The waves of wind

Minato looked a lot different from me. It was weird. We were so similar in my mind we should have been similar in person, but he was shorter, lithe muscle and thin frame, compared to my large, built frame. We were both healthy, but I was much, much stronger physically. I knew his speed would out do me though, even without his hirashin.

And his face. He was pretty, androgenous. If he had longer hair and make-up I could have mistook him for a girl, and an attractive one at that. Yet, now it was creased in anger, his blue eyes trying to pierce into my soul.

"Minato, I assume. Unless Iwa finally sent an assassin to take care of me."

He wasn't amused.

"You love Kushina then?"

My expression hardened, became serious, fully.

"I love her more than anything in the world. I'm in this hospital in the first place because I took a sword meant for her."

His eyes softened at that, but the intensity was still there. He was judging me, I knew.

And then in an instant, he was on me.

And then, we moved.

…

I came out of his hirashin heaving. Nothing came out, I hadn't eaten, and I suddenly realised how hungry that made me.

Minato looked fine though, his jonin uniform sticking tight to his body, and reminding me of the fact that though ANBU had the higher command during action, I was still technically a chunin, and Minato my superior. It was silly though to be jealous, especially when I should just be happy to be alive.

And even though the situation was fucked, me in front of a man who in all likelihood wanted me dead, I was happy. I liked the smell of the summer air, the heat, the moisture. Leaves blowing with a tasteful breeze, rustling like they danced. I looked past the man's tanned, clean face, to the rich blue skies above, and breathed in.

"She goes off, missing, and then comes back with a new boyfriend. I want to make sure you are a good choice for her."

I scoffed.

"What are you, her father?"

"Her best friend."

"Don't pretend you aren't jealous."

He blinked. He seemed offput by that.

I continued "She is a beautiful woman after all. I doubt you could be that close to her without wanting her."

"Don't compare me to you. You're an unknown, ANBU who abandoned his post for years."

"I didn't abandon my post. ANBU don't betray their country. I completed my mission and was stranded behind enemy lines for years."

Minato stayed silent.

"I know you're sceptical of me, and you were probably sent to interrogate me. Be rest assured, I joined ANBU at 13, and have been a part of it for 5 years. I have sacrificed so much of myself for this village, I am loyal."

"Well forgive me if I don't believe you."

We then stayed there, silent for a while, waiting and thinking.

"I remember meeting you once. Maybe you don't remember since it is so long ago, but we met on my first mission. By then, you had lost you entire squad, so it was just you and jiraya, and I had lost my squad too. I was an orphan too, so I only had my sensei, Orochimaru left."

Then Minato got a different gleam in his eye. He recognized me, my pink hair, the small boy he sympathised with long ago. He tried to not let it distract him, but it must have put him off.

"Come with me, you must be starving."

It was still tinged with the animosity from before, but I recognized the nice gesture for what it was.

Instead of teleporting like before, he let me walk through the woods with him, into the street, across and through the city. He pointed out every shop we went past, the memories he experienced clear. I had missed that, too busy keeping to myself. Minato loved the people, that much was clear.

Then he pulled me under a flap, and I entered to a face with squinted eyes, and a female in the back.

"Minato! And a friend. What are ya gonna have today?"

"Miso for me Teuchi, what about you Kizashi."

Ah, I expected as much.

"Chicken please. God it has been a while since I had some fine dining."

The woman in the back called out. "Fine dining? Don't expect too much from us."

I looked at teuchi.

"Your wife."

He reddened, but before he could say no the woman called out: "Not yet!"

Even Minato laughed.

Before long our bowls were served, and we ate. I was definitely biased, after all I had just came out of eating nothing but rations and stew for about 3 years, but that was the best meal I had ever had. I'll admit I even started crying a little.

…

Minato took me next to a training ground, an surrounding circle of trees leading to a flat expanse.

And a small team of genin. They rushed up eager and excited, and then I remembered.

God, I couldn't even remember their names, but I could remember their smiles, their disdain for the weird pink haired member of their team, how happy they were when they passed.

How silent they were when they died.

I started hyperventilating, then Minato grabbed my shoulder, teleporting me away and when I vomited this time it wasn't just because of the motion sickness.

I never cared about this before, why now?

Minato looked at me, and though I thought it would be disgust at my condition, it was pity and empathy. I hated that look, but it felt nice. To be cared for, even though I didn't deserve it.

"I won't pretend that I know what you went through during ANBU, hell, how you lost your teammates, but I know how you feel. That loss, that guilt, just from a simple reminder."

He was right, he didn't know anything. He didn't know what I had done, and was ready to give me a repairing pep talk or some shit.

"You need to know, whatever you did, you did it to survive. Maybe you didn't do it the right way, maybe you made a mistake, but you're here, and you lived, and you have to take what you gave up, what your sacrificed and move on with it."

Idiotic, it didn't make sense. I didn't just kill someone to survive, I killed 2 children, just like his, just like the child Kushina could have. I was a monster.

"We are all demons, Kizashi, but we fight for something. In reality, it might be selfish, might be destructive, but you have what you care about, and if the only thing letting your go on day after day with that guilt following you is fighting for it, then you have to fight for your village, for your people. I don't know about you, but I'd become a demon for Kushina."

The taste of bile was still in my mouth, but I understood. It was right, that it didn't matter if I was a deplorable piece of shit or not, I was Kushina's. And that meant I couldn't just kneel down and die. I had to live for her, for the world we would create together.

And as much as I wanted Minato to be that perfect enemy, he really was a good guy. He just wanted the best for Kushina, no matter if that was him or no. A better man than me really, because if someone else was with Kushina, they'd be dead by the end of the day.

But he looked at me, vomiting on the ground, knew I had killed at least one child, and forgave me without a second thought. It was moronic, he should be plunging a rasengan into my sternum, but he isn't. He is an idiot.

And one of the smartest men I have ever met.

I grabbed onto his open hand, and pulled myself up (and if Minato stumbled a little from the force of the pull I didn't say anything).

"I've always been a monster Minato, but I'll try to be better for Kushina. Forever."

Then I sighed, and stretched my arm out to his. A handshake. He accepted.

"Friends then, I hope?"

…

Minato was a preliminary test but I was actually due for a professional assessment later, in front of the damned hokage. I had never really met him, always from afar. Not even when I was Orochimaru's student, the man too busy, massacring or sending men to massacres my sensei always said. He had a macabre sense of humour.

Yet meeting the legendarily lethal man by myself wasn't enough, apparently. I needed to be flanked by all ends by elite ANBU, the cushy kind charged with protecting the Lord Hokage, and the ANBU commander, dragon.

Who, thankfully mind you, was clearly too tall and built to be Danzo.

Unfortunately, that also meant nobody in the room knew who I was.

"Let us start with what is on the official records?" The hokage, still in the prime of his life and body, face shaved apart from his chin etched under a hardened, aged face, spoke.

He opened the report placed on his desk, the only one looking away as the rest of the room looked at me, unblinking masks. I felt naked without my own. I still didn't know where it had ended up.

"Here, Haruno Kizashi, an orphan so your hair was the origin of your name. More inventive than me, I would have called you Sakura."

A bad joke.

"Joined the academy at age 4, showed skill beyond most of your peers, normal until graduation, where you managed to be put on a team with my own student, Orochimaru. Very lucky. Even luckier is that you managed to pass. Many of us thought he would fail teams until he died at the age of 300, yet there you were. Then, tragedy struck."

His brown eyes, harsh and perceptive stared right into my soul then.

"Your entire team, apart from you and Orochimaru died. I blamed him for it of course, but since you repeated his story beat for beat, we had to assume you were being truthful.

He took you on many missions after that, a solid year of being under his tutelage, and you were a solid contender for chunin. And then after you vanished."

Silence.

"Don't you have my ANBU record?"

"Gone, like most of them. The previous ANBU commander, and by the way his identity is confidential information most of this room are not privy to, destroyed most records in order to prevent a suspected spy from finding their identities."

I exhaled, trying not to lose it then and there.

"Of course he did. He ended up killing most of us after all."

"So you claim to be a second generation ANBU?"

"My callsign was Yurei. Mission after mission, with my squad, Tanuki, our captain, Kitsune, Onryō, completed without failure."

"And I am just meant to trust this?"

Fair point, frustrating still.

"Trust this. On august the 15th, me and my squad were sent to kill an important target. At the cost of my entire team, we managed to kill the 7 tails jinjuriki."

Hiruzen's eyes opened a little at that. Maybe he knew the entire time I was second gen, maybe this was the confirmation, but as far as I knew that situation was surrounded by a ridiculous fog. Anyone could have sent a squad to kill them, but they didn't. He sighed, and continued.

"I sent a squad of my own jonin to kill them. By the time they reached her, she was dead, surrounded by a few dead ANBU. They investigated, and found evidence of a 4th member, which was never found. Either you knew them somehow, as well as what a second generation ANBU even was, as well as their naming conventions, or you are telling the truth."

For a minute nobody spoke. Then the man, and I could tell for all of his wise-ness he was tired, leaned back, inhaling for a moment.

"I believe you. From tomorrow, you will be introduced to Dragon's command, with your previous mask intact of course. The ranks need a legend to lead them. For now, go back to your girlfriend. I hear she has already prepared your room in her house. Lucky man."

I was, wasn't I?

…

A/N: Short AN because it is like 6 minutes before I upload this, pretty fun chapter, with a lot of character development. Minato comes into the fray, Kizashi confronts his actions, and he gets accepted back into the leaf. If you have any questions or critique, leave a review.

Thank you for reading, goodbye.