Chapter 6
Phew – that one was hard work. I really only noticed now how much I forgot about the specifics of the manga. My annoying term paper is pretty much done, but another one is already waiting in line. Also, the first of my final exams are in February, so I’m getting really nervous. Writing is taking a serious backseat, but I’m giving it my all when I do have time.
On a happier note: There's a little extra for you at the end.
Part of Hisana breathes a deep sigh of relief at his crestfallen expression – canon is still on track. Another part hurts for him. Of course she knows that Naruto will be ok, but he doesn’t. Sasuke, too, looks as if he’s smelling something particularly unpleasant, watching his teammate stomp his way off the premise, head down and shoulders hunched.
When Naruto runs past them Hisana grips Sasuke’s shoulder. “Leave him,” she says quietly. “He’ll need some time to calm down. We’ll look for him tonight.” Sasuke’s face does something complicated, but then he shrugs.
“Fine. I don’t care.”
The day is filled with tension. Sasuke is frustrated, that much she can see. It’s a nice surprise; of course Hisana already knew that he feels something for his team, but this reaction is much more radical than she dared to hope for. Her cousin barely suffered through more than a ruffle of his hair in congratulation before gathering his shuriken and heading out. It’s cute that he’s pouting, but it also makes him very aggravating to be around. Sasuke rarely expresses emotions freely, but when he does it tends towards the radical.
Hisana follows him quietly. The last thing she needs right now is for him to go looking for their wayward Uzumaki too early and interfering with Mizuki. But she can’t very well lock her cousin up inside their apartment, no matter how appealing the thought sometimes.
But Sasuke is surprisingly patient – or at least knows how to channel his frustration properly. He leads them towards one of the outer training grounds, big and quiet, flanked by trees so tall and broad, the entire terrain is cast into perpetual shadow. Hisana crawls up one of the impressive trees and settles in for a long wait. It’s not an unfamiliar scenario, but one she hasn’t participated in for quite a while now. Nowadays Sasuke is usually quick to find her and call her down. Then again, Hisana isn’t usually inclined to stay hidden all that well.
In mild interest she watches him practice his shuriken technique, eyes sliding half-shut leisurely. Eight hours until sundown.
It’s not a pleasant task to lie in wait like this, spying on her only family, but a necessary one. Sasuke himself doesn’t pose much of a risk. He generally keeps his promises, even if they irk him; her cousin has other ways to demonstrate his irritation than disobeying her. Sakura, however, is a factor that Hisana can’t entirely calculate. There’s a very real chance that she’s already figured out what happened and wants to find their wayward teammate. And if she does, the girl would be more than able to talk Sasuke into complying. Hisana doesn’t think she’d go off on her own though, so watching Sasuke means she’d be able to head off both of them if necessary.
But Sakura is either high off her own promotion or unwilling to believe Naruto could have failed after all. Even after sundown there’s no trace of pink hair. Instead a different familiar chakra is hurrying into their direction: Genma.
Sasuke doesn’t seem to have noticed the low-level pulses of chakra that the tokujou is giving off; the only sound from below is the clink clink of Sasuke’s shuriken as he gathers them off the floor.
Abandoning her cousin to his training Hisana flickers away from the tree. There’s the disconcerting feeling of a vacuum sucking sound and color from around her, before they burst back life a few yards further south. And then another. And then another, before she’s suddenly nose to nose with her former supervisor.
“Genma,” she says, trying not to flinch away at the unexpected proximity. The other tokubetsu jounin slowly and exaggeratedly leans away from her, eyes alight with something akin to amusement despite the situation.
“Hisana,” he acknowledges wryly. “We might have a problem.”
It’s baffling how a person as small and essentially harmless as Naruto can throw an entire village of ninja into chaos like this. Or maybe not the entire village. While there are certainly a worrying amount of shinobi hovering around the Sandaime and calling for the blonde’s head, ANBU and jounin corps are noticeably absent. Hisana briefly wonders whether this is the Hokage’s attempt to contain the disaster as much as possible. Of course the man has been knocked out by the sight of a pretty, naked woman rather than any sort of offensive jutsu, so it’s pretty clear that this is not the Kyuubi’s work.
But the council will have campaigned for some sort of manhunt, so keeping it to a hand full of chuunin was probably the best way to appease everyone. Iruka-sensei is fidgeting next to her, half hidden by the bulky form of an enraged Akimichi cousin, and Hisana muses that their leader is a very sly person indeed. The only people here likely to find Naruto are after all Iruka, Genma and she – none of them at all eager to harm the idiot boy.
Hisana has no intention of letting anyone find Naruto. She catches Genma’s eye across from her, nodding imperceptibly towards a particularly blood thirsty group. Someone needs to keep them busy. The man makes a face but nods.
“It is essential that we find him fast,” the Hokage impresses on them. “The techniques in this scroll are … unstable. He may accidently hurt someone –“ The ‘or himself’ is lost in the roar of the crowd. The Hokage pinches the bridge of his nose, impatient and wary. “Just … go find him. Quickly.”
“I think I know where he might be,” Genma drawls, whacking one of the other men on the shoulder. “Just follow me and we’ll have this done with before dinner’s cold.”
Not for the first time Hisana marvels about how people gravitate naturally towards her old supervisor. The other man, a complete stranger by the looks of it, gives Genma an eager grin and immediately everyone is in higher spirits, almost relaxed. Past the others Genma raises an eyebrow at her. Where to? If she remembers right he should be somewhere in the woods – the only parts accessible without leaving the village are the Forest of Death, which is heavily guarded, and the Nara Woods. Watching Mizuki creep north she flashes a quick ‘south’ at him, covertly watching Iruka watch them. For a moment his eyes flicker back and forth between Hisana and the departing Mizuki, before he follows his colleague.
“You … need back up?” one of the younger chuunin asks her, half-hopeful but eying the wakizashi strapped to Hisana’s waist cautiously. She very slowly, very deliberately turns around to him.
“What?”
He fidgets. “Well, we should all go in teams. You never know, right? I don’t look it, but I’m pretty good with ninjutsu.” She blinks at him, unsure what to do with that sort of information. Is he … hitting on her? Right now, while on a man hunt? She raises her eyebrows at him incredulously and he blushes to the roots of his hair.
“No thanks.” And just to discourage him from following her she adds, “I’m just circling the village to make sure he doesn’t run away.” A flicker of killing intent bleaches the red of his face into a sickly white. Oops, she thinks a bit regretfully. Overkill. A few paces away Genma snickers at her.
Following after Mizuki and Iruka at a more leisurely pace is easy. Mizuki managed to cover his scent, probably wary of any Inuzuka that could sniff out the stink of his nerves, but Iruka is trailing a potent mixture of adrenaline and cold sweat. Fear and anger – he must have made the connection already. That’s … a little early. She lopes after him unhurriedly, chakra signature suppressed and out of sight. Honestly, Hisana has no idea what caliber of ninja Iruka and Mizuki actually are, but they’re both caught up enough in their own heads that she doesn’t worry about being detected.
With a muted sort of interest she watches Iruka-sensei henge into Naruto, preparing to head off Mizuki. So he’s not confronting Naruto first. While slightly worrisome, not necessarily a bad thing; if he manages to keep Mizuki away from Naruto entirely it would be better for the blonde’s state of mind. She watches as he roughly rubs his hands down his face, preparing to face down his childhood friend and colleague. He’s afraid, she realizes and it settles weirdly in her stomach. Maybe not used to field work anymore. Maybe too emotionally invested already. Hisana frowns – how strangely upsetting.
Iruka-sensei was always a strong, reassuring presence in the Academy. But watching him now, eyes darting around nervously and completely unaware that she’s watching him, it hits Hisana that he must be only around Tenzo’s age – barely into his twenties. Capable, yes, but also as vulnerable to emotional injury as every ninja who still managed to save a piece of their soul.
Mizuki streaks by her narrowly, jumping in front of Iruka-sensei with the air of a concerned guardian. “Naruto-kun,” he sighs, “there you are! I’ve been looking all over for you – do you have the scroll?”
The scroll that ‘Naruto’ pulls out of his jacket is only a chakra construct, but made so perfectly that it may fool the man just long enough. “‘Course I got it! I told you I’m a great ninja!” Iruka sends a convincingly mulish look at Mizuki and Hisana wonders at just how familiar he must be with the little blond ninja. “So what now? Did I pass?”
“Well,” Mizuki drawls, “you certainly did a good a job. Why don’t you give me that scroll and I check if you got the right one?”
After a moment of hesitation Iruka reaches out to hand over the scroll. The clanging of two kunai colliding is incredibly loud in the small clearing. Mizuki’s face twists into something angry but confused, until Iruka’s henge goes up in smoke. The blonde teacher sneers and spits at his feet.
“I should have known you wouldn’t leave it well enough alone.”
It feels wrong to just sit here and watch them beat the crap out of each other. They’re ninja, of course, but they were also her teachers. Watching Iruka-sensei in any sort of combat makes her feel like watching someone kick kittens; despite his legendary temper he’s not really the ferocious type. Mizuki on the other hand is driven by years and years of resentment and wounded pride. There’s an unnecessary cruelty to his attacks – this isn’t simply about incapacitating an enemy. This is personal too. But she can’t won’t show herself yet. Hisana is playing damage control and there’s nothing inherently wrong with what’s happening yet.
It only takes only a few blows to Iruka’s face for Mizuki to regain his head; now that some of his anger has dissolved in self-satisfaction his eyes are already darting around, probably looking for an escape route. Every moment he spends here is one moment more in which someone else could find Naruto.
Hisana’s fingers twitch. To interfere or not to interfere? She doesn’t want Naruto to be sad – she really doesn’t. She doesn’t want Iruka-sensei more hurt than he has to be. But she also needs Mizuki to find Naruto. He has to know about the Kyuubi. And just as importantly: Iruka needs to protect Naruto. Tonight their relationship would reach an important point, a mutual understanding that hasn’t been there before. It would irrevocably turn Iruka into a touchstone, a much needed pillar of strength in Naruto’s life. It would be an important development for Iruka too and Hisana couldn’t take that from them.
Truthfully, the decision is already made, no matter how heavily it weighs on her. Hisana bites her thumb, and when she summons Ran it’s perfectly silent and with so little smoke that it easily dissipates unseen into the dark.
“I need you to separate them without either of them noticing. Let blondie make a smooth getaway.”
The skunk only quirks her head at Hisana but then shrugs in acquiescence. In the dark cover of the trees the moonlight is dimmed enough for Ran to simply melt into the floor like a shadow. She darts between the shinobi, winding around Iruka’s legs like a cat. For a few moments she simply follows him harmlessly, but when Mizuki lands a blow against the other man’s sternum she comes to an abrupt stop behind his feet. Iruka trips. For a moment a confused expression comes over his face before his eyes go a little glassy. The genjutsu that Ran weaves over the agitated opponents is deceptively subtle; just enough to keep them from questioning why Iruka fell so hard. Why he’s heaving so hard that he can’t get up.
It only takes a second for Mizuki to recognize his chance and then he runs for it.
For a few long, tense heartbeats Iruka-sensei is lying on the ground, chest heaving and eyes darting around as if he instinctually knows that something strange is going on. But Ran has long since slunk back through the undergrowth and curled up around Hisana’s neck like an expensive fur shawl. “That good?” she murmurs slyly, smugly accepting a few scritches below her chin. “I’m good,” she decides.
“The best,” Hisana flatters. “Stay with him and make sure he doesn’t get himself killed. But stay out of sight. I’ll go after the other one.”
Following Mizuki-sensei is child’s play. Is sweat and increasing panic are a beacon for every tracker; Hisana strongly suspects he’s lost his head a little. Or maybe Ran’s genjutsu messed with his head a little harder than anticipated. Any ninja worth their salt would have taken the chance and finished Iruka-sensei, so that he wouldn’t go blab while Mizuki caught up with Naruto – honestly, she’d been ready to intercept a killing blow. Or at least to make enough noise to scare him off. But the thought didn’t even seem to occur to him. And now he’s forgotten or abandoned the idea of keeping a low profile.
Not used to field work, she thinks for the second time that night. She keeps forgetting that Academy instructors are not necessarily the cream of the crop in the first place; add a few years off the roster and you have a nervous mess of a ninja. They both stop in front of a small clearing where Naruto’s blonde head glows in the moonlight. He’s so absorbed in the scroll, his chakra is all over the place. It’s a miracle nobody else has found him yet. Mizuki runs his hands over his face, straightens his uniform and tries to compose his face. Only then he drops down to the forest floor.
“Naruto-kun, I’ve been looking for you all over!”
Since romance has been requested and the story doesn’t really have much space for it yet, I decided to do little non-canon tasters of what Hisana could possibly see in any of them. To test out the chemistry. First one up, because I find him amusing, Nara Shikano. And as an apology for being a lazy-ass, Neji.
EXTRA I Shikano (Introspective)
He’s not exactly handsome.
It vexes her a little; she herself finally has a pretty face – why is it someone like Shikano who interests her most? What a waste, she thinks a bit wryly. But it’s only a superficial thought. One taken with a pinch of humor and then easily forgotten.
He’s just so interesting. It doesn’t matter that his features are too harsh to be really good-looking; that his eyes are flinty and beady; that his humor is hard and cutting. She likes that. She likes that he’s like a stone wall that no one can put a scratch on. His attention is something she wants and fears in equal parts. The way he looks at her is as if she’s the most interesting thing in the world. It’s exhilarating and even … flattering. There’s not much that can hold his attention after all.
She’s not the only one who’s noticed it though. Kiba, of all people, seems to have scented a rival. It’s silly of course. She likes the boy, but he’s … not what she wants.
Shikano has acknowledged the Inuzuka’s existence in the same way he might acknowledge a bug – just enough to occasionally swat at him. Not a threat, just annoying. He must be aware that comparing them would be ridiculous. Kiba is in every sense of the word a boy. He’s loud and brash and cheerful. There is a six-year difference between them and it shows.
EXTRA II Neji (Setting)
It’s the Hyuuga-charm, she thinks flatly. The blatant capacity for good manners coupled with a complete disregard for them in the face of the undeserving rabble. ‘Holier-than-thou’-attitude Tenten calls it. Hisana hates it as much as she loves it when it’s directed at someone deserving. Someone else.
He stares at her, rudely, eyes glowing dimly under the street light. Maybe he thinks if he stares long enough he’ll be able to peel her apart like a tangerine, strip off the bitter skin and expose what’s inside. But Hisana takes far too much pleasure in denying him everything that he wants.
Eventually he’ll give in, turn away as if she isn’t worth his time anyway and it’ll taste of sweet victory. One of these days, she thinks, he’ll say something. Talk to her, snap, do something that will give her an opening to peel off his tough exterior. It may be her first step closer to the person he will eventually become. She cocks an eyebrow at him challengingly. The Byakugan make her feel like she’s being examined under a microscope and it send involuntary shivers down her spine. Any moment now, she thinks. But instead of turning away, he takes a step closer.
Yes, I do lie awake at night sometimes, randomly thinking this stuff up:D
They’re both pretty different in tone, I guess. Thoughts?