WhIP

by footfungus

nederlands verhalen over mijn otp

178. Chapter 178

instincts were for the trusting, safe, cuddly pups.

It also allowed him to actually hear and process Sakura's recounting of their little adventure, since the boys pressed her to tell them more.

And Sakura had been there for the informal debrief with Inoichi, so she knew the whole story, down to the last sentence spoken.

The kids all cried when Sakura repeated Aiko's words on sacrifice, and Aiko patiently repeated her salient points and rephrased at need, to make sure the kids at understood.

Her words landed like a knife in a long-festering part of his heart.

It hurt.

But... Well.

Maybe, just like in the start, when Aiko had been forcing him to involve himself with the pups, it was the good sort of hurt.

Maybe the knife to the heart was what was needed to let all the festering pus and survivor guilt seep out.

Kakashi felt his headband grow damp over Obito's eye, and this time he couldn't find it in him to curse his erstwhile teammate for a crybaby.

Inoichi said that tears were good. That they helped evacuate the feelings.

Kakashi would take the leakiness of Obito's eye as a gift.

Aiko sang the kids to sleep.

It wasn't a figure of speech. She actually tucked all three genins in, and then sang lullabies while playing the Biwa until they all were sleeping.

It looked like a magic trick to Kakashi.

And it brought out a longing for something he had never even had. No wonder Naruto and Sasuke had teared up when Aiko started with the singing.

No wonder Naruto had wanted Aiko to be solidified into the mother role. She did great at big sister, though. And Katsuyu was very good at being maternal. Naruto would see it for himself, sooner or later.

Once the kids were asleep, Aiko invited herself into Kakashi's bedroll.

He wasn't the least bit upset about that development.

Or by the kissing.

Aiko genuinely enjoyed kissing for it's own sake. Kakashi enjoyed the closeness, and yes, also the chance to check up on her health. He did have a non-negligible amount of canine in him. And also, kisses were nice.

When the kissing started to pick up intent, Kakashi simply shifted to be less stuck to Sasuke, so he wouldn't wake him up.

It might have grossed someone else out, having someone he routinely called sister pawing at him. In all truth, Kakashi couldn't be less bothered by it than he was.

On the Wolf side of things, Aiko was a Pack-Sister, yes. But wolves were a lot less particular about incest and such. Besides, the Wolf saw things more as Aiko's version of play-fighting. She was good at sexual interactions, and she played at it with him, where he always submitted easily. It didn't have anything to do with breeding. As far as the Wolf was concerned, his Pack-Sister was inviting him to play the game at which she always won. It was fine, Kakashi won all the other physical games. Besides, she made it all very enjoyable, even in his defeat.

On the human side of things, he didn't have any blood relationship, nor early childhood closeness with her. He had no problem at all having any sort of sex with Aiko, the only thing keeping him from it was the reaction his Wolf part had to her pheromones.

So he relaxed and let Aiko do whatever she wanted.

Not that he was in any way unwilling. Things always felt great. And Aiko had a tendency to be so tender that it kind of felt like Kakashi's rib-cage was caught in a vice if he had the spare brainpower to notice it.

For Aiko, sex with friends was an opportunity for emotional connection. She tended to pet his hair and face and whisper encouragements while Kakashi was losing his mind, in a way that made him feel incredibly cared for.

As usual, Kakashi came after a few minutes. He was never particularly noisy. Marks of a shinobi. But he went a bit further this time, pressing his face into her shoulder and restraining himself to a sob and deep sigh.

As usual, Aiko took care of gently lowering his head back down to his pillow so he wouldn't hit himself, and kissed him lightly until he could breathe more normally. She stroked his flank and shoulders and shushed him and stayed close until he wasn't liable to feeling abandoned if she left. And then she sat up and unsealed a towel and some water to clean her hand and his stomach.

Then, with a last lingering kiss, she got up and left to take care of herself out of his scenting range.

Kakashi blinked sluggishly until a yawn overcame him, then he rolled around, back toward Sasuke.

And then he froze.

Sasuke's eyes were open.

Uh.

Damn. They should have at least moved a few paces away.

At least the kid didn't look too traumatized? Or disgusted.

"Sasuke?" Kakashi murmured. "Are you alright?"

The kid looked mostly alright. Maybe he was blushing a bit. Kakashi couldn't quite tell in the night. It worried Kakashi a bit, to be honest. Especially since he was pretty sure that the Uchiha had no interest in sex.

"Is it really so great?" Sasuke whispered back, a small frown decorating his face.

Ah. Well. Now Kakashi was in for that conversation. He had really hoped that Aiko would take care of it. "Hmm. Yeah, kind of. It gives an hormonal high. Endorphins and Ocytocins. the same ones you'd get from a good workout and a good hug. Both at the same time, and in larger quantities. Some people can get addicted to the high. I also heard it can get even better if you are in love with your partner. It makes sense to me, it is very close emotional and physical connection with someone you care for a lot. But I've never really been in love that way, so I can't confirm it for sure."

"Really?" Sasuke asked. "Never?"

It wasn't something Kakashi usually talked about, but Sasuke obviously needed the validation of examples close by he could compare himself to.

"No." Kakashi hesitated a bit. Well, he did presumably wake up the kid with sex noises right next to him. He owed him a few details. "The silly childhood crush on Minato-sensei doesn't really count." Sasuke let out a surprised snicker at his words. "I know. It's embarrassing. Thankfully it went away before it could cause either of us too many problems. I thought I was so sneaky and he hadn't noticed, at the time. But I have very serious doubts now. He probably just didn't want to acknowledge it. I'm fairly sure it was just a mix of hero-worship and thinking he was dad-like without being willing to replace my actual dad, though."

Sasuke blinked and huffed silent laughter. "So, you haven't fallen in love otherwise? like Aiko?" He asked again.

Kakashi hummed in thought. "Well, no. But I'm pretty sure that unlike Aiko, I actually can. But I have to be willing to form a deeper emotional connection first, and so far I have never been. It feels too dangerous. Too much room to get hurt." Kakashi cleared his throat quietly. This was starting to feel too emotional to his taste. Thankfully, he had a much less emotionally charged subject to divert back to. "As for sex, I don't usually find it worth the vulnerability. I'm not... functioning at my best, in the middle of things. It makes me paranoid. Especially since your partner has to be well inside stabbing range for things to work."

Kakashi interrupted himself for another yawn. It made Sasuke huff in humor.

"Also, it makes me sleepy." Kakashi pointed out the obvious. "Lots of things that would make me feel unsafe and keep me from really getting in the mood. And when you can't relax into your reactions, it tends to refuse working. Or feel intrusive and bad instead." He stopped to give Sasuke a weighted look. "Which is why Aiko gave you such a lecture on consent. You never have to feel like you must have sex. And you can always want to stop, even in the middle of things. There is no cave-at for you. You're an Uchiha, you will never have do do a seduction mission. Or at the very least, not to those extents. Your right to consent is absolute."

Sasuke took a while to understand that Kakashi wanted a confirmation, and then nodded slowly.

Kakashi sighed, the yawned again. "For me, the paranoia issues add to my heightened sense of smell issues, and so I haven't found it worth it to attempt having sex for... years, actually. And as a Hatake with a semi-Kekkai-Genkai, I am also not required to do Seduction missions to the extent where actual sex is needed. Aiko, I can trust close by while I'm vulnerable, so I manage to enjoy sex if it's her. Or at least something close to sex. But she does cause some scent problems. She's alright most of the time, smells like family. But if she is sexually excited, then she smells mostly like someone poured a bottle of chili sauce up my nose."

Sasuke blushed violently enough for Kakashi to see it in the dark at the 'sexually excited' words, but he shuddered appropriately, face getting back under control at Kakashi's graphic description of his perception of smell.

"Where did she go?" Sasuke asked, still curious, despite the embarrassment.

Kakashi blinked. "To quote her, she's not made of stone, and I'm very pretty during things." Sasuke blushed again.

Being called pretty might have offended another man's sensibilities. Kakashi was a shinobi, he didn't believe things to be inherently inferior for being mainly used to describe women. Besides, despite how Aiko said it, Kakashi thought was much less about his physical characteristics, and much more about the fact that he was fully consenting. Everyone tended to find pleasure attractive on the face of a sexual partner.

He thought that Aiko was up for 'helping him out' so often because of that part, actually. Kakashi wasn't a Seduction Specialist. He could perform adequately in a pinch, sure, but he didn't have extensive training in it. To him sex hadn't been turned into a tool. But he knew that for Aiko it had. And the way things had to work with the two of them... It neatly swerved around most issues Aiko might have picked up about sex.

Kakashi was fully consenting. Without any pretenses or hidden motives muddling the waters. His pleasure was honest and unburdened. And since Aiko had to go away afterwards to take care of her own arousal, it meant she could do that, with the fresh memory of a willing partner, but without any public to make a spectacle out of her pleasure for.

Their arrangement allowed her to make things fully about him, then right afterwards, fully about her.

...

Oh. Sasuke was gracing him with a grossed out look.

Kakashi must have taken a bit too long lost in his thoughts with a stupid post-orgasmic expression on his face. "She's somewhere downwind. She'll wash before coming back so I can stand her presence." Kakashi yawned again. He was about to doze off, conversation or no. "Can I hug you?" He asked. Sasuke was allowed not to want Kakashi touching him after what he just witnessed.

Sasuke stilled for a moment. "Yeah, sure." He breathed after a pause.

Kakashi hummed and fiddled with his and Sasuke's covers until he could put his arm over the boy's waist. "You're fine the way you are, Sasuke. I'm pretty sure Gai isn't interested in sex at all. You're not alone, no matter how you feel about intimacy. And for all that sex does feel nice, you wouldn't be missing out on a vitally important facet of life if you decided you never want to do it." He murmured, Pushed by the Wolf's insistence that he must make his pup feel Accepted and Supported

Sasuke might have blushed again. Kakashi couldn't see it, with the boy's face hidden into his sternum.

He fell asleep before Aiko could come back.

Kakashi did wake up when Aiko came back. He was a Jounin. But he fell back asleep easily enough once ha heard her settle on the other side of the genin row and grab hold of Naruto in their well practiced embrace that was made to keep him from hitting others flailing in his sleep while still being gentle enough to let the boy sleep anyway.

There was something distinctively canine in how Kakashi melted whenever Aiko decided she wanted to pet his hair. It went beyond the years long touch starvation, too.

A part of his brain was convinced that as long as they were touching, they were safer. And that as long as the hand in his hair kept moving, he was being actively thought about and cared for.

It also made him a bit drowsy, especially when he was laying on his side with his head pillowed on Aiko's lap, lazily watching the genins finish gearing up. A task that he and his Pack Sister were already finished with, thanks to the long practice.

The fact that Aiko was wearing all of the Aburame silk Kakashi gifted her was as reassuring as Kakashi expected it to feel, when he stopped dead in the Aburame's shop, in front of a bolt of silk in a color he knew Aiko enjoyed wearing from seeing her in it often enough.

Kakashi did have the common sense to know that the fabric he ended up buying was way too expensive for a simple apology gift. He had walked into the shop intending to buy Aburame Silk, yes, but in the form of a bun cover, or a bracer. Something pretty and fairly expensive, but not exorbitant.

But when he had passed the bolt of pure Aburame Silk fabric in a color Aiko liked to wear, the Wolf had insisted that it was armor. His Pack-Sister needed the armor.

Kakashi was more than a bit wealthy. He had inherited his waning Clan's holdings, and then he had become a Jounin, then ANBU very young, and did very little to spend his pay. Even a good length of Aburame Silk would not be making that big of a hit to his finances.

Besides, when would he get such a good excuse to give Aiko super expensive stuff without her rejecting it out of pride? And it might get her to forgive him faster.

The fact that Aiko had forgiven him before even opening the gift had taken him by surprise, and made him a bit apprehensive of her giving his gift back. But now she was wearing it. And the new corset she had commissioned after their conversation. It did cover a lot more. And the ceramic plates Kakashi could make out in places reassured him.

Hopefully she would be fine through whatever upheaval the Tournament would throw at them.

Aiko wasn't impressed with Kakashi's intent to dawdle and make the kids be late for the tournament.

Sakura wasn't either.

So in the end, Kakashi was forced to leave the forest of his estate, that had grown to feel cozy while he wasn't paying attention, and show up at the Arena on time.

It was horrible.

Naruto didn't quite make a scene when he had to let Sasuke and Sakura split to head to the participant's lodge, while the other three needed to go among the regular public.

Naruto probably knew that Aiko would be pretty cutting with him if he did cause a scene, to be honest.

But anyway, Naruto didn't make a scene. Kakashi would honestly preferred it if he did, because then, he could have ignored the misbehaving child without any remorse.

Instead, Naruto got all teary-eyed and did his (pathetically see-through) best to shield his irrational sadness and anxiety at getting separated from his team.

Thankfully, the other Konoha candidates and their teammates and senseis showed up shortly after them, distracting Naruto from his separation anxiety.

Neji's new haircut was the first point of distraction, shortly followed by wanting to tell Hinata about the Fox Contract and how he had gotten her an interview with their ambassador.

All in all, things could have gone a lot worse.

Apparently, Aiko was Lee's new hero.

It wasn't very difficult to notice, with how the boy gravitated toward her babbled about being inspired by her bravery.

Tenten had also relocated her headband to around her neck for the day.

Kakashi wasn't sure that Aiko really appreciated the scope of her impact on young genins.

Kakashi saw it, all the time, how the kids, even those that weren't there straightened and did their best to always put their best foot forward around her. But he was pretty sure that his Pack-sister was too critical of her lack of combat abilities to really understand how much the younger generation were drawn in to her.

She didn't even seem to take young Lee's newfound hero-worship all that seriously. She just nodded at the gushing boy, pet his hair, chuckled at the uncontrollable blushing that her touch elicited, and asked him how his physical therapy was going along.

The first fight was Sasuke against Temari of the Hidden Sand.

Kakashi was a bit distracted from listening to the pre-fight banter by noticing the bird ANBU in plain sight at the back of the staggered seating.

They definitely shouldn't be there.

The Hokage's orders were to stay on guard but not be obvious about it. While Kakashi was obvious enough in private that Aiko was dressed in full battle uniform, visible ANBU were not the same.

That was fishy.

Especially since every Elemental Nation knew what Konoha ANBU masks looked like.

And Orochimaru had seen them from close enough to be able to make perfect replicas, too.

Kakashi turned his eye back down to the pit, but he also casually rested his hand on Aiko's thigh and tapped a message there for her to relay to the next Jounin next to her. 'Be wary from behind, suspicious cloak mask.'

Kakashi didn't follow the message as Aiko passed it along to Kurenai, because that was when the posturing ended, and Temari of Suna charged Sasuke.

Chapter 50: Kiba's impressions

Summary:

Kiba is much less stupid than people tend to think. He's just a bit hot-headed.

Notes:

Playing fast and lose with the Inuzuka mindset here.
We often see Canon Kiba be bewildered at Hinata when she pines on Naruto. Or, most of the time, really. And you know, dogs don't Mate the way wolves do. So I decided to make it into an Inuzuka trait, that they make very strong platonic bonds, like dogs, and have interest in sex, but the whole 'romance' aspect is usually replaced by a deep affection and a sense of wanting to stay together to raise children for convenience.
It does fall in line with Kiba's father not being around, if Tsume simply had children with a man that struck her fancy, and then got fed up with him when he started expecting romance, and scared him away with her abrasive personality. She is in a position where she can easily support her kids alone, anyway.

And yeah, I guess Inuzuka being ones to forgo marriage and have mostly bastard children because they couldn't be bothered to settle with a single partner would seem weird to other Clans. But since I already made Kakashi say that the Hatake are a Wild Clan and stuff about family is less about law and more about feelings for them, it can apply just as well to the Inuzuka.

So, Inuzuka not marrying would be "oh, Wild Clans, you know." There is probably some condescension in it, when is there not. The flavor of "Well, they let women be Clan Head, best not to expect civilized behavior out of them" or the like. But overall, Inuzuka are useful, strong and loyal. Their quirks are waved away as a Semi-Kenkai-Genkai eccentricity, and it's admitted that they do stuff differently, but they are not too bad.

(Did I just wave Tamaki away dismissively? Well, yes I did. Unextraordinary is based on the manga, not the anime, so I get to pick and chose which filler episodes are relevant. And Boruto never happened as far as I'm concerned. Also, Kiba's Tsukyomi was him being Hokage with Akamaru by him, and declaring a dog holiday. Like, just that. It tells me he's more invested in his dog than in Tamaki, even in Canon. I think they just added it for the dog-cat love story crack, frankly.)

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

Kiba had had an horrible month.

Sure, being in the final tournament of his very first Chunin Exam, as a Rookie, no less, was all sorts of awesome.

What was much less awesome was that his Mom and sister as well as their respective partners had then taken an interest in his training.

Kiba normally liked to train. He was made to run and fight, not sit still. But his Mom was a slave-driver. And Hana-nee was no better. Not even touching on Kuromaru or the Haimaru brothers.

So. The month had been horrible.

Well, at least Hinata was much happier. And she was acting weird a lot less too.

She had been nice enough to let him train against her to prepare for his fight against her cousin, but she had also warned him that Neji was much better than her at Jyuuken.

Kiba wasn't that sure that how he would manage this first match, to be honest.

But anyway, he would do his best. At least he didn't have to fight the murderous Suna redhead.

His team walked to the Arena with him and Shino to encourage them one last time while they still could.

They met Team Gai on the way.

Hinata blinked, and jumped a bit in surprise upon seeing her cousin's dramatically shortened hair. "N-Neji-nii? Your hair?"

The older Hyuuga gave her a smile and passed a hand through his shoulder-length locks. "Long hair is such a liability in combat, you know." He intoned, sounding remarkably dishonest for someone with his usual lack of intonation. Then he winked and smiled at Hinata. "I'm making a political statement in a way I can't easily be punished for." He added, before skimming the bottom of Hinata's own short hair with a finger.

Hinata blushed crimson and mumbled in her collar.

Kiba liked this new Neji much better than the old one that bullied his teammate.

Shikamaru's team converged with them a few hundred meters from the Arena's entrance, where Naruto's were already having what looked like a tearful separation. Though all the tears seemed to come from Naruto. The senseis seemed half amused, half pitying for the blonde's distress.

Kiba had a moment of hesitation at the hand-sized slug perched on the blonde's shoulder, but no-one from his team seemed to find it weird, so he shrugged it off.

He hollered for his academy friend, who promptly got distracted by commenting on Neji's haircut.

Kiba saw Naruto's Hatake Clan Sensei sag in relief as Naruto started babbling to Hinata about a summons contract she might be able to sign.

Kiba had only heard of Kakashi the last Hatake in passing before he went on a training trip and covert mission with him.

The Clan tended to avoid the subject as often as they could.

When Kiba had come back home from the training trip and asked his mother and sister for an actual explanation since he had gotten curious about Naruto's sensei, her mother had looked very pained.

"It's what happens to too Wild Clans when they're forced to be domesticated." Mom had told him.

Unlike the Inuzuka, Hatake were mainly bound to Wolves. Mom had explained. And Wolves did very badly in large groups, or in cramped spaces. The Hatake Clan had been fairly large, in the Warring Clan era. They had a structure where each Pack founded a Pack House a couple of hours' run from the nearest other Hatake Pack House.

Their strength, the reason why no one fucked with them, was that they almost all held the same Summoning Contract. If one Pack got attacked on home ground, all the Hatake Packs knew about it almost instantly, and converged on the offenders like... Well. Like a pack of rabid wolves. A huge pack, with about fifty summoners and around a hundred actual wolves. Afterwards, the Clan tended to dissolve into their respective Packs quickly and go back to their territories. But it was very impressive to witness and it handily kept the vultures at bay.

They had something of a jovial rivalry to the Inuzuka. But had no particular link together, other than their common canine instincts. They could understand one-another much easier than either did understand more human, less Wild Clans. But that was it.

When Konoha had been founded, not joining up very quickly became very unsafe, what with all the other nation also founding ninja villages. So despite not doing well with being cooped up, the Hatakes had been forced to come settle in Konoha.

Hashirama Senju had tried his best, giving the Wild Wolves Clan a large compound well away from the center of his Village Center. But it didn't change that all of the Hatake Packs had been forced to pile up in a territory that was one fourth as big as what a single Pack usually claimed for themselves.

"They all but stopped making babies" Mom had told him seriously. "Their instincts told them that they were too crowded. For wild wolves, it means you're about to overwhelm the prey population's ability to renew itself. So you absolutely must reduce the birth. For wolves, it tends to mean that only the Alpha pair continues reproducing. Which was also a point of heightened stress. Wolves don't really do Alpha, and so the Hatakes didn't really have one either, not the way we naturally do. Once all penned in together in close proximity, they were forced to resort to an ill fitting system of dominance to rule their interactions with one another."

Kiba had blinked at his Mom's explanation. "But. They were Humans, not Wolves. Even with the canine traits we don't make litters. And we don't make babies every year. They must have..." Kiba had stopped and thought again on the moniker his Clan gave to Kakashi-sensei. "They must have dropped to less than five members in a single generation." He had whispered in horror.

His mom had nodded. "They did. When Konoha was founded, there were over fifty Hatakes. Hatake Sakumo, the second to last Hatake was born nineteen years after the founding. When the First Shinobi War came around, the adult population got halved. When Hatake Sakumo's parents died in a mission later on, most of the rest of the adult clan members where past their optimal breeding window. The ones who had been very young during the founding still made a couple of kids, but those ended up dying in the Second Shinobi War, along with the older generation dropping off from old age, or from having to fight well past their prime."

Mom had gotten a faraway look in her eyes. Then she shook her head. "Hatake Sakumo, then a Hero of the Second War, and also the only Hatake alive, took a Mate, but she died in childbirth. And then there was... Well, looking back, it looks like a deliberate whisper campaign, actually."
"Anyway, Hatake are loyal to theirs, that's why we respected them so much even in the Warring era. Hatake Sakumo got a sensitive mission, and got ambushed in such a way that he could either finish his mission or rescue his team. He picked the second. Very shortly afterwards, the classified information leaked. Hatake Sakumo got wildly blamed for his choice by all and sundry. Called a traitor, blamed for starting the Third Shinobi War, the works. He committed suicide. Sepuku. Kakashi-san was five."

The history lesson had been like a war-hammer to the rib-cage. Kiba was very, very glad that he had dog instincts, and that dogs did well with large group socialization. He had also taken to looking closely at Kakashi-sensei, during their scentless tracking lessons.

He had been relieved to see that Aiko-san's intervention seemed to be paying off. Kakashi-sensei didn't exude the 'lone Wolf' depressed vibes he had heard his clan mourn about in the past. To Kiba's Inuzuka trained eyes, it was obvious that Kakashi the last Hatake had finally started building himself a Pack out of his team. He looked happy, proud, every time he looked at his students, or his... chunin? Heh. Kiba had no precise idea what Aiko-san was to Kakashi-sensei. So his chunin it was.

Mom had given him a relieved smile when Kiba told her that.

A part of Kiba wished he could be in Kakashi-sensei's team. It would feel great to be in a team with a canine-inclined sensei that saw him as a child of his Pack.

That part was pretty small, though.

It was a pretty lazy impulse. Hoping that the work of turning a group into a Pack would be shouldered by another. Kiba was now a genin. It was his job to find a way to make himself an out of Clan Pack. Kurenai-sensei, Shino and Hinata were being great. So what if they weren't naturally inclined to form a Pack? They were willing to listen to him explain and put the work in.

It was a pitfall all Inuzuka were warned against from childhood, since the founding. It was easy to want to stick to Clan-mates for Packs. But it would hurt their integration in Konoha, and so doing their field efficiency. They had to be willing to try and befriend others. They had to be willing to try to let non-Clan shinobi become Pack.

Not all Inuzuka started the work of building a Pack right out of the Academy. It was up to them to decide if their current team was Pack material. Kiba thought that his genin team was a great place to start. Kurenai was affectionate and encouraging, Shino was much more cooperative than Kiba had first assumed, and Hinata was genuinely nice.

He had an inkling that setting himself to turn his team into a Pack might mean integrating Hyuuga Neji too, since Hinata was rather attached to her 'Nii-sama', and then it might bleed onto the totality of Team Gai, the way those things tended to go. But, hey, Tenten was cool, and Lee was... Hmmm... Lee was well meaning. And their sensei was at least pretty strong. That said, their sensei might not end up absorbed into the Pack.

It was for later, anyway. Kiba had to form his team Pack first before he worried about these things.

He still had to keep it in mind, though. His first match was against Neji. So Kiba had to give it his all, not just for the tournament, but because it was a pre-recruiting spar. But he also had to be likable.

Ugh.

Well. It would go how it would go.

Kiba was definitely not holding back. He would just keep away from the true asshole moves.

After they had been paraded before the public, the six combatants that weren't fighting in the first match were sent to the participant box.

All the Konoha genins naturally converged together well away from the Suna redhead.

He wasn't really expecting it when Sakura got into his space and took a big sniff toward his shoulder, then leaned over Akamaru and sniffed him too. That was weird.

Well, it was weird in how not weird it was.

"Did you learn scent tracking?" He asked her with a curious head-tilt.

"Yup." Sakura answered with a proud grin, even as her eyes went back down to the arena to watch her teammate's fight. "It's just chakra-enhancement for now, though. And I can't tell nuances from scents yet either. But I figure acting like I already have the instincts can only help actually acquiring them for real."

Kiba blinked, lost. He shared a glance with Shino to see if this made more sense to him, but the Aburame didn't have any particular expression on his face. Thankfully he decided to pipe up, though. "I am unsure what you are speaking about. Why? I wasn't aware you had a way of gaining animal instincts without close partnership with these animals over generations."

Right. Kiba sometimes forgot, that the Aburame, while not generally thought of as a Wild Clan, in fact, they were a Noble Clan, so definitely not the common definition of Wild, still had animal association traits. It just happened that their synergy with bugs made them more logical and less emotional, so it didn't read as Wild Instincts.

Sakura actually turned to them again at that, apparently unphased by the fiery inferno her teammate had turned the Arena into by countering a Fuuton with a Katon. "I'm working on the 'over generations' bit. Sensei let me sign his contract! And I've decided I want to speed up the traits assimilation so he will have to adopt me as an Hatake. My lead Summons is helping."

Uh.

That... There was so much to unpack in there. Sakura was a ninken Summoner. The last Hatake had let a child sign in on his contract. Sakura wanted to get adopted into her Sensei's Clan. Sakura was apparently fucking with familiar association chakra to make herself change into a pseudo-Hatake...

Well.

That was bound to get interesting.

"Sasuke got the Wolves!" Sakura chirped happily. Then she extended her hand and, as if on cue, Sasuke summoned a cloud of smoke, from which a Wolf leaped out. "That one is Fuuga." Sakura added helpfully.

Kiba blinked down at the fight.

Uh.

Well. The Hatake Clan was less dead than it seemed, apparently. The Clan would probably be happy about that.

The Uchiha, in the other hand...

Never-mind. Sasuke was using his super-special eyes to dodge the bludgeoning swings of the Suna girl's oversized fan. Apparently, she had given up on ninjutsu? Sasuke did show an alarming propensity for setting Fuutons on fire. And very little concern about frying himself while doing so.

Still. The girl was attacking an Uchiha with a fan.

It was funny in itself. Even without Sasuke wearing his clan's uchiwa as large or as obvious as he did during the Academy.

Kiba watched avidly as the Wolf harried from the sides and back and Sasuke slashed at the girl with his oversized sword.

Their synchronization wasn't as good as an Inuzuka pair. Which, really, Kiba couldn't keep himself from bragging about. Even knowing that Sasuke had only had his Contract for a really short time and there was no way he could have gotten as good as a lifetime partnership in that interval of time.

Sakura simply hummed back at him. "Yeah." She said without a single hint of anger. "Sensei has plans to ask your Clan for help for our training, Sasuke and me. Aiko-Sensei needs a bit more rest time than she's been having so far."

Kiba blinked and stared at the pink-haired girl. He had never been offhandedly complimented before. It felt weird.

Sakura made a quiet exclamation, leaning a bit more over the railing, and Kiba turned his eyes back down to the ground. Just in time to witness the great Sasuke Uchiha plowing straight into his Summons, who gave a surprised yelp.

Kiba blinked. He hadn't thought the Uchiha's teamwork with the Wolf to be that bad.

Down in the Arena, Sasuke picked himself up, Fuuga scrambling to his feet just as fast.

The Suna girl's silent gloating gave Kiba a clue of what just happened. She had thrown a gust of wind of some kind, and Sasuke apparently dodged right into his Wolf.

Kiba couldn't help his laugh. He would never, ever lose track of where Akamaru was during a fight.

A quick glance at Sakura reveled the kunoichi smirking. It only lasted a second, before her face turned into a scowl, but it struck Kiba as weird.

Hadn't Naruto told Hinata that he didn't want to be made chunin yet?

Uh.

Well.

Either Sasuke actually lost track of his Summons, and he deserved to be mocked. Or he had done it on purpose, and Kiba wouldn't be the one to ruin his act.

Also, poking fun at the Uchiha was something Kiba hadn't yet tired of.

Kiba laughed some more.

In the end, Sasuke used a cheap trick with making a bunch of Academy Bunshins, and all attacking at once, so Temari of Suna wouldn't know where the real hit came from.

It worked and the Suna girl got hurled back into the Arena's wall. Sasuke then dashed up close to her, locking eyes with her before she could gather he bearings from the winding kick. The girl slumped limply against the back, and Sasuke placed his katana tip at her throat.

After three seconds of this, the proctor declared the fight in his favor.

Neji had changed his hair and moved his Hitai-Ate during the first match.

Normally, Kiba wouldn't even notice that kind of thing. In this case, though, Neji had put his hair in a Samurai-type topknot, with a short tail of hair running down the back of his head that mirrored Hinata's hairstyle, and the fact that his forehead protector was around his neck left his forehead bare, showing the green seal there visible.

So.

Pretty noticeable change.

Neji noticed the rookies looking at him and gave them a grim smile. "I souldn't be the one ashamed that I got branded like cattle when I was a toddler. Someone has to make a first step toward changing the out of sight out of mind status of the Caged Bird Seal."

He sounded like he was repeating something.

Sakura left the huddle of the Rookies and daringly accosted their senpai with a hug.

Neji looked very awkward with the hug. In fact, he seemed pretty relieved when the proctor cleared his throat and called for the two of them for a second time.

Kiba grinned at the Hyuuga he was coming to appreciate, and then vaulted over the balcony railing.

Boasting and pride aside, Kiba was pretty sure he was going to get his ass handed to him. He might as well be a little showy in his entry, he wasn't sure he would get another chance.

So.

Dogs were not immune to the gentle fist.

Kiba had known that, from sparring with Hinata.

The thing was, Hinata, despite everything was soft and gentle.

She also hated to hurt Akamaru.

Neji had no such reserves.

It meant the human-beast clone was all but useless. Instead of looking for the true one, Neji had just treated the both of them like Kiba, and delivered a series of hand slaps on Akamaru while he passed with the Fang over Fang.

As a result, Akamaru was back to canine form, laid out on the ground, whining softly, and Kiba was without his partner against an overwhelmingly stronger opponent.

At least Neji was nice enough to let Kiba know that Akamaru was not injured. He would be fine in an hour, but he was definitely out of the running for the match.

Kiba lost.

Badly.

Losing his partner in the first two minutes of the fight hadn't helped.

And Kiba didn't have the temperament to gather his ninken and try to play hide and seek against the all-seeing eyes of a Hyuuga for an hour for a second chance at double-teaming him.

He had gone for a frontal assault, and gotten himself laid out by a punch to the trachea.

Neji hadn't even used chakra for it.

There was no need for it when just the hit was enough to send Kiba heaving for breath in agony.

"Come on." Neji told him firmly. Kiba couldn't see much of his expression through the tears. "Tap out. Then the medics can help. They will have you on your feet in a minute."

Kiba slapped his hand on the ground twice.

So.

Yeah.

It was embarrassing.

At least he and Akamaru were back in top form in two minutes flat.

His mom was going to drive him into the ground with extra training.

Kiba arrived back to the competitor's balcony just in time to see Sakura forfeit.

He was less relieved about not being the fastest to lose than he may otherwise be.

Sakura was fighting the blood-crazy Suna genin.

Kiba was impressed that she had held out almost a minute before forfeiting.

"Nara Shikamaru against Aburame Shino!" The proctor declared.

Kiba gave his teammate a companionable slap on the shoulder to send him off. Gently, though. He didn't want to accidentally squash one of his bugs.

Notes:

A little drawing of Aiko's new gettup and Sakura and Neji's hair.

Who was expecting Meta on why the Hatakes dwindled?

I had this theory on the Wolf instincts causing it for a while, Kiba gave me an excellent reason to write it down.

Chapter 51: Who will win? (end of chunin exam arc)

Summary:

Since Gaara hasn't been invested enough in his matches to turn serious, they continue on.

Notes:

... Well. This took a while. On the bright side, the almost finished WIP I decided to pick back up is now finished with a tidy bow on top, so I'm back to writing Unextraordinary full time!

Chapter Text

Watching a Nara against Aburame fight was always an interesting spectacle.

A bit of a foregone conclusion, admittedly. But interesting nonetheless.

So long as you weren't a civilian, that is.

There was nothing epic about a cloud of bugs dispersing and trying to land on a kid while said kid tried to catch the bug's host in his shadow and force him to surrender.

The secret winning strategy for an Aburame fighting a Nara was to order the insects into small cluster and have them disperse everywhere then converge on their opponent. It sidestepped the pitfall of giving the Nara a direct shadow bridge to the host.

Obviously, Shino had been given the winning strategy by his Clan.

As a result, the match was a lot of jumping and dodging around, some explosive tag use (to disperse kikaichu) until Shikamaru sagged to his knees from chakra exhaustion, and surrendered.

Of course, the civilian public was disappointed in the lack of showy moves. Especially after Sasuke spoiled them with plenty of gratuitous pyromania.

On the ninja side, though, it was noted that Shikamaru hadn't used any insecticides despite their being widely available. It reflected well on him, his not destroying his opponent's hive willy nilly. It meant he hadn't let the public venue and promise of a promotion get to his head enough to forget that it was a comrade he was fighting.

Of course, Kakashi knew that Shikamaru mostly didn't want to be promoted out of laziness. That was much more likely to be the cause of the lack of pesticides than outstanding moral fiber. Unfortunately for Shikamaru, his deliberate self-sabotage was much less successful than Kakashi's own genins. He might still get promoted. Especially as it was obvious that he was playing up his levels of chakra exhaustion. And it was a very good thing for a ninja to be able to recognize when they can't win and play dead.

After half an hour to let the participants rest some more, and let the public go to the toilet and buy snacks and beverages, Sasuke's second match, against Neji, was called.

It was obvious that the public was hyped about that match.

Too bad that Sasuke wasn't intending to win it.

It had been a bit of a toss-up if Sasuke would even make it to the second match. Apparently Sakura prevailed upon him that it was necessary to avenge Ino. Or Sasuke had decided that losing first thing was too poor of a showing politics-wise.

But Neji made a perfect opponent to lose against. Especially with him being both a fellow Konoha genin, hailed as a genius, one year older, and in the midst of making a political statement that would benefit from him winning against the last Uchiha.

The public might end up very disappointed.

Unless Sasuke made a huge show of his eventual loss.

Kakashi casually threw an arm around Aiko's shoulder and tugged her closer into him. It made turning the opposite side to joke with Gai about whose genin would win the match seem more natural, and let Kakashi glance at the suspicious ANBU again.

Gai very obligingly started prattling about how good his student was, giving Kakashi another chance to sneak a glance, while asking his friend if he'd been talking, as was his custom. Gai, as was his own custom, exclaimed over how hip and cool Kakashi was.

The ANBU was probably fake. While it wasn't part of the official rules to acknowledge retired members when they looked at you, it was something of a tradition to do so anyway. It was the kind of thing you knew if you spent a couple of months in the ranks, but wouldn't know from appropriation the rule-book. Kakashi was pretty notoriously a retired ANBU. He hadn't covered his hair at all during his tenure as Hound. His identity was an open secret. And he was notorious enough of a captain that even fresh recruits should know about him.

Yet, Kakashi had looked twice in this masked person's direction, and they hadn't given him a single detail of why the hell they were there, or how Kakashi might best assist in their mission, be it 'ignore me' or 'be on lookout'.

Kakashi tapped 'enemy behind confirmed' on the front side of Aiko's shoulder, and shoved his elbow in Gai's gut in one of the place they had pre-determined as a be on alert, danger spotted, signal, before ruffling the back of his hair to signify which direction to be alert from. Passing the information on to actual Konoha ANBU would be best, but there was no reliable way for Kakashi to do so, given that he didn't know where the actual ANBU were stationed as a side-effect of no longer being ANBU himself.

He knew the usual guard posts for ANBU in the Arena, at least, so he did his best to make a light signal from his Hitai-Ate at each of the post and give a succinct report via ANBU special hand-signs, but it was a long shot.

Down in the Arena, Sasuke solemnly offered Neji the sign of confrontation, which got returned easily.

Since Sasuke had dismissed Fuuga rather than sustain his staying cost through the gap between the matches, and the Summons was rather costly to call up, Kakashi wasn't in any way surprised when Sasuke opened up the fight with a giant fireball. It was an Uchiha staple, after all.

It forced Neji to dodge, since he wasn't very heavy in ninjutsu. So of course, Sasuke attempted to roast him twice more.

It at least put an emphasis on how smart it was of Neji to opt for a shorter hairdo.

Once he had gotten enough clearance from his opponent by showing himself very willing to throw fire around, Sasuke busted out the shurikens and ninja wire. Another respectable Uchiha staple.

Neji was good enough to deflect shurikens with his bare hands, though, prompting Sasuke to dust off his sharingan to memorize the Hyuuga's timing so he could feed a Raiton through his ninja wire at just the right time to have it shock Neji when he swatted the projectile aside.

It was a good showing. And also showcased that Kakashi actually had taught him stuff, since Raiton was notoriously his own main element.

Neji then got fed up with distance and charged closer to Sasuke again, earning himself a fireball to the face for the proximity.

However, this time, the Hyuuga dodged to the side and around Sasuke, forcing the Uchiha to pitch a handful of shuriken at him and take a hasty, shunshin-assisted leap back to avoid a disabling Jyuuken strike.

Sasuke used the clearance to unsheathe his katana, then, with a couple of signs, sent a wave of blue lightning running down the blade.

It was pure showmanship. At Aiko's prompting, Kakashi hadn't taught him any sustained Raiton jutsu. Sasuke could make sparks. Nasty ones, even, but only one impulsion of them by jutsu. So Kakashi knew Sasuke had mainly done that just to show that he could. And that Neji would regret getting within range of Maika even if he was good enough at taijutsu to redirect blows by slapping the side of the sword rather than it's edge.

Then again, Sasuke actually was thirteen. He was very proud of his idea of adding metal wire along the handle wrap that connected to the tang of the blade via the handle pins and made the entire katana Raiton conductive. So there was a good chance Sasuke also just wanted to show off that he had a thunder sword. Kids were like that, sometimes.

Since Sasuke wouldn't be a true Uchiha if he wasn't also a little pyromaniac, he used the fact that Neji once again had to close in to be able to hit him, and blew yet another fireball at him.

Sasuke was possibly having a bit too much fun with pretending to give it his best.

Anyway, like a good little blood-thirsty genin, Sasuke followed his Katon Jutsu with a Raiton-charged swipe of his katana.

Which was where Neji pulled out his trump card and entered what Hinata called "Eight Trigrams Palm Revolving Heaven" with a surprised gasp, before informing them that Neji wasn't supposed to be taught this technique at all, since it was a Main House secret. She herself couldn't do it, despite being taught how to go about it, but Neji must have learned it from pure observation and deduction.

The Rotation knocked both the Fireball and Sasuke's sword strike away, allowing Neji a window of opportunity when Sasuke was disoriented to step closer and start a brutal barrage of Jyuuken strikes, while calling numbers. 2 4 8 16 32 64.

When he was done, Sasuke fell over to the floor from the impact forces, and couldn't stand up again.

"These are nice eyes you have." Neji commented clearly yet slowly, starring down at Sasuke. "Such a shame, isn't it, that they aren't protected."

Kakashi blinked at the non-sequitur, but after a glance at Aiko, who didn't look particularly angry, decided that it must be a part of Neji's political ploy. A good excuse for stepping into the arena with his own Cursed Seal bare. And Sasuke giving him a good opportunity to publicly state it.

Neji crouched down and reached his hand toward Sasuke's face, resting a finger on each cheekbone. "Like that, right now, you're so vulnerable to eye-theft. As soon as you can no longer fight to defend them, all the vultures will start circling." Neji's fingers left Sasuke's face.

Sasuke took a deep breath as soon as the hand stopped touching him, showing that he had, in fact, frozen from the contact despite his pain and the urge to groan from it.

"Take it from your cousin Clan, Uchiha." The older genin straightened fully and touched his own marred forehead with his middle finger. "For all the misgivings I might have about mine, these actually serve a purpose. Your sensei can do Fuuinjutsu. They are duty bound to protect you in all ways they can. You should ask for your own protection."

Sasuke gave out a cough. "Stop being so damn high and mighty, Hyuuga. Ao of Kirigakure has proven the limitations of your seal. The fact that it hasn't been reworked afterwards to cover that loophole just proves that protection isn't the primary function of this abomination. My entire Clan knew the real purpose of your Mark." Sasuke answered in a way that sounded totally scripted to Kakashi's ears.

It was mostly because he knew Sasuke, though. He doubted anyone else could tell that Sasuke and Neji had probably spoken about having this discussion in the most public setting they could find beforehand.

"Protecting your Doujutsu? A likely excuse. But tell me, if it was true, why doesn't the main family also bear it, rather than make themselves even bigger targets than they already are just by their political standing?" Sasuke spat out some blood and attempted to roll into a less vulnerable position. "All of Konoha knows it. The founding agreements just keeps anyone from having a say in Clan matters. But we all know and we all look down on your Clan's Main Family for Slavers. Nothing we can do about it, though, is there? So it's better to pretend we don't have a clue."

Kakashi was disproportionately proud of his little pup. That was some quality verbal smackdown. He definitely got that from Aiko.

"You should take it from your cousin Clan, Hyuuga. You lot aren't as safe as you like to think you are. All it takes is one terrible night. All it takes is one Massacre, and weighty Clan Traditions stop meaning anything." Sasuke coughed again. Kakashi was pretty sure it was just for effect. "I concede."

Well. Damn.

It took Genma a moment to process Sasuke's words and declare Neji the winner.

Kakashi looked at Aiko. "This is all you." He informed her solemnly.

Aiko coughed. "I'm sure we can find a way to blame Inoichi-sama too, for making him get over his trauma enough to actually talk about the Massacre in a public setting."

True.

The political fallout would be spectacular.

Kakashi looked over to the VIP box, where he could barely make out Hiashi Hyuuga's pale face.

Thankfully, Kakashi could blame other people for Sasuke still having bitter feelings about the Massacre. He had been given to him earmarked as a flight risk. This, right then, was an overall improvement. Inoichi would back him up on this.

It was only slightly unfortunate that Sasuke's heavy-handed reference to his own Clan's tragedy, coupled with Neji's shorter hair and mastery of Hyuuga main Family secrets all ended up pointing squarely at Hinata. She was the older of the Clan Head children, after all. And she had been raised with a similar heartless, strict style to Itachi.

The only difference was that of the two Hyuuga heirs, she wasn't the one lauded a genius.

Then again... It might prompt the Hyuuga Main Family to actually think of the resentment they were instilling daily into the two girls, Hinata, the eldest, and Hanabi, the genius, and ask themselves whether they were raising another Itachi to kill her whole Clan since it could obviously not be redeemed from it's cruel path the gentle way.

...

Ah.

Kakashi was being overly optimistic, for once.

Clan Elders had lost the ability to question themselves, that was why they were Venerated Elders. The very notion of looking at their actions and wondering if they were in the wrong was utterly foreign to them.

Hinata should be fine. Her stumbling, unsure, innocent impression was top notch. Probably because a great portion of it was completely true.

Down in the arena, Sasuke reached a shaky hand out past the med-nin restoring his chakra system, and offered Neji the seal of reconciliation.

Neji started, then bent down to meet Sasuke's fingers with his, as was proper.

That was an impressive show from the both of them. Kakashi wondered how much of it they had discussed in advance and how much was improvisation.

Kakashi also wondered when, exactly, Sasuke had found out about the actual purpose of the Caged Bird seal. He was perfectly right that his entire Clan had known. But Sasuke had been way too young to be explicitly told about it when it was still a possibility.

First possibility was that there had been some collusion, Hinata or Neji telling him the truth, and Sasuke was just covering up for how he had learned by giving a blanket statement that the Uchiha had known (the fact that he had been told then not voiced, but heavily implied).

Second possibility, Sasuke had picked up on the unvoiced tension with Hinata and Neji and the succession thing during the joint training trip, gotten curious, and had taken a look at his Clan's archives while they were in the Uchiha Compound to gather the weapons. In which case, 'My entire Clan knew' was a bit less dishonest, as it implied 'and when I looked it up, I easily found my deceased Clanpeople's opinion on it in our records'.

Kakashi would like to think that Sasuke's masterful performance would make his interaction with the Byakugan Clan more fraught... But... Well, to be honest, they had always hated him only marginally less than the Uchiha for the fact that he was allowed to keep Obito's sharingan.

The difference might not be appreciable.

Gai was going to be insufferable, though.

Shino Aburame against Gaara of Suna was a match that ended almost as soon as it started. Shino saw no use in getting his entire hive squished by Gaara's sand before conceding his defeat.

While the civilian public was extremely disappointed and some of them even booed Shino, Kakashi couldn't see fault with this choice. Even Sakura had only entered the Arena and spent half a minute evading Gaara's sand to emphasize that she was too hot tempered to know when to give up

As a compromise between allowing Neji, who actually had to fight, some rest between rounds, and not boring the public who already had a half-hour break a very short time before, The Final match was scheduled after a fifteen minutes pause. Genma had the delightful role of pretending it was to give gamblers some time to place their bets.

All bets might not be on Gaara.

Kakashi couldn't tell.

Civilians could be really weird, sometimes. So there were chances they might have taken Gaara not even fighting to get to the finals as a proof that he wasn't that good and his previous opponents were just plain weak (Sakura) or ludicrously badly matched against him (Shino).

Neji had given a pretty spectacular showing so far, between his speed take-down of Kiba and Akamaru and defeating the 'Last loyal Uchiha' in a ninjutsu-heavy match that had all the bells and whistles of a showy ninja match.

And then there was Village pride, of course.

Kakashi had a feeling that a whole bunch of Konoha civilians were about to get fleeced.

Neji was not quite as badly matched to Gaara as Shino was.

Having Gai as a fitness instructor made the kid pretty fast on his feet when he wanted to be, and Lee had handily demonstrated that Gaara's sand vulnerability, when facing him with Taijutsu, was speed.

The Hyuuga also demonstrated both his smarts and deductive reasoning, and the fact that Gai had, in fact, headed Aiko's words, by spitting a water bullet at Gaara's sand to slow it down further just before charging in for his first decisive strike.

While Gaara's automatic sand armor got between Neji's fingers and Gaara's shoulder, Jyuuken could apparently strike through sand armor at close enough range.

There was a thing about Jyuuken strikes that hadn't been evident for the match so far. The Gentle fist hurt. Akamaru's reaction was the most representative in the whole tournament. Kiba hadn't lost from a Jyuuken strike, so much as from being punched in the throat. And Sasuke was a little monster that Kakashi suspected of having spent much of his Academy time doing home training in ways that weren't very wise. It had left him with an above average pain tolerance.

And pain tolerance was something that Gaara, with his constant Sand Armor, seemed to have none of.

Gaara gave a yell.

And then, with his arm hanging limp from the shoulder, he started ranting about Mother and blood.

Unlike Kakashi's own genins, Neji had a horse in this race. He was a year older, more ready to be made chunin, and less attached to keeping his Jounin sensei close, since Gai had, for all appearances, only started taking Neji's individual training seriously a month ago. Also, Neji was making a point to his Clan, that would be better served by actually winning the home Chunin Exam tournament in front of as many witnesses as possible.

Neji was here to win.

So when he saw an opening, he repeated the lunge, water bullet, Jyuuken move. Except this time, he was greeted by a hard-packed dome of sand that also sprouted sand spikes.

Neji hastily leaped back, out of range of the spikes, and started circling the dome slowly, looking for an opening.

The Hyuuga techniques were pretty dependent on being able to make contact with the enemy, so Kakashi expected Neji to subside, and wait for an opening. Maybe lay some traps for when the Suna Genin came out of his shell.

Instead, Neji crouched and started slowly going through hand signs, brow furrowed in concentration.

Next to him, Gai nodded. "Earth Spike. It is the best technique in this context, even if earth is the affinity Neji has less success with from his main three."

Well. That answered Aiko's question from right after the Prelims. When called on his favoritism, Gai had started teaching his other student ninjutsu.

For some reason, Neji had turned his Byakugan off when Gaara cocooned himself. Kakashi could only guess that the sand shell was packed too thick with chakra for the Byakugan to see through. So Neji had opted to conserve some of his own chakra.

Neji breathed out and slowly placed his hands on the ground, brow still heavily furrowed in effort.

It didn't take much to guess whether the hit had struck.

A fairly inhuman voice started wailing about blood.

A few seconds later, the sand dome washed down from a small Suna genin holding on to his thigh.

Feathers started to fall down, bringing with it a feeling of weariness that had Kakashi instantly performing a Kai.

Chapter 52: Aiko during the Invasion (Invasion arc)

Summary:

What causes the most changes? An unextraordinary chunin, or the ripples she's been making from day one?

Notes:

A slightly shorter chapter this time. And minimal editing, too.

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

Aiko knew the feathers and sleepiness weren't natural. There was no reason for either. And the compulsion pushing her to ignore the discrepancy and just go to sleep was too heavy-handed. Kurenai would have done it a lot better.

She raised her heavy hands and performed a Kai.

Down on the ground of the Arena, Genma stood between Neji and Gaara's entire team.

After a moment, the three Suna genins leaped over the Arena wall, Gaara carried by one of his teammates.

Aiko was preoccupied for a moment with looking around. Kakashi, Gai, Asuma and Kurenai had all converged on the ANBU Kakashi tagged as suspicious. There were a few conscious Konoha nins, chunin and up. The bundle of genins the five of them had seated in front of them were slumped over in sleep, and Aiko cursed, readying herself to Kai them out of the Genjutsu.

She cursed when she saw Neji nod solemnly to Genma and leap over the Arena wall. What the hell? Genma surely did NOT just send a genin, all alone, to pursue three enemies, one of them a Jinchuuriki and another completely fresh and fond of poisons!

Aiko darted a look at the four jounin pileup happening in the back of the stands. She wasn't needed there. They had things well in hand.

She slapped her hands down on Lee's and Tenten's shoulders, dispelling the genjutsu from them. "Your teammate just went in pursuit of the three Suna genins all alone. Get to the concurrent balcony, gather any Konoha genin you can and launch pursuit. I'll catch up to you if I can."

Tenten and Lee nodded immediately, taking in the direction Aiko's finger was pointing to and jumping over the railing to go gather the genins.

Aiko sure hoped she hadn't doomed a whole bunch of genins with her decision.

She slapped her hands down on Naruto and Hinata next. "Hinata, your team is about to launch pursuit on an overwhelmingly strong opponent, find them, assist them, help them find and protect Neji." She barked. "Naruto, we're going to need healing, you know what I need from you."

Hinata promptly disappeared over the railing, while Naruto nicked his thumb.

Aiko moved on to waking Ino and Chouji. She ducked, summoned her wakizashi from her palm storage and gutted one of the enemies that lunged at her before turning, summoning her mini shield and bashing it on the head of the other. Dispassionately, she pulled her sword from the first enemy's gut and swung it at the neck of the second to make sure he wouldn't be moving anymore.

Ino and Chouji stared at her.

"You two, find someone trustworthy in your respective Clans and have them instruct you in how best to assist." Aiko growled, pushed Ino to the right while swinging herself to the left and re-sealed her buckler to grab a handful of shuriken and throw them at the head of the... Sound? Sound ninja who had met her sword with a kunai. This enemy too went down, and Aiko made, once again, sure that he wouldn't be rising back up. "Wait until the coast is clear, though." She grunted to the wide eyed kids.

Aiko was overstepping, ordering the genins around. But she was a superior, and a genin team sensei. In this situation, the kids' respective Jounins were too occupied with their own fights to micro-manage genins. Waking them up and giving them orders was better than leaving them unconscious as prime targets.

She glanced toward Naruto in time to see the house sized slug he had called forth dissolve into hundreds of fist-sized summons and start scurrying around to provide first aid.

"How's your Chakra reserve, Naruto?" She asked tersely.

Naruto frowned. "Three-quarters gone, but I can still fight!" Naruto said decisively.

Aiko spared him a glance. "If this is bravado, I will be very disappointed in you." She told him seriously. Naruto's stance firmed and his chin lifted. His expression was serious enough for Aiko to accept his words at face value. "Damn it all." She threw a few kunai at sound ninja who were inching toward the Jounin bundle's backs. "Your team will need your assistance." She pointed to the cluster of genins jumping across the Arena. "Join them, tell them I can't catch up to them in the end."

She grabbed Ino under her arm and Chouji by the hand and charged through the chaos toward the unmistakable bulk of an Akimichi in battle. "Your heirs." She informed the woman.

The Akimichi barely hesitated before taking Ino and Chouji from her. "I'll keep them safe." She assured Aiko. "Thank you for getting them to me."

And it was right back to chaos.

She turned back to Kakashi and the suspicious ANBU just in time to see Asuma plunge one of his chakra knives in the cloaked figure's abdomen.

Aiko glanced at the big chakra barrier on top of the Hokage viewing box.

Nothing she could do there. It was well out of her skill range.

Instead, she joined her hands and called forth one of the genjutsus Kurenai taught her. The one she referred to as 'nothing interesting to see here' Kurenai had warned her that it worked much better on civilians than ninja. At least when the ninja in question had the time to do a few visual swipes. Trained nins would notice their gaze jumping over an area without notice. But in the middle of battle chaos? Worth a try.

With her genjutsu in place, Aiko started striding toward Kakashi. His Jounin cluster was starting to dissolve, and Kurenai was already trying to find Hinata. It was best to inform them of where their students were sooner rather than later.

It was pure chance that Aiko's gaze strayed down to the fake ANBU when it did. Her eyes caught onto the unmasked features of Kabuto, the genin Sasuke had tagged as suspicious. It made sense that the Jounin had unmasked him after killing him, to verify his identity. And Aiko's eyes kept straying back to the traitor's youthful face in between using the fact that enemy's eyes passed straight over her to kill unsuspecting nins with well placed shuriken or the swipe of her sword.

And that was why Aiko caught it when the young infiltrator's eyes stopped staring at the ceiling glassily and instead sharpened on Kakashi's back.

At that point, Aiko couldn't really say what thoughts went through her head. She just knew that Kakashi had his back turned on a threat. She was close enough to bridge the distance with a shunshin, and seeing how long it took for four Jounins to take the man down in the first place, she could expect him to get from flat on his back to stabbing Kakashi very, very fast.

Aiko choked.

Damn. That hurt.

It was a good thing, a hazy part of her brain commented, that she was much shorter than Kakashi. The kunai meant for his heart had hit her above the breasts. Unfortunately for her, that above the breasts also happened to be just above her battle corset's neckline. Even though it had been dramatically raised up in this last iteration.

She heard Kakashi roar in rage.

Oh. Her cloaking genjutsu had slipped from the pain.

Aiko raised her eyes from the arm plunging toward her rib-cage to the pretty face of Yakushi Kabuto.

She saw his impulse to flee Kakashi's avenging rage in his face.

Damn him, anyway. He was planning to stab her Jounin.

Aiko raised both of her arms, letting her wakizashi fall to the ground, and grasped the kunai-wielding arm that had just stabbed her, adding chakra to stick her palms to it.

Her ears filled with the noises of a thousand birds, even as lighting went all out of whack.

A white blur sped past her and a ball of condensed lightning plowed into Kabuto's chest.

Aiko had just enough presence of mind to release the arm she had been clutching before getting pulled down along with Kabuto.

She numbly turned her head to the three Jounin Senseis that weren't currently avenging her. "Genma sent Neji after Gaara." She stated. It was important. She had been planning to tell them where she had sent the genins. "I sent Lee and Tenten to help him." She coughed up blood. "And also all of our teams... Except Ino and Chouji. I gave them to Akimichi-san... over... there?"

Aiko tried to point the correct direction, but her legs finally gave up on her.

Familiar arms caught her before she could collapse down to the ground.

One of the familiar arms was covered in blood.

Aiko tilted her face up and smiled at Kakashi.

Oh. That was bad. Was he crying?

She blinked and then planted a kiss on his masked cheek. Kakashi liked kisses.

Ah. He was sobbing. It hadn't helped.

There was something important to say.

She had forgotten.

There was something... Naruto? Oh.

"Katsuyu!" Aiko beamed out, proud of remembering the right thing. "Naruto summoned Katsuyu-sama before leaving. She can help!"

Kakashi's head immediately raised from Aiko's shoulder, and he roared for Katsuyu-sama to come and help, please.

Aiko blinked and raised one hand to soothingly pet Kakashi's head. He was very distraught.

"I need someone to remove the kunai and fabric from Aiko-san's wound, if you could." Katsuyu-sama instructed in her comically high-pitched voice.

Kurenai shot a look at Kakashi's trembling hands over Aiko's body, and bent close to do the honors herself. "Oh." Kurenai exclaimed, re-capturing Aiko's attention. "Aburame Silk. Nice."

Aiko saw Kakashi's face morph into a snarl visible even through his mask, but he stopped short when Kurenai brushed Aiko's Hitai-ate aside to pluck the neckline of Aiko's silk bolero above and under the kunai, and pulled the entire thing off, fabric and kunai alike.

Right. Aburame Silk. Over Armored mesh.

Aiko gave the section of Silk she could see a critical look. The very tip of the kunai was the only part that pierced through, the rest of the silk was wrapped up around the blade, keeping it from cutting into Aiko's flesh.

So that was why Aiko was in pain but didn't feel like she was about to die. She probably had a huge bruise, and maybe a couple of broken bones, but she wasn't losing that much blood.

Hopefully the silk jacket could be salvaged. It would be a shame to have only worn it once. Aiko gave the small tear a critical glance. It was right by the hem. Even if it couldn't be mended or patched, her tailor could probably fold the damaged part into a new hem by widening the neckline. Now, hopefully the blood wouldn't stain.

Kurenai delicately put her hand in the high neck of Aiko's armor mesh and gently freed the mesh from the wound.

Aiko blinked at the green glow from Katsuyu-sama's healing, then she lifted her eyes up to Kakashi. Gai and Asuma had already left their side to assist in fighting off the invasion.

She patted Kakashi's arm. "I'm in good hands." Aiko said seriously. "Kurenai and Katsuyu-sama will take care of me. Go. Help our comrades."

Kakashi swallowed. "Promise me you'll live." He demanded wetly.

Aiko hummed. "Yeah. I'm pretty sure I'll live." She told him gently. "Promise me you'll watch your back?" She teased.

Kakashi gave an ugly sound in response. Oh. Eww. Hopefully he hadn't, in fact, put snot in the inside of his mask. That would be horribly uncomfortable for him.

Aiko was feeling better, persistent lancing pain aside, but she was under strict orders from her medic not to strain her ribcage or right shoulder. It didn't matter that her medic was a Slug.

Kurenai was staying by her side, both maintaining a false surrounding genjutsu to hide them from view, and lobbing illusions at enemies at critical time to ease their take-down.

The barrier their Hokage had disappeared in was now filled with gigantic trees. It was not reassuring in the least.

Aiko eyed the green lights littering the viewing box turned battlefield. "Hey, Kurenai. Do you think you could still hide this section if all the injured were brought here for treatment?"

Kurenai turned to look at her, then back around to survey the arena. "An emergency triage station?" She hummed. "Yeah, I could keep that hidden, but it won't mean much if they can see the wounded being brought in."

Aiko nodded in understanding. "Maybe a smokescreen? To take care of the initial influx. But we would have to get the message of where to bring the wounded to all our comrades in time..."

The tiny Katsuyu that had stayed with Aiko once the initial treatment was done tilted her head. "I can do that." She informed them. "Can you provide the smoke screen, Aiko-san?"

Aiko nodded and rummaged in her belt pouch for the correct scroll. "Think you could add a fire genjutsu so the first reflex to the smoke would be Kai, rather than a wind jutsu?" Aiko inquired, getting a nod in answer.

The initial medical evacuation was a smashing success.

Of course, most of the nins who had dropped a wounded comrade next to Aiko and Kurenai wanted to know where Tsunade-sama was. That might prove a problem later. At the moment, it was a boon, because Katsuyu being known as Tsunade-sama's Summons meant her instructions on where to bring the wounded had been immediately followed.

Aiko very honestly answered any such questions with "I don't know." The battlefield was chaotic, so her vague answer was taken as 'somewhere around, probably' rather than 'presumably still in the Elemental Nations?'

The belief that Tsunade-sama was there, somewhere just out of sight, providing help thanks to her Summons was a great moral boost. They could go about revealing that Naruto was the one who summoned Katsuyu later.

Pretty soon, the fighting moved out of the Arena, but it stayed an emergency medical triage station. Mostly by virtue of already being an established place to bring the wounded. Katsuyu kept providing first aid, and a few medic joined the healing effort in the Arena.

Once the place was established as a healing hub, a defensive perimeter was established, which rendered Kurenai's false surrounding genjutsu useless, and Aiko urged the jounin to go join the fight where she could be most useful.

Aiko also did her best to be useful.

In her case, it looked more like being a walking storage unit, though.

It had started with a medic calling to ask if anyone had a blanket, to keep his patient from cooling down too much from blood loss. Aiko, of course, had spare blankets stored in her pouch, so she had yelled "yes, I do" and unsealed the requested article.

The medic-nin had hurried to her to take the blanket, and asked, half-joking, if she also had snacks and water to help with blood replenishment.

So of course, Aiko had rummaged some more and brought out her water bottles scroll and her quick snacks scroll.

Which is how she became the first one to be asked each time the medics needed something. From bandage (of course she had plenty of bandages!) to blankets and clothes to put the patients in after emergency treatment, to salt for makeshift rehydration solutions.

The first time she had to answer "sorry, no, I'm all out", she swore the entire station froze in disbelief. And yeah, she knew she tended to carry a lot of stuff, but her personal pack was meant to sustain her in emergencies. Not an entire makeshift medical station.

Offering a rainbow colored slinky instead of the requested blanket had at least broken the tension. Though no one wanted the slinky.

Slinkies were undervalued!

Being where they were, the medical station was in prime of place to see the barrier their Hokage was trapped in dissolve and five figures dash away.

The news of the Sandaime's death was also fast to reach them, and Aiko watched most of the ninja surrounding her slip into mourning, Katsuyu included.

Aiko closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She was grieved too, but apparently she was the odd one out, not having any personal feeling of connection with The Sensei.

Then again, she was not... important. She had been an almost faceless name in the Konoha roster until mere months ago. The Sandaime had gone out of his way to befriend a great many Konoha shinobi. She just... Didn't happen to be among those numbers. Civilian born, discarded by her sensei, not battle talented, clawed her way into two specializations that didn't go above chunin that she was.

She could respect and mourn her late Hokage for connecting with such a great proportion of his forces, despite the great demands on his time, without being bitter that she hadn't rated that same attention.

Notes:

So! Here is the Aiko being badass moment. There is a reason why I am suddenly making her competent at fighting: Sound is relying on surprise. Kakashi spent most of the month doing surprise attack training. So here comes the Sound shinobi, thinking, I'm attacking from behind, easy-peasy lemon squeezy, and Aiko surprises them by being aware of their approach and intercepting them with a sword to the face.

As for why Tenten, Lee, Hinata and Naruto got a 'join your teammates, they need help' while Ino and Chouji got chucked at the closest adult of their clan alliance... Well. It's the same reason why Canon Shikamaru would later leave Ino behind for the Sasuke rescue mission. Aiko got to see all the kids fight in the Preliminaries. And Ino and Chouji were definitely underwhelming.

By giving out orders to the kids, she's shouldering responsibility for whatever happens to them. Her own team she has legitimacy in ordering around so long as Kakashi doesn't countermand her. Sending Gai's team to help Neji, who would otherwise be alone makes perfect sense. Team Kurenai is a tracker team, so sending them also makes sense. Shikamaru is probably better off in the middle of a cluster of genins. Hinata would have her two loyal teammates by her side to protect her, even if she's a Clan heir.

Ino and Chouji, though, are both Clan heirs, and haven't displayed the skills necessary for Aiko to be confident that they would survive chasing Gaara. So, to the closest Akimichi it is. And no, Aiko couldn't have protected them herself. Aiko is very new at combat, and even then, she only trained as combat support for Kakashi. Akimichi tend to be good in body-guarding since their Clan Jutsu is well suited to it. Also, it makes the two of them no longer her problem and frees her up to actually help Kakashi.

Little question for you all: do we want Kabuto to be dead for good right now? Or does he miraculously survive?

Chapter 53: Failure of protection

Summary:

Kakashi is not alright. He might fool people, he's very used to functioning even when he's not well. But he really, is having, the WORST day.

Notes:

Hey, would you look at that? Express update! Even if the chapter is a bit short.

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

"Hhrkh"

It was a small noise.

Such a small noise.

Kakashi was sure this small noise would haunt his nightmares until the day he died.

It was the noise of Aiko getting a kunai to the chest while covering his back.

He hadn't known it at first. The noise only made him turn around because it was right behind him and he didn't live so long by ignoring noises, no matter how small, that came from behind his back.

And then he had recognized Aiko's distinctive braided crown and bun.

He had seen the kunai plunging into her chest, at the end of Yakushi Kabuto's arm.

The details kind of escaped him afterwards, but he had definitely speared a Chidori through the traitor's heart.

No sharingan was needed to help him target his trajectory, either. Not at a couple of pace from his target. And not with Aiko keeping his mark in place.

He blinked to Kabuto's face staring at him, blood escaping the corner of his mouth.

Aiko definitely was right in forbidding him from teaching that technique to Sasuke. It always ended with your target's dead eyes right in front of yours. Sasuke wasn't ready for that kind or baggage.

Kakashi lowered his arm, and the traitor slid from around his forearm with a wet squelch.

Despite not being all there, Kakashi had heard Aiko's sword fall to the ground, and it was the work of moments to yank it to his hand with a chakra string.

It was fairly familiar work, cutting through a neck with a short sword. ANBU sometimes got missions where the death had to be confirmed with a severed head.

The trick was to start with the spine. Put the subject on their knees, it's easy to do before rigor mortis sets in. Brace their shoulders, tip their head forward. Place the tip of the sword between two vertebrae, and quickly plunge it in to dissociate them. then the rest of the beheading was just raw flesh. Nothing difficult with the state of sharpness Aiko kept her Wakizashi in. Though it did help to keep a hold of the subject's hair through the whole procedure. Kept the head steady and the body upright until the neck is fully severed.

He saw Aiko wavering from the corner of his eye, and abandoned the sword and head right by the corpse so he could catch her before she fell over.

Aiko melted in his arms, like she always did, and tilted her head back over his shoulder to smile at him happily. There was blood dribbling from the corner of her lips.

She stared at his eye for a moment, then moved her head to plant a kiss on his cheek, and Kakashi understood that he had been crying when a sob tore out of his throat.

Not Aiko too.

Not Aiko too.

Please, not Aiko too.

What was it with his precious people smiling at him right after sacrificing themselves for him?

"Katsuyu!" Aiko exclaimed with a smile. "Naruto summoned Katsuyu-sama before leaving. She can help!"

Aiko was in shock, a part of Kakashi's brain observed. She wasn't battle hardened. It was normal for serious injuries to impact her cognitive abilities.

The rest of Kakashi was say too busy calling for Katsuyu-sama to help. The detached, mission cold part of him noted how his please sounded as much like a prayer as it sounded like begging. Kakashi couldn't care. He would happily build a shrine to Katsuyu-sama if she saved Aiko.

He held Aiko through Katsuyu making it to them, and her initial assessment. He almost stabbed Kurenai when she commented on the Aburame Silk, because who cared if it was nice? Aiko was hurt anyway. Even after his gift of Armor.

And then, Kurenai had grabbed the edge of Aiko's shirt and demonstrated just how nice Aburame Silk was.

Aiko was not bleeding out.

Kakashi's rational thoughts reengaged. He looked at the wound critically, the way he would do in the field to assess how long he had to get a teammate to the hospital. Aiko wasn't in critical condition. Especially not with a competent medic right at hand.

She was looking at a broken collarbone, one or two broken ribs, a deep puncture and potential deep tissue bruising. No affected vital organs other than a possibility of a nicked right lung. One month off the field, probably.

Kakashi took a deep breath in.

Aiko wasn't going to die.

She patted his arm to get his attention, then told him that she was in good hands and he should go.

Kakashi had to swallow his immediate refusal. She was right. He was still needed. "Promise me you'll live." He demanded.

She hummed and nodded. "Yeah. I'm pretty sure I'll live." She obeyed him with her gentle 'reassuring the kids' voice. "Promise me you'll watch your back?" She shot back mischievously.

Except...

She was right.

If he had been watching his back, she wouldn't have had to jump in front of a kunai for him.

Kakashi chocked.

He gave her a solemn nod, not up for words at the moment, and turned around.

His eyes fell on the beheaded body of Kabuto.

Normally, Kakashi would expect a beheading to be enough, but... He was feeling paranoid.

Kakashi's clean hand went to his pouch, where he still carried an empty body scroll. A carryover from his ANBU days. Sometimes bringing the body home for funerals was all you could do.

And sometimes, you wanted to make very, very sure that something was dead.

Kakashi grabbed the head by the hair with his bloodstained hand and lifted it over the storage seal. Something caught his eye, and he blinked, taking a second glance.

There. With the muscle relaxation from immediate post-death reactions, the jaw was hanging open, and the tongue was starting to loll out, and on the back of the tongue... A black mark.

Kakashi hurriedly stopped looking inside the mouth.

He doubted many people would have the time to spy on him, but this, this warranted all the subtlety he possessed.

Kakashi sealed the head, grabbed Aiko's sword, and shot a cremating Katon on the body, then he turned to Kurenai.

Aiko was sleeping. Or something else that involved her being insensate. Possibly sedation on the part of Katsuyu-sama. Or she had fainted from the adrenaline crash. She was alive, her chest was raising and falling slowly with each breath. Kakashi might have spent a disproportionate amount of time watching it do so.

And the fact that Kurenai had unbuttoned Aiko's battle corset to make sure she would breathe as fully as possible probably made his fixation a bit socially weird.

Aiko did not typically wear chest binding underneath her corsets. It ended up restricting her breathing too much if she did.

Kakashi shook himself back toward the subject on hand. Or in this case, in hand, since he was still holding the body scroll. "There's something odd. Please do not mention that I sealed the head before setting the traitor on fire to anyone but Inoichi-sama?"

Kurenai frowned, then slowly nodded. Kakashi was sure that setting Inoichi as the exception rather than the Hokage rang a few alarm bells. But Kurenai knew that Kakashi was aware of more of Konoha's dark underbelly than her.

And the Sandaime had always had a very unfortunate blind spot toward his 'old friend'. As evidenced by his complete refusal to consider Kakashi's hunch that the spy during the academy investigation was a Root agent because Danzo had told him that he had dissolved Root.

But Kakashi had proof of treason, and that justified some fancy maneuvering if he deemed it necessary. And Sarutobi's willful blindness made him inclined to deem some secrecy necessary.

Especially when one of Shimura Danzo's pawn had stabbed his Aiko. While trying to assassinate Kakashi himself. Possibly in another attempt to steal Obito's sharingan. After committing obvious treason in collusion with Orochimaru.

This was future plans, though. For the moment, there was an invasion to thwart.

Kakashi's hand clenched around the handle of Aiko's Wakizashi.

It was nothing fancy. A good blade he had helped her select in the Uchiha armory since they were both pretty sure that Sasuke would be very disappointed if she bought a blade after he had offered his clan's resources to them. Aiko kept it well sharpened and oiled.

The handle was a bit too skinny for Kakashi's hands, and the blade was proportional to Aiko's body, making it almost a tanto in Kakashi's hands.

But Kakashi knew very well how to handle a tanto.

And he was feeling sentimental enough to want to keep something of his Pack-Sister's at hand. It smelled a tiny bit of her.

She wouldn't be using a sword again for the day, anyway, her sword-arm was out of commission.

Kakashi kept the Wakizashi in hand as he jumped into the fray.

As an Elite Jounin in a time of emergency, there were many, many things Kakashi needed to pay attention to. From fighting of scores of invaders to yelling orders at chunins, genins, and even the occasional jounin because he obviously had the authority necessary to do so. His duties even passed through providing his summons to ease internal communication, and also making snap judgment on who to send where.

At least on his authority of 'person to go to to receive orders' Kakashi was aware that an emergency medical station had been set up in the Arena, behind a protective cordon. It helped stave off the anxiety over Aiko's safety.

White he wasn't on Sanin level, Kakashi was much closer to it than most of Konoha, so he was also the ace on the hole. Jiraiya needed punctual assist to help him eke out a win? Kakashi could flash by and give a couple of distracting blows to tip the balance in his favor. A commando of Sand-Sound Jounin was advancing toward the civilian bunkers at an alarming speed? Kakashi could make up half of the interception team all on his own. Someone needed to liaise with ANBU to ask for ANBU-specific support for a delicate situation? Kakashi was notoriously a retired ANBU and should know where to bring the message.

All in all, it meant that he didn't get a single moment of lull until the invasion was all but over and the still mobile shinobi all stared converging toward the Sandaime's body to confirm the news of his death for themselves and pay their respects.

At that point, Kakashi was pretty exhausted. But if ANBU was good for one thing, it was drilling shinobi on how to keep moving, and even fighting on three days of no sleep, minimal water and food, and while injured and half chakra exhausted. He definitely could keep going.

Kakashi did drop by Hiruzen-sama's body for a moment.

But he didn't linger.

While his mind had been elsewhere when Aiko reported about sending the four genin teams, Ino and Chouji excluded to chase Gaara, he had still heard it. And he had later processed it.

Not that long before the Invasion was all but finished, he had seen the colossal figure of a sand Tanuki and then an equally colossal Slug out in the woods surrounding Konoha.

And while the gigantic Slug made him hopeful that he still had pups, He did need to check for himself. Just to be sure.

One scare with Aiko had put him in an extremely unstable mental mindset, and he needed to firm up his bases.

Kurenai and Gai were close by, so Kakashi grabbed them both. They fell into step easily, guessing what he wanted.

They were also indulgent enough to wait for him one minute while he took a detour by the Arena's medical station to check on Aiko.

He contented himself with lurking in the rafters and watching Aiko breathe and move somewhat gingerly for a moment. He knew that if he went down to talk or touch her, he would categorically refuse to let go of her for a good ten hours. And he still needed to check on his kids.

Pups first.

Attaching himself to Aiko like a limpet second.

Aiko would agree with this schedule.

It was a good thing Kakashi had towed his fellow senseis along, because ten minutes into their run, they stumbled upon Tenten and Lee, sat together on a branch above eight downed and trussed-up Sound shinobi.

A quick debrief revealed that the genin party had been followed by Sound shinobi almost right away.

After a quick brainstorming session, it was decided that team Gai would be the one creating a counter ambush.

Lee had already been flagging, because he hadn't even started his physical therapy, and his body was not where it used to be. It made him an ideal bait to lure the pursuers into overconfidence. Neji possessed a technique that would allow him to deflect tons of projectiles at once, and also a long range with his Byakugan, that would enable him to catch up with the main body of the pursuing force once the counter-ambush was done. And Tenten was excellent at a range.

Shikamaru had also stayed behind as their most strategic genin, who had the handy ability to freeze multiple people long enough for Tenten to pincushion them.

The counter-ambush had gone particularly well, but upon it's success, it became obvious that Lee wasn't going further. Since none of the shinobi were dead, thanks to Tenten's reluctance to kill, and making prisoners obviously hadn't been a priority inside Konoha proper, Tenten had opted to stay there with Lee to guard their prisoners until such a time that it was possible to move them to Konoha.

Neji had left them to their new mission to help the rest of the genins in their chase, and to let them know that there had been no casualty from the counter-ambush.

Kakashi considered the girl's words, then tilted his head. "So, where, exactly is Shikamaru hidden?" He asked curiously.

That caused the Nara to step out from behind a tree a little ways away. "How did you guess I was still there? We omitted it on purpose in case you were impostors."

Kakashi managed to dredge up a smile for the young Nara. "Tenten alone and a mostly immobilized Lee aren't quite enough to secure that many prisoners. But with a hidden Nara, this whole setup becomes a perfect trap where you're the snare and she's the senbon-launcher." Kakashi gave him a mostly mean smile. "Very well planned. I'll be sure to put in my recommendation for your promotion to chunin."

Shikamaru called him annoying.

It lifted Kakashi's mood considerably.

About five minutes further out, they came across a charred bit of forest that looked suspiciously like Naruto and Sasuke had joint-jutsu-roasted someone.

The charred bits of puppet lying around even gave a pretty good clue as to who had gotten roasted.

The puppet parts were the only thing left on the premises, though.

That and the fact that all the charred bits of wood were fairly damp painted a bit of a picture for Kakashi.

Kankuro had decided to drop back to buy his siblings some time.

Sasuke, Naruto, and, most likely, Sakura. More because she wouldn't have let her boys do something without her than because Kakashi picked up clues of her presence, had fought the puppeteer, and, from the look of things, won fairly quickly. Neji had joined them on time to help Sakura put the fires out, and then they had probably tied up the puppeteer. Unless he was dead and in a storage scroll. And gone on to catch up with Team 8, who had kept on the pursuit since they were a tracker team.

They didn't linger on the scene very long. Kurenai, just like him, wanted to ensure her kids were well, and that was best confirmed by actually finding the kids. (Gai had stayed behind with Lee, Tenten and Shikamaru. But he had made Kakashi promise to bring Neji back along with his own team.)

Kakashi was a tracker.

A good one, even.

It was a talent that this particular task absolutely did not require of him once Kakashi made it to the general vicinity of where he had seen the giant Tanuki and Slug. The corridors of bowled-over trees would have let a particularly slow pre-genin find where the battle started and ended.

He wasn't going to complain about that.

The faster he found and gathered his genins, the faster he could stuff them in a pile with Aiko and growl at anything that came too close.

They found Kurenai's kids first, along with Neji.

"I was right." Shino informed them in his Aburame monotone. "Fighting Gaara... It's not a good idea."

Kurenai must have picked up some kind of distress in his words, because she knelled next to him and gently set a hand on his shoulder before asking him why he said that.

"He... Crushed the majority of my Hive." Shino informed them, in the same lifeless monotone. "In less than ten seconds." Shino added, for added context.

Kakashi winced behind his mask. It was entirely possible that Shino was in shock. If Aburame could go into shock, that is. He wasn't particularly physically hurt, as far as Kakashi could see and smell, but to an Aburame, the loss of the majority of their Hive did constitute a significant injury.

Behind him Neji was sprawled on the ground, a gash across his still bare temple telling enough about how he came to be unconscious. Kakashi quickly crouched next to him and did a rudimentary diagnostic jutsu to ascertain whether he needed immediate medical intervention. Luckily, he seemed stable enough both to be moved, and to wait a bit more for a medic.

Hinata was clutching Neji's hand, and she looked pretty abraded. Especially around the hands. She had probably tried to help or protect Neji. To be frank, she also looked in shock. Kakashi awkwardly informed her that her cousin should live. She very firmly corrected him, insisting that Neji was her brother. Kakashi decided to take that as a good sign.

Kiba and Akamaru were also out cold, but they sported no head injury. Kakashi also scanned them, but it just confirmed his initial suspicion, that aside from assorted cuts, abrasions and bruises, they were mainly chakra exhausted and suffering from soldier pill after effects.

By all measures, it was pretty obvious that they had tried to fight Gaara at some point after the Ichibi had started manifesting, and they had gotten soundly beaten.

Kakashi let Kurenai behind to tend to her genins and listen to their report, and followed the downed trees in search of his own kids.

He was starting to really dread what he would find.

Notes:

Okay, personal info overshare time: is there anyone reading this who is on the autistic spectrum? And if there is, do you have a feeling that Aiko might be on the spectrum too? I'm asking for a friend... Ahah. No, I'm asking for me.

I have zero diagnostic, even though I definitely tried. But I'm pretty sure I have ADHD.

For logistical plot purpose, Aiko, who is not quite a self-insert, doesn't have ADHD. I do need her to be able to function in the world she lives in for there to be a story, after all. (Not saying that an ADHD person couldn't live in the Naruto world. Just that someone with my presentation of it wouldn't be half as successful as a ninja as Aiko is, and needs to be to actually... Be the OC in my story...)

So, anyway, I nuked out what I have concluded to be my ADHD traits, but kept other quirks and social handicaps that I didn't identify as ADHD.

And I just found a video describing what it's like when you have ADHD AND Autism at the same time. And it feels... Very familiar. So. Yes. Please send help?

For clarification, the potentially autistic traits I'm talking about in Aiko are her difficulty maintaining friendships, her intermittent introvert tendencies, her storage scroll stash of everything she could need ever as a security blanket, her need to be over-prepared for everything, her tendency to control her appearance at all times, her tendency toward extreme bluntness, her short fuse where other's inadequacies are concerned, and possibly how she doesn't acknowledge that others are looking up to her, and how she tends toward over-analysis of why things are the way they are.

...

So, if anyone though 'it's funny, Aiko is coded pretty autistic, isn't she...' let me know, it will help me decide what the hell I should do on the 'finally get an actual diagnosis for my lack of neurotypicality' front.

Chapter 54: Kurama's perspective

Summary:

Kurama is resentful. But Naruto has a way about him...

Notes:

Many thanks to all the Spectrum people who took the time to answer last chapter's author's note. As soon as I next have a fit of "taking medical-related appointments" energy, I'll contact a specialist for a diagnostic. You all really helped me see that it wasn't just a flight of fancy in my part.

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

Kurama had spent the last few years sleeping. It was necessary. Getting half of his very being ripped away from his essence wasn't something that could be shrugged off easily. Nor swiftly.

Not even for the oldest and most powerful of the nine Bijuu.

Being awoken by a polite Fox Summons who addressed him with adequate respect and awe had been a pleasant deviation from his expectations. He had honestly expected to be woken up by an entitled, rude upstart of a human who believed they could demand his chakra just because they happened to be the vessel he had been sequestered into.

His vessel had accompanied the Fox Summons. But he too showed respect. Calling him Kyubi-sama, as he should. Kurama was older, wiser, and more powerful than any other entity who wandered this plane.

The visit had turned sour, when the Summons had dared refuse Kurama's demand that they kill his jailer and free him from his bondage.

The puny little flesh fox had dared tell Kurama that their patron Kami would not look favorably to their murdering the flesh-bag that served as Kurama's prison. On the basis that "Naruto-san is very purehearted. And he is innocent of the circumstances that brought him to become your Jinchuuriki, Kyubi-sama. Inari-sama would not approve of willfully killing him for a wrong that he hasn't committed."

Bah!

That had handily reminded Kurama of why he avoided dealing with Kitsune Summons. They insisted on venerating an outdated kami, and they acted like Kurama was the one in the wrong for not giving a rat's ass about their precious Inari-sama.

Kurama paid attention to what was happening around his container long enough to hear the little human turn down the Fox Summons.

Good riddance.

Kurama didn't want to have to bear these little self-righteous pricks until the current vessel died.

The fact that his Jinchuuriki swore "I promise to treat the Kyubi no Kitsune as their own person, to do my best to ease their captivity and be mindful of their consent", with all appearances of honestly to Kurama's senses gave him a pause.

But really. Who did this human child think he was. Mindful of Kurama's consent. Bah! As if any mere human other than those hateful Uchiha with their nightmare eyes even could make him do something against his consent. This runty meat bag thought much too highly of himself.

Kurama was ready to ignore all the going-ons concerning his Jinchuuriki. He had professed that he would not attempt to force Kurama in anything? Fine. Let him actually attempt to make good on his grand promises.

So far none of the humans who had the gall to imprison him had been able to resist the temptation of stealing Kurama's chakra for their own ends. This new one wanted to 'respect' Kurama's 'consent'? How nice of a sentiment, at least when it was only words bandied about.

How long would it take this particular little parasite to renege on his promise and attempt to steal Kurama's chakra? What excuses would the runt come up with to justify his deeds?

Kurama was idly curious about those things.

He was almost looking forward to it, actually. Because, when the kid broke the solemn promise he made to the Fox Summons envoy, then the cheeky little thing would be forced to admit that Kurama was right and they should have accepted to kill the runt in order to free Kurama.

Ignoring his container's surroundings became a bit less pressing of an issue when Kurama started sensing a very familiar malicious presence at close range.

The hatred made Kurama frown. Shukaku had always been a brat. He was the youngest, and the weakest of the Bijuu, and it showed in his way to comport himself. According to Kurama's memories, the Tanuki could be mischievous to the point of malice, and annoying to no end, but... So much hate?

Kurama hated much more than he had before in his life, for sure, but for his youngest sibling to feel so thoroughly unhinged was a bit concerning.

Not that it was truly his problem.

If the desert people had decided that they would rather contend with a perpetually hateful Bijuu who always wanted to escape and always wanted to cause the biggest possible amount of bloodshed possible rather than an occasionally misbehaving roaming sand-made creature... Well. The probably had been short-sighted enough not to expect backlash from their trespass against Kurama's annoying younger brother. Humans. Thinking their actions didn't come with costs. But frankly, the desert people deserved the result they got.

Same as the forest people had deserved having Kurama raze the pitiful little village they were so proud of. Even if Kurama was still not happy that a blasted Uchiha had once again stripped him of his agency to use him as nothing more than a weapon. Again.

The presence of Shukaku physically close to his vessel grated.

The hatred, all consuming and unhinged... Kurama understood. He didn't feel all that differently himself. But he also couldn't stop being aware of it. Shukaku was all but bellowing his hate at full volume at all time, and it was tiresome to hear.

When the hatred stopped being bound back by Shukaku's container and swelled before being let out to run freely into the world around them, Kurama's curiosity got the better of him.

There was no harm in just taking a peek at what his Jinchuuriki was seeing.

Actually, it was better. If Kurama knew exactly what was going on, he would have much more ammunition to taunt the little upstart whenever he decided that his vow to the Fox Summon wasn't important anymore.

Decided, Kurama closed his eyes and sought out the sympathetic link that his current restraining seal allowed.

Kurama's first vision of his youngest sibling through the human container's eye was a stark reminder that Shukaku lacked artistic appreciation. Kurama would never make his vessel look so ugly. Not even in the middle of initiating the first stage.

The juvenile fleshbag that the Tanuki inhabited was bulging in a decidedly asymmetrical fashion.

Ugh. Why must Kurama get second hand emotions when spectating on his prison's perception?

Kurama had not a single fuck to give to this Neji that his host was so worried he wouldn't reach in time.

He didn't.

Make it in time.

The dog and dog resonating ones were swatted away, the bugs of the buzzing one got crushed between shifting grains of sand, and the white eyed male was struck in the head and thrown from his branch into the ground bellow before 'Naruto' made it close enough to have any hope of intervening.

The white-eyed female attempted to make a stand over her fallen kinsman and keep Shukaku's sand from crawling over and crushing the limp white-eyed juvenile.

It didn't go very well for her, but before she could get killed along with the fleshbag she wanted to protect, the baby Uchiha that Kurama's jailer called his, flash-stepped forth, hateful eyes blazing red, and thrust his sparking sword into the sand-made arm.

Shukaku's Jinchuuriki burst into an unhinged laugh and started rambling about wanting to utterly crush anyone capable of drawing it's blood and inflict pain upon it to give itself an even greater sense of existence.

Shukaku had made quite a thorough job out of fucking up his newest container's head.

Kurama was almost impressed.

Kurama's own vessel stayed perched in the tree above the raging half-transformed sand ninja, tense and ready, his female juvenile perched by his side with her tiny little dog silently sitting upon her shoulder.

The reason for this became apparent when the Sand ninja launched himself at the Uchiha, and Kurama's vessel descended in an intercepting trajectory to kick the Tanuki's host away from the three tree people he was hurtling toward.

Kurama's container yelled at the white-eyed girl to take her brother and team and get away, and that they would take care of 'it'.

Kurama snorted at the idiocy of that statement. His fleshbag was horribly short in chakra compared to usual, and he had no access to Kurama's chakra unless Kurama willingly gave it. Even the Uchiha was down more than half of his reserve.

Believing they could manage Shukaku's Jinchuuriki when he had free access to Bijuu chakra was the height of arrogance.

Kurama crossed his paws and settled in to watch.

It was interesting.

At least visually.

On the front of listening, it was downright embarrassing. Shukaku's vessel went on the rant on how the power of his hatred was bigger and made him the strongest. Kurama's container answered with an impassioned speech on loneliness and sadness and the power of love.

...

Kurama was actually ashamed. It was his holder, being sappy and stupid and yelling about the 'Power Of Love' at the top of his lung. Before sticking an explosive tag wrapped kunai under the base of Shukaku's tail and yelling "1000 years of pain", too. Even if the slightly delayed explosion was, in fact, pretty effective.

At least Shukaku's host, while melodramatic, didn't sound like he had come out of a bedtime story for babies.

Kurama generally thought Shukaku annoying, but he was ready to cheer when his baby brother's claws raked diagonally across and down the Uchiha's torso, splashing blood upon the ground.

The pink-haired female screamed and launched herself in an arc to catch the injured Uchiha.

To her credit, she actually did catch the Uchiha.

She even managed to yank him out of range of the following beheading paw swipe. She didn't quite clear it herself, though.

Kurama watched dispassionately as a bit over a third of a leg fell down to the ground. The female's other leg was not quite severed, but it was hanging from muscle and skin rather than attached with a bone.

Kurama's Jinchuuriki howled and threw himself toward the obviously much stronger opponent headfirst.

Kurama sighed.

What a fool.

Contrary to what Kurama expected, especially with the mire of anger, pain and terror his vessel was feeling, the boy didn't try for a suicidal full frontal attack.

He just made it look like it.

And then he ducked, swiped the severed bit of leg from the ground and propelled himself up to the canopy with an overpowered chakra jump.

Oh. And the female had used the distraction to yank herself and the Uchiha out of range too.

Well. The three juveniles had still been thoroughly trounced. But... They were marginally less stupid than Kurama had first believed.

"Katsuyu-oba. Please. Tell me you can fix this!" Kurama's vessel pleaded to the slug upon his shoulder, holding the slowly bleeding calf and foot he had picked up from the ground like it was a bizarre cross between a fragile infant and a primed explosive tag.

The slug managed to look chagrined despite it's general lack of facial features. Saiken was the same way. It was always a bit jarring to see. "I can try. But for such injuries, with the chakra I have at my disposal, I can only slow the decay down."

"How much chakra do you need?" The boy asked desperately.

"More than you can spare and still keep yourself alive against this opponent." The slug answered. Though she still moved herself down the arm of her summoner to start attempting treatment.

As if to prove the summons right, this was the moment where Shukaku's vessel found them. It was moving pretty fast too.

Kurama felt the great welling wave of anger and fear, and then the sympathetic link dissolved.

"Well well well." Kurama hummed, back into his own body, sprawled in the water of the sewer mindscape. "What do we have here."

"Kyubi-sama." The boy exclaimed, rushing closer to the prison bars. Though he stayed cautiously out of swiping range. "I... Why am I here. I need... I'll die if I don't react. Or worse, they'll die!"

Kurama squinted his eyes at the human. Oh. that was mildly interesting. thinking his own death wasn't the worst part.

"Time is different here." Kurama informed the runt. "Especially while you are also occupying the seal space. There is a temporal dilatation at work."

Kurama didn't particularly want his jailer reassured, but the very same temporal dilatation meant that the longer the runt spent in there, and the more time Kurama lost on useless talk. Best cut to the heart of the matter. "Have you come to demand my chakra to help you and your precious humans to survive?"

"I..." The boy blinked, then looked down. "I promised to not do that. Your consent matters." It looked like it physically hurt the runt to say that. He had even started crying.

And then, the little human surprised him.

"That is why..." And he went down upon his knees in the dirty water, before bowing himself down on his hands. It wasn't quite a full on dogeza, mostly because the boy's head remained above the water. But it was pretty close. In any case, it was the most respect a human had shown Kurama in over a century. More, actually. "Please, Kyubi-sama. I beg you. Please allow me to use a little of your chakra to save my family."

Hmm. "No."

Kurama didn't feel bad about his refusal. While this human was being much more respectful than the last two, he was still the son of his previous container, and of the man who tore Kurama in two. Humans died all the time, it was their nature as mortal. Kurama had no obligation to help.

The boy lifted his head up, staring up at Kurama with wide, blue, supplicating teary eyes. Kurama snorted. "I hate Uchiha more than anything on this earth. Except maybe Uzumaki Mito who first imprisoned me, and Senju Hashirama, who hunted my siblings like animals to distribute around like party favors. Why should I participate in preserving the life of someone I hate? And for no recompense."

The runt opened his mouth, closed it, opened again. "Please. Kyubi-sama. Please!" Kurama snorted at his pathetic begging. The boy paused again. Opened, closed, opened again. "Please, name a price. What could I do in exchange that would make you willing to help?"

Oh.

Bargaining.

This little runt might be smarter than he looked.

"Die." Kurama answered coldly.

The boy looked down at his hands submerged in dirty water. "I... I'm sorry. I can't do that. I can't even be sure that you would help afterwards. I am very sorry. That you are trapped inside me. That the way for you to be free would be for me to die. But... I matter too, you know. You matter. And so do I."

Kurama snorted at the softhearted nonsense. Of course he mattered, he was the Kyubi No Kitsune, the strongest Bijuu. He didn't need a human child to say it for it to be true.

"Ask for something else, please. I... I will do what you ask. Just not that." The boy tried again, with his same hurt and pleading eyes.

Kurama pointed at the seal tag on the bars. The one that was a metaphorical representation of a corner of the eight trigrams seal. "Remove that tag."

The boy looked at the tag, then as Kurama again. "Right." He said, still kneeling in the water, and not getting up to obey. "I was too vague. Please ask for something that will not end up with me dead."

Hmm. Less stupid than he looked.

Kurama sighed and looked up into the darkness. "Forget it. I will simply wait until you get killed by your opponent."

The boy closed his eyes and lowered his head, before getting back up to standing. Then he sighed and raised his head again. "Alright. I see you don't want to give me a clue. How about I make offers instead?"

Kurama's ears raised up without conscious input. This could be interesting. What did the runt believe he could offer that would pay for Kurama willingly letting him use his chakra?

The boy looked around, then made an expensive gesture at... Everything. "Aiko-nee and Kaka-nii know Fuuinjutsu. I can ask them to make my seal be a nicer place to be than this." The runt offered.

He looked to be honest.

Kurama laughed.

"The scenery is not an effect of the seal." Kurama rebutted once he was done laughing. "Only the bars of the cage and the fact that this is a seal-space come from the fuuinjutsu. This..." Kurama swiped a claw at the gray walls and dirty water, "is simply a manifestation of your thoughts and feelings."

The boy frowned. "My thoughts and feelings?" He repeated.

Kurama climbed to his paws and stalked forth until his forehead was pressing against the bars, letting his eyes, which were as tall as the boy was, completely visible to him. "This. Is... A representation." Kurama drawled. "The seal creates a space for me inside of you. Unlike what you call storage scrolls, it is not a featureless pocket dimension. Instead, this place is what your subconscious deems an appropriate place to put me." Kurama demonstratively swung his head from left to right then to the opposite side, before fixing the runt with a stare. "Telling, isn't it? That the place you want me to be is in a sewer?"

The boy paled and stumbled back, falling on his behind in the dirty water.

Kurama stared down at him impassively.

"I don't want you to live in a sewer!" The boy exclaimed indignantly. "No one should be forced to live like that!"

Kurama raised a judgmental eyebrow. "And yet... Here I am, aren't I?"

The runt scowled fiercely back. "Subconscious... Isn't that that thing that happens without even thinking about it? Like deeper thoughts?" He asked slowly. At Kurama's slight incline of his head sideways, the boy frowned deeply and levered himself back to standing. "What it means isn't that I think that YOU should be in a sewer. The villagers have called me a monster and a demon since way before I knew that you were in me!" The runt growled, taking a step forward. "Can you really blame me for having parts of me want to put the 'demon' part of me that everyone believed me to be, hidden deep underground where no one can see it and hate me for it?"

Well. Aside from the fact that it was still a bit offensive, Kurama couldn't fault the kid's logic.

"But... I can work on it!" The boy exclaimed. "Inoichi-oji... He knows psychology. He even has ways to see people thoughts. What if I promise to work very hard to shift my perception of you and where you belong? You're a Fox, right? If I manage to make my deep thoughts see that you're a fox and you belong in nice forest undergrowth, with a dry, spacious burrow... If I promise to do my best to do that... Would you be willing to lend me a bit of your chakra, then?"

Kurama tilted his head.

Well.

It was at least an offer of something that had some value to his eyes.

If his container wouldn't accept dying prematurely to set Kurama free immediately, a less dreary cell to wait for freedom would make things less boring, at least.

Notes:

I will await your death threats!

Chapter 55: End of a Hunt (end of Invasion arc)

Summary:

Kakashi finds his genins. He manages to fake being mostly emotionally fine.

Notes:

You all took the limb severing much better than expected, to be honest...
I guess both canon and my obvious "this is a fix-it" approach has spoiled any fear of Sakura keeping her injury long term, heh?

Huh. Also. Ninja magic doesn't exist IRL, and I definitely am not aiming to be dismissive of or rude to real life amputees. Losing a limb is a big deal. Losing two legs can end the ability of standing ever again. I know it.
Just, in this context... it's not really a permanent condition, as canon has proved

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

The trees around him, while fallen bore claw gouges that had obviously been made before they fell.

Kakashi smelled blood.

Trying to convince himself that the blood wasn't necessarily his kids' was much harder than it should be.

Kakashi's tracker training led him unfailingly to a puddle of blood that was already starting to get soaked in by the soil.

He hesitated in his rush and stopped to investigate.

A deep sniff and visual rundown had his blood all but freeze in his veins. There were three distinct blood traces close together. Two smelled like they came from the same person, and the other was distinctive. And also smelled slightly like shit underneath the blood, which told Kakashi that someone had gotten their intestine punctured.

For all of Kakashi's hopes that the one dealing with all of the potential sepsis that came with a gut wound would be a Suna Genin... There were no scent mark of the Suna team's older girl or puppeteer for him to detect. Only his three genins, Sakura's ninken, Kokoro, Katsuyu-sama's weird, mucus-filled yet dry scent and the sandy-bloody smell of Gaara.

It meant that at best, one of his kids has gotten seriously injured, at worse, two of them had.

Kakashi scented and followed the smell of blood to another felled tree. The pattern of the blood splatter and drips meant that the tree was still upright when someone bled on it. So at the point, the... two, injured people fled to the canopy. It was pure Konoha-nin reflex.

Kakashi's attempt to sniff out more clues was thwarted the thick smell of... Fox? Wait. there were also a few smaller claw gouges, that looked a bit burned in.

So... Naruto. Naruto used the Kyubi's power. And...

Kakashi tilted his head sideways, trying to visualize the scene as it must have looked when the trees were still upright.

...

There. One tree that must have been in a clear trajectory looked thoroughly sanded, and also sported an impact mark. And it was also right next to an enormous paw print in the ground.

So, Naruto... Used the Kyubi's power to throw Gaara away from his teammates, then, Gaara morphed into a giant Tanuki that could be seen from Konoha.

Alright.

Obviously at least one of his genins survived this situation, since a giant portion of Katsuyu-sama had also been sighted.

Kakashi breathed deeply, then regretted it as instead of being calming, it brought in even more of the bloody scent.

Panic was unhelpful. He couldn't change what had already occurred.

Either way, the blood scent was the fastest way to track is pups.

Kakashi took a deliberately deep scenting breath and followed the track of drying blood smell.

Hopefully there wouldn't be any dead Konoha genins at the end of it.

Katsuyu-sama had also been summoned. And she was Tsunade-sama's Summons. So long as no kid was dead by the time Naruto called the big fragment of her in, they would have stayed alive after her arrival.

He had to believe that.

It was a huge relief to see acid-eaten trees a dozen of seconds into following the blood trail. Hopefully no one had died of blood loss between the injuries and Naruto summoning Katsuyu-sama.

By the time he had followed the signs of battle to his genins, the smell of blood had all but disappeared.

He was a bit alarmed that he couldn't smell Sakura, but that could easily be explained away by her habit of scent suppression.

Sasuke raised his head, and got into an exhausted guard position when Kakashi reached the pseudo-clearing his pups were in.

A quick scan showed Naruto laid out on the ground behind a shirtless and obviously scared Sasuke and a person-sized Katsuyu next to the two. With a slightly bigger Katsuyu 'standing' guard nearby.

Kakashi wanted more than anything to go and hug his boys and ask them what the hell happened. But first things first. "Where is Sakura?"

Sasuke blinked, flashed his sharingan, presumably to double-check That Kakashi was really Kakashi, and then pointed at the Katsuyu next to Naruto.

Kakashi frowned and turned to the Katsuyu fragment himself, before turning to the bigger Katsuyu instead. "You're healing her?"

"Yes. Considering the amount and quality of chakra I have to work with, a slow healing inside of one of my fragments is the best choice I have, if I want to ensure that she regains full function in both legs. It also allows me to make sure she does not die from blood loss while I slowly match each muscle fiber and blood vessel to the right place." Katsuyu told him calmly.

Kakashi froze. His mind trying to process 'regain full function in both legs' 'does not die of blood loss' and failing repeatedly.

He turned his gaze to Sasuke, hoping for more information, and all but fell in his black eyes with how they looked like pits of despair.

"She saved me." Sasuke whispered. His arm folded in, and his finger landed on one of the big, puckered scars that ran across his torso, then trailed in on his abdomen, all the way into his flank, confirming that he was the one who got his intestines punctured. "I got careless, and..." Sasuke trailed off, brushing his fingers from the top of his shoulder and down into the side of his waist, following the central claw mark. "But she grabbed me and pulled me out before he could kill me. Except..."

Sasuke sobbed, tears falling from his eyes and Kakashi jolted forth by his instinctive drive to go hug his distraught pup.

"She!" Sasuke sobbed, grabbed onto Kakashi's flack vest and shoved his head into Kakashi's neck. "Her leg... It fell to the ground like... Like..."

Kakashi cringed. Oh. Damn. Losing a leg. Watching a comrade and close friend lose a limb... It was horribly traumatic.

"Like it was just... meat! And... And Naruto went and grabbed it, but Sakura's other leg, it was... It wasn't really attached anymore. She couldn't... She couldn't land right! She had to smack us into a branch because I... Because I was so stupid, and Aiko was right!" Sasuke wailed.

Kakashi was at a loss on what to do, but the Wolf insisted that he only needed to hold fast and let Sasuke vent his fear. The most important was to not let go of the pup while he was crying.

It seemed a bit too... Simple, but damned if Kakashi had a better idea, so he squeezed Sasuke to himself and nuzzled his hair and rumbled soothingly, and listened to his kid's anguished report.

"Then... Naruto... He... He didn't have enough chakra for Katsuyu to heal Sakura, and then Gaara attacked, and all of a sudden, he glowed all red and he could fight Gaara and also call a huge portion of Katsuyu to help fight and heal us, but... I... I wasn't... Katsuyu adsorbed me to heal the..." Sasuke gestured at his scars once more. "And Sakura too. And when I came out, Naruto was..." Sasuke gestured at Naruto, who's position was telling enough. "And he told Gaara that he understood, and that he was all alone too, and we saved him, and that he would fight because he loves us, and Gaara... He looked a bit... less... less... crazy? And then his team came, and he told them not to fight us, so they grabbed him and fled, and now..."

Sasuke hiccuped and hunched over into Kakashi's arms.

"And now... I... Katsuyu... Sakura... And Naruto!"

Kakashi shushed Sasuke and stroked his hair gently. "It's alright. It's alright, Sasuke, I'll take care of everything. You can rest. I'm here, you can rest."

Apparently it was the right thing to say, because Sasuke relaxed a bit in his hold, then went limp against Kakashi's torso, with his face buried into his shoulder.

Kakashi kept petting at Sasuke's head rhythmically and turned his head back to Katsuyu-sama. "What is Sakura's prognostic?" He asked as levelly as he could.

Katsuyu hummed. "She will live. I have taken care of all of the blood loss issues, and fixed her circulatory system. The muscles and bones are taking me a while to piece back together in the right place to ensure she will retain full mobility. The chakra I am working with is unruly." Katsuyu-sama hesitated a bit. "And not particularly amiable to being used for healing. Naruto-dono's chakra is pretty typical Uzumaki. It tends to be undisciplined, but it wants to heal, even if it can sometimes rush for it too much and cause complications. The Kyubi's chakra is wild, fiery, and caries a significant amount of malice toward humans."

Kakashi grimaced. He hadn't expected all good news, but that definitely didn't sound good.

"I am able to corral it into healing anyway, but it demands a lot of effort, concentration and discipline. And even then, it's better to avoid too delicate operations until I have better resources to work with." Katsuyu-sama elaborated helpfully. "At the moment, I am working toward stabilization, and mending the parts of the injury that are likely to heal wrong and impede full mobility if left to their own device. Anything that is not life-endangering, and that will slowly and naturally regenerate right, I am leaving alone..."

Kakashi noticed the slight dragging at the end of the sentence. He was no medic, but he had heard them prevaricating on things they were not willing to promise often enough to have a suspicion. "But?" He asked leadingly.

Katsuyu-sama sighed. "Once Naruto-dono had recovered his own native chakra, I will be able to straighten out most of the things I am currently deciding not to treat. And I also can finish up on Sasuke-san's injuries to ensure they do not scar permanently."

Kakashi narrowed his eye. "Most of the things," he repeated, "meaning not all of them."

Katsuyu-sama slumped a bit. "As I said, Naruto-dono's chakra is unruly. it tends to rush a bit too much. It is something I can counteract by being careful and proceeding slowly. But... Even so, I am not confident enough to engage in the most delicate operations with it. And from what I have seen of Konoha medics so far... I am not confident they can do it perfectly right either."

Sasuke twitched and turned. "What? What is it that can't be healed in Sakura?"

The bigger Katsuyu lowered her head to the smaller one, that melted and split, before the smaller slugs dismissed themselves in puffs of smoke. Kakashi immediately scanned Sakura, looking for whatever was awry.

Nothing was obviously wrong. Both of her pants legs were dissolved starting a bit higher than the visible scars. She had a fairly messy scar around her upper right calf that looked to be going all the way around, and another on the left thigh, right above the knee, that ran three quarter of the way around, leaving an unmarred strip on the exterior side. Both scars were a reddish pink, well consolidated. Both feet were pointing up as they should, and Kakashi could follow the line of bones and muscles running smoothly along the legs despite the scars.

Kakashi turned back toward Katsuyu.

"In this section of the leg... both the nerves and chakra pathways run right next to the bone." Katsuyu-sama finally explained.

Kakashi digested the words and turned back to Sakura. Both of her legs had had the section around the bone thoroughly severed. "Will she...?" He choked on the question.

"Will she walk again?" Sasuke asked for him.

Katsuyu sighed. "Walk, yes, undoubtedly. Even with the capacities I'm working out of at the moment, I could ensure that she will be able to walk. Run, jump, tree and water walk, and use her chakra-strings from the feet like she's been doing so far, though? That is less certain."

Kakashi breathed out slowly.

Damn.

Sakura would take that so badly.

"It isn't a definitive no." Katsuyu-sama tried to reassure them. "I do have another summoner whose chakra is much better suited to delicate surgeries. If Tsunade-sama could be convinced... Even just of letting me access her chakra for a couple of hour so I can perform the needed surgeries, I have ensured that both the nerves and the chakra pathways are disposed in such a way that they will neither decay nor heal wrong. I, or another skilled medic can pick it back up at any time and finish reconnecting them. And if that is done well, everything will work as well as it did before."

Kakashi analyzed the words Katsuyu-sama just said. He had very limited knowledge in medicine. But his deductive reasoning was, and always had been very good. "So... Right now, she can't walk, or use chakra in her feet, at all?"

Katsuyu-sama's eyestaks drooped. "No. Her legs are nerveless and chakra-less starting from the scars."

Kakashi let go of Sasuke when he pushed himself away, and walked to Naruto so he could grab him and carry him closer to where Sasuke was now clinging to Sakura.

And Sasuke didn't even know that Aiko had also been seriously injured yet.

Kakashi sighed.

And to make matters worse, he probably wouldn't be there for the next... month or two. Possibly three... for Sasuke to cling to in reassurance.

In the wake of an invasion, Konoha would have to demonstrate strength by deploying all it's strongest ninja in places where they could be seen being extremely competent and strong. And Kakashi had no fake modesty surrounding the fact that he was strong and competent.

He would be lucky if he had one week to spend with his pups over the next two months.

Katsuyu-sama split in two, and one half dismissed herself, while the other crawled toward Naruto and started healing his injuries. All superficial. Good.

Kakashi stayed sat next to Naruto and Sakura for a moment to let Sasuke get his bearings. And to ground himself with touch to reassure himself that his pups were still all accounted for and alive, even if they weren't in mint condition.

Then he removed his Flack Jacket and his Jounin blue shirt, offering the later to Sasuke to wear in place of the shirt Katsuyu had dissolved for better access to his wounds. After that, he put the jacket back on over his sleeveless under-shirt, the one with the connected face-mask, that was highly ANBU reminiscent.

Then, he hoisted Naruto onto his back and stuck him with chakra, before picking Sakura up in a bastardized bridal carry, and he took his kids back home.

"I need a room with the big beds that fall under Wild Clan pack instincts rules." Kakashi told the harried nurse. He felt a bit bad about making more work for her, but he was worn through from the day, and he had helped enough during the invasion to warrant the five minutes needed to be truly comfortable in the hospital to watch his charges recover. "And to have chunin Sato Aiko moved there as well, if she's still in the hospital."

The nurse frowned. "Pack instincts rules are for Inuzuka. None of you are Inuzuka." The nurse snapped back at him, reaching for the registry of shared recovery rooms.

Well. Kakashi felt a lot less bad about bothering her, all of a sudden.

The growl he didn't even have to consciously think about to emit made the woman freeze and stare at him with wide eyes. "My name," Kakashi gritted out, "is Hatake Kakashi from the Hatake Wild Clan I am asking you for the special accommodations afforded to my Clan as part of the founding agreements. If there are no such accommodations free at the moment, please just tell me. None of my Pack members' injuries are so severe that they can't wait until tomorrow to be admitted."

The deathly pale face of the nurse and the quiet whimper Sakura made into his shoulder even without waking up, jolted Kakashi out of his fury and made him realize that he was leaking out violent intent.

Oops.

It was very rude to emit any kind of negative intent inside of the hospital.

Then again. This was the exact reason why there were Wild Clans laws. Sometimes, instincts moved ahead of thoughts. Especially when a Pack member was injured.

"What is going on here?" A powerful female voice underlined with a bit of a growl cut through the hospital foyer.

Kakashi turned around, Sakura still cradled in his arms, Naruto stuck on his back, and Sasuke clinging to his sleeve, and looked at the woman striding across the room. Red triangular face markings and three hip-sized ninken. That was Inuzuka Hana. Not unreasonable that the Inuzuka Clan spared the Alpha's daughter to the hospital to ensure none of theirs could make a mess. Especially since she was a vet herself and could apply first aid to humans in a pinch.

Kakashi narrowed his eye at her and shuffled a bit so that his hip and thigh was in more solid contact to Sasuke's side.

When it became obvious that Kakashi wasn't going to speak, Hana turned toward the nurse for answer. Kakashi usually would speak for himself, but his temper was very strained at the moment, and he didn't want to chance snapping at Hana. He respected her quite a bit, even if he barely knew her.

"Uhm... Hatake-san requested a Pack Room, which are reserved to Inuzuka, and..." The nurse squeaked, stopping dead when Hana fixed her with a glare.

"Pack Rooms are for Wild Clans with Pack instincts." The Inuzuka snapped. "The Hatake are explicitly listed as a part of these, just as much as Inuzuka. Did you actually read a rule book that stated only my Clan is to benefit from Wild Clan laws? Because if it is so, it should have passed in front of the council to be approved, and I know for a fact that my mother would never have allowed for the Hatake to be cut out of their dues while there was still anyone bearing the name."

Kakashi blinked at the passionate defense of his rights.

Uh.

He hadn't realized that the Inuzuka felt that passionately about his dying Clan.

Behind him, the nurse tried to stutteringly defend her not actually reading the rule book and making an assumption about the Inuzuka being the only Pack-inclined Clan in Konoha.

Hana cut across the crap with a very sharp edged recommendation of reading the fucking manuals, and a demand to know if there were any Pack Rooms free.

There weren't.

Before Hana could get very far in making space for Kakashi to have something resembling a Pack Room anyway, Kakashi coughed. "As I was just saying, I am uninjured, and my genins received first aid from Katsuyu-sama herself. They will need to be examined by a medic for the follow-up, but they can sleep outside of the hospital for now. And my teaching assistant already received treatment, since she was stabbed toward the start of the invasion. I can take my Pack home for now and come back tomorrow."

Much as it would soothe him to have medics on hand for his kids, they objectively could do without it.

Hana blinked, turned to him and then narrowed her eyes. "Uhm. I believe your district is one of the ones that had a Boss Summons battle in the middle of it." She told him slowly, and Kakashi drooped at the thought, mind already calculating the feasibility of going back to their camp in the Hatake Compound forest for the night. "But, the Inuzuka Compound is largely untouched, and we have a couple of more isolated houses that are always ready for pregnant members. I would like to offer you one in the name of my Clan."

Uh.

So. Either the Inuzuka felt much more strongly about his Clan than he had ever suspected... Or Kiba had said good stuff about him to his family.

The offer was very tempting either way. A guest house in another Compound would not be home, but there would be privacy, and the Inuzuka Veterinary Clinic close by in case something went catastrophically wrong with his pups in the night and he needed emergency medical help.

Besides, Inuzuka, while much more sociable than his own Clan as a rule, were also a canine inclined Wild Clan, that would understand if he was a bit of a menace while his people were hurt. That would buy him some much needed indulgence to his being growly and grumpy.

Kakashi tilted his head in thought, then nodded. "Sure. Can you hold her for a second?" He asked politely, pointing his chin at Sakura, who was still slumbering in his arms. It was a huge sign of trust, handing a pup over, but Hana had just proved herself trustworthy. Also, he did need his hands. "Careful with her legs, I'm not sure how much Katsuyu-sama consolidated the bones."

Hana accepted the sleeping genin with what looked like true professional veterinarian habit before understanding his actual words and looking at the telling scars circling Sakura's upper shin and lower thigh. "Uh. Yeah." She murmured. "You might want to have that put in a cast just... in case..." She blinked again, noticing Kakashi nicking his thumb with a shuriken and starting up the summoning signs. "You know, I can give her a diagnostic right now, see how things are. I can spare a moment to splint it, too."

Kakashi nodded his agreement and slapped his hand onto the counter.

The logic behind calling in Kokoro instead of Pakkun or Shiba was that she was less chakra costly and knew Aiko's scent just as well as any of his own personal summons.

Obviously his logical brain was being hindered by his emotions, because he failed to take into account that the last place he had smelled Kokoro was right where Sakura lost got slashed into two and a half pieces.

For such a small puppy, she could make quite the scene.

After a minute, when the Summons was done being very upset that she got dispelled by her main summoner right after seeing her take a hit, Kokoro accepted her orders and ran off to find Aiko and tell her to join the rest of the team at the Inuzuka Compound.

Kakashi covertly winced at all the attention he had garnered, before steeling his lackadaisical persona up and offering Hana one of his customary fake apologetic eye-smiles and a shrug. "Puppies, you know." He sighed, before gently lifting Sakura out of the Inuzuka's arms and nodding at her. "I wouldn't say no to a quick scan. And for Sasuke, too. Katsuyu-sama didn't tell me exactly where she was with their treatment before she dismissed herself."

Which was true.

But not that way.

Katsuyu had dismissed herself just before they reached the gates, to rest mentally and to avoid drawing attention to Naruto right-away when he was too worn out to field it. Katsuyu-sama also knew that Kakashi had limited understanding of iryo ninjutsu, or healing in general. So she hadn't bothered with an exact explanation that he wouldn't truly understand. And Kakashi had forgotten to ask her about the details he could understand.

Hana simply nodded and hovered a green-lit hand over Sakura's chest, before nodding and moving on to Sasuke.

"Well." Hana hummed. "It will keep until tomorrow. I'll just fetch a couple of knee braces for her, so she doesn't jar her breaks in her sleep, and a bottle of anti-inflammatory pills for them both just to be sure the muscles don't act up. What about him?" She asked, pointing at Naruto.

"Just bumps and bruises." Kakashi smiled. But he did turn to let her give his third pup a quick scan of his own. Medic-nins were fussy like that, it was better to let them reassure themselves that no one was hiding injuries. ... Unless you actually were hiding an injury, in which case a speedy exit was key.

Just as he suspected, Hana 'slipped' and scanned him too while she was at it.

He snorted and shot her a deadpan look. "Really?"

"You need sleep! Medic's order!" She answered cheekily. "Ah! There comes the famous Aiko-san. I will let you welcome her. Wait a minute before taking off, I'll be fast about fetching these braces."

Notes:

What? Actual mid-to-long-term negative consequences? In My Fic? It's more likely than you think!

Sakura will be fine. Eventually. I've planned for the injury to even end up benefiting her, I swear.

Besides, with Lee not nigh-on irreparably damaged, I needed to find another strong motivator for Naruto to give convincing Tsunade his all. It's his passion that ends up convincing her, so she need him to have something he's passionate about to tug at her heartstrings with.

Also. The Katsuyu cheat needed to be nerfed a bit. Sorry. No immediate Tsunade-level healing for Naruto. He's going to need to learn to filter his intent and regulate his chakra-flow before he can be counted as a world-class medic by proxy.

Sasuke is about to have a very bad time, though. ... Which... I guess means I could end up including the "Sasuke retrieval mission" anyway despite the divergence? Hmmm. Something to ponder. And possibly to give me a vote-comment on? :3

Chapter 56: Aiko's Guilt (Search for Tsunade arc)

Summary:

Once the dust settles, you see the damage clearly

Notes:

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Chapter Text

Aiko was a bit worried.

Kokoro looked really upset when she came to fetch her, and Aiko only managed to get "Sakura got hurt." out of her as an explanation.

Well. Following the ninken puppy back to Kakashi and the kids would get her her answers the fastest.

She got to the hospital's hall as fast as possible without jolting her broken bones with a bouncy gait, and slowed down at the scene in front of her.

Kakashi was easy to spot. Pretty much everyone in the Hall was turned toward him. He carried Sakura in his arms, Naruto on his back, and Sasuke was all but clinging to his hip, and all but swallowed in a too big Jounin shirt that made him look much younger. In front of the group, stood an Inuzuka and her three ninken.

Just as Aiko slowed down, the Inuzuka turned her head toward her with a smile. Aiko caught the tail end of her parting words, about fetching braces.

Aiko steeled herself and forced herself to walk forth into the focus center of every ninja in the hall's attention.

It's easy. You're a Seduction Specialist. The whole world is your stage. Come on. Smile. Walk confidently. No one will see how you feel inside if you act brazen enough.

Aiko covertly took a very deep breath and sashayed her way toward Kakashi. The fact that her right arm was in a scarf wasn't relevant. She just needed to appear serene. Easy. She did it all the time.

Once she was close enough, she set her hand on Kakashi's bare arm and strained forth over Sakura to plant a quick kiss on his chin. It has the doubled benefit of making Kakashi smile and pushing most of the spectators into dismissing her as a simple conquest of Kakashi's.

She could almost physically feel the attention veering away from her.

Aiko let out a slow breath.

It was always a bit funny, how easily she could make people dismiss her.

One gesture of physical affection, and she no longer was relevant.

Any ninja worth their salt knew just how dangerous a Seduction Specialist could be. They knew that their best weapon was being underestimated. And yet... Seduction Specialists were still routinely underestimated, even by competent ninjas.

Of course, it was way more reassuring when she got that exact reaction out of someone who wasn't a Konoha-nin. Other Village's nins should ignore her. When it was comrades she managed to trick into thinking her transparent, she always worried about their vulnerability in some corner of her mind.

Aiko firmly shelved the train of thought when she felt Kakashi sigh in relief against her nose.

She could tell Inoichi-sama about the incident later. He would know who to warn about their ninja needing remedial training in being wary of pretty and affectionate women.

For the moment, Kakashi was very tense beneath her palm. Even if he faked comfort pretty well, thanking Kokoro for her help and dismissing her with a promise to summon her again the next day if Sakura couldn't do so herself.

She really needed to know more about the state of her genins.

After a moment of scanning the foyer for a good place to relocate, Aiko let go of Kakashi, turned her uninjured flank toward Sasuke, bent her knees, pulled the boy flush against her side, slipped her arm behind his thighs, used her chakra to stick his torso to her, and stood back up.

Sasuke didn't even try to protest, instead he leaned his cheek against her shoulder and carefully looped his arms under her bust, where her injury was not.

Aiko pressed a kiss to his forehead, and then turned to the benches flanked by potted plants that would give them a bit of privacy to talk about what the hell happened to the genins outside the Village walls until the Inuzuka medic came back.

Aiko was starting to get concerned at how easily Sasuke allowed her to handle him. She knew that she was kind of fussy and occasionally huggy with people she liked. And most of the time, Sasuke humored her for ten seconds before demanding some space. Or straight up wiggling away.

Yet, here was Sasuke, letting her sit him in her lap as she sat down, after letting her carry him.

She looked to Kakashi for clues. He simply looked back at her and kind of drooped.

So he was out of his depth. Great.

Kakashi slowly sat next to her, his blind left to her injured right, covering for each-other. The maneuver was made slower by his needing to mind Naruto's legs so he didn't squish them under him, since he couldn't move them with his arms, that were still holding Sakura to his chest.

Aiko gave the pink-haired kunoichi a once-over, stopping at the jagged scars circling her legs. Ooh. That looked bad.

Kakashi was pretty fast about putting Sakura half in Aiko's lap once he was situated, and she noted how fast Sasuke turned himself into a backrest for his teammate.

Not that Sasuke wasn't helpful. From time to time. They had mostly managed to draw him out of his prickly hedgehog shell. But the haste with which Sasuke took hold of Sakura's torso as soon as Kakashi leaned the genin their way spoke of a quiet despair to touch. To hold. Confirm that... That she was still here. Solid and warm and breathing.

Damn. Aiko had sent their kids right into injury and trauma, hadn't she. She had known it was the most likely outcome, too.

Okay.

Hold on.

Guilt for later.

The kids and Kakashi needed her to emotionally stabilize them.

"What are the injuries?" She forced herself to ask.

Kakashi finished dragging Naruto around, off his back, onto the bench, leaned on his right side. "Naruto is generally fine." Kakashi started with. "Possible chakra exhaustion, scraps, bruises and bumps. He should be on his feet in a day or two, with the Uzumaki vitality at play."

"Sasuke got three claw gouges to the chest. At least one of them breached the abdominal cavity and punctured the intestines." He then recited calmly. Though Aiko could see him using mission calm to dissociate himself from the words. "Katsuyu-sama took care of them, mended the gut, cleared the infection risks, reconnected the muscles, reinforced the rib-cage if that was necessary and grew a solid and healthy scar at skin level. A secondary intervention will be needed to reduce the visible scarring."

Aiko looked down at the Uchiha sitting on her, but he didn't look to be listening. Well. He had his face into Sakura's hair... It was possible that he was asleep. Or maybe he didn't want to participate in the conversation.

"Sakura." Kakashi's breath hitched there, calling Aiko's full focus back to him. He breathed in deeply as his left hand lightly traced one of the jagged circles around the girl's legs. "Katsuyu-sama promised that she would be able to walk again, eventually."

Aiko breathed through the horror these words evoked. Eventually. Eventually. Walk. Sakura's leg currently couldn't bear her, and might not let her run in the future. Aiko's left hand thoughtlessly drifted off Sasuke's back to touch the short pink locks of her student's hair. Sakura. Not running around and jumping into and out of trees, giving Kakashi heart-attacks...

No.

No.

Please no.

Not on Aiko's orders.

The sob tore out of her throat, regardless of her resolve not to give into guilt at the moment.

Kakashi listed toward her, squirting around her shoulder to instead press his arm behind her back and rest his forehead on her temple.

"Her chakra pathways and nerves were severed along with the flesh, blood and bones." Kakashi breathed out softly. "Katsuyu-sama took care of everything life-threatening, or that might heal wrong on it's own, but she... Huh. Stoppered all the more delicate aspects to go over at a later date." Kakashi paused, then spoke up again, more slowly. "She assured me that she believes a return to full function possible, with a bit of," Kakashi paused for a moment, cluing Aiko in that he was half lying about Katsuyu's exact words so as to keep Naruto's status as the new Slug Summoner from becoming public right-away. "Personal attention from Tsunade-sama."

Ah.

Right.

Setting Sakura to rights would only demand the Senju Hime.

Easy.

Ha.

And it wasn't even everything.

Aiko swallowed, then took a deep breath. "And what about... Is there? Casualties?" She asked softly.

Kakashi blinked and then squeezed her a bit. "No. All Konoha Genins are alive. Ours were the most injured." Kakashi answered. "Most have no hurts worth mentioning. But Shino lost most of his Hive, and Neji got a head-wound."

Aiko let out a relieved sigh. Head wounds could get tricky, and Shino might experience some trauma from having his Hive depleted, but it would heal.

And... Sakura would too. Hopefully.

The Inuzuka medic hadn't lied about being quick, and came back not a minute later, carrying a few metal poles, padding and bandages.

The way the woman went about situating the padding, bandaging it in place, putting the hinged poles on either sides of Sakura's leg and marking where they needed to be bent. Kakashi obligingly bent the poles following Hana's (the Inuzuka medic) instructions since he was strong enough to do it by hand and it saved them the time needed for Hana to go and do it with the correct tools. Once that was done, Hana strapped the poles on securely and bandaged them over so they couldn't get caught on anything, before nodding solemnly and standing back up.

"Alright. It will hold just fine until tomorrow. Even the day after tomorrow wouldn't be a problem, but don't wait much more than that to come back." The Inuzuka told them in that particular medic orders tone. "For the house... Frankly, just go to the Compound and tell someone that I offered you sanctuary and you need a guide to a free pregnancy home.

Aiko slumped, suddenly exhausted.

The day had been extremely long.

Sasuke slipped from her lap to go support Naruto while Kakashi stood, and Aiko decided that she still had the energy to carry a genin. Sakura was still the lightest, and with the braces in places she could be carried in a piggyback.

The house that the Inuzuka put them in was cozy, comfortable. There was a definite theme of pelts and furs, but it obviously relaxed Kakashi, even if he didn't look like he noticed it.

It was something of a routine, tucking the kids in between them, even if the extra-large mattress was a rare luxury. Sasuke Situated himself with Kakashi at his back and Sakura held to his chest, leaving Aiko to bracket Naruto on the other side, taking firm hold of his arms and legs so he didn't end up hitting others in the middle of the night.

Despite how tired she was, she didn't manage to fall asleep. Sasuke and Kakashi had dropped off swiftly, but Aiko... He couldn't stop looking at Sakura over the top of Naruto's head.

Her orders.

It was her orders that sent the pink-haired girl into the breach to get an injury that was all but career-ending.

What if it couldn't be healed? What if Sakura ended up able to walk but not fight? Not jump? Not dance?

What if in the end it was her who clipped the young kunoichi's wings before she could even find out how high she could fly?

And Sasuke's haunted face.

The fear clinging to him.

She was the one who put them in that position by sending only genins after Neji and Gaara.

She wasn't conceited enough to think she would have made much of a difference if she had gone along. And she wouldn't have been able to keep Kakashi from being stabbed.

But. She had been in a bleacher full of nins. She could... Have found a chunin or Tokubetsu to send along. She could have urged Kurenai to catch up with their kids instead of staying put just to shield her.

Aiko sniffed, feeling the tears start spilling out.

There was a reason she was chunin, damn it. She wasn't made to lead. She wasn't made to make life or death decisions for others.

She didn't deserve to call herself a sensei.

Kakashi stirred.

Aiko blinked and pressed her face to her shoulder, ashamed of her bout of self-pity.

Of course that was useless.

Kakashi could smell the tears.

It was probably what woke him up.

So now she was even disturbing her Jounin's sleep.

Kakashi sniffed audibly, and propped himself on an elbow surveying their kids, and Aiko steeled herself to look him in the eye rather than let him worry which genin was distraught.

"Aiko?" He mumbled. "Are you in pain?"

Fuck.

How could she resist that earnest voice?

She shook her head. He didn't stop looking worried, and she knew that she had to speak up, or he would keep being concerned. "I sent them out there." Aiko whispered. "I sent her to track Gaara."

Kakashi blinked, frowned, blinked again. "Neji would have died, if he had gone alone." He told her firmly. "There is no question about it. I saw the state he was in, he wouldn't have survived alone. Your orders saved his life. I would have given the same ones if I hadn't been too busy with another fight." Kakashi awkwardly reached out a hand and patted her arm. "Death isn't fixable. Not the way every injury the genins ended up getting are."

Aiko nodded meekly, even if she wasn't totally convinced.

Kakashi levered himself upward, then put a hand down between Sakura and Naruto to brace himself so he could lean over their little row of genins to kiss her on the lips.

Aiko smiled. He was so awkward with it, too. Obviously replicating her own reassurance gesture toward him. A Jounin older than her shouldn't allowed to be so cute and earnest. It was unnatural.

It worked, though, and shortly after Kakashi was resettled behind Sasuke, she finally managed to fall asleep.

Aiko woke before any of her kids.

The first thing she did was look at the sleeping students for a minute, soaking up how peaceful they looked in sleep.

Then she got up, bodily picked Naruto under her healthy arm, and walked around the bed to set him down at Kakashi's back. This way if he did kick or punch something in his sleep once out of Aiko's restrictive grasp, it would be an adult Jounin, rather than an already injured Sakura.

Kakashi opened an eye at the disturbance, and gifted her with a sleepy smile before snuggling back into his pile of children.

Aiko smiled tenderly at the image and impulsively tugged at the blanket to tug it in securely before smacking an obnoxiously loud kiss on the Jounin's forehead. Only gaining a smile for her effort.

So she was in a pretty good mood when she entered the kitchen and looked in the cupboards and fridge for something to cook for breakfast.

The fridge was empty. Which made sense, since this was essentially a guest house, and the Inuzuka hadn't known to expect guests.

There were dry goods and nonperishable in the cupboards, though.

She could use honey, oats, water and floor to make oatcakes. It wouldn't be luxury food, but it would be edible. And there was a salted, smoked leg of something hanging in a dark, dry larder.

Of course. Inuzuka. They had to consider meat a necessity.

The method of preservation was one of the ones that would keep the meat edible for over a year, so Aiko wasn't sure if she could help herself to it. But then again. The Inuzuka considered feeding pups enough meat to grow strong a cornerstone. They wouldn't be upset that what they stocked this house with disappeared into tiny stomachs.

Slicing the hard meat thin enough to easily cook with only her left arm was a bit of a challenge, but before long, she had strips of meat sizzling away in the pan, replacing the cooked and cooling oatcakes.

As she expected, the smell of it woke everyone up in short order.

Aiko felt a pang of heartache at Sakura's panicked voice when she discovered that she couldn't move her lower legs at will, but Kakashi and Sasuke apparently had that in hand. After a couple of minutes of hearing soft voices explaining things in the bedroom, the whole team joined her in the kitchen.

Kakashi was once again carrying Sakura. Whose eyes and nose were reddened from tears even as she tried to put up a brave face.

Aiko smiled, and forbid herself to let any sadness or pity reach her face, even as she plated portions and set them down on the thick wooden table.

Sakura was strong.

No matter what happened, she would find a way to prevail.

Notes:

Looking at Lee during the finals, I concluded that Konoha's technology level around medicine would be well thought-out, but meant to be makeshift. Since they don't have full on automatized industry, they don't have a profusion of well finished braces for every injury and sizing.

Instead, they have flat metal poles of varying sizes, and some have a sturdy hinge that you can sandwich a joint in, and that allows this joint to move but only in one direction. Not sure I'm being clear, but anyway, I'm sure you all can picture how a knee brace made of one hinge on the right and left of the joint would work... Anyway, the hospital has the poles, and equipment to bend them a bit to conform to the body better, and the medics are the one who "splint" with the poles, making a custom-made brace for each injury.

It makes even more sense when you take into account the fact that Konoha ninja come in all sizes, from itty bitty little baby Kakashi to Ibiki. pre-finished cloth braces would have to be in storage for every body part and every size, while makeshift ones demand just poles in a variety of thickness and length (an possibly a hacksaw) and some bandages, straps and padding. It makes managing the storage much simpler.
If little baby Kakashi breaks his leg, you use the same pole to splint it that you would use to brace Jiraya's arm. Only the method of wrapping and securing changes.

(Cat goes on a rabbit hole about world building for tiny little in world details once again... Anyway. Yeah. Hana saying "I can splint it" and "I'll fetch braces" and coming back with an armful of poles is perfectly normal for Konoha hospital lingo.)

Chapter 57: Summer Storm

Summary:

After the Crush, there are funerals. And some pesky Inuzukas.

Notes:

Well, I'm late by two days, but you know, Happy my birthday to everyone, here is a gift!

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

Kakashi watched his pups eat.

The entire atmosphere was subdued. Sakura regularly leaned down to touch her knees and calves. As if to remind herself that they were there, despite her inability to feel them.

Apparently, she had swung back from panicking about not feeling her legs to being amazed that they were both attached to her.

The boys watched her like a pair of hawks, which made her irritable and confrontational. For all that she was still shaken from her injury, she still hated being coddled. Even Kakashi had gotten a lukewarm reception to his willingness to carry her around.

She also wasn't impressed that they had all forgotten to let her parents know that she was still alive.

At least that part meant that Kakashi summoned Kokoro to take the message to them, and the little dog got to fuss over her Summoner in peace.

Aiko still looked a bit off, but it probably couldn't be helped. He had totally forgotten that she wasn't used to command. And so she took the results of her orders as a personal failing.

Kakashi might have to ask Sakura if she remembered the exact wording of Aiko's speech on not usurping responsibility and allowing others the dignity of their choices. Maybe having her student quote her words back at her would help.

Kokoro was gone to carry Sakura's message to her parents when a knock sounded from the door.

Kakashi went to answer, since Aiko still had to be careful about her right arm, but she had cooked breakfast anyway.

On the doorstep stood an Inuzuka man, carrying a couple of grocery bags, as well as a backpack. Behind him trailed the customary Inuzuka ninken. This one happening to be a wolf-dog breed, the most common one in the Clan.

There was something about the man that felt familiar, but Kakashi had trouble placing it.

"Hi. I heard that Hana invited you to stay with us, so I brought you some food for the kids." The man grinned genially, lifting the bags in demonstration. "And a few clothes too. I don't really know how much of your homes got destroyed, or how long you plan to stay, but clean clothes make a lot of difference." That second part was accompanied with a one-shoulder shrug, that brought attention toward his backpack.

Kakashi blinked. Social situation. The bane of his existence.

He was saved by Aiko. He heard her walking closer quickly. The first thing she said once she came in view of the front door was "Fudō?"

Ah, this was where he had seen that face. When checking out Aiko's file and the linked ones. Inuzuka Fudō, her one surviving genin team member. Who smiled tenderly but less widely than before at the sight of Aiko. "Hey. Aiko. Long time no see."

Aiko laughed. "Yeah, it's been a while. Come on in, I heard something about groceries, and I would prefer not being the one to put them away." She grinned, pointing at her immobilized arm.

Kakashi obediently stepped out of the way at the invitation, letting Fudō pass before him.

Aiko kept smiling, and led the Inuzuka toward the kitchen and their genins without missing a beat, asking him about his career, and if he intended to try for Jounin soon.

Kakashi was a bit lost.

And, on the Wolf's side, he was also feeling possessive.

It was stupid, really. But the Wolf was being very clear that Aiko was his Pack Sister, and that he was not going to let an Inuzuka steal her. Not even if he had prior claim.

Well. That was not helpful. And the kind of thing that was likely to call down an imaginative Aiko revenge on him if he acted on it.

Thankfully, Aiko was not actually a mind reader. And she was distracted with introducing her genin teammate to the pups. So he had time to shove the unhelpful impulses aside before joining everyone in the kitchen.

Also, hearing her refer to the genins as "our" went a long way to smoothing the Wolf's impulses. Right. They were co-senseis. She wasn't going to bail on him.

Sasuke was his usual distrusting self, Naruto was cautious, bidding his time with the new person, and Sakura was uncharacteristically shy, probably because she didn't want to call attention to her, and to her injury shortly after.

The awkward silence didn't last very long, though. For better or for worse.

Aiko's old Inuzuka teammate cheerfully put his backpack on an empty chair before walking to the fridge to put the groceries away. "I hope what I brought fits. Anyone who's seen the tournament knows that Team 7 is fresh genins, so I took a few things for twelve to thirteen years old, and I can make a guess about tall but lanky over there, but it has been a while since I last saw you, Aiko." The man removed himself from the fridge to grin at Kakashi's Pack-Sister. "You've grown, especially around there." He winked, while indicating his own pectorals.

Kakashi felt his hackles rise, but Aiko simply snorted. "Not true. My boobs were already like that two years ago, when you came to talk to me because sensei died."

The Inuzuka hummed, looking a bit sad for a moment. "Right. I guess I just try not to think about it too much." He answered soberly. "All of the team dead except you and me, and I don't even see you once a year. It's depressing to contemplate."

Aiko shrugged. "Not that we were much of a team anyway." She sighed, looking up at the ceiling.

The Inuzuka paused in his tidying, and turned around to truly face Aiko. "Not that we were much of a team toward you, you're right."

Aiko made a very small smile. "Yeah. I guess you at least wanted to go to their funerals, so they must have been a slightly better team to you."

Inuzuka Fudō sighed. "And I wasn't much better." He kept speaking. "My excuses are that I was young and dumb and I was the one getting preferential treatment, so it didn't occur to me to stand up for you. Did I ever tell you that I am sorry for that?"

Wait, hold on. Why was Kakashi part of a sincere apology like that. He wanted no part in this mushy shit.

Also, too late. He had claimed Aiko. Go find Pack elsewhere, Inuzuka.

Aiko gave the kneeling Inuzuka a small smile. "Not that I remember. I do appreciate it. But I never really blamed you. You were a child, you are not responsible for the choice to sideline me, like sensei is. And you never outright insulted me like Shinshi did. I forgave you years ago." Then, she physically shook off the somber mood, and grinned. "Actually, you're the one I would actually go to a funeral for."

Fudō blinked. "Oh. Good. I... Huh. I'd also go to your funeral?" He blinked again, then shook his head. "Try not to need one, though. Having to stand before the graves of all three other members of my genin team as they get buried is a bit much."

Kakashi swallowed down the visceral reaction these words brought him.

Yeah.

Having all of your genin teammates die on you was, in fact, a bit much.

The Inuzuka shelved the last of the groceries he brought and stood up. "Well, anyway, this Uchiha is already much better than our previous one. He hasn't insulted anyone in all the time I was here."

And with that remark, Fudō clapped twice on the side of his thigh to call his ninken back to him and headed to the door.

The room stood frozen in the wake of the Inuzuka's revelation.

Then, Naruto spoke up for Sasuke. "Aiko-nee. Why did he speak about 'our previous' Uchiha? There was an Uchiha on your team?"

Aiko glowered at the door. Then she sighed and sat down at the table. "Yes. There was an Uchiha on my genin team, with Fudō and me. Uchiha Shinshi, written true sight. I never mentioned him because it seemed counterproductive to tell Sasuke that I knew someone of his clan, only to then tell him that I hated that Uchiha."

"Oh." Sasuke said softly. "He was insulting?"

Aiko looked at Sasuke, smiled gently, and then answered. "Shinshi was raised to believe that Uchiha were inherently superior. The way the Hyuuga did, and still do to this day. Picture Neji when we first met him, except worse." She smiled at the grimaces around the table. "As far at Shinshi was concerned, he was the best of the team simply because he was from the best Clan. Fudō was of an inferior Clan, and I, without even a ninja Family to back me, was not even worth the breath it would take to mention me. As far as he was concerned, a team was only dragging him down. And the fact that Sensei gave him the most attention, followed by Fudō, and only crumbs to me only reinforced him in that view."

Sasuke shrunk into himself, making Kakashi remember that he, too, had initially deemed his team a waste of his time.

Ouch.

The poor kid must be seeing himself a few months younger in Aiko's description.

Even Kakashi kind of was reminded of his bratty period, where he wasn't much better. And of his lackluster performance as a Sensei before Aiko found him.

"Fudō and Shinshi were something like rivals. Shinshi wanted to prove his innate superiority, and Fudō wanted to prove that Shinshi was wrong to believe himself that far above him. I was not even acknowledged as being here, most of the time. From what I know, after their promotion to chunin, Fudō and Shinshi mostly interacted together to insult the other and brag about their achievements. Fudō would greet me in the street if we met in passing, but Shinshi and I pretended that we hadn't seen the other." Aiko shrugged dispassionately.

Now, both Naruto and Sasuke were shooting Sakura side-glances.

Well. Yeah. The description was somewhat familiar. Then again, things like that happened pretty often on the whole. It was probably an effect of the skill gap the Academy created between male and female students.

Hopefully that would stop with the curriculum rewrite.

"Shinshi died during the Massacre." Aiko finished her story. "To be honest, I didn't mourn him. He was one twenty-one years old asshole. Compared to the children and grandmas, his death... didn't feel significant to me.

After a moment, Sasuke gave a slow nod of acknowledgment. "Thank you." He said gently, before turning his back toward Sakura to offer her a piggyback ride.

He was getting much better.

After a moment of hesitation, Sakura took hold of Sasuke's shoulders and hoisted herself onto his back with a bit of an impulse from her thighs.

Naruto grabbed the clothes bag and riffled through it to remove the adult sized one meant for Kakashi and Aiko and then followed his teammates toward the bedroom.

Yes.

The children still had life in them. They weren't broken yet.

The Sandaime's funeral, in the middle of a spectacularly timed summer rainstorm, was a hard hit. For the village as a whole, and even more so for Naruto himself.

Sasuke and Sakura, who had exceptionally agreed to sit in a wheelchair for the occasion, stuck to the boy's sides. And when Naruto asked his academy sensei, who was comforting the Hokage's grandson, about the meaning of life, Aiko didn't answer, and simply let Iruka give his own definition.

Kakashi found Iruka's explanation of the Will of Fire overly complicated, to be honest, but at least Naruto looked like he understood it.

The rain let up just as the service ended, which was, once again, spectacular timing. And no one in the team dared to push Sakura's wheelchair as they made their way back to the Inuzuka Compound. Sakura was getting extremely sanguine about her autonomy, in the wake of her injury.

She hated to have to be carried everywhere, disliked the wheelchair, and regularly attempted to use Chakra String to make her legs move and bear her. The last one had given way to a lecture about the importance of letting bones heal before putting any weigh on them. It was impressive that Sakura was able to use her legs even without a responsive nervous system. But that was no reason to hamper her healing.

So they walked next to the wheelchair, and accepted that Sakura didn't want to be helped. She wanted to exert control by moving on her own. The lack of working legs just made it even more important in her eyes that she could move herself wherever she wished to go on her own, with no help.

It was, from what Kakashi had seen, a fairly common response to loss of limb. And according to Inoichi, a mostly healthy one too.

That evening saw another Inuzuka visitor in their guest house.

Tsume Inuzuka herself, this time.

She knocked on the door, but when Kakashi went to check the door, she was a respectable distance away from it. Letting him really identify her without being at close range to herself or her huge ninken. And also letting him decide if he would rather close the door behind him and talk outside or invite her in without a pressure of expectation.

That was really nice. And nice was not a word he would normally use to describe the Inuzuka Alpha. It made him nervous.

He needed a clue to decide if he would rather talk to her alone outside, or have Aiko with him inside.

"What's the reason for the visit?" Kakashi asked her directly.

"Kiba mentioned something concerning that your pink student told him during the Tournament." Tsume said easily. Inuzukas were rarely fond of beating around the bushes. "I want to make sure you are aware of the dangerous shit she's up to."

Well. That was ominous.

Kakashi wasn't aware of any dangerous shit Sakura was up to before the invasion.

This also looked distinctly like an Aiko conversation.

"Come on in." He sighed, already feeling tired at the prospect of a heavy conversation.

The news Tsume gave them, about Sakura deliberately fudging with her sympathetic Ninken Summoner link to acquire canine traits faster, was, in fact, concerning.

The fact that she was apparently doing it in a plot to force Kakashi to actually officially adopt her made him freeze solid for almost a minute. A reaction that greatly entertained Aiko, Tsume and even Kuromaru, Tsume's Ninken, to no end.

"I'm too young to have a teenage daughter!" Kakashi blurted out once he had recovered his voice, but not his filter.

Tsume patted his shoulder with an obviously condescending "there, there."

Aiko giggled, and then actually decided to help him out when he turned a panicky puppy eye at her. "Sakura calls you Kakashi-nii. I doubt she wants you to act as a father. Especially since she already has one."

That was a little bit better.

Kakashi probably could swing older brother.

That's what he had been priming himself to be, when he learned that Kushina was pregnant.

Once Tsume took her leave, having delivered her message to her own satisfaction, Kakashi and Aiko turned to discussing what they should do about Sakura's dabbling into questionably safe chakra transfer procedures.

They decided not to address the issue right away.

Sakura was still reeling from her lack of mobility.

Exerting every bit of control over her life she possibly could as a defensive mechanism.

Forbidding her from her personal project would have... Unpredictable consequences.

They would speak of this with Inoichi, and decide how to broach the subject with his help.

Aiko warned him that the best way to make Sakura slow down and take the necessary precautions might be to simply give her what she wanted.

She thankfully let off on the subject of preemptively adopting Sakura into his Clan as a solution right after.

Kakashi was not able to process that.

Kakashi noticed the Toad Sage lurking around. And the occasional toad following them.

He had a feeling that Jiraya wanted to talk with Naruto and was hoping to catch him alone to sell his pitch. Unfortunately for him, the kids were being just as clingy and paranoid as Kakashi himself felt. Meaning that Naruto was never without his teammates, and very rarely without Kakashi.

At one point, Kakashi took leave of his team for a moment so that he could have a talk with the Sanin.

The high-handed declaration that he wanted to take custody of Naruto from then on irked him, But Kakashi decided not to fight the sage on that. It was, as Jiraiya would soon find out, very hard to get Naruto to do things he didn't want to do.

That cute Academy sensei could probably attest to that. Kakashi himself had heard enough through ANBU of the boy sneaking out of lessons any time he didn't want to stay for it.

Jiraiya had made decisions for and about Naruto all on his own, without actually knowing anything of him but what was wildly available and the fact that he was Minato's child. He would get what was coming for him from Naruto himself.

Kakashi simply stayed non-committal and fished for more intel on Jiraiya's motives.

The Sanin's way of entreating him to take care of Sasuke without even thinking to mention Sakura only further degraded the image he had of his sensei's sensei.

So he gave one of his cheery waves and Shunshined back to his Pack, and... Brooded, for a time. Like a mama chicken, yes. All but sitting on his kids. Yes. The White Chakra ha finally came back in full, and Kakashi was very stressed. He needed some cuddle time.

Sakura thankfully didn't protest him all but sprawling on her so long as he also did it to the boys equally.

Not very long afterward, such concerns left Kakashi.

He caught whiff of an old familiar scent.

Itachi.

And he definitely wasn't letting that one anywhere near Sasuke while he was still reeling from Sakura's injury.

No way.

So Kakashi left the kids to Aiko with an order to go to the Inuzuka compound and keep the pups there, under Inuzuka protection until he came back, and then he took off to follow that scent.

He bumped into Kurenai and Asuma on the way, who denied being on a date, but easily fell in step along with him on his hunt.

The fight... Didn't go well.

Kurenai was not good enough at genjutsu to take on Uchiha Itachi, and Asuma not good at Bukijutsu to fight off one of the seven swordsmen of the mist armed with Samehada.

The best technique would usually be to swap opponents, but Asuma wasn't that great at fighting Genjutsu experts, even without accounting that Itachi had plenty of other skills up his sleeve, and Kurenai was definitely not made to withstand even one hit from the shredder sword if her genjutsus were seen through.

Which meant that Kakashi had to pick up the slack in both.

His downfall was assuming that his own sharingan would protect him against any sharingan techniques.

The seventy two hours of getting stabbed were nowhere near pleasant, but Kakashi had gone through torture resistance training. He knew the tricks to mentally remove himself from a situation, even in the middle of a very strong genjutsu, he could still think of something else. Focus on another feeling, and let what happened happen with minimal conscious involvement.

In a way, Itachi made it easy for him. Getting stabbed with Katana continuously without ever dying or losing consciousness was bad, but it was purely on the physical side. Getting stabbed was pretty routine to Kakashi.

Being made to see Obito, Rin and Minato die over and over again would have been much more damaging. Or even a continuous reel of having his pups die in front of him.

Stab.

Stab.

Stab.

There was nothing really emotionally involved in it. It was straightforward torture.

Three days was still pushing it.

It was all he could do to stay above the water and keep the missing-nins talking thanks to the information Jiraiya had slipped him on the Akatsuki.

It was almost worse, to hear, in the middle of fighting an overwhelmingly strong duo, that they weren't, in fact after the last loyal Uchiha, but had their sights on Naruto.

He still managed to hold out against the creeping black of unconsciousness until Gai made it to them.

And then,

The world,

Went black.

Notes:

OwO
Sorry?

Chapter 58: Aiko's negotiations

Summary:

Choices have to be made, common sense applied. And it's Aiko's turn to be Not Okay.

Notes:

Happy new year 2023! Hopefully it goes well for everyone!

And goodbye to 2022, there were good moments no matter the rest, let's try to remember these!

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

A few minutes after Kakashi told her to bring the kids to the Inuzuka Compound, Jiraiya-sama 'bumped' into them.

Aiko had no idea how this man called himself a spymaster with a subtlety at that level.

And the kids were apparently getting a bit less gullible, since they also looked at the white-haired man with suspicion. Or it was just that they were holding a grudge. Either or.

"Oh, hey, so I heard this rumor..." The Sage tried to casually segue in.

Aiko wasn't in the mood to humor him. Especially after he waited for Kakashi to be absent to ambush them. "Sorry, we're in a hurry. We need to get to the Inuzuka compound. I would invite you to come with and talk there, but it would be rude of me to invite someone to a territory that we are only guests in ourselves." She briskly interjected.

And then she ushered the kids on. Whatever spooked Kakashi might be within the Sanin's ability to protect them from. But Aiko did not trust the man enough to countermand Kakashi's instructions on his behalf.

Jiraiya-sama tried to grab her wrist to make her stop.

That was how he discovered that Naruto could be impressively bitey with enough motivation. And a pervert touching her was apparently sufficient motivation.

The Sage squawked and waved the arm Naruto was chewing on dramatically. Naruto did not let go immediately. She had to hand it to the man. He was great at playing the buffoon.

"Naruto, heel." She commended before her student could get hurt by a Sanin deciding to take offense about his behavior. Once Naruto had released his bite and came back to her side, Aiko scowled. "Please do not touch me without my permission, Jiraiya-sama. I thought we already had a conversation about this. I am going to the Inuzuka Compound because Kakashi bid me to. If you really want to talk to us, you should consider politely asking the Inuzuka for the right to enter their territory for a while. But I am not disobeying my orders just because 'you heard a rumor'."

This time, when she went on her way with her gaggle of distrusting genins, Jiraiya didn't attempt to stop her.

Apparently, the Toad Sage's 'rumor' was important enough to make him get entry permission from the Inuzuka.

He got escorted to the main house, right next to the kennels, where Aiko decided to bring the kid seeing how tense Kakashi was when he told her to bring the genins under Inuzuka protection. The escort to the Main House's door was by one of the Inuzuka who patrolled the edge of their territory. But Jiraiya was brought to Aiko and the kids by Tsume herself. She looked wild, fierce and foreboding, leading the giant man, and telling Aiko to just yell if she wanted the lecher gone.

Jiraiya acted put upon by this suspicion on his person. Aiko wasn't sure how he expected women not to expect the worst out of him when he went around infringing on women's consent all the time.

She breathed out deeply and shelved that resentment.

Tsume had her back. She would barge back in the room at a single yell and kick the Sanin out of the Inuzuka Compound with pleasure.

Aiko was safe.

And Jiraiya-sama was one of the Sanin, no matter what she thought of his 'extracurricular activities'. If he was so insistent on talking with Team 7 (sans Kakashi), he probably had a good reason.

"Naruto-kun has to join me on a work trip." Jiraya-sama said.

Aiko frowned. She didn't have to intervene, though, Naruto beat her to it. "What? Why should I want to go anywhere with some pervert who doesn't understand consent?"

"It's a paid for work-trip. We'll stop by the Red-Light district in Hima. You'll learn a lot more than you do with Kakashi." Jiraiya-sama... tried to bride Naruto? He was aware that the boy was 12, wasn't he?

Naruto raised his eyebrows judgmentally while flattening his lips. Huh. He had stolen that expression of disdain from her. "Aiko-nee did learn a lot in a brothel. But it was over several months. And I don't think I want to be a Seduction Specialist."

Aiko stifled a snort at the retort. Sakura actually giggled, and Sasuke got a secret smile tugging at his left lip corner, hidden by his tilted down head.

Jiraiya-sama stalled at this answer he wasn't expecting. Then he leaned forward conspiratorially. "You know, we're going to search for this woman, she's hot. And she wants to meet you."

That got the Toad Sage an even more judgy look. "Look, great-grand-sensei, I don't know why you think I'm a lecher. I'm not. I don't care that you think a woman is hot. I'm 12. I notice cute girls. Sometimes. And anyway, I don't plan to go anywhere without my team anytime soon. Sakura is vulnerable right now, until her bones heal and she learns to use puppet strings to move her legs, or we somehow manage to track down Tsunade-sama to put her nerves to rights. I won't leave her and Sasuke all alone. They rely on me to have their back."

Jiraiya-sama paused, and looked at Sakura for long enough that Sasuke and Naruto decided to place themselves in front of her to shield her from the pervert. The Sanin frowned at the fact that the boys wanted to protect their kunoichi teammate from him. Aiko couldn't believe that he was surprised.

"Hey, I'm not interested in little girls!" The Toad Sage exclaimed "I only like adult women! with voluptuous figures!"

That was not the right thing to say. Not only was it kind of insulting to Sakura, which the boys took badly. The kids also twigged on that she actually was an adult, fairly curvy woman. The genins looked at Aiko, looked at the perverted old man, and in two seconds, Aiko found herself with Sakura sitting in her lap and the boys standing guard between her and the Sanin.

It was actually pretty funny.

"Anyway." The Sanin growled with narrowed eyes. "The person I will be searching for is Tsunade Senju. If you're so set on getting her to heal your teammate, it's only more reason for you to come with me."

That gave Naruto pause. But Sasuke valiantly took up the role of the distrusting brat. "And why do you want specifically Naruto to join you? What reason do you have to single him out?"

Oh. Good question. And now that Sasuke had asked, Naruto wouldn't agree to anything until he heard a good reason. Not that it was hard to find.

Jiraiya raised his brows. "Well. I know that Tsunade wasn't here during the Invasion. And so she wasn't the one to summon Katsuyu, but I happen to have learned a rumor that the mystery Slug Summoner was you. Were these right?"

Naruto fidgeted and then nodded. Okay, that was a descent reason. But if Naruto was to go try to convince Tsunade-sama to come to Konoha to help Sakura, Aiko was going to give him all the cards he possibly could need.

"Well. And there's the fact that you're related." Aiko remarked breezily. When all the eyes turned to her, she shrugged. "I did mention that Hashirama-sama married an Uzumaki princess, right? Tsunade-sama is the Shodai's granddaughter. She's one fourth Uzumaki, and since both the Senju and Uzumaki Clans are now down to one known member, the connection is pretty significant, even if I don't know how closely related you actually are to her."

Naruto stared at her like he'd just been clubbed upside the head. Oops. She, maybe, should have mentioned that tidbit earlier. The fact that there was still some family left for him to find was pretty significant when he had never had any before.

"So." Naruto said, trying to recover his composure. "When do you go?"

"As soon as your bag is done." Jiraiya answered.

This caused Aiko to feel suspicious. The Sage had waited until Kakashi was gone to ask Naruto to leave with him, and he also planned to be gone with Naruto in tow before Kakashi was back to hear of this.

"It can't wait until Kakashi is back?" She asked leadingly.

Jiraiya-sama seemed to grow serious at her question. "I cleared it with Kakashi-kun beforehand." And then, in hand signs, he added 'hostiles possible evacuation asset'.

Aiko pursed her lips. Kakashi had run off pretty fast. And if the thing that alerted him had been Orochimaru related, he would have roped the Toad Sanin along to even the odds. If Jiraiya had been watching, Kakashi would have noticed him. So chances were that removing Naruto was in fact the safest.

Finally, she gave a nod with narrowed eyes, and went for a threat. "Just be aware that Kakashi is an excellent tracker, and if you do not have his permission, he will surely find you."

Gathering Naruto's things was quickly dealt with by a couple of his shadow clones.

Sakura pulled her teammate aside and handed him a couple of scrolls, explaining that it was all the necessary things for an emergency getaway, and pointing out where the gasoline and magnesium flare were so he could light a blaze on his own even without Sasuke around to take care of the Katon.

Sasuke fussily replaced Naruto's shuriken and kunai pouches with his, since Naruto tended to be a bit less organized with his. And sometimes less quick on restocking.

Sakura graciously allowed Naruto to carry her piggyback until the Village gates to say goodbye, and Sasuke to carry her back.

With neither Kakashi nor Jiraiya with them and Sasuke still targeted by Orochimaru, Aiko elected to make the way back longer to maximize protection.

Without the destruction running rampant in Konoha from the recent Invasion, navigating only through place that had a good density of shinobi around would have taken ten to twenty more minutes. With it, it was markedly longer. They had to track back regularly to find another itinerary when the ninja gathering point Aiko was aiming for turned out to be destroyed or deserted.

The genins asked what she was doing when she first turned them around. But once they understood the point, they took to the exercise with grim focus.

It was pretty-much chance that they stumbled on Kurenai carrying a limp Kakashi toward the hospital, with Gai and Asuma accompanying her, on their ciruituous way to the Inuzuka Compound.

Sasuke immediately was right next to their injured sensei, trying to take a closer look at him. "What happened?" Sasuke asked the Jounins.

Sakura leaned forth over Sasuke's shoulder. "Sensei doesn't smell of blood. Not the way Asuma-sensei does. Did you fight something? Inside the Village?" She asked.

Aiko frowned and sidled close too. It wasn't much of a decision to follow along. Kakashi was going to need Hatake specific accommodations at the hospital. Which happened to include her and the kids staying in the same room as him.

Apparently the Jounins were only bringing Kakashi to the hospital to get looked over for anything dangerous. (Or water in the lungs. Kakashi apparently had bad luck with water.) And to get Asuma's shredded biceps patched over. As soon as the medics were done, they headed back out.

Of course, the fact that they respected the medics meant they left by the door. And since Sasuke was starting to flag a bit from carrying Sakura, and Sakura herself was getting fed-up with getting carried that way, Aiko's own set lagged a bit behind.

They had discovered, over the week and a half, that while Sakura disliked being carried, she had less problems with being sat on Aiko's or Kakashi's shoulders. Unlike piggyback or princess carry, it didn't scream 'I'm injured and incapable of moving on my own'. It was something that others of her age still did for fun sometimes. It engaged her core to stay upright, and it gave her a good vantage point.

So when Sakura got fidgety and Sasuke started to discreetly wince (just a tightening at the corner of the eye) from his chest injury pulling, They had stopped by the chairs in the hospital's main foyer to swap Sakura to Aiko's shoulder.

Aiko's shoulders were up to putting a teenage girl once again, since Naruto had called Katsuyu-sama to finish-up on Sakura and Sasuke's healing. Once the Slug Summons wasn't limited in how much chakra she could use, because there were too many people to take care of, she had fixed Aiko's simple stab wound in a few minutes.

Sasuke and Sakura's wounds were not inflicted by as sharp a weapon as a kunai. The edges of their wounds were shredded, and healing them was less quick and easy. And that was saying nothing of Sakura's bones having been splintered under the impact, and there being a few missing shards. So they were still convalescing.

The pause to move Sakura was the best excuse for how Iruka missed them when he went up to the group of Jounin-senseis to ask about the truth of a rumor he'd heard from the mission desk about Uchiha Itachi coming back to hunt Naruto.

Team 7 was, after all, mostly hidden behind a corner from where he was.

Aiko lunged to Sasuke to catch him before he could run rashly all the way to Hima with a half-healed chest and gut wound.

It was a good thing Sakura was at the 'sitting on a chair' portion of the transfer, she reflected, as her lunge bore down the both of them toward the floor.

Also in full view of the cluster of jounins and the academy sensei. But that wasn't important at the moment.

Sasuke squirmed, and demanded that Aiko let him go. "He already took my whole family! I'm not letting him steal Naruto too!" He growled.

Aiko firmed up her hold, grateful that Sasuke wasn't willing to hurt her for the sake of his escape. "Stop this!" She barked. "Stop, before I sedate you, and then you're not going to be any help at all!"

Sasuke froze and stared at her with wide eyes. "You're going to leave it? Naruto is in danger! We must go..."

Aiko pinched him. "We're not strong enough to take on Itachi." She cut in. "Not yet. We would be nothing but possible hostages if we rushed in. We need to be strategic."

She levered herself upright, keeping Sasuke Hugged tight to her front, and faced the Jounins. "Naruto just left with Jiraiya-sama." She told them. "A warning message wouldn't be amiss. Possibly some reinforcement, too. We need privacy for this, though." She added with a look around the hospital foyer, where most eyes were on them.

Aiko looked at Sakura, Sasuke in her arms, and the three jounins plus unconscious Kakashi and she nodded to herself. With a gentle push, she led Sasuke closer to Gai and asked him to carry that one, before going back to lift Sakura up. In light of the situation, Sakura accepted the downgrade from the planned shoulder-ride to a simpler piggyback one easily.

Iruka-sensei bashfully offered to open up a room in the academy to let them talk, since the entire situation with Sasuke was his fault. So it was a procession of Gai carrying a genin, Kurenai carrying Kakashi and Aiko carrying Sakura, with Iruka leading and Asuma closing that left the hospital toward the academy.

Aiko had thought about a plan during the walk over, so soon as they had closed the door and stuck down privacy seals, she rattled out all the info Jiraiya had provided about his itinerary, and then got to her questions. "Sakura. Do you have enough chakra to summon Pakkun and maintain him for a couple of hours?"

Sakura frowned in thought. She had practiced calling upon Pakkun. Just in case. During their time in the Hatake forest. After a moment, she nodded decisively. "I will get tired pretty quick, but I think I can do that." She acquiesced, before pointing to a chair that she wanted Aiko to set her down on.

Aiko set Sakura down, and then turned to Sasuke. She knew that he needed to contribute in some way, or he would end up stressing and sinking into negative feelings before long. "Sasuke, same question for Tsukiyo."

A huge wolf would be a good backup if Itachi had already made his move, so it wasn't just a waste of chakra.

Sasuke also gave the request a moment of thought before nodding and putting his hands together. Aiko stilled his hands and asked him to wait until they were outside.

Pakkun appeared in a small puff of smoke (Sakura was great at estimating exactly how much chakra was needed for summoning and not wasting extra in smoke). And Sakura greeted him as nii-san. It was a new development, but seeing Sakura's adoption related intention, not a surprising one. Kakashi had told them that Pakkun once was his mother's Summon.

Aiko let the jounins give the ninken the report of their situation, and what was being asked of him.

Pakkun was Kakashi's best tracker. Both scent-wise, and as a chakra-sensor. Which would be a great help if they had to find Naruto in a bustling city. The choice wasn't just for one of Kakashi's Summons that Sakura had enough chakra to call in, otherwise, Shiba or Bisuke would have been the first choices.

Aiko was horrified to learn that it wasn't only Itachi hunting Naruto, but also the Monster of the Hidden Mist, Hoshigaki Kisame, another of the seven Swordsmen of the Mist.

Well, that explained Kakashi's state, at least. And the worry about water in the lungs. As well as Asuma's shredded arm.

She was extremely relieved to hear Gai volunteer to go carry the warning along with the two Summons.

Gai was excellent. An Elite Jounin. Her misgivings about his teaching style took nothing away from that.

There was no-one she would trust more to keep Naruto safe except Kakashi himself. Who wasn't currently an option.

Once they were out of the Academy, Sasuke summoned Tsukiyo, who was still polite as anything and saw no problem with running for a few hours and possibly initiating combat to protect Kakashi's pup.

They watched Gai and the summons take off, then they headed back for the Inuzuka Compound, Team 7, and Kurenai still carrying Kakashi on her back and Asuma who didn't want to leave them (mostly Sasuke, probably) unprotected all the way to the Inuzuka Compound.

Over the following hour, Aiko watched the kids flag, then pale, as the Summons they were maintaining emptied them of chakra.

After some deliberation, she took out a soldier pill from her kit and carefully cut it in halves, before giving the individual parts to the kids with a glass of water and a firm instruction not to chew the pill but to swallow it straight.

Biting the pill made it give up it's core all of a sudden, and provided an instant boost that was useful for battlefield use. But swallowing it whole gave way to a more gradual release.

It was better for her genins, who were still very young. And she didn't want to have them damage their coils in any way while they were still growing.

The absence of surge and the half-dose should help mitigate the damage.

Aiko sure hoped that they didn't dip too far into chakra exhaustion. They weren't Uzumaki. They wouldn't bounce back without damage.

Sasuke straightened up first, hand going to touch his breastbone and breathing in deeply. "Tsukiyo dismissed herself."

Aiko nodded, taking in the worried frown appearing on her student's face.

Hopefully Tsukiyo hadn't been forced to dismiss herself due to injury.

They both turned to Sakura, who was still slumped in her seat from the chakra drain. "I'm still losing chakra." She murmured back.

They nodded back and waited tensely for ten more minutes, until Sakura also slumped in relief. "Pakkun dismissed himself." She informed them.

Aiko nodded. "We know that Pakkun can fight, but against opponents of this caliber, I doubt he would hold out ten minutes after Tsukiyo was already taken out of the equation. Hopefully, Tsukiyo dismissed herself after greeting Naruto properly, and Pakkun stayed around to help explain the situation and secure the perimeter."

She did her best to infuse her voice with certainty.

The kids were so tired and addled with Yin chakra depletion that they couldn't really think of all the counter-arguments to her scenario.

"Sakura can try calling Kokoro in when she has the chakra for it after sleeping. Pakkun will have told her what happened so she can reassure us. Come on, time to sleep you two." Aiko smiled gently before lifting Sasuke up in her arms and carrying him over to the bed.

Once the kids were tucked in and firmly sleeping, snuggling into an unresponsive Kakashi's sides, Aiko finally allowed her facade to crack.

She slumped down to her knees next to the bed and buried her face in her hands with a sob.

No. No. No.

Everything was spinning out of control.

Kakashi wasn't here anymore.

Naruto was out of her reach to help.

Sakura was badly hurt, with phantom pains that she tried to hide, and a slowly cracking mask of gentleness that might very well turn to lashing out from a single bad day.

Sasuke was emotionally hurt and on the edge of spiraling into despair and vengeance once again. Especially if he lost his disciplining grip on his Chakra Voice.

And Aiko couldn't even trust her own decisions anymore.

Was it common sense, or fear, that made her keep the kids home and only send Summons?

Had she just doomed Naruto because she was still feeling burnt by the fiasco of her last orders?

Was she being too cautious?

Aiko stumbled to the shower, sat under the spray, and cried, hugging her knees until the water ran cold.

Then, she tiredly changed into pajamas and slid into the big bed with Kakashi and the two kids.

Even with her aching eyes, stuffy nose and pounding ears, sleep came mercifully quickly.

Notes:

:3

Poor Aiko.

Chapter 59: Sasuke's Narutoless Month

Summary:

Waiting around isn't Sasuke's strong suit.

Notes:

Edit alert for last chapter: I initially forgot to write in that Aiko was healed by Katsuyu before the Sandaime's funeral, I added it in the last chapter, when Sakura is being transferred to Aiko.

I missed Sasuke's birthday in the in-between time where they were training in the Hatake lands! (Seeing when it happens, relative to my chapter cuts, it would be between chapters 47 and 48... I'm going to pretend that I omitted the actual celebration on purpose so I can mention it from Sasuke's POV now!)

For that matter, I also missed the fact that Sakura, as the oldest, born on march 28, has been thirteen pretty much all along! Which makes her a teenager!
My timeline has the graduation happening toward the end of February, but there was at least a couple of weeks before Aiko met team 7, then a couple more while he grills the genins on what they learned at the Academy. Which would have Sakura's birthday fall just before they left for the training trip/academy evaluation.

This has taken a bit of editing to fix!

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

Sasuke woke up more slowly than he was used to.

Aiko-sensei greeted him and then moved him bodily so he was sitting up against the headboard, so that he could eat the breakfast tray that she shoved into his lap, presumably. Sasuke blinked and rubbed his eyes. Sakura was in a similar position on the other side of Kakashi-sensei.

His tray held heaps of all kinds of foods that Sasuke recognized as fast and slow sugar, for immediate energy, proteins for a more long-term boost, and grease for even further out. There were also plenty of greens and a few fruits. Sasuke's attention, and chopsticks, went first to the steamed broad been and tomato salad that Aiko had been generous enough to include.

A foggy part of Sasuke's brain found the strength to note how reassuring it was that the Voice hadn't made a single remark on possible poison in the meal not prepared by himself.

With the hot milk, cinamon and honey that Aiko fed them right after they were done with their food and the lullaby and hair petting, it wasn't much of a surprise that he fell right back asleep within half an hour of waking up. Sakura hadn't fared much better.

On the upside, it meant that they avoided worrying themselves to death until Sakura had enough chakra to summon Kokoro and get a report of how Pakkun's warning message run went.

Sasuke was pretty sure that had been exactly what Aiko-sensei had planned.

Pakkun's messenger run had been eventful. Jiraiya had apparently deserted Naruto to flirt with a woman and given a window of opportunity for That Man and the Swordsman to try to kidnap Naruto, but the Summons and Gai-sensei had gotten there just before the missing nins.

It had caused a bit of a chase, with Naruto riding on Tsukiyo's back to keep up with Gai-sensei's pace.

They had managed to reach an unpopulated area so the fight wouldn't have collateral damage, and the sheer destruction Gai caused by fighting seriously had lured Jiraiya to come check it out.

Together with the canine Summons, Katsuyu and Naruto, they had managed to corner the two kidnappers enough that That Man had raised a wall of all-eating black flames (Amaterasu, the Voice exclaimed) to cover their retreat.

Gai had expressed his Deep Concerns about the Toad Sage leaving one of his Dear Friend's Youthful Students all alone while he was being hunted for and Jiraiya himself knew that.

Tsukiyo had elected to dismiss herself, with Pakkun and Gai delivered where they were meant to go and the fight already over with, rather to endure Gai's Youthful not-genjutsus. Sasuke couldn't blame her.

Pakkun, as Kakashi's main summons, was much more used (and immune) to the green Jounin's antics, and stayed around to hear Gai declare that he would stay by Naruto's side a couple more days as backup in case the missing nins made a comeback. Since Gai had his own students to mind, he couldn't stay away much longer. Pakkun had then stuck around long enough to lecture Naruto about not leaving a Katsuyu-portion in Konoha with his team as a means of instant communication, since he had the chakra to maintain such summons without even noticing it.

Sasuke felt very stupid for not thinking of it himself.

And from the faces Aiko-sensei and Sakura made, so did they.

At least Gai-sensei had promised to bring said Katsuyu-portion back to Team 7 when he made his way back to Konoha.

Of all the stupid things to miss, though.

They really needed to make an habit out of each having a small Katsuyu with them at all times, actually. It would make them much safer. For everyone.

Kakashi-sensei didn't wake up

Over the next week, Aiko-sensei visibly wilted. She looked tired, even after Gai brought the Katsuyu-sama fragment, who reassured them on Naruto's well-being anytime they asked her.

Kakashi-sensei still hadn't woken up.

Sasuke and Sakura could see that their teacher was not going well. They did their best not to make things worse, but it was becoming very difficult.

Sakura refused to go back to her parents because of what they said to her when she saw her just after she got out of the hospital. She hadn't told them exactly what they had said. Sasuke suspected they had tried to force her to retire.

Sasuke, ... He was self-aware enough to know that he wasn't well. Inoichi wasn't available to see him more than once a week. The destruction, and the Hokage's death were forcing him to take up a lot of work to shore up Konoha.

Also, he could feel himself start to stagnate, training wise, and that was annoying him to no end.

Things came to a head seven days after Naruto had gone.

Kakashi-sensei still hadn't woken up, but Sakura had recovered all of her chakra.

Which meant that she could summon Pakkun again, and have him find Gai, Asuma and Kurenai, and force them to tell them what was wrong with Kakashi since it obviously wasn't just his usual chakra exhaustion that came with overusing the sharingan.

Pakkun could be very persistent and persuasive when he was motivated. And learning what was wrong with his Summoner was enough to make him motivated.

What Pakkun found out...

Sasuke wasn't proud of how he reacted.

When the Summons came back to them with the news that Kakashi had been knocked out by a sharingan technique, Sasuke went into a rage.

In his defense, it definitely didn't help that the mention awoke previously repressed memories of experiencing a sharingan torture technique at the hand of That Man on the night of the massacre. He had spent three days watching his beloved older brother kill everyone in the Clan over and over again, back then. With no possibility of blinking or turning away.

He yelled and threw things.

Aiko-sensei approached him carefully. He yelled at her all the way until she took him in her arms. Then he bit her.

He barely felt the prick.

He only understood what it meant when weariness slammed into him.

She had warned him, that she would sedate him if he was out of control.

Sasuke woke up to Kiba's face looking at him.

Apparently, Aiko had decided to drop him off in the Inuzuka Clan Head home.

He would be training into cooperative Shinobi-canine forms from dawn until lunch every day, and then train the Inuzuka children in shurikenjutsu every afternoon to pay back the help given to him.

Hopefully, Tsume told him severely, it would tire him out enough to spend his temper.

Training into Shinobi-canine forms was apparently code for 'getting stuffed in with the seven years old Inuzuka, their baby ninkens and their instructor'. It was humiliating at first.

And then it got worse when the seven years old turned out to be better at cooperating with their ninken than he was at working with his wolves. Especially since his wolves could talk and the Inuzuka puppies couldn't.

Teaching Shurikenjutsu to kids was not in any way easy.

They didn't respect him, tested him and tried to either escape or attack him to prove themselves better than him.

At least, Sasuke was still better at taijutsu than Inuzuka children. Even if he wasn't as good at cooperating with his summons as they were with their ninken partners.

When he came back to their guest house, exhausted, that evening, Sakura also had news.

Aiko-sensei had brought Inuzuka Hana back with her to the guest house to give Kakashi a checkup, when she had gone to drop Sasuke off at the Head house. And Hana had brought along a pile of medical textbooks and promised her that Sakura could come by and help at the veterinary clinic once she had learned the books well enough for Hana to be satisfied.

Sakura was happy as could be, and, apparently, already one fifth of the way through the textbooks.

On the second day of learning and teaching with the Clan, Sasuke formally apologized to Aiko for his temper tantrum.

He couldn't be certain that he was being made to teach the little ankle-bitters (literally, in some case, as Sasuke could unfortunately attest. Inuzuka children apparently had to be eased out of the impulse to bite stuff when angry to enter less Wild society) to show him how hard teaching was for his senseis. But if it was on purpose, it was working.

Aiko forgave him easily and gave him a hug, which made him feel much better.

That in turn prompted him to go find Sakura and tell her that he forgave her for her actions during her fangirl phase. She got really teary at him, and Sasuke kept hugging her a few minutes past the point where he started feeling uncomfortable because of how emotional she was being.

On the sixth day of being integrated into Inuzuka Clan life, Sakura proved his initial assessment of her progress right by maneuvering herself into her wheelchair and leaving the guesthouse at the same time as him right after their very early breakfast.

Aiko-sensei saw then to the door, and gave them each a bento, then went back in. Probably to sleep a bit. Aiko-sensei had gotten less frazzled since Sasuke started spending most of the day away and Sakura was absorbed by her books. But Sasuke could see that she desperately needed to be alone for a bit. For some reason, Sakura didn't seem to see it.

Sasuke elected to walk with Sakura to the veterinary clinic before going for his own training.

She got a bit huffy and frowny, but, apparently, claiming to be there to cover her back for her scouting expedition like a good teammate was the right answer. It got her to laugh and relax from her tense posture.

That same evening, he came home to an obviously ecstatic and slightly blood splattered teammate.

Apparently, the first step of learning Iryou ninjutsu was to train on a fish. Since Hana didn't have expendable live fishes at hand, she had instead given Sakura the mice that the clinic kept on hand to feed snakes, birds of preys or particularly picky ninneko.

Starting with mammals right away made the exercise much harder, yet Sakura had only exploded one mouse, and killed another by shorting it's nervous system with her chakra before she got the exercise.

Sakura felt a bit bad for the death she caused, but Hana had assured her that such things had killed the mice too fast for them to suffer. Which was a great deal better than what would have happened if they had been given to a cat.

Also, Aiko's first reaction upon learning of Sakura's explosive foray into healing had been "Oh, that can definitely be weaponized." So Sakura was pumped to discover how deliberately botching the very basics of the mystic palm jutsu could be turned into a custom limb-exploding/deadening jutsu.

Sasuke was impressed and quietly a bit terrified by his teammate's determination to be a complete nightmare to her enemies.

Thankfully, Sasuke got a rest day a week.

Aiko-sensei forbid him from any chakra use on that days, since he had to summon at least one of his wolves every morning for a while, and his chakra reserves were steadily emptying as he failed to recover everything enough by the next morning.

Instead, they had a music lesson in the morning, and then Tsume escorted Kiba and the three of them to the Hyuuga Compound, where they kidnapped Hinata and Neji. After that they headed to the Aburame Compound and politely invited Shino to come shopping with them. And his father too if he wanted to. Tsume missed talking with him.

...

Sasuke sensed some history there, in the differential treatment of the two Clans.

Normally Sasuke would have expected spending his rest day shopping with his year-mates to be the exact opposite of relaxing.

And yet...

It was a mix of Aiko-sensei, Tsume and Aburame Shibi, he expected. All the possible troublemakers were too cowed by Tsume, or respectful of Aiko-sensei to be disruptive. The civilians were too cautious of the huge one-eyed ninken and buzzing jar of bugs on the Aburame Clan head's back to dare stare at Sasuke like he was a zoo animal, or maybe a walking historical relic.

And it was actually interesting. As they went along, each of the adult took a few seconds to share useful tidbits. How to spot the best soaps to replace shinobi-grade scentless one if you needed it and only had access to civilian shops. Which types of fabrics were best suited to dress like a civilian while retaining a maximum of protection. What kind of honing oils to prefer depending on the amount of carbon in your weapon's steel. What paints were best to coat blades so they won't reflect sun if you don't have the time to properly smoke them.

Aiko apparently needed to buy a lot of things. She had given the medics a good portion of her sealed up stash during the Invasion, and wanted to both replenish and build up her stocks in the areas she had shortages with.

The reason she had pushed the purchases back was apparently that she couldn't access the funds to. With the invasion and losing their Hokage and all the chaos and damage in the village, the steady salaries had been stalled in favor of more time critical things. Aiko had spent most of her disposable funds commissioning her new battle corset, and since she hadn't gone on any mission recently, she was actually dependent on the sensei salary to have spending money again.

The medics had more or less kept track of what she donated to help the emergency station, so she could expect some amount of reimbursement on that front, but it was likely to take even longer than the salary stall-up.

Though, as a result of Aiko-sensei needing to stock up again, she ended up making each of the genins on the shopping expedition their own custom storage scroll, and them help them constitute their stash of useful stuff to keep sealed on their person just in case. Blankets and pillows, ten to twenty days worth of drinking water, a really big bag of rice, sugar and salt, tea, rations, candles and fire bricks, changes of clothes for themselves and their teammates, a few wigs and sunglasses just in case, paper, pen and inks, tissues, a few remedies for common illnesses, and some high proof alcohol, to either sterilize tools and wounds, use as makeshift fire accelerant, or bribe unscrupulous adults.

Sasuke sat on the roof of their guest house, basking in the peace and quiet and rare solitude.

Two and a half weeks since Kakashi-sensei was attacked, they were in September and he still hadn't woken up.

In his hand, as had become his habit, he ran his thumb over and over on the wolf teeth pendant Naruto had given him for his birthday.

With his birthday in the middle of their month of training before the Chunin Exams' last stage, Sasuke hadn't been expecting much. And yet, they had taken a longer break from the training, cooked something as close to a cake as they could on a camp fire, and actually celebrated with him.

Aiko-sensei and Sakura, who had access to the village markets had gifted him a small crate of cherry tomatoes, and a nice starter kit of kunoichi-targeted scentless cosmetics, respectively. Kakashi had taken a chunk out of his afternoon to install the metal wire around Maika's handle that was connected to the blade's tang through the pins.

And Naruto... Somehow, he had managed to conspire with Sasuke's own Summons, to get them to smuggle him a discarded baby fang. It was wickedly sharp, as was apparently the norm in puppies, and it was simply wrapped around the root in a cotton twine, knotted, then glued in place, and attached to a leather thong. Naruto had also carefully painted a small Uchiha fan on one of the wide faces of the tooth. It was a bit crooked at the handle and squashed at the top. And sure to rub off in less than a year beside. But Sasuke adored it.

How could he not? A wolf tooth, that felt Hatake, with his own clan symbol on it, handmade by his teammate with his other teammate's help in sourcing the tie?

Frankly, his thirteen birthday had been his best one in... ever, really. Even before the Massacre, his birthday was always made into a political play, where he was paraded around and obviously compared to his older brother, then subsequently found wanting.

And after... He hadn't even marked it. At least he hadn't until some annoying fangirl tried to use it as an excuse to approach him with a gift and unbearable hopes that he would 'notice' them. It always tended to start a stampede, too. Sasuke had learned to spend the later part of the month of July practicing woodcraft, well away from his 'admirers'.

But sat in the leaf litter, surrounded by people he liked and who liked him back, eating as many cherry tomatoes as his heart desired and snarling at anyone who tried to steal them...

He had a good time.

Hopefully Naruto would be back soon.

Sasuke actually missed him.

'He's still an idiot' the Chakra Voice commented. Sasuke smiled. Yes, he is, but I miss him.

'He might not manage to convince Tsunade-sama to help' the voice grumbled, making Sasuke sigh. He had to hold on to hope. And at least, there was a back-up, easier to agree to solution, of just asking the Sanin to allow Katsuyu access to some of her chakra.

'And what if they don't find her?' The voice was being too talkative to Sasuke's taste, but he pushed back the irritation and seriously considered the fear.

Then we never stop searching.

'And what if he gets attacked?'

Then he'll have Katsuyu to protect him. Plus, Naruto was quite resourceful. And he had a strong healing factor. And the Pervert could at least be used as a meat shield.

'WhAt If hE dIeS?!' the Voice wailed. Sasuke winced at the loudness, regretting the solitude, as it was making the Voice much more prevalent.

Be kind. Be benevolent. Treat the Voice like a child version of yourself. Don't dismiss it, address the fears it brings up instead.

I care for Naruto deeply. I would be very hurt if he died, and that is very scary. But even then, he would want me to keep having Sakura's and Kakashi-sensei's backs in his stead. I can't freeze up just from the possibility. Especially since he isn't dead yet.

He closed his eyes, and breathed deeply, and thought of what he would do for a child in this situation. Not him. A long lost bastard cousin, maybe?

I'll go ask our Katsuyu for news on Naruto. That will help sooth the fear, right?

Unfortunately, the Voice fixated on worrying on what if Kakashi-sensei died or never woke up instead. At least Katsuyu also was able to help a little on that front too.

It took him two weeks in all to get good enough at cooperating with his Summons that he was shifted into lessons to the ten years old instead of the seven years old.

His superior attention span and his determination to improve as fast as possible probably had something to do with his overshooting the kids, but he was still pretty proud of his improvement.

They found Aiko-sensei crying when coming home on their first day or the following week. She tried to fob them off, but when they insisted to know what was wrong, she finally told them that it was Kakashi's birthday he had turned twenty-seven, and he was still sleeping.

They were also starting to wonder if they should get him a feeding tube, because they were closing in on the full month of unconsciousness. While it wasn't that hard to make him drink a bit every day to avoid complete dehydration so long as they were careful, and Aiko got him to the toilet and used a jutsu Hana had shown her to get him to pee even if he was unconscious, adding more than a bit of hydratation powder or sugar to the water would mean moving Kakashi-sensei back to the hospital, where they could monitor that he was digesting without trouble, and take care of bedpans and such.

Kakashi-sensei still didn't wake up, but in the week after his birthday, Katsuyu reported Naruto and Jiraiya finding Tsunade. The legendary medic was against coming back to Konoha, especially as Jiraiya had been looking for her to make her Hokage and she didn't want that responsibility.

Katsuyu conveyed Naruto's promise to do his very best to convince her to al least help Sakura and Kakashi-sensei.

It was a bit after that, around when Sakura was allowed to heal small scrapes under Hana's supervision, Sasuke was allowed to stop going to the lessons for the kids, but he was instead put directly under Tsume, who made him go through his drills along with Kiba.

Kiba was unhappy of being made to wake at dawn to train before joining his team for even more training at first.

Pretty soon, the Inuzuka boy got invested in competing against Sasuke on who was the best at joint maneuvers with their canine partner instead.

Sasuke tended to lose.

At least at the moment.

It really didn't help that Sasuke had an entire pack plus Tsukiyo to learn to operate smoothly with, and that he couldn't spend all day bonding with them because of the chakra cost of Summoning.

But he was growing up. His chakra reserves would deepen with time.

Plus, he was still much better at Shunshin than Kiba.

And then Katsuyu reported that Naruto was engaged in a fight against Orochimaru, of all people.

Notes:

Do we want Orochimaru to get dissolved by Katsuyu's acid right away? It just struck me that without Kabuto and with Naruto able to properly summon Katsuyu from not spending a full month doing it wrong because Jiraiya was only using the Summoning jutsu as a suitably draining jutsu to force Naruto to draw on the Kyubi's chakra, things would go very differently.

Or maybe Kimimaro would be the one to die? If I was Orochimaru, I'd use him to replace Kabuto in a situation with a high fight potential. He can even replace Haku in the 'that one boy I watched die because he was loyal to the death to an asshole.

Chapter 60: Wakeup Call

Summary:

Kakashi learns what happened while he was out.

Notes:

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Chapter Text

Kakashi woke up feeling starved.

He was also haggard, and weak.

The fact that all he could smell was his Pack helped him settle his mind and stall defensive reflexes.

He blinked his eye open, and saw a small Katsuyu-sama, held in someone's hands and learning above his eye toward his forehead.

He grunted, and the hands moved, taking Katsuyu-sama with them.

"Kakashi-sensei!" Oh. That was Sakura. She had been the one holding Katsuyu. "You're awake!"

And then he was hit with a genin Kunoichi. Kakashi wheezed a bit, and gingerly lifted his arm to tentatively hug his pup back.

He turned his head, clocking the guest house the Inuzuka had loaned them. Sasuke was standing behind Sakura's back, looking at Kakashi like he didn't believe that he was real, and it was almost reflex to beckon him closer.

Sasuke didn't take much coaxing to join Sakura on the bed and snuggle into Kakashi's free side.

The affection warmed Kakashi, but he was starting to feel antsy at his missing pup.

Unlike Aiko, who's scent was hanging all around him reassuringly, he couldn't smell Naruto.

Just as he was thinking of her, Aiko entered the room, carrying a plate with roasted chicken, rice and grilled eggplants and a pitcher of water.

Kakashi accepted the offering, and immediately stuffed a chunk of chicken in his mouth. Aiko admonished him to eat slowly and take his time to chew. He had been unconscious for over a month.

Kakashi choked a bit a the information, but obediently slowed down. He didn't need to throw up.

Once his mouth was cleared and his stomach settled, he finally asked about Naruto's whereabouts.

The answer that he was still away with Jiraiya but should be on his way back soon since they found Tsunade-sama and convinced her to become Hokage took him aback. Though he was more annoyed to learn that Jiraiya had claimed to have his permission to whisk Naruto away.

He could respect the results. And if Jiraiya hadn't specifically waited until he was gone to ask Naruto, he probably would have given his okay, since they did need Tsunade to heal Sakura.

The timing of the whole thing was just pretty fishy.

Maybe Jiraiya had been so involved in his own self-importance that he hadn't noticed that the answer Kakashi gave him was not actually a yes?

Kakashi had answered noncommittally because he kind of wanted to see a Sanin get utterly rejected by a twelve years old.

Also, there was possibly some left-over resentment over Jiraiya not stepping up to the plate to take care of Minato-sensei's son. Kakashi had been forbidden any significant interaction with the boy from birth and until he was given to him as a student. All the while witnessing his intended little brother get neglected and all but bullied for years. So yes, Kakashi had let a door open to having Naruto reject Jiraiya himself. It was a bit petty of him.

Still. As a spy-master, Jiraiya should have been able that he didn't have blanket permission to make away with his student without at least giving a courtesy notification.

The kids noticed his moment of stillness at that tidbit and honed in on it like a pair of very cute sharks.

His explanation of how his conversation with Jiraiya actually went didn't appease them in the least.

Well. It seemed Jiraiya had burned out all of his goodwill with Kakashi's pups.

That would be fun to watch unfold when the Toad Sanin came back to Konoha.

Katsuyu-sama requested that Sakura sit herself properly with her legs straight on the bed then, which got Kakashi a cuddly genin wedged under each arm. It made eating a bit challenging, but then again, he was meant to eat really slowly and chew thoroughly, so it wasn't that big of a deal.

As the little Katsuyu-sama put a green glow to the first leg, she obligingly explained the steps she was going through. Sakura asked pretty in-depth questions, and even hovered her hand with a diagnostic jutsu on top of the healing area to 'see' what was happening.

Right. Kakashi had been out of it for over a month, and Sakura always learned chakra-related and theory stuff scarily fast. And her own injury was a good motivator to start looking into medical training.

Basically, Katsuyu elected to fix everything but the nerves. Tsunade-sama had provided her with enough of her own chakra to enable Katsuyu to wake Kakashi up without the risks that using Naruto's chakra for that would entail.

With the leftover, Katsuyu-sama had decided to fully restore Sakura's chakra pathways, and smooth out any muscle fibers that weren't perfectly right, then give the bones a boost in their regeneration of the missing splinters that presumably ended up on the forest floor or stuck into Gaara's sand.

Sakura got curious about what was wrong with Kakashi, that Naruto's chakra couldn't be used to fix, and Katsuyu helpfully gave a lecture on how the use of a very brutally chakra intensive inescapable genjutsu had led to bits and pieces of the caster's chakra stuck into Kakashi's brain and the chakra pathways of his head and eye. The parts of Kakashi's brain responsible for the perception of time had been thoroughly gummed up, as well as a good chunk of his visual and sensory centers. As a result, the entire brain had shut the body down.

According to Katsuyu-sama, who had been monitoring his condition since she got to the house, Kakashi's spiritual energy circuit had shut down the body, so it could siphon more resources into creating the yin chakra necessary to flush out the clogs. It had been mildly successful, if very slow-going.

Using Naruto's too eager and undisciplined chakra on such a delicate body part as the brain could have easily mutilated Kakashi when he was in no immediate danger from letting his body try and heal at it's own pace, so Katsuyu-sama had just left it be. She had instead used some iryou-ninjutsu as needed to help keep his body in good condition despite the unconsciousness. that was why Kakashi didn't sport any bed sores, and his muscle tone was still mostly acceptable.

Kakashi wasn't in the least surprised when the first thing Sakura did after getting her bones and chakra pathways mended, was jump onto her feet and try to run straight at the load-bearing wall to test out wall-walking.

He wasn't surprised when she tripped on her own feet and face-planted three strides in, either.

Sakura might be a genius at chakra control, and in possession of near perfect memory. But walking, or running, was a much more complex process than it appeared at first. Just doing it relied on extensive muscle memory dating all the way back to before actual memories started being made. Making the body move the exact right way without using any of that built-in muscle memory was not the easy, intuitive process it might look like. It took studying the mechanisms of strides and joint function and balance.

When he told Sakura that, he added a few examples on how the big toe was actually a big part of regulating equilibrium, and ninja who had to have it amputated tended to need to re-train their walk and run. Sakura got a determined frown at that information, then looked at Sasuke in a way that told Kakashi that the Uchiha would probably be spending quite a bit of time walking and running around barefoot and in slow-motion to help Sakura model how feet and legs needed to move.

Kakashi had a feeling that it might actually prove beneficial for the both of them.

Walking and running was one of these things people didn't tend to think about. Also a base building block of being a ninja, to be honest. But Kakashi would never have dared to try and make twelve to thirteen years old genins spend days on deconstructing and reconstructing their stride. It might have proven beneficial, but it would also have tempted mutiny. Kids that age just didn't have the patience to want to do that well. It took a bit of experience to fully appreciate the importance of the basics.

So he simply didn't remind Sakura that Tsunade-sama would be there soon and should reconnect her nerves with some priority, because Naruto probably was a big part of her decision to come back, and she was a big part of Naruto's priorities for convincing Tsunade-sama.

Walking training was good.

Walking and Running training was great!

Walking and Running training was even more great when Kakashi himself needed some intense re-conditioning before being able to protect over-eager genins from their own training mistakes.

So, apparently, their portion of Katsuyu-sama had gone mostly silent after announcing that Naruto was in a fight against Orochimaru, so she could focus more fully on the fighting. The team had only received short, non-specific updates along the lines of 'Naruto-san will not die' or 'we're starting to win' or 'it's over, everyone is fine'.

And it meant that Kakashi got to hear the recounting of the confrontation at the same time as the rest of his team despite having been unconscious through the actual fight.

Tsunade had been approached by Orochimaru about having her repair the damage that the Sandaime did to his arms with the Dead Demon Consuming Seal before Jiraiya and Naruto even found her. He had offered to repay her by using Edo-tensei to bring back her little brother and fiance as a payment, and then given her time to consider their offer.

Naruto's party wasn't aware of the particulars, but the fact that a huge snake had destroyed the castle in the town they found Tsunade in did give them a clue that Orochimaru had most likely talked with Tsunade, and that he had probably made her some kind of offer.

Naruto had been somewhat hasty, in his charming, bumbling way that Aiko still hadn't managed to wholly cure him from, and he had told Tsunade about his learning Minato-sensei's prized Rasengan from Jiraiya, as an argument of his not being stupid? Naruto's spoken out logic sometimes took a huge hit from his heat-of-the-moment word-jumbling. Aiko had also not yet cured him of that.

Naruto had outright begged Tsunade-sama to help heal Sakura and him, either by coming back, or by allowing Katsuyu to use her chakra to do it by proxy.

Jiraiya, Katsuyu informed them smugly, had been quite surprised and disappointed by the development of Naruto not being completely desperate for Tsunade to come back to Konoha at any and all costs.

In any case, Naruto had begged, and brought up both the fact that they were related and that he was also Katsuyu's summoner as reasons why he hoped Tsunade would agree.

Tsunade had called him a naive fool, and Naruto had disagreed, by indignantly informing him that he was two-third of the way into mastering the fourth Hokage's most complicated jutsu, so he'd definitely be Hokage one day. And then, like the common-sense impaired brat that he sometimes was, he went on to demonstrate it inside of the restaurant they were in.

Katsuyu had relayed a lot of Aiko-lectures that same evening, according to the quick recap that was given for his benefit.

And then, Tsunade had made him a bet that if he could actually complete the jutsu within a week, she would give him her necklace and come back to Konoha, but if he couldn't, she would take all of his money. Which she had somehow pickpocketed.

Of course Naruto had agreed on the terms, because Sakura's (and Kakashi's) health was more important to him than his life-savings.

As a result of the bet, Naruto had pretty much trained himself to the bone for one week straight, and gone especially hard on the sixth night. He would have knocked himself out with chakra exhaustion if Katsuyu hadn't decided to put her metaphorical foot down and do it for him.

Katsuyu-sama had lost a lot of her deferential treatment for her summoner over the course of mothering Naruto. Since he was being pig-headed, and training past the point where he would actually gain anything from it, and forgetting about common-sense to the point of deliberately ruining his surroundings rather than stick with the prescribed exercise( a sign of too low Yin chakra reserves if there is any), she put him to sleep.

Then she used the fragment Naruto had generously left with Tsunade-sama to catch up because she still couldn't summon her on her own due to her blood phobia, and asked her other summoner to collect Naruto.

After doing so, Tsunade had forcefully unsummoned the fragments that were staying with her and Naruto.

It was kind of tricky to unsummon something you weren't the one to call, even with your name on the contract. Especially without using blood to focus the order. But physical contact did the trick if you were good enough. So Kakashi assumed that was how Tsunade-sama did it. Katsuyu-sama looked a bit abashed for getting caught like that. And also maybe a bit betrayed?

In any case, when Naruto woke up, much earlier than his chakra exhaustion would have made anyone assume he would, he summoned Katsuyu again, who learned that Tsunade had also attacked her apprentice, Shizune shortly after forcefully removing Katsuyu-sama.

Jiraiya had then shambled to them, drugged out of his gourd and impaired in his chakra use from it.

But when they made it, Tsunade was actually fighting against Orochimaru, not helping him.

Orochimaru had brought with him a bone user, of the late Kaguya Clan. The one Clan that pretty much kick-started the bloodline purges in Kiri.

Orochimaru possibly thought too highly of his fighting skills even while missing the full use of his arms, since he decided to actively engage against both Jiraiya and Tsunade-sama.

Tsunade-sama was at a distinct disadvantage against the bone user, because while the kid could keep himself from bleeding when poking his bones through his own muscles and skin, he could also just let himself get slightly injured by each sharp ended bone poking through. Which, since he knew of Tsunade's fear of blood, is exactly what he did.

Kimimaro, the Kaguya Clan teenager, helped Orochimaru with summoning his snakes, and when Jiraiya failed at summoning a boss frog Summons because of the poison, Naruto decided that he should call more of Katsuyu to him to even the odds.

With his near chakra-exhaustion the previous day, he only managed to call a portion about half as big as the snake, but the acid spray made a big difference.

Tsunade's apprentice, Shizune, tried her best to defend Tsunade-sama while she was catatonic from having blood splattered on her. The Kaguya decided to take on the healer that had attempted to betray his master under the guise of healing him, though he didn't intend to kill Tsunade, he had no such restrictions about Shizune.

The only reason why the poison-using medic didn't die from the way Kimimaro stabbed her in the chest with five of his arm bones was that Naruto knew well enough to rip the woman out of the situation and throw her at Katsuyu so the Slug could absorb her within her body and keep her from dying.

Naruto then decided to take up protecting Tsunade in Shizune's stead while Katsuyu-sama and Jiraiya engaged Orochimaru and the boss snake Summons.

Kakashi was proud for his pup not forgetting his main goal. Sakura needed Tsunade-sama, so of course Tsunade-sama had to be guarded if she couldn't protect herself on her own.

Because Naruto got one-track-minded if no one was there to yell at him that he knew more than one jutsu, he decided to use a ludicrous amount of clones to fight off the Kaguya.

And then, because Aiko was absolutely right about the danger of teaching Naruto two entire overpowered jutsus, he also took almost all the pointy bits of Kimimaro's weaponized rib-cage into his face and arm in order to plow a Rasengan, that he got a clone to help him make, into his opponent.

Kakashi didn't look at Aiko. But he could feel her disappointment in their student even so.

Yeah. Naruto was likely to discover how it felt to not be lectured but expected to tell what he did wrong himself instead, like Sakura had after her preliminary tournament match.

Anyway, the extensive injury from the Rasengan pushed the Kaguya to cover himself in a web of cracks that then turned him into something of a monster.

On top of the physical changes, the metamorphosis enabled Kimimaro to do even more extreme bone manipulations.

And while Naruto had his small Katsuyu portion with him, she still only had access to Naruto's chakra, making healing him tricky.

But that was about when the bigger portion of Kaguya actually nailed the snake summons with her acid and forced it to unsummon rather than die.

The abrupt unsummoning slammed Jiraiya into the ground and let Orochimaru attempt a kill strike on Naruto, though Tsunade-sama intercepted it.

Getting a sword to the stomach would normally have slowed someone down quite a bit, but Tsunade was a league of her own. And once she got over her fear of blood, she shone with exactly why she was the only viable Hokage candidate. Which, in the heat of the battle, she declared herself to have accepted.

That was when Jiraiya and Orochimaru called their boss Summons, finally succeeding at it, in Jiraiya's case. Tsunade more or less upstaged her two male teammates by calling almost as much of Katsuyu-sama through as the mass of the others' Summons, which meant that Katsuyu fairly towered over the battlefield, once added to the portion Naruto had already called in.

Katsuyu-sama made use of there being Tsunade's more healing-appropriate chakra at her disposal to expedite Shizune's care and patch Naruto back up to fighting shape.

Then, Katsuyu also dissolved a part of her body to coat Naruto and Shizune in an impassable barrier made of herself.

With that advantage, Naruto managed to take on the Kaguya by himself, letting Jiraiya and Tsunade free to handle Orochimaru.

And apparently, Naruto also got a bit less dumb at that point and remembered that he had more than two jutsus up his sleeve, using wind jutsus and traps instead of ludicrous amounts of kage-bunshins and the Rasengan, which he hadn't yet mastered.

What they hadn't anticipated was Orochimaru's willingness to use his companion as a distraction to make his own escape. Once Manda had been forced to unsummon from getting pinned to the ground like a fly with Gamabunta's sword, the Sanin declared that he would reclaim the use of his arms another way and then destroy Konoha, before ordering Kimimaro to cover his escape.

And then Orochimaru melted into the ground.

The Kaguya exploded into a veritable forest of bones, that forced the Toad Summon to dismiss himself to avoid being skewered, while the humans only stayed alive from a combination of their own dodging skills and Katsuyu's intervention.

Katsuyu, because of her nature, didn't get injured from the attack, but she still was lifted off the ground and thrown a good ways away, though she mitigated that by splitting into smaller portions to make her inertia lesser and make herself land faster.

The two Sanins landed on the bones, with there not being anywhere else to set foot except the Toad's over sized sword that still stuck out of the ground, and Naruto used his clones and the very rudimentary chakra strings (more like ropes, really) he could manage to steer himself and Shizune toward the Sanins.

It meant that the Katsuyu fragments that were coating the two of them were in prime position to witness the Kaguya sprouting out of the bones closest to Tsunade and aiming a huge bone sword at her back, just as her self-healing forehead seal was turning transparent from the chakra drain.

Fortunately for Konoha's Kageship, the teenager froze halfway out, and started coughing out blood.

Naruto was distraught to learn that their opponent was always going to die from an incurable bone marrow illness, but that the fight had dramatically sped his death up.

When Naruto emotionally asked why he would kill himself for such an awful person, the wheezing Kaguya had told him that he knew nothing of needing a purpose for life, and more importantly, for death. And since Orochimaru would never die, Kimimaro would be immortal through the man's memories, because of his sacrifice.

And then, the boy solidified into a bone statue, protruding out of his jutsu-made bone forest.

According to Katsuyu, Naruto was utterly gutted by Jiraiya and Tsunade's assessment of how fast Orochimaru was likely to forget all of his discarded tool.

So they would probably have to tell Naruto about loyalty and thankfulness and how these could be twisted and used by the wrong persons, especially with vulnerable targets, like children or abuse victims, and how to protect himself from being taken advantage of this way.

Notes:

You know, sometimes strange things happen when you think about fanfictions...

I had a stray thought about my Sakurama ficlet idea, that probably spawned from the fact that taking Sakura and tagging on the 'ama' that all the Senju brothers share, makes her have a Kurama in her name.

Obvious, I know, but then add on that the Sakura hosted in Tobirama's body is actually a chakra alter-ego, with incredibly strong capacities (though not in genjutsu specifically) and the Kurama Clan, that was probably more heavily populated in the warring Clans era, have a kenkai gankai that make them develop an alter-ego that can control the person's body, makes their appearance change (Tobirama's eyes get greenish and his hair get pink tinged from chakra projection when Sakura takes the reigns)... And you get a Senju Butsuma probably accusing his wife of cheating on him with a Kurama.

Funny, right!

But it gets funnier.

I took a swing by Narutopedia to check what Kurama Clan members look like, and they seem to go toward brown hair and dark eyes. not something Tobirama's coloring could be blamed on. But the funny thing is that all the members that have been shown... Have a bigger than average forehead!
I'm not kidding! And it's not just the balding old dudes either, even Yakumo and her mom seem to have really high brow under their side-part.

Just saying... I don't regret my current worldbuilding, but an alternative explanation to Inner could very easily be blamed on "huh, actually, we never did learn who your maternal grandfather was..." And therefore make Sakura a bastard Kurama! It would make never teaching her genjutsu despite her perfect control even worse of a crime against her badassry!

On a spoiler-connected note, check out Déjà vu no Jutsu by Vixen_Tail (if you don't have an AO3 account, you won't see it, but it also exists in ffnet) if you haven't already!
It's a really awesome reborn as a baby with previous life memories and plot knowledge, in Naruto world as Minato's contemporary, fanfic. Also, she becomes Kakashi's sister and adopts EVERYONE by the end of the story, which is always a plus in my books.

Chapter 61: Aiko's coping methods

Summary:

Aiko is finally able to get back to an even keel.

Chapter Text

Truthfully, Aiko felt on the edge of burnout.

While Tsume Inuzuka had been a lifesaver in helping get her genins properly challenged and engaged, and not worrying themselves sick about Kakashi and Naruto and Sakura's legs...

The fear hadn't left her.

She had done her best.

Cooked her anxiety away so the kids would always have something nice to eat if nothing else. Took naps when the kids were out so she could try and feel like she had some alone time.

But more than anything, she had spent the month when Kakashi was unconscious feeling stressed to hell, and turning to fuuinjutsu experimentation as a way to try and feel more in control.

With Kakashi out, she didn't get access to new material to study, but she had entire months of book study under her belt.

At this point, what she needed, with the understanding she had of fuuinjutsu, was to truly develop a sealing style of her own, all the way, not the halfhearted tweaking on storage seal she made for her wakizashi and shield.

So that's what she did, but the fear and anxiety didn't stop gnawing at her stomach even when she was busy arranging spirals and script lines and seeing if it felt 'right' to her.

Katsuyu announcing Naruto's fight against Orochimaru, of all people, had almost done her in.

Even the announcement of Naruto winning the fight and then Katsuyu healing Kakashi and mending Sakura's bones and chakra pathways with the leftover chakra that Tsunade-sama gave her during that fight did little to truly sooth her.

Aiko eyed her jounin.

Kakashi had eaten the meal she had fixed for him while Katsuyu was fixing his brain, and then had cuddled the children until they got antsy with the need to move.

Their genins had lost the entire morning of their respective training, but Sasuke had to teach the Inuzuka children shurikenjutsu in the afternoon, and he wasn't willing to blow his commitment off. The dogged determination not to miss a promised training session was interesting. She might mention it to Inoichi-sama, there probably was history behind it.

Sakura visibly decided that if Sasuke was resuming his normal schedule, so should she, and she determinedly yet slowly paced toward the door.

Aiko packed them both a bento with the extra she had cooked at the same time as Kakashi's meal, and added a tomato from her secret stash in Sasuke's, and a couple of mochis for Sakura, before catching up to her slowly exiting students and distributing the packed lunches.

Katsuyu had decided to go along with Sakura for the day so she could monitor the girl, So Aiko had set the Slug on her student's shoulder. She took a moment to watch Sakura's carefully measured, slightly wobbly strides, and Sasuke's not quite hovering.

It wasn't that Sasuke wouldn't have liked to be ready to catch his teammate if she fell while learning how to make her legs and feet move in a walk with just chakra strings.

It was that the boy knew exactly how little Sakura would appreciate his help if he dared to encroach on her self-agency, even just to help. And so he was smart enough to offer his help by walking a step to the left and a tiny bit ahead of Sakura, with slow movement to give her a template on how to puppet herself, now that she was allowed to stand on her leg and use the chakra strings to make herself move.

When she stepped back into 'their' house, Kakashi was out of his bed, standing at the window that let him also watch the kids walk away to their lessons.

He smiled at her and thanked her for looking after the kids, and that was what broke the dam.

Kakashi was still incredibly reassuring.

She sniffled and took a deep breath, relaxing in the feeling of the jounin she trusted to have her back holding her firmly.

The apologies had to go, though. It wasn't Kakashi's fault that he couldn't all beat two S-Rank shinobi with only a pair of extremely badly matched comrades as backup.

When she told Kakashi that, he answered that it wasn't her fault that she couldn't handle the genins' training and protection all on her own.

Aiko let him have his gotcha moment.

Joke was on him.

Aiko wasn't a guilt-hoarder. She had to have done something objectively and massively wrong, and have it have an actual lasting negative consequence to feel bad.

She was aware that it was rare, and when she actually noticed it (generally by comparing herself to people more likely to feel guilty), she was really glad for it.

She really didn't need bad conscience on top of her acute awareness of her vulnerability.

What Kakashi had taken for an attack of guilt, probably because that's what he would feel in her place, was actually her unloading one month of protracted fear and anxiety, and the constant feeling that she had to do something that she wasn't good enough at to do well. Protecting Sasuke, and worrying for Naruto, wondering if she had made the right call letting him out of her sight. That had been bad.

But while she did still feel the lingering sting of guilt over Sakura losing the use of her legs, she didn't think it a moral failing on her part to struggle at filling Kakashi's role of protecting the kids. She wasn't a Jounin. Of course she was struggling. The helplessness just got to her.

She didn't tell Kakashi that.

If her mumbles about all the thing that she hadn't been sure about had been taken for guilt by her ridiculous co-sensei, then it was a wonderful tool for her to use.

"If I'm not allowed to feel guilty, then neither are you." She sniffled at him.

Apparently Kakashi was weak to tears, because he agreed to her bargain all too quickly.

Even if not much had changed, Kakashi simply being awake did a great deal to relax Aiko. She didn't have the worry of him not waking up, at the very least.

Which meant that she finally could fully relax.

Of course, that meant a long, luxurious soak.

She had needed a shower after her crying episode, anyway, and Kakashi would appreciate a hot bath that smelled vaguely like her once he was done with his conditioning exercises. Win-win.

She relaxed and leaned back, and turned her mind, again, to the very interesting, if small, treatise on the mechanics of chakra use that she had been using as a basis for her fuuinjutsu experiments.

It had been part of the Yondaime's library that Kakashi allowed her to read over the months of her helping him teach the genins. She wasn't sure if it was there because the Yondaime himself had found it interesting and wanted to follow up on it, or if he had just picked it up, and decided to not get rid of it after reading it's contents.

It was old. Handwritten on yellowing pages, and with no author's name attached. Which might be a point in favor of discarding it. But the contents... The contents had so much potential.

The author's theory was that hand signs were a construct. Through the pages, the hypothesis went on. And what if chakra only works the way it does because we expect it to? What if hand signs only shape the chakra into jutsu because we were taught that they do? What if the chakric properties of the dog, boar, rat, horse... signs, only are that way because that's what everyone believe they are?

The theory had very interesting applications in ninjutsu. Aiko was tempted to believe it, just for how the Nidaime had invented entirely new signs, that resulted in entirely new results.

According to the author, the fact that there was a spiritual component in chakra meant that chakra worked as the wielder expected it to. If you believed, for instance, that fire trumped wind, then it would. If you believed that touching your extended pinky, index and thumb to each-other while lacing your ring and major curled toward your palm was the bird seal, and that the bird seal was a wind component... Then it did. Simple as that.

It went on to hypotheses that everything to do with chakra was entirely up to either the caster's belief, or the collective belief.

There was no way to prove anything, of course. It was a thought exercise.

But say that someone had come up with the bird seal. Through believing that the bird seal was the bird seal and should act like the bird seal does, they made the bird seal act that way. This person had then shown their new seal to others, explained how it worked and demonstrated that when they did it, it did, in fact act that way. Since the others saw it, they also believed it, making the seal work that way for them too.

Over time of everyone believing that the bird seal was the bird seal and acted like the bird seal, they imprinted their beliefs in chakra itself, to the point where chakra has accepted the rules around the bird seal.

While, yes, it was an intriguing theory for ninjutsu, it was even more interesting for fuuinjutsu.

It basically meant that the only thing that made fuuinjutsu work was the belief that it should work.

All the symbolism, the scripts, the calligraphy style... all the rules that surrounded the art were only crutches. If you honestly and wholly believed that a curled line meant power because it was what your teachers told you in no uncertain terms while believing it totally, then it did. Just that simple. Then seal-making became just an exercise in combining the different rules you were taught in just the right way to get the results you want.

If you honestly and wholly believed that instead of power, a curled line meant flexibility, then it should act that way.

The problem that the treaty caused, at least for Aiko, was that ruling that things only worked if you though they did... induced an horrible lot of disbelief.

She was no longer that sure that the old rules would work perfectly, and that was super dangerous, because she still was very sure that failed fuuinjutsu tended to explode.

In theory, she could make up a brand new set of rules and force them to work by believing they would.

In practice, it was horribly hard to trick oneself into wholeheartedly believing something without proof of it. And proving that it would work the way she wanted it to was easiest done by demonstrating it, which needed belief, which needed... proof. It was a circle.

Presumably, it had first been bridged through religious beliefs and experiments, the base cultural beliefs had provided an unshakable base. Of course things associated with the god of flame held flame properties, it was obvious, and then testing, failing, adjusting, testing again, gaining more belief and thus better result with each tweak, had finished convincing the persons building ninjutsu and fuuinjutsu up that there were rules, therefore solidifying the effectiveness of those same rules. Like the self-fulfilling prophecies of the old lore.

Aiko hummed and shifted the dial on the bath temperature a bit higher before slumping lower under the water.

So...

How could Aiko reproduce something similar?

Granted, knowing that the rules didn't really exist was no help at all in forcing herself to believe that there were rules.

What did Aiko believe, unshakably, up to her core, about seals?

She closed her eyes.

Seals worked on chakra.

That was... a decent starting point.

Seals didn't truly need ink or paper, as demonstrated by the fact that Summoning created it's own Summoning array out of thin air.

Still solid logic.

The array had to make sense to the caster to work.

Hmm.

Wobbly.

Make sense how?

What did Aiko truly, completely believe about how chakra worked?

The bigger the effect wanted, the more chakra needed?

That was... Yes. That worked.

Unless you were using something you had already seen work, you had to understand exactly how the chakra needed to act for it to do so.

Good. Even with things she had seen work before, she reproduced the effect better if she knew the hows and whys.

As a result in regard to fuuinjutsu... Her seals had to contain all the instructions of how and where the chakra should go if she wanted to truly be sure that it would work the way she intended it to.

She was sure that she couldn't just write 'seal' on a piece of paper and believe that it would act in any precise way.

She had to write down what she expected it to do.

All the instructions didn't have to be written in words. She knew that traditional fuuinjutsu had lines and curves and rays and points to represent functions. Hers could very well do the same.

Each concept could get it's own pictogram, for instance.

Or even a color. Aiko wouldn't have any trouble with a basis of 'anything in red is for fire, blue is for water, grey is for wind, brown is for earth and yellow is for lightning'. It was very obvious and well rooted in her core perceptions.

Did she want to need a heap of colored inks, though?

Yeah, no.

Okay.

Curves for softness and lines for hardness?

Yup.

And then add some line variation. the thicker the line, the stronger the associated element.

The more wavy and deep the curl, the more softness and elasticity? Then what about spirals? And how did she make straight lines more straight than straight? Add angles, maybe?

Aiko had a surprisingly productive bath on the fuuinjutsu front.

She had spent a month on this, and it was unlocking all at once.

It would be suspicious, but she knew that stress tended to hamper her thinking.

And she was suddenly much less stressed.

All the things that had been collating behind her internal panic was coming to the forefront once her brain wasn't too full of worry to really get things.

She toweled herself dry, and since the weather was still on the warm side, simply strode out of the bathroom naked, calling to Kakashi that the bath was free for him and steaming hot.

Aiko then went to the bedroom and got dressed in clean, comfortable clothes, before heading to the kitchen to start in on dinner.

She also strapped her pouch on, because she had notes to start taking while things simmered, and her nice stationary were inside of her scrolls. The full rainbow if pens wasn't strictly speaking, necessary for jotting down her ideas for her original fuuinjutsu style, but it was much more fun.

She wasn't in the least surprised to see Kakashi come out of the bathroom less than half an hour later. She would have liked him to take more time to soak and relax, but it wasn't in his temperament to willfully allow himself long stretches of relaxation. Maybe she could come up with some kind of bath centered meditation, to trick him into thinking baths productive and necessary to build his strength up?

In any case, she put him in charge of the stir-fry while she kept cooking something of a feast. His recovery deserved some celebration. There would need to be another celebration when Naruto was back, of course. Maybe with some homemade ramen?

Tanzaku-Gai wasn't all that far from Konoha, for all that it took Jiraiya a long while to track Tsunade-sama down to it. They could expect Naruto back in less than a week.

Since she had Kakashi close at hand, she took the opportunity to catch him up on what happened while he was out.

The news of Jiraiya ditching Naruto for a woman in the same day that Aiko entrusted the boy's safety to him made him growl. Aiko agreed wholeheartedly. And it wasn't even the worse misbehavior Katsuyu-sama reported.

Jiraiya had kept dismissing Naruto for solo training almost as soon as Gai had left. Leaving their genin without protection right after two S-Rank nins had tried to steal him. He had also loudly and repeatedly insulted Naruto's intelligence and talent when he didn't immediately grasp his halfheartedly explained instructions. And he had Stolen from the kid.

Aiko was honestly awed that Katsuyu-sama hadn't torn the asshole a new one for any of those. But then again... The way Katsuyu had reported every single instance of mistreatment to her in great detail made Aiko a bit suspicious that the Slug had simply been bidding her time.

They had been looking for Tsunade-sama, after all. Katsuyu-sama probably wanted to give the toad pervert enough rope to hang himself with when she had her strongest summoner in a position of authority over the idiot.

It wasn't hard to guess that Jiraiya was looking for the Senju princess to make her the new Hokage, after all.

And everything that Katsuyu had borne witness to was more than enough to ensure that the Toad Sage was never allowed anywhere near Naruto ever again. Katsuyu was a much more creditable witness than a twelve years old boy with an history for over-exaggeration and mischief.

Kakashi agreed with her assessment once he was down growling in rage. He also told her that Jiraiya had wanted to take long term custody of Naruto when he spoke to him and Kakashi gave him a noncommittal answer.

Yeah, no.

She wouldn't trust the old pervert with a house plant, much less her kid.

Naruto was not staying with Jiraiya without proper supervision ever again.

Compared to the minefield that was catching Kakashi up on Naruto's adventure, updating him on Sasuke and Sakura's progress was a breeze.

She had objectively done the best she could under the circumstances. Sasuke was regaining his emotional footing and improving in his cooperation with his summons in leaps and bounds. Sakura was regaining confidence and a feeling of control over her life from learning how to fix herself if anything injured her again. Aiko was getting closer and closer to making Fuuinjutsu into her ace in the hole.

Kakashi was an excellent sounding board where Fuuinjutsu is concerned. And he found the theory from his sensei's obscure little book just as intriguing as she does.

She sensed potential for future ninjutsu creation on this front.

Good.

The Chidori might be flashy, but it was also much too costly in chakra. Best keep it for situation where nothing else would do and make up another jutsu for less specific situations.

She would keep a notebook on hand in case she has ideas for him to play with.

Chapter 62: Re-Settling

Summary:

Kakashi settles back into his Pack's routine, and his Pack attempt to kill him with feelings

Notes:

Ugh. I hate how lethargic I'm being of late! I sleep almost all the time, it's so annoying. I actually have plans to do things! Things that need open stores and people answering their phone! Hopefully it's just the winter lack of light funk...

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

Kakashi watched his Pack Sister bustle around the kitchen while dutifully stirring his assigned pan so nothing had the time to burn. Aiko went on and about, cutting, mixing and stirring, occasionally adding a few things in one of her own pots or pans or in his.

Kakashi hadn't seen her do so much cooking before. Sure, she did cook. She was the best at creating edible and tasty food out of the team. But most of the time, she made the kids pull their weight, and she rarely cooked any more elaborately than was necessary to achieve a palatable result.

He didn't comment, letting her put him to use, and listening to anything she had to say about things that went on in his absence.

The theory she was working out of to build up her own Fuuinjutsu style was fascinating, and he could see many applications in ninjutsu.

Still, her behavior intrigued him. She was acting much more like what he had observed civilian housewives to be than the no-nonsense, competent and calm chunin he had gotten to know.

Was it the domestic setting? Being in one house for two months with kids under the same roof?

There was a niggling in his memory. It wasn't the first time he had seen her shed the kunoichi coat for a more maternal one. She had done similar things after the Exam Preliminaries. And on the night before the third stage too. Was it an anxiety response?

It made sense for it to be. Aiko was an Infiltration Specialist that generally posed as a civilian. For her response to stress and fear to be doubling down on the civilian act was strategically sound. An ingrained reflex of sorts.

She had always bounced back to more usual behavior once the fear was past before, so Kakashi decided not to worry and simply bask in the liveliness.

The kids came back with their own stories to tell, both about their day and about various things that happened over the previous month, and it was the easiest thing to listen to their too serious mini-reports and provide what insights he could.

Sakura demonstrated a small jump that she had worked out how to perform during the afternoon. She stumbled a bit on landing, but she had also figured that she could anchor herself to the ceiling when she couldn't manage to preserve her balance with just chakra-string steering on her legs and feet.

There were lots of compliments to Aiko's cooking during the meal. And how the kids gorged themselves, combined with the stress of the morning when they worried for Naruto, meant they turned sleepy before the sun was down.

Kakashi's eyes and nose stung with tears wanting to leak out at the easy way his pack snuggled up to him. Sasuke wiggled himself firmly beneath his arm, using his shoulder as a pillow, with his curled up legs tucked next to his flank while Sakura laid claim on his lap, with a pillow propped on his belly to support her head.

Aiko smilingly moved the arm not taken up by Sasuke closer to their Kunoichi, who thoughtlessly grasped his hand in both of her like a comforting stuffed toy.

It was a bit weird how they seamlessly made themselves at home over and around him. It was like they were simply used to it despite his unconsciousness.

Like there had been no pause in their habit formation.

And then it hit Kakashi that to them, there hadn't.

While Kakashi had a gap period. A long month of not interacting with his pups. They had still been interacting with him.

So while he saw a sudden jump in their ease around his person, it had been gradual for them.

The positions looked so practiced because they were. It was so obvious. The room had smelled like the four of them even when he woke up. The children had simply taken up the habit to use him as a pillow and mattress while he was unconscious.

The realization had tears wetting his headband from Obito's eye.

His pups had still found him comforting even when he wasn't able to protect them.

Kakashi breathed deeply and noticed the way it makes Sakura bob up and down.

Oh.

No.

They took to sleeping on him to monitor him?

Sasuke had his hand flat over Kakashi's heart, and Sakura's grip on his hand crept all the way up to his pulse point.

Did.

Did his adorable, precocious pups take to sleeping on him thinking that they were protecting him?

He helplessly turned his head toward Aiko, hoping for some kind of normalcy on that quarter, but instead he got an breathtakingly tender smile and the view of a hand moving toward his hair.

The petting relaxed him almost immediately. It was as much habit as instinct at that point. His eye stayed fixed on Aiko's face and the way she looked at him.

It was the kind of face that would have made him run away as fast as his body could carry him, if he was less invested in his Pack Sister. And if he didn't know for sure that Aiko did not do romance.

Kakashi had gotten captured a few times over his career. He'd been tied up even more often, because of evasion training. And yet. He was positive that he had never been detained more effectively than his genins had just managed. No actual restraints in view, but he couldn't bring himself to move anything other than the arm behind Sasuke. And even that movement was limited to what wouldn't jostle the boy.

Aiko, who had taken his other side, leaned over him and slowly rested her head over his neck and collarbone. She probably wasn't intending to scent him. She didn't have the nose for that. All the same, the position itself made Kakashi's breath hitch.

"You missed your birthday." Aiko murmured after a while.

Kakashi blinked and thought about the dates. Ah. Yes. It wouldn't be the first time his birthday passed by unacknowledged. There had been long missions and injuries in the past. But it was the first time since Minato-sensei's death that there was someone to be distressed about it.

Hmm. Tricky. "We can celebrate it when Naruto is back." Kakashi offered, even though he didn't particularly want to celebrate his birthday. Aiko wouldn't have mentioned it if she didn't have strong feelings about it, and Kakashi found himself desperate to offer up a valid seeming reason, other than the obvious why they couldn't have celebrated on the actual day of. "I remember you had a gift all planned out."

Okay, this part was his 'must make pack happy' instincts playing up. The old joke Aiko had made about using him as a dress-up doll on his birthday. It would cheer her up, for sure. But...

No, actually. He was pretty okay with it. It was... Normal. Not normal as something he had done often. Or ever. But normal as in mundane and low-stakes. His closest memory, despite the month that passed since, was spending three days being tortured. He had woken up to a diminished body, and stressful news. His Pack was anxious, which made him anxious in turn. With all that combined, yes, letting Aiko bully him in and out a dozen of outfits and probably touch him casually all through to adjust fits... It sounded relaxing. Ordinary. Centering.

So he didn't actually regret the impulsive offer.

Which was a good thing considering the luminous grin his Pack-Sister gave him in return.

His heart wasn't done being abused, though. Because after the kids were asleep, Aiko decided to flay it wide open with the most innocuous question. "You'll keep us safe?" She mumbled after a yawn, while positioning herself with her back against his flank.

Kakashi had trouble finding his voice. Even for the simple hum he gave.

She still trusted him to Protect.

Even after he was beaten. Even after a month of laying around uselessly.

Aiko still felt safest with him.

Even the kids. They were already asleep, clinging to him like a security blanket, and they had been doing that even when he was unconscious. They had found him reassuring even when he couldn't actively Protect them.

Is if to prove this, his Pack Sister gave a deep sigh and fell asleep almost instantly after his agreement.

At least it meant no one was awake to notice the tears escaping both of his eyes.

At breakfast, Sasuke and Sakura asked when they could expect him to be recovered enough to handle their training again so they could give their notice to the Inuzuka who were training them at the moment.

They then made Kakashi's case of dust in the eye even worse by enthusiastically scenting him before leaving for the day.

Even Aiko decided to join in on the league to make him die of feelings by dragging a sheet and pillow to the couch in the middle of the afternoon and casually going "you've got this guard?" before falling asleep while he was going through his push-ups.

And then the kids scented him again as soon as they came back from their day of training.

It was all a conspiracy to make his heart give out. A protracted assassination attempt.

He was sure of it.

Kakashi leaned over Aiko's shoulder to look at her seal prototype.

Just as he did so, she growled and crumpled the sheet in a ball.

Ah.

Creative frustration.

Sensei did that too, sometimes.

Kakashi had been too much of a little shit at the time to offer any help. He tended to get frustrated at Minato's distraction from him. But he knew that what helped Minato-sensei most was talking out his fuuinjutsu issues with Kushina. Kushina-nee even teased him about how he explained his problem to her and then found the solution all on his own.

He could at least do that much.

Kakashi extended his arms and gently caught Aiko's hand before she could throw the balled up paper in her frustration.

Aiko allowed him to take the sheet from her, and her sat opposite her, before smoothing the paper back out with his palms. "Alright. Why don't you explain to me what you're trying to achieve and how you're struggling?"

"Hmm. Alright. So, what rule are you working out of for this part?"

"You didn't tell me why you're starting out with a storage seal. Most people try their hand at explosive tags first, you know." He asked, one hour into Aiko's explanations.

"Yeah, I know." She sighed. "Explosive tags are objectively simpler than the space-time fuckery involved in storage seals. But I'm working off the assumption that belief is the most important element, and I have used storage seals thousands of time.

Much more than explosive seals. If the basis is that I must be confident that it will work, then I have a lot more faith in storage seals doing their job correctly and without turning into a danger to me or others if I fail than I do explosive seals. Going into my fuuinjutsu experimentation being sure that my seal will misfire and explode in my face seems like a really stupid move."

All about faith, huh? Mhh. He could probably... Yes. It might work. Best let Aiko try to work it out her own way though. He'd keep his solution for if she didn't manage anything before Naruto was back.

"I see. What part of this represents the current world, then?" he asked instead. Making Aiko think about how her rules worked was the best way he had to help her at this point.

"There isn't a representation of the normal state of things. It's not needed. The world will be the world without being ordered to act as normal. what I need to work on is crafting the pocket space in which to store things." Aiko answered promptly, taking out a standard sealing scroll to demonstrate how her approach had precedent.

"If the spirals are to act as springs, able to move, but that take their original place again after, then the spiral outward means a way of opening the pocket to the outside, so it's fine, but shouldn't there be a spiral inward too? To keep the sealed object in until you summon it again?"

Aiko stared at him. Blinked. Stared again. Then she snatched her prototype closer and started swearing.

Kakashi couldn't help the smile overtaking his face as Aiko grabbed a new page and started sketching again.

Mission accomplished.

He levered himself back to his feet and stretched.

The two hours of helping Aiko brainstorm had provided him with quite the break. It was time to go back to his conditioning exercises.

Aiko barely grunted at him when he told her he was going.

After some discussions, it was agreed that the kids would keep to their current training schedule with the Inuzuka until Naruto was back. Which was also when they would vacate the guest house. Tsume told them that there was no hurry. She had one pregnant member in the Clan at the moment, who preferred the comfort of her own home to isolating herself for safety.

Still. It was only courtesy to leave the house with enough time for their scents to air out before someone needed it. And Kakashi's apartment had not, in fact, gotten flattened by a summons, neither had Aiko's, Naruto's, Sasuke's or Sakura's parents' house, even if Sakura was very unenthusiastic at the idea of going back to them.

He sat his Kunoichi down for a talk. It was perfectly alright for her to have differences with her parents. She was adult by law, they had no authority over her if she wanted to move out.

But if she intended to move out, there was paperwork to fill to have her home address changed in the records. The address on the records was there so couriers could find her to give her urgent missions on short notice.

It meant that she could change her address to Sasuke's apartment without trouble. Moving herself into Kakashi's apartment was also possible, though it might prompt an investigation to make sure that nothing untoward of the abusing a position of authority kind was happening. She looked alarmed at this, and Kakashi shrugged and told her not to take it personally. Such systems were in place to ensure no genins got sexually abused by their senseis. Her being on his Clan's Summoning Contract would ease the procedure, since it made her something close to being his heir.

Sasuke then asked if he could move into Kakashi's apartment. The answer was pretty much the same. Clan's contract, heir. Except since Sasuke was an Uchiha, some people had a vested interest in Sasuke not being adopted to ensure the Uchiha Clan continued. On the other hand, if two of his students moved in, the sexual harassment possibility was considered lesser. On the other other hand, if two of his students moved in with him, there would be an investigation to assess favoritism in the disfavor of the one student not moving in with him.

His cute little genins deliberated and then decided that moving into Kakashi's place was something they needed to consider with Naruto, and that for the time being, Sakura would switch her address to Sasuke's place.

Kakashi didn't know if he should be flattered or not by how he wasn't even asked if he would allow the three gremlins to move into his place.

Well. Let's be honest. He would agree.

They were his Pack.

He wanted them as protected as possible.

He wanted his Den to smell like them.

Maybe he should start looking for a bigger apartment.

Or maybe he should get a contractor and build a cottage in his Clan Compound. That way he didn't have to live inside the house where his father... died. But they would still have space to run and train?

Well. He would think of that when Naruto was back.

Aiko took him on his impulsive offer to let her dress him on the day before the one Naruto would make it back home (as predicted by Katsuyu). She wanted him to have the outfit all ready to go for his belated birthday celebration.

As ordered, he put on one of his sleeveless shirts with an attached mask and some underwear he wouldn't mind being seen in too much under his jounin blues. And then he allowed his Pack Sister to bully him into a shop that he had never used before, but that he was pretty sure was an infiltration/seduction shop, from the large style choice available paired with how sturdy the fabrics were.

Both Aiko and the store clerks visibly had a blast making him try out a ton of outfits. Some were obviously just for the fun of it, like the full Geisha kimono he found himself stuffed into at one point. Or the male replica of Aiko's low risk mission uniform. But it was obvious that Aiko was assessing his reaction to everything, because pieces that he liked tended to reappear in later outfits.

A notable deviation to pieces reappearing in other outfits being the leather Hakama. It looked awesome, was much more comfortable than Kakashi would have guessed, and felt strong enough to make him feel secure. The price matched, though. And since Aiko intended to buy him the end outfit as his birthday gift, he understood why she didn't keep it in the running even after he tried it on. She had just wanted to put him in leather pants to see what it looked like, and it was the only one that wasn't so tight that he wouldn't even consider putting it on.

He might buy himself that Hakama anyway. It was really nice.

In the end, Aiko chose him pants in a slightly brighter blue than his uniform, and that were about as baggy as them, with a long cuff that tightened at the back of the calf with a corset-like lace-up. Kakashi took it as a reference to Aiko saying that she would love to see him in a corset, and appreciated her restraint. With tabi socks and sandals that were a callback to Waraji rice-straw woven sandals, except in more modern materials, and in black.

For the top, she ended up picking a dark grey hoodie that was incredibly soft, with 'Dog Person' printed in white on the front, thumb holes at the end of the sleeves that let him ditch his finger-less glove without feeling halfway naked, and pointy dog ears sewn to the hood, that Kakashi unironically loved. The hood's drawstrings had miniature bones hanging from them. It was ridiculous. But in a good way.

And then, she also made him ditch the hitai-ate in favor of a simple eye-patch and a zigzag hairband to pull his unruly puff of hair back.

He actually had fun.

Which was probably part of why he let Aiko attack him with an eye-liner to 'complete the look'.

The other reason, of course, was all the glorious double-take he garnered from just about any shinobi around on their way back to the Inuzuka compound.

There had been at least two spit-takes. And he was pretty sure that a Tokubetsu jounin had fallen from a tree out of shock.

Excellent entertainment.

Aiko obviously agreed with him, considering the snickers she kept muffling.

Since he felt particularly playful, he waited until a group of vaguely familiar jounins clocked him and stopped to stare, and then casually flipped the hood over his head. There was some clever fabric-based engineering in it to ensure that the base of the ears stuck vertically. The tips were floppy, though, and fell to either side of his head.

It was, once again, completely ridiculous. And yes, Kakashi still loved it. Loved it even more, in fact, when deploying it with strategic timing caused one of the vaguely familiar jounins to walk himself face-first into a wall.

Aiko almost chocked trying to keep her laughter silent.

Kakashi deliberately made it harder for her by tipping his head to the side, sending one ear flopping sideways while he sneakily used a chakra string to make the top one stand up straight.

Aiko actually collapsed on the ground from laughing too hard.

Mission accomplished.

The Inuzuka at the Compound entrance gave him compliments on the hoodie, which he knew were perfectly sincere. As was the question of where he bought it.

Inuzuka were Inuzuka. Wearing a hood with attached dog ears wasn't even really a joke to them.

Kakashi refused to tell them. But the few sniffs he had fielded on his way through meant the guards should be able to track the shop down on their own by scent.

He would have to resign himself to having copy-cats.

Heh. Copy Cats.

Notes:

Aiko's storage seals on the left, and Kakashi during and after the shopping trip

I screwed up the first seal drawing! the spirals are supposed to curl outward, like a purse... The kanji in the middle of the seal is Mono, meaning object/stuff. Also, the triangle, being an extremely stable structure, represent the fact that the object must be moved inside of the seal without having the seal's support move at all. so, put this inside a pocket that is not present in the physical world. Something like that.
I tried to find the best japanese kanjis to write 'dog person' in a way that can mean either dog lover of person who is a dog... Not sure I managed...

Chapter 63: Naruto's return (end of Search for Tsunade arc)

Summary:

Naruto is very happy to be back in Konoha.

Notes:

Trigger Warning: there is some fairly graphic description of the gory effect of shoving a Rasengan in anyone who's not a S-Rank ninja toward the end of the chapter. I put the double lines before and after it, just in case. Be safe.

Chapter Text

Naruto was very, very happy to see Konoha's gates.

Tsunade-oba was awesome, of course, and Shizune was nice. Jiraiya... could probably be worse.

Still. He missed his team. Katsuyu-oba told him about how they all were. Kakashi-nii had woken up, and Sakura only needed her nervous system fixed. Things were okay for them.

But he wanted snuggles! Kakashi was always happy when he crawled over him to sleep. Sure, Aiko-nee and Kaka-Sensei would usually restrain him a bit when he slept with them so he didn't hit anyone in his sleep, but it was a hug! It was nice and warm and safe.

Jiraiya-oo-ji-sensei pushed him away if he got to close in his sleep. And Tsunade-oba smelled way too much like alcohol to want to be close to her for hours.

The only warning he got was a growl.

And then, he was flattened to the ground by the impact in his back.

It was only Kakashi-sensei's insistence on ambushing him all the damn time in the time before Sasuke and Sakura competed in the tournament that kept him from eating the ground.

He tucked his torso in a ball, letting the impact and weight roll him forth, and used his arms to avoid hitting his head as he tumbled. There was a grunt as his assailant got flattened under him in his maneuver, and then a squeak as he launched another opponent forth with his legs.

He gave a good jab with his elbow into the body under him, and sprung back to his feet, scanning for his opponents.

Only to identify Sakura by her pink hair just as she lunged for his legs again with another growl. Sasuke was silent as he jumped on his back, but Naruto recognized him by his pale skin and spiky black hair.

Well.

Who else would be able to ambush him right inside of the gate, really.

They must have stuck themselves to the inside of the wall to lay in wait. With Aiko-nee and Kaka-sensei acting as their baits by waiting for him well in view. That explained his sensei's mischievous smiles, too.

Knowing that these were his teammates and he was in no actual danger, Naruto gave a growl of his own and threw himself backward, intending to both kick Sakura and flatten Sasuke once more.

In the same move, he grabbed his small Katsuyu-oba fragment from his shoulder and threw her toward Tsunade-oba so she wouldn't get squished in the shuffle. Even if it wouldn't really hurt Katsuyu, Naruto didn't want her to be squished either way. It was always very painful to see.

Except Sakura latched onto him with her chakra strings and moved right along with him, not giving him enough clearance for a good kick, and Sasuke managed to slip a bit to the side, meaning he ended up only half-flattened.

Things got a lot less strategic afterward. Especially after Sasuke bit him.

When Naruto pinned Sasuke down in revenge, Sakura smoothly turned her coat and joined him in tickling Sasuke until he tapped out between his peals of laughter.

Tickling Sasuke was one of their only opportunities to hear him laugh, but Aiko-nee had been very clear on the subject of consent and respecting when someone said no, so if Sasuke tapped out, they stopped with the tickling. No insisting.

Thankfully, Sasuke hated to admit defeat, so they generally got to get some tickling in before he tapped out.

Of course, as soon as Sasuke had his breath back, he lunged on Naruto and pinned him to the ground. Sakura turned her loyalties again and attacked him with tickles too.

Once his beloved and dearly missed teammates were done torturing him with tickles and let him up, he finally could see his two senseis. They were grinning at him, which immediately made him smile back too. His people were happy. Kakashi-sensei was awake and walking on his own, and Aiko-nee looked good too. Relaxed. Laughing at their antics.

He did notice that Kakashi-sensei wasn't in his uniform, though. It was a bit hard to miss. His hoodies had dog ears sewn on, after all.

Next to them, Tsunade was also smiling at them, even if she looked a bit happy-sad. Wishful. Right. The Oro-guy was her genin teammate, and Hokage-jiji was her sensei. Her other teammate was the lecher that liked talking to her boobs rather than to her face, too. She probably hadn't had a tickle battle in decades. That was really sad.

Naruto extended his hand down to Sakura to help her up once he was standing, but she slapped his hand away and stood all on her own.

He blinked and looked at her feet. "Wow. Katsuyu-oba was right! You're getting good at this scarily fast! Just wait one year and everyone will be pissing their pants when they see you!"

Sakura blushed at his compliment and Naruto grinned at Sasuke. It was a good thing that Aiko-nee had given them a lesson on how best to pay a kunoichi compliments after Lee tried to flirt with Sakura and got the hugest cold shoulder ever.

Aiko-nee had done a joint lesson with team Gai to teach them how to actually pay compliments. Naruto might not have gotten all of it. But saying to girls how scary, intelligent, skilled and hard-working they are was a pretty clear rule. Tenten sure loved to hear it during Aiko's demonstration.

"So you're the brat who's nerves I have to reconnect?" Tsunade-oba asked with just about the habitual amount of bluntness. "You look much more mobile than expected for someone with no command of their lower legs."

Sakura grinned like a shark and sauntered over to Kakashi-sensei, linked his hands and slung his arms over her head so she could grasp his arms securely. "It's chakra strings!" She chirped.

Then Sakura closed her eyes and breathed out. When she moved again, she was bracing hard on sensei's arms. She lifted her right leg and shook it, the foot went floppy and uncontrolled.

"I still have the knee on this one." Sakura explained seriously, sounding like she hadn't been extremely hurt by losing control in her own body. "So I can kind of walk with it even without the strings. So long as I brace the ankle. The other is more..."

And Sakura put her leg down, fussed with the placement of her foot and shifted her weight a couple of time before lifting her other leg. This one went floppy right at the knee and it was really disturbing to see the way half of her leg just swayed limply.

"But Katsuyu-sama says you can fix it." Sakura finished with a smile. "And in the meantime, Sasuke helped me figure out how to move my feet to walk and run and jump with my chakra strings.."

"It will take dozens of hours, it will be painful, and you will need to be conscious for all of it." Tsunade-oba informed Sakura flatly.

Maybe she was trying to scare Sakura into reconsidering, but Naruto's teammate only nodded seriously. "I understand. You are Hokage, and there are probably tons of things you need to be doing right now." Sakura answered politely. "I will present myself when summoned."

Naruto blinked in shock. Sakura intended to wait? After being so desperate?

He shot he legs another look. Well. Katsuyu had healed her enough so she could be mobile again, even if she wasn't all healed up. It was probably easier to be patient while standing on her own two legs. And Kakashi was also awake and well. There was nothing his team needed all that urgently.

"Now that Naruto is back, we're celebrating Sensei's birthday!" Sakura grinned. "At Sasuke's apartment. It's also going to be our moving in party!"

Naruto blinked, and looked at Sakura, then Aiko-sensei, who pointed to Kaka-sensei. Then he looked at Kakashi-nii, then at Sakura again, then at Sasuke. Huh.

" 'Our' moving in party? Who's our?" He asked slowly.

"You and I, dummy!" Sakura beamed. "We left the Inuzuka guest house this morning, cause they actually will need it at some point and it's best if it doesn't smell like us by then. And we agreed that we were going to wait for you to decide if we wanted to move in with Sensei. So for now, Sasuke's apartment is the best choice."

Naruto blinked rapidly to ward off the prickles inside his nose. No crying! He needed to answer, damn it. "You would let me?" He rasped at Sasuke, with his voice coming out a bit wetter than he would have liked.

"Hn. Why wouldn't I? Dobe." Sasuke answered with a nonchalant shrug which did nothing to hide his cheeks turning pink.

Naruto took it has his cue to jump on his friend and hug him tight. He ignored the squirming that got him, since Sasuke liked to pretend he didn't like hugs to preserve his image. So long as he didn't give and actual double slap of his palm to tap out, it meant he was just pretending to be uncomfortable rather than actually being uncomfortable.

"Why wouldn't I want to move in with Kakashi-nii?" Naruto asked once Sasuke had stopped squirming and started making a very exaggerated grumpy face so he could pretend he wasn't enjoying the hug for the onlookers.

It had taken him a moment to think about the second part of Sakura's declaration. Alright. He wasn't slow! He just got a bit distracted by how Sakura and Sasuke wanted him to be with them. It was all.

"Maa... Maybe because my place isn't big enough for four? And maybe I don't want you little menaces in my way 24/7?" Kaka-sensei drawled. Naruto looked at Sakura and then Sasuke, and they lifted their eyebrows up and gave a disbelieving stare in sync. They had practiced hard to achieve it. Both personally, to imitate Aiko-nee's 'unimpressed by your bullshit' stare, and together, to learn to do it at the exact same time.

"Alright!" Sakura exclaimed like Kakashi-nii hadn't spoken at all. "We're going to celebrate Sensei's birthday and our moving-in party at Sensei's place!"

Aiko-nee snorted and then started wheezing silently, leaning hard on Kakashi-sensei's shoulder to stay upright. Even Tsunade laughed.

Naruto grinned back at Sakura and let go of Sasuke. He made a little motion with his two palms flat and pushed them forward a little to convey his idea. It wasn't whatever secret language Senseis used together, but they had decided to make up their own. If Aiko-nee and Sensei could pass secret messages with their hands while they were here, so should they.

Sakura nodded and Sasuke was already sneaking closer to Sensei.

They probably didn't actually surprise Sensei when they all crowded behind him and started pushing him toward the inside of the village, but he let them, so it meant they were winning.

Aiko-nee choked and started laughing even harder when they all had to push as hard as they could just to make Kakashi-sensei take one single step.

"Maa. So impatient. Genins those days." Kakashi-sensei taunted them with a snicker of his own. And then he took one more step, slow and relaxed like he was on an afternoon stroll. He was taunting them on purpose.

Apparently, Aiko-nee got over her laughing fit, because it was definitely her who cleared her throat. Aiko-nee had a particular throat-clearing noise that made people feel extra sheepish.

"Aren't you forgetting something?" She asked with lifted eyebrows, but also with a smile that said that she wasn't actually mad. Naruto blinked and tilted his head in thought, but couldn't think of anything.

Aiko smiled more and put her hands together in the sign that meant hug in their secret sign language. Which... Apparently was less secret than they had hoped. Dang.

But well, it wasn't like it was a hard request to do, so Naruto nodded at his teammates and left his spot behind Kakashi-sensei to go give Aiko-nee a hug.

Aiko laughed happily and squeezed him firmly before ruffling his hair. "Thanks." She said with a wink, before leaning down to kiss his forehead. He was really thinking about putting his forehead protector around his neck like Sakura. It wasn't fair that she was the only one to get forehead kisses that were actually on the skin. "I meant Kakashi, though." She whispered wish a little amused wheeze. "He doesn't like to show it, but he really misses having your scent on him."

Oh!

Right!

Aiko-nee rarely asked things for herself, after all.

And hugging Kaka-nii wasn't a hardship either.

Hmm. It could even be fun!

Naruto smiled widely and feinted like he was about to go back to his spot pushing Sensei, then at the last moment, he took a running start and leaped at Kakashi-sensei's torso. Kaka-sensei had gotten really used to catching them, with Sakura swinging around in trees, so he reflexively caught Naruto when he hit his chest.

Win!

So Naruto did exactly what he was asked and wrapped his arms and legs around Kaka-nii and gave him a good long hug. He even rubbed his face into Kakashi's neck to make sure his scent would stick in.

Kakashi-sensei squeezed him tight and gave a really low rumble that only Naruto really heard before putting his nose right into his hair.

Yes!

Mission success!

Naruto turned his head a little so he could see Aiko-nee and gave her a wide grin and a thumbs up. He couldn't help but preen a little when she returned it just as fast.

He really had missed his team.

Then Aiko-nee rubbed her fingers together and frowned. "You really need to wash you hair though." She grumped. "So greasy. Go on, get to Kakashi's apartment and get washed up, I'll pick up lunch for us."

"Ramen!" Naruto exclaimed hopefully, only to get slapped on the butt by Sakura.

"It's Kakashi's birthday meal, Naruto!" Sakura nagged. "He gets to chose!"

"Ramen?" He tried again, turning to give Kaka-nii his most pitiful puppy eyes. He was at close range, right in front of his face! It had to work even better!

"No. We're getting salt-broiled saury and miso soup with eggplants." Kakashi-sensei answered flatly, before dropping Naruto back to the ground. ... He really needed to work on his puppy eyes. "Your birthday is in four days, you can pick Ramen then."

Oh! Right! He was about to turn thirteen!

Naruto took his place behind Kakashi again and resumed pushing him toward his home.

He only really registered Kakashi telling Tsunade-oba that she could ask for some Hayate guy at the hospital if she wanted a really though patient to heal right away because it made him look over his shoulder and see Tsunade smiling at them.

After that, Kakashi started letting them push him forth, even if he kept a pace only slightly above that of a snail. Katsuyu-oba would totally have bee able to keep up with them if she had been moving on the ground on her own.

Well. She wasn't. Because the fragment that usually rode on his shoulder had decided to stay with Tsunade, and the fragment that had stayed with his team for over a month was with Aiko-nee. But he could live without his Summons for about an hour until Aiko-nee joined them.

Kakashi-nii definitely had old man tastes. Salt broiled saury, honestly. Everyone took turns teasing him about it until Kakashi got fed up with it, jumped over the table grabbed them all in one arm before giving them all a noogie one after the other.

Aiko-nee didn't even move a finger to rescue them! She simply laughed at their expense!

...

It really felt like a true family.

Especially when Katsuyu started berating them about respecting their elders. Which totally made Kakashi whine that he wasn't even that old, come on, elder?

Sakura cheerfully piped up that twenty seven was positively ancient, and got her hair all messed up for the slight.

Naruto felt like his face might start aching from how hard he was smiling.

He was just so happy.

It had been too good to last, hadn't it?

All the day after coming back home had been so happy, so of course he had to pay the price now.

Naruto sniffled pitifully.

It did nothing to move Aiko-nee.

She kept staring at him just as hard with the exact same displeased expression.

Sasuke, Sakura, and even Kakashi gave him vaguely pitying glances from their own places around the bed, but they definitely didn't do anything to call Aiko-nee's attention on themselves.

Aiko-nee kept staring at him thunderously.

Naruto felt tears start to sting at his eyelids. Aiko-nee was angry at him!

What had he even done during the night?

After one more minute of Aiko-nee glaring with her arms crossed, Sakura took pity on him. "Katsuyu-sama told us how your fight went."

His immediate, impulsive reaction was probably the worse one could have had, actually. "Oh, yeah! I was so awesome!" He bragged thoughtlessly, only to freeze solid at the look of furious disappointment on Aiko-nee's face.

Oh, no.

He finally understood what was happening!

Aiko-nee had also glared at Sakura with her arms crossed after that preliminary fight with the Suna Puppeteer. Until... She... Apologized.

Damn.

He had started out in the absolute wrong direction. Once again.

He always said the wrong thing around Aiko-nee.

"I'm sorry." He mumbled to his knees, hunching his shoulders inward.

Silence.

He glanced up at Aiko and panicked a bit that she was still staring. At least until she made a small turning gesture with her pointer finger.

Ah. Naruto had been absolutely wrong when he said that a long lecture was worse than telling Aiko what they had done wrong. This was so much worse.

"I..." He tried to think back on the fight. Aiko-nee was upset. What would have upset her? "I... Put myself in danger?" He tried. At the time, it had looked like his best chance to get a hit in, but Aiko-nee didn't like them gambling their well-being. Getting close to the bone user, face first had been a gamble.

Aiko-nee hummed and then tilted her head sideways.

Ah. Huh. "I'm really really sorry? I won't do it again."

Aiko-nee sighed. Really deeply. She sounded so disappointed. "No. If you can't even say what you did wrong, you will most definitely do it again." She answered flatly. "Fine. You get a hint. Why did you use a technique you hadn't even fully mastered at a critical point in battle when failing it could have killed you, Naruto?"

He opened his mouth, thought for a moment and then cringed.

Oh. Alright.

That was pretty bad.

He had put himself in that position all on his own, though. Nothing else to do than bear the consequences like a man. "Because if I did it right, then it was the most powerful technique I had." He glanced up at Aiko's stony face and hunched in further. "Which you told me was the worst logic to go by. And that it was dangerous to think that I'm invincible because I have a strong technique. And that it can get me or my friends killed." He swallowed and thought back to the fight, then sighed. "There were a lot of other stuff I know that I could have used then that were less likely to fail and that wouldn't have put me in his range to get stabbed by pointy bone tips. But I was too stuck on wanting to master the Rasengan, so I didn't even attempt them first."

Aiko nodded and then uncrossed her arms with a sigh and sat on the side of the bed. Then she opened her arms so he could lunge in for a hug.

So maybe he cried a bit into Aiko-nee's shoulder. She wasn't going to tell.

"Kakashi originaly wanted to teach Sasuke his Chidori before the Third Stage." Aiko said gently. "I told him not to. Do you want to know why?"

Naruto blinked and looked over to Sasuke. He looked more curious than angry, so he nodded.

"Because I can think of very few worse ways to have your first kill than by shoving your bare hand through someone's rib-cage." Aiko-nee said flatly. "When the lightning goes out, you will end up feeling blood and muscles and shards of bones all along your arm. You will have their blood splattered all over you. You will be right in front of their face. See the life leave their eyes first-hand."

Naruto felt his jaw fall and his eyes water at the description. Next to him, Sasuke was looking much paler than usual, and Sakura was already crawling into Kakashi's lap to give him a hug, because that was horrible for him.

Aiko sighed again. "I'm not saying that just to say it, Naruto. think about my description, and think about what the Rasengan is supposed to do. You were very lucky, in the end, that your opponent was so far from normal. If things had been any different, you would have ended up wearing your first kill. He would have exploded all up in your face and literally showered you in gore. It was horribly irresponsible of Jiraiya to teach that jutsu to you when you're so young. And it's even worse that he first demonstrated it to you by using it on someone. A civilian, no less. It set a precedent that it was okay to use Rasengan on people. It really isn't. Not unless you want that person completely and irrevocably dead. And with a huge chunk missing right in the middle."

Naruto felt very, very cold, all of a sudden. The image. It stuck. It stuck hard. He had seen what the Rasengan did to a tree. Jiraiya showed him. And he...

He hurriedly let go of Aiko and ran to the toilets to throw up.

Oh.

Oh, no.

Why hadn't Jiraiya... Said anything?

When he came back, his whole team had moved into a group hug, and Naruto squirmed right in. He really needed the cuddles.

Aiko patted his hair for a minute before speaking again. "The other reason I was against teaching the Chidori also applies to the Rasengan, so I think you should hear it too."

Naruto swallowed and nodded.

Aiko-nee smiled at him gently and then spoke. "Don't worry. It's not the same thing. I just dislike teaching any of you techniques that involve launching yourself bodily at your powerful enemies, face first. It's the worst type of habit you can learn. Especially so early in your training."

Okay. She was right. It didn't make him feel squeamish. A bit sheepish about charging at his enemy face first. Because that was super dangerous. Objectively. But not like he needed to run back to the toilets.

The Rasengan might be a super showy, powerful jutsu. But Naruto wouldn't be using it.

At least not until he had his actual first kill.

He would like to never have to kill anyone. Ever. But... Not everyone could be turned around like Gaara and Zabuza.

Aiko had had to kill Gato. And Kakashi killed the guy who stabbed Aiko-nee in the chest.

One day, Naruto too would have no choice but to kill.

But Aiko-nee was right.

When this day came, he would prefer not having the person he killed splattered all over him.

Sakura was awesome, and she helped him lose the mental image by starting to rant about all the ways that Jiraiya was horrible and what they ought to do to him.

When she said that Kakashi hadn't even given Jiraiya the autorisation to steal Naruto, he set his mouth and started to scheme in earnest.

Kakashi and Aiko only smirked and watched them happily, so Naruto concluded that they were okay with letting them prank the hell out of the old pervert.

Chapter 64: Schemes (downtime)

Summary:

Kakashi trains back up to mission capability and ties his loose ends up.

Notes:

Woohoo! I'm on a roll! So many ideas!
Don't get too used to it, though. This is the part where I have a lot of stuff that I want to write.
The obligatory 'Orochimaru goes after Sasuke' arc is much less exciting to me.

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

Kakashi didn't slack off on his re-training.

He considered doing it, for a little while.

A month long coma was a wonderful excuse to plead field-unreadyness, at least for a while. It would let him stay close to his pack.

But being loyal to Konoha... It was most of his sense of identity. Now there was also his Pack. But the loyalty had been his only reason to keep on living for over a decade. Dereliction of duty right when his village was at it's weakest and needed him the most... He couldn't do that.

So he trained. Rebuilt his muscle tone and honed his reflexes.

And he spent each day of it dreading the moment when he would have to declare himself fit for duty.

Only Aiko really saw it.

The boys were too absorbed by their training. And Sakura too involved in her own treatment and subsequent re-training.

Sakura's healing ended up being portioned in two hours sessions every day. It was painful and needed active participation from Sakura, so the Hokage scheduled it as a break from paperwork crunching on her end.

The entire team came along for moral support on the first session, so they knew what it entailed.

Tsunade needed Sakura conscious and cooperating because while she could tell which severed nerve moved what from the foot up quite easily, telling which part of the nerve cluster coming down from the head was meant to move what was much harder. Much of the session was asking Sakura to try and move something, which she didn't have, so that Tsunade-sama could tell which nerve fiber went to which muscle commend.

According to Tsunade-sama, Sakura's mental plasticity, from being young, would allow her to rewire her commend if motor nerves were connected slightly wrong. But it would dramatically decrease her recovery time if she had the nerves connected correctly from the get-go.

The very first session was very frustrating for Sakura, because even though she tried to cooperate, moving a limb was not about thinking. She knew that she couldn't move her legs, so even if she thought about the movement, she didn't actually fire off the impulses to move things.

Tsunade-sama overcame that by selecting a random pain receptor and giving it a sharp jolt with chakra. When a reflexive flinch response came, she asked Sakura where she felt pain, and what muscle groups moved in preservation.

Apparently, that was what unlocked Sakura's ability to pretend that she was moving her legs so Tsunade could verify which nerves fired with her healing chakra, and reconnect them.

It helped that Sakura took a sharp interest in the process and used a diagnostic jutsu on herself to try and see what Tsunade-sama was seeing and doing.

According to Sakura, seeing her nerves light up in response to her orders helped her model how to give said orders correctly.

Kakashi felt perfectly comfortable not really understanding what she meant but being proud of her for her achievement anyway.

The emotion-laden subject had to come back, eventually.

With her treatment well underway, Sakura was no longer on the edge of impotency fueled breakdown. It meant that it was time to address her dangerous chakra self-experimentation.

Which meant it was also time to address her ambition to be adopted.

The harder part for Kakashi about that was probably how much he didn't really mind said ambitions.

The Wolf was firmly of the opinion that The pups were his. His pups, his. So, having the girl recognize him and wanting to stake a clear claim in turn was not only natural, it was flattering and a sign that he was doing his job well.

For the Wolf, if his pup wanted to publicly carry the mark of being his, it had to mean that she wanted everyone to know who was Protecting her, because it would make her feel Safe, and so he just had to do as she wished.

Wolves didn't grasp luck or superstitions. So the Wolf understood nothing of not wanting his little fragile pup to be linked to him, who had lost everyone he loved so far. At a stretch, the Wolf would understand people wanting to use his baby as leverage, but even then, its only response was, "then claim the pup, and rip up anything that gets too close to her until the message that she is well Protected is understood".

The Wolf somewhat understood wanting to hide his pups, because that made sense, but it was of the opinion that since the pups were now old enough and strong enough to hunt on their own, hiding them would make them weaker in the long run, so he needed to let them hunt and keep an eye on them to kill any other predator who tried to eat them.

When the Wolf was being obtuse, it didn't go halfway.

Unfortunately for Kakashi, Aiko was just as uncompromising. And also not above tattling to Inoichi that he was letting his self-esteem issues hamper his clear thinking.

Kakashi ended up cornered into having the dreaded adoption conversation with Sakura.

Ah.

No.

That would be too easy.

He ended up being cornered into having the dreaded 'you're doing dangerous experimentation with your chakra unsupervised and it's bad' conversation with Sakura. Though thankfully Aiko shouldered most of it.

Then they worked out an agreement that Sakura would only continue her experiments once Tsunade had monitored her actions and could confirm that it would be safe for her, and that she had to use Pakkun instead of Kokoro for it, because he was older and more mature, and better versed in the concept of caution. Kakashi would be the one to summon Pakkun, and would then transfer the ninken's upkeep to Sakura by putting a bit of his blood on her hand and having her take up the summoning. It would still take more to upkeep than her own personal summons, but it was safer than messing around with her chakra with the help of a puppy.

Only then, did he have the dreaded adoption discussion. But he didn't just have it with Sakura.

Oh, no.

Aiko insisted that he absolutely couldn't exclude the boys from the adoption discussion. It would make them feel rejected.

So he needed to have another talk with the boys about how adopting them officially was absolutely impossible. Sasuke was the last of a Clan that Konoha had to keep a token member of to preserve their standing, and Naruto was the Jinchuuriki, so it would be ill received for it to seem like he had more loyalty for Kakashi over the village.

Even though of course Naruto had more loyalty for him and his team than for the village. The village had been treating him like crap since he was a baby. That was not how one fostered loyalty.

Naruto got such a dejected expression on when Kakashi explained that Sakura, being a civilian born, had no such obstacles to adoption.

Thankfully, Aiko saved him from his fearful confusion. "Naruto, come, give your sensei a hug." Aiko intervened gently. "He doesn't intend to hurt you. Sometimes, the situations are just bad." Once Naruto was safely in Kakashi's arms listening intently to the sub-vocal rumble that the Wolf helped him make to soothe pups, she kept on talking. "I know it might feel like rejection. You got neither the Hatake Summoning Contracts, nor an official adoption."

Wait? This was what it was about? The Summoning Contracts? Kakashi thought Naruto was over that. He had understood that the Hatake Contracts were not suitable for him, and he was happy being the Slug Summoner, wasn't he? Katsuyu-sama was the reason he had managed to save Sakura and Sasuke after Gaara hurt them.

"Sometimes our feelings aren't rational." Aiko spoke gently while stroking Naruto's head. "I know that you know that Kakashi never wants to exclude you on purpose. And I know that even knowing that isn't enough not to feel a bit excluded anyway. Explaining things you already know all over again won't help with your feelings, because feelings are irrational. But maybe I can give you a distraction? Your current name, Uzumaki. It's why you can call Tsunade-sama oba-san. Only you are her family. And if you were a Hatake, you would lose a part of your connection to your chosen aunt, wouldn't you?"

Naruto tilted his head and pursed his lips, then nodded. "Yeah. I would." He nodded decisively and crossed his arms the way he did when he was thinking 'profound thoughts' then, he grinned and nodded again. "Yeah, you're right! Thanks Aiko-nee, that really helped!"

Kakashi had a bad feeling about the determined expression his pup was sporting, but at least he wasn't dejected anymore.

Heh. It was probably fine.

Naruto got fixated and enthusiastic about weird things sometimes. He probably just hatched a master-plan about giving Tsunade-sama flowers, or something.

It was fine.

Aha.

Why wouldn't the bad feeling go?

Sakura was placated by Kakashi's promise to adopt her as soon as the fires related to the invasion were all put out and Kakashi would be able to be present to protect her through the uproar that would come with her official adoption and name change.

About a week into Sakura getting daily treatment From Tsunade, her right leg was all reconnected on the movement side of things, and her pain receptors, pressure receptors and stretching receptors were also connected. There was still heat and cold to do on that leg, and then the ones that weren't consciously processed, like blood pressure, but Tsunade-sama was sure she would get all that in less than half a week. Especially since Sakura had an helpful chakra voice that eased the work greatly.

Kakashi was a bit hurt that Sakura had taken so long to let him know about her native chakra voice.

And he was also very proud that she kept a trump card secret, since that was very good ninja behavior.

Anyway. A week in, Tsunade's ANBU guard detail had gotten used to them, and no longer watched them like hawks all through the procedure.

Which made it a perfect opportunity to pass Tsunade-sama a message in secret.

Sakura was trilled to be entrusted with the mission to discreetly pass Kakashi's coded note to Tsunade-sama during her treatment.

Passing the information through Katsuyu-sama was an approach he had considered, but somethings were just better not being said out loud at all.

A secret meeting and a written report to be incinerated after the fact were much more secure.

Especially when one was about to go after Shimura Danzo.

Kakashi steeled himself and used a camouflage jutsu before scaling the wall.

He had already washed, applied the scent hiding jutsu and put on clean, odorless clothes before leaving.

He was in full ANBU stealth and wearing a carnival mask and a wig along with his old ANBU uniform, so that even if a spy saw him, it wouldn't be traced to him.

Now he only needed to scale the wall of the hospital and break into Hayate's hospital room.

The message that Sakura had successfully palmed to the Hokage was to let her know that he had information to give her that were sensitive and important to the village. It also had Hayate's recovery room as a meeting place, a meeting hour, and Tenzo and Yugao's masks listed as trustworthy backups. He also added Inoichi, Shikaku and Ibiki as possible non-ANBU backup, in case she suspected him of being a traitor and giving him other traitor's masks. That way, if she distrusted him at first and wanted to bring in a neutral third party, they were less likely to end up being spies for Danzo.

Just to be sure, Kakashi was also coming in half an hour early.

It would allow him to sweep for listening devices, seals or jutsu, and to install his own privacy arrays.

No way was he fucking around when he finally had an opportunity to get rid of the old war-hawk.

Even if it meant waiting for an hour in the horrible, sterile antiseptic smell of the hospital.

Tsunade-sama showed up ten minutes late. Probably a way to remind him of the power balance. It didn't matter, since she did come.

With her, she did have Tenzo and Yugao as her ANBU escorts. Which gave him hopes of being listened to. She also was accompanied by Shikaku, who was ostensibly here to discuss strategic things as to avoid losing time while she did her hospital rounds. Even better.

Kakashi waited until the door was firmly closed to activate his privacy seal and drop down into the corner of the room that couldn't be watched from the window.

He bowed to his knee, ANBU style, and put down his painstakingly detailed report on everything he knew about Danzo's dealings and spying. It had never been enough to get Sarutobi to move, but Tsunade wasn't burdened by the same camaraderie. Plus. Kakashi had an additional severed head to use as proof.

Shikaku helpfully retrieved the report, put into a medical style clipboard so that Tsunade could pretend that she was reviewing Hayate's charts, with his shadow jutsu, and handed it over to the Hokage after confirming that there was no trap in it. His eyebrows definitely climbed up when he skimmed the contents, and he gave Kakashi's non-ANBU mask a very piercing stare while Tsunade-sama read the report.

When Tsunade-sama was done reading, which took over ten minutes with how much information Kakashi had, she raised her head and opened her mouth.

Kakashi quickly signed 'no words, unfriendly ears everywhere suspicion'.

Tsunade's expression turned thunderous, and she made to sign back, but Kakashi interrupted her again. 'Signs not safe. Suspect unfriendly spy. Blind spot here.' before pointing to the other side of the window where he was still kneeling in wait.

Tsunade growled and slapped the clipboard down in demonstrative anger, before rounding the bed to start her chakra treatment of Hayate.

Tsunade-sama might have wasted decades of her life to grief, gambling and sake, but she was a ninja all the same. deception and discretion ran in her veins.

Shikaku nonchalantly picked the clipboard back up and pretended to be bored while he also read it. Just like he was reviewing it to pass time while Tsunade was absorbed with her jutsu.

Once he was done, the Nara swapped Kakashi's report with the actual medical clipboard and used his shadows to send the incriminating eyes only report to Kakashi, who immediately burned it, to further drive in the need for absolute secrecy.

Less than a minute later, Tsunade leaned back on her seat, right into the blind spot, and barked for Shikaku to hand her some damn sake.

After that, Kakashi spent ten more minutes answering all of Tsunade's signed question with his own ANBU sign language, while she pretended to get drunk and shoot the breeze with Shikaku, who also added his own questions in by forming kanjis with his shadow.

As the final nail in Danzo's proverbial coffin, Kakashi took out the sealing scroll in which he had put Kabuto's head and put it down on the ground with a signed suggestion to have Cat open it and show his own tongue to Tsunade.

It was a good thing that Tenzo trusted Kakashi unconditionally and that he had an eye for physiology, because he didn't hesitate one second to sneak his way into Kakashi's corner, open the scroll there, next to Kakashi to prove that there was nothing dangerous in it, and sneak to Tsunade's side in the other blind spot with the head so she could examine it.

Nor did he hesitate to show off his own tongue as a comparison point.

Yugao didn't hesitate either to come to Kakashi's side to give her supporting testimony that she had participated in rescuing Tenzo from Danzo's ROOT, and that the seal on his tongue was a silence seal to keep him from sharing anything about Danzo, that all ROOT members had.

At Shikaku's question on why the seal was there on the severed head when it hadn't been noticed when the traitor was in custody, Kakashi explained about the other seal under Kabuto's tongue, that was there to hide the fact that he had a ROOT seal. Probably because Kabuto was a trained spy. and that the seal failed upon death, when it stopped being fed chakra.

He had examined the seals, and concluded that the entire body was supposed to self-incinerate upon death. But that function had been overwritten. In Orochimaru's style.

It might have been done to allow Kabuto to put himself in a state of fake death, like Zabuza during the Wave mission, without getting incinerated for it. But in any case, the lack of self-combustion was an incredible boon, because it allowed them to link Danzo to a known traitor who was instrumental in the invasion of Konoha by Sand and Sound.

Once Yugao brought Tsunade the storage scroll to put the head back in, and Tsunade tucked it between her breast, where it was well hidden and she had every reason to punch someone who looked too closely, Kakashi jumped back to the ceiling and applied his camouflage jutsu again.

He waited an hour after Tsunade left to be sure that the coast was clear before exiting Hayate's room by the window again.

Ugh. He stunk of hospital. He would need to take a shower as soon as he came home.

Kakashi would have thought he could relax a bit once this major point was taken care of.

Unfortunately, Naruto decided to reveal exactly what he had been scheming since the adoption conversation the next time they came to Tsunade-sama's office.

By slapping down an adoption form on the Hokage's desk.

An adoption form to adopt Tsunade as an Uzumaki.

This kid.

Honestly.

Thankfully, Tsunade-sama was more endeared than angered by this antic, and only told Naruto that she would think of it carefully.

On the same day that Kakashi dropped by the mission room to declare himself fit for duty, the children asked him to take a trip by T&I so they could ask someone something in relation to their pranking project.

Kakashi was totally endeared by their deliberate vagueness. (They were learning the basics of operational security! His pups were growing so fast!) And took them there without complaint. He even only dragged his feet a little.

His genins were evil geniuses.

Kakashi would fight anyone who said otherwise.

Their pranking idea was to have Anko put on a wig and dress and pretend to flirt with Jiraiya.

And when he tried to grope her, she could have one of her concealed summoned snakes pop out from between her breasts or thighs and bite him.

Even Anko was enamored with their viciousness and barely even gave them a hard time while asking why she would do that.

And yet, Sakura still knocked that ball right out of the park by justifying that since Anko usually wore so little, they had thought her more likely to accept using her body for something, like seductions specialists were, and also, being a snake summoner, asking her in particular to pull something of this kind would be much more likely to inflict even more mental scaring. Especially once Jiraiya figured out her identity. Because of his past with Orochimaru.

When Anko pretended to be unmoved, Naruto went on to sweeten the deal, by telling Anko that Jiraiya was an horrible sucked for a pair of boobs, and that so long as she wore something that flattered her cleavage, he would no doubt buy her anything she asked so long as she asked before doing the snake trick. Also, Jiraiya was an enemy of all women and traumatizing him out of his gropy habits was a reward of it's own.

Kakashi relished in the dead silence and admiring stares from everyone in earshot. That was right. He had the best genins. Everyone ought to be in awe of them and be jealous of him for having the best team.

Even if traumatizing Jiraiya about women was likely to slow down his writing of Icha Icha...

Ibiki even intercepted the kids on their way out ans asked them if they had ever considered T&I.

His team was going to be a tracking and capture, high combat team.

Ibiki had no chance of poaching them.

Sucks to suck.

Notes:

Who forgot about Kabuto's head? I didn't! And Tsunade isn't about to, either!

Chapter 65: Aiko's pride (end of downtime)

Summary:

Aiko watches her genins grow.

Notes:

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Chapter Text

Aiko sat on Kakashi's bed, just as he requested and listened to what he was doing in the living room.

It was a bit weird, but alright. She trusted that he wanted her to learn something from eavesdropping.

Maybe a subject the kids wouldn't be comfortable talking about to her? She had done her best to put the children at ease, so she really wondered what subject Kakashi thought would be discussed better without her.

"Hey, Naruto, do you want to prepare a surprise for Aiko?" Well. That was interesting.

She smiled at the enthusiastic and slightly too loud reply and the shuffles and three curious voices that answered instead of one. Her genins were adorable.

"See, Aiko has been working on Fuuinjutsu since you left Konoha." There was some paper ruffling there, that told her that Kakashi was showing something to Naruto. "She's really incredible, she was starting to work out her own sealing style. And since hers has very little writing in it, I know that she wanted to give you her own design for a storage seal if it was done for your birthday."

Damn. Kakashi was good. If she had finished her experimentation and come up with a working prototype before Naruto's birthday, she would have gifted it to him, for sure. Since she hadn't, she had gotten him a sizable gift card from Ichiraku's. Which he had been ecstatic about.

"There's a secret, though." Kakashi told Naruto in a stage whisper. "There is actually nothing wrong that I can see with Aiko's last prototypes. They just aren't working because Aiko isn't absolutely sure that they will. That's very important in Fuuinjutsu. Especially with custom seals. The one who is drawing it has to have faith in their design. Do you want to help me prove to Aiko that her seal works?"

Aiko blinked in astonishment at that. Wait... Was Kakashi... Oh, that sly genius.

He knew that she was being hampered by the very theory that she was working with. She had told him so. He knew that she believed unshakable faith was one of the best basis to build a new chakra use.

And Naruto... Naruto had absolute faith in her.

It was a bit scary, at times, because that faith gave her so much power to hurt the boy.

But in this case, it was undoubtedly an advantage.

Naruto thought she could do anything. If the seal design was presented as something that should work the way it was, then it would work, done by Naruto. So long as it was functional, of course.

She smiled as Kakashi started explaining to Naruto all the characteristics and rules of her sealing style, explaining to the boy that because he would be the first one to try it out, he had to know how and why it would work, so his chakra knew how to make the things happen.

"All right! Done!" Naruto crowed in triumph. "Now I just need something to put in it!"

"Uh, shouldn't we do it outside? Just in case?" Sakura asked doubtfully.

"None of Aiko's seals have exploded." Kakashi reassured. "She said that storage seals aren't prone to it anyway. But we should use something easy to replace to test it anyway. There are some rice-balls in the fridge, so if the seal damages it's content, it won't be too bad."

Aiko leaned forward in anticipation.

"WhoA! ... oh." Huh. So a dud? Well. If it at least made enough of a reaction for Naruto to get excited before getting disappointed, it was already a great progress. They had always stayed inert when she was the one testing.

"Ah. It seems that there was something wrong with Aiko's seal, after all. Don't worry. She will love having solid results to work out of. You still helped a lot, Naruto. Naruto?"

"It went in." Naruto answered distractedly. "It went in. It just went back out right after. So it means... Oh! The spirals! You said this one is to keep the object in, and this one is to let the pocket dimension open and close, right?" There was a short pause, probably a nod. Aiko leaned even closer, curious about Naruto's theory. "But they aren't linked. It's pretty. But... There is a weak point right here, in the channel between the spirals, where the object can easily escape. These need to be interlocked!"

And then, there was more ruffling. Aiko had trouble staying inside the room. She wanted to see how Naruto was doing things.

"There. Like that. It should work, right?" Naruto declared after three minutes.

"Hmm. Yes. It should. Now let's see how it fares. Here." Kakashi encouraged.

Aiko bit her lip.

"YATTA!"

She got up and went to open the door.

Naruto looked surprised to see her, she only took a moment to register before seizing the boy in a tight hug. "Thank you, Naruto! You did so well." She praised quickly. "Your Uzumaki blood is really showing, isn't it? You found a solution right away!" Naruto started to grow red in the face, but she just smiled harder. "You will have to help me when I design the next one! I'm so lucky to have you here to help me work out the flaws in my designs. My personal little good luck charm."

Naruto gave her the sweetest blushing, beaming grin in response.

Then they tried to unseal the onigiri and discovered that they had still failed to put in a mechanism to unseal the contents.

But that was still incredible progress, and she made sure to tell Naruto that. They had a seal that did it's job well on one aspect that they needed. They just needed to perfect the other side, and it would be a perfectly functional storage seal.

Also, a sealing scroll in which you could put something but could only get that thing out via catastrophic failure definitely had it's use.

And they discovered that since it wasn't made to put things in with one use, then let them out in the next, and because Naruto still had a fairly loose grasp on Kanjis and how Thing and Things weren't written the same, they could keep putting objects into it even after using it once.

Aiko could definitely think of uses for this.

Especially with how easy it was to draw.

It looked like a great way to quickly shred ingredients for field cooking, for one.

When a garter snake slithered to them during training and told them the name of a Dango stand before unsummoning itself, the children broke out in delighted grins and asked them for leave to stop their training early.

Aiko saw Kakashi's lips twitch into a smile beneath his mask as he nodded his authorization.

When the genins ran excitedly toward Konoha, Kakashi turned to her with a deadpan look. Of course they were going to go after the children. Sasuke still needed protection, after all.

Also, they were curious ninja too, seeing Jiraiya the famous Toad sage defeated by a literal booby trap was just too tempting to pass.

The children decided to conceal themselves to spy on the outcome of their prank. Their efforts were almost chunin level. Which meant of course Jiraiya had to have noticed them.

Kakashi and Aiko opted not to hide. A ninja of the Sanin's caliber would detect them even if they did their best to conceal their presence. And a strong Jounin such as Kakashi hiding while looking at someone would immediately come across as threatening.

Instead, they simply posted themselves somewhere where they wouldn't be obvious, but also wouldn't be totally hidden, and assumed the role of indulgent senseis watching over their students' attempt at stealth to ensure nothing untoward happened to anyone.

Kakashi even pulled out his Icha Icha book and slumped the way he did to get civilians to underestimate him.

Jiraiya did glance at them briefly before turning back to the woman sitting by his side.

Mitarashi Anko did look pretty different in a blonde wig and a civilian type dress. The children had been right in their selection, she had exactly the type of figure that made the old pervert drool.

She was looking pretty happy just munching on stick after stick of dango and drinking juice while laughing at whatever Jiraiya was telling her. He was definitely starting to be obnoxious in his monopolizing of all the space around him. Seriously. Did he need to spread his legs that wide? And his arm behind Anko's back was starting to shift from hand on the shoulder toward her breasts.

Well, well. They were just in time, weren't they?

Anko spoke and Jiraiya laughingly pulled out a wallet to give the stand owner money, making the salesperson turn toward their storage unit and start preparing a plate.

That was when Jiraiya went for a grope after throwing his arm back behind Anko.

They didn't see the snake from where they were. What they saw was Jiraiya's hand flying away from Anko's breasts. A small shape went flying, before disappearing into a cloud of smoke.

That would have been enough, but Anko went even further, tilting her head innocently while a dozen of snakes crawled their way out of her dress. It was pretty creepy.

Jiraiya made a very interesting squeaky sound while hurriedly scooting away from Anko.

"It was venomous, you know." Anko said calmly, while raising her juice cup to her lips. "You should definitely get that treated."

Jiraiya had recovered from the shock and started loudly asking if Anko knew who he was. To which she dismissively answered "An old lecher who touched my breasts without my permission." before picking up one of the dango sticks from the plate the store clerk cautiously put down on the counter and biting into it.

When Jiraiya moved on to loudly demanding to know her identity, Anko dramatically paused in chewing her treat, and looked straight at him for a moment, before pulling off her wig and then tilting her head in a way that obviously displayed a very similar mark to Sasuke's on the side of her neck. "Just another one of the people you failed over the years." She said coldly, before dismissing him completely and turning back to her plate of dango.

Oh. Ouch.

Jiraiya stayed there staring at her for a moment, before storming away and toward the center of the village. whether he was heading for the hospital or planned to go directly bother Tsunade-sama was anyone's guess.

More important to Kakashi and Aiko, their little genins were leaving their hiding spot and swarming around Anko to gush at how cool she was.

Not that long afterward, Kakashi got assigned his first solo Jounin mission.

He hated having to leave the genins vulnerable, but they were staying inside of Konoha, after all.

Aiko also hated having Kakashi leave and needing to assume the kids' safety all on her own, but she knew there wasn't much choice on that, on anyone's part.

It quickly became obvious that Naruto wasn't just better at making Aiko's seals work than her. He was also better at using her sealing system to make new seals than she was, too.

Then again, most of this ease came from not knowing just how wishy-washy the whole thing was. As far as Naruto was concerned, if he didn't know a function to make a new concept work, he asked Aiko, and she would answer him with reliable rules around what he was trying to do.

Aiko did okay at making up rules for Naruto's benefit, but she had trouble feeling them as true when she knew she had just pulled it of her ass.

Rather than being bitter about it, it was much more efficient to just roll with it and make use of the resource. Once the need to read and write was out of the way, Naruto was showing all of the Uzumaki sealing affinity, and that would greatly help in a lot of project that Aiko had been thinking of.

Naruto was also uniquely motivated to make up new seals, because his campaign of harassment on the Toad Sage was far from finished, and Naruto had decided that seals were an incredible asset for it.

His latest creation was a reinforcement and sticking seal. Naruto painted it around one of the holes in the Onsen's fence in transparent chakra ink. As soon as something with innate chakra got in contact with said hole in the fencing, it would activate the sticking and reinforce the structure of the fence, and also make a loud perverted giggle sound.

As a result, Jiraiya found himself with his face stuck into the palisade, butt extremely vulnerable, while a bunch of furious kunoichi charged out of the Onsen to beat up the peeping tom.

It was a thing of beauty.

Both the intricately multilayered seal and the subsequent spectacle.

Aiko would be sure to tell Kakashi all about it when he came back.

Since Sakura was several kinds of incredible, the treatment of her second leg went much faster than the first. There was more to reconnect, due to the knee being under the cut, but she had grasped the trick of moving her phantom limb much more firmly, and was able to obey Tsunade-sama's orders efficiently and instantly.

It gained her so much goodwill, that she managed to sweet-talk Tsunade into allowing her to reconnect a handful of nerves on her own under the Hokage's supervision.

Since it was an intervention that happened entirely internally, there was nothing for Aiko to see to gauge how successful her student was being, but she watched Tsunade-sama's face instead for clues.

The biggest clue that Sakura had succeeded was Tsunade-sama offering Sakura an apprenticeship at the end of this healing session.

It was an incredible honor.

"No." Sakura answered without even a second thought, causing Naruto, Sasuke, and, alright, even Aiko to goggle at her in disbelief. "If I become your apprentice, then I will surely have to be a med-nin, and I refuse to bear that specialty."

Aiko cringed a bit at the somewhat insulting reply, but Tsunade-sama only linked her hands beneath he chin with an intrigued look on her face.

"Being a medic would allow you to heal your teammates." Tsunade-sama argued. "Why wouldn't you want that?"

Sakura smiled back in a way that felt familiar. "There are two reasons. The first is that Katsuyu-sama is perfectly able to heal my comrades. Naruto has healing the team well in hand, and I don't need to spend all of my valuable training time becoming an extremely well made redundancy, who's practically useless at anything else but the thing I'm not even going to be used for anyway." She said confidently. "And the second... Would I? Would I truly? Hana told me about the four laws of a medic-nin. Excluding me makes my team a front-line team. And where is it that a medic isn't allowed to go? Besides, 'shall be the last of their platoon'? Not on my life. I will fight to the bitter end at my team's side. And I will never, ever, decide that they should die before me. I would rather die right now than swear something like this."

Sakura was just as small, slight and pink-haired as she had ever been. But the way she stood tall on her two feet despite one of them being manipulated by chakra strings, the way she faced one of the strongest ninja in the world and most powerful persons in the village to tell her that she rejected every single aspect of the rules Tsunade-sama herself put into effect... She looked much taller. Much stronger, in that moment.

And for all that Aiko was quietly terrified for her student, she had also never felt so proud.

"That is only for those medics who do not have the Strength of a Hundred and Creation Rebirth." Tsunade-sama answered mildly.

Sakura tilted her head to the side and smiled sweetly. "Oh. Right. So I only have to abandon my team for however many years it takes to be deemed worthy of getting your personal technique and then master it, rather than forever." She smiled even more aggressively. "No. Not on my life. I will learn just enough iryou-ninjutsu to be able to repair myself so I never end up in a situation where I'm injured and unable to fight without relying on Naruto again. And enough for emergency first aid in case Katsuyu isn't right at hand to handle it, and not a single thing more. I never ever want that stupid classification applied to me, forcing me into an hospital and away from my boys. I will train with my Summons, and I will train with stealth and genjutsu and chakra strings, and I will be the most terrifying Kunoichi I can be. I won't accept to carry around this hobble called the four laws of medical ninja. I simply refuse."

"And if i make it an order?" Tsunade-sama asked with a very dangerous appearance of idle curiosity that made Aiko's hackles raise.

Sakura answered with her sweetest innocent smile. "Then I will make sure to be the worst apprentice you have ever had until Kakashi comes back and adopts me. And then, I will invoke Clan laws to formally complain against a Clan heir being forced into a career that hurts their future prospects and choice of traditional specialty."

Tsunade-sama squinted at Sakura for a moment, and then burst out laughing. "You have some spirit, kid. What if I waived the four laws just for you?"

"Then I would still be losing my time learning something that Katsuyu-sama can already handle perfectly well." Sakura answered immediately. "And it would be all but admitting that the four laws are stupid and unenforceable on your part, too."

Tsunade-sama frowned. "Stupid and unenforceable, you say?"

Sakura didn't back down. "Well, seriously. 'No medic ninja shall ever stop medical treatment until the lives of their party members have come to an end.' So what, I just stay there in danger of being killed too until everyone is completely and positively dead? While actively pushing back the moment when I'm able to run away by keeping someone who's already too wounded to survive alive for the longest possible? What about gravity assessment? Sometimes the best you can do is give the too wounded one a quick and clean death and move on to people you can actually save. I wouldn't be surprised if medics right now are forced to deliberately not see the wounded that they obviously can't save so they can focus on those that they can without breaking their oath. Which means those too wounded ones won't even receive pain relief."

Aiko winced. Well. True. Still. Tsunade-sama installed the four laws. Telling her they were stupid to her face was still not the wisest move.

"And then 'No medic ninja shall ever stand on the front lines.' It must really suck to be wounded on the front line, right. You won't get any help until your comrades manage to evacuate you to the relief bases. Which they can only do once the fighting is over. They will just have to suffer and get in worse shape in the meantime, I guess." Sakura kept on. Interestingly, Tsunade-sama made no move to stop her. Simply observed Sakura as she went about savagely dissing everything about her laws with all the appearances of calm contemplation.
"The worst is probably 'No medic ninja shall ever die until they are the last of their platoon.' I mean... oh, well great. I am formally forbidden to die. It will obviously help a great deal when my enemies spot me as a medic and start gunning for me specifically. I will simply tell them that it's forbidden for me to die. Please kill all my platoon first. I wouldn't want to be forsworn, you know."

To Aiko's surprise, Tsunade didn't get angry. "And you're going to tell me that the fourth law is also stupid?"

Sakura grinned. "It's also stupid. 'Only those medic ninja who have mastered the Strength of a Hundred Technique of the ninja art Creation Rebirth are permitted to discard the above-mentioned laws.' The Strength of a Hundred Creation rebirth is not a publicly available technique. The only way to get it is directly from you, and until just a month ago, you were all but a missing-nin who refused any kind of contact with anyone from Konoha. That law, in particular, should have been amended the very moment you left. There are more than one way to be strong enough for the battlefield. And also, all of the above mentioned laws? All of them? Not just the first one? You might as well have admitted right there and then that they were all so stupid that you never intended to abide by any of them and found the one technique only you had to set as an exception, so you could keep doing whatever you wanted."

"So you're calling me, your Hokage, hypocritical and stupid?" Tsunade-sama asked with dangerous calm.

"No." Sakura answered simply. "I am calling Tsunade Senju, the Sandaime's student of twenty five years ago hypocritical and blinded by grief, whose laws for the medical ninjas were only passed because of sheer nepotism. I am sure that our honored Hokage is much wiser now, and able to see her youthful mistakes, and fix them, now that she is back in Konoha and has the power to override her previous laws."

Tsunade grimaced in repressed mirth, then started chuckling, which soon turned into full out belly laughing. "You sure have some guts, girl. Insulting me like that, then calling to my pride immediately afterwards. Do you have no fear?"

Then, Sakura actually beamed. "Of course I do. I fear a lot of things, my cowardice and selfishness, Orochimaru, Kakashi-nii getting hurt, Gaara, spiders, leaving my boys on their own, Aiko-sensei being disappointed with me... But... I don't have to fear insulting you, do I? After all, you like Naruto. He still hasn't really learned tact even now. I knew you wouldn't get angry at me for saying what I think."

That made Naruto squawk in offense, and sent Tsunade-sama in another laughing fit.

Sasuke wasn't the kind to talk if he had nothing to say. Nor to mutter, as a rule. So when she heard "Just like sensei," she knew that he had meant for her to hear.

Ah. So it was why Sakura's words and postures had felt so familiar, wasn't it? She had been copying her.

She felt... Proud? And a bit weird, too. But, yes. Definitely proud.

The levity only lasted so long.

It was on their way back from the Hokage Tower that they got ambushed.

Notes:

My idea of the seals, plus some extras.

If you wonder why Anko says Jiraiya failed her, consider the fact that she was Orochimaru's student, and she has a seal based cursed mark. Has for years. Jiraiya, rather than trying to find a way to remove the seal to help her on his teammate's stead, kept perving around, without even trying to find a way to remove Anko's curse.

What did you all think of Sakura turning Tsunade down?

Chapter 66: Run like the wind (Sasuke rescue arc)

Summary:

Kakashi would like his genins not to get in trouble every time he isn't next to them.

Notes:

Sorry for the cliffhanger last chapter! I enjoyed the speculations it got me though!

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

Kakashi cursed his decision not to take along the Katsuyu fragment Naruto had offered him when he went out on mission.

He had decided that it would be too conspicuous.

After all, Naruto being a Slug Summoner wasn't yet public knowledge.

He had thought that sharing a Summoning Contract with Sakura would be enough as a means of passing messages with his team.

And yet...

Kokoro was a bit inarticulate on what exactly happened, or how. But the core of her report was telling enough even so.

After the team left their regular appointment at the Hokage Tower, they were ambushed by four sound nins. The ambush started by targeting Naruto, who was both the most troublesome one to fight long term, because of his healing factor and ability to summon huge chunks of Katsuyu, and had the worse awareness when he wasn't on his guard.

Naruto was also incredibly dogged, but the attackers had also taken that in account. Rather than let him use his determination, healing factor and tons of chakra, the four enemies had immediately converged on Naruto and managed to both physically knock him out and dose him with a strong sedative before anyone had the time to react.

While Aiko was getting stronger and stronger thanks to the rigorous training, she was still not more than middle class chunin as far as combat was concerned. Sakura was working with just one and a half leg, and hadn't done reconditioning after her immobilization, nor was she all that well trained to fight while moving her dead leg with chakra strings. And while Sasuke was exceptionally skilled for a genin, he couldn't rival with several people who got enhanced by Orochimaru's experiments.

Even summoning their partners only was a success in the sense that is made a lot of noise and forced the Sound shinobi to act a bit faster.

After a brief scuffle, Aiko was beaten unconscious and had three of her limbs broken, Sakura was stabbed and slashed so viciously that the Katsuyu fragment Naruto always kept on him had to immediately attend to her to keep her from dying of immediate blood-loss or organ failure.

Sasuke's summons, Fuuga was forced to unsummon to avoid dying from being thrown head first at incredible speed at a wall, then Sasuke was overwhelmed, wrapped in some kind of spider-silk cocoon, and whisked away.

Kokoro, who had put herself in ambush position but never had an opening to use it, was forcefully unsummoned by Sakura, who needed her chakra for her own chakra healing.

The fact that the young ninken had seen Tsunade-sama charge in before being forced back to the dog realm was probably the only reason why Kakashi got anything resembling a coherent report from her.

That had happened four hours before Kakashi summoned the small dog to get his daily update on his team.

He had waited until his mission objective was fulfilled before taking the risk of using the chakra necessary to summon Sakura's ninken, and that meant that there was nothing keeping him from running back to Konoha as fast as he could go.

He sent the hysteric puppy back home to the ninken realm with a thought.

And

He

RAN.

Tsunade-sama was his first stop.

There was no way that Naruto hadn't wanted to be involved in rescuing Sasuke, and considering the lack of manpower in Konoha, he had to have been included in the team. His injuries were the less severe of the team. Even excluding his spectacular healing factor.

And where Naruto was, there would be Katsuyu-sama too. The best place to procure an extra Katsuyu to speed up finding his genins, was in the Hokage Tower.

"Sakura's summons informed me of the ambush on my team." Was the first thing he said even as he slapped his previous mission scroll and objective confirmation on the desk. "What are their status?"

"Aiko Sato will be out of commission for a month but should otherwise be fine." Tsunade answered promptly. "Uzumaki Naruto was up and running within minutes of having the sedative flushed out of his system, even if there was enough of it to kill an elephant in the injection he received, and it was one of the extra nasty ones. Haruno Sakura... That kid is incredible. As soon as I had her injury treated, she reconnected all of the nerves in her leg alone in secret, no matter the pain that would have caused, and then she joined in on the rescue mission after finishing her healing on her own."

Kakashi blinked. He was torn. Of course he was proud of his pup, but joining a rescue mission? Right after being seriously injured? And without adequate re-training of her legs? But Tsunade-sama was a medic first, and medics hated to have their patients strain themselves. She must have deemed the risks acceptable.

"Who is in the rescue mission?" He asked instead of fretting.

"Let's see. ..." She pulled a sheet of paper from a corner of her desk. "We have Uzumaki Naruto, Haruno Sakura, Inuzuka Kiba, Rock Lee, Tenten, Yamanaka Ino and Akimichi Chouji, under Hyuuga Neji and Nara Shikamaru, as the commanding chunins for the mission." She sighed at whatever face he made. "I know. I wish I was able to spare better too. But any more than genins and I would be leaving the village vulnerable. Those are pretty outstanding genins, too."

He understood. It wasn't enough for him, but he did. Tsunade had to think of the village first. They had suffered an invasion and all eyes were turned on them, looking for any opening to cause Konoha harm. And Kakashi had just informed her of an internal threat that she was taking just as seriously. She couldn't allow the defense to take a hit at this time. Even her personal apprentice was taking missions to shore up the forces after all.

"I will go." He told her.

Tsunade sighed, lifting a mission scroll from her desk. "Well. that's what you were supposed to be doing next." She showed him the S-Rank from the heading. "But I suppose that since you were so prompt in finishing your previous mission and coming back, it can wait for you here until tomorrow." She lapsed for a moment, staring at him, and then stood. "Come here."

Kakashi obeyed, mostly out of habit, and was a bit surprised when green glowing hands came to a rest against his chest.

"There." Tsunade nodded after a minute, removing her hands and then pricking her finger with a small chakra scalpel for some blood. "Don't get used to it. Flushing the lactic acid and restoring micro-tears in the muscles from intense exercise is best left to natural recovery. But in this case, I think it's best to make sure you're in peak condition rather than worry about the small long-term impacts of the procedure. It won't do anything for the mental fatigue, but I trust an Elite Jounin can keep going on no sleep for much longer than this. Bring those kids back home safe, Hatake."

Kakashi accepted the small slug that was put in his hand after the explanation and turned to the door. "Yes, Hokage-sama."

He had pups to save, after all.

Katsuyu-sama had her own report to give him as he ran.

Since the whole thing with the Akatsuki and Jiraiya, Naruto had decided that leaving a Katsuyu fragment with other people was for the best. An impression that had, in her assessment, gotten even worse since Sasuke was kidnapped at a time when he didn't have his own Katsuyu ride-along.

It would be ridiculous as a notion coming from anyone else. But Naruto did have incredible chakra reserves, and so he could afford to maintain a dozen or two of hand-sized summons. Especially if this summons had healing abilities and could help whoever he gave it to not to die in a pinch.

Meaning that Katsuyu-sama was aware of the statuses of everyone on the rescue party. Plus Aiko, since Naruto insisted to leave a Katsuyu fragment with her too, and Tsunade, who had summoned a small fragment of her own to stay appraised.

It had taken the genins a while to catch up with the kidnappers at all, since it took an hour to give the orders and gather the team.

Between Kiba and Sakura handling scent tracking, the rescue team was able to follow at a good pace.

By the time the kids caught up, Sasuke had been stuffed in a large sealed barrel.

The sound four Left one of theirs behind to slow down pursuit. Since it was someone with Doton and a chakra-draining ability, the kids decided that it was best to leave Taijutsu oriented people to fight him while the rest kept pursuing. As such, Chouji, Lee, and a person sized Katsuyu-fragment stayed behind to fight.

Katsuyu had opinions about Chouji eating two of his three Akimichi food pills and Lee opening the first two of his eight gates during that fight. But she had still healed Lee enough to keep going and split a small part off to help him find the main body of the rescue team, before absorbing their opponent inside her to keep him unconscious and allowing Chouji to ride on her back while this fragment made it's way back to Konoha with the no-longer fight-capable Akimichi and prisoner.

Minding children had changed the Slug Summons. She used to be much less opinionated when Kakashi first met her. It was probably a side-effect of dealing with Naruto's thick skull all of the time for a few months.

Anyway, Chouji and the prisoner were and their way back and didn't need intervention from Kakashi, and Lee could handle himself.

The second Sound Shinobi to drop back to slow down pursuit was a six-armed, spider themed guy. Who incidentally was also the one who stabbed Sakura. It was relevant because... Sakura really needed to stop holding grudges so firmly. She insisted to fight him along with Neji. As a result, Tenten argued that she should also stay to fight with her teammate. They were trained to fight together, and her thrown weapons could be used to counter their enemy's own throws. Also, Sakura was freshly out of the hospital and had been ordered not to strain her still tender tissues.

That fight was still ongoing, and the kids were struggling, but Katsuyu was steering Lee toward it, so it would hopefully end favorably.

Kakashi got the blow by blow of Sakura's fight in between updates on the rest of the rescue team.

Things weren't going too well for Neji and Tenten, who were stuck to the ground playing stationary target while Sakura was on high-dodging aerial mode and trying to land blows on their opponent.

Aiko was probably pleased to hear that Tenten and Neji were less one-trick ponies than they had been a couple of months earlier. Gai had done good by his promise and taught Neji how to use shuriken-folded exploding tags to supplement the ninjutsu he already learned for the tournament, and Tenten had learned some actual, structured Kenjutsu on top of her Suiton use and bukijutsu.

The combination of throwing kunais and water bullets at the sticky webs headed their way and slapping them with Jyuuken or slashing with a sword allowed the two of them to have some breathing room where they stood back to back, even when their opponent summoned spiders that exploded into spiderwebs. And Lee was almost on the fight, which should turn the tides soon.

He only really felt anxiety when Katsuyu paused suddenly in her recounting of the Sound Shinobi's transformation due to his curse mark, and then said "Sakura just got speared through. Shoulder. It went right through the shoulder-blade."

The Sound shinobi had made a bow out of his hardening webs, and had taken Sakura by surprise with the faster projectiles.

She only survived falling to the ground because Neji and Tenten immediately jumped to her help. And even then, Neji got clipped in the side by another arrow when Tenten's parry didn't counter the guided aspect of the projectile.

Before Kakashi could exhaust himself sprinting all the way to his student's side, Katsuyu reported that Lee had dispatched the Spider-nin.

Then, after a pause, she informed him that Sakura had permanently dispatched the Sound ninja by making his heart fail with incompatible medical chakra.

As a jounin, he should be disapproving of his student lessening the number of prisoners to interrogate, but as an Hatake steadily going Wilder, he only felt satisfaction knowing that the one who hurt his pup was dead and unable to touch her ever again.

Besides, Naruto hadn't provided the second splinter group with a person sized Katsuyu since they were more numerous, so there was no convenient prisoner transport and coma-maintainer. Killing was safer.

And there already was a prisoner.

Katsuyu grumbled about reckless children while informing him that both Sakura and Neji were out of danger and that she was patching up Tenten's cuts and scrapes. A bit of prodding yielded a complaint about Sakura healing herself. Though Katsuyu reassured him that Sakura's healing job was adequate.

Kakashi wasn't tracking visually or by scent, since he was simply following Katsuyu's directions, but he still smelled smoke from the rescue team's first clash against the Sound shinobi. He was closing in.

Katsuyu abruptly interrupted her retelling of the second squad's decisions about who would go back to Konoha with the wounded Sakura and Neji, who had been forbidden from continuing the mission by Tsunade via Katsuyu's proxy, to let him know that the four genins left had entered yet another combat with the two Sound shinobi left.

This information must also have been relayed to Sakura's group, because their decisions sped up. Tenten, who had used most of her throwing weapons and could come back to fetch them later, would carry Neji and help protect Sakura all the way back to Konoha, while Lee would run to catch up and help Naruto, Shikamaru, Ino and Kiba.

Kakashi deviated his trajectory to intercept Sakura's group. He had no time to lose in pursuing the boys, but not confirming Sakura's well being himself would definitely impact his performances negatively due to anxiety.

Sakura leapt into his arms as soon as he dropped next to her, and easily let him scent her. Even scented him back. She smelled like blood and hurt, and that irked the Wolf, but neither was completely fresh, so he could live with this.

She was a bit reluctant to let him go, but did it quickly anyway, pasting on a brave face and ordering him to go help her boys.

He nodded, turned back in the right direction, and ran some more.

Naruto needed support, and Sasuke needed to be rescued.

In their fight against the two remaining Sound shinobi, Kiba got separated from the group. Along with one of their enemies. And to make matters worse, he was so focused in saving Akamaru from his tumble that he lost his shoulder Katsuyu.

And Shikamaru had gotten a case of decision paralysis when deciding what to do.

Kakashi frowned and asked Katsuyu how much time Lee and him would take to join up with Naruto. Two minutes for him, one for Lee. Alright.

"Send the Ino-Shika duo to help Kiba out. They will be more effective together. Tell Naruto to Summon more of you and hold out for just a minute, and remind him that he has more than one skill." With his instruction relayed, Kakashi concentrated on breathing over talking, and ran faster.

"Ino-kun and Shikamaru-kun have found Kiba-kun. They're doing well."

The little gasp was incredibly concerning. "A monster just appeared." Katsuyu breathlessly announced. "Naruto just barely survived." Kakashi threw caution in the wind and traded running for a series of shunshin.

Then.

"Lee reached Naruto." Then Katsuyu actually cursed. "The woman just ran away with the barrel."

Kakashi was almost on the fight, any second now.

But.

Sasuke...

"Can Lee and Naruto hold out without me?"

"... I think so."

Kakashi listened intently, pinpointed the the running footsteps and barreled straight past Naruto's fight against... Well. Monster was right.

He raised up his Hitai-ate and started in on his signs while sprinting after the fleeing sound Kunoichi.

The bird chirps screamed in his ears.

Blood erupted outward.

Kakashi took a fragment of a second to be grateful that he got this one in the back, and wouldn't see a surprised face in front of him to give him flashbacks of Rin's death.

Then he ripped his arm out of the woman's rib-cage.

He unsealed the tanto that Aiko insisted he needed to have at all time from the seal on his glove's wristband, and removed the head from the shoulders just to be extra sure.

"Can Lee and Naruto still hold?"

"Barely."

Kakashi cursed but still took a second to scan the seals on the barrel to see if he could open it.

It was protective style sealing.

Best to leave it.

He grabbed the barrel and ran back toward Naruto's fight. "Tell Naruto to summon more of you."

He burst into the clearing that wasn't there on his first pass and threw Sasuke's Barrel into the massive Slug right next to Naruto.

"Keep Sasuke safe." He instructed to the Katsuyu on his shoulder.

He didn't take the time to confirm what Katsuyu was doing with his instruction.

With his sharingan uncovered, taking stock of the situation didn't come with any delay.

Naruto was badly roughed up, but he was still struggling back to his feet.

Lee's skin was red. A sure sign that he had opened at least four of his gates.

The orange haired, gray skinned monster with the protrusions on it's back was accumulating chakra in a worrying manner.

And Lee was way too close to the accumulating chakra.

With four gates activated, Kakashi knew that Gai's student should be able to dodge anything short of instant strikes, but he was at very close range.

Decision made, Kakashi fished out some ninja wire and coated it in a thick chakra string, then Kawaramied just behind the rampaging... man?

A precise throw, and chakra steering later, Kakashi braced his hands and core with chakra, stuck himself to the ground, and gave a firm yank.

When the white discharge of chakra came, the projectiles were slightly off-course from the monster being tugged back by the neck.

It gave Lee the time to escape even though the chakra projectiles were somehow self-steering.

It also redirected the beast's attention squarely on him.

"I'LL KILL YOU!"

Kakashi leapt back from the strike of a suddenly ax-shaped arm.

"DIE!"

Kakashi ducked the beheading swipe and used the opening to get in a kick of his own.

It barely made the monster budge, despite all the power Kakashi put in it.

"I"

Kakashi dodged left.

Barely.

The monster had grown some kind of propeller to the back of his ax-arm to speed it up.

"WILL"

A Kawarimi got him clear of the next strike.

"KILL"

Damn but he was fast.

"YOU!"

At least Naruto and Lee had the good sense not to hinder him.

For the moment.

The ax changed for a chakra canon.

Kakashi escaped that one with the hiding like a mole Doton.

No way he was trying the double suicide decapitation technique on this opponent.

Kakashi instead sent an earth clone up, before propelling himself out in his enemy's back.

Instead of an open back to attack, Kakashi found himself nose to nose with an hammer shaped arm.

He barely had the time to brace his arms in front of his face.

The impact sent him flying right into the big Katsuyu cradling the barrel with Sasuke in it.

That was when he started to smell smoke.

Kakashi had no time to verify where the smoke was from. Another attack was already coming at him.

He dodged under the strike and delivered a punch and then Kawarimied away.

Then he saw the smoking barrel explode.

He was relieved to see his kidnapped student emerge from smoke seemingly unscathed.

At least until he spied the encroaching curse mark spreading across Sasuke's face.

And then Sasuke started laughing hysterically, and Kakashi's heart froze.

Notes:

Who was expecting this?

If any of my readers are also writers: I used a narrative trick to make the action scenes more dynamic. Shorter sentences, shorter paragraphs.

It makes the reading faster.

The eye has to move more.

The brain understands the text faster.

It makes the reading feel more dynamic.

Choppier.

Simply...

More...

Active!

Chapter 67: Ino's pride

Summary:

Ino is also doing her best!

Notes:

A longer chapter this time!

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

Ino gritted her teeth and threw herself to the side.

Her dad was there when Shikamaru had dropped by her house to tell her of the mission.

He had made her promise not to use any mind arts on the four shinobi from Sound.

He hadn't told her why, so she assumed he knew something classified.

Shikamaru had gotten a frown when she swore to dad. A face that told her that he didn't think it was worth taking her along if she couldn't use her Clan techniques.

That frown had hurt.

The idea that Shikamaru thought she was useless if not for the Yamanaka Jutsu. It was infuriating.

But it looked like she wasn't going to get a chance to prove him wrong.

Without her Shintenshin, she had passable shurikenjutsu and genjutsu, some poison knowledge but no senbon throwing skills and good-ish taijutsu and ninjutsu.

And it was unacceptable.

She couldn't accept being the weakest kunoichi out of all the rookies.

No. She was deluding herself.

She was the weakest of the rookies, full stop.

The only one to get knocked out cold immediately during the preliminaries.

Naruto did better than her.

Chouji did better than her.

Shika did better than her.

Kiba did better than her.

Shino did better than her.

Hinata did better than her.

And Sakura... She couldn't even try to compare herself to Sakura. It was like comparing ration bars to a restaurant meal.

Sakura had been breathtaking during her match with the Suna puppeteer.

Aiko-sensei had been willing to send Sakura out to help Neji with the Suna siblings during the invasion, instead of being foisted on a Shinobi of an allied Clan and left to helplessly watch as Aiko-sensei shunshined right into a kunai to save Kakashi-sensei.

It had been frightening, then irritating, but it seemed fine, back then, to tell herself she simply didn't have as good a sensei, or as good teammates. And that she would catch up on her own time.

It wasn't fine.

If she had decided to take her own training in hand then, rather than waiting for it to come to her, she wouldn't be in this situation.

This situation where Kiba and Akamaru fought. They had managed to hit the enemy with their three headed dog transformation, even if it only made them split apart.

Shikamaru called the shots and spun strategies. He had kept Kiba and Akamaru from slamming into the huge door thing the conjoined twin shinobi had summoned...

And she was nothing more useful than a mobile bait.

"Go for the overhang on the north face." Katsuyu-sama instructed her.

Ino swore, stuck the heel of her right foot to the ground and used it to swerve sharply and redirect herself.

North side. Where the shadows were. Shikamaru must be in ambush position.

She folded her hands into the bunshin signs and sent her two illusory clones running away on either side of her, to make it seem more like actual running away and less like deliberate steering.

She ducked and rolled at Katsuyu-sama's order, passing under the attack of one of the horned men, but the other one caught her before she could straighten up.

"Caught you."

She froze, and then turned her head.

There was a neck protruding from her shoulder.

The monstrous, horned, black-eyed face of her enemy leering at her.

Ino did not shriek.

It was a near thing but she didn't.

The head had come out of the shoulder where Katsuyu-sama had been, and the slug seemed to have been thrown off by it's apparition.

Ino didn't manage to spot the Summons at a glance.

Well she had a much more pressing problem.

She couldn't throw senbon yet, but she could stab them into people at close range.

Her fingers went for the small compartment she had sewn to the outside of her weapon pouch and she plucked one of the few poisoned senbons in it.

An arm emerged from her collarbone and grabbed her wrist before she could plunge the senbon into the disgusting parasite stuck to her.

She tried to free herself, but he was too strong.

When he started bragging about his abilities, Ino thought back to Sakura's words in the hospital room after the preliminaries.

He was wasting his surprise effect by telling her his secrets.

She should listen attentively to his threats and look for something she could use.

"I can move the part of my body at will to only destroy the parts of your body that aren't also mine with my chakra." He said.

Oho.

But there were parts that were merged, there had to be.

Lungs, for one. Since the head had a mouth and was talking, using air.

And Katsuyu-sama was a medic.

She just had to...

Not think about it.

Don't think about it, just do it.

Grab the Kunai.

Accumulate chakra in the forearms and...

STAB!

She coughed up blood in reaction to her own move.

But she noted with vicious satisfaction that the thing did the same, before removing himself from her body.

Good.

And he even kept bleeding once he was his own entity.

She grinned viciously and threw the kunai at his head.

He blocked with an arm.

He didn't note he how this particular kunai had a blue handle-wrap instead of the traditional white.

Good.

Good.

Hopefully he would merge back with his twin before understanding that he had been poisoned.

Ino didn't carry many poisoned kunais. They were more dangerous for the one handling it or for comrades than senbons because it had two sharp edges instead of a single sharp point. It was easier to hurt yourself accidentally with them and have the poison enter the bloodstream.

So her two blue-handled kunais had a simple anti-coagulant and blood thinner poison on them.

Something that would kill an enemy by blood-loss, but wouldn't kill an ally even if they didn't take the antidote so long as they knew to stem the bleeding thoroughly.

It meant that she would be fine with just a little bit of help from Katsuyu-sama.

It didn't feel like it at the moment.

She could feel herself starting to drown.

But that was a concern for later. First, she needed to flee.

The horned monster was regaining his composure and approaching her.

She reigned in her cough and scrambled to her feet.

There was a stray thought about trying to find her Katsuyu-fragment before bolting, but she discarded it.

Kiba and Shikamaru had their own fragments and would readily hand over the medic Summons to her.

And Katsuyu-sama had an acid attack that would be useful if she found herself in close range to the Sound shinobi.

Katsuyu-sama was pretty much invulnerable.

Ino wasn't.

She ran for the shaded overhang on the north face and prayed that Shikamaru's trap was still ready to be used.

Ino blinked her eyes open to Kiba and Shikamaru staring at her from above, and a diffuse green glow at the bottom of her field of vision.

"Huh." Was her very intelligent greeting.

"You almost died!" Shikamaru scolded.

Oh, right. That.

She had cut it closer than she was expecting. The barely made it to the overhang's shadow before her vision blacked out.

Note for later: anticoagulant poison and stabs to the lungs didn't go well together.

"Did he merge with the other one?" She asked feeling her lips peel from her teeth. More a snarl then a smile.

"Yeah." Shikamaru sighed. He jerked his head to the side, indicating a body lying in a pool of blood a dozen of steps away. "Your poison helped us a lot. They didn't notice until it was too late. But you still almost died."

Ino thought for a moment then nodded. "I know." She glanced down at Katsuyu-sama, who was still glowing. Oh. She was bigger. It looked like their three fragments reformed together. "But I'm a shinobi too, you know. Almost dying is part of the job."

That caused Katsuyu-sama to growl. Actually growl at her.

"Hey. I didn't do it recklessly. I knew that you were there." Ino argued. Looking down was a mistake. For a being with so little in the way of facial features, Katsuyu-sama expressed disappointment surprisingly clearly. She felt herself blush and looked away. "I shouldn't have gone for the lungs. I didn't expect it to get so bad so quick. I thought I would have more time to seek treatment, since the poison was just a blood thinner."

Katsuyu-sama huffed and started grumbling about reckless mammals with needlessly complicated anatomies who couldn't even comprehend how their own bodies worked.

Ino blinked and looked down at the invertebrate healer making sure she didn't drown from having her own blood flood her lungs. From a self-inflicted wound. "Well... That's fair." Was all she could really answer to that.

Ino decided that since her medic was already upset with her, she should be the model patient.

She relaxed and laid back fully on her back, concentrating on taking deep, long breaths. Medics usually liked that. And since the problem Katsuyu-sama was fixing was in her lungs, it probably would help.

Katsuyu-sama was really amazing, she wasn't even feeling short of breath.

And on top of being a medic, Katsuyu-sama also had effective attacks in the for of her acid spray.

Plus Naruto summoning so many separate fragments had demonstrated her incredible ability as a coordinator.

...

"Say, Katsuyu-sama? Would you mind one more Summoner?" She asked with her best attempt at innocence.

There was a short pause, then. "I wouldn't particularly mind, no." She felt the weight on her midsection shift, and a glance showed Katsuyu-sama crawling off her. "You're done." Katsuyu-sama explained simply, prompting Ino to offer the Slug Summons her help in getting down to the ground.

Ino was still trying to think of how to word a request to be Katsuyu-sama's Summoner when the Summons in question tilted her head. "Kakashi-san requests your presence urgently, Yamanaka-san."

Ino had a moment of hesitation, because Katsuyu-sama had been calling her Ino-kun so far. Being suddenly referred to by her Clan name in this situation meant that she was being singled out because of her Clan abilities.

Of course she took great pride in her Clan, and the skills she was taught as a Yamanaka while growing up, but she was still just a genin. Kakashi-sensei had gone to war with jounins of her Clan. What he expected of her while calling her Yamanaka might very well be outside of her range.

Still. Urgently was urgently. Ino was a Kunoichi, and a genin. If a jounin gave her a mission-related order, she was duty-bound to obey. It was the same reason why Shikamaru had taken the order to go help Kiba with her despite being the initial leader of the mission. Unless explicitly stated otherwise, the moment Kakashi-sensei got assigned the same mission as them, he immediately took precedence on every lower-ranked shinobi present in it. Which, in this case, was everyone.

Shikamaru took it very well, firstly, because the situation had been time-sensitive, and he was aware that his waffling was being detrimental to a comrade. A jounin giving him a firm order had allowed him to bypass his performance anxiety and perfectionism and just relocate his brainpower to how best to help Kiba rather than how to juggle helping Kiba and saving Sasuke. Also, Shikamaru had no strong professional ambition. Getting his first mission in commend position hijacked by a more experienced shinobi was a blessing rather than a curse, to him.

Kakashi-sensei was a competent and fair jounin. He knew that Ino was just genin. He wouldn't expect more of her than she could give. Especially since he had a good idea of what Ino's skills were from seeing her train before and being friends with her sensei.

She viciously crushed her doubts and stuffed them to the back of her head to go over at a more convenient time.

Right now, she only needed to trust her superior's competence and hop to.

She went to scoop Katsuyu-sama up, but Shikamaru beat her to it, cradling the puppy-sized Slug to his chest and nodding solemnly her way as she climbed to her feet.

She found herself sandwiched between the boys on their run toward Kakashi-sensei's location. Which was logical, because she was the one who suffered a big injury and was running on less blood than was optimal. It was also why she was empty-handed while Kiba carried his ninken and Shikamaru carried their Katsuyu-portion.

Katsuyu-sama was nice enough to let them know that the combat was over on their destination. She still reminded them that there could be extra enemies to look out for, but They could sense that she wasn't too worried about that. Not that it kept them from maintaining their spatial awareness as they ran through the forest.

The worry came back, and Ino spared a bit of air to talk. "About the request... I promised d-" wait, no, not dad, not in this context; "my Clan-head not to use my Clan technique against the Sound Shinobi."

Katsuyu-sama's eye-stalks turned her way. "Don't worry, Ino-kun, you aren't being called in so you can use your Clan's jutsu on an enemy."

Alright. Fine. Things were fine.

She tried to be discreet in her sigh of relief.

See. She was right, she just had to trust Kakashi-sensei.

Dad and Aiko-sensei trusted him, after all.

Though, if she wasn't being called for her Clan's jutsu, what else was there that rated a 'Yamanaka-san'?

Uh. Wait, Aiko-sensei mentioned it during their first B-Rank mission to report on the Academy! Psychology.

At least it wasn't too personally dangerous. Hopefully she wouldn't bring shame to her Clan by failing to be useful in their stated specialty despite being the heiress.

The first thing she did when they arrived at their destination was draw a kunai.

A new fight must have started since Katsuyu-sama told them that combat was over.

It was the only explanation.

Why else would these three be there?

The woman who slammed her into a wall during the Chunin Exam, the guy who poisoned Sakura during her match, and the one who cut Sakura's legs off.

"Stand down." She glanced over to Kakashi-sensei. This was his voice. Mostly. He normally sounded cheerful, not half-growly. "These are ambassadors sent by Suna in a show of good will." Ino could almost hear his teeth gritting through his words. "Tsunade-sama asked them to come support our fight when it looked too unfavorable, and they were kind enough to assist."

She lowered her kunai, but kept her scowl.

She could empathize with Kakashi-sensei. Sakura got seriously hurt by that redhead boy. She hadn't even started her physical therapy to strengthen her legs again. Ino knew that despite having finished to reconnect all of her nerves to be fit to help Sasuke, Sakura had still been using her chakra strings to bolster her lacking muscle strength and avoid slowing the whole team down.

They were showing goodwill? They had helped in a fight? Fine. Alright. But they couldn't expect everything to be forgiven right-away anyway.

Sakura's life had been significantly impacted. Her relationship with her parents might very well be irreparably damaged, her self-confidence had taken a hit and her training schedule to gain physical strength that she had been working in for months was all out of whack.

Ino didn't have to forgive all of that. She only had to be polite to the foreign Ambassadors. No more.

A glance at Shikamaru had him come to her rescue so she didn't have to open her mouth and possibly fail her 'don't be rude' goal. "We have arrived. What was it that needed a Yamanaka?"

Huh. Yes, right. Shikamaru tended to be blunt because he didn't want to bother with talking about things for longer than necessary. Well. It got the job done, in that case.

Kakashi-sensei nodded and turned toward the huddle of genins leaning against the body of a horse-sized Katsuyu-sama on the other side of the clearing, well away from the huge sand pile Gaara was standing on top of. "Sasuke... Isn't well. I want his state of mind evaluated to know if he should walk back to Konoha under his own power, or if he needs to be put to sleep and brought directly to secure facilities."

Oh, crap. That didn't sound good. That sounded bad. Very bad.

"I... I will need context to make that decision." She hedged, nervous.

Kakashi-sensei waved a hand. "Katsuyu-sama and Lee will brief you. I still need to work out how to handle our latest prisoner with Suna's envoys."

Okay. That was a dismissal. Ino nodded professionally and hurried toward Sasuke. She felt a bit sorry for Kakashi-sensei. He was the one who needed to be polite to the boy who cut off Sakura's legs.

So, after Sasuke broke the sealed barrel from the inside, he emerged with the same crawling marks as the Sound shinobi and an unhinged laugh. It distracted Kakashi-sensei, who almost got cleaved in half for it. That made Sasuke react violently. As a result, he almost got cleaved in half for recklessly charging at the overwhelming enemy.

Only Gaara's equally overwhelming commend on sand and his timely arrival kept them all from failing their mission by having Sasuke die on them.

Unfortunately, Sasuke then recognized Gaara and charged him. Which, fair. But not helpful in context.

Both Temari and the Puppet guy had to step in to protect Gaara from Sasuke, and nearly turned into collaterals. Gaara found himself having to fight a shape-shifting, bloodthirsty monster that had the ability to summon energy surges while dodging Sasuke's attacks at the same time.

...

Ino was still not ready to forgive him.

In the end, Gaara produced a ton of sand from the ground to thoroughly imprison the berserker. Kakashi-sensei was free enough to go grab Sasuke and... hug him into submission? Well. Katsuyu-sama was overly clinical, Lee was overly enthusiastic and 'Youthful', Naruto was overly attached to describing things with sound effects, and Sasuke wasn't willing to say anything on the matter.

Ino decided that she was going to put 'hugged into submission' down in her report, Sasuke should speak up if he didn't want misunderstandings.

While Naruto, Katsuyu-sama and Kakashi-sensei were trying to coach Sasuke into getting control over the curse seal, the berserker who was supposed to be crushed to death reemerged from the sand, and Sasuke sharingan-ed him unconscious somehow.

Kurenai was awesome, and Ino needed to have Asuma-sensei arrange genjutsu lessons for her too. Her chakra-control was good enough for it!

So it was why Gaara was guarding a pile of sand and Kakashi-sensei had spoken of a prisoner.

They had a maybe-immortal prisoner to manage.

Yikes.

Good thing that Ino wasn't a jounin and had no responsibility in this particular thorn-bush.

Since Kakashi-sensei was still in hugging position, he managed to re-calm Sasuke, and they finally got him to stop the curse-seal's spread.

Once Katsuyu-sama confirmed that Sasuke was as close to his baseline as he would go, and that she could knock him out if he looked like he was about to go out of control again, Kakashi-sensei made some excuses about Sasuke's assault being Orochimaru's fault, and then he got Katsuyu-sama to call her for a field assessment of Sasuke's mental stability.

And that was the point where Ino had all the context she would get and needed to actually get Sasuke to speak to her to do her job.

Sasuke didn't want to talk.

She wasn't surprised.

Her dad took patient confidentiality seriously, but he was also her dad. She knew how his day went by looking at him in the evening. And on the first days where he arranged a replacement in the flower-shop for Sasuke's visits, he had looked quietly not-quite-resigned. The 'my patient is being stubborn, and I can only out-stubborn them or send them to another doctor' kind of feeling.

And. She had gone to the Academy with Sasuke.

Once Sakura and her made up and the blinders about her 'Sasuke-kun' went away, she had understood that Sasuke just was awkward and didn't like talking. And liked talking about himself even less.

But she needed to conduct a field evaluation. They were both shinobi and it was Sasuke's duty to give her the Intel she needed to make sound decisions about him.

She decided to bluntly remind him of his duty to share critical information that were crucial to decision-making. That was not how you went about things in proper counseling. But dad was Sasuke's counselor, not her. She wasn't here to solve the problems, just to get a vague idea of how deep the problem was.

Sasuke didn't like it, but grumpily conceded that she was right.

Ino took a moment to congratulate herself for her growth. Less than a month ago, she would have been ecstatic to hear those words from Sasuke. Probably planning a wedding in her head and already bragging to Sakura. Now, she felt the kind of grim determination and vague disquiet that was suitable for a Yamanaka in this particular position.

Shinobi had a first kill.

Most Yamanaka also had a first situation where they had to force a comrade to do something they didn't want to do. It was the weight of their Clan specialty.

She shoved the realization that actually, she had her first kill today too, since she was the one who poisoned their enemy and made killing him easier. She would talk about everything with dad.

It wasn't about her.

After a long look at Sasuke's avoidant gaze, she asked Katsuyu-sama if she would be enough to keep Sasuke from being dangerous, and them told Naruto and Lee to go talk with Kiba and Shikamaru.

Naruto could be a bit clueless, so she had to spell out 'go away, I want to speak with Sasuke with some semblance of privacy' a bit more clearly to him. And Lee got it faster and dragged the other boy away.

Sasuke smirked and shook his head. "He means well."

Ino nodded and sat down in front of her patient. "Yeah, I know. He will get it, eventually. ... Or Aiko-sensei will slap him with a clue. Now. I need you to know that nothing you tell me will be repeated to anyone but dad, and that if you wish, I will pretend never to have heard anything you say now later on."
"I know I haven't given you reasons to trust me in the past, but I hope you can at least trust Sakura's judgment, and also my loyalty to her. I wouldn't betray her, and betraying you is betraying her. So please believe me. Right now... I'm not really Ino who you went to the Academy with, I'm Yamanaka. And I was ordered to evaluate your mental stability by my superior officer."

Sasuke closed his eyes and sighed, before looking over at Kakashi-sensei. Ino barely herd his whispered "he means well too".

She decided not to comment on that. Dad would take care of it. Or Aiko-sensei.

"Alright!" Ino nodded, covering up her anxiety about the new task with enthusiasm. "Firstly, can you just describe what happened when you got kidnapped? I know you're not very comfortable talking about feelings, so it's fine to go with a factual recounting at first. Like a normal mission report."

Getting a factual recounting from Sasuke was pretty straight-forward. She had to coach him along at some points, but overall, he was willing to tell her things if she didn't dig into his feelings about them.

The Sound Four overwhelmed his team, tied him up inescapably while severely injuring two of the team. Then they forced him to swallow a pill that immediately made his curse mark burn up, and then he passed out.

The next part was a bit harder to get out of him, but she found that if she made eye-contact, he would ease up a bit and talk more naturally. It took her a few times to understand why. She had her father's eyes. The Yamanaka pupil-less eyes. And focusing on them made it easier for him to pretend that he was just talking with his actual therapist with whom he had a rapport built-up.

It was convenient for her purposes, so she didn't bother feeling hurt that she didn't rate such trust on her own right, but only as a proxy for her dad. It was the price of her previous actions.

Ino had recently been put through a long lecture on what consent meant and why it should be respected when possible by her father, who usually spoiled her. She suspected Sakura or Aiko-sensei as the reason why it happened. And frankly, even if it was Sakura, she couldn't feel betrayed.

A Yamanaka couldn't afford to be sloppy about consent. It was her shame that she forgot it. And a detailed reminder of exactly why from someone who did care about her and wouldn't stop loving her even if he was disappointed in her... She probably deserved worse for what she did to Sasuke over the years.

During his time unconscious, or maybe right upon waking, Sasuke had a number of vivid flashbacks involving his family, but generally centered around Uchiha Itachi. Including vivid recall of scenes of the massacre that were implanted by Itachi himself via unbreakable genjutsu when he was 7. Then an imaginary Orochimaru offering him all the power he could ever need for his revenge.

When that didn't work, there was a second pass with a flashback of Sakura with her legs severed, and her blood running right out of the cuts while he was paralyzed uselessly. Then another sales pitch on why he should accept Orochimaru's freely given power that would undoubtedly be very expensive to repay in a conveniently unmentioned way.

And then, generously, he was shown yet another flashback of his latest fight, watching Naruto immobile on the floor, Aiko-sensei struggling to help despite only having one leg that didn't go in a funny angle, and Sakura bleeding on the ground. Just to be extra-shitty, the Orochimaru impression also removed Katsuyu-sama from the picture but put Sasuke's Wolf Summons back in, dead while attempting to help. And then lengthened the scene to show Sakura die of her wounds and Aiko get a kunai through the heart while Sasuke could only watch.

Then he emerged from the vessel, saw first Kakashi in danger, and then the one who hurt Sakura, and didn't manage to get out of the haze of rage until Kakashi-sensei grabbed him and assured him that everyone in the team was alive, and they weren't in any danger.

Sasuke freely admitted to wanting to stab Gaara even without the irrational rage, but... That wasn't particularly concerning. He hadn't actually attempted it after calming down.

Sasuke's mind breaking under the intense psychological torture meant that there would be a lot of work for dad to get him back in shape.

Overall, the new damage to Sasuke's psyche was going to take months to undo. Older trauma was all reopened and raw again. Worse, the fact that he had an Orochimaru-shaped mental parasite was really concerning. And his inborn Chakra-voice had also decided to be in utter bitch just to round things out.

Now, she only had to determine if they should treat him like a wounded ally or a compromised loose canon going forward. Joy.

Yeah, stop, feeling sorry for yourself, she scolded herself with a sigh. You're not the most pitiful in this situation. Not by a landslide.

She straightened and looked at the Summons Sasuke was still leaning against. "Can you call Kakashi-taichou over for my report, Katsuyu-sama?"

Notes:

Because Ino should also get to be a baby badass!

If any of you smell an ino/Sakura ship in the future... Well, I don't exclude it. They are ninjas anyway, I don't see why they would have to go straight to the OTP. Frankly, I think they will at least try it, and three other partners before deciding to settle down.

! I have started writing Sakurama! It's not going very fast, since I am still prioritizing this fic, and I still would prefer posting it all at once rather than in chapters. Because, once again, I want to focus on Unextraordinary.

*Sakurama*
After a doomsday end to canon Naruto, Sakura dies.
Instead of moving on, be it to the pure lands, to reincarnation, or to non-being, Sakura finds herself facing the Sage of Six path.
Sakura can be brought back to the past, to change the end of the world from there. It has to be her, because unlike Naruto or Sasuke, who's souls are mired in a reincarnation cycle and already exist at most times, making bringing them backward impossible, Sakura's soul is brand new from her birth.

Sakura accepts, and is placed in a soon to be born body.
Except, this body already has an occupant.
Damn the Sage, but she refuses to squish this little soul with her larger awareness of life. She will fade in the background and bolster the original owner of her new body.

That is, until their father dares to raise a hand on them.
The end of the world can wait. For now, No one gets to hurt her little brothers.

Or: Senju Butsuma gets his arm broken by his four years old son (or is it his seventeen years old daughter?) for being a shit dad. It changes things.

Chapter 68: Anger and Love

Summary:

Back to Konoha

Notes:

I now officially have one less tooth! And a suture point on the inside of the palate. In the words of the surgeon, 'Well, that's an original one. I never saw a tooth like that!' So, the second upper wisdom tooth to get pulled out because it got a cavity before poking out fully had decided that it would be funny to put it's roots as far apart as possible.

Other unimportant news, I cut my hair just like Sakura! undershave and angled bob. Except since my hair is wavy (with ringlets when it gets long enough for it, it looks very different on me than on the darwing I did of Sakura on chapter 50.
On a related note, it's super easy to do this cut! First gather hair in a high ponytail, put a rigid hairband where you want the undershave to begin, and buzz everything underneath (it's best to keep the headband in place with one hand during the process so it doesn't slip). Then take the ponytail out, remove the cut hair, and re-tie all the hair in a low ponytail just at the edge of the undershave, while making sure it's centered to you spine. And then cut the tail off at whatever length seems best. When in doubt cut a little longer, it's possible to trim a bit more, but you can't put hair back on after it's cut
Of course this works best with help, but I did mine on my own. I'd rate the 'on your own' experience as medium to high difficulty, though.

Chapter Text

The only reason why Kakashi managed not to attack the Suna Jinchuuriki on the spot was because his very first action upon arrival was to save Sasuke.

Knowing that Sakura was almost completely healed from her last brush with him also helped.

Still, being polite to him was taking a lot of self-control.

Thankfully, blaming Orochimaru for Sasuke's outburst was fairly easy, since it was objectively Orochimaru's fault, and it was likely to garner a sympathetic response. Suna hadn't forgotten that Orochimaru was the reason they lost their Kage and involved themselves in a catastrophic attack against Konoha.

Also thankfully, what to do about the berserker was a complicated matter, and gave him plenty to think about other than his worries while he waited for his tiny Yamanaka to give him her assessment on Sasuke's state of mind.

He was just about done with his talk when the small Katsuyu on his shoulder told him that Yamanaka Ino wanted to talk to him.

"So?" He asked tersely, trying to cover up his anxiety.

Asuma's student stared up at him steadily with a firm expression. It looked good on her. "I do not believe that the circumstances warrant treating Uchiha Sasuke like a potential traitor nor a sleeper agent. Though I recommend getting a second opinion on the second point by someone better versed in this aspect of my Clan techniques than me as soon as possible."

Kakashi nodded. Confirming the lack of sleeper codes was an advanced skill that she lacked. But so long as Sasuke saw Inoichi before an opportunity to use these sleeper codes could arise, there was very little actual danger.

"However," the girl went on, "the situation is still very delicate, and we cannot yet know what caused the wave of rage, nor how he would act if it was triggered again. So for the travel back to Konoha, I think you should carry him."

Kakashi blinked. "Elaborate?"

Ino nodded and glanced to Sasuke, who was not looking elsewhere, pretending that he wasn't listening. "His initial access of rage was calmed down from being in contact with you. There are very good odds that staying close to you will help in preventing a new episode, and, should an episode happen anyway, help him snap out of it before things get too bad. Also, you're the only jounin here, and someone he values, so in the case of another episode, you're the least likely to end up seriously hurt."

Hmm. Fair. "And once in Konoha?"

"Keep carrying him until a more experienced therapist can confirm that it will be fine to put him down."

Sasuke turned his head to send Ino a wide-eyed look of horror. Kakashi stifled a laugh. You'd think she had suggested something truly outrageous, going by his face.

Truthfully, it was a bit of a cop-out, this answer. But Ino was just thirteen, and she had very little experience in this field, wanting to hedge her bets as much as she could was a smart response to the situation. Besides, her solution was clever. And after the stress of the day, Kakashi had not a single problem with keeping his pup in his arms for as long as he could.

Sasuke predictably flailed, grumbled and then made an exaggerated grumpy face when Kakashi picked him up, but within minutes, he had his face stuffed into Kakashi's shoulder and was starting to doze, showing his actual feelings about the arrangement.

Once Naruto and Kiba were back with the bodies of the kunoichi Kakashi beheaded and the two-headed shinobi sealed in scrolls, Kakashi called for the return.

Sakura's group had the time to seal up the body of their opponent, so they didn't need to go and fetch it.

Kakashi readjusted his hold on Sasuke, smiling when that earned him a sleepy grumble, and organized their return formation.

The most massive portion of Katsuyu dismissed herself to save Naruto's chakra, leaving just one small portion for each of the Konoha shinobi present.

Gaara awkwardly offered to carry Lee with him on his sand platform, since he was forbidden from moving much on his own until Tsunade cleared him to after his latest use of the Gates. Lee enthusiastically agreed, showing his good nature.

Kakashi saw the young Suna Jinchuuriki hesitate and glance at the other genins, but he didn't extend the offer to Naruto, who was determined to stick by Sasuke and keep an eye on him, or Ino, who still radiated hostile wariness in the Suna group's general direction.

Well, this was fine. Naruto and Ino were good to move on their own, according to the medic Summons.

Kakashi signaled the return trip, and Gaara levitated a huge ball of sand with their unconscious prisoner in it and put it, as arranged, ahead of the group, before lifting himself and Lee on a separate chunk of sand.

Kakashi had good ears, always had them. So when Ino's Katsuyu spoke up after a good deal of fidgeting on the girl's part, Kakashi heard it perfectly well. There was a good chance that Kiba, who had similarly good ears to him, and Shikamaru, who held the rear just behind Ino, heard too.

"I wouldn't mind more Summoners" Ino's small Slug said in her fluting voice. "But I am unsure if we are well matched for one-another. And I am unsure it is really me that you want to make a contract with."

Oh. Interesting! Kakashi kept an ear on their surroundings, but a part of his attention stayed on the conversation between genin and Summons. He had been told that he had the soul of a gossip-hungry grandma in the past, and it wasn't altogether wrong. He had an healthy appreciation for drama.

"What do you mean?" Ino asked quietly.

There was a little hum from the slug. "Well. I think you should ask yourself if you want to have a contract with me, or if you want to have a summoning contract to be stronger and I was the closest Summon you could ask when the thought struck."

Silence.

Such drama!

"I... I really think you're great." Ino mumbled. "You're a medic, and you have acid attacks, and you're all but invincible, and you enable instant communication."

"Thank you. I'm flattered." Katsuyu answered easily. "But do you really want to be my Summoner? You can only hold one contract. Are you sure these things are all that you want out of your Summons? You will grow up, what then? Will these still feel like enough?"

"It's enough for Naruto." Ino grumbled.

"Naruto has an extremely deep-seated wish to keep others from being hurt, at all, ever." Katsuyu explained. "He wants to be a healer, which I allow him to be. He will not regret his choice, as it is a part of who he is, down to the core, to wish health and protection for others. Also, his chakra reserves are huge, and will grow even more with time, which is what allows him to use me as a battle Summons in a pinch even though it isn't my forte."

Kakashi blinked and hid his smile in Sasuke's hair. It was familiar. It sounded like his conversation with Naruto about the fact that none of the Hatake contracts really fit him. Well, Ino also needed to learn these things, and Katsuyu was a good choice for it.

"Your chakra reserves are those of a Clan born Kunoichi, but even as an adult, Summoning something much bigger than yourself will be a stretch. And unlike Naruto, you aren't passionate about healing others. I don't feel like we are a good fit for each-other, and I think with time you would regret rashly signing with me if you did so now." Katsuyu explained. When Ino didn't answer for half a minute, she went on. "I think you should take the time to ask yourself what you find the most important. What skills hold the most value to you, what makes you happy, and then, rethink signing on with Summons, Ino-kun. It will help keep you from making a choice you will regret later on."

"You really don't want me?" Ino asked pitifully.

Katsuyu paused, then gave a small, high-pitched sigh. "I think that what you truly want has little to do with what is natural for me to do. And I don't really want to be stuck being asked to fill a role I am ill-suited for until your death. It would make me feel bad to constantly fall short of your wants. Aiko-san would tell you that Summons are people. And that we are each unique. Slugs are more peaceful. We do not like violence, and only use it when no other choice is possible. You are a warrior, you like the thrill of a fight, the challenges. A carnivorous species would fit you better."

There was another pause during which Kakashi turned what he knew of the little Yamanaka in his head. Right. Ninneko would fit her much better than a slow-moving invertebrate medic species.

"Are you... Angry with me?" Ino asked at length.

"No." was the answer. "As I said, I am flattered. And I know that you can't know things before they are told to you. You were a bit clumsy in your proposal, but it's natural for a first time. In the future, you would be better served to start such negotiations by asking what the Summoning species look for in a Summoner, and what their strength are, before asking if they would mind contracting with you. As I said, we are people. We prefer to feel like our wants are taken into account. And like we are wanted for what we are able to do, and appreciated for our skills by the person we are linked to for life. Being a second best choice, or getting an ill-fitting job, is discouraging."

Kakashi glanced at Ino. She was looking kind of down. He readjusted his grip on Sasuke and glanced at the Katsuyu on his own shoulder, who acted as if nothing of note was happening. Right. Confidentiality. She was a medic-slug after all, keeping other's secrets safe was part of the definition.

"If you want a trial run," Katsuyu said gently, "I would recommend asking Hinata-kun for a talk with her Contract's ambassador. The Foxes might suit you, and Suano-san struck me as the kind of person who likes teaching children."

Oh. Interesting! Also, foxes were pretty much cats in canine bodies, so the fit would also be pretty good.

Sakura was waiting for them at the Village's doors. Kakashi suspected that Tsunade-sama had an opinion about that. But considering that her injury was in the shoulder, and Katsuyu had validated her field-patch, she was lower priority than the two pills Akimichi or Neji with a hole in his abdomen anyway.

Unlike Lee, though, Sakura was not over her last encounter with Gaara.

She didn't immediately attack like Sasuke. Nor did she go for a Kunai like Ino.

No.

Sakura disappeared.

Kakashi sighed and craned his head. Getting to higher ground made sense, with her chakra-string pendulum tactics, but it also was horribly predictable. A Konoha genin jumping up at the first sign of danger? No one who knew Konoha nin would be the least bit surprised.

In fact, most competent opponents would lay traps vertically rather than horizontally in the Land of Fire. Tree Huggers was one of the most often used insulting monikers, but monkeys was an immediate second.

There was no shinobi more at ease than a Suna nin in a desert, a Kumo nin on a mountain, and Iwa nin underground, a Mizu nin on water or a Konoha nin among trees.

Kakashi needed to train her in less obvious evasion trajectories.

"There is no danger." He announced seemingly to empty air. Well, he could definitely feel the camouflage genjutsu Sakura pulled around herself, so he he knew that he was probably managing eye-contact as he spoke. "The former Kazekage's children have come as peace envoys to show their village goodwill."

After three seconds of pause, he heard the muffled thump of a genin landing with a successful chakra cushioning technique but slightly incorrect feet position. She needed to work on that too.

Sakura had a good sense of theatrics, because she waited until she was on the ground to dispel her camouflage genjutsu. Which made it way less obvious where she had disappeared to.

Even with his assurance, Sakura skirted around the group from Suna with a lot of space to spare, and didn't let the Jinchuuriki out of her view once until she was well within Kakashi's protection range.

It was adorable.

Once Sakura was next to him, she stared at Sasuke for a moment, before gingerly extending a hand and patting the boy's leg, as if to confirm that he was solid.

For a moment, Sakura looked speculatively at the way Kakashi held her teammate, and he almost hear the calculation going through her brain.

It was why he wasn't really surprised when she decided to jump on him. Frankly, the children feeling free to just climb up on him was nothing new. It also highly pleased his wolfy instincts. Not that those were all that prominent at the moment. He had just used the sharingan, and there wasn't any White Chakra left in him.

It didn't mean that Sakura scenting him didn't warm him a bit inside.

At that point, the pups had completely integrated Hatake-like habits, to the point where they felt like casual affection gestures even to his more human side. A genin sniffing at the joint of his neck and shoulder meant 'I missed you and I feel safer now that you're close.' He didn't need the Wolf to know that.

Nonetheless, it was impressive that Sakura managed to find a way to latch onto him when he was holding Sasuke to his chest. She had her feet braced on his hip, and one hand adhered to his furthest shoulder-blade with chakra, while the other was wrapped around Sasuke's shoulder.

He chuckled and used some chakra of his own to maintain Sasuke while he freed an arm to loop behind his kunoichi's thighs. The way Sakura used the jostle to nuzzle into her teammate's temple threatened to make him melt.

Of course, Naruto then decided that he couldn't be left out and jumped on Kakashi's back. His genins were still a bit jealous of one-another and didn't tolerate any perceived injustice.

Inoichi-san had assured him that it was perfectly normal for their age, and that so long as it stayed harmless and Aiko and him did their best to communicate clearly and didn't play favorites, it was even pretty healthy. It showed that they were confident enough to demand their fair share of affection. And it promoted a slight competitiveness that drove them to be their best selves.

In this particular situation, it also meant that Kakashi ended up carrying all three of his cute little students all the way to the Hokage tower. But he was an elite jounin. even after two days without sleep, half a day of full-speed run and an intense fight, three little teenagers were easy enough to bear.

He stayed behind Gaara so Sakura could keep him in her sight. After a while, Naruto and Sakura got into a complicated slap fighting game over his shoulder. Kakashi thoroughly enjoyed the double takes he got on the way too. Maybe he should carry the kids around more often. It was great entertainment.

Tsunade was apparently both not impressed at all and very impressed with Sakura.

After the entire debrief and political wrangling was done, Team 7 had been personally escorted to Aiko's room by the Hokage to get an equally personal check-up.

And that was when they learned what was going on with Sakura and self-healing.

The thing with medical ninjutsu was that it was much easier to bungle than to do right. There was a reason why Kakashi couldn't do it despite having a sharingan and plenty of occasions to copy iryou-ninjutsu. The horror stories around using it wrong ran from cancerous tumors to connecting a vein to an artery and causing an entire limb to be irrigated with blood that was already used, or putting the wrong muscle groups to the wrong tendons...

Generally, medical ninjutsu was something that didn't do the job well on it's own. If you used it, it did something. What it actually did was up to the user's control.

And to guide the control, you needed to know what needed to be done. Hence the very long anatomy studies that all medics went through.

Sakura had decided that book learning was for people who didn't have near eidetic memory. And so, instead of studying how and why bodies worked, she had gone for the simpler yet much more difficult path of using diagnostic jutsu on herself to map out her entire body and memorizing the personal baseline exactly.

What she had done that caused Katsuyu to grumble about reckless genins was restoring her injured shoulder to how she knew they were supposed to be to the best of her abilities.

The bones were not all the way fused back because that was best left to natural recovery as much as possible, and the skin still sported noticeable scarring since Sakura didn't deem it important enough to waste her chakra on, but she had effectively done a standard medic's job at patching herself up.

On the fly and on field.

Aiko was sure that a good part of Tsunade-sama's fuming and ranting was her frustration at not getting to poach Sakura. Kakashi raised a brow at the whispered bet and decided that he needed to hear more about that when there wasn't an irate Hokage in the room.

In the end, Tsunade-sama discharged their team so long as they went to stay with Inoichi, who could monitor Sasuke's condition, and gave Kakashi a 'no less than ten hours of sleep' leave before coming back to pick his next mission.

Kakashi crashed straight into sleep as soon as a sufficiently large mattress was in view so he didn't have to let go of his pups in order to lay down.

He just had the time to register Sasuke's grumbling for staying trapped in his arms even in this situation before sleep claimed him.

He had to go back to get a S-Rank mission once he had slept and rested.

But knowing that his Pack was being safeguarded by a strong (there were still legends about the Ino-Shika-Cho trio in Kumo) and trustworthy ally (both from personal assessment and because Minato-sensei had trusted the Triad's heads when he was still alive) when he wasn't there helped with the separation anxiety.

Sasuke's separation anxiety was another matter, but the prickly little Uchiha still didn't like looking weak, so he didn't make a scene when Kakashi had to leave. He just pouted extra-hard.

It was supposed to be a glare.

Sasuke was just a tad young to pull off glares, so it ended up being adorable pouts instead.

Well. He would get the hang of it in due time.

In the meantime Kakashi got to enjoy how adorable his little pup looked when play-acting as a dangerous predator.

Chapter 69: Aiko and domestic affairs (end of Sasuke rescue arc)

Summary:

Life settles into a new normal, with more or less normal problems.

Notes:

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Chapter Text

Kakashi was a jounin.

That was obvious.

It came with side effects.

Like how once he went to sleep with Sasuke and Sakura in his arms immediately after the end of the rescue mission, there was no escaping for them.

Sakura was a little cuddlebug when she felt like it, so she was perfectly alright with it. Sasuke was much more grumpy about the predicament.

And since Kakashi was on a sleep debt, the Sa-duo ended up trapped for a serious length of time. Sakura took to it fairly well, and after she was done catching up on sleep, she entertained herself with some chakra control exercises, and meditation. Sasuke was another matter entirely.

In fact Sasuke ended up bargaining with Aiko and promising to go have a long session with Inoichi right away if she rescued him.

The offer was good enough for her, so she woke Kakashi by dangling a piece of smoked fish in front of his nose with a chakra string. Sasuke used this moment of half-awareness while Kakashi ate to wriggle out since he wasn't as likely to react violently, and Aiko pushed Naruto in the jounin's arms in his place with her foot.

It worked like a charm.

Once Kakashi was done chewing the slice of smoked salmon, he buried his nose in Naruto's hair and resumed sleeping.

Sasuke sat in shocked silence, staring at Kakashi while Sakura and Naruto giggled at the maneuver.

Naruto happily snuggled into the embrace and snoozed off within seconds.

Aiko grinned, braced her broken bones with chakra, and took hold of Sasuke's shoulders to steer him to Inoichi's study. It wasn't that she truly doubted that he would keep his word. It was just that as a sensei it was her role to be slightly annoying.

Jiraiya came by before Kakashi left for his next mission, and it was obvious that he would have preferred things to be different.

Well. Kakashi was watching the Toad Sage like a hawk for the entire time, so his lack of enthusiasm made sense.

Jiraiya declared that the seal was still just as confined by the evil sealing method as it had been previously, and that while the script had changed a little from what the Sound shinobi had done, the base of the seal was still the same.

So while the effects of losing control over the cursed heaven seal were worse, it was still fine so long as Sasuke had the will to keep it contained.

Before leaving, Jiraiya made noises about wanting to take Naruto away on a long training trip.

Kakashi all but turned into stone and told the Sanin that he would only let that happen if the Hokage personally told him so. As an order.

And then, before any such order could be given, Kakashi left on his next mission, making it so the Hokage wouldn't be able to personally give the order to him until he got back.

Once Kakashi left on his jounin mission, Aiko found herself in the middle of a tight genin group at all times.

Well. Sasuke had a daily session with Inoichi every early morning, but apart from that and the time sleeping in the Yamanaka Clan Head's house, Team 7 was a rallying point for tiny genins.

The kids from all four teams seemed to really believe in strength in numbers. And since their own senseis were also busy doing high-ranking missions to help shore up Konoha's reputation, they were somewhat at lose ends and seemingly determined to play bodyguards after Sasuke got snatched right in Konoha.

Tsunade had gotten the sort of scary aura when talking about rectifying the hole in their perimeter that allowed enemies in without any notice, that told Aiko that all hells were going to be raised over that. Heads were probably going to roll. And it was unlikely that any hostile shinobi would manage to secretly sneak in any time soon.

With the exception of the Hyuuga, the clans of the collection of genins seemed pretty chill about having their heirs and heir adjacent kids blow off training in favor of hanging out. But then again. In political terms it could also be defined as deepening cordial connections with the future Clan Heads. So making fast friends with the rest of the genins of the same year as them was well worth the lost training time. Especially since they didn't have their jounin senseis to make the best out of their training, and their level in their Clans' techniques were presumably already descent.

For the Hyuugas, there had been some kind of peer pressure or something that meant they didn't raise a stink about Hinata and Neji doing as they wanted, because otherwise, their Clan would be the only one left out of the multi-clans political faction/alliance/friendship in the future. They just were extra condescending to everyone when handing the genins over to remind the other Clan heirs that the Hyuugas had their own standards.

Considering that Hyuuga standards included torture and slavery of their own Clanspeople, no one was particularly impressed.

Aiko didn't mind the political side all that much and simply enjoyed having a gaggle of genins to push her wheelchair at reckless speeds for fun.

Tsunade-sama had given her a verdict of one month on the wheelchair (having one leg and two arms full of broken bones didn't give the option for crutches), and then one month of being careful and doing physical therapy before she could start re-training in earnest.

Lee was in worse straits than her. He had a lot of torn muscles and micro-fractures, plus a concerning condition in his spine that had gotten him a warning to avoid opening his Gates unless he was willing to give up on being a shinobi. Lee was pretty down about it for a while, and then he decided to take it as a challenge to get stronger without needing to rely on opening his Gates, and to only use that when there was something worth dying for. That kid was pretty incredible.

Akimichi Chouji had lost a good half of his body fat, and there were some internal systems that were pretty touch and go for a while, due to his eating two of his Clan's catalyst pills. But with the Akimichi and Nara opening their records to Tsunade-sama and her working her medic magic, he would be alright.

It had taken a few days for the medics to let the young Akimichi out and to his Clan's care, and he had to eat even more than usual in order to recoup his reserves.

Ino was quite militant about his diet. She had all but banned chips for him so he wouldn't go about rebuilding his reserves on poor bases.

Chouji had been quite put out and angry about the decree until his teammate slapped an overfull bowl of fried tempura chicken breasts in front of him as a replacement and started lecturing him about excessive salt intake. Then, he finally understood that she didn't want to put him on an unreasonable diet, and was actually okay with him eating more, she just wanted him to eat the right kinds of foods, as was dictated by his Clan's specific needs.

Neji for his part, was almost fully healed, and Sakura only had to be a bit careful about moving her right arm, and kept it in a scarf as a reminder.

Shino and Hinata were a bit put out that they hadn't been part of the rescue mission, But Shino hadn't been available, and Hinata understood that going out of the safety of the village to fetch someone who got kidnapped because of his Doujutsu was unwise for an unsealed Hyuuga.

Sakura having her arm in a scarf wasn't anything weird for most people. Young Kunoichis got hurt in a variety of ways, including because of their training.

But it was the reason why Aiko found herself part of a scene in the middle of a crowded street.

Sakura's parents.

Aiko never met them before.

The image she had made from Sakura's few comments and complaints was that they were painfully civilian and somewhat controlling. Not ideal, but not the worst either.

Apparently, Sakura had been overly generous in her description.

Aside from Sakura going completely rigid and alert, the first sign of the problem was a pretty unremarkable woman charging straight toward them with a slightly taller man with purplish-grayish hair styled in five spikes trailing in her wake.

Aiko frowned and straightened as much as she could while sat in a wheelchair. She noticed a good third of the nine other genins around her go to alert around her in reaction to Sakura and her stiffening.

"What is this?" The woman all but yelled when she was in front of their group. "You got hurt again? When will you get back to your senses and quit? You're obviously too weak to be a ninja! You'd better stop before you become so full of scars that no one wants to marry you."

Aiko blinked in shock.

Wow.

What a bitch.

And the man that was presumably Sakura's father didn't intervene one way or another.

Oh, wait, no there he was opening his mouth. ""It's best not to be scar-y, after all! Hahaha!"

...

Oh.

Yes, a pun.

Such a valuable interjection.

Sakura's desperation to get adopted by Kakashi made a lot of sense in this context.

Aiko would also pick Kakashi over that.

Yeah, she tried to be charitable for a second. Sakura had come back with two nerveless, freshly reattached legs accompanied with gruesome scars before, and most parents would balk at that and ask their kids to quit the dangerous career. Still, yelling in public that your daughter is weak and won't be able to marry? Dick move.

Aiko looked at Sakura. While she wanted to intervene immediately to respond to the many insults done to her student, it was Sakura's family matter, and she shouldn't butt in uninvited.

Sakura didn't notice her. She was too busy seething with rage.

All the genins that were with them were also frozen gaping in various shades of shock and offence. Well. They mainly came from Clans, wanting one's child to not be a ninja was pretty foreign to them, and they knew just how good Sakura was in a fight from watching her battle in the Preliminaries.

"So that's what you're concerned about." Sakura hissed. "My marriageability. Right. You know, for a moment, I thought you actually cared about me as a person. How silly, right? It's a good thing you made yourself clear, Okaa-san. I might have misunderstood your intent."

Sakura gave her parents a very wide falsely sweet smile, making the woman recoil at the pure venom of her words. A wave of whispers traveled through the ring of onlookers that formed at the promise of drama.

Sakura's face hardened and she used her mostly immobilized hand to strap her spiked gauntlet on in fighting configuration over her free hand. "Is that what it would take for you to stop pestering me about retiring and turning into a civilian housewife?" She asked viciously while lifting her left hand and positioning the claws of her gauntlet on her forehead. "My becoming too 'Scar-Y' for marriage? Will you respect my choices, then?"

Ah. Teenage rebelliousness and overreaction at their best.

Aiko gave a cough. "Sakura." She said to get her student's attention. "Please do not deliberately cause yourself harm in a way that will end up mimicking Kakashi's facial scar. It would hurt his reputation if you did."

Sakura jolted and removed the claws from her face. Aiko nodded at her and gave her a warm smile.

"You're going too far!" Sakura's mother screeched while taking an aggressive stride toward Sakura and raising a fist in threat. "Are you truly so determined to ruin your own life so that you can make me into the villain?"

"Why should she?" Aiko asked sharply, dismissing her initial decision not to interfere. "You do that just fine on your own."

Aiko felt the woman's ire turn on her along with her glare. That was perfectly fine with her. Aiko was a grown woman who didn't give a single flying shit about that pitiful civilian woman's opinion. She would gladly bear abuse in the place of her student who would get hurt from her mother's words even if she was disillusioned with her.

"You can talk, look at you! You could be at home peacefully caring for children, but instead you're in a wheelchair because you decided to play ninja! And you want my daughter to end up like you?" The woman growled at Aiko.

Aiko smiled sweetly and tilted her head sideways. She was about to answer when Sasuke scoffed behind her.

"I understand better why Sakura thinks being an orphan is great. I would think the same if I had parents like that." Sasuke sneered with an impressively Uchiha type of facial expression. Look at that, Aiko wasn't the only one who decided to butt in. "At least she doesn't have to put up with you anymore. As a genin, she's a legal adult, so she was able to move out and get rid of you."

Ouch. Her kids were savage.

Sakura blinked and turned to Sasuke. "Right. I don't need to mind them. I have a good team to support me instead." She grinned at Naruto afterwards to include him in.

"How could our own child be so heartless! I only want what's best for you!" The woman wailed.

Ugh.

Did Aiko really have to be conciliatory to this? It was the only way to deescalate, but...

Okay.

She would give it one try, just so she could say she did.

She turned her head and glanced at the different genins around her before picking. "Shino. I would like your opinion for a moment."

The Aburame boy raised an eyebrow but gamely stepped closer. "Yes? What may I help with, Aiko-sensei?"

"As a part of a Noble Clan's main branch, what would happen if you asked for permission to marry Sakura in about six years?"

Shino crossed his arms. "I don't believe I am the right person to ask that of. Why? Because Sakura-san is working on re-creating the Hatake White Chakra and canine instincts, and that might be incompatible with my own Clan traits on the reproductive front. If it wasn't for that, I would be congratulated for bringing such a talented partner into our Clan."

Right. Bug-based instincts and canine ones might not mesh right. It was on her for picking the wrong boy. "Kiba? Same question."

The Inuzuka got a mean little smirk. "Well. Inuzuka don't tend to marry. But if it was for her, she would be considered well worth the exception. Sakura has shown herself to be talented, resourceful, strong, and good with ninken. In fact, marrying her would be considered a boon to my Clan even if I ended up having to be the one marrying out and into the Hatake Clan."

Aiko smiled serenely. How sly of him to bring up Sakura's pending adoption in this context. "And would that change if she was absolutely full of scars by then?"

Kiba tilted his head sideways. "Why should that matter?" he asked with slightly put on cluelessness.

Aiko smiled and turned back to Sakura's mother. "So you see. If Sakura ever decides that being at home caring for children is the best for her, she will have no trouble finding a shinobi husband. You don't need to verbally assault her in the middle of a street for her best interest."

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN HATAKE CLAN?" Sakura's mother roared instead of answering Aiko's actual words. Ah. It took her that long to process Kiba's dig.

Sakura eagerly grabbed this new subject. "Oh. Kakashi-nii said that giving me his Summoning Contract was an unofficial adoption. But I wanted a true adoption, so he promised to do it when he has the time to fill the paperwork." There she added some eager bouncing and a small hand-clap to empathize how happy she was about the promise.

"Why are we hearing this for the first time now?" the Haruno woman spluttered.

Sakura blinked innocently. "It was none of your business? I'm being adopted as an adult heir to the Hatake Clan so your consent isn't necessary. I thought you would be happy about it? All you ever talk to me about lately is getting ready for marriage. Even though I'm only thirteen. I thought you would be overjoyed that I'm going to lose the Haruno name even faster. Soon you won't need to bear the shame of there being a Kunoichi with your family name."

Oof. Sakura didn't pull her punches.

Objectively speaking, Sakura was in the wrong on that particular subject. Warning her parents who raised her from birth well in advance would have been an expected courtesy. And most would prefer having their parents' consent for an adult adoption even if it wasn't legally necessary. But none of that was in the law. And Sakura was benefiting from a pretty big moral high-ground at the moment, because of how her mother had been acting so far.

"What do you mean, shame? Having our daughter try to be a Kunoichi when she can't even do housework properly is what's embarrassing!" ... Well, some people just didn't know when to stop digging their own graves.

"I fail to see why you believe that to be even remotely relevant." Aiko sighed. "Being a Kunoichi has nothing to do with your ability to do housework. Unless you're aiming for infiltration. Which Sakura isn't. And as a future Clan head, hiring someone to do the housework is pretty much expected. In fact, the only path where Sakura would be handicapped by an inability to do housework is that of a housewife. Why are you so adamant to force your own daughter in the one path where she wouldn't shine? Is that what you call wanting the best for her?"

Apparently that was when Sakura's mother finally noticed that the bulk of the onlookers weren't on her side. She started fuming silently.

And that was when Sakura's father decided to give his own opinion. "Sakura, don't you think you need to add options other than adoption? Hahaha."

"No." Sakura simply said, her face freezing with contempt. Without another word, she grabbed the one of handles of Aiko's wheelchair, positioned her chest behind the other one, and started steering away.

There was an indignant call not to walk away from her own mother. Sakura answered that with a raised middle finger that gave Naruto the opportunity to step in and take up pushing Aiko's wheelchair.

Well.

So Aiko had finally met Sakura's parents.

She could understand why Sakura never introduced them of her own will before.

Speaking of... "What are your parents' names, again?"

Sakura snorted. "Haruno Mebuki and Kizashi."

"Thanks."

What more was there to say, anyway.

Aiko showed her support by taking Sakura's side in the argument. The rest was best left to her friends. Their sympathy would be better received than hers. Not matter how much she loved her kids, she was still a teacher, not a friend.

Right on cue, Ino started to grumble about how Sakura should have been adopted into her own family instead, and she would have stolen her for herself if she had known that Sakura was looking to be adopted. It made Sakura laugh, which was probably the aim.

Then Kiba asked Sasuke if he was looking to be adopted too because the Inuzuka might accept him even if he kind of sucked at partnering with his wolves still. That started a brawl. Which was also probably the aim.

Aiko smiled and gently reminded them that ninjas shouldn't fight in Konoha unless they were in a training ground, so Kiba enthusiastically volunteered his Clan's training grounds and started trash talking about how much he would beat Sasuke once they got there.

Naruto started trash talking back, and before long, the kids were running as fast as Aiko's wheelchair could go while planning a group spar.

Aiko was sure that was Kiba's idea of how to distract someone from being down about their parents being assholes.

Inuzukas, after all, believed that a good brawl could cure most things.

Notes:

Mebuki and Kizashi are mainly based on the road to ninja movie.

I am not considering it canon, hence why they are both civilians in my fic,.

But I borrowed character traits from the one time we actually see Sakura's parents speak. Where Sakura's mom, loudly, in public, despite Sakura's protests and in front of all of Sakura's friends, mocks her for not liking to clean or tidy up, and tells her that she will be an embarrassment if she gets promoted (as a fucking ninja!) because of her lack of housewife skills. Then she laughs at Sakura in a way that invites all of her friends and colleagues and their parents to join in, Kizashi adds an useless joke about how having a master will keep Sakura from disaster and laughs some more, and when Sakura tells her in a mildly sharp way that she's going too far, she responds with anger and more or less a threat of physical violence.

I have no idea why Sakura ever fucking forgives them.

In their defense for this particular situation, though, Mebuki, as a civilian housewife, does believe that marriage is a woman's happiness, so her comment on no one wanting to marry Sakura was somewhat well intended. As in, "you will ruin your chances of marriage and then be miserable and single all your life!"

And... Sakura did get badly injured before, and she's worried that her daughter might actually die.

This is why communication is key, guys. "I love you and I'm so worried that one day being a ninja will kill you" would have been received much better than what Mebuki actually ended up saying.

Chapter 70: Busy times (transition arc)

Summary:

Kakashi kills stuff. Aiko doesn't but it's not so far off.

Notes:

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Chapter Text

In all honesty, this mission was beneath Kakashi.

There were two reasons why he got it anyway.

It was close to the location of his actual S-Rank Mission, so he could take care of it at the same time without losing too long on travel.

And the bandit subjugation was just by the Grass border, and as such, very close to Earth.

Sending him there, with instructions to be as flashy as possible, was a direct flex to Iwa. A reminder that the Yondaime's student was still alive and kicking. In case they entertained the notion of starting the fourth Shinobi War.

So Kakashi did as instructed and was as blatantly 'Copy-nin' as possible.

By the time he was done, his Chakra reserves were low, but there was a great big scar among the trees from an overpowered Fuuton, the camp was burnt to a crisp, the two missing-nin chunins who were part of the bandit band were visibly killed by drowning, and the rank and file of the band were equal parts fried by lightning or crushed via Doton.

The five element compatibility was one of his most remarkable traits, after all.

Kakashi dispassionately surveyed the field of bodies strewn around, then turned toward the border-station.

He would normally grab the head of the missing-nins for bounties, but the point there was for spies to be able to track his actions.

The border station would dispatch a clean-up team. It would give Iwa or Kusa the time to be nosy.

The border station provided him with a meal and a bed.

And, once he woke up, with an Hokage-signed order to take at least one border-patrol before heading back home.

His stay in Konoha lasted two days.

He caught up on sleep and cuddles, learned of Sakura's confrontation with her parents and her public declaration of his intent to adopt her, and relished in tasty, well cooked meals.

He took half a day mercilessly drilling genins (not all of them his) in evasive maneuvers, and taught Naruto, Sasuke and Sakura a new mid-level Jutsu each. In Fuuton, Raiton and Suiton, respectively. He had a feeling that those were going to leak out to the little collective of genins that had accumulated around Aiko, but he didn't mind.

Somehow, he ended up coaching Hyuuga Hinata and, for some reason, the entire Ino-Shika-Cho trio how to adapt your body-language so a Fox could easily read it..

Last he had heard, only Ino had been a candidate for that contract. It seemed that kids nowadays thought the more Summoners on a Contract the better.

Not that Kakashi had anything to say on that. It was what his Clan also thought in the Warring Clans Era.

Then, his rest period came to an end, and off he was to an assassination.

Kakashi slid a kunai in the back of his mark and shook away the auditory flashback of Aiko choking as Kabuto stabbed her in the chest.

It was not Aiko.

Aiko was fine. At home with the pups.

Once the pulse vanished, Kakashi took the body and arranged it in a way that made the cause of death obvious.

The mark was a mob boss. The type who ran a protection racket and doubled as a loan shark.

It was the only reason why the mission had been accepted and was being done by someone not from ANBU.

Of course, there were heavy suspicions that the request came from a rival mob organization rather that the family of a victim that the client introduced themselves as. But so far as a token effort was made to cover up their identity, and the proper proofs of law-breaking were provided, Konoha was willing to close their eyes on that.

At least until they needed a legitimate reason to knock down this rival mob client.

Not that it was Kakashi's problem anyway.

He slipped out of the window as silently as he had slipped in, and made his way back to Konoha.

This one had been rather close to home, so he would be back before evening.

He would also be sent right back out and probably not even be able to greet his Pack, but that was how it was.

He was wrong.

Tsunade didn't send him right back out, but instead sent him back to the Yamanaka compound to rest with an appointment the next morning and a warning that she had already given matching appointment to Aiko, so he better not think of showing up late.

Kakashi would wonder how his Hokage knew that his Pack-Sister was one of the only persons able to get him anywhere on time.

But he did, in fact, know about Naruto's bragging habits. The little menace probably was the one to tell his precious oba-chan about his dear old sensei's weakness. He would have to think about an appropriately grueling training exercise for punishment.

In any case, Kakashi already had a pretty good guess why he and Aiko were summoned to the Hokage's office in the morning.

The office still had a lingering smell of toad oil, meaning that Jiraiya was there not too long ago.

Chances were that the meeting would be about Naruto.

And Kakashi wasn't about to relinquish his pup without a fight.

Thankfully, Tsunade-sama did like Naruto quite a lot, so even if the appointment was meat to be an unilateral order to give Naruto to Jiraiya rather than a chance to explain why exactly he wouldn't allow it, there was still one recourse left to change things by having Naruto himself tell his oba-san why he didn't trust the Toad Sage.

Also, the fact that it took a full month for Tsunade to get around to asking him to show up told him that she probably wasn't going to give an unilateral order.

Aiko had told him that she suspected Katsuyu had been bidding her time all through the search for Tsunade because she wanted to be in a position of power to tell the old pervert off for his blatant neglect.

Kakashi was pretty sure that Tsunade knew exactly what her Personal Summons thought of Jiraiya taking off with Naruto.

Angering your Personal Summons was never a smart choice, Orochimaru could attest to that.

The appointment was probably to get both Kakashi and Jiraiya to defend their sides, and then pass a judgment that they then would all have to respect.

When he entered Inoichi's home, where he was still a guest, there was a grand-total of twelve genins in the living-room. Inoichi himself seemed perfectly alright with the invasion of tiny ninjas, so Kakashi gave him a simple nod and headed for Aiko.

For some reason, Aiko was sitting alone on the couch while the kids had formed a circle sitting on the ground.

Ah.

It was for better brawling access. As Kakashi walked around them, Ino made an angry noise and lunged at Neji with an indignant demand to withdraw his latest words.

The Hyuuga took it much better than Kakashi would have guessed, seeing how Ino didn't get her tenketsu messed up for it. He didn't withdraw his words, though.

His Pack-Sister barely reacted when Kakashi lifted her up so he could situate himself behind her. Well, she smiled and welcomed him back, then she relaxed back into his chest and reached a hand up to pet his hair.

The genins gawked for a while, but went back to their lively conversation about which was best between kunais shuriken and senbon soon enough.

Sakura tossed in ninja wire and exploding tags as new contenders. Probably just to watch the chaos unfold further.

Kakashi tuned them out, wrapped his arms around Aiko's midsection, put his nose into her hair and let himself sink into a light doze.

He woke up from the feeling of being observed, about half an hour into his nap.

A glance around revealed the culprit to be Kiba.

That was surprising. Especially since the young Inuzuka seemed to be seizing up the space right next to him rather than really looking at him.

When their eyes met, Kiba straightened, pushed Akamaru into Hinata's lap and took a decisive step closer.

In a few seconds, the kid had climbed up on the sofa next to him and was tentatively resting his head on Kakashi's arm.

Kakashi really had thought that he was past feeling wrong-footed from having a little genin hug him. Truly.

Apparently, the immunity only extended to his own little genins, because he had no idea what to do with an extra one.

He knew that Inuzuka children were much more friendly to new people than Hatake ones on the whole. He just hadn't expected to be included in the people to be friendly towards.

When did that happen, anyway?

Looking to Aiko for help only yielded a snort at his expense and a little pat on the head. Pats were good. But it didn't help much.

Kakashi helplessly looked back down at the kid by his elbow. He blinked when his gaze met yellow eyes. The kid sighed in a way that felt way too old for such a young pup and then then he reached for Kakashi's hand and pulled it closer.

Kakashi was honestly not expecting getting bitten.

Giving a little backhanded swat on the nose to misbehaving, biting puppies was so ingrained that he did it without even thinking.

Kiba huffed indignantly, but he looked more proud of himself than anything else.

Well, the awkward indecision had reduced quite a lot, so he probably was right to smirk so happily.

Then there was a noise from the kids, and Sasuke was climbing to his feet with a glower at Kiba.

Kakashi braced himself for a brawl, but Sasuke didn't attack, instead flopping on his other side an aggressively cuddling.

Kiba snickered and Aiko muffled a huff of laughter.

Inoichi was very polite when asking if Kakashi had time for a session before sleep since he just had a nap.

It still felt like a threat.

Even if Kakashi did feel a bit better when he got out of the Yamanaka's study.

He wasn't all that sure why Inoichi always insisted, Kakashi tended to brag about his Pack more than talk about his problems when he saw the man alone, but Inoichi always acted like he was satisfied with what Kakashi was willing to share.

Kakashi made a valiant effort at being late.

He unfortunately was bludgeoned with logic and then physically dragged into the Hokage's office only a couple of minutes late.

He hadn't fought Aiko with all his strength. He was a jounin, if he had really not wanted to go, Aiko cold never have forced him to.

But it was the same as how Aiko didn't manipulate him with subtle lies and emotional manipulations but instead smacked him with blunt truths.

Fighting with your full skill-set was for enemies.

Bickering all the way to the Hokage tower and making halfhearted attempts at running-away was playful tussling, and bringing out his full strength would be cheating.

"Jiraiya has volunteered to take Naruto with him for a three years to escape the notice of the Akatsuki." Tsunade-sama announced neutrally once the two of them made it into her office.

Just as Kakashi expected, Jiraiya was also in the office, and there was a small Katsuyu sitting on the desk.

Aiko didn't speak. She wasn't one to discuss direct orders from the Hokage. But the way her face closed off and her lips thinned in displeasure told Kakashi all he needed to know about her feelings on the matter.

And Kakashi was definitely one to discuss direct orders. "Aiko? Can you tell me what disturbs you about this?" He asked. While he was not speaking at a low volume, he made sure his tone didn't sound like an order.

Aiko glanced at him, but kept her mouth tightly shut.

Kakashi was actually impressed that she still managed to maintain such decorum around the Hokage when she had spent so much time in the office during Sakura's nerve reconnecting sessions with both Naruto and Sakura not minding the gap in ranks all that much.

It probably was a form of over-compensation. Aiko holding all the decorum because Naruto wasn't.

"Chunin Sato Aiko?" Tsunade interjected. "If you have anything to share about this decision, I would like to hear it."

"I do not trust Jiraiya-sama with Naruto's well-being." Aiko said shortly. Though she didn't elaborate any more. It must be the effect of speaking directly to the Hokage. In the room's corner, Jiraiya spluttered in offense.

Tsunade gave a slow blink, then raised her brows. "And do you have any reason for your distrust?"

Aiko nodded, taking the question as permission to spill her misgivings. "Well, there is obviously the fact that he left Naruto all alone in an hotel room to get ambushed by the Akatsuki." She said.

As Jiraiya opened his mouth to defend himself, she plowed on. "And while that one could maybe be forgiven in that he didn't know Naruto had to be specifically protected from them, the fact that he still sent Naruto out to train alone without any supervision or guard for a whole month afterward where he could have been grabbed before anyone had the time to react does not reassure me of his ability to protect Naruto adequately."

Kakashi noticed the way her stop was abrupt. Like she had more to say, but was refraining for the sake of decorum.

Tsunade apparently heard the same. "That's not all, is it?"

Aiko swayed on her heels for a moment, eyes flitting around the office, before her face hardened and set. "Right... These were just my doubts regarding Naruto's safety from the Akatsuki while under Jiraiya-sama's protection. As his current teacher, though, I also worry about Naruto's emotional well-being."

"What are you going on about?" Jiraiya all but growled, seeming to swell. Kakashi couldn't help his answering growl. Not even for decorum in front of their brand-new Hokage.

"Jiraiya, hush. Every account I heard on Kakashi's teaching assistant chunin mentioned a strong insight on her part. I want to know what she has to say." Tsunade-sama cut in with a smack of her palm on the table-top, before settling her elbows back on the table and her chin on the back of her hand. "Please elaborate on your concerns for the brat, Sato-san."

"Jiraiya-sama stole Naruto's money. More specifically, he stole the entirety of Naruto's hard-earned and carefully saved money, which are a safety blanket to him. Naruto grew up never sure if he would eat enough because his orphan stipend barely covered food and clothes, without adding the ludicrous price inflation that the entirety of the village inflicted on him for the pettiest of reasons. Finally being a genin. Having a few high-ranking missions pay stored away for later just in case... That was Naruto's assurance that he wouldn't have to fear starving. An assurance that Jiraiya-sama shamelessly and remorselessly ripped away from him by abusing his position of authority and the trust that should have come with it."

Tsunade frowned and glanced sideways at her teammate, who stood frozen in his corner. Kakashi thought he saw a bit of guilt in the man's eyes, but he couldn't be sure.

"Theft is pretty bad. And the circumstances you are outlining are in fact concerning." Tsunade-sama answered slowly. "I will see that Naruto is reimbursed. Would my giving Jiraiya a formal order never to take Naruto's money away from him reassure you on your student's emotional well-being while away?"

Aiko hesitated, then slowly shook her head. "The theft is merely the biggest example of how emotionally neglectful Jiraiya-sama has been for the two months that Naruto was in his care. The accumulation of smaller offenses may sound less damning, but they are no less damaging, especially on the long term. From what I've heard, Jiraiya-sama has spent the entire trip making Naruto feel like he was a burden to some extent. Be it calling him a baby for expressing his emotions, spending the minimum time necessary on him, if that, or guilt-tripping him for not being perfect right-away, and outright insulting him and yelling that he has no talent, or making him feel like he somehow owed him for teaching him a jutsu."

Jiraiya opened and closed his mouth a bit like fish, but ultimately didn't speak up. Probably because he didn't have any real defense against the truth of Aiko's accusation.

"Naruto has spent his entire childhood alone, unloved and reviled. He has finally started getting positive attention and care," Aiko added gravely, moving in for the kill without even knowing how damning her words had to be to Naruto's named godfather.

"If he was to be trust back into casual emotional abuse on order of the Hokage whom he trusts as his only blood relative, I am afraid that the damage wouldn't stop at just undoing all of the progress in his mental health since graduation. In this situation, losing all trust in anyone at all wouldn't be such a long shot. Especially since we aren't talking about a month length trip that he could grit his teeth through by reminding himself that he will be back soon. Naruto is thirteen, three years might as well be forever, to him."

Kakashi was impressed. That was quite the thorough slam-down. And even better, since Aiko wasn't aware of the truth of Jiraiya's relation to Naruto, no one could accuse her of going for low blows on purpose.

Ah. Jiraiya had apparently found his tongue! "Casual emotional abuse!? How can you say that? I have never hurt...!"

Aiko spared the Toad sage a very frosty flat look, and then turned toward Tsunade and finished her evaluation like there hadn't been an interruption. "As things stands, I would barely entrust Jiraiya with the well-being of a houseplant, let alone a cat. A traumatized orphan with trust issues that we wish to raise into a well-adjusted adult and trustworthy member of the village is absolutely out of the question."

Notes:

!
I have posted the very first chapter of Sakurama!

Chapter 71: Tsunade's Headache

Summary:

Tsunade needs a drink. It doesn't keep her from getting shit done.

Notes:

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Chapter Text

Tsunade wanted a drink.

She always wanted a drink.

And it wasn't just that she enjoyed the taste of a good sake, unfortunately.

Her medical expertise allowed her to remove the physical aspects of addiction quite easily,and she could perform a full detox anytime with pretty much no adverse effects.

The mental and emotional addiction, on the other hand, couldn't be handled with a precise application of chakra.

The only cure was full sobriety. Ideally spanning multiple years.

And as Hokage... She couldn't swing that. She would definitely kill someone, or herself, if she didn't have the option to indulge.

There was the paperwork, the base level of politics involved in managing a village that was more of a town, the ongoing thing with the Hyuugas, the clash of civilian and shinobi, and modern against traditionalists within both.

Then, add in the fact that they were in immediate post-crisis, with an image to shore up as fast as possible after getting attacked in their own village.

And the thing with the rogue Elder, who apparently took advantage of the vacancy before Tsunade was instated to scrub all the evidences of his treasonous actions from the Hokage-only archives, and whose supporters Tsunade couldn't be absolutely clear on.

Oh, also the Akatsuki. Can't forget the Akatsuki, who wanted to steal Biju for god knows what reason.

There was Orochimaru, too, gunning for both Konoha and Uchiha Sasuke. And probably benefiting from help from the previously mentioned rogue Elder, because holes like the one that enabled Sasuke's kidnapping didn't just happen without inside help.

Then there was the thing Inoichi had brought up to her, about the Academy, Tobirama-oji's pride and joy, suffering from decades of sabotage. And the investigation on it having stalled... In a way that implicated a certain Elder. And that Hiruzen-sensei had allowed to stall... In a way that implicated a certain Elder.

The Hospital was in shambles, by the way.

So Jiraiya's... Thing... Ahhhh. It wasn't the worst. But she could have done without it.

Initially, when Jiraiya had come to her to complain about Hatake stonewalling him on the subject of taking Naruto on a training journey, she had answered with schadenfreude.

Well, Orochimaru isn't getting Sasuke, I'm not getting Sakura, I don't see why you should get to have Naruto.

Also, Katsuyu was adamantly against the very notion of letting her younger Summoner go with the Toad Sage. She couldn't quite articulate clearly why she was against it, but her dislike of the idea was clear and loud.

Being an invertebrate, and therefore not a mammal, Katsuyu sometimes struggled to express her feelings in a way that made sense to humans. And it didn't help that Tsunade was out of practice for interpreting her personal Summons feelings by over two decades because of her hematophobia.

In the end, Katsuyu had growled in frustration and told her to ask Sato Aiko what the problem was with allowing Jiraiya near Naruto.

That was original.

Then again, she had asked about the unassuming chunin because of how highly Naruto spoke of her. According to her diverse reports, including one from Inoichi's, the woman's main strengths were her common sense and emotional intelligence. It was why Kakashi had appropriated her as an assistant sensei. To delegate handling feelings.

It made sense that Katsuyu also took an habit to kick emotion-related problems to the designated emotion handler.

It intrigued her enough that the next time Jiraiya came by to pester her about forcing Hatake to hand over Naruto, she told him to come by the following morning. (The mission Kakashi had taken in the morning was pretty cut and dry, as well as close by, so he should be back by then.) And then she wrote a summons for chunin Sato Aiko for the same time and sent it out.

Hearing what the chunin had to say about her former teammate was eye-opening.

Tsunade had always known Jiraiya to be immature and annoying, and she had gotten used to it, in part. But listening to this woman deconstruct his behavior and blame every single part of it made any excuse she might have found for Jiraiya fall flat.

She hadn't even touched on the lecherous habits, either.

Also, Tsunade saw why Katsuyu wasn't willing to explain things herself. Just the facts as a list of Jiraiya did this, then Jiraiya did that, wouldn't have worked as well as the way Chunin Sato took each example and outlined exactly why that particular thing would be bad for Naruto.

She nodded. "Alright. Your point is made. I will not force Naruto to go with Jiraiya. This causes a problem, though. It is entirely true that having Naruto outside the village, traveling all the time, difficult to track down and perpetually protected by Jiraiya would make it much more difficult for the Akatsuki to grab him. The other option being staying in the village and going on very thoroughly documented missions."

The grateful smile that had appeared on the chunin's face faded in favor of a thoughtful frown. Kakashi didn't emote quite as clearly, but it was normal for him. Jiraiya, for his part, looked indignant.

"Konoha can't afford to have Hatake removed from the active rosters entirely to focus on teaching genins for over a year." Tsunade pointed out "And that's the only way I see to ensure neither of the two highly coveted genins under his care end up snatched by the S-ranked ninjas gunning for them. Assuming the protection of young Uchiha alone would be mostly manageable, but the presence of both him and Naruto makes deploying Team 7 impossible."

Hatake frowned but gave a reluctant nod, accepting that him alone wouldn't be able to shield Naruto from something like the Akatsuki out of the village.

Sato Aiko hummed and tilted her head. "Why not make a decoy? If Jiraiya-sama is going to leave on his ongoing information collection mission anyway, he could take a fake Naruto along. We could make sure that all official documents list Naruto as Jiraiya-sama's apprentice. I'm sure there are a few shinobi around here, either in the genin corps or chunins, who could act as a body double. And learning Fuuinjutsu from Jiraiya-sama himself would be a strong motivation for many."

"How come you just called me unable to care for your genin, but are now volunteering another genin for it?" Jiraiya asked venomously. "That's pretty hypocritical of you."

Ah, Jiraiya was still hurt over Aiko's complete dismissal of him. Tsunade raised an eyebrow and waited for an answer, curious of how Sato would defend herself.

"Contrary to what you might think, not all genins in the genin corps are emotionally fragile, formerly neglected and collectively despised orphans, Jiraiya-sama." Aiko-san answered slowly. "Most of them are perfectly well adjusted. And just happen not to have caught the favor of their assigned jounin-sensei out of the academy, and who lack the Clan support to make up for it."

Tsunade had read Sato Aiko's file, so she knew that these words came from experience. She didn't think that Jiraiya had done the same...

"They also are very aware that they were shoved into a dead-end, career-wise, and would be willing to endure a lot for an opportunity to progress." Aiko went on. "And being your apprentice is one such opportunity. So long as the person playing decoy is stable enough to endure neglect, they should be fine. You can take that as an opportunity to prove me wrong. Teach them well enough that they can be promoted when they come back. Then I won't object to leaving Naruto alone with you."

Ouch.

Actually, Tsunade really liked that plan.

For all that Jiraiya acted like a fool pretty much all the time, he had valuable things to teach, and sending a genin who was currently stagnating out as his apprentice could turn out a future asset for the village.

"And what would we do with Naruto while he's supposed to be wandering the Elemental Nations with Jiraiya?" Tsunade asked curiously.

Aiko-san shrugged. "Well. Reverse Summoning is an option?" She looked over at Katsuyu for confirmation. "He needs to refine his chakra control for Katsuyu-sama to be better able to use his reserves for healing. Isn't it something he could learn in the Shikkotsu Forest? So long as we time it well, he would still be able to come home sometimes so he can stay in touch with his team, and after a few months he could be brought back under a disguise as a new addition to Team 7 to balance 'Naruto's' departure with Jiraiya-sama?"

Tsunade crossed her arms and leaned back in her chair, considering the logistics. Putting Naruto right back with his own team, even under a disguise, might be too obvious. But she could temporarily assign him to the hospital to solidify the fake identity, and then attach him to his former team as a medic from time to time. Hatake's propensity for near death and chakra exhaustion would provide her all the excuses she needed to sick a medic-nin on him.

If she prepared the field in advance by assigning various medics on his missions and having Hatake be the horrible patient he knew how to be, she would have a perfect excuse to make the first medic who could survive him into a permanent fixture for Team 7...

The fact that she was more widely known as a medic than anything else could only help.

"I will start looking for someone with the right height, and the temperament for a long term undercover mission. Naruto is at the age where sudden growth spurts happen, so that will give me some wiggle room. Expect to be summoned within the week to brief Naruto on his trip to Shikkotsu Forest if I find someone." Tsunade sighed.

Both Hatake and Aiko-san took the cue to leave, while Jiraiya rounded on her, opening his mouth indignantly.

Tsunade sighed again, holding a palm up to stop him. "I'm not Sensei. You screwed up. Big time. Don't expect me to sweep it under the rug for you." She raised her hand to massage her brow. "You stole from the kid? Really?"

"He had to learn to learn wariness!" Jiraiya tried to defend himself.

"Toward his senseis and immediate superiors?" Tsunade fired back archly. "Whoever ends up posing as Naruto will get debriefed on their return to Konoha, and whatever they have to tell me about your treatment of them will have an impact on your access to Naruto. Let me see how you act when you don't think that you're immune to anything like consequences to your own actions. I hope it is somewhat better than what you do when you know that someone will fix all your messes for you."

Jiraiya turned pretty red and puffed up with indignation, and she normally would have been slightly endeared at the bratty boy behavior, but right then? Right. He was angry at her. Because he was in the wrong, and he knew it, and she wasn't falling over herself to make excuses for him.

She dismissed him with a gesture and leaned back in her chair.

She heard the door slam and gave another deep sigh.

Alright.

Now she just needed to look for someone with the work ethic to stay in character for several years, the emotional stability to endure Jiraiya, and generally correct body type and face shape.

Easy.

She should just give the order and have Elder Danzo die from a 'truly unfortunate heart-attack'. Or fall down the stairs 'because of a seizure'.

She was Hokage.

She wouldn't be the first in her seat to quietly 'suicide' someone.

The problem was this particular Elder's paranoia and private army.

Well. She could always go for something a little more convoluted and do the assassination herself. A fake poison bomb attack while he was in the room that would allow her to 'heal' him and plant a fatal condition while doing so. He could die of an actual heart attack on his way out of the tower, and it would be blamed on the stress of the action after so long and his old age.

It would be much easier than slogging through any scrap of proof she could find, looking for a reason to investigate his 'personal guard'. He wasn't even holding an official seat in any council anyway.

Also, he held way too much sway over the Hokage advisory council. The one with only Hiruzen-sensei's teammates on it.

She had to find a way to boot the old crones out. Either there was dirt to dig up, or it was time to use their age against them.

After all, someone aware of as much sensitive material as an Hokage advisor did should have the combat abilities to defend themselves from enemies targeting them for their knowledge.

That one just meant that whoever she picked in their place would have to be jounin-level in combat. But she should be able to rustle something up.

There were still quite a few jounins in Konoha.

She could even keep up with the 'traditional' nepotism by picking Sensei's son for the post.

(Tradition... There had been village for less than a century, and already, old entitled pricks were using the 'we've been doing things that way since immemorial times' card to cling to power. Grandfather would cry. Great-uncle would probably take out a sword. Or worse, a pen. And start drafting policies.)

But since Tsunade was not her Great-uncle, she would have a bitch of a time getting any new policy through. With the bunch of old farts trying to imply that she knew nothing of her job, and that she was chosen only because of the various illustrious relations she had rather than her own merit. Even though they were the ones who picked her, and doing so should be more of a strike against them than against her.

Why had she accepted the hat, again?

Jiraiya burst into her office. She blinked at him inquisitively, and listened to him starting to rant about not having the time to teach some random brat.

Ah.

So he was trying to wiggle out of the Decoy Naruto plan. Since he wasn't getting Naruto, he would rather be alone and unencumbered.

Why wasn't she surprised.

She stared at him for a few seconds, but when he showed himself entirely impervious to silent cues, she switched to a more efficient way of emoting.

Jiraiya shut his mouth with a click when Tsunade slapped both of her palms down on the desktop, sending a flurry of paper to the ground.

"I AM YOUR HOKAGE." She yelled at him. "You didn't want it. You shoved it onto me. FINE! But it means that I give the orders now. You don't get to both skirt around the responsibility AND avoid obeying orders! I SAID THAT YOU WILL TAKE ON AN APPRENTICE, AND YOU WILL! Know your fucking place. And don't you dare neglect the kid! Sensei may never have punished you for any of your shit but I definitely will! Maybe what you need is six months of D-Ranks to remind you that you're supposed to be part of a fucking hidden village!"

Jiraiya narrowed his eyes and started leaking intent. "These are big words for someone who avoided the village for three decades." He hissed venomously.

Tsunade narrowed her eyes back. She generally eschewed intent. Punching people through walls was much more her speed, but she could do it as well as any jounin.

If it was the game he wanted to play... "And you functionally did the exact same." She struck back. "But right now, I'm the one struck behind a desk, wearing a hat I never wanted and getting headaches trying to straighten out the the mess this village is in, and you're the one looking for any excuse to only do what you want to. Wake up. You're a shinobi, did you forget? Take your duties seriously!"

Tsunade watched her frozen genin teammates for a couple of seconds, then her eyes tracked to the mess of papers on her desk.

Ah. There.

She grabbed the mission slip. An S-Rank, investigation of a suspicious death in the Fire Daimyo's court. With risks of suffering an 'accident' during the process. She had deemed it too long to send Kakashi on when he was on standby with his team until she picked Jiraiya's 'apprentice'.

She had been planning to hand it over to Asuma instead, but this would work too. "There is a mission for you. Remind the other villages that you're still alive and still on our side. I hope you will be more reasonable when you come back. And do not shame Konoha by harassing courtier ladies!"

Jiraiya stayed still for so long that she almost thought he would refuse. After a good minute, though, he reached for the mission slip and turned around and toward the door.

Once she had drunk a bottle of sake, she decided that the fight with Jiraiya was probably a good thing overall.

She had yelled her order for Jiraiya to take on an apprentice. When he was visibly against it.

Gossip of the fight would spread out. Interest would focus on who it was that Jiraiya was ordered to teach.

When Jiraiya left Konoha with 'Naruto', the news would spread even faster because it already was a subject of speculations and bets. She could slap a classification on the matter just a bit too late, and have any and all spies absolutely convinced that Naruto was off with Jiraiya.

In light of the importance of the work, and the difficulty inherent in picking a young ninja who had the necessary professionalism for long term undercover, it was Inoichi who handled screening candidates for the decoy Naruto. The fact that he had participated in the investigation on the Academy's sabotage also meant he had some insight on recently graduated genins.

Seeing Naruto's height, recently graduated was their best bet.

One good thing might have come out of the Academy Sabotage: There was a good chance that at least one of the civilian born kids that ended up in the genin corps actually had the abilities for undercover work and the talent necessary to learn from Jiraiya.

It was shitty, as far as silver linings went.

Hopefully Inoichi would find a boy that fit.

She really didn't want to make a teenage girl deal with Jiraiya.

They did manage to find a boy that fit.

Over a year older than Naruto, but only a bit too tall, with brown hair that would need regular bleaching.

His personality modest enough not to give away the game for the opportunity to brag, yet upbeat enough to both reliably impersonate Naruto and withstand Jiraiya's lack of... general care in anything that wasn't of personal interest to him.

Fairly good at logical reasoning, too, even if he wasn't genius level.

His Taijutsu could use work, and his chakra reserves were around average for a civilian-born boy.

When Tsunade summoned him to her office to brief him on his mission, he received it with the gravity it deserved. Well, there was also some wonder at getting to be one of the Sanin's apprentice. It dimmed a bit when she told him to threaten his shishou with her when he slacked off on teaching him, though.

She gave him a week to put his affairs in order for a long mission and spend time with his friends and family, and then drafted a summons for team 7 so she could inform them of the plan surrounding Naruto.

Notes:

New OC has appeared! He will be needing a name. And possibly some actual character. If anyone has an idea, feel free to tell me.

Retired whore secretary almost made an apparition too, but I ended up scrapping it because it didn't fit with the chapter dynamic, but if she it to appear, she could use a name too...

Chapter 72: Downtime

Summary:

Being put on standby means staying home. Or in some cases, building a home.

Notes:

Alternative title for this chapter: Let's go chase down the plot holes and lose ends together!

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

Kakashi was satisfied with Aiko's solution to the problem of hiding Naruto from the Akatsuki.

Katsuyu was a much better guardian than Jiraiya.

And Naruto would be able to drop back home regularly, even if it wasn't for very long at a time.

There were two conditions to fulfill for that though.

The first one would end up being Aiko's job. They had to teach Sakura and Sasuke to hide any signs that they weren't missing their teammate as much as they should.

The second... They needed a secure place to meet.

That second concern dovetailed into another thing he had been thinking about.

Being guests in another Compound was starting to grate on him.

And if Naruto was to leave for an extended period of time, Kakashi would like it if he really had a dedicated place to call his waiting for his return.

It was time for Kakashi to consider lodging options.

Since he was standby until Tsunade-sama summoned him, it was the perfect moment to tackle that.

And considering where he had spent the preparation month during the Chunin Exam, he already had an idea.

The Hatake Compound still stood empty. And while Kakashi couldn't bring himself to move back into his childhood home, where his father died, the woods where they had camped together as a team were a happy place.

Kakashi hesitated about giving the pups a room each since they had taken to puppy piles like ducks to water, and would obviously be sleeping in his bed, but Aiko had stressed the need for privacy in order to really feel at home.

Also, the children were all young teens now, and they would start to be interested in sex at some point. And even if they didn't sneak partners in, they would appreciate a bedroom all their own for experimenting.

He bowed to her superior wisdom on that, and also added a room for her to the plans while he was at it.

That same day of drafting plans ended up doubling up as playing catch-up on his team's lives.

Since he had only come back for short rest periods, some details were skipped, that the children were eager to tell him all about now that he had at least a full week free.

Well. Naruto most of all the children. He had been active on his personal projects.

Naruto spent time around the fox summons, whose contract was now held by Hinata, Neji, Ino, Shikamaru and Chouji (for Summons that weren't really looking for Summoners, they had sure accepted a lot all at once) to get to know them better in his quest to make the nine-tails' living space better, as promised.

Naruto was also the kind of bleeding-heart who would ask after their prisoner, the monstrous Berserker that had given them so much difficulty.

Tsunade had given him access to the report from the prisoner's interrogation a week back.

What Naruto had learned had an impact.

Their prisoner was named Juugo. He had a condition that caused him to absorb nature chakra, but that also caused him to lose his mind and become violent.

He didn't usually allow himself to go off rail, because he hated to kill, and his Berserker side tended to be bloodthirsty. That was why he had happily stayed with Orochimaru for so long. Orochimaru had the means to keep him contained, and had promised to help cure him.

A promise he received through a friend that was like a brother.

Kimimaro.

The Kaguya Clan shinobi who had confronted Tsunade and Jiraiya along with Orochimaru.

The one that Naruto had seen die on the Snake Sanin's orders.

Juugo had been told that Konoha killed the boy. That was what had triggered his berserker episode.

Naruto wanted to go and talk to Juugo. Tell him the truth about Kimimaro's last moments.

Kakashi was very unsure if that would be wise.

He wasn't the only one... But... Aiko's rational explanation on why it wasn't a good idea to tell a very powerful berserker something that was sure to upset him had instead convinced Naruto that he needed Sabaku no Gaara to act as his spotter.

That particular endeavor hadn't been very successful. ... Yet...

Because the little pack of genins collectively didn't do very well with the boy that cut off Sakura's legs and gutted Sasuke, and also knocked team 8 out within seconds. And they also weren't willing to let Naruto go anywhere on his own.

Naruto was apparently working on it by appealing to his friends' better nature and going on about how terrible Gaara's life had been so far.

It was starting to work, according to Aiko.

Also, Gaara had spent a significant amount of his time playing ambassador, loitering awkwardly near the genin huddle.

Or maybe near Aiko, if Sakura's remark on where the redhead was looking most of the time were to be believed.

Well, a significant amount of time was less than one hour a day, so it was still within the polite margin, at least.

Sasuke still had to see Inoichi once a week, but he had actually been cleared to move out of the Yamanaka's house. At least while Kakashi was in-village.

Aiko and Sakura were done with needing to be careful of their injured bones, and could take up physical training again. They had both lost a significant amount of muscle mass, and needed retraining.

Neither of them was all that happy about it.

Since he didn't like the idea of letting a lot of people into the tightly warded Hatake Compound, he asked Tenzo to grow him the house he needed.

Tenzo grumbled about his Senpai abusing his Mokuton until Kakashi told him that he had free reign on the design choices. Then his cute little Kouhai got a lot more enthusiastic.

Even with Mokuton-grown foundations, floors, walls and roof, there was still a lot of work to be done for the house to be finished.

And he still would prefer not to key civilians into his wards.

But, hey!

He had three cute little genins.

That was practically what they were for!

How difficult could it be to do the plumbing and electricity of a house?

It was more difficult than he had thought.

Connecting the house to water, and then handling the waste was...

Well, the kids ended up getting pretty wet. Along with Aiko and him.

Several times.

For a couple of days in a row.

Once they had vanquished the evil plumbing, the kids staged a mutiny and demanded a day off.

They were adorable. Truly.

But since they were pretty beat with muscle aches from the unfamiliar postures and movements they had used for their work, Kakashi allowed it.

Also, he didn't want the nine other genins who were friends with his to attack him next time he went about the village for stealing their comrades.

The community that the rookies had fallen in was a good thing for their future.

From all accounts, Minato-sensei had something similar going on with the assorted clan-heads when he was this age.

And that was the occasion when Naruto decided to go talk to Gaara when he spotted the Suna Jinchuuriki nearby.

Kakashi decided to believe that Naruto had waited to do that until he was close at hand and could protect him in case things went sideways.

It was better for his heart to tell himself that.

A couple of minutes after Naruto took off to greet the small redhead, he brought the other boy back by the hand and called for Aiko.

Apparently, Aiko's bid for time back at the hospital right before the third part of the Chunin Exams and subsequent invasion had left it's mark. Gaara wanted to talk to her about people's inherent worth. And whether all the lives he had taken while obeying the voice of the Bijuu lowered his own right to live.

The outing turned into a teachable moment about ninjas needing to kill, and lives having inherent worth, and how both applied at the same time, and how to balance the two.

And also an aside about how small children were especially vulnerable to all kinds of manipulations by people who know the world better than them. And how once you had been manipulated for long enough, it didn't really matter that you weren't a small child anymore, because you were too conditioned to do as your manipulator told you to stop obeying without a strong incentive to look closer at what you were being told to do.

And how when that happened, the child was the one who deserved the least blame.

That last one hit it's mark, because Gaara straightened out, and Ino stopped glaring at him quite as hard. Actually, Sasuke and Sakura both looked much more sympathetic too.

Well, between Sakura who only recently kicked the marriage obsession her mother instilled in her and Sasuke who was ordered to seek only revenge by his beloved older brother...

Apparently they were over the attempt on their lives.

...

It would probably serve them well as ninjas. Fighting others was almost never personal in their line of work. There was a reason why Zabuza didn't put his all into finishing his mission once his client was dead.

Aiko made him babysit the genins and brought Gaara a bit to the side to have a private talk with the kid. It was pretty short, in no small part because she knew that Kakashi would be on edge until she was out of range of the previously unhinged S-rank threat. But he couldn't overhear anything because an entire pack of feral genins was too noisy of an interference.

Well, she would tell him if there was anything he needed to know.

The house's electricity...

Kakashi decided to handle the electricity himself. At least until he was sure of how to do things well enough that he could supervise adequately.

Wet kids were fine. Funny, even.

Electrocuted kids? Much less so.

It turned out that despite it being his main affinity, there was a lot that Kakashi didn't know about electricity.

Who would have thought?

What started out as a quick trip to the library to check out the safety regulations on electrical installations ended up turning into a few days of studying.

He had so many thoughts about jutsus.

He might actually try his hand at creating another original one, actually.

It would be a nice bonding activity to do with Sasuke.

The new Raiton Jutsu turned into a team activity. Sakura, even without a lightning affinity of her own, decided that she wanted in on the jutsu-creation experience. And Naruto, after listening in, decided that he should try out an electro-magnet seal for a way to catch shurikens and kunais.

So studying the properties of electricity turned into group sessions.

They did manage to install electricity in the house too.

Despite electricity having a lot of very interesting properties that he couldn't wait to play with, domestic application was still fairly simple.

The appliances and components handled the complicated aspects. He only had to wire them in with the right wire to the right place.

Practically child play.

Adding the safety features in, like the fuses box was a bit more challenging, but it boiled down to math, so he still could do it.

When the summons from the Hokage came around, the house was all but finished. There was some furnishing to do, but overall, they were almost there.

Despite having helped with the construction, via plumbing and windows installation, the genins were still all awed about their new place.

Anyway, the summons came shortly after the kids had picked their rooms, but before they were done moving their stuff.

The kids weren't thrilled about Naruto having to leave for months, but they understood the need to hide from the Akatsuki.

At least until they were strong enough to fight them.

No one could accuse his genins of lacking ambition.

And they trusted Katsuyu a lot more than they trusted Jiraiya, so when they knew what the alternative had been, they wholeheartedly approved of the trip to the Summoning realm.

Tsunade-sama wanted Naruto to spend some time with his body double before Jiraiya left, so the other boy would know how to act Naruto-like when he was in populated places.

She also wanted the actual Naruto to be the one who left through the gates with Jiraiya. He would simply trigger the reverse-Summoning once he was far enough, and his double would replace him by Jiraiya's side.

Still, they had at least a couple of months before Naruto was slated to go. Kakashi would keep getting solo missions, but not quite back-to-back like the previous month.

Well. He knew what he would be doing once they were done moving into their new house.

Training!

Or no.

Naruto had another priority.

Juugo.

The Berserker.

Gaara's ambassador duties in Konoha were almost over, and Naruto had succeeded in befriending him. Also, Naruto was sure that he would want to help Juugo if he knew what he went through with his lapses in control.

Tsunade linked her hands in front of her mouth and narrowed her eyes As she listened to Naruto's plead to let him see the prisoner. Then, she told him that if he could get Gaara to agree, she would personally escort them to the high-security cell.

Ah.

His Hokage was planning something.

Alright.

Kakashi would make sure to invite himself to the prison visit.

Once they got back home (Kakashi still couldn't get over the fact that his Clan Compound was now home. For real too, it felt like a home, like somewhere to relax and know he was safe) Sakura decided to catch him up on her Summons growth.

Puppies grew so fast, he has almost forgotten that.

Kokoro was a young adult ninken. Yue and Rensui had turned into juveniles and were able to talk and train more seriously. Though the three were still small breeds, and didn't clear knee-height.

It was incredibly soothing to sit down with small, wriggly, cuddly fluff balls who liked to both lick people's face and chatter on about all kind of things with great enthusiasm.

Naruto, in particular, was spoiling Yue horribly. But then, Yue was a sight-hound, and the excuses to run around was good for her.

Kakashi noted that Sakura's chakra stores had grown enough to let her Summon all three of her personal Summons at the same time, despite her having lost muscle mass from getting injured and having to reduce muscle training.

He attributed it to her ditching diets for over half a year. Actually, looking at her, she had gained some baby fat around the cheeks that made her look much more healthy.

She also... had more glow... He didn't know how else to describe it. She looked happy. confident. Grounded.

She also noticed that he was looking at her and jumped right into his lap to badger him about her adoption.

He... Wasn't in any way prepared to being called Nii-chan. That was probably why he folded like wet paper and promised to go do the paperwork on the next day.

Aiko totally laughed at him.

She didn't even try to hide it.

That evening, Aiko put the kids to bed, kissed him on the forehead, and left to go back to her own apartment.

It dimmed his happiness a bit, but he knew that his Pack Sister needed her own space.

She needed to be alone, and unlike him, she wasn't genetically programmed to have an exception for Pack.

It still left him feeling the empty spot in the bed where he felt she should be, but he tried to ignore it, and buried his nose in Naruto's hair.

It was unrealistic to expect absolutely everything to be perfect, after all.

The next morning saw him and his genins heading to the Hokage Tower's administrative levels to file Sakura's adoption.

The boys opted to come along so they could celebrate with her, and Sakura almost cried when they told her that.

Aiko was taking the opportunity to have a day to herself, so they didn't wait for her.

It took them a good half a day to get the paperwork for Sakura's adoption squared away.

And then, after a lunch break, three more hours to have Sakura's identification card re-printed with Hatake Sakura as her name.

Then Sakura dragged him to a Kimono-shop to order a Haori with the Hatake Clan mon embroidered over the entire back.

He was a bit surprised that she even know what design to order, since he didn't wear his mon at all, but... Well, her researching it showed how serious she was, didn't it?

Anyway, Kakashi decided to pay it for her, as a gift.

He also offered to pay one for each boys, and gladly added extra to have lightweight armored padding added to the lining. He had learned, from seeing Aiko get stabbed during the Invasion, that paying for armor for his Pack wasn't something he would ever regret.

In any case, Kakashi's offer to pay one armored Haori with an embroidered Clan mon on the back for each of his kids had the genins convene together and start discussing how to look coordinated in them.

They settled on pastel tones of their favorite color, because the desaturation looked uniform even in different colors.

He pretended not to hear them plot to gift Aiko a matching one in grayish pastel green for her upcoming birthday. Or that they could pick out a gray one for him for his birthday...

Had they really forgotten that he could hear them, or was some kind of disinformation campaign?

Anyway, Kakashi left that shop with a lot less money but three happily bouncing genins.

They happened upon Kurenai's team, without Kurenai, an their way back, so Kakashi took the opportunity to impart a very important Hatake Clan lesson on Sakura.

How to scoff at Inuzukas properly.

Kiba looked downright delighted by Sakura's attempt, and gleefully launched into trash-talking back.

Kakashi grinned and crouched down nest to Sakura. "Now you talk about how well domesticated he is." He prompted in a faux-whisper. "But you have to sound condescending about it. Wolves are wild, and proud of it."

Sasuke immediately dove into the exercise with gusto, with a 'oh, what, are you going to give the paw now' type of jab.

"Well, at least I have a partner who is with me all the time, not just when I pay him to be!" Kiba shot back.

"Now call Akamaru cute." Kakashi instructed. "And ask where he misplaced his collar."

Sakura jolted and stared at him. She knew how offensive it was to say that kind of things about Inuzuka ninkens.

Kakashi shrugged. "Or you can just start the scuffle yourself right now, if you want."

"Wait. That's the goal? To get in a fight?" Sakura asked curiously.

"Well obviously. You don't insult people to their faces unless you want them to take a swing at you." Kakashi pointed out.

"Oh, alright." And then, Sakura unstrapped her spiked gauntlets, gave them to him, and lunged at a laughing Kiba.

Two seconds later, Sasuke handed him his Katana and followed after her to try and pin Akamaru.

"Remember, actual fights are reserved for training grounds. So long as you're in the streets, you want to aim for harmless scuffle." He called at the enthusiastically tussling genins.

"Umm" Hinata called to catch his attention, which he obligingly shifted to her. "Is there a reason why you wanted Sakura to fight Kiba?"

"Clan tradition." Kakashi answered simply. "She's a Hatake, now. She needs to know how to properly antagonize Inuzuka."

"Wow! Sweet!" Kiba exclaimed, releasing his grappling hold on Sakura to offer her a high five. "I knew you would do it!"

Sakura clapped Kiba's hand and then kicked his legs from under him.

"I am confused. Why? I was not aware that the Inuzuka and Hatake Clans had such bad relationship as to have antagonizing one another as a Clan tradition." Shino droned out.

Kakashi smirked at him. "That's because we don't. We get along pretty well." He gestured toward the kids happily shoving one another in the dirt to illustrate. Then lowered his voice to a whisper, causing Hinata, Shino and Naruto to lean closer to hear him better. "The reason actually is something of a secret, but I guess I can make an exception for you two. You're Pack members to an Inuzuka, after all."

The blush it caused on the two kids. And Kiba, who had let his ears wander, was a thing of beauty.

"Break it up, kids. You've played enough. Let's go take a break. Somewhere with actual privacy." He tilted his head and considered their location. "Do you think your Compound would be okay?" He asked to Shino.

It was pretty obvious how curious the young Aburame was from how quickly he agreed.

"It's a ruse." Kakashi explained over a cup of tea in Aburame Shibi's house. "One that's been going on since well in the Warring Clans Era. Hatake and Inuzuka were always Wild Clans. And we both always found a good brawl to be the best way to get to know another canine-inclined shinobi."

Kiba nodded.

"The thing is, when you don't have a whole shinobi village to back you, and many other clans would be happy to take on a mission to kill one of yours, having nobles think of you as interchangeable with a mad dog also makes them likely to want to put you down like one. Especially if they don't want to pay you. Or if you sniffed out a compromising secret while in their employ." Kakashi explained.

Hinata and Shino made sounds of understanding that told him they had heard of a few examples from before the village founding.

"So being known to get in random fights for no reason... It was not a good idea." Kakashi summed up. "So instead we made up a rivalry. We can't be called savages for getting in fights with a rival Clan over a few insults when plenty of other Clans, and even civilian Nobles routinely did the same, could we?"

Kakashi's back and forth glance at Hinata and Sasuke was maybe a bit obvious, but it illustrated his point well enough.

"So whenever we met a person from the other Clan and wanted to get in a scuffle with them to get to know them better, we just have to make sure to insult one-another enough to justify it, and then we were good to go." Kakashi explained. "That's not really necessary anymore now. But it's been tradition for long enough that it's worth keeping alive. Also. It's fun."

Kiba nodded once again. "And I heard that people thinking that we were mortal enemies, or something also helped a lot, back then. Clients looking to double-cross us tended to call upon Hatakes. And since we actually had a pretty good relationship with the Wolf Summoners, we got out of attempts at double-crossing us much better than other Clans with actual feuds did."

Notes:

*Props the shovel against a tree* I think that's all the plot holes filled in. But feel free to inform me if you can think of any that I missed!

Chapter 73: Aiko's staycation

Summary:

In the background, things are being set in motion.

Notes:

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Chapter Text

Aiko really needed the time to herself.

Between accusing Jiraiya-sama in front of the Hokage, who happened to be his genin teammate, and the talk with Gaara... She had pent up stress. Plenty of it.

But well.

Naruto wasn't going to leave anywhere with Jiraiya.

And Gaara had needed the talk. Even if she didn't know how effective it ended up being. She wasn't someone who had particular authority over him. Nor did he have reasons to respect her all that much. He probably just approached her as the only person he knew might have answers to his questions.

She hoped her answers had helped.

And she hoped he would understand her personal message.

It was rushed. Talking about forgiveness right out of the bat. But... Who knew when she would meet him next?

So she had told him.

That he was entitled to his anger toward the Bijuu who manipulated him into killing. That the resentment was healthy. But that Bijuu were ageless, people, yes, but also very different to humans. That to a Bijuu, they were like overly ambitious ants, and that after getting trapped for almost a century, wanting revenge was understandable on their parts. It didn't excuse what they did to Gaara. But it put it in perspective.

Gaara had looked like he understood her at least.

As for what he would do with it... Only time could tell.

In the meantime, she was going to treat herself.

And a good long soak in the Onsen was a good start for the day.

Once she had spent long enough in the hot water for most of her tension to be gone, she went on to her spa appointment.

The sun was getting lower in the sky by the time she headed home. So she indulged in a short nap before changing into evening-wear and going out to a bar. She felt like having sex, and she knew where her Seduction Corps colleagues likes to go out. One of them would be the mood to get a room with her. Or more than one.

Sleeping with seduction specialists was something she was a little ambivalent about. It was always spectacular, but there was no heart in it. It was more of a competition of skills.

But it was also easy. Uncomplicated. No strings and no guilt. No expectations of catching feelings from it.

It was just also not particularly relaxing.

Aiko knew exactly how easy any of them would find it to kill a bed-partner. Just like her, they had done it plenty of times before.

But since they were comrades from Konoha, they wouldn't. Not to her.

The knowledge just tended to float there, at the back of her mind. A little 'this would have given an opportunity to kill me.' 'This is where I would have killed them'.

Not enough to make her stop it completely, but enough that she didn't do it all that often.

She ended up spending half of the night with a woman who had stunning thighs and a man with a nice smile and nicer shoulder muscles.

It was fun, and left her feeling boneless.

She actually used chakra to help brace her legs on her way back to her apartment.

She couldn't fall asleep.

She was relaxed from the morning, and tired from her night, warm from the shower she took when she got back. But sleep wouldn't come.

...

She didn't feel safe.

Right.

The little voice of paranoia that had woken up from sleeping with colleagues was still there.

She was a prime target.

Alone, laying down and impeded in her movements by the sheets and blankets.

No one at her back.

No jounin to guard her.

...

Damn it. Kakashi had spoiled her.

...

So. What did she do about it?

She could be stubborn and toss and turn the whole night...

Or she could go back to the small house in the Hatake Compound and slip in bed with Kakashi and the kids.

...

Yeah.

Alright.

It was safe.

Kakashi was safe to rely upon.

He had canine-bred loyalty. And he had chosen her as his.

She didn't need to cling to her distance.

She got up and shrugged on her chunin vest and sandals, snagged her back pouch, and left.

Kakashi was awake when she pushed the door to the bedroom. Probably had been since he could sense her. Or since she opened the front door.

He lifted the corner of the covers for her so she could slide in at his back, then turned so he could squeeze her in his arm and sniff at her neck. He made a disgruntled face that she recognized as his disliking her lack of scent, but before long he had fallen back asleep.

She sighed and shifted into a better position.

Ah. There it was.

Actual relaxation.

She just needed her jounin nearby, huh?

That was such an expensive habit to acquire.

Well, at least it only got triggered by having sex with unsafe people. She could still sleep while he was away on normal nights.

She woke to an exited Sakura proudly showing off her brand new ID with a picture of her practical hairdo and Hatake written in front of Sakura. There would probably be at least two weeks of bragging about that on her part before she settled.

Aiko smiled and congratulated her.

The most surprising was that she sincerely felt happy for her student. Down to the core. No bitter voice of envy lurking anywhere.

Well. After all, Aiko too had Kakashi. If she asked him, he would probably marry her even if they didn't have a romantic relation. Just to ensure she would be safe if something happened to him.

She wouldn't ask.

Because in the end... She didn't need the name Hatake like Sakura did. She would be happy to wear the name her parents gave her to the grave.

Also, on a gratificating second thought that proved that the man had much less weight on her mind than he used to, Aiko had never wished for her Jounin Sensei to adopt her. It would have rated nightmare scenario back when she was a genin. And it was still a distasteful thought years after he died.

That must be why she wasn't jealous in the least.

But the boys...

The boys might.

And as the day to day emotional translator of the team, it was her job to keep an eye on that.

Well, no time like the present.

Naruto had spoken about his feelings regarding Sakura's adoption with Inoichi when the matter was first raised and worked through it. There was still some hurt feelings, but more toward the injustice of not being allowed something that would make him happy because of his circumstances. When these same circumstances had already cost him to be hated by the entire village since childhood.

The problem with that was that it was absolutely true. Konoha was very lucky that Naruto was so forgiving. He would have been absolutely justified to hate the entire village for what it made him live through.

But no.

Instead, Naruto was planning his second adoption proposal to Tsunade-sama.

He intended to make it into something of a private running joke.

Because he knew that the Hokage getting adopted was a long shot. But he still wanted her to know that he considered her family anyway.

Naruto was too cute for words, sometimes

Sasuke had mixed feelings.

Some of it came from Sakura calling Kakashi her older brother.

The very thought of older-brother was an emotional minefield where Sasuke was concerned. But when pressed, he admitted that Kakashi made for a better one than his original one.

Sasuke did have a strong identity base of being Uchiha. Unlike Naruto, who just started to connect with his name and what it meant, no part of Sasuke envied Sakura for being adopted.

He was the last of his Clan who hadn't violently betrayed the rest of them. If Sasuke lost his name, his Clan would become Itachi alone. So long as Sasuke called himself Uchiha, he set the standard of what an Uchiha was. If he had become an Hatake, then Itachi set that standard. Itachi's standard being kin-slaying.

Sasuke wouldn't have wanted to be adopted even before accounting the in-Village politics that wouldn't allow him to anyway.

He felt that he owed it to all the innocent victims of the Uchiha massacre to uphold the standard of the Clan in the eyes of the world.

It was a much healthier view of what he owed to his deceased clan-mates than the perpetual doom and gloom of revenge and survivor guilt that Kakashi had told her about when recounting his introduction after the Academy graduation.

It had the advantage that Sasuke didn't even need to be perfect to uphold a standard better than Itachi's. Simply not turning into a mass-murderer of allies and family would do.

On the whole, Sakura's adoption was not a problem to Sasuke at all, and he was sincerely happy for her.

The only problem came from Sakura having transitioned to calling Kakashi Kakashi-nii instead of Kakashi-sensei. And the implications of her doing it when Naruto already called Aiko Aiko-nee and seemed eager to jump on the boat of calling Kakashi his older brother. Both facts converging in Sasuke being pushed toward treating Kakashi like a brother too when he had huge older brother issues.

Aiko congratulated him on understanding all of that about himself, and reminded him that communication was key, and that if he told Sakura and Naruto why he didn't want to call anyone brother, they would avoid peer-pressuring him into it as best they could.

Sasuke nodded, then mumbled that he would wait to do that, because he didn't want them to give up on something that would make them happy on his account.

The only reason why Aiko didn't immediately hug him for that thoughtfulness and generosity was because she knew that Sasuke didn't like hugs all that much. Not full ones anyway.

She tucked him into her side with an arm over his shoulder, then kissed him on the brow and told him that she was proud of him instead.

Sasuke turned pink, but this time, he didn't immediately attempt to flee the situation.

Instead, he surprised her.

Aiko saw Sasuke raise his hand up to his headband, and for a moment, she thought that was it. But then the boy grabber the metal plate and tugged it down. Over his eyes, nose, until it landed around his neck.

The way he turned his face up to her with a determined expression and hopeful eyes was frankly irresistible. Aiko barely registered herself leaning down to peck another kiss on his bare forehead.

After that, Sasuke closed his eyes and reclined into her side for almost a minute.

When he straightened and undid the knot of his Hitai-Ate to reposition it over his forehead, he looked... Different.

More settled, maybe.

The last step of making sure everyone was alright was, funnily enough, Kakashi.

She knew that he had made the choice himself, and that he already considered the genins his adopted siblings in a way. But things were different in theory and in practice.

Now he had actually, legally adopted Sakura.

She wore his name. Proudly showed off her Ninja ID. Openly called him Kakashi-nii at every occasion she got.

And Kakashi was emotionally stunted. He had trouble processing positive emotions.

Aiko just wanted to touch base with him and make sure he wasn't feeling too overwhelmed.

Kakashi was happy that Sakura liked flaunting her link with him.

His problem was that he was waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Not that he told her that.

The way his eyes skated away when he spoke of Sakura's pride was what gave him away.

Historically, Kakashi had suffered from debilitating losses each time he was somewhat happy, so his fear had reason to exist.

Hopefully, they could prove to him that the fear wasn't rational by not dying horribly on him.

On a related note, she had training in armed combat training planned with and against Tenten for her next free day.

The kids were also doing their best to become as hard to kill as possible.

Once she had done her 'how do you feel' rounds, they had to go. Naruto needed to meet the genin who would replace him by Jiraiya's side.

And he also had the intention to ambush Gaara with his proposition to go see Juugo the prisoner once the meet-up was over.

Maybe also to go try and adopt Tsunade again. Aiko was unclear on what his timing on that looked like, but he'd had ample opportunity to snatch a form for it while accompanying Sakura for her adoption.

Aiko felt a bit sorry for the boy they were setting up for years with Jiraiya. But at least he had full backing from Tsunade-sama to harass the old pervert about lessons. Also, he had orders to send a weekly progress report, that doubled up with tattling on Jiraiya whenever he slacked on teaching, back along with the Toad Sage's correspondence and intel reports.

Genin Tsuji Yuuto turned out to be an engaging teenager. Not very charismatic, but grounded and intelligent.

He was calmer than most fourteen years old tended to be, and was glad for the opportunity to get out of the dead-end he found himself in, even if doing something out of the opportunity would require hard work on his part.

He also wasn't mean to Naruto despite being from civilian background. And Naruto didn't give any indications of recognizing him as a former bully.

There had been some reserve and initial wariness on Yuuto's part when he first saw Naruto, though it was subtle enough that the genins didn't notice.

But he had warmed up quickly. That spoke of good adaptability and ability to overcome bias. It would serve the teenager well as a ninja.

Once they had bid the older boy goodbye, Naruto somehow tracked Gaara down fast enough to manage to invite him for lunch.

That was where he sold his idea to go visit Juugo to clear up the matter of Kimimaro's death.

the redhead Suna boy agreed very easily. Aiko wondered if he was emphasizing with the Berserker's wish to be nonviolent and simultaneous inability to do so, or if there was some linked trauma about having a loved one die and being lied to about it...

It also wasn't her business.

Naruto had his backup to go and announce very unwelcome news to a very powerful person.

Gaara was looking stable and even almost smiled at Naruto's celebrating over his agreement to come along.

The two other children of the late Kazekage didn't look hostile, either.

Things were apparently going pretty well.

Just as she suspected he would, the first thing Naruto did upon entering the Hokage's office, dragging Gaara along, was slap an adoption form on her desk.

The Hokage looked absolutely charmed by his antics, and took the time to tell Naruto that she would consider it carefully before turning her attention to the befuddled Suna Jinchuuriki.

After confirming that Gaara was willing to accompany Naruto to see the Prisoner, Tsunade-sama got out of her chair and strode out of the office, beckoning the boys along.

Kakashi made eye contact with her before tilting his head toward Sakura and Sasuke, and then sidled out the door to follow Tsunade and Naruto.

Well.

That was interesting.

Aiko considered her options, and then opted to simply park herself in the small living-room setup in the corner of the office, where they had taken to sitting while Sakura worked on reconnecting her nerves with Tsunade-sama.

It wasn't like the Hokage Office would be used without the Hokage in it.

She watched Sasuke and Sakura get out their respective books and notebooks and start brainstorming on how to modify the tension or intensity of a Raiton Jutsu with a smile, and then took out her own Notebook on her burgeoning Fuuinjutsu script and got to work straightening out the rules and interactions.

Naruto was starting to run into problems when creating seals because her systems clashed with one-another sometimes. That happened when you created rules on the fly. Everything turned into a rough draft. It needed some editing to flow smoothly.

Thankfully, time was one of the things she now had. Naruto was about to go and get specialized training from his Summons, and Sasuke and Sakura didn't use her sealing script the way Naruto did.

Naruto, Kakashi and Tsunade came back about an hour after they left. It made sense considering the time it took to get to the cells.

Naruto looked happy, Kakashi looked grave and Tsunade looked neutral.

...

Should she ask?

She didn't need to ask, because Naruto immediately spilled everything.

Like how Gaara had left them at the entrance rather than make all the way back up to the Hokage office.

Or how betrayed Juugo was to learn that he was lied to about Kimimaro's death, and then used as a weapon by the man who promised to cure him from his rages.

Or the fact that Tsunade-sama had offered to let Juugo leave Konoha for Suna with Gaara since he could keep Juugo from killing people thanks to his sand.

Tsunade-sama dampened his enthusiasm a bit by reminding the boy that Juugo going to Suna could only happen if Suna accepted his transfer. In which case Gaara would come back for him.

It failed at deflating Naruto's enthusiasm. At least until Aiko reminded him that by the time Gaara eventually came back to get Juugo, He would already be gone on his training journey.

On their way back, Sasuke asked that they stop by the Uchiha Compound.

He wanted to restock on consumable, possibly prepare a pack for Yuuto, since he was a genin corps member, and didn't have access to the good supplies easily. And, In Sasuke's words, he would at least need good gear if he was to survive pretending to be Naruto.

And also, he was on the search for a gift for Lee.

The trip was relatively painless, even if Sakura insisted that they conclude it by lighting some incense for the dead in the Clan Shrine.

Sasuke actually looked touched by her thoughtfulness, and even Naruto managed to pray in silence for a minute.

They got back in their mostly finished house in the Hatake Compound and ate.

Then Aiko sent Kakashi off to bed early before leading the children outside and taking out the practice instrument to start their music lesson.

Halfway through the lesson, an half-awake Kakashi shambled out of the house to come and drape himself around her shoulders, where he promptly started to doze.

She shared amused smiles with the kids, but a part of her loosened at the knowledge that she wasn't the only one to have grown to need company in order to sleep.

Also, a drowsing Kakashi was an incredibly cute Kakashi.

The next day, Kakashi decided to put the genins through their paces.

Aiko didn't even have to remind him to offer praises on the progress that they made.

According to Kakashi, Sasuke hadn't quite cracked Shisui's trick with the Shunshin, but he already had jounin-worthy proficiency at the jutsu. His cooperation with his Summons was much better thanks to the Inuzuka training methods, but he could stand to work on his teamwork with human members a bit more, since it had turned into his weaker side.

His ninjutsu was good too, but stayed capped by his chakra reserves. These would grow with his body, so there was nothing for it but to wait. His sharingan genjutsu had grown more than adequate. Not on par with Kurenai or Itachi, but it would get there with more work.

Naruto had gotten much better with Taijutsu thanks to his frequently soliciting Lee's help. His handling of his trick weaponry was fairly good, and Kakashi suggested going out to a few shops to see if they could find a few more for him as a reward.

It worked very well as an incentive, as far as Aiko could see.

His trap-work had also improved, but that was mostly because of self-study and the application of custom seals. His scent tracking had also gotten very good under Sakura's instruction. His total capacity for Ninjutsu was still impaired by his subpar control, but since his Summons were going to train him in that, Kakashi let it go easily.

Sakura still needed a lot of physical training to recoup the damage to her muscle-tone from prolonged immobilization. Still, Kakashi noted that her Taijutsu forms were good, and that her grasp of assisting her body's movements with chakra was more than impressive. She had actually gotten better at using chakra strings over her convalescence.

The fact that she had compensated for her physical immobility with more Yin-building exercise meant that her reserves in Yin chakra were pretty ridiculous.

A result of the increased Yin chakra and meditation, added to her weaponizing her Chakra Voice: her Genjutsu were great. Almost better than Sasuke, who started with an advantage.

Her chakra reserves... Would also grow with her body, but she would never have as much Yang Chakra as she did Yin. Partly from early malnutrition. Part from lack of muscle training at the start of her chakra maturation process. And also, she wasn't from a shinobi family line that had bred selectively for generation in order to maximize chakra reserves.

There was still time to mitigate this, but it was better for her to plan accordingly. She was unlikely to turn into a Ninjutsu powerhouse.

Sakura took the verdict with a resigned grimace that told Aiko that she already had been expecting this outcome. She looked like she took it well, at least. Since both Naruto and Sasuke had Ninjutsu well in hand, she didn't really need to be a ninjutsu tank to be useful to the team.

Her tracking evasion skills had rusted over a bit while she didn't use them for various reasons (like how Aiko didn't have the freedom to tutor her in those since she had to ensure Sasuke and Naruto's safety, or, you know, their respective injuries...) but it was still serviceable, even if she needed to retrain in it.

After the midday meal, Kakashi turned to her.

Aiko didn't really look forward to being put through her paces.

She had a sneaking feeling that her progress wouldn't be as good as the kids'. It kind of hurt her pride.

Notes:

Aiko: Hey Kakashi, would you marry me?
Kakashi: WHAT? Why?
Aiko: So that I can get widow benefits if you die, of course.
Kakashi. Oh, that? Yeah sure, of course.

Sasuke's thoughts: Ah! I knew it. Forehead kisses are much nicer than forehead taps! Take that, Itachi!

Tsunade, looking at the adoption: after all, why not? Why shouldn't I keep it? *insert Bilbo with the ring gif*

Naruto: Juugo can go to Suna with Gaara!
Kakashi: It's a trap!
Tsunade: Yup. Let's see if any fish bites.
Naruto: *stays clueless*

Chapter 74: Growth

Summary:

And while no one notices, the undergrowth thrives and gets stronger

Notes:

Wow it's been a while.
I got blocked by wanting to make sure Aiko's spar was just the right balance of badass enough not to feel like she's being useless, but not OP enough to betray the fic's name. And then I had a bit of an impromptu hibernation break...

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

Kakashi had different expectations from Aiko than he did for the genins.

She started from higher, for one. it was much easier to get spectacular improvement starting from nothing than it was starting from a good grasp on a subject.

She had also, as she told him herself, overshot her window for easy improvement. It was an unfair yet unshakable truth that as ninja, you improved less and less easily until you were twenty, plateaued, then started declining around thirty, forty if you were lucky.

In that, Aiko had the chance of having a few avenues where she hadn't reached her potential because of a lack of opportunity rather than a lack of ability.

The reason he wanted to assess her skill level was because he hadn't had the opportunity to train with her for months and needed to refresh his assessment of her skills to effectively work with her and plan her training effectively.

She looked like she took it very seriously, though.

But it was just as well, honestly.

He would get even more accurate results if she was going all out.

Shortly after Sasuke's abduction, Aiko had told him, in passing, about getting a trim added to her battle corset where she had etched and inked dozens of her and Naruto's tiny storage seals. He had seen them since. Approved, even.

They looked a lot more menacing when he was standing as her opponent.

Tidy strips of silver leather with black motifs. Down each side of Her corset's front closure. Over each of the fashion seams; decorating the shoulder straps, over the bottom edges of the corset, around the neckline... She even had matching straps over her thighs. Hundreds of seals.

And he had only the vaguest idea what the hell she stuffed in there.

He was fighting against a wildcard.

Even if he did know Aiko, he knew that she liked nothing more than to take people by surprise. And she had come up with things he wouldn't have thought of before.

Kakashi felt a smile spread over his face.

It had been a while since since he got a surprising challenge in a spar. He was starting to really look forward to it.

What tricks would she pull out on him?

Only one way to find out.

Kakashi lunged

Aiko threw some kind of object at his head.

He decided to be cautious and kawaramied out of the way, layering a genjutsu over his replacement log.

His new position in the trees at the edge of the training ground gave him an excellent view of his bunshin getting an explosion to the face.

Smoke billowed out.

Kakashi choked when the smell hit him.

Fuck.

A bottle of civilian perfume wrapped in an explosive tag, accompanied with a smoke bomb.

His nose was out of commission.

He hurriedly blocked his nose with chakra so he could avoid throwing up.

That was well played.

He almost was hurt that she had something so sure to take him out prepared.

Until he remembered that Orochimaru's senses were just as good as his.

This was a handmade perfume bomb to use against a Sanin. He just happened to share a weakness with the man aiming for Sasuke.

Since she already had it ready at hand, it would have been a waste not to use it in this spar.

In the clearing, another handmade bomb burst above the smoke screen.

Kakashi decided that he didn't want to find out how that one was tailored to him.

He dove for the ground flipping through the signs for the hiding like a mole jutsu.

After that, he felt the ground shake from the sound of the boom.

He wouldn't be surprised if the boom came with a blinding flash.

But now he was in position to trap her.

He followed the micro-vibrations of the earth to the center of the clearing. Aiko hadn't moved much, huh.

Either she was a lot too stationary, or she was up to something.

His hand closed around her ankle.

He didn't have the time to pull her under.

His shoulder pulled as he surfaced, pulled along by the strength of her chakra-jump.

Since his initial grab was strong enough for the double suicide decapitation, he didn't manage to let go until he was already all the way out of the ground.

Well, at least the actual fight was about to start. Aiko's tricks were interesting. But he already knew that she preferred to avoid confrontation.

The problem was that she couldn't always avoid it. All her injuries had happened when she had no choice but to hold her ground.

Time to see how she did when she couldn't run away from the fight.

Kakashi ran through the signs for gale palm and dissipated the lingering perfumed smoke, giving himself visibility.

Then he took out a kunai and pounced on Aiko.

She must have understood the point of the frontal assault, because she didn't try for a trick.

In a small puff of smoke, a small shield and short sword materialized in her hands.

Her kenjutsu was acceptable. Not more, but she had only practiced for a very short time, so it was to be expected.

She still managed to surprise him.

In the middle of an exchange where Kakashi was using his superior experience to exploit the holes in her defense, Aiko switched the sword and shield.

He lost a moment analysing what sort of seal she had to immediately switch the content of her hands.

So much so that when he concluded that she must have a sword and a shield at the ready in separate seals on her glove, he had to hastily duck out of the shield bash she tried to nail his head with.

Well, that was an interesting trick. Now he had to see how much mileage she could get out of it.

Kakashi took out a second kunai and stepped inside of her guard.

In the following minute, he discovered that Aiko had learned to use two swords at once pretty efficiently. That using two mini shield at once provided almost full cover, and...

That Aiko had learned to quickly seal then unseal a blade to the effect of making something functionally phase through it.

It gave her an interesting option when she was in a block. But she would have used the opening her trick gave her much better if she was better in kenjutsu to start with.

After the short bout, Aiko decided to throw another wildcard in his face.

In the form of an over-sized warring era Tate shield.

Deployed right in his face, yes.

The faded Uchiwa painted on the face gave Kakashi a very good clue where she had gotten the huge shield.

Also, Kakashi had no idea how many of them she had.

Which she used to her advantage by faking him out.

When he dodged out of the next chakra smoke cloud expecting another surprise, she threw... Was that a rainbow colored slinky?

She threw a flimsy plastic slinky at his feet, and jumped away and under the cover of the trees.

Unfortunately for Aiko, Kakashi knew the broad lines of her skills.

He was expecting the genjutsu.

And even the fireball, honestly.

He was also expecting Aiko to use his distraction to do some sort of escape and ambush.

He even kind of expected her to use an acrobatic move to unseal whatever she had in her thigh straps at some point.

He wasn't expecting what fell over him when she jumped over his head.

Rubble, gravel, sand, water and earth.

Not really weapons, but really annoying.

Especially when it all turned into traitorous mud.

Kakashi was better than her at navigating rough terrain, but since she was expecting it when he didn't, she landed better than him.

A swipe to the front of her corset and she was throwing a handful of kunai.

He saw the glint of the ninja wire, but he had no problem ignoring it, since the kunais hadn't stuck firm.

He only needed to reinforce his arms with chakra and bat the wire away. And easily took her by surprise when she expected him to be delayed.

She still managed to send a couple of volleys of kunai and shuriken.

Then a couple of smoke bombs.

And once they had progressed to grappling, she also nailed him with one of Naruto's prank-oriented sticking seals.

Kakashi knew how to get out of those, but he gave her points for the strategy. Even Jiraiya had taken a while to figure it out when Naruto got him with those.

But after that, he quickly ended the fight once she had spent her tricks.

Aiko looked a bit disappointed, but she had lasted pretty long. For a chunin there wasn't anything to be ashamed of.

The kids looked pretty awed too. That cheered her up.

Aiko was a bit less cheered up when he gave her his rundown of her performance, but she took it well too. Especially since he moved on to training plans.

She wanted to get better, after all.

The next week was full with training.

Kakashi was sent out on a couple of shorter, half-day missions, but he managed to plan everyone's training around it.

He had heavy suspicion that a good part of his and his fellow jounin-senseis light duty was to arm the trap Tsunade had baited with Juugo.

It was a clever plan. Danzo was the type to think of people like pawns. He would see the offer to transfer Juugo to Suna as 'giving a powerful weapon to an enemy village'.

And since his ROOT was still active, and Danzo thought that human thoughts and emotions were a liability. A berserker was right up his alley. He would want to disappear him and brainwash him into a natural energy bomb.

Having as many jounins as possible close by but with an excuse that could be blamed on Tsunade's 'feminine softheartedness' would make it much easier to catch a possible abduction red-handed.

And wanting the senseis to actually teach was something that sounded natural for an idealistic, newly appointed Hokage to decide.

Before he knew it, he was herding his ducklings to Team Gai's favored training ground to celebrate Rock Lee's birthday.

All the little genins were there, to the obvious delight of their senpais. And Kakashi took advantage of the many Jounins there to guard his little trouble-magnets to accept a challenge from Gai.

So, alright, it was a cartwheeling challenge. And Gai won. Well. There was still the next time.

By the time he was done horsing around with his 'Eternal Rival', the kids were done with eating cake, and Lee was about to open his gifts.

Kakashi hurriedly added his offering to the pile. Nothing too involved. Just a diet and workout journal, so he could balance his food intake with his activity level. He had purposefully chosen one that had a beginner friendly explanatory text attached at the start, so the kid knew not to go to dangerous extremes where eating and drinking was concerned.

Okay, so it was meant for academy kids and was full of cute cartoons, but he was sure that Lee would appreciate the 'Youthfulness' of it.

His gift was opened second, after Gai's, of course. Which was a heavier set of leg weight. Also of course.

Neji gave the genin homemade hair mask, which was greatly appreciated.

Tenten offered a pair of light green leg warmers 'for mission that need more camouflage'. Kakashi was pretty sure she was desperately trying to make him be less eye-searing.

Aiko's gift was a simple small, pebble-size rock on a little charm-like thong. When Lee looked askance at her, she leaned into his ear and Kakashi heard her whisper in the sudden silence thanks to his superior hearing. "This is a little reminder of my most important lesson. You are you, and it is enough. You don't need to try and be anyone else but you, you're already Rock Lee. Hopefully this will remind you who you are. A Rock isn't a bad thing to be. It's solid and reliable."

Lee burst in tears and tied the small charm to his hitai-ate belt while swearing to wear it always.

Naruto had made a pair of seals that were not quite storage seals, but not quite not storage seals either. As far as Kakashi could tell, he had replaced the 'pocket dimension' of a storage seal with a 'pocket of compressed space'. As a result, you could put things in it, and the seal got heavier without gaining bulk. Naruto came up with it so Lee could add training weights to his wrists or hands without needing to hide them under a bulky fashion accessory.

The fact that Naruto was very insistent that the seals didn't even explode violently if there was a catastrophic failure made a worrying glint appear in Aiko's eyes because it implied that some earlier versions did explode dangerously, and Aiko was all for using failures as features.

(On their way back, they would learn that Naruto came up with the design in half a day after panicking because Sakura offered to wrap his gift and he realized that he didn't have any. He didn't even need to ask Aiko for help in revolutionizing the field of Fuuinjutsu, because he managed his new seal with just the rules he already knew.

If Kakashi had been looking for proofs that Naruto was his parent's child, he could have stopped there, honestly.)

Kiba had brought a bright, fluorescent orange modesty skirt for Lee to wear over his leotard. It was probably a gag gift. It was also probably going to be worn enthusiastically and unironically, and might get Kiba mildly poisoned, if the glare Tenten was giving the boy was anything to go by.

Ino gave Lee a wig, and told him that he couldn't be the only one of his team absolutely unable to pass as a girl. It was probably also a gag gift. But seeing the way Gai was sparkling, it would give way to very interesting team shopping outings.

Kakashi was probably going to be challenged to a drag race at some point too. It might be smart to get a couple of Aiko lessons on the subject in advance to stack the deck his way.

Sakura gave Lee a pair of orange compression half-gloves, to help protect his knuckles since he couldn't reinforce them with chakra, and so he could gain time on the wrapping and unwrapping

Hinata's gift was a salve to help muscle recuperate from intense workouts.

Chouji had brought a jar of berries that were very healthy and good for building muscles.

Sasuke had unearthed a waist and thighs harness, much like the one Aiko wore in Wave, that would give Lee some quick-access storage abilities.

Shikamaru had give lee a book on mixed philosophy and tactics, and told Lee that he knew that he was smarter than he liked to show, but that a hiden weapon was much more effective if it was honed properly.

Kakashi gave even odds that the Nara was full of shit and had just reached for an easy gift idea.

Shino gave an assortments of honeys from different flower species and spent quite some time detailing the dfference in taste and texture of the different kinds to a surprisingly interested Lee. Oh, an actual personal interest, then?

Going to see Inoichi was getting more and more fraught.

Part of it was that he smelled Kakashi's fear due to Sakura's adoption like a shark smelled blood in water.

Another part was that his daughter was turning terrifying.

Ino had somehow caught the attention of Tsunade's apprentice, Shizune. Shizune, who was specialized in poisons on top of her medical ninjutsu.

Kakashi had his idea of how Ino got close enough to Shizune to charm her into becoming her poison mentor.

And he was pretty sure that it had something to do with Shikamaru's constipated expression and Asuma's long face.

Or with how often Team 10 was around the Hokage Tower.

Or how slithering rumors were starting to spread about the Konoha council being too old, and too few, after Shimura Danzo's dismissal.

Tsunade was restructuring the council. And stacking the deck her way.

Poor Asuma was being used as a sacrificial offering to the great beast of politics.

Kakashi should see about making Sakura act 'corrupted' enough that no one will ever want him to have any sway on anything. He was sure that she would help him out if she knew why he needed her help.

He was pretty sure that his brand new heir secretly wanted to scandalize everyone and everything around her.

He just needed to find her an entry point that wasn't porn novels. She had made her feelings about those clear enough.

Also, as a soon to be young woman and heir of a clan, reading porn in public would likely get her the kind of sexual harassment that would force Kakashi to do unfortunate things to Konoha citizens...

But he could find something else. Lateness, bad jokes... Insubordination? Insolence? There were plenty of options. He would brainstorm it with Sakura and Aiko. The boys too, probably. They could find their own corruption to indulge in. It would perfect Kakashi's shield against responsibilities.

And he had a feeling that some poor Aburame would end up suckered into the role too at some point.

Well. It wasn't sure to be an Aburame, but... If Kakashi was in Tsunade's place, and he was aiming to weaken Danzo's influence on the Council, he would pick a respected Aburame Jounin immediately after Asuma.

And then use the Hyuuga Clan's immediate outrage at not being represented as an excuse to point out that their slave seal made them very untrustworthy for decision or advisory positions... Just, you know, quick blow in passing...

But he wasn't Hokage, thank everything. And hopefully, he never would be.

...

Huh.

Oh.

He probably should try and find a promising young jounin that he could conspire to train up into a viable Hokage Candidate.

Just in case...

Who could do the trick?

Hmm.

Wait, there was a very promising Akimichi hidden away in ANBU. She was only Tokujo, but a few public spars with Gai would handily increase her notoriety and get her well on the way...

And since Hayate had just woken up from his coma and was about to start physical therapy... Maybe pair her up with Yugao...

Yugao would be a good choice too, thinking of it. Two candidates with one stone...

Something to reflect on.

And fast.

Tsunade-sama wasn't getting any younger.

Notes:

Hopefully the fans of the rainbow colored slinky feel gratified by Aiko's trick...

Chapter 75: Yuuto's perspective

Summary:

Tsuji Yuuto had great dreams, when he was a child. He hadn't thought they would amount to much after he landed in the Genin Corps

Notes:

Tsuji: 辻: crossroads, intersection.
Yuuto: 勇:bravery, courage + 仁:humanity, benevolence, kindness

You know that feeling when you introduce an OC because the plot demands it, and don't even name him because he'll be gone before long, and then you pick out a name for him, and then you start to flesh out his character, and you end up getting attached to him?

Anyway, here is Tsuji Yuuto.

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

Yuuto was nothing special.

The jounin who rejected him and his team right out of the Academy had been pretty clear on that.

And at some point, he had been angry. He had dreamed to become a legend, back when he signed into the Academy with hopes of becoming a shinobi.

No one sets out to be insignificant.

Ever little boy dreams of fame.

But...

What use was there in being angry, anyway?

He was at least a shinobi.

And if he wasn't paid enough to leave his parents' house and live on his own... Well, he was still young. He was contributing to the household. He could buy snacks for his little sister.

He had gotten used to the idea of staying in the Genin Corps for four or five years, and then look for a civilian job. Maybe traveling merchant, since his full Academy training at least made him better at defending himself than most people.

He should actually have had his growth spurt by then.

And it would be a way to go up in life too.

With Dad working as an accountant, he should be able to help Yuuto learn how to handle merchandise and money.

And while Mom's home-business in mending and embroidering in her free time for cheap wasn't applicable as a merchant skill, it would still help him keep a good appearence.

His parents hadn't been too thrilled when Yuuto told them about his plans. They worried for his safety, even if they wanted him to succeed. But at least, being a merchant was less dangerous than being a shinobi, and they had gotten prepared for that when Yuuto graduated the Academy.

Just a bit over a year into Yuuto's career in the Genin Corps, he heard the rumors.

T&I had seemingly woken up. The infamous department was recalling their losely attached chunins. Getting back up to wartime levels of activity. And they were chewing right into the Academy.

It surprised him, of course. But at first, he only noted it because of the abundance of better paying missions on offer. With less chunins hanging around free for missions, all the in village missions that weren't claimed by a genin team went straight to the Genin Corps.

He noticed it much more clearly when he was called in by T&I.

It would have panicked him. Except all the younger genins had gotten the same summons in staggered waves, starting with the rookies. Also, by then, the Academy personnel had been let out. Yuuto had seen his Academy teacher on the street, and she looked perfectly fine.

So he hadn't gone to his summons expecting to get tortured.

Some of his comrades would say that it was naive of him. But Yuuto didn't think that a knowledge and attitude evaluation was torture.

There were a few pointed questions here and there that confirmed the rumors he had heard.

T&I was investigating the Academy with suspicions of having taught wrong. The newly graduated genins were being interrogated to create a sort of benchmark of all the holes in the education and patch them over going forward.

Honestly, Yuuto was feeling jealous.

So he had been sabotaged.

So the younger kids wouldn't be getting sabotaged in the future.

Great.

It was just unlucky of him that he had already gone through and lost his opportunity, wasn't it?

But he got out of T&I. A polite chunin thanked him for his cooperation, and he went back home.

Back to his family.

Back to his menial missions for the Genin Corps.

The Invasion by Sand and Sound during the finals of the Chunin Exams was several kinds of nerve-wracking.

Yuuto was just a Genin Corps Academy graduate. He knew a couple of handfuls of jutsus and barely could walk on walls.

The fear gripped him until he could finally find his family. No one was hurt. It was a huge relief.

The two to three months afterwards were extremely was cleanup andd reconstruction to handle, and all the chunins and jounins were out and about on away missions. So the Genin Corps had to pick up the slack.

All the Genin Corps reservists, who had opted to keep their names down on the Corps for the yearly stipend rather than go for a full retirement were called back in from their civil lives.

Life had barely started to settle down again when Yuuto got summoned again.

This time, he wasn't called in with an entire batch of genins. But at least, the Summons came out of Intel, not T&I

He also got escorted to one of the fancy, spacious offices, and found himself in front of an actual Clan Head. One that was retired from active services, according to the gossip chains. Though Yamanaka Inoichi had also took up service in his old position for the academy Investigation, so he was obviously still in Reserve.

He would have been very nervous, but the his interview started with informing him that he was being assessed for a confidential mission.

After a full day of tests and conversation, Inoichi-sama informed him that he should stay in standby for another summons.

When he scrapped the courage to ask why he was considered for something as important as a confidential mission when he was just a genin...

Well. Learning that what set him apart was his continued lack of growth spurt was humbling.

Apparently, still being a shrimp at 14 had it's uses.

He was firmly instructed not to tell anyone about the possibility of going on a confidential missions until he got called in again, and then he was sent back home.

Yuuto really hadn't expected his next summons to come directly from the Hokage.

He was pretty awestruck, standing in front of Tsunade-sama. And learning that he had been picked for the confidential mission and it included being the apprentice of Jiraiya from the legendary Sanin felt unreal.

He got back down to earth right after, though.

The way the Hokage spoke about it, being the Toad Sage's apprentice was more of a chore than a blessing. But at least, Yuuto was tasked with learning as much as he could from the man, not keep out of his way.

There was also the part about keeping a disguise and being a decoy.

Decoy was... A dangerous word, for sure.

Yuuto was to pretend to be the one who enemies chasing him.

There was no assurance that he wouldn't die while doing it.

But Tsunade-sama was insistant that Jiraiya-sama would protect him (Yuuto heard a "or else" between her words that was honestly a little reassuring).

The Hokage gave him a scroll with the details of his cover-mission, the one he was supposed to talk about going on in place of the actual, confidential one, and told him to let his friends of family know that he would be leaving for three years in a couple of months.

Yuuto felt very dazed on his way back home.

Three whole years.

and personal instruction from a legend.

So apparently, retiring and becoming a traveling merchant might not be his only option anymore.

His handler was Yamanaka Inoichi.

If the fact that the mission was given to him directly by the Hokage and that an actual Sanin would be there to secure the illusion of the decoy Yuuto was providing wasn't enough to tell him how confidential his mission was, the fact that he had only seen one person other than the Hokage, and that person was a retired division head would have solidified the seriousness of the secrecy.

His next summons was in the Yamanaka's Flower shop. Inoichi-sama's home.

And there he met the one he would be impersonating for three years.

His first reaction was very unprofessional. But at least, he managed to reign in his knee-jerk recoil enough for the rookies not to see it. The two adult jounins... No, wait, one jounin and one chunin, her vest was the slightly lighter green that could so easily be attributed to light difference or fading. The two adults definitely saw it, judging by the way their eyes sharpened.

Yuuto breathed in deeply, shunted away any prejudice toward the boy, and refocused.

While his mom and dad told him not to get close to that boy while he was at the academy, he wasn't an academy student, practically a civilian, anymore. He was a genin. He couldn't allow civilian superstitions to sway him.

He smiled and introduced himself and listened to the introductions he got in return.

By the time he left the flower shop, he had almost forgotten about his initial dislike of Uzumaki Naruto. He was a very nice kid. Much more friendly than anyone could expect, seeing how he was bullied in school.

He refrained from asking his parents why they had warned him against the little blond kid once he was home.

He knew what confidential meant.

And bringing the boy he was supposed to impersonate up in conversation right after informing his family of his long mission was a clue, no matter how small, that he was better off not leaving. Both for the sake of the mission, and to avoid the very real risk of dying from getting found out.

The next time he made his way to the Yamanaka shop -his cover for that was that he was being taught the ropes of getting things to grow, as part of his posting as greenhouse hand for a far-flung rest station- it was to learn about how to apply makeup and how to bleach and dye his hair.

For practice with the dye, he was given a much more diluted lightening agent, so he wouldn't destroy his hair before even leaving, and then he learned applying color by putting his own original color in. By the time his mission was due to leave, his hair would have been bleached enough that he would only need to lift off the dye and apply a bright yellow one instead.

Inoichi-sama told him that later sessions would see him practice with doing the roots rather than the whole head.

There was a time while the dyes were setting, where they couldn't work on makeup because of the plastic cap, and so that became lecture time.

Yuuto learned what type of things he could say in his weekly letters to his family, the balence of enough true life details not to feel suspiciously redacted, yet not enough to give anything of importance away.

He learned secret ANBU signaling systems from the second Shinobi War, that only Jiraiya-sama should know, so that he could send him secret messages. (These systems had been switched out long ago enough that no one, enemy or ally should recognize them, excluding exceptionally bad luck on their part.)

He learned the best way to 'lay low' in a not perfect way that would get his decoy 'Naruto' noticed just enough so a tracker would 'know' that 'Naruto' was still with Jiraiya-sama if they looked, but wouldn't get anyone looking for him to immediately find him.

The couple of months before his departure for the mission taught him more than all his time in the Genin Corps.

Yuuto kept having semi-regular meeting with Naruto-san at the Yamanaka flower shop. Both with just him, and with his entire team. They were friends of the house, it seemed.

Talking with the younger boy both gave him a better understanding of his target for copy (though Inoichi had told him that he didn't need to be exactly spot-on about that. Very few people actually knew enough about Naruto's personality to call him an impostor over his acting unless he was completely off-base, and there would be growing up, and life events such as leaving his beloved team behind, that could justify him changing and mellowing out), and finished washing away the last of his prejudices.

It was a good thing, because otherwise, he would have felt like a complete heel on their last meeting before his departure.

When Jiraiya-sama came back to Konoha, Yuuto met him. (He understood better the emphasis on tattling to the Hokage if he wasn't being taught properly. The man radiated unreliability. It might just be an aspect of his spy cover, but giving him the benefit of the doubt really was hard.)

And then the departures dates were set.

Jiraiya-sama would go three weeks after his return, but Yuuto was to leave Konoha only one week later.

He would be leaving the village with an ANBU team, under the guise of the new live-in gardener for a super-secret ANBU hideout that needed a hidden vegetable garden to avoid buying supplies too often.

That was the official, yet classified, version.

The version that he was allowed to tell in public was mostly 'don't worry, it's classified, but I won't be doing anything dangerous. Just gardening.'

Once he was out, he would wash out the dye but not put the yellow in instead, and blend into the population of Tenzaku-Gai. A street rat, preferably.

He had one spot to hang out in at a set time of the day, that would allow Jiraiya-sama to easily find him again.

The ANBU would not be staying with him for that time. They had another super off the book mission to complete that would take them long enough to have brought Yuuto to the super secret base and come back. Though he might not be supposed to know that.

Yuuto assumed it was a double bluff from Tsunade-sama. The ANBU team would assume that the fake mission to take Yuuto somewhere was to give their mission even more cover, not to give Yuuto more cover. He was a genin, of course he was the excuse, not the important piece. And the secret mission was probably also very important too. Why not kill two birds with one stone?

And that way, if anyone figured that his escort team did the super secret mission, they were even more likely to discard Yuuto as unimportant.

And for their last meeting right before Yuuto was set to go on his most important mission so far, Naruto and his team brought him gifts.

Gifts.

It was much more than he expected to get.

And no cheap, perfunctory gifts, either.

They pretty much decided to kit him out completely.

From consumables to an array of specialty weapons that he might ask 'great grand-sensei' to teach him, passing through sealing scrolls and calligraphy supplies. With a detour through clothes and field appliances, all the way to armored mesh shirt and leggings.

And that was the common stuff.

The stuff that Sasuke-san waved away as "just some old things gathering dust in the my compound, all my team has them." Because these rookies also each had a care package to give him that was 'from them'.

Yuuto barely even expected that much from his family.

But apparently, Team 7 found it normal.

Sakura-san's gift was a small pouch filled with small color-coded scrolls that fit an entire medical kit, just in case.

Naruto-san solemnly presented him with an armored Haori in dull orange that had the same red spiral in it's back as the flack jackets and that was, as it turned out, the Uzumaki Clan's mon, stitched on the back.

And that wasn't even the most outrageous gift.

No.

That honor came to Sasuke-san, who spread half a dozen scrolls on the table and announced that he thought Yuuto should have a Summoning contract to help keep him safe.

Summoning contracts.

Just like that.

"Those are... They're your Clan's?" Yuuto asked haltingly.

Sasuke nodded with one of his quiet Hn. "Yes. But there won't be anyone from my Clan to sign them for a good long while. No sense letting them collect dust in the meantime."

Yuuto stalled at the casualness that Sasuke was treating Summoning Contracts with. These were supposed to be highly sought after and jealously guarded, not spread on a table in front of a virtual stranger to pick out of.

Sasuke-san must have understood his bewilderment, because he decided to talk some more. "Summons are people too. They aren't object. All of these Summoning species were used to having a Summoner, or several, and they just lost all of them in one fell swoop. They might actually have needed the contract to subsist. It isn't fair to hoard their scrolls when I could give them a good Summoner."

Yuuto let the words steep in. Right. Sasuke-san was the Summoner for an Hatake Contract that had gone unused for two decades at least. Maybe offering him the contracts had more to do with the Summons of his Clan that he felt obliged to than with being insanely generous to Yuuto.

"Alright." He answered. "Do you know what species they are?"

Sasuke-san nodded and pointed to the first scroll on Yuuto's right. "These are Eagles. They probably will be too chakra costly for you, but I thought I would bring them all. Those here are Hawks, I think they are more versatile than Eagles, but I didn't find much on them, so who knows. Then, next, Cats. They are a long time Uchiha Contract, and they don't take too much chakra, but they aren't obedient in the least. That one is Tigers, I think it speaks for itself, very cool, but not very cooperative, or all that friendly, and very costly in chakra. These are Stoats."

Sasuke's hand lingered on that scroll for a moment, and Yuuto wondered if it had to do with Itachi meaning weasel, a close relative of stoats. In any case, Sasuke-san shook off the hesitation and moved on to the next scrolls.

"And then we have the more secret ones. I'd like it if you didn't talk about them, or where they come from if you pick those. Sparrows. The really plain brown ones, and there are Grass Lizards."

"You want to keep the house sparrows and the tiny wall lizards secret? Not the tigers or the eagles?" Yuuto repeated just to make sure.

Sasuke shrugged. "Tigers and Eagles aren't stealthy in the least. If someone picks them, they won't be able to keep them secret the moment they Summon them. House Sparrows and Grass Lizards, though? Those are prime spying Summons. Most shinobi don't even notice them. And they're even more effective as spies when no one knows that you have access to them. If it became common knowledge that the Uchiha have a Sparrow Contract, Hidden Villages would start paying much more attention to the species, and their spying value would plummet."

Yuuto nodded in understanding, then hesitated. "But you're letting me take one of them anyway?"

"You're going to apprentice with a spymaster." Sasuke-san answered simply, apparently done with talking for the day.

Yuuto decided to stop looking the gift horse in the mouth. Cats and stoats were tempting. As well as Hawks. But Sasuke was right that Yuuto would be going to learn from Konoha's spymaster. His eyes drifted to the two secret Summons. House Sparrows and Grass Lizards. They both had their advantages. Sparrows could fly, always an useful trait. But Lizards could squeeze themselves into the smallest crevices, which was ideal for spying.

In the end, he decided on sparrow. They were fluffy and pet-able. And his little sister would love them. If he ever got a chance to show her his Summons.

Yuuto signed his name in blood at the bottom of the Sparrow Contract, and flipped through the signs for Summoning in order to meet his new Summons.

He had Summons!

The Sparrow he met was skittish and suspicious, but absolutely adorable.

He left the Flower Shop feeling much better about his upcoming mission.

Notes:

Yuuto's feelings about having the system be fixed after he passed through it do reflect mine a bit. School bullying became a national priority after I was done with school. And you know. It felt so bittersweet. Even if I know that the problem isn't solved all the way even now. I would at least have had some protection from the adults around, if I had been a bit younger.

The Haori Naruto gave Yuuto is actually the one he picked out after Sakura's adoption. And they had a discussion about it! It is something publicly bought for Naruto, Yuuto wearing it, even occasionally, reinforces the illusion that HE IS Naruto. It is also armored, which is always nice.

And since he can't wear it around the village, he doesn't really need it. The plan is for Sakura, Sasuke and Kakashi to go order him another one in a bigger size a few months after he 'leaves', to 'gift him when he comes back' and he will wear that one when he's in private in the Hatake Compound and wants to be coordinated.

Now, say bye to Yuuto, we won't be seeing him again for two and a half years!

Chapter 76: Farewells and new beginnings (end of transition arc)

Notes:

Today's theme is 'fuck it, I don't feel like re-reading'
If anyone has a beta's soul, feel free to point out any mistakes in my English down in the comment.

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

When Kakashi got out of Inoichi's study after finishing his session, Genin Tsuji Yuuto was already gone.

His little genins looked happily sitting in the living-room, so he deducted that their farewell went alright.

But his gaze paused on Naruto anyway.

He matched with his two teammates, all clad in their pastel Clan mon embroidered haoris.

"Didn't you plan to give him that?" Kakashi asked casually.

Naruto blinked and followed his eyes down to his clothes. "Oh, yeah. He accepted it, but he says I should wear it around Konoha and have it on the day of the departure, so it works even better as an identifying trait. I'll give it to him when I see him next."

Kakashi took a moment to be proud of Naruto for managing to keep all the confidential information out of his answer. Aiko was doing a great job teaching him subtlety.

"Alright. Then I guess I should take you gremlins out to buy ice-cream. So you can be seen."

The kids lit up and scrambled up to him.

Kakashi ruffled all their hair and pushed them toward the door.

He caught a glimpse of Inoichi smiling fondly at his back from the corner of his eye, but he decided to ignore it.

It was an Aiko-less day. She needed her space and was doing whatever she did when she took the day off.

Kakashi could feel her absence, but it was bearable.

The happy pups running underfoot helped with that mindset.

Except Sasuke was behaving weirdly.

He didn't look bad. Merely nervous. He kept the small bag he had brought along to their farewell meeting clutched close to him, and his face remained tense.

"Sasuke?" Kakashi tried, leaning closer so he could speak quietly. "Is something the matter?"

Sasuke shook his head. "I just... I decided that if he didn't take it, I'd give it to Aiko-sensei."

Next to Kakashi, the two other genins quieted down, listening.

Kakashi tilted his head. "Give Aiko what?"

Sasuke didn't answer verbally. He merely took one slim scroll out of his satchel and handed it over.

Kakashi dutifully took it and unrolled the scroll.

The heading was something of a shock. Ermine Contract.

Well. That...

There were a lot of stoats. And weasels イタチ (Itachi) were not a part of these. オコジョ (Okojo) were. But it was really damn close. They fell under the same 鼬 (Itachi) kanji. That's how close it was.

And yeah, Itachi's name wasn't the one written with the kanji.

Still.

This scroll had a very strong meaning to Sasuke.

And he could easily have hidden it away and ignored it.

Instead he was planning to give it to someone he saw every day.

Kakashi rolled the scroll again and pulled his little Uchiha into his side in the half-hugs he tolerated in public. "I'm very, very proud of you, Sasuke. I'm sure Inoichi is too." He murmured into the boy's hair.

Sasuke pinked up and looked away. "They're really small. They'll fit her."

Kakashi nodded agreeably. "And known to take down preys twice as big as them, yes. Tiny little terrors under their fluffy, cute and harmless appearance. They're perfect for her. But it doesn't make the gesture any less brave of you. I'm very proud of you, Sasuke." Kakashi rumbled out.

Sasuke shook and hid his face into Kakashi's vest. Naruto and Sakura immediately placed themselves at his back, hiding him from view.

"He doesn't get to define all my actions." Sasuke hissed. "I won't let him!."

Kakashi hummed and stroked his hand over the boy's dark hair.

Yes. His nerves made sense. It was quite a big step he was taking.

The moment Sasuke got out of his arms, he was book-ended between Sakura and Naruto.

Kakashi watched them and wondered at the warm bubble in his lungs.

The kids were alright.

Of course, that was when Sakura decided that she needed to shift public attention away from Sasuke and jump-scaled Kakashi to sit herself on his shoulders.

He should probably be grateful that she decided to sit there rather than attempting to stand up on his shoulders, honestly.

Her balance was good enough to swing it, but it still stressed him a bit.

He shrugged and gave a quick spin on himself just to hear her giggle at the speed.

Aiko had brought them takeout for dinner.

After they were done with desert, Sasuke slapped the Summoning Contract in front of Aiko in a quick, skittish move.

Aiko blinked and reached for the scroll slowly.

She inspired sharply when she read the title, and lowered the scroll to stare at Sasuke. "You really want me to have this?"

Sasuke nodded abruptly. "They're small. And fierce. They'll fit you." He mumbled.

Aiko stalled and looked at Sasuke. Then she put the scroll down on the table and got up to hug Sasuke.

"I'm very flattered and humbled that you want to give me one of your Clan's Contracts. And I can see that this particular one is very meaningful to you." Aiko said, crouching to look him in the eyes.

"It's not their fault that he went bad." Sasuke grumbled. "They still deserve a good Summoner."

"Thank you, Sasuke, for thinking about me." She answered warmly.

"There are others if you don't like this one." Sasuke mumbled, turning his head to the side. "Lizards, robins, cats and hawks..."

"But this one is the one you want me to have." Aiko finished in his stead.

Sasuke nodded jerkily. "He doesn't get to define my actions."

"And you want to change the meaning of stoats away from him. I understand." Aiko murmured. "I'm honored you thought of me for that. I'll be glad to help out."

She squeezed Sasuke's hands, and then stood up. By the time she was back at her seat, she had a shuriken in her hand. She cut a small cut into the side of her thumb and ran her fingertips into the welling blood, before pressing her hand-prints and then signing her name onto the scroll. Then she presented her hand to Sakura for her to heal.

Once Sakura was done with the cut, Aiko flipped through the hand-signs for summoning and put her hands down on the table.

The small white, noddle-like mustelid that popped in with a cloud of smoke looked around, then sat up on it's haunches and cleaned it's whiskers fussily.

"Hello." The Summons squeaked. "I'm Yukina. You do not look like an Uchiha."

Aiko nodded seriously. "I'm not. Uchihas have... Drastically reduced of late. Your Contract was entrusted to me by Uchiha Sasuke. He decided that you deserve to have a Summoner even if that Summoner doesn't come from his Clan."

Yukina tilted her head to the side and turned to Sasuke. "How many Uchihas are left?" She asked bluntly.

"Two." Sasuke answered just as bluntly. "Me and my brother, Itachi, who killed everyone else in the Clan."

"Itachi." The stoat hissed, hair bristling up. "We knew our Summoner died without being able to call us. But the whole Clan? By the heir with a weasel name?"

And there were the teeth. The ones that told anyone looking that mustelids were closer to cats than to rodents. Yukina looked like the little murder-noodle she really was, like that.

Well, she matched well with Aiko. She was terrifying too, under her pretty coat.

Yukina begged off shortly after to inform her Summoning Clan of what she learned.

Sasuke blushed up a storm when Aiko told him how proud she was of him. He still snuggled into her side easily for sleep anyway.

As time went by and everyone (including Kakashi and Aiko) progressed through their training program, Kakashi saw Sakura and Sasuke get progressively more clingy of Naruto.

The blond boy didn't protest this in the least, and looked to be enjoying every sign of affection. It did make him look a bit melancholic from time to times, though.

Kakashi hadn't thought that much about Sasuke trying to get over his obsession with Itachi.

It was progress, it was good, Kakashi felt very proud.

But he had forgotten how bull-headed his cute little Uchiha student was.

Of course Sasuke putting fratricide at the back of his list of priorities meant that his 'rebuild my Clan' goal became much more immediate.

Why wouldn't it?

Sasuke was thirteen and possibly sex-repulsed.

Why should that be any kind of obstacle, right?

Thankfully, Sasuke's first stop to his new crusade was asking Aiko for her opinion.

Surprisingly, or maybe not, who knew, at this point, Aiko had an actual answer for him.

"You all know that I'm a Seduction Specialist. As someone without an heritage of my own, it was always a possibility that I might be asked to go steal a Kenkai-Genkai the 'old fashioned' way. By seducing a male holder and using fertility drugs. So I got curious. About what would happen afterward." Was how she answered Sasuke's shy inquiry at the dinner table.

Well. They all knew that Aiko was blunt.

"So?" Sakura asked innocently.

"Well. Chakra means it's hard to really predict things. It mixes weird with genetics. It's good for rebuilding your Clan, since strong chakra-backed traits tend to persist more than they should. But for chakra-less animals, I know that each generation halves the genome. If you have a black pigeon and you cross it with a regular pigeon, you can get a black pigeon, a darker pigeon, an half-black pigeon, or a regular pigeon as offspring." Aiko explained.

"So... I can't be sure that my children would get the sharingan?" Sasuke asked.

"Exactly. Though, with the pigeon example, there is a subtlety. You see, the children of the original black pigeon, all of them, including the ones who look perfectly regular... All of them could potentially have a black-colored offspring. And it gets even more likely if the one the cross was with another pigeon with a black parent. Of course, it's very unwise to try and pair up siblings. That's how you get inbreeding. It's a bit less dangerous with half siblings, but still not a good idea. It gets safer one generation later, but by then you have more chances to have completely lost the black trait in the ones who look regular."

The kids stared at Aiko with scrunched up faces.

Aiko sighed. "Yes, I know, it's pretty disgusting. Especially if you think about it with humans as a basis. So, back to pigeons, please. If a pigeon breeder wants to cultivate a trait that they only have one holder of, the first thing they'll do is to ensure that this individuals has offsprings with as many different partners as possible. It means that they can have a large variety of genetically different holders of the trait they want to reproduce. It can let them shave off one generation before they're able to cross the descendants back together in the hope of revealing the trait where it had been lost."

"So you think I should try to have children with a lot of people?" Sasuke summarized.

"Well, if you think that the sharingan is the most important part of your Clan, then yes. Keep in mind that people have free will, though. You can ensure that you have as much genetic diversity among your children. It's much easier to do as a male than as a female, of course. But you can't have all that much influence on your grandchildren of great grandchildren to make sure they'll cross back together."

Sasuke nodded firmly. "Even if I had that power, I wouldn't do it. It's unfair to force people to have children. I don't want to build a Clan that would do that."

"Well, then, you have another question to consider." At Sasuke's curious head-tilt, Aiko nodded her head toward Sakura. "Do you consider the sharingan to be necessary to be part of your Clan. And if not, how do you feel about adoption?"

Sasuke blinked and turned to stare at Sakura. Then he turned to stare at Aiko, before turning toward Kakashi, and then to Sakura. "Hn. I'll think on it."

"If you do decide to adopt new Clanspeople, I know a ton of women who would jump on an opportunity to leave their current work and become caretakers and inhabitants of the Uchiha Compound." Aiko grinned.

Sasuke blinked at her, and then got a small smile to the side of his face. "Let me guess, from the red light district?"

Aiko smiled at him. "How did you guess?"

"Hn, I'll think about it."

Before they knew it, they were waving Naruto off at the Gates.

Sakura had worried a bit about what they would do if Jiraiya tried to kidnap Naruto, but Katsuyu was quick to reassure her that it wasn't possible to remove Naruto from the range of reverse-summoning short of cutting off his hands or completely sealing off his access to chakra. Neither of which Jiraiya was suicidal enough to do to Tsunade's dear nephew.

It was enough to pacify Sakura.

So here the kids were, having a very emotional, teary farewell. Complete with mother-henning and replacing Naruto's gear.

Not all of it was faked. Naruto would be spending two entire months in Shikkotsu Forest before he first visited in again.

It was to help Sakura and Sasuke to act natural in missing Naruto.

The day after Naruto left, Sasuke informed them that Tsukiyo was pregnant and had requested human assistance to make sure the delivery went well. He had a month before the cubs were due, and he intended to move into the Inuzuka Compound, straight into Tsume's house, to ensure his safety. And he would take the place Sakura had during Kakashi's time unconscious. All day every day shadowing Hana at the Inuzuka Clinic. So he would be ready to be real help when the time came.

Kakashi easily validated the plan. Learning to heal was never a bad idea in their job. And yes, three kids able to use some iryo-ninjutsu in one team was overkill. But if it would keep all his cute genins alive, Kakashi was all for the overkill.

With Naruto off in Summons' realm (but still providing them each with their tiny Katsuyu for communication), Sasuke learning veterinarian care for his Summons, and Aiko off to train with Tenten and teaching the ecstatic girl fuuinjutsu after getting Kakashi's go ahead for it... Well, Kakashi got Sakura.

It looked like it was Clan heir teaching time.

It would help for Kakashi to know more about his Clan for that. But... There was an entire Compound for them to explore while looking for answer. All the movement could only be good for her muscle tone.

So of course, three days into his one-to-one time with his adopted little sister, he got summoned by the Hokage.

Answer came in from Suna about possibly hosting Juugo. It wasn't an immediate no. More of a 'we'll see about it once we've picked a new Kazekage'.

It wasn't a no, in any case. And it meant that they were in critical 'Danzo will be tempted to meddle' territory.

Tsunade had gotten the time to talk with Clan Heads about the Danzo problem, and it turned out that the Aburames were very willing to help put nails in the bastard's coffin as soon as they knew the Hokage was not in his corner.

They had agreed to host Juugo.

Kikaichu were pretty ideal to help out with the Berserk problem. It turned out that they could eat Nature Energy safely. And so, right in the middle of the Aburame Clan was a good place to temporarily stash Juugo until Suna could receive him.

It was also a place where Danzo might think he had a chance of sneaking in and stealing Juugo.

After all, he had managed to steal Shibi's nephew and adoptive son that exact way.

But that was while the Aburames weren't on their guard.

And all the trusted jounins were asked to find a reason to coincidentally be close enough to intervene yet far enough not to make things look like a trap.

It was pretty easy for Kakashi. The Hatake Compound bordered the Aburame land. And since he had his own shoulder Katsuyu to let him receive messages from Tsunade immediately, he only needed to know to be on standby.

Well. He knew he was getting too comfortable.

In true hurry up and wait fashion, the call didn't come in until five days after Sasuke left to go play nurse in the Kairyoku Steppes.

Well, at least Naruto and Sasuke were safely out of harm's way.

Notes:

Yukina: 雪 snow; 華 flower, splendor, brilliance.
Kairyoku: 灰 grey; 緑 green

Looks like I'm going to end up breaking the Kakashi-other-Kakashi-Aiko pattern.

The fight might warrant a different POV.

But then again, no-one said the fight had to be against Danzo right now. It could also just be a ROOT strike team.

Chapter 77: Aiko's Birthday (Bonus)

Summary:

Aiko turns 25! Or maybe she turns 1... Who knows, really?

Notes:

Happy birthday to the Fic! A Little Unextraordinary Help is now one year old! An entire year of writing (almost) every day, at least half an hour. Wow. I'm so proud of managing to build and hold a routine over an entire year. And I'm very proud of the story I wrote on the way.

As a treat for you readers, here is an early chapter.

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

Kakashi remembered her birthday.

She didn't expect any less from him.

He told the kids about it.

She wasn't surprised that he did.

And she also wasn't surprised that they prepared a party for her 25th birthday.

They had one first party with everyone. Good food and good company. The three genin teams she had gotten close to over the months, most of them tussling around in the training ground while the adults enjoyed a few fresh beers.

They made her blow the 25 candles sitting on top of a cake, and then brought out the gifts.

Aiko cried.

She wasn't really proud of it. But it had been thirteen years since she got such meaningful and personal gifts for her birthday.

Ino got her a set of home-cooked poisons, complete with the pre-dozed immunity building samples.

Kiba gave her a dozen of stoat-sized nin-animal Konoha Hitai-ate

Neji gifted her a stunningly beautiful ink painting. The lines were minimal, but the message came through stronger for it. It looked to be her, even if there weren't enough details to be sure. A woman seen from bellow face hard but hand extended down and forth in help. She chocked up. Even more so once Neji admitted to painting it himself.
There was no escaping a hug for him.

Chouji gave her a booklet of cookie recipes. Someone must have tattled about her fun shaped cookie cutters.

Hinata gave her a very pretty hairpin that could double up as a very dangerous dagger while still leaving the sheath in the hair so the hairdo didn't collapse in her face.

Lee shyly extended a small figurine of a little girl holding a ball and smiling that had a pinkish red heart clumsily glued to her chest and mumbled that he thought she would like having an Ai Ko to also remind her of who she was. The boy was adorable.

Shikamaru handed over a bag that was full of pine-cones. There was a slingshot at the top of the bag, making the message even clearer. She had a good laugh over it. When she was done, Shikamaru told her that even though it was annoying, showing Ino a way to force him to train seriously had probably saved his life a few times since the Chunin Exams.
At least it was heartfelt.

Tenten gifted her a pair of perfectly matching wakizashi. The fact that they had a simple yet distinctive design etched on the blades that was identical on either blade should buy her half a second of confusion when she did her 'seal in one hand, unseal in the other' maneuver, where people might think it was the same blade and she teleported it. They were of excellent quality, and Aiko made sure to thank the girl for them.

Her own team said that her gifts were at home

When they made it home, she discovered that the gift was a private Onsen.

She could only speculate that Naruto had clones dig it during the party. He joked that it made at least one use for the jutsu Jiraiya taught him. The joke kind of backfired, because it reminded everyone that Naruto would be leaving Konoha with the Sanin the next day, and that he wouldn't be back for a month.

Kakashi clapped his hands and distracted them by doing a Suiton Jutsu in order to fill up the large, stone-lined pool Naruto had contrived to dig.

Then Sasuke spat a grand fireball at the big rock that protruded from one side of the pool side.

He had to make a couple more fireballs to get the water at the right temperature.

And then, they had a good, long, leisurely soak.

They even got to watch the stars from the water, since it was mid-winter and the night fell early.

Once everyone was out, cocooned in fluffy bathrobes and giggling at how they looked with moisturizing face-masks on, Sakura squirreled a small package from somewhere and put it on her lap. Then Naruto, Sasuke and Kakashi did the same.

Even more gifts? She was at risk of getting spoiled.

Kakashi's gift was a spare pair of armored leather pants with Aburame Silk inseam. It was her exact size, telling her that there was some ninja-ing to find out her measurments involved in planning the gift.

Sasuke's packet contained a simple, red and white lacquered Uchiwa fan. The boy blushed furiously, but told her that he knew she liked who she was, but that she was more his family than some of his actual family, and that he wanted her to have a symbol of his naming her honorary Clan member. Aiko solemnly thanked him, and then went to immediately hang the fan over the headboard of their bed.

Naruto... These little sneaks! Naruto gave her an ornamental plate painted with red Uzumaki spiral. He didn't say a speech. He simply grinned at her, large and luminous.

She decided to open Sakura's gift right away, and as expected, she found the Hatake Clan mon hanging in an embroidery frame.

Aiko laughed, shook her head, and hugged the two rascals before standing up and going back to the bedroom to hang the two Clan symbols next to the Uchiwa.

They all had an excellent night, even while knowing that Naruto would be leaving soon.

The following night, after they saw Naruto off, and once Sasuke and Sakura had fallen asleep in each-other's arms, Kakashi tapped her midsection and hummed. "We need to do something about that."

Aiko blinked down at her navel, then stared up at Kakashi's face. "Kakashi, I'm not pregnant." She informed him.

It made him splutter. "What? No. I meant your corset! Your corset Aiko!"

She blinked and looked back down. Right. She was wearing her corset.

After getting ambushed inside the village and seeing Sakura get impaled, Aiko had decided that she would be wearing her armored corset all the time, not just when she intended to leave Konoha. It was a very comfortable corset, so she barely noticed it. "What about it?"

"It restrains your lower spine mobility. You could make better use of your flexibility if you ditched it."

"I know." Aiko sighed. "But I don't know any flexibility based taijutsu forms. And neither does Gai. If I ditched the corset now, I would be losing armor while not actually gaining mobility."

"What if I could introduce you to a teacher for flexibility based taijutsu?" Kakashi asked.

"Then I would train with them out of my corset but still wear it the rest of the time until I'm confident that shortening my battle corset would give me better survival odds, not worse ones."

He smiled at her and squeezed her against his chest. "We'll go as soon as we can, then."

Kakashi's flexibility taijutsu teacher was an older Kunoichi from a small Clan.

Most interestingly, Kakashi automatically called her Taichou. It told Aiko a lot about where he had met her. She would bet on ANBU.

The woman stared at Aiko for a full minute after Kakashi asked her to help train his pack-sister. Then she barked at her to hurry up and show her what she had to work with.

Aiko complied and went through her whole stretching routine, then demonstrated one of her most demanding dances.

"No Taijutsu forms?" The woman barked.

"No, I... I never learned any that use flexibility." She responded honestly.

The woman hummed and narrowed her eyes. She shot a vicious glare at Kakashi (it made him SMILE!) and then she grunted. "Well, at least you won't have to unlearn bad habits. Listen there, young woman. You will call me Shizuko-shishou. You will show up at sunrise and stay with me until noon. Every day. You will do everything I tell you to. You will not complain, you will not slack off. If you keep to that, then I will teach you to use that flexibility of yours in combat. Am I understood?"

Aiko hurriedly nodded.

That woman looked stricter that her old Madam.

But she had learned a lot under her Madam.

And if she knew something, it was that she would need to learn a lot more if she wanted to keep her kids alive.

And she wanted to keep them alive.

One month into the most grueling training of her life (with added on bukijutsu training and fuuinjutsu lessons with Tenten in the afternoon when she could still move) she heard a big explosion from the side of the village their home was in.

The small Katsuyu who was waiting at the edge of the field for her to be done with training straightened up and called her.

Shizuko-shishou allowed her to go but followed close behind her.

"Kakashi-san went to engage in combat. And Sakura-kun disobeyed his orders and is intending to go with him. She already left my side, I can't catch up to her. Kakashi-san absolutely cannot be distracted from his fight by having to shield her. You need to intercept."

Shizuko-shishou had scooped Katsuyu up before she was even done speaking and was running straight toward the explosion.

"Where?" The older Kunoichi barked at the Summons. "Where is that fight happening?"

Notes:

Shizuko: 静 quiet, still, calm. 紅 crimson, deep red.

...

Yes I'm evil. Didn't you all know that already?

Chapter 78: ROOT problems (Danzo arc)

Summary:

Kakashi finally fights against ROOT

Notes:

I decided that since I was mean and put you into a cliffhanger twice, I would post this one even while it's a bit shorter, so you can all get a breather from the suspense.

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

Katsuyu telling him that Sakura had just ditched her own slug tag-along and was trying to follow him almost gave Kakashi a heart-attack. But then a few seconds later, the Slug Summons told him that Aiko was chasing their wayward student down and that Shizuko-dono was coming along to serve as support for Kakashi.

Kakashi would worry a bit about the unknown element butting in on their trap, but Lynx-taicho had been so protective of Kakashi the very moment she set eyes on him, that he doubted she would ever support anything like ROOT.

It had annoyed the hell out of him, back then. Now that he had his own pups to look after, he emphasized with her a lot more.

Kakashi shoved his uneasiness about Sakura toward the back of his mind and focused back on the fight ahead of him.

The Aburame Compound looked like nothing more than a kicked anthill. The air was thick and seething with insects, and Kakashi knew that the reason he wasn't set upon the moment he stepped on Clan lands was because the Aburame had been warned in advance that he was part of the intervention force.

Thinking about that...

He could afford a short stop.

Thankfully, Shibi-sama was fairly easy to spot by the Killing Intent he was leaking out.

Rare for his Clan, this kind of anger, but he had lost a child to the very enemy he was fighting.

"Shibi-sama." Kakashi spoke as soon as he landed next to the Clan Head. "ANBU Lynx is getting out of retirement to assist us. Is there an ANBU veteran in your Clan who might identify her before she gets eaten alive?"

"Can we trust her?" Shibi asked immediately.

"She took one look at me and decided I needed mothering." Kakashi answered. It was his best answer.

Shibi blinked, but then nodded. "I passed the message." Kakashi took it as his cue to head for the fight, but he still heard the solemn tones of the Aburame Clan Head as he dashed away. "Most people thought that. Including Minato-sama"

If it had been from anyone else, Kakashi would have assumed that his hearing was being underestimated and that he wasn't meant to hear the last part. But Aburames... They were very deliberate about most things. Shibi-sama knew he had heard him.

It wasn't important at the moment. He could ask the older man what he wanted to tell him at a later point.

Kakashi reached the battle.

It was easy to spot, what with Juugo turned into his semi-monstrous form and the spontaneous clearing. Not even touching on the scent of blood and adrenaline.

Aside from the thick cloud of Aburame insects, Kakashi was the first combatant to make it to the fight.

A quick scan showed over twenty blank-masked shinobi trying to subdue Juugo and avoid insects simultaneously.

Kakashi quickly assessed the field for the best target, and then lunged at a ROOT shinobi who was generally successful at avoiding Kikaichu but was far enough for the rest for him to have a chance to take them out without any other noticing him.

Tsunade had instructed to keep as many ROOT operatives alive as possible. They might be useful to gather intel. Also, it wasn't their fault if the man who brainwashed them was a traitor.

Kakashi had already knocked out two Root ninjas and was fighting a third by the time Asuma and Gai made it to the fight.

"Aiko-san successfully intercepted Sakura." Katsuyu let him know just as Kurenai made it into the clearing.

There were only ten Root operative left to fight.

About ten were laying around, unconscious.

About ten more were also on the ground, but visibly dead. Juugo was not trying to keep his opponents alive.

Before long, fighting the ROOT ninjas became complicated, not because of the operatives themselves, but because Juugo was running out of other opponents and attacking them instead.

Shizuko made an impressive entry by taking down one of the masked shinobi.

Kakashi signed at Kurenai that Juugo had shown a weakness to genjutsu in the past, and dashed into a new foe.

less than a minute later, there were only five ROOT standing.

But Kurenai had not managed to snare Juugo and was reduced to frantic dodges.

Kakashi saw Gai kick someone unconscious while Asuma nailed another down.

Only two Root left.

He decided to attempt to genjutsu Juugo himself.

If Sasuke managed it while Kurenai didn't, it meant that it came down to sharingan use.

The fight must have lasted less than fifteen minutes from beginning to end.

The longest was to secure their captives in a way that ensured they couldn't kill themselves and ensure their transport so that they didn't risk disappearing before Tsunade-sama could use them as proof of Danzo's wrong-doings in front of the Clan heads.

Or at least that's what Kakashi assumed she wanted to do with those.

Kakashi went back home to the Hatake compound to a very subdued Sakura and a very irate Aiko.

It seemed that Kakashi's Pack-Sister had taken Sakura's recklessness personally.

Well.

Seeing how sorry she looked, Kakashi could at least hope that his little kunoichi wouldn't be doing this kind of stunts again.

"Hello. Thank you for coming to help." Kakashi told Aiko before hugging her. "Shizuko said that you were done for today, and thank you for the opportunity to get some exercise."

Aiko nodded distractedly and gave him a kiss and a once-over. Once she had made sure that he was still whole, she turned her attention back to Sakura and her lecture.

Kakashi decided that discretion was the better part of valor and found somewhere else to be.

Shouldn't he report to Tsunade-sama?

Yes, definitely.

Better go right away so he had plenty of margin to get there late.

The debrief happened in an windowless room, with the ANBU guards told to stand guard outside and the privacy seals activated. Going against Danzo was an endeavor that demanded a lot of discretion and caution.

The following weeks felt like the calm before the storm to him. A bit similar to the build up to the Chunin Exam finals.

Everyone went about their life as usual, but Kakashi knew that danger was lurking.

Danzo knew that Tsunade was at least suspecting something.

Tsunade was setting her pawns to go after Danzo.

And the Village knew nothing.

But Kakashi was a professional, and there would be no leak through him.

Not even toward Aiko.

Well.

Aiko had looked at him, asked "above my clearance?" and then not talked about it again.

Little Genins were a lot more nosy as a rule. But with Naruto and Sasuke in Summoning realms and Sakura still being sheepish after her dressing down for disobeying Kakashi's order to stay safe at home and ditching Katsuyu, Kakashi's genins were not the biggest trouble-makers. For once.

Kakashi made sure to savor that fact while it lasted.

He was sure trouble would find them again soon enough.

Hopefully after the Danzo problem was dealt with.

Naruto came home on the two month mark of his departure.

The Slugs Summons gave him three days off, but he was expected back for training after that.

Sasuke had timed his return from his midwife duties to see his teammate, and Sakura made up a long training session to justify not seeing her friends for three days and they had a grand time.

Kakashi allowed himself to bask in the peace and happiness of having his entire Pack around him.

The kids were still cute and entertaining, and he tried to forget about the entire Danzo problem for a while.

Naruto was a true chatterbox. There were a lot of things about his training that he wanted them to know.

Like how humongous Katsuyu was in person, and he had kind of managed to think her smaller than she was in the time since he last saw her. Or about the older Slug who was teaching him control and who grumbled a lot, but was still very nice.

There apparently was another over sized medic Slug who had shyly asked him if he would like another personal Summons, and they were Katsuyu's child. Katsuyu had children! hundreds of them!

That prompted Sasuke into gushing about how adorable Tsukiyo's cubs were and how he got to hold all of them, and sleep with them right after they were born. It earned him suitable levels of awe and envy.

Sakura decided that she absolutely needed to show off her slightly sharper canines and inform them of her progress in copying the Hatake Bloodline traits, then let them know all the new tricks that Kokoro, Yue and Rensui had learned.

In the end, it was decided that for the moment, Sasuke won, and then they started asking Aiko how her relationship with her own Summons was progressing.

Aiko and Yukina had become fast friends She was also working on getting friendly with a couple of shier stoats who were adults but smaller than the norm for their mundane counterparts. It would take her a bit more time to win them over, but she had hope. Possibly calling them over to hunt rabbits might help.

On the second day of staying at home enjoying Naruto's presence, Sakura spent a good ten minutes sneaking peeks at him and Aiko; who was comfortably reclining against his chest.

Kakashi politely pretended not to notice his little kunoichi's glances and kept his arms linked around Aiko's midsection.

Sakura started surveying Naruto and Sasuke with a calculating glint in her eyes.

Kakashi kept a straight face and tapped a message on Aiko's belly to pay attention to her student.

Right on time, Sakura got up and firmly strode over to Sasuke.

The boy blinked quizzically, but allowed Sakura to situate herself behind him and sit at his back like a guardian.

He still looked puzzled, though.

When Naruto bounded over and asked what was up, Sakura pointed Kakashi and Aiko to him.

Naruto then nodded very seriously, proclaimed that of course, Sasuke needed guarding, and sprawled all over the two sets of legs.

Sasuke turned red and elected to pretend he hadn't heard anything.

He didn't push Naruto off or stalk away from Sakura, though, which was all the permission they needed.

Aiko muffled a snicker into Kakashi's jounin vest, and he wondered at the warm glow that had become so familiar in his lungs.

There was a moment, with every plan, where too many people were in on it to keep things strictly secret.

Unfortunately, in the case of the unROOTing operation, that point was reached much sooner than they had made allowances for.

They had been conservative in their estimates, as much as they could be. But they had still somehow missed something.

There shouldn't have been a leak when the Clan Heads were the only ones in the know.

But somehow there had been.

In the face of having been discovered, Danzo went with his usual method of dealing with a fallout. Compromise the Hokage.

But he had forgotten two things.

The first was Katsuyu.

The Slug Summons had gotten used to having at least a part of her present with her Summoner at all times, and had expressed her preference for that system over only being called in at need. She simply liked being there with her Summoner, looking over them. And, more to the point, she also had a few fragments with Kakashi's team at all times.

The second, in a way, was Tobirama-sama himself.

Tsunade was a Senju. She had grown in Konoha, after the long Feud was over. But she had also grown at the knee of the Niidaime. She had learned a very important Senju lesson as a child: never look into a sharingan.

And the two combined meant that Danzo's attempt to make Tsunade turn a blind eye to his misdeeds never landed, and that Kakashi was immediately informed that he needed to come and assist his Hokage in a fight against a bloodline thief.

His three little Genins turned large, surprised eyes on him when Katsuyu urgently told him to get battle ready as fast as possible because Danzo had moved.

Kakashi thought for all of two seconds before ordering all three of them to go and get safe in their respective Summoning realms and only come back in 24 hours.

There was an attack on the Hokage. The last thing he needed was to also worry about his pups getting snatched while he wasn't looking at them.

Aiko asked him what she could do, and Kakashi instructed her to collect Kurenai's and Asuma's students and bring them to the Aburame Compound for safekeeping. The next generation of Clan Heirs needed to be safeguarded. And the Aburame, even after mobilizing all their combatant nins, was the Clan that had the best home turf defense.

His genins disappeared in uncoordinated puffs of smoke, and Kakashi slammed a hand down to call his ninken in. As well as Sakura's, he needed as many messengers as he could get, and Yue, Rensui and Kokoro were perfectly able to find a stationary Clan Compound.

That freed up Pakkun to help Aiko track down Kurenai, Asuma and Gai.

And then Shiba, Bisuke, Urushi, Akino and Guruko could round up the other Clan Compounds and trustworthy jounins.

Once they were done distributing the three genins' Katsuyu companions to the dogs who might need them most, he ran.

A blank masked figure flew out of the Hokage office's window just as Kakashi made it close.

The window was already broken before that happened, so Tsunade had probably already thrown a few people through it.

He spared a quick prayer that his backup would make it there as fast as possible, and then he dove through the window to assist his Hokage.

The ANBU guard was already down when he got in. At least two were dead. Shizune was curled up in a corner, green shining hand pushed to her chest and breathing laborious.

Shizune obviously was prime hostage material, if Danzo got desperate enough to think he needed one.

Which is, of course, why Kakashi slapped his little shoulder Katsuyu on the young medic, grabbed her and the pet pig, and threw all three of them out the window.

Shizune should manage the landing. And Katsuyu should help with the healing.

And the possible hostage was well out of the way.

Now, the fight.

And no looking into the mind-scrambling sharingan. One encounter with week-long torture genjutsu was enough.

Tsunade was holding her own against a dozen of ROOT operatives and Danzo. She was bleeding and glowing green at the same time her various wounds closing slowly as she kept fighting.

Every other punch or kick throwing someone through a broken window or a wall at speed.

And Danzo stood near the door, both hands on his cane, and occasionally sent a jutsu toward Tsunade, not caring if he got one of his operatives in the crossfire so long as he also got the Hokage.

But Kakashi had a feeling that the old war-hawk hadn't been looking to cause so much damage.

Already, curious jounins were poking their noses at the window, wondering why their Hokage was throwing people out.

If Danzo didn't finish this quickly, he would burn up all his credibility.

And Kakashi had just upped the timetables by sending word to come help the Hokage to all the corners of the village.

Danzo was about to get cornered.

And cornered beasts were the nastiest.

But that was a 'later' concern.

At the moment, giving his fighting Hokage a small breather so she could heal herself back to full capacity came first.

With the typical ROOT lack of initiative, no one turned away from Tsunade until Danzo gave the order to also kill Kakashi.

By then, he had already killed five blank-masked operatives.

Tsunade nodded at him shortly and used the spare seconds he had bought her to Summon a room-sized Katsuyu fragment

While unconventional and not very good for the infrastructure, the huge Slug did the job of crushing anyone she didn't immediately absorb inside herself for protection.

Kakashi spent about ten seconds suspended in clammy ooze, before the wall of flesh surrounding him broke apart and hundreds of smaller slugs swarmed through the windows. Knowing the Summons, she was probably going to take care of anyone outside who became a collateral of the Kage fight.

Tsunade stood next to him, hands braced on her knees and panting a bit, and two good dozen of dislocated bodies laid on the floor at their feet.

Kakashi turned to make sure Danzo was dead.

But just as his eye found the laid-out form of the elder, reality seemed to blur up.

Notes:

In other news, yes, I'm still evil XD

Chapter 79: Asuma's struggle

Summary:

Asuma was born the son of a Hokage. It always haunted his life, and he always resented it. But it turns out that it could still be worse.

Notes:

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Chapter Text

"Don't look into his eyes!" Hatake Kakashi barked as Asuma jumped through the window of the Hokage office. "Special sharingan patterns mean special genjutsu powers."

Well, that was clear enough.

Asuma never really liked this teammate of his father's. Bloodline thievery was more than he'd have expected, though.

Just as he scanned the room for an idea of where was safe to step (not a lot of spots, the room looked remarkably structurally unsound), Tsunade went in for one of her punches that created a shock-wave as it missed.

Kakashi flash-stepped behind Danzo and went in for a stab.

Danzo dodged around the stab and almost got pulped by a kick from the Hokage that he barely managed to duck under.

Kakashi kawaramied with a loose bit of rubble and this time, managed to strike true with the tanto he apparently was now carrying again.

Asuma blinked as the elder crumpled.

He hadn't even gotten to fight.

But instead of relaxing, Kakashi and Tsunade-sama tensed up and got back-to-back, warily scanning the room.

He cleared his throat politely, hoping for an explanation.

"Some kind of time jutsu." Tsunade-sama grunted. "He dies, and then reappears. But it kills a sharingan in his arm each time."

Right on cue, the world seemed to blur, and the old warhawk was standing at the center of the room.

Alright.

This was bullshit, but alright.

Now Asuma needed to pull his weight;

Enough hanging around uselessly.

He was little more than a moving distraction for the next kill.

At least he was a distraction to the benefit of his Hokage, not her detriment.

The next time, he didn't touch the old traitor himself, but managed to make him evade into Kakashi's blade.

"How many left?" Asuma panted.

"Five plus the one in his head, unless there are more somewhere else." Kakashi answered shortly. "We should be getting backup soon, but they will need to be warned about the stolen sharingans."

Asuma nodded.

Reality blurred once more.

Asuma sensed Kurenai's familiar chakra and perked up. "I'll take care of it if you can hold alone." He hushed.

Tsunade-sama nodded sharply, and Asuma darted through the window, aiming at Kurenai.

Kurenai's genjutsu made her ideal for delivering sped up briefs to a large amount of people.

Apparently, the Hokage Tower was the one that lost the fight.

Just as Asuma finished relaying his Intel to Kurenai, there was a great crash, and the Tower seemingly collapsed inward. Then there was a huge puff of chakra smoke, reminiscent of Summoning effects.

"HE'S ON THE RUN!" sounded off from the wreckage as the Hokage and Kakashi burst out of the wreckage.

Hopefully the non-jounin personal had already evacuated the building when it became obvious that a Kage level fight was happening just over their head.

Asuma spotted Gai running in just as Kakashi took the lead and launched into a pursuit.

Well. Not much to do but follow.

Asuma, Kurenai and Gai weren't the only ones called for help.

Of course.

Four entire Clans barged in on the pursuit.

Aburame, Inuzuka, Yamanaka and Nara.

At the moment.

The Akimichi had to be right behind.

In any case, no one had much hope of escaping an entire battalion of Inuzukas and Aburames once they were on your tail. At least not with Tsunade right at hand to punch a crater through any secret passage or barrier seal.

Danzo apparently understood it, and stopped his flight to instead face the pursuing force.

Expecting a straight forward charge was, in hindsight, naive of Asuma.

No, the asshole decided to talk.

Asuma had spent years with an Hokage for a father. And then more years around the court of a Daimyo. He was an expert at tuning out political minded speeches made in bad faith.

The high points of the passionate speech Danzo was making revolved around him only ever doing things for the good of Konoha, Asuma's father being too soft to do what needed to be done, Konoha needing him (Danzo) to take the place that was rightfully theirs and how Tsunade-sama was obviously a traitor for taking up arms against him without reason.

Apparently "without reason" meant 'when I attempted to make her into a puppet using the obviously stolen doujutsu.' Very nice of Tsunade to clarify that point. Some people might have misunderstood otherwise. She also reminded Danzo that she was the Hokage, not him, and as such what was treason was him attacking her, not the other way around.

And Doing what Hiruzen was to soft to do included stealing children from clans through force and coercion (Shibi-sama's contribution), and also helping Orochimaru plan an invasion during the Chunin Exams and then creating a hole in Village Security so Sasuke Uchiha could be kidnapped (That part was from Kakashi).

Yes, obviously, Danzo must be the one in the right... Not.

Predictably, the attempt to sway them didn't work, and the fight happened anyway.

Unfortunately, it looked like Danzo's passionate speech had also served as a distraction to give his private army the time to come and assist him.

While the group loyal to Tsunade was much larger, the blank-masked people under Danzo's orders were brutally efficient, so the fight was mostly equal.

Though, the blank masked almost ANBU style had the disadvantage of screaming enemy. Which meant that any curious shinobi who came to check what was happening and saw the scene immediately took the side of fighting against the fake ANBU, even if they hadn't heard the confrontation that happened beforehand.

In other news, the Akimichi and Hyuugas had made it to the fight too.

But Asuma didn't have a lot of time to look at that, it was right back to the game of 'try to kill Danzo' for him.

But with Gai at his side, it was a much easier game.

And when Gai was serious, he could kick through someone's rib-cage. Asuma knew that. Of course he did. It was just jarring seeing it happen.

Also, Gai and Kakashi had this thing between them, what with the long standing eternal rivalry. It made them terrifying to face together. They had this perfect synergy of two excellent jounins who knew the other's skill-set and habits perfectly. It looked like telepathy to anyone who saw them fight.

Considering that there was also Tsunade ready to drop down with an ax-kick if someone was distracted and lost track of her... Danzo died three times in a minute. Then two more the next one.

And... that was all the eyes in the arm closed and dead. Only one resurrection left.

... Wow.

Was that Mokuton?

It was Mokuton.

And... Eww. A face on his shoulder too?

Apparently, Danzo had gone and committed bloodline theft on the Senju as well.

Why had Asuma thought it would only be the Uchiha he stole from?

There was no honor for thieves.

But at least there wasn't any other eyes on this arm.

They would see if there was another cache of them easily enough. They just needed to kill him once more.

Contrary to what would have been expected, Danzo lasted longer that time. Maybe he was just getting nervous?

Unfortunately for the old man, his Mokuton backfired on him, and his entire right arm got caught up in an enormous tree. He had to physically rip himself away from it, leaving the arm there.

At least it took care of the creepy shoulder face.

Then Danzo ducked under Gai's kick, swerved around Kakashi's stab and jumped over Asuma's wind blade, but got swatted right into the ground by an over-powered punch, courtesy of Tsunade.

Once again, reality blurred and Danzo reappeared elsewhere. But his arm was still gone, and his right eye was closed.

While Asuma was sighing with relief with the prospect of only needing one more kill to finish the old traitor off, said traitor decided to do something drastic.

Well. Stripping out of his top wasn't truly the drastic part.

But the seal he apparently wanted to activate apparently was, if Tsunade-sama's immediate bellow to get away was any indication.

"Use your wind enhanced blades and behead him." Kakashi hissed at Asuma under the cover of their Hokage's yelled orders.

Well. It was as good a plan as any.

Asuma coated his knives in wind chakra and threw.

The head fell down to the ground.

Kakashi exploded from his side.

Aimed right for danger instead of away from it.

Kakashi landed on the freshly corpse-ed body with a scroll already unfurled and slapped it to the chest.

Danzo's body disappeared in a cloud of chakra smoke.

Asuma, even while jumping away from the danger, spotted the earth jutsu hand-signs Hatake went through.

Kakashi slammed his hand on the ground.

A deep crevice formed right in the seal Danzo had conjured.

Kakashi dropped the storage scroll and leaped away.

Once everyone, ROOT and regular shinobi alike had evacuated the training ground, a comparatively small explosion sounded off.

A lot of bemused glances got thrown around when nothing else happened.

Kakashi abruptly collapsed to the ground and started laughing.

"Hatake, report." Tsunade-sama snapped at him.

"I'll have to kiss Aiko when I get back. She's the one who inspired this approach to diffusing fuuinjutsu." Kakashi smiled.

"Elaborate." Their Hokage ordered tersely.

"I disrupted the sealing matrix by removing the focal point via storage scroll and then destroyed it by causing a catastrophic seal failure on the storage scroll. And I also disrupted the larger scheme with a Doton." Kakashi reported calmly. "There is not enough fuuinjutsu array left out there to do anything. But I guess it would be prudent to remove all the traces that are left anyway."

Tsunade grunted and then sighed deeply. "Well, that's one thing done, at least." She huffed. "Now I only need to clean up this mess. ... Joy."

That was when the Hokage hat and mantle seemed to materialize around Tsunade despite her not wearing them. She turned away from her Danzo-elimination squad and toward the few ROOT agents who were still alive and seemed to be struck dumb by the disappearance of their leader. "Hey! You! Are you loyal to Konoha?" She barked at the blank-masked figures.

The blank masked people seemed to have a moment of uncertainty. There were a few looks shot at the crevice in the newly re-landscaped training ground. Then one of them seemed to decide that Danzo wasn't going to come back and that Tsunade was the highest authority they would find.

The fierce affirmation of loyalty to Konoha that followed was... probably good news. Even if it would make having had to kill more than half of them difficult to swallow for whoever landed those hits.

A few minutes after the fight itself was done, Kakashi scooped a small Katsuyu from somewhere on his person and asked her for an update on how Aiko and Shizune were doing.

Katsuyu-sama was a little aggressive in assuring him that Shizune and Tonton were doing fairly well for having been thrown out of a window at great height, and everyone else was perfectly alright. Kakashi gave her a sorry-not-sorry kind of answer that made the Slug Summons sigh and admit that yes, Shizune being outside was much better for her health later on when the entire top of the Hokage Tower collapsed.

Kakashi then Summoned his student's little fluff-ball of a ninken and asked her to let Sakura know that the fight was over and he was fine but she shouldn't come back yet, and to please run a message of the same to the Wolves for Sasuke so they wouldn't worry.

"Wait." Asuma asked. "You... Stashed your students into their Summoning realms?"

"Yeah." Kakashi answered with a slow blink. "Didn't you?"

Asuma decided that he was done with talking to Kakashi for the day, and went to Tsunade-sama to see if she had follow-up orders for him.

Going to ask orders to Tsunade-sama was a mistake.

He had known that she was setting him up to become a part of the Konoha Council.

The timetable had just been moved up.

As in, the two Konoha-council members who had been close with Danzo were just about to be invited to graciously retire, and Asuma was expected to start taking the duties up right away.

Also, he was welcome to get familiar with his new colleagues, a twenty-something Aburame, an almost-forty Akimichi and a fifty years old Inuzuka who seemed to have found her zen with old age.

Damn it.

He knew that his dad would keep haunting him even after death, but he had expected it to be through unexpected bouts of nostalgia and having to straighten out his nephew Konohamaru's horrible bratty habits, not Political Responsibilities.

But apparently, having a retired member of the Twelve Guardian Ninjas on the Council was a good in with the Daimyo. Which, yes, alright.

And putting the Sandaime's son in the council after removing the Sandaime's teammates from it might appease those that thought that blatant favoritism was the way a government should work. Which... Yeah. Asuma didn't like that one. But at least, Tsunade-sama was as disgusted as him with the prospect.

At least Tsunade-sama assured him that she wouldn't have pushed his name forth if she didn't think that he would be competent in the role.

So while the shinobi who mobilized to help their Hokage out ebbed away or started working on collecting the bodies and clearing the rubble from the tower's destruction, Asuma got to involve himself in politics.

But really, the politics weren't the nastiest part.

No, that honor fell to having to clean up after Danzo, and then discovering all that the old bastard had done. And then getting an inkling of how much his dad had known Danzo was doing.

Asuma had quite a few drinking sessions with Tsunade-sama. They were probably the two who felt the most personally betrayed by having Sarutobi Hiruzen turn into a monster of complacency in front of their own two eyes.

At least they had retrieved the splattered remains from the jutsu-made crevice, and Tsunade had very carefully accounted for every single bit of body and made sure it was really Danzo's, before carefully incinerating every single spoonful of genetic material there was. As far as they knew, Danzo was very, very dead, and not even Edo-Tensei should be able to bring him back.

It didn't do much for the bitter taste of betrayal, but at least it ensured that the Danzo matter was closed.

At least Asuma can console himself with the knowledge that he's not the only one to have acquired more attention from the Hokage than her ever wished to have.

It was, maybe, a little cruel of him.

But Tsunade-sama's attention was good for Shikamaru.

The boy had been much more shaken than he wanted people to know, when the Sasuke retrieval mission left him with two teammates in almost critical conditions who only survived thanks to rapid and thorough medical intervention.

Especially since both of them had injuries that were more or less self-inflicted. With Chouji eating two Akimichi pills and Ino stabbing herself in the chest to disable her enemy.

Shikamaru had tried to sound nonchalant when he asked Tsunade what it took to become a medic. She told him that it required having every aspects of your chakra control refined to perfection, a large amount of specialized knowledge, the ability to apply your knowledge and never give up... As well as the 'most important thing' that made someone a first class medical ninja.

And then she had stared at Shikamaru's eyes for a few moments before nodding. and proclaiming that maybe he had what it took. And that she would be willing to teach him what she knew so he would be able to help when his team got wounded, but that she wouldn't tolerate any slacking at all, and she wouldn't go easy on him in the least.

In that moment, Shikamaru had accepted the offer.

He had never backed down since, even if he did grumble and groan and complain about Tsunade-sama being a slave-driver.

Asuma knew that Shikaku-sama had a discreet talk with the Hokage to let her know about the real physical limitations of a Nara of Shikamaru's age, and what amount of rest and sleep a day was a Clan quirk rather than slacking off due to lack of motivation.

Chouji and Ino had a very good idea of why their Shikamaru was committing to enormous amounts of book-learning and chakra exercises a day, even if they had agreed to stay quiet about it until Shikamaru actually earned his stripes and started medic training in earnest at the Hospital.

Over the following month, Asuma saw his two remaining actual genins get absorbed into his friends' little teaching collective. With Neji and Shikamaru promoted and tasked with chunin level responsibilities and Naruto gone from the village with Jiraya, plus Asuma taken up by administrative duties there was a gap of three genins and a jounin. Which meant that when Gai, Kakashi and Kurenai pooled their teams together with Asuma's they managed to reform three genins squads.

It was, by all accounts, a very good experience for Ino and Chouji to learn how to adapt all kinds of team makeups and how to integrate themselves into other dynamics than the iconic Ino-Shika-Cho. From what he heard of Kurenai, she also saw definite advantages to not letting her own genins get too used to being exclusive.

With the discovery of Danzo's bloodline theft and suspicions over what he could do with the sharingan in his eye-socket, based on his attempt to corrupt Tsunade, The Yamanaka clan started looking for where the leak had come from.

What they discovered was hard for anyone to swallow.

Notes:

Hatake Kakashi: Damn, I need to kiss Aiko for that.
Kakashi: bends down to give Aiko an hello kiss whenever he comes out of a stressfull situation.

Also Kakashi: I don't get why everyone thinks that I'm dating Aiko! *confused Pikachu face*

I need to get on to naming the arcs and marking the right chapters with their corresponding arcs. I'm pretty sure we're already in Danzo extermination arc, and it is almost over...

Once again, no Beta reader, no re-reading, and I want to sleep now. You can tell me if I screwed something up badly, and I'll edit it.

Chapter 80: Damage Control

Summary:

There are a lot of messes strewn around due to Danzo, and they need to be straightened out. Sometimes it involves talking about feelings. Or just setting stuff on fire.

Notes:

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Chapter Text

Kakashi's adorable little genins fussed over him when they reverse-summoned back.

Sakura was looking a bit worse for wear, due to the chakra cost of the Reverse Summoning that she had to shoulder, and Kakashi noted that sending her to the Ninken's realm wasn't a viable strategy for her in the future. She had a lot less chakra than the boys, he had failed to take that into account.

It was maybe a bit cowardly, but he made sure to help out with the aftermaths of the unROOTing but not call the attention of the Hokage onto him. She would slap him with responsibilities if she remembered that he existed.

Less than a month into the clean-up, Tsunade called him in and gave him a paper file with that was strictly confidential, at least at the moment, but that he could share with his team and had to share with Sasuke.

Kakashi wasn't sure why he had never suspected Danzo of being neck-deep in the Uchiha massacre.

At least they were getting Naruto back from the Summoning realm for this talk.

It was going to be a disaster.

Fortunately, begging to borrow Inoichi for the talk worked.

Hopefully between Aiko, him and the genins, they would manage to keep the damage contained to the Hatake Compound.

...

Well.

Tsunade was in a generous mood, so maybe...

"And could I get an exception to the gag order about Minato-sensei?" He tried.

Tsunade frowned and gave her a 'please elaborate' look.

"The one about his marriage and... Family situation." He explained.

"Wait." Tsunade all but chocked. "There is a gag order on that? The boy doesn't... Of course he doesn't know. He's kind of a braggart. Yes, you can tell him. And your team. Just make sure to stress that he's not supposed to talk about it. I assume that Inoichi also knows?"

"Of course." Kakashi sighed, relieved.

It wouldn't be easy, letting Naruto know that he had let him down even as a baby. But at least he would get to learn about his parents.

Hmm. He better not tell both things at once, though.

Sasuke first.

No one in Konoha was unaware of Danzo's treason and at least some broad facts about his actions.

It was a side-effect of the very public execution.

Sasuke had already learned about the sharingan theft, and he had boiled with anger about it for a while.

It made things both easier and harder.

There was a basis to work on to let him know that the Doujutsu theft wasn't just opportunistic.

There also was a chance of Sasuke's anger boiling over.

The first step, of course, should be to consult with Aiko and Inoichi.

The information would need to be passed on. Keeping it secret was just an even bigger risk for resentment against the entire village.

But there were ways of giving information that might make it easier to swallow.

Maybe.

Naruto reverse-Summoned back home while Inoichi was sitting in the kitchen of their house because it was the day they had chosen to tell Sasuke.

Kakashi couldn't remember a time where he was more nervous.

Aiko gently patted his shoulder and tucked herself into his side for support.

For once it barely made him feel better.

Sasuke needed to be told. Kakashi was an adult Jounin, he could deal with his hang-ups.

" ... Tsunade-sama found proof that Danzo used Itachi's young age and desperation, plus the implicit trust he had enjoyed until then to usurp Sandaime-sama's authority and give the order for the Uchiha Massacre. He made it sound as if he was only relaying an order from the Hokage, but the Hokage had given no such order." Kakashi finished explaining.

He breathed out heavily, and looked at Sasuke again. He still looked frozen.

Naruto looked horribly betrayed. Much more than Sasuke did, and Kakashi was very glad that he had decided not to tackle the issue of his parentage at the same time as the Uchiha Massacre.

Sakura was staying extremely quiet, and kept her hands folded over her stomach probably to control her urge to try and hug the boys because she felt that it wouldn't be received very well at the moment.

"And the Sandaime didn't punish Danzo?" Sasuke asked blankly.

"He gave the order to dissolve Root and removed Danzo from the Konoha Council." Kakashi answered neutrally.

Sasuke's grimace said it all, and Kakashi generally felt the same about the Sandaime.

"The same Root that you had to fight to save Tsunade-sama?" Sasuke spat.

Kakashi sighed and rubbed his face. "Yes, that one."

"If it helps any, we're pretty sure from context that the stolen eye Danzo kept in his face had some kind of brainwashing power. It would explain why Danzo took so many risks to try and catch Tsunade-sama with it." Inoichi elaborated. "Danzo's records attribute it to Uchiha Shisui. And... It's existence might explain some inconsistencies. Like the Sandaime's willful blindness to the fact that Root wasn't actually disbanded. Or the fact that your brother didn't double-check with the Hokage before going to massacre the Clan."

"Shisui..." Sasuke whispered. "That... That traitor used Shisui's eyes to commit more crimes?"

Ah.

Oh.

That was bad.

"All of Danzo's records point to him having only one of Shisui's sharingan. Considering the context... It's very likely that Itachi has the other one. That one has been safeguarded from Danzo's influence."

"Not that it helped Itachi." Sasuke mumbled. "Or the Clan. Or Konoha..."

Sasuke fell silent for a long time.

"I want to be alone for a while." He finally said. "Take a trip to the Uchiha Compound."

Kakashi started nodding after checking Inoichi's face, but Aiko cut in. "Alright, but please Summon one of your Wolves while you're out there alone. You're still Orochimaru's target, and Konoha's security isn't at it's best."

Sasuke nodded, and then jumped away.

Kakashi waited until he could no longer hear the boy, and then slumped over. "Well, this went great." He huffed. "Hopefully Sasuke will still be loyal to Konoha by the evening."

"Why would Jiji let that Danzo guy get away after he did all these horrible things?" Naruto asked despondently.

Oh, look, there was another fire for Kakashi to put out!

Ugh.

Game face back on.

Kakashi sat back up and looked at Naruto.

"The most accurate explanation is also the most terrible one to hear." He said woodenly. "Danzo was Hiruzen-sama's friend from all the way back to their genin days. Sure, Danzo was a big name, and losing him might have made other Villages think that Konoha was weak enough to try something... But in the end... Hiruzen-sama took harsher measures for less. Danzo just enjoyed particular favoritism, in the end. So did I at some points. So did Utatane Kohaku and Mitokado Homura from the previous Konoha Council."

Naruto gaped, eyes watering. "Just like that? A friend over an entire Clan? Hundreds of Sasuke's uncles, aunties and cousins?"

"Power corrupts." Aiko said simply. "Or maybe it just exacerbates the corruption that already is there. Maybe it's just that more power means you can make even bigger mistakes. Mistakes that affect even more people. If I decided to protect a friend even thought they are objectively in the wrong, it's unlikely to impact all that much in the grand scheme of things. I can't shield them from all that much, with my strength and influence. If Inoichi decided the same, he might do a lot more damage."

"I definitely would." Inoichi confirmed. "Between the fact that I'm a jounin, a Clan Head, an ex-department Head, Tsunade-sama's unofficial councilor, and the fact that my Clan techniques can be misused in pretty horrible ways when you're as proficient with them as I am..."

Naruto frowned and crossed his arms over his chest. "So how do you avoid becoming bad?" He asked with his characteristic bluntness.

"You avoid getting more power than you can handle." Inoichi answered simply. "And when you can't, you use your best judgment, remind yourself why it's important to keep to your standards and you hope for the best."

"Authority is always difficult to handle well." Aiko explained. "In a way, you can't handle it well without empathy, but you also can't handle it well with empathy. And being a good leader and being a good person don't always align the way you'd expect them to."

Naruto frowned deeper. "I don't get it."

Aiko hummed and leaned back to look at the sky. "So, let's go back to the Danzo thing. He got the entire Uchiha Clan killed, and the Sandaime more or less let it go. It's unfair. But what would you say if tomorrow Sasuke went and killed the entire Hyuuga Clan except for Hinata and Neji? If you were the one who had to decide what to do to Sasuke afterwards? What would your choice be? Do you execute Sasuke as a mass murderer, betraying him but giving justice to the Hyuugas? Or do you spare Sasuke and betray all the dead Hyuugas' right to justice?"

Ouch. That was a raw example. Though also accurate.

Naruto dimmed even more. "Why should it have to be killing my friend? Can't there be another punishment?"

Aiko tilted her head. "But what punishment would feel equal to the death of hundred of people? What do you feel is the right punishment for killing Sasuke's Clan? And should the punishment be different if it was another Clan that died?"

Naruto hummed and crossed his arms tighter. "And why should I be the one who has to decide?" He whined.

Aiko shrugged. "Because in this scenario, you're the Hokage, and it's your duty to handle justice."

Naruto blinked. "I'm Hokage?"

Aiko raised her eyebrows at the grin Naruto shot her. "Yes, and that's why you need to decide if you kill Sasuke or let Hinata and Neji down by letting the murderer of their Clan, and of Hinata's younger sister, live despite his crime."

That shut Naruto right back down.

"Alright. I think your example ran it's course." Inoichi interrupted. "You made your point. But I don't feel that this discussion will do much good to our relationship with Sasuke. He's not a mass murderer. If we keep talking about what we would do if he was, we will start to accept that he could be in some parts of our mind."

Uh.

Oh, this was twisty.

But all right.

Aiko gave Inoichi an agreeing nod and resettled in a more vertical seating style.

"Anyway. Being in charge is hard. It's harder when you're in charge of people you love. And sometimes being a leader means deciding who is going to receive help, and who will probably die alone because you decided to send the help you could spare elsewhere." Aiko summed up. "And sometimes the only group you can reasonably condemn to death is the one with your friends in it. And sometimes you decide that you'd rather be a bad leader but save your friends rather than the more reasonable option."

Kakashi nodded. "That's why I would like your help to make sure I'm never considered a viable Hokage candidate, ever." He threw in.

Inoichi smirked his way and raised his eyebrows. "And how do you intend to do that? You're the only viable candidate. Your talent will be hard to overshadow."

"I'm not telling you. You might sabotage me just for fun." He shot back good-naturally.

Inoichi laughed along and then stood with a promise to drop by in a couple of hours to check if Sasuke was back yet.

There was a plume of smoke rising from the Uchiha Compound.

Kakashi looked at Aiko. Aiko looked at Kakashi.

"I'll go... Make sure that the only things that burn are ones Sasuke want to be set on fire." Kakashi decided.

She nodded her agreement and he dashed for the Uchiha Compound.

At least Kakashi was right that the smoke was due to Sasuke setting things on fire. No enemies, no danger to his pup. Very good.

The thing that was on fire was the Clan-Head house.

Hmm.

Well.

Sasuke had offered to burn Kakashi's childhood house as a way to exorcise his trauma, so he was going to assume it was completely on purpose.

The fact that his wolf Summons was placidly laying down close by reinforced that idea.

Now, how to ask tactfully?

"Hey, I'm going to respect your need for silence, but I'm better at water jutsus, so I came for fire control." Kakashi tried. "Tell me if the fire spreads to something you don't want to burn, alright. I'll put it out."

Sasuke didn't stop staring at the fire, but he gave a small nod and an acknowledging "hn".

Kakashi perched somewhere nearby and supervised the fire and his student.

Sasuke asked him to keep the forest behind the house from burning when it became endangered, but otherwise didn't move as the entire Head House went up in flames.

A few jounins and chunins dropped by to investigate the fire, and Kakashi sent them back with a reassurance that he had it handled.

When the head house was nothing more than a smoldering heap of embers and tile rubble, a few other houses having also burned but apparently being collateral, and the fire was inching closer to the warehouse they put the gear in, Sasuke finally turned away from the blaze and asked Kakashi to put it out.

After Kakashi had doused the fire until it was completely out, Sasuke silently turned and headed back home with his wolf trailing after him.

Inoichi was waiting for them with a cup of tea when they made it. "I figured that the change from smoke to steam meant that you were done venting." He announced. "I'm here to listen if you want to talk, but you don't have to talk to me right away. I will want to talk, but it can wait a week if you want some time."

Sasuke nodded. "I don't want to talk today." He answered. "Not tomorrow either, I think." He added after a moment. "Maybe in two days."

Inoichi nodded, drained his tea, got up and walked away with a confirmation that he would drop by two days later, but that Sasuke could come to him if he decided that he needed to talk any closer.

Sasuke hummed, and then he strode up to Naruto and Sakura, grabbed them both, and towed them into the main bedroom. Kakashi heard him push the others in bed and order them to nap.

Alright.

That...

That was handled?

Wow.

Apparently they had managed to implement healthy coping mechanisms that the genins could go to when they were upset.

Miracles did happen.

Kakashi gave a long, relieved sigh and slumped next to Aiko.

"Have I thanked you for being in my life yet?" He asked her wearily while pathetically slumping right into her lap.

Aiko chuckled lowly. "I don't think you have." She answered gently. "At least not in those terms. But thank you. It means a lot to me to hear it."

Kakashi sighed and grabbed her hand to place it on his head so she would start petting. "Well, thank you. I don't think I could do that alone."

Aiko didn't try to contradict him, and he was grateful for the honesty.

he also started gently scratching at his scalp, which was very nice.

The next morning, Sasuke told Aiko that he wanted to go meet the women she thought he could adopt into the Uchiha Clan.

Alright.

Naruto shrugged and asked if it meant he should go back to the Slugs' Realm. Katsuyu informed him that yes, he should.

That left him with Sakura.

Hmm. Well, he could grab Ino and Tenten and show Sakura how to track poisonous plants by smell? It sounded like something the girls would like.

In the end, Inoichi didn't drop back the next day.

He ended up having more pressing matters to attend to.

His Clan had found another nasty gift that Danzo had left behind.

Of course he had to burn the rice fields as he left, even while being forcefully removed.

It was kept under wraps until they could deal with it properly, but Kakashi was sure it was a right pain to straighten.

But he was also sure that it was being taken care of by the ones most capable to do so. Kakashi simply focused in herding genins and taking them on D and C-rank in-village or close-by missions five times a week to help out with the mission load.

Notes:

*Author runs away cackling* Ahaha! You thought!

I managed to do the one cliffhanger, two chapter trick again!

Chapter 81: Aiko's Panic (end of Danzo arc)

Summary:

Aiko is Unextraordinary. She knows that. Maybe too well, it left her horribly unready for the importance she took.

Notes:

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Chapter Text

Aiko didn't know exactly what to think when a masked ANBU came to inform her that she was summoned by the Hokage.

It got even weirder when they let her know that she didn't need to call Kakashi along, as she was the only one summoned.

She still made them wait to have Kakashi validate them as true ANBU. She normally wouldn't have bothered, but... Yeah. The private army in ANBU reminiscent masks didn't make her too likely to just trust any masked person to be a legitimate ANBU.

They took it mostly well. Though Aiko wouldn't have been able to tell if they were annoyed, since she had no familiarity with the corps at all. Unless she included Kakashi.

Anyway, Kakashi validated the ANBU for her and wished her a nice day before gathering up the genins and taking them out on a mission.

She followed the ANBU, since she didn't know exactly where Tsunade-sama had set her office while the Hokage Tower was being rebuilt.

Tsunade-sama's temporary office (or at least one of them) was in the Hokage Monument's cliff. It made sense, after two upheavals one right after the other, security was a true concern. The Hokage being seen was important for morale, of course. But keeping her secret documents secure also had to be a top priority.

Now, why the hell Aiko was being called in to what she was pretty sure was Tsunade-sama's high-security ANBU office was...

Hm. Well, she would have been very concerned if this ever happened to her under the Sandaime.

Since she actually had a personal rapport with this Hokage and apparently earned Inoichi's seal of approval for thinking outside the box for serious matters... She assumed that there was something fairly secret that her Hokage needed a fresh set of eyes with.

Still. Knowing where the ANBU apparently were headquartered was exceedingly uncomfortable. It was not information she was supposed to know. She was not supposed to live in the sort of world where she knew even one entrance to the black-ops' headquarters.

But... She had been moving up in the world, hadn't she? Slowly, sneakily, without her really noticing it... The moment Kakashi decided that she would make a good support for his teaching needs, she no longer was just another chunin from Seduction and Infiltration.

She was... Hatake Kakashi's secretary and advisor and Kakashi was the kind of person who needed special, foolproof plans to not end up Hokage because of how uniquely talented and trusted he was.

And she had his trust. It wasn't just a personal life matter. Kakashi trusting her meant that people at the top thought of her as trustworthy.

It was... BIG.

It was very big.

But also not something to panic about while on her way to the Hokage's office.

She would have a panic attack about gaining more power than she ever dreamed for in the evening. After the kids were asleep. When she had Kakashi to lean on.

For the moment, she was going to be professional.

The office she was led to had Tsunade-sama, Inoichi, and Shikaku-sama in it.

No one else.

And they all looked very serious.

Okay.

Troubleshooting apparently wasn't on a somewhat secret matter. It was S-rank classification kind of stuff.

Right, yeah, alright, okay.

"I only have level 1 torture resistance training!" Was the thing that decided to go out of her mouth instead of any sort of normal greeting.

Hmm.

Well. At least it was an important information for them to know. And it looked like it made Inoichi and Shikaku-sama relax a bit.

Tsunade blinked and then frowned at her. "Right. I'll make a reminder to address that." She answered calmly. "For today, it shouldn't be critical. Take a seat."

Well. That was... Not as reassuring as it could have been. But it was something.

"So, do you know about the brainwashing Genjutsu Danzo had access to?" Tsunade started out with.

Aiko nodded slowly. "I know it's the best theory as to why he would have barged in your office and bared a proof of his traitorous actions and bloodline theft from you." She answered neutrally. Inoichi-sama had told them all that when they explained the Uchiha Massacre to Sasuke, and it was everywhere on the rumor mills.

"It's no longer only a theory." Inoichi sighed. "We found a tangible proof of it's use."

Aiko wasn't totally stupid. Of course her eyes immediately went to Shikaku-sama.

The Nara Clan Head gave her a tired look. "Bastard got me." He confirmed wearily.

Oh, fuck.

"Uhm. What do you need me for, exactly?" She asked shakily. She knew just enough psychology to use it on enemies in the field, no way she could do something about the brainwashing genjutsu that Inoichi-sama couldn't.

"Just to hear the whole thing and give your opinion for now." Tsunade smiled back.

Alright. Fresh eyes.

Alright.

She could do that.

She could do that?

"I'm listening." Aiko said with the best smile she could manage.

"Since we knew that there had to be a leak among the Clan Heads who were entrusted with our suspicions on Danzo, we screened each one of them for any intentional or accidental slip-up, hoping to dig out the mole in their inner circle. Even with Danzo removed, it's dangerous to leave such a weakness so high in the power structure." Inoichi explained. So far so good. "When we didn't find anything in any of the person who were aware, we re-checked the privacy seals we used, and screened the possible ANBU guards, but it was perfect. So we did a second screening on the people who knew about our move against Danzo, but this time we looked for hostile jutsus of fake memories use..."

"And then I stuck out." Shikaku finished for his friend.

Inoichi sighed and nodded. "And then we found a Self-Suppressed Memory of Shikaku penning in a coded note about Tsunade's plans against Danzo less than an hour after being informed, and wedging it under the coffee maker in his office's waiting room. It took one minute at max, which explains how he didn't notice that he was missing some memories. Self-Suppressed Memories are a pain to hunt, especially when it's done well, backed in chakra thanks to the expert explanation of a friendly Yamanaka." Inoichi winced at her. It helped her feel slightly more at ease even if she knew he only did it to relax her.

Shikaku sighed heavily and slumped even more.

Uh. Aiko was possibly giving out more signs of stress than she thought she did. Tsunade was also looking at her with a 'medic trying a preliminary diagnostic' kind of way.

She wasn't hyperventilating, though. And her chakra cooling trick meant she wasn't sweating noticeably either. Pupillary reaction? Maybe? She couldn't control that...

"You found more." She prompted Inoichi with.

Inoichi nodded slowly. He was also looking at her closely.

"We found more. Hundreds of similar short lapse where Shikaku betrayed a secret within hours of learning it, all of them extremely short, all of them via coded notes in relatively obvious place that wouldn't take him long to access and that wouldn't be weird for him to interact with. And we also found the initial suppressed memory, when Danzo bared Shisui's sharingan to him while placing the Genjutsu. This one had traces of further tampering, but they were so subtle that it's hard to really pinpoint the command. We've tried a diagnostic to Shikaku's current mindset, but the Genjutsu is so subtle that even I can't, for certain, isolate it and destroy it."

Aiko took a deep breath.

Then another.

Nope.

The panic attack wouldn't wait until the evening.

Her compartmentalization skills were not trained to handle this level of stress. She could handle mid-and high-mid levels for up to twelve hours and high-levels for up to half an hour, with extreme stress for ten minutes.

This was apparently extreme levels.

Too bad.

"Can I have a dog-size Katsuyu?" She requested desperately. It was going to suck, but Katsuyu was familiar and safe, at least she might speed up Aiko's recovery.

Thankfully Tsunade-sama didn't even hesitate to provide her with the requested Summons.

Aiko got up shakily, grabbed the Slug and retreated into a corner of the room.

Then the shakes forced her to slide down along the wall.

Katsuyu had a soothing voice and a familiar chakra. Plus, she wasn't slimy at all, with left her with a firm textured skin.

When Aiko was in control of her breathing again and felt up to raising her head and facing the high-ranked people who just witnessed her go through a panic attack, she found Inoichi and Tsunade occupied with papers of some kind and Shikaku-sama reclined in his chair with closed eyes.

Yeah, they weren't fooling her into believing they hadn't noticed her collapse from stress.

But it was nice that they were willing to pretend in order to leave her some dignity and the space to recover.

"I'm just a low-level Chunin." Aiko tried to explain. It did sound a bit like whining

"Not anymore, you're not." Tsunade answered kindly but firmly without lifting her eyes from the paper in front of her. "Kakashi's taken your training in hand and you're well on track for Special Jounin, at least skills-wise. And you're part of the emotional support system for the last loyal Uchiha, our Jinchuuriki and a Clan Heir. You're VIP, whether you want it or not."

Tsunade turned her page

Aiko squeezed Katsuyu closer and decided that no, she was not done freaking out. Everyone was waiting for her to get herself together very politely, one more minute to compose herself wouldn't hurt.

"We need to train you in another method to deal with distress. Suppression might have been appropriate for Infiltration and Seduction, but it's not working very well for your current position." Inoichi noted neutrally after a minute.

Aiko snorted irreverently. She didn't answer 'no really, you think?' But it was close.

"We'll integrate it with the Torture Resistance module." Tsunade hummed. Aiko heard a pen scratching that might actually be Tsunade taking note on that.

Alright, fine. She was done panicking.

She thanked the Slug in her arms, but Katsuyu only answered with a kind "you're welcome" rather than taking it as a prompt to unsummon.

Hmm. Yeah, she was probably right. Katsuyu would help her not to feel too overwhelmed for the rest of the conversation.

Aiko got up, Katsuyu cradled in her arms and went back to her chair.

"So. Sharingan genjutsu. Gaps in memories, no way to know if it's gone. Is there more?" She asked in a small voice.

"No, that's about all." Shikaku told her, eyes still closed. "We want your opinion on my possible anticipated retirement."

Aiko took a deep breath. "Well, without knowing exactly what the trigger to leaking secrets without remembering about it is... There is a chance that it could be exploited by hostile parties. Or leftover Danzo loyalists. Could you find a pattern in the leaks?"

"I'm pretty sure it was 'things that Danzo needs to know for the good of Konoha'." Shikaku sighed.

Yikes.

"Uhm. Very short term, I'd say getting the legendary Ino-Shika-Cho team from the Third War out on the field would be good for morale and propaganda?" Aiko proposed.

Tsunade tilted her head and nodded. "A stopgap measure."

Aiko nodded and tried to force her mind to cooperate. "I'm guessing that the truly confidential duties of the Jounin Commander could be shifted to ANBU and the Hokage temporarily?"

Tsunade sighed and nodded. "That's what we already arranged. Any idea for the long-term?"

Aiko bit her lip. "Start training a replacement?" She joked. But... Oh, wait. "Inoichi spoke about getting Shikaku a personal secretary and common-sense filter a while back. I made a joke about getting a retired prostitute, but a Low-combat Seduction Corps chunin would work just as well."

Shikaku raised his eyebrows at her. "I would welcome it, but how would it help?"

"All the message were written, right?" She confirmed. at the nods she cleared her throat. "Don't write at all. At least for a few months. Make your new secretary write everything, and have them know that they need to report all instances of you writing a note yourself back to you, Inoichi-sama and the Hokage."

Shikaku hummed and scratched his beard. "It might work. It would help spot resurgences, wouldn't it?"

Inoichi nodded. "We would still need to check for suppressed memories monthly, in case we find out a change in methods... But it's a start. Anything else?"

"Split the Jounin Commander post in two. Like Intel and T&I, then shift the sensitive information away from Shikaku-sama? I'm guessing there are plenty of less classified tasks like screening the jounin candidates and keeping track of the jounins out in missions and those that are still available as well as who gets which high-rank mission? We wouldn't lose your expertise but it would reduce the risks for leaks."

Wait, there was something there.

"Tsunade-sama could spin it as a prevention reform. split all the high-level position in two to limit the power and private support any one individual can gather. A way to avoid a Danzo situation from happening again..."

"And limit the overworking of my top personnel." Tsunade agreed. "Nothing else?"

Aiko shrugged. "Hope that Inoichi-sama finds a way to neutralize the compulsion?"

"So no. Anyone you would recommend for the more classified sides of Jounin Commander?" Tsunade asked tiredly.

"I know a lot less jounins than anyone else in this room." Aiko pointed out.

"Alright." Tsunade sighed. "Write me a list of names for the Seduction Specialists you'd recommend as Shikaku's private secretary, and I'll have them screened."

Aiko nodded and unsealed a pen and notepad.

Kakashi didn't ask her why she turned into a limpet when she made her way back to him, and instead hefted her into his arms and treated her need for comfort like some kind of weight training for the rest of the day, carrying her out and about while supervising the genins' mission.

Aiko's training schedule became very loaded up, between her flexibility taijutsu in the morning, training with Tenten, and the modules for torture resistance and alternative compartmentalization methods.

Kakashi never asked, but she thought he knew about the torture resistance, at least in some ways, because he always was willing to load her on his back or princess-carry her when she came to him needing support once the modules were done.

In the meantime, Kakashi became Genin-central along with Kurenai. With Asuma taken up by the Council and Gai picking up the slack on away missions to remind everyone that Konoha's gold-standard for jounins was terrifying.

Kakashi was doing very well, too, even if part of it came from all his students knowing to needle him if he went aloof.

She made sure to tell him that she was very proud of his progress.

Sasuke made his choice and adopted a retired Madam into the Uchiha Clan to represent the Uchiha in the Clans Council meetings.

It was only a start.

Apparently, he had decided that he would be chaos incarnate as a revenge for what Konoha did to his Clan.

Honestly, it was fair.

Just about one month after telling Sasuke about the truth of the Uchiha Massacre, Kakashi invited Inoichi over again on the second day of Naruto's home vacation.

The secret he unveiled that time really threatened to rip Aiko's heart out.

It did worse to Naruto.

Notes:

Apparently, Danzo is supposed to be able to use untraceable genjutsus without even removing the bandages... Sorry, that's too OP for me, so I'm tweaking it.
The occasion where we know that he does is against Mifune, who isn't a Shinobi but a Samurai, and who probably wouldn't have noticed a genjutsu anyway. Besides, Danzo's goal then was to make Mifune pick him as the anti-Akatsuki-Shinobi-alliance leader.

So I'm going with Kotoamatsukami having two settings: 'small, unperceptive nudge' possible even without eye-contact, and 'hamfisted long-term brainwashing' (the thing that Itachi's crow used to break the Edo-Tensei control and that Shisui wanted to use on the Uchiha Clan) that needs his victim to look into the pinwheel.

Since Danzo wanted to make Tsunade believe that she had given him all the rights to do the stuff he does and that she disproves of, so that she would call off the operation and tell the Clan Heads that Danzo enjoys her complete backing, he needed the second one for her. Convincing Hiruzen that ROOT was disbanded and that he should discard any evidence to the contrary also needed eye-contact. And yes, making Shikaku a double agent was the same.

Danzo was probably trying to use the first when he turned around during the chase and made a speech about only wanting the best for Konoha, but it failed due to a small nudge not being enough to counter the very valid arguments that were opposed to his pleading. like 'And Tsunade is really the one committing treason! she attacked me! I've been important to Konoha for ages!' *nudge!* "Yeah sure! It was treason to punch you through a wall when you tried to nail me with a Genjutsu technique with an obviously stolen Sharingan!" *nudge fails*
'I only ever wanted the best for Konoha!' *nudge!* "You mean when you stole my son? And countless other children, even from Clans, without their permission, or the Clans' permissions?" "Or when you opened a hole in our defenses for Orochimaru to Invade? And then to let him steal Uchiha Sasuke?" *nudge failed*

Chapter 82: Heart to heart (Emotional growth arc)

Summary:

There are secrets that need to be revealed to allow hurts to heal.

Notes:

Sorry for the long wait. I was about as enthusiastic as Kakashi to tackle this part. I added some fluff to the end to make up for the hurt.

(the chapter is a bit short, but I figured you would rather get out of the cliffhanger rather than have a full 3K chapter.)

Chapter Text

Talking to Naruto about his parents was one of the harder things Kakashi ever set out to do. Even letting Sasuke know about what happened with his Clan wasn't as bad. At least Kakashi held no responsibility for the Uchiha Massacre.

Naruto's life, in the other hand...

Well, he had been present and aware.

He actually talked about it with Inoichi. Even spoke about feelings.

They decided to let the first of Naruto's free days be just about his comeback.

They hugged and listened to his training stories, cooked his favorites, and then went to sleep in a big pile.

The next morning they had breakfast and then morning training.

But eventually, Inoichi got there, and it was time to sit down and start talking.

Unlike with Sasuke, Kakashi had no obvious point to jump off of. He had thought about what he wanted to say. He had spent the last twenty-four hours going through the conversation in his head.

But sitting in front of his three pups, with Naruto's bright inquisitive blue eyes trained on him, words refused to come out.

After a minute of Kakashi sitting tongue-tied, Inoichi took pity on him.

"You know that I was a friend of Kakashi's sensei, don't you?"

The children looked at one another for a moment, then Sasuke finally piped up. "Minato, right? Sensei mentioned him..."

Uhm. Wait was this the time when he told Sasuke about his silly childhood crush? Was that really the only time he spoke about Minato-sensei?

Inoichi blinked at him, but then moved on. "That's right. Namikaze Minato."

It only took Sakura a few seconds to react to the name. "The Yondaime Hokage. Right! He told us, didn't he? When he said why we couldn't go to the Iwa Chunin Exam..."

"You mean that the perverted sage taught an Hokage?" Naruto asked incredulously.

... Huh.

Naruto had forgotten about Kakashi being an Hokage's student.

Wild.

"Yes." Inoichi answered seriously. "Minato was truly exceptional, and managed to get terrifying even with the toad sage as a sensei."

...

Hmm.

So Inoichi must know about Jiraiya being Naruto's godfather.

Well. Kakashi wasn't the Toad Sanin's greatest fan either.

"But there is one thing about Minato, and his legacy, that was hidden at his death." Inoichi explained. Then he looked at Kakashi in question, giving him the opportunity to continue himself.

Kakashi swallowed and nodded. He did need to face up to this. He couldn't keep failing Naruto to the last moment.

"Minato-sensei was married." Kakashi started. "And the day of his death was also the day of his son's birth." The genins were watching him uncomprehendingly. Aiko was already starting to eye Naruto, but then again, she was around when Minato-sensei was Hokage, and would remember the Yondaime's spectacular blue eyes, yellow hair coloring much more vividly than children whose perception of the Hokages of the past was heavily influenced by the stone colored Hokage Monument.

Okay deep breath.

He could do it.

"Minato-sensei's wife was Kushina Uzumaki." There. It was enough for the children to understand the point he was driving at.

Naruto's eyes grew round and his breathing caught. "You mean? ..."

Kakashi took the picture of Minato and Kushina standing together out of his breast pocket and gave it to Naruto. It was a wedding picture, because photography had been used very sparingly at the time and it was one of the only pictures Kakashi had of them together. Digging in his belongings for a memento to give Naruto was the least he could do.

Naruto accepted the photograph silently and stared at it for a full minute. His eyes gradually dampened and he started sniffling as he stared at the picture.

Sakura and Sasuke leaned over his shoulders to look at the picture too, but they allowed Naruto his silence.

After a while of staring at the picture, Naruto lifted his head up and looked at Kakashi. He opened his mouth then closed it. Kakashi could almost see all the questions fighting in his head to come out first.

"It was the Yondaime who sealed the Kyubi inside me." Naruto finally landed on. "If he's my father... Why did he do that to me? Did he hate me?"

Kakashi all but lost his breath at the question. How? Minato, Hating the son he waited for so eagerly? "No!" The word slipped out on it's own. "Minato-sensei was so happy to become a father. He loved you since he knew you would be born. He was so eager to meet you..."

Naruto squinted at him distrustfully. "Then why would he seal the Kyubi inside me?"

Kakashi stalled. He didn't know all the details. He had, after all, been bared from helping out during the Kyubi attack. He could take a few guesses, but...

"There are many reasons for that." Inoichi answered for him. "From the most practical from the most wishful."

Naruto frowned. "What do you mean?"

"Well. The kyubi had two Jinchuuriki before you. Both of them were Uzumakis, and both were highly respected for their sacrifice." Inoichi explained. "I doubt Minato even thought that you could get treated the way you were because of the Kyubi. There wasn't precedent for it. He thought that you would be seen as the hero who kept the Kyubi trapped and unable to attack again. And when he had to decide where to seal you, Kushina was dying from the battle and from having the Kyubi escape. You were the only Uzumaki around who was sure to survive the sealing and allow Konoha to keep a Jinchuuriki to balance the other nations'."

Naruto frowned. "Mom also had the Kyubi sealed inside her?"

Inoichi nodded. "That's why she was in Konoha when Uzushio fell in the first place. Mito-sama was getting old enough to need a replacement, and it had become obvious that only and Uzumaki, with their bloodline's vitality, would survive the sealing. Kushina was sent over to us as part of our treaty with Uzushio."

"So..." Naruto mumbled. "Then... My dad didn't have any other choice?"

Inoichi nodded. "Aside from the temporary solution of putting the Kyubi back inside Kushina and have it die along with her. But Bijuus do not die the way humans do. It would have dispersed, and taken some time to reform itself. But it would probably have reformed by now. You were the only viable solution."

Naruto took a deep breath and focused back on the photograph.

Kakashi decided that it was a good time to get the rest of the pictures he prepared for this talk out, and handed them over to Naruto.

There weren't that many pictures, but Kakashi had more than most, by virtue of being Minato's student.

There was his team picture, which the kids had seen, but they never asked about his sensei. At most, Sasuke had asked him about his Uchiha teammate and Sakura had asked if they would ever meet the people on the photograph. His explanation that he was the only one still alive had stopped all the questions on the subject.

There was also a picture taken at Minato-sensei's introduction as Hokage. In contrast, he only had Kushina-nee's registration photograph as a genin and as a Jounin. But it was better than nothing.

Naruto eagerly accepted the pictures and stared at them fervently for a minute.

But then his head snapped up and he fixed Kakashi with a stare.

"You knew? Did you... All along, did you...?"

Kakashi didn't grimace because he was a professional. "Yes, I knew that you were my sensei's son since you were born."

The betrayal in these blue eyes really threatened to do him in.

"I knew too." Inoichi added with a stern glance at Kakashi. "And so did all of Minato and Kushina's friends. We were ordered to keep it secret. And to never get close to you, so as to help keep your parentage secret."

Naruto froze. "Ordered." He repeated. "Ordered. Like. Like the secret about me having the Kyubi sealed inside me? That kind of order?"

Kakashi nodded.

"So. It was Hokage-jiji who gave the order, then? He made it so no one would ever tell me about my parents?" Naruto had started crying, and honestly, Kakashi kind of wanted to cry with him.

It was hard to see the entire base of his student's world crumble under him. The one person he had always thought to be the only one on his side was the one who robbed him of knowing about his parents.

Kakashi sat uselessly watching Naruto hiccup and sniffle.

What was there to say?

After a while, Naruto calmed down, then he looked up at Kakashi again. "If there hadn't been the order... Would you... Would you have wanted to raise me?"

Kakashi paused. The question was... Hard. But in a different way.

"I was fourteen." He hedged. "I would have been... really bad at taking care of a baby." He gave Inoichi a sideways look; not really wanting the man to hear the next part, but knowing that Naruto needed to hear it. "And... I wasn't doing very well with emotions. Everyone I loved had died. I... I would have found it easier to die for you than to live for you."

Naruto swallowed and then nodded. "But... You would have wanted to know me? ... And to come pick me up from the Academy with the parents?"

"Yes." Kakashi blurted, shocked by how small Naruto's desires were. "And to make you eat your vegetables. At least... At least so long as I wasn't trying to die on a mission."

"But Hokage-jiji forbid it." Naruto finished flatly.

That was the end of it for a while. Naruto lowered his eyes and looked at the pictures silently, handling the paper with reverent gentleness.

"I don't think I want to be Hokage anymore." Naruto whispered after a long while. "I don't like how being Hokage is making the choice between being terrible to the ones you love, or being terrible for Konoha."

There was another long silence.

"Even if he didn't think so... My dad made my life terrible to help Konoha. And then Hokage-jiji put these secrets about me that hurt me a lot... I don't think I want to hurt those I love like this."

It hurt a bit to hear Minato and Kushina's son declare he wouldn't be Hokage. But also... Kakashi felt immense relief at hearing his change of mind. He wanted Naruto to be Happy. And Aiko had made it obvious that being Hokage wasn't the way to achieve that.

After a minute, Naruto sat up and looked at Inoichi and Kakashi again. "Was that... Was that all?"

Kakashi blinked. Hum.

"Jiraiya also was the one that Minato chose to serve as your godfather." Inoichi answered. "And Kushina picked Uchiha Mikoto for your godmother, but Danzo made it so she wouldn't be able to raise you."

Naruto stopped breathing for a moment. Then he turned to Sasuke with wide eyes, that the boy mirrored back at him.

Sakura started leaking killing intent. Just a little, but considering that she hadn't been taught to do it, it was an impressive achievement.

"It was meant to protect you." Kakashi tagged on. "You were small and unable to defend yourself, and being known as the Yondaime's son would have made you a 's why no one went against the interdiction once it was put in place."

Aiko grunted something unflattering about old idiots making stupid decisions.

When it got her everyone's attention, she crossed her arms over her chest and huffed. "Come on. There were two secrets about Naruto. And one was much more likely to get him targeted by other villages than the other. Being the Yondaime's son doesn't mean that much as far as needing to kidnap him as being the Jinchuuriki does. The Yondaime was already dead. It's not like he would have been that useful for leverage. Why is it that the secret that would make Naruto's life a living hell ended up leaking like a sieve while the one that would have gotten him more respected stayed entirely secret? That reeks of bad priorities."

Naruto got up and hugged her, then he grabbed Sakura and Sasuke and dragged them into the main bedroom.

Well.

Snuggling with the team was apparently the new go to for dealing with bad news.

Frankly, there were many worse coping mechanisms.

The children came out of the bedroom toward the end of the afternoon.

Naruto had red eyes, which was pretty telling, considering his healing factor.

"So, what was this plan you were speaking of to avoid becoming Hokage, Sensei?" Naruto exclaimed as he sat at the kitchen table. "You said you would need our help!"

Kakashi tilted his head sideways, alright, if the kids needed a distraction, he would help. Besides, Inoichi had left after their talk, so there was no risk of leaks.

"Yes, sure." He answered, pulling a chair up for himself. "So I need the three of you to develop the kind of bad habits that will make people not want me in charge of anything."

Aiko hummed doubtfully from the stove. "These would need to be pretty big bad habits. You are the favorite candidate, you know."

"That's why we need all your help with coming up with suitable bad habits." Kakashi smiled.

"Mmm. Alright." Naruto nodded. "So we need really bad habits. That look like they are because of you... I could be very late?"

"I could be very rude." Sasuke volunteered.

Aiko hummed. "Not sure it would be enough. Kakashi's lateness and rude habits never made much of an impact on his career."

"How about bringing up the Uchiha Massacre and Uzushio all the time?" Naruto asked.

"Not sure it would be blamed on Kakashi." Sasuke answered. "I would do it all on my own."

"I could be an horrible gossip?" Sakura tried slowly, brow furrowed in thought.

"I can definitely do small whoopie-cushion type pranks?" Naruto added.

"I could be horribly condescending." Sasuke volunteered dispassionately.

Then, Sakura got up and strode up to Kakashi and lifted her arms, before sternly demanding "up!"

Kakashi blinked at her uncomprehendingly. After a moment he decided to just go along and just pick her up.

Once she was in his arms, Sakura nodded decisively with a smug expression.

"Got it!" She exclaimed. "We can just be horribly spoiled!" Then she went all slack and noodly, and Kakashi had to scramble to keep a hold of her, causing her to giggle.

"Well." Sasuke hedged. "We can. But how would it help?"

"Cause no one wants a pushover for Hokage!" Sakura answered smartly. "Especially after the entire Danzo thing. Look at things from the outside. After about six months of being Kakashi-nii's students, I got the Ninken contract from him and made my intention to get adopted known, and I got him to agree in less than three months. Now he's named me his heir. We know that there were good reasons, but from the outside, it would be easy to think that he's just super easy to sway by the people he likes!"

Kakashi shot Aiko an alarmed look, but she looked more thoughtful than understanding.

"You mean we just act entitled around him?" Sasuke asked seriously.

"Ask for treats and stuff?" Naruto added. "Make him carry us around?"

Kakashi might not have thought this through. "Admit you're just trying to swindle me.' He grunted at the happy pup in his arms.

Sakura grinned at him. "It's for your own good!"

Kakashi sighed and leaned back in his seat with Sakura still sitting smugly in his lap.

Honestly.

It was the strategy that was most likely to work. If he was seen being horribly indulgent on his brats, he would draw unfavorable comparisons with Hiruzen and get rejected as a possible Hokage out of hand.

If he just managed to train up a couple of viable candidates, he would be golden.

Chapter 83: Sakura's growth

Summary:

Sakura is fourteen. There are good things and bad things about it.
But mostly good things.

Notes:

Content warning for kisses and stuff!

The one with four line breaks features Aiko and pre-teens, back in the first mission, the one with two breaks is a pair of teenagers deciding they want to make out.

Also, I went back and changed a detail on the previous chapter!
Kakashi had actually mentioned that his sensei was the Yondaime Hokage when telling the kids about the chunin exams, and I changed the part about it to reflect that.

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

Looking back on things, Sakura was glad that her birthday happened the week before Kakashi told Sasuke about his Clan and over a month before telling Naruto the truth about being the Yondaime's son.

It was slightly selfish, yes. But at least she got happy Naruto and Sasuke to celebrate her turning fourteen. Even if she had only seen him for a few hours at the time.

She had a birthday party with the people in Konoha who didn't know about Naruto being able to come back occasionally, first.

And then they had an evening gift-giving session.

Sasuke and Naruto proudly presented her with a very soft, pure black fur collar and told her that they had hunted it in their first week of camping in the Hatake lands with Kakashi, who had taught them how to skin a rabbit while preserving the pelt because they had thought she would like the fur.

They told her they had a hard time deciding what to make the fur into for her, but in the end they decided not to cut it, so she could use it as a collar, or refashion it into something else later if she felt like it.

She had hugged them for their thoughtfulness and how meaningful a gift they had given her.

Kakashi gave her his dad's tanto. Kakashi had broken it on a mission as a teenager, so it wasn't as sturdy as it used to be. But it was still a chakra-conductive blade, and he figured that she would find a way to make use of the reforged white light chakra saber. (It didn't make white light in Sakura's hands, but she had the feeling that it was a relief for Kakashi-nii, and that he had a complicated relationship with this heirloom.)

Aiko got her a pair of ninja-grade nail-polish, that could turn your fingernails into a backup weapon if you painted the top, tip and the underside of the tips of the nails with it. In sakura pink and sage green, to match her eyes or hair. It was also, according to her old Inuzuka teammate, perfectly safe to put onto ninken claws.

With Hinata, Tenten and Sakura celebrating their birthdays within three months of one-another, a lot of poison kits had been gifted. (Shino had his birthday too, but he hadn't been given poison.)

As a result, Kakashi had asked Genma for more tutoring time for his growing army of young, poison-wielding kunoichis. (Ino didn't need to be gifted poisons, she was a Yamanaka, and had access to more than enough poisonous plants through her Clan.)

Genma had taken the duty of poison instructor gamely, and had taken to teasing them about picking his successor among them. They didn't take it very seriously, but they still teased each-other on who was on head of the race for Genma's heir.

After Kakashi told Naruto about his parents...

Well.

Apparently Sasuke and Naruto had been meant to be brothers.

Naruto was the son of the teacher that all but raised Kakashi.

These three.

They were meant to be a family, apparently.

The intruder was Sakura.

She was the one Kakashi had adopted as a younger sister.

But she was also the one who still had living parents.

She was the cuckoo in the nest.

Thankfully these thoughts had only come about once she wasn't with them.

Back then, when Kakashi was talking, when Naruto was hurt, she only wanted to help.

But the next day. When she let the boys at home to sort out their feelings.

Then she started to feel down about not belonging.

The one thing she had to put up against the bad thoughts was the fact that if she didn't belong, then neither did Aiko. And Aiko was the heart of their family.

Maybe Sakura was another Aiko. Someone who wasn't meant to be there, but that found her way in anyway and helped out by airing up the fated relationship.

It helped a bit.

Inner helped her come up with arguments against her insecurity, but they were both very cautious about how close Inner went to the negative thoughts.

Inner was a precious and valued part of Sakura, and the last thing they both needed was for Inner to try absorbing the insecurities and have them stay stuck inside her forever. It was much better to let them out in the open and vent them safely.

But at the same time. She was out of the house and alone and...

And she decided that the best remedy to feeling down was to go see Ino.

Ino had her hair wound up in a towel when she came out of her room at Inoichi-san's call.

"Hello, it's early for the Kunoichi get-together. Is there... Sakura? Do you need help?" The way her eyes sharpened and her tone changed when she really looked at Sakura told her that her conflict was easy to read on her face. Or at least easy to read to a Yamanaka trained in her Clan's arts.

Sakura took in a deep breath and then went to hug Ino. "Yeah. I need your help. Please distract me?"

Ino was the best, and so she pulled Sakura inside her bedroom, sat her on the bed, and started telling her about all the gossip.

Sakura sat, then lounged mindlessly listening to her friend go about strangers' lives for about ten minutes while Ino fucked around with her lotions and clothes.

Ino was really pretty.

Then she took an habitual scenting sniff, as she had taken the habit of doing on her ongoing quest to replicate Hatake traits, and added 'Ino smells good' to the list of distracting thoughts.

It was a very distracting thought.

She wondered how soft Ino's skin was, considering the care she put into it...

A flash of a memory came to her, pushed forth by Inner.

Aiko was teaching them about why Seduction was not 'just seduction', using Tenten as an example.

Once the impromptu lesson was over, Ino stood up and stalked over toward Aiko to kiss her, and Aiko laughed before pulling Ino into her lap and kissing her.

Ino standing up, then bowing down to Aiko and thanking her for her instruction.

Ino pushing Shino into Aiko's lap, and Shino pulling the top of his collar away from his face and reaching up to kiss Aiko, then telling them that it would be foolish to turn down valuable shinobi lessons if they were on offer.

Just ask!

Are you crazy?

Are YOU a fucking coward?

Sakura sighed and looked at the ceiling intently. Inner prodded her again, and she turned back toward Ino.

Ino, who had stopped talking and turned to her at her sigh.

Alright. All or nothing, right?

"Would you kiss me?"

Ino blinked. "Uh. Yeah? I guess? What brought this on?"

She could probably skate by with a half-truth, but...

Just tell her!

"You're pretty, and you smell good, and you know how to kiss, since Aiko-sensei showed you. I never asked her, because it would be weird, she's almost my sister. But you... I trust you. And I like you. And I kind of want to kiss you even without the excuse of learning about it." Sakura got out all in one breath.

Ino took a long breath in, her mouth staying open longer than necessary. Then she narrowed her eyes seriously, got up from her desk chair and walked over to the bed.

Oh. Oh, she looked very intense when she was serious.

Pretty.

Ino pushed her hair towel off her head, planted her hand by Sakura's head, sat herself next to Sakura's hips, and then leaned in to kiss her.

She held her breath when Ino bent down, but the kiss ended up being just a little peck.

Then Ino leaned back by a bit and smiled at her, before leaning down a second time.

When the second kiss ended up being just another tiny press of lips, Sakura's breath whooshed out of her, taking the fear along.

Alright. It wasn't that scary.

Ino grinned and cupped her cheek with the hand not holding her weight up. "There you are."

The next kiss had a bit more pressure behind it.

When Ino straightened up out of that kiss, she shifted her legs and threw one over Sakura's hips into a straddling kneel. Then she grabbed Sakura's hand and set it at the small of her back with a smile.

Sakura gulped at the change, but Ino didn't kiss her again. She simply spread herself out over Sakura's torso, and stare into her eyes, small smile still firmly in place.

Come on, idiot. It's INO, stop acting like a civilian.

Ah.

Yeah.

It was INO.

Her nice and protective Ino.

She was safe.

She had nothing to fear, except not liking it as much as she hoped she would.

And even that was barely a threat.

She should stop being a coward.

She firmed up her hold on Ino's back, pressing their midsections together firmly, and brought up her other hand to tentatively sneak it under the hem of Ino's top.

Ino beamed at her happily. "Better?"

"Yeah. Sorry for freaking out on you."

"No problem. But I'm happy having my Sakura back."

Sakura swallowed at the possessive pronoun.

Oh.

Alright.

That...

She could get used to that.

The time, she was the one to move her head upward to kiss Ino, even if the kiss was as short as all the previous ones.

It was really nice.

They both ended up turning up late for the Kunoichi get-together.

But Sakura was thoroughly distracted from any stray thoughts about fate.

When the afternoon came to an end, and the Kunoichi club bid each-other goodbye, Sakura found herself standing a bit awkwardly next to Ino.

The boys could use some more time to themselves, surely?

She glanced at Ino.

"Would you like to come have dinner at my place?" Ino asked with a playful smile.

"Yes!"

Ino laughed and grabbed her hand with a soft smile, before turning and leading the way back to her house.

Maybe Sakura was getting a bit carried away.

But...

She was a teenager.

And unlike the harassment she engaged in toward Sasuke for half of her Academy time, Ino was perfectly consenting.

It wasn't like she was hurting anything.

Besides, Ino had a really soft skin, on top of being pretty and smelling good.

Ino's dad gave her the most knowing look ever when she got out of Ino's room toward midnight to head back home.

When she crawled into bed, Kakashi-nii gave her a sniff, then smirked. "Ino, uh? Hmm. Can't fault your taste."

She grabbed a pillow and tried to smother him.

Since Kakashi was an Elite jounin, her try was deeply unsuccessful, but his laughter at her attempt woke Naruto and Sasuke up, and they ended up having a very spirited pillow battle.

Once they had exhausted themselves out and Naruto asked why she was trying to assassinate Kakashi, and if she just wanted to become Clan Head earlier, Kakashi laughingly told them that Sakura smelled like she had spent hours rubbing against Ino. And also like she had enjoyed it.

It was a dick move, and Sakura blushed what she suspected to be a deep red while Aiko swatted Kakashi for spreading Sakura's private life around.

"We only kissed, you horrible pervert!" She yelled.

"Uhu. I'm sure. a very chaste, very quick peck on the cheek." Kakashi taunted back. "That's why you smell as much like her as like yourself."

Then Kakashi jumped up to stick to the ceiling to be out of Aiko's reach.

Aiko also jumped and swatted him again.

"Okay." Sakura mumbled. "So there might have been some snuggling involved. Still! No need to make it sound illicit."

Kakashi stopped clowning around and landed next to Sakura, then bent down to look at her straight on. "It's not?" He told her hesitantly. "Ino is an adult, so are you, and so long as you both enjoyed yourselves, there's nothing even remotely illicit about it?"

Sakura blinked.

Then she took a deep breath.

Damn her mother.

Kakashi was absolutely right. And she had totally overreacted by getting defensive when he was simply teasing her.

She breathed out and then reached out to hug him.

"Sorry. The Civilian mindset got to me." She mumbled into his chest.

Kakashi patted her head. "No need to worry, you didn't even manage to hurt me."

She pinched him for that one.

After about a week of fooling around with Ino, they decided to try out civilian dating for a month together and see what it was about.

It was really nice.

The plan to make Kakashi look like an indulgent pushover also got put in motion.

Sakura also thoroughly enjoyed it.

Now that she had her legs back and didn't have to feel like she had no control every time someone else moved her, she enjoyed being carried around a lot more.

Sasuke and her took turns demanding to be picked up and put on Kakashi's shoulders.

The double-takes it got them whenever Kakashi sighed, bent down to grab them, and then had to stand straight to avoid fucking his back up through having weight on his shoulders while slouching was absolutely hilarious.

She wondered if anyone other than the Inuzuka were aware that their concerted effort to be horribly free with Kakashi's personal space was as much them spoiling him than him spoiling them.

The thought hit, quite fittingly, while she was half dozing in Kakashi's lap, head pillowed on his shoulder, while he was sitting at the Clan Head Council, after having justified her presence as needing to teach her the ropes of being the Hatake heir.

(She was listening a lot more closely than anyone thought. And Inner was there to store everything she didn't actively pay attention to for later review.)

She was pretty proud of the pouting and semi-public tantrum that had gotten Kakashi to take her to the council. It was a great advancement in their 'no Hokage' plan!

Aiko has also taken the habit of snubbing any chair laid out for her and sitting on Kakashi's lap any time Sakura or Sasuke wasn't already there.

The funnier was that the genins who didn't know about their plan were also beginning to act spoiled around Kakashi.

Their plan was perfect!

About two weeks into 'dating' Ino, they got around to having sex.

Maybe Sakura should marry Ino.

She could see no downsides to that plan.

If anyone had asked her if she wanted her own heavy Danzo-related family fact reveal to be on equal footing with the boys, she would have answered with a categorical 'hell no'.

Unfortunately, no one asked her.

Notes:

Hey guys. I'm going to start cutting back on my strict 3K per chapter rule, because half of the reason why I turn toward Sakurama more than Unextraordinary when writing time comes is that it feels a lot more rewarding to be able to churn out a full chapter in 1-2 day(s) than needing half a week to write a chapter.

So...

Hopefully I'll get back in the swing of posting A Little Unextraordinary Help more regularly!

Chapter 84: Hatake Matters

Summary:

The consequences keep rolling on.

Notes:

Everyone who commented about me said they were okay with shorter chapters, so we're going a bit shorter today!

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

Kakashi hoisted Sakura more firmly up over his hip and tried to tune out her chewing.

At least when she was eating, she didn't indulge in her new habit of pulling her rabbit fur collar front to back and imitating his mask by hiding her nose in it.

It was very cute. But it got him a lot of side-eyes and snickers.

He was curious why the hell Tsunade had called him and Sakura over to her low security office, but he was sure he'd find out in good time.

Tsunade-sama looked tired, angry, and overall done with everything.

"Come in, close the door." She grunted. "I don't feel like repeating myself. Or losing my time."

Kakashi obeyed, and set Sakura down on her own two legs.

"We found a cache of Danzo's archives." Tsunade told them while bending down to retrieve sake in her desk's drawer. "Stuff from the second and third ninja wars. Turns out he was already up to his crimes back then. And he already wanted to be Hokage."

Kakashi raised his eyebrows and shot a sideways glance at Sakura. She was standing at attention and being polite and serious, but he had no idea why she was there if they were talking of stuff dating back to the second and third wars.

Tsunade didn't verbally pick up on his question, but shot him a half-glare. "He had taken to shooting down any other serious Hokage candidates by various means. That's about when my little brother died in a trap while under Orochimaru's care, for instance. He wrote down an account of spreading malicious rumors on Orochimaru's morals, and encouraging the Sandaime to leave Jiraiya to wander anywhere he wanted under the guise of spying. Dan's death was also mentioned."

Right. But how did that concern Sakura?

"And then, there is the matter of Sakumo." She kept going. "Too strong and too respected. A hero of the second war."

Kakashi jolted. What. His dad?

"There is no doubt that the mission he chose to abort was sabotaged on purpose." Tsunade told them, voice a tiny bit softer. "The leak of him failing a secret mission came from Danzo too, and he fed fuel to the whisper campaign. I'm sorry, Hatake, young heir Hatake. It seems that your father was also a victim of Danzo's ambitions."

Kakashi made it back home because Sakura towed him there.

When he was recovered enough to be at least mildly verbal, Sakura curled up in his lap and demanded that he tell her stories about his dad. Their dad, because he had adopted her as little sister, not daughter.

When Sasuke got home, Sakura asked him if he would mind getting them one of Sakumo's wolf Summons, because they had news about the cause of his death.

Recounting the information Tsunade-sama had given him while stroking the graying fur of his father's main Summons helped make it feel more real. Helped him let go of his last grudges against a father who chose to die rather than stay by him.

When Aiko came home, he was almost back to normal again.

The next day, he told Sakura about the white-light chakra saber being his father's iconic weapon, and started teaching her how to convert her chakra toward lightning nature. Sakura asked him if she had any chance at becoming known as the pink fang of Konoha in honor to Sakumo. They concluded that it was a bit of a long shot.

And also, that she should get to be her own legend, not a repeat of someone else's. Kakashi was pretty confident letting her know that his dad would have agreed with him on that.

With the plan to make him look soft and indulgent in place, Kakashi had decided that he didn't need to be self-conscious about being a tiny bit touchy with Aiko in public and semi-public places.

Which is how he ended up more or less dissolved in a puddle over Aiko's lap in a training ground while the genins sparred among themselves and tried new techniques. They would come to him or Aiko if they got stuck.

And Kakashi was just sprawled over Aiko's lap while she pet his hair.

After a couple of minutes, Sakura showed up to play with his hair too. The kids had recently discovered that he pretty much had wolf fur for hair. It was stupidly dense (and took hours to dry whenever it got wet if he didn't help it along with a jutsu) and the under-coat was much softer than the longer hair that liked to go up in ridiculous spikes.

The kids found it funny that they could almost stick their entire hand in his hair and not make it move on the edges.

Frankly, he didn't really care, so long as they didn't pull on it while he was trying to relax.

About three minutes later, Sakura had managed to convince Hinata to also pat his hair. Which of course meant that Kiba came over to investigate what the fuss was about, and then Shino slunk in to see too.

Eh. Still fine. No reason to move. He was comfortable.

Then Sasuke decided to bring his pissing contest into the matter and tackled the Inuzuka straight onto Kakashi's back.

That particular interaction ended up with Kakashi comfortably reclining on a squishy mattress of squirming genins, because he was still much stronger than them and they had managed to make him move.

Aiko laughed at the spectacle, so he decided that he must still be doing good.

Sakura tried growling at him. He snapped his teeth right next to her ear to illustrate that he was in a stronger position.

Then Sasuke Summoned a Wolf to help him throw Kakashi off, and the collective of squished little genins tried an uprising against his oppression, and he decided that since he was being barred from relaxing, he might as well engage in the play-fighting with the pups.

After about ten seconds of him batting the genins about, they got into the program and banded together to try and beat him.

Since the point of play-fighting was practice, he kept himself at a lazy, comfortable high-chunin so they could win if they worked together effectively.

He was proud of the brat brigade for managing to bring him down in less than ten minutes.

Then of course, Sakura demanded sweets as a forfeit for beating him, and he ended up having to leave the training ground to take his little pack of genins into Konoha to actually buy the sweets.

The children ranged in front of him as they strolled down Konoha's streets, playfully squabbling about which type of sweets to swindle off Kakashi.

It was peaceful.

They could take the opportunity to swing by the rebuilding Hokage Tower and grab a mission after the kids had their fill. Maybe a close-by C-Rank?

"Sakura!"

Kakashi turned toward the shout, already primed to react with violence from the angry tone.

Sakura turned too, and immediately went to a quiet ready position, though not an overly aggressive one.

Kakashi stiffened and narrowed his eyes at the angry woman striding their way.

"Haruno Mebuki" Aiko told him. Not particularly loudly, nor particularly quietly.

Ah. Sakura's mother.

The one who didn't even notice that her child was starving.

Right.

She was pretty unremarkable, her dirty-blonde hair a far cry from Sakura's pink. And she was towing a grey-purple haired man in her wake as she strode closer.

"Haruno Kizashi" Aiko added.

Right.

Sakura's parents. Best not to be the one to start hostilities.

Seeing the woman's eyes, it wouldn't be that hard to achieve.

On a hunch, Kakashi grabbed Sakura and lifted her so she could sit on his shoulders. Having the high-ground was a valuable advantage in an argument, and Sakura was still shorter than her mother.

"Who are you?" Were the woman's first words, aimed at Kakashi.

See. Lifting Sakura was a good move.

He crossed his arms over his chest, taking advantage of the fact that having a genin on his shoulders forced him to straighten his spine out and that he towered over the woman.

"Hatake Kakashi." He pronounced slowly after a pause that he hoped to be long enough to let Mebuki know how unimpressed he was with her. "You had something to discuss with my heir?"

"With your?" The woman appeared to strangle herself over her own words for a moment. Kakashi felt a tug in his hair that told him Sakura was clutching at it. "I have something to say to my daughter!"

Kakashi gave her the most regal 'Clan Head' nod that he knew felt horribly condescending from having it used on him before. "We're listening."

Mebuki seethed at him, and her husband had to try and placate her.

Kakashi didn't move a single muscle and kept staring her down.

"Sakura! Don't you think it's time to stop with this stupid tantrum and come home!?" She finally said, having to crane her head up to look at Sakura.

"No." Kakashi answered for his pup.

"I wasn't talking to you!" Mebuki nearly yelled at him.

He raised a condescending eyebrow at her. then he shrugged, making the genin on his shoulder bob up and down. "Alright. What's your answer, then, Sakura?"

"No." She said firmly and clearly. "My career isn't a tantrum. My adoption isn't a tantrum. At least Kakashi-nii understands that and respects my choices."

"Listen, young woman!" Mebuki growled. "We have indulged your whims so far, but this rebellious phase has to end now. You need to start thinking about your future!"

Kakashi growled. A true wolf growl that his bloodline gave him access to. "You will speak to my Heir with the respect she is owed."

"I can talk to my daughter however I want!" The woman actually yelled at him.

Kakashi took a deep breath in, and then released it along with a wave of chakra. It wasn't killing intent. It was illegal to use formed intents on Konoha citizens.

It was just enough chakra to make the air start to feel heavy. And since Kakashi had lighting natured chakra naturally, it also felt a bit like a bolt of lightning was about to strike down, too.

"Hatake Sakura is my adoptive sister, and the Heir to the Hatake Clan. If you ever dare to talk to her like this again, you had better be ready to face my anger."

Sakura's father tried to make a joke to lighten the mood, but Kakashi didn't let him finish it. He simply pushed the couple sideways, out of his way, gently, as not to actually hurt them, and then walked past them. The woman tried to get their attention verbally again. Kakashi ignored her and kept on walking.

"I really don't like your parents." He quietly told Sakura as they moved away from the commotion they had caused.

"They... Aren't always like that?" Sakura answered just as quietly. "Mom just doesn't like being contradicted..."

Kakashi let out a short growl to let her know just how he felt about that type of parenting strategy. Sakura sighed and slumped over his head. "After this, I want extra dango."

Kakashi bought her the extra dango.

Notes:

I guess I could actually make a Danzo related genetical family fact for Sakura, but I don't think I want to.

For all that it would be easy to make her a snuck in Kurama+her dad test tube baby, I like that she doesn't have illustrious parentage and that she got to where she is by her own work... Or I guess her mom's mindset could be something Danzo encouraged through making the civilian school be misogynists'?

Heh.
Or we can let last chapter's cliffhanger be only about Sakumo.

Chapter 85: Aiko's genins

Summary:

Some things have to be learned, practiced... And even plotted...

Notes:

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Chapter Text

After Kakashi paid for the children's sweets, he disappeared in a shunshin.

Aiko didn't really know why, so she had a bit of trouble fielding the children's questions, but they accepted to wait until they had eaten their sweets before running him down.

Kakashi did come back pretty promptly, and slid a form in front of Sakura, who glanced it over cursorily before stopping in her chewing and turning her head fully to look at her sensei.

"It... It looks serious. Do I have to..." Sakura asked slowly.

Kakashi sighed and sat besides her. "So firstly, it's not that serious, and secondly, no, you don't have to. But You definitely should have it in case you want to."

Aiko shot a curious look at the form. She recognized the header. Oh, right. how had she not thought of it.

Sasuke leaned over to look at the form over Sakura's shoulder. After a couple of seconds, he almost shouted. "Wait a second! This is something that exists? Why didn't I know about that?"

Aiko decided that it was an useful life lesson to let Kakashi answer that himself, and strategically bit into a pastry just as he glanced at her.

"Tell me you wouldn't have abused it if you had access to it right out of the Academy?" Kakashi tried for an answer. Aiko shot his a thumbs up for, and made sure to take another bite. "I told Sakura is isn't that serious, but it still isn't made for frivolous use. Filling a fallacious harassment report is a serious offense."

By this point, Team 8 had also investigated the form and turned to Kakashi with their own questions. "So, when is it appropriate to use it? Obviously you deem today's events to qualify" Shino asked.

"Generally, it's for whenever a Konohan citizen abuses the fact that Konohan Shinobi aren't allowed to be violent to them in order to harass, harangue or otherwise insult them. It includes insistent unwanted sexual or romantic advances, threats of violence, actual violence and lack of respect. Generally, anything that makes you tell yourself 'I can't hit a civilian' is likely to be worth reporting." Kakashi explained.

"And then what happens?" Sakura asked.

Kakashi shrugged. "Most of the time it just gets filled. Unless the report was about something truly serious, it takes at least three reports before anything is actually done to the reported citizen. Most often five. But then the reported person gets to have a very scary and stressful appointment with T&I, where the reports are read to them and they are asked their versions, left to stew a bit and then allowed to go back home having hopefully learned not to aggravate shinobi on purpose. That is... So long as T&I doesn't find anything majorly disturbing about them while hosting them, or in their investigation."

Sakura considered the form again. Being told that there wouldn't be immediate ill effect obviously made her less weary.

"Three to five reports? Total, or by shinobi?" Hinata asked curiously.

"Total." Kakashi told her lightly. "That way we get opportunistic sex offenders much quicker. But if the five reports in question make it seem like the person was just misguided, they get a gentler stay, and an explanation of why needling shinobi is not a game, and can in fact end up deadly in the wrong circumstances, citizen of Konoha or no."

"But it needs the offender's name, doesn't it?" Sasuke pointed out.

"If you consider someone's behavior worth reporting, then it's worth stalking them long enough to find their name. You're a ninja, you can find a civilian's name." Kakashi told him boredly. "An address to go with the name is ideal, so it's easier to avoid screw-ups with homonyms."

Sasuke nodded thoughtfully.

"And what if they don't stop harassing ninjas after the visit in T&I?" Sakura asked.

"Most do." Kakashi told her with a grin. "But for the special cases, they get a second visit after only three more reports, then two, then one. Eventually they get a good look at the torture equipment, a firm reminder that Shinobi are actually dangerous and that they might have an accident with a startle-prone ninja if they keep on like this. But most of the time it doesn't get to this point. Or the investigation team finds something more serious than harassment to punish the offender for. People who antagonize shinobi that regularly tend to have some other, more serious offenses going on too."

Sakura nodded and looked back down at her form. "But this won't put them in trouble, right." She confirmed. "At least not right-away."

"No. They might have an investigator swing by to confirm your story, but nothing dire will happen from you filling one report out. But it means that if they keep acting like that every time they see you, they will see a consequence much sooner." Kakashi reassured her. "They are disrespecting you, and it deserves a punishment, even if that's just a light scare. Besides, these reports can only be filled within a month of the original incident. And right now you have six witnesses right at hand to co-sign, so it would be expedient to fill it out now."

Sakura grimaced down at the paper, so Aiko decided to pipe up. "We will all still be here later in the month if you want to wait and think about it. You do have a full month."

After a moment, Sakura shook he head and took out a pen. "No, Kakashi-nii is right. If it isn't something that will really hurt them a lot, there's no reason to wait until they have done it ten times to start reporting. This is already the second time. I shouldn't let them walk all over me."

Once Sakura had penned in her report, Kakashi added his own details before signing, and passed the sheet to Aiko to sign as a witness, and then all the genins added their own signatures.

After that, Kakashi gave it another look-over before folding the form and telling Sakura that she could get it filled at the same time as they went to get their mission.

When the time came to pick the mission and turn in the Harassment report, Sasuke split off for his own administrative matters. He answered to any questions about what the matter was with a mischievous 'Clan Matters' that obviously spelled mischief.

Since they were herding a veritable army of genins, they picked a C-Rank to help a farmer close to Konoha prepare his fields for spring sowing. Which was really only a C-Rank because it was outside of Konoha and how much land there was to till.

The Land of Fire by and large barely had seasons, but spring was still the best time to sow annual crops.

With five well-trained genins, the work took them until noon of the next day to be done, even it they had to talk Kiba out of using his jutsu for digging since it would end up a lot of deeper, less fertile soil to the good, nutrient-rich topsoil.

They gave Team 8 back to Kurenai when they made it back, and played hide and seek (Sakura and Aiko practiced their tracking evasion and scent camouflage while Kakashi and Sasuke tried to find them).

In the evening, Sasuke summoned a wolf and went to talk with his adopted Clan Matriarch.

Kakashi decided to do something about the Hatake Clan Head House. It was less drastic than Sasuke's approach, since they emptied it of any appliances and books, papers or clothing and removed the roof tiles before setting the house on fire.

After two decades of sitting empty, refurbishing it would have been a nightmare anyway. And even with the discovery of how his father was intentionally sabotaged, the house was not a place where Kakashi wanted to live.

Sakura went to look for saplings to plant where the house had been, so this area could at least become a nice forested place for hunting in the future.

Sasuke asked for more kenjutsu lessons, and Kakashi arranged for the man who had refereed the preliminary matches of the chunin Exams to tutor him.

Hayate looked much less ill, and didn't cough quite as much. Tsunade-sama's work over a few months, according to him. He was glad to have something to do, and knew enough of the Uchiha
kenjutsu to keep Sasuke happy.

Sakura kept practicing with her chakra stings, and added some new, custom weapons to her technique. It was a very simple set of bolas. Two small metal balls, about the same diameter as a finger, linked by a forearm's length of razor wire.

Since Sakura opted to sometimes coat the wire in various poisons, it was a truly terrifying adaptation, for all that it barely looked dangerous at all at first glance. It fit her perfectly, since she also barely looked dangerous to the unwary.

The next time they saw Naruto, Sasuke pulled him aside for some 'private matters'. Naruto's giggles at Sasuke's whispered words boded... Tellingly about the kind of things Sasuke was planning. In any case, Sasuke appeared to get Naruto's solemn approval for whatever he was planning.

Aiko and Kakashi firmly deemed it not their problem after having confirmed that those were still Clan Matters he'd been discussing. They were senseis, not legal guardians, Any trouble their genin got up to for Clan related reasons was officially not their fault.

It took Sasuke about five days and one more visit to his retired Madam Clan Matriarch before he decided to bring them unto his Plan.

Notes:

About the 'Civilian Harassment': anyone who has been to middle school and seen schoolyard bullies operate knows that laying down the law about no violence allowed is a surefire way to see assholes needle others verbally to be able to claim the other struck first. I'm expecting that Konoha set a rule about not hurting civilians pretty early on, and that some civilians tried to take advantage of it, either to be nasty to shinobi since they couldn't retaliate or to try and provoke shinobi they didn't like to violence so they could petition to have them punished for it.

It would be a bit futile, since I can see an angry shinobi just walking away and then sneakily sabotaging the annoying civilian's business in revenge, but even that would be counterproductive for Konoha as a whole. So I'm picturing Tobirama deciding that it needed fixing and creating the Harassment Of Shinobi By Civilians Report. Where if a civilian did something that honestly deserved getting hit, you go away, and then sneakily follow them home, find out their name and address, check out signs of domestic violence while you were at it because why not? and then you filled the report and turned it in.

Civilians with an habit to abuse the 'no hurting our civilians' rule would get a good scare, be reminded that Konoha is a Shinobi village that welcomes civilians and not the other way around, and either stop it because they're afraid, or enter a watchlist that will make them much more likely to get apprehended for any shady shit they might be engaging in.

Kakashi definitely didn't lie to Sakura, though. Filling a report against her parents has very little chance to actually make their lives harder. At most, they will get called in T&I for an "interrogation" about their behavior toward their Kunoichi daughter once there are three to five reports filled.

Chapter 86: Clan Matters = None Of Your Business

Summary:

Sasuke's Plan is unveiled!

Notes:

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Chapter Text

Sasuke's secret 'Clan Matter' was a plan for mass adoption.

Well. It did make some sense. His Clan was mostly avenged, and he had mostly ruled out repopulating via a hundred babies. Aiko had already suggested adoption as a viable alternative.

The secrecy and the 'all at once' was probably both to create as much chaos as possible with the process, and to avoid giving anyone the time to ask him to slow down. Not that Sasuke would have to obey any such demand, it was firmly Clan Matter, and Sasuke was Clan Head. He could adopt as much as he damn well pleased.

So, the all at once was probably just for the chaos and to make as many old stay-the-same-ers choke in offense and get very concerned.

In any case, Kakashi, along with Aiko and Sakura, found out about Sasuke's plan because he invited them to his last screening of the adoptee candidates and final signing of the adoption forms. It was Sasuke's new family he was building, and he wanted their input on it.

Naruto, who couldn't be present for the screening, got told in advance, and had given Sasuke his blanket blessings for his family expansion plans.

Sasuke's adopted Uchiha matriarch, Uchiha Ayaka (since her adoption) had done the first and second screening herself, for anyone who might like to be provided with a house in the Uchiha district, and who were willing to put some work in toward making the old compound feel less like a mass grave.

Ayaka had also done her best to remove anyone who was only interested in getting adopted into the Uchiha Clan out of greed.

The last pass was to personally meet them, ask them questions about their willingness to do yard work, house reparation work, or to raise children that might not be their own, and then have Sasuke's senseis and sister in arms tell him if they didn't like anyone.

Since Ayaka had invited over two hundred persons (mostly women, ranging from upper teenage to elderly, but with mid-aged ones being the most numerous), the screening process of meeting each one personally and trying to get to know them at least a tiny bit took from dawn until mid-afternoon.

Of course, Sasuke wasn't done with his bout of CHAOS because he then rounded up his new Clan members who had answered yes to possibly raising children, and headed straight for the Konoha Orphanage.

Once he got there, he asked the flabbergasted matron to get him the adoption forms for all of the children in their care.

He answered to the very sensible question of whether he would prefer to see the kids first with a very firm "no". He was taking all the children, and he didn't care if some weren't perfect adoption material, they would all have a place in his Clan and get to grow up happy and provided for.

It was the kind of declarations that Sasuke wouldn't be able to back up with only his pay as a genin. But since he had inherited all the collective wealth of his Clan after the Massacre (that hadn't been disappeared by corrupt officials in the aftermath), he absolutely could back it up.

He got out of the building four hours later with about sixty children.

When they made their way over to the Uchiha Compound to settle the newly adopted children and their prospective caretakers in, they also discovered that the Uchiha Matriarch had arranged for renovations in the Compound.

The place they arrived to, and where the mostly female population of new Uchiha was starting to buzz about, settling down into place, had very little in common with the ghost town within the village that was very slowly crumbling under it's own disrepair where they had first helped Sasuke round out his Clan's weapon caches.

It was... A lot more people than Kakashi would be okay with adopting in his Clan, even in several decades. But Sasuke wasn't Kakashi. And the Uchiha Clan wasn't the Hatake Clan. If Sasuke deemed the adoption of three hundred almost-strangers to be the best way to help him recover from the trauma of having his entire Clan killed off when he was seven; then Kakashi would trust him about it.

Honestly, it sounded logical.

Formally adopting Sakura had done a lot for Kakashi's mental health. There might be a multiplication factor at work too. Sasuke sure was about to find out.

The next Clan Council was one of the first one Kakashi was happy to be called in for.

The council had been pushed forth by a week, and Kakashi just knew that it was because of the Uchiha Mass Adoption.

Obviously Sasuke had a plan for whenever he got called to task about it, and Kakashi absolutely didn't want to miss it. Sakura was also going to come, as was her right as his heir, and actually, most of the Clan heirs from their peer group had volunteered to come with their parents to enjoy the show. (Hinata was notably missing, a side effect of her relationship with her father. Kiba also wasn't there, but that was because the Clan heir was Hana, not him.)

Sakura was earnestly promising to memorize everything so she could show it to Aiko in a genjutsu later when Tsunade-sama stalked over, looked at the Team 7 huddled together, then at the various clan heir loitering by the council room entrance by their parent's side, sighed, and told Aiko that she was coming along with her (as the Hokage, not as Senju Clan Head, even though she was both) and helping her corral the chaos gremlins.

Most of the young heirs around snickered at the declaration, knowing how likely Aiko was to actually rein anything in when her gremlins were on the side of righteous vengeance.

Tsunade glared at them but didn't rescind her invitation, so Aiko scurried after her and into the Council room.

The Clan council ended up being half Clan Council and half city council too, because Sasuke going out to adopt a third of the red light district and all of the orphanage's residents was apparently enough to make the city council think it was any of their business.

Sasuke and Uchiha Ayaka sat calmly ignoring any animosity with typical Clan arrogance, which Kakashi found hilarious considering the context.

The council ended being a lot of accusations carefully phrased as polite expression or worry for the balance and well-being of Konoha.

Ayaka had a blast dismantling every single argument and verbally eviscerating the ones who had made them.

One of Kakashi's personal favorite times was when she answered to "But you can see that a Clan growing by three hundred members could upset the balance of the Clans" and she answered. "So you think that it's better for the Uchiha to only have one living member, rather than hundreds... Much like Danzo did, right?"

No one suggested it was better to have the number of named Uchiha stay low after that...

"If none of your new members bear the Uchiha blood, then what about the Clan's famed Kenkai Genkai's risks of dying out?" The Kurama Clan head asked.

"That's firmly Clan Matter, and as such, none of your damn business." Ayaka answered immediately.

Someone dared to suggest that it was implied in the Konoha Founding charter that the Uchiha would provide the Village with their Doujutsu, and that making the majority of the Clan not bearing Uchiha blood was a failing to this promise.

Ayaka had a field day with this. "Well, seeing how our Clan was thanked for 'Providing Konoha with our Doujutsu', I really see no reason to consider ourselves still beholden by a promise that only ever was 'implied' to begin with."

"But how can Konoha justify supporting a Clan that has hundreds of members but only one shinobi and no certainty that it will even breed any other ones?" A soon to be ex-official (going by Tsunade-sama's face at his question) asked pedantically.

"First-off," Ayaka said, "Every single adopted member of the Clan was already a Konoha Citizen, and as such was Konoha already 'supporting' them. Secondly, it is not Konoha who will support these new members, but the Uchiha Clan, I find myself curious if you're only bringing up the difficulty to support so many people because you're afraid we'll find ourselves short in some money we should rightfully have, since the collective wealth of the Uchiha Clan should have been inherited in full by the new Clan Head. Could it be that some of it evaporated and you already know about it?"

The official squirmed and shut his mouth very fast.

Then, Sasuke tilted his head at Ayaka, whose face hardened, but Kakashi was unsure if it was in anger or in mirth.

"As for the last point," Sasuke took up, speaking for the first time in the Council. "About 'Breeding' more shinobi... For all that people aren't pigs, to be talked about like cattle." The official flushed violently and recoiled back at the glares he collected. "While this is still firmly Clan Matter, and still firmly none of your business, I was told that to ensure the best possible genetic diversity starting from one single holder of the desired characteristics, it's best to make sure to have as many different second parents as possible. Which is easier in this case, because I'm male. Since Konoha doesn't endorse polygamy, having a lot of women who aren't related to me already bearing the Uchiha name because of an adoption would make things a lot easier in the long run."

Murmurs of approval ran through the room even though Tsunade looked kind of pinched. And the council wound down fairly quickly after that.

There was one question about the role of the orphans in this, and Sasuke shrugged and said that Danzo's corruption had been pretty entrenched in the orphanage, and that he figured that removing all the children in it's care would allow Konoha much more freedom for tackling the problem.

Since it sounded a lot like Sasuke was in it for some form of personal vengeance, everyone was quite happy to take it at face value.

Tsunade had Sasuke, Ayaka, and the rest of Team 7 follow her to her office after the council's end was called.

"Was any of that true?" She asked tersely.

"All of that was true." Ayaka answered right away.

"I mean" Tsunade growled. "Did you really adopt over a hundred vulnerable women just because you wanted a stable of broodmares for your Kenkai Genkai?"

Oh, personal feelings, then.

Though Kakashi was also a bit curious. Only a bit, though. Because he was pretty sure he already knew the answer.

"No." Sasuke answered frankly. "I adopted three hundred men women and children because I wanted my Clan's Compound to feel alive and happy again rather than feeling like a ghost town or a mausoleum."

"And that part about genetic diversity?" Tsunade asked again, but much more calmly this time.

"Factually true." Ayaka piped up. "Lots of different mothers would make for better diversity and hundreds of women who already bear the name would make concerns around marriage lessen."

"Which is not saying that you actually intend to go through with the scenario you outlined." Sakura finished with a grin.

Sasuke snickered in answer. "Or course not. Sex is gross." He grinned. "If any of them volunteer to bear a child of mine through artificial means to help preserve the historic Uchiha bloodline for future generations, I'll be grateful, but it's not a requirement. And it won't happen for years yet, I'm thirteen!"

"Then why did you imply that it was your thought process?" Tsunade asked much more calmly.

"Because from now on, any child these women might have will be suspected to possibly be mine, and them not manifesting the sharingan could easily be blamed on them being half-blooded, rather than having no 'Uchiha blood' at all. And because one day, someone said that when faced with people you don't want to fight, you should make them think that you're the same as them and have the right kind of excuses lined up. They would have been annoying for at least one more hour without my explanation." Sasuke smiled.

Tsunade sat down and sighed. "And did these women know you were going to make them sound like you personal breeding stable today?"

"Yes" Ayaka answered. "I didn't tell them so in so many words before the adoption was signed, but there was an implication of it even then. And I informed the adopted women in childbearing age about our plans for today. They are pretty happy with the arrangement of being able to have 'fatherless' children and not have anyone cast aspersions at their virtue

Notes:

Ahaha!
This has been a daydream for this fic for a WHILE! I always thought I'd include it if I could make it work! ;3

Omake:
Fifteen years later:
There's a rumor that half of the Uchihas are actually Naras. Apparently, the women that the Clan Head adopted under the guise of being breeding stock decided to go above and beyond and make sure their kids would look the part (but not so far as to go and sleep with Hyuugas, because for all that their Clan Head would have stood between the Hyuugas and the children and argued that the white-eyed child was obviously Uchiha until he was blue in the face, it just wasn't worth it).
As a result, there are quite a lot of Uchiha-Nara marriage, from when a Uchiha child shows great aptitude for Nara arts.
The Nara see it as a great way to freshen their Clan's blood.

Chapter 87: Neji's observations

Summary:

Things are changing, in Konoha, and in the Hyuuga Clan. Little by little and then all at once.

Notes:

I was asked what about the Hyuugas. So here we get some Hyuuga time!

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

Neji had been away on a mission when Uchiha Sasuke pulled the Great Uchiha Mass Adoption.

But honestly, he would have had to be blind and deaf to miss the ripples it caused. The frown on the Hyuuga Elders, the confusion in the civilian, the anger in the more abusive parts of the Red Light district where they'd lost the most underpaid employees, The smile on Hinata's face.

Of course, the Uchiha Compound was where it was the most obvious.

At first, Neji had just swung by out of curiosity, to get a glimpse through the front door. But he saw something that kept him coming back. To just watch. Watch... The life, the joy.

He met Sasuke there more than once. Perched on a roof or in a tree, with a Wolf Summon laying nearby, serving as his guard for whenever his Sensei couldn't do so himself. Because he still needed to be wary of Orochimaru trying to steal him.

Sasuke didn't mind having Neji come and sit with him to observe the life in his Compound.

Actually, the younger Uchiha seemed to like having someone else around who shared the same awe for how vibrantly alive his new Clanspeople were.

While the Main House Hyuuga Elders wrinkled their noses at the common people staining a Noble lineage, Neji saw much more nobility in these ladies happily twirling to show off their Uchiwa-embroidered indigo coats than in the shy, washed out Hyuuga women who were so polite and 'well-mannered' but that Neji saw as sad more than anything.

The new Uchiha ladies were for the most part, strikingly beautiful. It was no wonder that they could have earned their living from their looks. Though Neji found them prettier with their faces bare of paints and makeup but adorned with a smile than the women that still worked in the red-light district. They certainly were upholding the Uchiha's historic reputation for being pretty.

Down on the street, a young woman of about eighteen ran through, a broom brandished high up in the air, yelling at a pair of older children that were now Uchiha rather than 'orphans'. The children were clutching a bundle to their chest of what Neji assumed was stolen sweets, since there wasn't much else the Uchiha children take the risk of stealing.

An elderly woman stepped right in the running children's path and stared them down as they stumbled over their feet and crashed to the floor rather than barrel straight into her. Neji and Sasuke observed with a smile as the 'grandma' berated the children for stealing while the young woman retrieved her stolen goods, but then gave each child a small piece of sweet with an exasperated face.

The two children apologized quickly to both women, and then scampered away, cheeks stuffed with their treat. Behind them, the two women looked at one another and shared a fond sigh before turning back to their lives.

At Neji's side, Sasuke looked just as entranced by the small scene of everyday life as he felt.

Maybe this was similar to what Shikamaru saw in the drifting clouds. Neji still thought happy people were more interesting, though.

Hinata's plan was a slow war on traditions. A methodical crumbling of the accepted mindset.

It would maybe feel discouraging to someone else, but for Neji, it was still more progress than he had ever expected. More work than he though anyone in the Main House would ever put forth for him.

He kept his hair short and tied up. He kept his forehead bare, exposing the shame of his Clan.

It became easier with each day.

At first, right after the Chunin exam, the eyes of the Konoha onlookers felt like brands on his skin, and he was so glad that the Village had so many other problems to think about. At home he felt the hatred wafting out of the Main House members, some of them even took him to task, trying to order him to cover his brand up. Only Hiashi-sama's protection kept him from being tortured with the Caged Bird Seal for refusing to keep it hidden like the dirty secret it was.

But several months later, there was now another Branch House Hyuuga, a Jounin, even (his rank was probably why he dared to be so bold), who went around with a bared forehead and shortened hair that showed his favor for Hinata as a Heir. A good few other Clanspersons watched the two of them with considering eyes.

After Danzo's crimes were brought to the light and the fact that he had used seals to keep his secret army docile and silent, more and more eyes turned accusingly to the Hyuuga Clan.

That was one of the reason, according to Ino, why no one in his Clan dared to speak up against Sasuke's big adoption in the Council that was dedicated to it. His Clan's elders were apparently among the very few who had grasped just how dangerous an ex-madam like Uchiha Ayaka could be, with her utter fearlessness of throwing rocks into the glasshouses.

If the Hyuugas had raised their voices about what was very clearly exclusively Uchiha Clan Business, Ayaka would have remarked that if they felt the right to police their decisions, she had something to raise up about the Caged Bird Seal.

Neji purchased a bunch of flower from Ino (with complimentary meanings) to deliver to the old lady. She was a true inspiration.

A thought that Hinata shared with him. Though she had to be even more covert about it.

It was a shock to Neji when it happened.

He hadn't...

He had thought...

He had forgotten that his gamble was based on playing with their own lives, protected as he was.

But not everyone was the Clan Head's nephew, who almost ended up in the running for Clan Heir thanks to the support of the Head's oldest daughter. Or a respected Jounin of Konoha, out of retaliation range.

Some of the Branch House Hyuugas who might decide to emulate his example were just Chunin who didn't have any powerful family within the Clan.

Some of them... Could be made an example of.

The scream was what alerted Neji that it was happening.

When he ran out to the front courtyard, there was already a circle of onlookers building.

The victim was a chunin of the Branch House.

Koushirou. He was... Eighteen.

Dressed in civilian clothes that said he just came back from outside of the compound, and his bared forehead showed the glowing seal that was causing him to writhe on the floor in pain.

The culprit of his pain was standing arrogantly, even surrounded by angry and distraught Branch House members, and talking calmly about the need to stop making their Clan look bad like he wasn't on the verge of killing a member of his own family.

Murmurs of anger ran through the gathered Branch House spectators as they stood forced to see one of theirs tortured but unable to intervene for fear of simply joining him down on the ground.

Neji was feeling his eyes burn with tears and his teeth grind under the strain he put on it. His nails, through short, were digging into his palms from how hard he was clenching his fists.

And then Hinata arrived.

It was...

Well.

Hinata arrived fist first.

There was nothing all that flashy about the execution.

She simply ran up to the Main Branch Elder from behind, cushioning her footsteps with chakra, and threw a healthy, solid punch right to the man's kidney. She didn't even use the Gentle fist.

Neji heard the gasp go through the ring of spectators.

But Hinata wasn't done. Immediately following her punch, she swept the Elder's feet from under him. Then he hand flashed up and grabbed the long plume of hair that followed the man's head, wrapped it around her fist, and brutally slammed his forehead down on the compacted dirt thanks to the handle she just made.

In the silence that followed her attack, Hinata lifted the Elder's head enough to strain his neck. "Don't you ever!" She seethed. "Harm my..."

Hinata's "Clan!" Was accompanied with the Elder's head striking the ground again.

She lifted his head up again before her name was called sternly from the direction of the Head House.

Hinata's face smoothed out from a fierce snarl into a cold, polite mask. She let go of the Elder's hair, making his face fall back down to the ground. Then she stood and turned toward her father with a polite smile.

"Hinata, what are you doing?" Hiashi-sama scolded.

"Protecting my Clan from being thought equals to the late Councilman Danzo." Hinata answered in her slow cadence that she adopted when she wanted to avoid stuttering at all costs. "Torturing our own family with the seal we brand on them as children when they dare to air out the barbarity of the practice will do nothing for our standing within Konoha."

Hiashi surveyed the scene. Koushirou was still laid out on the ground, panting in pain. The elder was gathering his elbows under himself, and even if he hadn't yet raised his head, the dirt was turning muddy from the blood running out of a small cut that must have come from a little rock.

"Did you need to be so undignified about it?" Hiashi finally asked, nose slightly wrinkled.

The fact that this was the only reproach he was making telling on which side he fell.

Hinata smiled even more sweetly. "It felt like the best way to get the entirety of my point across. Forgive me for reacting on impulse. I will pay more attention to staying graceful and dignified if I ever need to do something like this again."

Hiashi's lips twitched into a small smile, and Neji saw Hinata get half-frozen by it.

The Elder finally managed to get his hands under himself and straighten up, and started snarling at Hiashi that Hinata needed to be punished.

"Shut up before you embarrass yourself even more." Hiashi ordered coldly. Then he made a gesture for another of the Main House members to collect the Elder from the ground, and gestured to Hinata to follow him.

The gathered Branch Hyuugas followed the group with their eyes until they disappeared behind the Byakugan-proof wards of the Council room.

"Will Hinata-hime be alright?" A younger member asked Neji worriedly.

Neji blinked at being the new center of attention. "Yes. Yes, Hinata-sama is clever and very good at seeming harmless. Don't worry for her. How about you go get some ice for Koushirou instead?"

Neji ducked away while everyone turned toward Koushirou, and discreetly summoned one of his Foxes.

Atsumu solemnly accepted the mission to go ask Shikamaru to please wander by the Hyuuga compound 'by chance'.

"Hey, Is Neji in? I felt like challenging him to a game of Shoji today."

Neji burst out of the Hyuuga compound gate, grabbed Shikamaru by the wrist, said. "Great timing. We need some medical expertise." And dragged his fellow chunin to the room where Koushirou was laid out.

Hopefully, it would look spontaneous enough to shield him from backlash.

Most of their peer group weren't yet aware of Shikamaru's medic skills. But Hinata and Neji, by virtue of sharing a secret Summoning Contract, were much closer to Team 10 than most others (excluding Sakura, who was dating Ino. But then again, Neji doubted they spent much time talking about Shikamaru during their dates).

Shikamaru took one look at the laid out chunin and warned Neji that he wasn't cleared for full on healing yet. To which Neji begged him to at least check that his Clansman would be fine.

Shikamaru inclined his head and reached out with a green glowing hand. After a minute, he straightened out and pronounced his verdict. "We need to call Tsunade-shishou."

"We can't!" An older Clanswoman exclaimed. "Are you crazy? We'll get..."

"Don't tell me it's Clan Matters." Shikamaru growled. "This man is a shinobi of Konoha, hurt within Konoha. Tsunade-sama can save him. Whoever keeps her from doing so would be complicit of actions against Konoha's force of arms.

Apparently, that was enough to convince the people around to do what they already wanted to.

Shikamaru drew a Kunai and cut a small slice into the back of his forearm, before drawing his thumb in the blood and Summoning Suano-san to run the message to Tsunade-sama that there was a medical emergency in the Hyuuga Compound.

Tsunade-sama's arrival to their Compound's gates and refusal to wait until the Main House was called over to go and check on her patient was a thing of beauty.

Neji all but physically felt fate shift when the Main House people barged into Koushirou's room to ask Tsunade-sama what she was doing there.

"My apprentice informed me that one of my shinobi was in critical condition within your Compound. A Critical Condition, might I add, that was obviously caused by hostile action via the patient's seal."

"That's Clan Matters!" The Elder with a newly bandaged forehead exclaimed.

Tsunade gestured toward Shikamaru, who placed his hands next to hers, apparently holding something for her until she could come back.

"Be very careful what you say now. This shinobi is a chunin of Konoha. He would have died without immediate medical attention. Medical attention that your Clan wasn't providing him with. After being the one who put him on the edge of life and death. If you dare to ask me to leave him to die because it's Clan Matters... I will have to ask myself very uncomfortable questions about your Clan's commitment to Konoha."

Neji winced while hisses of indignation went through the room.

Hiashi turned to the Elder who had caused the problem by torturing Koushirou and then worsened it by yelling at Tsunade-sama. "Go. Go away, now."

The elder looked like he would protest, but decided against it in the end and slunk away.

"It is our negligence that we prioritized sorting out political and disciplinary consequences of the Caged Bird Seal use over ensuring that young Koushirou got adequate treatment. I will admit that since my daughter halted the seal's use with fairly brutal means, I had assumed the matter less critical than you are outlining. The Hyuuga Clan thanks you and your apprentice for intervening before it was too late to save Koushirou-kun." Hiashi said with a polite head-tilt.

Neji hid his slight smile at Hiashi pointing out that Hinata had stopped the punishment. It was a way to dissociate himself and, in general, the Clan from being responsible of Koushirou's state. It also meant that he couldn't apply a disciplinary measure to Hinata anymore. Not after all but endorsing her actions.

The next day, Neji noticed a lot more short hair around the Clan Compound.

Notes:

I guess I had to make things move, huh. I didn't start writing this chapter thinking something so drastic would happen.

Chapter 88: Abut the Kids

Summary:

Life goes on, children grow up, and Kakashi sometimes indulges in some pouting.

Chapter Text

A ninja village was always an interesting balance of horrible gossip and aggressive Intel compartmentalization.

An example was the latest thing with the Hyuugas. On Saturday, Tsunade had rushed to their Compound and came back out an hour later with a chunin that she rushed to the hospital.

The next day, the number of Branch Hyuugas with the short hair that meant they supported Hinata for the position of Clan head had multiplied wildly. It had increased even further as time went on. Then over two weeks, the number of Branch Hyuugas going bare-head went from Neji and one jounin to four persons, then ten, then sixteen, then thirty-one, then fifty...

It was quite obvious that something had happened over the week-end. But none of the Hyuuga were willing to say what. Tsunade didn't talk either.

And so, the Byakugan Clan was the hottest gossip subject.

Everyone had a theory, every single detail about them got circulated around the rumor mill, and every eyes stayed glued on the Noble Clan. After all something was happening, and no one wanted to miss out on it.

Kakashi didn't know more factual details than the general population. But he knew Hinata and Neji, and he had seen them on Monday, so he was fairly sure that they had something to do with it. But so long as they didn't directly ask for his help, he was fine to assume that they could take care of their Clan affairs without him.

On another note, Kiba had adopted all twelve of the kids of his group into his pack.

Poor Inuzuka thought he was being stealthy about it...

Just to be clear. No. Kiba was not being stealthy about his pack-bonding.

He was possessive, protective, and needy. And then he tried to cover all of these up with prickliness.

It was a fairly irritating mix.

Sasuke and Sakura seemed to be glad for the excuses to get in brawls all the time, and Lee often tried to frame it as a challenge as a means to join in. The more even-tempered genins generally disregarded the scuffles and engaged in their own things.

Kakashi occasionally got fed up with the rowdy Inuzuka and scuffed him before tucking him and his baby ninken under an arm and keeping them immobilized for a while to force them to cool down.

He knew that he had also been adopted by Kiba.

It was surprising how that didn't make him panic.

In the contrary, understanding that Kiba had pegged him as the main alpha (in his dog vocabulary that didn't quite match with Kakashi's wolf one, but didn't really clash with it either) of the little Pack had pushed him to start actually treating the kid like a pup under his care.

Tsume had seen him carrying Kiba and Akamaru by their scruff and growling at them for being idiots, and he had yet to live it down.

She snickered at him every time she saw him.

It had spread!

Random adult Inuzuka laughed when they saw him wrangle Kiba.

Fortunately, Tsume was quite chill about having another adult start trying to parent her mostly grown pup. It might simply be that Kakashi was male and she saw the paternal role as up for grabs. Or it might be that Inuzuka raised the children communally. Or even just that she considered Kiba weaned and didn't see it fit to police his role-models.

Unfortunately...

Once he had more or less accepted his place as Kiba's minder, he got sucked into the brat's excessive pack-seeking.

For Hatake, being Pack was about family. Once a child pack-bonded to an adult, the adult was in a parental position. If the child then picked another child as Pack... Well, it meant that the adult Hatake should parent this new Pack-member too.

And Kiba had decided to adopt all twelve members of their social group.

Twelve pups.

Kakashi might be getting better in the head, but twelve was still an excessive number!

Aiko found it hilarious.

She also thought that it was good for him.

Maybe she was going crazy.

Irritating little dog-brats aside, things were going suspiciously well.

Sakura's canine teeth had started lengthening up, and her baseline sense of smell had gotten better too, even when she wasn't using chakra to boost it.

It meant that her method to speed-run an imitation of the Hatake semi-Kenkai-Genkai was going well, and he was very proud of her for it. Even if Tsunade insisted on seeing the girl weekly to monitor her physical changes and ensure nothing dangerous was happening along with the apparition of common summoner marks.

Sasuke was progressing well, his chakra reserves deepened, his ninjutsu gained finesse, his use of his sharingan got better, and his Kenjutsu visibly improved every week.

Naruto, as far as Kakashi had heard, had been drilled in the meditation exercises necessary to smooth his chakra flow out in the long term, and the Slugs were considering letting him out of their realm for longer stretches of time so long as he kept to his regimen in the meantime. Something they could easily ensure simply by having him summon a small portion of his sensei-slug along with his usual Katsuyu shoulder-companion.

The slugs were considering giving him Sage training, after he learned to moderate his chakra flow on his own. But for the moment it was a far flung objective.

In any case, they might be getting Naruto back in a couple of months.

Tsunade had received the same assessment as Kakashi, and was starting to set up a background that would allow her to have Naruto re-appear by under a fake identity. The ROOT operatives would provide her a great smokescreen to have a previously undocumented young boy appear out of thin air.

Her latest conversation with Kakashi and Aiko had brought up the possibility of claiming that he was an operative that had been planted somewhere as a long term infiltrated surveillance and was just coming back to Konoha, explaining both his lack of previous existence and the fact that he wasn't emotionless like most ROOT operatives. If anyone asked what he had been on a long-term mission on, he could just answer 'classified'.

The kids were already making up their excuses as to why they would be especially welcoming to this newcomer. It mostly involved 'because fuck Danzo!' on Sasuke's part, and 'his life was so hard until now, I want to protect him' from Sakura.

Tenten was turning properly terrifying.

With the addition of Ninjutsu to her arsenal (she was water-natured, and while she didn't have enough chakra for big jutsus, she was good at subtle manipulations like making puddles appear underfoot during fights) and her growing mastery of fuuinjutsu under Aiko's tutelage (Tenten didn't learn Aiko's new sealing language the way that Naruto did, but she had grasped the concept of 'write it in a way that makes sense to you' and Aiko had also taught her what she had learned from less avant-garde parts of Minato-sensei's sealing library), on top of her blooming love for pole-arms, Kakashi was looking forward to giving a firmly chunin-level kunoichi back to Gai when he was done with back-to-back missions.

Neji was, similarly, blooming from having stopped limiting himself to the gentle-fist. Though Kakashi saw less of him than Tenten and Lee because Neji was a chunin and got missions accordingly. Either as squad-leader for his old genin team, or with other teams made up for specific missions. He was starting to make an hell of a name for himself, and Kakashi wouldn't be surprised if he made Jounin within the year.

Lee... Lee thankfully adored and revered Aiko, which made it much easier for her to instill caution into his foolish head. And also to teach him how to use more than just Taijutsu in his fights. His drive was praiseworthy, wanting to be recognized as a capable shinobi even without being able to mold chakra. But it didn't mean that he couldn't use weapons, traps, subterfuge, or the terrain in his advantage. Making a tree fall on your opponent from a previous hit and well placed wire while he was keeping both eyes on you because you were a speedy, hard-hitting bastard would make you win the fight.

Lee took to the terrain manipulation with enthusiasm.

Even better, Lee and Tenten discovered that their respective skills allowed them to use teamwork to make the terrain creatively treacherous, with Lee smashing stuff until it was appropriately structurally compromised, and Tenten then using her incredible accuracy to break it the rest of the way while their opponent was busy keeping both eyes on the speedy hard-hitter and the miss pincushion and spear.

Their usual training ground was starting to look very battered, and it was a good thing that Kakashi knew someone who could regrow trees with Mokuton.

Kakashi saw the other two teams less than Team Gai. Asuma was still in the village to teach his own team from time to times. Kurenai was less of a Bingo-book-star than Gai or Kakashi, so she could afford to take a lot of short missions rather than the further, longer ones and see her students twice a week despite how busy she was.

All the same, he did notice that Sakura's rapid growth in skills was spurring Ino to train harder and diversify her skill-set to more than Yamanaka techniques. Her poison handling was getting very good, and she had discovered a whip with which she immediately fell in love in the weapon shop Tenten worked part-time in. She was already getting past Kakashi's own proficiency level with it thanks to all her eager practice, and he had already advised Asuma to find her another teacher for it.

Chouji wasn't as motivated as Ino, but since Shikamaru was already chunin and Ino was getting better by leaps and bounds, he was aware that he was at a risk of either being left behind or becoming his genin team's dead-weight, and that was enough to make him try a little bit harder. Though in his case, he did it by asking his father to teach him his staff-wielding techniques, and as such, he didn't need much of Kakashi's help with it, except as a critical adversary he could get better against.

Hinata had finished her transition to mostly using taijutsu that used impacts over her Clan's gentle fist. It was a very beneficial arrangement for her, because people still were extremely wary of her using Jyuuken at first, since she still was a Hyuuga. Once her opponent understood that she wasn't bothering with it was when she was the most dangerous, though. Because not using it all the time didn't mean she couldn't use it at all, and a well locked forearm that was held up in a block was very easy to slap with a chakra plug.

Kiba and Akamaru were also getting good. Kiba wouldn't allow anything else, not when he had decided that Sasuke was a rival. They still leaned heavily toward Clan Techniques, but it wasn't like they had exhausted that source. And his Clan techniques truly were the best tailored for them.

Shino was looking to diversify his hive. Insects' life spans was such that it wasn't a very long process in itself, but balancing the changes he did in a way that didn't upset his hive was best done with caution, so it was slow-going anyway. In the meantime, he had decided that he had to come with a way of fighting that didn't entirely rely on his bugs. The fight with Gaara that had all but decimated his hive at the time had taught him that he needed a backup for situations where his insects were at a disadvantage. He had decided to lean toward fuuinjutsu as his best bet for this, and Aiko was very pleased with her new pupil. Even more so since it counted as a payment to Kurenai in exchange for the Genjutsu lessons she had gotten earlier.

Chapter 89: Aiko's scheme (end of Emotional growth arc)

Summary:

What could Tsunade and Aiko be planning behind closed doors?

Notes:

Thank you for all the nice comments on the last chapter, sorry for not answering them all, but I definitely read them! And sorry for the long wait between chapters... Sakurama is coming to a climax, and felt more fun to write...

But I'm currently re-reading Unextraordinary from the start to avoid plot holes, so I will come back stronger soon!

Chapter Text

Aiko had become mostly used to being called to Tsunade-sama's office as a consultant.

Truthfully, it still scared her, each time she was faced with the reality of being counted as an advisor, no matter how informally.

But in this case, it was very useful.

They needed to make an identity for Naruto to come back with.

Since she was close enough to the boy to know his personality, and she also had a specialty in infiltration, having her involved in the process and the room sealed into secrecy because of her reputation was an excellent way to keep Naruto's return as secret as possible.

Since Tsunade shared the same summons as Naruto, having him summoned into the room without a witness was easy.

And once Naruto was there, it was easy to use the 'infiltration scrolls' that Sakura and Sasuke had prepared 'for themselves' with her to sort out Naruto's disguise. Having her genins learn her specialty was an excellent cover to purchase everything Naruto might need to conceal his identity.

Of course, disguising Naruto up was also a lot of fun for Aiko and Tsunade. Naruto also took the entire thing in stride and had great fun brainstorming with them.

This was how Aiko discovered that Naruto had made a dedicated Jutsu to pass himself as a girl.

The boy looked kind of ashamed to tell her, and she saw why once he actually demonstrated his "sexy Jutsu" but at the same time, Aiko was a Seduction Specialist. If someone could be distracted or thrown off-balance by seeing a woman's body, it was their problem, and Aiko's dances achieved about the same thing as Naruto's Jutsu. Only slightly less directly.

Tsunade looked a bit put off, but agreed with Aiko. Only adding that Naruto's henge was of a really young woman, since it retained his youthful face, and that he really shouldn't trust the kind of person who were taken in by it. It was fine in his age range, but grown men who got their head turned around by such baby-faced girls, no matter how big-chested, were untrustworthy perverts.

Aiko agreed on that point. It made Naruto go a bit shifty-eyed, so she changed the subject rather than press him on which grown man it had worked on.

They added 'pretend to be a girl' to the possible covers and proceeded on.

The main parts they needed to hide were Naruto's distinctive whisker-like cheek markings, his bright-yellow hair, and possibly his eyes, though these came last. His language tick would also need to be addressed, but that would fall on the Slugs to train him out of, since they wouldn't get long enough to truly impact that while maintaining secrecy.

Naruto's whisker marks couldn't simply be covered with makeup, at least not in the long run, it would be much too easy for it to rub off. And for some reason, his henges just refused to hold over them for more than a few minutes at a time. Slapping Clan markings of some sort over them would clash with the background of a long-term infiltrator. But a disfiguring scar might explain his return.

If the agent Naruto pretended to be had been caught in the face with a trap while sneaking somewhere he shouldn't, then returning to Konoha to receive a new assignment that didn't rely on having a forgettable face was a logical reaction.

Facial burns were hard to paint on, but a well-made prosthetic could be made once and then re-applied as many times as needed. if they faked a scar on the lower face with the eyes intact (from being shielded with the forearms and hands), then they would have a good excuse for Naruto to go around masked all the time after showing his scars a few times.

For Naruto's hair, there were two ways to look at it. Going lighter would make the root effect less noticeable whenever it happened, but would also be higher maintenance overall. Plus, platinum blonde was a rare color in the land of fire, and would make him stand out.

Brown was the easiest to attain, and depending on the ingredients used, might not even leave a scent mark. Plus, it would mean root effect could be concealed in a pinch by simply rubbing soil into his scalp for long enough to be able to re-do his color. Naruto would need to be on top of his hair-care schedule to avoid having his lighter roots show, but it would have the advantage of being very plain and unremarkable.

Tsunade played with the idea of claiming Naruto's new identity as a Senju that Danzo bloodline thieved since they tended to have brown hair, and it would make Naruto happy, but it was a tad too conspicuous.

Naruto was happy enough to have Tsunade consider it at all.

For the eyes, they would be relying on colored lenses at first, but Naruto suggested adding goggles with colored lenses later on. It made sense in a character-building perspective. A boy who had just gotten disfigured by fire while shielding his eyes might end up with lingering trauma and take an habit to excessively protect his face as a coping habit. Especially after being deprogrammed from the ROOT mindset.

With Naruto not having cut his hair in a good long while, he had enough length for a samurai topknot which would help camouflage his distinctive spikes.

And if they were going for a traditional updo, then a matching traditional garb would work well. Traditional kimonos were something of an infiltrator staple. Especially coupled with brown eyes and hair. So long as it wasn't excessively luxurious, it blended in well everywhere within Fire Country. It also came across as humble and personable. Plus, it went directly against the style of dress that Naruto had worn before leaving.

And making his appearance back in Konoha with a veiled rice-straw hat would allow him to both somewhat hide the facial scar, and show it off enough that no one would question him wearing a mask later on.

Naruto was all for copying Kakashi's masked-up looks.

It was really cute.

Though he definitely would have to make do with a face veil over the nose at first.

Once they had settled on a general look, and the underlying background, they buckled down to create the specifics of his new identity.

While they would have liked to create a meaningful new name, Danzo had the habit of giving his operatives very short, unimaginative names. And the operatives themselves generally refused to part with those plain names. Even the unnamed ones that had been asked to try and pick a name for themselves tended to go for something that only had one syllable, and that came with a very obvious meaning. (There was a boy who was good at drawing who had called himself Sai.)

As a result, they opted for naming Naruto's cover identity Ruu, as in stream, for someone who's nature was adaptable and would flow into each situation, adjusting to it. It also had the advantage of having something in common with his true name without being conspicuous about it. Naruto should be able to respond to this name well with minimal adaptation time.

Besides, as Tsunade pointed out, Naruto, his name, which meant Maelstrom and not fishcake, followed the Uzumaki tradition of having something to do with forces of nature. At least Ruu could be taken to mean stream or current, which kept some of the original meaning.

Not having a family name would be more in line with being from ROOT, though as an infiltrator, he would have been used to using one anyway. They advised him to not use a last name initially, but give an obviously fake one like Tanaka, if pressed about it.

The hardest part for Naruto would be to train into making a dead-eyed look and saying "It's classified" in a very monotone voice every time someone asked him about details on what he did before coming back to Konoha.

Aiko took a cast of Naruto's lower face to start working in crafting his scar prosthetic, and they used the time where Naruto couldn't speak because the cast was drying on his face to hash out how Tsunade could fold him in in a way that would allow him to re-join Team 7 at some point.

Tsunade made the very pertinent remark that Sasuke and Sakura wouldn't be staying genins for long, as they were already chunin level, and so having Ruu join them under the guise of a chunin would work better.

Even in ROOT, infiltrators weren't the best at combat. If only because that level of proficiency demanded constant upkeep and that an infiltrator didn't typically have entire days free and a training ground to train in.

The best card for 'Ruu' to have was trap specialist. It was something that Naruto excelled at but that wasn't his most distinctive skill as far as Konoha ninja knew.

He would need to build more up, as coherent with an infiltrator who could no longer stay in their specialty and was being reintegrated to the main forces, but that was something they could discuss with Kakashi later. The new skills would have to be different from Naruto's baseline, but they would surly rustle something up.

As for the Slug-Sensei that Naruto had promised to keep with him once out of the Summoning Realm, Tsunade could easily say that it was a therapist and watchman that she had summoned to keep an eye on 'Ruu'. A new method she was testing out to help integrate the ROOT operatives back into the village life with limited risks to themselves and Konoha's secrets.

They bid Naruto farewell after a few hours, after giving him the clothes his character would be wearing and teaching him how to do his traditional hairstyle on his own.

It was best that he get comfortable in them ahead of time, so he could look natural.

Aiko also gave Naruto an hair mask with walnut husks mixed in so Naruto could learn how to apply his color touch-up without staining his entire face, neck and hands at the same time.

These things were kind of tricky, and Naruto learned better when he had the chances to fail a few times in the process.

Chapter 90: Misdirections (Suna arc)

Summary:

They had promised Juugo to take him to Suna if he wanted.

Chapter Text

"Do you have any questions about your mission?" Tsunade-sama asked seriously.

"No, Hokage-sama." Kakashi answered by rote while catching his new mission scroll.

He would have preferred to get a little more time before taking Sasuke out of Konoha's protective walls, but as Tsunade-sama had pointed out, they had promised to let Juugo go to Suna if he wanted to, and they had already delayed the actual trip by several month because of Danzo's execution and the chaos it caused.

It wasn't a definitive relocation. Juugo had taken a shine to the Aburame, who had effectively kept him from harming anyone for his minor episodes. He still wanted to go and see Suna for himself, to check if the relative lack of natural chakra in the middle of the desert could help him. Suna didn't mind his lack of definitive answer about moving in, since it meant they had more time to make the decision.

Suna's opinion on accepting Juugo was understandably uncertain. On one hand, their Biju, was the Ichibi, the weakest of them all, when three of the other main ninja villages (nominally) had two stronger Biju each, and Konoha had the all time strongest Biju. And Juugo, while not a Jinchuuriki, had an absurdly powerful bloodline.

This mission was also an opportunity to let Team 7 stretch their wings a little while staying relatively safe.

He was taking Gai's team along, and would have Juugo to provide help if Orochimaru aimed for Sasuke again, then they were coming back with Gai and Shikaku who were in Suna for diplomatic purposes.

Some might wonder at the wisdom of sending Gai for diplomacy, but he was likeable when he tried. And also, he was terrifying, which had it's use when you were talking to a Village that had tried to invade yours not too long ago and that you were letting off scott-free.

Shikaku was no less terrifying, if in a different way. And he was using that diplomatic mission as a way to give his chosen successor and partner to the post of Jounin Commander a test-run at home. Gai had been overjoyed to get some bonding time with his beloved Sensei's close friend, so hopefully, Shikaku was still in one piece.

In the end, Gaara wasn't able to come and pick Juugo up himself, he had been deemed one of the best Kazekage candidate, and as such, he was mired into politics at home. Hence the two teams for escort.

It was as safe as they could make Sasuke on an away mission.

And frankly, Sakura and Sasuke had started to chafe under their restriction from harder, farther missions. And even Kakashi had to admit that their progress was starting to suffer from the lack of appropriate challenge.

The trip to Suna would do them good.

Plus, their roughly month-long mission would give Tsunade plenty of time to make Naruto's cover identity (Ruu) appear in the village in a context that had absolutely no links with Team 7 and keep him from being subconsciously linked up with Naruto by anyone.

At least with Kakashi and Sasuke in the escort team, they didn't have to be nervous about Juugo going berserk. They had the necessary sharingans to knock him out of a rage if necessary.

The pups were nervous to be out of Konoha's protective walls, but also excited at the prospect of going on a real mission again. Even if they wished they had Naruto by their side for it.

All of the genins were gratifyingly vigilant, aware that they were a tempting target, mainly to Orochimaru, who was from Konoha, and as such, had a very good grasp on how Konoha worked and on the layout of the Land of Fire. Even Kakashi and Juugo weren't a foolproof protection.

Their main advantage was the secrecy of their mission.

They had left under the cover of night through a section of the wall that ANBU had cleared of witnesses for them for five minutes. Suna knew to expect them within a couple of months, but they didn't have the exact arrival date, nor did they know their route.

Once they reached the Land of Wind, they would make themselves known, and then Suna would send an escort out to them while they waited in the nearest Konoha border station.

Tsunade had kept their mission under tight wraps, too. At least Danzo's recent death meant that there was no traitor to sell them out.

Or.

Well, there always were traitors. But at least it wouldn't be an incredibly influential and well informed traitor, if it happened at all.

Juugo said that he missed Aburames, but the Land of Wind was not a good environment for the insect users. Which he understood well enough.

Kikaichu were not made for the desert. Of course, if needed, the Aburame Clan could breed new, more heat and wind-resistant strains. But they hadn't seen the need to do so so far, and to start now might be taken as a sign of hostility. Besides, the Aburame Clan members themselves were much better suited for the Land of Fire's temperate climates. And at need, they were better at coping with a colder temperature than a warmer one, as they tended toward the traditional fire nature of Clans from Hi no Kuni.

The atmosphere was kind of tense between the genins and Juugo at first, especially since Naruto wasn't there to liven the mood.

But Sakura was quite friendly and Lee was both forgiving and enthusiastic about meeting strong people.

Juugo didn't seem to appreciate the enthusiasm all that much, but that helped him create a bond with Tenten, Neji and Sasuke, who felt similarly about Lee's overwhelming personality.

With that said, Lee had gotten a lot tamer thanks to Aiko's influence. She didn't keep him from being himself, but she encouraged him to avoid doing it too much at people who weren't receptive to his Youth. Since he toned it down a bit, he'd had a lot more luck with his various challenges. Sasuke, Neji and Kiba didn't mind indulging him so long as Lee was mindful of his own health and respected their boundaries.

So while Lee sulked a little that Juugo wasn't willing to engage in 'Youth', he did allow him his space. Aiko spoke with him to help him sort out his feelings, and he was back to himself in a few hours and very earnestly apologized to Juugo for being too much.

Juugo seemed a bit startled by it, but he did accept it well enough so that there weren't any problems going forward.

Kakashi was still certain that Aiko was some kind of magician. No matter what she said about it. Even ANBU didn't instill this kind of team-wide peace. Not without some blood and pain.

They made their snail pace across the Land of Fire. Between Kakashi and Aiko they had the skill to ensure that their track were, if not invisible, at least not distinguishable from any other team of Konoha chunins heading for the Land of Rivers.

As far as the Konoha administration knew, they were halfway through the Land of Waterfall to go escort a movie star toward the Land of Snow. Kakashi was sure That Teams 8 and 10 would do great at it. It was a bit overkill, but Tsunade seemed to think that the Rookies were trouble magnets. Not that Kurenai and Asuma would complain for the picturesque date mission. Especially since it gave Asuma a break from his Councilman duties.

Kakashi kind of wondered about the lack of Medic in the team, especially seeing the frostbite-prone location. Their dear Hokage had gotten a tiny bit protective of her ninjas. As evidenced by how all the former ROOT agents with the necessary control were being taught in the Hospital as part of their deprogramming program.

Or by the fact that every one in their escort team had a shoulder Katsuyu that she had officially given to them. Of course it was from Naruto, but they had decided to let the mystery of Katsuyu's presence at the Chunin Exam be. The less the Akatsuki knew for sure about Naruto, the safer he would be. And the safer Yuuto would be while pretending to be a bottom-less chakra well of a Jinchuuriki while being a civilian-born who only held a Summoning Contract for sparrows. It was enough for emergency Reverse-Summoning to get out of trouble, but nothing close to the battle prowesses a house-sized Slug Summons with acid spit.

Once they reached the frontier-post, Aiko went alone to the closest Suna outpost, on the other side of the Land of Rivers to ask for the agreed-upon escort.

Aiko was to wait for the escort in the Suna outpost, and then take them back across the Land of Rivers to fetch Kakashi and his four genins plus one chunin. (Neji didn't truly object to being lumped with the genins, but he was a chunin. With the skills to match.)

Their Suna Escort turned out to be Kankuro, Temari, and their Jounin-sensei, Baki.

They assured them that Gaara would be waiting for them at the edge of the desert when they had crossed the Land of Rivers. It was as much time as he could free up.

Chapter 91: Gaara's burden

Summary:

Gaara has never had friends before. It partly explains why things go wrong on the way home.

Chapter Text

Gaara was looking forward to joining up Konoha team.

He hadn't looked forward to seeing people in... A decade. Probably.

He knew that Naruto wouldn't be there, but their female sensei, Aiko would be there.

Aiko was... weird. She was weak. Much weaker than she tried to make herself appear when she faced him down in the Konoha hospital. Which should have made Gaara dismiss her, and definitely made Shukaku want her dead. But at the same time, Shikaku liked her since she took Gaara aside to tell him that the Biju had it's reasons. But since Shukaku was also a prickly asshole, he wanted to kill her more for it since 'he needed no pity from puny humans'.

Either way, Gaara might not like her yet, but he was curious. Who looked at a monster and felt compassion?

He had never felt any dishonesty from her. Which was surprising, seeing what she had been speaking about when he saw her.

He just wanted to see her again and confirm what he thought he had seen. Doubt was starting to creep in, especially with Shukaku trying to convince him that she must secretely hate him and just talk a good game.

He was also looking forward to seeing Juugo again. Plus, Aiko-san had registered her team at the border post as containing Lee, the Taijutsu master he had fought in the preliminaries and who had easily forgiven him his murder attempt in the hospital, and Neji, the boy he had fought in the Chunin Exams finals and who had managed to wound Gaara. That one hadn't forgiven him quite as fast, but that only made it feel more real. And also the Uchiha and the pink girl, whose legs he had chopped off but who walked on them again.

Kankuro, for one, was very excited to see the pink Kunoichi again. She had beaten him using chakra strings, and her was personally offended and professionally curious about her techniques.

The Uchiha had beaten Temari, which his sister also took a bit personally, but then again, she also acknowledged that wind was simply a bad match for fire. Temari had still decided to add a war-hammer to her arsenal for those instances were her wind wouldn't cut it and flinging around her huge fan was simply an unnecessary waste of stamina. She got good enough with them that Kankuro no longer accepted to spar her when she used the hammer. He had, in his words, better things to do than continuously repair his puppets because his sister smashed them without any respect for the artistry of his craft.

Gaara thanked the messenger and stood.

They had gotten word from the border-post. The Konoha team had made it. It was time for him to go and join them.

How would they react to seeing him?

His arrival to the border post to escort the Konoha Team and their prospective new citizen was heralded by much flinching an cowering. It was understandable, as he had been killing indiscriminately not that long ago.

In the guarded suspicion that preceded him, The Konohan's polite respect was truly refreshing. Even his siblings were still wary of him, conscious of how blood crazy he had been not a full year before.

But the team from Konoha didn't fear him. Not really. Juugo even smiled at him when he saw him. That was very new.

He did manage to confirm Aiko-san's disposition, too. She nodded at him and gave him a small smile before asking how he had been doing since he left Konoha.

The whole team, two teams treated him in a friendly way, and attempted to catch up.

It made muffling Shukaku's shrieks much easier.

Of course things had to go sideways.

They were making good time toward Sunagakure, running at a relaxed shinobi lope.

He felt it on the sensory sand he automatically spread around himself.

Weight. Enough to be a human, but spread out over a large surface to avoid sinking in. Shinobi. Suna shinobi, even. Or at least shinobi who trained in deserts enough to master sand walking. Hatake Sakura might have gotten the grasp of the technique nigh-on instantly, but most people took way longer to perfect it.

It could have been another Suna team. Or even one of the nomad tribes who used chakra this way almost instinctively.

Except...

Their pattern was off.

These shinobi were tailing them. Spying on them, but keeping their distance. It wasn't dissimilar to the ANBU Father periodically sent to assassinate Gaara.

Hatake Kakashi raised a hand to signal the need to slow down. "I smell blood." He growled. "Human blood, even. Straight ahead."

The Ichibi started laughing.

Hyuuga Neji activated his doujutsu while Hatake Sakura started sniffing at the air and the three other Konoha genins assumed wary stances

They didn't have the time to hear out what the Hyuuga had to say.

The sand ahead of them surged up and toward them.

A sand-perfected Doton.

Gaara reacted.

There was something very mentally taxing in holding the Konoha Team and his own in a bubble of his own sand.

He had done it to protect them. It was to protect them.

But Shukaku laughed and shrieked about crushing. His chakra tried to rebel and force the bubble to contract.

"Gaara." He heard faintly over the Ichibi's yells.

He took a shallow breath in.

"Gaara. Let Kakashi and Neji get out. They'll deal with the attackers. Gaara. Gaara?"

Woman. This was... Aiko-san?

Gaara took another breath and located where over his bubble the sand Doton was the weakest. Then he pulled the shield away from there.

The air whooshed with movement.

Having a hole in his sand cocoon helped. It helped a lot.

He pushed Shukaku's ravings aside and wrenched the whole bubble up and away from the Doton Jutsu covering his sand.

An explosion rang.

Steel on steel.

A cry.

"Careful!"

Another explosion.

More clangs.

"Let me get out too!"

"No, Sasuke, it could be Orochimaru."

"Then let me go! I'm fast enough to avoid Sand traps."

The creaks of Kankuro unwrapping his puppet.

Temari's snarl.

"ALL CLEAR! YOU CAN COME DOWN!"

Gaara gratefully let the top of the bubble fall away at Hatake's call, leaving them all standing on a floating sand platform.

The haze of Ichibi's bloodlust blew away in the fresh wind streaming past.

Gaara surveyed the ground bellow and took stock of what his sensory sand told him.

Six shinobi were laying on the sand. Four of them dead. The last two seemingly taken down by Neji's Hyuuga technique, still alive. No other suspicious presence.

He carefully lowered the platform back down.

What?

Baki-sensei strode away and ripped the cloth mask off one of the corpses. "That's a Suna shinobi." Their sensei intoned gravely before stalking to the next body.

"Traitors?" Sasuke asked.

"I see no other explanation." Temari growled back, stalking toward the living captive. "Kankuro, I'll need one of your nasty poisons." She added while ripping the veil off the prisoner. "Looks like an interrogation is needed."

Hatake Kakashi and Sakura crouched down and started sniffing at handful of sand while Tenten and Lee started rounding the bodies up together and Aiko-san pulled out ink and paper and started drawing seals.

In the meantime, Baki-sensei brought the other live shinobi next to the one Temari was threatening.

"We did it for the good of Sunagakure!" One of the two spat as soon as Neji undid whatever jutsu was holding him still. "How can we accept such a monster for Kazekage?"

"So you decided to kill a Konohan negotiating party and frame Gaara for it so Konoha would pressure Suna to pick someone else?" Kakashi-san hummed. "That's why you drenched this patch of sand with blood? To better frame Gaara?"

"He's been killing our citizens since he was a child! The Yondaime never considered him stable, he wouldn't want him as Kazekage!"

Kankuro stabbed a poisoned needle into the prisoner.

"Maa. We need him alive to report this incident to your council." Kakashi-san drawled.

"Don't worry." Kankuro hissed. "It's a sedative. I heard enough."

"Well. Aiko is done sealing the bodies." Kakashi huffed. "Can you carry those two with your sand, Gaara-san? It looks like we need to get to Suna sooner rather than later. We don't know if they had accomplices."

Gaara nodded and gathered the two living shinobi on a cloud of sand.

Reporting the incident would have gone over smoother if Elder Chiyo, their interim Kazekage hadn't attacked Kakashi-san on sight.

Thankfully, the Konoha Jounin brushed it off easily.

Sakura-san, though didn't seem to forgive the old woman that easily.

Chapter 92: Kageship Classes

Summary:

Kakashi hadn't intended in getting mired in intrigue. The intrigue just... Found him. But it was at least entertaining.

Notes:

This chapter was churning in my head and keeping me from sleep! So, after two hours of typing here you get a fast chapter.
Figuring out a goal and conflict for this arc really helped in the writing process, just saying.

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

Sakura was utterly adorable.

It was a fact. Kakashi's little Heir was trying to get revenge on an actual Kage in the name of his father's honor. So precious. His adorable little pup thought she was a great predator already.

Though, thanks to Aiko's influence, she stopped at poisonous glares and pointed remarks when addressed. That was good. Very good for Kakashi's poor old heart. He didn't need his little genin to try and throw down with a crafty old puppeteer. Not yet and preferably not ever.

But she made a good show of being annoyed and haughty, proudly declaring herself his Heir, and the Heir of the Hatake Clan.

So cute.

The children of the late Kazekage stuck around them well after they got dismissed and led to their quarters. If Kakashi had been alone, he would have made an excuse and ditched them, but as he was totting a pack of children and Aiko, that's not what happened.

Instead, the three Sand Genins got invited in and served tea and mochis. There were some downsides to having a well adjusted member in his team..

But, well, he wasn't really complaining.

Because the conversation ended up being really entertaining.

Kankuro raved about the idiocy of the ambush against them, and Gaara huffed that he didn't even want to be Kazekage and Temari was a better choice since she was the oldest, and all of a sudden, Kakashi was part of a plot to make Temari Kazekage candidate.

How exciting!

Such good training, too! If he could help the Sabaku genin to supplant her little brother as a Kazekage candidate, he'd have valuable Intel on how to foist the ugly hat to some poor schmuck. Perfect.

The conversation started on ways to power Temari up.

Neji suggested working on her secondary natural affinity. (Earth, excellent for Suna's situation!)

Tenten suggested Fuuinjutsu, which Aiko agreed would be excellent considering that Suna was kind of behind on that art, but they would need Tsunade's approval to share that kind of knowledge. (Katsuyu informed them that she would relay the request at the earliest possibility, was Katsuyu in on the plot too?)

Sasuke recommended switching her wind-jutsu medium to hand-fan type tessen, and work up her proficiency on them, while keeping her oversized battle-fan for more climatic moments. Have her be terrifying with a pair of small fans, but with the knowledge that she also had a big fuck-off battle fan, let the speculation run wild as to how terrifying she was when she deemed the situation to warrant getting out her trump card, much like how the Sandaime Hokage had his Enma adamantine battle staff, but almost never used it.

Lee thought she should blind everyone with the power of her Youth, which wasn't that helpful.

Sakura suggested investing in flashy but easy and low-consumption chakra tricks. Kind of like how Tsunade-sama looked no older than twenty-five. Something like a chakra trick to always look pristine and fresh out of a shower even in the midst of battle. Invest in psychological warfare.

Aiko pointed out how useful it would be to have her brothers' explicit support. Not necessarily obedience, but at least their affection and loyalty. Like having Gaara share his levitating cloud of sand trick with her to take her places in style, showing that he was willing to do stuff for her.

Gaara nodded his understanding at that. Temari was frantically writing down every suggestion on the notebook Aiko lent her at the start of their brainstorming session, nodding along with the different suggestions.

And then the subject moved on to political shows of force. Namely, getting the Wind Daimyo back on Suna's side. It would ease Suna's situation greatly, and show that she had the skills to be the Village's leader.

That talk was very enlightening.

"What you need is something for the Daimyo to proudly brag about." Aiko mused. "And I don't mean strength of arms. The Wind Daimyo has very little worth attacking him over. And he knows it. Having elite Shinobi to protect his land isn't what he needs. What he needs is an exclusive luxury that only he has easy access to, that he can show off to other Nobles and dignitaries, or even other Daimyos, and have them turn green with envy."

Temari frowned but wrote it down.

"What kind of luxury, though, we aren't that rich in them." Kankuro sighed.

"Something only you can make." Aiko answered. "And in that, you are in fact quite rich. The Land of Wind is unique. Where anything easily found in the Land of Fire can just as easily be sourced from the Land of Waterfalls, Rivers, Rice or Hot Springs, only the Land of Wind has a desert. And Suna is much deeper in the desert than your coastal Capital city. What you need is a resource that can only be found here, and not elsewhere. Something hard to copy or reproduce. Like a local species. Just look at the Noble Shinobi Clans of Fire. They all got the Noble title because at some point, they made something stupidly luxurious that our Daimyo wanted bragging rights on."

"Oh?" Neji asked curiously. "What?"

"Well." Aiko hummed. "The Uchiha and Hyuuga are a bit different, since you came from a very ancient and pure line, which Nobles are pedant about. But the Akimichi had the best cuisine, on top of being very physically powerful and great at escorts. The Aburame obviously have their silk." She spread her arms out to show off her Aburame Silk jacket. She'd had it laundered and mended with some silk thread from longer hems, and the hole where Kabuto's Kunai had stabbed her wasn't visible at all anymore.

"Aburame Silk obviously is very precious for shinobi, as it is very durable, acts like armor without restricting movement or weighing too much, but that's not what the Daimyo was interested in. What the time's Daimyo saw was an obscenely expensive fabric, with more sheen than typical silk. One that took dye very well, was absurdly soft, and that no one else could make." Aiko elaborated. "You wore silk if you were rich. But if you were the richest, then you could buy the horribly expensive Aburame silk. Which was subtly different, but enough so to make any other rich person feel inferior."

"And the Uchiha did make some spectacular glass art, back in the day..." She added. Then she tilted her head. "Actually, that's an avenue too. Suna certainly doesn't lack for sand. Or heat. I think only certain types of sands can be used for glass-making, but Gaara might be able to detect those with some training... Also gemstones for coloring... The Uchihas did leave the glass-work niche wide open, since..." She winced and looked at Sasuke.

Sasuke sighed. "It's okay." He smiled sadly. "It's true that we don't do it anymore. And the adopted Clan members don't all have the strong Katon affinity my Clan used to have. Besides, I'm not looking to turn into a glassblower, so it makes sense to suggest it as a possibility."

Aiko nodded and changed the subject. "As for the Hyuuga, they were great for personal protection and detecting assassination attempts on stationary Nobles. Plus they had a wide knowledge in acupuncture. On top of that, they were always beautiful themselves. Elegant, poised, well dressed, with good posture, long, luxurious hair, stunning faces and body and mesmerizing eyes. They pretty much were a luxurious and exotic decoration in and of themselves. It was an expensive privilege to have some on retainer, either as physicians or as guards. A decorative escort, if you will."

Neji grimaced at the description, but since Aiko wasn't wrong, he didn't linger on the slight objectification. "Wait, was that how my Clan used to get Intel? Inside information from their employers rather than infiltration and seduction?"

Aiko blinked. "I'm sure seducing the Noble clients might have been a way too, but I think you're right. The Hyuugas moved in different circles than most other Clans in the Warring Era. The Aburames weren't overly social, the Uchiha were preoccupied with their Feud, and the Akimichi were quite down to earth and preoccupied with their vassals. The Hyuuga probably got their sources from the Nobles they worked closely with."

"Uhm?" Temari piped up.

"Right, sorry, follow up on another discussion." Aiko smiled. "Where were we?"

"Stupidly luxurious good that a Daimyo wants bragging rights about." Kankuro prompted.

"Right." Aiko nodded. "Historically speaking, Suna had those too. Spices, deep red dyes, Puppet theater and some gem mines. But the spices are much more commonly available now, so they aren't viewed as a luxury. Dyes can now be synthesized more cheaply, Puppet Theater now looks dated with the rise of modern movies, and your Daimyo appropriated the Gem mines, which don't need chakra for operating anymore because of machinery. Which left you bereft of bragging points as far as Nobles are concerned, and I'd wagger it's when his favor turned away from you. And the defeat in the Shinobi Wars probably didn't help."

Temari nodded seriously. "Sounds about right." She hummed, ignoring Kankuro's pouting at having Puppet Theater called dated. "So we need to make up another stupidly expensive luxury?"

"Yes." Aiko nodded. "That's the fastest way I can see to get him back on your side. Give him something country-made to be proud about and show off."

"But what?" Temari huffed. "What does the desert have?"

"Poisons." Sakura suggested. All the heads turned to her and she crossed her arms. "I know there are tons of different types of poisons." She grumbled. "And your fauna has lots of unique ones."

"Are you suggesting we give our Daimyo poisons so he can assassinate people with them? We need to keep the assassination jobs to ourselves." Kankuro refuted.

"Not for assassinations." Sakura sighed. "For recreation." She huffed at the incredulous stares. "There are some plant-based poisons that are used as drugs. Opium is one. If the dose is right, it makes people feel floaty and good. Also a few hallucinogens. See if any of the poisons you're already excellent at making could be turned into a recreative drug." She argued.

"That could work." Aiko hummed. "But if you want your Daimyo to appreciate it, it needs to be perfectly safe. Not too much addiction, and no nasty side-effects. Also no cases of it being unpleasant instead of good. But I mean, you still have Elder Chiyo, I'm sure she could rise to the challenge. I'm sure she'd appreciate the difficulty, and a break from boredom as well as an opportunity to show off her skills. You'd better hurry on that, though, before you lose her."

Temari wrote the suggestion down. "Anything else?"

"Music instruments." Sasuke hummed. "You already have very skilled wood-workers in the puppet makers, and you could easily import wood from the Land of Fire by using storage scrolls for the trip. If you use your cultural roots for decorations and carving, and maybe do some inlays, you could easily launch a new line of exotic and never seen before wood-crafted instruments. You could even make them in sets. A full orchestra of matching artworks that create music."

Temari wrote it down.

"Fur might be a good thing too. Or reptile skins. It doesn't matter if the animal is small, boasting that their cape took a thousand animals to make is the kind of thing Nobles use to boost their ego. If they are really soft, interestingly textured or patterned, or have striking colors, then all for the better." Aiko said. "Same for beetles with pretty shells. See if there is any animal you could breed for their hides that would only thrive here. Since we're talking luxury good, you will recoup the cost of feeding them on the sales of their products, so you could even import forage once the demand is stable. Especially since you're going to be producing them for influence, not profit."

Temari nodded, still writing, a thoughtful frown on her face. She must be thinking about which species would fit the bill. "Alright. That seems enough to start." She nodded. "Thanks."

"Don't mention it." Aiko smiled. "Like, actually, don't mention me at all. I don't want my name linked to this. I'm not looking to become famous. And those ideas will help you more if you pretend they are solely yours."

Temari scowled at the answer.

"Don't see it like charity." Kakashi said. "If the idea is solely yours, then it is also solely your fault if it fails. Aiko's kind of making you a gift, but also kind of not."

"Exactly." Aiko nodded. "I wouldn't suggest reporting this right-away. Investigate the matter, make some tests on the different options, start working out how to turn the raw material into finished luxury goods, and present and full plan to the Council when you're sure it will work. It will only make your breakthrough look more impressive. And it will have much more of you than me, than us in it, too. We only gave you the inspiration. Everything from here on out will be your own hard work, you will be able to be proud of it, instead of thinking of it as a theft."

Temari sighed and then nodded. "I am a shinobi. Secrets are our craft." She agreed.

"And misdirection." Aiko added with a smirk. "Keep in mind that Nobles have their own standards. They value the frivolous. The unpractical and the fragile. The more something is hard to get, and hard to keep in good repair, the more it screams wealth. As a rule, if something makes you think 'no self-respecting shinobi would be caught dead with that, you're probably in the right track. Dangling little ornaments, stuff that chimes with every move, objects that are supposed to be useful but are much too fussy for that actual use long-term... Those are good bets."

"Like a hand-fan made with moth or butterfly wings?" Temari asked.

"So long as the wing pattern is pretty, then yes. Though that might be pushing the impracticality a bit. Think more decorative headpiece if you have pretty, over-sized butterfly wings to use." Aiko answered.

Temari nodded decisively and stood, stowing the notebook away. "Thank you for your advice. I have much to do." She declared.

"Don't forget to ride in style on Gaara's Sand." Sakura called at her back.

Temari nodded and turned to Gaara, who gave them a short head-bow and strolled toward his sister.

"Well." Kakashi said once the Sand Siblings were out. "That happened."

"Yeah." Tenten breathed. "That happened. Wow."

Notes:

What? World-building? In my fanfic?
It's more likely than you think!
XD

We're riding for Kazekage Temari! She'll be great! (This world's Naruto never bragging about becoming Hokage where Gaara heard it, and so Gaara wasn't inspired by it. He has no horse in this race, and a handy elder sister to foist the whole mess to, so that's exactly what he's doing.)

(We might be heading toward a majority of women at the Kage Summit, thinking about it... There's Tsunade, Mei, and now Temari... Plus the Tsuchikage's granddaughter as his heir... Huh.)

Chapter 93: Aiko's Fights

Summary:

Aiko would never be the best combat shinobi. But she had gotten better.

Notes:

I decided to participate in NaNoWriMo this year! If I stick to it, I should be writing twice as much for a month!

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

Once the Sand siblings were out, Gai's kids wanted to meet their Sensei, since they hadn't seen them in a long time. They also wanted to show him their progress.

They wanted Gai to be proud of them. It was obvious. For all that Aiko had been hard on him for neglecting Tenten and Neji in Lee's favor, all three of them loved him and respected him. He had put a lot of work into their training since they became his students. And they were grateful for it.

It was also obvious that while Neji and Tenten had stagnated in skills since coming out of the Academy, their time under Gai's guidance had let them build very solid bases from which they could then build up easily. They had soared as soon as they started branching out because of the strong body they had cultivated and the great work ethic they had built up.

Gai might not have taught them anything but Taijutsu during one year, but it had primed them to be ready to learn everything else they might need. Tenten wouldn't be as terrifying with her spear if her muscles weren't so strong to begin with. Neji wouldn't be so fast on his feet if he hadn't done the daily runs with his team. He wouldn't have such great bases on non-gentle-fist taijutsu without Gai's intervention. And Lee, of course, had gotten most of what he could do directly from Gai.

Kakashi could easily track Gai down, with how well he knew him, even if it took some wheedling for him to agree to searching for Gai at all.

The best way to show one's improvement being a spar, Sasuke and Sakura wanted to come along to see it. Juugo came along too, since the natural energy was more present inside the village where people lived.

Kakashi found Gai in a training ground shaded by the cliff circling the village.

The Jounin hadn't known they would come, since the communications with Suna was far from secure. The reunion was tearful, at least on Lee and Gai's part.

Gai agreed enthusiastically when they asked for a spar to demonstrate their progress.

The problem with their plan was... Well, it was Suna.

Tenten and Neji had a less than adequate amount of water for Suiton jutsus. And there were no trees or other vertical things except for the cliff and destroying Suna's fortress cliffs for terrain control would be deeply unpolitical. So a good half of the things the kids learned couldn't be applied.

Neji could still demonstrate his other Taijutsu forms, as well as his Genjutsus, but Gai was probably the worst opponent for that. Tenten demonstrated her improvement with the Naginata, and use of battle seals, and Lee showed off his new weapons, but the three of them still couldn't beat Gai.

After a few minutes of watching Gai's team fail to best their sensei, Kakashi turned to Sasuke, Sakura and her and raised his visible eyebrow. "You're all a team on this mission." He pointed out. "What are you waiting for?"

Aiko startled a bit at being included, but when her two genins turned their wide, bloodthirsty grins her way, she smiled back and raced forth.

Gai reacted to the new opponents with a laugh and declaration about youthfulness. Neji, Tenten and Lee welcomed their arrival with some relief and smoothly transitioned into the new of strategies a larger team while Sasuke tried to roast Gai with a Katon and Sakura jumped up with chakra bounces to make up for the lack of tree branches or ceilings from which to hang herself with chakra strings and introduced Gai to her delightful new weapons.

Aiko slunk behind Neji and Lee to be able to take advantage of any opening they created.

Meanwhile, Sasuke had unsheathed his Katana and Sakura had busted out his earth jutsus after Gai batted her mini-bolas away without difficulty. Gai should stay wary of the bolas, they might be on the ground, but chances were that Sakura had a chakra string attached to them.

Tenten took some distance and started pelting Gai with projectiles to give them cover while Lee and Neji went for a pincer move.

Aiko put on her 'don't notice me' Genjutsu and circled the field toward Gai's back and unsealed her wakizashi. No bucklers for the moment, she needed the hitting power more.

Sasuke ran lightning into his blade right when Gai slapped it aside, shocking him.

Then Lee and Neji lunged in one high and one low, while Tenten threw a scroll that contained a boulder over Gai's head.

Gai got out of the combined assault with a sideways somersault that lifted his legs over Lee's attack and brought his torso away from Neji's lunge. He used the fact that he was facing upward to kick the boulder into chunks.

Sakura threw in a new batch of bolas at Gai while sneakily lifting up the one on the ground.

Gai used Sasuke's sword to intercept the bolas, clapping the blade between his palms and pulling it in an arc around him.

He didn't see the flash seal Tenten threw at his face in time to avoid getting blinded and Neji and Lee recovered from their failed attack and drove for his back with kunais.

Aiko decided to use her Chidori-imitating genjutsu to make Gai think Kakashi had joined the fray, the startled dodge Gai reacted with gave Tenten an opening to jump in with her spear.

Sasuke threw in another electric shock in the katana still held between Gai's palms.

Neji threw his kunais and turned back to the gentle fist managing to plug Gai's shoulder up as Gai deflected the projectiles while Lee kicked his legs out from under him.

Meanwhile, Sakura who had managed to get height thanks to the cliff, and dropped down upon Gai feet first.

Aiko decided to add one of her scrolls full of water to the mix, to help Neji and Tenten if they wanted to use ninjutsu. It also shocked the hell out of Gai.

Sakura barely missed Gai as he rolled to the side.

Neji dropped down to use the newly-added water in a restraining jutsu, to which Sasuke promptly added Raiton.

Sakura recovered from her landing and threw in an ax-kick to Gai's midsection.

Tenten put her Naginata blade at Gai's neck right afterward, deciding the match.

For a drenched, lightning-burned, tenketsu blocked and bruised, winded man, Gai took his defeat with great joy. As soon as he had recovered his breath, he started gushing at their teamwork and improvement.

It was no wonder that his students loved him. He was incredibly supportive.

Kakashi ambled forth slowly with an eye-smile. "It took four genins and two chunins, but you did beat the Green Beast. Congratulations, all."

Tenten laughed and dropped on her butt in the wet sand. "We did it! Next time we won't need Team 7 for it!" She grinned, holding her palms up for her teammates to clap.

"Yosh!" Lee answered, clapping her palm. "We're even better in a forest, sensei! If we can't beat you when we get back home, I'll do two thousand sit-ups!"

"I will not do two thousand sit-ups if we don't beat him." Neji put in as he gave Tenten's other hand his own clap. "But we'll definitely surprise you, sensei."

"I shall look forward to your youthful victory!" Gai grinned back. "Your Raitons are impressive, young Sasuke! And young Sakura sure can hit hard! That Chidori genjutsu was inspired, too. I almost forgot you'd joined the fight, Aiko-san. Great concealment!"

Neji removed the chakra plugs and their shoulder Katsuyus healed the electric burns, then Aiko unsealed a change of clothes in Kakashi's size to replace the wet yet charred leotard, kakashi put an earth wall up for modesty so Gai could get changed, and Aiko got a hug from a grateful Tenten who loved having her sensei dressed normally for once.

Once Gai was sorted out, they all strolled off to eat some Suna Cuisine. Juugo was in a good mood and quietly congratulated them for their victory and commented on the match.

Kakashi ribbed her a little about using 'him' in their match, which made her grin and answer that she was a ninja, after all.

Suna dishes were fairly spicy, which Lee and Gai loved, but Sasuke hated. Aiko wasn't really a fan either, and she didn't really plan to eat out all that much in during their stay. She had brought plenty of rice and water along. She would share her bland rice with Sasuke. They would bond over their dislike of spicy food.

Rice... Wasn't a Suna staple. At all. It needed a flooded field to grow in, and water to cook. They preferred meat, dates and cereals, which needed much less water.

Maybe she should invite the sand siblings to her rice parties, it would give them some diversity. She also had some dried freshwater fish in her storage...

Temari dropped by early the next morning, and Tenten eagerly joined Aiko in introducing someone new to fuuinjutsu.

Gaara, who had come with Temari, invited Juugo to go out into the desert proper with him while his sister was busy and didn't need a floating sand vehicle, which Juugo was happy to agree to. The two of them had something in common, having killed people without meaning to or wanting to. The outing might allow them to bond.

Temari had a neat handwriting and a steady drawing hand, which would help her a lot. She took a lot of notes, and asked interesting questions. Some concepts gave her difficulties, but it was only the first lesson, and she was doing well.

After a couple of hour, when sustained concentration would be getting hard, Aiko winked at Temari and went to fetch Kakashi. Temari still had to learn to use tessen instead of a huge battle fan. And start in on Doton Ninjutsu.

Sasuke and Sakura elected to go along, but Aiko decided to stay in and out of the heat and have some lazy alone time. Neji, and Lee had gone out with Gai earlier, and Tenten wanted to find them.

Aiko unsealed a book (Icha Icha, just to be able to make fun of Jiraiya's work and be able to cite the worse passages to Kakashi when she wanted to tease him). She soon unsealed a pack of highlighter and picked pink for blatant misogyny, yellow for stupid metaphors, blue for impossible sex acts, purple for lazy plot devices and green for plot holes.

Maybe she'd add a caption and give Kakashi the book.

She should have suspected there was more.

Apparently the anti-Gaara faction lacked common sense. Attacking the same Konoha envoys who were already aware of their plot? Dumb. Everyone would suspect it was a hoax.

And since she didn't have a dog nose, she didn't smell the sand with as much advance.

The ninja henged as Gaara had managed a good resemblance, but their prejudice played against them. Their Gaara had the crazy look she'd seen at the hospital, not the slowly thawing face of an abused kid. Also, they didn't have Juugo with them.

She didn't think for a moment it was the true Gaara. Which was exactly why her first reaction was to throw up a genjutsu and hide, not to run away.

She couldn't kill that impostor. It most likely was a Suna shinobi, he needed to be brought to the Village Council alive. It would also keep her from being accused of murdering one of their ninjas without reason.

It was a better ninja than she though, for all that his plan to break into the Konoha guest apartment henged as Gaara and menacing her was dumb. They got out of her genjutsu before she could truly hide away.

Thankfully, they were still set in framing Gaara, so their attack was relying on sand-using Doton. Much slower than Gaara's actual attacks, and easier to dodge.

But also, she was alone. No teammates to piggyback off.

She would need to be inventive.

First, make them think their plan was working. "Gaara? What's the problem?" She asked breathlessly. Sounding afraid wasn't hard at all. She was being attacked by a shinobi of unknown skill level.

Since shortening her battle corset to only reach the bottom of her rib-cage, after grasping the flexibility-based taijutsu, she wore it all the time. It was sinfully comfortable, almost comforting, in it's firm support, and it let her abdomen free, allowing for easy belly-breathing.

And having her battle corset on even in downtime meant that she had a whole swathe storage seals right at hand that she's filled specifically for battle use.

Her hand went to the center front line. She wasn't wearing her sealed gloves, so she didn't have her wakizashi and shields at hand. She needed weapons.

The seal under her finger discharged, giving her a large wooden club. Ideal for not killing an opponent.

The false Gaara's eyes widened.

She grabbed another seal tag from the inside of her corset lapel and slapped it on the club before throwing the whole thing at the shinobi.

They dodged, obviously, and got surprised by the sudden flood coming out of the club. Water was such an under-valued surprise tactic. There was a good pool's worth of it in that one tag. It meant that a good portion of it escaped by the window.

It should attract attention. Sudden flood in Suna? Someone would come. If only to berate her on wastage of a precious resource.

The shinobi and his sand was well and truly sodden. And Aiko had superior experience in fighting on a wet, slippery floor. She charged forth.

The shinobi braced for straightforward hits, and Aiko used that to her advantage. She faked a slip, letting her legs slide forth and bringing her arms over her head, then bowed her back in a sharp arch, sticking her hands to the floor and sending a powerful donkey-kick right under the shinobi's guard.

He was taken off-guard and stumbled closer to the window. Good.

She let her chakra bracing go and fell flat on the ground, allowing her to push closer with arms and legs, unsealed a kunai and planted it into the shinobi's calves.

The surprise was wearing off, but she had a good footing and a stable handhold in the stabbed-in kunai. She surged forth in a headbutt.

The shinobi reached the window and she only had to add a chakra-powered punch to throw him out the window and out into the street.

The Gaara henge would turn against him. Seeing Gaara fight a Konoha envoy would cause alarm. Suna Jounins and ANBU should swarm in post-haste.

The shinobi had recovered during the fall, and it was a much more collected opponent she ended up facing once she jumped out of the window after them.

She dodged under a swipe, blocked a kick, and took out another water storage tag. She was also more experienced than the typical Suna shinobi in fighting on mud.

This time, her opponent was braced for the flood, but it didn't reduce her advantage. Mud.

She also had another advantage. Her opponent now expected her seal tags to have water in them.

So the next tag she slapped on a shuriken and sent over his head surprised him by containing a good sized boulder.

They dodged, but she had bought enough time for Suna reinforcement to arrive.

"It's not really Gaara." She announced, even as her hand went for another one of the storage seals painted on her corset.

The fake Gaara narrowed their eyes.

Tough luck. She was done with them.

This time, she unsealed a Warring Era Uchiha Tate shield, and braced it between them before crouching in it's safety. Best leave the battle to the Suna shinobi.

The fight was fairly short once help came in.

After less than a minute, there was a polite knock to the front of her shield. "It's over." A male voice informed her, sounding entertained.

"Right." She sighed, standing back up. "Thanks." She re-sealed the war-shield and looked around. The fake Gaara was laid out on the wet floor, henge dispersed. Uh, it was a woman.

"Just a question." The Suna jounin who had let her know the fight was finished smiled. "Where does the water come from?"

Aiko blinked. "I sealed it into individual tags in the Naka River." She answered. "Back home."

"Hmm." The Shinobi smiled. "A shame it's all going to be wasted in evaporation. We could have used it..."

Aiko blinked. "Oh." She smiled. "Hyuuga Neji is quite good at suiton. If you find him fast and prepare some barrels, he could retrieve most of it for agricultural use."

The fact that a couple of Suna ninja looked at one another and then ran off was a bit surprising. She didn't know that the water situation of Suna was that bad.

Well. It was no loss for her. She might teach Temari how to make her water-storage seals. It would help with her popularity.

Talking of Temari, she appeared by the time Aiko had reached the room the Suna Council was in along with her escort and their new prisoner.

She wasn't alone. She had Kakashi' Sakura and Sasuke with her. Their Katsuyus must have let them know that she'd been attacked and guided them to her.

She hugged her kids and let them reassure themselves that she was perfectly alright before stepping into the Council room to recount the attack on her.

The jounin who had told her the fight was over flirted lightly with her during the debrief and on their way out. Hmm. She might take him up on that.

Notes:

I'm not too sure about this one... Let me know if you feel the quality of this chapter is subpar?

Chapter 94: Leaving Suna

Summary:

There weren't complications in Suna after the attack on Aiko.
No, the complications waited until they were on their way back home.

Notes:

Alright! the comments on the last chapter pointed out that this story is starting to lose steam. Which I already knew. So let's try a new approach!
Full speed ahead it is!

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

As it turned out, The Suna people weren't too angry at having to relocate the Konoha delegation to another building after Aiko had mildly flooded their living quarters. Their problems tended to revolve around not having enough water rather than the opposite, and with the pragmatism of people getting what they needed though not in the way they wanted, they decided that a flooded room was a very good excuse to deep clean the entire building with the abundance of water.

Good busywork for their genins.

All the waterlogged furniture had been carted outside, to dry in the local excess of sun and heat while the building itself got cleaned. The water used for cleaning wouldn't be wasted either, as it would be used to water crops after being thoroughly dirtied by mopping the floors.

That's what Temari explained on her next lesson with them. Her own enthusiasm might have had something to do with Aiko having taught her how to copy her personal water-storage seal first thing in the morning. That had given way to a discussion about how to use these seals without causing ecological distress to the places they gathered the freshwater from.

Aiko's suggestion to offer very discounted mission to anyone suffering from floods and needing help with their excess water had promise. They could form an alliance with Tanigakure in order to offer these services, as the Shinobi Village of the Land of Rivers had an abundance of Suiton users who could gather the excess water up and make it easier to seal up. Besides, Tanigakure was much easier to access for clients from wetter areas, and having a specialty mission profile would benefit them.

It would be up to Suna to hammer out terms and conditions in their cooperation that made Tanigakure happy to work with them, but that too would end up beneficial in the long run. A mark of a wise future Kage, forging solid ties with their bordering country. Besides, Tanigakure itself did get some seasonal floods due to their main river running from the Land of Rain, and digging a big lake to corral this seasonal flood in and having Suna periodically come and empty it would be easier for them than arranging the entire river to handle the increased waterflow, and that would help out the entire Land of River's agriculture.

Temari listened raptly to the ideas around collecting excess water in other countries and wrote them down dutifully.

The Land of Wind didn't lack for sun, and bringing water in would allow their food production to flourish. Turning their hidden village into a fertile oasis wasn't so far-fetched, if they managed to make good use of water storage scrolls. The Puppet Corps would definitely be delighted if they managed to grow more trees of their own to carve with.

On the subject of Puppet Corps, Kankuro brought a small porcelain automaton to Aiko at the start of their second week staying in Suna.

It was a small doll in the sand-colored clay of Suna, decorated with Kabuki-style makeup in glaze, and dressed in tasteful desert attire. It could walk in a straight line on it's own and bow politely. Kankuro seemed a bit put out that it was all it could do yet, but Aiko congratulated him heartily. It was exclusive, stupidly fragile and all but useless practically, as well as local product that their Daimyo could brag about being the only one to get early access to. Exactly what she had suggested.

Kankuro demurred that it was only a test product and that he wanted to make it smoother and prettier, but Aiko assured him that even that would make a good gift/bribe to their Daimyo to get him to stop exporting all the Capital's missions to Konoha.

Juugo and Gaara had bonded over their stay, but Juugo ended up deciding that the Aburames were a better way to control his power than the relative lack of Natural Energy of the desert. Unless he decided to settle in the Dead Wastes, there was still too much risk of him going berserk. Especially if he lived inside Sunagakure that had a lot of life in it.

Plus, Gaara added sadly, his Villages people still hadn't accepted him fully, as evidenced by the two attacks on Team 7. Adding another unpredictable and unstable "monster" to the mix wouldn't be a good thing. Not for the Village, not for Gaara and not for Juugo. The Aburames were at least glad to have Juugo feeding their chakra-eating bugs for free.

It was a little heartbreaking to see the two fast friends forced to split up, but Gaara seemed happy enough at the prospect of letters and occasional trips to Konoha to see Juugo and his new genin friends.

The young redhead also had a refreshing air of purpose around him, since they had started to plot to get his sister in the hat. Indeed, he had used a few of his outings with Juugo to look for precious stones and metals with his sand-based chakra. He had found a few turquoises and some sand roses already, which Temari had happily appropriated for her own project.

The return date to Konoha was mostly set by the end of Shikaku and Gai's own diplomatic mission. According to the older Nara, Aiko getting attacked in their quarters by a shinobi namely loyal to Sand and the initial ambush during their trip in had greatly helped the process along. They could have demanded concessions because of those, and since they hadn't, it had made their initial demands go through painlessly.

In the end, their stay in Suna lasted a week and a half all told. The fact that Juugo decided not to stay had decidedly cut their stay shorter too, as they didn't need to bargain for his stay. And the Suna Council couldn't even be angry about it after Gaara himself came in to explain why he thought it was a bad idea seeing the length their own people seemed willing to go to to push him away from the post of Kazekage, and the startling similarities between him and Juugo.

On the morning of their departure, a winded Temari ran into their apartment to proudly present Aiko with a very pretty gold-plated headdress decorated with a myriad of sand roses and framed in colorful desert butterfly wings as well as a pair of ornate Kanzashis (bun pins) holding bigger sand roses with turquoises set in the middle and a ton of dangling, tinkling ornaments trailing from tiny chains, most of them decorated with color-shifting insect carapaces as well as their own butterfly wings. Shikaku, who was in their room for breakfast admired the objects critically and joined his own praises to Aiko's when told what they were for.

Temari glowed under the praises and modestly argued that she mostly commissioned the pieces rather than making them herself, but that didn't save her from the Jounin Commander's approval.

Kankuro appeared half an hour later with his own finished automaton, which also got Shikaku to act like the father he was deep down.

Both of them decided to drag Gaara into it, as the provider of the fine stones they had used in their creations.

The way Gaara blushed when dragged in to face Shikaku's approval made Kakashi suspect that Shikaku might have adopted himself a few sand genins without noticing. It wasn't that he was that nice to them. But Kakashi got the feeling that the late Kazekage hadn't been overly generous with praises and even Shikaku's laid-back encouragement were more fatherly than they were used to.

Well. Kakashi wasn't fit to be anyone's father figure, as evidenced by his adoption of Sakura being a sibling one. And Shikaku was objectively a good pick for these three as an example for all that he was a very laid-back father to Shikamaru.

Also, since Shikaku was informed about their overarching plan, they decided to grill him on how to present their request for a gift-giving mission to the Suna Council.

It set their departure back by a bit, but no one in their mission team minded it, for the glowing smiles upon the sand siblings faces as they waved them away at the gates.

Shikaku did tease Aiko a bit about making her Tsunade's official councilor seeing her excellent work in Suna. It made her grimace and shudder in faked disgust, which in turn caused everyone to laugh at her misery.

Later on, when Kakashi discretely commented on Sakura's lack of retaliation on Elder Chiyo for insulting their father, the girl grinned at him deviously and answered that if he hadn't seen it, then it meant her revenge would be even more successful.

He decided that probable deniability was more important than his curiosity. Sakura was their most reasonable genin, so he'd trust that nothing she did would be traced back to them.

They didn't get attacked on their way across the Suna desert this time.

But, hey! There was still all the way across the Land of Rivers and the Land of Fire for that.

...

He probably shouldn't have tempted fate with that one...

But in a way, coming across Uchiha Itachi at the border between Rivers and Fire turned out in their favor as their long stay in Suna had allowed Orochimaru to discover where he was and prepare an ambush on their way back.

It was only luck that made both events happen roughly at the same time.

By the time the fires were put out, the snake had run away and Itachi's shark Swordsman headed away with a jaunty wave and a brand new legendary blade at his hip, Itachi's cover was well and truly blown.

The young Uchiha didn't seem to mind it all that much, too entranced by his little brother's impassioned rant at his stupidity. Katsuyu informing them that Itachi was all but blind and ran on less than one lung's worth of air probably had something to do with Sasuke's anger.

Aiko didn't seem too delighted with the avid way Itachi drank in Sasuke's reproach. But then again, her incredible ability for empathy was somewhat hobbled by the month Kakashi had spent in a coma after his last encounter with the Uchiha genius.

On the rest of their way back, Itachi shyly shared his circumstances in seeking out his brother to make sure he was doing well.

Tsunade would be incensed, that was for sure. She had been very careful and secret about contacting him to let him know that she knew the truth behind the Uchiha Massacre, using Aoba's crow summons to inconspicuously pass the message as a report from Itachi's own Summons.

(Kakashi was quietly intrigued by the thought of Aoba temporarily joining an ANBU squad with Raido and Genma. He would surely have looked quite fetching in and ANBU uniform. Hmm. Interesting. Worth digging into at a later date. Also... Wouldn't Aoba make a viable Hokage candidate with some polishing? Kakashi silently added him to his list of 'poor schmucks I can stick the hat to in a pinch'.)

Hoshigaki Kisame had stayed unaware of Itachi's true loyalties until Itachi decided to blow it all out of the water because his little brother was in danger and no longer dead-set on killing him. That sure looked like a huge headache for their valiant Hokage, that. Good thing Kakashi was not in her shoes (or in her hat).

Well, at least, Itachi looked delighted at the prospect of getting a disciplinary retirement order and having to stay in the newly repopulated Uchiha Compound to protect their possible pregnant members from getting targeted by bloodline thieves who might assume that the babies were Sasuke's.

Even with the very long Genjutsu torture session at his hand, Kakashi was warmed by seeing his old Kouhai on ANBU Team Ro start in on a more healthy path. He had been so small, so hurt, when 'Hound' was his captain. Kakashi had abandoned all hopes for him when he learned about the Uchiha Massacre being his work.

He had rarely had such a good outlook on the future since Minato-sensei died. It was a novel feeling.

It was also kind of jarring to discover that even his slow healing at the hands of his team hadn't healed him as well as seeing Itachi pick a new, less painful path for himself.

He'd been happier, with his pack. But the pessimism had stayed, lurking quietly in the corners. But Itachi... Itachi let a breath of fresh air into these molding cobwebs.

Uh.

Maybe everything would turn out alright in the end?

How nice was that thought?

Well. They still had to make it to Konoha in one piece and keep Itachi from being killed on sight at the Gate to solidify that, though.

Notes:

Expect a time skip in the near future, it seems my best way to rescue this story is to end it as soon as I can. It has done most of the job I envisioned when I designed Aiko for an OC insert, and the last thing I want for my fanfic baby is to have it bogged down into an endless drop in quality.

On another subject, who's for Kakashi/Aoba?

Chapter 95: Temari's road (end of Suna arc)

Summary:

Temari will be Kazekage. That's the choice she made. It meant making some sacrifices. But unlike her father, she would make sure these sacrifices didn't include Gaara.

Chapter Text

The Suna Council had accepted the trip to give gifts to the Daimyo suspiciously easily, considering how against they had been letting Gaara go and fetch Juugo from Konoha. But then again, there had been two attacks on Konoha representatives by 'loyal' Suna Shinobi in an anti-Gaara plot. It made sense that they now thought getting Gaara out of the Village was more of a priority.

Besides, the gift had cost no one but Temari, which meant that letting them go deliver them was no-risk high possible reward. She had been very clear that if the Daimyo did not like her gifts, she would pretend they were entirely from her, and if he did like them, then it was a gift from Suna. No risk for anyone but her. Well. Her and her siblings.

They weren't even taking Baki-sensei along, freeing him up for missions, since they were staying in the Land of Wind, a perfectly safe place for Gaara to be, with all it's Sand and his sand based Jinchuuriki power. (Of course, it was significantly less safe for Kankuro and her, seeing how they would be with Gaara, and therefore weren't completely safe from... Gaara. They would be very safe from anything else, though. Once again, Gaara. She was now quite confident of their safety where Gaara was concerned, which was impressive progress.)

The Council is pretty-much humoring her. But that's fine. Temari, at least, is taking it as seriously as it deserves to be. And so are her brothers.

They go over their roles, their parts, their preparations and their gear and supplies seriously before departure. They pack proper court attire and check the gifts for any damage thoroughly and re-check that the gift boxes they are stored in won't cause any damage to the goods inside before carefully sealing them into scrolls for safekeeping. Then they set out before dawn, not letting too many see them go to reduce the possibility of further anti-Gaara ambushes. For the same reason, they won't be taking the shortest path to the capital. Nor any established roads.

In the desert, straying from roads is dangerous. But they have Gaara, and no mundane threat will reach him, nor, by extension, them. They have plenty of food and water, thanks to the sealing scrolls Aiko-sensei taught her to draw. And if they get lost... Well. The Capital isn't hard to find again. They simply needed to go full west, then south-west, then full south, and they would reach the ocean's shore and then only needed to follow it east then south-east and they would eventually get to the Capital, even if they got hopelessly lost. They had the sun during the day and the stars during the night to tell them where the cardinal points were.

Getting lost was no true danger. Especially as they had all the time in the world The Daimyo didn't know to wait for them, and therefore wouldn't be upset to wait longer than expected if they arrived days, or even weeks later than they thought they would.

Very safe, all in all.

Well, except for the risks of getting murdered by Gaara somewhere out in the desert.

But she chose not to focus on that. Gaara had been improving since their father's death, the Chunin Exams and failed invasion. He'd gotten even better after their second stay in Konoha, and was, surprisingly, even more agreeable since Juugo and his Konoha Escort had arrived.

If anything, being told he could be helpful simply by being Temari's personal means of transportation and by scouring the desert for pretty rocks, bugs or metal seemed to have settled him better than anything ever had.

Temari wouldn't have thought, ever, that being her personal chauffeur would make Gaara calmer. It definitely would have made him murderous before Naruto cried all over him about loneliness being painful. But here they were. She had a little brother who took her to and from places on his incredibly advanced sand-control jutsu gladly. Enjoyed the task, even.

Life was weird.

Anyway, they set out at night, full west, on Gaara's sand cloud/sand slide. Not needing to walk or run, pretty much ever, might become a problem for their training at some point. But for the moment, it was a safe, and very fast means of transportation that barely tired them at all. Good for the long trip they had planned.

What she absolutely hadn't expected to discover on the trip was that Gaara was both curious and distractible. Their Gaara. Distracted. And not by the need to commit gruesome murders. Oh, no. Gaara got distracted by the Desert. Sabaku no Gaara, indeed.

The first time Gaara swerved off course, they had been a little concerned. Had complained and argued and asked for explanations. Gaara shook his head, eyes narrowed and led them exactly where he wanted to go. Then he lifted up and entire dune of sand up and sideways and floated them gently to the rock formation he had just dug out to observe it and poke at rocks. After a while, he crowed (quietly) in satisfaction and pointed out a dirty, gray quartz within the schist rock with small golden flecks through it.

Temari and Kankuro blinked at it in shock. Huh. Gaara had found gold.

That was why he deviated. Because he wanted to investigate a rock formation for gold. And he'd found some. As they watched, Gaara set his hand on the schist and started bleeding chakra.

In a couple of minute, the entire rock formation dissolved into sand and clay dust, and Gaara made the new sand pool and collect, pushing the dirty, gold-bearing quartz up to the surface.

If Rasa had known that Gaara was able to do that, he would have had to sell so much less of his gold dust. Gold dust that he had actually needed for his magnet release jutsus.

Temari shook the thoughts out and laid a sealing scroll out so Gaara could put his gold-bearing quartz on it and they could seal it up and go again.

Before, going, though, Gaara slid the sand dune back to it's place, and... Dusted it. Until the fauna and flora in it were back the way it was before and in not danger of suffocating.

There was much she had never suspected about her little brother. And seeing Kankuro's wide eyes, neither had he.

After that first deviation and stop, they were much more relaxed the next time Gaara veered off-course. More curious than concerned.

This time, it was a fennec fox that had intrigued him. They stayed hidden away for an hour, watching the tiny fox hunt for desert mice, insects and lizards. Well, it was night, anyway, they could stop for a rest.

The next day, they stopped for some bus Gaara hadn't 'felt' before and then for an amethyst.

The day after that it was some pretty quartz and a bird's nest.

They got used to the detours.

And as they stopped questioning him with fright, then waited to see what he went out of his way to check, then started engaging him positively about his finds when they noticed the trajectory changes, Gaara opened up. It was like watching a flower bloom. He stopped ignoring them while going where he wanted to go, and instead smiled at them, shared his findings, how he discovered things, what he thought he might find or why his attention got caught.

It was fascinating, how alive he got under their attention.

Had he been that attention deprived?

Ah.

Yes.

Of course he had.

Putting her hand on his head wasn't quite a conscious decision. But... Gaara looked like a puppy. And his hair was one of the only parts of him that wasn't constantly blocked off by his sand shield. Mostly stationary and widely safe as he was, his automatic defense was dormant, part of it scattered around in his other sand, and a small portion turned into it's sand armor form, resting in a thin layer over his skin. And that meant against the scalp, not coating his hair. That habit was why Gaara's hair tended to be unruly and dry though clean looking, as the sand stripped it of it's natural grease that would make it smoother, or dirty-looking.

But his actual hair poked out, and Temari hoped it meant he would feel her touch on them.

It did, seeing how Gaara jumped and turned, wide, surprised eyes to her as soon as her hand landed on his head. He stood stock still under her hand, with a nearly desperate expression trained on her. It was heartbreaking.

But her hand stayed attached, and after a long moment, Gaara leaned into the touch.

What had they done to this child?

What had they done to her brother?

Kankuro looked as surprised as her from the reaction.

The next day, he too tentatively ruffled Gaara's hair when his face lit up at another, likely mundane, discovery.

She was really proud of them. They were finally stepping up to take care of their little brother. Something Father should have done but did the exact opposite of. Mom would be proud of them. Temari knew mom loved Gaara, for all that father decided to sacrifice her in order to make her baby into a weapon.

Father had failed both mom and Gaara. But it didn't mean that Temari and Kankuro had to do the same.

They reached the ocean. It was eerily similar to the desert. Blue instead of gold, and with waves that moved much, much faster than sand dunes, but still.

Of course they has seen the sea before, but still. They marked a long pause when it came into view. It was spectacular, immense and deadly, just like their native desert. It commended respect, just like their home.

When the capital city was in view, Gaara made them some sand walls so they could wash and change into more court-appropriate attire. Not full on court attire, they were still ninjas, but something formal and, in Temari's case, especially, modest.

She shrugged on a full sleeved, Suna red, mid-thigh length kimono over a pair of black leggings (at home, she would have picked white or cream, to avoid over-heating, but the Capital's oceanic climate was much milder, allowing for dark, skin tight clothing). And ditched her body-armor in favor of a simple, billowing sash/obi. She also undid her usual four pigtails and gathered all her hair into a single high, puffy ponytail, that made her look older and more mature.

Kankuro was forced to ditch his jumpsuit and cat-eared hood, putting a Suna nomad style belted robe in matching crimson on. His makeup also had to be parred down to something less kabuki style and more 'Suna typical face marks'. Since his spiky hair tended to make him look a bit goofy if he went bare-head, he replaced his usual cap with a black headscarf that went with his general nomad style.

Gaara had picked himself a formal-looking long, high-collared vest in the same Suna crimson as the two of them, and black civilian-cut pants. He was also forced to dissolve his sand gourd, which Temari knew made him feel vulnerable. He had little choice, though. His sand gourd would be seen as a potential weapon, and they would never be allowed into the Daimyo's palace with it. As a compromise, he solidified chunks of it around his forearms, and shins, to look like jewelry, or armor plus another band worn over his vest like a belt. It was still very little sand, but hopefully enough that he'd feel safe.

Once fit to be received at court, they climbed back on a cloud of Gaara's sand and resumed their way toward the Capital.

The palace's guards made them very aware that one didn't get to see the Daimyo without a prior appointment.

The awe at seeing the three of them descend into the receiving courtyard on a cloud of sand and solidifying it into a big square tile once there wasn't enough to spare them from the scorn.

Thankfully, they had unsealed the three gift boxes before entering the city, and they were able to present those along with their excuse that they didn't want the information of them coming to present the Daimyo with precious gifts to leak, as to avoid being ambushed and robbed on the way.

They had to wait two hours in the courtyard before their Daimyo had them called in. A power play. But they were shinobi. Desert-dwelling shinobi. Ambush was one of their skills. Waiting a few hours for something to happen was no hardship to them.

Kneeling on the ground in front of their monarch was a trial of it's own. She had no respect for this man. Almost hatted him. But she was a Kunoichi. She could lie with the best of them.

So she laid the apologies thick for dropping by unannounced. And then she started waxing poetics about the value of their diplomatic gifts. rare treasures of their very own desert, exquisite craft of Suna artisans, her own father's legendary gold dust... The works. She mentioned that her and her brothers found the materials themselves, how precious her youngest brother's help had been in locating the raw materials.

The whole spiel.

By the time she was done, the Daimyo's eyes were glittering with greed.

How predictable.

The Konoha shinobi that was guarding him (another betrayal) came to collect the box she pushed forward from her kneeling bow. He looked professionally bland about his distaste for them. Temari couldn't blame him, Suna had invaded his Village while he wasn't there to weigh in on the fight. That kind of thing created resentment.

At least the Konoha shinobi was professional in checking the gift over for anything potentially dangerous to his charge. He also kept the item hidden in it's box while examining it, preserving the surprise. Once certain there wasn't anything dangerous, he gently closed the box again and handed it over to the Daimyo's servants, so they could ceremonially present it to their master.

The Daimyo smiled when the gold-plated ceremonial headdress was shown to him and a servant cautiously lifted it out of it's box, careful not to touch the delicate butterfly wings set on it's edges. He examined it avidly, clucking at the little details. the sand roses crowning it, the colorful wings, the little chimes and inset insect carapaces, the tiny, delicate golden chains dripping from it.

After a moment, he removed his current hat to allow the servant to place Temari's gift in it's place.

The gathered courtiers tittered and cooed, making a spectacle of their jealousy.

Temari smiled delightedly, naively. And then she turned to Gaara, who handed her the next box. "While it may be presumptuous of me to dare make a gift to your wife, I couldn't let our precious royal couple not match each-other. Please accept this as well. It was made with the same care and materials from the Land of Wind's own desert, to showcase the beauty of our land to any guest who steps in your court." She once again bowed deeply, sliding the new box forth with the end of her fingers.

The Konoha ninja was observing her carefully as he came forth once more. Respect for her act sliding into his eyes. He must know how much this mascarade was costing her. It didn't matter, her own steely gaze told him. It is for the good of my Village.

Once the two Kanzashi were dully checked, they too were put through the circus of a reveal, and the Daimyo's wife gasped in delight at the over-sized, too bright, too loud, too fragile, too heavy, completely useless pins. And she too allowed a servant to put them in in place of her previous ornaments. She giggled hapily at the mirror brought to her to admire the effect. Once again, the court gasped and clapped.

Temari wouldn't last a full day in a place like that.

No matter, though. They wouldn't be staying long. She turned to Kankuro with her bright, fake smile, and he handed his own gift box over.

"This one is my brother Kankuro's work." She chirped happily. "We are considering selling these, once the fabrication process is streamlined." She pushed a blush to her cheeks with a touch of chakra. "We would humbly beg your highness' help in that endeavor, as selling luxuries is not our Village's area of expertise."

The greed was back.

The Konoha shinobi came forth one more time, and Temari murmured that she would prefer for the box to stay there so she could do the demonstration herself. So he knelled in front of her and bent over the box with renewed wariness. This was, after all, a puppet. Something Suna shinobi were known to weaponize. He was impressively thorough in checking each joint and each piece for possible traps, and even glowed a diagnostic jutsu over the doll to ensure it contained no poison before pronouncing it safe and standing again.

Temari bowed her head and carefully lifted the fragile porcelain doll from it's cushioned box. She gently smoothed it's clothes to perfection and then showed it to their audience, before retrieving the ornate, golden wind-up key from it's place inside the box and parting the back of it's clothes to fit it in. She gave a precise ten turns of the key, and then set the little doll on the ground, where it stated walking forth on it's own. Ten paces, and then it stopped, brought it's hands together and folded in as deep a bow it could without over-balancing and falling.

Their audience was delighted at the show, even as the doll straightened out and stilled.

Temari waited to be allowed up before striding back to the doll and demonstrating how to wind it up again and setting it back down to walk the other way. Away from the royal couple, as not to come across as threatening.

With her not in her place, and her brothers seated in either side of her empty cushion the doll bowed to empty air at the end of it's walk. No diplomatic incident, hopefully. She sedately retook her place and tucked the doll back into it's box with the wind-up key, then handed the whole box to the Daimyo's servant who stepped forth for it.

That was when the three of them were finally allowed to stand. They spoke some more about how not to damage the butterfly wings and sand roses, and then about Temari's 'request' for the Daimyo's 'help' in commercializing the automaton dolls. She passed him a slip of paper with the 'minimal price' they could sell it (about twenty times the actual price of making them, since they were aiming for 'luxury good', and he promised to get back to them on it.

It made it sound like he was making them a huge favor. Of course. They were handing over the right to distribute the new luxury at his whim. To leverage it for influence and also make profit off it. What a huge sacrifice in on his part. How dare thy give him everything he might want on a silver platter.

Whatever.

Their mission was done.

They got caught in a sandstorm on their way back, and while Gaara easily sheltered them from it, it visibly took a toll on him, having them inside a dome of his sand. He even cried as he clutched his head and snarled at the Ichibi to stop trying to kill Temari and Kankuro.

Chapter 96: New person (re-settling)

Summary:

Team 7 is back to Konoha. Tsunade has a surprise for them.

Notes:

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Chapter Text

Itachi did not get killed on-sight at the Konoha gates. It helped that he agreed to have his arms bound in ninja-special method behind his back and to wear a blindfold as to not look dangerous.

The magic words "It's a Danzo crime." From Sasuke also helped the Gate's guards suspend their disbelief and call the ANBU to take custody of Itachi rather than stay jumpy and on guard.

Kakashi covertly signed at the ABU detail that came for Itachi to get Tsunade-sama's orders before giving Itachi the traitor treatment, as things were complicated. The captain of the squad answered that they were already briefed. Right. Katsuyu must have informed Tsunade. In a hot minute, they found themselves Itachi-less, and proceeded toward the Hokage Tower for their report and possible dressing-down.

Tsunade-sama was, predictably, not thrilled by their new acquisition. But she did agree that it wasn't their fault and that at least Itachi's break from cover had helped them with Orochimaru. She also muttered about how she would have called Itachi back right-away if she had known his medical condition. Katsuyu must have informed her about that waved the whole subject away with a well manicured hand and asked for their reports. She patiently sat through the entire debrief and hummed in interest upon learning that they had meddled with Kazekageship and given Temari political advices.

Once everyone was done reporting, she gave Gai, his team and Shikaku their leave, and then and barked "Let him in" at the door.

A slender and pale-skinned boy with a ridiculous, midriff baring top walked in obediently and stood at attention.

"This is Sai." Tsunade rumbled. "One of the reformed ROOT kids. Thankfully, with his artistically oriented skill-set, he has managed to retain some personality, as art is something that does require and help preserve individuality. Inoichi has vetted him thoroughly, and deemed him trustworthy, redeemable and loyal. As such, he will be part of an experiment in re-integrating the genin-to chunin aged ROOT operatives, and your team happens to have an open spot."

Kakashi blinked in surprise. What about Naruto? They were supposed to get him back, weren't they?

"If the experiment proves successful, we are considering grafting most active Jounin-genin cells with an additional young ROOT. Give them teamwork and camaraderie, as well as involved jounin support to help them reform themselves. I have also implemented a partnership program for ex-ROOTs. They are now paired with another ex-operative, for emotional support and to have someone who does understand their unique difficulties and empathize with them. His is named Ruu."

That was Naruto's cover identity. The kids also recognized it, judging by how their eyes lit up.

"Ruu just came back home from a long undercover mission and is the subject of another experiment of signing onto my Summons Contract to use them as a sort of emotional support animal. He is, however, not yet vetted or ready to be sent out of Konoha on missions. But when he is... Well. Your team will still only be three person strong instead of the upcoming standard of four genins a team, so he might very-well be folded onto Team 7."

Oh. Alright. an additional plot to obscure Naruto's identity. A plausible reason for his inclusion and for having Team 7 interact with him before that inclusion happened.

Tsunade then slid her hand along the desk surface and activated the Hokage office's privacy seals. "Now, as for the real reason why you get your own ROOT first... Sai is the best one I found. Well, the best one Inoichi found. He still generally lacks personality, and you will have to work on that, but he isn't as brainwashed as he could be. Art, all that. And so he has been briefed on the true reason for his placement. Naruto has already met him and they are friends... After a fashion that leaves space for how traumatizing ROOT training is. He is your accomplice in this, and you can talk freely about it with him."

Sai nodded shortly. "I am comprehensively trained in keeping secrets." He declared formally.

That was... an egregious understatement of what being a trained ROOT operative entailed.

"And Inoichi validated him for this." Kakashi confirmed.

"Yes." Tsunade answered firmly. "It is a risk, of course, any additional person in the scheme is a risk. But I estimated the added alibi to be worth that risk. As you know, Naruto being undercover has no meaning at all if the entire village suspect that he is Ruu. Sai being in your team to give you a valid reason to talk to Ruu will strengthen the secret more than it puts it at risk."

Aiko nodded at his side.

Sakura and Sasuke followed after. "I guess we can use our pre-made excuses with Sai just as well as with Na- Ruu." Sakura stated.

"Fuck Danzo, anyway." Sasuke huffed, crossing his arms.

"He had such a hard life! We need to protect him and support him." Sakura chirped with a brisk nod.

Sai starred at them incredulously. Tsunade chuckled and deactivated the privacy seal.

"Well, Team 7. Here, you have been all briefed up. Please take a good care of your new team-member. I will be checking on your progress periodically. I do hope that your results are encouraging, since you are the pilot project for our best bet at rehabilitating our mistreated but no less loyal shinobi who were so egregiously abused by Danzo. Sasuke? I will also be keeping you informed on the Itachi situation. As is your right as his Clan Head."

They nodded and turned to the door.

Aiko waved Sai forth and nudged him into the correct place on the genin formation so they could walk out looking like a team.

It was a bit difficult, emotionally, for Kakashi to add Sai to the Hatake Compound's wards. He didn't know the boy. But he didn't have anywhere else to go. Or at least he couldn't go somewhere else and still feel welcomed and included in the team.

It might not be important right-away, seeing as he was still largely ROOT-emotionless. But it wouldn't be conductive to progress in his mindset either.

Kakashi still remembered Tenzo's first years out of ROOT. Treating Sai like a person would help him start to act like one.

"We usually sleep all together on my bed." He told the boy. "But if you don't feel comfortable with it yet, there is a bed in Naruto's room, and I'm sure he wouldn't mind you using it. We will see about adding you your own room, since it looks like you're with us to stay."

"He could take my room." Sasuke put in. "I sleep in your room when I'm here, and I'll probably take a house or an apartment in the Uchiha compound with Itachi, so I can go there if I want intimacy."

Aiko patted his shoulder in approval, and Kakashi nodded. "Alright. Then I guess you can take Sasuke's room if you don't want to sleep with us. But you're welcome to join us. Sleeping in a group is an important bonding process for my Clan. But you don't have to feel pressured to participate. You have plenty of time to get used to us."

Sai tilted his head sideways. "You want me to bond with you?" He asked blandly.

"Hmm. Yes. You are under my care now. I know that, of course, but Wild Clan Instincts are a crutch in acting the part, for me. Hatake adopt children easily enough; up to a certain point. Seeing what being a Jounin Sensei is about, this informal adoption is a an advantage in taking good care of my genins. Especially since Naruto and Sasuke are orphans and Sakura's parents are... Not ideal. As far as I know, you don't have a family to call your own either?"

Sai nodded, still looking a bit poleaxed. "But... You'd adopt me? Just like that?"

Kakashi tilted his head. "Yes? Inoichi deemed you trustworthy. You are a child. And I need to add you to my team workably. Pack adoption makes you more akin to an adopted younger sibling, rather than a child of my own. And Wolf Packs are modulable by nature. You striking out on your own at a latter date wouldn't hurt me, it's a natural part of life for youngsters to go out in the world and found their own packs. As an Hatake, I have instincts to care for my younger Pack members. Having you as one will allow me better instinctual insight on your feelings and needs. I think it will be helpful, because ROOT conditioning will likely make the signs muddled."

Aiko had her 'I'm so proud of you' face on.

Yes, he knew. He was doing much better at being emotionally open. The egregious number of pups he had unwittingly acquired did help him get in a better mind-space.

Sai looked at his feet and fidgeted a little. "I think I'd prefer to sleep on my own... For now."

"Alright." Sasuke nodded. "I'll grab a few scrolls and pack up my things so you can take my room."

Of course, the scrolls he grabbed were blank, and he wrote the sealing array himself before dragging Sai to his new room.

Kakashi was proud of his kids.

He would need to invite Tenzo soon. He might be able to help Sai.

After all, Tsunade was right. It wasn't the boy's fault that he was abducted and brainwashed by Danzo. He deserved to be helped.

Sai took them to meet his 'ex-ROOT buddy' two days later. It was a good thing that this meeting happened 'under Inoichi's supervision' and not in public, because none of the kids were all that successful in pretending they'd never met before.

Thankfully, they would have several more private meetings to fine-tune their pretense and set up enough of an official acquaintance to justify their ease with 'Ruu'.

And they then would be able to pass Ruu's un-ROOT-like personality on him being an infiltrator and needing to be less weird to avoid raising suspicion. It would explain him being more at ease with Sai's team than Sai himself.

Teams Asuma and Kurenai came back about two weeks after them.

It turned out that the actress they were escorting in the Land of Snow was in fact the legitimate princess of the place, and they had helped her install herself as Daimyo. And became movie-stars in the process. Also, the Land of Snow had been renamed the Land of Spring.

A very eventful mission. And less of a date mission for Asuma and Kurenai in the end, though they got to dress up fancy at the coronation.

The genins that had wormed their way into Kakashi's Pack generally were quite welcoming of Sai, though Aiko had to set him right on a few interpersonal matters. Like his use of nickname, which he went about completely wrong.

"A book. That's it? No cross-referencing? No observation. You just read a book and applied what it said?" Aiko asked, voice full of disbelief.

Sai blinked at her. "Yes."

"Alright, you know what, you will run all of your reference books by me from now on. And also the ones you've used so far. I will not abide by having a student who is absolutely off-base on interpersonal relationship. My reputation as an infiltration specialist in on the line there."

Ah. Making things about her professional pride, since Sai still lacked the personal drive to want to improve.

"Come here, lesson time!" Aiko sniffed and whisked Sai away from the still stunned Lee who had just gotten nicknamed annoying, much to Shikamaru's amusement.

On the month mark, she decided to tackle the fact that Sai still kept his distance from the Team.

"In any case, you were given to me to teach, and I am a Seduction Specialist. I refuse to have any student of mine be stupidly vulnerable to my own Specialty."

The black-haired boy tilted his head to the side.

"You're touch starved, and that definitely needs to go sooner rather than later. People who have a severe lack of human contact tend to turn to sex much more easily. Lust it is the best way the body has to trick someone into initiating close contact with others to satisfy it's craving for human warmth. Any good seduction specialist is trained to spot people who are touch starved and target them first. A few gentle brushes and an inviting smile, and most of the time, nothing more is needed to get your mark to follow you into a secluded corner."

"I... Don't, though." Sai blinked.

"You don't yet and you're fifteen. You might turn out to be completely uninterested in sex when puberty sets in fully, but you might also not, so we're fixing that before it becomes a problem. I get that forcing touch and intimacy on you will have the exact opposite effect to what we are looking to achieve, but I do need you to start putting some work in on reversing the touch aversion you've been conditioned to have. Little by little, in small increments, but we need to start without waiting."

Sai pinched his lips and looked down. "What do you want me to do, then, sensei?" He asked in his emotionless voice.

"Come sit next to me, I'll show you." Aiko ordered.

Sai sat.

She shuffled and touched her knee to his. "That's how we start." She gently informed him. "I won't ask you to do it all the time. It would do more harm than good. You can, and should, move away from the touch if it starts to feel like too much. But I will ask that you do seek some small touches from me or the Team a few times a day, even if you don't really feel like it at the time. Hold it a few seconds, and then you can move away if it gets to be too much."

Sai nodded, and then shifted away from her.

"Very good." Aiko praised. "We are working on your touch aversion. It doesn't mean training yourself to bear through it when it feels bad. It means convincing your mind that it is not bad, and won't hurt you. We all know that you have your issues with touch. So we're the safest ones to start practicing with."

Sasuke and Sakura nodded seriously.

"Once you get used to touching us without anything bad coming from it, it will become easier for you to accept other touches too. For now, the goal is for you to touch us regularly and have nothing bad come from it, until you unlearn your aversion to it. So sitting close enough to have knees touching, or standing shoulder to shoulder for now. When you're used to these, we'll get into more involved things. Don't set yourself timed objectives. It will happen as it happens. Putting pressure on yourself for when it should be done will just hinder your progress. Thankfully, we are still at the very start of your puberty, so we have plenty of time to fix your vulnerability."

Sai nodded hesitantly and tentatively put his hand on Aiko's shoulder for two seconds, frowning, before removing it. "Like that?"

"Yes. Like that." Aiko praised. "Don't force yourself to do it too often. Making it into a chore will not help. But do try to do it at least once a day, alright?"

Sai nodded, looked at her appraisingly, and then fled to his room.

Aiko looked pleased enough with it.

Notes:

Oh, look! A Wild Sai has appeared!

Chapter 97: Aiko's copy-cats (end of re-settling)

Summary:

Aiko should have seen the imitations coming.

Notes:

This time, I mistyped Kakashi as Mamashi. XD so funny!

Chapter Text

Things got... Busy for Aiko.

She had never expected to become the authority for anything. Truly. She had, up to a few months earlier, been working on being okay with staying a mediocre, middle of the road Chunin for her entire career.

Kakashi changed that.

More than she ever expected he would.

For instance, she now accompanied Sasuke every time he went to visit Itachi in his highly medicalized T&I room, where his psychological state was being assessed (and fixed) to make sure that he would be safe to released into the wild. (For a definition of wild that mostly meant "allowed to roam within the Uchiha Compound at will, and under escort outside of it").

Her, though? She spent the time Sasuke was visiting his brother with various profilers who were assessing her personality traits. Not because of suspicion. No. But because they were looking to establish a baseline on why she had been so helpful in making Team 7 so wildly healthy and successful. She was the pilot in a new measure Tsunade was looking to implement.

Since Sai was progressing so well, Tsunade was turning the initial excuse for grafting Sai into Team 7 into truth. And what better moment to implement the use of... emotional-support-chunins than right when she was about to dump a bunch of traumatized ex-ROOT kids onto a bunch of unready Jounins?

On top of being used as a guideline for what traits were helpful (accounting for the fact that different Jounins might need different type of aid, and that there were other ways to be helpful than being exactly like Aiko was), she was also consulting with Inoichi and Shikaku on how best to make the system work without creating resentment that would hinder the stated objective of helping the emotional state of Jounins and their teams of students.

So far they had gotten a proposal based completely on voluntary participation.

Chunins over a certain age that at least a Yamanaka thought to have sufficient grounding in psychology would be encouraged to come take a suitability test for the role of emotional helper for a Jounin cell. With the understanding that such closeness to a Jounin-sensei would in turn help them brush up their combat skills and give them a leg-up to try for Tokubetsu later on.

On the other hand, any Jounin receiving a new ex-ROOT member would be informed that they could apply for a chunin assistant to help them integrate their new member and solve any inter-personal problems the integration might have caused. This in exchange for also helping the chunin in question brush up their combat skills.

From there, T&I would compare the profiles of the Jounin cells and the available Chunin-help, and matchmake the two parties as best possible. The Jounin cell and their attributed chunin would get a few meetings to get to know one-another, and validate if they felt they were a good match. If they weren't they could tell T&I so, and they would try another match based on the feedback.

It meant that T&I would have to get almost back to wartime manpower, and liaise with Psych. But it was hopefully only going to be so for a few months until they set up a good system. Then the system would likely be handed off to Psych and T&I could return to baseline.

So far the support Chunin were not meant to be integrated to the Jounin cells fully, the way Aiko was, but instead kept as an in-village personal assistance. Though that was liable to change too, and the Jounins would be able to request their chunin-support for missions on a case-by-case basis.

She was also writing the handbook on how to help a young ex-ROOT with touch aversion, emotional repression, and social hang-ups. this too, would need revision and additions as more operative with possibly different hang-ups, or who needed different handling went through, but for the moment, T&I wanted her methods documented so they could be reproduced and cross-referenced.

She was looking forward to having other colleagues with good common sense found and valued for their skills, it would get some heat off of her.

At least they had managed to celebrate Naruto's birthday all together under Inoichi's 'supervision' about a week after returning from Suna.

Unlike Kakashi's birthday, that had to go with minimal celebration, since it occurred during their way back from Suna. She suspected that Kakashi didn't mind it too much. They had done Sasuke's birthday properly before their mission to Suna, and Kakashi still shied away from having things be too much about him.

He had eagerly proposed making Aiko's birthday even more special to make up for his.

His schemes were horribly transparent.

Their genins were already starting to plot on the subject of Sai's birthday celebration. For some reason, Danzo had logged most of his stolen ROOT children's day and year of birth. Possibly just a way to help differentiate them. Or just to know their ages at any given time.

Either way, his birthday was on November 25 and he would be turning sixteen. The children were intent on making it a special day for the boy who had not had his existence celebrated in all his time in ROOT.

Sasuke wasn't idle while waiting for Itachi to be let out.

He set up a small house for him and Itachi in the Uchiha Compound. (A new house, built somewhere he had torched after discovering the truth of the Uchiha Massacre, but not on the old Clan Head House's emplacement, so Itachi wouldn't have to live somewhere that would remind him of what he got forced to do.)

Sasuke also took it upon himself to tell Aiko's stoat Summons the whole truth about Itachi's lack of choice in the Uchiha Massacre, and the participation and continued survival of an apparent third Uchiha for it. An Uchiha that pretended to be Madara but probably wasn't.

He also informed Ayaka, and his adopted Uchiha about that same truth. The new Uchiha were largely sympathetic to Itachi's circumstances. The fact they were civilians probably helped them see a thirteen years old under incredible pressure would have been very likely to act unwisely when put in front of an impossible choice. Sasuke had shared Itachi's sweet tooth with them, and he had confided in Aiko that he had a suspicion Itachi would end up putting on a lot of weight in the upcoming months.

She also ended up playing wingman for Kakashi.

They had gone out to a bar to celebrate Asuma and Kurenai's engagement (apparently the actress/Daimyo they had been escorting had played matchmaker during the mission because she thought they went well together). Kakashi had been sending glances toward Aoba often enough that Aiko had started needling him about actually talking to the man. Kakashi had made a bullshit excuse about explaining his hangup with scent, so Aiko had pulled him out of his seat while assuring him that she would help him explain.

It was probably a good thing that she was there for this discussion, because it turned out that Aoba thought the two of them were a couple, so having her assurance that no, they were not involved romantically, and no, she didn't mind Kakashi being interested in him did help Kakashi out a lot. Aoba ended up tentatively agreeing to test the scent thing out. He looked a bit flustered at having Kakashi's attention in that way.

Aiko ended up taking Genma to bed (to his bed, not hers) shortly after Kakashi exited the bar with Aoba for the short date the Tokubetsu had demanded before doing anything more involved.

Genma was really good in bed, but as an assassin with some seduction training, he did cause some of the same problems that sleeping with a fellow Seduction Specialist caused. At least she had enough personal trust in him not to cramp Kakashi's style by needing his presence to fall asleep afterward.

The genins were getting better at Intel gathering. Unsurprisingly, they showed it by pestering Kakashi and Aiko about their night out. Sai's bland facial expression gave Aiko a decent guess as to how they got so much better at keeping themselves abreast of their Senseis' private lives.

Well, she wasn't going to get upset at her students getting better at spying or learning information through gossip.

Also, she was not defenseless in the face of nosy genins. and she had much less shame around sex than a trio of teenagers. In the end, the kids begged her to shut up when she started elaborating on kink etiquette and safewords. Kakashi spared her a grateful look for turning the kids off of asking him about his own sex life.

Sai was much less deterred by the spontaneous lecture on safe-sane-consensual that his more sex-shy teammates. (Admittedly, only Sasuke didn't want to hear about sex. Sakura's problem was more that it was awkward to get this type of lecture from a sister-figure and sensei) But then again... Aiko didn't mind teaching him more about sex. And the bases for leaning seduction were all about body language and reading your mark's cues. Things Sai would find useful for everyday social life.

Sasuke observed the two of them during the newly integrated seduction lessons with a plotting glint in his eyes.

Hopefully his new devious plan was harmless.

Sasuke's new devious Plan had been to get him and Sai battle corsets that matched Aiko's.

His reasoning was that if Sakura and Naruto were going to imitate Kakashi's mask, he and Sai got to imitate Aiko.

...

Well...

At least the armored corset was a step-up from the uncovered midriff.

Also, Sasuke and Sai did look good in men's corsets. And it gave them added team uniformity. Also, they made Sai and Sasuke look even more alike. They already had pale skin, black hair and black eyes, but adding identical clothes made them look eerily similar. ... It might become a tactical advantage if they learned to use it right.

She resigned herself to the ribbing about her genins dressing like her.

Especially when she caught Sakura's pout at not getting included in the matching corset scheme.

She had a feeling that when 'Ruu' got folded into the team, they would find themselves with four corseted, masked genins. The kids lived to embarrass their senseis and loved to match.

Oh, well. It was good for team bonding.

But Kakashi shouldn't laugh at her. He was next, and his hilarity at her predicament wasn't going to make her sympathetic to his own plight when that came around to bite him in the ass.

She was right. Sakura got herself a matching corset of her own within a week.

Worse, the assembled kunoichis of their group decided that it was an excellent idea. And Ino and Tenten followed suit.

She was cursed.

Cursed with adoring genins.

Oh, and by the way, the Sato scroll had started getting deployed in it's 'make it fail and have foreign shinobi lose weeks analyzing useless data' function. At least very few people knew it was named after her. She did not need fame. She didn't.

Sai's birthday came around, and he looked adorably (heart-breakingly) surprised at having a party thrown for him and receiving gifts.

He got mainly art supplies, though Ino threw in makeup, (it's drawing, but on the face!) Hinata gave him a book of pressed flowers, and Kiba got him a pair of boots that looked like Aiko's to 'complete the look' (she was going to get back on that brat).

About a week after Sai's birthday, Itachi was finally released from his T&I stay, with twice weekly visits at the hospital to monitor his lung and eyes, and an appointment a week in Psych.

Sasuke was a bit preoccupied with him for a while, so Kakashi appropriated Sakura for Hatake training, and Aiko took Sai to her old brothel for field observation on Seduction.

Interestingly, watching others be free with touch in a setting where he wasn't expected to participate (they took a corner booth in the receiving room) helped the boy rationalize the whole touching thing just as well as their previous slow acclimatizing work. He was progressing by leaps and bounds, and his facial expressions were gaining in natural.

Chapter 98: New opportunity (Kiri Exams)

Summary:

Kakashi makes his way to Kiri with his horrible gremlins.

Notes:

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Chapter Text

Word came from Kiri that the Misukage had been deposed and replaced. They claimed that they were out of the Bloody Mist period, and as such, renewed the invitation for the Chunin Exam, with an assurance that no candidate or escort would be harmed.

There were still a couple of months before the start of the exams, and Kiri started the Exams. And Kiri did the Exams by teams of 4, so they needed to reorganize the teams and do some training because Kiri was very different from the Land of Fire.

With Shikamaru and Neji promoted to chunin, they had ten genins in their group of close-knit students. Which didn't divide by four.

Tenten and Lee were all for giving less favored genins their chance to be promoted, and so they had opted to go and recruit a couple of extra team-members in the Genin corps. It meant that they had eight genins between Kakashi's, Kurenai and Asuma's teams.

The more obvious solution was to keep Kakashi and Kurenai's teams whole and re-dispatch Chouji and Ino (Ino wanted to be on Sakura's team).

However, with Sakura being a ninken Summoner and Sasuke a wolf Summoner, Kiba would also be a good fit for them, as they would find communication easier. It was good to put all the chances on their side, since they wouldn't be on home-grounds. Sai could handle long-range with his Ink beasts, Sakura had mid-range and Sasuke and Kiba could handle short to mid-range.

In that configuration, The other team would be Ino, Chouji, Hinata and Shino, which was a well balanced team, with close, mid and long-range.

'Ruu' was not yet included into the team and wouldn't be coming along, it was best to let him adapt to his new limitations as a fighter, since he had to remove things from his arsenal in order not to be recognized.

Due to Asuma's responsibilities, he couldn't travel out to Kiri, so the new Ino-Shino-Chouji-Hinata would be under Kurenai.

Tenten and Lee picked up a seventeen years old boy, Hiroto who had the chakra reserves to be a ninjutsu specialist but lacked jutsus to live up to the position. Something they could work on with Kakashi's help. As well as an eighteen years old Kunoichi, Mitaki who had strong bases on genjutsu, that Kurenai, Sakura or Aiko could help her build on until the Exams.

Both Genin Corps members were initially wary, suspecting they were picked up to be throwaway members of the team, but as Tenten, Lee, Neji, Gai and the members of the three other teams kept pouring time and effort into their training, they relaxed and got less distant.

This would still probably be their one chance to make Chunin, so some stress remained.

They celebrated Aiko's, then Hinata's and Gai's birthday, but Shino's had to be spent on the road to Kiri. Which meant Aiko wasn't there, since the Chunin exam invitations were for a jounin sensei and four genins, no place for chunin assistant senseis.

There were two other Konoha teams besides Kakashi's genin cluster. Kakashi knew the Jounin Senseis. They weren't friends, but he respected them as colleagues. The kids tried to get friendly with the new faces, but the older genins stayed a bit stand-offish.

They encountered a pair of familiar faces at the Gates of Kiri.

Kakashi would have appreciated it more if the first thing Zabuza did wasn't challenging him to a rematch.

He tiredly proposed postponing that spar to later.

Ugh. Kakashi didn't want to do it though.

Hmm. Maybe... "How about sparring Gai instead? You mentioned being interested in my Maito rival, didn't you?"

Sicking Gai on the swordsman was a bit mean, but it bought him some breathing room.

Haku was still kind of bland and self-effacing, but he was polite and nice, so Sakura easily started small talk with him.

Kiri wasn't Konoha. For the first task, the team were let in one by one in the academy class with a pool in it, and tasked to catch three very fast fishes, marked with a paint spot on their back, among a school of fishes of the same breed. And all the fishes had to still be alive by the end, both the captured ones and the decoys.

It might look like a joke, but it did cut down the number of contestants quite handily.

They had even made the test harder by having fifteen paint-marked fishes, in five different colors. They told each team their color one full hour before they were let in, to test both their memory of mission parameters, and whether they would link the color they were told in advance with the context to guess what was expected of them once they entered the pool classroom.

It was much tamer than what most would have thought for Kiri, but that was probably a plus for the new Mizukage. A way to show they had cut back on gratuitous cruelty.

One of the Konoha teams failed. Kakashi's own team almost got disqualified because Sasuke saw the fishes and thought no water would make them easier to catch. Thankfully, Sakura kept him from cooking all the fishes alive and caught the three needed fishes with her chakra strings.

The second stage was more brutal, but then again, it always was. It was a battle type test, in teams, like usual. Every team had each member given a token with different point values, for a total of thirty by team, and the candidates needed to gather a hundred points. They didn't have to defeat the whole team to gain new tokens and could just ambush stray people instead.

Just to add in some Kiri spice, and possibly to cause some mayhem in teams from other villages, there was the possibility for a single genin, without their team, to progress from this stage with only thirty points. So the Exam rewarded turning on your team to steal all their tokens for yourself and then booking it to the checkpoint. It also discouraged the teams from entrusting all the tokens to a single member, or to hide them in a safe space while hunting. Mistrust was a powerful tool.

In a way, it was a smart move from Kiri. While genins might get nearsighted due to the promise of an easier promotion, their Villages would want to sideline people who tend to betray comrades due to greed. Putting a situation where the genins would be very tempted to betray their people was pretty much doing all the participating Villages a favor by stress-testing their Chunin candidates for them.

Plus, a team missing one member, even due to betrayal could still advance. But it would need the hundred points to do so, even with one less member in it. And if they had all their tokens stolen by one single unscrupulous teammate, gathering the needed hundred points would get much harder.

At least Kakashi didn't have to worry about his team resorting to back-stabbing.

In fact, his team went one better and joined up with Kurenai's team for coordinated ambushes.

It was only logical, since ninety points didn't make a round number of teams to take down. If they guarded all of their points, they needed to grab the tokens off two full teams, plus ten extra points from somewhere. With two teams allying, they only needed to grab the tokens of five teams between them. And they would have an extra ten points they might use as a bargaining chip later on.

They met Gai's team and decided to use safety in numbers to go back to the checkpoint without getting ambushed by other teams who might think right next to the checkpoint was the best place to get a lot of points quickly.

Predictably, very few wanted to try their hand against a twelve genins strong unit. And those that did try it, most likely based on the age of the kids making them look weaker than they were, were beaten up soundly.

There were thirty six candidate remaining by the end of the Second Stage.

Seven full teams (three of those from Konoha, which was a credit to them, even if it meant the other Konoha team that wasn't his kids hadn't made it, as well as two Kumo teams, one from Kiri and one from Frost).

Five betrayals (from Kiri, Sound and Grass. Kakashi was suspecting that the Misukage was very upset that her own village did such a poor showing, two of hers willing to betray their teams was opposite to what she was aiming to show) and two teams who had understood they wouldn't be finding the full hundred points and had elected one of theirs to take all the team's tokens and progress to the next stage on their own (two from Sky, from the same team, that had only gathered sixty points, and one from Tanigakure).

Kiri only gave them two weeks for training before the third stage. They didn't bother with preliminary matches, though. Partly because they had cut the number of candidates back by quite a bit, and because they weren't adverse to having a longer tournament time. More time to let spectators explore Kiri and see that it was much less bloodthirsty than it was reputed to be.

During these two weeks of training, Gai did spar with Zabuza, and unfortunately, so did Kakashi. But at least he was protected by the Exam truce, so he could throw the match without possibly dying for it. Hopefully a solid win would get Zabuza to drop the subject.

Possibly not. Zabuza looked pretty suspicious of his easy win.

And wining because his opponent didn't give it his all didn't seem to please him.

Oh, well.

Since the kids were way more ready to fly on their own, they didn't spend the two weeks planning how to throw their tournament matches, but instead spied on their opponent's training and formulated winning strategies.

Sasuke's first opponent was a young Kumo Kunoichi, with their typical Raiton jutsus supplemented by Genjutsu. Which was quite unlucky for her. She was very badly matched against a lightning-fire natured Uchiha who had the sharingan.

Sakura's match was a twenty-ish shinobi from the Hidden Sky Village. He had a glider and used wind jutsus to fly, so Sakura wouldn't have the high-ground, even with her chakra threads, but it didn't discourage her. As she said, it only meant she had to disable the glider somehow to be the one with control of the air.

Sai's opponent was from Frost and favored twin swords. Not the best match for his ink construct, that weren't resistant to slash injuries, but Sai was quite handy with a tanto himself, and Aiko lent her one of her spare wakizashi to give him a bit more reach, and Kakashi helped him touch up his Kenjutsu with a slightly longer blade. Coming from ROOT, Sai's fighting skills were nothing to sneeze at anyway.

Kiba was up against a Tanigakure shinobi on the older side of genin ages. A poison user who favored senbons, and also seemed to favor genjutsu in order to nail his enemies more easily. It gave Sakura and Sasuke excellent reason to use Kiba and Akamaru as practice target for genjutsu, since they needed to get excellent at noticing and dispelling genjutsu to avoid ending up poisoned.

The matches weren't assigned randomly. Not fully. Kiri had agreed not to make teams from the same Village fight each-other on the first match, and no two members of the same team on the second one.

Kakashi knew who everyone else in their group would be fighting, but the Jounins had agreed to each focus on their own team for the training period unless one of their students needed specialist guidance that fell outside the perspective of their sensei. (Meaning that Kakashi tutored Hiroto in ninjutsu, and Kurenai helped Mitaki with her Genjutsu, in exchange of having Gai help out with Sakura's and Hinata's taijutsu.)

Two weeks went over fast, and they soon escorted the genins to the arena.

Notes:

The thirty-six candidates going to third stage:
Konoha: 12
Kumo: 8
Kiri: 6
Frost: 4
Sound: 2
Grass: 1
Sky: 2
Tani:1

Chapter 99: Haku's perspective

Notes:

I managed to sleep 28hours in a row, which set me way back for the NaNoWriMo. This chapter is part of my effort to catch back up to my wordcount...

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

Haku hadn't been entered into the Chunin Exams. Mei-sama had deemed it a waste of his talent. She wanted to keep him in reserve for the next one. In six months, Tanigakure would be hosting the Chunin Exams. Since Tani was a small village, and mostly neutral as a result, as well as in a much more central location, there would be a lot more spectators there. More participants, too. And more Kages in the viewing box.

It was the best place to showcase an excellent genin and use him as a village promotion tool. Plus, his official rank didn't truly matter either way. He was Zabuza-sama's apprentice. He went along on Zabuza-sama's missions. No one cared if he was a genin or not, and most accepted his place as the long-time apprentice to one of the Seven Swordsmen to be more than enough assurance of his skills.

It meant that Haku would see the tournament from the VIP seats, next to his master, and not from the contestants' box.

Even their seats was about politics. Mei-sama wanted the VIPs to see her one experimented loyal Swordsman. And since Zabuza didn't have the most personable personality, Haku was with him to talk to the important clients in his stead. He was pretty, soft-spoken and polite. Plus, anyone who talked to him than and came to the Tanigakure Exams would get to tell everyone else that they knew him when he hopefully won the entire tournament there.

Haku was truly interested in the matches, though. The contract in Wave had been a turning point for him and Zabuza. They had never gotten so close to getting killed than when facing Hatake Kakashi and his team. And while the Chunin that had killed Gato and handed them a bunch of cash wasn't there, Haku wanted to see what their students were like after a full year.

They had apparently swapped the loud blonde with a black-haired boy who was dressed very similarly to the Chunin Aiko. And the pink-haired girl went by Hatake for the Exams. And the Uchiha boy now wore a man's corset. Haku was kind of eyeing the getup speculatively. Sure, he liked to dress in traditional kimonos, but there was something to be said for the corset look.

He might use one as an obi replacement. It would kind of look like a wide woman's obi, but less restrictive. And he would hopefully be able to stash just as many senbons in it.

The way Zabuza was looking at him, he probably knew what Haku was thinking.

But Aiko-san had been right. Zabuza did like Haku being a person rather than a tool. He had discovered it during their year playing pirates and smugglers for the Mist rebellion with the yacht they appropriated at Gato's death. Haku had started with small things. He spoiled their pet bunny a little more. He'd looked at slightly more expensive fabric when replacing his kimono. He'd expressed preferences when eating. Each time, Zabuza got that soft look in his eyes and gave him what he wanted.

It had been eye-opening.

Haku wished that Aiko-san could have come for the Exams, so he could talk with her a little more about how to keep getting more 'person'. Maybe there would be other opportunities. Or maybe Haku would figure it out on his own.

But he did want to copy that corset look. Uchiha Sasuke and 'Sai' looked really good in them. He could get one made in Obi fabric... Lace it with an obijime and loop it around the corset to imitate a traditional look... Add an obidome ornament at the front of the obijime cord...

Sure, he would be even more likely to be mistaken for a girl, but he had never minded that. It was kind of fun, telling people he was a boy and watching their faces go weird.

He had politely stalked Hatake Kakashi during their two weeks of training, and it appeared that he was involved in the training of all twelve Konoha Genins.

With eighteen matches for the first Round, each pair of contestants was given half an hour for their match

There were nine matches in the morning, from a quarter to nine in the morning until twelve and a half, with a fifteen minutes pause at the two hour mark for toilet break then one hour of recess for lunch, then four more matches until three and a half in the afternoon, then another fifteen minutes intermission, then three more matches until a quarter to six.

Haku was to sit through all of the matches next to Zabuza-sama and make nice with the rich clients.

The second match had one of the Konoha genins that wasn't from Kakashi-san's team, Tenten. She was up against a Kiri genin (one that hadn't betrayed his own team), Kouta. Kouta was good at Suiton, which should have given him advantage in the Kiri arena that was half ocean water.

It turned out that the weapons mistress didn't just have her spear and throwing weapons going for her, but that she was also a pretty good Suiton user herself she didn't use big flashy jutsus, but she always managed to use just enough water in just the right jutsu to counter her opponent's attacks.

Haku could almost physically feel Zabuza-sama's interest getting piked looking at the Kunoichi fight. He understood that. Haku wasn't primed to become Zabuza's successor as the Kubikiribocho's next wielder. The beheading sword just didn't fit Haku's style. And this girl did have what it took. A propensity to swing a huge weapon around, Suiton affinity, and showmanship.

He heard Zabuza-sama mutter "shame she's from Konoha" which... Summed things up quite well.

Tenten-san won, two minutes from the end of the match, by making the cliff behind her opponent explode and fall on him, then using his distraction in dodging the falling rocks to knock him out. In her defense, she then dragged the boy out of the danger zone rather than just letting him get crushed by the falling rocks. It went very well with Konoha's image as good-doers.

The very next match was the new member of Kakashi-san's team, Sai. Against Takumi-san from Frost. And it ended up being almost a straight Kenjutsu fight. Sai-san was very fast, and could use ink constructs as flying mounts.

The match ended fast with a spiraling drop-down manoever that almost took off his opponent's arm, following which, Sai-san wrapped his legs around the Frost ninja's neck, overbalanced them both so they fell on their back, and leveled a kunai at Takumi's throat. The shorter match worked well to give the watchers time to get up, stretch their legs, go to the toilet and buy snacks.

Fourth match was a Kumo Kunoichi against a Sound Shinobi. The Sound Shinobi won, but he lost a leg on the process.

Fifth match was a Kumo Kunoichi against Mihiro from Kiri. They fought for almost the entire half-hour they had. Mihiro-san won in the end, but he was quite battered by the fight.

Six match was the Konoha Genin that Kakashi-san spent time tutoring despite not being in his team, Hiroto, against Itaru, from Sound. Hiroto-san lost, but he made a very good showing as a ninjutsu specialist. Plus, the Sound shinobi was a solid Chunin level, who had unique sound-based weaponry and jutsus. As well as a sneaky perception impacting genjutsu. It was to Hiroto-san's credit that he didn't lose any limbs, and managed to nail his opponent with a few solid hits in earth-style and fire-style jutsus, and then conceded before he could sustain a career-ending injury.

Seventh was Aburame Shino against Taito, from Kiri. It should have been a very unfavorable match-up for the bug user. Water jutsus and bugs wasn't the best match. And it looked to hold true. Until thin lines if Kikaichus scuttled themselves up to draw a design around Taito's feet in living insects, freezing him in place long enough for the rest of his hive to drain him of chakra.

That. That was terrifying. Insects standing in as the ink for Fuuinjutsu, drawing a seal on the fly.

The civilians didn't quite grasp why it was impressive. But the ninjas in the audience definitely did. Fuuinjutsu was terrifying of it's own right. And being able to draw just any seal one wanted to, at a distance, and also adapt the seal used at will at a moment's notice? Shino-san had just made himself a name to be remembered.

Right next was a Kumo shinobi against a Sky shinobi. The Kumo candidate won, which wasn't a surprise, Kumo was one of the big villages, and Sky wasn't. The Sky candidate did make a good showing of himself, though maybe not enough to gain his promotion to Chunin.

Last before lunch break was another Kumo shinobi against a Kunoichi from Frost, who managed to surprise everyone by actually winning against her opponent from a bigger village.

Haku used the lunch break to decompress from the constant pandering to somewhat condescending rich clients who also tended to mildly sexually harass him. Zabuza-sama also needed the breather, because he did not take kindly to people being creepy to Haku.

The first match after lunch Was Inuzuka Kiba, from Kakashi-san's team (obviously a member of another team that got split and re-stitched to Kakashi's team for the four genin condition of the Kiri Exam), against Yutaka, from Tanigakure. Yutaka-san was a fellow senbon user, but seeing how Kiba and his ninken went out of their way to dodge every single needle, Haku was pretty sure that the Tani shinobi was a poison user.

The Inuzuka genin tricked his opponent into dismissing his ninken as stupid, by having it stumble and seemingly get nailed by a poisoned senbon.

Except, the senbon had simply glanced the dog's fur and stayed stuck into the hair rather than actually pierced through it's skin. It just pretended to be knocked out, until their opponent stopped paying him attention, then they used a transformation technique that made them both look like a slightly beastly human, and the ninken jumped the Tani shinobi from behind as he was focused on trying to pin the Kiba in front of him with his senbons before he did whatever he wanted to use his transformation was for.

Inuzuka Kiba-san wouldn't be able to make his opponents dismiss his ninken again later, but it was a good use of a ninja classic while that was still possible.

Second match after lunch was Akimichi Chouji against Raiya from Kumo, who, very unsurprisingly, seeing his name, was a Raiton specialist.

Apparently, Akimichi could use their fat stores to insulate themselves against lighting. And they could also make themselves gigantic. Raiya-san got flattened by an immense fist.

That was a fairly short match.

Also, it explained why the Yamanaka-Nara-Akimichi triad had gotten famous for terrifying Kumo shinobi during the Third Shinobi War.

Next Match was one Haku (and Zabuza-sama) was really interested in. Hatake Sakura against Akito from Sky.

At the start of the match, Akito-san took to the air with his glider and a wind jutsu.

Sakura used that time to summon a Ninken. A small, lanky thing with a really long snout. And then she jumped up into the air, toward Akito. When Akito swerved to avoid the projectiles she threw at the wings of his glider, she hurled her small dog at him.

The small greyhound landed on the top of the glider and shredded the wings with it's teeth and claws, then unsummoned itself as the Sky shinobi started plummeting to the ground.

Once her opponent was grounded, Sakura started to shine.

It was obvious that she was an acrobatic fighter. She was found of jumping way up, doing acrobatics mid-air, and showering her enemy with waves of projectiles. A couple of minutes into the fight, when it became obvious that her opponent kept blowing her thrown weapons off-course with wind jutsu, the scattered weaponry lifted up and started to revolve around her in a sharp-edged tornado. And then she charged in, with her rotating weaponry and brutal taijutsu.

That put her opponent on his back foot. And then a set of bolas materialized behind her back, made half a turn around her, and tangled Akito up just as she threw an uppercut with her bladed gauntlets right at his throat.

The two claws of her gauntlet stopped just as she had nicked the skin of his neck, but before opening up both of his carotid arteries in one go.

Akito froze, and then conceded defeat.

Sakura-san got a round of applause out of the crowd for her spectacular fight.

After her came Rock Lee. Maito-san's little look-alike student, against Chihiro, from Kumo. Zabuza-sama was very interested about that match too.

Chihiro-san did not get to make an opening move. When the proctor declared the go, Lee-san blurred up, and then Chihiro flew back from a powerful hit to the chest. The young Kumo-nin surrendered right after, sounding wheezy like half of his ribs had broken from the hit. Which was likely exactly what happened.

Lee-san did not get as warm a reception as Sakura-san for his win. Too fast for spectacle. But as far as ninja standards went, instant win was an excellent tactic. Allowed you to move on to another opponent and reduced the risks of getting injured.

The very short match for an almost half-hour recess. Meaning that Haku had to do a lot of small talk.

Next was Shizuku from Kiri against a Frost shinobi. Shizuku-san won. He did have the advantage of home-ground, so it made sense. Not that he didn't make a good showing of himself through the match too.

After that, there was the planned recess.

Next was Yamanaka Ino against Runa from Kiri.

Ino-san had a whip. And senbon. Senbon that Runa-san found the hard way were poisoned. It took a few minutes for the senbons' poison to start acting, but when it did, Ino-san's win was a mere formality. At least Runa got to show off her kenjutsu and Suiton jutsu before getting paralyzed

The next match was an interest point, and not just for Haku and Zabuza. Uchiha Sasuke against Ginka from Kumo. Sasuke-san took exemple on Lee-san and ended his fight within minutes. He intercepted a Raiton jutsu with his lightning sparking sword, threw off a genjutsu with his sharingan eyes, and shunshined at Ginka-san's shoulder to smack her at the back of the neck with the flat side of his katana, and down she went. Clean and fast. Once again, the civilian spectators were disappointed, but he was making a good showing for his Chunin promotion.

After another fairly long wait (and even more being polite to rich sleazebags), Hyuuga Hinata went up against Tentarou from Kumo. She was properly terrifying. Instead of the airy fighting style one might have expected, she went in with powerful punches and kicks. She added replacement jutsu in liberally. Tentarou's loss was sealed when he decided to block a brutal punch, and instead of punching, she activated her doujutsu and slapped lightly at his forearm. The famed Hyuuga tenketsu block, which she hadn't seemed to use at all so far.

Tentarou had to do without that one hand from there, meaning that he couldn't do hand-signs anymore. He then took a brutal kick to the shin, and another chakra block to his other arm's upper arm. Then Hinata-san punched him square in the face, full force, and he went down cold.

The last match of the day was Mitaki of Konoha against Takami, from Kiri. That one devolved into a genjutsu against ninjutsu battle. Takami-san almost never aimed his jutsus or weapons at the right place because of the Genjutsu, but Mitaki-san never managed to capitalize on her genjutsu to actually take her opponent out because Takami-san used a mist-sensing jutsu that told him when something was sneaking up on him too close. These two 'fought' for the full half-hour and were declared a draw. As such, neither would be moving up to the next round.

Since one of the matches of the next day would not be happening, the very end of the Tournament day gave way to an announcement about the changes to the next day's fights.

The next round would be:

Tei, from Frost, against Tenten, of Konoha.

Sai, from Konoha, against Wataru, from Sound.

Mihiro, from Kiri, against Itaru, from Sound.

Aburame Shino, from Konoha, against Katana, from Kumo.

Kio, from Frost, against Inuzuka Kiba, from Konoha.

Akimichi Chouji, from Konoha, against Hatake Sakura, from Konoha.

Rock Lee, from Konoha, against Shizuku, from Kiri.

Uchiha Sasuke, from Konoha, against Yamanaka Ino, from Konoha.

And lastly, an extra match between Hyuuga Hinata and the winner of the very first match, to even up the brackets while still being fair enough to let her opponent rest up nice and long before the second match of the day.

More to the point, Making Hinata-san fight someone from the first bracket meant she wouldn't have to potentially fight Ino-san if she came out winner in her match against Sasuke. And Ino and Hinata were from the same team and couldn't be made to fight each-other on the second round. Unlike Tenten-san, who was from an entirely different team.

Notes:

Please do me the favor of pretending that I came up with appropriate family names for all of the throwaway Kumo, Kiri, Frost, Sky, Grass and Sound shinobi. Just picking first name for them was hard enough.

Chapter 100: Second Round

Summary:

The second day of the tournament dawns

Chapter Text

Kakashi was proud of all his cute little genins. They had all won their first match. Sure their joy about that was a bit clouded over by Hiroto and Mitaki getting knocked off on the first day of the Tournament. But then again, the genin corps member had taken their loss with grace. As Gai pointed out, they might still get promoted despite losing on the first round. That had happened to Shikamaru, after all.

Shikamaru's circumstances were quite special, though. As it stood, they both had shown some skill and the wit to know when to cut their losses, but Mitaki was the only one he felt might get the promotion. For a Genjutsu Specialist, managing to evade attacks and shift other's perspective for a full thirty minutes was enough to qualify as chunin. With the understanding that in field conditions, she would have had the other members of her team pitch in to finish off an enemy she snared in her Genjutsu.

But then again, for this Exam, it was Kiri deciding who got the promotion. With how talented the rest of the Konoha Contestant that had ended up in the finals was, there was a good chance that both Mitaki and Hiroto would be dismissed to "balance' the number of promotions they handed to all the participating Villages.

His own reassurances were a bit more down to earth as a result of this political truth: Their skills had grown a lot over the whole Exam period thanks to the dedicated training. And even if Tenten and Lee kind of carried them through the first and second stage, they had gone through both without becoming a dead-weight to their team. There was a good chance they would be picked first either to re-fill a team that lost a member, or to punctually replace a team-member who had already been promoted on a previous Exam.

Their participation and the fact that they made it all the way to the Tournament would be added to their file, so so long as they kept building on the bases he, Kurenai, Gai and the Genins gave them, they would eventually get somewhere.

Hiroto nodded at his lukewarm encouragement. "That's right." The boy sighed. "We did manage to unstick ourselves a fair bit. We're better now than we were before agreeing to join the Exams. And we're not dead, either. We'll be in better position back home when we return."

That did reassure the kids. Their new friends weren't completely marooned by their defeats. "Also, nothing keeps you two from coming to train with the rest of us when you're off-duty. That way you can keep on improving." Kurenai chipped in. Which finished lifting the mood.

Then they started to talk about their next opponents and working on their strategies, or swapping tags and weapons around as would get them the best results. Kakashi showed Tenten a handy Suiton jutsu for intercepting Raiton attacks before getting struck by it yourself.

Sasuke wrote Sai a few dozen exploding seals that Sai could make his Ink construct carry to turn them into a sort of suicide bomber.

Shino grabbed a few of the small, razor wire bolas Sakura offered him to have a new, surprising weapon to use against his Kumo opponent.

Sasuke solemnly presented Kiba with a rainbow slinky and told him that it would confuse his enemy if he or Akamaru threw it at his opponent and he might create himself an opening while his challenger was trying to guess the nefarious use of the innocent looking plastic spring. Kiba raised a brow at the suggestion, but still pocketed the toy.

Sakura and Chouji started debating on which one of them should win, until Shino pointed out that it wasn't very sportsmanlike, and that they should just do their best and use each-other to demonstrate their best skills while only using half of their chakra, and let whoever won win. That way the one who won would still be relatively fresh for their next match.

At that, Hinata looked to Tenten and nodded, getting an answering nod back. They were fine with that way of doing things, at least.

Sakura shrugged and told Chouji that he best bring his best game, because she would kick his ass if he didn't go all out. Apparently Ino's habit of "motivating' her teammates with thrown objects had eroded Chouji's distaste for hurting girls, because he swallowed uneasily and nodded back. That got him a satisfied nod from Sakura.

Lee's style didn't lend itself very well to adding new parts in, but Tenten still handed him a few spools of ninja wire, 'just in case'. He stashed them in the pockets of his bright orange "modesty skirt' that had been gifted to him as a joke but that he hadn't stopped wearing since receiving. (Something that Tenten still hadn't really forgiven Kiba for...)

Ino and Sasuke were deeply involved in discussing how to make their katana against whip fight as spectacular as possible. But Ino also wanted a shot for using her Clan's jutsu, since she wasn't sure she would get another match to show it off for after, and she wanted to show all she could do.

The next day was more relaxed than the first. With only nine fights to fit in the day, Kiri had raised the time limit for those matches to forty-five minutes, and the first match was at nine.

The first match being Tenten's, and Kakashi couldn't miss it, both because Gai would never let him, and because, willingly or not, Tenten was pack now (thanks, Kiba) and he couldn't let her down.

Tenten indulged in her own showmanship, by laying an intricate trap under the guise of of evasion and attacks, and triggered the complex ninja-wire net while her opponent was in the middle of it. This level of on-the-fly trap-laying was impressive and promotion-worthy. Especially since her opponent hadn't seen it happen at all, and she hadn't put herself in danger while putting her trap in place.

She also finished her match quickly enough to cause a true, long waiting period before Sai's match. The Public wasn't too found of that, and Kakashi predicted that the next day wouldn't have matched set at fixed hours, but directly one after the other. For that day anyway, the set hours were a positive, because it meant that Tenten would get plenty of time to recover from her first match of the day before facing off against Hinata.

Sai had an incredible mobility advantage against his opponent, who hadn't withdrawn despite losing a leg on the previous day. And seeing that Sai had drawn his ink construct around explosive tags, each one of them exploded immediately upon destruction, or on commend. Which meant his opponent's devastating sound-based attacks ended up working against him pretty badly. Especially since Sai drew fierce, massive tigers and tiny little mice with the same ease. Meaning some of the small suicide bomber ink constructs could sneak around and detonate almost at the Sound shinobi's foot.

Yes, that meant that the Sound Shinobi ended his match with one more missing leg. Bringing his total of legs to 0. Kakashi had a bit of trouble feeling sorry for him, seeing how his Village had attacked Konoha one year prior. And yes, he knew that the Genins had no influence on Orochimaru's decision and that that one particular boy was essentially a victim of Orochimaru's scheming. Kakashi still wouldn't be crying on his fate. And neither would Sai, who still lacked the necessary affect. And the other kids weren't as naive as Naruto, so none of them seemed all that sorry for the newly legless genin.

Kakashi paid attention to the next match, even though none of his kids were in it. The winner would be fighting Shino next, after all.

The Kiri Genin won. He had apparently decided that since his opponent used perception blurring Genjutsu and sound attack, the best bet was to be very extra and call an almost tidal wave down on the fighting space of the arena and then catch his opponent in a water prison to drown him. It worked, and Mihiro of Kiri was declared victor as the medic hustled his opponent away to save him from his near drowning. But on Kakashi's estimate, the Chakra spent on the spectacular water jutsu should be about three quarters of the boy's reserves. He wouldn't be back to full capacity by the time he faced Shino and his chakra-eating insects down.

Well. If Shino won, which Kakashi didn't truly doubt, but he would get to see for sure in the next match.

The Kumo Kunoichi, Katana, was extremely wary of Shino's bugs. Possibly a side-effect of his demonstration of insect based fuuinjutsu use. In any case, she killed any insect getting close to her with a revenge.

Her strategy had two disadvantages. The first one being that she was hemorrhaging chakra, zapping every single bug she saw. The second one: spending so much attention on the insects meant she neglected Shino himself. It was a bad idea to neglect the Aburame for his insects.

Firstly, because any ninja had more than one trick up their sleeve. Shino was pretty good in Taijutsu, bukijutsu, shurikenjutsu, and ninja wire handling, thanks to his training with Lee, Tenten, Sakura, Sasuke, mainly. Secondly, sometimes, the Aburame you were paying minimal attention to swapped themselves with an insect clone.

And then, when the apparent not too dangerous human went in for a taijutsu charge, he dissolved into a cloud of the very bugs you were so intent on not letting close.

And with how much chakra she had been using, getting a cloud of kikaichu to the face spelled instant defeat for her.

After lunch break, Kiba fought Kio, from Frost. That fight was hard for Kiba. Kio was a brilliant Kunoichi, as proved by her victory against her opponent from Kumo in the previous Round. And she wasn't about the underestimate Akamaru, after seeing Kiba's win the previous day.

Her skill and caution forced Kiba and Akamaru to pull a new card from his sleeve. The Double Headed Wolf Human Beast Combination Transformation. The giant two headed dog gave the Frost Kunoichi a pause, but she rallied impressively and kept on fighting, playing for time as long as she could. That was good for her promotion. The match was forty-five minutes long, and, when unable to win outright, forcing a draw was her best way to, if not win, then at least eliminate her opponent from the tournament.

Kiba and Akamaru won by feigning exhaustion and slowing down noticeably after a few minutes, then putting in a burst of speed to catch her between their oversized fangs. Kio surrendered then, before she could get crushed in their jaws.

Kiba and Akamaru were significantly depleted in chakra by the end of the match, which boded badly for the next day for him.

After Kiba, it was Sakura and Chouji's match. After solemly offering each-other the sign of confrontation, they gave it their all to look flashy. Chouji started out the fight by showing off his proficiency in handling the bo staff, then moved on to his Multi-Size technique, making himself gigantic, to which Sakura reacted by getting even quicker and acrobatic thanks to her chakra-string swinging. After all, a giant Chouji made for excellent anchors from which to swing around.

Chouji still couldn't sustain the Multi-size Jutsu for very long. And so, Sakura ending the fight by driving a chakra-powered punch straight in his face was something of a favor to him, since she knocked him out before his technique could fail, revealing Chouji's very real weakness. Even without baring his sharingan, Kakashi could tell that Sakura used a variation of the chakra jump to give herself more speed and power, as well as bracing her arms with chakra to put all of her core weight right into the punch.

Chouji toppled back from the punch while shrinking back to his regular size. Sakura landed lightly on her feet and waited a second to be named victor before lighting her hands with chakra and kneeling at Chouji's side and putting her hands to his head.

When Chouji came to, Sakura offered him the sign of reconciliation. Then they made their way to the contestant's box, Chouji leaning some of his not inconsiderable weight on Sakura. Once there, Ino descended on her teammate with nutritional food.

Lee's match wasn't quite as fast as his first one, but he was still a very speedy and hard-hitting Taijutsu specialist. Besides, he would still have his next match against Ino or Sasuke to show his battlefield control off against, so he didn't really bother to show off. He got to demonstrate that he was faster that a Kiri-nin's water jutsu, which was good enough. And he ended the fight tidily with a solid kick to Shizuku's back before bearing down on his downed enemy with a spool of razor wire that he looped around the Kiri genin's neck to make him concede defeat.

Ino and Sasuke started their fight with the sign of confrontation, then got their preferred weapons out. Sasuke was excellent at Kenjutsu, but whips were tricky, with their curved trajectories and occasional deafening cracks. Especially since Ino was fond of launching poisoned senbons with her off hand. That plus her small, sneaky genjutsus made Sasuke's sharingan a very useful tool to avoid losing out of hand.

Ino still had to be careful about using her Clan's techniques against someone bearing Orochimaru's cursed seal, so she went for the Mind Body Disturbance technique instead, which left her consciousness safely inside her own body.

Kakashi suspected that Sasuke's solution against that was inspired from Naruto. The huge wave of chakra he let out when his own arm lifted to put his sword at his throat looked a lot like Naruto's over-powered Kais.

Ino rocked back from the chakra schockwave, even as Sasuke lowered his arm again and shook himself out.

With Ino having gotten her chance to show off a Clan technique, Sasuke decided it was time to take off the gloves and started in on Katon jutsus. Ino knew very well how much of an enthusiastic little pyromaniac Sasuke was, so she decided to evade rather than engage.

Sasuke used a particularly big plume of flame to hide his summoning of one of his Wolves. (His chakra reserves had significantly deepened in the year and a half since his previous Chunin Exams, so he could afford to summon his wolves longer and more often.)

The Wolf hid in a smoke Genjutsu and circled around the arena for a pincer move. Once his Wolf was in place, Sasuke used his shunshin to move in on Ino, and when she spun to block him, his wolf pounced on her from behind, pinning her to the floor. Sasuke immediately leveled his katana at her neck, before she could try to poison his Summons to get herself out of the pin. Ino gave in and gamely returned Sasuke's sign of reconciliation once the Wolf let her up.

Sasuke's Wolf stuck around long enough to playfully lick Sai in the face before dismissing himself.

Then it was time for the last fight of the day. Tenten against Hinata.

It gave the two girls plenty of opportunity to show off their water jutsus and battle abilities. Tenten was used to sparring against Taijutsu specialist, so her expertise int blocking and dodging gave Hinata a solid adversary to show her excellent Taijutsu against. The thrown weapons gave Hinata plenty of room to show off her dodging and blocking abilities, slapping projectiles out of the air in precise strikes.

Tenten's unsealed barrage of weaponry forced Hinata to use her Protecting Eight Trigrams Sixty-Four Palms original gentle fist jutsu that replaced the revolving heaven technique for an absolute defense strategy.

Tenten won. She was simply more versatile and more experimented than Hinata, and had a grasp on fuuinjutsu as well as battlefield control that meant she managed to rig the area in her favor and wait for Hinata to escape a naginata strike right into a pre-set trap.

Hinata took her defeat well and easily accepted Tenten's sign of reconciliation.

And that was the end of the second day of the Tournament. There was only one non-Konoha Genin left in the running, Thankfully for Kiri, the one other Genin left was from Kiri. Less fortunately, it was one of the ones that had betrayed his comrades in the second stage.

The final announcement of the next day's matches closed the day.

Tenten would be fighting Sai, Mihiro from Kiri would be up against Shino, Kiba against Sakura and Lee against Sasuke. And the fights wouldn't have fixed times, but succeed one another after small recesses.

Chapter 101: Aiko's almost chunins

Summary:

Aiko apparently is done being a background character. But at least it has some adventages. She gets to go to Kiri and see the three last days of the Kiri Chunin Exam.

Chapter Text

In the month after Kakashi left for the Kiri exams with the genins, Aiko got moved as an assistant for the Hokage. She wasn't very happy about it, at first, but it turned out that Tsunade wanted her input on how to keep the Chunin and Genin Corps from stagnating quite as badly. It was delightful to work on. Fulfilling. It felt like a revenge on her early life.

It was still a surprise when Tsunade strode in and told her to pack up and it was time for them to leave for Kiri. Apparently, Tsunade was leaving Shizune there to keep an eye on Konoha. And since all the genins who made it to the Tournament stage were part of her group, Tsunade was giving her a chance to see them shine at the tournament.

They would be missing the first two days of it, since Tsunade could only be absent for so long and the first elimination rounds were pretty much preliminary matches.

Aiko was surprised to notice that she was keeping pace with Tsunade as they ran across the Land of Fire to the boat waiting for them on the coast. All of her training with Kakashi and the Genins was paying off, it seemed.

The reached Kiri late into the night of the second day of the Tournament, and Tsunade declined getting their own accommodations, asking to be brought to the same place as the competing genins and their Senseis. Strength in numbers and all that. Not that she said that to their Kiri guide, but they both knew he would understand it that way.

These considerations left Aiko's head when they entered the apartments the three teams were staying in and she was enthusiastically greeted by happy children.

It was a relief to slip into bed behind Kakashi. She had been able to sleep alone, but she had missed the way her tension fled as soon as she put her Jounin between her and the world. Safe. She was safe. Nothing could reach her, with Kakashi guarding her sleep. Well. Not nothing. But very little.

Kakashi roused long enough to snuffle at her hair and then drop a quick, still masked kiss on her lips.

Tsunade smirked at her.

Ah, she too thought they had a romantic relationship, then.

Oh, well.

So long as Tsunade didn't explicitly ask her, Aiko didn't have to explain the truth of their relationship. It wasn't lying.

She was tired, anyway.

In the morning, Aiko dressed appropriately for her role as Tsunade's assistant and followed her to the Kage box. The Mizukage playfully made a few jabs at them for flooding their exams with talented genins and leaving only one out of eight spots to other village by the third Round. Tsunade answered that it was a gage of their trust that they had sent such promising and precious young genins, and Mei laughed. Then she asked Tsunade if she cared to bet on the matches.

Ugh, politics.

Tsunade asked the odds.

"Tenten is favorite for the first match." Mei-sama smiled. "By five against four, then, even with Village loyalty, Aburame Shino is the favorite for the second one, eight against two. Inuzuka Kiba against Hatake Sakura is almost equal, and Uchiha Sasuke has slightly better odds than Rock lee."

"No bets on the final winner?" Tsunade hummed.

"Ah, what was I thinking. Yes, there are bets on the tournament's winner. Since there are still eight contestants, their return is quite high, even without accounting for everyone's personal odds. Aburame Shino is favorite, though." Mei answered gamely.

Tsunade got a handful of cash from her sleeve and handed it to Mei. "I bet on Hatake Sakura to win the whole thing." She declared.

Aiko hoped it didn't mean that her Hokage was wishing defeat upon her female student. Tsunade-sama's ill luck with betting was almost as legendary as her skills as a medic and combatant.

But then again, Sakura would be fighting Sasuke on the next Round if they both won that day. It might be Tsunade betting on the underdog. Or she just esteemed Sakura that much.

Time would tell.

First match was Tenten against Sai. Aiko wasn't really the betting kind, and she didn't even know which one she wanted to cheer on. Sai was part of her team, but she had been tutoring Tenten for longer than she knew Sai.

Well, whichever one won, she would be proud.

After making the sign of confrontation, Tenten jumped backward, unsealing her naginata.

the following few minutes were a bloodbath of ink. Between the spear and the thrown weapons, none of Sai's ink constructs made it close enough to touch her. Or even to explode close enough to hurt her. And since he was expending chakra while Tenten wasn't, he quickly decided to change tracks and attacked with his tanto instead.

While he was ANBU-good, Tenten was unpredictable, and very well trained at fending close-range.

Mei-sama hummed in appreciation as Tenten used the shaft of her spear as a pole to launch herself over Sai's head. Aiko, for her part squinted at the spot Tenten had just jumped away from. She had a suspicion that she had left a sealing tag there. Tenten had gotten excellent at putting down traps and making the terrain work in her favor.

The fight took on again, spear against short sword. And when Sai managed to get inside of Tenten's range, she vaulted over him again.

The point where she landed made a perfect equal triangle with her two previous positions. Looked more and more like a trap.

Sai apparently saw it too. His eyes widened and he grabbed a scroll from his thigh pouch and infused it with chakra, sending a tiger-shaped ink construct at Tenten just as she triggered her trap seal.

She lost a few seconds dispatching the beast, and then turned back toward Sai, who was firmly stuck to the ground by Tenten's seal, probably inspired by the one Naruto used to stick Jiraiya to an Onsen's fence. But he was making up for it with thrown weapons from one hand, and frantically drawing more ink constructs with his other.

Tenten spent the next minute swinging her naginata to dispel the ink animals and dodging the kunais and shurikens. But Sai eventually used up all his weapons, and then Tenten managed to set her spear-tip to his throat.

Sai conceded and Tenten deactivated her trap seal, allowing him to return her sign of reconciliation.

"Your genins seem particularly interested in Fuuinjutsu." The Mizukage hummed.

"Well." Tsunade answered, shooting Aiko a quick glance. "Hatake Kakashi is Namikaze Minato's student. He never had much interest in the art, but he inherited his books and notes. And he has an Uzumaki student. That's reason enough to dust his sensei's things."

"But Tenten and Aburame Shino aren't his students, are they?" Mei-sama asked with a raised eyebrow.

Tsunade laughed. "You'd be surprised. All the genins here have learned from Hatake at some point. The senseis are all old friends, they trade lessons to one another. It's giving such promising results that I'm considering how to recreate their dynamics for future graduations. These ones learned Taijutsu from Maito Gai, Genjutsu from Yuhi Kurenai, strategy from Sarutobi Asuma, and how to be annoying from Hatake Kakashi."

Aiko ducked her head and huffed a sigh of relief. Tsunade was not mentioning her. Good. She was already better known than she would like.

"How to be annoying? Not Ninjutsu?" The Mizukage asked.

"I am sure Hatake slipped in some Ninjutsu lessons, but trust me, his true specialty is in being a huge pain in the neck." Tsunade grumbled.

Mei laughed.

The Proctor announced the next match. Shino against the Kiri genin.

The Kiri genin started the match with a big Suiton jutsu, trying to take Shino out before he could deploy his bugs. He took few enough signs for his jutsu that Shino couldn't attack him before he was done. Instead, he spread his kikaichu in a dome around him, they blinked blue just as the water approached him. When the great waterfall technique washed away, taking a chunk of the beach with it, Shino was standing in the one intact spot.

Mihiro from Kiri stumbled as he reached for a Kunai.

Shino let his chakra barrier go, and his bugs flew out and toward his opponent.

The Kiri Genin was drained of what was left of his chakra in seconds. The match was called in Shino's favor.

The third match was Sakura against Kiba. Meaning that Aiko was heavily biased. She was sure that Kiba would forgive her for that.

Sakura opted not to call a summon in from the start, and to deploy her terrifying razor-wire mini-bolas instead. Kiba and Akamaru knew exactly how deadly they were, so they started the match on the back foot, dodging all of Sakura's throws and avoiding getting too close to the revolving bolas she kept spinning around her.

After a couple of minutes, Kiba opted to throw out a smoke bomb to obscure Sakura's sight-line, since he and Akamaru could aim by nose.

Sakura could too, she had progressed a lot in becoming a proto-Hatake.

The first sign that things wouldn't be going the way Kiba hoped came when Akamaru rolled out of the smoke cloud, tumbling with Urushi.

It was something of a cheat that Sakura had access to her sensei (and adopted brother)'s extremely well-trained ninkens on top of her own personal Summons through her summoning contract. But cheating was what being a shinobi was about, after all.

The smoke blew out quickly, since they were outside, and they could see Kiba tangled in several meters of ninja wire, Sakura crouched over him, tanto at his neck. She jerked her chin at the boy, so he could see Akamaru, on his back, with Urushi's teeth at his neck, despite the difference in size between the two dogs.

Kiba swore and tapped out.

Urushi let Akamaru go and shook himself out before unsummoning himself.

Sakura started freeing Kiba from his wire prison, helped him up and offered him the sign of reconciliation.

"Your bet seems on good tracks." Mei-sama commented. "I was unaware that there were more Hatakes."

"She's adopted." Tsunade smiled. "Hatake got her first. She'd be mine, otherwise."

"You have a high opinion of her."

"She figured out the most difficult way to be lazy about learning chakra-healing." Tsunade scoffed. "It's as impressive as it is infuriating." She shook her head with a sniff and then smiled. "She has spunk."

Mei laughed. "I see. I'll have to pay attention to her career."

The last match was Sasuke against Lee. It promised to be spectacular, with these two.

Sasuke got his sharingan out first thing, and summoned three wolves as soon as he got a breathing moment, then unsheathed his katana. He wasn't playing around.

And with three Wolves summoned, he would have to be quick with the fight. He would be against Sakura the next day if he won, and he might very well drain his chakra pool before that.

Between Sasuke's doujutsu, his kenjutsu, his fire and lightning jutsus, the shunshins his brother had helped him get almost as good as Shisui and the three wolves, even Lee's speed and excellent reflexes weren't enough.

He had nothing to blush about, though. He lost in a very well oiled four vs one match. And still held out for ten whole minutes in these unfavorable conditions.

Sasuke was panting from the chakra expenditure when two of his wolves finally managed to pin Lee down and he leveled his katana at the other genin's neck.

And Lee had one of his blinding smiles on as he returned Sasuke's sign of reconciliation and congratulated him on his win.

Sasuke was going to go into his fight against Sakura with a disadvantage.

Tsunade might actually win her bet.

Chapter 102: Quiet night in

Summary:

Downtime between the quarter-finals and semi-finals.

Notes:

Woohoo!

I am done with Sakurama (for now) s time to get back in the saddle with Unextraordinary!
I hope you like the relaxed downtime chapter.

I still feel like I have less and less to tell in this story... But that's fine, honestly. I think the 'OC crashes in and changes things' plot has just about run it's course and it's almost time to sprint to the end (what is Shippuden but a very protracted run toward the end, really?) We're almost done with the time-skip, and I am honestly quite tempted to insert my own time-skip in the place where the Manga decided to let go of all rationality instead. We'll see...

Chapter Text

The moment they saw her after the matches were done, Aiko got buried in genins.

It honestly was her own fault for being so great with them.

She didn't even scold them for calling the Mizukage's attention to her.

And the Mizukage's attention had been well and truly snagged. Not surprising. Aiko had probably done her best 'background character' impression while standing at Tsunade-sama's back during the matches. Competent but unremarkable secretary. The kind of things her infiltration training primed her for.

There was nothing unremarkable about all the wildly successful yet very young chunin candidates flocking to her for praises and hugs.

Apparently, being proud of the kids rated higher than not being noticed as being one of the gremlin pack's senseis. Sakura got folded into a side hug, Sasuke got a quick hair-ruffle. Sai was reassured that he did well and that his loss wasn't shameful, that he held himself great and won time that would be precious in a real battle scenario. Kiba got a wink and assurances that he too had done well. Lee got congratulated on fighting so well and on how graceful he'd been in the face of his defeat. Shino got a toothy grin and a comment on how he would have his Bingo Book entry right after making chunin.

Right about then, Tsunade-sama bustled forth and lightly berated them for clogging up the passageways, and then she herded them toward their accommodations. Though, with some carefully applied bribery (promising that Kakashi would buy her sake, since the plan to be deemed unfit for Hokageship by spoiling his genins meant they felt free to bully him into paying stuff even though he was notorious for skipping on bills), Sakura and Sasuke managed to get their fearless Hokage to agree to a restaurant outing to celebrate the day's matches.

The poor waitresses looked entirely overwhelmed to have a foreign Kage in their humble shop (the kids hadn't wanted to go somewhere high-end, since they were planning to pay for their meals themselves with their hard-earned genin mission pay). But Chouji, being an Akimichi through and through, managed to get their table's waitress to relax by engaging her in a conversation about Kiri's traditional dishes and seasonings.

Once Chouji had placed his order for three full, different adult's servings of Kirigakure's most commonly eaten dishes, the rest of the group had the time to read their own menu and listen in enough to make their choices, and ordering was pretty smooth sailing.

The restaurant carried broiled saury (unsurprising, seeing as they were an island in the middle of the ocean) which Kakashi happily ordered for himself. Most of the kids gamely ordered seafood-based fare even though they had been eating fish for some time. (Sakura ordered hers raw, in the form of sashimi. Kakashi didn't know if it was a sign of her Hatake-bloodline-copy, that appetite for uncooked flesh.)

Sai asked for Tofu, but that was a very positive development. He was finally expressing favorites as far as food went, and sticking with it even when the situation kind of called for something else. It might get concerning if it kept up, but for the moment, that budding selfishness was excellent news.

Kiba decided to pay the extra price to get red meat in a place where fishing was much more common than herding, which also wasn't all that surprising. It had been over a month, and Inuzukas were more carnivorous than not.

Similarly, Sasuke getting himself rice with a tomato omelet was kind of expected. That kid was kind of obsessed with tomatoes. At least he was adding some protein to his meal in the form of eggs. He needed it to build strong muscles.

After some debate, the genins (not for long anymore... though they would always be genins to Kakashi) decided that everyone that was out of the running for the next day of tournament would be grabbing Gai and Kurenai and going out into Kiri to explore and have fun. Sakura, Sasuke, Tenten and Shino needed to rest and recover, and conserve their stamina so they could put up a good show on the next day. They were staying in for the evening with Kakashi, Tsunade-sama and Aiko.

Unfortunately, well on their way to becoming chunins or not, the kids were still only teenagers, and they grew restless after a while. Chakra-recovering meditation was kind of dull, and there were quite a few hours to kill, and energy to blow off if they were to have any hope at actually falling asleep in the evening. Except they had consumed a good chunk of chakra in the day and still needed to conserve all they had and prioritize their recovery to put on a good fight the next day.

After a while, Aiko sighed and shook her head, then called the kids close while carefully counting the seals lining her battle corset.

Aiko ended up unsealing a pack of card and a few bags of candy and cheerfully calling Tsunade-sama over with an innocent "want to play poker?"

Tsunade was a bit bemused to be given a share of various candies in the place of poker chips. She took it in stride, though, and agreed that while healthy competition was good, the genins shouldn't be betting money while on a mission.

Two rounds in, Tsunade-sama seemed to have completely forgotten about the unimpressive stakes and to have taken to the game with her legendary focus.

As well as her legendary lack of luck.

Ten rounds in, and Tsunade had no more candies to her name and seemed on track to go out and buy some more so she could win back.

Aiko blinked a few times, looked around the tables and then unsealed seven small bottles of sake, putting one in front of all the players.

"Let's just say one sake bottle is worth twenty candies. That way Tsunade-sama can keep playing with us. ... Once we stop playing, we can trade the bottles against sweets if one of you kids don't feel like drinking alcohol yet. In any case, whether you keep the sake or not, I expect the four of you to know better than to drink alcohol right before an important international tournament, alright. Keep it for celebrating your promotion once everything is done."

The children nodded seriously.

Tsunade-sama lost her bottle the next round.

Aiko, who had been one of the most successful players so far, chewed her lip for a few seconds then smiled mischievously and slid her pile of candies to Tsunade-sama. "Alright, you're back in the race, then, Hokage-sama. You now have a good bankroll of candies, let's see if you manage to use them to win a couple of bottles."

Tsunade-sama grumbled a bit, but she accepted the new 'chips' and set out in earnest again.

Two rounds later, it was Kakashi's turn to slide his pile of candies to their fearless Hokage. He didn't like sweets anyway, and wasn't that much of a fan of mind-altering substances. And anyway, the game was more fun than the wins.

And in a way, seeing Tsunade-sama swear and lose and swear and lose again was it's own kind of entertaining. Especially since she didn't cross the line into violence and looked relaxed enough.

Tsunade-sama finally managed to win one round that had two bottles set as bets, and immediately downed one. Then she lost the other one and all the candies she had in the next round.

The kids were plenty relaxed and entertained by the time Kurenai, Gai, and the other genins made it back, and they smoothly moved onto planning the guard rotation for the night and settling the kids to bed.

Tenten palmed the bottle she had managed to hold onto to the Hokage with a smile that wasn't as shy and hero-worshipful as it had been when they started playing. She winked and declared that it was her bribe so Tsunade-sama would cheer on her on the next day.

Shino stared at Tenten for a while, then handed his two bottles to the Hokage without a word. Then he handed Aiko his candies.

Shino was cute in his own way. Especially when he loosened enough to engage in his own particular brand of being a bit of a brat.

Tenten scowled at Shino, then went to trade Sasuke and Sakura for their own bottles and handed the resulting two bottles to Tsunade too while reiterating the request that Tsunade cheer for her.

Tsunade-sama laughed, holding all five bottles. "Well, it seems I'm cheering for Tenten and Sakura tomorrow." She grinned with a soft look in her eyes.

Shino pouted.

"Don't worry, I'll cheer for you, Shino-kun." Aiko chuckled. "That's only fair."

"Wait." Sasuke grumbled. "Sakura? She didn't even bribe you!"

"I have money riding on her." Tsunade answered haughtily.

Sasuke and Sakura both made conflicted faces at that. Tsunade's lack of luck with bets was as legendary as her lack of prowess with games, after all.

"And I will be cheering on the two of you equally." Aiko added in.

"That sounds acceptable." Shino stated in his customary monotone. He did not ask for his bribe sake back even it he had been out-bid on it.

Everyone went to bed (or to their guard post) in high spirits.

Chapter 103: Shino's truth

Summary:

Shino is not very demonstrative. But he knows he has friends. He knows he isn't alone. Not anymore.

Chapter Text

Since they both lived in Konoha, people had a habit to compare Aburames with Inuzukas. They were both Clans that worked closely with nin-animals, after all.

The comparison wasn't flattering to the Aburame, to be honest. Inuzuka were known to be highly attached to their Ninken. Emotionally as well as physically. In contrast, Aburame were known to sacrifice large parts of their hives when the need arose.

Shino himself had lost a very large chunk of his hive in his battle against Gaara, during the Invasion. It had been an horrible experience for him. His entire team had treated it like the traumatic injury that it was. And while yes, the hurt was emotional, it wasn't truly in the loss of a dear friend. Not the way Kiba would be hurt if Akamaru died or lost a limb. Not the way Shino would feel if Kiba, Akamaru or Hinata died.

The trauma came from being defenseless. From not having any kikaichu meant to defend him present in his body at all. That lack of a strength he had always had with him left him feeling distinctly vulnerable all the time until the new generation was ready to hatch.

His hive's reproducers and workers were still safely held in his body. Even as all of his soldier kikaichu got crushed in one fell swoop, eggs and larvae were already being re-shuffled. The new generation of kikaichu switched around so they would all be soldiers.

Two weeks at most and a careful application of his and a few of his relatives' chakra and his hive had reclaimed it's offensive and defensive abilities. The hive internal workers felt the strain, as they had to work double-time to raise all the new soldiers and forgo being replaced at the normal rate since the eggs and larvae that should have been workers had been redistributed to new roles. Three generations of his bugs were greatly disturbed by having to re-staff all the lost combat kikaichu. But it was alright in the end.

Shino had not been hurt by losing friends, but from the lack of his all time allies at a time when he needed them. He had felt alone in the face of adversity the way he would if the backup team he needed and was counting on didn't show in time.

Even losing one's entire Hive did not hurt an Aburame the way losing a Ninken hurt an Inuzuka. If Kiba ever lost Akamaru, he would feel the loss of a close friend his entire life, and might never be able to stomach getting a new puppy to replace him. He would then forever be only half of himself. An Inuzuka without their Ninken not only lost a friend, an ally, but also a large part of their ninja techniques.

Whereas losing a Hive... the very thought was enough to make Shino shiver. Yes, it was hard to conceive. But it was survivable. And if, by the worst of luck, it ever happened to Shino... Then the first thing he would do once back home would be to get a new Hive. He would not be able to delay even one second more than necessary to do so. He would get a young new fertile females, and have his father lend him his workers in order to help her settle in and care for her eggs and larvae until his new Hive was able to support itself on it's own.

Any other path was unconscionable. He would go crazy without the continuous background hum and scuttle of insects beneath his skin. Just like how locking a shinobi in a perfectly soundless and chakra-less room would break them within hours.

And he would feel so, so vulnerable, not only losing his soldiers but also the reassurance that he would be getting them back shortly. Then there would be a period of adjustment and frustration as his new hive needed to learn him and learn their roles in supporting him. As he needed to learn them too, and how to communicate with what was likely to be a slightly different strain than the one he was used to without the adjustment period he was used to when breeding new strains while still having the old ones to fill in the gaps.

But even completely hive-less, (horrible!) an Aburame was still an Aburame. They were still, in essence, a nest. An empty nest was still a nest. Beekeepers knew that an old, empty nest would still call to any bee swarm that drew close. The smell of used wax a beacon to tell the swarm that there was an hospitable place for them to settle.

Even if Shino lost his Hive and couldn't go to Konoha to get a new one from his Clan, he would have a chance to lure a wild swarm to him. Or at least a few mothers whose offsprings could be coaxed into creating a full blown hive. It would be all kinds of inconvenient, but it was feasible. He would never have to face the possibility to be an Aburame without a hive. To be half of himself like most Inuzuka ended up if they lost their partner.

Out-Clan people didn't understand having one's entire identity so intricately linked to animals but so little emotional attachment to them at the same time. How they saw their insects as expendable while having them be such an essential part of them.

They didn't understand that with such a short lifespan, insects died all the time, and that their passing away and being replaced was a daily occurrence. The insects died and the Hive lived on. it was something even the smallest Aburame child knew. Their insects died all the time. There was no graveyard for them. The Hive simply disposed of them by dumping them out of their host body, or ate them, and kept going.

The world at large saw them as heartless. Practicalities overwhelming emotion. And that was kind of true. They had an habit to think that way. How could they not, living in synergy with a hive from the cradle? But the truth was that they simply didn't see insects as persons. Because they weren't. Even a Hive wasn't a person. Wasn't a friend. They lacked the emotional width to be anything but allies. Only persons could be friends.

Shino had friends. His Hive wasn't one. Hinata, Kiba, Akamaru and the other genins from his group were. His senseis were. His Hive was a semi-parasitic symbiote. Allies. Something that cost him to keep but helped him in turn. Something that obeyed him only because it knew that it lacked the perspective that Shino had, and that Shino dying would leave them homeless and starving.

Allies. In the truest meaning of the term. Two things that helped and protected each-other because it was best for themselves. Not because of an emotional bond.

Of course Shino didn't like having his insects die in combat or in training. Some loss was normal and accounted for, but replacing large parts of his combat swarm meant he would then have less of them until the new generation was ready, which made both him and his hive vulnerable. And it was costly in chakra to raise large quantities of new eggs that weren't yet useful.

And that was why Fuuinjutsu was such a good tool. All of his insects had chakra, every single one of them, soldier or worker or even eggs and larvae had what it took to stand in as chakra ink.

Even if he lost all his soldiers another time, he wouldn't be defenseless. His workers could be used in their place. Less effectively, sure, but they could do the work of defending him if there was no alternative. (It would wreak havoc on even more future generations, but it was a reassuring thought.)

Hell, in a pinch, he could get a depleted hive to hand over the eggs it wouldn't be able to care for due to being short-staffed, crush them and use it as ink to draw. Of course, using his own blood for that purpose would be better, but if he got short on that too, it was a viable strategy.

Fuuinjutsu, just like Taijutsu and weapon handling made him more versatile. Less reliant on just his kikaichus' battle application.

He would never be willing to go hiveless. Being a nest was a part of him. But it wasn't all he was. It had never been.

He was a nest. He was a friend. He was a shinobi of Konoha. He was his father and mother's child. His sister's older brother. Torune's cousin and adopted brother (he had Torune back, he had him back, he wasn't dead.)

And he was himself. Like he had been even before receiving his very first hive. Like he would still be if he lost his friends, family and parents. If he became missing nin. He would always be himself until the day he died. No one else. And no one else could be him. Being himself was important.

Aiko-sensei had taught him that. She called it the most important lesson. He was inclined to agree. The knowledge that he had something that was just his, that couldn't be stolen, that he could never lose, even in death. That was an anchor. A bedrock of certainty. Something that allowed him to look past what was expected of him because of his Clan heritage and reach for more. He was himself, and it would never change. But he could be the very most of him. The very best version. He just had to make it into his shape and take it, make it his.

Like he had made his hive his, Like he had claimed people and made them into his friends by being theirs. Like he had gained the right to be a shinobi of Konoha through hard work.

He was himself and if he wanted to be more then he could. He just had to nurture it, the way he nurtured his kikaichu when he needed more.

Fuuinjutsu had become a part of him through study, like Taijutsu had become a part of him through repetition and friends and family had become a part of him from love. Once something became a part of him, then it was there and it would never leave. If he lost use of his limbs, his Taijutsu would be a part of him, no matter that he couldn't apply it anymore. If his friends and family died they would still be his friends and family. If he betrayed or was betrayed, Konoha, his friends, his family, his Clan, his hive, they would still forever be a part of him.

He was himself, and himself could change, but it would still, in the end, it also wouldn't. It would still be him.

Now fuuinjutsu was a part of him too.

Aiko-sensei had never phrased it like that. Maybe it wasn't the way she saw it.

It didn't matter, because it was how Shino saw it, and that made it true for him.

He didn't know why he was thinking of that at the moment.

Maybe it was because, for the first time since the beginning of the Chunin Exams, he would be facing a comrade from Konoha. One of his friends. In more than just a spar. A true tournament match where he had to show his village's best. They both had to, even if their promotions were pretty-much guaranteed.

Being Tenten's friend was a part of him by this point.

He knew it wouldn't change. No matter the outcome of the match.

But it was the first time he had to put such strain on it.

Well.

No choice but to put his trust in her steadfastness. Her friendship to Hinata and Sai was still intact. She wouldn't turn on him.

She wouldn't.

It didn't matter that his entire Clan faced a subtle ostracization in their own village. Tenten. All of his friends were different from Academy bullies and clueless civilians or flaky comrades. They were his friends, he'd made them himself. He had to trust in the strength of what he made with his own hard work and love. If he didn't trust in them, why would they trust in him?

Tenten was solid and true. She too, had made Fuuinjutsu into a part of her. They were kindred in that.

And equals.

The words Naruto had spoken during his first Chunin Exam came back to him. Equals owed each-other the respect of fighting seriously.

He couldn't hesitate to beat Tenten if it come to that. Not even if it was out of fear of losing her friendship. She wouldn't thank him for it, and it would weaken their bond instead of preserving it.

Shino was afraid of going back to being lonely and alone. It had been so common for him, after losing Torune and before Hinata and Kiba tore that wall down with their kindness and understanding.

But the fear would only hold him back. So he set it aside and made the sign of confrontation. And he trusted that there would be a seal of reconciliation at the end. Isolation everything that was about to happen into a match, for which no grudges would be held.

Tenten returned the seal of confrontation with a smile in her otherwise serious face.

And then she burst into movement.

This was going to be a Fuuinjutsu-heavy battle. How could it not be, with the two of them.

But that wasn't all.

Tenten was on track to become a weapon master. Something Shino wasn't even if he'd put in some work. He had his hive, just like she had her weapons and her speed.

The match was about avoiding each-other's seals and a direct hit from the other's specialty.

Shino had to avoid Tenten's weapons and her seal tag traps. Tenten had to avoid Shino's kikaichus draining her dry of chakra or to get stuck in the middle of a seal he made with them.

Speed and evasion was of the essence. For both of them.

But his insects could dig, and sand was a soft medium, so long as they avoided getting so deep that they reached sea-level and drowned. It was a long game, and he would need to keep her from thinking of it. Keep a good chunk of his hive visible above ground, not let her see that he was weaving a trap under her feet. She had a water affinity, if she noticed it, she could easily drown the underground insects by calling in a wave from the ocean.

So he reinforced his forearm with chakra, blocked the naginata's swing right under the blade, where it was still safely just a shaft, and let a cloud of kikaichu out at her face to make her jump back.

He made sure to direct his insects into seals, above ground, visible, where Tenten knew he was using them that way. So she wouldn't suspect that they weren't his real plan. She was crafty and sneaky, and Shino so rarely bothered to be, past getting his allies on people who he needed drained. She was the one who planted seals unseen. He used them blatantly.

Or at least he had done so so far.

She blew away a cloud of kikaichu aiming for her. He directed them to drain the seal tags she planted.

He made his insects spread out so they wouldn't be seen, she spotted them and avoided them.

In the meantime, his hidden allies burrowed and waited.

He carefully took a hit, let himself bleed and let the kikaichu cover the wound to staunch the pouring blood, retreating.

She pursued.

There!

The seal design flashed on the ground and it's lightning trap activated.

Tenten only seized for a couple of second.

That was enough for the insects that had been applying first aid to swarm out and cover her.

Tenten had a lot of chakra. More that people would expect, in any case.

But even if his allies couldn't drain her completely in one go, losing a big chunk of chakra in one go was always dizzying.

He leaped forth and grabbed the razor-wire bolas Sakura had given him a couple of days earlier and grabbed it by one of it's safely rounded ends, sending the other in a circular trajectory. It wrapped around Tenten's neck twice and he grabbed the other end with the opposite hand.

She looked him in the eye and nodded. "I give." She whispered, careful because moving her throat muscles would hurt her.

But the proctor wasn't in this position for nothing. He heard and called the match.

Shino flicked the bola the other way, unwinding it.

When he extended two fingers in the seal of reconciliation, Tenten wrapped hers around them without any hesitation.

She congratulated him as they walked back out of the arena. Smiled and declared that at least, she'd had her idol cheering for her. Even if she lost that match.

He had picked Tenten as his friend for a good reason.

He supported her weight a little as they sat side by side to watch Sakura and Sasuke fight.

The day wasn't over for Shino. Unlike the previous days, both the semi-finals and finals were to be held the same day. He hadn't lost that many allies so far, but both Sakura and Sasuke were formidable opponents. Even if fighting each-other would take a lot out of them, the second match would be just as tricky to win as the first. No matter which one of Kakashi-sensei and Aiko-sensei's student won.

Chapter 104: Newly Chunin

Summary:

The tournament ends. Other troubles start...

Chapter Text

After Shino won his match against Tenten, it was Sakura and Sasuke's turn to head out into the arena.

Kakashi couldn't bring himself to cheer for one over the other. They were both his pups.

So he just watched.

After the sign of confrontation, the match started.

Sakura didn't have trees or ceiling to use for swinging around.

Sasuke didn't have enough chakra to call in his wolves for long.

It was going to be grueling for them both.

Sasuke still had more than enough chakra for his eyes and for his shunshins and for Raiton and Katons.

Sakura could still chakra-jump better than anyone else, and use chakra threads linked to the ground to control her descents.

They were both fast. Both unpredictable in their own way. Both excellent at using and dispelling Genjutsu.

Even Kakashi couldn't be sure who would win.

Sasuke seemed to be everywhere at once. Something that called memories of Shisui to the forefront of Kakashi's mind.

The civilian spectators could probably only see blurs with how fast his kids were moving. But Kakashi didn't even need to uncover his sharingan to follow their movements.

The succession of high-speed attacks and dodges showcased their skills, even if they were both conserving chakra. (In fact, showing that they knew how to conserve chakra was also good for them. As a Chunin, they wouldn't always get to start each fight in peak condition.)

And then it happened.

Sakura charged, Sasuke used a wide slash of his katana to make her retreat. She dove forth instead.

Blood sprayed out of Sakura's left arm as she completed her dive.

Sasuke jumped backward, but even so, when he came to a stop, there was a poisoner's short needle sticking out from his thigh. He cursed and plucked out the needle.

Both Sasuke and Kakashi knew that the needle had to be poisoned. There was no other reason why Sakura would take such a risk to get him with it.

Sakura's right hand clamped down on her wound and started glowing green.

Since the clock was ticking for Sasuke, he immediately charged. Winning now involved finishing the match before the poison took effect.

Sakura spent the next two minutes fleeing and dodging while working on her healing. Her concentration faltered at some points, the green glow going out as she had to do some fancy maneuvering to avoid him.

Sasuke soon started to falter and stumble, though.

After he almost fell on his face, he stilled and raised a hand.

"I have been poisoned and don't know with what." He declared clearly. "I surrender in order to receive medical treatment before the poison can have long lasting effects on my body." He didn't say the rest loud enough to be heard, but Kakashi could read his lips 'even if I don't think Sakura would use something dangerous on me.'

The proctor called the match in Sakura's favor.

The medics rushed in and examined the both of them, revealing Sakura's arm to be almost completely healed.

She handed over the antidote to them and Sasuke was back in his feet in minutes.

They solemnly shared the sign of reconciliation before heading together toward the stands.

A lunch recess was called.

Sakura's match against Shino would take place in the afternoon.

Normally, Kakashi would say Shino was the most likely to win.

He was, actually. Between his Clan's techniques and the derivative ability to make seals at will with his insects, he truly was a formidable opponent.

But Sakura was also Naruto's teammate, and she had sparred with him plenty after he became good at using seals himself. She also had decent sensor skills that would allow her to detect a seal activating and the quick evasive ability to clear an area in the short time it took between a seal surging with chakra and it's effects spreading.

She'd also conserved her chakra enough to still be able to call on her summons if she needed them.

Also, Shino liked her.

Not that he would go easy on her because of it. But Kakashi didn't have to fear her getting big injuries or dying during the match.

Besides, her promotion was already all but guaranteed.

She would try to win. Of course she would. But even if she didn't, she would be fine.

He watched Sakura's hand disappear into her butt pouch as soon as she completed the seal of confrontation.

What she brought out made him realize that he had underestimated his heir's tendency to copy Aiko.

The explosive-tag wrapped bottle sailed between the two of them and exploded next to Shino. He dodged, but when his hand lifted, the insects that came out started wandering about aimlessly rather than attacking.

Sakura smiled toothily and lobbed two more rigged up bottles into the fray. She must have found some extracts that either had pheromones or imitated their smell. Or some kind of nerve poison that was effective on kikaichu beetles.

Maybe a sedative that worked on small invertebrates.

He'd get to ask her once they were far from anyone who could use the knowledge against a Clan from their village.

In any case, Shino seemed to be unable to use his insects at the moment. The match was looking increasingly unfavorable for him.

Then the smell made it to Kakashi's nose and he chocked a bit while hurriedly plugging his nose with chakra.

No, it was worse. It was much worse. This was the civilian perfume Sakura used to wear before Aiko interfered. The one that was so full of chemical that it had driven him to distraction. It must be doing something similar to the beetles as it did to him. Except they couldn't block their sense of smell with chakra and they received their orders mostly through that sense, so even if they did block their smell, they couldn't obey Shino anymore.

Shino made a good show of having back-up options, but with Sakura showering the field with perfume every time his insect got responsive again, she finished the match tidily in a few minutes.

Sakura showed how much she respected Shino's skills by nailing him with two poisoned senbons before lunging in and putting her spiked gauntlet at her throat.

Shino surrendered and they exchanged the seal of reconciliation.

The Mizukage announced a recess to let the fighting area air out before announcing the promotions.

Half an hour later, all the tournament participants lined up down in the arena to receive their results.

Itaru, from Sound, was called forth first, and given his flack jacket. Then Kio, from Frost.

After that, Hinata, Sai, Chouji, Kiba, Ino, Lee, Tenten, Sasuke, Sakura and Shino came in and each received their own jacket.

Kakashi would bet that there had been some fierce haggling involved, but not giving Hinata, Ino or Kiba promotions since they didn't do as well as the rest in the tournament matches would make it so no one at all from other villages could get promoted.

Kiri tellingly had no new chunins. It wasn't surprising, since Mihiro, who did the best by far, was also part of the ones who betrayed his team on the second stage. Kiri was trying to turn it's image around, so rewarding this type of thing with a promotion was very bad optics. Mihiro still had talent, but he would have to show that he understood the problem with turning on his own team before he ever got to participate in a Chunin Exam again.

Oh, well.

That evening, they returned to their quarters and started packing so they would be able to leave early the next morning. Tsunade-sama looked frazzled all the way through.

Her legendary capricious luck explained that. She had won the jackpot by betting on Sakura. And she was now waiting for the other shoe to drop...

The packing was interrupted by a visit, though.

Zabuza's little apprentice still looked very pretty and harmless. Kakashi wasn't the only one not to buy it. But Haku was nice, polite and non-threatening when he asked if he could invite Aiko for a walk.

After exchanging some charged glances among themselves, Kakashi stood to escort them. Not that he didn't trust Kiri, of course. But letting a chunin who was officially there as the Hokage's assistant and secretary wander around alone was just not possible. It was like begging for trouble.

Haku gracefully accepted having a Jounin escort for his walk with Aiko and offered her an arm as they strolled away from their guest quarters.

In the end, Haku only wanted to follow-up on a conversation he'd had with Aiko while Kakashi was sparring Zabuza. About how if Haku limited himself to being a tool instead of a person, then Zabuza would keep being all alone. And how Haku actually being a person while staying close would be better for Zabuza.

He threw a startled glance at Aiko, but she took the questioning with aplomb and asked what had happened to make him want to ask follow-up questions. And the young shinobi blushed and recounted asking for things because he liked them, and Zabuza grumbling but buying them anyway.

They spoke for a while. the kind of things Aiko would only say to Sai, because with their other kids she started with a higher baseline of them knowing their worth. She asked him the meaning of being alive (being there for Zabuza) and then Zabuza's meaning for being alive (Haku didn't know). She suggested that knowing more, opening up more, would give Haku directions. Being what Zabuza needed had to start out with knowing what Zabuza needed. What he really needed, not just surface whims.

Their conversation was cut short when a concussive boom came in from the ocean as they strolled along the shore. When they looked out into the sea, it was to see a huge wave rushing for Kiri.

He exchanged a glance with Aiko, and then a few hand-signs. And then she rushed to their quarters to report and receive orders from their Hokage while Kakashi stayed at the shoreline with Haku to hopefully break the Tsunami before it hit and reduce the damages to the maybe-allied Hidden Village.

Chapter 105: Aiko's resolve

Summary:

Trouble finds them in Kiri. Aiko makes an important decision.

Chapter Text

Aiko had gotten a great deal faster since she had gotten to know Kakashi, so she was back at their guest apartment and reporting the disturbance within a minute.

Tsunade-sama straightened out immediately, anxiety gone the moment she knew what her rotten luck had decided to throw at her this time to make up for her winning bet. (The correlation between a win and a disaster still sounded fishy to Aiko, but Tsunade seemed to take it less like a malediction on her, making everything her fault, and more like her winning was an advance warning system, so it was probably alright...)

The children were ordered to stay all together, watch each-other's back and prioritize their safety unless they got a new order from the Hokage. This was still a Kiri problem. Tsunade would assist, because not doing so despite being present was a really bad look. She had no obligation to sacrifice her promising new talents that also happened to be a majority of Clan Heirs just to show good faith.

Still, thekids would come along, because the best place to be able to ensure their safety while shit was going down was where their senseis and Tsunade could see them.

Orders given, they all followed Aiko back to Kakashi's side. Kakashi needed his new orders. And to have backup.

There had been no huge Tsunami destroying Kiri while Aiko reported, and they saw why once they reached the shore.

Both Kakashi and Haku were on their knees, panting from exertion. In front of them, a barrier made from earth spiked that supported a wall of ice stood mostly destroyed. They had created a breakwater to shield Kiri. Taking themselves out in the process.

"You." Tsunade instructed, pointing at Haku. "No more than one chakra pill. And you," she pointed to Kakashi, "two, three if the situation is dire enough to still need it." Then she threw a container at them. "Everyone, wait here, I'll go see what's happening out there."

Aiko blinked as the Hokage sprinted out onto open water, her ANBU Guard losing their camouflage as they put everything into speed.

Hurry-up and wait. The calling sign of shinobi missions. She unsealed a couple of water gourds for Kakashi and Haku to drink in order to make the chakra pill less harmful to their health.

Tsunade returned at the same time as the Mizukage making it to their position with Zabuza and her own ANBU and Jounins. "The Akatsuki, fighting against the Sanbi. I don't know what they want with a Bijuu, but they have tried to attack our Jinchuuriki in the past, too. I don't think it's a good idea to let them capture any Bijuu at all. And apparently, Tailed beasts can be reasoned with. I say we should go and assist the three tails to keep him from getting captured by an unknown and likely hostile element."

Tsunade-sama turned toward Terumi Mei. "I am Hokage, not Mizukage." She stated. "I do not have the authority to command any of Kiri's ninjas. And What I have now is only four Jounins, a few ANBU, a handful of Chunins and two genins. I think now is the time to take decisive action. But the final choice falls on you, Mizukage-sama."

Tsunade-sama inclined her head politely and then stood tall again.

Politics.

There was no time for it. But then again, there was never really time for it, and yet it always needed to be done anyway.

"A tidal wave should have hit my village." The Mizukage stated, looking at the quickly crumbling protective barrier. "And it didn't. I can easily see that Zabuza's apprentice had something to do with it. Was he the only one?"

"No." Haku answered demurely. "I have created an ice-wall to protect Kiri, but it was Hatake-san who used a Doton in order to provide my wall anchors and keep it from being swept in along with the wave."

Terumi Mei closed her eyes, shoulders sagging forth a bit. "It is quite the impressive feat. Kiri isn't small. Not just the Hyouton, but the Doton involved in protecting the entire western shoreline had to be significant. Help provided to us unasked in our time of need." She straightened out into a regal position. "Such actions deserve to be answered in kind. I will heed your advice, Hokage-sama."

She turned to the army of Kiri shinobi that had congregated behind her while they spoke. "We head out to sea!" She barked. "We offer the three tails our help to evade capture at the hands of the Akatsuki! Do not engage the Bijuu, tell it we are there to help if you get the chance."

"Hatake Kakashi, Maito Gai, Yuhi Kurenai, Sai, Hyuuga Hinata, Rock Lee, Yamanaka Ino, Uchiha Sasuke and Hatake Sakura, with me! Everyone else, you guard the shore in case of another tidal wave!" Tsunade ordered in turn, before handing Sakura and Sasuke two chakra pill each and ordering them not to take the second one unless they ran completely out of chakra and needed them to make a clean getaway.

Aiko didn't feel great about being benched and letting her kids go into battle, but she understood why Tsunade-sama picked as she did. With only strong fighters going in the fray, she and the jounins wouldn't have to split their attention between the fight and protecting them.

Akatsuki tended to be in small units, so grabbing Ino was a good call, since disabling even one of them could be crucial and that was what her Clan techniques were best at doing. Hinata would help them spot danger from farther away while also keeping anyone from fleeing or planning ambushes, and could also protect Ino while she was unconscious thanks to her ultimate defense. Sai could give aerial support thanks to his ink beasts. Lee was a truly excellent taijutsu fighter, and even if he couldn't use ninjutsu, he could still walk on water. Sasuke and Sakura were also excellent.

In the meantime, Shino and Tenten's fuuinjutsu could be used to protect the shore, as well as Kiba and Chouji's oversize techniques that could break a wave a safe distance away from land. And Aiko had the experience to direct them. Hiroto and Mitaki were still just genins, so they had no business getting anywhere close an S-Rank fight.

So she kissed Kakashi on his masked lips for luck and ruffled the kids' hair, then took her position.

...

Tsunade and Shizune had been making a lot of not quite subtle remarks on Aiko possibly becoming a Tokubetsu. She hadn't taken it seriously so far, because she liked her anonymity. But...

As a Tokubetsu, she would be a lot less likely to get sidelined when her team had to go and put themselves in danger. She had ironed out a lot of her flaws as a shinobi since meeting Kakashi, then getting sealing skills thanks to his and Naruto's help. Not even mentioning Shizuko-shishou training her to use a flexibility-based taijutsu. With all her bases covered, she met the requirement to become a special jounin in evasion. Even Kakashi struggled to track her, these days. Or even in sealing, since seal masters were so rare.

She might need to do a brief stint in ANBU to learn advanced stealth techniques in order to round out her special skillset, but...

It was a price she was willing to pay.

She wanted to keep her kids and jounin alive. That hadn't changed.

What was her anonymity in the face of that?

But for now, she had her mission orders.

And she had already made her mind to leave the comforting shade of obscure mediocrity behind.

She unsealed a table, paper and ink and knelt down in the sand to start drawing her own seals.

If she could do nothing for the kids who went out to fight, she could at least protect the ones her Hokage left in her care.

Chapter 106: Explosive battle (end of Kiri Exams)

Summary:

Kakashi goes out to defend the Sanbi with his intrepid Hokage. And Kiri's intrepid Mizukage too, yeah.

Notes:

guys, the fight scene killed me. If you were wondering why this took so long to update... At least half comes down to the battle scene being a killer.

Chapter Text

"Please flee, Sanbi-sama! We will hold them back!" Kakashi yelled when the Bijuu turned their way threateningly after seeing (or sensing, who knew) a small army of shinobi converging on it. Aside from his kids, Kakashi was the one who had the most experience with Bijuu, even if it was second hand from Naruto telling him about how he had to beg and bargain with the Kyubi for assistance.

The Turtle Bijuu froze for a moment, appraising him, then an explosion rocked his side, causing it to bellow. But instead of charging, it started to sink lower under the waterline. Then, it tipped forth and with a heave of it's tails, dove under the surface.

It's huge form stayed visible, a dark shape under the surface as it sunk down further and further.

But there wasn't room to care for that anymore. They might be an army of mostly jounins and two Kages, but against them stood two S-Rank shinobi. They needed their entire focus.

Hinata, temples bulging from her active byakugan, went through the hand signs for a minor water jutsu and yanked a dozen of globes of water from the salt-water before merging them together into a water prison.

"How dare you disrupt my art!?" The blonde standing on top of the bird yelled, bringing his fingers up into a half tiger hand sign.

Hinata leaped away from her water prison, and Kakashi instinctively jolted in her direction. Sasuke got there first, though, with a pair of his swift shunshins, he managed to drag Hinata clear away from the explosion as the water prison went off.

Kakashi saw Sai set a flurry of ink birds on the blonde missing-nin, and heard said missing-nin go on a rant about the meaning of art. Namely, about Sai's ink-based art was lesser than his own explosive one.

Well, that was one enemy handily distracted. Sai was holding his own well as far as the debate went, arguing about everything being ephemeral anyway, even granite statues and art being about beauty and feelings more than about the medium.

That left the clown in the swirly orange mask.

Well, broadly. Deidara, the explosive guy seemed good enough to debate (yell about) art, destroy Sai's ink beasts and throw random bombs into the fray. So the fight stayed chaotic. But with only half of the Iwa missing-nin's attention on the fight below his feet, that left only one opponent for the two Kages and all the jounins to focus on.

But man was the orange masked man slippery.

The worst part was how he took his time clowning around while expertly dodging.

Kakashi could respect driving your opponents spare by being lackadaisical, but it was much less fun when he wasn't the one doing it.

The fight lasted for an incredibly long time, considering all the high-ranked fighter participating.

There was a clear divide between the Konoha forces and the Kiri ones, and it would look bad if they had people watching. But since there wasn't, it was simply good sense. Tsunade-sama couldn't get away with casually ordering jounins from another village, even if her orders were the right ones. And their villages weren't used to cooperating. So drawing the lines and acting as two separate forces with different leadership but a common goal was for the best.

Since Mei-sama had a lot more fighter, her side acted as a wall, while the Konoha team was more hit and run. Leaving the complicated army-like maneuvers to Kiri and intervening to disrupt their opponent momentum whenever it got too settled.

Except then, the orange-masked man started to phase through attacks.

Things started to get really bad then.

S-Rank fighters were no joke.

Terumi Mei couldn't use some of her more deadly techniques since she was surrounded by her own people, and Tsunade, even for all her strength could only do damage if she actually connected. Same for Gai, who was one of the only one who could match a Kage fight without getting in the way.

Thankfully, both of the Kages concentrating on the slippery guy in the orange mask meant the rest of the forces could refocus on Deidara, who got serious instead of just arguing about art with Sai. (Kakashi needed to tell Aiko that Sai managed to actually argue about his favored medium to Aiko, she would be so proud of their ex-ROOT.)

Since battle was chaotic, Kakashi didn't catch everything that happened, but after a while of having the two Kages concentrate solely on him, the guy in the orange mask disappeared in a space-warping spiral that made his uncovered sharingan eye pulse and warm up. Then Deidara cursed up a storm and threw a huge amount of his explosive beasts before turning tail and fleeing.
everyone was way too preoccupied with not dying from that last parting shot to pursue.

Thankfully, the mass of Kiri shinobi with an excellent grasp on Suiton meant they were able to avoid casualties as a swarm of water barriers went up. Kakashi busied himself with ensuring all his little ducklings managed to make it under cover, and then the sky exploded.

Judging from the screams, not all the water barriers were up to snuff. Or some of the explosive constructs managed to swim inside some of the barriers.

Tsunade-sama immediately started triaging even as the burned shinobi she didn't immediately hone in on were loaded on their comrades' backs and brought back to the shore.

Kakashi hung around since Sakura was a somewhat competent medic and had gotten co-opted as an assistant by their Hokage who was elbow-deep in guts. Sasuke followed his lead, and Sai dismissed his flying mount and landed on the water surface to start painting once again.

In seconds, Tsunade and her patient were on the back of a massive turtle (Kakashi was going to call inspiration from having just met the Sanbi) swimming back to the shore too.

"Well." Mai sighed from her place next to Tsunade-sama, observing the work going into keeping one of her Jounins alive. "It would have been better if we caught them, but Sanbi-sama managed to flee and wasn't caught, so we can call this our win. You were right on that. I do not want fighter who are already this strong to turn themselves into Jinchuuriki on top of everything."

Kakashi doubted that the end result the Akatsuki was so mundane. Why would such a variety of differing personalities work together just so they could become jinchuurikis? but Mei-sama was right that even that was bad enough.

"What worries me is that we won't always be right at hand to help the Sanbi. It's good that it fled successfully this time, but what about the next time?" Tsunade answered distractedly, knitting skin and organs back together. "The ocean is vast, and we don't know how the Akatsuki even tracked it in the first place."

The Mizukage sighed, her eyes roving over her shinobi like a herder. "The Sanbi was originally Kiri's." She pointed out. "We will try to find it again. It was known to be a rather amiable partner, and we have hopefully helped our case by coming to it's help just now. Hopefully we can track it down again and use the goodwill built up today to make it agree to either be resealed or to at least stay in our waters where we can monitor it's safety."

Hmm. That wouldn't be such a bad deal for Kiri, having one of the Bijuus hanging around next to their Village, the protection would obviously go both way... So long as Kumo (or any other village) didn't try and steal it for themselves...

Tsunade-sama got up, her patient cradled in her arms and passed him over to Mei-sama. Their turtle vehicle hit the shore and she jumped off, yelling for anyone injured.

The Kiri medics quickly clustered around her and a makeshift field hospital organized itself on the spot.

Kakashi gathered all the kids close by and meandered toward Aiko.

He got a distracted kiss as she busily unloaded her sealed supplies to hand over to the medics.

Aiko did light up and praise Sai when Kakashi reported his argument, though.

Chapter 107: Yuuto's progress (interlude)

Summary:

Yuuto tries to learn while pretending to be Naruto. It goes... Meh

Chapter Text

In the year since Yuuto had been singled out to get removed from the Genin Corps, mainly because of his age, height and looks, as well as his ability to keep secrets, things had changed a lot.

First of all, he was on an actual mission. A long term one. The kind of thing he had been dreaming of when he was still in the Academy. Of course the mission was a lot less... Missiony than he would have anticipated back then.

His one objective was to pass as Naruto. Everything else, except squeeze as much teaching as he could from his escort (Jiraiya was definitely much more of an escort than a teacher) as he could, as per Hokage order, was up in the air.

Go along. Act cheerful and, if possible, clueless. Attract some attention so he (Naruto) could be traced as not in Konoha but not enough to immediately alert people who actually were after Naruto of his exact location right away.

But... It was his one opportunity to actually be a ninja.

Sure, the Hokage and T&I head had been nice to him. It didn't mean that he wasn't still an expendable Genin. Actually, being an expendable Genin was his job description. If the ones after Naruto managed to see through Jiraiya's traveling plans and brought a force big enough to defeat Jiraiya... Well, then at least the genin who would be captured and probably die was the decoy, not the actual, valuable Naruto.

Yes, Sasuke had gifted him the sparrow summons to avoid that particular disaster scenario. But, first, the amount of time Yuuto could hide out in his Summons realm was dictated by how much chakra he had. Which wasn't a lot. And an enemy could simply stay in the place where he reverse-summoned until Yuuto ran out of chakra to stay hidden. Secondly, it was a gift from Sasuke not Jiraiya or the Hokage. This last ditch plan was not built into the mission, but provided by a peer who felt a bit bad about sending someone else as a decoy.

So while, yes, Yuuto was grateful to Sasuke for looking out for him, it didn't change the fact that his job was 'expandable Genin'.

It was... fine. Being a Shinobi did mean sacrificing for the village or the mission if the situation called for it. Not that it had been Academy-Yuuto's aspiration. Nor had he truly thought it would apply to him since graduating.

But this mission was his last proper chance to be a shinobi in effect rather than in name.

So, going forward, he had three paths.

Die during the mission. Always a possibility.

Not die in the mission, come back without having learned anything valuable from Jiraiya, and probably go back to being in the Genin Corps until he could resign and become a traveling merchant.

Or, squeeze as much as he could from Jiraiya, go back home, and somehow leverage his learning to start climbing up from Genin, committing to being a true Shinobi as his career path and life calling.

He was tentatively banking on the third option.

Trouble was, even with 'tattle on Jiraiya if he neglects you' as his orders, Jiraiya was a very uncooperative teacher.

He made token efforts whenever an irate slug (or a missive brought by an ANBU team) berated him to. But in the end... Eh.

Yuuto had been kind of expecting it.

It was about the same amount of overview as he'd gotten in his time in the Genin Corps. Kind of sad to say.

But since he didn't have comrades to complain and slack-off with, nor a home and family to go back to at the end of each day... Yuuto got creative.

Sasuke was onto something, directing him to the sneaky, unnoticeable Summons because he would be spending this mission following a spy-master.

Konoha had one true spy-master. And it was Jiraiya. (well, that and the ANBU, probably) and Jiraiya was... Just as old as the Hokage. One day, he would need to be replaced. Or at least supplemented with someone younger.

So while Jiraiya dragged his feet on teaching Yuuto jutsus or ninjutsu, there was one valuable skill set Yuuto could still learn from him. And if he wouldn't learn by being taught then he could at least learn by observing.

That's what he'd been doing since he had come to his conclusions about his future career paths.

Observing Jiraiya.

He watched, he listened, and he stuck as close as the old pervert would let him. Which wasn't that close, because for all that he apparently did do his job as a spymaster, Jiraiya also definitely was a pervert who preferred not having a teenager around to cramp he style while he was harassing ladies and 'researching' for his 'books'.

But Yuuto could turn that around.

The first step was to be cute and charming. Jiraiya was absolute crap at seducing women unless he could pay for their time. But Yuuto calling him 'uncle' and paying sincere compliments to the women he wanted to seduce gave him enough of a leg up that he got less prickly about wanting him to be out of sight.

Naruto had babbled about Aiko-san's advice on how to pay women compliments, so Yuuto was pretty good at it. It was fairly simple after all. 'Nee-san has very kind eyes' or 'nee-san has shiny hair, you must take such good care of them' or even 'nee-san is so slim!' Compliments went to things women had control over. So definitely not breast size.

Most of the time the women in question softened and complimented Jiraiya on how polite and charming his nephew was. Which he tended to then ruin by puffing up like a peacock and bragging about how awesome he was. But that was his own problem.

Either way, he managed to get more observation time out of the trick.

More time to try and working how and when Jiraiya did his spymaster thing.

The answer, sadly enough, was in bars and brothels. Jiraiya was a master eavesdropper. And he used whorehouses to set up meetings with informants. Seeing his reputation, it was pretty clever. No one would expect him to go to a brothel for anything other than women's company.

It took quite a lot of wheedling, and some coercion, to get Jiraiya to take him along even once. But he managed. Once there, he used another thing he learned from listening to Team 7 brag about Aiko-san, and offered to dust the ceilings for them in exchange for staying around a bit. Which won him some sweets and the workers' goodwill. Jiraiya noticed that (and how Yuuto's goodwill shone on him) and didn't resist taking Yuuto along as much from then on.

Still, learning the ropes kept relying a lot more on Yuuto digging, observing, and coming to conclusions on his own.

One good aspect of that was that there wasn't any lie in letting Tsunade-sama know that Jiraiya was still not teaching him with his letters. Which in turn led to Jiraiya begrudgingly sitting him down with a calligraphy brush and ink and setting him some fuuinjutsu exercise. Even if he was a condescending asshole about it. Sealing was a precious skill, so Yuuto did his best to learn it, no matter the source it came from.

The letters from his family and Team 7 were always a welcome reprieve, and he loved receiving them.

That's how he learned that the whole of Team 7 (except Naruto, who was still hiding) became chunins during the Kiri exams. And the trouble there had been afterward with the Sanbi and the Akatsuki.

He wrote back to his family with his cover story and small facts about eating nice food, or seeing animals, and to Team 7 with anecdotes on his life with Jiraiya that didn't include anything that would point to his true location.

Told them that he had managed to get the girls in one of the houses to teach him how to pretend to be a teen girl in training so he could spend his time in brothels serving drinks and learning to eavesdrop. Complained about Jiraiya. That kind of things.

He couldn't be entirely sure that he would have learned enough by the time he got back to Konoha to get on his way to becoming a spectacular ninja. But he was trying his best. That had to count for something.

At least in his eyes, it did.

Chapter 108: Heading into the unknown (ANBU Arc)

Summary:

Kakashi is back home, but things aren't right anymore.

Chapter Text

After the entire thing with the Akatsuki, getting home had been quite uneventful. Thankfully.

The Mizukage seemed to like them better than she did when Konoha took over her Chunin Exams' Tournament stage. Which was good. And Tsunade-sama seemed to have worked out a deal around training up Kiri medics.

Once they got back and bid the rest of the group of genin/chunins goodbye, they caught up with Naruto And enjoyed a week of vacation.

Sasuke probably got praised for his promotion by Itachi (and probably his Clan ladies), judging by his quietly happy expression.

Sakura oscillated between pride (she was Chunin, also, she won the whole Tournament), and anxiety over what the promotion meant for future missions.

Naruto was at once proud of his teammates and a bummed that he wasn't chunin along with them.

Sai was... Still hard to read, honestly. Kakashi was guessing that he didn't see what all the fuss about being Chunin was about when he'd been completing ANBU Missions not so long ago, but he was attempting to emulate the behavior of everyone else anyway.

Aiko would sort him out.

Kakashi was... Not really looking forward to having all of his official students (Naruto didn't count, he was 'on a training mission with Jiraiya') be officially chunin. They were good enough to wear it, but... Jounin-senseis rarely got assigned missions with their genin teams anymore once they weren't genins anymore.

Tsunade-sama would be making excuse to keep his team together and to add Ruu (Naruto) onto the cell, but she couldn't be too openly playing favorite. And even the excuse of Team 7 being the Pilot for new genin team structures including ex-Root and emotional-support Chunin, there was only so much she could do to keep all five of them together at this point.

His pups were grown and ready to leave his protection.

He was proud of them, of course.

But he was already starting to dread not having the gremlins around all the time anymore.

Of course he wasn't the only one who didn't have any genins in his genin team anymore. Gai, Asuma and Kurenai were also seeing their full team of chunins off. But... They weren't from Wild Clans. Besides, Asuma and Gai had been slowly letting go of the apron strings for a while already. Both of them already having one Chunin in the team, and both frequently absorbed by other duties.

Kurenai also was a but apprehensive to not be full-time sensei anymore, but she looked a lot more assured than he felt about the next step in her team's growth.

Then again, Hinata usually radiated contentment, meaning that her intra-Clan schemes were probably going well. Shino would probably get his first entry in the Bingo books whenever they got re-printed, and Kiba had the Pack instinct to keep his new Chunin cell cohesive through the changes to come.

Kakashi's team... Wasn't all that coherent anymore. Unlike the Ino-Shika-Cho or the super-tracker team, Sasuke and Sakura were heading in different directions, with Sasuke going heavy combat while Sakura was more stealth and ambushes (with a side of tracking that had yet to bloom fully). And Sai, for all his strength and talent, had yet to develop a trajectory of his own.

The three of them (five of them, counting Kakashi and Aiko) could conceivably be a functional ANBU team, but not a general force one. And Naruto definitely did not fit any sort of ANBU standard.

Kakashi felt like he was standing at the crossroads of drifting apart, and that hurt right down to his instincts. Inoichi was going to have a field day with that. He was a mess. It was the role of a sensei to teach kids to stand on their own then release them into the wild to trace their own path.

He had just poured so much of himself into his little Pack. Relied so heavily on them to give him direction and motivate him to heal. What would he do after he no longer had them? The same as before getting them? It seemed impossible. It was hard to believe he'd only been a sensei for two years. It felt like a ridiculously small time for all the change he had gone through since passing them.

And yes, he knew that everything felt much more final than it really was. Sakura would always be his adopted sister and Heir. Sasuke still had a contract with his Clan Summons standing as an unofficial adoption. Aiko would stay his Pack-sister even without the kids to mind. Sai still needed his and Aiko's efforts to learn to be human and find a path that he followed because he wanted to. And Naruto (Ruu) was still Sai's ROOT buddy, who was sure to eventually get given to Kakashi in an apprentice-like system.

Still, Kakashi was feeling unbalanced and kind of melancholy.

And the fact that Aiko didn't seem to be on the same wavelength as him and was instead talking about trying for a promotion to Tokubetsu made him feel even sadder.

Kakashi's breakdown came to head when the "you just came back from a long mission and have promotion paperwork to take care of" vacation came to an end and Sasuke and Sakura got their first mission without him.

They were with a full Chunin cell, with sempais to teach them the ropes. And they weren't going too far since Orochimaru trying to steal Sasuke was still a concern. But still.

His pups were flying with their own wings, not needing Kakashi there along with them. And Kakashi was feeling the empty nest keenly.

Aiko had left shortly before the kids, being very noncommittal about where she was going.

And Kakashi...

Kakashi went to stand before the memorial for five hours, like he used to.

Then, defeated, he slunk along to Inochi's shop.

He would have stayed alone and brooded some more, but Aiko's ghost was nagging at him to sort his mess out even if she wasn't around to do it herself.

Ino goggled at him incredulously when he slumped in the cheery flower shop and grumbled a request to see Inoichi. She still nodded and went to fetch her father.

Ino took one look at him and invited him into his heavily warded personal office.

Kakashi took the offered seat and stared into nothing for a few minutes while Inoichi looked at him and stayed silent.

Then, with a huge sigh, Kakashi raised his eye to him and smiled in a way that probably showed all of his fear.

For once, he didn't evade talking about himself to his therapist and spoke to the man.

Kakashi came back from his emergency therapy session feeling all kinds of raw and vulnerable and curled up alone in his suddenly too big bed.

Sleep took a very long time to come.

Fortunately, he got a mission of his own the next day, and had to shelve his misery to make space for mission focus.

When he came back, having found and killed the serial murderer he'd been sent after, Aiko bumped into him at the entrance of the Hatake Compound.

She smelled of underground stillness.

Kakashi froze at the smell.

She smelled like the ANBU headquarters.

Aiko.

ANBU.

He felt himself dissociate.

Aiko's secretiveness came from becoming ANBU.

She too was leaving.

She was going into ANBU.

And he wasn't there with her to have her back.

ANBU Seduction Specialists took significantly more dangerous missions than the general forces ones.

Aiko was going into danger, and Kakashi wasn't in the team with her to cover for her.

His breath froze in his lungs.

He couldn't.

He couldn't lose Aiko too.

The kids leaving was natural, in a way. Kids were meant to evolve and leave the Pack to found their own.

But not Aiko.

Not Aiko.

Aiko was his Pack.

He should be with her when she hunted.

But he wasn't.

He heard, distantly, Aiko calling his name. Asking if he was alright.

He wasn't.

He shunshined away without even being fully conscious of it.

Kakashi only got fully cognizant once he was crouched at the Hokage office's windowsill.

He might not be able or willing to keep the kids from growing up and away from him.

But he sure as hell was going to cling onto his Pack-Sister.

"Brat." Tsunade-sama said, pushing the window open. "What do you want."

"Let me reintegrate ANBU."

Tsunade-sama stared straight at him for almost a full minute, eyes narrowed.

Kakashi felt himself growing even tenser, teeth gritting together and an inaudible growl building up in his throat.

After a moment, Tsunade-sama sighed deeply through her nose and crossed her arms under her chest. "Alright." She stated. "I will."

He felt the tension leave him in a rush. At least until his Hokage opened her mouth again.

"If you can pass the psych evaluation and prove that the problems that forced you to retire are gone." She added. "I have no plan to let you use ANBU to commit suicide by mission."

Kakashi blinked, stunned.

Oh.

Chapter 109: Stoat

Summary:

Kakashi is being weird.

Chapter Text

Aiko was worried. She'd come back from her first rotation as Konoha guard for ANBU, met him, and he'd... Freaked out. Then ran away.

She didn't know what it was about, but she didn't like it.

Kakashi came back home before it was time to go to bed, but he didn't tell her anything. He looked distracted. She also wasn't sure what it was in his eye when he looked at her, but it felt significant.

Still, he didn't talk about it, and she wasn't so sure about needling him on the matter when she was keeping secrets of her own from him.

Maybe it was still his ongoing separation anxiety about the kids becoming Chunins.

The next day, Kakashi seemed to have evened out. He kissed her and told her that he needed to go and see Inoichi, which was always a good thing. Aiko might be with him for mental health purposes, but she wasn't a trained therapist.

Maybe that was what the previous day was about? Kakashi deciding to take an active care of his mental health.

Things kept feeling a little off-kilter for the next week. Even when Sasuke and Sakura came back from their first Chunin Mission. Even when Naruto dropped in for lunch since Sai was back in village.

She found out why Kakashi had felt off the next time she was summoned in by ANBU.

She stood at attention next to her temporary teammates, with her mask and the uniform that bared her unmarked shoulder, letting others know that she wasn't full ANBU yet (or maybe ever).

Her temporary Captain entered the room.

He wasn't alone.

Stalking in after him came a tall ANBU man with a dog mask and distinctive silver hair, radiating calm authority.

Kakashi?

"Our team has acquired another potentially temporary member." Captain Badger intoned. "This is Hound, who came back out of retirement."

Raven, Cat and Lynx all jolted.

Kakashi. Hound stepped forth. "I am not here as a cell captain. And if I ever become one again, it won't be for Team Green. You don't have to deffer to me, actually, avoid doing so at all cost, we don't want to throw the hierarchy off."

Aiko (Stoat, she shouldn't have picked that mask because it exposed her identity, but she didn't expect to be ANBU for very long) nodded along with her teammates.

What the hell?

Why was Kakashi there?

It was a good thing that as a trainee she wasn't expected to participate meaningfully to strategy meetings, because she would have had trouble doing so. Even just listening was hard at the moment.

Kakashi had gone back into ANBU. And he'd been placed into her team.

She didn't for a moment believe that it was a coincidence.

Team Green was full since she had been added to it. And going from Ka-Hound's little speech, he used to be Captain.

He had to have been the one who asked to be with her.

She wasn't sure how she felt about that.

Part of her wanted to be angry that he did this without talking with her first, but the other part was very aware that it would be hypocritical to be mad at Kakashi for re-joining ANBU without telling her when she had joined without telling him in the first place.

So she said nothing and did her best to listen. To remember, even if she was distracted.

Once the talk about not giving Hound special treatment even though he was something of a legend within the Shadow Corps was done, Captain Badger gave the four of them leave to go to the refectory to eat and stayed behind with Kakashi to talk some more. Possibly about why the hell Hound had asked to be on his team specifically.

Aiko (Stoat) followed her teammates along distractedly, still grappling with the depth of Kakashi's actions. Was that why he'd shunshined away after seeing her? Was that why he'd been distracted?

She filled a tray at the self-service line and put the ANBU specific genjutsu/henge on to be able to eat without showing her face. But her thoughts were still on Kakashi.

And the man in question entered the room just as she finished her meal, so she took it as a sign.

She heard the waves of whispers spreading around the room. The awe they carried. Apparently, Hound was an ANBU legend. She almost re-thought her plan, but then the grey eye behind the dog mask landed on her, and she firmed her resolution up.

She had gotten used to the whispers, after all. Everyone seemed to think that she was Kakashi's girlfriend, even after he started his thing with Aoba.

She took a deep breath and strode up to Hound and her Captain. She stopped in front of Kakashi. "Could we talk?" She asked politely.

The room went entirely silent. Unsurprising. An untattoed trainee had just gone up to a legend to make a demand on his time. She shoved her growing anxiety back and stared into her idiot Jounin's one uncovered eye.

The porcelain mask dipped down in a nod, and Hound turned around, walking out of the room. She followed him out just as another wave of whispers started.

Hound strode through the underground halls with natural, exuding an authority Aiko so rarely saw him use as a Jounin. The ANBU operatives they saw all stopped and stared, causing Hound to shake his head disapprovingly. Which tended to make people move again.

After a fairly long walk, Hound opened a door and gestured her inside a small room with a table and chairs.

He closed the door behind them then spoke. "This is a debrief room. No one will hear us talk."

She nodded and then removed her mask. Kakashi reluctantly did the same.

"Will you yell at me?" He asked, his authoritative self-confidence apparently having left along with the mask.

Aiko sighed. "No. I don't like being an hypocrite. Can you tell me why, though?"

She listened to Kakashi babble about her not leaving him too and not letting her go into danger without being at her back to protect her. But only long enough to grasp the meaning.

She interrupted him with a hug.

"Oh, Kakashi." She sighed into his chest. "My dumbass Jounin. I wasn't in danger. I never planned to leave you behind. I just joined ANBU temporarily to get my stealth up to snuff for Tokubetsu. And I only want to be a Tokubetsu Jounin so that I won't be left on the rear-lines while you or the kids go to the front to fight."

Kakashi squeezed her to his chest and sighed. "Well." He mumbled. "Now I feel silly."

She snorted. "You're always silly." She teased. "But I promise I was only planning to do some patrol rotations and maybe be the on the Hokage's guard a couple of times." She rocked back and grinned at him. "Not that I'd complain having you with me for that time, though. I didn't like not telling you why or how long I would leave either."

Chapter 110: Bear/Swan

Summary:

Bear is old, but he still has tricks.

Notes:

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Chapter Text

ANBU General Bear had been a shinobi for a very long time. He had seen a lot about ninjas in his career.

So it stood to reason that almost nothing could phase him anymore about shinobi.

There was one thing, though, that hadn't seemed strange at first but that seemed more and more incredible about ninjas the deeper he went into the shadowy bowels of being a part of a Hidden Village.

Shinobi really were horrible gossips.

It didn't seem strange straight out of the Academy, of course.

But the higher in grade you went. The further from the light. The more 'Classified' became a valid answer, and the more remarkable it felt.

ANBU, just like any other shinobi, were still horrible gossips.

They often didn't tell their friends of family they were in ANBU. Most of their missions could only be discussed with their own teammates, the Hokage or Bear himself, and even then, not freely. They largely didn't know the faces or true names, even general forces rank of their own comrades.

And they still gossiped over everything that didn't fall under the very strict system of classification and secrets.

They gossiped about which ANBU captains didn't like which other ANBU captains. They gossiped over inter-team dramas, over who liked who... Over hundreds of the most mundane aspects of life inside ANBU headquarters or even outpost life.

Bear supposed he might have been annoyed about that. He was a General, after all.

Honestly, what he found most annoying was that all gossip stopped when he was in the vicinity and that no one would dare waste his time by reporting headquarter's gossip to him as it truly was.

If the gossip miraculously kept going even inside the monument mountain, then it would be foolish to not keep himself on top of it.

After all, it might all seem entirely pointless, but it turned out that at least half of the gossip was valuable information when you were the one in charge.

For instance, knowing which captains were in bad terms might save future missions by not appointing two teams who had bad chemistry to the same group mission. If one particular operative was always in the center of drama, then it might be time to dismiss them before they caused damage to the corp's cohesion. If everyone hated one particular dish, corridor, armor piece or field ration, then it was worth solving to elevate morale in the already daunting life as ANBU.

So Bear's opinion on ANBU Gossip was that it was truly stunning that it actually existed. That it was an useful source of baseline information on his people. And that it was slightly annoying that the entire Corps seemed to want to keep him out of the loop on it.

Not that keeping him out of the loop was particularly successful. Hence the slight annoyance. Bear had been ANBU General for long enough that he had come up with a solution to his exclusion from the gossip mill.

The solution was Swan.

Swan had 'joined' ANBU shortly after Bear became general and got annoyed about no longer being in on the gossip. Since being ANBU General meant that he had full control over the roster, creating a second mask for himself was almost a formality.

Swan had originally been a standing substitute operative with special circumstances that kept him from being able to leave Konoha proper from long stretches of times. Swan had, of course, never told anyone why. But the reasons had created themselves on their own.

Either Swan had a sickly family member with possible mental health complications that absolutely needed to see him every day to not go off the deep end, or he had a vital day-job that limited how long he could be away. That second option had gained popularity over the years, since the sickly family would surely have died by then if it existed, freeing Swan up to leave for longer.

Surely Swan worked somewhere pivotal. Intel, or Hokage office. Somewhere he would be missed if he disappeared for more than a day at a time and call unfortunate questions on where the hell he'd gone if no one could find him at his home to bring the ill some soup.

(Bear found it hilarious that at a time, Umino Iruka had been the leading suspect for Swan's identity. It still cropped up from time to time, even if their statures didn't quite match, but the speculation was always very discrete because speculation on an ANBU's identity was part of these things that were excluded from safe gossip topics in the Corps.)

In any case, Swan was friendly and well-known. He popped up regularly at the headquarters to socialize with everyone, as part of his role as a standing free substitute. Even if the missions he could go to were limited in length, he still took his role seriously. And being in good terms with everyone meant that he could easily slide into any team as a replacement member if they had something to do and were a person short.

Gossip speculated that his popping up so often was a side effect of him bringing new intel or orders from the Hokage to Bear just as often, and that his socialization time was taken in as a margin whenever his public identity got ordered to bring the ANBU General something. The general forces had no idea how long popping by ANBU headquarters took, so of course Swan could spare one hour or two on every trip to hang around and gossip before anyone missed him and he had to head back to his regular job.

With time, Swan had been moved up to be a substitute Captain instead, since Bear honestly had trouble following orders anymore and was more comfortable giving them, but the easy friendliness stayed.

Honestly, Bear was pretty sure most of the Captains knew that he was Swan. He wasn't being all that careful with his second secret identity, and the higher ups could probably tell, that Bear and Swan never were at the same place and that most of Bear's disappearances coincided with Swan's missions. So long as they kept the secret, it was fine. He was pretty sure the Captains understood he needed to keep on top of ANBU gossip and that being ANBU General got in the way of that the way being an inconsequential Captain didn't.

In any case, Bear had his in on the gossip network.

So he knew all about Stoat managing to get Hound alone with a simple request.

Now, as ANBU General, Bear knew who they both were.

Stoat was a special case. In many way.

It wasn't often that a chunin was allowed into ANBU just so they could pad up their skill for Tokubetsu, after all.

It was even rarer for said chunin to get in with a personal recommendation from the Hokage.

Knowing that Stoat was there temporarily, Bear had thrown her into a random team that needed a rebound member after a tragic loss. She would help dull the feeling of a ghost hanging around and pave the way for the real new member to come.

Hound was even more of a special case. Formerly youngest ANBU, formerly incredibly good Captain. And someone who had been reintegrated to the forces only to immediately request a spot on the Team Stoat was in (using her general name).

Bear would bet that he was there just as temporarily as her.

But...

Well. Bear wasn't the ANBU General for nothing.

Retaining promising members was something he took seriously.

And Stoat...

Stoat stood to become very promising indeed.

If he hadn't bothered to really look into her all that hard at first since she wouldn't be staying and had the Hokage's backing, that had definitely changed after Hound's visit.

So he knew about her skills and achievements.

He also knew about that ex-ROOT kid she and Hound were tutoring.

That had a lot of potential.

Three person hit-teams weren't all that common, but they existed. And Hound was an excellent candidate to lead one.

He just needed a reason that Hound and Stoat would accept as good enough for them to need to stay in ANBU for.

And he had one.

The Akatsuki and their bijuu and Jinchuuriki stealing ways, combined with their affection toward Uzumaki was an excellent incentive. If he lumped Hound and Stoat together and invited their baby ROOT over to create a special Akatsuki-focused strike team...

He could even try and grab Weasel for it. He wasn't supposed to go on missions or do any shinobi work, but he had been in Akatsuki and was an ex-ANBU. As well as a former member of Hound's own team. Bear could even swing a non-combatant, advisory position for the Uchiha if anyone strenuously objected the not-really-a-traitor becoming a fighter once again.

Yes.

It could work.

Notes:

I accidentally misspelled Hokage as Jokage in this chapter, and I have to say that I adore that title! Bets on that being canon Naruto's nickname?

Notes:

Feel free to leave me a comment! I do my best to answer, and they make me happy and make me want to write more!