Obito snorted. He tilted the other way, which gave him a better view of the chaos below with his eye. That was a lot of broken stuff and flashing lights and angry people. They didn't have chakra, but they were organized, which was better. "Figured the widespread destruction of property and all the spooked civilians counted as hints. You're getting a bit predictable."

"There is that," Kei said, scrunching herself a little into her own frame as she folded her arms sullenly.

There was that, always that. While Kei preferred to use the minimum amount of energy possible to solve her problems—less, if she could finagle a way to get explosives involved—she'd been pushed too far tonight. Her temper roused, and then Isobu wanted in, and then the metal things with wheels got kicked around like tin cans. And, of course, the number of things she could do with that power were always a little terrifying, which civilians never liked. While Obito would've been really surprised to learn she or Hayate directly killed a real human tonight, there were Zetsu corpses melting into the street and being washed into sewers by rain. He'd helped pile them up like firewood. It was hard to miss the wary looks that resulted. A brief headcount indicated six dead emergency workers and four dead civilians, having been briefly lined up on the sidewalk under black tarps until transportation could arrive.

Not a great look, was Obito's humble opinion.

After the fighting ended and the rest of the local authorities arrived, Kei had barely unwound enough to hug Obito, Rin, and Kakashi in that order. It wasn't until she took down all her barrier jutsu that the guy with the weird skintight outfit and the bird emblem finally told them to go wait on a roof. When asked, he specified a place that had a roof overhang that kept them from being drowned on dry land, at least. The storm sucked.

It was probably mostly to get them out of the way.

And, well, battlefield cleanup was pretty grim work. Obito knew that one down to his remaining bones. Though she hadn't done a stint specifically as the person hauling bodies into grave pits, Rin kept involved. She didn't actually retreat until a medic, specifically, told her things would go better without her. At least, that was the feeling Obito got.

"Did you get our messages?" Kakashi asked, cautious like he knew he was tiptoeing around broken glass. Since the fight, he'd dropped right past calm and into a kind of melancholy. That was a microcosm of the last month.

"Mm-hm." Kei made a noise that might've been a watery laugh, but the mask muffled it. "Is it good or bad that that's the first time I cried since I got here?"

Going by that spike of alarm in Kakashi's body language, maybe not good? Obito cleared his throat, then said, "Sorry about that. I, uh, guess we just really had a lot of feelings to get across."

"Y-Yeah," Kei managed. Her voice was a little squeaky. "I guess."

After a couple of seconds, Kei lifted her hands to rub firmly at her temples. Even with her face hidden, her headache was pretty obvious. With his Sharingan active, Obito could easily see the orange glow of Isobu's chakra pooling reluctantly under her fingers and trying to soothe it.

Rin edged closer to Kei and looped an arm around her waist. After a second where Kei went all rigid like a cat, she let Rin settle in and apply pressure. Her chakra overwrote Isobu's, replacing it with something more precise, and some of that tension seeped out of Kei's frame. Rin asked, "Have you been hurting the whole time?"

Kei nodded. Still sounding a little snotty, she said, "Something in the air, I think."

Yeah, this place was a real bad one for Kei. Grasping for a different topic, Obito asked, "So, what's with the weirdos in costumes?"

Kakashi sighed. "Obito, we're weirdos in costumes."

"It's—well, we're not exactly in uniform, I guess, but hey, it's just being prepared." With that weird avalanche of a sentence complete, Obito pouted. He knew what it sounded like. "I'm not wearing something cut that tight."

As far as Obito was concerned, Gai could make his own life choices. And if Gai's life choices included leaving basically nothing to the imagination, that was both his choice and everyone else's problem. There was a certain enviable confidence oozing from his every pore.

Rin glanced at him. "Gai—"

"Still wears a flak jacket, dammit." Obito shuddered more for effect than anything, but maybe the weather also sucked. He wouldn't have been surprised if the thermometers around here recorded a temperature barely above freezing. Why would anyone willingly choose to live here in winter and not stay safe in Konoha? Obviously, Kei would've chosen differently, but Hayate seemed like he was getting along with frankly offensive cheer.

"I'm starting to think maybe you have a problem with spandex." Kei sagged a little as the remaining adrenaline left her system, but at least she sounded amused.

Obito made a show of groaning into his hands, even with the mask. That wasn't in doubt. And it kept up the bit. "Anyway, I had a point when I started. Right, weirdos. Why?"

Kei's body language screamed, "I don't want to talk about this." All she actually said was, "That's a long story."

"Can we have the shorter version?" Obito asked with a whine, as though he hadn't noticed her discomfort.

Kei wriggled out of Rin's grip—an impressive feat these days—and searched the rooftop for something specific, by the way she was moving. After she spotted a security camera, she waved at it and said something in a language Obito definitely didn't understand. It did sound like a question, though.

The camera bobbed up and down in a clear nod.

Obito was gonna have to ask about that later.

"The local masked weirdos," Kei said, turning back to the three of them, "have control over who gets to see or hear what we do here. Which is probably why they wanted us on this roof. It keeps them safe."

"I take it they have enemies." Kakashi fished around in one of his ANBU uniform pockets until he withdrew a totally different cloth mask and held it out for the group to inspect. Going by the design, it belonged to one of the totally interchangeable people who worked for Sideburns Cape Guy in that secret glowy basement. "Or are just paranoid."

"People are definitely out to get them. Hence the elaborate disguise routines," Kei muttered. She picked up the cloth thing and turned it inside-out, sticking her fingers through the eyeholes. "This world has a really wide range of threats, and these masked heroes pop up to try and deal with the weird stuff. In this city, it's mostly corruption and other creeps in strange costumes. Nobody has chakra, but they do have other weapons."

Rin tilted her head questioningly, trying to catch Kei's gaze. "Is that why you had us use fake names?"

"No one who goes around in a cape and costume uses their real ones." Kei continued fussing with the fabric as she spoke. "There's this expectation that if someone knows your real name, you'll be a target. Sort of like ANBU."

It made sense, but it wasn't quite the same rationale used in ANBU. There, the point was that no one could be traced back to the village and linked to less-than-legal decisions made in foreign countries. Or know who was paid for a given assassination. Ordinary shinobi, particularly in peacetime, cared more about concealing their strength than their faces, because fame made it paradoxically easier to achieve certain goals.

Like Sensei repeatedly running off all of Iwagakure. Nobody who fought alongside him had to risk their lives as much during the war if the enemy just turned tail and ran.

"Other people could probably explain this better," Kei admitted. "The only really important thing to know is that none of the heroes are willing to kill. So, try to avoid it." She shook herself a little, scattering raindrops here and there like an umbrella, and turned directly to Obito with intensity she usually reserved for fights. "Can you get us home?"

Obito felt embarrassed heat rush to his cheeks. Well, one of them. "About that…"

Kei read his hesitation clear as day. "Fuck. What did it take you to get here?"

Oh, only a month's worth of super experimental fūinjutsu etched into his fake arm. They'd done their best with just ink until that scroll delivery, but the backlash was too high for all they'd managed to send Kei and Hayate's way. While Sensei promised he'd put it back later, the work done since then to stabilize the connection had kinda-sorta cracked something fundamental. Obito didn't know how to put it into words in a way that encompassed the entire situation, but the closest comparison was probably a sprain.

And he'd maybe burned out a couple of the seals in the process. His right arm didn't usually have enough sensation to itch, so that was probably a bad sign.

Instead of letting all of that out into the air so it could stay on film forever, Obito said, "A lot. We all agreed it was more important to get here than to wait for Sensei and the others to keep experimenting. Even if it'd be a one-way trip."

"But—"

"You were getting overwhelmed," Rin said sharply, smacking Kei's bicep with the back of her hand. "Whoever runs this army of Zetsu clones is clearly after you, and you can't be everywhere at once! And don't think we missed that trick you pulled with Isobu, either. How much did you hurt yourself that time, Kei?"

Kei remained worryingly silent.

Rin sighed. "We can circle back to that later, then. I don't know enough fūinjutsu to help, but maybe someone does."

Meaning: Kakashi and Obito maybe kinda-sorta memorized enough fūinjutsu scribbling over the last month via Sharingan to supply Kei with some notes! Hopefully, they were even remotely relevant to Kei's ongoing attempts to shake her stalkers. And if they weren't, Obito had a lot of faith in their team's ability to wreck everything that got in their way, with bonus violence allotted because of stalkers generally being acceptable targets.

"Mm-hm," was Kei's lackluster response.

"Where's your brother?" Kakashi asked, which would've been a question for way earlier in this conversation if not for Kei's lack of worry on the topic. Like, if she hadn't immediately sent Obito after him, then maybe there wasn't a problem?

Kei unfroze a little and waved vaguely in the direction of the next island to the south. "He's safe for now." Before Obito could call her on that surprising calm, she went on, "When you were checking in on us, did you see him with a man wearing a red helmet? If what he's told me was accurate, he spent most of his time hanging around that guy."

That startled a snort out of Obito, and Rin ducked her head as though to hide it. Obito waved off Kei's concerned twitch in his direction. "Uh, it was a little hard to miss. I've never seen that kid give anyone that much attitude and get away with it before."

"'Akaboshi-niisan' is a pushover between crime sprees." Obito's eyebrows rose without his permission as he registered the sheer amount of scorn in Kei's voice. She tossed her head like she was rolling her hidden eyes and continued, "But he's safer there, given all this."

There was a brief pause in the conversation, as all of them tried to absorb Kei's bad mood.

Then, Kakashi broke it with, "I can't believe it. You're jealous."

"I am not," Kei snapped, too quickly to be trusted. She clearly bit back whatever names she wanted to call Akaboshi besides the obvious.

"You totally are!" Obito nudged her shoulder as she bristled like an angry cat, knocking her just that little bit off-balance. Okay, so maybe Akaboshi was a huge jerk or a murderer or something, but Obito knew Hayate's intuition about people was reliable. If Kei was genuinely worried for his safety around this other masked weirdo, she'd have run after him immediately. "Tell me he knows."

"Which 'he' would be funnier?" Rin pondered.

Obito didn't even have to think about it. "If we noticed, the kid definitely already knows about it. Only one left is Akaboshi!"

"And to think I missed you," Kei grumbled. She let herself be tugged sideways into a hug by Obito, but she kept her arms crossed even as she relaxed almost against her will. "Hell if I know why."

"We love you too," Rin chirped. After the month she'd had, Obito figured they could all forgive a bit of sulking, and it seemed like Rin agreed.

Kakashi could've taken that opportunity to maybe finally confess a certain thing or two, but no. Instead, he remained silent as he drew his katana and sent sparks curling along its length. They were downwind of the wreckage of Kei's big brawl with the Zetsu clones, so it wasn't that surprising he noticed something wrong first.

As for Obito's part, he activated his Sharingan again and spotted the problem a half-second later. Without a chakra system, Nightwing didn't really stand out against the background except when he moved, but Obito caught that immediately. He still got the same Sharingan brain-itch that let him know he'd be able to mimic those movements later.

Yeah, cool flips, but that hook-shooty device wasn't better than Obito's actual jumping ability. At least, he didn't think so.

"I come in peace," Nightwing said as he finally walked up to them. While his accent was pretty good, Obito was more interested in finally getting a good look at someone speaking the language they used here. While he and Kakashi had tried through the crystal ball recordings, the lack of sound was a major pain in the ass. "We aren't expecting any more new arrivals, are we?"

Kakashi sheathed his sword again, wordlessly accepting Nightwing's presence. It probably had less to do with the man's actual personality and relied a lot more on Kei's total dismissal of the guy as a threat. She had barrier-bubbled him for being too squishy to survive melee combat.

Not that Obito was going to be shy about copying his moves or anything.

"The next ones through will probably be insects again, so you might not spot them immediately," Rin suggested. Mask or not, it was pretty easy to recognize Rin's thoughtful body language and the rising spirit of scientific enquiry. "Arthropods tend to survive the journey better, at least through the main methods we've managed to develop thus far. I hope they're still recording."

There was a brief silence as Nightwing looked at all of them as though expecting extra legs or carapaces.

"I'm not an arthropod that I know of, but I have one," was the totally normal way to continue that thought, and then Rin pulled her brand new summoned buddy out of one of her sleeves.

"…Kirin," Kei said after a careful moment as the scorpion uncurled, noticed the temperature, and curled up again, "I don't think Nightwing wants to meet your pet right now."

"She's not a pet. I signed a summon contract," Rin protested, tucking her friend up against her chest and making Nightwing clearly fight the urge between wincing and lunging to protect her. Rin pretended not to notice. "If she was a pet, I'd have left her at home with Sasa-chan. But not in the same terrarium, I think."

Capable of complaining about the cold with actual words (sometimes), the red-and-green Ichigo was a fat-knuckled scorpion the size of Rin's entire palm. Obito saw the tail coil entirely up to defend its length from the winter weather, the legs bunched up, and the claws tuck close to her body, and figured Ichigo was not about to be useful today.

It was not the most terrifying thing Rin could have done when left to stew in her frustration over not being able to help for a solid month. Undirected summoning attempts had ended worse for other people, sure, but Rin came back alive and without losing any limbs. The actual bad choices—asking Nagato about the Ten-Tails statue and Zetsu stocks, for example—weren't even on her list.

Maybe if not for the scorpions, they could've been.

"…I'm sorry, why do you have a scorpion in your pocket?" Nightwing asked at last. "Not that it bugs me that much. I know love's in the eye of the bee-holder."

Not another one, Obito thought, with only the quickest possible glance at Kakashi. Didn't even turn his head. Maybe if he didn't say anything, Kakashi wouldn't join in.

"Just go with it," Kei suggested to Nightwing, sounding exhausted all over again. She edged forward so Rin was safely tucked behind her, a common habit leftover from the war. "So, now what?"

Nightwing shook himself as the four of them all focused their attention on him, for basically the first time since the corpse collecting interlude. There was still white Zetsu-mush clinging to his costume despite the rain, and he looked even more like someone papering over "tired" with "determination" than Kei did. Maybe that was what it was like to live as someone without chakra? There was a part of Obito that wondered how Nightwing—or any of the people like him—even functioned, biologically.

Kei was clearly used to it, but Obito? Nah.

(Rin hid Ichigo up her sleeve again.)

"We need to talk," said Nightwing. "Something's been bugging me about all of this."

"At least come out of the rain first," Obito suggested, like he hadn't noticed the wariness in Nightwing's body language. It wasn't that different from most people after they realized Kei could totally rip someone's limbs off barehanded, and this guy was outnumbered four-to-one.

Kei noticed too, going by the way she made a point to shift from a defensive to a more open stance. It was mostly in the shoulders. "All right. What's the first thing?"

Nightwing clearly reshuffled his priorities a little when Kei asked, before coming up with, "So, can we run through introductions properly? It'd be nice to know who we're working with amid all these convergent crises."

Pff, the city wasn't even mostly on fire. And that part that burned had mostly gotten to the sad midnight smoldering stage by now.

"Kirin, Byakko, Seiryū, and Genbu," Kei rattled off as she pointed to each teammate, once she got confirmation from Kakashi that he would follow her lead when dealing with Nightwing. It was a very subtle tweak of his chakra, because of course Kakashi was still too wired to unbend enough even for a nod. "The medic, the strategist, the infiltrator, and the heavy hitter, in that order. Byakko has command."

And not even a tiny twitch to react to Isobu's inevitable corrections. Obito was reluctantly impressed.

There had to be some information that Kei handed to this guy ahead of time, because he didn't question that assignment of roles. "Then what role does Suzaku play?"

"The apprentice," Kei said, a little too casually.

Obito did not laugh. But it took some effort; after all his involvement so far, Hayate would have some very pointed things to say about his sister downplaying his importance. He had his pride. And Kei, undoubtedly, had a reason to make him sound less responsible than he was.

Might've had something to do with the occasional killings. Obito would have to ask the kid about what happened.

At least Nightwing accepted that. Though that playful edge to his mannerisms wasn't entirely gone, there was still worry etched into his general bearing. "You already knew what those things were when the fight broke out. What can you tell me?"

"We call them 'Zetsu clones,'" Kei told him immediately, as though the information had been primed to burst out of her for way too long.

Between Rin (biological un-fun facts), Kakashi (procedural details), and Kei (the one dealing with most of the bullshit), Obito figured they mostly had the explanation covered. Obito's main contribution to the presentation was holding a Kamui-transported whiteboard steady as Rin drew out her anatomy chart and explained how to keep the bad guys from getting back up. They also had a nasty tendency to eat humans kinda just because they wanted to, usually after breaking necks. Guruguru and White Zetsu's old conversations with Obito served as proof that they didn't need to eat, or even have a digestive system worth the name. He mentioned it during the presentation, and it was added to the pile.

And despite that kind of clinical way to putting things, Obito remembered all the horrible squelching and ripping sounds from the Konoha invasion perfectly fucking well. Even three years later. His Sharingan burned the images into his brain like red-hot brands. It wove some more information into his memory like he wanted to know exactly the motions needed to rend flesh from bone. Like he somehow needed to know the perfect leverage to facilitate cannibalism.

Obito just tried really hard not to think about it. To fill his life and mind with, frankly, better things. It'd crowd out the bad eventually.

"How fast do they replicate?" Nightwing asked in the middle of that. It was right after the part where Rin explained how Zetsu clones could copy a person's appearance after touching them, which soothed most of the man's lingering resentment about how Kakashi decided to deal with his fake little brother.

"One can spawn at least five more." Kakashi's voice was completely even, like he hadn't fought in the same horrible battles Obito had.

"Great." It was more of an aside than anything. Nightwing had a thinking pose a little like Sensei's, crossing one arm over his chest while the opposite hand tapped against his chin. "How many do you think there are in the city? You've been here, what, a month? Assuming they could replicate exponentially—"

Well, since Team Minato had cleared out the immediate area with extreme prejudice…?

"Probably hundreds, if they wasted this much mass on a single attack," was Kei's response. She had her hand on her hip and her fingers drumming as she thought. She'd handed the enemy ninja's cloth mask thing to Kakashi to stow it away. "But each successive budding is weaker, and they're not great strategists. It's just that quality and quantity aren't totally separate."

"And they're working for that guy in the green cape," Obito put in. He mimed the strange man's double-horned hairstyle, just to make his point. "We tried sending you evidence of the time we got Shimika-senpai's bugs into their base and spied on them, but… Wait, where did that go, anyway?"

Nightwing looked outright baffled, just for a second. Then there was a sort of sharpening effect as all of his features—baring what little was hidden by the thin strip of a mask—focused. "That's news to me. What evidence?"

"It's on a tape," Kei said, spreading her hands apologetically. She'd probably stowed it in a storage scroll. "I was still working on getting all this compiled for your people when Robin showed up. Once he did, things went wrong within ten minutes. League of Assassins stuff. I had my brother take pictures of what he could, but the only person he'd have sent them to was probably—"

"—Akaboshi?" Rin guessed. She whistled behind her mask. "You were probably right to be jealous."

"Don't even start." Kei sighed through her teeth this time. It was more of a groan.

Nightwing said something that was probably in his language, and this time Obito got his Sharingan input lined up with his ears in time to catch "Red Hood." Which didn't mean the same thing, but it sounded like a translation everyone had more or less agreed on. Also, Nightwing's tone was even more unhappy with the development than it had been before. He'd raised a hand to an in-ear thing that was probably a radio, but with fewer wires than normal.

"I still have the original paperwork, so I can share that. Though I'm pretty sure my brother destroyed his phone during the fight, so it's not like I can grab his pictures," Kei admitted, watching Nightwing closely. Obito kind of wanted to know what a "phone" was, but it didn't seem appropriate to ask. Maybe it was like a radio; Hayate had killed enough of those that Kei sometimes complained that his sensei was complaining about it. "But I didn't send him and Robin off alone. Tsuruya took them, and she has orders to take down anyone or anything that tries to hurt them."

Since Tsuruya was basically a whole wall of swords in the shape of a bird, that seemed pretty safe. Though, because of that fact, Kei was probably fudging the order a little. Tsuruya took her bodyguarding shifts more seriously than was probably legal in some places.

To Nightwing's credit, he'd adapted to having to fight a shitload of Zetsu clones pretty well. Ducking and weaving was a good strategy for anybody who couldn't (or wouldn't) kill them outright. Lightning did okay against them if there was follow-through, but it seemed like the sparks on Nightwing's weapons didn't help when it came to making cuts. Only the really squishy clones stayed down when hit anywhere but the head or heart, though.

Nightwing was still talking. Maybe Obito needed to pay attention.

"—until your barrier blocked the signals."

Yeah, that didn't make sense. What?

"I already apologized for that," Kei was saying. It sounded like she knew what was going on, at least. "You could still call afterward, right?"

"Yeah, Agent A and O already replied." Nightwing frowned, scanning the city. Oh, he was talking about radio stuff. "But B's been silent so far."

Kei didn't ask, though the tension in her spine implied she'd have liked to. She definitely knew way more than she was saying, but that was common for Kei. What wasn't common was the fact that she was letting it show. Obito didn't usually see Kei get her hackles up over that kind of thing until they were safely away from witnesses and she could report to Sensei instead. She even hid that kind of thing from Hayate. Obito wasn't sure what she told him about her many mysterious absences to go deal with special future knowledge stuff.

Actually… Obito frowned at the thought. While Kei said her future knowledge was a one-time deal, and she made her predictions based on that, she got along pretty well in this city. Like, she was miserable, but Kei hadn't been hurt, except by stuff she did herself, and she only had a month to learn everything about a place a hundred times bigger and weirder than Konoha. The Great Toad Sage's prophecies were weird and vague enough that even he didn't entirely know what he was talking about, but Kei's wasn't. She seemed to get way more detail and have more time to think things over. Maybe that was why she seemed to have figured out their language, too.

Between that thought process and keeping busy scooping Rin's diagram supplies back into Kamui, Obito left the serious stuff to other people. Rin was trying to find a spot in the conversation to interrogate Nightwing about something, maybe his no-chakra flips. Kei was saying something in that other language, and Nightwing was trying to juggle both conversations.

Kakashi once again noticed a problem before the rest of them and drew his sword.

Kei put one finger on the tip of his katana and nudged it away from the guy with the body armor, cape, and little ears on his cowl.

And while that happened, Nightwing had drawn his escrima and angled himself against Kakashi, the most obvious immediate threat, but settled when Kei intervened.

Obito kind of remembered this guy, though for the most part he wasn't that important to Konoha's surveillance up until this point. He didn't hang out with Kei or Hayate, which made him kind of boring. He still waved with his left hand, now free of the whiteboard and other objects.

As the man stalked closer, Obito picked up other details despite his lack of chakra. While this man was taller and older than Nightwing, they shared a degree of training that suggested a master-apprentice relationship. There was a barely-detectable stiffness to his movements that could also either be an old injury playing up or the result of wearing heavier armor under the gray layers of the costume. At a glance, Obito wasn't sure. And though the rain was well underway, there was a layer of dust and crumbly stuff stuck in the crevices, and the smell was a hint of residual explosives and burned electronics.

Hm. Thinking of it now, Obito recognized Nightwing's movement tempo from the occasions when Akaboshi—Red Hood—did his flippy stuff. The guy might've preferred long-range fights, but he wasn't a slouch in melee and Hayate didn't seem to find him too slow to work with. That was maybe another tally in the "ally" side of the chart.

"Batman," Kei said, as flat and cold as a midwinter Kirigakure lake. "Busy night?"

Those were not bat ears on that headpiece. They were too…pointy. Like little baby goat horns. They were even shorter than the ones on Kei's mask. Nightwing had lied.

"Status report, Genbu," Batman asked without so much as a courtesy bow.

"No." With a motion so quick Obito might not have caught it if he wasn't using his Sharingan, Kakashi stood between Kei and Batman with his shoulders squared and his stance firmly in the not-to-be-fucked-with zone. It was also the starting position to a taijutsu sequence that Gai perfected with him, so it'd probably kill anyone besides another jōnin. "She doesn't answer to you."

"Captain," Kei said, and allowed it.

Ordinarily, she wouldn't. Technically, the command structure of their team went in this order: Sensei, Kakashi, Kei, Obito, and then Rin. It went mostly by rank, then personality. Rin came back to the top of the list in any medical matters, despite not really being assigned to their team officially. But, aside from Sensei, the rest was more of an agreement between equals to be bossed around according to business requirements and within each other's expertise.

She must really not like the guy.

"Genbu is a special jōnin," Kakashi said quietly, but his body thrummed with restrained lightning. The hair on Obito's left arm rose as the tingling started. "You have no rank within our military. Do not give her orders."

"Byakko," Obito warned him anyway. The last thing anyone needed was for Kakashi to cue off Kei's mood more.

Batman eyed them both—almost his size, if a little thinner in build and really different in terms of skills and powers—and leaned his weight a little onto his back foot instead. He didn't try to loom over Kei again, and Nightwing took his cue from that.

"Well, that started off badly," Rin said, which seemed to be aimed at Nightwing.

"Kirin's right." Nightwing holstered his stick weapons and said, quelling, "Let's try that again with less posturing."

Rin nodded firmly. "We're all friends here."

Not…really. Allies, probably?

Slowly, Kakashi and Batman both stopped looking two seconds from throttling each other.

"I was wondering why you didn't show up to the fight, Batman," Kei said, resting her hand against Kakashi's shoulder. The spark that leapt between them was very literal, but she didn't flinch, and Kakashi wouldn't have let anyone see him do so if he had a choice. "But it wasn't that you weren't answering. It was that you couldn't. You couldn't hear anyone calling for you."

Batman inclined his head just slightly. It barely qualified.

"Did Red Hood do something?" Kei didn't normally push. There had to be a purpose.

"An EMP."

Whatever that meant, it didn't sound great.

"So that's all of your electronics dead. And you fought." Okay, yeah, she was either thinking aloud because Isobu was giving her a rest, or because she was trying to give her team more information without making it obvious that they needed it. "Great. Just…great."

Batman's tone was twice as forbidding even as his face remained still. "You sent Robin to Red Hood."

"I sent Robin with Suzaku, who probably decided he needed help keeping Robin alive," Kei corrected again, sharpening in turn. She splayed her hands out, either asking for patience or preparing for another argument. "My brother takes his missions seriously, and he'll defend anyone placed under his care. Including Robin."

Yeah, that argument wasn't working.

Nightwing, ahead of his very upset but also very statue-like mentor, tried to cut in. "Genbu—"

"I can go get them," Obito offered, before the situation could get totally out of hand. When the two older guys eyed him, Obito wiggled his fingers at them to imply it was just that simple. "Suzaku's pretty easy to find if you know the trick. And I bet you I'm faster than anybody here."

Mostly because Kamui worked based on how well Obito knew the target. If he'd met someone, he could find them. Places were harder to figure out. The only reason Obito had dropped the entirety of their team at Kei's location was because she seemed like she needed the most help. Hayate was fine with his helmeted big bro.

"Wait," Kakashi said, before they could rush away on this new idea. He hadn't ripped his gaze from Nightwing and Batman to look at his teammates even once so far. "Are we viewing 'Red Hood' as an active threat to the situation? Or is the Zetsu clone army more of a concern? I doubt we're in actual agreement yet."

Oh, no. That was Kakashi putting his hackles up for real.

"You did not know that the Zetsu clones were a significant problem before tonight," Kakashi said, eying the heroes carefully. "While you gave Genbu a place to rest, her observed actions up to this point prove that her greatest obstacle was being constantly pursued by an enemy that struck without warning and would have—and has—killed anyone near her at the time." Kakashi's chakra buzzed in agitation again. "But at no point has she or Suzaku raised a hand against Akaboshi. And he hasn't acted against them."

Because if Akaboshi had decided to hurt her brother, Kei would've put his head through a wall. Probably without the rest of him still attached.

"So, despite whatever violence Akaboshi is capable of, he's not a threat to them. He's a threat to you." Kakashi shifted his weight, mirroring both Batman and Nightwing as they tensed.

Typical Kakashi. He'd known these people for ten minutes and already figured out how to hit an acute nerve.

"Well, none of you seem to need us here for the yelling part," Obito suggested after a moment, because that snappish lecture was hanging in the air like a bad smell. He didn't really want to be a part of it. "I'm just gonna…go. Have fun planning to kill everything that looks at you funny."

Kakashi and Kei and Batman and Nightwing all gave Obito glares. Even if he was only sure of two of those, the other two were implied and Obito knew their body language. Hooray for common ground?

"I can go, too. If Robin needs medical attention that badly, then I'll be more useful there," Rin volunteered. She scooted so she was in Obito's reach, for easy pickup. And if Obito tried going into another situation that required a lot of Kamui usage without her, he'd be in trouble the second he got back. Especially after all the experiments they'd been doing lately.

"Fine," said Kakashi, only a little grudgingly.

"Bye!" And between one wave of his hand and the next, he and Rin left that mess behind.

There was a giant bird on the roof of the clinic and Jason was deliberately ignoring that fact.

"You may call me Tsuruya," had been the introduction, about half a second after Jason drew his sidearm on her. Her beady eyes noticed the threat, assessed, and clearly dismissed it. "Keisuke-sama placed her brother in my care, and this protection extends to those he considers allies. It is very nice to meet you, Akaboshi-san."

And Jason had put his gun away and said, "Nice to meet you too, Tsuruya-san. Good to have you on board."

Because what the fuck else was he supposed to do?

Tsuruya basically had the roof angle covered, once they threw a tarp over her to camouflage her presence. Apparently, the giant crane in fact suffered from a lack of stealth options in addition to the thumb deficit. Hayate assured Jason that it wouldn't stop her from putting a sword-feather through someone at a dozen paces, or summoning a whirlwind, which was only so helpful once the freight phase was finished.

Speaking of deliveries, arrival at the clinic went…okay.

The Thomas Wayne Memorial Clinic—Dr. Leslie Thompkins's territory of thirty-five years—wasn't always open. Even the kinds of people who ran free clinics had to sleep sometime. But between the warning signs that the Joker was out, the Red Hood's latest battle with the Bat, and the chaos in Midtown, it appeared the good doctor had found space for an exception in her schedule.

And Jason knocked on the roof access door. Generally a vigilante procedure, left over from the days when Jason wore the yellow cape, but it was a code both of them still remembered. At least, that seemed to be the case based on the sudden sound of feet hiking up the indoor stairs.

"Red Hood," was the doctor's response, with recognition in her eyes. Not the kind of recognition that saw through his damn helmet, but the wariness of a woman confronted by a potential new threat. Jason hadn't exactly kept it a secret that the clinic fell under his aegis, along with the rest of Crime Alley, so she had to be aware of the general mood toward his gang. "What do you need?"

"Kid, get over here," Jason said, turning his head in the direction of the warm blob that was a couple of teenagers stacked on top of each other. Hopefully, the bird was less obvious. "Got a patient for you, Doc."

Hayate dropped his illusion as though stepping through a curtain. "Hello!"

Leslie clearly noted the kid, mouth pursed disapprovingly. And then the other kid, who still hadn't meaningfully stirred since being hauled out a window and across several streets to get here. It took only a second or two for her to pick out the cape and the domino mask, and that got her out of the doorway and beckoning them down the steps. "Quickly. What do you know?"

"Some kind of assassin dart, but meant for a nonlethal takedown." Jason pulled an unused dart out of his pocket alongside the empty one Hayate had brought along.

Leslie didn't take them immediately. Instead, she guided them both to the clinic's biggest exam room. Then she grabbed a new set of gloves from a dispenser and got the rest of her PPE in order. Jason allowed Hayate past him and helped get Tim stretched out across the exam bed. After a couple of seconds to consider, Leslie also handed nitrile gloves to Hayate and had him put them on.

"Nothing for little ol' me?" Jason asked, even as he dropped the dart samples onto a wheeled tray table Leslie shoved in his direction.

"Not yet. What treatment have you already administered?" Leslie, apparently, wasn't in a mood for banter.

Fair. Jason was in the mood to kill someone, so—in a way—he could relate.

"Naloxone," Jason said. "Nasal spray version, so you're on a timer. Going theory is the dart might contain Fear Toxin or something worse, so we held off on anything more sensitive. But speaking of…" Jason eyed Hayate, who stood on the other side of the exam bed and had one hand locked around Tim's wrist. "You didn't explain earlier. Why'd you come running to me?"

The story that came spilling out was at least not a Gotham standard, which was new. While the kid and his sister were planning to give the Bats an info dump and ditch the apartment safehouse, the problem they were trying to solve came and found them. While the plant-men and their homicidal intentions were…not good, Tim's hero complex got the brunt of that alien incursion deciding to team up with the League of Assassins. Because everyone needed a local guide.

Not for the first time, Jason wondered what, exactly, he'd done to deserve getting wrapped up in all of this.

"—and I don't know what would've happened if Oneesan did get poisoned," Hayate continued, though it sounded like he was starting to wind down. "It's hard to tell if I should be thanking Robin or not. She's bigger than him, and a jinchūriki, so I don't think it would've been as dangerous."

"Yeah, well, here we are." Wingding would probably want to throttle little Timmy for this trick. Jason kinda did already. He turned his attention from that to Leslie. "Long story short: Robin's the only one who got hit. What's the verdict, Doc?"

During the explanation, Leslie had drawn Tim's blood and laid out a series of tests as only Gotham could ever need. The Batcave kept them arranged like goddamn piano keys, all lined up and ready to go. Test strips for Smilex, Fear Toxin, Ivy's botanical nightmares, a scanner for any of Tetch's mind control chips, something for Man-Bats' serum, and then a whole suite for street drugs the likes of which other cities only ever saw half.

"You were right to use an opioid inhibitor." Oh, good. At the very least, Jason knew that adding that particular drug to the mix couldn't have made Tim worse, even at the time. "The other components of the dose were Fear Toxin and one part Poison Ivy's spores. I won't speculate on its purpose."

"Thanks for the expert opinion," Jason drawled. Guess it wasn't ever a mystery who I was gonna have to shoot, but at least I know the breakdown.

"Little Red, I'll need you to let go of Robin for a moment," Leslie said, ignoring the sass. When Hayate didn't immediately move, Leslie cut her gaze toward Jason. She must have noticed that the kid mostly didn't understand English. "I'll need him to get away from the monitors."

After a second, Jason spotted a spark jumping between Hayate's fingers. Which, if the kid's interactions with a lot of electronics were anything to go by, explained why Leslie was suddenly very concerned. And why they weren't currently being swarmed under by Bats; Hayate had probably already fried every tracker in Tim's costume. That meant the only way they'd find out what happened to Tim was when Leslie inevitably called Bruce for a pickup.

Which meant this place was still going to be swarmed, but on a delay.

"Let's go," Jason said, and tugged Hayate out of the room. "The doctor can handle the rest."

As they passed an open, empty exam room, Hayate stuck his feet to the floor like he'd suddenly decided to be about two hundred pounds heavier, then pivoted them both into the doorway.

"Kid, what the hell," Jason protested, though he did slide the door shut and then turn on the light switch, since the kid seemed determined to lead for once. Then, "We have to leave. I'm not sticking around for the inevitable interrogation."

"We can't go outside yet," was Hayate's response. He hopped up onto the exam bed like it was the couch in the apartment, even though he still had his shoes on and no one had rolled out the sterile paper.

"Why not?" Jason couldn't stay. Even with a ten-foot bird made of knives on the roof, there was an inherent danger to Red Hood being pinned down anywhere. Everyone's eyes were on the inevitable confrontation Jason had been building toward all month. "You'll be fine if you just stay put. Tsuruya-san's here. I need to go."

"It's not safe, Aniki," Hayate insisted. His hand had drifted to the hilt of his sword, thus far left sheathed. "You can't pick out the Zetsu clones before they attack, and there's hundreds of them. If you leave, I can't spot them for you, but—but my sister gave me a mission. To keep Robin safe. So I can't go with you."

And Jason was not going to get fucking cornered by Batman in one of his pet charities. It'd either ruin one of the only good things in Crime Alley, or it'd burn—this. This fragile thing made of unearned faith and maybe naivete, coming from a child who'd maybe never really been one. "Hayate—"

"Can't you just stay?" Hayate grabbed his hands, nitrile gloves over Jason's leather ones. His voice had gone plaintive and sad, and it made Jason's stomach clench like he'd been punched. "What are you afraid of? If—If you want to go, I can't make you—" Hayate swallowed as he tried to get his breathing under control, and Jason's heart cracked as the kid let his grip fail. "Sorry. I-I didn't mean…"

"Hayate. You don't know what you're asking," Jason said, settling his hand atop the kid's head. Even with the hood in his way, Jason imagined that Hayate could still feel the warmth. "It's complicated."

"Then uncomplicate it," Hayate insisted, peering up at Jason from around his sleeve.

Jason—didn't want to get into it. He'd lived, he'd died, he'd risen as a fucking ghost in his own skin and here they were. With a kid begging him not to leave, a city in crisis, and another helpless brat in the Robin colors barely a room away, fighting for his life.

It made Jason want to claw his own hand off to run, and yet—

"Mom never came back. " Hayate's voice cracked on a sob.

Jason froze.

"She s-said she had to go." Hayate's hand had somehow snaked around Jason's wrist, anchoring him there. "It—it was important. No choice. But I—"

Jason found himself sitting on the exam table, tucking Hayate against his side with one arm around the kid's shoulders as he trembled. "Hey, I'm right here."

Hayate swore and ripped his goggles off, flinging the fogging lenses into the sink. He rubbed at his eyes, breathing still unsteady, and bowed his head over his knees. It forced Jason's arm to coil a little around Hayate's back torso to keep him slightly upright.

"Breathe, kid," Jason murmured. "Just breathe. In for seven, out for five. Can you do that for me?"

Hayate leaned so he was sprawled half against Jason's leg. "I—"

"Focus on breathing. Don't worry about me going anywhere." Jason bit the inside of his cheek, though there was no way Hayate could tell. Then he swept Hayate's hood back so he could slowly pet the kid's hair, even with the hair tie still intact and with a glove in the way. "I'm sorry, Hayate."

"Don't die." Hayate's fingers gripped Jason's pant leg hard enough to warp even the armored layer a little. The lights overhead started flickering. "Don't you dare die. You can't."

Jason couldn't help it. He laughed. "A little late for that, kid."

"Wh-what?"

It just—ripped its way out of him. A joke that clawed its way up from six feet under. As Hayate scrubbed furiously at his eyes and smeared the tearstains, Jason wasn't sure if he even had the right to be horrified at his own admission.

He'd never said it aloud before, in front of someone who didn't already know.

Just. Just something that never needed to be said.

Jason Todd died. Boom. No more hope, magic, or thought .

No more pain.

Then Red Hood haunted his footsteps. Walked familiar streets. Settled old scores.

And Akaboshi? Aniki? Lived.

"God, kid," Jason muttered. He let the exhaustion—the lingering injuries, the stress—flow through him until his spine felt less like a spring. Nah, overcooked noodles suited him better.

When was the last time he slept at night without waking up screaming? Without being driven by spite?

Had to have been a different kid to even dream of something so…simple.

"Aniki," Hayate croaked, even as he stared directly into Jason's expressionless mask with his reddened eyes in full view. He clutched at Jason's jacket. "Aniki, please. Tell me what you meant."

"I…" Jason swallowed. Thought about it. And removed the helmet so he could let Hayate see his face. It'd be fair, that way. They could both be complete wrecks. "Hi, Hayate."

"Hi?" Hayate tilted his head carefully, though he was still sniffling.

"My name's Jason. So we're on the same page." Maybe the kid would even be able to say it without tripping. Hah. "When I was fifteen years old, I…died."

And the whole, terrible story flowed out from there.

Notes:

1. The Four Symbols in Chinese mythology consist of the White Tiger, Black Tortoise, Vermillion Bird, and Blue Dragon. But the Four Holy Beasts swap the White Tiger for the Qilin, which about matches up to Rin's position waaaay back when Team Minato took their Chūnin Exams, seeing as Kakashi was already a chūnin and therefore not invited to Team Awesomeness. Additionally, while Chinese mythology uses a fifth beast—the Yellow Dragon of the Center—Japanese doesn't, since their fifth element is Void. Basically, these kids are aware enough to pull names for dramatic purposes, they're not using the symbolism perfectly.

2. Obito may not be the wisest guy in the room, but he does have a fully-matured Sharingan and a reason to use it. The "old injury" he notices when Bruce moves is a reference to Bane's introductory storyline, where the culmination of his (quite impressive) evil plan is successfully breaking Bruce's spine.