AN: Chapter title: Rookie Blunder.
"That all?"
"Y-Yes. That was everything given to me."
"You're dismissed."
The pink-haired Genin couldn't leave the room fast enough. She nearly tripped over her own two feet in her haste to get up from the chair and get to the door. She stopped in her escape just long enough to shoot a look towards Yugao, earned a short nod, before she was gone. The Shinobi she had reported to remained standing in front of the desk.
He had, intentionally, chosen to loom over her. A basic tactic that couldn't even be considered fit for interrogation.
Anko entered the room a few minutes later.
"She's already halfway home. She's gotten faster." Anko's joke fell flat. It wasn't that great of one to begin with.
Ibiki Morino remained standing in front of the desk. He offered nothing to any of the Hidden Leaf Shinobi in the room with him.
He breathed in.
He breathed out.
He reminded himself that these were Genin and Chunin, the two who had earned that promotion currently nothing more than Chunin in name only. They hadn't gone through any additional training, hadn't received any guidance on their new ranks due to the village's current circumstances.
They hadn't been trained for information gathering beyond the basics.
They hadn't been trained for leadership.
They hadn't been trained for operating in enemy territory.
They hadn't been trained for any of this.
All of them had just graduated from the Academy. They were still inexperienced rookies, fresh Shinobi that needed years of experience to develop. Clan Heirs or not, they needed time, missions that would take them to lands beyond the village.
Still, no matter the excused he gave them, he couldn't fully keep the shadows of a grimace off his face.
Anko shared a glance with Yugao.
'He's mad.' It was subtle but it was there. And Anko didn't need more than one guess to know why. 'Guess he figured out what the kids have been doing all this time.'
"Yugao. Why aren't they working together?" Ibiki was direct at least. He leaned back against the desk behind him and met the purple-haired Kunoichi's dark eyes.
"I'm working on that theory still." The ANBU currently serving as a Jonin answered as best she could. Her eyes turned to Anko. "You've been around them more than me. Anything?"
"Just the obvious: Kids don't stray from what they know. They stick to their teams and their friends. Kiba Inuzuka is either spending his time with Shino Aburame or with the girl Uzumaki brought into the tower, Ino Yamanaka spends most of her time with Choji Akimichi, Shikamaru Naru, and Sakura Haruno, and Hinata Hyuga is busy with something from either the Uzumaki or the Uchiha. But we all already knew she wasn't going to provide much intel. I don't even think she bothered to show up to the debriefings when their squad leaders were still in the village." Anko turned her eyes to Ibiki. "They're kids Ibiki. We weren't exactly ready for this opportunity either. We can't expect them to be. They went with what they knew, grouped up because they don't know what to expect when they go into that tower."
"I'm well aware of that, we all are. If we had the choice, none of them would be involved in this. If we had a choice, none of this would've happened. But we don't. And this is a unique opportunity we may never get again." Ibiki rubbed at his scarred brow, his frown becoming even more obvious. "I don't like it but they need to run this like any other intelligence mission. If they need pointers, they can ask us. That's why we've been put in charge."
"I mean, they're pretty scared of us. I don't think Tenzo has even said a word to them since he started this assignment. He just stands around and stares at them." Anko hadn't needed more than a few minutes with the Genin and Chunin to learn that fact. "Honestly, the Daimyo couldn't have picked a worse time to head back to the capital."
Personally, Ibiki agreed with her. "The Daimyo's departure was a known factor. And it was supposed to make their assignment easier."
"That was a mistake on our end. Before he left, they had less opportunities for direct collection on what exactly they're planning but he also prevented any of the clones from directly interfering and kept discipline in the ranks. It's been gradually coming undone since his departure." Yugao had been watching the younger Shinobi for longer than they knew. Almost as soon as Asuma had brought the Uchiha's offer to the Hokage she had been assigned to observe and report on all of them, one of several ANBU Black Ops given the task.
The Third Hokage did not want a repeat of either Sasuke Uchiha or Hinata Hyuga coming from any of the other Genin. The two of them were proving to be problematic enough.
It was only a matter of time until the Hyuga Clan and Naruto Uzumaki's Orange Legion came to blows.
"We theorized that before. This confirmed it." Ibiki hadn't wasted his time either. He had been overworked since the failed attack but had adjusted to the increased work load by now. "And that's not the point." He was being sidetracked, Anko offering a wave when he shot a glare towards her for causing it in the first place. "I want them working together from now on."
"I'll see to it. Their next report will be in a group. Is that all?" She was waiting for a dismissal.
Ibiki nodded.
The purple-haired ANBU didn't bother with walking to the door. She was gone in the time it took to blink.
She left Ibiki and Anko alone.
The scarred Jonin was given a moment of quiet before something sticky poked his cheek. He resolutely ignored the stick of dango being shoved into his face. Anko popped the stick into her mouth, set the case she must've gotten on her way back on the desk as she took a seat next to Ibiki.
"You're really mad about this." Anko set the skewer down on a napkin Ibiki provided, the commander of the Hidden Leaf's Intelligence Division familiar enough with her habits to have gotten into the habit of carrying some. They had worked together for years after all. "I get why." She did. But she also wasn't taking that part of the mission as serious as Ibiki. "They've got a great chance to learn more about the kid and his army, maybe figure out a way to stop him before he gets any crazier, and they look like they're wasting it to you. But they are kids Ibiki. You don't have to be so hard on them when this is out of their depth. Yamanaka has a good chance of being her dad's replacement but that's once she's older. They didn't have to grow up fast like us."
"A luxury I'm glad they had." Ibiki ignored the next stick brought up to his face, hadn't wiped the smeared sauce off his cheek. "But we both know peace is fleeting."
The Third Shinobi World War had shaped both their childhoods after all. A war everyone knew was coming but had desperately hoped to avoid day after day, month after month, year after year. It had dragged all five great powers into a bloody conflict that they were still nursing the wounds of. The war may had come to a close nearly two decades ago but all of them still carried scars from it.
The peace after the Second Shinobi World War felt just as fleeting as the peace that had come to be after the Third.
It would end just like any other. National interests and the conflicts they created had a way of making wars happen.
"Yeah." Anko conceded to his point when she didn't poke him with her stick of dango again, just settled for dipping it in the sauce and popping another of the treats in her mouth. "But we're also here to help them get ready for when it ends. Come on. Better to fail here and now and learn from it instead of ending up dead later. Uzumaki may not even be as bad as we think he is."
Her lie was so bad that Ibiki couldn't help the undignified snort of laughter he let out.
Anko smiled around the stick between her lips.
'At least he can still laugh.'
"OK. He's definitely going to be a problem later. Him and his army." Anko conceded another point. "I've been messing with his clones a lot. So far, the biggest issues are their numbers and their weird personalities."
"I've heard them called fanatical."
"They're so much worse than you think, than anything you've heard about them. Sure, they're disciplined enough to accomplish all the missions they do but they're so one note. They take everything personally. If they fail, it's the most awful thing ever. If they succeed, it's the greatest thing ever. And it's always for him. I'm surprised they don't kiss the ground the kid walks on with how much they worship him." Anko shook her head. She couldn't deny the smile stretching across her lips as she thought about the clones. "They're going crazy with this PPP thing I have them doing. I'm planning to let the group with Haruno pass just to see what they do."
"Don't put the girl in unnecessary risk."
"None of the others have gotten hurt."
"He didn't try to kill any of the others."
"Yeah…" Anko nodded at Ibiki's very good point. "…Good thing Kakashi doesn't know about that." The reports from the ANBU Black Ops had been redacted when it came to Kakashi's version at the Hokage's direction. The less Kakashi knew about THAT situation, the better.
With what the Hokage had planned, the Jonin couldn't know about that.
He wouldn't listen to reason if he heard about what had nearly happened to Sakura Haruno. He would act first, think later.
And the Jinchuriki may or ma not be dead by the time he stopped seeing red.
"Just remember that." Ibiki frowned at what laid ahead. "This entire situation is a mess. We're letting an enemy rest his head right in the middle of our home. Even if it wouldn't work to get rid of his army, we should just kill him before he grows any stronger. A rookie, even one like him, is easy enough to get rid of."
"I don't like our chances of pulling that off." Anko set down her dango. "Even if he didn't get training from Jiraiya-sama on how to control the Kyubi, he's a problem thanks to just being the Jinchuriki. If we push him too far, if we don't kill him quickly enough, he may let the Fox run loose. The kid seems spiteful enough to do it if he thinks he's backed into a corner."
Ibiki grimaced at Anko's words.
The Kyubi couldn't be underestimated. Naruto Uzumaki likely didn't even know that his assassination was being held off thanks to the Tailed Beast sealed inside of him.
"It'll be a mess no matter where it happens. Even if we find a place far enough away from the village, containing the beast before it does any damage will be borderline impossible. I don't know what Jiraiya-sama discovered when he checked the seal but he confirmed it's still stable."
'Although the man isn't unbiased. Would he go so far as to lie to the Third Hokage if he thought he needed to?' Confidential information had been revealed to Ibiki in regard to Jiraiya's relationship with Naruto, information that he wasn't sure Anko know.
"If anyone would know, it's him." Anko couldn't help but lift her hand up to her neck where Orochimaru's Cursed Seal of Heaven laid. Ever since her change, it was always on her mind. It was impossible to ignore it, push it out of her mind like she could before the invasion Orochimaru had planned. Not with what it had done to her, how it had twisted her body into this new form. "Since the Fourth Hokage died, he's the best in the village when it comes to seals."
Ibiki was silent.
He didn't know what to say. Anko didn't seem to notice the way her claws pressed against her neck, how they would tear through anything else but her changed skin. Or she did.
She might even be hoping to find the limit to it, what it would take to see what exactly she bled now.
"That brat is such a headache." Ibiki settled for shaking his head, giving in and picking up a stick of dango. "Any bets on how long Jiraiya-sama's going to keep him out the village?"
Anko's hand fell back to her side.
"I wish I could tell you."
Sakura Haruno didn't head home.
She couldn't.
Not after her meeting with Ibiki Morino tonight.
Her parents would see how shaken she was, would ask too many questions.
They had gotten used to her getting home late. She had urged them not to stay up waiting for her during the month long break she spent training with Kakashi during the Chunin Exams. She would just need to leave them a note before she left for her mission tomorrow morning.
Even if she wasn't staying in her room tonight, she could stop by. It was the least she could do so they didn't worry too much about her.
"How does anyone talk to him?" She couldn't stop trembling, kept her arms wrapped around herself. "He's terrifying…" She slid down the closed door of the empty apartment.
Kakashi-sensei's apartment.
After that meeting, how much it frayed her nerves, this was the only place she could think of coming to and calming down. Even if the masked Jonin wasn't in the village now, she felt safer here than anywhere else.
"What did I do wrong now?"
Why else would Ibiki Morino have talked to her? Why else would he had looked so infuriated with her, looked as if he was barely holding himself back from lunging at her?
She dragged her feet up beneath her, dropped her forehead on to her knees.
"When are you coming back Kakashi-sensei?"
She needed someone to make sense of what was going on around her, help her make sense of this insane mission.
Someone who could keep her safe from all of this.
"I need your advice. I can't do this by myself."
She knew she couldn't. Not when it came to Naruto and Sasuke. Not when it came to the clones. She couldn't do this alone.
Ino tried to help but she didn't even understand what was wrong. She couldn't imagine being on a team as divided as Team 7. Even at their worst back at the Academy, when they were fighting over Sasuke, Ino could always rely on Choji and Shikamaru. The Yamanaka didn't know what it was like to not have those two with her, to support her no matter what.
She didn't know what it was like to not know if today was the day that one of your teammates decided to hurt you. If today was the day he decided to beat you until you were choking on your own blood. If today was the day he would just kill you. And there wasn't a thing you could do about it.
She didn't know what it was like to be weak.
She didn't know what it was like to be terrified of your "teammates".
Ino could never understand.
She had teammates she could trust, a sensei who was always there for her. She even had a clan to fall back on if none of them could help her.
She couldn't understand.
"Please. Just come back soon." She shut her eyes, tried to force the tears away. Tears wouldn't help after all. Not anymore. "Please."
The empty apartment didn't answer her.
Kakashi Hatake didn't magically appear at her plea.
No one would show up to help her.
Not here at least.
But she could break here. Break for a few hours before she put herself back together again.
By the morning, she'd be back together.
AN: 3/4 chapters for this update.