DISCLAIMER: I don't own anything from the Naruto universe. This is my Mito, though.
Thinking (+ flashbacks, "Mito speaking to Kurama in her mindscape," etc.)
Emphasis
Bijuu, etc. speaking
Bijuu, etc. thinking
Mito smiled tightly and nodded back at Mei who was reviewing what she called "The State of the State" but shooting her worried looks every now and then. –Or maybe that's simply how Mito perceived it. There were a LOT of frickin' people here for Mei's big speech.
Thanks a lot, Genma, for "fixing my sensory issues." What a drag! Maybe she should start stuffing her pie-hole full of those weird butterscotch candies that shouldn't have (but did or seemed to) dim her senses.
Little butterscotch globules, like plaques: splotching and clogging up my brain, Mito imagined somewhat longingly like a crazy person.
"Are you paying attention?" Utakata whispered, leaning closer.
"Of course, I am," she hissed back, learning away which pushed her into Chukichi who was seated on the other side of her. She was just… distracted.
"I'm going to quiz you," Utakata whispered in a sing-song voice.
A nasally, subdued sing-song voice, Mito thought, mainly to be mean but also because it was true. "I look forward to it."
Mei nodded at Chojuro who again clicked on a laptop, which brought up a new PowerPoint slide. Mito quietly groaned. So unfair. She planned to question everyone who touched the cool technology at length because she wanted to play on it, too. -Er, ensure she brought it back for the benefit of Konoha.
Ha! Who was she kidding? Although Mito really would like to use it at the hospital for better recordkeeping.
Recently, Konoha had "procured" a bunch of smartphones and accessories but their testing and distribution were incredibly slow. Apparently, her father thought that a bunch of ninjas suddenly able to play games and maybe even someday message each other would mean that they would train less, etc. Ah, he knows us so well. Mito had gotten hold of Anko's phone and had played Snake and Solitaire for hours since she couldn't sleep before finding Anko's pictures. Heehee. And from what Mito had heard, Snake was supposedly an incredibly sucky, old game.
I mean, obviously, it's not great, she thought to herself.
Solitaire Mito was all too familiar with, considering that when she was 10 and living at the Fire Temple, her clones were oftentimes rotten and deranged.
The Temple
Well, it's not like Mito wanted to spend time there anymore, anyway, right?
Mei began going over some figures Mito had already seen and her mind began to again wander back to the night before and what had happened to blow everything up in her face early this morning.
Chiriku isn't that type of guy, Mito was positive. He wouldn't have "seduced me" for information!
No, the probability was more in favor of Mito somehow drunkenly seducing Chiriku, against all odds.
Chiriku had been quite upset about some new directives the Daimyo was instituting at the temple although he wasn't able to tell her exactly what those new orders were. He'd repeatedly assured her - truthfully, Mito was almost sure (and only "almost" because of what happened this morning) - that whatever Daimyo-sama wanted would not interfere with Konoha or "ninja business" so they'd just reminisced about some of their better memories - which there had been a lot of, despite… everything else. And drank to the fallen again. And drank to... any and everything.
They'd gone to a nearby inn, both henged although it was only for Chiriku's sake, (now Mito was grateful they had,) and had started off with sake before mixing things up at the bar. –Too much! Too much mixing AND too much alcohol! Mito had gotten a migraine and Chiriku had walked her to a room he may have rented out for her and then… Nothing.
Well, not quite "nothing!" Not "nothing" by a long shot!
Fuck. Me.
Oh, and he did, I suppose.
HOW did that even happen?!
Mito (barely) remembered being a willing participant - from the extremely little she remembered - at the beginning; kind of: meaning that she kind of remembered.
She and Chiriku had both been stumbling around and Mito may have caught him - holding him up, in her arms: for fuck's sake, I am such an ogre - and then she'd kissed him, almost as a joke. And that was all she could remember.
At least until EARLY this morning when her head was pounding with renewed vigor. She and Chiriku were softly arguing and Mito still didn't even remember how THAT had started. Not only had her head desperately hurt, but she was sore as fuck in other areas… Inconsiderate jerk.
Well, that was to be expected, though, wasn't it? The idea that she and Chiriku might have just started dropping clothes and gone for it with little or no foreplay wasn't that hard to believe when she remembered what she'd been pissed off about in the previous days AND the fact that he couldn't have had any experience. Chiriku probably had less experience than Mito and she'd been at what she thought was a zero game!
Although he left a lot of hickeys.
Jerk.
She'd had to fucking HEAL herself and that was just ridiculous. Not only that, but Mito had dropped all of the prophylactics that she had on her with that hag at the brothel so they… hadn't used protection. We raw-dogged it: you damn hypocrite, Namikaze!
Mito was the one to lecture her peers on always using protection but had she?
Nooooo! What a dumbass! Now, whether she thought Chirku had sexual experience or not, Mito was going to have to do STD testing on herself, huh?
Dumbass, dumbass, dumbass!
"Are you really listening?" Chukichi asked quietly while fingering his large prayer beads.
"Yes, I'm listening, goddammit!"
Lady Mei raised her eyebrows and Mito winced before raising her hand to see if she could (properly) voice her… whatever. So I can stop making an ass out of myself and show respect before I have to dodge lava. "Forgive me, Mizukage-sama. Personally, I think your strategy between Wind and Fire Country is thoughtful and wise. It's always best to consider the balance of power between the great nations although you know my feelings on that subject."
"Ahhhh," Mei perked up before giving her closest advisor the stink-eye. "See, Ao. Ambassador Namikaze believes my idea is best!"
Mito couldn't hear what Ao mumbled back to his leader but bit her quirking lips when Mei narrowed her eyes at him after a few silent seconds. Her chakra turned dark.
"Shut up, Ao! Or I'll kill you."
Mito felt like she'd been doused in very cold water.
"I've thought about it, Mito, and after everything that's happened here," Chiriku said (frowning) before pausing and speaking in an even lower, yet still tense voice, "you'll… It will be as if this didn't happen. We shall be discreet and I'm sure you'll agree that this will not happen again: tell no one and I'll tell no one that you killed our Honored Elders."
"'Honored Elders?'" Mito parroted back in anger.
What the hell was happening? What in Kami-sama's name had she done?
"Those assholes were little better than Kazuma and your precious 'Elder Erin!' Do you KNOW what they did to me?!"
WHY and WHEN the hell had she admitted that she'd killed those two elders after her kidnapping?
Mito barely remembered finally facing them, let alone anything else!
For YEARS, she wasn't sure that she had taken their lives until Kurama said what he did. She STILL didn't feel anything - anything at all - about their deaths. How did that "come up in conversation?"
Fuck! She was (sort of: ugh) trained to withstand shit like this!
"I will… investigate it," Chiriku said, looking away from her again.
"Well, let me just say, for the record, that I'm SO sorry you're ashamed of…"
"Mito. It's not that. Um…"
"Get out," Mito demanded between clenched teeth. "I'd like you to leave. NOW."
Chiriku nodded and turned to leave again, softly closing the door behind him. He had already been dressed when she began to come out of her blacked-out drunken haze. Mito threw the sheet she was covered in back onto the bed, using a Katon jutsu to set the whole thing on fire to get rid of the evidence. She quickly burned the whole thing to a crisp before using a Suiton jutsu to douse it: one she swept out the window.
Mito might have also been pissed.
Chiriku came running back in, gaping but quickly looked away from her naked body.
Mito pulled out a new scroll that had several uniforms in it and began pulling on clothes. "Put your henge back on, Dumbass!"
Chiriku looked shocked (still looking away from her but it was clear that he was mortified, even from his profile) - but did as she asked (and so did Mito.)
"I'm sorry."
"It's fine," Mito lied. "Keep your end of the bargain, Chiriku-sama: I won't tell anyone and you won't give your opinions of THAT to anyone."
"Wait!"
Mito didn't wait.
God, she had been so reckless! Although… Nope: Mito couldn't even be proud of herself for not wailing on the monk who had disrespected her(?) or at least so clearly regretted their shared actions considering that they spent their entire adolescence/early adulthood together. She'd had so few friends - and none at the temple - until Chiriku.
Dammit. It sucked to lose a friend: sexually inconsiderate jerk or not.
She'd barely made it back to Konoha with time to shower and change to get ready this morning.
Mito was continuing to wallow in misery and second guesses like an angsty teenager, she knew, as she and Mei left their entourage behind them. Mei had bought a boat and was eager to zip around the bay, showing it off. "Wow!"
Seriously, Mito's real affect was flat. She needed to get her shit together! She felt like little more than that "zombie" that Anko had videotaped.
Mito had been SO happy to delete that video.
Mei grinned, unaware of Mito's thoughts on zombies and Anko. She'd been flying back and forth, skipping her speedboat over the waves for a while, and wanted to speak to Mito alone. "Ha! I almost threw you off!"
"Diplomatically, that cannot be okay," Mito grinned, beginning to almost genuinely laugh and clutching onto the rail without chakra for dear life. "Gah!" As time passed - and for a few wonderful minutes - it was as if she had become a giddy civilian.
Mei smiled back at the younger kunoichi and began to slow down before letting off the accelerator completely. "Do you think you can tell me about Suna? –I won't betray your trust and I know you won't betray your father's."
"Sure, why not," Mito shrugged, making Mei hold back a snicker. "I don't really know much but Suna is hurting." Mei nodded, listening carefully as she turned in her captain's chair. "I'm sure they still have some strong shinobis that stayed behind: that only makes sense - but most of those that are well-known were killed during the invasion."
"So. Foolish!"
"It was."
"WHAT in the world was the Kazekage thinking, taking on the Yellow Flash? –You don't mind that I call him that in passing sometimes, do you?"
"No, that's who he is in battle. Or what he looks like." Her father definitely looked like a yellow comet when he was trying to battle the tag-teaming reanimated three Hokage so that he could better keep them away from the village proper. Mito also knew not to bring up Orochimaru; she wasn't sure his role in the Kazekage's death was known.
"Hmm. Would one call you the red and yellow flash then?"
"No," Mito sighed, sliding her hands into her neatly hidden pockets (crazy or not, Orochimaru's sewing skills were still as outstanding as ever) as she enjoyed the view of a nearby, high, hilly island that was said to be off-limits. Being out on the water really put her mind at ease when she allowed it. –And when she wasn't being thrown around in the boat left and right. Momentarily she wondered if Mei was simply a terrible driver. "You know what my moniker is."
"Hmm. I know it doesn't suit you."
"I really appreciate that." Yeah. Mito never liked being called The Reaper. "Hey, how about we do an information exchange!"
"Ohhhhhhh?" Mei drawled playfully, glad to see the younger woman had finally cheered up. The water will do that. "And what information are you hoping to extract from me?" Mito snorted - loudly - making Mei smile more. "And what are you willing to do or give to get it?"
It took what Mei would like to think was a good portion of ANYONE'S kunoichi training not to react to the way Mito reeled back as if she had been slapped. "Mito," she said seriously, frowning and unable to hide her concern. "I can assure you that I was joking. I… value your… friendship and opinions," she said with a heavy sigh. "Here in Kiri, there are few powerful kunoichis left. We will raise them up…"
"Undoubtedly." Mito really hoped so. Without powerful kunoichis around, male shinobis could get the wrong idea.
Mei bobbed her head. "Being in my position, I've found, has made many things difficult or at least challenging, even with 'the boys.'"
Mito felt awful. It was clear that her unfortunately unfiltered reaction had alarmed her friend, and that's exactly what Mei was to her. I wish we weren't from different villages. Plus, Mito was a kunoichi: she shouldn't be so freaking open: like a book or something. "I appreciate you saying that," Mito sighed, sitting down on the side of the boat. "A lot! And I'm so sorry that you've lost friends."
Mei bit her lip but hid it, looking around in her pretty beach bag. "Yeah. …Ha. My friends were weird."
"The best friends always are," Mito said, believing that wholeheartedly.
"Especially kunoichi friends," Mei said, pulling out a magnum of sake. Mito groaned, kicking both her legs up, and allowed herself to fall off the boat, making Mei laugh. "Baka! Get back up here!"
.
"This is bullshit and you know it, Minato," Shikaku scolded his friend.
"Maybe," Minato admitted, as he looked through the various gate reports. "Maybe not."
"Spying on your adult Jonin kid's sex life will not ingratiate you to your shinobis!" Shikaku glanced up into the rafters and sighed, not having paid much attention to who exactly was on ANBU guard duty this evening until now. Hound was stiff but Shikaku had seen Kakashi-kun nearly stumble where he was standing. The silver-haired shinobi also dropped his book.
Minato cursed when it hit the floor.
Good, Shikaku thought. "You want your book back, Hound?" Minato snatched it away and tucked it into his desk drawer, making the masked operative above them slump, Shikaku was sure. He'd seen Kakashi pout about not having his book often enough. He looked up again and shook his head: it seemed the kid had another one on him.
"She wasn't in the village last night," Minato mumbled to himself, showing Mito's sign-out to his closest friend and advisor.
"Troublesome. But that doesn't mean anything."
"Hound," Minato barked, repeatedly making some kind of weird gesture none of them had seen before.
Minato was trying to figure out what to do next but since Kakashi was aware of this now, maybe he could assist. He gave his apprentice a look before giving Shikaku the same.
Shikaku shouldn't have said what he did out loud!
However, Kakashi would certainly be motivated to find out what his daughter had been up to, more than anyone, he guessed. Minato didn't care what Kakashi said: he hadn't said anything about it in quite some time, but he'd seen Kakashi pining for Mito often enough. Staring is not caring, Kakashi-kun. "Hound, I want you to find out who was on gate duty; see if there are any witnesses or information you can dig up for me on… this. Get back to me within the hour and be discrete. Dismissed."
Kakashi grumbled and stomped off - or at least Minato felt he did. The Hokage sighed and ordered his other ANBUs to keep their mouths shut about all of this: completely.
In his ANBU uniform and mask, mostly disguised (and highly disgruntled,) Kakashi leaned on the North Gate's manned station, aggressively sharpening a kunai until he realized he was spewing KI everywhere. He sighed and licked his masked lips. Normally he was much cooler than this. "You were here when Jonin Namikaze left last?"
"Nah, I think she went to Kiri," Izumo grinned. "Right?" he asked his partner.
"Right. She's the ambassador." Kotetsu saw Hatake droop but roll his one eye behind his mask. Masks. At least Hatake wasn't making them want to run and hide from all of that nasty attitude and KI he was emitting before: it was suffocating. He and Izumo looked at each other and grinned.
"WHAT DID SHE DO?" they both asked merrily at the same time.
"Nothing! She did nothing!"
"Ahhhhh," Izumo sang knowingly. Kotetsu nodded along when they caught each other's twinkling eyes. "You like her!"
"I do not," Kakashi said reflexively. This whole thing was so stupid and infuriating! He hadn't made a move yet and what? Did Kakashi expect Mito to wait for him to man up and ask her out - as himself? Would he ever do that? Did he really want to?
And did his Hokage investigate his sex life when he wasn't in the village?
Maybe sensei needs some action, himself. –As soon as Kakashi thought that, he winced, remembering Kushina. He couldn't imagine what losing a wife: a mate would be like.
"Why not?" Kotetsu asked, feeling offended on Mito's behalf. "You don't like her? Ha. Mito's cool."
"I thought she was scary at first," Izumo agreed, "but she treated us after a mission at the hospital and we got to know her a little."
"She is scary, though," Kotetsu grinned at his partner.
"She really is!"
Kakashi gritted his teeth as he often did when questioning these two. Normally he really liked Izumo and Kotetsu but whenever he needed information, they were way too cheerful and took forever to deal with. "Do you know where she went?"
"Temple. –Uzumaki Temple," Izumo clarified, unsure whether or not he heard Hatake growl. A growling Hatake was a dangerous Hatake. He CLEARLY recalled sparring against a growling chibi-Hatake at the Academy: yikes. "She goes up there every once in a while to check on the aquarium she and Naruto-kun set up."
"I want to see those fish," Kotetsu said with dramatically bigger eyes; he knew Izumo did, too. "Naruto really bragged about those tropical fish."
Kakashi sighed. "You didn't see or hear anything."
"Where?" both men asked, looking around suspiciously.
"Just… think about what I've said?" Kakashi sunshinned away to go pound his head into a tree in frustration. Now he needed to find who was on guard duty when Mito returned from her little excursion and what they'd seen or heard.
.
Minutes later, Kakashi sagged, guessing all of the Chunin gate guards were overly-happy, mischievous types. Both of these younger Chunins were clan kids but one of them was from the Sarutobi clan so Kakashi hoped he'd be more willing to keep his mouth shut.
Kakashi didn't trust today's young Chunins much, especially the ones that were nosy gate guards. He really didn't trust them when they were looking at him with suspicion clear in their eyes, despite his higher rank and status. "Did Jonin Namikaze say anything?"
"I thiiiiink," the Sarutobi teen said, obviously trying to recall, "she was grumbling about… fish."
"Yep," the other kid said as he scratched his head - and then winked at Kakashi, making the masked shinobi sigh even more heavily and want to whack him. "It was suspicious, though." In just over a whisper, he added, "Plus when she dropped the henge to sign back in, I saw the hickeys for a second."
Kakashi's eyes slowly widened under his masks but he took a deep, silent, calm, and steadying breath. Who's she seeing? Mito just doesn't seem the type to sleep around although with Minato's eyes lurking everywhere, he may have driven her to whoever she went to.
And then there was the whole thing with Gai: when they went to Mito for medical assistance after their challenge and she reset the Green Beast's tooth. Dammit, Gai! –Did what you say cause this?!
The question is, did Minato also see evidence of something or is he just overly suspicious?
Of course, he's being overly suspicious: this is none of his/our damn business!
Although I certainly want to know.
"Do you want Uncle Asuma to kill you, man?"
"You hardly know Asuma-san," the Yamanaka kid chided. "Your clan's huge."
"It's not that big! Yours is bigger! Plus Mito-sensei's like my aunt or something."
"You don't know? You hardly know her!"
"I don't know her at all. I mean, I've seen her around the village but she moved out before I was born, I think. Maybe. …I DO know enough to know that she used to be under the Sarutobi Clan's protection."
"She's already got a clan! She's…"
"That's enough," Kakashi interrupted, directing some intent at the kids. "I don't know what you think you saw but I strongly advise you to keep it to yourself. Don't. Tell. Anyone: and I mean anyone, alright?" Both boys nodded but Kakashi stuck around to really drill his orders into their heads (and maybe scare them a little.)
"Uhhhh… I may have said something to Old Man Hideki, Sir."
Well, at least Hideki, aka Monkey, can keep his mouth shut, Kakashi thought as he sunshinned a short distance away. He had a clone go back to hear what the Chunins had to say when they thought he was gone.
"He's the Hokage's dog. You'd better not say anything, 'nawi."
"You're right. –You're absolutely right."
.
A little after the hour mark, Kakashi reported in and signaled for everyone else to leave the room. Once he was positive that he was alone with the Hokage he spoke. "Jonin Namikaze left to visit the Uzumaki Shrine." Minato frowned at him and it was clear to Kakashi that he expected more information. "It makes sense: Jonin Namikaze has often voiced concern about her seals effectively supporting an aquatic ecosystem enough times for me to believe it. From what I've deduced, she had to alter or repair those seals which resulted in her spending more time there than she normally would have. She informed the gate guards of such: that she would be back by morning at the very latest." And she was.
Minato found his pen to be very interesting and almost wondered why he was playing with it. He tapped it on his fingers, his stomach was turning and churning. He definitely had other things to worry about in the village. But a daughter that was potentially involved with foreign shinobis? That he could not stand for. "Did she now?"
Could Mito have been seeing this person for a while? He'd known about her quick trips to the Uzumaki Shrine. Before this, he'd never doubted that she was only checking on the aquarium she and Naruto had installed and possibly praying. He'd heard so much about that aquarium…
Kakashi only stood there, staring at him blankly. Minato sighed. "Can you track her movements?"
"Is that really necessary?" Kakashi asked plainly since they were alone.
"It might be," Minato sighed. "It would at least ease my mind. You do know how to track a teleporter, Kakashi, and I don't doubt that she went to the shrine so that would be a good place to start, hm?"
Kakashi looked out the window, trying to will storm clouds to hinder his search. "As you will it, so shall it be," Kakashi mumbled before sunshinning away.
Now. Was he really going to do this? Was he going to return to his pre-Team 7 role as "The Hokage's Dog?" Or was he going to cover for his… his friend?
.
Mito let out a puff of irritation as Ao reprimanded Utakata for sparring with her in the Mizukage's private training area. But this is where Mei TOLD them to spar! Surely Utakata-kun was telling him that.
She reclined in a huge bubble: something Mito had dreamed of while bathing fairly often, floating a couple of meters off the ground. She could easily put her chains through it but why would she want to?
Yet another memory hit her of what had happened with Chiriku and she pinched the bridge of her nose. Well, at least she HAD had some fun - kind of? - although it wasn't anything great. First times, though: maybe it was good that she'd been wasted enough to have blanked out major parts of it.
"I remember the first time I had sex," Tsunade said dreamily as she nearly tipped her cup of alcoholic something or other on a 9-year-old Mito.
Mito pulled a disgusted face and leaned forward toward Shizune, scratching Tonton affectionately behind her ear. When Tsunade had been going over human sexuality this is not what she was expecting. TMI! "Sharing is not always caring, 'ttebane."
"Sharing is definitely not caring," Shizune agreed. She didn't want to hear this, either!
Tsunade choked. "I'm trying to impart wisdom here, you total brats," Tsunade fumed, bopping her fist on the table and making it come off the ground. Shizune grabbed Tonton in the nick of time… again.
As always.
"It was absolutely terrible! There was all of this…sweating and tangling of limbs… and Ha! Pain: my sweet then-idiot boyfriend didn't know what he was doing! Let me tell ya: it was over QUICKLY."
"Please don't talk about Uncle Dan that way! I'm gonna throw up."
"I think I'm going to be sick, too," Mito murmured to herself, holding her belly.
"Hey! It got much better. Much… MUCH better," Tsunade recalled and then hiccuped.
Mito grimaced at the longing, lost, yet pervy look on Tsunade's face. "Where's the wisdom in that?!"
"Hmm?" Tsunade appeared to have definitely forgotten she'd said that while reliving her pervacious memories, Mito thought.
"Keep trying until you get it right? Yes! 'Keep trying until you get it right!' Bartender! Bring me another!"
Mito had had enough. "If Mom finds out you've been dragging me from bar to bar again, she's going to pound you." Again.
Tsunade paled and asked for the check.
.
Their little encounter began much as she figured. Chiriku dropped trou/his robes and Mito jumped Chiriku. –It was like a horny teenage Mito's non-fantasy. "Oh, geez." So not cool, Mito.
Mito felt the bubble's chakra change but allowed herself to plop on the ground, now feeling like she had a slick coating of liquid soap all over her. "Ew."
Ao had trudged off and Mito smirked, putting up her dukes again after getting up. "Ready to get your ass kicked?"
What the heck were Utakata's bubbles made out of? Surely they weren't simply chakra-infused bubble soap! –That would be hilarious!
It's similar to Sai's ink jutsus, Mito imagined. Sai's jutsus began simply as chakra-infused ink.
"Not really," Utakata sighed. "Ao-sama is exhausting."
"Is he freaking out that Mei allowed this?"
He nodded. "Who wants 'two jinchuurikis sparring?'" Utakata grumbled. "Yagura used to train me; Ao's memories of that do not favor us sparring after this."
"Did you like… transform with him? I saw Yagura's transformation, ya know: it was terrifying."
Utakata drew in a deep breath. "I don't want to talk about it. Let's just spar before he comes back." If I have to sit in another meeting for several hours straight, I'm going to lose my mind. Utakata knew Mito felt the same way. How could he not? She was rather "open" about detesting meetings or sitting, in general. He had noticed that she preferred either pacing, jumping around, or leaning/reclining on something.
Utakata moved into his opening taijutsu stance, which was taught to him by his village's oftentimes psychotic former leader. "Hajime."
Both ninjas flew at each other.
Mito admired Utakata's taijutsu form: he moved fast, like a raging river which was fun and quite different to fight against. She hadn't fought against someone like this since… Well, since her mother used to train her. Slightly distracted - especially when Zabuza came into the training field, Mito got punched in the side. "OOF!"
So she wrapped Utakata up in her chains and sat on him.
"I don't like this," Utakata admitted, panting underneath her with his face in the moss. He could try to liquefy Mito and her chains with an acid attack but figured that wouldn't be too "diplomatic" of him. "I'm glad I know now."
"Pervert," Mito whispered before getting up; her chains seeming to dissolve into the air. "Yo, Zabuza! What's up?"
"'What's up,' she asks," Zabuza groaned before looking back at his kids as if Mito had done something wrong. "I want to show you something and see if you've seen anything like it."
"Congratulations on making Chunin, Haku-kun?" Mito asked more than said. The Yuki kid was massively talented and had the chakra of a Jonin so maybe he got a field promotion, she guessed. "Yo, Chojuro-kun, Suigetsu-kun: I'm so glad to see you!
Seeing that Zabuza-shishou's eyes had narrowed on him, Haku coughed and explained. "I'm the team leader for Zabuza-shishou. I haven't yet been promoted to Chunin, sensei."
"Ah," Mito uttered with a smirk. She raised an eyebrow at Zabuza, figuring that Haku acted as a Chunin for the village but Zabuza wanted his apprentice to show off in the next Chunin Exams, "pretending" to be a Genin. Shit. Haku was definitely good enough to win the whole thing. He was probably the most overpowered and talented (non) Genin she'd ever met. Double shit! She needed to get home and turn her cubs into the lions she was sure they could someday be! "Well, I have no doubts that you'll get that official promotion the next time the Chunin Exams roll around."
"That's not gonna be for a year or more," Suigetsu moped.
"You don't know that," Zabuza gritted out, glaring at the little brat. Both Hozuki brothers drove him crazy. Actually, all three of these damn kids did. And speaking of Mangetsu...
"How's your brother doing, Suigetsu?" Mito asked.
"He's okay; he's on a mission."
"I'm glad to hear that…"
"THIS IS NOT A SOCIAL CALL," Zabuza suddenly cried out.
"Well excuse the hell outta me for being nice," Mito hotly responded. "What do you want to show me?"
.
Kakashi sat in front of the head ninja monk, staring at him passively but really wanting to lash out - something that was inappropriate. He picked up his teacup and drank the ginseng blend through his mask. He could wait forever for answers and Chiriku-sama was nervous. Kakashi's nose never lied; it didn't matter that the monk had a hell of a poker face.
"Yes, I saw her," the monk admitted again with an exasperated sigh. "Is there a problem?"
The problem is that the bottom of your laundry reeks of Mito-chan and sex. –Which makes me want to destroy you. Kakashi guessed that the way he felt indicated that he was more of a goner for the kunoichi than he'd like to believe; maybe. For a while, he'd been disturbed by these… new feelings. "Maa, not a problem, per se."
Chiriku couldn't help but pull a slight face. He had things to do and dealing with a Konoha nin like this was not something his psyche was up for after… after everything. Just be glad that Asuma isn't here. –Oh, what a terrible thought! Asuma was one of his very close friends - so is Mito and you hurt her, his conscience whispered - and Asuma doted on the woman he considered his younger sister.
The woman I deflowered.
I broke a vow.
Chiriku felt as if that fact was eating away at his soul! Taking a deep breath, Chiriku reminded himself of the mantra he was now often chanting to himself: "I am a ninja as well as a monk." Plus, isn't this what Daimyo-sama wanted anyway?
No.
Absolutely not.
Not really. It certainly wasn't what Chiriku wanted.
Daimyo-sama stated that he wanted to bring more women to the Temple, to train as kunoichis. Chiriku didn't like it, but not because he had anything against women or kunoichis. When Daimyo-sama "joked" that he'd like to see more "ninja baby monks" at the Temple in the same conversation, Chiriku thought he might be serious, wishing for the monks to begin taking wives. –Or perhaps one day forcing us to take wives.
Regaining his senses, Chiriku straightened up. "Has Mito-hime gone missing?!"
"No."
Chiriku sighed in relief. "I'm pleased to hear that. What is it that you or Hokage-sama want, Hatake-sama?"
Kakashi already knew that this guy was the one Mito slept with. Shouldn't he be headed back to Konoha? "What's your true relationship with hime-sama?"
"We grew up together; we are close friends and comrades."
Kakashi nodded and finished his tea, eventually crossing his arms over his chest again. This lying son of a bitch was going to tell him the truth before he left.
Two hours later -
Kakashi lazily jumped from tree to tree on his way back to Konoha, deep in thought. What the hell did that mean? Before having him thrown/escorted out, Chiriku admitted that he and Mito "have an agreement" and that Kakashi could question her about it - but whether or not Chiriku wanted to admit it, the monk had been angry.
Surely the head ninja monk didn't force anything on Mito that made her agree to…
That was unthinkable.
And then Kakashi remembered that Mito was originally kidnapped from the Fire Temple by a trusted comrade: a monk and an elder, at least one of whom had attempted to sexually assault her.
In the meantime -
Mito was so excited! "This is perfect! Chojuro-kun, I had wanted to ask you about this!"
A laptop; a laptop!
Zabuza groaned, wishing Mito would go back to her surly self; he liked dealing with the feisty woman then best. "It's what's ON the computer that I'm concerned with, baka."
"Well, let's see it! –And you're the baka, 'ttebane," Mito added in a little growl afterward. Chojuro brought up the strange file he'd found on the laptop when he was assisting Mei-sama with her presentation. He looked up and saw that his sensei's growing-in eyebrows were raised as Mito-sensei tried not to gawk (and failed) at what he'd brought up. "You recognize this, Mito-sensei?" Should he call her that? She was the ambassador but Chojuro got to know Namikaze Mito, as Fox, as a doctor: thus "sensei."
"I need to check on this," Mito said carefully. The file Zabuza brought up was definitely code but not an entire code. But Mito might have the rest of it in the files that were in one of her seals. She made a clone so that it could flash off and get permission to investigate this more.
.
Shikaku was surprised that the new Kiri Ambassador - his friend's possibly sexually-active daughter: Yech. Shikaku did NOT want to know or think about that!
What a crime she's committed, he thought sarcastically (Shikaku had gotten it on with more than a few girls from other villages before Yoshino came along. It wasn't traitorous or anything close to it.) "I thought you were in Kiri."
"I am," the clone chirped. "But I've got a lead in the Gato/Missing Persons Investigation: a big one!"
Shikaku opened his home's door more. "Let's go to the office and you can tell me all about it."
"Yosh!" As soon as the door to the Jonin Commander's home office was closed and the seals went up, the clone couldn't stand it anymore. "Kiri's recovered a laptop - well, a ton of technology, I think - but the laptop's got the missing part of the code you outlined in that giant bunch of paperwork you gave me about the Gato investigation. I think."
"Unbelievable. What do you advise, Ambassador?"