Chapter 1
"Three incoming from the northwest, around two miles away, high chunin level," Kirari whispered sharply, her hand automatically reaching for her sword and pulling it out of its sheath in one swift movement. Three chunin were nothing threatening for her and her partner, but they could never be too cautious in their line of work.
Beside her, Genma nodded, taking his fighting stance without wasting a breath, every movement calculated and quick. She gave him a small smirk that he returned, as they both headed for their pursuers, they hadn't encountered any threats on their journey back home yet. It was getting almost boring, so this seemed like a nice challenge.
She easily fended off the nameless chunin from Iwagakure, not having to put in much effort as she jabbed a mild paralytic in his arm. Genma seemed to have no problem as well as he tied up the other two, now unconscious women, both from Iwa as well. Both of them preferred not to kill their opponents unless necessary, and these three looked to be some of those who wanted revenge on Konoha for their losses in the third war. If their enraged shouting and total lack of tact was anything to go by.
They left them tied up and unconscious in their previously made makeshift camp and started on their journey home again, eager to be in the walls of Konoha once again, surrounded by the green trees and familiar faces. There really was nothing like home.
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It took them another three days to reach the front gates of their village, from what Kirari could make out, Izumo and Kotetsu got stuck with the guard duty again. Probably punished for something or the other. She snorted under her breath and Genma gave a small sigh of resignation. He was the biggest mother hen in the whole jonin pool. Izumo and Kotetsu were just a few of the chunin he had managed to adopt.
"Aw, don't be sulky, let the kids have some fun," she said teasingly and ignored the glare he gave her.
"They probably messed up the order of mission reports again, God knows the Sandaime should know by now that those two are not compatible with any sort of paperwork," he sighed again, shaking his head almost fondly.
"Mhm, as their mom you should probably teach them about the downside of life as a shinobi which appears in the form of paperwork sometimes," she said sagely and dodged the well-aimed senbon she received for her comment. "Hey, that would've hurt!"
"You wouldn't be a very competent kunoichi if you couldn't dodge one flimsy weapon, would you?" he sassed back and she rolled her eyes, but remained quiet. They reached the gates soon enough.
"Lieutenant Shirunai Genma, registration number 010203 reporting from S-rank mission," he said and she held up the mission scroll in her hand, "Lieutenant Senju Kirari, registration number 022012 reporting from the same," she added. They didn't go on this as an ANBU mission, so there was no reason for masks and anonymity. Izumo and Kotetsu were both professional enough to not start whining until they confirmed their identities but once that was out of the way Izumo all but threw himself at Genma.
"Genma-san! I haven't seen you in months, months! I thought you died or something. Raidou-san wouldn't say anything either," he cried.
"Well, you do realise S-rank missions are classified right?" she asked with a small smirk and he sputtered in offence. Genma rolled his eyes but coaxed the other to let go of him. "Yes, yes, I missed you too. We need to hand in the report for the mission now, so please save you dramatics for later." he admonished and Kirari chuckled. As they walked towards the Hokage tower she could hear him complaining about 'not being dramatic at all'.
It really was amazing to be back home.
Both of them made way into the Hokage's office silently and bowed.
"Ah, Genma-kun, Kirari-chan, you're both later than expected," he stated, letting out a puff of smoke from his pipe. "Yes, Hokage-sama, we ran into some skirmishes from Iwa on our way back," Kirari informed, it wasn't as if that wasn't true, but they'd taken care of them quickly. If Genma and her had spent a week or two enjoying the luxury of a nice hotel in Land of Grass, well, no one had to know.
From the Hokage's amused look, he didn't really buy the excuse but didn't press either. "So I presume the mission went well?' he asked.
"Hai, the target was easy enough to subdue, it took some time tailing her to get the information, but it wasn't very hard," Genma reported calmly. "And your concerns weren't unfounded Hokage-sama, she had help and information from inside the village. The sort of knowledge she had wasn't something available to genin or chunin. It appears we have a traitor amongst the higher ranks," Kirari added, her voice losing the casual tone.
The Sandaime sighed, looking ten years older than a moment ago. It was hard to accept the thought of having traitors in a shinobi village, especially high ranking ones. The fact that jonin and ANBU worked more closely with the Hokage just added to the concern and hesitation. They didn't find many traitors in their ranks, most were caught and eliminated before they could harm the village, yet there has been someone who's been feeding information, classified information , to their enemies for over six months and they only got to know about it now. It was unacceptable.
"I thought so, you're dismissed, I will have someone look into the source of this problem immediately. Good luck on a well-completed mission, at least I know I can trust my favourite ANBU regardless of the situation," he said the last part with a small smile.
"Ex-Anbu" Kirari corrected, even though everyone knew you never really stopped being an ANBU after resigning.
"And you're not supposed to have favourites, Hokage-sama," Genma added, making all three of them chuckle.
It was no secret that their team had been amongst the highest-ranking members of Anbu. After Genma, Kirari, Raidou, Hatake Kakashi and well, due to different circumstances but Uchiha Itachi as well, had left the Anbu forces, the Hokage hadn't been very pleased. The organisation's skill level had dropped significantly, though that may be due to the incompetence of new members.
Kiari didn't know Hatake Kakashi or Uchiha Itachi personally, but Genma had liked them well enough. And it was no secret they were insanely talented.
"Yes, yes." the Hokage waved off his words with a small sigh. "I expect both of you to get proper medical check-up immediately. The written report can be handed in this week anytime, No missions till you get clearance from the hospital," both Genma and Kirari winced at the last part. If there was something almost all Anbu and jonin hated, it was hospitals. After so much experience with death and killing, it was natural to be uncomfortable to have someone see all your wounds and look closely.
Also, the medic-nin in the hospital were fucking scary.
"Sometimes your expressions make me feel as if I'm looking at the female version of Tobirama-sensei," The Hokage said with fondness in his voice. Kirari beamed at him, "Well, his kickass ninja skills aren't the only thing I inherited," she replied. And it was true, while she had the blondish white hair of her father, her red eyes and the facial structure was extremely similar to her grandfather. As well as her use of Suiton and sensory skills. Most people didn't take more than a few minutes to figure out her heritage.
The Hokage laughed and dismissed them, both bowed and left the office, heading straight to the hospital to get the necessary check-up done with as soon as possible.
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"A broken rib. How long ago did this even happen!? It would have started joining back abnormally if you hadn't gotten it checked right now!" a medic fussed as she lay on the hospital bed. She mostly had superficial injuries, she could heal almost everything herself after all, but the rib had left her mind some time ago. It had been a few weeks since that happened. Despite the fussing and fluttering around, the man did his job well enough and healed it efficiently.
Genma and Kirari were both field medics. Genma was a certified medic who was capable of healing others during missions but Kirari was more inclined towards using extremely delicate chakra control to join limbs, flush out poisons and in very fortunate cases, regrow organs. She wasn't a medic cleared for performing surgeries or working at the hospital. She didn't have such sort of training, what she had was amazing chakra control and Senju Tsunade as an aunt. So of course, she could do some medical ninjutsu, even if it leaned towards the scientific end.
A few more minutes of torture and she was cleared for missions, not that she planned on taking one right now. The last one had been months long and there was a mandatory break of seven days before she could take another A-rank or higher. And she really didn't want boring C-rank or B-rank missions right now. Maybe she could take some time off and go visit Tsunade-Obasan. It had been a while since she last saw her and she really loved the kickass kunoichi. She just had to follow the rumours of the large bets her aunt owed and she'd reach him.
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Kirari's luck was the absolute worse.
What part of the 'I-don't-want-C-rank-missions' did the universe not understand?
And to get C-rank missions along with a genin team no less.
With team Kakashi of all. She didn't even know the man! Sure, they might have worked on the same missions once or twice but that was back in Anbu, she hadn't even ever spoken to the guy. Plus the genin team had the Jinchuriki, the last Uchiha, and some pink-haired brat. Great. Just great.
The Hokage had asked her to go as extra protection since there were rumours of problems near the border of the wave country. She knew he was just a little paranoid when it came to his honourary grandson. Kakashi wasn't considered to be the next Hokage candidate just because he looked pretty and was the student of the yondaime. Uzumaki Naruto huh? He was a nice boy. Kirari didn't know him personally but he had given many chunin and even some jonin a run for their money with his pranks. The boy had some skill. And he has just the perfect combination of his parents too. In looks and personality, though the latter seemed to lean towards his mother.
And there was the Uchiha, it almost hurt to look at him, Kirari had been close to Uchiha Shisui, and his suicide had left an aching wound on her heart. After the massacre, she had all but disconnected from the situation, even though she knew there was once survivor, Uchiha Sasuke. She did feel guilty for never checking up on him, she owed it to his cousin at least.
But she couldn't face him without remembering his older cousin, her best friend. Shisui was her own personal failure. She had known him since they were genin and didn't even know he was feeling low enough to consider suicide. Later, there were speculations that Uchiha Itachi had killed him but she couldn't digest that either. Shisui adored Itachi, and it was obvious for everyone to see that the sentiment was returned. How did she miss all those changes? How could she be such a bad friend?
At least the last member of their team was a simple civilian born girl, easier to focus at without any past connections. She begrudgingly accepted the mission request and was informed to meet the team at the gates tomorrow morning at six am.
She nodded and left for the jonin bar where she had planned to meet up with Yugao and Kurenai.
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"Ah, team 7 huh? They're a good team, I think. Even though they are immature right now, they have great potential," Kurenai told her when she told them about her mission tomorrow. Her friend had her own genin team now. Ugh, so much effort.
"And what about their sensei?" she asked as she downed another shot of sake, she was thankful for the hangover potions Shizune had taught her, without them the mission would have been even more annoying.
"Mmm. He's a great shinobi, but he has his.... uh.... quirks," Kurenai replied and she snorted, that was just a polite way to point out 'crazy'. It wasn't like most jonin weren't crazy in some way or the other. Take Gai for example, the man wore green body-fitting spandex and spoke about youth every minute of the day. Kirari was weak to cute things, especially cute animals, which was harmless most of the time. Anko was, well, she was a little more of what would fit the general description of 'crazy'. So it wasn't really surprising that the Hatake would have a 'quirk'
"Yeah? What is it?"
"Ah, he likes to be late. Deliberately, makes every possible effort to be as late as possible to every meeting." Kirari grimaced, punctuality wasn't something she was set on, but she hated waiting for long periods of time. Made her feel on edge for some reason.
"Great. Just great," she said and banged her head on the table, hearing two amused snorts.
"C'mon, both of us have missions tomorrow, let's get you home," Yugao stood up and pulled her up as well, they waved their goodbyes to Kurenai and left the bar. "Don't worry, Kakashi-senpai is a good captain," she said once they were outside.
"I'm not worried about that. It's just a C-rank anyway. I'm more worried about the headaches that come with dealing with genin and snobbish clients." she grinned, but it was a little weak, she really wanted to take a whole week off and relax, or travel. Now she was stuck on babysitting duty.
"Details," Yugao dismissed. "Goodnight Kirari," she added and waved as they went their separate ways. She murmured similar greetings and walked towards home. She lived alone in one of the shinobi apartments, she didn't like staying at the Senju compound much. It was too big for one or two families, much less a single person to live in. She still visited regularly, made sure everything was clean and maintained, but didn't live there.
Her mother used to tell her that the houses used to be filled at one point, and their clan were all skilled in different arts. A clan of a thousand skills. It was a beautiful compound, surrounded by trees from all sides, the clan gates adorned with colourful flowers, but it was still empty. Where once hundreds of people lived, civilians and shinobi alike, there was only silence. Kirari couldn't bring herself to live in that silence anymore.
She unlocked her apartment and made way inside. It was a fairly spacious place. Two bedrooms, one bath, a decent sized kitchen and eating place. A small balcony, that was overflowing with plants. It wasn't much, but it was home. She quickly packed some clothes, medicine and food pills for the mission tomorrow before sealing it into a scroll, and made way to her bed. She collapsed on the mattress with a content sigh, letting sleep overtake her quickly.
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