Chapter 2
Ever since the Fourth War ended about a year and three months ago, Lord Kakashi had his hands full trying to rebuild the village and pull it out of a recession. Thirty-four-year-old Genma had been doing triple the work he had been before, despite being relieved of his post as one of three guards and advisors to the Hokage. He was in charge of a genin team that had graduated the Academy just this past spring, which was a lot more work than he had given it credit for initially. In addition to that he was also doing whatever high-ranking missions Lord Kakashi assigned him.
Today, Tuesday, January 12th had started out like any other day. He had gotten back with Raido very early in the morning from a B-rank bodyguarding job for a powerful merchant and had the day off, so he slept in until noon.
First thing he did after getting up and getting ready for the day was to call his genin and leave them a message at home as well as with the chunin that had been taking over for him in his absence.
"Hey, it's Genma, I just wanted to let you know I'm back home. Training resumes tomorrow as usual, so see you on the field." He said, leaving the same generic quick message to all four of them.
He ended up having just toast for breakfast cause there wasn't anything left in the fridge after two weeks away. He had hired his own genin for a D-rank job to come by and look after the place every couple of days.
So, he wrote up a grocery list and headed out the door around half past noon to go pickup his paycheck, deposit it and withdraw some cash, and buy groceries. He was at the meat and seafood section picking out what to eat for lunch when Ino telepathically interrupted him.
"Genma! I'm sorry, I know you just got back, but Lord Kakashi asked for you." She said, sounding worried. "Someone unknown to the system just bypassed our barrier and appeared in the Forest of Death in the middle of quadrant 5. The signal is really weird too, no one here has seen anything like it before. I'll put him through."
"Take someone with you for backup. No one other than Sasuke should be able to teleport themselves into the village like that. I'm going to have the barrier team look into it as well. Be careful, and report back to me immediately." Lord Kakashi added through the mental link.
"Yes, Lord Kakashi." He replied mentally, before running up towards the front of the store.
"I keep telling you, just Kakashi is fine." Replied Lord Kakashi.
"Sorry, Lord Fifth summoned me. I have to leave all this here." He said, leaving his hand basket full of groceries beside a surprised and bewildered cashier's station as she was checking out another customer.
"O-oh, of course!" she replied, stuttering, as he ran out the door.
He ran along the rooftops, thinking about everyone who lived on the way and debating who to bring with him. He wanted a tracker who would be quick to find on short notice. A Hyuga would be ideal, but the clan compound was in the opposite direction and he didn't want to have to wait on Hiashi to find him someone who was available. That left an Inuzuka or an Aburame.
The Aburame were closest.
"Hey, Shino, are you free? I need a tracker. There's been a security breech." He asked when the nineteen-year-old came to the door.
"Sure, I can join you." Shino replied, briefly ducking back inside. "Mom, I'm going on a mission, bye!"
"Bye, Shino, be careful!" His mom replied.
Like most ninja chunin and above, he was always ready to leave at a moment's notice.
"What happened?" Shino asked as they ran across the rooftops.
"Ino's security team detected an unusual foreign chakra that teleported into the 44th Training Grounds. Obito's dead so only Sasuke should be able to do that, but he's registered in the system so it's not him. We need to find out who it is and what their intentions are." He explained.
"Have they cleared the training grounds?" Shino asked.
"Probably not. If it's a missing nin, we'll engage and have everyone there as backup." He replied.
"Alright." Shino replied.
They got to the forest gates and entered, heading for quadrant 5. Shino sent out his bugs to scout ahead of them to search.
Not long into their search, one of Shino's bugs came back with a message.
"He says there's something unusual over that way." Shino said, translating for the bug and pointing over in the direction of quadrant 6.
"Let's go." Genma said, and they followed the bug off into the trees.
They hid crouched in the tree branches as they came upon a giant forest snake leading a young boy wearing a large collar.
"Now that's weird." Genma muttered, watching as the snake behaved more like a summon or a ninken than a wild animal.
An ordinary giant forest snake would have tried to eat the boy, but instead this one was very clearly leading him somewhere. It was occasionally hissing at the boy and the boy was hissing back.
'Does he have a kekkei genkai? It could be a ninken, then. Did his family put him up to this?'
The boy had black hair and green eyes and was very underweight. He looked terrified, and was walking close to the snake as if seeking comfort from the scary forest around him.
"You should be seeing the intruder now. Can you see anyone?" Ino asked over the telepathic link.
"Yeah, it's a little kid wearing a collar with a giant snake at his side, leading him somewhere. A bomb collar, maybe? He looks like he's five or six." Genma replied.
"A little boy?" Ino repeated, surprised.
"Someone probably put him up to it. He's skin and bones." He added.
"I'll evacuate the neighborhood around the forest. Everyone currently on training missions inside will be rerouted to intercept at either of the two open gates. I want you and Shino to kill the summon and take the boy to T&I alive." Said Lord Kakashi.
"Yes, Lord Kakashi." He replied.
"Shino, that collar might be a bomb. Lord Kakashi is evacuating the neighborhood and rerouting everyone inside the forest to guard the gates. Can you kill the snake?" Genma asked.
"Yes, I can." Shino replied.
"Good. While you do that, I'm going after the boy." Genma explained.
They jumped down to engage. Shino sent a female beetle to hide in the boy's clothes while he attacked the snake, throwing a handful of kunai at it to get the boy away from it. As expected, the boy screamed and ran when the kunai slashed his snake across the face and back.
Genma easily ran ahead of the boy and dropped down in front of him once he'd ran a ways away, eliciting a scream of fear from the boy as he stumbled and fell back on his butt, looking up at him frozen in fear.
No one else is around.
"It's okay, kid. I'm not going to kill you. If you cooperate, I can get that collar off you." He said, speaking calmly and gently, disarmingly crouching down to talk to him.
The boy talked to him, but he didn't understand a single word he was saying. He was begging and pleading desperately.
"Ino, Lord Kakashi, he's from the Outside. He speaks another language." he said quickly, through the mental link he could still feel in the back of his mind.
This really complicated things.
He held up his hands, showing his open palms in what he hoped was a universal sign to show he wasn't armed and wasn't a threat. He beckoned at the boy to stand up and come over to him. The boy hesitated a long moment before standing up and walking over, careful to stay out of arm's reach. He said something, fearful.
He paused so the boy could tell he wasn't answering, before pointing at himself. "Genma."
Then, he pointed at the boy and waited for a response.
Understanding shone in the boy's bright green eyes and some of the fear left his tense body. "Hari."
"His name's Hari. He's about five or six years old and has black hair and green eyes. He's wearing an oversized, long-sleeve green shirt with black sweatpants." He told Lord Kakashi through Ino's mental link.
"I'll look into it." Lord Kakashi replied.
Almost no one used bomb collars. Explosive tags were better because they costed less and could be set, left, and activated at a distance and caused more damage.
He gestured at Hari to stay silent and to stop, and the boy said something in a subdued voice. Hari was shaking badly as he moved closer to look at the collar around his neck.
Most of the collar was made of leather and fastened with a simple buckle, with one bulky rectangular part of it that stuck out.
'That must be what the snake was for. He could have just reached up and taken it off himself this whole time.'
"Alright, Hari. I'm going to take the collar off now. Stay still." He said, trying to communicate through just his tone of voice, body language, and gestures.
The boy didn't move and just stood there stock still, eyes squeezed shut, jaw clenched, frozen in fear as he reached towards his neck.
He moved his hands slowly around the boy's neck and took off the collar, sealing it up immediately and stuffing the scroll in his vest.
"There, all done!" He exclaimed, standing up and stepping away from Hari to give him some space.
It took a moment for Hari to realize he was safe and unharmed. He held still for a moment longer before he was brave enough to open his eyes and look up at him, surprised. He held his gaze, searching his face for something, and then he asked him a question in a very confused voice.
"Sorry Hari, I don't understand you." He replied, before holding out his hand. "Come on, let's go."
Hari smiled shyly, taking his hand and saying something to him in a happier voice, his green eyes sparkling as he said it.
"You're welcome." He said, guessing what the boy had said.
He met up with Shino and together they took the boy to the T&I department.
Author's Note: Thanks so much for reading! Please leave a review and let me know what you think! This chapter and the last kind of just wrote themselves. I'll go back to Harry's pov next chapter, which is the reason I cut this one so short. This one is late cause I was working on a timeline for the entire Naruto series in regards to everyone's ages when stuff happens so all my one-liners can line up.