"Lord Seventh would like to see you now," Kurabira Mikapen emerged from behind closed doors with a pleasant smile. Whether she was genuinely able to overlook the animosity that most of the village fostered toward Mana or if there was none to speak of, Mana could not tell. Seeing Mikapen serve Mana just like she'd any other customer made the magician leave home her own spiky shell too.
She didn't partake in the usual etiquette these days. Rarely did Mana bother with interacting with other villagers beyond flipping them off or casting a dismissive glare their way. Part of it was just playing the role she took over as officially the worst person ever born but Mana was too poor of a liar to not be able to see right through herself and realize how good it felt to play that role sometimes. Despite her new habits, Mana kneeled and greeted Lord Seventh as customary for ninja serving the Seventh Hokage and her village.
"It's rare that a ninja comes to me without being summoned…" Lord Seventh acknowledged after his assistant took her rightful side to the right of Seventh's chair. "Even though I am willing to listen to what brought you to my office, do know that the assignment I'm preparing for you is not yet finalized which is why you haven't yet received a summon. If asking for more work is your reason for coming, you should know that."
"A lot of greener ninja are under the impression that they'd receive missions day after day, just like they used to. A lot of genin these days clear out the eight-mission requirement for being considered for the Chuunin Exams during their first day. You are a special jounin now, Mana-san, your services will not be required until a task comes up that requires your particular expertise," Mikapen seconded her superior with a cheerful façade. Even though she had a slightly condescending and posturing vibe to her addition, hr point sounded valid nevertheless.
"Actually…" Mana scratched her elbow and turned away. The leathery patches on her scraped jacket rubbed roughly against her soft and preserved hands. "I came with a request. It pertains to my civilian occupation as a stage magician."
"Oh, that's odd. I've been wondering if that'll ever clash with your duties as a ninja whenever your name came up but I'd have never expected that to come when your popularity has dipped…" Lord Seventh leaned back in his chair. He hadn't expected this topic to be brought up, that much was self-evident.
"I've been talking to my manager and we both agree that it would be for the best if… If maybe I get to perform somewhere abroad for a while. He's making it sound like a really big deal, "World Magic Tour", or whatever… It doesn't have to be that though. I realize that odds are that I'll be just as polarizing anywhere else in the world but… I just want a time-out, just for a little bit, at least…" Mana felt like a whiny child and her self-loathing must have become more and more apparent the more her tongue flipped and rolled.
A burst of resolute laughter spread through the office. Even if Mana fully embraced the idea of being shut down, she didn't expect her superior to be this nasty about it as to laugh her off. Then again, he enjoyed more than a decent approval from both the civilians and ninja so he might not have been aware of what it was like to face hatred day to day. Civilians appreciated the man's past of keeping them safe from cataclysmic threats and wars as the leader of Village Protection in the past, ninja praised his tough and decisive touch on sensitive matters and inner strength as both a ninja and a leader.
Before Mana could dismiss herself and rush out of the man's office, Lord Seventh nodded his head and tilted the front of his hat. His expression looked apologetic.
"Sorry, sorry… I didn't mean to make it seem like I was laughing at you or your suggestion. It was unprofessional of me. It was just that we appear to have been rolling the same meatball, so to speak. I also have been wondering about potential opportunities to send you out. In fact, I am waiting for a reply from Allied Ninja to make you a part of the organization," the Seventh Hokage explained his spontaneous and bashful reaction.
"Allied Ninja?" Mana ran her hand through the side of her hair. She didn't mind the Seventh trying to build her up as a ninja specializing in international matters as it would have fixed his problem of having a constant catalyst for drama and riots around in a village that he tried keeping as stable and boring as possible though her own feelings of that organization weren't too bright.
What seemed like an eternity ago, she worked alongside a squad of Allied Ninja in an attempt to uncover the mystery behind the black-market drugs flooding the Konohagakure market that even involved her father. In some way, one might have viewed that encounter with the Spliced as the beginning of the tragic clash with Guru Ayushi Mana would have in the future.
At that time, she had formed an impression of the Allied Ninja as a rather apathetic bunch, answering to no specific village but in the process appearing without care for the fate of the lives of ordinary villagers in the face of what they saw as the greater picture. Whether they were right or wrong in thinking that was not Mana's judgment to make, though she vastly preferred a more grounded attitude toward her service.
"That's right, I started just wanting to send you to Kirigakure as an emissary. After I reached out to Kirigakure, I ran into an old acquaintance who now works with the Allied Ninja and you seem to have impressed a few of the bunch as he jumped at the opportunity to enlist you, having heard nothing but good things from his comrades in the organization," Lord Seventh replied. "I do admit, while it was not my original intention, it would do you a heap of good to change your environment and leave all of this nastiness back home behind. Given your somewhat rebellious nature, at times, I thought you'd be excited to not answer to any village…"
"To be fair, I had always hoped to protect my village as a member of Village Protection or the Barrier Corps," Mana admitted with a sad look in her eyes, as this was the first time that she had said this childish dream out loud after the whole affair with Root and Guru Ayushi. "If the emissary deal is still on the table, I'd gladly take it, even if it is in Kirigakure…"
Uzumaki Midoben turned for his assistant. Mikapen leaned beside her superior and whispered something to his ear. In the middle of her whisper, the Seventh's gaze widened and he blew out a full chest of air after moving his ear further from his assistant.
"I see… Your father's injury, huh? Whatever will I do with you?" Lord Seventh flicked the tip of his hat back and leaned back in his chair, moving it left and right in a rhythmic, mirrored motion. "Well, I can't possibly send you to Kirigakure, given the recent news… I'm afraid it's either the Allied Ninja or no deal. I'd think hard about it in your shoes, kid. Serving a few years as an Allied Ninja would do wonders in building you and your character up and give you an opportunity to perform your magic shows all over the world. You never really burned with Konoha team spirit. I could always tell. You'd never quite cut it in VP, sorry to break it for you this way."
"Okay then, we'll be waiting for your answer soon, Mana-san!" Mikapen leaned her head and upper body to the right with a cheerful expression.
"Alright, I'll work with the Allied Ninja," Mana pocketed her hands and blew out her cheeks, realizing that it was either testing her bad first impression or letting things simmer on the same rancid flame.
"Wow, when I said soon, I didn't mean this soon!" Mikapen laughed out, Lord Seventh shared her smile with an expression that seemed to imply that he had just rolled off a boulder off his chest. Frankly, the fact that Seventh not only accepted Mana's request for the World Magic Tour but, in fact, insisted on it and provided her with all the necessary details and options to make it happen was just as shocking to the magician herself.
"It will be a few days but… We'll just have to sort out a few formalities. The Allied Ninja will send someone to pick you up, there's no way they'll let someone as… Provoking as you roam across the Land of Fire alone. Even if things get stuck on that front, I'll get a team together to escort you and hand you over to them so no worries there," Lord Seventh nodded a few times.
Somehow Mana was getting the feeling that she was being pushed out the door as a tribute rather than merely her request for departure being approved. Though she didn't have much choice in the matter. Something had to change and that something had to be her environment.
While talking outside of the father's ward, on their way out of the hospital wasn't what Mana would have called the ideal conditions, she wasn't sure how much more time she had to brief mother in on her plans for the future. It would be rough, that much Mana knew for certain, but it would have been a whole lot rougher if the Allied Ninja just knocked on the Nakotsumi family home door and briefed the businesswoman in on it on the fly.
It'd have been the absolute worse if she wasn't even home when the Allied Ninja came to escort Mana. Given how Mana's impressions suggested they had absolutely zero shits to give about the common folk, they would have been the least likely folks to wait around for Mana to have the tough talk so it might have been now or never.
"I've been planning on leaving the village for a while," Mana mumbled. She didn't speak loud enough to overpower the usual bustle of the hospital but she knew that mother heard her. "Mr. Hiro brought up the idea. The Seventh seconded it. I'd be working with the Allied Ninja abroad while performing in the countries I visit. Both of them agree that would be best for me."
"Both of them agree?" mother asked. "What about you?"
As always, mother grabbed her by the crotch and didn't let go. She was always the one to clutch and twist it without any warning. Mana didn't want to admit it that she hated being back home, that she dreaded every day spent here sinking in the marinade of hatred. Working with the Allied Ninja didn't guarantee anything but change and change was what Mana needed. Still, she didn't want to be the one to say it. To say it that Mana wanted to be further away from the village, further from mother… Further from her friends and family that she longed to rejoin for six months of pure torture straight.
"I… I want to perform and… I want to help people. There is no stage greater than the world and I might end up helping a whole lot of people, people from all over the world…" Mana shrugged.
"But will you like it? Will you for a day not look as miserable and angry as you do back home?" mother looked at Mana, trying to connect with her daughter but given how much time they've been apart and how much growing her daughter did outside of her control, even the optimistic ballbuster that was Nakotsumi Kei doubted that being possible.
"Yeah…" Mana shrugged. "It'll be peachy."
"All I'm saying is - if you want to leave out there to war and criminal syndicates and all that rubbish outside the village walls… You should at the very least enjoy what you're doing," mother let Mana have another try at lying to her.
"If someone told me about this opportunity a few years ago, I'd have laughed at the person saying it. I still felt like I had to clean my own room before going out to save the world, you know what I mean? Not to mention the people I'd have been leaving behind," Mana began spinning her web after a big breather. "But what about now though? A lot of people I know are gone, some of them now hate my guts and the others I've returned to don't even feel like the same people anymore. I've only been gone for six months and somehow it feels like I've been stranded in time. It's funny, you know, I've been to other universes and yet somehow they've felt more welcoming and familiar than home feels right now. I don't know what's out there, but I'd rather find out outside my shell rather than stay put and serve the village that is even too disgusted by me to squish me and be done with it."
"Well… If that's how you feel…" mother sat down just a few good steps short from the reception area of the hospital.
"Look, mom… I…" it was a rarer and rarer feeling these days – the regret of possibly having offended someone. Lately, everyone's been clanging their swords and throwing their turds at her with such ferocity and intensity that she stopped caring about how these people felt. Who cared if she offended them, they stabbed at her first and you couldn't pull the knife out of their hands without getting cut even a little bit in the process.
"No, I get it, you didn't mean all those things about me. It's just… A lot, you know? Too much all of a sudden. We got to hang out and see each other less and less as both your jobs got more serious, when the world took off the kiddy gloves and decided to punch you down just like it's been punching me and your father all this time. It will hurt knowing that my daughter is out there and that I might not end up seeing her face for years on end, still, at least I'll know she'll be happy," mother stood back up and wiped the few early tears off her face. There'll be plenty of time for that in the few days left.
"Will you and dad be okay? I'll make sure to send you whatever I get paid, I'm not sure how Allied Ninja get paid but… They've been a thing for so long so they have to be making a killing out there, right?" Mana shrugged.
"It's called "profit", dear. And yes, we'll be fine. I have a few more tricks up my sleeve and we've got money saved from your magic superstar days," mother nodded and wrapped her arms over Mana's neck, pushing the magician's head closer in to hers. "You got so good at lying, not sure if I should be proud of my little girl getting all grown up or if I should cry my eyes out for how hard you must've been hit to learn to do it that well."
"I've got to say, I believed in it myself…" Mana cracked a grin, just half-kidding, just like her mother was. "Wait, how much money you've got saved up? Are you sure it'll cover it?"
"Oh, don't you worry about that. That money's always moving, it'll be quite enough…" mother assured her. Mana wanted to dig around more but she lacked the words to speak her mother's language and find out just what exactly did she mean about that. For now, just knowing that the money won't be an immediate problem with Mana moving out will have to do.
"It's harsh!" Mana poked fun at her mother, just trying to cheer her up a little bit. "So cold when your own mother tells you that you're unnecessary back home,"
"It's not like I told you that you're not welcome, or anything, though I'm sure Nakotsumi Café will pick right back up without you acting indecently to my customers…" mother poked Mana's side with her elbow while the mother and daughter left the hospital.
"They're always starting it…" Mana shrugged.
"Yeah, I know. Just promise me one thing though," mother turned at Mana.
"You're not sucking me into that one, you've scolded me enough as a little girl to always find the thing out before signing on the dotted line," Mana chuckled at her mother's teasing.
"Wow, you really have grown up, I've only got like 85% of everything I know left to teach you…" mother sighed. "Anyway, just promise me that you'll give this Allied Ninja and World Magic Tour gig an honest shot. That you won't be walking into it all hurt and edgy. Burn this leather jacket, for God's sake comb your hair, and take your uniform with you."
"Do I have to? It's pretty tight and stringy… I'm kind of getting used to not giving a shit, plus, I'm not even sure that old thing will even fit me. Mana from six-months ago was a whole different person…" Mana teased her mother, oblivious to the stares aimed at her. Mother served as the world's best shield against all the arrows and spears that Konoha had to fling at her but she was long out of the age where she could've just hung out with mother the whole time.
"Don't sass me, young lady. Just be serious for once!" mother scolded her.
"If I have to… Fine, I'll see if it still fits," Mana rolled her eyes. "I have to say, I've always kind of felt almost like I was naked without the top hat. Had that feeling like I had left something at home, you know?"
"You will be leaving something at home, make sure you don't forget that and come back once in a while to check on it," mother placed her hands over her hips.
"Heh, dad was the one that designed the storage seal inside that hat. I'll always have a part of him with me if I return to the classics," Mana shrugged.
"See? Only good things come out of listening to me…" mother nodded to herself before breaking out to laughter which she and her daughter shared.