Chapter 3
Tenzou was perched on the highest branch available to him, carefully disguised from anyone who might happen to be looking up.
Wind speed was an estimated thirty kilometers per hour. Sky was clear, and the birds flying overhead weren’t following the irregular circulatory patterns of summons, and chances of an aerial attack were forty two point three percent. The real danger was from underground and surface attacks.
Turning his attention back on the ground, he could see flickers of signatures moving around miles away, completely ignorant of the two ANBU agents. Sometimes, a few would stop over at the river they had used to trace back to the farm community.
Rivers were a good way of finding settlements and mapping out local terrain. But they were also an endless magnet for other people. Because of that, they retreated a good distance away from that particular landmark. Yet still, Tenzou still had his head tilted slightly towards the exact point where they had sworn to meet up again with Crow and Weasel.
He had marked one of the trees in that area with his chakra, to act as an anchor and make it easier to pinpoint that spot. Nothing had crossed in that area, though, which was making him worry.
“Relax,” Hound advised him from a few branches below, which was an odd request in such harrowing circumstances. Tenzou tensed his shoulders, disgruntled, and Hound huffed out a laugh and elaborated, “There is a certain number of tasks that the human brain can take before falling apart. Your sensing ability is strong, so we need you to focus on the area around us, and not constantly reaching out over to the Uchiha compound,” he hesitated for a second, “Wait, can you sense all the way to the Uchiha compound?”
Tenzou nodded, before clarifying verbally, “But I am monitoring the rendezvous point, not the compound, currently.”
A soft whistle, at the exact pitch Taichou used to convey being impressed.
They were silent after that – ANBU entailed a lot of silence, so that wasn’t the issue at all – until Tenzou decided to ask, “Taichou, permission to ask for possibly restricted clan information pertinent to this mission?”
Hound shifted lightly, and the only hint Tenzou received of that was the sound of the bough bending slightly under the moving weight. Then, he said quietly, “Permission granted.”
“The civilians recognized you as a Hatake,” he chose his words carefully, “Why was that the reaction they had?”
No response in the time it would take for an ANBU to give a full report easily, and Tenzou took it as the hint it was and responded, “I understand, it is a clan se-”
“Ah, no, not exactly,” Hound broke in, and Tenzou realized he had just been reaching for the right words, as he now explained, “The Hatake have their roots in a lot of places. We’re old, but the way we present nowadays is quite different from what our customs used to be.”
Tenzou was nothing more than the extension of the Hokage’s will. He had no business knowing more than the absolute minimum needed to make good decisions on a mission. Yet he found himself listening intently to the history of a clan that was now whittled down to a single man.
“We were nomadic people, with a unique kekkei genkai that gives us the Bright White chakra. Yet also had a physical effect, resulting in characteristics and mannerisms of animals. Like the Inuzuka’s animalistic forms, except it was a bit more pronounced for both clans back in the Warring Eras.”
Ah, okay. Tenzou had interacted with many Inuzuka in ANBU, so he understood what that meant. A dogteeth mutation, according to a few comments made by Orochimaru in the few interactions they had. He didn’t understand Hound’s reticence around that information.
“I’m assuming that at this period of time, they didn’t have a good reputation?” Tenzou guessed.
Hound hummed, “We folded into another family, with farms. That’s how we got our clan insignia. Unknown what time period we’re in, but we should still be around the time where that merging is happening, so they won’t deal with anyone except a select few families. Everyone else… perceives us as unknowable threats.”
Tenzou nodded, calling back to Yukimi and the Iburi clan living within trees, hiding from the wind. He could understand the situation, somewhat.
“Infiltrating into civilian areas will be difficult, then?” he surmised.
“Maybe,” Hound allowed, “Though a quick transformation should fix that issue. I merely wanted to feel out the situation we were in.”
Tenzou nodded, to show that he understood. Taichou appreciated signals that he was listening and following the logic, instead of expecting him to get it immediately like they were trained to be.
They had failed their mission. Shame burnt through Tenzou simply by thinking of it. Failure was not tolerated in Root. It did not go unpunished. He was not aware what the systems of correction were in ANBU, as he had not failed even once since being transferred. Until now.
Could this be a punishment for giving up that easily? They were sloppy, and this was the consequences of their dereliction of duty.
His mind was shaking. Panic threatening to overwhelm him in a way that he was meant to have trained out of his body years ago.
“Taichou,” his voice was even, despite the way it felt like his thoughts was screaming inside his head, “any further plans for returning to Konoha?”
Surprisingly, Hound hummed affirmatively, “Got a few ideas. I know a lot about this time period, and can pinpoint some good sealmasters and teaching academies that might be willing to work with us to repair it. But we could try retracing our steps back to where the seal was. Once Weasel and Crow return.”
“Their current infiltration mission is redundant?” Tenzou checked.
“All information is vital,” Taichou concurred, “but yes, it would seem so.”
“Permission to signal them to retreat?”
“Granted. But be careful about it.”
He had to stop the instinctive flinch from the words. Tenzou didn’t have to be instructed on this before. Like he was new. But it was his fault they had been caught unawares like this, wasn’t it? He was the Mokuton user. The long-range sensor. He should have noticed that something was wrong ages before they arrived at the spot Konoha wasn’t.
Perhaps a reminder that Taichou deemed necessary, then. He inclined his head lightly, and then Body Flickered away to get closer to the compound.
Itachi knew something was wrong when they arrived at dinner, and plates were being handed out.
There was a stack of plates that the clan members in charge of the rations that day were giving to each of them, and he noticed both of them carefully counting through the stack. They were keeping track of who was eating.
Shisui looked at him from the corner of his eyes, and Itachi showed that he understood with a short nod. A presence must have been detected within the compound. Or the rations were suddenly being tightened. Both were equally likely explanations, but dismissing the danger would be hubris.
Fleeing now was impossible. They were surrounded by their own kin; the most observant and protective breed of shinobi Itachi had encountered. The only reason they had ever managed to breach the compound’s defenses was because they understood how the Uchiha clan operated and had grown up learning of their history. They knew more about this era than even the people here.
Even as the noose hovered right over his skin, Itachi forced himself to remain calm. Remember the etiquette picked up in long-winded tea ceremonies.
When he was first setting out, his teachers recognized that he was going to be the youngest and smallest by a large margin in every team he would be placed in. To capitalize off this supposed weakness, he was given a thorough education in not only fighting styles best suited for fighting larger opponents, but also the art of subterfuge, and the unbreakable composure needed for it, as people were the most likely to let their guards down around a child who could never be expected to be a shinobi in this day and age.
Well, the day and age they came from, anyway. Through his careful observations, he had not missed the kids, struggling to put one foot in front of the other, yet doing exercises to improve their dexterity, stamina, and flexibility, years ahead of the standard modern-day Konoha demanded.
Even now, he watched a young child, perhaps not even three, stoking the fire providing them all warmth and light with a Katon jutsu that Father had not taught Itachi until he had begun the Academy. And Itachi was meant to be ahead of the curve. A prodigy, found only once in a generation. Yet here was this child who could outdo that, because that was what was expected nowadays.
Was he… strong? Or was it simply Konoha which had gotten weaker?
No. He had to force those thoughts out of himself. Whether he was strong or not meant nothing. As long as he continued to serve Konoha with all his abilities, the extent of them didn’t matter. He had to keep his faith in his duty firm.
(Duty. What a strange thing. Who did he pledge his life to? His clan? Or his Hokage? Their interests were always supposed to align, and yet all of a sudden, just when he had been brought into the most trusted fold of the Village, his family was ordering him to choose-)
The traitorous thoughts were broken by a sharp spike of killing intent, and the distinctive flare of chakra denoting the activation of a Sharingan.
So the reason for the food restrictions had become apparent. Itachi forced himself to continue breathing, even as Shisui carefully reared his head back to cover Itachi’s blind sides, and a not small amount of killer intent thrumming under his skin.
Itachi looked at him from the corner of his eye, trying to get him to back down. The chakra signature that had flared came closer, and it took a lot of self-control to keep his head down on the plate and continue eating. Even the ninjas from this time period reacted, heads swiveling around to watch as Uchiha Madara marched through the dining area, radiating rage and suspicion and the Sharingan glowing from under the mop of his hair.
“Izuna,” he growled, and even though his eyes caught his brother immediately, he was still scanning through the room, “I need to have a word.”
Izuna, the brother who Itachi still couldn’t quite separate from Sasuke despite him being much older than his baby brother, huffed out a laugh and stood up, “Calm down, Brother, you’re scaring everyone.”
“It is quite important,” Madara insisted, and for a second, he was looking Itachi right in the eyes. He didn’t look away, because he was the Uchiha heir, and avoiding eye contact was an admission of weakness.
If that struck Madara as odd, he showed no sign of it, carefully ushering his brother away.
There is silence, until soft conversation and the clinking of chopsticks against plates started up again.
Food hurdle was done. Now, the matter of sleeping quarters was the next challenge to their infiltration.
Except, they found that it became a non-issue, as Itachi extracted himself from the group, followed carefully by Shisui like always.
They didn’t go close to the boundaries, as there was a constant patrol there, but they were still able to find an isolated place to regroup and think about how to cover for the fact that they had no place in this world.
The constant thrum of background noise in this world was broken by an irregular sound of moving earth. Too small to be a Doton or mole-jutsu, but distinctive enough to feel the soil move near his shoes. Itachi looked down, and a tiny green sprout pulled itself out from the ground, growing a few inches in front of his eyes, and then tilted perfectly ninety degrees, right towards the place they had parted ways with Hound and Cat.
A message for extraction.
He looked up at Shisui, who nodded carefully.
Izuna looked carefully at his brother, struggling to believe this.
“You think,” he had to repeat, hopefully so that Madara would recognize how insane it sounded when he heard it from someone else, “that someone infiltrated the compound. Because of a misfiled form.”
“Yes!”
Never mind, then.
“Have you slept recently?” Izuna checked. There were recent studies going around that showed a correlation between cognitive decline and consistent sleep deprivation. He would not consider his brother to allow such a weakness to slip by him, but it never hurt to check.
“Not in the past seventy five hours, but I don’t see why you’re bringing this up,” Madara replied, crossing his arms, “I really don’t think you’re taking this seriously.”
Well, that wasn’t too bad. Izuna himself had gone longer without sleep plenty of times for a mission. Granted, he wasn’t even sure what those fancy scientists were using to categorize as ‘sleep deprivation’ in their studies, so this likely had nothing to do with that. Something else was responsible for this sudden bout of paranoia.
“Listen, it was likely a mistake by one of the new filers,” Izuna justified, “If you promise not to throttle the poor kid, we’ll ask around and figure out who was in that section.”
“Kai was doing intake,” Madara replied, quick as a whip. Izuna did remember him being there when he had gone into the records office today. And he was also sitting to the side of the group at dinner. All the better to corner and question him.
Izuna made to caution his brother about putting everyone else on edge, but he was already moving, so fast that it felt like he vanished on the spot. Truly a speed to rival even the White Demon.
He followed behind at a more sedate pace, leaping to the rooftops to get an accurate headcount of the group gathered here. Not many missed meals, as that was the only three times in a day food was made available. If Madara’s claims had any merit at all, they were most likely disguised as one of their own.
Even upon activating his Sharingan, Izuna saw no signs of Henge or genjutsu or even any practical application of makeup for deception.
But there was a boy, not too far from the edge of the crowd, but also not firmly in the center, eating quietly. Izuna remembered seeing him, right outside the records office today.
On the young side, obviously a trained shinobi, and a model of Uchiha behavior. The name of the boy escaped him, but only because there were many, many shinobi in the Uchiha rank and file that fit that exact description. An image that a lot of their clan failed to embody, and an outsider would not know to look out for.
The only reason he was thinking about the boy now was because his eyes slid away to take a headcount of everyone. And then when they moved back to double-check the figure, the boy was gone. Along with his companion.
Odd. But nothing of much concern. Izuna wasn’t a sensor, but when he twisted his head around, his Sharingan was able to pinpoint their chakra signatures in the sleeping quarters.
Then there was a peculiar flare of something, there for a second, gone the next. But whatever it was made Madara tense up from where he was questioning a Kai that looked close to tears.
Izuna fell into step with him as they ran the short distance to where the flare had come from – right where the boys had been standing, and now had vanished from.
“Two Uchiha men were here,” he informed Madara, “One was low teens. The other, younger. Current status unknown.”
“Impossible,” Madara said drily, both coming to an abrupt stop at the scene of the crime.
Nothing was there. Not a single thing amiss.
Except for a single green weed, where previously there had been none.
Izuna stood back, but Madara stepped forward without concern, bending down to pluck the shoot out of the ground with almost reverent gentleness.
“Mokuton,” he whispered.
Izuna felt vitriol boil through his veins like acid. Not this again.