Whenever one treated Meiko to some food or, in this case, allowed her to treat herself, there was always the awkward moment when one was done with their food but, naturally, it took far longer for Meiko to finish gorging on her own treats. The blacksmith was the type of person to inspire worry if they could both eat and talk at the same time so Mana could recall just relaxing and watching her friend's finishing touches that lasted longer than her own full course.
Except, right now, there was nothing relaxing about hanging around the place any longer than absolutely necessary. Still, with Meiko, the fact that food was still on the table comprised all the necessary elements of that which was absolutely necessary.
Something that came off as a new experience to Mana was the fact that while she walked the evening Konoha streets alongside a friend, she received far fewer of the more abhorrent examples of disrespect and the disdain that the village felt for Mana's guts. The worst she got while walking alongside Meiko was a few sullen stares but that was about it and it was just the ground layer comprised of mere feathers compared to what Mana was used to.
"I was always wondering though, you make more money than both me and Kiyomi, right? I mean, maybe less than Kiyomi now that she's become all big Yamanaka princess and all but… Still… How come your arsenal has mostly remained the same, you still live in the same house and it feels like you can barely afford eating out?" Meiko squinted at Mana. If anyone else asked her that question, they'd have been smacked across the face with something mean and undeserving though this was Meiko, someone with whom Mana went through thick and thin and someone she could have always relied on and wished a similar relationship from the other side.
"Things aren't easy right now. My mother's business is suffering because of what I've done. One chunk of people walked out and never looked back when I got imprisoned, far more left when mother spoke out in my defense in the public. I mean… Our family name is on the title of the Nakotsumi Café, it was to come eventually that she'd have to speak her mind," Mana pocketed her hands. Focusing on kicking an empty can of conserved tomatoes helped her not fumble over her words or crash in embarrassment.
"Yeah, though… I wonder if anyone really expected your mother to have anything else but words of support…" Meiko scratched the back of her head. The blacksmith stood out so much with her blazing hairdo and challenging to the eye casual streetwear that nobody ever started off looking at Mana when the two were sharing their time together.
"Maybe not but things are rarely rational when human emotion is involved…" Mana sighed. "Case and point – my father. It costs my soul and then some to keep him alive and hooked up to the life-support machinery."
"Whoa, it costs that much?" Meiko freaked out. "Then again, it's cutting edge gadgetry. No other place on Earth has comparable medical technology to us and gizmos of pretty much any kind are expensive to come by."
Meiko intended on speaking up, Mana knew what she wanted to talk about and that was why she brought up this topic again. The blacksmith was never somebody that quivered in the face of difficult topics and she was always blunt even when she risked offending somebody though now might have been the first time in fresh memory that the redhead hesitated to shred it as she saw it.
"You think that we should let him go, don't you?" Mana did the hard lifting for her friend.
"Well… I mean… Look…" Meiko started stuttering.
"That's alright, if anyone cared, they'd suggest the same thing. Heck, the medical staff would have long since called it quits. This sort of stunt is not common, usually, people are just let go. It's odd that they even allowed us to bypass their usual policy and let us buy favorable medical opinions." Mana sighed.
"I can't say I don't understand it. Most people would choose to die in dignity rather than live unconscious and permanently comatose without hopes for ever recovering. Heck, some people would name it as their worst nightmares and more still would say that this sort of life isn't much different from being dead," Meiko shrugged, feeling a boulder shifting off her chest after Mana pulled the veil off of the difficult topic herself. Now the blacksmith found it decidedly easier to be earnest.
"What's so dignified about being dead? Death strips everything away, even if your behavior moments before it puts one ribbon for honor and one for dignity, in the end, nothing remains. It might sound like just a matter of speech, of perspective but the way father is now… He's not dead, something's there, something to support. I remember every lesson he ever taught me, seeing him still makes me chuckle sometimes when I recall my childhood. Death is the ultimate absence of everything," Mana replied with a pill of bitterness stuck in her throat.
"Wait… It's not that you don't want to let him go, it's that you can't, is it? Wait, Mana, does your mother want to let him go?" Meiko turned to Mana.
"I don't know what she wants, honestly. There are times when we argue about it, then there are times when she spends hours in the evening talking to him. There are still things she'd rather talk to him about rather than telling me," Mana flipped off an old woman that appeared to take offense at the magician's very presence on the same street as her as the old lady dropped her bags and clutched at her chest with an expression of outrage. "Of course, I can't let him go, Meiko. When I say that all life is necessary, I don't mean it some of the time, you know…"
"Holy shit… I mean… I try to not kill, not even when it seems necessary just because I respect your hustle and, frankly, it would be disrespectful of me as your friend to spit in the face of the message you spread and the struggle you put onto yourself but… Your belief is almost approaching toxic levels," Meiko raised an eyebrow without failing to stay truthful with her friend.
"You sound like Hisako and Kiyomi. I think at this point both of them have called me sick, despite one feeling resolute about killing criminals while the other just likes killing in general," Mana coughed from a dry throat.
"Hisako… I can't recall meeting her…" Meiko pondered.
"Really? You might like each other, she's a swordfighter, one of the better ones too," Mana replied. "Anyway, I suppose all bridges are burnt with me and Kiyomi, huh? Things already got pretty tense with us before I was a criminal."
"Heck if I know... Kiyomi's changed a lot. This one time, before the finals of the Inter-whatever Chuunin Exams, she spoke to me about liking me and after we parted ways she became way different. I think she's married now," Meiko scratched her head.
"Liking you? Married!?" Mana's jaw dropped. "I was only gone for half a year…"
"Yeah… She's in charge of the Yamanaka for the most part. She married this Inuzuka fellow, the clans are pretty tight now. I don't think even the Uchiha would screw with the Yamanaka now," Meiko explained. It was better to find it out this way, Mana reckoned, something sparked the feeling that Kiyomi would lash out at her if she appeared in fifty meters to her now.
"I bet. It's impossible to imagine the village just souring the relationship with both the Yamanaka and the Inuzuka, even if it is to appease the Uchiha." Mana crossed her arms over her chest after pulling her leather jacket in to cover up more of her chest from the late midsummer evening breeze. She wasn't cold, not really. It was a little bit of friendly envy as well as the regret for bridges that remained forever burnt now that made Mana perceive chills.
"Just for how long are you gonna keep lying?" Meiko looked to Mana with a worried expression.
"Lying?" Mana asked.
"To yourself, to the rest of the village. You didn't beat up Guru Ayushi, hurting people just isn't you, not to mention… I mean… Guru Ayushi… He's been stuck in between life and death himself for the last six months. Nobody knows either how to kill him or cure him and here you were kicking his ass to such a state. I think you're cool and probably one of the sharpest tools I've known but… Come on…" Meiko spoke her mind.
It was odd that she would deny the fact that Mana fought Ayushi at all, something that actually happened instead of questioning Ayushi's motives, which was far closer to the truth. Meiko didn't say it, she didn't have to, but she was hurting from seeing the effect that this life Mana took over had on her. Nobody could live such a life long without letting the sum of all things drag them deep down. Even the hardened shadow-people of the Root questioned Mana's choice and if she could handle this new life she'd be destined to live back before and during the trial.
"I have things to get at this here… Clothing store," Mana turned at the nearest distraction so that she could avoid being bad at lying to her best friend. She could see how this would end because she'd danced this tango before – she'd lie to Meiko, Meiko would see her through and feel bad about herself for not being trustworthy enough to be trusted with the truth. Classified secrets and best friends with a well-hidden inferiority complex didn't comprise the neatest of combinations.
"Fine, though I don't think you'll be able to pull those leather pants high enough to cover up all the holes I can see right through…" Meiko pouted. "We should get together again. I'm almost always busy these days but… Maybe we can catch each other in the training grounds some time."
It was so much like Meiko to hope to be able to physically bully some sense into Mana, though the magician had to admit that she felt somewhat intrigued to see the strength that Meiko had garnered and the skill that helped guide her toward a higher rank.
"It has come to our attention that Nakotsumi Mana has been released from prison and that she's even been getting work. Would you care to comment on that, Lord Seventh?" a balding old man with thick glasses turned to the standing leader of the village who continued to shift his attention from the board behind him with leftover scribbles from the meeting that had just transpired to the Council.
"From what is available on the public records, not only has Nakotsumi Mana been released but she has also been promoted to Special Jounin," a Konoha ninja of thick, spiky brown hair raised the issue, in a rare sight complementing the voice of the civilian councilman.
"Is that all that the information you've picked up on?" Lord Seventh sat down and weaved his fingers together, speaking through raspy irritation. "How about what common civilians know about the village's plot to brush Guru Ayushi's accident underneath the bed of Nakotsumi Mana?"
"Common civilians?" a plump old lady from the Civilian Council looked displeased by the Hokage's tone when addressing the people she represented. "Care to elaborate on what those words mean? Do you somehow see yourself above the people you serve, Lord Seventh?"
"Of course, in a manner of speaking. I am above them in the sense that I concern myself with far more sensitive and important matters than they do. I do not, however, consider myself a superior man to them. If you meant to discredit me in front of the council, lady councilwoman, the word superior is what you were looking for," Lord Seventh growled.
"We do not mean to discredit you, Lord Seventh, it is just that the Civilian Council receives a ton of complaints about that girl. People are uneasy about her presence and her work inside the village escalates matters further…" the councilwoman stood firm on her position.
"With the strides we've achieved in improving the civilian rights inside this ninja village of ours, surely the esteemed Civilian Council can handle writing back to some sheets of paper while us ninja may worry about us not getting nuked away into oblivion as Iwagakure was," Lord Seventh appeared thoroughly unimpressed by the case the Civilian Council was building toward Mana.
"True, if it were just mere complaints…" this time it was another ninja councilman speaking up. A middle-aged woman of pink hair and sharp features that suggested a bit of western, Land of Wind element in her upbringing. "Though whether she likes it or not, Nakotsumi Mana's presence sharpens the conflict between the civilians and ninja. I do not wish to blame it entirely on the girl, maybe it is true and she just wishes to get back to work but… What about the incident two weeks ago with the falling out between the group of special jounin and the crowd of civilians?"
"A mob that was protecting members of a terrorist organization?" Kuribira Mikapen, Lord Seventh's lively assistant jumped to intercept the narrative that the ninja councilwoman was weaving together.
"While the fact that the civilians were sheltering members of a terrorist organization is an unfortunate truth, this councilman can only wonder that perhaps if the Hokage chose to include the civilians more into the process of governing the village and provided them with a more transparent public service, even this unfortunate scenario could have been avoided…" a civilian councilman with thick, cream-colored hair brought up.
"It takes a lot of nerve to say that when half of the council is comprised of civilians and the man saying this is a civilian councilmember talking down to the Seventh Hokage," Lord Seventh stabbed at the outspoken civilian councilman who promptly silenced himself and pushed his chair slightly back so that he could hide from the entirety of Lord Seventh's focused gaze behind an obese civilian councilwoman sitting right to him.
"In either case, I was not overly fond of either this promotion or giving Nakotsumi Mana any work. Truth be told, her ninja license has only been suspended, not terminated by the Ninja Tribunal. That means that she had the right to renew it whenever she was capable of returning to active duty. In addition, the young woman was put through enough tests of her faithfulness to the village already. Given the unfortunate leak of information we are all aware of, none of us have the right to reserve awe from the fact she's been supporting the village's version and continues to drag her own good name through the mud," Lord Seventh ruled, silencing the unruly councilmen on each side of the table.
"Not to mention, she's been sent on one high-ranking mission and that mission was Lord Seventh's test, was it not? A test that young Mana has passed with flying colors, safe to say," a subtle old lady in a floor-reaching black jacket and a decorative black hat chuckled. Despite her fragile frame, the old-timer sat on the side of the Ninja Council even if none of the ninja at the meeting could place her face to a name.
"You're a respected elder, ma'am," a fellow ninja councilwoman of shoulder-long, ginger hair, sports-themed dressing style and a faceful of freckles decorating her visage spoke up. "Someone of your age, sitting at the table of the Ninja Council would have to have a dozen notable feats and be of great renown. And yet… I cannot for the life of me recall your name or any feats from your past life. Come to think of it, you've been sitting in that very chair since before I joined the Ninja Council five years ago, haven't you? If I didn't know any better, I'd say that you'd been sitting here well over the longest possible tenure of nine years for a council member."
"It is a good thing then that you do know better and do not speak such baloney out loud, councilwoman Taiki," the old hag cackled to herself.
"Indeed, councilmen and councilwomen, I've put Nakotsumi Mana through a test of honesty, a trial by fire, if you will. Not many ninja would have accomplished the task of silencing the very voices singing her praise when she was drowning in filth. Let's not lie to ourselves, the situation of Nakotsumi Mana and her family is nothing enviable," Lord Seventh admitted. "At which point do we begin to ask ourselves if we are being unjust in giving the young woman a second chance? At which point are we, the supposed voices of reason that are meant to govern our village ask ourselves if we are not just being as spiteful toward that girl because of what she has done as the rest of the village that possesses neither our better judgment nor the duty to mete it out?"
"Wise words, without question…" the thick, creamy-haired civilian councilman clapped his hands with gusto behind the notion. So eager was this man who had thought he had scorned Lord Seventh before to get back on Seventh's good side that he slipped the right side of his blue kimono robe that he wore off by accident from the erratic clapping.
"Lord Seventh, if I may…" a familiar, elderly and screechy voice disturbed Lord Seventh's peace after just another exhausting meeting. It was the old, black hag from before. The supposedly eternal member of the Ninja Council whom nobody could recall seeing take the post or offer it to someone else. The black, elderly enigma rooted within the council.
"The opposite has never stopped you before," Lord Seventh breathed out a heavy sigh.
"Perhaps what the council had said today about Nakotsumi Mana has been true? That's not to say that what you said about the young woman is wrong, of course…" the black lady chuckled to herself, still guising herself behind a mask of faux politeness.
"You guys are no Root, you're wrapping and climbing off the backs of others like a weed. Just tell me what you suggest I do. She's your pet project, after all," the Seventh said in a raspy voice.
"Oh, perhaps Nakotsumi Mana has been putting a dent in the relationship between the civilians and the ninja. Maybe this dent is destabilizing what we've all worked so heavily toward achieving? We wouldn't like the closest cooperation between the Hokage and the Root to be a failure, now would we?" the old-timer shrugged a couple of times, almost as if second-guessing her own deceitful wrapping of the ivy vine.
"I'm not executing her or her family. The folks from the Wandering Ninja are a black stain in our history already, while not many people think about that wound of our past, that doesn't mean I'll allow it to bleed all over my conscious either," Uzumaki Midoben made a dismissive gesture.
"Oh, that's not what I meant at all. But perhaps you should look into an opportunity to realize the girl's talents elsewhere? Elsewhere as if in… Somewhere else. I've heard that Konoha hasn't had strong emissaries in Kirigakure for a while. The girl's complexion would make her accepted as a representative in Kumogakure as well, her good nature would make her a welcome agent in the troubled Iwagakure too… So many options, I pity your position," the black lady of the root pinched her own purple lip.