AN: Chapter title: Ink Dots and Inner Thoughts
"You're from the Ninth?"
"More like I survived the Ninth." The Praetorian scoffed where he sat, the two currently not on guard duty. His blue eyes darkened, wisps of red beginning to spread. He clearly didn't view his prior Cohort in a positive light.
"I'm from the Third." There was silence between the two as they returned to their meal. For a moment. "Are the stories true?"
"Of the Fox tearing us to pieces?" The Praetorian nearly snarled the words. "They hardly do it all justice. My Centurion was ripped apart along with almost half the Century. Nearly fifty of my brothers dead in the blink of an eye. They didn't even get the chance to draw their blades, to demand the beast to face them. The Optio died next, torn apart when he tried to bring some order to what was left of us. It was the Tesserarious who finally drew us together. Of the four Centuries advancing with the Primus Pilus, four hundred Legionnaires turned into ninety-four brothers at the ready." He growled, his fist tight at his side. "We had to run like dogs from the Fox. It would've torn us apart if not for the reserves rallying, pushing it back. Even then, our losses were heavy. By the time the Tenth arrived, we were scattered. With the Primus Pilus and most of the Centurions dead, we were leaderless. I still question how we managed to survive lost in that darkness…"
Red snapped away, gave way to blue in the blink of an eye.
"I'm living in the past." His hold on his utensils was crushing. Hollow blue eyes turned to his fellow Praetorian. "What of the Third? I heard it was the Legate's personal unit. That must've been interesting."
"For less than a month." The Praetorian from the Third forced a laugh from his lips. "The Legate committed some foolishness while I was out scouting one of the bandit camps. By the time I returned to camp, Caesar had stripped him of his authority, limited him to the camp. The Praefectus Castrorum was given overall command of the Third. To this day, I have no idea what happened. Whatever it was, it didn't seem to matter. The Third's assigned to Nami no Kuni now, ordered to grow into a Legion like the rest and the Legate was raised once more to his full power during the attack from those fools."
"I'm surprised you made it to Praetorian still." The Praetorian from the Ninth earned a look of affront for his words. "I mean no disrespect brother but…Your foe were simple bandits and thugs. Even with my time in the Ninth, I had to fight for the chance to earn this cloak." A hand was laid on his shoulder, the purple cloak that was secured there. "I'm just curious on what your journey was to get here."
"Ronin." The Praetorian from the Third leaned back in his seat. "We've been dealing with them since Gato's death. There's a massive bounty on Vicarius Kaiza's head. It draws an even mix of the desperate and the strong to try and claim it. My Centurion saw me in enough battles and decided to push for my place here, that I at least deserved the chance to prove myself."
"Your Centurion should feel honored." The Praetorian from the Nine lifted his drink in a clear toast. "You more than deserve that cloak."
"The same for you brother." The Praetorian from the Third accepted the praise and answered in kind.
Anko silently listened to the conversation from above the two clones.
She had been watching the Praetorians across the tower all day. Just like she had been all the days since she had first stepped into the tower.
Many of their conversations had been much the same on the first day as they were now.
This all sounded like a fresh crop of bodyguards making small-talk amongst each other. Not dissimilar to an escort squad getting to know each other before a long mission, passing the time with idle chatter.
'So where are the experienced ones?' The village's files on the Praetorians as a whole were still limited, behavior difficult to pin down even with the Third Hokage's long delayed shift to active intelligence gathering taken into account. All they knew was that there was little crossover between them and the rest of the clones. They seemed to perform a wide variety of tasks for Naruto, seemingly whatever he needed. Sasuke Uchiha played a roll of some kind with them but they were Naruto's to command, fulfilled his myriad of orders first and foremost.
But the fact remained: They were bodyguards first and specialists second.
Naruto didn't leave with them when Jiraiya took him out the village. His army of clones was following him but it wasn't the Praetorians. The vast majority of them seemed to simply be missing.
Anko moved on after silently marking the helmets of both with a drop of ink.
She had to keep track of which identical clones she had already eavesdropped on and which she hadn't somehow. So far, dropping ink on top of their helmets was the best way to do it. With her little addition, it would not only disappear soon after impact but was easy to sense her Chakra on the ones she had marked no matter where they went in the village.
She moved on to her next stop.
And another group of Praetorians.
This one was actually a quartet. Two guard pairs had seemingly met up during their patrols.
A fifth Praetorian was approaching them. Anko recognized the crest on his helmet as the marking of a Centurion.
One nudged the others, brought their attentions to the end of the hall. "Centurion Uzumaki."
Fists hit their armor, the Centurion returning it as he walked past.
"He didn't seem to be in a good mood." Anko almost liked this one. He seemed to have some snark to him. His words earned a light punch to the shoulder from the Praetorian next to him.
"Easy there brother." The clone nodded towards where the Centurion had come from. "Caesar's Hyuga is an experience."
The other two Praetorians only shook their heads.
"She almost makes me want the Legate back. She doesn't even carry Caesar's mark yet she acts as if she is his." The clone laughed. "If I didn't know any better, I would be worried for Caesar. She will not handle rejection well."
"As long as she obeys Caesar, there will be nothing to fear. She cannot threaten him with her strength." The second Praetorian to speak, the one who had mentioned the Hyuga in the first place laughed. "Perhaps she'll be motivated enough to replace the Legate on his return."
"I would sooner have Caesar's foe battle the Legate for his rank. Her cousin would be less of an irritation than she would be." One of the otherwise silent Praetorians spoke up, scoffed at the idea of Hinata in charge of the Legion.
"The Legate won't be changing anytime soon." The last Praetorian to hold onto his silence finally broke it. His words earned a look from all three, a mix of annoyed and disbelieving. He scoffed. "As much as you despise him, he holds his position because Caesar has decided he should hold it. And he continues to display his competency. Until one of those things change, his position is secure."
"You speak from personal experience?" One of the other three may have spoken but all three clearly had the same thoughts.
Anko was curious herself about what had changed this one's opinion.
"Yes." The Praetorian's eyes focused on the wall across from them. "I was deployed on the day of the invasion, thought my duty would be boring under his command. For much of the day, it was. We chased the mad beast Caesar sought to battle, we prevented any from interrupting, and then the Legate called for us to assemble with all haste. While he informed Caesar of the Fifth's state, our Centurions spoke to the rest of us. The Fifth was being torn apart and we were, like the rest of the Legion that could, to reinforce them. The Legate was the first of us to enter the battle, the first to draw his blade to defend what remained of the Fifth."
The Praetorian paused, his face unreadable to Anko as he looked to the other three.
"We all know his strength already. He commands us because only Caesar is stronger than him. Like it or not, we have all admitted he is stronger than any of us." The Praetorian tightened his hold on his sword. "On that day, I can say I finally understood why he was given such an honor above all our brothers: His strength is beyond the sword and shield. Before our charge across the village, I knew I felt fear. But I rallied to the Legate's call. I heeded his orders without a moment of hesitation."
He turned red eyes to the three Praetorians with him.
"I consider it my finest honor to have fought side by side with him even once."
Anko marked all four with drops of ink.
'That's the third today.' The Uchiha was a regular talking point for both the few Legionnaires she bothered listening to and the majority of the Praetorians. Usually, the Praetorians focused only on how much they disliked the Uchiha and grudgingly tolerated him. Anko knew enough of the situation to read between the lines:
They feared the Uchiha.
From what she had gathered, he had beaten his authority into the Praetorians at nearly every opportunity. Into a majority of the Legionnaires. The Yamanaka even had a memory from Choji of the Uchiha beating down one of the Optio's who had disrespected him, had left the clone bleeding on the ground by the time he was done.
But some Praetorians also deeply respected the Uchiha. Like the one she had just listened to.
And around fourteen others. All of them shared the same story, told it in different ways but they were all about the day of the invasion by the Hidden Sand and Sound. She didn't know exactly what he had done that day outside the Chunin Exams but it was enough for some to change their opinion on him.
'This is only the second group to bring up Neji Hyuga and him taking the Legate position.' It was another running tally Anko was keeping in her head. 'It'll clearly switch if the Uchiha doesn't meet the blonde's standard but the criteria still don't make sense. Supposedly, he can lose it the moment he loses a fight but nothing's clear yet on how that fight should go. Is it ceremonial? Is it a formal challenge? Spontaneous? Those four yesterday talked about losing to him all at once so does it have to be a one-on-one encounter or not?'
The first group had spoken far more about the Legate position than the group beneath her now.
Even if it had been a joke.
"Ha. You're hilarious."
"Come on! Humor me if I'm so hilarious!"
"Fine. Fine. If I had no choice I would choose…Tribune Akimichi."
"Ah. He'd be a poor Legate."
"Of course he would. No worse than Tribune Nara or Tribune Inuzuka."
"What about Tribune Yamanaka? She's at least stupid enough to be fearless."
"No. That's my pick. She'd be entertaining to see work with Caesar. He'd order her crucifixion in a day."
"A day? No. It'll be an hour!"
That group of (possibly drunk) Praetorians had at least helped identify what exactly the Tribunes were, had explained the lingering strangeness of their position: They were here to prevent the Hidden Grass from attempting to retrieve Karin Uzumaki.
They were, primarily, human shields.
'Not a bad plan if it was really spur of the moment. Not great but not bad. Would help to know which of the two came up with it.' Anko came across another group of Praetorians patrolling the tower, seven of them this time. They were clearly heading somewhere, earned Anko's attention as they hurried along. One of them was even a Centurion.
She frowned when she noticed where they were going.
It was to the basement of the tower, sublevels, whatever the blonde in charge had built beneath it. It was the one area where security was too tight to enter, too many guards and too many patrols to even get to an area as open as the stairwell that would take her down. Which was under even heavier guard from the few glimpses she could get of it.
It was clear that whatever the kid was keeping down there was something he wanted to remain hidden.
Anko had been tempted to try since she had noticed how out of the ordinary the security at the stairs had been but had decided against it, placed her mission first.
She had, so far, only seen the Hyuga slip through the door on this floor. She had spent hours on the other side of it before she had come back through.
'Later.' She would find out whatever it was he was keeping down there eventually. Just not now.
She gave up on following the seven of them after marking them with a dot of ink on their helmets.
She also dropped off of the ceiling, was once more visible as she headed off down the hall.
'So far, this is a lot of what I expected.' Anko hadn't been surprised to be correct. 'His Praetorians are his bodyguard unit and have some type of specialized training courtesy of Sasuke Uchiha. There's also some selection process at work. He has at least ten units to draw from. And around 99% don't like the Uchiha. His position of Legate is also tenuous. Current theory: Beating him nets the victor the position. The criteria for the fight is still unclear. Isn't likely that holds true for the other ranks in his Legion. Legate's a special case. Decanus are elected from among the rank and file, Centurions are appointed, they pick an Optio as their second in command, Tesserarius is a separate appointment and likely involves special duties. Possibly third in command.'
She reached into one of the pockets inside Ibiki's coat, drew out a container of miniature dango. She popped one into her mouth before putting the rest away.
'Higher up leadership isn't clearly marked, at least to an outsider. Centurions wear a distinctive crest on their helmets but the number of crests in a unit number more than ten. There's at least a rank above Centurion, a Primus Pilus. They're in charge of one of the ten units. And they likely serve as advisors for the two of them, field commanders for larger units.' Anko thought back to the heavily guarded stairwell. The pieces came together. 'He may have underground meetings. The Primus Pilus form a council, possibly including the leader of his bodyguard as well. And he may store records underground as well. Easy access for reference or clarification.' She continued on her path. 'Beyond those ten, his Praetorians are an independent unit who recruit from the other ten by unknown means. Possibly recommendation. Additional training follows recruitment. They're led by a Praefectus Castrorum. Possibly outranks the Primus Pilus and, temporarily at least, outranked the Legate. Possibly an equivalent rank?'
Once she finished the stick of dango, she resisted the temptation to throw it into a wall. She drew out the box again, switched out the empty stick for a new one.
'Numbers are currently unknown. His Cohorts are expected to be approximately a thousand clones. The Barrier Team can't get an accurate count with all of them having the same Chakra. Our best intelligence points to over a thousand for each.'
She didn't blame the Genin and Chunin for not being able to find anything on his numbers. She couldn't find anything on his numbers. Wherever he or Sasuke kept them, they weren't easily accessible even in the tower.
'We're going to have to rely on whatever number the Barrier Team manages to come up with.' Her ink dots were mainly for her own use, imperceptible to non-sensors and helped her keep track of who was who with her recent…changes. 'Even with the Chakra I added to the ink, I can't keep track of them all if they're numbers are as big as I think.'
She finished off her stick of dango, moved on to the next.
'Ten thousand clones considered regular Legionnaires. I would guess a thousand considered Praetorians. Is probably less than that but better to be safe than sorry so overestimation. That's, at minimum, eleven thousand clones. But he has reserves. Enough to still not be hurting after the invasion. More likely that all of those numbers can be raised by three hundred each. That puts him at fourteen thousand and three hundred clones. Before the invasion, we could field somewhere around fifteen thousand Shinobi. Most of that Chunin and Genin. Our numbers definitely suffered a drop from the attack. Even if we pull from the reserves, we wouldn't be close to his numbers right now. If he attacked us now, we would suffer heavier casualties than the invasion.'
Her fangs wore away at the wooden skewer between her lips. She didn't notice.
'Skill level is another issue.' She hadn't wasted her time before she had officially taken on this mission to join the blonde's army, had read up on what she could, spent some time watching them move around the village herself. 'Chakra Flow isn't exactly taught at the Academy. How exactly did the kid learn it, spread it to the rest of his army so quickly?' His attacks during the Chunin Exams came to her mind, primarily the massive waves he had used against Neji Hyuga. 'It's a wasteful version but effective when you have the reserves of a Jinchuriki. He relied on overwhelming power to compensate for any gaps. He can at the very least control the amount of power he sends out with each attack judging by how he varied it for the situation. So what else can he do? Does he know anything about adding his Chakra Nature to his weapons? Do his clones?'
Once her observations were done and she had a baseline behavior to work with, she would set herself to figuring out exactly what Naruto Uzumaki's army could do and just how fast they could learn.
'With the Uchiha as his second, there's no telling what he can train them to do. Regular Shadow Clones can speed up training and at the rate he seems to create these clones, he could possibly gain skills at an exponential rate. Even if he's using a strange Kinjutsu nobody knows about, having such large numbers can still aid training even without the benefits from the Shadow Clones. I'll have to assess their critical thinking as well, see their problem solving. Academy thought exercises are out but I can come up with something to get them engaged.'
She had something in mind already, would be familiar enough to what the Praetorians already seemed adept at doing. Familiarity would hopefully make them sloppy, let her see other exploitable gaps, see what kept them motivated and what kept them lazy. The Genin and Chunin she had in mind wouldn't even be in much danger if things went wrong.
'Hopefully.' While most of the Tribunes were seen in an indifferent or almost positive light, there were clear issues with Yamanaka and Haruno. 'The Praetorians will need to be watched if I use them. Especially with Yamanaka.' The Uchiha wasn't in the village any longer to reprimand them if they went too far.
'Him leaving really seems to be a double-edged sword. He can't stop them like they reported but he also can't keep a hold of the clones anymore either. The Praetorians may not need much of an excuse to try and take them out.' The claws at the end of her fingers dug into her palm. 'And then things will get messy. I'll have to get them out as quickly as I can.'
She almost didn't want to think what would happen if the worst came to pass, if the clones actually turned hostile.
Even with the changes to her body, what Ibiki said she could do…she doubted she could get all of the kids out alive.
She walked past a pair of Centurions, noticed the ink dot on one of their helmets.
'They don't look at me like an enemy…' That had been a shocker. It still took some getting used to. 'They don't even look surprised to see me.'
The clones were easy to read and they didn't seem to dislike her. They were curious.
And she couldn't help but be worried about why that was.
The clones could change their opinions seemingly in an instant.
They had gone from adoring Haruno, willing to die for her in droves from Kakashi's reports on what happened in the Land of Waves, to despising her after the relationship between her and Naruto had turned sour.
They had gone from indifference towards Yamanaka to outright despising her by the time the invasion was over with.
They could even go from hating the Uchiha to respecting him.
Once she was sure she was alone, she came to stop.
Her black and yellow eyes took in the empty hall of the tower around her.
"Can I even do this?"
A dark part of her couldn't help but add to it.
"Does he even expect me to succeed? Or am I here to be his scapegoat? Is this just the proof that 'Mitarashi's always been a traitor'?"
AN: 2/4 chapters for this update.