Runner

XIV.

"Again," the man sitting in the chair ordered.

The child, her arm hanging broken and useless at her side, struggled to push herself to her feet to face him. Judging by the way she placed slightly more weight on her back leg than average as she took her ready stance, her front leg was likely injured as well. If this were really training with one of his students, he may have stopped here. Or at least stopped to explain to her the purpose of this as an exercise. But she was not his student, and the purpose of this farce of a training session was known to all parties present. They all just took care to not acknowledge it for what it was truly was.

"Operative Hakka." The girl stiffened in acknowledgement but did not look away from her opponent. Good, but even the distraction was enough for him to move in for a strike. "It has been reported that you are no longer living at the apartment that was assigned to you. Why is that?"

"My apartment was flooded. I was forced relocate."

"I also note that you are now living with Jounin Uzumaki Kushina. How did that come about?"

There was a hitch between the girl's block and counterattack, the man facing her noticed.

"Jounin Namikaze Minato set up the arrangement. She is his significant other."

"That is very advantageous to your mission. Was this arrangement planned?"

"No, Danzou-sama," the operative answered as she barely dodged a foot to the gut.

"Hmm." The man facing her could admit he found that sound incredibly irritating, and he had been on a team with two of the most irritating, loud people on this earth. "I suppose that I am fine with you keeping this arrangement for as long as it is available to you."

"Un."

"However," the old war hawk started, and as he did so, made a hand signal to the man facing her.

Moving faster than the girl could react, the man slammed a fist into the side of her face that sent her flying through the air and crashing into a wall. If he had put anymore force into that blow, he would've killed her. As it was, she assuredly had serious bruising on her back and possibly a dislocated jaw.

"However," Danzou repeated, "You have failed to avoid attracting the suspicion of Jounin Namikaze Minato. He is asking questions of your origins, and digging into the gaps in your records. He won't find anything to lead back to us, but if he is not turned back from this path, he may soon involve his teacher and even the hokage himself."

Everyone present understood fully the weight and implication of that statement. The old ninja stood and crossed the room to stand before her.

"You will devise a way to divert his attentions."

The other operative's guess about the dislocated jaw were confirmed when instead of answering verbally, the girl simply bowed in lieu of it.

"Operative Hakka, you will report to Operative Nonou to be healed and then you will return to Jounin Uzumaki Kushina's home." He turned. "Operative Hebi, you are dismissed."

The operative nodded and turned to leave.

Danzou was a fool.

He thought himself so clever, the puppet master did, bending men, women, and children to his will. Bend them too much, and his pretty toys broke. Yet he didn't seem to understand that as he used and misused his puppets again and again. Beat what made them someone out of them, and there would be nothing left. Not even the fear of death. And once that was gone, only death could await them.

Operative Hakka… such a shame. He remembered her smaller, and so full of rage, and hate, and fear, and hope. So unpredictable and delightful. What he could have done with her if he had gotten to her first.

Such a shame.

XV.

"You know Uchiha-san has romantic feelings towards you, Nohara-san."

Glancing furtively at her companion, she found her gaze unwavering and off putting still.

Why exactly had she agreed to this?

Oh, that's right. Because she thought Obito-kun's teammate would actually be someone normal.

Not long ago, she'd noted a change in the conversations she had with her longtime friend. Before, he'd often come to her and spend much of their time together complaining about his teammates. It appeared that one of said teammates, previously assumed to be strange and rude, was responsible for the shift in their talks. Now she was often treated to days where Obito-kun would only spend a small fraction of his time griping about "Bakashi," what he'd recently taken to calling the other boy. Much of the rest of the time was spent talking about whatever he had done recently with the mysterious "Hakka-chan."

All of it had made her curious about actually meeting the other girl. It would be beyond wonderful to be acquainted with another female kunoichi. With her entire family, her best friend, and her entire team being all male, she had been wondering if her life was doomed to be a testosterone wasteland. So she had asked said best friend to arrange a meeting between the two of them at a café that he claimed his teammate favored.

Of course, now Rin was wondering how she hadn't seen this coming. Anyone who hung out with Obito-kun had to be strange like him or stranger. She was still wondering if she should run now to avoid acknowledging the girl's comment.

"Um."

"You pretend you don't know."

Blushing furiously, the medic-nin in training looked down, wishing she could make the other girl stop talking.

"You are trying to avoid hurting his feelings." There was a long pause. "And you seem to have a history with my other teammate."

"How did you-?" Rin nearly squeaked, "No one is supposed to know about that!"

"A guess," Hakka-san answered blandly, before raising her cup of tea to her lips to blow, sending warm, sweet-smelling gusts of steam across the table.

Rin goggled at her, wondering if guessing wildly accurately was true.

"Why would you even bring any of that up?"

"The wellbeing of my teammates is important. You have the potential to cause harm to them."

"I would never hurt either of them!" Rin protested.

"Maybe not intentionally. But the more someone matters to another person, the more harm they can cause them with even the simplest of words or actions. I want you to be very careful with the way you treat my teammates, because at least to one of them, you are a very precious person."

Rin wondered if she should be angry at this girl. What right did she have to lecture her about how she treated her friends? Still.

"Is this your way of telling me I better not break your teammates' hearts or else?" she finally asked somewhat jokingly, deciding to try humor over anger.

This seemed like something out of those shoujo mangas that her civilian cousin liked to read. It was always smarter to keep a cool head in situations like that.

"If that is how you would like to take it."

That pulled a chuckle out of Rin.

"Do you always have these kinds of talks with people you meet for the first time?"

"No."

"Really?" the medic-nin in training frowned, "What makes me so special then?"

"You're special to Uchiha-san. Anyone special to my teammates is special to me."

"Somehow, I feel like that's a big admission coming from you." Rin pulled her own cup of tea close so she could wrap her hands around it and let the heat seep into them. "You really care about those two, don't you?"

Instead of answering, Hakka-san took another sip. Rin smiled knowingly. Obito-kun's teammate was strange indeed, so abrupt and blunt, but she obviously cared a lot about her teammates.

It was a relief to know that Obito-kun had someone else besides her watching out for him. Even as friendly as he was, he seemed to have trouble making true friends with anyone else like she had with their other age mates at the Academy. Not many people seemed to know what to do with an Uchiha who was actually nice. She had worried that, when they had been put on different teams, things would only be more difficult for him.

As for Kakashi-kun, she worried in a similar but different way. No one knew, but before the Hatake clan fell from grace, the Nohara clan had been one of the minor clans in their service. Her family had helped look after her and the boy together when they were very young because they were the same age, and Hatake-dono had needed someone to help tend his son after his mother had died. But after his father's failed mission, her family come after hard times themselves, many including her mother lost in the war, and they had abandoned the Hatakes. Rin hadn't seen Kakashi-kun again until the Academy, and by then a distant and fiercely independent stranger to her. She had wished for a time to be on a team with him if only just to look after him, and to maybe salvage some of her family's honor.

It seemed now that at least someone, Hakka-san, was willing to look after him just as she would Obito-kun.

"I think I like you Hakka-san," Rin told the other girl as she poured herself another cup of tea.

"I am still undecided on you, Nohara-san."

Rin smiled a little wider.

"I think I can live with that."

XVI.

His teammates might chastise him from time to time about always joking around, but even they appreciated being able laugh in the midst of battle when things should've been serious. After all, his team would at some point be facing off against the Yellow Flash's students in their exams, one of which was already a chuunin (and how was that even fair?). He knew he ought to keep up his team's spirits as best as possible.

Although it seemed unnecessary in Gai's case, since he already seemed pumped up beyond belief to be fighting the Hatake kid. He'd been so quick in his excitement to get at him and steal away their scroll that he'd knee'd the Uchiha in the face in his haste.

That was where they were now, with the Uchiha flat on his back knocked out, his teammate standing guard over him. Gai and Hatake were trading blows almost too fast to track.

And him and Ebisu?

Standing side by side, trying to not to crack up and take their attention off of their opponents. He was sure that their proctor was shaking their head at the six of them. That thought just had him working even harder not to laugh.

If he and his teammate hadn't held off laughing, they probably would've been mowed down by the girl and the previously unconscious Uchiha who suddenly rushed them. Unexpectedly, the girl came after him while the Uchiha went after Ebisu. For some reason, he would've had her pegged as the type to go after his other teammate, who looked physically weaker in comparison to him and Gai. Then again, maybe he was underestimating her because she was a girl, assuming she'd go after the easier fight as the weakest of her own team. For all he knew, she might be the tougher of the two.

His suspicions were confirmed the moment he went to take another leap away to put distance between them, and his legs immediately gave beneath him.

In half a second, his hands were together performing the seals for shunshin. The other half second later, he was on his ass a few meters away watching as the patch of forest floor he would've fallen upon was turned into a pincushion of senbon.

"Ah, I missed."

The girl was now standing there next to her patch of senbon, shooting him a curious look.

Before she could do anything else, he quickly took a breath and spat the senbon in his mouth at her and prepared to shunshin away. Even as he landed ungracefully in his new spot, he found that he had not lost her at all. There she was standing right before him on the tree branch he'd hoped to hide on.

And she had his senbon.

It was in her mouth.

No, correction, it was in her teeth.

His eyes went wide in awe.

She had caught his senbon. With her teeth.

Fumbling with his hands to form the seals for shunshin again, he found himself interrupted when the girl grabbed one of his hands with a surprisingly tight grip, pressed the back flat against the bark of the tree and then-

-drove a kunai through the palm of his hand.

So pained and shocked at the brutality, he didn't even notice she repeated the same treatment with his other hand until it was already done. Both hands stung like hell for all of five seconds before going blissfully numb, much like his legs. He turned his head to look at each of his impaled and sluggishly bleeding hands, and then to look straight at her, his senbon drooping lazily from the corner of her mouth like it belonged there.

Indirect kiss, he thought, staring really hard at her mouth before leaning his head back against the tree and busting out laughing.

He may have imagined her lips twitching, but he was so sure they did. She reached into his coat and pulled the scroll out from where he had stashed it. After another beat, she reached for his side and took his senbon holder, too.

"Gratefully accepted," she informed him as she held her prizes up for him to see.

Still unable to figure out exactly why his interactions with the girl were so amusing as opposed to humiliating, he tipped his chin up as if to tell her, You're very welcome. In response, she put her goodies away and then pulled a bottle of a milky liquid out of her own pouch. He watched curiously as she tucked it into the pocket where the scroll had been.

"What's that for?"

"Antidote," she answered, standing and backing away from him.

"Hey," he said, noticing she was preparing to go, "My name is Shiranui Genma. What's yours Senbon-chan?"

And this time, he was sure she smiled, because even though her back was turned he could see the senbon in her mouth tick upwards just over her shoulder. He never got his answer from her, because she'd already leapt down from the tree to report the scroll claimed.

"Well damn," he huffed.

He wasn't sure if he was supposed to be terrified or in love with her.

.

Only after he'd been rescued by his teammates and his hands healed, and his team went on to either watch or participate in the elimination rounds of the third part of the exam, was he able to learn her name was Hakka. Genma got to see it on the scoreboard quite a few times as he watched her knock out a couple more opponents before Gai finally took her out with an instant KO punch. After that match, Gai had come up to him, his face pinched in a perplexed expression that emphasized his eyebrows more than necessary.

"Was that your most Youthful senbon in her mouth?"

Next to Genma, Ebisu choked.

Genma laughed and laughed.

XVII.

Wet, so wet and dirty and despicably cold. Such a disgusting place for her mistress to send her.

Keeping below the surface, she tunneled along underground as she followed the faceless apes. She went over her mistress's commands as she traveled, remembering to stay out of sight until the battle had commenced to do what she was sent for and deliver a message. Her mistress had stressed how important it was to stay alert and evade any jutsus thrown her way.

When the time was right, she burst out of the ground unnoticed to coil herself around the torso of the orange furred ape, hidden away in his clothing. She felt cold steel cut into her body as well as the ape's, but it was not fatal for either of them. Still, a part was meant to be played as mistress said, so she plunged her fangs into the ape and let him carry them both to the ground, cold and still as death.

Safe where she was, she listened to the sound of explosions, and yelling, and weeping. When the fighting sounds died away and she sensed only two strong and one weak ape chakra, she revealed herself to them.

"This one has not yet passed," she hissed to the ones who could hear her, drawing a gasp from the female ape.

"Get away from him."

The red furred ape's eyes gave her a moment's pause, before she ignored his words and went on, "I have saved this one's life. Do not tell me if I can or cannot rest upon him."

"You keep saying you've saved him, but how can that be? I can no longer sense his chakra. He is… dead."

If she were more immature, she would've snorted.

"Then your sensing ability is no good. Life chakra still burns in this one. I feel the warmth of it even in my scales. He lives."

Moving more slowly due to his wounds, his breath laboring, he lowered himself by the fallen orange ape and pressed his hands to his chest. His eyes went wide with realization.

"You're right."

"He's alive?" the female ape asked, desperation in her voice.

Silent tears began to spill anew down the cheeks of the blue female when the red ape nodded in confirmation.

"Why have you done this?"

"For my mistress, who begs a favor in return."

The red ape's eyes narrowed.

"Who is your mistress? Why must we owe her anything?"

"My mistress must not reveal herself. However, she claims that she has changed your fate from one of pain and death. In return, you who is to be savior, must heed her words if you hope to bring peace the world."

Though those words seemed to strike a chord with him, the ape still seemed wary.

"Why should we trust the words of a woman who hides herself away and sends serpents to treat with us on her behalf?" the blue ape demanded for him, "We have only just now barely survived a deception that could have ended us all."

"She does not expect you to trust her," the creature intoned, "She simply asks you to listen."

After a moment of tense silence where the apes look to one another, the red ape finally nodded.

"We'll listen."

"Then listen well, oh savior."