Kakashi caught the Hokage in a meeting with the other three village elders and no less than a dozen ANBU, five of whom he recognised as top hunter-nin with tracking abilities. They all turned to watch him enter, masked faces inscrutable. A lower-ranked ninja might have run from the room and thanked the gods he hadn't been struck down for his audacity. As a former ANBU agent himself, he was immune to their intimidating aura and strolled right up to the main desk.
"Kakashi." The Third arched an eyebrow. "Mission allocations are on the ground floor."
"Respectfully sir, my team can't take a mission while we're short one member."
"Nonsense, I'm sure there are plenty of local D-rank missions that two boys could more than handle." Homura Mitokado, one of the village elders, shuffled some papers. "It's normal to start rookies out weeding gardens, catching cats and the like. By the time they're ready for something more challenging, we'll have found a suitable replacement."
"A replacement?" Kakashi bristled. "Haruno Sakura has barely been missing a day. Are we giving up on one of our own so easily?"
"Of course not," The Third said. He sat a moment, appraising Kakashi. Eventually he spoke again. "Clear the room."
There was the briefest pause, and then every ANBU agent disappeared in a puff of smoke. Once it was just Kakashi and the elders left, he spoke.
"Do not doubt that we are saddened by the loss of Haruno Sakura," he told Kakashi. "She was a village asset, but more importantly she was a little girl. We are doing all in our power to investigate her disappearance."
"And my team is prepared to do whatever it takes to assist with that investigation," Kakashi replied. "But to do that, we need more information."
"To be honest, we had planned to leave you and the rest of your team out of it until we had something conclusive to report." Koharu Utatane, the only female elder present, spoke up. "Your time as the girl's teacher was too brief for anyone to consider you obligated to her."
"Apparently it was long enough to consider me a suspect." He didn't bother to keep the scorn from his voice, even though the Third was giving him a warning look.
Danzo Shimura, the last elder present and a man Kakashi could barely stand on a normal day, slammed his hands down on the desk. "Your attitude is unbecoming of a jounin of Konoha, Hatake Kakashi. The fact of the matter is this: the training of the last Uchiha and the Nine Tails' jinchuuriki cannot be delayed for the sake of an irrelevant kunoichi."
"She is not irrelevant to me." Kakashi wanted to say more, but Danzo cut him off.
"Finding a missing girl is not your mission; your mission is to continue your training with the rest of Team Seven." He regarded Kakashi with barely concealed contempt, and Kakashi could tell that it was the ghost of Hatake Sakumo that he really saw. "If you understand that, then consider yourself dismissed."
Kakashi looked to the Third, the only council member he actually respected, but the man's expression was completely closed off to him. He left, gritting his teeth beneath his mask.
ⴵⴵⴵⴵⴵⴵⴵⴵⴵⴵ
It was later that evening, more than 48 hours since Sakura's disappearance, that Tiger once again made a visit to Kakashi. This time, however, he knocked at the front door instead of walking through the window.
"Genma," Kakashi acknowledged, because he wasn't wearing his ANBU mask and therefore this was a social call.
"Hey." Genma held up a bottle of saké. "Let me in."
Kakashi ignored the rudeness, stepping out of the way of his old friend. "I'm not really in the mood for this."
The door clicked shut, and Genma's casual façade immediately dropped. "Officially speaking, I'm only here for a drink."
"Understood." Kakashi quickly refreshed his apartment's security seals. "And unofficially?"
"The Third assumes you have no intention of giving up on Haruno Sakura."
"He'd be correct; but if you're here to stop me-"
"I'm here to help you." Genma stomped noisily to the kitchen and grabbed two cups. "But if the elders find out you're investigating, they'll call it insubordination. Which it technically is."
"I just need to know what you all know." Kakashi didn't want to beg, but he was prepared to. "The intel from other villages: have other shinobi been abducted?"
Genma clinked the cups noisily, in stark contrast to how quietly he spoke. "They've all been genin, barely out of the academy. Children, unable to defend themselves against an enemy who leaves no trace. Sometimes whole three-man cells disappear with no signs of struggle, sometimes it's just one child snatched when they're alone and vulnerable."
It was only years of training that stopped Kakashi from wincing. Sakura wouldn't have been alone if her team, the people who were meant to protect her, hadn't gone out of their way to avoid her that evening.
"Have any of them come back? Or been…recovered."
Genma shook his head. "We have seriously limited information; not because we've been lax in our recon, but because there's just no information. No trails, no bodies, no indication of why someone wants green shinobi in the first place. The only odd thing we've learned recently might not even be connected."
"What's that?"
"Again, it might be unconnected." Genma took a tiny sip of sake. "But we found a listing in our academy records for a genin team that apparently graduated four years ago, who appears to have gone AWOL."
"So Sakura wasn't the first Konoha genin to be taken?" Kakashi leaned forward in his chair. "When did the other team go missing?"
"That's the thing," Genma said. "When we dug a little deeper, we found that the record was a plant; the team never existed. We think it was part of a planned infiltration that was either called off or waylaid before it could be carried out."
"Waylaid, for example, by the team getting abducted?" Kakashi guessed.
Genma nodded. "It's pure speculation of course. It's just as likely that they're spies who don't even realise they've been made, and we'll see them surface just before the chunin exam."
It made sense that the upcoming chunin exam would be their goal; why else would a group of presumably well-trained spies pretend to be low-ranking genin? "Any more leads to be gained from the dummy record?"
A senbon was placed in his hands, identical to the ones he knew Genma liked to use (and occasionally pick his teeth with). But the weighting was off slightly, and he quickly found the secret catch that broke the needle in two and revealed the hollow inside. The sheet of paper rolled up inside was wafer thin, and Kakashi held it up to the light. There were three dot-matrix photographs plus names and all the other details one might expect to find on an official academy record, but written tiny and in Genma's handwriting.
Once he had read it twice and burned it into his memory, Kakashi dropped the fragile paper into his sake cup and stirred it gently with the broken senbon. Within seconds it had dissolved into pulp. He screwed the senbon back together and handed it to Genma.
"Thanks for the drink."
"Keep the rest of the bottle," Genma told him. "It's got a short-range privacy seal on the label, so you can bring it to my place if your investigation turns up anything useful."
"Investigation?" He blinked innocently. "I thought my mission was to train Naruto and Sasuke."
"It is, officially, so if you're seen neglecting your teacher duties the Third won't defend you from the other elders. But he also knows you're not the type of guy to sit idly while a teammate is in trouble, and he'd prefer you do it the smart way." And with that, Genma stood and let himself out.
After a moment, Kakashi stood and put the half-bottle of saké in his vegetable crisper. It was probably exactly what Genma had said it was, but if it was actually a listening device then he'd prefer it sit in the makeshift faraday cage of his refrigerator for now.
He would have to convince the boys to move on and start taking missions without Sakura. Sasuke probably wouldn't take much persuasion, but Naruto was already talking like it was assumed they would be dropping everything to go looking for her. The sooner he abandoned that notion, the sooner Kakashi could bag them a field mission. He had contacts all over the Land of Fire and beyond, and he wanted them putting out feelers for intel as soon as possible. If there was so much as a rumour about a pink-haired girl, he would sniff it out. He would also be able to learn more about this missing ninja team: Misumi Tsurugi, Yoroi Akado, and Yakushi Kabuto.
ⴵⴵⴵⴵⴵⴵⴵⴵⴵⴵ
Sakura ached all over.
She'd been convinced The Others were going to end up killing her after all, despite Karin's assurances that they had gone pretty light on her. After a while Sakura had simply gone limp, hoping they'd get bored or feel guilty for beating up a helpless child; and indeed, after a few more seconds they all seemed to collectively agree that she'd had enough. She assumed they would all just run off after that, but they'd all stuck around and even helped her to her feet.
"Not a completely disappointing showing, but you've got a long way to go before The Watcher will be satisfied with you," Jun said, slapping her painfully on the back.
Sakura wanted to cry again, but it wasn't a good look for ninjas and also she didn't want everyone trying to taste her tears like Karin had. Instead, she tried to find her voice. "You did all that for The Watcher? Aren't they the one who did this to us in the first place? Why would you…"
"Obey someone who keeps us trapped in hell?" Karin supplied, slipping under one of Sakura's arms to support her weight. "Because, Konoha, 'hell' can get a whole lot worse if we don't. Now shut up until we get you to Sensei. You look like you're about to pass out, and that always gets weird in here."
"Sensei? There's a teacher here?" Hope flared briefly. Kakashi hadn't been far off when she was taken. If teachers weren't safe, then maybe he got snatched just after her, and would be falling through the non-existent ceiling any minute now. She hadn't known him for long, but he was a real adult. He could get them out.
"Sensei as in Doctor, not Sensei as in Teacher," Karin explained. "He's been here so long that's he's properly old now." She tried to help drag Sakura wherever they were going, but after they almost fell in the gap between their stone platform and the next, the pointy-teeth man rolled his eyes and scooped Sakura into his arms instead. Karin still led the way, and now it was clear to Sakura that her 'friend' was some sort of sensory type, directing the others to wherever the last remaining prisoner was hiding.
On the way, they introduced themselves. The youngest other than Karin were Jun and the woman with the red hair necklace whose name was Naomi. They were apparently teammates before they were snatched just outside the Hidden Waterfall. They didn't mention what happened to their third member, and Sakura didn't ask.
The three ninjas from the Hidden Cloud looked to be in their late thirties. The blonde woman introduced herself as Manami, and then turned around to show Sakura what she had assumed at first was a giant backpack, but was actually a huge rat-shaped puppet.
"And this is Chu-chan!" Manami announced. "Say hello, Chu-chan! Hello, Chu-chan," she said in a high voice, while the puppet's mouth flapped vaguely in sync with the words. Sakura looked around at the others' reactions to the ridiculous performance, but they all seemed unfazed.
"Chu-chan's a great listener," Karin said, and it was impossible to tell if she was joking. "Manami, not so much."
Manami stuck her tongue out at Karin while the puppet pressed its shabby paws to its face. "Oh Red, you're making me blush!"
The other two Cloud ninja were Tomo, the man with tinted goggles who everyone apparently called 'Pinch' because he had a tendency to steal anything that wasn't actively protected (Sakura pointedly tucked her uneven patch of hair behind her ear), and the dark-skinned Yoshi, who everyone called Siren for reasons that hadn't been explained.
"And that's Teeth," Karin finished, pointing at the man still carrying her. "Don't bother asking his real name, because he never says."
Teeth smiled, and even though the jagged teeth made him look quite scary, up close Sakura could see that he had long, dark eyelashes and a heart-shaped face. If he were about thirty years younger, he might have been even more handsome than Sasuke.
Sasuke… The thought of her crush made her bruised chest ache with homesickness. She should have been training with her team, maybe going on a mission, not here with a bunch of insane adults who apparently beat each other senseless half the time.
Eventually they stopped on a stone platform that once again looked exactly the same as every other. Teeth put Sakura back on her feet, while Karin stepped up to the edge and leaned down.
"Sensei…newcomer."
After a moment, a middle-aged man with grey hair tied back in a long ponytail walked up the side of the platform. Like Karin, he wore a pair of glasses that had seen better days. He greeted the others with a nod before focusing on Sakura.
"You must be the newcomer," he said, eyes taking in her various cuts and bruises.
"Sakura," she tried to smile. "From Konoha."
"I'm the doctor. Some of the ruder inmates call me 'Doc' or even 'Glasses', but I'd prefer Sensei." He reached out, hands glowing faintly blue. "May I examine you?"
She nodded, laying down as instructed. Her injured outsides were making her far too aware of her strangely absent insides.
Sensei handled her more gently than anyone had so far, even Karin. Perhaps it was the fact that he was pushing sixty, or the fact that his medical jutsu was precise and comforting even under such strange conditions, but he seemed saner than the others. If she closed her eyes she might have been at a normal hospital in Konoha, getting treated for a normal sparring injury.
"What's your real name?" She asked quietly. "Or do you also refuse to say?"
Sensei's comforting smile remained unchanged. "It's good practice among ninjas from different villages to keep your secrets to yourself; even with zero hope of escape, you never know what information might lead to harm for your village. But in my case, it's not that I refuse to say. I can't."
"You don't…remember?" Perhaps Sensei wasn't as sane as he seemed.
He laughed. "I'm not that old. When we were first taken, my team and I were given curse seals so that we wouldn't blab about…certain things." He stuck out his tongue, revealing a series of black bars like tattoos.
Sakura glanced at the others, who were all busy catching up with Karin a short distance away. "Do we all get one?"
"No." Sensei's gaze shifted from her bruised ribs to look her squarely in the eye. "Just me." He held her gaze patiently, even as his chakra continued to work its magic on her injuries.
"Because…" this felt like the kind of problem Iruka might have set them at the academy, and she tried to push past her pain and homesickness to grasp at the answer. "Because you know something that would harm your village? You're from The Watcher's village, and he wants to protect its secrets?"
Sensei's expression turned complicated. "Obviously I can neither confirm nor deny your guess," he said, but Sakura felt that she had guessed wrong. "But at least you're still trying to find out more. People tend to give up hope after a few years, alas."
"Have you given up?" She asked, and he shook his head.
"I've been here longer than anyone else, and based on how long it's been since The Watcher aged out my teammates, I don't think they're planning on letting me leave any time soon. My medical jutsu is too valuable for patching up the rest of you, plus the Medicals. But," he smiled, his dark eyes unreadable, "I am very patient."
"The others mentioned Medical." Sakura swallowed nervously. "They said it's for…" she gestured vaguely at her abdomen, "but honestly I don't plan to do anything like that, so it's not necessary for me actually."
Sensei gave her an apologetic pat on the head, a gesture she hated even under normal circumstances. "Sorry, Sakura, but even if I had a say in what The Watcher makes me do to your body, the tubal ligation is a practicality you'll be glad of one day."
"But I want to have children," she whispered, tears prickling at her eyes. Sasuke was the last member of an important clan. She'd assumed he'd want to have lots of heirs, and there was no way he'd pick her if she couldn't help with that.
"I'm sorry," he repeated, the glow in his hands finally fading as he removed them from her sides. She hadn't even noticed he'd finished healing her.
She got back to her feet and twisted her body experimentally. Nothing hurt anymore, but she didn't feel 'normal' either.
"You had two fractured ribs, a fractured ulna, a few nasty bruises on your legs, and a bit of trauma in your kidneys," Sensei reported, standing up and rubbing his hands together. Sakura could see that they were slightly chapped from the chakra.
"So I still have kidneys," she mused, rubbing her lower back.
"Try not to think too hard about the lack of bodily functions in here," Sensei advised, with a small smile. "Just be grateful we don't need to expel waste."
"If we don't sleep or sweat or…expel waste," she said, "why do I need to get…that thing that'll happen in Medical?"
"I wonder…" Sensei hummed, and once again Sakura felt like she was being quizzed.
"You ready?" Karin called, coming over. Behind her, the others were breaking off by themselves or in groups. Sakura caught Naomi glaring at her before she left with Jun.
"Karin," Sensei smiled. Always a pleasure. Was there any particular reason you couldn't heal Sakura's injuries yourself?"
"I thought it was a good opportunity for you two to meet before Medical," she said, "but yes, I can probably fix her up next time."
"You don't have to talk about me like I'm a child," she complained, knowing it probably did make her sound like a child, but unable to help herself. She hated when people talked about her instead of to her.
Sensei and Karin gave each other a look that confirmed Sakura was coming across exactly as childishly as she felt, but to their credit neither of them said anything. "Are you still good to travel with me for now?" Karin asked. "Obviously later if you want to be by yourself or join up with someone else, that's your prerogative. But like Sensei said, I can do a bit of healing too, so I'm your best bet until you can look after yourself."
Sakura thought about the others: the ones who weren't standoffish were clearly crazy. "Yes please."
Karin smiled. "Great. I'll teach you everything I know." She took off at a more leisurely pace than before, with the threat of The Others no longer dogging them. Sakura glanced back just in time to see Sensei disappear into the space between rocks.
"I'll take you back to where we stashed the gear for now, but I still don't recommend grabbing it until after Medical." Karin spoke as she ran. "I'll also come find you after. The Watcher never puts us back in the same place they take us out from."
"What's to just stop me attacking The Watcher the second they take me out?" Sakura asked. She figured a person powerful enough to send people to a void dimension was out of her league, but that wouldn't stop her from trying if the alternative was coming back here.
"I asked the same thing when I first arrived," Karin said. "If The Watcher takes us out all the time, why doesn't anyone escape? Maybe the people that never came back didn't age out; maybe they got away." She looked at Sakura with a sad smile. "But you'll find out soon enough why that's not likely."
