"Is this going to take much longer?" Wolf asked quietly, not taking his eyes off of our surroundings in case anyone attempted to assassinate me. Or, worse, asked why he was crouched on the wall of Mitarashi Anko's apartment holding me in place by my jury-rigged climbing harness. (I hadn't quite mastered wall-walking yet, by which I mean I had a slight falling problem. Ah gravity, my ancient nemesis.)
"Almost ready," I said, not looking up as I continued pressing seal-equipped blocks into the resin that I'd already painted on the wall.
Ninja are paranoid folk. They prefer to have apartments on an upper floor to make it harder for spies. They prefer places with an exterior wall so that there's a window to go out through in a pinch, but said windows are typically shuttered over with locked metal shutters, and probably trapped.
All of this is in the nature of a burglar alarm—it doesn't keep anyone out if the person is determined and willing to make some noise, it just means you know they're there. If an enemy ninja is willing to blow through your wall with Chidori, Rasengan, explosive tags, or insert-other-ninja-bullshit-here, then there's no practical way to keep them out. (Unless, of course, you happen to be a sealmaster and have papered the walls, floor, and sealing...er, ceiling, of your assigned dorm room with Force Wall seals because fuck you that's why.)
Now, all of the aforementioned methods of impolitely entering a ninja's abode contain a significant risk of collateral damage. This was not an acceptable idea to me; I had no interest in hurting anyone, not even Ms-I'm-a-Raging-Bitch-Bordering-on-Sex-Predator Mitarashi. No, hurting people is for the unimaginative.
"Done," I said, pushing a little chakra into some of the seals.
Wolf didn't wait to be told twice, he simply launched himself across the alley to the roof of the neighboring building, dragging me along for the ride. I almost got whiplash in the process, but I didn't complain; Wolf was doing me a huge favor and I didn't want him changing his mind. Granted, part of the reason he was doing it was because he had his own beef with Anko—apparently he'd been chatting up a comely lass when Anko swooped in and swept the girl off her feet and into a frenetic and still ongoing relationship. Despite being an ANBU (i.e., a masked (well, usually, but not tonight) special forces / assassin / warrior / cop / Praetorian-Guard-circa-Augustus (i.e., not the politicking / emperor-choosing group of the later Empire)), Wolf was only sixteen (as per Oli, who had scanned the guy's sheet for me) and still quite shy with girls. (Again, as per Oli, who had thus far been right about everything. (Well, except maybe for his trust in Kabuto, but maybe I was being paranoid there. After all, Kishimoto had written Kabuto as a spy for Orochimaru (of course, that entire plot line was idiotic—why would Orochimaru put his life's work on hold to spend months (years?) scheming to level Konoha (Val never actually said anything when I wrote 'Konoha' instead of 'Leaf', since we had agreed we were going to translate everything except for certain words that don't translate, like 'sensei', but I could almost see the British Eyebrow I was getting whenever I slipped. Still, it was how I preferred it and now that we were living it instead of writing it I could call it anything I wanted because whatever was doing the translating for us didn't seem to have any disgruntlement on the subject and oh wow I let my mind wander down the branching rabbit hole. Where was I? Oh, yeah: B&E, sealmaster style.))))
I knelt to check over the seals on the barrel that balanced precariously on the edge of the roof. Everything was in order, so I sighted over the top to make sure it was lined up properly.
"You're sure this is going to be safe?" Wolf asked nervously.
"It'll be fine," I said. "It's not going to be moving that fast."
"If she gets hurt there will be a lot of trouble."
"It'll be fine," I said again. "Even if she were bent over with her head against the wall in exactly the wrong spot, she'd probably only get a concussion, and what are the odds? It's three in the morning, she's in bed asleep."
"Who's in bed asleep?" Anko asked from just behind us.
I nearly jumped out of my skin, and I spun around so quickly that I made myself dizzy.
"This isn't what it looks like," Wolf said quickly. The moon was full and it gave enough light that I could tell the sandy-haired kid was blushing as he fought to keep his eyes on Anko's face since, as usual, Anko was wearing a mesh shirt that would have been street-legal in San Francisco, but only barely.
"Actually, it is," I said, activating all the seals on the barrel and diving off the roof.
The force-projection seals acted like rocket engines, launching the barrel off the roof and into the wall opposite us. Specifically, the part of the wall that I had carefully covered in a grid of chakra tripwires. The tripwires activated a whole series of very short-range force axe seals that turned that section of wall into rubble so that the barrel could sail through unobstructed and into the middle of Anko's living room. Just in time for the low-powered explosives seals on the barrel to detonate and paint the entire room with fifty gallons of rancid grease.
My original plan had been to (A) prep the prank, (B) trigger the prank, (C) spend a few seconds watching the results with a gleeful schadenfreude warming the cockles of my heart, and (D) scamper before I got in trouble. Having accomplished A and B I decided to skip straight to D and haul ass. I wasn't too worried about Wolf; Anko was going to be far more interested in going after me than him.
Speaking of which, I should probably do something to discourage that.
I was halfway down to the ground, moving in something that was more of a 'plummet' than anything else, so I didn't have any attention to spare for distractions. I hit the ground hard, pulsing the strongest burst of chakra repulsion that I could manage just before making contact so as to cushion the fall, and then rolled. My everything hurt but nothing broke, so I was calling that a win.
I was on my feet and running immediately, pulling seals out of my pockets and flinging them over my shoulder without pausing to look. It was a bit of a smorgasbord: flashbangs, low-powered explosives, and a crapton of storage seals. The flashbangs were to blind my almost-certainly-not-hypothetical pursuer, the explosives were to destroy the storage seals and thus release their contents.
I heard a yelp of pain when the flashbangs went off, followed by an impact and a series of curses as she tripped over the shin-high logs that had been dispensed and then fell on the thumbnail-sized caltrops. They were more like omni-directional thumbtacks than anything seriously dangerous, but she'd need to spend a few seconds digging them out before she could pursue, and I had already planned my escape route.
I could hear Anko's cursing fading behind me as I turned down the next alley and ran away, giggling like a maniac.
o-o-o-o
"Okay, Yūta, this is your last chance to back out. You sure you want to do this?"
"Yes, Lord Jiraiya," Yūta said. "I would do anything to be reaccepted." The boy was no more than eight, short and scrawny for his age, with hair like a dirty mop. Despite that, he stood tall and straight as a spear, a look of determination on his face that would have done a grown man proud. It didn't mask the fear, but that simply made it more impressive.
Jiraiya studied him for a moment, face a study in conflicting emotions, before thumping his chest in the salute of one warrior to another. "Good man. Let's do this."
The act was far less impressive than the lead-up. Oli simply reached out and tapped the air a few dozen times. "Done," he said. "Chakra Reserves is at four, talent's at ninety-nine percent, and he's got one XP to spend. How do you feel, Yūta?"
The boy shrugged. "No different, sir. Was something supposed to have happened?"
"Let's find out if it did," Val said, stepping forward. "Okay, Yūta, there's only two seals to this jutsu: Boar, then Tiger. Like this, okay?" He watched the boy's fingers dance fluidly through the tricky transition. "Good. Now, I want you to picture your chakra pooling in your hara, forming into a sphere of earth, rich and dark like forest loam. Spin that sphere into a thread and send it up your arm to your fingertips, then touch the earth and—"
I tuned out Val's explanation of the jutsu, choosing instead to focus on Jiraiya's face. It was closed off and unreadable, but if I had to guess I'd say that he was hiding some combination of fear for the boy, horror at his own willingness to do the experiment, curiosity, and probably a flicker of hope and excitement. He'd been dead set against letting Oli modify the character sheet of any Konoha ninja, especially any of the Academy students. Oli had been the one smart enough to ask, "What about someone who isn't a Konoha ninja? Like, someone who washed out of the Academy? We could give a kid a second chance to become a ninja. I'm sure there'd be plenty of volunteers."
Jiraiya had fought against the idea at first, but the 'if' had pretty much been settled so we were really into the "we're just haggling about the price, my dear" territory, especially once the Hokage weighed in with cautious approval predicated on actually finding a volunteer.
"Earth Element: Swamp of the Underworld!" Yūta cried, slamming his hand into the ground and breaking me out of my reverie. I watched in satisfaction as the ground immediately around Yūta's feet turned to mud. The boy sank in, but the 'swamp' was only an inch deep so he didn't do more than dirty his sandals.
Jiraiya blinked.
"So...what do you think?" I asked, struggling not to smile. I once again found myself wondering if I was a bad person because I so very much enjoyed watching someone's treasured beliefs collapse like a bad soufflé.
Jiraiya scrubbed a hand through his hair in aggravation. "That is an A-rank technique."
"Yup." I could feel my face fighting not to grin. It was losing.
"That's why we picked it," Val reminded him, amusement lurking somewhere behind the words. "Because you would know just how hard it is."
"I...I...I did it!" Yūta said in disbelief, kneeling down in the mud and scooping up two handfuls of it. "I did it!"
"You sure did," Oli said, grinning and kneeling next to him for a high-five that paid no attention to the mud.
Of the three of us, Oli was definitely the best with the smols. Val and I weren't bad, but Oli had a real knack for it. Granted, the ninja kids were utterly alien to all of us; their life goals involved (but generally did not center on) killing people, and they worked harder than any of us had ever even dreamed of working in order to attain said goals. It was humbling.
Yūta had washed out for not having the reserves, the control, or the natural gifts. He had worked his ass off at the Academy, but he simply hadn't had the ability. When Oli had named him as a potential based on the details of his character sheet, Yūta had practically beaten down the doors for the chance to undergo whatever experimental techniques we wanted to inflict on him if it meant another chance to get into the Academy. Now he'd mastered one of Jiraiya's signature moves in a few minutes...well, 'mastered' was a bit strong. After all, it wasn't called 'Mud Puddle of the Underworld'. Still, from what Val had said, the real hurdle lay in being able to perform a jutsu at all; making the swamp wider and deeper was simply a matter of practice and chakra.
"Great. Let's go get you enough ice cream to drown in, and then we'll talk about how to work you back into the Academy in the middle of the year."
"Yaaayyyyyy!"
The Toad Sage shot a look at the three of us and shook his head, but he was smiling. "We'll talk later." He swooped Yūta up onto his shoulders and galloped off the training field in search of ice cream, the young boy shrieking in delight all the way.
"That went well," Val said, watching Jiraiya disappear down the path that lead back towards Konoha proper.
"Yep," I replied. Pause. "So, when he gets back can I introduce him to the seal-based Industrial Revolution?"
"Maybe leave that for tomorrow?" Oli suggested. "Spread the shocks out a bit. Wouldn't want to give him a heart attack."
"Always ruining my fun," I pretend-grumbled. "You guys get to transform the world in a matter of minutes with your bullshit jutsu and reality-warping-spreadsheet bullshit bullshitiness, but do I get my turn with my hard-earned skills? Noooo. No, I get ditched in favor of ice cream."
"Speaking of desserts, I saw a place that does sea-salt caramels," Val said, in what I was absolutely certain was an attempt to distract me from my entirely reasonable and righteous grumblefest.
"I'm in!" said Oli, trotting off down the path. Val smiled and went after him; I, of course, followed.
Turned out, sea-salt caramels were a pretty good reason to forego a grumblefest, no matter how righteous. Damn, those things were amazing.
Author's Notes:
The plan from last time is still in force. I'm going to try to write that for Sunday, but I'm doing family things almost all day Sunday, meaning that I'll need to do all the writing Saturday. Depending on spoons and other commitments you might end up getting another CfG update, but I should be able to produce something.
Keiko closed the scroll and leaned back against the wall at the head of her bunk, tapping the document slowly on her leg in thought. "Interesting."
"That is bonkers," Noburi said. "We're actually going to be fighting in the city itself?"
"The penalties for collateral damage are sufficiently severe that it should be relatively safe," Keiko said. "No one is going to risk the disqualification of every single one of the contestants from their village, and even minor property damage costs you more points than most people earned in the first event. Everyone will be extremely careful."
"Still...." Noburi trailed off and shook his head. "More of a risk than I would take, but I guess they weren't asking me. Okay, so, fake escort mission means there's two parts to the exam: keeping our fake merchant safe and making sure he makes a ton of money so we get lots of points. We can take advantage of the collateral damage rules for the first part—keep him surrounded by barriers at all times. Maybe move him around in a palanquin? No one could hit him without damaging the palanquin."
"Some teams might be willing to accept a small amount of collateral damage in the interest of eliminating us from the event," Keiko noted. "The lowest-scoring teams might even choose to sacrifice their own chances in the Exam in order to eliminate high-scoring teams from other villages, thereby enhancing the chances of the other ninja from their own village."
"Umph," Hazō muttered. "Hadn't thought of that one. Okay, the palanquin idea is a good one, but we'll need to extend it. How about we have two palanquins? Or we send the palanquin out as a decoy, carried by clones, and actually move the client separately?"
"That would require a lot of clones," Noburi pointed out. "Chakra management is going to be important. It'll be hard for me to recharge during this event. I can siphon from you guys in the evening, but the two of you together don't have enough chakra to completely refill me, and you're not going to be full yourselves. Well, except you, Hazō—you're always full of it." He grinned at his own witticism; his adoptive brother replied with a withering glare.
"I suspect we could pay some of the Leaf jōnin to let you drain chakra from them at night," Keiko said, studiously ignoring the banter. "Based on your ability to keep multiple people full, your capacity is significantly higher than a normal—that is, than a non-Wakahisa ninja. As such, we will need to arrange a deal with multiple jōnin. I can see about extracting some or all of our next month's stipend from the Pangolin clan, especially if Hazō is willing to make some of the next month's seals early."
"Of course," Hazō said, nodding. "Having a lot of money on hand sounds like a good plan regardless. If we can find a way to feed some of it to the client it'll be to the good."
"We aren't allowed to give money to the client," Noburi pointed out. "Side note: The 'no questions' part of the rules is a problem. It's probably another way to avoid loophole abuse—if we don't know all the details of the rules then we have to play conservatively and only do things that are definitely safe."
Keiko nodded. "Indeed. Giving the money to a merchant to pass on to our client might be a breach of the rules, so we should avoid that. We can, however, use the money to gather information and locate opportunities which we then steer the client to. Ideally ones that would appeal to other clients in the event, thereby cutting them out of particularly lucrative deals."
"Speaking of other clients," Hazō said, "what do we tell the other Leaf teams? We agreed that we would all share the start time and location of events but we don't have to give them anything beyond that. We could trade the information, though."
Keiko nodded thoughtfully. "Either for direct assistance or at least a non-interference pact."
"I was thinking maybe we link up with one of the other teams," Hazō said. "With six people available we can keep four back to cover the two clients while we send two of us out hunting other teams. Assassinating someone's client would probably wipe out whatever gains they made in the first event and leave them in the hole. Gives us a real leg up."
"The plan is predicated on the clients being willing to stick together," Keiko pointed out. "I find this unlikely. It would make it too difficult for them to make deals, unless they were willing to split profits, which they will not be."
"Yeah, about that," Hazō said. "How do you think the trade works? Are they actually going to be making deals, or is it all a sham?"
Keiko raised an eyebrow. "A sham?"
"You know...they walk into a shop, sit around for fifteen or twenty minutes to simulate the time that a negotiation would take, then the merchant hands over a specified amount of money and the client leaves."
She shook her head. "I doubt it. The Mizukage would need to supply the money for that or risk damaging the economy, or at least angering the merchants. Although the merchants lack direct power it is still inefficient to have them angry. Supplying the money would greatly increase the cost of the Exams and it would either render the scoring of the event pointless—if the amounts were all the same—or it would be too open to accusations of favoritism if the amounts were variable. Much more likely is that the clients will actually be negotiating for real."
"What incentive do they have?" Noburi asked. "If our client just sits around the alehouse for five days then we're pretty much screwed on points. Plus, he'd be a static target, much easier for assassins."
Silence fell as the team pondered that.
"That would definitely be cause for protest," Keiko said at last. "Most likely the clients have all been ordered to at least make a good-faith effort. To do otherwise would shame Mist."
"Going back to what we tell the other teams," Noburi said. "Cooperating with all of them in the last event made everything a lot safer but kinda screwed us on points. I'd like to get a non-interference pact but otherwise steer clear of them so we can really shine on our own."
"Might be nice to get some sort of alliance with Team Asuma," Hazō said. "Their abilities make them absolutely brutal assassins, especially with these collateral-damage rules in play. At the very least I want a non-interference pact with them." He paused to think. "Actually, we might go one step beyond non-interference with all the Leaf teams: arrange to bunk our clients in the same place so we can form a mutual defense society at night. Arranging lodging is a thing that bodyguards do, right?"
"Yeah. Also, choosing movement schedules and plans within the client's general requirements."
Hazō frowned. "What does that mean, exactly? And how do you know about this?"
Noburi shrugged. "One of my older cousins was a great storyteller and whenever he babysat for the youngers he would tell us about various missions he and his team had done. Some of those stories were about escort and bodyguard work. Not exactly a font of information—he was pretty long on how awesome he was and short on specific details, but a few things came through. The client specifies where he needs to be and generally what time he needs to be there. Nori's team would choose the route and vary their departure times slightly in order to keep the client safe. He did say that some clients were difficult to work with and refused to cooperate."
Hazō winced. "Let's hope ours isn't like that."
"Your lips to the Sage's ear. Anyway, Keiko, you should go get the money. Then the three of us should find some safe places to stay and get reservations made."
"We're done with hunting for word-halves, right?"
"Absolutely. / Hell yeah."
"Okay, where does that leave us?"
Keiko ticked points off on her fingers. "Get money from the pangolins. Exchange it for spendable local currency. Find lodgings, ideally at several different places and then we randomly select which one to use immediately beforehand. Locate and rent or purchase two separate palanquins. Parenthetically, it would be a good idea to rent one with an extremely high replacement cost as a further disincentive for other teams to attack us. Scout mercantile opportunities, although that will be difficult given that we don't know what sort of business our client will be looking for. Talk to the other Leaf teams over dinner tonight and try to work out a non-aggression treaty. Be at the mission room before dawn so that we can get started as early as possible."
"We should talk to Jiraiya, too," Hazō said. "We'll be out of touch for five days."
"We can still communicate through the Seventh Path," Keiko noted. "Given the most minimal precautions on our part, I defy Mist to prove that we did any such thing."
"Point," Hazō said, nodding thoughtfully. "That's handy. Among other things, I could draw seal blanks and send them to him for infusion.
"Speaking of points," he said, a thought occurring to him, "how many do you think we could reasonably get? I'm assuming that they'll want the events to be worth about the same, so maybe eighty to a hundred?"
"First, I doubt that they have actually put a limit on it," Keiko said. "Second, making later events worth more would be a reasonable strategy in that it would allow teams who did poorly in one event to catch up." She shrugged. "Of course, it would also be reasonable to make all events worth the same, as you suggested—that way the early events are not overshadowed. Still, this particular event seems like an open-ended opportunity. I suspect that, if our client manages to legitimately earn a million ryō, the proctors will be perfectly willing to let us have a thousand points."
"...Interesting," Hazō said, gazing into the middle distance as he thought. "That gives me an idea."
Noburi glanced at Keiko. "Did you just feel a shudder down your spine? Because I felt a shudder down my spine."
"I did not." Pause. "It was more of a looming sense of doom."
"Very funny, you two. Look, here's what I'm thinking...."
o-o-o-o
The woman who walked into the bar was in her mid-thirties, dressed in the simple clothes of a lower-class person—perhaps a seamstress, given how expertly the small hole in the right sleeve had been patched. She wore a yellow hat and an attractive leather purse as minor concessions to fashion and carried a copy of Icha Icha: Paradise of the Heart clutched in one hand.
She settled at the end of the bar and eyed the bartender politely until he finished serving the half-drunk boozer halfway down and came over to her.
"Can I get you something, ma'am?" he asked politely.
Her mouth smiled but it didn't reach her eyes. "Tea, please. And if you could pass on a message for me."
The bartender raised an eyebrow. "A message, ma'am? To whom?"
"My respected eldest uncle," she said. "Could you please give him this"—from her purse she produced a small package bound in waterproofed oilskin and slid it across the bar to him—"and tell him that my friends and I deeply regret that we will not be able to have dinner with him this week? We were very much looking forward to trying his sea turtle soup, but we will be working with an extremely demanding merchant and it is critical to my family's future that this client have a successful commercial venture here in Mist. We therefore cannot afford any distraction, even one so desirable as visiting my most excellent eldest uncle. I do hope he will understand but, as I said, the success of this merchant's venture is critical to my family. We would like to discuss business next week, if he is willing."
The bartender's eyes widened. "Oh! Yes, ma'am, I can pass that on. Tell your eldest uncle that you wanted to try his sea turtle soup but won't be able to this week since you'll be working with a merchant and you can't afford distractions. You want to discuss business next week."
"We cannot afford distractions because the success of this merchant is criticial to my family's future," the woman said, locking eyes with him in a way that made the older and larger bartender pale.
"Y-yes, ma'am. You wanted to try his sea turtle soup but can't this week because you're working with a merchant whose success is critical to your family's future and so you can't afford distractions. You want to discuss business next week. The package is for him." He gestured clumsily towards the oilskin.
The woman released his gaze and smiled like a china doll. "Thank you so much. Now, about that tea? I'm afraid I can't stay long, but I would like one cup."
"Of course, ma'am. Right away, ma'am."
o-o-o-o
The members of SuperTeam Leaf, plus Hinata's team, had gathered for dinner in the Ino/Shika/Chō rooms, since those were centrally located on the hall that Leaf had claimed as their own. The dorms were designed for six ninja to bunk together; it was a tight squeeze to fit everyone in the room at all and people were perched on every free surface and the floor with plates balanced on their laps. Even the floorspace was sufficiently limited that Lee was sitting on the wall, the soles of his feet anchored to the surface with chakra adhesion. Hazō waited for a lull in the dinnertime chatter before dropping his explosive tag. "We found out about the next event," he said quietly.
There were immediately a dozen interested gazes locked on him. Shikamaru was nodding and making a rolling gesture with one hand that Hazō recalled meant well, yes, obviously, now skip ahead.
"How? / Where? / What is it? / When does it st—"
"It's tomorrow at dawn," Keiko said, cutting through the chatter. "It starts at the mission office in Mizukage Tower and it runs for five days, ending at dawn on November 7."
"Where did you get that?" Yamanaka demanded, flicking her hair over her shoulder.
"Some people I knew from when I was a kid," Hazō said vaguely. "We got more than the when and where, though. We have what looks to be full details on the event, and we're willing to trade them for a non-interference pact. Anyone who wants to deal agrees that they won't do anything to decrease our score in the event so long as we don't do anything to decrease your score."
"We should state up front that we have not yet found a way to verify the information," Keiko added. "Nonetheless, we believe it to be accurate. Should we turn out to be wrong we will notify everyone of that fact as soon as we are able and any non-inteference pacts will be null and void."
Glances were exchanged.
"We also obtained information about the event," Hinata said quietly. "Our information could act as a check for yours."
"Same here," Sakura said.
"How did you guys get it?" Noburi asked.
"I read it off some papers that one of the proctors was carrying," Hinata said. "They were in his jacket at the time, but Shino and Kiba kept him talking long enough for me to make it out."
"I hit Kiba with a genjutsu in the bath," Sakura said. "Made him think I was Shino."
"What?! No you didn't!"
She gave him a pitying look. "'What are your thoughts on the event, Kiba? For my own part, I have yet to come up with satisfactory tactics on how to optimize our chances for success.'"
Kiba's mouth was sagging open. "You raging bitch."
The pink-haired girl shrugged and leaned over to serve herself some dango from one of the communal take-out boxes. "Ninja. Saw you guys chatting up that proctor while Hinata hung back with her eyes going, figured she was reading something off the proctor, decided to take a chance." She glanced up at Kiba, offering him a mocking grin. "You shouldn't have left Akamaru back in your room to guard your stuff. He's obviously the brains of the pair. As well as the bigger boy." She wiggled her little finger at him; Kiba's shock transformed into horror, than anger. He started to leap up but Aburame caught his shoulder and pressed him back down.
"Be calm, Kiba," the bug user said. "She is trying to rile you. Why? Because it allows her to score social points." He turned to Akane. "I assume this is why you intercepted me in the hall—to provide a distraction while Sakura interrogated Kiba? I congratulate you. Your queries about my allies' intelligence-gathering capabilities and offer to share information made an excellent cover."
"So, about that information," Hazō said, desperately attempting to divert the soon-to-be volcanic eruption that was Inuzuka Kiba. "Who wants to deal?"
"A non-interference pact sounds good," Akane said. "It would be very unyouthful to fight allies. I know we will need to do so at some point, but I am not looking forward to it."
"I have no objection to a non-interference agreement," Hinata said, looking at her teammates. Shino shrugged and nodded. Kiba glared pointedly at Sakura for several long seconds, but the pinkette simply grinned smugly at him. Finally the dog-clan member nodded a grudging acceptance.
"How youthful! For a second time our entire group shall mingle our most youthful essence!"
"Lee! / Argh! / Lee! / Shut up, Lee!"
The green-clad genin cheerfully ignored the outburst of protests at his language in favor of munching on his kimchi.
"Right," Hazō said. "Okay, we got a scroll that lays it all out. It's an escort / bodyguard mission. We're going to be assigned a proctor as a client, he'll be traveling around the city doing deals and we need to keep him safe. If he gets touched by a hostile contestant or hit with a weapon or whatever else would injure or kill a civilian then he's dead and your team is disqualified. There's some really harsh penalties for collateral damage, including...." He laid out the details in a few quick sentences, Keiko filling in a few bits that he'd forgotten. Afterwards, the original Team Uplift looked around the table at the other teams that had claimed to have the information.
"That mostly matches what I saw," Hinata said. "Although I suspect the documents I was reading were a later draft than yours. For one thing, it specified that the client is responsible for room, board, and all other expenses for themselves and the team. For another, instead of saying 'anything that would injure or kill a civilian' would be considered a kill, it made things more concrete: the proctor will be wearing a henge at all times. If the henge pops then the client is considered killed."
"That...sounds problematic," Hazō said. "The proctor could just deliberately bump into a wall, pop their own henge, and thereby disqualify the team assigned to them."
"Yeah, good point," Yamanaka said, nodding in a fashion that was so serious it was sarcastic. "Boy, I sure wouldn't want to be a team that everyone in Mist had reason to hate. That would suck."
Shikamaru rolled his eyes. "Ino."
"Aww, come on, Shika. You can't even let me wind them up for a second?"
"Ino."
"Fine, fine. Don't worry, the proctors aren't going to be putzing around...or, at least, the one that I mind-dived isn't going to."
"You mind-dived a proctor?"
Shrug. "Ninja. Yamanaka, even. Anyway, it's being left up to the individual proctors whether they communicate this to their team or not, but the 'clients' have a major incentive not to screw around: they get to keep the money."
Frowns went around the table, except for Keiko, who was nodding in comprehension. "Of course. Presumably with an audit process."
"Yep. They're given a persona to play and they need to stay within that persona. As long as they don't use ninja abilities and don't break character, they get to keep whatever money they can make during the event."
"What does breaking character look like?" Hazō asked.
Ino shrugged. "That's a little more detailed than I was able to get in the time I had, but I'd assume it basically means don't do anything that a merchant who is a civilian and a foreigner wouldn't do. Follow the law, don't take advantage of contacts that you have that your character wouldn't have, that kind of thing."
"Interesting..." Hazō muttered. "Okay, we can work with this. If the proctors are taking it seriously then we'll all be able to make points from their earnings. That leaves the other side of the coin: eliminating other teams' clients so as to wreck those teams' scores. I had some ideas that I want to bounce off you guys...."
The remainder of this plan will be handled by the inimitable @Velorien. He will take care of awarding XP and/or FP. There will be no voting until after his update.
It's up to Velorien how much of the remaining scenes from the plan he shows on camera, but the parts that remain are:
The end of the dinner with the other SuperTeam Leaf. This would be mostly social but could include some of the discussion in the following bullet point:
(From section '2. Go Back to Leaf Barracks') Talk with Ino/Shika/Chō re taking out the Lightning team. Most of the rest of this section has been invalidated by scheduling, although they could still try to mess with the bandanas if everyone thought that was a good idea.
Conversation with Jiraiya in the evening, after dinner, if he's available.
Flashback to the afternoon: cf the 'Businesses/Bandanas' section of the plan
Arriving at the Tower at dawn and meeting the 'client'.
Madness and wacky hijinks ensue as mercantile shenanigans begin.
Author's Notes:
The oilskin package that Keiko gave to the Yakuza bartender contained 90 full-power explosive tags. These have been deducted from Hazō, Noburi, and Keiko's supply. The point of that scene is that Keiko was sending a message to the Oyabun saying "I'm not going to say anything that would imply I'm giving you money to pass on to our client, but it would be in your interest to steer business to our client during this event."
Regarding the plan: There were some chronological issues that I had trouble working around. In chapter 166.2 you went to the Yakuza in the morning and got the details of the event. The plan for this chapter (167) had you first talk to Keiko and Noburi, then talk to Team Asuma. Problem: Team Asuma and all the other Leaf teams were out in the city trying to find out where the next event will be. There's no plausible way I could think of for you to locate them in a city the size of Mist, so you were stuck waiting until they come back to the barracks for dinner. You had a billion different things you wanted to do in the city, but the main one (dealing with the bandanas) was predicated on having talked to Team Asuma first and gotten their help.
Final resolution:
Keiko went to the 7th Path and did a quick deal. Next month you owe the pangolins an extra 20 seals but they are giving you half the payment now. Keiko got a pound of gold (all they were able to put their claws on immediately) and more will become available over the next couple days.
You traded the gold to a goldsmith and got ryō for it. The other QMs aren't around now so we don't have an exact number, but you're pretty flush.
You ran all over the city sussing out the local businesses, choosing ambush locations, and putting some travel routes into the "good/safe" bucket and others into the "bad/avoid" bucket.
You made reservations for yourselves + 1 at two different boarding houses (one middle-class, one high-class) in widely separated parts of Mist. Keiko suggests that, if the client can be persuaded, you (by which she means anyone other than Hazō) roll a die to decide which one you actually stay at. Given the rules about the client covering expenses it may turn out that this money was wasted but it was a sensible thing to do given the information you had at the time.
You managed to find and purchase an enclosed palanquin, as well as hire a pair of bearers. The bearers will be sleeping at their own homes and will show up in the morning wherever you tell them to be, work through the day, and leave in the evening. They expect to be provided with lunch as part of their payment.
In the plan you had an idea to convince rickshaw drivers / palanquin bearers / etc to leave their vehicles at Mizukage Tower overnight in order to be there early in the morning. Hazō was then going to set simulated traps in each of these things that would 'kill' any client who got in the vehicle. This seemed very impractical to me—no rickshaw driver is going to leave his vehicle unattended overnight, the vehicles aren't really big enough to conceal a trap, and if there is anywhere in the city that is going to have guards watching the area and thereby making it hard to sneak into parked vehicles, it would be Mizukage Tower. As such, that didn't happen.
You've done lots of planning and set up lots of codes.
You left a message with Jiraiya giving him the thumbnail sketch of what's going on for the next five days. @Velorien will decide if he's available or not.
There was no opportunity to do anything on the Yamamoto Haru project, although Velorien might choose to have something after dinner.
Before dinner, Hazō made 10 macerators and loaded them with perfume. They are listed on his character sheet which should be released soon.
Hazō couldn't think of a better word for Jiraiya's guest quarters than "opulent", which was a problem because it was like calling a dragon's treasure hoard shiny. From vibrantly-coloured carpets, to sofas you could drown in, to large paintings on the walls which were certainly priceless originals, and vast stately bookshelves that probably held more tomes than a small library—in a village without a printing press—the message was clear. "Mist is wealthy and powerful, and it will generously share that wealth and power with you as long as you remain its friend."
The other word to describe the guest quarters was "unlived-in", and that one fit perfectly. The place wasn't dusty, as that would be below Mist's dignity, but it had the sense of a showroom untouched by human hands. It was as if Jiraiya visited it only to sleep, and barely that.
"It's good to see you, kids," the most powerful man in the world said, massaging his temples wearily as he sank into an armchair. "I'm sure you're here to bring me another helping of troubles, but I'll take that—or a hammer to the face—over one more second of Kurosawa Ren's courteous smile."
"That bad?" Hazō asked.
"Don't get me started," Jiraiya said. "Seriously, don't. Let me have a few minutes of genin-level problems before I have to dive back in there for the formal dinner."
"Ouch," Noburi said sympathetically. "Well, your wish is our command. How secure is this place?"
"Secure as the Pax Konoha right now. Which is to say, assume that a copy of everything you're about to say is already on the Mizukage's desk. We haven't got any Mist ANBU listening in—they're scared of my detection skills, and rightly so—but that woman's no fool, and if she hasn't figured out some way to keep tabs on my free time, I'll eat my hat and hand the replacement to Hyūga Hiashi."
"What about privacy seals?" Hazō asked.
"You don't put up visible anti-spying defences in somebody else's property. That's as much of a faux pas as getting caught spying in the first place. I trust that woman as far as I can throw Gamabunta, and she trusts me even less, but being blatant about it is as bad as being blatant about anything in the diplomatic game. Now, let me forget about her for a few minutes and give me your latest report."
-o-
Jiraiya looked slightly less exhausted by the end of their account.
"If there's one thing you kids don't do, it's do things by half-measures. It's great that you have an in with the yakuza. It opens up possibilities, and it's something that even that woman won't have seen coming. There are plenty of ways I can play that card. Assuming you don't screw up with the Oyabun, even the Mizukage won't be able to close this opening without burning more capital than it's worth.
"On which note. Don't screw up."
"Any advice, sir?" Keiko asked.
Jiraiya leaned back into the armchair for a few seconds.
"Don't posture. The Oyabun isn't a street-level enforcer. He's a businessman, a general and a spiritual leader rolled into one. I don't know this one personally, but the head of a yakuza group in one of the Big Five can't be anything less or his rivals will eat him alive. He's smarter than you, he's craftier than you, and he's more dangerous than you, for all that he can't punch clean through a tree. He'll get the measure of you within a few seconds of conversation, and if you try to act tough or suck up to him, he'll know you're not worth his time.
"Speaking of which, don't waste his time. He has people that he plays mind games with, and you're not ready to compete on their level. If you try, he'll just get bored. Be polite but be direct. Tell him what you want, tell him what you're offering in return, answer whatever questions he has, and then calmly wait for him to decide how to respond. Relationships with the yakuza take time to cultivate, which is a thing you don't have, so get used to the idea that there's only so much you can do to earn his trust and respect right now.
"This is as basic as diplomacy gets, but don't make him lose face. I can't overstate that. A yakuza's honour is their Will of Fire, the thing that makes them more than common thugs. Any insult has to be answered and any hurt has to be avenged. So if you think you've insulted him, apologise instantly and don't hold back. That said, a good Oyabun can control the conversation enough to give you warning if you misstep, assuming they like you.
"All right, I'm running low on time. Anything else before I go take another swim in the shark tank?"
"There's the third event," Hazō said. "The escort mission. I'm particularly concerned that the proctor might dock us the full twenty points on principle, like the previous proctor 'coincidentally' made us last."
Jiraiya nodded. "You don't have all that many options. It's a safe bet that enough proctors have it in for you that you can't just get a bad one replaced. There's an appeals procedure, but when it's your word against theirs on something this subjective, things are going to get messy. The best thing you can do, and I know this isn't much consolation, is try to be the perfect bodyguards. It's easy for proctors to screw you over when you're just a faceless traitor, but after five days' flawless performance, they know you well enough for other factors to kick in. Maybe their dormant sense of fair play wakes up and they decide they'll feel bad if they give you the opposite of what you earned. Maybe you get enough other people to like you during your work that the proctor starts to feel peer pressure. Maybe, and I know this is a long shot, maybe you'll even manage to charm the pants off them.
"That's your lot." Jiraiya extricated himself from the armchair with some effort. "Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go do that very thing with Kurosawa Ren, and you have no idea how hard it is to flirt with a woman whose special power lets her make bedroom eyes one second and be frigid as a glacier the next."
-o-
"What gives you the right to just waltz in here, traitors?" the proctor spat from behind the mission desk. "This is the Mist mission office—a place for loyal ninja who want to serve their village, not filthy Leaf lapdogs who sell out their own."
It was going to be one of those days.
"Team Gōketsu, reporting for the Chūnin Exam Third Event, sir," Hazō said evenly. They were the only genin in the mission office, suggesting that either the other teams had got here even earlier (which was unlikely, given that Team Gōketsu had arrived at the crack of dawn), didn't care about getting an early start before all hell broke loose (even more unlikely), hadn't found the event (pure wishful thinking), or… had turned up on time and were now silently spying on the Gōketsu from outside instead of immediately heading in. Or was he just being paranoid?
"Very well," the proctor grudgingly conceded. He was a tall, wiry man with short red hair and a pair of oversized glasses that suggested membership in one of Mist's wealthier clans. Hazō seemed to recall there were quite a few redheads among the Kani.
The proctor beckoned the trio over to the mission desk. He glanced down at the unfurled scroll in front of him.
"You may consider yourselves to have been politely greeted," he said reluctantly.
"Thank you," Keiko said coolly. "Please also consider us to have treated you with all the respect you deserve."
The proctor blinked.
"It's good you know your place," he said with a touch of uncertainty. Then, without further ado, he reached into a crate behind him and pulled out three of the most hideously garish bandanas Hazō had seen in his life. The interlocking triangles of flaming red and luminescent yellow made Hazō think of nothing so much as the mating display of the chakra firebird, which was said to involve setting villages alight and dancing on the resulting thermals.
The proctor cast a gaze around the room, not that there was anything to see since he and Team Gōketsu were the only people present.
"I will now give you the instructions for this event. You will hear them only once. Do you understand?"
So far, so on-script.
"I understand."
"Yes."
"Yes, sir."
The proctor gave a smirk so smug he might as well have been Kagome's egomaniac rendition of the Sage of Six Paths made flesh. Hazō tried to memorise it for the next time he got one over on Noburi in their prank war.
After glancing at the scroll one more time, the proctor took a very slow and very deep breath in. His voice, when he began to speak, was clear and precise, with unimpeachably perfect diction but also the speed of a particularly hyperactive chakra woodpecker drawing on its natural Lightning affinity.
"The third event open square bracket begins at dawn close square bracket on November second it ends at dawn on November seventh the event simulates a bodyguard slash escort mission for a civilian merchant who is in Mist to conduct business you will be assigned a proctor who will play the part of your client the single quote mark client single quote mark will have a persona indicating what sort of merchant they are what contacts they have et cetera the client will be making all decisions concerning the business and dictating their own travel schedule around town as well as selecting and paying for room and board for both them and yourselves it is your job to support these decisions as with any escort mission it is important to make a positive impression so that the merchant is inclined to hire you in the future at the end of the event you will receive between minus twenty and twenty points depending on your client's review of your helpfulness courtesy and professionalism you and your client are playing the part of foreigners for the duration of the event teams may not make contact with any of their clan members personally or through intermediaries attempts to do so will result in penalties or disqualification depending on the nature of the violation both you and your client must be visibly wearing these bandanas"—he briefly waved at the bandanas without interrupting the flow of his speech—"around your neck at all times in order to make it clear that you are part of the event if you remove your bandana you are disqualified from the event if you remove another contestant's bandana or cause it to be removed you are disqualified from the event if you are disqualified then your team will be taken directly to the barracks and confined there for the duration of the event your score for the event will be a flat minus fifty points or whatever score you have earned if it is below minus fifty scoring is as follows teams are scored as a whole whatever score your team earns is added to each individual's total at the end of the event you will receive one point for every one thousand Mist ryō your client has amassed you are not permitted to give the client money or its equivalents you will be assessed the aforementioned minus twenty to twenty points based on the client's review if your client is single quote mark killed single quote mark then you are disqualified from the event and your score for the event is a flat minus two hundred points or whatever score you have earned if it is below minus two hundred the client will be under the Transformation Technique at all times while performing their role and is considered killed if their disguise is destroyed for any reason you will be moving around the village during this event collateral damage is not acceptable and must be stringently avoided in the event of injury or property damage the consequences will apply to anyone the proctors think may have been directly or indirectly involved regardless of whether they personally caused the damage or were definitively known to be present the penalty for a death is disqualification from the Exams forfeiture of your village's bond and all of your village's contestants being sent home immediately if a Mist contestant is involved in a death then all Mist contestants will be sent to an outpost on the edge of the Land of Water for the duration of the Exams and the Mist bond will be forfeit as per normal Chūnin Exam rules the penalty for injuring a proctor or anyone who is not part of the event even so much as a bruise is minus fifty to minus one thousand points depending on the severity of the injury you will also be responsible for the victim's medical fees plus ten thousand ryō those monies will be paid twice once from your client's supply and once from your village's bond property damage will be scored as injury to a person a scorch mark or broken table will cost minus fifty points and the price of replacement plus ten thousand ryō paid twice the costs go up from there depending on the severity of the damage any action intended to cause another team to inflict collateral damage will be treated as your team causing a fatality disqualification for all teams from your village forfeiture of your village's bond and ejection from the Land of Water."
Hazō and Noburi stared at the proctor in stunned disbelief. He had delivered the entire speech without once pausing for breath, looking down at the sheet in front of him a second time, or using any visible ninjutsu.
The proctor gave an even bigger smirk. "Do all of you understand the rules section I have just read out to you regarding collateral damage?"
Keiko looked him in the eye. "Collateral damage is not acceptable and must be stringently avoided. In the event of injury or property damage, the consequences will apply to anyone the proctors think may have been directly or indirectly involved, regardless of whether they personally caused the damage or were definitively known to be present. The penalty for a death is disqualification from the Exams, forfeiture of our village's bond, and all of our village's contestants being sent home immediately." Breath in. "If a Mist contestant is involved in a death then all Mist contestants will be sent to an outpost on the edge of the Land of Water for the duration of the Exams and the Mist bond will be forfeit as per normal Chūnin Exam rules. The penalty for injuring a proctor or anyone who is not part of the event, even so much as a bruise, is minus fifty to minus one thousand points depending on the severity of the injury. We will also be responsible for the victim's medical fees plus ten thousand ryō; those monies will be paid twice: once from our client's supply and once from our village's bond." Breath in. "Property damage will be scored as injury to a person—a scorch mark or broken table will cost minus fifty points and the price of replacement plus ten thousand ryō, paid twice. The costs go up from there depending on the severity of the damage. Any action intended to cause another team to inflict collateral damage will be treated as our team causing a fatality: disqualification for all teams from our village, forfeiture of our village's bond, and ejection from the Land of Water."
She was still holding the proctor's gaze when she finished. He was the first to look away.
"Put your bandanas around your necks," he muttered as he sagged in his seat. After a cursory glance which did not involve meeting their eyes, he waved them over to the door at the far side of the office. "The Team Gōketsu client is in the civilian waiting area down that corridor."
Hazō suppressed a grin. It had almost been worth having early access to the script for that alone.
However, the proctors weren't done with them yet.
"My, what strapping young lads," Team Gōketsu's new client cackled. "Why, if I were fifty years younger, I'd snap you right up."
The client was an old hag who looked like she predated not only the village system but also the Warring Clans Period. One of her eyes was electric blue while the other was an unhealthy crimson, and they looked Hazō and Noburi up and down without particularly coordinating with each other. She had a long, hooked nose, warts all over her skin, warts all over her warts, teeth which looked like she'd spent her life chewing iron bars, and bony fingers that twitched like jumping spiders ready to pounce. All she needed was a pointy hat and Hazō wouldn't hesitate to burn her at the stake.
"No, I'm being daft," she decided. "Age is no obstacle to having a good time, hmm?"
Hazō and Noburi gave a synchronised shudder. Keiko's body language was entirely unreadable.
"Well," the hag gave a sinister grin, "won't one of you come closer, and give an old lady a hand with her luggage?"
After a count of three, Hazō surreptitiously signalled "scissors", keeping his hand unobtrusively by his side.
He glanced over at Noburi.
"Paper". Thank the Sage and all his many brothers.
The hag, who was clearly very observant for someone with a near-terminal squint, grinned at Noburi expectantly.
"You know," Noburi rallied after an agonised second, "it really wouldn't be safe for one of your bodyguards to get weighed down by your backpack while we watch out for danger. Water Element: Water Clone Technique!"
The water clone formed next to Noburi, gave him a look that could have read either "Instructions acknowledged" or "Worst original self ever", and marched over to the hag's backpack, which was actually bigger than its owner's stooped-over form. (Oh, yes, and she was leaning on a stick. Did Hazō mention the stick? She was going to be so much fun to rush through the inevitable crossfire if the palanquin went down…)
The clone grunted as it tried to heft the backpack… and failed. After a few more attempts, it looked helplessly at Noburi.
"My," the hag chuckled. "They don't make strapping young lads like they used to. To think that a third of your strength isn't even enough to lift an old lady's bag. Well, maybe you make up for it with stamina, hmm?"
She gave Noburi a lascivious wink.
Noburi urgently summoned another clone. Working together and applying fundamental principles of leverage, the two were ultimately victorious. What did the hag have in there, the complete contents of the Nara Library?
"If I may be so bold as to interrupt this admittedly entertaining comedy sketch," Keiko said, "would you mind providing us with your name and your plans for the next few days, madam?"
"There," the hag said, "you two could stand to learn a thing or two from this cute little girl."
Through long acquaintance, Hazō was able to notice Keiko suppress the twitch.
"I'm Gisō Karina, but you children can call me Granny Karina if you like. I'm a… well, let's just say 'herbalist', and leave it at that, hmm?"
"A herbalist," Keiko said neutrally. "Am I to infer that you will be primarily be trading with doctors and apothecaries, then?"
"Those too." Karina's spider hands rattled as she played them across the wooden handle of her walking stick. "But I also have some more unusual herbs which I'm sure Mist's more… colourful characters will be interested in."
The team exchanged wary glances.
"If you're implying what I think you're implying," Noburi said, "doesn't that kind of trade normally go through the yakuza?"
"On the contrary," Keiko said. "The previous Mizukage was ruthless when it came to attempts to import narcotics into the Water Country. If you recall, My Vision describes them as anathema to the responsible, disciplined society he sought to create. By contrast, the First was not inherently opposed to the drug trade as long as it was firmly regulated by the state. As such, if the current Mizukage has not made her stance on the matter clear, which she may simply not yet have found time to do, the issue remains in limbo. Until she or her representatives codify the new status quo, formally or otherwise, the yakuza must retain their existing stance of zero tolerance."
"In other words," Hazō concluded, "if you want to peddle 'unusual herbs', you have to do so without the yakuza's consent. Is that what you intend to do, ma'am?"
"Call me Granny Karina," the hag smiled. "Now, I never said I was doing anything illegal. Just selling unusual herbs that can't be bought on the open market. Probably best to avoid the yakuza, though. They might not be very understanding."
Keiko raised an eyebrow.
"Oh, you can turn me down as a client if you like, but that won't be much good for either of us, hmm?"
Keiko gave her a hard look.
"We would like an assurance, in your official capacity, that there will be no legal consequences for us as a result of assisting you during this event."
The hag chuckled. "Aren't you a sharp one? Any sharper and you'll cut yourself, little girl. Very well, in my capacity as a Chūnin Exam proctor, I confirm that there will be no legal consequences for you as a result of assisting me in this event.
"Now come along, boys. Daylight's burning, and there's so much we need to do before we can reward ourselves with a pleasurable night."
Hazō had been wrong. This was going to be so much worse than one of those days.
-o-
You have received 4 XP and 1 FP.
-o-
Granny Karina is starting off with a couple of ordinary apothecaries. One is in an upmarket area and caters to merchant households, while the other is an up-and-coming business not far from Hazō's old home.
She has consented to ride in a palanquin. Her pack is making the thing sag a little, but the bearers took one look at her and swallowed their complaints.
She has agreed with your lodging plans on one condition—the boys stay in the same room as her, since she "fears for her safety", while Keiko stays in another room in order to be "bait for assassins".
I gaped at Val. "What do you mean, 'no'? It's absolutely the right thing to do. Pax Konoha, right? Whether or not we created all of it or just channeled it, this whole world is a shit show and we need to do whatever we can to put it right. Giving them my battletech seals would go a long way towards that. Val, having Oli crank them all up to 99%ers and then you teach everyone Edo Tensei and all the other crap would go even farther. Shoot, Telescope no Jutsu alone would do it—sure, we banned it for being OP crap, but you know it so let's get that OP on our side. Plus, there's A—"
Val coughed and I broke off. He glanced around my rather spartan dorm room before looking at me inquiringly.
"Yes, we're secure," I told him, rolling my eyes. "First thing I researched when we got here was privacy seals, and this room is covered with more of them than Jiraiya has even dreamed of. The Sage himself isn't going to see or hear anything we say."
"That's a relief," Oli said. "Have either of you thought of a way to tell who he's wearing?"
I rubbed my face in aggravation. "No. With the change in the timeline...Isobe isn't the Hokage's secretary in this world, so the Sage obviously isn't hiding in him like we wrote. Maybe he's in the current secretary, or maybe he gave up on the whole 'work from the shadows' thing and jumped back to Hiruzen years ago, then got rid of Isobe's corpse. Or, for that matter, maybe he didn't manage to jump out of Minato before the Shinigami ate him. Val, anything in that mental library of yours that could spot him?"
Val shook his head. "I mean, sure, I could use the Yamanaka techniques on him, but his Resolve must be through the roof."
Oli nodded fervently. "Hell yes. Ninety-seven. Even Jiraiya is only at sixty-three. I mean, his sheet says 'Sarutobi Hiruzen', but I have to wonder if maybe a demigod could make his sheet lie to me."
I digested that. "Well, that's not troubling at all."
"Indeed," Val said. "And if his Resolve is that high he'd spot me instantly and rip my mind apart. Oli, you sure you can't uparrow me?"
Oli shook his head. "Sorry. When we were in the Coatroom Between Worlds I could tweak things, but the stats I was seeing were derived off that abortive Champions-rules rewrite that we started on. Once we got here everything shifted to the Dresden Files rules and I can't do anything significant with our sheets, aside from some inventory management. Still, this isn't really a problem, right? It's August now, so Akatsuki is only six months from finishing their plan. Once they do, everything's great."
"Except without Hazō and Kagome to invent skywalkers, Hiruzen and his strike group don't go to Noodle to ambush Yagura," Val pointed out. "He doesn't get captured, so Itachi can't mind-control him into ordering the Tailed Beasts to obey Pain. Without that, Pain doesn't have enough power to form the chakra net."
"Val, has anyone ever told you that you are an incredible killjoy?" I asked.
"I live to crush your youthful hopes and dreams," he said, offering a polite nod. Oli snorted and I glared at him in utter betrayal.
"Seriously, it's like it's a drug with you," I complained. "'Ooh, I've got a great idea, guys! Let's send them to the Chūnin Exams! We can have one event be an escort mission where they aren't allowed to hurt anyone, and then one of the local teams will hire a jōnin from outside the event to take out their escortee! The players will weep salty salty tears!'
"'Oh, we can't do that, Earl,' I replied to myself in a bad parody of Val's voice. "'Yes, it would be diabolically evil and fun, but then it would spread. It's an easy and fully general tactic and therefore someone would have thought of it in the past, so there would be a rule against it.'" I glared at him. "Pitooie. Always ruining my fun, you gigantic wet blanket."
Val looked irritatingly satisfied at what he no doubt perceived as a compliment.
"'Oh, oh, I've got one!'" Oli said eagerly. "'How about an event where they need to collect a gazillion seals, all of which are seal failures waiting to happen? That would be awesome!'"
"'We can't do that, Oli,'" I said, in an even worse parody of Val's voice than I had used before. "'We already stated that these seals were in use within Mist. A seal failure would have happened before.'"
"'But they were very rare!'" he recited triumphantly. "'If the chances of a failure are very low then it's not a problem when there's only a couple dozen of them around, but now they've cranked production up to make thousands of them. With this many around, a thousand-to-one chance is going to happen four times over the course of the two days in the swamp, and that's if you don't actually know anything about probabilities of independent events!'"
"'But Oli,'" Oli said, frowning with mock seriousness in much the way I imagined Val had when we'd originally had this conversation in QM chat, "'Wouldn't the Mist sealsmiths have recognized the danger?'"
"'No! Because the seals were the project of an apprentice who was badly injured in the accident that killed his master. He couldn't do ninja work anymore and needed an income, so—'"
"Very funny, you two," Val said.
I looked at Oli and shrugged. "I thought so." I was pleased to receive a firm nod of agreement from our self-proclaimed kōhai QM and an eyeroll from Val.
"Our real problem is going to be keeping Homura from leaving Rain," Val said, heading off the next round of mockery that Oli was opening his mouth to deliver. "I'd say that everything else needs to be on hold for that."
"Yeah, remind me why we set him up with that unstoppable 'rip you apart with a touch' ability?"
Oli shrugged. "Don't blame me, guys. I wasn't there for that part."
"Regardless," Val said, demonstrating the upside of his wet-blanket ways by keeping us on topic, "Akatsuki would have finished their plan in six months and fixed Homura, but without the skywalkers that's not happening."
"And thus we come back to the start," I said. "The part where I was going to give battletech seals to Konoha? Jump harness, reactive armor, force lances...they're better than skywalkers in every way. If Hiruzen and the rest were willing to go fight Yagura with just skywalkers they'll be all over it with the battletech seals."
"That's the problem: They're too much better. Konoha will walk over Mist with no real risk. Hiruzen only died to a bad roll; that's unlikely to happen in real life, especially with the advantage of the battletech seals. He'll kill Yagura easily, meaning that the Three-Tails disperses for ten years. Without the Three-Tails, Akatsuki can't complete the chakra net, meaning they can't catch Homura before he hears about his brother's death, realizes that there's no more chance of Hagoromo fixing him, so he goes out and converts the entire world into his clones."
"Have I mentioned the part about you being a killjoy?"
"Mmmm. Youthful hopes and dreams."
"Okay, so I make skywalker seals. Actually, Jiraiya may have made them by now. We told him and Hiruzen the idea when we first got here; I'm sure he could figure it out on his own."
"Which means that they might leave for Noodle now, instead of on schedule."
I rubbed my face. "And, of course, Yagura is currently busy with the Summon Realm squabble, so he couldn't afford to attend a party in Noodle. And without his firepower, he's not going to send the others along to what his Beast has undoubtedly told him is definitely a trap. No matter how much the little psycho might want to take a swing at Leaf, he'll listen to Isobu."
"We could tell Jiraiya about the Summon Realm issues...?" Oli offered. "If the Parakeets had some reinfocements, then maybe—"
"That would bring the Toads in immediately, meaning they wouldn't be available to cover the Pangolin flank when the Lemurs made their move."
All three of us went silent, considering the options.
Silence reigned.
Oli started to say something, then shook his head.
"Remind me, Oli...why exactly did we make this such a crapsack world?"
"Don't blame Oli. He wasn't there during the initial worldbuilding."
"Out! Out, vile harridan! Go back and tell your corrupt masters that Usui Saruhiko is a law-abiding citizen who will not fall for your gross blandishments!"
As the client moved to flee the shop, cackling and holding a money pouch in her right hand (she'd had the common sense to finish selling her ordinary goods before introducing the apothecary to anything else), Keiko quickly stepped ahead of her to check the outside for traps. As she reached the exit, she skidded to a dead halt and thrust an arm out sideways in warning.
"Tripwire," she hissed.
The team shifted into formation. Keiko stepped outside, ready to defend against an attack. Noburi knelt down to disarm the trap lest by unlucky chance it catch the "decrepit and poorly-coordinated" client or indeed the apothecary. Hazō simultaneously covered him and kept the client from stepping outside (or being clobbered by the apothecary, who seemed torn between his righteous rage and the moral commandment not to inflict violence on frail old women).
Noburi: Cracking 1 - 6 = -5
Enemy: Trapbuilding ? + ? = 24
Noburi fails to disarm the trap.
"Aargh, my fingers!" Noburi cursed. "Who the hell puts this much effort into a damn tripwire?"
"Leave it for now, then," Hazō said. "We can deal with it once the area is secure."
Noburi's Aspect "Trouble: Star of the Show" is invoked. Noburi gains 1 FP.
Noburi glanced back at the client and the apothecary, who were watching him with expressions of entertainment at his expense and simmering anger respectively.
"It's fine," he snapped. "I'm almost there."
Hazō sighed. "Keiko?"
"Nothing," Keiko replied after a few seconds. "But then, the enemy's stealth was sufficient to prepare the trap in such close proximity to us unnoticed. Stay alert—they may still be in the area."
She paused.
"Madam, please remain indoors until I have finished checking the palanquin for traps."
Behind her, Noburi was still struggling with the tripwire.
"When I get my hands on whoever set this thing…"
The next few minutes were uneventful, as Hazō continued to cover a frustrated Noburi from ranged attacks while trying not to be distracted by the apothecary (who had switched from imminent violence to demanding reparations for obstruction of business). The client, meanwhile, just watched the proceedings with clear amusement.
"There was a bomb," Keiko called out from the palanquin. "Minimal-strength training tag with a long time delay under the seating cushion. I doused it with water from a canteen. I believe we were intended to lower our guard after successfully forestalling an ambush and allow the client into the palanquin, shortly after which the tag would detonate with minimal damage to everything but the client. I will continue my search in case it was a decoy."
"You do that," Hazō said. "Noburi, are you seriously not done with that—"
Ambush!
Enemy invokes "Melding into the Crowd".
Enemy: Stealth ? + ? + ? = 31
Hazō invokes "(Formerly) Marked for Death".
Hazō: Alertness 30 + 4 - 6 = 28
Hazō spends 1 FP to reroll.
Hazō: Alertness 30 + 4 - 6 = 31
Hazō detects the enemy! No ambush effects apply.
Initiative!
Hazō: Alertness 30 - 9 = 21
Hazō spends 1 FP to reroll.
Hazō: Alertness 30 - 9 = 21
Enemy: Alertness ? + ? = 39
Keiko and Noburi do not roll this round as they have no line of sight to the enemy and any sound the enemy makes is masked by ambient noise from the inn.
Turn order: Enemy, Hazō
Round 1
Enemy invokes "Aim" on themselves for free.
Enemy: Ranged Weapons ? + ? + ? = 28
Enemy burns 1 FP to reroll.
Enemy: Ranged Weapons ? + ? + ? = 37
Generous rules interpretation: Since the plan explicitly specified having Blocks up at all times, I'm treating the Block as a readied action, something I don't believe we have a rule for. Hazō is allowed to have his Block up even though he lost Initiative, with the corollary that he is precommitted to spending his first turn of the combat performing that Block. Depending on the other QMs' judgement, this may be a one-off.
Hazō: Taijutsu Block (attacks against the client) 43 + 5 - 6 = 42
Enemy is blocked!
Combat ends.
The eternal little voice of paranoia at the back of Hazō's mind, already at a constant low-volume screech due to the nature of the event, as well as the client's periodic attempts to grope him, rose to a scream. They've finally come for me!
He whirled around to the window of the inn opposite. The last second of his memory instantly replayed itself, as if he'd been caught spacing out in the middle of a conversation. He saw a glint of light, so subtle that he wouldn't have noticed it through conscious attention alone.
Clink! Clink! Clink!
The enemy's aim was perfect, but somehow the needles were a little slower than Hazō expected, and he intercepted every last one with a hastily-drawn kunai before they could reach the client and doom them all.
Through the inn's window, he could see someone moving away, towards the back of the taproom.
"Do not engage!" he barked as Noburi and Keiko belatedly sprang up. "It could be another diversion."
His teammates reassembled by the apothecary's front door, weapons out.
"I concur," Keiko said. "The assailant likely confirmed that the inn had a rear exit before engaging, since otherwise we could easily intercept them as they escaped."
She glanced at the apothecary floor.
"Soft-tipped needles, angled low so as to strike the target's legs. Aerodynamically inferior, but virtually no risk of ricochet. Concealment in a busy location where ambient noise would drown out the sound of their movement, combined with a window position that would prevent the risk of collateral damage to patrons from them while inhibiting return fire from us.
"A difficult-to-disarm tripwire to distract one team member, followed by a seal-based trap to do the same for the other, leaving only one defender capable of deflecting the real attack. It seems we are being targeted by an opponent who relies on a functioning brain rather than raw firepower. I admit I find the experience refreshing."
As Keiko returned to checking for secondary traps, Hazō found himself once more accosted by the apothecary.
"This is an outrage!" the man spat, emerging from behind the counter where he'd taken cover. "You are driving away customers with all this clamour. Rest assured, I will be lodging a formal complaint with the Mizukage's Office!"
The client gave Hazō a gleeful "you're on your own" look.
"Sir," Hazō said in his most honeyed voice, "I humbly apologise for any inconvenience caused. Your attackers' actions were in flagrant violation of the Chūnin Exam rules, and rest assured that as soon as we are able to identify them, we will report them to the Mizukage's Office directly on your behalf. I'm sure that the relevant officials will be much quicker to address your claim if it is delivered by a ninja rather than a member of the civilian population."
Usui considered this for a second, then relaxed.
"Yes," he said, "that would be most acceptable. I apologise for my earlier outburst, esteemed ninja. Still, I must insist that you escort Miss Gisō out of my establishment and never bring her here again. I am a law-abiding man, and have no interest in the… items she peddles."
Hazō bowed, and escorted the completely unrepentant client out as soon as Noburi was finally done with the tripwire and ready to back him up.
"All clear?" he asked Keiko.
"A few minutes more," Keiko replied. "Given the calibre of the opponent we appear to be dealing with, I wish to leave no metaphorical stone unturned."
Hazō and Noburi waited uneasily outside while Keiko performed a yet more thorough sweep.
"I found one more trap, this one much better concealed," she eventually reported. "A weight had been attached to the roof of the palanquin with weak adhesive, such that the palanquin's natural swaying during transport would eventually unhinge it and drop it on the client's head. I imagine that we were expected to assume that the first two traps were distractions to render us vulnerable to the needle attack, thereby failing to realise that the needle attack itself was a distraction from the real trap."
She gave a shadow of a smile. "This is much closer to the Chūnin Exam I was hoping for. It is almost a pity that we will have to comprehensively crush this team and their plans into a fine, fine dust."
The look in her eyes made Hazō shudder in spite of himself.
-o-
Buoyed by an inexplicable and frankly unnerving good mood, Keiko took the lead in the security arrangements for the group's lunch break. The table she'd chosen gave clear lines of sight to the café's door and windows, while at the same time putting enough bodies between them and the team that even a Kage would hesitate to try a projectile attack. For the first time that day, Hazō permitted himself something vaguely resembling relaxation.
This was it, he decided. The timing couldn't be better. They were all in the same place at the same time, the location was relatively secure, and the client had gone off to powder her nose, which given her anatomy could take upwards of half an hour. He leaned in to indicate a sensitive subject.
"I've had an idea."
Noburi promptly raised his hand. "Check, please!"
"Very funny. Do I need to remind you who thought of trading for information with the yakuza?"
Noburi shrugged. "Yeah, there's no way making deals with the underworld could possibly come back to haunt us. But all right, since it hasn't yet, I'm all ears."
Hazō opened his mouth to speak, but before he could, an anxious-looking waiter materialised at Noburi's side.
"Honoured shinobi," the man said in an urgent voice, "I most humbly apologise for not having your order ready yet. If you'll just give me a minute, I'll speak with the chef, and we'll make sure—"
"No," Noburi waved him away, "it's my bad. Didn't mean to catch you in the crossfire. I'll wait for my meal like everyone else."
The waiter bowed. "Thank you for your patience, honoured shinobi." He hurried away.
"Ouch," Noburi said. "After all our time in Leaf, I kind of forgot how big the ninja-civilian divide was over here."
"I know," Hazō said. "It feels weird, doesn't it? Anyway, here is what I've been thinking. Right now, all the shady people our client wants to trade with are going to be hesitant because they don't know if the goods are going to be declared illegal tomorrow. It's not so much a matter of which side the Mizukage comes down on, because some of them will be fine with trading in illegal goods as long as they make a decent profit out of it, but either way they're not going to make any big investments without knowing what the market is going to look like."
"Logical," Keiko agreed. "Doubtless this major obstacle is one of the reasons why we've been assigned this particular client, together with the dangers inherent in black market trade, whether real or simulated, and the potential for unintentionally earning the enmity of the yakuza in one way or another."
Hazō smiled. "But for once we're ahead of the game."
"Indeed. I look forward to hearing your plan for snatching defeat from the jaws of victory."
"Thank you, Keiko," Hazō gave her a pointed look. "In any case, my idea is this: we force the Mizukage's hand."
The silence lasted for a full five seconds.
"Pardon me," Keiko said slowly. "For a moment, it sounded as if you were proposing to manipulate the head of a sovereign state into making far-reaching changes to village law in order to grant a genin team an advantage in an annual examination."
"By secretly drugging and/or planting drugs on a person of influence, and then making sure they are discovered in a compromising position," Hazō added.
Keiko opened her mouth, doubtless to deliver a deadpan summary of why she had never heard anything more preposterous in her entire life. Noburi got there first.
"That is the most ninja thing I have ever heard," he said with awe.
"Noburi!" Keiko said in a tone of mixed disbelief and outrage, staring at him as if he'd invited her to join the Momochi Zabuza Fan Club.
"C'mon, Keiko," Noburi grinned. "Think of all the stories. Hanamura Uzume, who brought down a kingdom by implicating a daimyo with his general's wife. Ayame the Thrice-Lecherous, who nobody can prove started the Fang-Claw conflict. Kondo Mamoru, whose name is still cursed in seven countries two hundred years later. All of them became legends by doing things like this."
"Yes," Keiko said. "That is why they are second-rate shinobi."
"What are you talking about?"
"Shinobi are beings of shadow," Keiko explained slowly, as if to a small child. "A perfect assassination is when the target appears to have died of natural causes. A perfect theft is when the target is convinced that they misplaced the item themselves. A perfect seduction is when the target believes that they were the seducer. Do you perceive the trend?"
Noburi gave this some thought.
"What about the fireballs?"
"The fireballs," Keiko said coldly, "are inefficient. They are the product of a completely unnecessary arms race which has consumed the majority of the shinobi world's resources since time immemorial. In the right hands, the Transformation Technique is sufficient to cast down empires, yet a jōnin's power is measured by the size of the crater they leave behind when destroying their foes. If there are gods in the heavens above, how they must laugh."
"It's not that I don't enjoy scathing critiques of the shinobi world's status quo," Hazō said after a few seconds of existentially-troubled silence, "but I do want to know what you two think of my idea."
"Very well," Keiko said. She closed her eyes.
Hazō and Noburi waited patiently. There was still no sign of the client. (They'd briefly sent Keiko in to sweep the ladies' room for potential threats, so Hazō wasn't particularly worried.)
A few minutes later, she opened them again.
"Viable," she decided. "The main point in its favour is that, insofar as the legal status of narcotics is in limbo, so are the legal implications of planting them on an individual without their consent. However, concerns remain. It would be difficult to plant the drugs in a container that can be guaranteed to be opened before the Mizukage, or in a similarly conspicuous location, and if it is, we still cannot guarantee that the owner will not find some way of concealing them again before their nature can be identified. On the other hand, if we were to introduce the drugs directly into someone's system, that person's reduced self-control may lead to injury, which would be considered collateral damage under the rules of the event."
"On that topic…" Noburi gave a disturbingly diabolical grin. "I was thinking while you were using your Bloodline Limit, and I may just have an idea of my own."
"Yes?" Keiko asked warily.
"Well, if we want a target who'll still be able to take care of themselves when drugged, obviously we need to target a ninja."
Hazō and Keiko nodded.
"Then we need somebody who's important enough that them taking drugs is a big deal, but not so powerful that they can get crush us like a bug, literally or politically, if things go south."
Hazō and Keiko nodded again.
"Ladies and gentlemen, I give you… Old Lizardbreath, Headmaster of the Mist Academy of the Ninja Arts."
The perfection of it took Hazō's breath away.
-o-
You have earned 3 XP. Hazō has spent 1 FP and earned 2 FP. Noburi has earned 2 FP. Keiko has earned 1 FP.
-o-
You have done your best to treat the client courteously. She has insisted on the Granny Karina appellation, which you have acceded to (but at least refused to use inside your head because it feels creepy). You have been unable to bring yourself to be flirtatious with her, but have achieved the middle ground of largely hiding how uncomfortable she makes you. You're not sure to what extent she sees through your bluff, but you are at least acting politely. You did remind her of professional standards for client-bodyguard interaction, to which she responded that in her day, when a ninja committed to fulfilling a client's needs for the duration of the mission, they committed to fulfilling all of a client's needs. It's hard to call her on this because "her day" may well predate recorded history. Worse, she acts as if she's convinced that you are on the verge of reciprocating, and are only holding back out of youthful bashfulness. This woman, if woman she be under that disguise, is good.
As an escortee, she follows instructions willingly and more or less to the letter, but does not take the initiative in securing her own well-being, instead "trusting you strapping young lads to get her out of any trouble she might get into".
She has no fixed appointments that she's told you about, but a sizeable list of persons and establishments she intends to visit, and she intends to solicit additional contact information from cooperative "dealers". She has no special dinner plans, but she has listed very specific dietary requirements caused by a combination of her advanced knowledge of the human body and her advanced age, such as refusing to eat meals containing certain common cooking herbs (which her expertise claims to be unhealthy), disliking certain kinds of meat and so on. You may have a challenging time satisfying her.
-o-
Tactical information based on your team's pooled recollections:
Headmaster Ichigaya Yasuzaemon, known out of earshot as Old Lizardbreath, is a short, fat man in his mid-fifties who wears gold-rimmed glasses even though he doesn't need them. He is a chūnin, and rumours claim him to be a T&I dropout. He was awarded his post as a reward for unspecified "services to the state" around thirty years ago, a mixed blessing since on the one hand it is a cushy, well-paid job away from the front lines, and on the other hand, he hates children. There is not one child in the Academy who does not hate him back. Each of the three of you has suffered repeatedly at his hands, being forced to endure endless litanies concerning your inferior abilities, your poor behaviour, your selfishness, your inability to integrate with the rest of the group, the many ways in which you are a disappointment to your parents, this Academy and the village, and… you get the idea. He also does not hesitate to play favourites in order to try and ingratiate himself with the village clans.
Ichigaya is a competent administrator when he's not offloading his work onto other people, and is skilled at corporal punishment. His abilities as a ninja are not known to you since he never displays any, but may include traps insofar as more or less everyone knows that he has a secret stash of alcohol in his office, and countless schoolchildren have tried and failed to steal it as a dare. He is arrogant, short-tempered and sadistic, with an ego the size of a Tailed Beast. He frequently patrols the Academy corridors in lieu of doing paperwork, dropping in on detentions in order to "show them how it's done" and making unreasonable demands of students in the middle of practical classes (he loves making people do sit-ups).
His daily routine is well-known to you. Around 7 am, he enters the Old Schoolhouse building of the Academy, having walked from his home in the northwest, and proceeds to his office, where he drinks from his hidden alcohol stash to fortify himself for the day (as you infer based on his breath if encountered in the morning). He is typically in his office until around 10 am, after which he often walks around the grounds until lunchtime. At 12, he leaves the Academy to have lunch at one of a number of nearby cafes, and returns by 2 pm. He remains in his office until at least 4 pm. He leaves the Academy at 6 pm after taking another drink from his stash (as you found out after one particularly long detention), while many other staff members, including his secretary, are still hard at work. You do not know what he does afterwards.
In addition to the hidden alcohol stash, the office contains a variety of useful documents which you have seen him consult before or after loudly upbraiding you, and it seems likely that his weekly schedule will be among them. The office has two windows and one door, which leads to his secretary's room. She is an overworked young woman who frequently snaps at the children, but always seems vaguely guilty about it afterwards.
Ignore the measurements; I couldn't figure out how to get rid of them.
-o-
It is now the early afternoon. You have visited the first two places on the client's itinerary, mostly successfully, and are now having lunch at a cheap and cheerful café (the client has taken mercy on you and chosen her first dining location for herself). The client is taking her time in the bathroom, so you have plenty of opportunity to discuss further plans before she returns.
What do you do?
Voting closes on Saturday 24th of March, 9 am New York time.
Last edited:
Chapter 170: There's (Going to Be) Something Off about Lizardbreath....
"Better yet," Noburi said, "I've got just the right thing for him: essence of betel nut."
Hazō raised an eyebrow. "Betel nut?"
"Yeah," Noburi said, smiling cruelly. "Think about it: assume he actually was taking drugs. What would he be taking? Not a hallucinogen, not if he's taking it at the Academy. Not a feel-good—if they're strong enough to give you much of a high then they leave you lethargic and fuzzy-headed, something else he couldn't afford at work. No, he'd be taking something to help him get through the day, right? So, stimulants. Everyone drinks tea to get a lift, but maybe he needs something stronger. Unfortunately, his latest dose was a hotshot...poor quality control, no doubt. The drug mixer was careless, used a little too much betel nut meat in his wash, ended up with something that would give a chakra panther heart palpitations. Lizardbreath takes some, he starts getting the sweats, can't sit still, needs to be moving. Gets him out of his office and rushing around the building. Walking too fast, talking too fast and too loud, jumpy and angry. The effect will come on over a few minutes as it gets digested. With the right dose, when the stuff hits peak intensity it should send him into a full-on fit of paranoia. A very visible fit of paranoia. Oh, and best of all: the stuff has mild aphrodisiac properties, so he might even get himself in trouble with some of the other teachers."
"You have this stuff on you?"
Noburi nodded. "Sure. It's a basic part of any medkit. In small doses it's no problem, commonly used as a stimulant to get wounded or chakra-exhausted ninja back on their feet so they can run."
"You have not yet mentioned side effects," Keiko said. "What risks would the concentrate pose?
"Well..." Noburi looked uncomfortable. "Nothing serious. Maybe a little vomiting, some diarrhea, chest pain, heart attack, death, shortness of breath, that kind of thing...."
Keiko fixed him with a gimlet eye. "I seem to recall something about causing fatalities being discouraged under the Exam rules."
"Look, it's not a problem, okay?" Noburi snapped. "That's only if you take a massive overdose. I just won't give him that much."
"How would we administer it?" Hazō asked, interjecting himself without any intent to derail the incipient argument, nope nope nope.
"It'll dissolve in alchohol. We just need to spike his booze or coat the inside of his mugs. The oil is a light yellow and tastes smokey, but the alcohol will cover a lot of that."
"Okay, so that part of the plan seems feasible," Hazō said. "What about political consequences? If we did this, would it be likely to have any sort of fallout on Mist, Leaf, or the alliance?"
Both of the boys looked at Keiko. She looked at them in disgusted betrayal. "Really?"
"Seems like a reasonable question?"
She sighed. "Politics is difficult to model. Obviously, so long as we are not caught there will be no political consequences. If we are caught on the way in to plant the drugs then it would most likely be seen as a failed prank. It would be an embarrassment to Jiraiya that we would do such a thing, and a greater embarrassment that we were caught. If we are caught after Headmaster Ichigaya drinks the stimulants, then any injury or property damage that he inflicts, including to himself, will be treated as collateral damage that we caused. The only good news is that he is not a contestant, so when we are inevitably caught and convicted, I doubt they will be able to claim that we motivated another team to cause collateral damage. On the other hand, if Noburi miscalculates the dose and the Headmaster dies then it will be treated as us causing a fatality during this event—Leaf's bond will be forfeit and all Leaf contestants will be ejected from Mist. "
"Let's avoid that last one."
"Don't worry, I'll be careful."
"What about getting a message to Jiraiya via pangolin?" Hazō asked, looking around quickly before he spoke and then lowering his voice. "I could see this being the sort of bold stroke he'd approve of—shoot, I could even imagine him outing us himself, once the Exams are over. It would give him a hell of a political windfall to be able to say that Leaf in general, and his kids in particular, are such good ninja that just three us were able to shape national policy."
"Are we seriously going forward with this feather-brained idea?"
"Hell yeah!" said Noburi, grinning. "C'mon, you know you want to see Old Lizardbreath get his."
Keiko hesitated before grimacing and admitting, "It would be...not entirely unsatisfying."
"So, are we doing this?" The expression on Noburi's face made clear that this was less of a question and more of a playground taunt.
Keiko glowered at him. "Very well. Yes, sending a message to Jiraiya is a good idea. It can be done securely, and it will offer him an opportunity to either capitalize on our success or order us not to commence. He will be checking in at sundown, so we have about three hours to plan. I am unsure what 'planning' would consist of—we cannot afford to be seen on the grounds of the Academy while wearing our bandanas, meaning that the only practical scheme will be to sneak in after hours without being seen."
"Noburi, can you have the drugs ready by then?" Hazō asked.
Noburi nodded. "No problem. I've got a bunch of the oil in a vial. I'll measure some of it out and then whoever goes in just pours the whole amount in. Which brings us to the real question: who's going in? Two of us need to stay with the old bat."
Hazō was irritated but utterly unsurprised when two pairs of eyes locked on him.
"Okay," he said. "As to who to send in, it seems to me like the logical choice is—"
Sorry this is short; family ate much of my day today. @Velorien will continue from here, and will be responsible for XP and FP awards.
Vote time! What to do now? You can:
Do nothing (default option): If there is no relevant voting then Keiko will attempt the burglary tonight, since in an emergency she can have herself reverse-summoned to the Seventh Path in order to temporarily avoid detection. (Note that she must go back to the same place and cannot tell what's happening there, so this is something of a desperation tactic.)
Suggest that either Hazō or Noburi should be the one to go in. On the one hand, Hazō has Living Roots which might let him detect people coming sooner. On the other, Noburi is actually the medic.
Hazō's common sense says that sending a pangolin in alone would be unwise, since if one was caught it would instantly reveal that it was your team. If there are at least 15 votes in favor of overriding this opinion then you may do so.
You can rethink the whole idea and not go forward with it, in which case you should suggest what you want to do instead.
Write-in.
Voting ends on Wednesday, March 28, 2018, at 12pm London time.
The Old Schoolhouse loomed in the darkness like a slumbering behemoth, sated for now with the suffering of schoolchildren, but not averse to a late-night snack were one to stumble into its lair. Even now, with the lights out and its form indistinct beneath the faint moonlight, Keiko could feel it listening like a sleeping cat, deceptively peaceful yet ready to pounce.
DO YOU THINK YOU CAN JUST COAST THROUGH MY ACADEMY RIDING YOUR SISTER'S COAT-TAILS, MORI KEIKO? ARE YOU PERHAPS TOO GOOD TO RAISE YOUR HAND OR SPEAK BEFORE THE CLASS? DO YOU FEEL OUR EDUCATION SYSTEM DOES NOT FIT YOUR NEEDS? PERHAPS YOU'D RATHER OBTAIN AN EDUCATION ELSEWHERE? I HEAR THE TANNERS ARE TAKING APPRENTICES RIGHT NOW, AND THERE IS ALWAYS ROOM FOR ANOTHER STREET CLEANER. NO? THEN GO REPORT FOR DETENTION. I EXPECT TO HAVE NO NEED TO SEE YOU IN THIS OFFICE AGAIN.
DO YOU KNOW WHY A SERIOUS INSTITUTION LIKE THE MIST ACADEMY OF THE NINJA ARTS HAS A PLAYGROUND, MORI KEIKO? IT IS BECAUSE THE SOCIAL BONDS YOU FORGE DURING YOUR CHILDHOOD ARE WHAT WILL DETERMINE THE ENTIRE REST OF YOUR LIFE AS A NINJA. BOTH YOUR REFUSAL TO SIT WITH THE OTHER CHILDREN DURING LUNCH AND THE WAY YOU SPEND YOUR BREAKS ENSCONCED IN THE LIBRARY LIKE A WORM BURYING ITSELF INTO THE GROUND ARE UTTERLY UNACCEPTABLE. DO YOU FEEL YOURSELF ABOVE THE NEED FOR FRIENDS? PERHAPS THE IDEA OF TEAMWORK DOES NOT APPEAL TO YOU? THE NORTHERN VILLAGES ALWAYS HAVE ROOM FOR MORE HUNTERS AND TRAPPERS, THE ATTRITION RATE BEING WHAT IT IS. NO? THEN GO REPORT FOR DETENTION. I EXPECT TO SEE YOU PLAYING WITH THE OTHER CHILDREN WITH A SMILE ON YOUR FACE NEXT TIME I PASS THROUGH THE PLAYGROUND.
CAUGHT IN ANOTHER ALTERCATION, MORI KEIKO? IS IT TOO MUCH TO ASK OF YOU TO GO ONE SINGLE WEEK WITHOUT DISRUPTING MY ACADEMY'S DISCIPLINE? HAVE YOU CONSIDERED THE FEELINGS OF THE OTHER CHILDREN WHEN YOU PROVOKE THEM WITH YOUR ARROGANT BEHAVIOUR? WHEN DESPITE EVERY SIGN OF THEIR DISAPPROVAL YOU FAIL TO INTEGRATE YOURSELF INTO THE GROUP? DO YOU CONSIDER YOURSELF… UGH. NOT AGAIN. YOU GIRLS ALWAYS THINK A LITTLE CRYING WILL BE ENOUGH TO GET YOU OUT OF TROUBLE. MURANO! REMOVE THIS SNIVELLING CHILD FROM MY PRESENCE. SHE HAS A DETENTION TO ATTEND.
Ordinarily, Kei might have hesitated to target a man with a fundamentally civilian role who posed no obstacle to any of her objectives. Ordinarily, Kei might have hesitated to feed a man narcotic substances when a miscalculation could ruin his health, or worse. Ordinarily, Kei might have hesitated to destroy a man's career, or manoeuvre him into publicly humiliating the highest levels of government. Fortunate, then, that Old Lizardbreath had always claimed to be an extraordinary man. If there was any hesitation before Kei signalled to commence his downfall, it was because she knew that she could only savour the experience once.
"Proceed," she whispered to Panashe.
"Acknowledged, Summoner," came the hissed response, and then if Kei had not known what to look for, she might not have realised that the pangolin was no longer at her side.
Panashe invokes the scene Aspect "Darkest Night".
Panashe: Stealth ? + ? + ? = 47
Guards (highest): Alertness ? + ? = 38
Panashe melds into the darkness.
Panashe invokes the created Aspect "Lay of the Land".
Panashe: Examination (Casing) ? + ? + ? = 30
Casing TN = 20
Panashe spends several hours and acquires two pieces of information. She creates the Aspect "Dancing on the Pad of My Paw".
With no way to support Panashe's scouting, Kei could only wait. A few times, she could feel herself becoming drowsy, but all she needed to do was recall those visits to the headmaster's office, the sensation of her very sense of self shrivelling beneath his litany of contempt, and the flare of emotions would restore her to the peak of alertness.
Finally, there came another whisper. "Scouting complete."
"Report."
"There are three guards whose patrol routes take them through this part of the compound. Unimposing specimens, with no special equipment that I could see. They carry lanterns. Searching for traps was harder, but between watching the guards' movements and my own decades of experience in the field, it was child's play to figure out a safe route to the target location."
Kei nodded, then recalled that the act was pointless. "What is our infiltration window?"
"Fifteen minutes. After that, a guard will be in position to see any light from the office window."
Kei frowned. "How much light will you need to work on the traps?"
"Enough, Summoner. Surely you know that vision is not my kind's strongest sense. Why do you think my scouting of the area took so long?"
"Fifteen minutes," Kei repeated. "As the expert, do you feel this would be sufficient time?"
"For traps designed to fend off half-trained human children, certainly," Panashe said smugly.
"Then tell me when it is safe to move."
No rolls are necessary as Panashe has secured a (temporarily) safe route.
In her head, Kei commenced the timer. With all sound blocked off by the Silence Mine and the moon invisible behind the clouds, she was deeply, deeply grateful that Ami had taken the time to drill her in the practice of precise mental countdowns.
Ami. Ami whom she would never see again, not as a sister. Ami who must have felt so betrayed to know that Kei had left the clan once and for all. Ami, whose smile in those final moments had been a bottomless abyss that no amount of light could fill.
Panashe turned around, and pointed a claw meaningfully at the lantern. Kei steadied her hands.
The infiltration, at least, had been easy. The guards were, true to Panashe's word, neither to be seen nor heard. The path through the traps, while circuitous, was straightforward to follow, with no "step into my footsteps" nonsense. More remarkably still, Old Lizardbreath had been lazy enough to leave the window unshuttered before his departure, doubtless trusting in his traps and the strength of his reputation to ward off any would-be intruders. With a grim smile nobody could see, Kei added complacency to his vast pile of sins.
Panashe: Examination ? + ? = 39
Panashe takes a step up the time ladder from "ten minutes" to "a few minutes", increasing the trap TN.
Trap TN = ? + ? + ? + 10 = 37
Panashe beckoned Kei over and indicated a sliding panel in the floor, not that well-concealed—as if Old Lizardbreath wanted children to find it so that they could proceed to be mauled by the traps.
The trap is designed to be frequently disarmed and rearmed by human hands. Panache suffers from an Aspect penalty for using claws.
Panashe: Cracking ? + ? + ? = 21
Panashe spends a fate point to reroll.
Panashe: Cracking ? + ? + ? = 24
Trap TN = ? + ? + ? = 12
A great deal highly professional pangolin scrabbling later, Kei found herself with a nearly-full bottle of Kurohige's Revenge in her hand. Of course Old Lizardbreath would drink expensive premium whisky. He was a man convinced that he deserved the best of everything. Much about his behaviour could be understood if one considered how far the Academy was from being the best of everything if you despised children.
Fortune continued to favour the bold. The bottle was open (had it been sealed, the mission would have been a failure there and then), and while there was room for others, no other alcohol was in evidence tonight.
On the other hand, the disarming had taken longer than Kei had hoped. Looking at the disassembled traps, Kei suspected that, despite being a man of mediocre talent who had little respect for the skills of children, over the decades Old Lizardbreath had nevertheless found time to optimise his setup to a surprising level. She supposed he had to do something with all the free time generated by offloading his work onto his long-suffering secretary.
The rest was trivial. Kei extracted the flask of betel oil from her backpack and began to calculate the necessary dose based on Noburi's exacting instructions.
Her hand paused as it hovered over Kurohige's Revenge. Looking at the label again, the word called out to her. Could it truly be a coincidence that this was Old Lizardbreath's preferred brand? Or could it be called fate, or at least beautiful irony?
HOW MUCH DISCIPLINE WILL IT TAKE BEFORE YOU LEARN, MORI KEIKO?
It would be so easy to add a fraction too much oil. She had miscalculated, or perhaps her hand had slipped, or perhaps as a teetotal fourteen-year-old, she did not realise whisky was so strong. An accident. She could not be blamed. And in the end, a headmaster dead of a drug overdose would serve their purposes just as well. A one-off incident of betel oil-fuelled rampage could be concealed, but the death of so prominent a personage? Why, the Mizukage would be forced to declare narcotics illegal, if only to prevent a reprise of the incident. From that perspective, she would only be optimising the plan.
IS THIS HOW YOU LIVE UP TO YOUR SISTER'S LEGACY, MORI KEIKO?
Justice. Vengeance. The protection of innocents. The good of the team. It was a sign that all these factors should align so well. An opportunity to do some genuine good, not in Hazō's promised future but here and now, with an act with permanent, measurable effects.
"DO YOU THINK THERE IS ROOM AT MY ACADEMY FOR THOSE WHO REFUSE TO BELONG, MORI KEIKO?"
Her hand began to tip the flask…
(Timer ends.)
-o-
"Well," Granny Karina smiled, "I've been looking forward to this all day. Shall we see how you strapping young lads acquit yourselves?"
The client lounged back on the bed suggestively, the light glinting off her gold tooth (which had the horrifying effect of accentuating her other teeth). Hazō and Noburi naturally sat as far back against the opposite wall as human flexibility could allow… but politely.
Where was Keiko? She should have been back by now. Had something gone wrong? Had she been caught? Hazō would give his right hand to be able to go out and look for her (and flee the client in the process), but knew that his arrival on the scene could only make things worse. And besides, part of their objective right now was to distract the client from Keiko's absence. Admittedly, this wasn't difficult, since she generally showed no interest in Keiko apart from occasionally belittling her with uncanny precision, but she was also an evil, evil witch who might decide to do the least convenient thing on the spur of the moment.
Hazō prayed that Keiko was all right and would be back soon. Then they could invite her in here and stall with comparatively untraumatising conversation until it was too late for anything but sleep.
"You flatter us, Granny Karina," Noburi said in a not-at-all choked voice. "But I was actually wondering about how today went," he went on urgently. "Did you earn much money? Are you likely to need more stock?"
The client chuckled as her bony fingers rattled against the wood of the bed. "Low-hanging fruit. Delicious, juicy low-hanging fruit. Oh, we did well enough with the common apothecaries selling common goods, but that's not the kind of income that'll get us ahead of the game, hmm? I could spend the next four days trading in fever cures and bedroom salves, assuming there were enough buyers, and that wouldn't be so bad for me. But boys like you should be a little more ambitious if you don't want to lose the race to the fur and spice traders."
"You mean you know who the other clients are?" Hazō leaned forward attentively.
"Oops," the client smirked. "Naughty boys, trying to make Granny Karina spill her secrets. Though if you really want me to bare it all…"
For some reason, Hazō's mind offered up the image of one of his scarier sealing failures, when through the rift that was not a rift he briefly glimpsed a creature with too few limbs and too many dimensions, and realised that he was probably still alive only because its senses were the wrong senses for the substances he was made of.
"So what you're saying," he said as soon as he recovered, "is that even if you restock your common goods, you won't be able to sell them at enough of a profit to give us a good position in the event unless we also start dealing in the other kind."
"Clever boy," the client said approvingly. "Today was a good day for looking around the village and figuring out how you're all going to keep me safe, but if we want to get anywhere, soon we'll need to start talking to the interesting gentlemen with the long knives."
"Do you have an end goal?" Hazō asked. "I mean, a set amount of money that you want to make before you retire or something like that?"
The client's jaw dropped, and her eyes spun further away from each other than usual. "Me? Retire?! How rude! Just how old do you think I am, young man?"
Hazō and Noburi exchanged panicked looks to the effect of "Why would you even say something like that?" and "Shut up and help me find a way to get out of this!"
After several seconds of internal flailing, Hazō was shocked to hear the client cackle.
"Oh, you should have seen the looks on your faces, boys! That'll teach you to imply things about a woman's age. You'll never get yourself girlfriends if you go around being so tactless, hmm? Then again, why would you want to, with such a welcoming specimen of womanhood right in front of you?"
The client stood up from the bed, moving steadily towards Hazō and Noburi, and coincidentally interposing herself between them and the door.
"You've been such good boys today. And good boys deserve a special reward…"
She stepped within touching range, leaned over…
There was a knock on the door.
"Hazō? Noburi? Can I speak with you for a moment?"
The fact that it would mean certain agonising death notwithstanding, Hazō could have kissed Keiko just then.
-o-
"You're sure you weren't seen?" Hazō asked again.
"We were not," Kei reaffirmed with a touch of irritation. "Panashe reverse-summoned me as soon as she saw the glow of light from outside. Thanks to her detailed observation of the patrol routes, we knew exactly how long to wait before it would be safe for me to re-emerge."
Her neutral account withheld the shock of the moment, when Panashe reached out to clasp her on the shoulder, the pangolin's other paw grabbing the lantern even as the glow of a guard's approach became visible from outside. She could not describe the sensation of resolve shaken by the pull of interdimensional forces. She did not want to describe the horror of the subsequent revelation.
"What about the mission? Were you able to drug the alcohol stash before you got away?"
Kei remembered holding the whisky bottle in her left hand. The flask of betel oil raised in her right. Panashe's sudden touch, merged with the impact of arrival on the Seventh Path. Surprise. A lack of balance. Pouring oil. She had just barely caught herself in time.
"Yes," she said, feeling guilty, or relieved, or both, or neither. She did not know which, and it would no longer matter anyway.
"It went just as planned," she added with imperfect honesty. "There was exactly enough oil for the volume and potency of alcohol, though I was forced to leave an empty flask. However, the smell of the oil is distinctive, and I am confident that an attentive medic-nin would recognise it."
"Exactly enough?" Noburi gasped. "That much oil wouldn't be safe even if he was drinking water!"
"I assume you didn't actually use the rest," Hazō said more calmly. "What happened to it?"
Kei gave a melancholy smile, thinking of a monster's punishment slowly soaking into the ground of another world. "It was out of my hands."
-o-
You have gained 3 XP. Keiko has gained 2 FP.
-o-
This update ends when everyone goes to bed at night. Note that this means you have another chance to come up with a decent plan for how to spread the news of the prank, since the old one was significantly lacking.
-o-
What do you do?
Voting ends on Saturday 31st of March, 9 am New York Time.
The little shits were streaming into their classrooms, ear-gougingly shrill as always.
Yasuzaemon strode past his secretary without more than an inchoate growl, secluding himself in his office and locking the door behind him. His hands were shaking hard enough that it was difficult to disarm the traps, but long practice helped him through. Once the various spikes and daggers were safed he pulled out his best friend and poured himself two fingers of ability-to-get-through-the-morning-without-killing-the-little-monsters.
Disgusting little larvae, all of them. Their shrill little voices, their tiny little hands. Always lying—that was the worst of it, the incessant, unnecessary lying. "I didn't do it, Headmaster!" they would say, while standing in front of thirteen different witnesses that said they had done it. Or "I never touched him, Headmaster!" when the cuts on their knuckles perfectly matched the bruises on the other brat's face.
No, wait. The lying wasn't the worst part, the worst part was the cheating. "But we're ninja!" they would say, when he caught them redhanded trying to steal exam questions. Or sometimes they would appeal to power: "Well, I'm really rich because my daddy is a clan head and so you have to let me do what I want!"
No, wait. It wasn't the lying or the cheating that was the worst part, it was the incompetence. Every day, his duty required him to offer constructive criticism to some little firstie who couldn't even wall-walk, or a second-year who kept smacking himself in the face every time he tried to do kata #17 with the chain whip, or some other ridiculous loser failing at some ridiculously simple task. It was enough to make a good man utterly despair.
No, wait. It wasn't the lying, or the cheating, or the incompetence that was the worst part. It was the smugness. Every single one of them thought it was the next Byakuren. The minute they learned one trick or technique, no matter how trivially simple, they would preen and prance around as though the entire world should pay them honor.
He snarled at his own thoughts and slammed the two fingers of whiskey back. This batch was smokier than he remembered, but not bad. Those fingers got lost somewhere on the way to his stomach, so he sent another finger as an advance scout to track them down while he got on with the serious business of paperwork.
Ten minutes and twelve forms later the scout still hadn't reported back, so he paused long enough to send two more reinforcements after it. He was finally starting to loosen up, getting past the perfectly understandable irritation of waking up too early in order to come drown in a sea of shrieking maggots one more time. He had slept for crap again last night, but the lethargy was falling away. The paperwork was, bizarrely, actually pretty okay. It was satisfying to flick his brush over each one, solving problems with his normal speed and efficiency. Today was one of the better days; the fingers of whiskey had finally found one another and come together in a clasped hand of friendship and warmth that fizzed out from his belly and through his blood.
He went back to the paperwork and zipped through more pages, fingers flicking and mind flashing as he tore through it all, shredding problems and destroying difficulties with skill and aplomb because all of it was so easy as to be trivial. So easy that he found himself tapping a foot as he went, impatience requiring motion because this was all beneath him and that sense of success was fading as he saw how tedious and dull it all was and he really just couldn't stand it anymore, couldn't stand sitting here wasting his life on these little brats, couldn't stand being locked away from sun and trapped at a desk and Sage why was he just sitting here with this abominable stuff?
He pushed himself to his feet, fidgety fingers flicking the papers into a pile, the brush resting to the side. He couldn't stand the desk, needed to be out and about, needed to be sure the little brats weren't destroying his school. Yes, definitely. Motion! That was what was needed!
He shoved his way through the door to the outer office, striding for the door to the hall. That ugly cow was at her desk as always and her head came up as he passed by. "Headmaster?"
"What?!" Couldn't she see that his hand was already on the knob?!
"Nothing, sir. Just...you aren't usually out so early. Did you need som—"
"I'm fine!" The aggravating woman was making his skin itch; he glared at her as he scratched at it, then barged out into the hall and down a few doors to the nearest classroom.
The teacher was standing in front of his desk lecturing a bunch of firsties; he broke off midword when Yasuzaemon yanked the door open.
"Good morning, Head—"
"Never mind that! Are the students behaving properly?!"
"Uh...I mean...yes, sir. Why do you ask? They've been—"
"Bah!" He waved the stammering idiot aside and rounded on the maggots who were the source of all his pain and the ultimate cause of that infuriating itch. "LOOK, YOU LITTLE BRATS! YOU'D BETTER PAY ATTENTION, YOU HEAR ME?!" Gah, they made him itch even more than that stupid secretary. "MIND ME, AND MIND YOUR TEACHERS! UNLESS YOU THINK YOU'RE TOO GOOD FOR THESE CLASSES? YOU'RE NOT! YOU'RE NOT! YOU'LL PAY ATTENTION TO EVERYTHING YOU ARE TAUGHT HERE, DO YOU HEAR ME?!" The fizz in his blood was pouring out through his mouth, the anger leaving him panting for breath as it departed.
"Headmaster, are you feeling all right?" the teacher asked cautiously.
"I'M FINE! Why do you all keep wasting my time with these stupid questions?" His triceps were itching the worst, and just like the little shits they refused to settle down no matter how hard he scratched. "I'm fine! And why is this room so hot?! HAVE YOU BEEN TEACHING FIRE JUTSU TO A BUNCH OF FIRSTIES?! I'LL HAVE YOU SENT TO THE FLOGGING POST FOR THAT!"
The instructor stepped back, an expression of alarm and confusion spreading across his big stupid face. "Headmaster, I haven't been teaching any jutsu at all. We're discussing equipment maintenance, like we always do this wee—"
"Equipment maintenance?! EQUIPMENT MAINTENANCE?! WHY ARE YOU WASTING TIME ON THAT?!" Gah, why wouldn't his damn arms stop itching?! He dug harder at them, hard enough to be painful.
"Headmaster...are you sure you're all right, sir?"
"I'M FINE! SHUT UP WITH YOUR STUPID QUESTIONS!"
"Sir...you're bleeding, sir."
"What?! No, I'm n—" He glanced down to find dark wetness on his sleeve over that damn itch that he couldn't get to stop and why wouldn't it fucking stop?! Where had the wet patch come from, anyway? "SHUT UP! Just shut up and teach your damn class! AND NO MORE JUTSU!" He leaned forward, shouting the words into the instructor's stupid ugly fat stupid face because these people were all stupid, incompetent idiots who couldn't do the simplest things unless you told them over and over and over and why couldn't he stop the damn itching?!
"Yes, sir." The instructor was leaning slightly away, but one foot had slid back into a ready stance, body shifting as though to attack or defend. Was the fool actually thinking he could threaten his Headmaster and get away with it?!
"ARE YOU THREATENING ME, YOU FAT BASTARD?!" He raised both hands, shaking his fists at the impertinent bastard as though trying to smash the words through his ugly stupid head.
The instructor slid back a few inches, body squaring off in what was now undoubtedly a combat stance. "Sir, please calm down. I'm not sure what—"
"DON'T YOU TELL ME TO CALM DOWN, YOU CATFISH'S ASS! YOU CALM DOWN! AND STOP TEACHING THE LITTLE BASTARDS FIRE JUTSU! YOU THINK I CAN'T TELL?! THIS ROOM IS ROASTING HOT, YOU LIAR!" The anger had taken all his breath; he was panting in his rage, his professionalism barely restraining him from knocking appropriate deference into the instructor's head with a well-deserved Divine Hammer Fist.
In his peripheral vision he could see the lying little bastards looking at each other in confusion. They were all hunching down at their desks like the animals they were, frightened little mice trying to hide from their well-deserved fates.
"Sir, it's not hot and I have not been teaching fire jutsu," said the lying liar of an incompetent instructor who never should have been allowed into a classroom in the first place because he was much too soft on the animals and he was making Yasuzaemon itch even worse, the prickles under his skin now turning to stinging sparks. "Sir, something is wrong with you. I think we should get you to sickbay."
Yasuzaemon, Taijutsu: 46
Kenshin, Taijutsu + tag Yasuzaemon's "Out of Control" Aspect: 49
Yasuzaemon takes 1 shift off his 3-shift track! Yasuzaemon, Wind Blade + invoke "Ninja of the Mist" + invoke "Frenzy" + invoke "Bottled-Up Fury": 51
Yasuzaemon spends 1 FP to reroll!
Yasuzaemon, Wind Blade + invoke "Ninja of the Mist" + invoke "Frenzy" + invoke "Bottled-Up Fury": 54
Kenshin, Taijutsu + invoke Yasuzaemon's "Out of Control" + invoke "Classroom": 66
Yasuzaemon takes 4 stress! He sheds 3 of it with a Moderate Consequence, "Lightly Concussed", leaving him with a full stress track but not taken out. He chooses to end the conflict.
"SHUT YOUR MOUTH, YOU LIAR!" That was enough, and way more than enough! Yasuzaemon stepped forward and backhanded the lying bastard across his fat stupid face, showing him just what happened to people who taught fire jutsu to firsties and then lied about it, the rotten—
The instructor blocked the strike with a bong sao that sent pins and needles up Yasuzaemon's arm, then slipped aside with a condescending, "Headmaster, please—"
Yasuzaemon stepped forward with a smashing kick to the belly, but an intercepting gaun sao deflected the kick and activated the nerve cluster in the side of his calf, causing Yasuzaemon to stumble when his weight came down on the leg. The bastard instructor ducked back, putting the desk between them, but he would launch his next attack the moment he saw Yasuzaemon's vulnerability. Quick, handseals! "Wind Element: Wind Blade!"
Chakra poured out of him, compressing and condensing the air into a barely-visible arc that leaped forward faster than any kunai. The instructor was faster, kicking the massive desk up and forward with chakra-enhanced power. The Wind Blade sliced deeply into the spinning mass of wood and was disrupted. It did nothing to stop the desk's forward motion, nor to prevent it from clipping Yasuzaemon in the side of the head as he desperately tried to duck beneath it. The world swam around him and he staggered.
"Headmaster, please, stop!" The bastard was no longer in a combat stance and he had raised his hands placatingly.
Yasuzaemon growled and stumbled for the door. "Just...stay here! And teach your class! No more fire jutsu!"
The door closed behind him with a click.
o-o-o-o
"Switch. Shifty's up," Noburi murmured, not looking away from his assigned arc.
Hazō's eyes flicked to the man in the poorly-dyed clothes who was not-casually-enough loitering in front of a street vendor across the way, pretending to examine the man's pots and pans. He and two others had been running a rotating tail on Team Uplift all morning, occasionally changing clothes in an effort to go unnoticed. They were better than average, but they didn't stand a chance against a team that had lived in the wilds for two years. After you had spent weeks checking to make sure that no vampire grass had migrated into the area of your camp and disguised itself among the normal greenery...yeah. Spotting a trio of faces that kept disappearing and reappearing among the crowd didn't require much effort.
The team had affectionately dubbed this guy 'Shifty' for the way he was constantly keeping his profile to his targets and flicking his eyes over to watch them. His co-inadequates were 'Stubby' (he was short) and 'Squashy' (cauliflower ear and multiply-broken nose suggested that he was no stranger to fights and didn't always win them). Squashy had been on duty when they went into the store, but was moving off to the north now that Shifty had taken his place.
"Stubby, south, cafe," Keiko said quietly.
Hazō didn't look and he stopped himself from raising an eyebrow. This was the first time that all three members of their tail had been in sight at the same time and he didn't like the way they had the team bracketed. The street ran north/south and there wasn't a corner for another hundred feet, so no opportunity to slip out of the box. The buildings here were low, mostly only one story, with flat roofs that would make perfect sniper roosts.
The team had protested strongly against coming through this area, but Granny Karina had insisted. They were even less thrilled about where they were going next: into the maze of slums and squalor that was the docks. The sun was nearly on the horizon, the shadows were long as a water python and by the time they got to their destination it would be full dark, which just made everything perfect.
"Hey, you!"
Whoever had spoken must have stepped in front of the palanquin, because it had jolted to a halt. Hazō didn't turn to look. The voice came from Arc 1—everything from the palanquin's twelve o'clock to four belonged to Keiko. Noburi had Arc 2, the space from eight to twelve, and Hazō was currently riding drag in Arc 3, covering the area from four o'clock to eight. They would switch later; he couldn't wait, as walking backwards for miles was a pain.
"Yer one'a those ninja kids, right? The ones in the 'xams?" Hazō could almost smell the alcohol that must be seeping from the man's pores to make the words that sloppy.
"Please stay back," Keiko said, her voice only pretending to be polite. "We are bodyguards for an important person and we require a buffer zone for her safety."
"Yeah, whatcha gonna do, huh? I see those ban..band...neck things. Yer not 'lowed to hurt me or you lose points and I get paid! Huh? Right?"
In this corner: Gōketsu Keiko, former missing-nin, signatory of the Pangolin Clan's Summoning contract, wielder of the Frozen Skein, She of the 3.4 Mile Stare.
In the other corner, Nishimura Sora, a thoroughly drunk idiot who thinks he's found a shortcut to wealth:
Sora, Resolve: ? + tag "Drunk Off My Ass" + invoke "Fuckin' Ninja" + invoke "The World Owes Me!" + dice: 12
Sora takes all the shifts of social stress and is defeated. Also, in need of a new pair of shorts.
There was a pause; without turning around, Hazō could almost see Keiko eyeing the man. At last she spoke, her voice utterly disinterested: "It's true that if I hurt you I must pay your medical bills. On the other hand, I have a lot of money. How much would you like to be paid?"
There was a momentary silence and then the sound of drunken footsteps attempting to run.
o-o-o-o
When the team moved out, their tail kept them in the box. They didn't approach, maintaining a carefully non-threatening distance, but they stayed there. It made Hazō's teeth itch, and he found himself wanting to gank one of them just to make the other shoe drop sooner rather than later.
They had switched guard positions, so Hazō was covering Arc 1. Walking forwards was nice, but that just meant he was in a position to watch Shifty paralleling them the whole time. And to watch when the man finally broke position to hurry ahead and out of sight.
"Shifty just went on ahead," Hazō murmured to the others. Grunts of acknowledge from Arcs 2 and 3 were his only response.
Over the next twenty minutes, the missing tail stretched Hazō's nerves to the breaking point. The palanquin moved slowly, the bearers struggling to manage the weight of that woman and her ludicrously overloaded baggage that she had refused to allow the team to put in a storage scroll. The crawling pace meant that there was far too much time for Shifty to get ahead and set up whatever ambush he intended. The worst part was that Hazō couldn't figure out what the game was; there was no obvious reason for civilians to be tailing them, which suggested that Shifty and company were ninja. Three people was a ninja cell, but no team in the Exams would leave their 'client' unprotected and any who had lost their client would be confined to barracks. They had been only moderately stealthy, so perhaps it was a combat team, ones who weren't in the Exams? If they weren't in the Exams then why hadn't they engaged already? It would have been smart to engage in the crowded streets where Team Uplift couldn't use area weapons and needed to be careful about collateral damage. Granted, then there would have been witnesses....
Too many possibilities.
Stressful as it was, nothing happened before they arrived at their next destination: an incredibly disreputable shop in one of the seediest neighborhoods Hazō had ever seen in his entire life. It was full dark by the time they arrived and very few of the buildings in this area had lights on inside, so Hazō and Keiko pulled oil lamps out of their scrolls and held them high, sticking close to the palanquin while Noburi inspected the entryway and the store. When he was satisfied, the three of them escorted Granny Karina inside as quickly as possible.
The store was set in the basement of another building, accessible only by going down a four-step staircase that wasn't exactly hidden but definitely wasn't obvious. At the bottom was a heavy wooden door with blobs of paint on it that, with a bit of imagination, could have been half of a blue rooster. Or maybe a blob of diseased snot, it wasn't clear. The door stood open, held by a balding man in his fifties that Hazō presumed was the owner.
Hazō glanced around the room as he followed Granny Karina inside. Small, dark, and smelled of mildew. An oil lamp hung from the ceiling, swinging slightly and causing the shadows to bob and weave like Drunken Fist fighters. The walls were covered in floor-to-ceiling racks filled with small clay jars, as well as a half dozen larger bins full of loose herbs. A small desk in the far corner held a ledger and a set of scales. Behind the desk was a door that was trying and failing to be unassuming.
"Good evening!" the owner said, bowing and smiling a gap-toothed grin. Most civilians were missing at least some teeth by the time they got to their old age, but this man only had three left and they seemed positively diseased. Hazō ignored it; the man wasn't carrying any visible weapons or displaying hostile body language and that was all that mattered. (Hazō really would have preferred to throw the guy up against the wall and give him a patdown to be sure he didn't have any weapons, but that wasn't a pro-business manuever and risked invoking the collateral damage rules.)
"Good evening to you as well, young man," Granny Karina said, giving him a look that was disturbingly too close to a leer. "Such a pleasure. I'm Granny Karina."
"A pleasure to meet you, Granny Karina," the man said. "I am Tokaji Kyo, at your service. What would you like?" A hint of unwarranted nervousness behind the words made Hazō's ears prickle. He scuffed a foot lightly, signalling to the others that something was wrong but he didn't know what. Noburi scratched his ear and Keiko brushed her hair back, acknowledging that they'd received the message.
"Rumor has it that you're the man to come to for specialty medicinals," said Granny Karina, apparently not noticing the byplay amongst her bodyguard. "You know, things suitable for unusual conditions. I sell such goods."
"Do you now?" the man asked brightly. "Well, the Sage has blessed me because that's exactly what I need! I'd be very interested in buying. How much do you have?"
Granny frowned and Hazō felt a prickle of sweat on the back of his neck. You did not open a negotiation by expressing interest. What was this man doing?
"You haven't even heard what I'm carrying," she said.
The man flashed a sickly smile. "Ah, so I haven't. Please, tell me. What are you carrying?"
Granny studied him carefully for a moment. "Nothing all that special," she said at last. "Merely some neatsfoot oil, sageblood grasses, and dried sunvine flowers." They were the sorts of things you could buy in any medicinal shop.
The owner blinked in surprise, looking like an inexperienced actor faced with an ad-libbing counterpart. "Ah...nothing more unusual?" he asked at last. "I was hoping perhaps you'd have some painkillers. Strong ones? I have three customers with the fireleg, they can't even sleep without something strong. Another who got his feet smashed on the boats and set badly, needs medicine just to walk. Plenty more like that."
Granny paused even longer. "I might have a small amount of elders-ease," she said at last. "It's rather dear, though."
"I'll give you two hundred ryō the ounce."
Hazō forced himself not to look at Tokaji. He was no expert on the prices of medicine, but that sounded pretty good to him and he couldn't tell why Tokaji was opening with it.
"Done," Granny said. "I've got ten ounces. I'll get it." She started to turn for the door.
"Wait, please!" Tokaji was wringing his hands. "Please. I really need something better. I had some supplies that were...spoiled recently. They've already been paid for by some of my more important customers and I would hate to disappoint them."
Granny's posture suddenly eased. "Oh, well, that's a shame. Always a hazard of our business, isn't it? You take all kinds of precautions but eventually something goes wrong and you lose a whole batch."
"Indeed, indeed. So, do you have anything stronger? I need...a lot."
"Well, now, I suppose if I rooted around a bit I might find some bloodbark," Granny allowed. "Maybe a pound of it?"
"I'll take it. Can you get more? I could use more."
"Hold on there. It's expensive stuff. I've got top-quality bark. Already ground, sieved three times, and washed pure as a virgin stream. I'd be asking ten thousand for it, and not a ry—"
"Done. How much more can you get?" Tokaji was twisting his shirt in his hands and shifting his weight impatiently.
Granny paused again. "How much do you need?"
"Look, how about I just give you five hundred thousand ryō for everything you've got? All of it. Your whole supply of everything."
Hazō had been watching the door but he couldn't keep from shooting a shocked glance at Tokaji before forcing himself back to his duty.
Granny Karina was absolutely still for a long second. "You don't know what I have."
Tokaji was starting to sweat; he pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his head. "I don't care. I can find a way to sell it."
Granny thought about that. "Eight hundred," she said at last, her tone probing.
"Six. It's all I have on hand."
"Mist ryō," Granny specified, clearly looking for the trap.
"I've got three hundred thousand in Mist ryō, eighty in Leaf ryō, about fifty in various others, and the rest in gold. I can get it all turned to Mist ryō but I'd need a week or two."
"Show me," Granny said.
"Show me the product."
Granny paused, then nodded to Noburi. A few hand gestures, a muttered phrase, and a pair of Noburis sprang into existence. They hurried out the door and up the stairs.
The silence dragged on, no one speaking or moving aside from Tokaji's restless fidgeting.
A minute trudged past.
Another limped after it.
A third hove into sight on the horizon.
Finally, just as the tension was becoming unbearable, the clones returned, grunting and barely managing to lug Granny Karina's ridiculous backpack between them.
Tokaji glanced at the old hag for permission before flipping the pack open and searching inside. The search was far more casual than Hazō would have expected for such a sale, and then Tokaji hurried to the desk in the corner and ducked behind it. One after the next he hefted a trio of lockboxes up off the floor, grunting as he dropped each one on the desk. He unlocked them with a set of keys that he took from his pocket and flipped them open for Granny Karina to inspect.
The old woman went through the boxes far more cautiously than Tokaji had gone through her wares. She brought out her own set of weights and verified that Tokaji's scales were fair, then went through and weighed each piece of the gold—much of it in the form of jewelry but also some plain nuggets—and a selection of the coinage. She was exacting, and careful; it was over two hours before she had finished. Keiko had gone outside twice to tell the palanquin bearers to keep waiting; it was well past the hour that the men were expected to knock off for the night, and only the promise of more money was keeping them here. (Well, that and the unwillingness to overstep themselves with a group of foreign ninja of unknown temperament.)
"Be a dear and store these for me, cutie?" Granny Karina asked, waving Noburi towards the lockboxes. The young ninja hurried to obey; everyone was itching to get this weird transaction done and get out of here. Keiko took it as her cue to prepare for their departure, and start checking the door, stairs, street, and palanquin for traps. By the time their 'client' was done exchanging pleasantries, everything was set and the team was able to bundle her into the palanquin and back to their lodgings.
o-o-o-o
Jiraiya scrubbed at his face and looked blearily out the window. Yes, it was just about dawn. Time to check in. Ugh. Why had he agreed with this schedule again? Should have said something like noon and dinner. Or just not come to Mist at all.
Well, maybe not that last one. The information he'd been able to gather had more than made up for the inconvenience. Didn't mean he had to enjoy it, though.
He nicked his thumb on a kunai and slammed his hand on the desk. "Summoning Technique: Gamasid!"
There was a puff of foul-smelling smoke and a tiny toad, hardly bigger than Jiraiya's thumb, crouched atop the bloodstain. "Morning, Jiraiya," the toad said, its voice surprisingly deep for its size.
"Morning, Sid," Jiraiya said, yawning and stretching. "Want some tea?" Sid was a touchy one and he got pissy if you didn't observe the social niceties.
"Nah, I'm good. Just had some. Thanks for offering, though."
"No worries. Anything for me, or can I go back to sleep?"
Sid's bulging eyes switched around the room quickly. "You should come back with me."
Jiraiya groaned, but he knew better than to protest. This was the entire point of communicating via the Summon Realm; it was the one place where he could be certain he wasn't observed by That Woman or her minions. "Okay, let me just grab my sandals."
He slid the footwear on, refilled his mug, and laid his free hand on the desk so that Gamasid could jump on it.
"Return," the toad said.
There was the expected and uncomfortable sense of being pulled through a multidimensional cheesegrater and suddenly he was standing in front of the conference room table in the heart of the Pangolin Clan Embassy to the Toad Clan. Two human-sized and -shaped chairs were set at one corner of the table, a pot of tea with steam wisping from the spout resting on a trivet in front of the chair closest to him. The other chair held his adoptive daughter; the moment she saw him she jumped to her feet and bowed.
Jiraiya dropped into his chair and sighed. He turned the chair slightly so he could put his feet up.
"Ahem," Sid said pointedly.
"C'mon, Sid, I'm tired," Jiraiya grunted, letting his head drop back against the chair. Another even more pointed clearing of a bactrian throat made him put his feet back on the floor. He sipped from his mug and looked over at Keiko. "What's up, kid?"
"We had an unusual interaction with a local merchant," Keiko said, her voice precise and metronomic as she laid out the details of their day.
When she finished, Jiraiya scrubbed at his face again and finished his tea, then refilled it from the steaming pot and sipped a bit. "Well, that's fun," he said. "Nice to see the Oyabun making such positive outreach. Not thrilled about owing him a favor, though."
"Is it likely to be a problem, sir?"
Jiraiya shrugged. "Dun—" He had to cut himself off as a jaw-cracking yawn slipped out. "Dunno. Probably not; there's a limited degree to which the Mist Yakuza can threaten us—meaning either Leaf in general or the Gōketsu in specific—and they know it. Everyone is going to be happier if we all stay on good terms. Can't imagine that they won't try to take advantage somehow, though." He yawned again and gulped more of the tea, burning his mouth in the process. "Anyway, not your problem. You kids did fine."
"Thank you, sir."
He shot her a glower. "My, aren't we formal?" He rolled his eyes and finished his tea, then refilled it again. "Anyway, speaking of doing fine...you might be interested to know that your old headmaster had a bad day. Apparently he'd been using betel nut to help him get through the day. He took a little too much, had a bad reaction, and attacked one of the Academy instructors."
Keiko froze, her eyes locked on him and her face utterly motionless.
Jiraiya waved away her concerns. "Don't worry, no one was seriously hurt. The headmaster is a little concussed, a desk was trashed, and a couple dozen firsties were traumatized—including the youngest from three different major clans, so that's fun."
"I see," Keiko said calmly. "What might the consequences of this be?"
"Too soon to tell, but it's put the smoke in the hornets' cave, I'll tell you that." He chuckled. "You should have seen That Woman's face. Just for a moment I thought she'd swallowed one of Sunny's slugs." He yawned again and rubbed his eyes. "Anyway, I've got maybe an hour before I have to be at my next meeting and I'd like to slip in at least twenty more winks. Anything else?"
"No, sir."
"Right. I'll check back tonight. Keep up the good work." He glanced at the small toad perched on the table. "Thanks, Sid. Are you still the one on duty tonight?"
"Yep. I'm on until about midnight your time."
"Great. Okay, catch you later." With a casual wave he unsummoned himself back to the Human Path.
Keiko stared at his now-empty chair for several long seconds before sighing and pushing herself to her feet. It would be an interesting conversation with the rest of the team when she got back.
XP AWARD: 3
FP AWARD: 1
Vote time! What to do now?
Voting ends on Wednesday, April 4, 2018, at 12pm London time.
It was a complicated morning. On the positive side, there had been no overnight assassination attempts, the news from Jiraiya was something the team could celebrate quietly once the client was out of sight, and to top it all off, the old hag had low blood pressure and thus was at her least "feisty" in the early mornings. The latter was almost certainly a lie, given what she'd been like when they originally met at dawn, and was bound to come back to haunt them if somebody attacked in the morning, but for now Hazō would take whatever breaks from the client's libido he could get. On the negative side, she had not decided to go to bed early last night, but instead to celebrate their unprecedented success with alcohol and new and hitherto-unseen levels of lechery. Finding ways to politely avoid partaking in either had been nerve-wracking, and the lack of sleep was not doing anyone any favours now.
Fortunately, they were having a slow start today. The client was finishing the last of her painstakingly prepared herbal porridge, ensconced in the safety of her room. Keiko was sitting in a corner, evaluating Hazō's latest security proposal with the Frozen Skein. Noburi was deep in thought about something, or possibly dozing with his eyes open. Hazō himself was pondering the team's options in advance of the upcoming discussion on what to do next, and regretting that his ability to come up with instantaneous plans no matter what was going on around him only functioned in bursts.
In short, all of them were completely off guard.
"So," the client said as she set aside her empty bowl, "just how long have you strapping young lads, and the little girl there, been batting for the other team, hmm?"
Keiko's eyes snapped open. Noburi choked.
"What?!" Hazō exclaimed without thinking. "No, you have completely the wrong idea! I'm not—we're not—"
Wait. If he denied it now and insisted he was into women, there was no way she wouldn't turn that into some kind of come-on. On the other hand, what if rolling with it meant she'd stop harassing him?
"You've got me," he said, forcing himself to smile widely. "I'm as gay as a Noodle bard. Nothing but other men for me. I was hiding it before because… because… I only recently realised it and hadn't come out of the closet yet. I should have known you wouldn't be taken in."
It was his worst acting since he'd started training with Mari-sensei. But on the other hand, it was probably normal for somebody to be acting very awkward when admitting this kind of thing to a stranger, and the client ought to be as tired and off her game as the rest of them (though she certainly didn't look it).
Then Hazō caught the look of absolute shock on Keiko's face. Crap. Painful past experience had established that being abruptly jerked out of the Frozen Skein did not do her mental clarity any favours, and this particular topic would never be a laughing matter for Keiko to begin with.
But at this point, there was no choice for Hazō but to go all in.
"You feel the same way, don't you, Noburi?"
Noburi was giving him the weirdest stare. Double crap. He'd really thought Noburi was perceptive enough to pick up on his intentions, but apparently he was feeling even worse than Hazō himself. Noburi's mouth opened.
"You know, Noburi," Hazō said quickly, "weren't you telling me the other day that you'd finally given up on women, all women, and that you were going to find solace in the hairy arms of the manliest man you could find?"
Noburi's expression was balanced somewhere between disbelief and murderous intent. Then, mercifully, after a couple of seconds it clicked.
"That's right," he said, much more smoothly than Hazō. "I wasn't ready to make it public just yet, but I've been talking to Rock Lee, Maito Gai's apprentice, and it turns out we have a lot more in common than I thought."
Keiko gave an appalled squeak that sounded like she'd swallowed a weasel. Her stunned expression gained hints of both horror and regret.
The client's attention swivelled to her.
Still apparently unable to speak, Keiko just shook her head in a desperate and not-all-that-convincing motion.
Granny Karina gave a raspy chuckle.
"That's nice, children, but I was asking how long it's been since you started working for Hidden Leaf."
Hazō couldn't commit honourable suicide right here. The cost of getting the blood out of the floor would come out of Team Gōketsu's points.
"How long?" he squeezed out.
"When were you recruited?" the client asked in a voice of neutral curiosity. "Was it before or after you graduated from the Academy? What did they bribe you with? It's not every day I get to be escorted by a team that's changed villages."
"We—we weren't recruited at all," Hazō said dizzily. "Not from Mist."
"Oh?"
Hazō's brain started to pull itself together.
"There was a Mist jōnin who wanted to start his own hidden village. He chose some genin and chūnin to take with them on a large-scale mission, then murdered the real commander and told us that we were on a suicide mission and had to run or die."
Granny Karina raised an eyebrow. "I didn't know ninja were allowed to abandon suicide missions. Isn't the point of a suicide mission that letting a few ninja die in one place will save lots more ninja somewhere else? That's how they did it when I was a little girl."
Ouch. This woman was good.
"He said it wasn't a proper suicide mission," Noburi came to the rescue. "That they'd just picked the ninja they most wanted rid of and decided to throw them in the vague direction of the enemy to cut down numbers before the real attack. If that was true, it wouldn't be a strategic sacrifice—it would be like having us executed even though we didn't do anything wrong. And since a lot of us weren't much liked by the authorities, or by our clans, it sounded way too plausible."
"Hmm," Granny Karina said. "And this jōnin thought he could found his own village with just a handful of particularly unvalued genin and chūnin?"
"There were two other jōnin as well," Noburi said. "Strong ones."
"Aren't jōnin those big super-ninja who can break whole armies with their bare hands and blow up mountains with their mind?" Granny Karina asked. "They sound really valuable. And you say you thought Mist had sent three on a suicide mission?"
Hazō… didn't actually have an answer for that. Why had they believed that the Mizukage had sent Shikigami, Kanna and Mari-sensei on a suicide mission? Mari-sensei on her own would already be too valuable to sacrifice, and with the wrong specialization for frontline combat anyway. And if the Mizukage had doubts about their loyalty, then putting all three of them together on an out-of-village mission was the stupidest possible thing he could have done. Yagura had been ruthlessly pragmatic, but never stupid.
Hazō glanced at Keiko for help, but she was still out of action. He cringed at the thought of what must be going through her head right now.
"Well, it doesn't matter anyway," Noburi said after several seconds. "If he was lying, that would mean he was a traitor. If we'd called him out on being a traitor, he wouldn't have let us go back to Mist—he'd have killed us."
"Couldn't you have run away?" Granny Karina asked. "With as big a group as yours and only three jōnin, he couldn't possibly have kept an eye on you every minute of the day."
"By the time we knew what was happening, we were in Fire being chased by Leaf patrols. And then we were in the middle of the Swamp of Death, full of extra-deadly chakra monsters, with the patrols still outside. There was no possible way genin like us would have survived the journey back."
"So this jōnin," Granny Karina said slowly, "took a bunch of genin like you into the Fire Country, and then into a terribly dangerous spot in the Fire Country where you had no chance of surviving on your own. And this was his idea for building a hidden village. Are you sure you're not spinning me a tall tale, boys?"
Noburi looked back to Hazō.
"It's not our fault he was insane," Hazō said. "We had no choice but to follow him anyway."
"All three of them must have been insane," Granny Karina corrected. "All three of these incredibly powerful and experienced ninja made the same enormous mistake at the same time, if you're to be believed.
"But let's set all that aside, hmm? If you claim you weren't already working for Leaf when you left, then how did they recruit you?"
It didn't feel like it was a good idea to openly admit that Jiraiya used missing-nin as deniable assets, and Mist missing-nin at that, especially not while he was in the middle of sensitive negotiations. What was the best thing to do here, given that he didn't want to lie to the client's face (since she was almost certainly some kind of social spec)?
"We found a good bargaining chip," Hazō said carefully, "and we were the ones to approach Leaf with an offer to exchange it for citizenship. There wasn't any kind of conspiracy."
Granny Karina raised an eyebrow. "What kind of bargaining chip?"
"I'm afraid I can't say."
"So you're saying you chose to join Mist's worst enemy entirely on your own initiative? Instead of, say, offering this mysterious bargaining chip to Mist in exchange for amnesty? Or at least choosing a village that wasn't out to kill everyone you knew back home?"
Hazō couldn't think of a reply. It was a uniquely horrible feeling.
"Well," Granny Karina said mildly. "I think I have the measure of you now, my strapping young lads. Unless you have anything to add, why don't we move on to deciding our plans for the next few days?"
Wasn't there anything Hazō could say? Some justification for joining Leaf that didn't involve explaining their relationship with Jiraiya or their ideological approval of the village (and the corresponding condemnation of Mist)?
He mentally sighed. Maybe they could come back to this conversation once he'd had a chance to think things through in a non-sleep-deprived kind of way.
"Are you going to be able to restock?" he asked instead.
Granny Karina chuckled. "I never expected I'd sell out so quickly. Something you and I have in common, hmm? But no, I won't be able to restock—wouldn't do to give some creative young ninja indirect access to an unlimited supply of goods and risk flooding the market, after all."
"I see," Hazō said. "And what would happen if we stepped down from the event with our current earnings?"
"You'd be confined to the barracks until the event was over. Can't have you going around assassinating my fellow traders, now can we?"
That was… less than optimal. Well, from a certain point of view it was optimal—it would mean securing their winnings and being safe from opportunistic assault by other teams. But in a way, it also felt like giving up. It wouldn't let him gather valuable information about other teams, or practice his skills in a challenging but fundamentally non-lethal environment, or devise and test new strategies… he'd put aside his preferences for the good of the team if he had to, but what if there was a better way?
"Granny Karina," he asked suddenly, "is there any rule saying we're only allowed to sell the supplies we've been provided with?"
"Now, now," the client waggled a crooked finger in mock admonition, "it would be terribly poor manners to ask questions about the rules when you've already been told everything a boy your age needs to know."
"Does that mean if we haven't been told a rule, then we don't have to assume it exists?"
The client smiled, but didn't say a word.
"In that case… what's to stop us taking the money we've earned and reinvesting it into more goods so we can keep making a profit?"
The client's smile widened, unfortunately revealing her terrifying teeth. "Well, you got there a lot quicker than I thought you would. What do you have in mind?"
Hazō thought about it. "Keiko can run the numbers and tell me if my idea is at all viable, but I was thinking we could start trading in…"
-o-
You have earned 1 XP and 1 FP.
-o-
What do you do?
Voting ends on Saturday 7th of April, 9 am New York time.
The client's smile widened, unfortunately revealing her terrifying teeth. "Well, you got there a lot quicker than I thought you would. What do you have in mind?"
Hazō thought about it. "Keiko can run the numbers and tell me if my idea is at all viable, but I was thinking we could start trading in—"
He stopped, then shook his head. "No, never mind. I don't think we should trade, actually. From our perspective, we've got six hundred points, which should put us well in the lead. If you get 'killed' then we lose all of those points and two hundred more. We probably aren't going to be able to make enough extra from here on out to be worth it, so it's better to focus on not losing points instead of on gaining more.
"That's from our perspective. From your perspective, you've made over half a million ryō. My assumption is that if your henge pops then you lose all that money?"
"What do you mean, my henge?" asked Granny Karina, smiling a knowing smile made horrible by rotted and snaggled teeth. "I'm simply a poor civilian, with none of those magic powers you ninja have."
"...Of course you are," Noburi said. "On that subject, civilian or not, you're a proctor in the Chūnin Exams. Here's a question in your role as proctor: Is our score for this event dependent on the number of ryō that you make, or the number of Mist ryō that you make?"
Granny Karina laughed. It was a laugh that had to have been learned from the PsyOps section of Mist's eternally creative Torture and Interrogation department. "My, aren't you the suspicious one, my fine and hunky young man?"
"Just being cautious, ma'am...er, Granny Karina."
She rolled her eyes—an especially cringe-inducing thing, since the eyes didn't move perfectly in sync. "I'm sure you recall hearing that the instructions would be given only once and that questions would not be answered except insofar as they related to the collateral damage rules."
The team digested that for a moment.
"I note that only half of your payment from the merchant was in Mist ryō," Keiko said. "We should see about getting the rest of it exchanged for you, simply as a convenience."
"Not an issue. Most merchants here in the resplendent city of Mist will be fine to accept non-Mist currency, and certainly they'll accept the gold. I'm not ready to cash out yet, so we can do a little more trading first."
Author's note: Time for social combat! Noburi has recognized the potential danger here: if only Mist ryō counts for your score then Granny Karina can screw you by changing her money into non-Mist currencies or buying products, which she's likely to do if she thinks you're traitors. Noburi is going to try to talk her out of that belief. I've rolled all the rolls but am not including them here; revealing the mechanical outcome would tell whether or not Granny had been convinced and I wouldn't want to prevent you from having the fun of figuring that out with in-character information.
The key fact is that Noburi is down 7 FP from assessments and social combat rolls.
"It really is resplendent, isn't it?" Noburi said quietly, his eyes drifting into memory as a small, sad smile crept onto his face. "Sage, I never thought I'd see it again. I hadn't realized how much I missed it."
"Shame you chose to leave and not come back, hm?"
Noburi snorted, coming back to the present. "Granny, choosing to leave was the farthest thing from what happened. Hazō already told you how we were betrayed by our jōnin commander and we managed to wangle acceptance in Leaf for a bargaining chip we found along the way." His eyes flicked to Keiko for a moment; Granny clearly caught the glance. "What he left out was that we didn't find the sc—the chip and then immediately rush off to Leaf. Jiraiya has been making a big fuss about this new Gōketsu clan of his and claiming that we're his kids, but before that we are...were Wakahisa, Mori, and Kurosawa. Our clans are pillars of Mist.
"You know that the Wakahisa clan has a lot of medics and that our bloodline lets us transfer chakra to our teammates, right?" He waited for the older woman to nod before continuing. "My clan has records going back decades that prove teams with a Wakahisa member have a much higher survival rate than equivalent teams without. That's the role of the Wakahisa: saving the lives of other Mist ninja. It's not sexy and it's not dramatic, but we make a difference.
"Then there's Hazō. Do you know the motto of the Kurosawa clan? 'By darkness unmoved.' Hazō explained it to me once—it means that they hold the line, standing between the people of Mist and any threat that comes along. He goes on and on about that motto until I want to smack him." He flashed a grin at his 'brother'. "He's a jerk, and he puts his foot in his mouth at least once a day—twice on Sundays and three times if we go into a library—but I've lost count of the number of times he's thrown himself in front of a kunai for me, and for Keiko, and even for random civilians. Ever since we were tricked into leaving home, one of his main goals has been to get back here to see his mother and make sure she was okay.
"And let's not forget Keiko." He glanced at his 'sister' again, more openly, and smiled. "The Mori are Mist's answer to the Nara—brilliant at logistics and at implementing the plans given to them by the Mizukage. Have you ever heard of a Mori who didn't live up to the ideals of the Mist? One who did anything but show loyalty and honor to the Kage?"
Granny paused, before grudgingly admitting, "No. They rarely shine, but they never fall either."
Noburi nodded. "You know what lead us to Leaf? The knowledge that we could do more for Mist there than we could here."
Granny snorted and sat back in her chair, folding her arms beneath saggy bosoms. "Oh, really? And the fact that you became the Hokage's children and received a life of comfort and power, accepted and revered by all, with one of the greatest ninja in the world as a teacher...that had nothing to do with it?"
Noburi waved that aside impatiently. "That's a fiction, and you know it. When the Gōketsu clan was formed, Jiraiya was essentially broke. After buying the clan compound we were so strapped for cash that the three of us were doing whatever missions we could get almost until the last minute before coming h—coming back to Mist, just so that we could keep the clan afloat. And it's no picnic otherwise, either. We're looked at with suspicion by everyone in Mist and half the people in Leaf. Jiraiya is busy being Hokage, so he's hardly ever around and, when he is, he's exhausted. Before he took the hat he taught Hazō the basics of a couple of jutsu and he arranged some teachers for us, but it's not like we actually get to study with him seriously.
"Going back a minute though: yes, part of the appeal of going to Leaf was that we had a better chance of surviving there than here, given Mizukage Yagura's famous attitude towards defectors. That said, we didn't need to go anywhere. We were fine on our own and we had a jōnin, Inoue Mari-sensei, to protect and teach us. I have some training as a medic-nin, so I could keep us healthy. We could have disappeared into the wilds and lived fairly safe and comfortable lives without anyone looking side-eyed at us for not being born there. It wouldn't have hurt Mist in any way if we had done that...but it wouldn't have helped either.
"Leaf is Mist's biggest enemy and we were pretty sure we could get in. We had our bargaining chip...." He paused, then shook his head in disgust. "Oh hells, forget the secrecy; I'm sure you can figure it out: We had the Pangolin Summoning contract. That was valuable in and of itself, but the Toads are allies of the Pangolins, so Jiraiya had a slight motivation not to kill us.
"More importantly, we could help Mist better by going to Leaf than by coming home." He raised a hand to cut her off. "Look, I don't expect you to believe this, but it's true. We were a bunch of junior genin. Even if we could have been accepted back into Mist without being killed on sight, our direct contribution to the power and safety of Mist was effectively nil if we came home, but in Leaf...in Leaf we could make a difference. We could advocate on Mist's behalf, show the Leaf ninja that those of the Mist are people just like them. We could try to influence attitudes, especially since we had the reputation as Jiraiya's new clan."
Noburi leaned forward, the words coming faster and more intensely as he locked eyes with Granny Karina. "We had conditions for joining. We wanted Jiraiya and the Third to promise that they wouldn't start a war against Mist and that, if it happened anyway, they would do their best to keep casualties down." He snorted, the sound full of bitter frustration. "They wouldn't promise that one, but they said they'd at least try. We did get them to agree to keep us in support roles so that we'd never have to fight anyone from Mist. We wouldn't let them study our bloodlines or demand our clan secrets—what we knew, anyway, which wasn't much."
He sat back with a sigh, the intensity seeming to go out of him. "Look," he said tiredly, "I'm sure you're utterly convinced that we're evil traitors and everything I've said is a lie and I'm being manipulative and whatever. And yes, I'm putting things in the most positive light because I want you to...maybe not like us, but at least not hate us. We all became ninja because we wanted to serve the Mist. We never intended to betray Mist, never intended to leave. We got caught up in someone else's drama and we've done our best since then. Yes, we've joined the Leaf, but we have never, ever, done anything to harm Mist. And we never will."
Granny Karina eyed him carefully. "Hm," she said at last. "Passionate and eloquent as well as hunky. Maybe later on you can show me just how silver that tongue of yours is, hey?"
Noburi cringed.
"Speaking of silver," Keiko said, mercifully laying down conversational fire so that Noburi could get to metaphorical cover, "did we decide on the plan? Hazō was advocating for ending the event early. Is that acceptable to you, Granny Karina?"
Hazō admired Keiko's iron control; she had barely gagged at all on the old hag's nom de guerre.
The old woman sat, silently considering. After a moment she looked away from Keiko, staring at her gnarled, spider-web-veined fingers and their blackened or yellowing nails and the swollen joints.
"Yes," she said at last, her voice more serious than it had been since meeting them. "Yes, I think I'm ready to cash out after all. We'll head to Mizukage Tower immediately after breakfast."
"With a stop at the money changers on the way, right?" Hazō asked. "I'm sure it would be better for you to have Mist ryō instead of all that foreign currency."
"No. We'll go straight to the Tower."
"But—"
The familiar grin spread back across her face. "Aww, that's so sweet! You just can't get enough of me, can you? I suppose we could make some time before we go...what do you say, want to escort me upstairs and make some time? Hmmm?"
Only the Iron Nerve kept Hazō's face in an expression of polite professionalism. "I'm afraid I must refuse. Not only would it be unethical and unprofessional but, as I said earlier, I'm really only interested in men. Big, hairy men."
"Now, now, don't knock it 'til you've tried it!" She cackled. "Let me tell you, my lovely young niblet, experience counts! One hour with me and you'll be ruined for all others— men and women!"
Hazō felt his gorge rising and swallowed it back. "Thank you for your offer, but I really must refuse."
The embodiment of evil and cruelty made a moue that was undoubtedly supposed to seem coquettish. "Fine, well, if you're not able to perform then I suppose I'll need to turn elsewhere for my satisfaction." Her gaze tracked to Noburi, whose eyes got very big. "How about you, Mr. Silver Tongue? I thought you said you were going to show me what you could do with it?"
"I never said that!" Noburi yelped. "I mean...um...like Hazō said, it wouldn't be professional. And I'm gay. Like suuuuper gay. All gay, all the way. Sorry."
Granny Karina sighed theatrically. "Very well. Let's get moving, then. That money's not going to turn itself in!" She stood up and counted some ryō out of her purse for the meal.
Team Uplift exchanged glances, the content of which could safely be rendered as You got any ideas? and Nope. Not even the hint of one. Eventually there was nothing for it but to bite the kunai and start the process of moving their personal nightmare through the city streets to Mizukage Tower.
o-o-o-o
It took quite some time for Granny Karina to pack up her trivial amount of possessions, probably because she seemed far more interested in cramming in every last possible moment of pedophilic sexual harrassment before the end of the event and the resulting loss of her favorite chew toys. Hazō and Noburi were forced to bear the brunt of it, since they were providing close-in protection while Keiko checked over the exit and the palanquin for traps.
The team was feeling thoroughly paranoid at this point and their precautions reflected this. Keiko quietly asked Noburi and Hazō for their storage scrolls full of camping gear, and for some chakra water; the boys handed them over without question, eager to be done with this whole thing. Keiko tucked the items into her pack and searched the hallway, stairs, and main room of the boarding house; Granny Karina would need to pass through them all on the way to the street and her palanquin. Then she searched the palanquin. Finally, she stepped back inside to summon Panashe and Pandā.
"Hi Keiko!" Pandā said, bouncing on his toes. "What can I do for you?"
"Ready for orders, Summoner," Panashe said calmly, pointedly ignoring the younger pangolin's excitement.
"Hello, both of you," Keiko said. "One moment, please." She took the flask of chakra water from her backpack and downed it. The taste of it banished the vague touch of lightheadedness that came with spending so much chakra so quickly when she summoned Panashe, and left her feeling energized, her coils straining at the overcharge of chakra.
"Summoning Technique: Pankurashun!" she cried. There was a puff of green smoke and the massive Lochagos of her tessera stood before her.
The senior pangolin's weak eyes flicked around the room and his nose twitched briefly as he verified the security of the location. Only then did he turn to Keiko. "Greetings, Summoner. Ready for orders."
"Thank you, Lochagos," Keiko said, nodding respectfully. "We are about to finish this event. We need only transport our client from here to Mizukage Tower without incident, at which time we will be secure from attack and will receive a significant number of points towards our promotion. We have been targeted by at least one other team in the past and this would be a very reasonable time for them to strike again. I would like the three of you to escort us in hopes that your presence will discourage attacks."
"Oh boy, oh—" Pandā's words were cut off when a massive hand grabbed his snout.
"Of course, Summoner," Pankurashun said calmly, seeming not to notice that he had one heavily-clawed hand wrapped around his subordinate's face. "What are the rules of engagement?"
Keiko paused, wondering if she should comment on Pandā's predicament. Finally she decided that discretion was the better part of valor. "Very strict, I'm afraid. The only people that we are allowed to fight are other contestants. Contestants are required to wear these horrific things." She tapped the bandana around her neck. "It is absolutely critical that you not injure anyone who is not a contestant, and that you not cause any property damage whatsoever. 'Injury' and 'damage' include things as mild as a minor bruise or a few scratches. As such, it will be better if you do not engage at all. Simply provide a visible deterrant, warn us of potential threats, and physically shield the client if that becomes relevant—which it shouldn't. Do not physically engage, at all."
"But—" Pandā said, his voice clear now that Pankurashun had released his snout. The Lochagos turned and looked at the younger pangolin, who promptly shut up and dropped his head, claws tapping furiously on his underbelly.
"Understood, Summoner," Pankurashun rumbled. "We will escort you. We will maintain an appearance of professionalism befitting the warriors of the Polemarch. We will not make any overt threat displays. We will not physically engage with assailants. We will not make physical contact with any human and will avoid contact with objects and buildings so far as possible."
"Exactly," Keiko said. What a pleasure it was to have competent subordinates who could translate high-level orders into implementation without the need for hand-holding! "Now, if you'll help me, I'd like to set something up."
o-o-o-o
When the boys came downstairs with Granny Karina, they were surprised to find that the few people who had been having breakfast in the common room had all been relocated to tables against one wall. Pankurashun and Pandā sat by the door while Panashe kept watch over the humans. She was doing a fine job of looming menacingly despite being well shorter than a normal human—something about the massive claws seemed to keep people docile.
The palanquin was immediately outside the common room and connected to the door of the boarding house made by a short tunnel composed of rainflies and tent components. Pandā and Pankurashun were standing guard over the palanquin itself while Keiko waited impatiently inside.
"My, my, quite the busy little bee you've been, haven't you?" Granny Karina asked. "All this for me?"
"It would be aggravating to lose you at this point," Keiko said calmly. "Until now the chakra expenditure for summoning my pangolins was not worth the advantage. Now it is."
"Well, I must say, I'm flattered." The old woman eyed Panashe up and down, leaning in disturbingly close to study her scales and general structure.
"I would appreciate it if you would step back," Panashe said. "I find your proximity distracting."
"Now, now, is that any way to speak to your summoner's overlord?" the old woman cackled.
Panashe studied her, then looked to Keiko. "I was unaware that 'overlord' was a title among humans."
"She is our client," Keiko said, dodging the conversational landmine. "She is the one we're here to protect. She is not directly in the chain of command but she still deserves respect and protection."
"I see," Panashe said again, studying the client, who had yet to move back and had her beaky nose almost in contact with Panashe's snout. "Will she be your client tomorrow?"
"She will not," Keiko said with a tiny smile.
"Interesting."
Granny Karina stepped back with studied casualness.
"Everything okay?" Noburi asked, looking at Keiko.
"I feel like I did when we crossed that first island chain," Keiko said. "Recent attack, not that recent. Time for the other sandal to drop."
Noburi nodded, remembering the run into Hot Springs. All of them had been badly on edge after the megalodon attack. "Got it. You ready to roll or is there more to do?"
"Cash out and final checks. I told the owner that he could keep the tents and such, so we don't have to waste time taking them down." She turned to the client. "Granny Karina, I am going to do a final check of the palanquin, at which point we will ask you to get in. The team and the pangolins will surround you on our way to Mizukage Tower; as before, we ask that you stay in the palanquin with the windows closed, no matter what happens. You are safest in cover and looking outside would only open you to attack."
The old woman laughed and nodded, but said nothing.
"Could you please settle the bill while we get ready?" Hazō asked, nervous at the looming sense that perhaps the impossible woman was going to take one last chance to mess with them, even if it got her 'killed' at the very last second.
The boys waited semi-patiently while Granny counted out ryō for the boarding house owner, who already had the bill in hand and was clearly eager to see the back of his most disturbing guest, her bodyguard, and their inhuman companions. Meanwhile, Keiko went outside to check the palanquin over one last time.
Hazō stopped Granny where the open door of the boarding house met the four-foot-long canvas tunnel that Keiko and the pangolins had set up in order to prevent a potential watcher from seeing Granny come outside. He hissed softly to catch Keiko's attention, then waited for her nod before letting the client take the three steps through the tunnel and into the palanquin.
Most teams would have bumped fists, or even stacked hands, at a moment such as this; Team Uplift nodded grimly to one another and flipped the canvas aside, flowing into their assigned positions around the palanquin bearers. The men had been crouched beside their poles for forty minutes, waiting with the stoic patience of people whose job is to wait...and then hurry...and then wait. They had had no warning that the team was present, and they jumped to their feet in surprise when the ninja appeared. The surprise turned to fear when the three pangolins came out of the tunnel and assumed a loose perimeter outside the ninja perimeter.
"Sir," the left-front bearer (apparently the position of leadership, as he was the one who always spoke for the crew), "what...um...I mean...."
"They're friends," Hazō said. "We're headed to Mizukage tower. Today's going to be the last day of the hire, but we'll pay for the full day if you can maintain a trot the whole way."
"Right!" The bearers hoisted the palanquin to their shoulders with a grunt and set off at the quickest trot that could be maintained across distance, following Hazō's directions as they went. Pankurashun led the way, massive claws stretched out in front of him for balance as his battle-trained snout cast around before them for the slightest sniff of threat. Panashe was at the left rear; based on the way every civilian in the area shrank back, her assassin's grace and silent steps rendered her no less intimidating than her physically larger commander. Pandā was at right rear; a knowledgeable ninja with time to observe might have seen him to be the smallest and least trained of the three pangolins, but that knowledgeable ninja would still have given respect to the senses of the pangolin, as well as the size and sharpness of their claws.
Within the pangolin perimeter moved a ring of Gōketsu killers. They were making no effort at seeming non-threatening today; Keiko held kunai in each hand, Hazō wore his clawed gauntlets, and Noburi's Water Whip dangled from his grip. Battle-readiness sang from all three of them, and no one on the street was willing to make eye contact. That was fine; the ninja were less interested in eye contact and more interested in keeping their eyes moving, constantly probing for the threat that they could feel looming.
The trip was utterly uneventful.
o-o-o-o
"Gah. I cannot believe her," Noburi growled, dropping onto his bunk. "What a raging bitch."
"She did give us fifteen points on the review," Hazō pointed out. "She obviously thought we did a good job."
"Yeah, but we only got points for the Mist ryō! Would it have killed her to stop at a money changer on the way?"
"We should be glad she didn't," Keiko said. "She could just as easily have traded Mist currency for Leaf's in order to deny us points. Leaf currency has almost as much purchasing power here as Mist's own, so it wouldn't have been to her detriment to do so."
"Probably why she gave us a fifteen point review," Noburi grumbled. "Salving her conscience for screwing us out of half our points. Hey, Keiko, I don't suppose that Panashe could maybe go eat her a little bit?"
"Pangolins lack teeth," Keiko replied. "They are not capable of eating human flesh."
"So not the point," Noburi mumbled.
XP AWARD: 1
FP AWARD: 0 (Noburi may have received one, if he won his contest)
Points awarded for this event: 315
Vote time! What to do now?
Voting ends on Wednesday, April 11, 2018, at 12pm London time.
Author's Notes: The FP 0 should not be taken as a criticism. The QMs are still feeling our way on the FP-award policy, and are growing a bit concerned about the rate at which they are piling up as opposed to the rate at which there are opportunities for them to be used. This update feels too short to warrant something as relatively significant as an FP, especially given how many you have already stockpiled.
In other news, you apologized to Keiko for claiming to be homosexual. She was shocked and slightly appalled at the time but, once she had time to think about it, she wasn't too bothered. She appreciated the gesture, nonetheless. +1 Friendship Point!
Note that you got 315 points for this update, which is 300 from the Yakuza-threatened merchant buying Granny's stuff, plus 15 from her review of you. She did some trading before the Yakuza buy, but that was just enough to cover room and board for the four of you.
It was lunchtime in the barracks. Mist had kindly provided the food, which was exactly what Hazō had expected—filling and nutritious, but requiring a true shinobi's strength of jaw to chew through, especially the meat. Not that, after seeing how civilians lived in their villages, Hazō would ever turn his nose up at free meat.
Despite the aching jaws, the mess hall was abuzz with conversation, teams either trying to subtly extract information from each other or form new alliances ahead of the next event. In one corner, a trio of heavily-muscled men with enormous bladed weapons were trying to convert a fearful young woman to… something or other, and it made Hazō doubly grateful that Leaf had no popular religion beyond the Will of Fire.
Suddenly, this relative idyll came to a crashing halt.
"There you are, my strapping young lads!"
It couldn't be. It couldn't possibly be. The event was over as far as they were concerned.
But no. Granny Karina shambled over to their corner table, grinning widely and displaying the toothy grin of a mouth that, never mind chewing rations, could probably bite the table clean in half.
"You don't write, you don't send summon messengers… here I was beginning to think you'd already forgotten the nights of passion the three of us shared together."
All conversation stopped. A dozen appalled looks focused on Hazō and Noburi.
"You know," Hazō said coldly, "now that we're no longer part of the event, we have no reason to keep playing along."
Granny Karina chuckled. "Oh, you're not bitter about the scoring, are you, boy? You do realise that if I wanted to, I could have changed the money and left you with an even score of minus twenty, hmm? It was what any good proctor would have done, and you should thank your lucky stars that your friend here made me have second thoughts.
"Oh, how I enjoyed that silver tongue," she added more loudly for the benefit of the audience.
Was Keiko really not back from the bathroom yet? Hazō had an awful feeling about where this was going, and he did not want to go there without her.
"So is there something you wanted, or…"
"Let's go to your room," Granny Karina said at the same volume. "There's something I'd like to show you."
The worst part, Hazō reflected, was that the consequences of refusing would almost certainly be even worse.
-o-
"Well?" Noburi asked. "What do you want from us?"
"Oh, nothing," the hag grinned. "It's just that you've been such good sports that I felt like giving you a little reward."
There was a pop and a dramatic puff of smoke, as of a magical creature being released from confinement and readying itself to grant any conceivable wish.
"G-G-Gisuji Kanako?!"
The young woman gave the two of them an alluring smile.
Hazō wouldn't have thought it possible, but the last two years had made their senior even more irresistible than she'd been before. The most popular girl at the Academy had always had a certain slender, willowy elegance, but now it had been literally rounded out with eye-catching curves, and the way she stood even when relaxed made it clear that her ambitions of an infiltration/seduction career had not been idle talk. Hazō could feel a stirring deep down. Based on the dazed look on Noburi's face, he wasn't immune either.
"You know, I was ever so impressed with your resolve," she said in a voice like warm honey. "I know I never made it easy for you, but you handled yourselves like real men."
She stalked closer to them, so close that they could almost lean in and kiss her. Hazō could smell her scent, a heady mix of unfamiliar spices.
"Such a shame," Gisuji purred. "I'd never expected you to develop quite so much during your time away," she went on, slowly stroking the tips of her fingers down their pectoral muscles, one hand on each boy's chest. "If only you'd given in just once, what unforgettable nights we could have had…"
Then she lightly pushed them with a flick of those same fingertips, forcing them to take a step back to regain their balance.
"Such a shame," she repeated.
She swivelled on her heels and slowly walked away, leaving Hazō and Noburi to watch the hypnotic swaying of her hips.
"I'll be seeing you around, boys…"
The sound of the door closing behind her was also the sound of two hearts breaking.
-o-
The rest of the afternoon was uneventful. The boys were too dispirited to get much done. Keiko could roll her eyes at them all she liked, but it wasn't like she was volunteering to do the team's socialising for them either. A couple of proctors had been marked as having vague curiosity about the supposed traitors, though they weren't in a hurry to impart any useful information. On the other hand, the other teams were now half-convinced that they were a pair of particularly sick gerontophiles (of course "Granny Karina" would put on her disguise, complete with a satisfied smile, once outside the room), and took the client being "alive and well" and apparently pleased with them as evidence that the team had cashed out early after a successful performance. Hazō should have been feeling bitter about that, but now every time he started dwelling on the iniquity of Granny Karina, his mind substituted in Gisuji Kanako and he found himself unable to concentrate on much of anything.
"Should have figured you'd already be here, Hazō."
The familiar voice took Hazō completely by surprise.
"Shin?"
His former classmate was just how he remembered him, from the unstyled but naturally neat black hair (which Hazō had always envied), to his perpetual relaxed smile, to the custom-fitted clan combat uniform that constantly reminded Hazō of the once-unbridgeable gap between them.
"I admit, I came down here half prepared to spit in your face for being a traitor who's brought shame to our clan. But after hearing what you did to Old Lizardbreath? I'm this close to shaking your hand instead."
"Old Lizardbreath?" Hazō asked with an innocent curiosity. "What about Old Lizardbreath?"
"Classic Hazō. So full of bright ideas he forgets that other people are allowed to be smart as well." Shin laughed, but without malice. "As soon as I heard the announcement this afternoon, I knew it had to be you. Who else benefits from the Mizukage making an official statement on the legality of drugs? Who else would pick Old Lizardbreath as a target? Who else would think this crazy stunt was a good idea and get away with it?"
"What makes you think that the legal status of narcotic substances has any bearing whatsoever on our exam performance?" Keiko asked.
"We all know what the high-ups think of your team, Gōketsu. There was no way they'd give you something as easy as common apothecary goods and call it a day.
"Still, though," Shin went on, "beautiful work. My insider friends say Old Lizardbreath hasn't been seen since he was taken into custody yesterday, still off his head on whatever it is you slipped him, and they're expecting Mori Junko to be sitting in his office within the fortnight."
"Aunt Junko? Why would the Mizukage…?"
"You really don't know? Mori, your clan were the ones to propose Lady Ren's candidacy. It's not quite public knowledge, but I really thought the Hokage's adopted children would be more on the ball."
"Sorry," Hazō said. "We're not really involved in the politics side of things. We're just trying to keep our heads down and get through the exams in one piece."
"By successfully violating all known military doctrine, and then drugging a major authority figure? Which isn't public knowledge yet, by the way. Obviously, everyone put the pieces together after the Mizukage made the proclamation earlier today, but according to the proctors, you were already in the barracks at that time, and we're the first team to arrive here since it was made. Funny how the idea of Old Lizardbreath going on a drug-fuelled rampage didn't come as any surprise to you."
Hazō was all ready to make the obvious comeback, that they had their own source of insider knowledge in the form of Jiraiya, but spotted the trap just in time. Admitting they'd been talking to the head of their clan during the event could still get them disqualified for real. Had Shin done that deliberately?
"We all knew he was a drunkard," Noburi said lightly. "Why should it surprise us that he decided to take the next step up? Not that I'm not flattered that you'd make us out to be some kind of heroes of justice, Kurosawa, but we're not taking the credit for this one."
"Don't worry," Shin said. "I'm not trying to get you in trouble just yet. I actually came by because I had an invitation for you. My teammates each have private business with you two, and I wouldn't mind a chance to catch up with Hazō one-on-one either. On my honour as a Kurosawa that it's not a trap, a distraction or some other way to manipulate you into a position of weakness."
He gave Hazō Look Thirty-One: Do Not Mistake My Playfulness for Insincerity.
Hazō glanced at his teammates behind him, realising with an inward wince that Shin had just put them in a position where refusing would make them sound like they were afraid of mere social interaction.
"On your word that this is just a conversation with no ulterior motives," Hazō repeated.
"Honour of the Kurosawa," Shin said. "If those words mean anything to you."
-o-
She hadn't changed at all. Still taller than him, still a striking blonde, still with that "I own this world and you're only here because I feel like it" smirk. Still drop-dead gorgeous. The old Noburi would have fallen at her feet.
Today's Noburi, though? He had this new-fangled thing called self-esteem. (Also the memory of Gisuji Kanako fresh in his mind.)
"What do you want, Kiri?" he asked with a deliberate casualness.
"Oh, just to see how you've been, Noburi. I was wondering how that snot-nosed brat who used to follow me around like a lovesick puppy ended up being the Hokage's son. I can't imagine how you managed to extract your tongue from that much ass when it was time to come back here."
"Very funny," Noburi said, suppressing the flinch—not at the content of her words, but at the tone. He didn't care about her approval anymore. He didn't. It was long past time his brain got the message. "If you just called me here to insult me, then I have better things to do. I hear there's some paint drying near the entrance."
"Still covering up your insecurities with lame jokes, then? Sorry, Noburi. Didn't mean to hit a nerve. Obviously you didn't have the initiative to go after the Hokage's ass. One of the other traitors probably took charge, and you followed their lead because what else were you going to do? Make your own decisions?
"That's why I wasn't interested in you, you know. You've got no ambition in you. You get yourself a girlfriend yet? Or did you once again fall for a girl only to find out she was aiming higher? Bet your leader hasn't had any problems scoring himself some tail. Girls everywhere swoon over the strong, decisive types—even if they're amoral filth. Hey, maybe you should sell out a little further. There must be some girl out there who'll go for you just because you're the Hokage's son."
Noburi knew what she was doing. It wasn't subtle—nothing about Kiri ever was. He knew, he had known from the beginning, and he hated himself because it still worked. He wanted to tell her to shut up, to fire some clever insult back, but the fact was that back in the day he'd been too busy crushing to ever find any of her own weaknesses.
"I don't even hate you, Noburi. The more I look at you, the more I realise that I just feel sorry for you. Some of us are bigger than the barrel. But it looks like you still only exist to serve drinks."
It was something about her tone of voice. The sheer smugness of it. For a second, Yamanaka Neira's eminently punchable face flickered across Noburi's mind. There had been an expert at taking Noburi's still-healing wounds and tearing them open with her long painted fingernails. A woman who'd destroyed his relationship with Keiko without batting an eyelid, leaving an abyss of uncertainty and pain between them that he still hadn't even begun to fill. A professional torturer where Kiri was… just a schoolyard bully.
"Nice try, Kiri," he said. "You almost had me for a second there. Tell me, have you ever faced a chakra megalodon? Huge beast, aquatic, teeth more than half your height in length. Or a horde of ninja mounted on trained chakra monsters? An angry jōnin in close quarters, twice? A psycho bio-sealer who could raise the dead? No? That's all right. Maybe you managed to keep outwitting the world's greatest hunter-nin until he died of ninja natural causes. No, wait, I've got it. Maybe you beat your village's greatest chūnin candidate in a single duel with zero chakra on unfamiliar terrain. You've had two years, same as me, and with a village at your back."
"Fucking bullshit," Kiri growled. "Just an empty barrel making the loudest noise."
"Newsflash, Kiri," Noburi gave her a smile as sharp as a cutting blade, "I don't care what you think. I'm not the team planner and I don't have to be. Am I jealous of Hazō getting all the glory and hogging all the girls? Sure, why not. Do I wish I had Keiko's brain the size of a planet or her deadpan wit? Well, frankly, who wouldn't? Do I feel like I don't get enough recognition for the things I do? Yeah, more than a little. So what?
"At the end of the day, I'm the reason our team works, as much as anyone else. I'm the reason we can all reach our full potential, and the one who keeps the home fires burning while the others are busy wrestling with their issues. I own the support role, and if you think being a Wakahisa is about the barrel, then maybe I'm not the one letting down the clan."
Kiri stared silently, that ever-present smirk for once replaced with an expression of uncertainty.
Noburi turned to leave.
"Hey, Noburi."
He looked back.
"You doing anything in the post-tournament break? Because if you're free, I wouldn't mind hearing some of those stories."
"Sure," he said. "Look me up whenever you decide you're done being such a bitch."
As he left, he could hear Kiri's laughter even through the walls.
-o-
Kei didn't recognise the girl at first. She had been facing away from the door, sorting storage scrolls, and her lustrous red hair had surpassed its former neat bob in favour of an elegant ponytail. By the time she turned around, Kei had already closed the door behind her.
Otherwise she would likely have fled, and appearances be damned.
"Anna?!"
"Keiko?!"
The other girl seemed as stricken as Kei herself. "That bastard," she muttered under her breath.
Assessing the situation immediately, if with no clue as to Kurosawa Shin's motives, Kei turned around and made to leave.
"Wait!"
Kei froze.
"Wait," Anna repeated.
Keep it together, Kei. Keep it together. This was no longer the Academy, she reminded herself. She was a competent, mature shinobi, nearly a chūnin. There was nothing Anna or her clique could do to her, and even if they attacked, this time she had her own team standing ready to defend her.
Still, Kei's heart beat very fast.
"What do you want?" she demanded.
Anna didn't say anything. Her gaze suggested fascination with Kei's sandals. Was Kei to find pins in them tomorrow morning?
The silence stretched on. Finally, Kei reached for the doorknob once more.
"Please."
There was a desperation in Anna's voice that made no sense. Anna was the powerful one, the one in control. Kei was the victim. Always and forever. There were no grounds for role reversal.
"What do you want from me?" Kei asked insistently, wanting nothing more than to leave before the situation could develop into anything.
"I don't know," Anna said quietly. "But please. Don't go just yet."
She sat down on the bed, hands running through her hair. There was something pitiful about it, an adjective that did not belong to her sneering tormentor.
Kei did not know what she was seeing. Doubtless Mari-sensei would have been able to read this situation in an instant, would have been able to understand why Anna seemed to be displaying neither of her usual hatred or cruelty, but fear of all things.
Something was expected of her, that much was clear. It was also clear that Anna did not know what it was any more than Kei.
Kei could leave. She should leave. She owed Anna nothing—unless it was vengeance. She was under no obligation to be here, and indeed merely being in the same room as one of the ringleaders was making her tremble inside. But it was at times like these that Kei hated herself—more than usual, at least—for being unable to walk away and leave a mystery forever unsolved. She found a place on the bed opposite Anna's and let herself seek clues in the girl's pose of inexplicable distress.
Time passed.
"You hurt me first." It was barely more than a whisper.
"What?" Kei leaned forward, thinking she had misheard.
"You hurt me first. It was only fair."
Kei reeled. "Hurt you first?" she hissed. "I did no such thing. I made no provocation, gave you no reason to torment me for your vile amusement! If that is all you have to say—"
"You wouldn't kiss me."
For a second, Kei's mind filled with panicked static.
"Kiss you? Whyever would I kiss you?"
This time, it was Anna's turn to reel. "You forgot?!"
"I forgot what?"
"You don't remember," Anna said softly. "Moemi's birthday party. The dare. The closet."
The memory was distant, covered by the haze of time. Long enough ago to have happened to another girl.
"Oh," Kei said. "That. But what does that have to do with anything?"
"You pushed me away. I thought we were friends, but then you pushed me away. You screamed at me, as if I was something disgusting, and then you ran out."
In retrospect, that had been an overreaction.
"And then," Anna said in an increasingly shrill voice, "the next time I saw you, you didn't say a word about it. As if that was all I was to you. As if it was natural to treat me that way. As if you barely tolerated me at the best of times, and now that tolerance had run out and you could let your contempt for me show."
"I don't understand," Kei said. "That isn't what happened. I did not apologise because… well, because I did not have the words. You knew I struggled with self-expression. And then you also said nothing, and I assumed that you had found the experience too humiliating to remember, and wished it buried forevermore."
"But why? Why would you treat me that way if we were friends?"
Kei weighed her words carefully. They no longer shared the relationship of a bully and her victim. Indeed, after the Chūnin Exam was over, they would likely never see each other again. And her personal weakness did not truly hinder her in combat, where physical contact was already inherently antagonistic and could freely be treated as such. Even so, she hesitated.
But if she held back, if it was so easy to resolve a major misunderstanding and she refused to do so, what kind of person would that make her? Even if it was to hurt Anna, it felt somehow wrong.
"I did not realise at the time quite how uncomfortable it made me to be touched by others," she said cautiously. "The claustrophobia of the closet and the intense proximity involved were aggravating factors. I would have reacted the same way with absolutely anyone."
At this, the room was silent as the grave. Rather than displaying relief, Anna's eyes filled with a horror Kei had only previously seen in the eyes of sealmasters.
"You mean…" she said as if every word was being ripped from her, "I betrayed you first?"
Kei simply nodded.
Anna burst into tears.
Kei looked at her helplessly, having no idea what to do, nor any clue as to what was happening inside Anna's head. Perhaps this was the point at which she should bow out, and allow the girl to face her inner demons on her own. If nothing else, the situation was awkward beyond words.
"Wait," a hoarse voice reached her through the sobs. "You have… the right… to see this."
Kei waited. The tears did not slow.
-o-
"You'd really bet your mother's life on Leaf's kindness?" Shin asked.
"They're not monsters," Hazō repeated. "Sure, there's a lot of hatred on both sides. But it's not like we, as in Mist, want to raze Leaf to the ground and slaughter them down to the youngest child either."
"Well, no," Shin conceded. "But that's because we're sane. Three times now Leaf has declared war on us. Our ancestors left in order to escape the Fire Country ninja's persecution. They've broken the ultimate taboo and accepted missing-nin in order to have another weapon to use against us. The evidence adds up."
Hazō shook his head.
"According to Leaf, three times now Mist has declared war on them. Our ancestors left because they refused to accept the Fire Country ninja's desire for peace and mutual understanding. They've broken the ultimate taboo and accepted missing-nin because we're proof that even bitter enemies can find it in themselves to embrace the Will of Fire.
"Shin, I've had a unique opportunity to see the conflict from both sides, and the evidence doesn't add up. I've made friends in Leaf. Sure, there are still people there who would try to kill me if they thought they could get away with it, but there are also people who would fight to defend me if they did. The same people who trusted my team enough to sleep while we kept watch. Jiraiya of the Three has adopted me as his potential heir when a couple of years ago I was cheering at the Mizukage's speeches alongside everyone else. If there is hatred and suspicion there, it can be overcome."
"So what are you saying? That every single authority figure in Mist's history is wrong and you are right? Doesn't it seem more likely that you have been taken in by their lies, and that they welcome you because you're a successful test case for Leaf taking in foreign missing-nin? Imagine what a massive military advantage Leaf would get if they could make this sacrilege into a policy without provoking retaliation from the other villages."
"I can only use my own judgement, Shin. It's all any of us can ever do. And my judgement says that Leaf are not genocidal maniacs. Some of them want to conquer Mist so Mist doesn't conquer them first. Some of them want to conquer Mist because they want to spread their way of life, which they honestly believe will make us happier. Sure, some just want to pillage Mist to get themselves money and power, but I could find people who want to do the same to Leaf within a hundred metres of this building.
"Most importantly, some of them don't want to conquer Mist at all. The Hokage wants to do what's best for Leaf, and he will always put that first, but the best thing Leaf can ever have is a world without war. That's the opportunity we're looking at here, the new status quo we're working to create. If these two passionate enemies can forge a firm alliance, it will open a door for us to understand each other. We'll be able to see how alike we all really are, and then we can stop fighting over the different symbols on the hats."
Shin tweaked the bridge of his nose as if trying to forestall a headache.
"They got you good, didn't they, Hazō? We were warned that Leaf's propaganda machine is the best there is."
Hazō's heart sank. "You mean you don't believe me?"
"I'm not stupid, Hazō. I know reality is more complicated than it looks. I think Lady Ren is the epitome of what a Kurosawa shinobi should be, but having seen her up close, I know that putting on the Mizukage's mantle hasn't magically made her omniscient or omnipotent. And if she's fallible, then maybe past Mizukage were fallible as well. Maybe My Vision isn't gospel truth, and maybe the Fourth's system of denunciations and secret police didn't create the utopian society he promised.
"But I have to judge the world with my own eyes too. You're asking me to take a leap of faith based on the words of a boy who kept getting punished at the Academy for failing to understand how people worked, who let an unfamiliar authority figure trick him into betraying the village, and whose claim to objectivity disappeared right around the time he got adopted by Leaf's ruling clan."
Shin's expression grew serious. "Unlike you, I don't claim to have already found my answers—but I'm willing to meet you halfway. My team is still going to take your team down with everything we've got, and climb your unconscious bodies to Chūnin Exam success. But it won't be because we're sworn enemies trying to punish traitors at the behest of the Powers That Be. It'll be because I believe your worldview is simplistic and naïve, and your defeat at our hands will show you that you are not yet strong enough or smart enough or wise enough to try to force it on anyone else. If you want to prove me wrong, do it with actions, not with words."
Hazō smiled. "Noburi and Keiko aren't here, and I don't think it's a coincidence that you lured both of our teams away before asking me how I really felt. Even so, I think I speak for all of us when I say… Team Uplift accepts your challenge."
A playful spark danced behind Shin's eyes.
"Team Uplift, you say? Then I guess that makes us Team Downfall. Our enemies' generally and yours specifically."
He met Hazō's gaze.
"Let's do this fair and square."
Both boys laughed at the joke.
As Shin walked away, Hazō could hear him muttering to himself. "You know, we should keep that name. It sounds way more badass than 'Team Retsu'."
-o-
You have earned 2 XP and 0 FP (as this update is only half a day long and we still need to figure out FP rebalancing).
-o-
It is now the late afternoon. You have not yet done your sealcrafting or your sleight of hand training, leaving those for the evening once socialisation becomes impractical. I suggest you come up with a reason why Hazō wants to practice sleight of hand.
You have made note of a couple of proctors to imitate, though your attempts to observe the older ones have only served to confirm the belief in your gerontophilia for anyone that noticed. The security measures around the barracks appear to consist of a handful of patrolling proctors. If there are traps or seals, they are either on the outside of the building or very well-concealed. A few rooms appear to be locked, while those you're staying in have no such security features.
There aren't many teams to talk to yet, and the ones present are still suspicious of you for aforementioned reasons. Hazō is hoping this will be less of an issue for new arrivals (who might just assume this to be an ordinary discrediting ploy). The only thing you've managed to learn, thanks to some fine work by Noburi, is that jinchūriki are not an interesting topic of discussion. None of the teams seem like they'd admit it if their jinchūriki had recently gone missing, and they're not reporting any disappearances of anyone else's.
-o-
What do you do?
Voting closes on Saturday 14th of April, 9 am New York Time.
"Well, that was interesting," Hazō said, walking in with a puzzled expression on his face that clearly presaged a desire to share. Which, of course, would be followed by a request that Kei share in turn.
"Oh?" she asked calmly, meanwhile turning her eyes back to the kunai she was busily sharpening. The repeated, rhythmic glide of the blade across the whetstone was calming. It was the whetstone that Hazō had given her for her birthday, the one that showed them all seated around the game table together, alongside the other Leaf genin teams.
This way, every time you use it, you'll remember how awesome you are, and how handily you thrashed some of the world's greatest ninja gamers. And as you keep using it, you'll start making room for new memories, and they'll be awesome as well.
Hazō's remembered words rang hollow in her ear. For years now, she had been destroying relationships without even realizing she'd done it. How different would her world have been had she been more in control of herself? If she hadn't panicked over something that normal people didn't even imagine could be an issue, leading her to push Anna away? If she had been considerate enough to actually notice the impact her lack of control had had on the other girl?
"Yeah," Hazō said. "Shin wanted to...honestly, I'm not sure what he wanted. We talked about how we ended up in Leaf, and how Leaf differs from the propaganda, and then he called us out. He said that his team would 'take us down' and 'climb our unconscious bodies to Chūnin Exam success'. Not because we're traitors, though—he was actually pretty good about the whole thing. He's prepared to...maybe not exactly 'work with us', but at least interact in a non-hostile way."
"What did you tell him?" Noburi asked from his seat on the bunk opposite Kei's.
"About what?"
"About how we went to Leaf, and what it's like there."
Hazō thought about that for a moment, then pulled out a pair of Air Dome seals and started setting them up on the floor. With a sigh, Kei slid down and joined her clansibs.
"I told him that we'd seen both sides of the conflict," Hazō said, once the Dome was up. He took care to cover his mouth against notional and wildly unlikely lipreaders. "We'd seen both sides, and that there was the possibility for peace. That the evidence doesn't add up for Mist's propaganda—that not everyone in Leaf hated Mist or wanted to murder them, that determining the aggressor in the last three wars wasn't easy, and so on."
"Bet that went over real well," Noburi said with a laugh, likewise covering his mouth.
"Yeah," Hazō said. "I told him that Team Uplift accepted his challenge, and he said that he guessed that made them Team Downfall—ours in particular."
Noburi snorted. Kei held herself merely to a small smile.
"I wish them all the luck," Noburi said. "They're gonna need it."
Hazō laughed. "Hey, what ended up happening with you?"
"I had a great talk with cousin Kiri," Noburi said casually. "She was trying to mess with my head before the next event, but it kinda backfired on her. I shut her down hard and started to leave, so she switched over to 'hey, want to go out some time'? I told her to call me when she was done being such a bitch."
Something in Noburi's overly-casual tone pinged an alarm at the back of Kei's mind. "When you say you 'shut her down', what exactly does that mean?"
Noburi shrugged. "Nothing special. I just told her that I'm not the lameass she was making me out to be, that I'm a valuable member of this team, and that she doesn't have shit on me as far as experience goes."
"'As far as experience goes'?" Hazō asked. "Did you mention anything in particular?"
Noburi shifted uncomfortably. "I...might have said something about a chakra megalodon."
"What else?" Kei asked. She might not have spent as much time as Hazō had working on deception training with Mari-sensei, but even she could see that there was more.
"...I maybe alluded to Arikada once."
"By name?"
"Mmmmmore along the lines of 'psycho bio-sealer who can raise the dead'?"
Hazō facepalmed. "Anything else?"
"Not really...or, at least, nothing important," Noburi said defensively. "I said something about ninja riding trained chakra beasts, but no details. Oh, and I mentioned beating Neji on unfamiliar ground when I didn't have any chakra, and I guess I mentioned staying ahead of Captain Zabuza until he died of natural ninja causes, but I didn't use their names. I just said 'the greatest hunter-nin' and 'the greatest chūnin-candidate', or something like that."
"Suggesting that not only do we know that Captain Zabuza is dead, but how he died," Kei said.
"We could easily know that just by being Jiraiya's kids," Hazō pointed out. "Captain Zabuza was a famous enemy nin, but he wasn't politically powerful. It would be good news in Leaf if he died, but it wouldn't have the sort of international implications that Yagura's death had. It's perfectly reasonable to imagine Jiraiya coming home from the office crowing about something like that." He snorted. "Especially if you know Jiraiya."
"True," Kei admitted grudgingly. "So, you alluded to a crazy bio-seal expert who can raise the dead. That should attract some attention."
"Um."
"I will also note that there are comparatively few sealmasters in the Elemental Nations, and vanishingly few bio-seal experts. In fact, of the two sealmasters we know, Kagome thinks the mere idea is insanity and as far as I'm aware Jiraiya has never so much as dabbled in the area."
"We don't know half of what he's done," Hazō said. "Remember when I asked him about what seals he knew of and what we got instead was a bunch of stories about the Three?"
"Yeah, and you just know those stories were full of crap," Noburi said, obviously glad to have the focus off of himself. "He was saying that Lady Tsunade was open to being propositioned, and I'm really not seeing it. All the medic-nin and doctors say that she used to smack him around for being such a skirt-chaser."
"We are becoming sidetracked," Keiko said. "Hazō, I am sorry to say that you have been dethroned."
Hazō's brow furrowed. "Dethroned?"
"Yes. You are no longer the prime infosec leaker on the team."
"Hey/Hey!" said both Noburi and Hazō at the same time, before pausing and frowning as they tried to figure out exactly which of them should be insulted.
"Hey, all I did was vaguely allude to a couple of things in a quiet coversation with one person," Noburi objected. "I didn't shout my bloodline secrets in a public library."
"Look, I thought we settled this—" Hazō began.
Noburi rode right over his objection. "And what about that time in Sarubetsu when you infodumped all the details of our adventures to those ninja in the alley, huh?"
Kei fought not to hunch her shoulders at the memory. The anger, buoying her up and pulling unwise words out of her mouth. "That was different," she said uncomfortably.
"Oh?" Noburi said, smug grin spreading across his face. "Do tell?"
"We were in immediate danger for our lives. I had no time to think, and I needed a way to bluff the enemy out of combat."
"Uh-huh. Sure. No infosec leak at all."
"Speaking of infosec," Hazō said, very obviously coming to her rescue, "we should get our story straight concerning how we ended up in Leaf. Granny Karina called us out on this and someone else is sure to sooner or later. I'm thinking we blame it on Yagura and his policies. We say that we decided we'd rather live than give ourselves up and die to Yagura's paranoia, and if that makes us disloyal, then so be it. We should take the blame for following Shikigami in the first place, even though we didn't really have a choice. Then we keep things vague—talk about our life on the road but no details, just 'constant threat of death but beauty of the wilderness' kind of things."
"I'm onboard with that last part," Noburi said. "Although I definitely don't think we should admit to being disloyal in so many words."
"We can work on the wording," Hazō said with a shrug. "The tricky part is going to be explaining how we joined Leaf."
"No," Keiko said. "The tricky part is going to be reconciling what we actually did, what we have already told people here in Mist that we did, and what Jiraiya told the people back in Leaf that we did. Remember? He claimed that a group of Mist ninja spontaneously developed the Will of Fire, attempted to work through channels to change Yagura's policies, then left when they couldn't. Yagura butchered them, Mari-sensei got us out, and then we volunteered to be agents of Jiraiya's until he could bring us in, which he did once Yagura died. We then told Granny Karina that Shikigami lied and told us we'd been sent on a suicide mission and forced us to go with him, and that we couldn't have gotten home on our own. Once we did leave Shikigami we eventually negotiated our way into Leaf by means of a 'bargaining chip' that Noburi stated was the summoning scroll. How do we fit all that together?"
Silence reigned.
"Well," Hazō said, "how about—"
XP AWARD: 1
FP AWARD: 0
What does Hazō say next? Options include:
"—we think about this tomorrow, because it's time for bed."
"—we come clean and admit the unvarnished truth in all its details."
YOOOOOUUUUUUTTTTTHHHHHHHH!!!!!
Diplomacy is hard, let's go shopping
Write in
Voting ends on Wednesday, April 18, 2018, at 12pm London time.
"No, walking on mist was the easy part—at least once we figured out how. I mean, it's made of water, duh." Noburi rolled his eyes as if to dismiss the obvious. "Where we hit the problem was when it started dissipating and we were still high up. It kept rising, and by that point we were a mile above the ground. If we leaped down, we'd go splat and that would be the end of Team Uplift's adventures. Instead, we had to keep moving between patches of cloud, hoping another one would drift down and let us get off safely. I'll jump ahead now," he gave a sly grin, "and tell you that's not how we made our amazing escape."
"See, instead of finding a way down, we ended up climbing right onto the cloud layer. And let me tell you, the view up there? It's to die for. Almost literally, in our case. I was still busy trying to give Hazō a hand up—he's kinda clumsy for a ninja—when we came under attack. Yes, above the clouds. We barely had a second's warning before we got hit by an entire patrol from the Village Hidden in the Sky.
"I mean, that wasn't so bad in and of itself. Sure, they had all sorts of Wind Element ninjutsu we'd never seen before, but there were only twelve of them, and only the leader was a jōnin. No, what nearly got us was their sky squid mounts. Yeah, sky squid are real, and they really do like to latch onto your head and eat your brains." Noburi made tentacular wiggling motions with his hands, prompting a couple of the kunoichi in the audience to shrink back. "And while Hazō was obviously safe, that just meant more of them went for me. To say nothing of Keiko, who was like breakfast, lunch and dinner to them all at once."
"It was nearly the end of us there and then. But at the last second, I had a flash of inspiration. See, I'm a Wakahisa—and those were rainclouds we were standing on. All I had to do was synchronise my chakra system with Keiko's mental powers, and together we unleashed the world's first Fusion Bloodline Limit: the Liquid Barrel!"
-o-
A few hours earlier…
"Well," Hazō said, "how about we just lie?"
Keiko raised an eyebrow. "I am confident that I will regret it, but pray elaborate."
"We're ninja. Of course we're going to lie, mislead and dissemble. It's what ninja do. How many people do you think believe the official story in the first place? Maybe civilians will, but even they have politicians who must have seen this kind of thing before. I'm not saying we should get up on a podium and proclaim that the Hokage is a liar, but in private conversations I think we'll find everyone already knows the official story is fiction, and for all we know they'll secretly be offended if we talk like we expect them to believe it."
"All right," Noburi said. "So you want us to lie, which is to say the exact opposite of what you did earlier. What's your version of the story?"
"Everyone's already expecting us to lie about the details because we're ninja. So if we want to earn goodwill, we have to focus on the emotional side, and make that sound as genuine as possible. That's not hard. Just blame Yagura for everything. That should go over well since I don't think anyone in this building is much of a fan of his, foreigners or Mist-nin. His policies made us miserable while we were still in Mist. We didn't become missing-nin out of treason but because of circumstances outside our control, and then we were too afraid to go back because we knew what he'd do to us. We saw a chance to get taken in by Leaf and stop being missing-nin, and we took it as part of a trade. Doesn't matter what. The Pangolin Scroll, maybe. We like Leaf, we're happy there, but that doesn't mean we hate Mist. There are still plenty of people here we care about, and it's not like we ever had a problem with the village, just with the previous Mizukage who is no longer here. None of the emotional core of that is a lie, and if anyone calls us on contradicting details, so what? We correct them, or we deflect it, or we find some way to brush it off like it doesn't matter.
"If anything, now I think of it, it's an advantage in terms of information control. If everyone else has slightly different stories, they won't be able to home in on the truth and extract any valuable information we might have accidentally let slip."
Keiko raised her eyebrow again.
"I'm just saying. So what do you two think?"
"I must confess a certain amount of scepticism regarding the underlying concept," Keiko said. "The key to mastery of deception is a reputation for honesty, or at the very least for not lying about matters of profound importance. Mari-sensei is an excellent example, as despite her terrifying readiness to deceive us for her own amusement, she has nevertheless earned our absolute trust.
"On the other hand, when you lie so frequently that it becomes impossible to tell whether you are telling the truth at any given time, the signal to noise ratio deteriorates beyond repair and others simply cease to listen to you. I fail to see how being a ninja has any bearing on this."
"Does that mean you object to the idea?"
Keiko shook her head. "I am sceptical, yes, but I also acknowledge that we are more likely to successfully purchase a telescope than I am to achieve mastery of social manipulation. In this regard, I would prefer to rely on Noburi's opinion."
Noburi gave her a surprised look. "Thanks, Keiko."
Huh. That was the first time they'd made eye contact in days. It wasn't something Hazō would normally have noticed, but ever since the second event or so, the two hadn't really spoken to each other much at all apart from purely pragmatic topics. Meaning that all the ribbing and all the snark from both sides ended up being directed at him. He hoped they weren't having a fight, because now was not a good time.
"As it happens, I'm willing to give it a try," Noburi said. "It'll make a nice change from Hazō's usual open mouth policy, and it's a long-overdue chance to start writing our own story."
"Speaking of open mouths," Hazō said, "you have some damage control to do…"
-o-
"We really thought we were done for. I mean, we'd heard all about all the famous battles which actually took place in ancient Earth Country, but we never expected this giant enemy worm. This thing was huge. It could tunnel through mountains like they were made of foam. It had teeth the size of chakra megalodons." Noburi reached up to indicate the size of the teeth, then stopped with a tsk when his hand hit the ceiling.
"But what the worm didn't know as it dived at us was that Hazō had prepared explosive runes that morning. Now I'll be the first to admit that my teammate can't punch for toffee, but on the other hand he's a sealmaster taught by the Black Hunter himself. So when he prepares explosive runes, he really prepares explosive runes. Blam!" Noburi flung his hands open as if forced apart by an explosion. "Between my leadership, Keiko's encyclopaedic knowledge of monster weaknesses and Hazō's destructive seals, we were able to attack its weak point for massive damage. This giant chakra earthworm, which had torn through Hidden Rock's best squads like they were parchment—no offence, Team Malachite—went down with half a mountain on top of it. Blood and guts everywhere. Even then, it was about to get up again, but before it had a chance, I plunged the giant chakra blades I'd looted from Hidden Sky right into its eyes! It was a fitting end to the monster slaying of the century.
"Why have none of the Rock teams ever heard about this, you ask? That's a great question. See, the Tsuchikage's beautiful daughter had taken a shine to me from the moment we met, and that very night…"
-o-
"Come on, Team Mamoru," Hazō pleaded. "You have to send Hatake Kakashi to close that interdimensional gate before anything else comes through. You know Uchiha Itachi doesn't have the sanity, and Killer Bee is still delayed after that bad roll."
"Are you sure?" Hinago asked. "We were thinking we'd grab that clue token in Wolf since Team Bloodrage isn't getting a new agent until next turn."
"It's the dice," Hōjō muttered as he absent-mindedly adjusted the scythe perpetually slung over his shoulder. "Jashin has cursed them. Why else would we have lost four agents in a row?"
"Because you keep sending them at the toughest monsters without taking time to gear up first, maybe?" Fūma smirked, tapping her agent's set of kinjutsu cards meaningfully with a fingertip. "Why don't we just use Tsunade's ability to un-delay Killer Bee and then send him to Hidden Mist by ship? I think we can all agree that getting rid of the gate in Mist is a bigger priority. We need those hunter-nin if we're going to take out the spandex horror in Fang."
"Not bad for a backwater dog," Yotsuki sneered. "After last round's fiasco, I was starting to think the Fūma were as stupid as they were ugly."
Fūma leapt to her feet. "You want to say that again, Cloud scum?"
"Not now, girls," Hinago said wearily. Hazō noticed her hand moving surreptitiously towards the snake-patterned pouch at her waist. "Do I need to remind you that the Moon Princess will awaken in six rounds if we don't do anything?"
Yotsuki glanced back down at the board. "Ugh. Fine. Tsunade uses Breath of Life to un-delay Killer Bee and restore two health. Then we move her to Claw to try and buff her Taijutsu. Pass the encounter deck, Fūma dog."
The cooperative game of Sealing Failure was in its seventh round, and so far not one drop of real-life blood had been shed. Hazō was a genius.
Of course, the first couple of games had not gone anywhere near so well, but now Hazō was finally getting the hang of it. The key was to get the right balance of peacemakers (like Team Mamoru's Hinago Yuri), people who got so into the game that they stopped caring about inter-village rivalries (like the entirety of Team Bloodrage) and people who hated each other but would grudgingly cooperate when influenced by the other two groups (like Team Q's Yotsuki Hanako and Team Sayuri's Fūma Jun).
"You know," Hazō said casually, "Killer Bee's situation reminds me of what happened in the Second Event. We had lots of resources, but no matter how much we ran around, we didn't get the opportunity to use most of them before we took a lethal hit. Funny coincidence, huh?"
Hinago gave him a sideways look. "Sure you did, Gōketsu. I was there when your proctor dropped by for a booty call. I know love is supposed to conquer all, but seriously, ick."
"Are you kidding? That was just her coming back to mess with us because everybody in Mist hates us. You mean your proctor didn't mess with you?"
"Our proctor was fine," Hinago said. "He was just in it for the money. What got us were the assholes who snuck into our room at the inn and left three different layers of traps. Or at least we found three before the client got propelled out of the window."
"Hey, Yuri," one of the other members of Team Mamoru called out. "It's our turn. Are we still sending Hatake Kakashi to close the gate in Rain, or are we using his Perverted Novels to restore Uchiha Itachi's sanity so he can do it?"
-o-
"Nonono, this was after we stole the Sage's blood from the chakra kitsune, but before Hazō used it to write the Pangolin Scroll. And besides, pangolins make terrible wingmen. Last thing you want when you're trying to pick up girls is someone standing over your shoulder asking anatomically detailed questions about human mating rituals. No, if I was going to beat Hyūga Neji's challenge and bring ten hot dates to the Leaf Founding Anniversary party (I'll skip ahead and tell you, he didn't even get one), I was going to have to get creative.
"Now, Yamanaka Ino was easy to please as long as you knew your flowers, and Hyūga Hinata loved discussing literature. Akimichi Chōko was easy to seduce with the promise of food. Haruno Sakura took more work, but in the end she couldn't resist my masculine charm. Keiko was a given, of course. Aburame Takano had never been asked out before. Tenten mostly came to annoy Hyūga, I think. But that was where I started hitting difficulties, the first one being that Rock Lee had got wind of the challenge and decided he wanted to be one of my dates. Sometimes it's tough being irresistible to both genders. Fortunately, I knew exactly what to—
"Oh, uh, hey there, girls. Didn't know the other Leaf teams were already here.
"Please put that down! I can explain!"
-o-
Hazō spends 1 FP to invoke the Aspect "Lists and Plans".
Hazō Deceit: 24 + 3 + 9 = 36
Hazō creates a Strength 36 Deceit block. Anyone trying to assess his Taijutsu skills must beat this block. Otherwise, they gain the fragile Aspect "Hazō Can't Punch for Toffee".
-o-
You have earned 3 XP. Hazō has spent 1 FP and Noburi has gained 1 FP.
We've decided to follow @Cariyaga's suggestion for preventing FP stockpiling. Thus:
0-3 Fate Points: Get one (or more) every update
4-7: Get one on substantial updates
7+: Get one for player cleverness
This is in addition to the usual awards for winning conflicts and gaining Consequences.
-o-
Your impromptu gaming group has borne fruit. You are now acquainted with a number of teams from various different countries and villages. Some of them like you more than they did before, and some of them like each other more than they did before. The latter is a triumph from a long-term perspective, but could be a disaster in the short-term.
You're pretty sure that everything you tried to do on a social level, at least some of them tried to do as well.
Most of the teams you met claim that they were disqualified due to client assassination or misunderstanding the rules. Team Bloodrage claims that their client ran away. Only a couple admit to having used clever tricks to game the rules, such as the Mist team that subtly hinted at belonging to the Mizukage's secret police and thus got bribed with enormously favourable terms.
Opinions on the Leaf-Mist situation vary. Nobody except Cloud, Hot Springs and a few of the far eastern villages particularly likes Mist, but there is vague hope that the new Mizukage (about whom they know little) will be less of a warmonger than the last, and thus the other villages will finally be free to turn their attention to their more immediate enemies. Mist's well-cultivated reputation for viciousness is serving as an incentive to hold off on attacking it, since even if it lost, it would make invaders bleed for every inch of ground. That said, if it shows weakness at the exams...
Everybody is generally relieved that Leaf has been weakened, since while it is seen as less aggressive than Mist, it is a sleeping giant which is likely hiding its full strength. Right now, everyone seems to be waiting to see just how weak Leaf has become, and whether Jiraiya is a strong enough leader to maintain the geopolitical status quo or whether this is an opening to take Leaf down the like of which might not come again for generations.
As for Leaf-Mist diplomacy, many of the ninja you've spoken to are unaware that anything special is going on beyond the usual opportunities for negotiation created by the Chūnin Exam. However, some of the clan kids are savvy enough to know or at least speculate. Some of them (particularly from the smaller villages) expect an alliance which will be the beginning of a new tyrannical superpower, combining Leaf's resources and technology with Mist's ruthlessness and ambition. They consider a Fourth Great Ninja War to be a matter of time as the alliance reaches for world domination. Others (particularly from the larger villages) think that the two enemies' differences are too great and negotiations will come to nothing. There is a distinct balance between "Wait and see" and "Strike now before it's too late", though naturally the latter isn't said outright because you are currently in the middle of Mist. Pretty much nobody anywhere thinks that the alliance would be a good thing.
You have done your training and made 5 5SB seals. The rest of the day was spent socialising. Running board games for large numbers of beginners turned out to be extremely time-consuming.
It is now the last night of the event. You may have last-minute discussions with your team before you go to bed, or proceed straight to the next day.
-o-
What do you do?
Voting ends on Saturday 19th of April, 9 am New York time.
Noburi shifted his weight, preparing to get out of the tub, but paused when Hazō tapped his arm. He eyed his teammate with a raised eyebrow; Hazō shook his head minutely, flicking his eyes towards the other two contestants who were soaking alongside them. Noburi shrugged minutely and sat back.
It was almost time for chow call, and anyone who didn't have several dozen storage scrolls (many of them filled with delicious just-cooked meals) in their team's possession was finishing up their soak and getting dressed. It was only a few minutes before the boys' bathing room had emptied of everyone but the two of them.
"What's up?" Noburi asked, keeping his voice low.
Hazō paused and took a breath; Noburi instantly braced himself for yet another fun and exciting session of the Clear Communication technique. Inwardly, he sighed; why couldn't Hazō just talk like a normal person? I mean, sure, you had to appreciate the earnestness, and the effort that he was obviously putting forth, but it was always a little exhausting and a lot uncomfortable. After all, no one ever used the Clear Communication technique to explain how much they loved kittens. No, it was always "please admit your romantic feelings towards me so that we can both feel awkward for the next few days" or "I'll serve you forever if you don't tell anyone that my clanmate is a stupid idiot who leaked my other clanmate's secret technique but if you do tell anyone then I'll kill everyone you love" or "I know you're the greatest sealmaster in the world but I want to find a polite way of telling you that I think you're dumb as a box of hammers for doubting the efficacy of Kagome's 'Please Do Not Let the Monsters From Beyond Time and Space Eat My Face' butt-wiggle dance".
"Just spit it out, Hazō," he said, shaking his head in amusement. "I'm turning into a prune over here."
Hazō's mouth closed with a clop. "Right," he said after a moment. "I'm worried about you and Keiko, that's all. It seems like you guys have been avoiding each other for a couple of days...or, at least, wanting to avoid each other. Is there anything I can do to help?"
"Nah," Noburi said, climbing out of the tub and starting to towel off. "Thanks, but it's fine. Remember back in Leaf, when Yamanaka Neira was doing the psychological warfare drill with us and she told Keiko about my crush? Well, Keiko came to me at the end of the swamp event and asked if that was really true."
Hazō winced. "Ouch. What did you say?" he asked, stepping out of the tub himself and grabbing a towel.
Noburi shrugged. "I told her the truth. That yes, I had had a crush on her since we first met back in Mist. That I thought she was beautiful, and smart, and had a wicked deadpan humor. And that I knew it was never going to happen because she's not interested in guys, and that I was okay with that." He tossed the towel in a hamper and started pulling his clothes on with the efficiency of every trained soldier. "She took it pretty well." He chuckled at the memory. "She offered to make a list of all her personal failings in hopes that it would help me get over her."
Hazō laughed. "That sounds like Keiko."
"Of course, I told her that she couldn't make that list because that was your schtick."
Hazō mock-glared at him and Noburi chuckled. "It's fine," he said. "It felt good to clear the air, you know? It was like putting down this heavy thing that I'd been carrying. Yeah, things are a little awkward right now, but it'll be fine."
"You sure?" Hazō said, buckling his equipment belt on and sitting on one of the benches so he could pull on his shoes. "You know I'm here if you want to talk, right?"
"Oh Sage, you sound like my mother!" Noburi said, shaking his head. "Seriously, don't worry about it, man. It'll be fine. C'mon, let's catch up to Keiko before she assumes we've drowned in the tub." He turned immediately for the door, carefully ignoring the imagined pressure on his back from his adoptive brother's dubious gaze.
o-o-o-o
The cafeteria was full, ninja from different villages clumping together and keeping watchful eyes in all directions. Noburi, Keiko, and Hazō were one of the last teams in; they automatically stepped to the side as they came through the door in order not to be backlit...only to have to catch themselves from bumping into the team before them, who had already automatically stepped to the side in order not to be backlit. Mutual glares, but fortunately no blows, were exchanged, and then both teams went to the serving lines to receive their portion of...food?...before heading for tables.
The Leaf teams had staked out a prime location and defended it against all comers: in the corner, near the door, just below the makes-a-good-secondary-exit windows. Team Uplift pushed through the crowded dining hall to get to their seats, only to find that there were now twice as many Leaf teams as there had been on the previous night.
"Hey! Gōketsu, about time!" Ino called, scooting over to make room between herself and Nara.
"Yamanaka," Hazō said, nodding and taking the offered seat while Noburi sat on the far side of Akimichi and Keiko settled beside him. "You guys in early, or did you get eliminated?"
Nara was poking at his food brick meatloaf with barely-disguised disgust, studiously ignoring his Akimichi teammate, who was happily shoveling the food down. The larger boy paused in his eating to wave happily at the new arrivals and gesture for them to sit beside him.
"Nah, just got in," Yamanaka said, not looking up because she was busy picking the peppers out of her food before taking the first bite. "We figured we had as good a total as we were going to get and it was better just to lock it in, so we managed to talk our proctor into coming in early."
"Kinda slow, weren't you?" Noburi teased. "We cashed out yesterday."
Yamanaka glanced up. "You did not!"
"We did," Keiko said, working her way through the meatloaf with the mechanical actions of someone long experienced with the doctrine of Mist Academy cafeteria food: Its job was to keep your body and soul together and nobody said anything about flavor. "Around eleven in the morning."
Yamanaka digested that. "Well, I bet we scored higher."
"Exchanging scores would actually be really useful," Hazō said. "I have no idea where we stand in the rankings, and most people don't want to talk about it."
"Unsurprising," Nara said, finally giving up and engaging his protein-rich enemy in unenthusiastic battle. "Anyone who admits to scoring high will be a target." He chewed a few more times, then choked the bite down. "How did the cooks manage to create such a perfect combination of burnt and undercooked?"
Hazō masticated thoughtfully for a moment, considering exactly what it was that he was eating. "The prawns aren't actually undercooked," he said. "The insides are supposed to squish like that. I don't think anything's burnt, either...the crunch is probably from the shells—they always leave a few in just to provide texture—and the smoky flavor is from the way they preserve the prawns. They smoked it a little too long though, so it's tough."
"What's a prawn?" Yamanaka asked.
"Water bug," Noburi said. "They're a staple here. You find them under rocks near the water's edge...the baby ones aren't much bigger than your fingernail and only have four legs, but they can grow as big as your hand and the big ones have up to nineteen legs. Don't worry, the venom isn't dangerous to humans unless you eat a ton of it. It's what gives the meat that tangy flavor."
"I need to get some of these," Akimichi said, wiping his mouth. "They're delicious, and the tang is really unusual. I bet my mom would love to have a regular supply."
Yamanaka pushed back from the table in horror, but whether it was at what she'd been eating or at what her teammate had said, Hazō wasn't sure. He honestly couldn't understand the problem...for Sage's sake, in Leaf they ate geese.
"You can find purveyors down at the fish market every morning," Keiko said. "They aren't typically exported to the mainland, simply because they go off too quickly for civilian transport and most ninja don't want to be mewed up on a boat for days. I'm sure we could arrange something; we have plenty of storage scrolls that you could use, for an appropriate fee."
Akimichi's eyes lit up. "How much of a fee?" he demanded.
Noburi wordlessly stood up and stepped back so that Akimichi could slide down to haggle with Keiko. The bigger boy moved down without even seeming to notice he'd done so, so engaged was he in his mercantile negotiations. Noburi was happy enough to find himself sitting beside Yamanaka instead.
"I'll tell you our score if you tell us yours," Noburi said to the blonde.
She glanced at Nara, who couldn't be bothered to shrug both shoulders so settled for just one.
"Deal," Yamanaka said. "Two ninety-nine. What did you guys get?"
"Six hundred," Noburi said with a smile. "...Half of which our stinking proctor cheated us out of. She gave us a fifteen point review, though."
"You scored three hundred and fifteen points?" Yamanaka said in frank disbelief.
"Yep." Smugley Smuggington had been reinstated as the mayor of Smuggton.
"Interesting," Nara said, looking up from his food. "What did the proctors tell you about the minimum amount of time before the next event?"
Hazō paused, exchanging a glance with Noburi. "Our information-sharing agreement is still in effect, right?" he asked Nara. "It was supposed to last throughout the Exams, but I just want to check."
Nara nodded, flicking a hand gesture that even those unfamiliar with Nara sign language could guess meant something like stop wasting my time with pointless quibbling. "Yes, of course."
"They didn't say anything about when the next event would be. I figured they'd be doing it at the official end of the event."
Nara shook his head. "No. When we cashed out we were advised that there would be at least one hundred hours between the end of the third event and the start of the fourth."
"A hundred hours?" Hazō said thoughtfully. "That's a lot of time to go hunting for people's words."
"Indeed. It also suggests that the next event will be another socially-oriented event as opposed to a combat mission."
Noburi cocked his head in confusion. "How do you get that?"
"It is possible that the excessive rest period between events is simply to stretch the duration of the Exams, or to give us time to fight one another," Nara said, waving one hand to indicate that he was granting a technical potentiality that did not match his expectation. "More likely, however, is that it is to give the proctors who were acting as clients the opportunity to rest after living under nearly continuous henge for multiple days in a row. They were, of course, taking breaks periodically—I'm sure you noticed that your client always took a lot of time in the bathroom—but being henged so long would cause significant mental fatigue. Holding off on the next event until the proctors are rested suggests that it is not something that can be administered by the small group of proctors who were not acting as clients. It requires the body of contestants to have significant interaction with a large number of proctors and those proctors need to be mentally at their best. Ergo, social."
Noburi looked at Hazō. "It's like a boy version of Keiko."
Hazō nodded. "You two are made for each other," he told Nara.
Nara shuddered and went back to his meatloaf, the muttered "Troublesome" almost quiet enough to pass unheard.
o-o-o-o
The night of the 6th, Hazō stayed up as late as he could, waiting for Akane's team to come in. Nearly everyone seemed to have shown up already; when midnight came and went, he finally turned in and then tossed and turned most of the night before finally managing to doze off...
...just before the proctors started racing up and down the halls banging pots together and screaming, "UP AND OUT! UP AND OUT! DRESSED AND IN THE ASSEMBLY HALL IN FIVE, GO GO GO!!!"
Muscle memory from years of studies catapulted him out of bed and into his pants. He was fully dressed and one step into the hall before realizing that he was no longer a lone and unpopular student, that that boy was gone and the one who stood in his place was a Chūnin Exams candidate with years of field experience and clanmates on either side. The recognition came out of his throat riding a wave of wild laughter; instead of slowing down he leapt forward even faster. Keiko and Noburi kept pace; Noburi caught Hazō's mood, his face splitting in a grin that was just as wild as his clanmate's laughter. An amused tilt of the lips was Keiko's equivalent of mad laughter.
The hallway was jammed full of half-awake foreign ninja stumbling out of their dorms in confusion. Soft foreign ninja, with enough years out of the Academy to have forgotten pre-dawn callups and not enough years in the wilderness to be accustomed to pre-dawn assaults. There was no room to pass through the herd, so the Gōketsu clan went up the walls and ran across the ceiling, crouching slightly so as not to have their inverted and awake heads crash into the right-side-up and groggy heads of their 'peers'.
o-o-o-o
They weren't the first to arrive at the Assembly Hall—their dorm had been too far away for that—but there were only nine teams ahead of them.
The Assembly Hall was smaller than the cavernous space that Hazō remembered, although still large enough. The familiar stage still ran along the north side and the rough wooden bleachers along the south. A collection of senior ninja from various nations were up on the stage, standing at parade rest against the back wall. Shiomi-sensei, the grizzled old veteran who taught the dirtiest of dirty fighting tactics to the advanced taijutsu students at the Mist Academy, was standing at the podium, hands clasped behind his back and a statue's frozen expression on his face as he watched the candidates stream in.
Team Uplift didn't manage to get the absolute best seats in the house (top bleacher, the end nearest the door), but they did at least manage to be on the top bleacher. More reassuring than having no one behind them was the sight of Hatake Kakashi slouching against the wall on stage, Maito Gai standing upright beside him with an expression of friendly interest.
That momentary sense of reassurance vanished when Hazō realized that Akane and her team were not among the candidates already in the room. He kept an eye on the door, hoping to see her come in, and tried to keep a mental tally of how many had arrived. With every non-Akane genin through the door, his stomach tied itself into one more knot. By the time his count got to one hundred and ninety-seven the knots of concern had started to become a molten slag of panic.
When Akane, Haruno, and Yamamoto finally arrived, all the panic transmuted instantly into relief and elation. He clamped down with the full power of the Iron Nerve to keep himself from leaping up and shouting for her; instead, he managed to keep it to a frantic wave of one half-raised hand. The way her face lit up when she saw him caused the elation to intensify.
"Hazō!" Akane shouted, running up the wall and leaping to the bleachers. Haruno followed her, graceful as the cherry blossoms for which she was named. Yamamoto went directly up the side of the bleachers themselves, his movements tight, thoroughly controlled, and utterly without any overt threat that would account for how other genin scrambled to get out of his way. That bubble of space around him was sufficient to net three empty seats for his team, directly adjacent to Hazō's.
Akane dropped into the seat beside Hazō and hugged him tight. "I missed you," she whispered.
"I missed you too! What took you so long?" Hazō hissed back, keeping one eye on the stage in a former student's deeply-ingrained fear of being caught talking.
"Our client was determined to stay out all—"
"Shh!" Hazō said. "They're starting."
Shiomi-sensei had unclasped his hands from behind himself and laced them together atop the podium. At this signal silence quickly spread through the room. The old veteran waited until the last whisper had faded before he spoke.
"The third event of this year's Chūnin Exams is at an end," he announced, his deep voice carrying effortlessly to the very back of the room. "Your performances in this event ranged from execrable to excellent; I will speak more to that in a moment, but first I must deal with the eliminations."
A sussurant rustle went through the room as candidates shifted nervously.
"This year's Chūnin Exams are well attended. There are a hundred teams here, from every corner of the Elemental Nations. You should all be proud to have been chosen to represent your villages. Every one of you is a competent ninja and a worthy fist in the service of your various leaders.
"That said, it is time to reduce the size of the field. Three hundred candidates was fine during relatively open events such as we have had thus far, but from now on things will be more focused, and we need more manageable numbers. Those of you with a running score low enough that you have no chance of making the cutoff for promotion will now be eliminated. Those of you who have violated an Exam rule will likewise be eliminated. Those of you who have been withdrawn by your Kage—for reasons that I must assume are purely political and have no reflection on you—will likewise be eliminated. Finally, those of you who have acted in ways that disgrace your village...." He paused, surveying the crowd with narrowed eyes. "You will most definitely be eliminated."
The sounds of nervousness were louder this time.
"Those of you who are eliminated will be permitted to remain in Mist so long as you do nothing to affect the score or the readiness of any team still in the Exams. Note that, should there be any dubious behavior that does not meet those definitions, Mist will accomodate any request from any village leader to have an eliminated team confined to barracks for the remainder of the Exams." He paused to let that sink in. "Now, as I call your name, please come down from the bleachers and line up at attention with your back against the stage so that the other contestants can see you. Team Nakamura of Wind."
The room was completely silent for a moment before three boys in the second row stood and slowly shuffled to the end of the bleacher. Every eye in the room watched them as they made their way to the stage. For the first dozen steps they moved like men walking to the gallows, shoulders hunched and feet dragging; Hazō could literally see the moment when their shock was washed away by defiance. They straightened, closing ranks against the world and standing fierce. Their strides lengthened, falling into perfect sync as they took up position against the stage, directly in front of where Shiomi-sensei stood at the podium, with faces completely impassive and eyes staring straight ahead with no acknowledgement of the fact that they had just washed out of the Chūnin Exams in front of literally hundreds of their peers.
"Team Chinen of Earth."
Hazō blanched. Shiomi-sensei was going to stretch this out, force each team to wallow in their shame one at a time. Surely that stepped fully across the line from cruelty to sadism? Unfortunately, there was nothing he could do about it; there was no choice but to watch as one team after another was called. The only good part was that each team had learned from Team Nakamura's example; they strode down the bleachers and to the stage with honor and dignity pulled tight around themselves so that they cleared the path quickly. Having it go slowly was the only way it could possibly get worse.
"Team Gōketsu of Leaf."
Hazō had been dreading/expecting/fearing that name to be called, but he'd had time to consider what he would do if he heard it. When it sounded, he turned to his team and opened his mouth.
"Alley Oop," Noburi said, his voice tight with suppressed rage as he grabbed his left wrist with his right hand and reached out to Hazō. Where Hazō had intended to make the words a question, his were a demand.
Without a word, Hazō interlocked hands with Noburi, hands gripping wrists to provide a platform onto which Keiko could step. A massive surge of chakra gave them the strength to fling her forward, over the heads of all the other students in the bleachers. In midair, she flipped and twisted, pulling a pair of storage scrolls from holsters on her thighs. Twin pulses of chakra opened the scrolls, dispensing a pair of genin-sized logs from their extradimensional storage space. An instant later, the logs were gone, Substituted back to the bleachers, and all three Gōketsu genin landed in side-by-side three-point stances in front of the stage. They straightened as one, taking up their positions with drill-ground perfection and looking out across a sea of gaping mouths.
Even Shiomi-sensei seemed to have been given pause by the gesture of defiance; he said nothing for long seconds before eventually calling the next name as though nothing had happened.
The names rolled on and on, no particular pattern to them that would allow a team to know that they had made it past the cutoff. One by one, every member of SuperTeam Leaf was called, as were three of the teams that he could specifically remember buying seals from them during the swamp event. It served only to confirm Hazō's fear: Some of the Kage were smart enough to realize that rewarding collaboration between villages was dangerous. It was the first chink in the idea that all other villages were evil and untrustworthy, the first step towards a lasting peace built on mutual understanding.
Although...Shiomi-sensei had made a point of mentioning being withdrawn for political reasons. Was Jiraiya pulling them because he feared the political fallout if his clan didn't make a good enough showing? They had only scored middling-well in the swamp event, and they had come back to the barracks early in this event...if Mist had refused to divulge any details then Jiraiya would quite reasonably assume that Team Uplift had failed and been eliminated by another team. Or possibly—
His attention was brought back to his surroundings when Shiomi-sensei finally stopped calling names. The bleachers were half-empty, filled with genin who a moment before had been near panic and were now slowly relaxing at having dodged the kunai.
"You who remain in the bleachers," Shiomi-sensei said, "look carefully at these people I have called. Consider what decisions they made that kept them from being up there with you. Think carefully about how close you may have come to being down here with them. Take a moment for that, and then get out. You're eliminated."
The room broke out in gasps and protests, which Shiomi-sensei gaveled down with a fist pounded on the podium.
"ENOUGH!" he bellowed. He let the echoes ring, eyeing the candidates the way a raptor eyes mice until complete silence was restored.
"Many of you failed to keep your client safe, revealing that your skills are below those of your peers. A ninja village needs shinobi who can stand up to their enemies; those who can't are eliminated.
"Most of you who did keep your client safe devoted yourselves exclusively to escorting and protecting them. You demonstrated responsibility and generally effective tactics, but no proactivity. Chūnin are leaders and teachers; proactivity is required, and those who don't have it are eliminated.
"A few of you devoted your primary efforts to hunting other teams, thereby demonstrating proactivity but a nigh-criminal lack of comprehension regarding the nature of your mission. Chūnin are the backbone of the ninja forces. They perform advanced missions while solo; reliability is required, and those who don't have it are eliminated." A snort that mixed equal measures of amusement and disdain slipped out of the gray old man. "On that subject, I would like to especially call out Team Okazaki from Rock. They decided that the optimal strategy for this event was to imprison their client in a goldsmith's vault for the duration of the event and spend the entire time hunting other teams. Apparently they calculated that they would score negative twenty points after the review but would cause everyone else to score negative two hundred. Clever approach but, as of this morning's total, your accumulated collateral damage penalties have put you at a very comfortable minus seventeen hundred and thirty-four points, not to mention the damage done to your village's coffers. Next time, gentlemen, I advise you think before you try to get too clever.
"Having stated what not to do, I would like to hold up two examples of what you should do, so that those of you who are being eliminated may have something to learn from. Team Gōketsu from Leaf: congratulations, you have demonstrated skill and responsibility as bodyguards and escorts. You were smooth and effective at protecting your client, you communicated well with her, and your performance satisfied her so thoroughly that she gave you a fifteen point review. I also applaud your proactivity. We are still investigating how you convinced that merchant to give your client literally every ryō he possessed so that you could cash out on the second day of the event; once we finish the investigation I intend to see your actions incorporated into the Academy curriculum." The words rang with professionalism and courtesy, but Hazō imagined he could hear a gleam of teeth behind them, close enough to the surface to make him shudder.
"Regardless of how you did it, I must congratulate you on your victory. With three hundred and fifteen points, you are solidly in the lead for this event.
"As an example of a different kind of success, I would like to compliment Team Asuma of Leaf. They did not come in first in the event—first, after all, is a position that draws the attention of every eye. Neither did they come in second, a position that draws the attention of those wise enough to realize that the second runner must dodge far fewer kunai yet still has every chance of victory. No, they came in third, even going so far as to earn exactly two hundred and ninety-nine points so that they wouldn't seem so threatening as those who had scored above three hundred. Granted, when you have someone with the Nara shadow techniques for controlling an enemy's body, and someone with the Yamanaka techniques for mind control and information extraction...well, it's hardly surprising that you did so well as you did in an event that was fundamentally about information management. I salute your perspicacity and look forward to finding out how you managed to earn a perfect twenty points on your review.
"With all of this said, I believe we can end this assembly. Those of you who have been eliminated, please remain here so that the proctors may brief you more thoroughly on the non-interference rules. Those of you not eliminated, feel free to go back to sleep or to wander the city. Everyone except for Team Gōketsu already knows how much time is available before the next event, so feel free to enjoy yourselves until time is called.
"Contestants, please face the stage."
Hazō turned in place, a parade-ground heel-and-toe, and looked calmly and expectantly up at Shiomi-sensei. It took every trace of the skills that Mari-sensei had hammered into him not to let his anger at Shiomi-sensei's cruel trick show on his face.
"Shinobi of the Elemental Nations," Shiomi-sensei began, gripping the podium's sides loosely with both hands as he looked down at the upturned eyes. "Regardless of whether you were eliminated or not, remember that simply being here is one of the highest honors a Village can give to its genin. I applaud you for the determination and diligence that got you to where you stand at this moment. Simply by being in this hall at this time, you have demonstrated that you are among the best your village has to offer. I feel certain that all of you will serve with distinction and bring honor to your people when the Reaper finally calls."
The old man snapped to attention and thumped his chest in salute, holding the gesture as he offered a shallow bow of respect to fifty teams of genin from all across the Elemental Nations who, for a few short weeks, had come together to not kill each other.
XP AWARD: 6 This event covered roughly 48 hours.
FP AWARD: 1 I'm giving this out as something of an apology for not getting the rest of the way through the plan. I was really looking forward to the conversation with Haru, and to the scene with tunnelling under Exam HQ. Sadly, there was not enough gas in the mental tank, it's late, and I must sleep.
Note that Leaf was hit fairly lightly during the eliminations. You lost track partway through, but you know that all of SuperTeam Leaf is still in, as is Hinata's team, and you think there's at least a couple more Leaf teams in as well.
Vote time! What to do now?
Voting ends on Wednesday, April 25, 2018, at 12pm London time.
After the miserable experience that was the elimination meeting, Hazō could feel his soul being salved by the mere presence of Akane as they ate breakfast together. Naturally, they discussed what any young man would discuss when finally reuniting with his girlfriend after a period of separation, which is to say Yamamoto Haru. Noburi, meanwhile, was over on the other side of the mess hall, applying to the man himself all the powers of subtlety that he possessed and Hazō allegedly didn't.
"He's a good kid," Akane said confidently. "Sure, he has his issues, but once you get to know him, it's obvious that there's more to him than that. Did you know that he sketches? He's pretty good at it, too. He loves to capture things changing over time, like animal life cycles and the way landscapes change with the seasons. He showed me some of his sketches after a little—well, more than a little—persuasion."
A creative hobby? That might be a point of contact. Hazō doubted that Yamamoto would appreciate the fine art of list-crafting, and sealing was not something you discussed with laypeople, but maybe Hazō might be able get something out of his flute-playing experience.
"What about the clan thing, though?" Hazō asked. "That's going to be the barrier we have to deal with before we can get any communication going, at least between him and the Gōketsu."
Akane nodded. "What you have to understand is, he wanted to be Hokage. Well, every kid in Leaf wants to be Hokage, but Haru was serious about it. He idolised the Third. Then he grew up a little and it hit him like a hammer to the face that it was never going to happen. The Hokage was always going to be somebody from a major clan, or at least with that level of influence, like Jiraiya. The only way around that would be for Haru to be incredibly talented so everybody acknowledged his power, but again, that wasn't going to happen when there were other ninja around who were talented and had been receiving clan training since birth. And Haru was the kind of kid who looked around and saw that the same thing was true for all the other common-born ninja like him."
Hazō got that. He remembered the invisible wall. In another place, another time, that could also have been a point of contact, but not now that Hazō had been adopted into the Gōketsu Clan. In a way, that might make it even worse—"once a clan kid, always a clan kid", always landing on his feet and being heaped with privilege even if his original clan disowned him and his very village turned on him. In Haru's eyes, it would be obvious that Hazō's adoption stemmed from his possession of a Bloodline Limit and his blood ties to the woman who would soon become Mizukage.
"I can't blame him for being angry," Hazō said. "Anyone who didn't grow up in a clan can instantly see how unfair the system is." He'd made his apologies to Keiko and Noburi, and he knew they were trying to understand his position, but he also knew that they were failing. Would he have to deal with that so they could present Yamamoto with a united front?
"We don't all react the same way, though," Akane said. "I'm a common-born ninja as well, but I know that as long as I hold on to the Spirit of Youth and keep doing my best, eventually I'll reach the place where I most need to be. After all, that's how I ended up with you."
Her smile was so radiant it was a mystery how the other ninja weren't spooked by the room suddenly doubling in brightness.
"Haru isn't like you and me, though," she said a second later, the smile dimming to a more thoughtful expression. "He's constantly living in a world that needs changing, and he can't do anything about it, and he's aware of that contradiction 24/7. At this point, I don't think it's so much about his personal career being blocked off as it is about the world being wrong for him and everyone like him. It's not so different to how you think about civilians, only instead of making passionate speeches he bottles it all up until it's ready to explode."
Someone like him? That was a very weird idea. Hazō didn't see how Yamamoto was at all like him. Hazō was the diplomat (foot in mouth aside), the friendly, open one even when, in retrospect, other things might have been called for. The one who'd thrown himself headfirst into Mari-sensei's deception training and then never remembered to use it because, deep down, what he wanted was for people to understand and respond to the real him. It was something he'd need to work on before he got properly involved in clan politics, he knew, but he found himself in two minds as to whether he wanted to.
Regardless, he was nothing like Yamamoto. He made himself approachable when he could, and he only intimidated others when he honestly thought it was the best way to approach the situation. He reached out to others, just like he was trying to reach out to Yamamoto now.
Except... Hazō had the blessings of friends who understood, of an ever-greater collection of resources (from a close bond with an elite jōnin to sealing to Gōketsu influence) and of an environment which, if it did not embrace his particular ideals, at least treated them with nothing worse than bemusement. Who was to say that, if he'd never had any of those things, his passion wouldn't have been compressed into helpless anger?
It was an uncomfortable comparison, and it was weird that Akane was in a position to make it after only having interacted with Yamamoto for a matter of weeks (he was pretty sure the two hadn't been friends at the Academy).
Hazō said as much.
Akane shrugged. "I listen. Sakura's… less social than you might think, especially around someone as intense as Haru, so often it's just the two of us in the evenings. I listen without telling him that he's wrong or that he's right but needs to accept the inevitable, and he appreciates it. Also I've managed to get him interested in the Spirit of Youth, because if he's ever going to break the common sense of the shinobi world, what could be better than a power that transcends common sense altogether?"
Hazō laughed.
Akane gave him a look. "I'm serious, you know. It's another thing I realised while I was in hospital—the Spirit of Youth isn't an ideology that you learn and then try as hard as you can to follow. It's a way of being true to a part of yourself that most people end up rejecting when they grow up. Those people are the ones who define what common sense is. So if you want to beat the average, if you want to live the absolute best life you can, then you have to reject their common sense and substitute your own.
"Those are your own words, the ones that made me run away with you. You told me that entering the Springtime of Youth meant letting go of other people's dreams for you so that you could start living the ones that came from your own heart. I don't know if I've surpassed 'Nishino-sensei' yet, but maybe I'll be able to get that message across to Haru. It would mean the world to me to be able to do for someone else what you and Rock Lee did for me."
"Are you sure there's even room for me to step in?" Hazō asked. "It's starting to sound like you've got everything handled on your own."
Akane shook her head. "The Spirit of Youth isn't a magic cure-all, and it's not a royal road to success. I've been following it for half a lifetime, and I'm still in the middle of figuring things out. Haru's chains are a lot heavier than mine were when I discovered the Spirit of Youth, and he doesn't have a strong role model to follow the way I did. The more ways we can find to break them, the better our odds of setting him free."
-o-
"That was a most youthful display back there, Gōketsu! I'm sure you'll be getting a lot more attention now that you've shown off your enormous manhood to all the other teams!"
"And hello to you too, Rock Lee," Hazō said wearily. It was way too early in the morning for this. Of course, it would also have been way too early for Rock Lee in the afternoon, evening, night, or any mysterious extra time zones that might exist on other Paths.
Keiko and Tenten exchanged slow, meaningful nods, which Hazō guessed to mean something like "Prepared for yet another cavalcade of incoherent buffoonery from our respective teams?" and "Gōketsu, that is my life" respectively.
As for Noburi and Neji…
"Couldn't you have got the other one, Hazō?"
Hazō refrained from facepalming.
"Noburi, that is not how we address a most respected shinobi of the Hyūga Clan whom we're about to offer a valuable deal."
"The other one?" Neji asked. "Gōketsu, I have been made aware of your indecent fantasies in regard to my cousin, and I assure you that if you are about to attempt to pursue them in real life, then you'll soon find out how many non-functional organs you can have while still being nominally alive."
Noburi opened his mouth to retaliate, but Hazō gave him a threatening look. To his surprise, it more or less worked.
"Fine. Hyūga, in the absence of someone whose presence I can actually stand, we've got a deal to offer you. How'd you like to get your hands on all the juicy Chūnin Exam info in the proctors' possession?"
"This may shock you, Gōketsu, but some of us do not have large empty spaces in the cavities between our ears. Of course I've tried to locate the proctors' information repository using the Byakugan. Do you have any idea how large this sorry excuse for a village is, or how many concealed shinobi facilities of unclear purpose it contains?"
"Why, Hyūga, I always knew you were a bonehead, but I had no idea it was literal. Just as well that my team went and took the trouble to find Proctor HQ ourselves."
"You see?" Rock Lee asked Keiko. "Neji and your brother complete each other as perfectly as you and Tenten do, to say nothing of me and Hazō. Isn't it beautiful?"
"When it comes, your destruction will be both unexpected and excruciatingly thorough," Keiko said in the level, disinterested voice she used when totalling up the inventory.
"It is most unyouthful to strike here," Tenten added cryptically, tapping her kunai holster.
Hazō and Noburi looked at her blankly while Hyūga and Keiko gave simultaneous approving nods. Hazō began to posit a conspiracy.
"Gōketsu," Hyūga finally said in a voice which bore much of the weariness of Hazō's own. "Are you proposing that, in exchange for the location of Proctor HQ and such sundry assistance as may be necessary to investigate it, I share any discoveries with your team, thereby giving us both a significant advantage in the remaining events?"
"That's the idea," Hazō said before Noburi could drag Hyūga back into verbal sparring. "I don't know your range, but if you need to, we'd also be prepared to dig you a tunnel so you can get close without being seen by the guards."
Hyūga looked uncharacteristically serious. "The amount of information I'd be able to extract in practice would be quite limited compared to what you are doubtless imagining. Also, if we get caught, the risks of reminding Mist that they have Hyūga spying on their territory are significant. They could claim we were after actual state secrets and expel us from the Exam. This is one reason why I have had to be judicious in the Byakugan's use despite certain imbeciles' constant prodding."
"We're prepared to sweeten the deal," Hazō said. "We can offer you a few seals that you'd have no other way of getting right now, or we can use some of the time we've got until the next event on your behalf…"
Hyūga beckoned his teammates for a private discussion for a couple of minutes.
"Agreed. In exchange for our cooperation, you will arrange a major diversion for us at a place and time we specify, lasting for at least half an hour."
"A major diversion? Why?"
"That's nothing for you to concern yourself with."
Hyūga was unmistakably up to something, or planning to be up to something. On the other hand, creating a diversion was not in itself dangerous, as long as they were sensible about it. Besides, Hazō was forced to admit that it was a task ideally suited to Team Uplift.
"In addition, you will not share any information gained with others."
That was more of a sticking point. Hyūga was denying them the use of a very valuable bargaining chip, as well as an opportunity to help other Leaf teams should they decide to do so.
"What about Nara et cetera?"
"Doubly so. Do you have no concept of how dangerous the other elite Leaf teams are? There is a reason that the proctor prioritised ensuring their elimination earlier."
Team Gōketsu exchanged glances. After a long pause, there was a mutual nod.
But before Hazō could accede, Keiko intervened.
"The non-sharing clause will be mutually binding. You may not share the information either."
Oh, duh. Hazō couldn't believe he'd nearly forgot. Otherwise there'd be nothing stopping Team Gai from using the information to negotiate with other teams, selling it whenever they thought it would give them an overall advantage, and thereby also reducing Team Gōketsu's advantage each time.
Hyūga gave Keiko a hostile look, with no impact whatsoever. "Fine. You help us get the information, we share it, it goes no further. Plus the distraction."
"Deal."
-o-
"Out! Out, treacherous deceivers! Go back and tell your secret police masters that Kawarai Taiyoku is a loyal citizen who will not fall for your diabolical entrapments!"
One of goons in Leaf uniforms raised his hands. Taiyoku nearly made a break for the rear exit before he realised that it was meant to be a placating gesture.
"Chill, dude. We're not with the secret police. Even they aren't going to be hunting for sympathisers when the freaking Hokage is in town."
Taiyoku snorted. This wasn't his first fishing trip.
"You and I both know it's the perfect time. The Chūnin Exam is always when the village is flooded with spies and all the would-be defectors come out of the woodwork. Well, I'm not one of them, so you can kindly leave my establishment and take your subversive mission with you."
Another goon sighed. "We're not trying to offer you a subversive mission… sir. We actually are—"
There was a meaningful cough from one of the others.
"—here on behalf of the Gōketsu Clan. The Hokage's birthday is coming up, a verifiable fact, and we just want to give him a birthday present. Now if you feel your skills aren't up to the task, that's perfectly fine and we'll go elsewhere, but please don't assume this request isn't genuine."
Taiyoku looked down again at the sketch he'd been presented with: the Hidden Leaf symbol, with the first character of the Hokage's clan name embedded into it. Only last year, they'd caught and executed four Leaf sympathisers in this district alone, and he still had vivid memories of what they'd done to that one commoner ninja who'd turned out to be a Leaf spy. IF anyone, anyone found out he'd made something like this…
But then there were the bills. The merciless, gruesome bills. The Leaf ninja must have known he was desperate. Why else would they have come to him instead of the snooty silversmiths up in the merchant district, with their fancy licenses, and guild memberships, and regular clients who bought jewellery for people they were actually married to?
The third goon, a girl who'd been silent until now, spoke up.
"Please do not assume us unsympathetic to your situation, sir. It is most laudable that you should hold so steadfastly to your convictions. I hope that said convictions aid you with your business when the current negotiations are complete and every other silversmith is taking advantage of unrestricted Leaf-Mist trade. The Hokage and Leaf's ruling clan will, of course, have to find a different establishment to patronise for their exotic foreign jewellery needs."
Aargh. Right in the money pouch.
"That's nice and all," Taiyoku said reluctantly, "but negotiations are finicky things. Suppose they go south the way such things usually do, and then I'm left selling things to an enemy of the state?"
"Are you aware that one of the Gōketsu Clan's core members is the Mizukage's nephew? Even supposing that she were to prosecute local craftsmen for dealing with Leaf during the Chūnin Exam, in which event she would surely depopulate half the merchant district, she would certainly avoid targeting his business contacts lest the implication of dishonourable behaviour on his part rebound onto her own reputation."
The Mizukage's nephew was the Hokage's son? How did that…? No, best not to think about it. Politics made no sense at the best of times, and a commoner like him sticking his nose into the Mizukage's business should expect to find it cut off, together with his ears and other valuable but ultimately non-vital parts of his anatomy.
The whole thing could pay off magnificently, or it could be suicide. It would be a major gamble, and the last time Taiyoku had taken a major gamble… well, he was still paying for that casino trip, once a month on the dot for what might end up being the rest of his life.
Then again, that was all the more reason why he needed the money. If this was a real sale, it was going to be a big one. Everyone knew the Hokage had ill-gotten gains coming out of his ears, seized from the helpless populace under flimsy excuses, with those who held out being falsely denounced as enemies of the state and executed for no crime at all. It was just one of many reasons why Leaf was the enemy of all right-thinking people.
"Twenty thousand ryō up front," he said.
None of the Leaf goons showed any sign of shock, which only confirmed his suspicions about their enviable sickening wealth.
They exchanged glances, then the female one stepped forward.
"A simple piece like this? Why, in Leaf I could find any number of craftsmen capable of making it for two thousand at most."
"If Leaf craftsmen undercharge for their wares—which of course they do, who'd charge the ruling clan full price?—that's no concern of mine. Feel free to go back to Leaf and get your order there. Oh, wait, you can't leave in mid-exam, can you?"
He watched for hints of dismay on her face, but there was only an eerie blankness there.
"If you feel that a mere necklace is so challenging as to require astronomical sums in compensation, this speaks poorly of your skill. Perhaps we should take our business elsewhere."
"Good luck with that," Taiyoku smirked, taking another major gamble. "Nobody comes to my shop unless they have nowhere else they can go. I'm betting any 'reputable' jeweller in Mist has already refused to touch this little treason bomb."
The goon shrugged. "We are not particularly set on the necklace. If we are unable to obtain a reasonable price here—say, four thousand ryō, in recognition of your complicated circumstances—we will simply abandon it in favour of a different kind of present."
"Twelve thousand, and I'll throw in a carved box for the thing."
The goon fixed him with the cool stare of a woman who knew the exact day and hour of his death.
"Six thousand. Final offer."
Six thousand. Not bad, truth be told. Not the jackpot he'd been hoping for, but a sale was a sale, assuming this really wasn't a secret test that would end with a public execution.
"Done. Pay up."
The goon shook her head. "Payment on delivery."
He locked gazes with her, but it was a futile endeavour from the start. With that demeanour, she was probably Leaf T&I.
"Fine," he growled a second later. "Come back in two weeks and I'll have it ready for you."
The goons exchanged alarmed glances at this.
"Two weeks?"
Yes, it was as Taiyoku had suspected. Ruling clan children in their ivory towers, knowing nothing of the effort the common folk went to in order to live their lives.
"We require it by the tenth."
"I'm sorry, what?"
"The tenth. We will be prepared to provide reasonable compensation for the shortened deadline."
"The tenth," Taiyoku repeated slowly. "A present worthy of a Kage by the tenth." These people couldn't ever have done a day's work in their lives. He was almost tempted to laugh at them and kick them out of the shop (the fact that they were ninja who could probably break him in half with their little finger nothwithstanding). Almost. But then he remembered that it was going to be time for the next payment soon.
"Fifteen thousand," he said after taking a moment to figure out whether it was possible at all. "Half now, half on delivery."
"I remind you that we are under no—"
"You've left your shopping until the last minute, haven't you? I can tell you now that nobody is going to make any personalised gift worth a damn for you in time for that kind of deadline, even if wasn't borderline treasonous. Assuming I'm kind enough to take this on, that's no food or sleep for me for the next three days."
"Fifteen thousand," one of the other goons said, apparently to himself. "That's a lot of seals."
"I don't accept chakra beast parts in payment. Not after what happened to poor Kinshirō."
"That wasn't—never mind. We'll take it."
"Good. Now hand over the money and get out. I need to start work straight away."
Taiyoku started thinking about the proportions for the necklace's silver chain (and resisting the temptation to make it tight enough to strangle the Hokage), even as his imagination painted iron ones around his hands and feet.
-o-
Sunset approached rapidly, and Team Gōketsu, currently disguised as Leaf Team Fifteen, were on their way to meet up with Team Gai. So far the day had passed without ambushes, deadly ninja battles or proctors stopping them to inform them that they had broken some massive rule and had to be penalised, though several times they'd felt somebody watching them (by now a sensation as familiar as breathing). At present, Hazō and Noburi were discussing anti-Yamamoto (pro-Yamamoto?) strategy, undermined by the fact that Yamamoto had been coldly professional towards Noburi throughout their conversation. Noburi thought he might have been expecting some kind of manipulation attempt, and therefore taken care to give away nothing.
The point at which problems arose was when the team reached a condemned area on the outskirts of Mist, a sparsely populated area known to Mist ninja (and only to Mist ninja) as an ideal rendezvous spot for shinobi up to no good. Being more familiar with the terrain, they had inevitably arrived early, while Team Gai was not yet anywhere to be seen.
"Three people," Keiko said under her breath. "Directly behind us."
The team whirled around instantly to find three ninja in ready stances. One held kunai, another a sword lifted over her head, and a third had his hands together in a pre-ninjutsu position.
"Drop your disguises," the leader snarled. "Now."
The original Team Fifteen looked one step away from murder.
-o-
You have earned 2 XP.
-o-
You reached your yakuza contact, only to learn that he had just been about to send a messenger for you. The Oyabun would appreciate it if you were to grant him the pleasure of your company in his office tomorrow at sunset. He specified wanting to meet all three of you.
After some discussion, you've decided that an exotic Seventh Path object would make an excellent gift. Alcohol is too predictable. A Leaf book could be interesting and would be a reminder of your noteworthy origins, but you're not exactly in a convenient position to get any. On the other hand, a pangolin artwork would possess great symbolic value, being unique, intriguing, and a reminder of your extraordinary powers.
Noburi thinks the yakuza will want the use of Leaf's diplomatic abilities to secure some kind of advantage in the new status quo the two Kage are hashing out. Helpful legislation, maybe, or something that will give them leverage in dealing with their Fire counterparts (with whom they're almost certainly in touch after at least eighty years of coexistence and however many more years yakuza were around for before that). Or it could simply be an introductory meeting to secure goodwill with the clan and get the team's measure.
Keiko thinks the yakuza will want the use of Jiraiya's spy network for something they are unable or unwilling to hire Mist ninja for, whether because Jiraiya's network can do things Mist's can't or because there's something they don't want to be traceable back to them via Mist contacts. It could even just be a test to establish how well it performs, so as to know whether they can rely on it for future deals.
You have yet to commiserate with Shikamaru. You think he looks slightly more annoyed at the world than before, but any change in his demeanour is eclipsed by Ino's barely-suppressed rage.
-o-
What do you do?
Voting closes on Saturday 28th of April, 3 pm New York Time.
Hazou and Noburi slid smoothly into more open body language, raising hands out to their sides in a gesture of non-threat. Keiko remained tense, as did the ninja facing them.
"So... anybody up for a ceiling race?" Hazou asked.
The ninja who sure looked like Team Fifteen relaxed marginally. The kunai-wielder, an Inuzuka, obstinately maintained a half-snarl on her red-marked face.
"I'll do you one better and race you on the sky," the swordswoman replied steadily, completing one of the Leaf countersigns.
Shoot, what's her name? Ichimaru? Ishimaru? Ishimura? Hazou cursed inwardly and hoped Noburi would pick up that particular bit of social slack. Satisfied that at the very least these were Leaf nin, he dispelled his disguise. Noburi followed a moment later, as did Keiko, after a slightly longer hesitation and a Look at Hazou.
Inuzuka's scowl deepened, and looks of confusion flitted across the faces of the other two.
"Is cavorting around town in others' faces without permission normal in Mist? I always felt it was in pretty poor taste," the guy who'd been prepping a jutsu, a Sarutobi if Hazou remembered right, inquired.
"And poor smell," Inuzuka growled.
Ishi-whatever rolled her eyes. "I bet you'd survive not making that joke for once in your life."
"Maybe, but why take the chance, right?" Noburi cut in smoothly, grinning between the two girls. Inuzuka started nodding and then seemed to catch herself.
"Our sincerest apologies," Hazou followed up quickly. "We thought disguising ourselves as another Leaf team would be a way to avoid the target that got painted on our backs at the end of the last event, and to avoid getting prices jacked up while we were shopping for a birthday gift for our father, without causing some international kerfuffle if our henges were popped during our outing. I give you my solemn word as a representative of Clan Gouketsu that we have done nothing that would reflect poorly on yourselves, your clans, or on our village."
"Way to kill the relaxed atmosphere, bro," Noburi stage-whispered, elbowing Hazou lightly in the ribs.
"Sorry," he replied with a grimace. "Wanted to get that out of the way." He turned back to the other team. "And sorry for not asking your permission. It's obvious in hindsight."
Team Fifteen looked between one another. This clearly hadn't gone the way they anticipated. After several moments, Sarutobi turned back to Team Uplift. "Look, we appreciate your forthrightness in apologizing, but we're not especially comfortable leaving it at just words. I don't know if it's a difference in how Mist teaches its academy students or whatever, but you can't just go around in someone's henge without permission."
"I… see," Hazou said slowly, mulling that over. "Would a more material form of apology be appropriate, in your view?"
"It might."
Keiko spoke up for the first time. "This all assumes, of course, that you really are the team in question, and have not yourselves adopted their guises to extract unwarranted concessions from us."
In response, Inuzuka dropped one of her kunai. In a puff of smoke, it expanded into a handsome black dog with a stunted snout and bright yellow eyes. "Good enough?"
"Unfortunately, no, as there are more than one Inuzuka clan member present in the city. Would you all be willing to show that you are not henged?"
In short order Team Fifteen verified that they were, in fact, Team Fifteen, and Keiko...
Keiko vs Sarutobi: Fair Success vs Sarutobi
...managed to talk them down to taking a trio of explosive tags each as an apology gift. Then all that was left to do was wait for Team Gai to arrive.
-o-
"There are blatant decoy documents on a couple of the desks of more important-looking offices, so hopefully that means we can eliminate a mathematics and history test as an event, at least," Hyuuga reported with a smirk. That drew some snickers and snorts from the otherwise largely silent assembly, including from Hazou, though Keiko pouted a bit. A written test for the chuunin exams? You'd have to be an idiot to fall for that one. "Give me a moment to try and parse out a couple of the more securely-stored scrolls. It's difficult to read read multiple overlapping layers of text that are wrapped in a spiral, even for me."
The pair of teams was huddled in an alleyway at a surprisingly long distance from the nondescript building Panashe had identified as the proctors' hub - Hazou made a mental note to spend some time being extra worried about the range of the Byakugan in the near future. He had been surprised by the level of professionalism Hyuuga and Lee had brought to the operation. Even Noburi was behaving himself - no pointless antagonism or ribbing, just business.
Hyuuga cut through Hazou's musing. "No, no, these are all inconsistent. Some of them might be revisions or different versions of the same plan, but they aren't marked by date or organized in a coherent way. Suggestions for a city-wide battle royale, simultaneous wilderness escort and assassination missions, races and other athletic competitions..."
"Any other options?" Keiko asked quietly.
"None that are obvious. But…" Hyuuga hesitated, frowning. "There's a storage seal in a pile of logistics papers in one of the offices on the second floor, rather than in the actual storage room. It might, perhaps, be nothing, but it may have more sensitive papers."
"Fabulous. So, to clarify, if we want them, we have to break in?" Noburi asked.
The veins around Hyuuga's forehead began to subside, and he reached up to massage his temples. "For once, Gouketsu, we appear to be on the same page."
You have earned 1 XP, due to the shortness of the time covered.
Planning Suggestions:
Do you attempt to break into the Proctor HQ immediately? If so, how?
If not, what do you try to accomplish during the coming day, and how do you approach the Yakuza meeting at sunset? Be sure to keep in mind your teammates' perspectives:
Noburi thinks the yakuza will want the use of Leaf's diplomatic abilities to secure some kind of advantage in the new status quo the two Kage are hashing out. Helpful legislation, maybe, or something that will give them leverage in dealing with their Fire counterparts (with whom they're almost certainly in touch after at least eighty years of coexistence and however many more years yakuza were around for before that). Or it could simply be an introductory meeting to secure goodwill with the clan and get the team's measure.
Keiko thinks the yakuza will want the use of Jiraiya's spy network for something they are unable or unwilling to hire Mist ninja for, whether because Jiraiya's network can do things Mist's can't or because there's something they don't want to be traceable back to them via Mist contacts. It could even just be a test to establish how well it performs, so as to know whether they can rely on it for future deals.
"Fabulous. So, to clarify, if we want them, we have to break in?" Noburi asked.
The veins around Hyūga's forehead began to subside, and he reached up to massage his temples. "For once, Gōketsu, we appear to be on the same page."
Hazō raised his hand in a stopping motion. "I don't think I'm even reading the same book. That's a full-scale infiltration you're talking about."
Hyūga raised an eyebrow condescendingly. "You're pulling out now, Gōketsu? I thought this plan seemed too bold for the man who spent one event cowering behind thick walls and another running to safety as soon as his minimal objective was fulfilled."
Hazō was about to call Hyūga out on his hypocrisy, but before he could open his mouth, the master took his appointed seat.
"You may be right, Hyūga," Noburi said with an innocent smile. "We hardly took any risks, and we willingly gave up a lot of opportunities to earn extra points. In which case the fact that we beat your score by miles anyway must say a lot more about you than it does about us."
While Neji gritted his teeth, Rock Lee just laughed.
"It's a shame," he said. "What could possibly be more youthful than a joint adventure with our eternal rivals?"
"Not getting caught and disqualified, for a start," Hazō said. "We're not talking a clever attempt to leverage our unique advantages anymore. We're talking infiltrating a heavily-guarded secure site, with proctors doing actual work that makes their movements unpredictable. For all we know, they expect somebody to try a trick exactly like this. Not to mention that the scroll could easily be a decoy, or simply a random storage scroll that has nothing to do with the next event. It's a big and unnecessary risk, with the potential to be disqualified, cause an international crisis or who knows what else, all for information that there are plenty of other ways to get."
Keiko and Tenten nodded simultaneously, then caught each other's eyes.
Noburi winced. "Way to stop us having any fun ever, Hazō. But I take your point. This whole idea was based on swallowing our pride, and our good taste, and our sense of smell, all in order to borrow Hyūga's powers and cheat the system.
"No offence to you, Rock Lee, Tenten. You guys are cool.
"But Hazō makes a decent case, and anything that's got Keiko's seal of approval is worth taking seriously. So yeah, I guess we're stepping down, and frankly, maybe you should think about doing the same."
"The last thing I need from you is your concern, Gōketsu," Hyūga sneered. "Maybe cowardice was a valuable survival trait while you were a missing-nin cowering at shadows in the night, but don't you think it's past time you started learning how to act like a real Leaf ninja?"
"You mean you're going ahead with this?" Hazō asked. "Even on your own?"
"That's none of your concern at this point."
Then Hyūga frowned as if briefly wrestling with himself. "I concede that your original plan had its merits, and you were wise to come to us with it," he said tensely.
"But now," he relaxed again, at least insofar as Hyūga ever relaxed, "we're done cooperating. Next time we face each other, it will be as rivals."
Rock Lee beamed. "Finally! Neji, I knew sooner or later you'd stop abstaining and allow yourself to be penetrated by the Power of Youth!"
Hyūga gave him a despairing look.
"Allow me to rephrase," he said. "Next time we face each other, it will be as opponents in a competitive examination. A member of the Hyūga Clan has no rivals.
"Especially not the likes of you," he added, looking pointedly at Noburi.
"Don't worry, Hyūga," Noburi said. "I know the genin-chūnin gap can feel big, but I promise I'll still accept your challenges after I get promoted, and it's not like you won't catch up eventually."
There was a shared four-person eye roll, and then Hazō dragged Noburi away before those two could get into full flow.
-o-
"The Oyabun will see you now."
Contrary to expectations, the Oyabun's office was not in the darkest, most sinister part of the village—it was in a well-kept but otherwise unremarkable building next to the Artisans' Guild headquarters. Its entrance was not guarded by towering, scar-faced guards with wooden clubs big enough to invite compensation jokes, but by a receptionist who scanned them with a Byakugan-tier piercing gaze before allowing them past the waiting area. Rather than screams from distant dungeons, the background noise was mostly the rustling of parchment, and once a fragment of overheard conversation about market trends in shipwrighting. Keiko speculated that the Oyabun had different offices for receiving different kinds of people, and the fact that they had been invited to this one was in itself a pre-emptive indication of the level on which he intended to deal with them.
Unlike the building, the actual office was nothing short of luxurious. The walls were panelled with a rich, dark wood, the carpet was an exotic patterned thing from some distant country, and while a chunky carved desk stood by one of the room's two windows, the Oyabun himself was lounging back on the far one of the two facing sofas that occupied the centre. He stood up as they entered.
The visual impact of the man was stunning, mostly thanks to his red-and-gold kimono, decorated with a full-size pattern of a tiger wrestling with a dragon, seeming to merge seamlessly with the tattoos visible on his collar and wrists, and all but shimmering as he moved. A dense black ponytail and oddly pale eyes formed a disorienting contrast to the panoply of colours.
Mari-sensei had drilled them on this, though ever so long ago. The guest introduced themselves before the host as an expression of respect.
"My name is Gōketsu Hazō. It's a pleasure to meet you, sir."
"Gōketsu Noburi. Thank you very much for agreeing to meet with us."
"Gōketsu Keiko. A pleasure."
The Oyabun gave a smile, revealing unusually white teeth. "My name is Asahi Teuchi. As you are, of course, aware, I serve as the present leader of the Kuronuma Group. I assure you that the pleasure is all mine. I would not have expected to meet the illustrious heirs of the Hokage face to face even if I were to live for a hundred years."
"I would like to thank you for your time," Hazō said, proffering the pangolin gift before anything else. "It is only a little thing, but I hope that it is to your liking."
The Oyabun took the item with an expression of growing curiosity. He examined it closely from all angles, turning it around in his hands several times in the fashion of an apprentice craftsman trying to analyse his master's work.
"It seems deceptively familiar at first, but looking closely, the material had a touch of the alien about it from the beginning, and was shaped in ways that greatly expanded the effect of that originally subtle difference. The result seems like any piece until observed from the correct angle, at which point a profound uniqueness reveals itself. Is this what I think it is?"
"The renowned pangolin wood carver Pandara crafted this statuette during the latter days of the Condor War," Keiko explained. "It portrays Strategos Pangasu tearing out the throat of Conea, guardian of the Condor POW camp, with his famously sharp claws. I believe it is the only item of its kind on the Human Path."
It was an inspired choice, Hazō had to admit. In addition to its rarity value (and the fact that it had been comparatively cheap to buy since Pandara had mass-produced the things to take advantage of overwhelming public demand for patriotic symbols), it was also a salient reminder that this was the kind of firepower Keiko could call upon whenever she chose.
"A gift worthy of a Kage," the Oyabun said, placing the statuette on a prominent shelf. "But where are my manners? May I offer you wine?"
Ah. This was a problem. Alcohol of any sort was a terrible idea for this kind of meeting. Not that Hazō intended on drinking enough to get drunk in the first place, but he wasn't terribly good at holding his liquor (like most ninja his age), and if he accepted, there was every chance the Oyabun would find some way of getting him drink more and more in order to put him at a disadvantage. Mari-sensei considered it a classic negotiation strategy.
At the same time, Hazō realised as he registered the Oyabun watching him carefully, refusing the offer would be a clear insult, the one thing Hazō couldn't afford to do. It was a test. It had to be a test. And the Oyabun was still watching. Was leaving this long before replying an insult in itself, like he was weighing the odds of the Oyabun poisoning him or something?
Right as he was about to open his mouth to say something, anything, the Oyabun spoke.
"If you consider wine to be too much for a first meeting, perhaps I might instead offer you some chocolate?"
"That would be very kind of you, sir," Hazō said, trying not to show any sign of the tidal wave of relief sweeping through him.
The Oyabun moved over to a cabinet to his side. His movements were smooth, flowing, almost serpent-like. Hazō got such a sense of elegance concealing raw physical power that he found it hard to believe the man wasn't a ninja.
The Oyabun placed a carved wooden box of chocolate on the small table between the two sofas, and sat down. The team followed suit.
Following the Oyabun's example, Hazō tried some of the chocolate. It was the strangest thing he'd eaten for some time. Who put spices in chocolate? It did peculiar things to the entirety of his mouth, never quite drowning out the basic bitter sweetness of the chocolate, but overlaying it with a layer of complexity his taste buds couldn't quite decipher.
"An acquired taste for some, of course," the Oyabun said as he took one for himself, briefly holding it up almost as if to inhale its fragrance. "People will avoid exposing their palate to such things for the longest time out of some misguided wariness, then after a few times, they wonder why they ever denied themselves such unalloyed pleasure. It is a tale I hear often."
"Delicious," Hazō lied.
"You flatter me. Perhaps this would be a good opportunity to thank you for your own gifts for my subordinates. I am certain that the shinobi of Mist will find them of great value. May I take it that they were made by yourself?"
Hazō nodded. If the Oyabun was asking, it was because he already knew.
"Were I born with chakra reserves," the Oyabun said contemplatively, "I think I should have liked to be a sealmaster. All shinobi have great powers, of course, but deep understanding of the underlying patterns of the world can achieve so much that pure imposition of one's will upon it can't.
"Of course, one of the paradoxes of power is that the more one gains, the more dangerous it becomes to exercise it. Something you and I have in common, don't you think?"
Hazō didn't think. Doing anything seal-related was insanely dangerous according to the Kagome school, but why would it be dangerous to use the power of the yakuza?
"You mean because if you exercise too much power you come into conflict with the ninja?" he gave his best guess.
"Just so," the Oyabun nodded. "The resulting conflict is ruinous to all parties, even those not directly involved. The case of the Earth Country demonstrates why the exercise of power must be collaborative—when each side acts on the other's behalf, imbalance is avoided and the seeds of conflict go unwatered."
Should he ask? Admitting ignorance was never good, but, thinking about it, the Nara Shikaku scenario was worse. The last thing he wanted was for the conversation to move on and leave him behind, only to be humiliated when his lack of understanding was discovered later.
"You are referring to the economic conundrum of Earth's fluctuating export levels?" Keiko asked before he could embarrass himself. "I have not heard of the Chivalrous Organisation's involvement being proposed as an explanation."
The Oyabun chuckled. "Please feel free to refer to us as the yakuza. Only a fool expects others to suspend universal patterns of thought for him alone. To speak of ourselves as the Chivalrous Organisation is something more personal, a microcosmic creed intended to remind those of us engaged in morally complex work that our power exists for more than mere survival, control or accumulation.
"In answer to your question, our former sister organisation, the Yamane Group, held strong influence over Earth mining since before the village era. Unwisely strong, perhaps, but there is no value in speculating at this late stage. Either way, the First Tsuchikage considered them to be nothing but parasites, and wished to exert total control over Earth's extraordinary mineral resources. To that end, he declared war on the Yamane.
"Needless to say, the Yamane were unprepared for the power of the united clans, and Hidden Rock eliminated them to the last man. Unfortunately, rarely has history seen a more Pyrrhic victory."
Keiko nodded. "He created a power vacuum."
"Just so. Every ambitious individual in Earth sought to rise up to take the Yamane Group's place, from the smaller rival groups it had been suppressing, to petty local hoodlums and even opportunistic foreign organisations. Every night, the Tsuchikage's forces would assassinate a hundred would-be princes of the underworld, and every day, two hundred more would rise to claim their emptied seats.
"How many shinobi could the Tsuchikage commit to keeping the peace while remaining ever on guard against credible military threats? When those shinobi's eyes were inevitably drawn away, which of a dozen competing factions could the miners rely on for protection from the rest? Whom could they trust to represent their interests in the face of greater legal and economic powers, when their chosen champion might not live to see the morrow? Of those who would claim the right to regulate the shadow markets, who had the competence and rational self-interest needed to succeed, and who would only drive them deeper into the ground?
"I'm sure I do not need to belabour the point. Rock should by rights be the wealthiest of the great hidden villages, but instead it is the poorest after Sand, and its foreign policy reflects its vulnerability. It took the Third Tsuchikage, known as Ōnoki of Both Scales for his dedication to balance in all things, to set aside his predecessors' preoccupation with shinobi being obeyed and apply his prodigious intellect to the problem from a new angle. While Earth Country politics are somewhat outside my sphere of expertise, I am given to understand that his primary obstacle at this stage is not the condition of the underworld but the conservatism of the Hidden Rock clans, who feel that allowing civilians to maintain their own public order would represent a catastrophic loss of face.
"You see therefore," the Oyabun smiled, "why it brings me unalloyed pleasure to meet with representatives of a ruling clan in the spirit of cooperation and mutual respect."
"Your assistance so far has been invaluable," Hazō said honestly. "I hope we can continue this relationship in the future."
"Likewise."
The Oyabun leaned forward a little.
"Indulge my curiosity, if you would. This tale of ideological rebels and the Will of Fire that has defined your destiny. What truly lies behind it?"
What was the right answer to that? Obviously, Hazō couldn't promote the official story here. At the same time, his earlier idea of off-the-cuff emotionally-focused explanations didn't seem like a good idea when dealing with someone like the Oyabun, who had access to unknown amounts of information and probably got a lot of practice seeing through lies and half-truths. But telling him the actual truth wasn't a winning plan either from the long-overdue perspective of operational security. Who knew what a man like him would use it for?
"We would love to," Noburi stepped in, "but information is power, and no matter what the three of us might personally feel, I think it would be disrespectful to the Hokage to give away bits of our clan's power without his permission."
The Oyabun gave Noburi a slight nod, like a chess player acknowledging a good move. "We like to say that information is currency. My predecessor in fact liked to say that everything was currency, from love to ideology to trust."
He paused.
"Though if so, he should have paid greater attention to exchange rates."
"Information on each Chūnin Exam event is progressively more difficult to obtain—not only for you but also for us, which has fascinating implications for the calibre of our opponent. I have anticipated your needs and obtained some knowledge of the Fourth Event, and I could certainly investigate the rest if that is your desire."
He must have noticed Hazō's brief flash of surprise.
"I see," he said. "Well, consider it another taste of chocolate. In the meantime, however, the best use of power is collaborative, and do you not feel that it would strengthen the bond of trust between us if I were to request a favour in return?"
"Of course," Hazō said. "We'd be happy to help you as best we can, though we don't have the authority to offer any greater clan resources without the Hokage's approval."
"Entirely acceptable," the Oyabun said. "This favour is so trivial for a man with the Hokage's resources that it would be extraordinary if he gave it more than a second's thought."
He moved back to an upright position, his warm, playful tone turning serious. His hands came together in a semicircle.
"There is a man named Goda Haruto. He is, shall we say, a prominent accountant working for our Noodle counterparts. On the 19th of September, he left Ise on a vessel named the Sunset Racer. He was headed for Ijima, where he would assess the condition of certain joint operations. The Sunset Racer never arrived, in Ijima or anywhere else.
"For obvious reasons, we have been unable to purchase a Mist investigation mission. The Nettō Association's own search also has yet to bear fruit. On the other hand, the Hokage's information network is a thing of legend, and of course in this case there is no conflict of interest involved. It should be a trivial task to locate Goda and eliminate his kidnappers, or at minimum provide their identities and locations. If he has been murdered, we would like his body retrieved, together with the ledger that he always carries on his person. The details are in this scroll." He drew a scroll out of a sleeve and handed it to Hazō.
Hazō couldn't let his voice shake. The Oyabun would notice.
"If his ship disappeared, what makes you think it wasn't a chakra monster attack?" Noburi asked in an admirably casual tone.
"His bodyguards," the Oyabun explained. "They were two fine Noodle shinobi, with the skill and equipment to eliminate any ordinary sea monster or to carry Goda—a small man—to safety if the situation called for it. Besides, for obvious reasons the Sunset Racer was travelling a known safe route."
Hazō had to abort this meeting now. The longer they spent in the Oyabun's presence, the more likely he was to notice what the mention of Goda had done to their mood. This was almost certainly the kind of meeting where they should wait for the Oyabun to dismiss them, but that level of rudeness was a small sacrifice relative to what could happen to them otherwise.
"We'll be certain to take your request directly to the Hokage, sir. And I would like to thank you very much for your hospitality."
"And the chocolate," Noburi said, mercifully shifting attention from Hazō before he began to sweat. "And the history lesson. We'd love to stay longer if we could, but it's going to be time for our daily check-in soon, and if we're late, the Hokage is going to start thinking we've been assassinated again."
"I wouldn't dream of inconveniencing the Hokage," the Oyabun agreed. "Thank you for gracing me with your company."
He pushed the chocolate box across the table. "Please feel free to take it with you. As acquired tastes go, I believe this one is well worth developing."
-o-
She places the last tag. The line from five to six draws itself into place. She watches it grow thicker, brighter, clearer in sequence with the rest. Each one its own timer.
She steps back, erased by the shadows.
Neji is diagonally across. His hemisphere both includes and ignores her. If he signals now, it will already be too late.
Why are they here?
Gōketsu had been warning them. All structure, no social. Information for its own sake. She preferred him like this. Also, he was right.
Keiko had agreed, her certainty a firm candle flame. (On that one night, for that one moment, it had been brighter than the sun.) She trusts Keiko's certainty, except about herself.
Why are they here?
There are only ever the same reasons. Neji thinks his pride is a shard of ice when it is a starving fire. Lee is Lee (she's given up on other words). She can't make other people see her world. Team Gai will never break its pattern.
First line solid, bright, snapping into place.
Detonation. Line erased.
Too late for regrets.
Causality running down the lines like fire. Second tag, third.
Fourth tag is Lee, wearing sound like camouflage. Proctor's office window. Neji's world, where perfect planning equals victory.
Fifth tag, sixth. The last line disappears. Shouting.
Stops abruptly.
The silence of professionals.
Proctors out. Arrows in flight. Known vectors, predictable trajectories. A second's peace.
The dissonance is like being shaken awake.
She watches the arrows curve past their targets.
Grains of horror pour down the hourglass.
In the plan, they move like guards looking for intruders. Arrows to explosion sites, block across the entrance.
In the world, they draw a circle. Points flicker to the rooftops for line of sight. The only words she can hear are code.
Neji is gone, saved by the hemisphere. She stays erased, because the lines of sight are a beautiful, perfect web.
A point makes a line of connection to the Mizukage's Office, ending everything.
She smiles a broken smile as she learns that Hidden Mist has no code for "green spandex".
-o-
You have earned 3 XP.
-o-
It is the evening of November 8. It has been an unproductive day as Keiko's Seventh Path shopping took longer than expected and you didn't feel it was safe for just you and Noburi to go out into Mist.
What do you do?
Voting ends on Saturday the 5th of May, 9 am New York Time.
"We need to talk," Hazō said, as the team emerged onto the still-bustling street. It was well past dark but that simply meant that torches had been deployed to illuminate the goods on display at the Night Market.
"The four most terrifying words in the language when spoken by a woman," Noburi noted. "And even more so when spoken by you." The joking tone dropped away, grimness replacing it. "But, yeah. We definitely do. Not here, though."
"Not in the barracks, either," Keiko said. "Cheating eyes."
"I don't know if we're allowed out of the city," Hazō said, frowning in thought.
Noburi laughed as a thought struck him. "Got you covered. Follow me." He turned and leapt for the nearest roof, racing off across the ninja highway with his team a step behind.
o-o-o-o
The docks were dark except for the torches of those unfortunates tasked with patrolling the shore to ensure that no chakra beasts came up onto the land and rampaged destructively through the city. And that no smugglers made a profit not shared with the Mizukage.
Team Uplift waited in the shadows of a warehouse until a gap between patrols coincided with a cloud passing in front of the moon, then raced forward to the water's edge and out onto the surface of the massive half-circle bay.
Half a mile out, they stopped and crouched down, putting one hand on the surface for stability but otherwise ignoring the up-and-down motion of the water. When you'd run across a few hundred miles of the stuff, some of it forming waves ten feet high, a little bit of swell like this didn't really reach the threshold of attention. Neither did the cool air of the evening and the resulting thin blanket of mist in which it had swaddled the world.
Hazō pulled out a Silence Mine and activated it, tucking it under his forehead protector so as to leave his hands free. The area around then became muffled and quiet as though a blanket had been thrown over everything. "Not bad," he said to his adoptive brother. "Too far for the Hyūga, nowhere for a Kozu to have put an ear and no reason for them to have done it...I can't think of anyone who could spy on us out here. Good thinking."
"Well of course," Noburi said. "It's me."
Hazō's eyes rolled like dice and Keiko's exasperated expression was the stuff of legend.
"Back on topic," Noburi said. "What do we tell Jiraiya?"
Hazō shifted in thought, ignoring the slight splash that had soaked his sleeve and left it cold on his skin. "Did you guys get the feeling that the Oyabun already knows we were the ones?"
"I think it unlikely," Keiko said. "Kagome ensured that the ship went straight down with very little wreckage left on the surface, and he also widened the holes made by my pangolins in order to confuse any possibility of guessing their origin. I can imagine scenarios in which we were spotted trailing the ship, but they are beyond wildly improbable. Try as I might, I cannot think of a way that anyone would have sufficient data to be certain that we did it."
Hazō started to breathe a sigh of relief, never having been happier to be wrong.
"No, I believe he merely has a strong suspicion."
Hazō glowered at Keiko's completely innocent expression. "You did that on purpose, didn't you?" he grumbled.
"I have no idea what you mean," Keiko said, her voice a model of wounded innocence that fooled no one. "In seriousness, he must consider Leaf a serious candidate.
"Killing or capturing Goda required three things: intelligence regarding his route and schedule, military capacity, and motivation. The intelligence was only available to those with assets onsite—the ship carried no commercial cargo, only Goda and his team, meaning that it was a charter with no fixed route. There was no reason for Goda to tell anyone what his itinerary was more than one leg in advance, so only someone in Ise could obtain that information." She paused. "I suppose it's possible that he had a fixed route assigned to him by his superiors and the information could have leaked from that end. It seems far more likely, however, that he was given a series of places to stop and then allowed to determine his own route and schedule. He certainly felt free to change the schedule—Noburi, you told us that he was originally supposed to depart a day earlier than he did, but he chose to delay in order to obtain a bit of personal cargo. Under those circumstances, it seems likely that he chose his own route, and therefore agents would have needed to be in Ise to discover his next move."
"Sure," Noburi said. "But Noodle has always been a chewtoy caught between Leaf and Mist. I'm sure that every nation has some intelligence operatives there, just to keep an eye on the geopolitics."
"Perhaps," Keiko admitted. "However, that brings us to the question of military capability. There was a significant escort attached to Goda—fifteen civilian guards and two chūnin-class ninja. Only a ninja force could hope to defeat such an escort, and it would need to be powerful in order to be sure of success—perhaps four chūnin or a jōnin with backup. Such a group would not be kept permanently on station at Ise, so they would have needed to be sent for. That means that the only people who could have killed Goda are those who have intelligence agents in Ise and are close enough that a message could get to them and a squad get back within about a week.
"Then we get to the topic of motive. Who benefits from capturing or killing Goda? Various Yakuza groups—anyone who was concerned about his upcoming audit, for example. Perhaps merchant groups who could make money off the trade information he must have had. Neither of those would have a standing ninja force; perhaps they could have hired one in time, but that's dubious.
"So far as nations go, the only clear motive would be a very time-sensitive intelligence need that was so important as to warrant sledgehammer tactics...such as finding a missing jinchūriki. There are other potential motives, but those seem like the most likely.
"In summary, we are looking for a group that has an intelligence service, some of whose operatives are in Ise, who is able to get a message back to their base in a short time frame, and can dispatch a powerful strike team on little or no notice."
The boys thought about that for a moment.
"Well, when you put it like that..." Hazō said.
"So, what do we tell Jiraiya?" Noburi asked.
"Everything, obviously," Keiko said, frowning.
Noburi shook his head. "Not what I meant. You've seen him; he's so exhausted he can barely see straight and he's holding things together with his fingernails. Yeah, we bring him all the information, but we should also have analysis and recommendations to go with it. Don't make him do all the work. So, what do we tell him?"
Noburi and Keiko immediately looked at Hazō.
Hazō sighed. "Okay," he said, thinking. "I don't think we can simply stonewall the Oyabun. He saw that we were uncomfortable, and that would have added to his suspicion. We want him to work with us in the future, and outright lying or refusing the request isn't going to help that. We need to tell at least part of the truth." He paused to think.
"Honestly, I'm tempted to come clean," he said carefully. "It's probably not feasible politically, but it would be great if we could just be honest and admit what we did. Goda wasn't from Mist, so the Oyabun has no face at stake as far as we know. Given that, being open about the fact that we did this and we regret it would suggest a bunch of things that seem useful to get across: That we really do care about civilians. That we are self-aware and humble enough to admit a mistake. That the three of us are physically powerful. That we were able to talk Jiraiya into letting us reveal this, thereby showing that the Hokage trusts us despite our age.
"On the other hand, it might be too much. In which case...maybe Jiraiya sends a written response with a few hidden phrases that reveal what happened but not too much? It would answer the question but let us keep plausible deniability."
Noburi shifted his weight as a particularly large wave went under him. "I don't know about that openness thing," he said carefully. "It seems like it leaves us too exposed. Keiko, you said that Mist and Leaf are the most likely candidates. Can't we throw it on Mist's front step?" He shrugged. "Regardless, we're going to have some time. If we didn't already know the answer then it would take at least a few weeks for the orders to get out into the network, the agents to find anything, and word to come back. Possibly even months."
"Okay," Hazō said. "What about this, then? Let's suggest that...."
o-o-o-o
"Well, ain't that a kick in the head?" Jiraiya muttered to himself once Kei finished her report. He sighed and rubbed his face.
"Tea, Summoners?" asked a child-sized pangolin wearing a purple hakama, offering a tray with two steaming cups of green tea.
"Thank you, Pantrei," Jiraiya said, smiling at the creature and lifting one of the cups to his lips. "I appreciate it. The hospitality of your embassy does us honor."
Kei took the other cup and gave Pantrei a smile and nod of her own. (Smiles help, Kei.) "Thank you, Pantrei. As Jiraiya says, your hospitality is much appreciated."
The pangolin's mouth gaped open and his tongue flicked out in a manidaen smile. "Thank you, Summoners," it said, its weight shifting between its feet in a pleased jig.
Jiraiya took another sip, still keeping the polite smile on his face as he watched the young pangolin. After a moment, he said, "I think we're probably set for now."
"Oh! Right! Sorry, sir," Pantrei said, eyes going wide. "Call if you need anything!" He turned and scuttled away, the combination of speed and the hunched-over pangolin gait causing him to sway like a drunken sailor.
"Cute kid," Jiraiya said as he watched their server leave. "Anyway, where were we...? Ah, right. First, good job bringing this to me straight off, and good job with the report. You analyzed the situation nicely and put together a concise summary of the relevant factors. I'm impressed."
Kei blinked in surprise. She had been expecting a dismissive laugh, perhaps a terse acknowledgement while Jiraiya disappeared into his thoughts, but actual praise?
Jiraiya's eyes unfocused in thought; he leaned back in his chair and crossed his legs, right ankle on left knee. One hand drummed on the table while the other held his cup. Kei waited silently, not wanting to make a mistake now.
"You guys are right that we can't afford to be open," Jiraiya said after a moment, uncrossing his legs and leaning forward again, setting the tea aside. "I'll send him a message with the answer; it's okay to meet with him again, but if he brings this up again, refer further discussion to me.
"Now, so that we're on the same page, here's what I'm going to tell him: My network notified me when Goda arrived in Ise and I sent a team to capture him, because I was desperate to find information on Akatsuki. What I didn't know was that Mist was already in town, doing the same thing for the same reason. I don't know for certain, but my best estimate is that they had penetrated my network, rolling up one of my local subcommanders and working out from there. The team I sent to get Goda was jumped and mauled, meaning we had to abort the operation. The information breach in Ise rippled out and shredded the entire eastern side of my network, leaving me with almost no assets in Water. If Goda's gone, that means Mist must have both him and the ledger. You were part of the cleanup efforts; you know the things I've just said but nothing beyond that. Got it?"
Kei nodded slowly, watching in awe as the patterns clicked into place in her mind like shogi pieces on the board. The story was almost entirely true, the addition of Mist being the only falsehood, but that one addition served to completely recast events. Jiraiya was turning the Yakuza into a spear to throw at the Mizukage, as well as providing the Yakuza with an opportunity for them to ask him if they could become his intelligence operatives. And it was all wrapped up in a mildly embarrassing admission, causing Jiraiya to lose some face and thereby make the whole thing seem more believable.
"Yes sir," she said. "I understand. To confirm, you have no problem with us interacting with the Yakuza in future?"
Jiraiya shook his head. "It should be fine. I'll make a point of telling the Oyabun that he's welcome to reach out to me directly if he needs any other information—much more efficient than passing messages through a genin team, after all. He'll understand that it's a warn-off from trying to suck high-level information out of you guys and that he should stick with more immediate topics." He thought for a moment, rubbing one hand across his chin. "Yeah, that should do it. Any further questions?"
"No, sir."
"Good!" He pushed himself to his feet; his hand moved as though to clap her on the shoulder and Kei fought not to flinch. The motion transitioned with almost-perfect smoothness into picking up his cup from the table and knocking back the last of its contents.
"Good job, Keiko," said Jiraiya quietly. "All three of you. Now, go kick some ass!" He gave her a firm nod and vanished from the Seventh Path.
Keiko set down her untouched cup of tea and went to thank the embassy staff before taking her own leave.
XP AWARD: 1
FP AWARD: 0
Vote time! What to do now?
Voting ends on Wednesday, May 9, 2018, at 12pm London time.
If it wasn't for her vivid brown eyes, Hazō would have sworn that the Oyabun's receptionist was a Hyūga. She had the perfect combination of a gaze that seemed to penetrate his very being and a look in her eyes that indicated how unimpressed she was at what she found. Was Hyūga Hiashi currently married?
"We don't have an appointment," Hazō said.
The receptionist considered him as if she was trying to decide whether he was worth the effort of setting on fire.
"Name?" she finally demanded.
Hazō blinked. They were here only yesterday. Surely the Oyabun wouldn't hire staff with such a poor memory?
Then it occurred to him that he himself had, only earlier that morning, bought the right to wear another ninja's face, and his respect for the woman went up considerably.
"Gōketsu Hazō, Keiko and Noburi."
"Take a seat," the woman said briskly, then beckoned a guard over and said something to him in a low voice. The man left, presumably to inform the Oyabun of their arrival. Hazō wished he'd made arrangements for the second meeting in advance, perhaps if he hadn't been in such a hurry at the end of the first. On the other hand they didn't have much time left before the next event, and the Oyabun would surely be lenient since he was expecting them to be carrying Jiraiya's response.
Ten minutes passed, then twenty.
"The Oyabun will see you now," the receptionist said. The fact that the statement came apparently out of nowhere made it seem like she and her employer had some kind of telepathic link.
But to the team's surprise, the Oyabun's office was already occupied. A very pale man sat in a chair in front of the Oyabun's desk. His hands trembled as they clutched a sheet of parchment as if it was digging into them with unseen hooks.
"Oh," Hazō said. "I'm sorry, I didn't realise you were still busy. The receptionist—"
"Not at all," the Oyabun said. "Mr Horii was just leaving."
There was a choked intake of breath from the pale man.
"No, please, sir, if you just give me another chance I swear I can repay—"
"Mr Horii." The Oyabun's voice was soft, but it silenced the man instantly. "This is no longer a matter of debt. All debts between gentlemen are settled in time. As you have seen fit to discard that rank, however, you no longer possess its attendant privileges.
"Kindly do not trespass upon my patience any further. My representatives will find you when you are next wanted."
The man stuttered something incoherent, gave a deep but very quick bow, and then fled as if a thousand hungry ghosts were clawing at his back.
The Oyabun rose from behind his desk. "I do apologise for that unsightly display. It is too often the case that men who rise too rapidly in station grow conceited, and come to believe that they are capable of deceiving the Chivalrous Organisation without consequences.
"Please, allow me to help you cleanse your palate. Has the taste of the chocolate grown on you yet?"
"Thank you, sir," Noburi replied before Hazō could come up with an answer that was both honest and polite. "It's not as strong as the kind we're used to back in Leaf, but still enjoyable in its own way."
The Oyabun chuckled as he placed another box of chocolate on the table between the sofas and beckoned them to sit down.
"Leaf is known for importing the best of everything," he said, "even by the most unusual routes. What will it be known for exporting, I wonder, and to whom?"
He took a chocolate and broke it in two parts with his fingertips, then three, before eating it.
"Tell me, do you bring the Hokage's response to my request?"
"Yes, sir. He said he'll be sending a messenger to you himself, and would appreciate it if any further discussion on the subject took place with him directly."
"How delightful," the Oyabun said with what seemed to be heartfelt appreciation.
He noted the team's puzzled looks.
"I only considered it an outside chance that the Hokage would already have the answer to my question, and now I regret ever underestimating him."
"What makes you think he already has the answer?" Hazō asked warily.
"There would be no need for a separate messenger if his answer were merely 'Yes, I will investigate' or 'No, I cannot do this for you'," the Oyabun said as if it was the height of obviousness. "A more interesting question would be why the Hokage has chosen to remove you from dealing with this matter, but it would be discourteous to speculate. Instead, if you would hand me back the Goda scroll so that we may move on?"
"I apologise," Keiko said with the immediacy of a snapping trap, "but we are no longer in possession of that item, having of course passed it on to the Hokage. If you wish, we can request its return when we next report to him."
"No need," the Oyabun smiled. "On reflection, it was an unnecessary request. Allow me to waste no more of your time. You wish to learn of the fourth event?"
"Yes, sir," Hazō said. "We'd also be interested in any dossiers you can provide us with on the top remaining teams."
The Oyabun's hands came together in a semicircle.
"The Mizukage's Office has rented Nari Manor and its grounds from the 11th to the 13th of this month. Master Sumashi, head of the family and a good friend of the Chivalrous Organisation, claims that he was fairly compensated, but given no right of refusal. Considering that the reservation was made a few months in advance…"
Hazō nodded.
"That is all I can offer you on that front, I fear. If any special equipment has been ordered for the event, it has not come to my attention, and no information has been made available to the public the way it was for the third.
"As to dossiers. Certain sources refer to ten teams as being particularly worthy of note. The first of these is, of course, Team Gōketsu, and while I imagine I could tell you some very interesting things about yourselves, that is not our purpose today. The third has likewise been announced, and I imagine you know far more about them than I. For the rest, I do not have access to exact point totals, of course—one would have to infiltrate the proctors' headquarters for that kind of information—but I can make reasonable inferences as to their identities.
"For obvious reasons, there are four I cannot name. However, I can provide you with basic materials on teams Kongō, Chinen, Gensō and Mugiwara, all of which have recently come to my attention through their extraordinary performance in the last event."
He drew a slim scroll from a sleeve and passed it to Hazō.
"Thank you, sir. We will be sure to repay your kindness."
"I do not doubt it," the Oyabun said. "On a related note of mutual benefit, there is one more team which might benefit from your detailed attention."
"Which one is that?"
"They are known, in defiance of all good taste, as Team Bloodrage."
Team Bloodrage? Why would the Oyabun think for a moment that they'd be interested in Team Bloodrage?
No, the Oyabun said nothing without a good reason. (Which was in itself alarming, given that a lot of the time Hazō couldn't figure out what that reason was.)
"Team Bloodrage have been eliminated," Keiko observed. "Their further activities should be of no relevance to the Chūnin Exam. Do you expect them to violate the non-interference rules?"
"I couldn't hazard a guess as to their plans and motivations," the Oyabun replied smoothly. "But if, in observing or interacting with them, you should learn anything of interest…"
"I see," Hazō said, trying to think of anything noteworthy that Team Bloodrage had done other than being bad at strategy games and claiming they'd never heard of someone named Jashin, and coming up blank. "We'll keep it in mind.
"The other thing we wanted to talk about was communication," he remembered. "Obviously, we'd like to continue this relationship after the exams are over and we're back in Leaf. Do you have any thoughts on how best to do that?"
The Oyabun relaxed his hands as he leaned back against the sofa.
"It is not a trivial feat. Conventional messengers are slow and unreliable in a variety of ways, and of course this is not something we would entrust to Mist shinobi. The means by which you communicate with the Hokage—is it limited by distance? Or could any summoner replicate it in order to contact you securely?"
"Any summoner?" Hazō asked incredulously.
"Is that not how you check in with him, at least while in Mist?"
Hazō had no idea what to say, or how much the Oyabun actually knew. He decided to go with the safest option. "What makes you say that?"
"It is obvious from inference that all summons hail from the same place, and that summoners must possess the ability to travel there personally. On the assumption that summoners are able to encounter each other while there, it would make for an ideal secure communication route. And nobody who could plausibly have been yourselves has approached the diplomatic guest quarters since last night.
"Would it suffice for us to employ the services of a summoner to deliver messages to you via the other world, or are there other conditions that must be fulfilled?"
Hazō considered it briefly. It could work, if the summoner was from a clan with territory bordering either the Toads or the Pangolins (did Leaf have any other summons?) so they could send a runner with a message on a reasonable timescale. Oh, but that clan would have to be friendly as well, or at least neutral and open to bribes…
"It depends on the summoner," Hazō said thoughtfully. "You'd need—"
"The means of communication you propose is not viable."
Keiko's tone was unimpeachably neutral, but also a near-perfect match for Voice Ninety-Seven: I Am Carrying On As Normal Because We're In Public, But You Are In So Much Trouble When We Get Home, Young Man. Hazō suppressed a shiver.
"Hey, what about the Chivalrous Organisation in Leaf?" Noburi asked quickly. "You guys must have your own channels for dealing with underworld business."
The Oyabun shook his head regretfully. "Would that such an option were open to us. I take it the Hokage has not briefed you on the state of the Akasugi Organisation and its influence in the Fire Country."
"I'm afraid not."
The Oyabun lounged back slightly.
"Once upon a time, in what we of Water might call happier days, the entire Fire underworld was held in the unyielding grasp of a singular individual who wielded it almost as an extension of Leaf's clandestine activities. The Akasugi operated solely on his sufferance, and in the full awareness that, should they fail to perform to his specifications, they would be cast down and he would choose a more useful organisation to raise up in their stead. He had learned well the lessons of the Earth Country, you see. Some might even speculate that he contributed to maintaining its tragic status quo, though no such insinuation will ever pass my lips.
"Unfortunately, all things must end. The singular individual perished in an unfortunate accident, and the Akasugi Organisation exploited the advantageous position in which he'd placed them to trigger a process of explosive expansion. The Third Hokage, may his spirit be one with the Will of Fire forever, chose not to curb them as much as he could have, for reasons I'm certain the Fifth could explain better than I. And we of Water, who had until that point enjoyed uncontested control over certain spheres of influence, found ourselves engaged in a bitter struggle for what my complacent predecessors considered 'rightfully ours'. The impact of that struggle rippled through the other maritime powers and provoked a shadow war no less complex and vicious than the shinobi world wars you are familiar with. The aftermath redrew many boundaries, paving the way for the ascendancy of the Nettō Association, breaking the pirate lords' stranglehold over southern Tea, and having many other effects which are entirely irrelevant to you, save that it left us and the Akasugi as implacable rivals in an ironic parallel to our countries' respective villages."
"And you will have an enormous advantage over them if you can get the Hokage on your side," Hazō reasoned.
The Oyabun smiled. "All things in good time. I am not an ambitious man.
"As to communication channels, perhaps that is something for me to discuss with the Hokage. The master of the world's greatest intelligence network would certainly find it effortless to call upon the services of the underworld should he so desire.
"Now, while your company continues to bring me unalloyed pleasure, I fear I must attend to my other associates, including those whom you might not wish to note your presence here. You need not fear, of course—I would never betray the secrets of a partner in good standing."
He stood up, and walked smoothly over to a wooden cabinet set into a bookshelf, pulling open a door and studying the cabinet's unseen contents. Finally, he pulled out a bottle.
Keiko gave a barely perceptible twitch as the Oyabun presented it to the team.
"The Hokage's birthday is imminent, is it not? Please offer this to him with my compliments. Perhaps as Mist-born shinobi you can even instruct him in the history behind the brand."
"Thank you, sir," Hazō said with a genuine smile on his face as he reached out to accept the bottle of Kurohige's Revenge.
-o-
Hazō was not in a great mood by the time Team Uplift returned to the barracks for the day. Keiko had had many things to say on the subjects of OPSEC, summoner secrets and moving without thinking, and Noburi hadn't missed the opportunities for digs at Hazō's personality in between Keiko's bloodcurdling intimations of his fate should it ever happen again.
Unfortunately, matters did not improve once inside.
"Hey, Gōketsu, have you heard?" A gleeful Cloud genin accosted him on his way to the team quarters. "They executed that Rock Lee guy you hang out with."
Hazō ground to a dead halt.
"What."
"They say he tried to blow up the Mizukage's Office. Apparently the guards cut him to pieces on the spot."
"Ugh. Shut up, Makoto. That's not what happened." One of her teammates rolled her eyes. "They took him alive and escorted him all the way through town into Mist T&I. Everyone saw it."
Hazō grabbed her shoulder, to which she responded by taking his wrist and very nearly pulling him into an elaborate death hold.
"Give! Give!" he yelped. (He could probably have taken her, he absently noted in the back of his mind.) She released him.
"Sorry about that. Didn't think. I just wanted to ask about what happened."
"Oh. It's cool. I'd be upset too. But yeah, I heard it from Uesugi, who heard from one of the Grass guys, who heard it from an anonymous source who heard it from a proctor. Apparently, the announcement says they'll be executing him and his team tomorrow in the main square."
Hazō glanced helplessly at his teammates. Dammit, Hyūga.
"Rumours become distorted in the telling," Keiko said flatly. "It is a well-attested fact. Only a fool listens to such unverified information. Besides, the Mizukage cannot execute Team Gai. It would gravely endanger the ongoing negotiations, whereas if they are alive but captured, they can be used for all manner of leverage. There is no cause for alarm."
Hazō had just started to open his mouth—
"I need to go."
Keiko turned and headed straight for the exit.
"Keiko, wait! Where are you going?"
"To acquire information which will lead me to Team Gai's location," Keiko said as if it was obvious. "You may accompany me if you so desire."
"That's a bad idea," Hazō insisted. "We don't have any rights here. They'll just turn us away, and maybe mark us as possible accomplices."
"We shall see," Keiko said coldly. "I am the Pangolin Summoner and the Hokage's daughter, and I have yet to test the limits of my influence. Should that fail, I will be forced to consider other methods, and at that point I will welcome any creative suggestions from you."
"Whoa there!" Noburi hurried ahead of her, interposing himself between her and the door. "Are you listening to yourself, Keiko? Because you're starting to sound a little crazy."
Keiko gave him a look that could freeze the Will of Fire. "Stand aside, Noburi. I do not have time."
Noburi looked to Hazō for help.
"Can we at least ask some of the proctors in the barracks first?" Hazō said after a second's desperate thought.
Keiko stopped. "Yes. Yes, that would be reasonable. Reconvene here in five minutes' time."
She disappeared in a flicker of ninja speed.
-o-
"All right," said a breathless Hazō, "what have we got?"
"Team Gai tried to break into Proctor HQ," Noburi volunteered, "because they're complete idiots."
He did a double-take at Keiko's glare. "What?"
"Nothing. Proceed."
"Uh, anyway, Rock Lee got caught on-site, and then the proctors hunted down the rest pretty fast. They've been taken in for questioning. Yes, they're in T&I, no, they won't be tortured. Probably. They're just exam candidates doing an obvious—if really dumb—exam candidate thing."
"T&I," Keiko repeated, turning back towards the exit.
"Probably not being tortured," Noburi repeated. "Besides, it's not like we can break in and save them, and it would be a terrible idea on like a dozen levels if we tried. Hazō, say something."
"The proctors I talked to said they crossed the line when they used explosives, but on the other hand they only blew up one window. Breaking a window for infiltration purposes isn't that big a deal in relative terms. I think they should be fine."
"Fine?!" Keiko screeched, her rigid composure finally cracking. "Fine?! They were caught using the Byakugan to spy on a secure military installation. Every intelligence worker in the world's worst nightmare! During the war, there were kill-on-sight orders for Byakugan-equipped teams!"
She froze.
"This is all my fault. I allowed the initial infiltration to proceed even though I should have known the risks. I placed them in this situation. I had one job, which was not to allow this to happen. If I'd made even a minimal effort…"
"Keiko," Hazō said firmly. "This is not your fault. This is their fault, and quite honestly, Noburi is probably right that Hyūga's the one responsible. On the Mist side, remember that they agreed to let not one but two Hyūga into the village, and that they didn't put any restrictions on how we were supposed to gather event information. Besides, even if the Mizukage decides to use this incident against Jiraiya, which I guess she'd be crazy not to, she'd be cutting herself with her own kunai if she decided to hurt them. The Hyūga would be calling for blood, and she wants peace with Leaf in some form."
Keiko closed her eyes slowly.
She stood still for about a minute. Hazō watched the movement of her chest as it indicated her breathing slowly stabilising. It then occurred to him that he was staring at her chest, and in no possible world could anything good come of this.
Keiko opened her eyes again just as he averted his.
"You're certain?" she asked hesitantly.
"I'm certain," Hazō nodded. He wasn't, but right now bringing Keiko down from her burst of temporary insanity took priority.
"Thank you," Keiko said after a second, then "excuse me."
She walked off in the direction of the bathrooms.
Hazō and Noburi exchanged glances.
"Well," Noburi sighed, "now that's settled, want to figure out what to do when Hyūga inevitably tells them that the whole thing was our idea?"
-o-
"Gōketsu," Nara greeted him as they sat down for dinner. "Will your sister not be joining us?"
"She's feeling under the weather," Hazō said euphemistically. She'd told them she didn't feel like eating with the others, and elected to spend dinnertime on her own in their quarters (locking the door as a natural precaution given that she'd be alone and every other team was theoretically out to get them).
"An illness?" Nara asked immediately. "Perhaps I should speak to her. My clan has special herbal remedies..."
"It's fine," Hazō said. "I think she's just a bit shaken by what happened to Team Gai."
"How peculiar," Nara mused. "I would have expected her to be pleased with the pending disqualification of a Byakugan-capable competitor, to say nothing of blissful liberation from Rock Lee."
Noburi looked at him for a couple of seconds with an expression of dawning understanding. "Oh." Then, in a quieter, more melancholy tone, "figures."
"Noburi?" Hazō asked.
"No, never mind. Just a random thought."
Akane who'd caught the exchange, also went "oh" after a second.
"What is it, Akane?"
She gave an amused smile. "It's nothing important, Hazō."
"Waaaait…" Yamanaka, on the other side of the table, gave the two of them a suspicious look. "My gossip sense is tingling. Fess up, girl."
Sakura, who up until that point had been deeply occupied with her food, leaned in with an expression of keen interest.
"Your gossip sense is always tingling, Ino," Nara muttered. "Whether it's Captain Asuma and Captain Kurenai exchanging tactical advice over a restaurant dinner, or Shiori giving me that expensive hair tie for my birthday, you invariably manage to see dubious subtext where none exists. Must you contaminate even this dinner with your troublesome speculations?"
Yamanaka gave Nara a disdainful snort and turned away. Sakura rolled her eyes in wry resignation and went back to trying to cut through her Mist-style armour-plated steak.
"Speaking of troublesome speculations," Hazō said, "does anybody else think it's ridiculously unfair how that proctor singled us out during the elimination meeting?"
"Unfair?" Nara asked mockingly. "That would imply that the Chūnin Exams have some form of fairness to be found in them somewhere, an allegation which remains to be made, much less proven. I do not deny having expected some trick along those lines, but that makes it no less frustrating. So much careful calculation, rendered worthless in the blink of an eye…"
"Tell me about it," Noburi said. "Not that we did any careful calculation—we spent most of our time trying not to be sexually assaulted by our skeevy (if secretly gorgeous) proctor—but we still worked hard to get that top rank, and all it's done is put a target on our backs."
Yamanaka stared.
"Wait, Gōketsu, did you just call that old hag gorgeous? For real? I thought those were just, y'know, rumours to discredit you or whatever, but… wow. That sure explains a few things."
"What do you mean, it explains a few things?!" Noburi demanded. "Did I or did I not, at the cost of a great deal of integrity and also great physical pain afterwards, tell the entire barracks that I'd taken ten dazzlingly beautiful teenage girls on a date?"
"Dazzlingly beautiful?" Yamanaka repeated with a curious expression on her face.
She smirked. "Fine, you're off the hook this time, Gōketsu. But I'll be watching you closely, and if I catch you making bedroom eyes at even a single granny…"
"You can watch me closely all you like," Noburi winked, "as long as you're prepared to be watched closely right back!"
Hazō, who was in no way feeling jealous at watching Noburi flirt with Yamanaka, decided this was a good time to try talking to Yamamoto.
"Hey, Yamamoto, how are you finding Mist rations? Did you know we used to use the bread rolls to sharpen our kunai?"
Yamamoto looked up. "What do you want, Gōketsu? Going to try and buy my face from me again?"
Ouch.
"I really didn't mean that to come out as an insult," Hazō said. "We made the same offer to all the Leaf teams. And Team Thirteen thought it was perfectly reasonable once we paid them enough."
"The fact that Kunō and the others put a price on their dignity doesn't mean all clanless ninja do, Gōketsu," Yamamoto spat the name like an insult. "There are some things money can't buy. Not that I'd expect you to understand."
"I do understand," Hazō said quietly. "My mother left her clan for love."
Yamamoto frowned. "What do you mean?"
"She was clan heir," Hazō explained. "With all the wealth and power you'd expect. Then she fell in love with a clanless ninja and her family made her choose. She chose."
Yamamoto took several seconds to absorb this.
"What, so you grew up outside the clan?"
"Right. I'm not saying my situation was just like yours, but I didn't grow up as a clan kid, and that's why."
Yamamoto gave him a hostile look. "Don't pretend you understand anything about my 'situation', Gōketsu. Your mother gave you a Bloodline Limit good enough that the Hokage broke all the rules to get you. You had a clan heir training you all your life, which is more clan training than any of us will ever get.
"Do you know who my dad is? He's a cobbler. He used to make sandals for the Leaf military, and when they needed lots of sandals life was good, and when they didn't, we just had to tighten our belts and not buy anything we didn't need. And then a couple of months ago some Nara somewhere decides that a different cobbler does ninja sandals better, and wham, that's half of our income gone forever. Because that's how it works, right? Everything revolves around the clans, and if you're not in a clan, then all that matters is how you can serve the ninja who are."
Nara turned his head slightly, but wisely decided not to get involved.
Unexpectedly, it was Haruno who did.
"Can you not do the thing, Haru? I know Gōketsu is the embodiment of all that is evil et cetera—no offence, Gōketsu—but can't we just have one peaceful dinner without the ranting?"
"Didn't you hear him, Sakura? The Hokage's adopted son who tried to buy our faces trying to tell me he knows what it's like to be poor? How can it not make you mad?"
The look Haruno gave him started out exasperated, but ended up transitioning into... something else.
"Why does it matter?" she asked softly. "All you're doing is howling at the moon. It doesn't change anything, and it just makes the rest of us look crazy. I don't want to keep picking fights with people, at least unless they screw with me or make fun of my forehead or happen to be named Inuzuka Kiba. I just want to train hard, get promoted, and be the next Kurenai-sensei, or Kakashi-sensei, or Jiraiya of the Three, or any of the other clanless ninja who made it to the top because they spent their time on getting stronger instead of going on about how the world isn't fair. Try not being so selfish for a change, Haru."
She turned away, back to her dinner. Yamamoto looked at her as if she'd somehow betrayed him.
Hazō reluctantly abandoned his latest diplomatic attempt and went back to chatting with Akane. It was a tiny bubble of peace to immerse himself in until the next thing went wrong.
-o-
You have earned 3 XP. Noburi has gained 1 FP. Keiko has spent 2 FP.
-o-
You have checked in with Jiraiya. He assures you that Team Gai have not been executed. He has been able to commute their sentence (whatever it would have been otherwise) to disqualification and confinement to barracks. They are currently in T&I being questioned, and will be released tomorrow. Jiraiya is apprehensive, but given that they won't be tortured, and trying to get village secrets out of them would risk a diplomatic incident right back in Mist's face, Team Gai should be fine as long as they pay careful attention and don't say anything stupid. (On reflection, he's doomed.)
The Mizukage is, naturally, having a field day with the fact that the least damaging explanation for Team Gai's actions is that the Hokage can't control his ninja, and also that his elite Chūnin Exam candidates bungle (supposedly) simple infiltrations even with all the power of the Byakugan. Jiraiya is struggling to hold back her offensive, and is kept going only by the knowledge that when he gets home he'll be able to rub the whole thing in Hyūga Hiashi's face twice as hard.
Keiko decided it was a bad time to give him the Oyabun's present.
-o-
The Oyabun's dossier (abridged):
Team Kongō (Cloud)
Hazama Kyū: Member of the Hazama Clan, which has a Bloodline Limit involving pillars of lightning(?).
Ryūgamine Eichi: Member of the Ryūgamine Clan, creators of the famous Ryūgamine-style taijutsu.
Hotoke Eru: Clanless ninja.
Team Chinin (Rock)
Namazu Jishin: Heir of the Namazu Clan, Earth Element users with many unique techniques.
Tama Ruri: Member of the Tama Clan, entrusted with top-level management of Rock mining operations due to their extreme intelligence and unspecified Bloodline Limit. (Keiko addendum: The Tama are known to suffer from a condition which can best be summarised as "tunnel vision proportional to the degree of concentration"; they do not appreciate puns being made on the subject.)
Yakeyama Ganshō: Member of the Yakeyama Clan, secretive technique hackers who specialize in combining the Fire and Water Elements in some unknown fashion.
Team Mugiwara (Hot Springs)
Kotsuzui Kenji: Member of the Kotsuzui Clan, wielders of the Blood Element Bloodline Limit and legendary hunter-nin.
Kashiwagi Noriko: Member of the Kashiwagi minor clan.
Minawa Ichirō: Member of the Minawa Clan, support specialists who wield the Inner Fire Bloodline Limit. (Noburi addendum: These guys are said to be Hot Springs's answer to the Wakahisa, but they don't wear barrels.)
Team Gensō (Waterfall)
Sakamoto Shiina: Member of the Sakamoto Clan, wielders of the Phantom Element Bloodline Limit, which gives them the power of invisibility.
Mitsurugi Ryūichi: Member of the Mitsurugi Clan, creators of the Mitsurugi Sword Style.
Oroka Hina: Clanless ninja.
-o-
You have given Leaf Team Thirteen thirty explosive seals in return for the right to use their appearance to enter and exit the barracks.
You have commenced negotiations with Team Kurenai. They are open to your invitation to cooperate, pending specifics and a list of what types of seal you're prepared to offer.
-o-
You owe Noburi an unspecified favour in return for not telling Keiko that you spent a full minute staring at her chest.
-o-
Kurohige's Revenge was the flagship of the legendary pirate lord Kurohige Ranmaru, whose story may be found summarised near the end of Chapter 10: Those Left Behind.
-o-
What do you do?
Voting closes on Saturday 12th of May, 9 am New York time.
"Keiko? How are you feeling?" Hazō asked, pushing open the door to their dorms after his teammate unlocked it.
"Fine." She turned away and moved back to her bunk.
Hazō considered that carefully. "Keiko," he said, "I am worried about you. You are very clearly upset and are cutting yourself off from us because of it. We are your friends; we want you to be happy and we're willing to go pretty damn far"—he grinned—"in order to ensure that you are. Please talk to us."
"Seconded," Noburi said, moving to sit on the bunk across from her. "Let us help, sis. After all, that's what brothers are for, right? Beat up anyone who makes their sister sad?" The tone and the expression were joking, but his eyes were concerned.
Keiko glanced at him in shock for a moment, then looked away. She sat on the edge of the bunk, staring down at her hands; they lay limp in her lap, fingers twisted together. After a moment she moved them apart and looked up, shifting so she was leaning back against the wall, her face slightly in shadow from the bunk above her and looking far calmer than a moment ago. Hazō wasn't fooled for an instant.
"I was concerned about a fellow Leaf team," she said in a voice that she no doubt thought sounded completely calm and reasonable. "More specifically, I was concerned about the impact that their actions would have on Leaf as a whole. Hyūga's decision—I have no doubt it was his, and that Lee went along enthusiastically—was even more foolish than our choice to continue that information-retrieval mission after we knew what we were facing. In that situation we were risking only ourselves, while Hyūga was risking Leaf's reputation during critical negotiations between two Kage. He has given the Mizukage significant leverage over Jiraiya; she was doubtless able to blackmail him into making concessions in order to get Team Gai released. Jiraiya had no option but to make those concessions, since leaving them in prison, or even delaying their freedom, would cause the Hyūga clan to shift from disapproval to active hostility upon our return. I don't know what he had to give up, but I'm sure it was something significant, given the caliber of negotiator the Mizukage has revealed herself to be."
She paused, head tipped in thought. "I wish I knew more about their negotiations. I would guess that among other things there are economic issues at play; perhaps she wants Fire to commit to supplying food to Mist at reduced rates. Leaf cannot expect merchants to go out of business doing this, which means that the Hokage will need to supply subsidies to those merchants out of the Tower's accounts. That reduces the budget available to pay for intelligence assets, making it more difficult to find things that the village needs."
Hazō took note of the carefully vague phrasings Keiko was using and firmly committed to using such in the future.
"Okay, that's all fair," Noburi said. "But how is us going off half-cocked going to help matters? If we blundered in, throwing our weight around, wouldn't that just stir up even more trouble?" He held up a hand to cut off her first response. "And, seriously, it will always be 'we'. If you go off half-cocked, I'll be right there beside you so that I can back you up as you talk Hazō out of whatever crazy plan he's come up with to make things wo—I mean, to fix the problem."
Keiko looked away, embarrassed. "Perhaps. However, I note that if we had managed to get Team Gai out of prison promptly then the Mizukage's leverage would have evaporated. Yes, she could have complained about a bunch of genin 'throwing their weight around', but doing so would merely make her look weak in the eyes of the other Kage. It might even have given Jiraiya more leverage to use against her."
She slid forward and stood up. "Regardless, you have convinced me that it was an unwise course of action, and the issue is moot now anyway, since Jiraiya has already negotiated their freedom. I would suggest that we follow Hazō's earlier suggestion: go find Team Kurenai and see if we can convince them to assist us in scouting for the next event." She moved quickly to the door...a touch more quickly than her normal pace, Hazō noted.
He frowned, but climbed to his feet and followed her. Nara was right; girls were troublesome.
o-o-o-o
"...so that's what we're thinking," Noburi said, smiling genially. "What do you say? Want to work with the incredible, awesome, amazing Clan Gōketsu so we can all crush the next event?"
Aburame, Inuzuka, and Hyūga exchanged glances. Inuzuka and Hyūga nodded to one another, and the white-eyed girl said, "It seems like a—"
"—interesting plan," Aburame interrupted. "However, I note that it helps you far more than it helps us. Why? You are ahead of us in the scoring, so giving you an advantage is not in our interest."
"Yeah," said Inuzuka, clearly doing a 180 from his agreement with Hyūga when he picked up on his other teammate's strategy. "And what do you bring to the table, anyway? Me and Akamaru can track. Shino's bugs can sneak into places. Hinata has the Byakugan. We're way better at getting info about stuff then you guys. All you do is blow things up and make forts."
Noburi laughed. "We do a little more than that," he said, smiling. "How about seals that make us silent so that we can sneak past guards? Or the ability to summon an infiltration-spec pangolin for investigation, plus a bunch of badass pangolin if we need to fight our way out? Or make tunnels that let us move under the building without being noticed and then come up inside it somewhere, behind all the guards? Or make fog banks to obscure sight, either for entry or escape? Plus the ability to share chakra so you can afford to use high-cost techniques without worry about running low?"
"The fact that we are in the lead is more reason for you to ally with us," Keiko noted. "The information is disproportionately useful to you, since it will make it easier for you to close the gap. My team's performance on the escort mission was superlative; the law of averages suggests that we will not do as well in the next event, making it easier for you to outscore us."
Kurenai's students exchanged dubious looks. "Perhaps," Aburame said. "However, it would be a more attractive offer were there a sweetener to go with it. Why? Because your assistance would be useful, but I do not believe that we need it. If we have the information and you do not then we are far more likely to outscore you than if we are competing on an even playing field."
"I note that we have not yet said where the event will take place," Keiko said. "Or when. If you choose not to work with us...."
Inuzuka waved a hand dismissively. "Like we can't find that out on our own."
"Fine," Hazō said. "You want a sweetener? How about we tell you where the event is and give you some seals?"
All three members of Team Kurenai shifted slightly, trying and failing to hide their interest.
"Eh, we could just buy seals," Inuzuka said with clearly studied casualness. "What else you got?"
Hazō snorted. "Pull the other one. You can't buy seals here in Mist and you know it. Plus, you can't buy Silence Mine seals anywhere...except from us, in exchange for a mission that will help you more than us."
"Never mind, Hazō," Keiko said, standing up. "We are wasting our time here. Working with them would be an advantage, yes, but it's not worth the trouble; Inuzuka is clearly too arrogant, and Aburame's grasping nature annoys me. Team Asuma will be more useful and far less trouble."
"I told you so, Hazō," Noburi said, looking at his teammate. "Yamanaka's jutsu are way better for spying than what these guys offer. I know you wanted to branch out, forge more alliances, but it's not worth the—"
"A moment, please," Hyūga said quietly. "Please, sit. I believe we can work something out."
"Why should we bother?" Keiko asked, looking the heiress in the eyes with a flat stare. "We are capable of doing this entirely on our own; your team has no skills essential to the mission and the only reason we approached you was, as Noburi said, because we are attempting to forge positive bonds with other clans. We already have a good relationship with Team Asuma and experience working with them. We are in the lead for the Exams and we do not need you, so why should we beg and bribe for assistance when you are being pointlessly difficult?"
"Be nice, Keiko," Hazō chided. "Don't let tactics override strategy; Gōketsu is new and we want to be on good terms with the other clans. Helping them is a good way to demonstrate that cooperation is better than competition. We're already in the good graces of Ino-Shika-Chō, so working with a different group of clans has more long-term benefit. And they really do have a lot to offer. Inuzuka was right—tracking, sneaking, Byakugan...? It would be great to have them on our side."
"Yeah, but they're being a pain in the ass," Noburi said, aggrieved. "If they don't want to—"
"Now, just hold on," Inuzuka said uncomfortably. "We don't need to fight. You guys would have a way easier time with us than without us."
Keiko's cold gaze swiveled to the boy. "You are too much trouble, Inuzuka," she said. "Your teammates are tolerable, but you were bothersome to work with back in the swamp and you have continued to be bothersome ever since. Considering how badly we mauled you in sparring I find your arrogance misplaced."
"Hey!" Inuzuka said. "We spanked you in the first round!"
Keiko snorted. "And then we destroyed you in the next two. Do you honestly believe it would have been different in the fourth?"
"Keiko!" Hazō snapped. "Be. Nice. We need to work with their clans in the future, and fighting with their kids isn't helping. And, again, they really would be useful." He turned to Inuzuka. "I'm sorry for her," he said, rubbing his neck in embarrassment. "Really. She's been feeling a little under the weather lately and it's making her short-tempered."
"I am not short-tempered," Keiko said, still not sitting down. "I am simply tired of—"
"—short-tempered, but I'm sure she's sorry for being rude!" Hazō interrupted. "Aren't you, Keiko?" He stared at his clan sister expectantly. After a few seconds of silence he raised an eyebrow. "Aren't you, Keiko?"
Keiko matched his gaze for a few more seconds, then looked away, deflating. "Fine," she grumbled. "Yes, the Gōketsu will need to work with your clans in the future, and it would be easier if we were on good terms. Helping you in this event would be good, and I suppose you do have some useful skills."
"Thank you," Hyūga said with a smile and a nod. She gestured to the seat that Keiko had vacated. "Please, won't you sit and discuss it with us?"
Keiko gave a put-upon sigh, but dropped back into the chair, crossing her arms and pursing her lips in distaste.
"You were going to tell us where the event is?" Aburame asked carefully.
"Does that mean you're in?" Noburi asked, raising his eyebrows in hopeful surprise. "I thought you didn't want to work with us?"
"Nah, we're in," Inuzuka said, pretending casualness. "We gotta show you how it's done."
"Great!" Hazō said, grinning. "Really glad to hear it. Having you guys along will make this way easier." He nodded absently, gathering his thoughts. "Okay, so the event is taking place at the Nari mansion, which is in the rich part of town. I'm thinking we do a sweep of the perimeter to start with, then pop mist so we can sneak up to the house...."
o-o-o-o
"That just makes no damn sense," Hazō said, irritated. "Seriously, it's like they're prepping for a party, not a Chūnin Exams event." He took a sip of his tea and then chomped into one of the pastries that Inuzuka had bought for the table. (Hazō had started to pull out money for his share, but the other boy had waved it away, insisting that it was his treat.)
The tea house where the genin had gathered after their scouting was only about half-full, and the hostess had been happy to seat them in a corner away from everyone. Hyūga had briefly activated her bloodline and done a careful examination of the area before announcing that she could detect no traps or eavesdroppers. No one had completely relaxed, but they were at least on only medium alert as they enjoyed delicious treats and fancy tea while waiting for their food.
"Let us review," Aburame said, ticking points off on his finger. "A walled-in compound, which you say is normal for expensive properties here. The security of the building is laughable—large windows without bars, multiple doors, three separate chimneys that we could probably fit through in a pinch."
"Twenty proctors guarding the place, though," Noburi said. He took a bite of his own pastry and looked pleasantly surprised. "Damn, Inuzuka, these are amazing. Thank you."
"No worries," the other boy said, waving dismissively. "Call it a thank you for sharing the location with us." He took a bite of one of the lemon-curd dumplings and proceeded to talk with his mouth full. "Besides, that 'misterator' trick of yours is cool. Really made it easier."
Noburi flashed him a friendly grin and a nod, not commenting on the sight of half-masticated lemon mash. "Yeah, but you were the one who convinced the guard dogs to back off," he said, holding out a fist. The other boy bumped it with his own, looking pleased with himself.
"Twenty proctor guards," Aburame began again, his tone chiding at the interruption. "And Akamaru scented at least six dogs in addition to the two that he and Kiba scared off."
"The thing that gets me is the number of scents going in and out," Inuzuka said. "We couldn't even get a good count. Dozens, at least. Plus lots and lots of food smells."
"The long tables against the wall in the ballroom suggest that there will in fact be a party," Hyūga offered. "They are set up for a buffet, not for group dining. And they have linen tablecloths, suggesting a high-class event."
"An infiltration test would make sense," Keiko offered. "Teams would be expected to infiltrate during a simulated party, steal some document or other prize, and exfiltrate without being seen."
"Upper floors would make sense for the target location," Hazō noted. "Hyūga, do you recall seeing anything like a safe?"
The girl shook her head, nibbling on one of her chicken skewers. "Sorry, I didn't have enough time for a really thorough scan—especially not of anything other than the ground floor. And even some of that was out of my range."
"'Out of your range', huh?" Hazō said, making air quotes. "And I'm sure it would never dawn on you to claim that your range is shorter than it really is, in order to preserve a strategic advantage and to keep a certain amount of information back." He grinned at her to take the sting out of the words.
The girl turned innocent white eyes at him. "The thought hadn't even occurred to me," she said.
Noburi chuckled. "Uh-huh. Anyway, the downstairs is big enough," he said, looking at the sketched-out floorplan that she had provided. "Front door here, library to the left, dining room to the right that connects to a sitting room big enough to play dodgeball in. Liquor closet off the sitting room is the size of my bedroom when I was growing up. Kitchen down the hall from the dining room, definitely big enough for a massive party. Big pantry, hallway leading off the kitchen into something 'out of your range'." (He glanced over at her and snickered.) "Sounds like you could hide half a village in there. And you've got...at least three doors, just in the section we can see: front, kitchen, sitting room. Gardens and hedge maze off the sitting room. The place is an infiltrator's wet dream. Hard to believe they would make it this easy for us."
"Maybe an extraction?" Aburame suggested. "Have a proctor inside, pretending to be injured. We need to sneak in and rescue them without alerting the guards."
"Maybe," Hazō said doubtfully. "Feels wrong, though. Still too easy to get in."
"Mari-sensei suggested that there would be a leadership challenge at some point," Noburi noted. "Maybe this is it? They're choosing an easy infiltration target because the real challenge is going to be managing a team of people you don't know."
Keiko stiffened.
"It's a possibility," Hazō said, "but not a certainty. I can think of other things. Maybe it is an infiltration test, but we're supposed to be blue team and the proctors are red team. It would explain why they chose a place so tilted towards the attacker." He paused, looking up as the waitress approached with a tray piled so high with food that he was worried it would collapse.
"Sorry to interrupt," the girl said with a professionally friendly smile. She set her tray down on the edge of the table so she pass out the mountain of food. "I'll be right back with the blood shrimp and the mango dango. Can I get you anything else?"
"No, thank you," Aburame said.
"I'll take some more tea," Noburi said, raising his empty cup and giving the only-slightly-older girl a wink. She blushed and bobbed her head, then scurried off.
Conversation paused as the hungry kids dug into half a dozen of Keiko, Hazō, and Noburi's favorite comfort foods from their childhoods. The children of Leaf were dubious about the ink-sauce squid until they tried it, but were converted after the first bite. The fruit-stuffed fried cheese was a far easier sell, and for a time the conversation consisted solely of happy eating noises and loud demands that a particular dish be passed down the table instead of greedily consumed by its current steward.
Overall, Hazō thought to himself with a pleased glow, both missions had been successful.
XP AWARD: 2
FP AWARD: 0
You went in to do the scouting after dark.
Things that were in the plan but not shown onscreen and/or didn't happen:
Hazō telling Noburi/Keiko his idea on how the team should react to Team Gai's capture: Not done. Keiko shut the conversation down too sharply and there wasn't a good time to bring it up afterwards.
Agreeing with Team 8 that you should take down other teams, and giving them dossiers on those teams: Not done yet. Keiko and Noburi felt it would be better to work with them on one thing and see how it went before moving on.
Scouting Nari manor: You did not use a tunnel. You scouted the perimeter, popped misterators on three different sides of the place, then Kiba, Keiko, and Shino caused a distraction while Hazō, Noburi, and Hinata snuck up to the house and crouched in the bushes for about two minutes while Hinata scanned the place. At that point you heard a guard coming and boogied out of there.
Leaving a weapons cache: while Hinata was scanning, Hazō dug out a small hollow under one of the bushes and buried an oilskin package containing four kunai, a storage scroll containing a box full of random useful stuff (you may spend an FP to say what's in it), and two dozen explosive tags.
You have not yet told the other Leaf teams that this is the site of the next event; that will automatically happen after dinner unless you vote otherwise for some reason.
Nothing related to Team Bloodrage or Jiraiya's birthday has happened yet.
Vote time! What to do now?
Voting ends on Wednesday, May 16, 2018, at 12pm London time.
Hazō and Noburi gave each other one last nod, and then Noburi knocked on the door of Team Bloodrage's room.
"Gōketsu?" Hojō asked, peering through the open crack suspiciously. "What do you want?"
"Just wanted to chat," Noburi said cheerfully. "We're bored out of our skulls, and Hazō here says you guys are really into board games."
"You remember our games of Sealing Failure, don't you, Hōjō?" Hazō asked. "I'm thinking of putting together an updated version, and it would be great to get some feedback from you. For example, rules you'd like to change, parts of the game that aren't fun enough, maybe even new scenarios or any ideas you have based on the games you play in Demon Country."
"Hey, that does sound good," Hōjō gave a warm smile. "Now's a bad time, though. Our leader's been laying into us for spending too much time playing games instead of gathering intelli—uh, getting to know people, and I think it might just piss him off more. No offence, but maybe we can do it another time, once he's calmed down?"
"That's fair," Hazō said. "But since we were going to ask you about Demon anyway, why don't we make it a proper cultural exchange instead? You can tell us about your country and we can tell you about Leaf. As you might know, we joined them not that long ago, and you wouldn't believe the crazy OPSEC protocols they expect us to follow."
"Huh," Hōjō said. He glanced back into the room for a second as if asking permission, then opened the door wide. "Come on in."
Sage's ballsack. Hazō had been prepared to play it off as a joke, but they really fell for it. Not that he didn't like Hōjō and the other Bloodrage gamer on a personal level, but how had Demon decided to send these clowns as their best representatives?
Meanwhile, Team Bloodrage's room was just as Hyūga had described. Fearsome oversized weapons were stacked against the wall, within easy reach at all times, a bunch of others were scattered on small rugs across the floor for maintenance, and a black three-foot cube in the corner, with closed doors at the front, looked a lot like one of those miniature shrines used by particularly devout followers of the Will of Fire. According to her, the inside featured a number of unfamiliar sigils, as well as the dried remains of some liquid.
Both of the other members of Team Bloodrage were in attendance. Shuraō, the tactically inept but easygoing swordsman from the gaming sessions, was busy sharpening a blade that already looked as if it could cut through bone as easily as butter. Another ninja was hurriedly stuffing some scrolls into a bag out of sight as Hazō and Noburi entered.
"You must be the Gōketsu," the third ninja said pompously when his task was finished. "I have heard much about you. I am Chigiri, leader of Team Bloodrage."
"Gōketsu Noburi," Noburi said. "And this is Hazō, sort-of leader of Team Gōketsu, though I don't know how much of a leader you can be when you can't fight your way out of a paper bag."
Were they still doing that? Yes, Hazō supposed they were, insofar as Team Bloodrage might pass on the information to someone else. At any rate, Noburi wouldn't stop while he had an excuse to keep embarrassing Hazō in front of strangers.
Chigiri snorted. "Couldn't agree more." He changed his stance to not-too-subtly face more towards Noburi.
"Anyway, listen," Noburi said, "we'd love to hear anything you have to tell us about Demon Country. Hazō and I have bunch of bets going that only you can settle. Like, is it true that the place is chock-full of deadly chakra monsters so everybody in Demon has to be a taijutsu master to survive?"
"That's right," Hojō and Shuraō said simultaneously.
"It's a freezing-cold mountain range full of cougars and bears—"
"It's a poisonous swamp full of giant alligators—"
The two locked gazes.
"It's a freezing-cold mountain range full of giant alligators," Hōjō finally compromised.
"We all come from different parts of Demon Country," Chigiri said testily, "so sometimes our stories don't match up. It's completely normal."
"It sounds like a very hard place to live in," Hazō said. "We spent a couple of years in the wilderness right after we became genin, and every day was a fight for survival."
He wasn't sure where to go from there, though. Ask about where they got their training? Their gear? Whether they had a jōnin instructor?
Then he remembered how Hōjō was talking about someone or something "cursing" his dice, as if he believed in kami or ancestor worship or some such, and inspiration struck.
"You know the worst part about having to live out in the wilderness, though? The way it becomes all about survival. You find yourself forgetting what you live for, what matters to you apart from just staying alive. Do you know what I'm talking about?"
"Ha," Shuraō gave an arrogant laugh. "We never have that kind of problem, because we know Lord Jashin is always watching—"
"Ahem," Chigiri interrupted. "My friend misspoke. We've never heard of this Jashin. What he meant to say was… was…"
Hazō could see Chigiri's face gradually tense as he struggled to come up with a context-appropriate word that could plausibly be mistaken for "Jashin".
"Rations!" he said triumphantly after half a minute of thought. "Our rations are what keeps us going in the wilderness. The mispronunciation is a private joke."
"That's right," Hōjō hastened to agree. "If you ever heard us talking about Jashin, that's what we meant. And if we ever said anything about the Great Prophet, then we were actually talking about… great profit. You know, because we're mercenaries."
"Yeah!" Shuraō joined in. "And if we said anything that sounded like 'blood sacrifice rituals'—"
"We never said anything that sounded like 'blood sacrifice rituals'," Hōjō said sharply. "How would that even happen?"
He glanced at Hazō and Noburi.
"That, uh, was also a private joke," he added hastily.
"I think this conversation has gone on long enough," Chigiri said. "It's late, and we have many things to do. Shuraō, show them out."
Hazō inwardly winced. Knowing that Team Bloodrage followed some kind of extremely disturbing religion wasn't useless, but it wasn't much to take back to Jiraiya either, and he knew Team Gōketsu wouldn't get another chance to catch them off guard.
"You know," Noburi said as Shuraō was about to close the door, "I've figured out why you guys have been eliminated while we're still going strong."
"Huh?"
"It's because we have a badass master and you don't. We have Jiraiya of the Three himself teaching us, while you've just got your Jashin dude or your prophet or whatever."
"You fucking take that back!" Shuraō roared. "Your Jiraiya's nothing next to the Great Prophet!"
"Nuh-uh," Noburi said. "Jiraiya can take down a jōnin with his bare hands in thirty seconds flat."
"The Great Prophet can butcher a jōnin with his scythe in ten seconds flat!"
"Jiraiya is in his early fifties and still the strongest ninja around."
"The Great Prophet is in his early twenties and already the strongest ninja around!"
Chigiri grabbed Shuraō from behind and tried to drag him away from the door. "What the hell are you—"
Shuraō fought his hold. "You stay out of this, Chigiri. This bastard's insulting the Great Prophet!"
"Give it up, Shuraō," Noburi sneered. "You've already lost. Only Jiraiya can summon heroic battle toads."
"So what? Only the Great Prophet can ignore mortal wounds!"
"Jiraiya has a professional army of a thousand skilled ninja."
"The Great Prophet has a hidden cult of the world's strongest warriors!"
"Jiraiya has the likes of Tsunade and Ino-Shika-Chō for allies."
"The Great Prophet has—"
Shuraō collapsed on the ground, unconscious. Behind him, Chigiri lowered his fist.
"This conversation is over," he snarled, slamming the door in Hazō and Noburi's faces.
Hazō and Noburi gave each other an epic high five as they beat a hasty retreat.
-o-
The restaurant had been chosen at the last second based on a random die roll, disguised Leaf ANBU had made their way to three others simultaneously, the private room had no windows and very thick walls, and Jiraiya still warned them to say nothing that they didn't want to end up on the Mizukage's desk within the hour. But the important part was that it made the event feel like a spymaster's birthday should. They could tell that Jiraiya appreciated (or at least was amused by) Hazō's extra OPSEC efforts.
Now they waited silently for the moment that might set the tone for their relationships with their adoptive father for a long time to come… his reaction to their present.
Jiraiya held the necklace up by the chain so that it rotated back and forth in mid-air. His eyes followed its movements as if he was hypnotised.
"It's… quite something," he said slowly.
"We figured," Hazō explained, "that now you have everything you need to be head of a noble clan.
"You have a village." He brought his thumb and index finger in a semicircle to indicate the Leaf symbol serving as the pendant's frame.
"You have a name." He pulled his fingers back, then poked his index finger in the middle of where they'd been to indicate the 'Gō' symbol.
"You have a crest." He brought his thumb and index finger back out, wider this time to indicate the pendant as a whole.
"And you have a family." He spread his arms wide to indicate himself, Keiko and Noburi.
"We gave Mari-sensei a present like this before, for the same reason, and we hope that when you wear it, you'll remember that your family is always here with you.
"And one day soon," he said after a hesitant second, "we hope we'll get to meet others who share the privilege of being your family."
"Kids…" Jiraiya said after a couple of seconds in a choked-up voice.
"Kids," he tried again. "Apparently I'm as hopelessly sappy as you are, because this is one hell of an amazing present."
He took another long look at the necklace, studying it with the all-absorbing attention of a high-life-expectancy genin reading his first ninjutsu scroll. He put it around his neck, a sense of gentle reverence in the movement.
"The symbolism is one thing," he said in his more familiar jovial tones, "but the craftsmanship is top-notch as well. You've got to tell me who made it, because I think their name needs to go on the Hokage's list of favoured suppliers. I thought I knew all the Leaf jewellers from back when I was doing that research during your trip out east, but I don't recognise the maker's mark."
"Actually, we got it made in Mist. A silversmith named Kawarai Taiyoku did it as a special order."
Jiraiya goggled. "You got a Mist jeweller to make this? What did you do, kidnap his family?"
"We were very persuasive," Hazō said. And then very poor.
"I'll be damned. Maybe you really are Mari's pupils."
Hazō and Noburi beamed. Keiko gave a small satisfied smile.
"But when?" Jiraiya asked. "A piece like this would take… and if you ordered it on… no, I don't see it. How did you have time?"
"Trade secret," Hazō said with his most convincing smug expression. The truth must never be made known.
Jiraiya contemplated his necklace a little more. Then his attention returned to the genin.
"All right. What did you kids do?"
"What do you mean?" Hazō asked. "We haven't done anything."
"That we know of," Noburi clarified.
"That would negatively impact on yourself, the clan or the Village Hidden in the Leaves," Keiko added for good measure.
Jiraiya gave a mock groan. "Oh, no, you don't. Nobody gives me a present this good unless they're trying to make up for something really awful. Spill it, what did you do? Did you drop a pangolin on the Momochi residence 'just to be sure'? Did you give Yamanaka Ino a bouquet without checking Leaf flower language first? Did you," his gaze swung to Keiko, "allow Rock Lee to procreate?"
Hazō could see Keiko's brain urgently scan for any possible interpretation of the question other than the obvious one, give up, and reluctantly allow Jiraiya's words to filter through to her conscious mind.
Her face twisted into a visage of deep cosmic horror, as if she were a sealmistress who'd just realised that a sealing failure had added subtle errors to every single uninfused blank in the laboratory, and that she wouldn't make it there before the day's experiments began. Her mouth worked silently for a few seconds, but nothing came out.
"Gaahk?!" she finally managed.
"All right, I'll believe you're innocent this time," Jiraiya chuckled. "Keiko, if you like, I can ask Tsunade for emergency brain surgery when we get back."
Keiko gave a dazed nod.
Looking at Jiraiya's smirk, Hazō decided that it was his duty as a scion of the Gōketsu Clan to avenge his sister's honour.
"Actually," he said, "there was this one unexpected thing that happened with our chocolate-loving friend…"
Jiraiya tensed.
"You mean how talking to us prompted him to put his revenge into motion?" Noburi asked.
Jiraiya sagged into his seat. His groan this time echoed from the very depths of his soul.
Hazō grinned and pulled out the bottle of Kurohige's Revenge. "It's a birthday present. With his compliments."
"You know," Jiraiya said pointedly, "I am the one who determines your allowance and your mission pay."
"We get an allowance?" Noburi perked up.
"Not anymore you don't. Hand it over, you pack of reprobates."
Hazō gave him the bottle.
"Huh," Jiraiya said after a second. "I've heard of this one before. Premium brand. Hell of an ominous name for a gift, though."
"It's a historical reference," Hazō said. "One he wanted us to explain to you, actually. Keiko, if you wouldn't mind?"
"Oh, can I do it? Can I?" Noburi practically shot up from his chair. "No offence, Keiko, I know you'd get it right down to the tiniest detail, but telling stories to a new audience is just so much fun."
"Far be it from me to deny you the pleasures of extroversion," Keiko said wryly, "if that is truly not an oxymoron."
"Great. One history lesson on the origins of Hidden Mist, coming right up."
Noburi began to speak, punctuating his narration with broad dramatic gestures.
"First thing you've got to know is that the old Water Country is a mess. All the territory's been divided up between the pirate lords, who are all ninja if that wasn't obvious. You want to sail their waters, you pay them a toll and hope they're not going to take your stuff anyway. If you happen to make an enemy of a pirate lord, or anybody else high up in the food chain, you may as well take a long walk off a short plank because the sharks will be a lot more merciful.
"Which is where Byakuren, the future First Mizukage, comes in. His clan—a teeny little clan nobody cares about—is in charge of this equally teeny port. It's in a lousy location, the taverns and brothels are nothing to write home about, and the terrain makes it a pain for bigger ships to dock. But the one big thing it's got going for it is, guess what, nobody cares about it. It's the perfect place for smugglers who've crossed the wrong guy to quietly do their thing and build up some capital until they can afford to bribe their way back into the pirate lords' good graces.
"One day, Byakuren, the young clan heir, starts hearing stories from the sailors about how all the Fire clans are joining up into one big alliance. Byakuren's a smart guy, and he sees the writing on the wall straight away. As soon as the Fire clans are done dealing with their own country, they're going to come for us, because Fire is the land of evil and they hate us and want to murder us all, down to the smallest child. Don't look at me like that, this is just the story as I was told it. Oh, it also doesn't hurt that anyone who holds both Fire and Water is going to rule the mainland by default through sheer trade superiority.
"Funnily enough, Byakuren doesn't want to be conquered by the most evil ninja in the world. He goes to his dad, the clan chief, and tells him they need to start putting together their own shinobi alliance ASAP. His dad, who's good at his job but not one of nature's politicians, tells him to get a girlfriend. Next thing you know, whoops, Dad dies in a tragic fishing accident and Byakuren's in charge.
"Just goes to show that you can't trust fish, am I right? Byakuren cries a few bitter, manly tears, and sets about explaining to all the smuggler clans that Fire is coming for them, and that because Fire ninja are stupid landlubbers who think port is a kind of drink, they're going to try to seize complete control of maritime trade and start killing smugglers left, right and centre—much like what you-know-who said about the Earth Country, now I think of it. Some he persuades, some he bribes, and the rest he threatens, because did I mention that he also happens to be the greatest Water Element user in history? Legend says he could sink ships by looking at them long enough.
"Then he has a stroke of genius. He does the same thing to the civilian smugglers. He points out everything they've got to lose, and then he promises them total absolution and trade privileges in his new regime. Bear in mind, these guys are only there in the first place because they've made the wrong enemies and are now de facto outlaws. They jump at the offer like drowning men grabbing at a thrown rope.
"The reason Byakuren does this is that, precisely because they're civilians, they know their sailing inside out. They can't walk on water or lighten their loads with storage scrolls or fight off chakra monsters, so instead they have to manage with pure knowledge and skill. They know every route, including the secret routes that get you to a place extra-fast, the routes that get you to a place unseen, and the routes that look safe but get your ship ripped apart by hidden reefs or hungry kraken. They know every trick in the book.
"So now Byakuren's fleet is still small, but it's faster, craftier and more efficient than any of the big ninja fleets. Then he has his second stroke of genius. He founds his hidden village inland. He takes all the inland clans, the ones who get abused to hell and back by the pirate lords because they don't have the naval power to trade on their own terms, and he promises them unconditionally open seas. They've got nothing to lose and everything to gain.
"Before you know it, Byakuren's fleet is a power to be reckoned with. He's sweeping up ports and pirates like a baleen whale sweeping up plankton, and his new slogan is 'Serve me or serve the pirate lords'. Only he's here knocking at the gates, and the pirate lords are somewhere out there doing their own thing—they're afraid that if any one of them takes Byakuren on, the others will stab them in the back and take their stuff. It's probably how half of them got into power in the first place.
"Except there happens to be one pirate lord who's head and shoulders above the rest. Kurohige Ranmaru can read the writing on the wall too, and he agrees that the clans have to unite or Leaf (which is a thing by this point) will wipe them out and replace the freedom of the sea with a tyranny the likes of which the world has never seen. But he doesn't think Byakuren's got what it takes. He looks at Byakuren folding defeated enemies into his alliance, and what he sees is a hundred harpoons aimed at Byakuren's back, ready to turn him into a pincushion and tear Hidden Mist apart the second he shows a hint of weakness. In Kurohige's world, you crush your enemies once and for all, and then you make better use of their stuff than they did.
"Kurohige tries to do the smart thing and end Byakuren before he becomes unstoppable, but he underestimates the inland clans because no one's ever seen them fight in open water, and he gets his keel handed to him by their ninjutsu. If you were wondering why he called his next ship Kurohige's Revenge, now you know.
"Once Kurohige gets home, which he does because he's one tough bastard who can shrug off having his ship set on fire and then sunk in chakra megalodon waters, he goes into overdrive. He declares that he will turn the ocean red before he lets Byakuren hand Water to Leaf on a silver platter, and he starts building his own inter-territorial fleet. Only Kurohige's going straight after the other big guys, putting together the world's first pirate lords' alliance by hook or by crook. That's going to be ironic later, keep an eye out.
"Obviously, there ain't room on the high seas for the both of 'em. Anybody who hasn't got the stomach for the big fight gets the hell out of Water territory—that's one reason why there are still pirate lords ruling the south Kanashii Ocean—and the rest come together in the greatest naval battle ever fought. I could be here all day telling you all the legends I've heard about that battle, from how Byakuren found the lair of the last chakra leviathan and sacrificed ten ships to lure it beneath Kurohige's fleet, to how Kurohige let Byakuren's forces 'ambush' a bunch of traders carrying strong rum the night before the final confrontation… these were people who thought nothing of juggling half a dozen fleet-wide stratagems in their heads while using one hand to fight a captains' duel with a chakra cutlass and the other to steer their ship through a maze of erupting rock spikes, whirlpools and giant rampaging summon monsters.
"Spoiler alert: Byakuren wins. He tells the surviving pirate lords that they can take the long journey to Hidden Mist to swear eternal allegiance to him or the short journey to the bottom of the ocean, and it turns out most of them have always wanted to see the Mist mainland this time of year. Then he has his third stroke of genius. See, Kurohige is still alive. He lost an arm and a leg in his epic duel with Byakuren, which also has a hundred legends about it, but instead of executing the enemy leader or putting the cripple out of his misery, both fine Water Country traditions at that time, Byakuren offers him a job.
"The reason he does this is that Kurohige is a bona fide pirate lord from a long line of rulers and conquerors, while Byakuren is a ninja harbourmaster's son who's made it this far on sheer brilliance and force of personality. Byakuren knows that Kurohige can offer him the one thing he doesn't have, which is depth of experience.
"Meanwhile, Kurohige isn't just one tough bastard who is still alive after losing two limbs in a world without modern medical ninjutsu. He's also the most cunning ninja in Water, or was until Byakuren came along. He bargains his way into the position of Naval Warfare Advisor, makes himself Mist's Nara Shikaku, and between the two, they have the rest of the Water Country pirates sewn up before you can say 'Help, my beard's on fire!' Then, decades of wealth and power later, Kurohige retires and disappears from the public eye right as Mist politics start getting dangerous again with Byakuren's death.
"People always remember the First Mizukage as the man who united the Water ninja, turned Mist into a global shinobi power and created the world we now live in, but in reality he didn't do it alone. Kurohige Ranmaru accepted his brutal defeat with humility, used it to get everything he ever wanted for himself and his country, and then faded into the shadows of history like a true shinobi.
"But even to this day, every Mist ninja worth his salt knows the old mantra: 'Win like Byakuren; lose like Kurohige'."
There was a round of applause. Noburi bowed theatrically.
"I think the message is clear," Hazō said. "Byakuren benefited hugely from making an ally out of Kurohige despite their past opposition. I would guess that our friend is suggesting the same thing to us."
"That would be the obvious reading," Jiraiya agreed. "But not as obvious as you think. What does our friend get out of making the statement that we were ever enemies to begin with? Is it a coincidence that he's placing the Hokage in the role of the Mizukage? For that matter, sending someone a gift with 'revenge' written on it doesn't exactly scream 'Let's let bygones be bygones.' I reckon there's a more subtle message here, but I also reckon that we don't want to be discussing it in detail until we're in a more secure space."
Next to Hazō, Keiko shifted uneasily.
"Actually... there is one more factor to consider," she said.
"What's that?"
"According to rumours," Keiko said carefully, "the former headmaster of the Mist Academy was drinking Kurohige's Revenge on the morning of the incident."
"What a curious coincidence," Jiraiya said just as carefully. "I wonder if our friend knows.
"That's enough of that for now," he said decisively after a second. "This is a birthday party, not an all-you-can-eat clue buffet for the Mizukage's spies. If there's anything else that isn't for their ears, we can do it via the usual check-in. Instead, for just a couple of hours, why don't we forget work and take a stab at doing normal family stuff? What do normal families do when they're together, anyway?"
"Beats me," Noburi said with a laugh. "But whenever my family had nothing better to do on a quiet afternoon, we used to…"
-o-
It was late evening, and Kei was anxiously patrolling the corridors near the entrance for no reason worth noting. The boys were elsewhere, busy briefing the other Leaf teams on the information from the Oyabun's dossier, which was convenient and not entirely accidental. Her momentary relief at finally seeing Hyūga shamble in was immediately cancelled out by the fact that Rock Lee, and more importantly Tenten, did not follow.
"You are alone," she said to Hyūga in lieu of greeting.
"You." Hyūga's eyes narrowed. "You are the last person to have any right to comment on the internal dynamics of my team. Count your blessings that I do not have the energy to deal with you today."
In other words, Rock Lee and Tenten had elected to walk back independently rather than with the imbecile responsible for their problems. Good. She could devote her full attention to the task at hand.
"Is that so?" Kei asked. "How unfortunate for you. The room I have selected for our conversation is on your right."
She gestured.
Hyūga did not move. "Make no mistake, Gōketsu. I have every intention of dealing with you and your treacherous siblings, but I am going to do it on my time, not yours."
"I believe you are misunderstanding the situation," Kei said in an even voice. "This is the solitary shred of mercy I am offering you as a fellow Leaf shinobi. If you do not follow me into this room to speak in private, then we will have to speak in public, and I promise you that you will regret that for a very long time to come."
"As usual, I have no idea what you're babbling on about. But if you really want to do this now, fine. I hope you're ready." He gave her what he must have thought was a venomous glare as he led the way.
Kei closed the door firmly behind him. It had been tempting, so tempting, to do what she was about to do in full hearing of the entire shinobi world, but Hyūga had already done enough damage to Leaf's public standing and Team Gai's reputation. She wanted the rest of the contestants to move on swiftly from this appalling incident, not have it reinforced in their minds.
She had the opposite plan for him.
"I have no stake in your personal survival," she began before he could open his mouth, "except insofar as it influences Leaf's military strength. If you feel the need to throw away your life on some foolish misadventure, I do not intend to go beyond the call of duty to protect you. However, I will not have you endangering those around you for the sake of your pathetic, childish pride."
"How dare you?!" A dangerous light flared in Hyūga's eyes.
It was like wielding a tinderbox against a blizzard.
"I dare?!" Kei demanded. "You were warned, Hyūga. Of the five people who advised you on your plan, four objected in no uncertain terms, and you chose to ignore them in favour of Rock Lee. Do you even comprehend how low you have fallen? Or does your puerile compulsion to 'grab the shiny thing' outweigh whatever meagre powers of self-reflection you possess?"
"What makes you," Hyūga growled, "a mere half-tamed missing-nin, think you have the right—"
"Silence, you pitiful child!" Kei snapped. "You betrayed the teammates who trusted in your leadership, and for what? For the sake of feeding your delusional belief in your own superiority? That belief ends here, Hyūga, as much to your own benefit as to theirs."
"I—I don't know what you think you're—"
"Allow me to be clear," Kei said in a voice that drained any remaining warmth from the room. "You very nearly led your teammates to their deaths, whether in using explosives to provoke the guardians of a military site or in risking summary execution for that act. Or do you believe that there are no factions in Mist who would gladly see Leaf shinobi dead, had they but the pretext? No war hawks who would take any opportunity to sabotage the peace negotiations? No ninja who lost loved ones to the Byakugan during the war?
"You forced the Hokage to discard his game plan to ensure your safety. You humiliated him, your own clan, and the entirety of Leaf before every shinobi power under the sun. Your career hangs by a thread.
"Look me in the eye, Hyūga."
As if he had the strength of will to look away.
"I have the personal trust of the Hokage. I have the favour of Nara Shikaku. I have the military value of a summoner ascendant. I have defied impossible odds and broken unbreakable laws in order to be where I am now. Look me in the eye, and tell me that I cannot sever your thread if I so choose."
He gazed at her mutely, and she did not need social skills to know that he was flailing to find a last-minute counter. She would allow him none.
"Allow me to be clear," Kei said once more. "If you persist in placing your worthless pride above the safety of your team, if you ever force me to intervene on her behalf again, then you will spend the rest of your miserable life manning one of the oubliette guard towers on the southern border, and you will weep with joy when you receive your supply package once a month and see that someone still remembers you exist.
"Now begone. I have better uses for my time."
Keiko declares formal social combat.
Keiko (Initiative): 31
Neji (Initiative): less than 31
Turn order: Keiko, Neji
Round 1
Keiko attacks with Intimidation.
Keiko spends 2 FP to invoke "Budding Romance" and "Just Follow the Plan".
Keiko (Intimidation): 25 + 6 + 6 + 0 = 37
Keiko spends 1 FP to reroll.
Keiko (Intimidation): 25 + 6 + 6 + 6 = 43
Neji defends with Resolve.
Neji spends 1 FP to invoke "Pride of the Hyūga".
Neji (Resolve): ? + ? + ? = ?
Neji takes 9 shifts of mental stress. He takes the Mild Consequence "Uneasy", the Moderate Consequence "Shaken" and the Severe Consequence "Haunted".
Neji uses the Sprint action to move.
Neji (Athletics): ? + ? = ?
Neji leaves the zone.
Combat ends.
-o-
A chilling winter night had long since fallen on the barracks rooftop, but Kei could see a single figure on a bench, staring into the distance as if attempting to pursue the vanished sun. Kei approached, taking care to keep her footsteps audible.
Tenten glanced over her shoulder briefly, and in that instant Kei saw first recognition, and then a terrible uncertainty that she did not understand. Nevertheless, she continued walking towards the bench.
She glanced at Tenten for permission. Without meeting her eyes, Tenten gave a barely perceptible nod. Kei sat down next to her.
She had no idea what to do next.
Up close, it did not take her long to recognise the clues. The slight trembling. The tightly clenched hands. The heartbreakingly hollow look in Tenten's eyes. Something had gone very wrong.
What was the correct thing to do here? Should she ask? Or would forcing Tenten to talk about it only make it worse? Should she leave and allow Tenten her privacy, or would that be abandoning her to face her problems without support? Mari-sensei would have identified the issue with a single look, Kei knew, and within the space of a breath determined how to address it with both sensitivity and insight. Why couldn't Kei be Mari-sensei? (The eternal question.)
Finally, she compromised on simply remaining where she was, potentially the worst of both worlds, yet somehow feeling more intuitive than either.
As time passed, Kei held to her chosen course, providing silent company, wishing to seek understanding or offer reassurance but damned by ignorance of what to say.
"They wouldn't stop asking questions," Tenten suddenly whispered, still staring straight ahead. "Ever since they took me… only questions."
Kei's mind immediately conjured the image. Tenten, alone and helpless, versus the interrogators of the world's most dreaded T&I division. Them using every tool in their peacetime toolbox to provoke her into making some statement damaging to the Hokage. Her not knowing whether her death warrant was already signed, and aware that any attempt to protest her innocence or appease her captors would only sound terse and uncooperative.
Kei had to forcefully remind herself that wiping Mist T&I from the face of the earth would not be any better an idea now than it had been yesterday. (In hindsight, her reaction could have been more nuanced.)
Her pent-up outrage sought other targets. Leaf could have anticipated this. Tenten was theirs to understand and to protect. Why had they not provided her with anti-interrogation training?
But an old memory surfaced to provide the answer.
Kei had gone to the Mist Academy librarian (who, as a fellow bookworm, held her in less contempt than most instructors) to ask about that very thing, in the vague hope that it might offer transferrable skills. The librarian had told her that the Academy did not provide anti-interrogation training, and that it had never provided anti-interrogation training. Kei, too young at the time to understand the meaning of the special voice, had asked why not. The librarian had made certain that they were alone and then, still without offering any explanation, asked Kei some questions. What would it take, she asked, to make a child capable of enduring the intensity of torture that a T&I division habitually wielded? What would such conditioning do to the children too weak to complete it? What, she asked in an even lower voice, would it do to the ones who did? Then she told Kei to never bring the subject up again with anyone.
A motion by Kei's side pulled her back from the latest realisation of her own powerlessness.
With the answer to Kei's unspoken question given, Tenten seemed to crumple as if some knot of tension had become undone, allowing her head to fall into her hands.
Kei moved closer to her, as close as she dared, wishing that she had the mental fortitude to put her arm around Tenten's shoulders or whatever it was normal people did at times like these.
Kei could hear the soft sounds coming from between Tenten's cupped hands, and it instinctively made her want to turn away. Kei had not earned the kind of trust it would take for someone to be able to cry in front of her. For the same reason, she knew that Tenten's next whisper was not meant for her.
"I was supposed to be strong…"
The raw pain in that voice, the too-familiar self-loathing, tore through Kei like a jagged knife. She could not allow Tenten to proceed any further down that path, not ever, even if she risked saying things that she had not yet earned the right to say.
"Tenten," she said, mustering her courage. "Mist T&I is the best in the world. No, the worst in the world. Inflicting suffering is their job, their privilege and their pride. They have refined their arts sufficiently to break veteran jōnin, the people you and I revere as heroes."
The words rang false. She could not reason Tenten out of the darkness shrouding her. Her structured intellect, the only part of her that was of value, had no power here. Did she truly have nothing else to offer?
No, there was one more thing. Untried. Untrained. Often opaque even to herself and, charitably put, a mess. Still, it had to be good for something.
Kei cast away control and spoke from her heart.
"I do not know what you are feeling. I cannot know what you are feeling. But you are not broken. You have survived. You will heal. I know this because…"
An unnameable fear swelled up inside her. She had never felt anything like it before, not even when the Mori Voice was at its loudest. It promised failure. It promised the end of all hope. It promised final rejection and an endless fall into the abyss of loneliness.
It was also standing between her and doing the right thing for the girl she loved.
"…because you were strong enough to come back to me."
For the first time that night, Tenten turned to look at her. Through the tears, she forced out a single word.
"Always."
Eventually, they watched the sun rise together.
-o-
You have earned 4 XP. Keiko has spent 3 FP and gained 1 FP for winning a significant conflict.
-o
The Noburi/Inuzuka team was highly successful. It took a lot of waiting, but eventually they found a maid leaving the mansion to go shopping. After some time spent building rapport, she told them that there was going to be a twenty-four-hour fetish orgy starting at sunset on the 12th.
Admittedly, the butler was careful not to say it outright, but the instructions were unambiguous. A number of rooms all over the mansion had to be fitted with locks, and beds if they didn't already have any. The servants would be receiving a lot of hazard pay to make up for guests potentially laying hands on them. They were instructed to "slap" anyone they saw who wasn't on the guest list, and then immediately report to one of the ninja guarding the event (there would be ninja guarding the event!). They had to swear not to share anything they might overhear at the party with anyone. Oh, and Mikiko the scullery wench said she'd overheard two of the ninja saying something about people coming in disguise. The maid had been told that more instructions would be issued closer to the event, and she seemed uncertain whether she was more terrified or excited to hear what they were.
The Keiko/Aburame team had a harder time. The majority of businesses they visited seemed to have no particular knowledge of the party, while a few politely informed them that they could not discuss the subject. Keiko suspects that these are the caterers actively involved in the event in some fashion, and that they still remember the days when revealing information about Mist government contracts could be used as evidence of treason. Based on their numbers and scale, the pair estimate a couple of hundred guests and an event lasting half a day to a day. The food is likely to be of high quality but not noble-level.
Hazō and Hinata also struggled. Some people would not speak to them without an appointment, and of the rest, few knew anything in particular about the party, much less had been invited. In the end, they found three people who admitted to being on the guest list—a wealthy fur trader, a retired government official and the owner of a recently-founded alcohol import business. All three were happy to tell them that the event began at sunset on the 13th (not the 12th), that there would be members of a variety of social layers in attendance, and that there would apparently be ninja overseeing the affair. The last guest also described the basic layout of the mansion and its grounds.
Team Kurenai is interested in eliminating Team Gensō first, on the logic that if they aren't already targeting Team Kurenai, then they are likely to do so as soon as they discover Team Kurenai's abilities. Kiba and Akamaru will find some opportunity to memorise Sakamoto's scent, and then tomorrow your teams can track them down and eliminate them.
-o-
The other Leaf teams have received the information from the dossier with various degrees of gratitude. Shikamaru expressed his surprise that Team Gōketsu were willing to shoot their threat rating up even higher by revealing that they have access to this level of intel (especially since every Leaf team would now be wondering if Gōketsu had similar intel on them), but conceded that it could be a valid trade-off in the context of certain broader strategies.
-o-
Jiraiya's first impulse on hearing the information on Team Bloodrage was to command the Leaf ANBU to "extract" them immediately, and consequences be damned, but with Keiko's aid he was able to get hold of himself. He says you've done a sterling job, and he owes the Oyabun a hell of a favour as well. However, on reflection this has to be a trap. Akatsuki is competent, and these guys are… Team Bloodrage. It's a trap, either for him or for the Mizukage or both, and he's going to have to figure out what's behind it before he can safely make a move. Worse, he can't set ANBU to spy on them because he can't risk Mist noticing and snatching them first. For now, you are to pass along a directive to all Leaf teams to watch Team Bloodrage closely, and especially to alert him immediately (via you) if there is any indication that they are preparing to leave the village.
-o-
Your Sleight of Hand training is ongoing, but mechanically you have now spent the XP and possess the stunt and its benefits.
-o-
You have mentioned your pangolin leadership idea to Keiko. She says she will take it under advisement, which could mean anything.
-o-
It is the morning of the 11th. What do you do?
Voting ends on Saturday 19th of May, 9 am New York Time.
"Noburi, Keiko," Hazō said quietly, gesturing for his sibs to hold back as they left the chow hall. They each gave him a raised eyebrow but followed without complaint as he led them out of the building and onto a randomly-chosen rooftop far enough away from the barracks to be out of even the most implausible (for genin) range of cheating eyeballs.
"Jiraiya told us to tell the other teams to keep an eye on Team Bloodrage," he said. "I think we should pass the word to Gai and let him tell everyone else; he's one of the senior Leaf jōnin and it won't look as weird coming from him as it would from us. No one will think twice if he says it, but if we say it then it might look like we're scamming. People would question our truthfulness and that would just slow things down."
"Agreed," Keiko said. "Also, before you ask, I feel this is entirely consistent with Jiraiya's intent."
"Yeah, that was going to be my next question," Hazō said, smiling. "Okay, well...related to Gai, I wanted to talk to you about Hyūga Neji," Hazō said. "In parti—
"That puling child deserves no concern from us."
Keiko's voice was like the night winds of Snow Country: sharp as a blade and colder than ice. It pared away the reality of any possibility for debate, making her statement a pure fact of existence. It stopped Hazō dead in his mental tracks.
Silence loomed on the rooftop as Hazō and Noburi struggled to find a response and Keiko felt no need of one.
"Keiko..." Hazō said at last. "You're right. He doesn't deserve anything from us. He's a complete dipshit who thinks his bloodline and skill at taijutsu somehow make him valuable outside of a battlefield. He's rude, inconsiderate, arrogant, and lacks any trace of the Will of Fire as I understand it. I fully recognize all of those things. That doesn't mean he isn't a risk that we need to deal with. He talked his team into doing something insanely stupid—" He raised a hand as Keiko's eyes blazed and her mouth opened. "No, that's wrong. I doubt he actually talked them into anything. He probably just bulled ahead on his own. Rock Lee went along because it was exciting and 'youthful', and Tenten went along because she's too responsible to let her teammates go into danger without trying her best to protect them.
"Regardless, that doesn't mean the problem he represents is resolved. If anything, it might even be worse. He's reeling right now, his confidence destroyed and his self-image badly damaged. He's too arrogant to accept that he made a mistake, so he's undoubtedly trying to justify it as everyone else being unfair. Once he does that he'll be looking for a way to prove himself, to do something that will exonerate him in the eyes of Jiraiya and the other Leaf teams. Think about that for a minute; what might someone with a major chip on their shoulder get up to? Especially one whose only skills are the Byakugan and expert taijutsu? Is anything that he's likely to do going to be good for Leaf?"
Keiko's lips thinned; a normal observer would have thought her utterly stone-faced, but to to Hazō's Mari-sensei-trained eyes, Keiko's microexpressions, the faint trembling in her hands, and the slight change in her breathing all shrieked of killing rage balanced on the tip of a knife.
"His sensei would not allow him to do anything so criminally stupid," she said at last.
Noburi snorted. "Gai wouldn't allow it?" he said. "Gai, who is maxi-Lee? Spandex, youth, all that?" He paused, then shook his head. "Yeah, okay, he probably wouldn't...if he noticed. Are we willing to bet that he'll think of it, and that Hyūga will respect his orders and not sneak off?" He chuckled sourly. "Thinking about bad team dynamics again, huh, Hazō?"
The taste of over-salted ramen and the sounds of a long-gone busy street in Iron flickered briefly through Hazō's mind. The corner of his lip twitched at the memory. "Yeah, something like that. I think we have an opportunity here. Hyūga is reeling, off balance. His defenses have been stripped away, his sense of superiority has been crushed, and his self-image has taken a major hit. He's in a perfect state to be recruited. He'll latch on to anyone who offers him a lifeline—friendship, support, a chance for self-respect. That could be us. If we give him that support we could mould him into being a better person. Say what you will about him, he's a hell of a fighter and his eyes mean he would be an incredible intelligence agent if he could learn some of the necessary soft skills. He's also the star of the Hyūga clan. His behavior has shamed them, and they're going to hate Jiraiya all the more for it." He once again raised a hand to cut off protest, this time from Noburi. "It's not fair and it's not logical, but it's true." He waited until Noburi subsided with a sour nod. "On the other hand, suppose we befriended him—or, at least, rehabilitated him? If Gōketsu publicly...'forgives' would be a strong word, but shows that he's not outcast, that he has a chance to earn back respect in the eyes of the Hokage and, by extension, the eyes of Leaf, that he has a chance to become a valued and trusted shinobi again...well, for one thing we could save a good ninja for Leaf. More importantly, if we become his allies then the Hyūga elders are in a bind. Criticizing Jiraiya, and by extension us, would make it seem that we had been wrong to forgive him. They would need to publicly support us in order to avoid the shame he brings upon them."
He stopped talking, looking from one of his sibs to the other as he waited to see how the words landed.
Silence reigned on the rooftop.
"Are you saying," Keiko said, her voice far off in the Ice despite the fact that no plan yet existed for her to analyze, "that you wish to turn Neji against his clan and make him an intelligence operative of the Gōketsu?"
Hazō hesitated, thinking about it. "I guess?" In truth, he'd been thinking more about defusing a problem than about generating a future asset, but yes. Keiko's version worked too.
Every trace of body language and expression had disappeared from Keiko's body. She was a puppet, her muscles and tendons pushed and pulled by a far-off hand made out of Ice. The sight was terrifying; he'd never seen her go this deep, even back in that room in Iron where she had barely come out of it.
"Keiko?" Noburi asked carefully. His hand twitched, saying loud as a shout how badly he wanted to reach out to her, how clearly he hoped that the touch of warm flesh would melt the Ice, but both he and Hazō knew better. "Come back, Keiko. You're scaring us."
Slowly, so very slowly and unwillingly, the fingers of the Ice unclenched from Keiko's soul and she became human once again. "Very well," she said, traces of frost still creeping through her tone. "We will permit Neji to redeem himself by becoming a loyal servant of the Gōketsu. I will be, as Yamamoto put it, 'hard man' during any necessary discussions; given the conversation we had earlier the option for me to be anything else has been foreclosed."
Hazō carefully did not say that 'loyal servant' wasn't exactly where he'd been aiming, nor did it seem terribly plausible. The level of Keiko's opposition was far higher than he'd expected. He'd known she was furious, but this....
"What conversation?" Hazō asked carefully.
"I spoke to Hyūga last night," Keiko said. "I suggested to him that perhaps his lack of caution was inappropriate and unprofessional. I also suggested that perhaps it would be good if he attempted to be more measured in his actions going forward, and that I would be very disappointed if he did not succeed." She paused and smiled very, very slightly. "I feel confident that it was a productive discussion." Her tone was dry as dust, not even pretending that what she said was anything other than grossest understatement.
"I see," Hazō said.
"We could work it like we did with Team Kurenai," Noburi said, clearly deciding to ride right on past that entire line of discussion. "Keiko takes point on opposition, I back her up but a little less firmly, Hazō is the good guy."
"You're better at charming people," Hazō objected. "Maybe you should take lead this time?"
"I hate the bastard's guts and I've made no secret of it. You're the only one on the team who doesn't have...." He searched for a phrase, then laughed. "Doesn't have negative social modifiers with him."
Hazō smiled at the reference to their games of Dungeon Walk; sometimes it seemed like it would be nice if life really were just a game, ruled by numbers and dice. It would be so much easier to understand people if you could see their character sheets!
"Okay," he said. "Good, it's a plan. More immediately, though, we need to find out more about the event. If we can get Team Kurenai to work with us again I think we can get that done. We just need to go back to the Nari mansion and get them to check the guest list. First, we tunnel under the estate with Team Kurenai. Once we're in position we have a messenger go up to the gate and tell them that his master has a shellfish allergy and could they please check to see if that's going to be an issue. They'll want to know if the messenger is telling the truth, so someone will go to look at the list. We should be able to tunnel under the estate far enough that Hyūga will be in range to read the list once they show us where it is. Then—"
"Why would they need to check the guest list?" Keiko interrupted. "Why would they not simply answer the question? The menu is hardly a secret."
Hazō froze. "Um."
Noburi patted him on the arm. "It's okay, Hazō. Honestly I think that if you'd come up with two smart and workable plans in a row then the world might have ended."
Hazō glared. "Okay, well, fine. Maybe that part needs some more work. Still, we can at least go get some clothes that are fit for a party, just in case we need them."
Keiko's face became even more sour as she very obviously thought about enduring the horror that was clothes shopping.
"Beyond that," Hazō continued, "I think we should get Team Kurenai to help us ambush one of the high-scoring teams that the Oyabun gave us dossiers on. I've put some thought into it and I think I know who to hit and how to make the battle unfair and one-sided in our favor."
"Standard terms?" Noburi asked Keiko.
"No bet," she said, shaking her head firmly.
"Three to one?"
"Are you two betting on how well my tactics will work?" Hazō asked hopefully.
Noburi shook his head. "Nah, we're betting on whether there's going to be some key fact that you missed that Keiko can clean up. I'm betting fifty ryō that she can."
Hazō pondered the significance of the fact that Keiko was unwilling to take that bet. Mentally, he reviewed his plans: get Team Kurenai to assist so that they had the advantage of numbers. Prepare a battleground so that they had the advantage of terrain. Open with Goo Bomb to remove enemy mobility, then have Aburame's insects drain chakra from the swordsman while everyone stayed at range. Pop mist so that the ninja with the invisibility bloodline could be spotted by the space they left, and so that Noburi's chakra-sense would work...although, of course don't mention that ability, for OPSEC reasons.
"On second thought, maybe we just go talk to Neji," Hazō said. "I'll think on the rest of it a bit more."
"Aw, man," Noburi said. "I was looking to make some bank."
o-o-o-o
The barracks of this Sage-forsaken mudhole's pathetic attempt at a ninja academy contained a number of multi-purpose rooms that could be reconfigured for various purposes. Push the desks up against the wall and take the striking dummy out of the closet, it became a training room. Put the dummy away and pull the desks out, it became a classroom. And, of course, meditation required no particular setup.
Neji was seated cross-legged on one of the desks, backs of his hands loose on his thighs, eyes closed, breathing slow and steady. He did not open his eyes when the door opened an inch and then banged up against the desk that had been placed in front of it.
"Hyūga?" called the voice of that repellent beast who had caused all this.
Neji stayed silent and focused on his breathing.
Slow and steady pressure forced the door open just enough that the idiot could slip inside.
"What do you want, Gōketsu?" Neji asked, not opening his eyes.
"I brought you some lunch."
Neji allowed his eyes to drift open. Gōketsu stood before him, relaxed and confident as he always was. He wore the same resting smile he always did, the one that fooled everyone into thinking that he was open and friendly and honorable. He was nothing more than a missing-nin. Also, he was carrying a tray of food; two plates, some kind of stew and a cornbread that smelled amazing and had in no way come from this place's disgusting slop troughs.
"What's that?"
"Lunch," Gōketsu repeated, offering the tray. "It's out of one of our storage scrolls. Kagome-sensei cooked it...." He frowned, thinking. "Three months ago? Maybe four? He was going through an experimental phase at the time, so it's got sweet berries mixed in with the savory meats and spices. Anyway, he made a ginormous batch of it and we sealed up portions for later. It's a little weird, but pretty good." He set the tray on the desk in front of Neji and hopped up himself so that it sat between them. He took one of the plates for himself and gestured invitation to the other.
"Why are you here, Gōketsu?" Neji demanded, not moving. "Your sister has already told me what you all think of me. Do you really feel the need to get your own licks in?"
Gōketsu waited a moment for Neji to pick up the food, then shrugged and took a bite of his own. "I don't know what she said, and I really don't care," he said. "You made a mistake, and you're paying for it. I don't think you should have done it, but at the end of the day no one was hurt. Yes, Jiraiya lost some political points and that's a problem, but he's brilliant and I'm sure he'll make it work. Beside, I'm hardly in a position to criticize."
"What does that mean?" Neji demanded, suspiciously.
Gōketsu thought for a moment, then sighed and put his food down so that he could lean back on his hands. Neji was surprised to see just how tired Gōketsu seemed.
"I'm trying to count up the number of times I did something or said something that nearly got my team killed," Hazō said softly, his eyes unfocused as he looked into memory. "There was the box...and maybe the inn, although that was sort of a group decision...the cave wasn't on me...I feel like I'm forgetting one." He paused, thinking for another moment, then shook himself back to the present. "Well, leaving aside the times I've nearly gotten us killed, I can't even remember the number of times I've put my foot in it, said the wrong thing, and either hurt those around me or made myself look incredibly stupid. I blabbed a close friend's most important secret without even realizing I'd done it until they pointed it out to me later. Nara Shikaku chewed me out for not thinking about the potential downsides of an idea I'd had. Jiraiya assigned us to work with a Leaf ninja and I deeply offended her within hours. For that matter, I do most of the planning for my team and Keiko is constantly shooting holes in my plans, pointing out things that I didn't think of or was wrong about."
"I see," Neji said. "Well, at least you acknowledge that you're a stupid cretin."
Gōketsu shot him a reproving glare. "Don't be quite so quick to throw stones, O Attacker of Enemy Military Headquarters." He shrugged and picked up his plate again, swizzling the cornbread around in the meat gravy and taking a bite. "My point," he said once he'd swallowed the fragant morsel, "is that I know what it's like to get ahead of yourself and do something that seems perfectly sensible at the moment but turns out to be a mistake. Mari-sensei has said to me any number of times that everyone makes mistakes, but the important thing is owning them and learning from them."
Neji started to interject but Gōketsu cut him off with an upraised hand. "Face it, Hyūga: You screwed up. You need to admit that to yourself before you can learn from it, and until you do no one is going to be confident enough to work with you.
"Here's the thing, though: I really hope you do. You're prickly, and you're a little arrogant, but underneath it I think you're worthy of respect. You're an incredible fighter, a natural leader, and every single person that I've spoken to says that you're wildly loyal to Leaf. At the end of the day, that's what matters."
Neji blinked. "Are you feeling all right, Gōketsu?"
Hazō rolled his eyes. "Come on, Hyūga, I'm offering an olive branch here. I've been where you are and I've felt what you've felt—"
"You know nothing about what I feel!"
"Yes I fucking do, you jackass! I got my team thrown in a cell, same as yours! The difference is that your team was released without any harm done. Mine came within a whisker of being executed, so stop being such a pretty princess about how your fucking pain is worse than anyone else's!"
Neji recoiled, white eyes going wide at the sudden fury. "But...." He trailed off, unsure how to finish the sentence.
Gōketsu sighed and rubbed his face with the hand that wasn't holding his plate, then set the food down. "I really do get it, okay? No matter what you think, I really do. I've done way stupider things than what you're dealing with right now, and I got through them. The difference between us is that you've got a chip on your shoulder; I don't know where it comes from, but it's getting in your way.
"It's up to you where you go from here. What I wanted to tell you is that yes, you made a mistake and no, it's not the end of the world. Things are strained between you and your team right now, but you'll get through it if you decide to. More importantly, I think you've got the potential to be an incredible ninja and a great leader...if you can put that chip down and start being a little more open to others."
Neji sat, stunned, as the words sank in. He ran them through his mind over and over, looking for the subtle mockery, the hidden jape. There...wasn't one?
"What are you doing, Gōketsu?" he asked suspiciously.
The other ninja looked at him disgustedly for a moment. "I'm reaching out, nitwit. I made all these mistakes, but I had Mari-sensei to pick me up after each one. From what I've seen, Gai is a legendary taijutsu master, an excellent teacher, and a truly good man...but I haven't seen anything that suggests he remembers what it's like to be a teenager, or that he's good at dealing with a crisis of confidence. I figured you could use a...well, I guess we don't know each other well enough yet to say 'a friend', but at least a friendly acquaintance? A brother-in-arms who wants you to be successful because it will strengthen the Leaf?" He snorted. "Besides, Noburi would be so upset if you gave up and lost all your snark. He lives to trade barbs with you."
Neji snorted. "As if that simpleton could hope to out-argue a Hyūga," he said, lifting his nose in exaggerated condescension and keeping one eye carefully turned to Gōketsu to make sure the joke was obvious.
"Yes, well, perhaps you can cooperate his ass to victory sometime soon," Gōketsu replied, a smile dancing around his mouth.
Neji snorted and picked up the plate of stew in order to give himself something else to look at. And because it smelled delicious.
"In more serious news," Gōketsu continued. "Jiraiya passed an order to all Leaf ninja to keep an eye on Team Bloodrage. There's a suggestion that they either have some important information or are connected to someone who does. Very important information. He doesn't want them leaving Mist without us knowing about it. Also, Team Gōketsu has an absolutely secure communication link to Jiraiya, although it's got some lag time built in. If you have something to report, use your judgement—you can give it to us if there's time and you judge that's the right move, or you can give it to one of the jōnin or ANBU if not. If you give it to us we'll pass it on and tell Jiraiya that it came from you."
Neji looked up suspiciously, but there was nothing but sincerity on Gōketsu's face; oddly, Neji couldn't help but believe that the other boy really would give credit where it was due.
"Thank you, Gōketsu," he said.
The other boy shrugged. "Don't mention it. And it's Hazō, if you want."
Hazō, Deceit (25) + invoke "Creative Idealist" (+3, -1FP) + 4dF (-3): 25
Neji has less Deceit than Hazō at the best of times and is currently operating at (-3 * Aspect Bonus) due to having a Moderate and Severe Consequence. He loses big time.
XP AWARD: 1 This update covered about 6 hours.
FP AWARD: 0
It is now noon on November 11; the next event starts either sunset on the 12th (according to one source), sunset on the 13th (according to others), or Sage-only-knows-when if those sources are all wrong.
Vote time! What to do now?
Voting ends on Wednesday, May 23, 2018, at 12pm London time.
Author's Notes: This plan was a bit of a mixed bag and definitely not a 4 XP/day plan, but it also wasn't even nearly bad enough to deserve nothing, so I awarded it at least 1 XP.
The part with Bloodrage was smart; there's a chain of command for a reason and passing orders through the jōnin removes a lot of issues. That part happened offscreen, and Gai said it was okay for you to talk to Neji. If anything, he seemed glad that you wanted to.
The part about Neji was equally well planned; very character-appropriate, opened lots of plot hooks, etc. There was no in-character reason why Hazō would talk to Noburi about it but not to Keiko; remember that he didn't know that she'd reamed Neji out, which is (as I understand it) the only reason you did not include talking to her in the plan. As such, I had him loop both of them in.
I was really excited to write the ambush of Team Gensō—yay, finally some punching! Unfortunately, you neglected the keystone: where is the ambush site, how do you get the enemy there, and how do you keep from being interrupted? I sat down to write it and could not come up with a plausible way to make it work, which is why it got aborted.
The plan to spy on the Nari mansion had the same problem: Why do they need to check the guest list in order to answer the question? What do you do when they don't?
Given these issues, I opted to end the update early so that you would still have time to re-plan and try again.
"Master Amai, there is a gentleman asking to see you."
The servant waited patiently for instructions.
Bonku took several seconds to savour the moment. He, Amai Bonku, son of a leatherworker of very limited means, now had his very own servant, perhaps even the first of many. Never again would he wake up to the smell of cow hide. Never again would the high-born sneer at him in the street. Amai Bonku was one of the elite by definition now, with a two-floor house on the Yasuraka Promenade to his name and yes, his very own servant.
"What does he want?" Bonku demanded with the hard-earned arrogance of the nouveau riche.
"He says he is from the Mizukage's Office."
All trace of levity disappeared from Bonku's heart. Had someone denounced him? Had his charitable donation to the inspectors been too miserly? Would his books be found to be in order? Dear spirits of the depths, were his books in order?
"S-Show him in," Bonku said after weighing his odds of success if he dove through the window and started running now.
It turned out that Bonku had made the right call. The visitor was a ninja, and could have caught him within seconds, then added "resisting arrest" to whatever charges were about to be heaped upon him.
"Welcome to my humble home, noble ninja."
The ninja, a slim young man probably capable of breaking Bonku in two with his little finger, gave a light bow.
"Thank you for agreeing to see me, Mr Amai. My name is Shinsa Modoki. I am here to speak with you about the upcoming party."
"Oh, the Chūnin Exam event?" Bonku asked. He hoped his hastily-erected calm façade was fooling the visitor, and not backfiring to make him seem unaccountably suspicious. He'd heard of people being taken away for less.
"Indeed. I am pleased to inform you that my superiors have taken note of your loyalty and reliability, and have sent me to make you an offer."
Loyalty? Reliability? Was this a trap? It had to be a trap. Bonku was as loyal and reliable as any man, but the regime didn't single people out for rewards just like that, not without some heroic act or significant donation.
Then again, the regime also didn't need to entrap people. The Mizukage and his—her—agents had full discretion when it came to rooting out treachery. Could this be for real?
"I would be delighted to serve the Mizukage's Office in any way I can," Bonku said emphatically.
"I knew you would be." The ninja gave a faint smile. "During the party, you may be approached by someone who speaks the code words 'Kurohige's Revenge' during casual conversation. If you are, it would be greatly appreciated if you performed whatever small favour they may ask of you. Rest assured that you will be compensated for any trouble you have to go to, and your willingness to assist will be noted on your record."
His record? So the rumours were true. The Mizukage really did keep detailed records on everyone in the village, noting every act of loyalty and disloyalty in preparation for the day on which he or his minions decided to pronounce judgement on a citizen's soul. That was either reassuring or terrifying... but probably terrifying. If Bonku's rise was to continue, he had to make sure his record was spotless.
"Of course, sir," Bonku said. "Anything to help the Chūnin Exam go as smoothly as possible."
"Good. Good. Then I will leave you to your work."
The ninja turned to leave, but before he did, he asked one final question.
"You do remember when we will be expecting you for the party, don't you, Mr Amai?"
"Sunset of the 12th," Bonku answered promptly. "I'll be there the second the sun so much as touches the horizon."
"Well, then, a good day to you."
It wasn't until the ninja disappeared out of sight at the end of the street that Bonku was able to breathe again.
"Hyūga, have you got a minute?" Hazō said, once the girl opened her dorm room door in response to his knock.
The heiress to the second most powerful clan in Leaf (because obviously the most powerful clan was the one that included the Fifth Hokage, an elite jōnin infiltrator, three sealmasters, two summoners, one of the Legendary Three, and a skilled medic-nin who could suck someone dry of chakra just by being in the same fogbank (granted, several of those people were Jiraiya)) smiled and gestured the Gōketsu trio inside.
"Please, Hazō, I thought we agreed on first names?" she said, still smiling. "So much easier when multiple people from the same clan are in the room, right?"
Hazō kept himself from frowning. "Yes, of course. Thank you, Hinata."
"What did you guys get?" Inuzuka asked from where he lounged on one of the bunks.
Hazō grinned. "Check this out, I talked—"
"A moment," Keiko said, cutting him off. "We had a deal with you three whereby our teams would collaborate to spy on the Nari mansion. That deal is now over. Our only remaining arrangement is with the members of SuperTeam Leaf, in which we all exchange information about the location and starting time of events. You are not part of that group. We are not here to add one more tally to our list of OPSEC failures"—she paused to glare at Hazō—"we are here to offer you a chance to join SuperTeam Leaf. This invitation is not free. You will need to supply some information to buy in."
"Keiko!" Hazō said. "What are you doing? That wasn't the plan!"
She met his gaze unflinchingly. "You are too trusting, and too generous. The goal is for Leaf to, as you put it, 'crush the Exams like a bug'. Team Kurenai's contribution to that goal thus far has been to provide a floor plan and scare off two dogs, both things that we could have done easily. We, on the other hand, have discovered and shared the location and starting time of each event, obtained dossiers on the top non-Mist teams, come up with a strategem that allowed everyone to do well in the swamp event, and created a battle plan that Nara Shikamaru approved, in which we fully utilized a dozen ninja whose capabilities we were not familiar with in advance. None of Team Kurenai's members are our equals in combat and we have no experience working with them, meaning that asking them to 'help' us at eliminating other top-ranked teams is of marginal utility at best. If they want the advantages of working with the top-ranked teams then they need to bring something to the table."
Noburi facepalmed. "Sage's saltlick, Keiko," he muttered. "Way to Kagome all the goodwill we've built up. We need to work with these people once the Exams are over."
"Guys, I'm sorry about this," Hazō said to Team Kurenai, nodding a particular apology to the scion of the Inuzuka, who was on his feet and shooting Keiko a fulminating glare. "Please forgive my sister, her former clan has been—"
"Hazō!" Keiko hissed.
"Right, sorry," Hazō said, rubbing the back of his neck in embarrassment. "Well, anyway.... Look, we want you to join the alliance. We've got pretty solid confirmation on the time of the next event and an additional item of value. What do you say?"
Inuzuka was having none of it. "You three think you're the next coming of the fucking Sage, don't you? You don't get to talk shit about—"
"Okay, everyone take a breath," Noburi said, raising both hands placatingly. "Everyone's wound a little tight about the Exams and being in Mist. Let's just breathe for a second, okay?" He waited until Inuzuka's stance had relaxed slightly, then turned to his clan sister. "Keiko, you're being unfair. Team Kurenai are badass fighters and better intelligence assets than anyone else in the SuperTeam. We want them in the group." He turned to Hyūga. "That said, do you have something you could share? We haven't actually talked to the rest of the group about bringing you in. I doubt it's a problem no matter what, but if you had anything then it would pretty much be a shoo-in."
Team Kurenai exchanged looks and varied silent acknowledgements.
"We do," Hyūga said. "We managed to find a proctor who was doing his paperwork in a tea shop—presumably in order to deliberately create an opportunity for information theft. I was able to read some of it before he finished and threw everything into a storage seal. Furthermore, Kiba and Shino were able to track him after he left the tea shop. His route was informative."
Noburi laughed. "Yes!" He turned to Keiko triumphantly. "See? Told you so."
Keiko glared at him. "Just because—"
"Keiko, I just realized I left that thing in our room. Would you mind getting it?" Hazō asked.
Keiko raised an eyebrow. "What thing?"
"You know...the thing. The thing that the guy gave us. I know it's in one of the storage scrolls, but I don't recall which one. I'm afraid you'll just have to check them all. Oh, and once you find it do you think you could ask the other teams to meet us in room 115?"
Her expression got even more sour. "Fine." She turned and left, closing the door behind her with pointed precision.
Hazō and Noburi looked at each and shared a relieved chuckle.
"Your sister seems to dislike us," Aburame noted.
"Nah," Noburi said. "It's not you, it's Hazō. She thinks he's being too free with information and too focused on building alliances for the future—"
"Way to throw me under the chakra bison there, Nobby," Hazō grumbled.
Noburi ignored him with the relaxed ease whereby a ninja ignores a fly. A fly that is in a different country, far away from the ninja. And dead. "Don't get me wrong, we all agree that making friends and alliances is the right play, it's just that she'd like to be a little more concerned about the immediate future. She thought we should be out chasing down leads on the next event instead of coming back to check in with everyone else."
"My understanding is that the Mori bloodline makes her a tactical genius on the level of the Nara, so why—"
"Her brain makes her a tactical genius," Noburi snapped, all traces of humor gone. "Her bloodline helps, but she'd still be the smartest thing on two legs even without it—the Nara should be proud that they're on her level. And she's not Mori anymore, she's Gōketsu."
"Easy, Noburi," Hazō said, resting a hand on the other's shoulder. "He didn't mean anything by it. Aburame, I think what you were asking is why we're ignoring her advice, right?"
"Indeed."
Hazō nodded. "Okay, well, we generally don't. She's pretty much always right when she points out a flaw in a plan or suggests a fix. In this case, it's not a question of her being wrong, it's just a disagreement about what plan to follow. Of what the priorities should be, and whether long-term or short-term is the most important focus right now."
"I see."
"Anyway, we're going to round up the rest of the SuperTeam who are in barracks right now. You guys want to join us?"
o-o-o-o
SuperTeam Leaf were waiting in classroom 115 by the time Hazō and the others arrived. Or, at least, most of the SuperTeam were waiting. Ino-Shika-Chō were there, as were Team Clanless and now Team Kurenai, but Team Gai had absented themselves. Everyone was careful not to comment on that fact.
"Hinata, Shino, Kiba! Nice to see you guys!" Chōji beamed as Kurenai's students came in. "I was wondering why you hadn't been in the group before this."
"Yeah," Kiba said. "I was wondering that too." He looked pointedly at Hazō.
Hazō shrugged. "Wasn't deliberate, it's just that you guys didn't show up at the fort during the swamp event and things were busy after that, so we didn't really think about it."
"You are here now," Nara said. "I assume you wish to join our information-sharing alliance?"
"Yes," Hyūga said, quietly taking her seat between her teammates. "And we have some information of our own to offer."
"Cool," Yamanaka said, flashing the other girl a grin. "Did you sucker another proctor?"
"Not exactly. We waited at the Headquarters building until one of them left, then Kiba and Akamaru tracked him to a tea shop. He was doing paperwork in the street-side seating and I had an opportunity to read some of it. He finished and put everything into a storage scroll before I could see much, but we were able to track him again after he left."
"Your team is most impressive," Akane said, smiling. "I for one am very glad to have you join us."
Inuzuka puffed out his chest. "Easy as cake," he said. "These streets are filthy and the whole city is jammed with stinky civilians but, even with that, me 'n' Akamaru didn't have any trouble following this jerk."
"It's 'easy as pie', doofus," Yamanaka corrected.
"Hey!"
"What did you find?" Nara asked, raising his voice slightly to cut through the incipient verbal brawl. All eyes immediately turned back to Hyūga.
"Before I share that," she said, "I would like to know the exact agreement that's being offered."
"We will all share with each other the location and starting time of each event," Nara replied. "Sharing anything beyond that is up to the individual teams, although personally I feel that it is to all our advantage that we do so."
"Okay, so if we tell you what we know then you'll all tell us what you know?" Inuzuka demanded, looking around the circle. Nods were his reply—some enthusiastic, some hesitant, and at least one sour. (Yamamoto, unsurprisingly.)
"Why don't you start?" Shino suggested.
"Very well," Nara said. "All of our sources agree that the event will take place at the Nari mansion and that it begins at sunset, although there is debate as to whether it is starts tomorrow or the next day."
"I disguised myself as an Exam proctor and spoke to one of the civilian guests that we identified," Hazō said. "He was confident that the exam starts tomorrow."
"Sneaky," Yamanaka said, raising an eyebrow. "That's what we figured, too."
"Oh?" Noburi asked. "Where are you getting that from?"
"We broke into some of the food vendors around town and checked their delivery schedules," she said. "A lot of food has already been delivered to the Nari mansion, but the prawns are only being delivered tomorrow afternoon. Like you said, they don't keep."
"Slick."
"We also know that there's going to be somewhere between two hundred and three hundred guests," Hazō said. "There's fifty teams still in the Exams—"
"Forty-eight," Nara said. "In addition to Team Gai, a team was disqualified due to a discipline issue."
"Okay, forty-eight teams," Hazō said. "Anyway, that's about a hundred and fifty contestants. Presumably the rest of the guests will be proctors and civilians."
"Mist only has...maybe three hundred chūnin?" Noburi pointed out. "And not all of them are proctors. There's no way they're going to have the bulk of their forces gathered in one building and not out protecting the city or doing things, so a good chunk of the other guests will be civilians."
"There have been rumors that it's supposed to be an orgy," Haruno pointed out. "That seems unlikely, though. Lots of ninja wouldn't want their kids banging people from Mist—no offense, Gōketsu, I'm sure your granny-lusting selves are perfectly nice people—so sending us into that sort of environment would be frowned on."
"Seduction skills are a thing," Yamamoto said. "After all, if you can seduce a target it's an easy way to get favors, information, good reviews...." As he spoke the final words he was being utterly unsubtle about looking back and forth between Hazō and Noburi.
"I believe this is where our information fits in," Hyūga said, thankfully distracting everyone. "The documents that the proctor was working on were a set of briefing sheets. Name, background, job details, that sort of thing. They were all numbered, and each one had a note at the top saying 'secret role', and then 'Counterpart' and a blank. I only had a chance to see three of the sheets before he packed everything away, but I've got copies and can make more for all of you. One of them was for a jeweler, one was a weaponsmith, and one was a lady's maid for someone I hadn't heard of."
"And after he packed it all up, he went out of the city," Inuzuka said. "Me and Akamaru tracked him the whole way. He stopped off at this blacksmith shop to pick up a pair of lockboxes. They were each about as big as me, solid metal, and the proctor couldn't lift them on his own. He and another proctor put 'em on a wagon along with a bunch of tools and went out the east gate."
"What kind of tools?" Nara demanded.
Inuzuka shrugged. "Carpentry stuff, I guess? Hammers, saws, nails, that kind of thing. Also a lot of sand and ash, for some weird reason."
"It was probably lime, not sand," Yamamoto said. "For making concrete."
Inuzuka shrugged. "Yeah, I guess. Anyway, they're clearly building something outside the city."
"That doesn't fit well with the idea of a big party in a mansion," Akane said. "Maybe it's for the following event?"
"Probably," Yamamoto said. "It takes at least a day or two for concrete to set, and it's not fully cured for nearly a month. If they're doing a quick slap-up then they wouldn't need full strength, but it would still be pretty late in the game to be putting up concrete for an event that starts tomorrow."
"The question that remains is where we go to report in for this event," Keiko said. "Has anyone heard anything at all about this?"
Everyone around the circle shook their heads.
"I say we simply show up to the party," Aburame said. "Why? The Exams need to be possible to pass. Given that none of us have heard even a trace about a location other than the mansion, the party itself becomes the logical place to go. Furthermore, a party like this would have a greeter to welcome the guests, take their coats, and so on. Presumably in this case the greeter will brief us on what is expected. I would, however, suggest that we arrive before sunset."
Silence reigned for a few seconds as everyone looked for additional facts or ideas to offer and came up empty.
"I guess the last question is what do we do with the rest of today and tomorrow?" Hazō asked. "We could go out hunting for word-halves again. And we've got dossiers on some of the top teams; this might be a good time to take a few of them out."
Inuzuka made a disgusted noise. Hazō looked over at him, one eyebrow raised in invitation.
"Fuckin' Gensō," the dog-clan ninja mumbled. "They hardly step foot out of the damn barracks, and when they do they stick to the most populated streets."
"Hm," Keiko said. "They must have already discovered everything they needed to know for the event. I wonder how?"
"One of their team can be invisible," Noburi said. "Saying 'ninja' doesn't really cover just how much cheating bullshit that is."
"Any chance you could mindrip it out of them, Yamanaka?" Hazō asked.
She frowned in thought, then looked over at Inuzuka. "Which ones are they again? I'm not placing the name."
"They're from Waterfall. Their leader has those two butterfly swords?"
Yamanaka thought for a moment, then nodded. "Oh, yeah. Them. You're right, they've been sticking close to home lately. And being careful to always have witnesses around." She waffled her hand back and forth. "Maybe I could get them, but probably not. We aren't supposed to fight or use jutsu on each other in the barracks."
"Why don't you just call them out?" Yamamoto asked.
Everyone looked at him.
"What? Inuzuka, you're all about being dramatic and direct. Stand up at dinner and tell them they're a bunch of incompetents who are cowering in the barracks for fear of facing the mighty Inuzuka clan. Then name a place and time and see if they show up."
"There is no way that would work," Yamanaka said. "No one would be stupid enough to rise to bait that obvious."
Yamamoto shrugged. "If they don't, nothing lost. If they do, you get to eliminate a high-ranked enemy team. Where's the downside?"
"The downside is that we could get a dozen teams showing up all at once," Inuzuka snapped back. "Yeah, we'll kick ass against any three of them, but there's still a limit."
"Yeah, I suppose," Yamamoto said, sounding disappointed. "Well, you'd know better than me if you're not strong enough to handle that."
"Ye—wait, what?" Inuzuka said, turning to the shadow-wielder. "What are you saying?"
"He means that it is not youthful for Leaf ninja to insult each other. Even if they are attempting to do it subtly, Haru," Akane scolded.
"This looks like a good place to call a stop," Hazō said. "Sunset tomorrow is around five o'clock. How about we all meet at the mansion at three? And if anyone comes up with anything useful between now and then, let us know, okay?"
A chorus of assent went around the table. Slowly, the pride of the Village Hidden in the Leaves went forth to mingle with their counterparts and seek out methods of committing horrific violence without getting caught. Also, pudding. It had been listed on the menu for tonight.
o-o-o-o
Somehow, Hazō was only moderately surprised to find the gates of the Nari mansion open and a pair of elderly manservants waiting beside them. The two watched the SuperTeam Leaf ninja approach without saying a word, then bowed politely as the ninja all stopped at the gates.
"Good afternoon, young sirs and ladies," said the one on the left, a tall and rake-thin man who had to be in his fifties at least. "You are early for the event. Please follow me and I will lead you to the briefing station." He turned and paced off towards the house, not bothering to check whether or not they were following him.
Hazō and the others trailed along in his wake like bemused ducklings, wondering how this could possibly get weirder. What kind of infiltration test started with the infiltrator being led into the infiltration target by an elderly civilian? Or, alternatively, if this wasn't an infiltration test then why was there a Chūnin Exam event consisting of a gala?
The old man led them past the doors of the house and around to a back lawn that was out of sight from the entrance. There awaited an awning under which three proctors lounged on folding chairs, each of them with a bottle of something in hand. The smell of roasted meat wafted up from the skewers of chicken that rested on the hibachi behind them.
"Another batch for you, sirs," the butler said, bowing deeply to the proctors.
"Huh. More early birds than I expected," said the middle proctor. He was old for a ninja, probably in his early forties, with black hair and a missing ring and pinky finger on his left hand. He glanced to his right. "Looks like you win, Himari." He pulled a fifty ryō coin from his pocket and flicked it over.
Himari, a brunette in her early twenties, caught the coin with an easy grin. "Happy to take your money. Want to go again? I bet there's at least twenty more between now and sunset."
The older proctor snorted. "Thanks, I like my money where it is. You're too good at this."
"Hey, it's not my fault that—"
"Excuse me," said the third proctor, a short and surprisingly fleshy man with a fussy look about him. "A bit of professionalism, if you please?" He turned to the Leaf teams. "Welcome to the fourth event. This event simulates an intelligence-gathering mission. I will state the instructions now, once. There is to be no talking until I say so. Anyone speaking will be docked one hundred points per word. This is intended to prevent contestants from creating methods of collusion after being briefed. Attempts to circumvent this limit will be penalized."
He looked around to make sure everyone had gotten the message, then nodded firmly and started reading off a mental scroll.
"There will be a party in the house running from sunset today until sunset tomorrow. Leaving the estate grounds during this time will cost you one thousand points and will disqualify you from the event. The purpose of the event is to identify the other guests at the party. The event uses individual scoring, so you are competing against your teammates.
"Each participant in the event will be given a civilian role and a physical description. You must use henge to maintain both throughout the duration of the event. There will be break rooms scattered around in which you can drop your disguise for a time in order to avoid transformation sickness. You will receive a summary of all roles at the beginning of the event, although obviously you will not be told which of the other roles are assigned to which person.
"Some of the 'guests' at the party will be proctors, while others will be real civilians and fellow contestants. Being seen by a proctor without your assigned disguise is grounds for immediate disqualification. You will not be told that you have been disqualified. If you are disqualified then you will no longer be able to gain points for the event, but will still be able to lose them. You lose two hundred points every time you cause someone's disguise to break, regardless of whether you do it yourself, induce someone else to do it, or simply do it by accident. Proctors decide who loses the points and if there's any doubt then they'll just choose everyone nearby who might conceivably have been involved.
"At the end of the event, there will be a closed ballot for which roles belong to ninja. For each ninja you correctly identify, you gain points and they lose the same amount. You gain additional points for being able to specify that ninja's name, team affiliation, and/or village of origin, and they lose the same amount. There is no penalty if these extra details are wrong. You lose points for each proctor and/or civilian you name.
"In addition to their civilian role, each participant is given a secret identity. A list of all secret identities will likewise be provided at the beginning of the event. Secret identities come in pairs, such as 'spy and handler'. If you correctly identify your counterpart during the ballot, both you and they gain points—quite a lot more points then you get simply for identifying someone as a ninja, in fact. If you fail to identify your counterpart then both of you lose points. If you correctly identify the secret identity of anyone other than your counterpart then you gain points and that person loses points.
"The collateral damage rules from the bodyguard event are in effect—harming people, property, or civilians carries penalties both monetary and point-based. Fatalities cause disqualification for your entire village and forfeiture of your bond.
"There will be servants at the party. Contestants may not disguise themselves as servants. Anyone is allowed to slap a servant at any time in order to check for henge; this act will not carry the normal penalty for breaking someone's henge. Lightly bruising the servants while checking for henge is frowned upon but will not invoke the collateral damage rules.
"If a servant sees anyone who is not on the guest list, they are permitted to slap them in order to check for henge. Reacting violently to a servant checking you for henge will be met with extremely harsh collateral damage penalties, so don't do it. Servants may disclose information to proctors about anyone they spot as a ninja. The proctors may, at their option, spread this information around."
He glanced at Hyūga. "You, young lady, will be taken to an offsite facility and brought back once everyone has had a chance to read their character dossiers. I'm afraid that your ability to read through walls would compromise the event."
Hyūga nodded, trying and failing not to look nervous at the idea of being taken off to some unidentified location, all alone, by the traditional enemies of Leaf.
The proctor nodded acknowledgement, then stood up. "Miss Hyūga, Himari will lead you to your staging area. The rest of you, follow me. No talking until you're in your individual holding area."
XP AWARD: 7 (This includes the points from @Velorien's update.)
FP AWARD: 0
It is now just before sunset on November 12th. Yesterday you assembled disguises and discussed contingencies with Keiko, Noburi, and Akane. It didn't become relevant, but for completeness I'll note that Keiko had no problems calling in the pangolins.
Right now Hazō is locked in a walk-in closet. He has received his documentation, including his role. (Details to come in separate post.) Any minute now, someone will come to fetch him and the event will begin.
Vote time! What to do now?
Voting ends on Wednesday, May 30, 2018, at 12pm London time.
The tension in the room was suffocating. Lord Hyūga was not wearing a smile of triumph, but probably only because he thought it beneath his dignity. Around him, ten other clan heads prepared to discard their uncertainties and forge the future of the village.
"Well, then," Lord Hyūga said with finality, "if no one else has any further comment, I call for—"
The doors to the meeting chamber flew open. The slamming sound as they hit the side walls made several people jump.
"Sorry I'm late!" Mari exclaimed with an innocent smile. "Did I miss anything?"
She took in the state of the room in a glance. Hyūga in the middle, chairing. Ino-Shika-Chō. Inuzuka, of course. She'd been less sure about Aburame, but he was there, his expression as cryptic as ever. Kurusu, Motoyoshi, Kyoshō and… Minami. Huh. Well played, Hyūga.
"I do apologise," Hyūga said, recovering with undeniable grace. "It seems you didn't receive your invitation on time. I will have my messengers disciplined most thoroughly."
Which was utter bullshit, and Mari reckoned most of the people in the room knew it. If it hadn't been for the anonymous tip-off (which had probably come from Nara Shikaku, because the day that man wasn't one hundred percent on the ball would be the day the sun failed to rise), she'd have been home enjoying a hot bath in blissful ignorance right now. As it was, the note had arrived after the meeting had already begun, and she'd had to run (well, rapidly shuffle, since this was a medium-formal kimono affair) to the Hyūga compound in order to have time to prepare a dramatic entrance.
First blood to Hyūga, then, forcing her to rely on outside help just so she could arrive in the arena. But that humiliation was a mere scratch compared to what she was going to do to him in return.
"I'm so sorry for disrupting the proceedings with my lateness," she said cheerfully. "Lord Nara, would you care to briefly summarise what I've missed?"
She could see the flicker of frustration in Hyūga's eyes, but Nara's reputation for accuracy and conciseness was ironclad, and Hyūga would only seem petulant if he demanded the right to repeat his own words instead. Nara had trusted her and now she was going to trust him back.
Nara cleared his throat. "Lord Hyūga has gathered what he has named the most influential and foresighted clans in Leaf in order to discuss the matter of the Hokage succession. Debate in this chamber has been based on consideration of a few key points.
"First, the matter of legality. Lord Hyūga observes that the Third Hokage's will, naming the Fifth as successor, is not in itself legally binding. As we all know, any decision regarding choice of Hokage must be made by a formal gathering of the full Clan Council. Lord Hyūga further implies that the decision to accept the Fifth's interim rule was made under duress, which is to say that those of us present at the event, himself included, were all intimidated into compliance."
Hyūga opened his mouth as he realised just what he'd let himself in for. Didn't see that one coming, did you, Byakugan boy?
Nara kept himself turned towards Mari, and coincidentally towards the less politically decided clans. Not that there was anything coincidental about where Mari was standing, or the fact that, rather than taking a seat, she'd chosen to stay on her feet as a sharp visual reminder of the Gōketsu Clan's presence.
"Second, the matter of the Fifth's character," Nara went on, using the angle as an excuse not to notice Hyūga's desire to speak. "Lord Hyūga acknowledges the Fifth's right to feel distress at the loss of his father figure, his godson, many loyal shinobi, and of course everything the Third represented to us all. However, he judges that degree of distress to be excessive, and asserts that only a man who can maintain equanimity under such conditions is acceptable as Hokage."
Out of the corner of her eye, Mari noted the uneasy shuffling and suppressed a smile.
"Third, the matter of the Fifth's qualifications. Lord Hyūga notes that while the Fifth has managed the world's greatest intelligence network for decades, he has no experience of the form of public leadership practised by Hokage past, nor any relevant training such as might be possessed by any ordinary clan head. Lord Hyūga also obliquely refers to the Leaf Three, and implies that the Fifth was the leader of that legendary team, and that he is to be held responsible for its dissolution, Tsunade's choice to distance herself from Leaf, and Orochimaru's choice to betray the village, thus further proving himself to lack the qualities needed to be Hokage."
The shuffling intensified. Mari was willing to bet that Hyūga's version of the reference had been both elegant and exceedingly subtle, doubtless painstankingly prepared in the hours or even days before the meeting. He should have known not to try it on the head of a clan which habitually provided a detailed critique of what people were saying while they were still in the middle of saying it.
"Thank you very much, Lord Nara."
Mari half-turned to sweep her gaze over the other clans. "Does anyone have anything to add?"
The sticklers for protocol and accuracy among the clan heads couldn't allow any significant omission. Others would be feeling guilty for letting the meeting go ahead without Jiraiya's representative present. But at the same time, thanks to the tone of Nara's summary, anyone speaking up now would be knowingly choosing complicity in Nara's further criticism of the Hyūga.
After a few seconds, it was Aburame who spoke.
"The Chūnin Exam," he said laconically.
As Mari suspected. She'd been working hard at making inroads with the self-possessed, somewhat distant man—fortunately, his wife, Natsuki, opened up easily to others, and whenever she spoke of her husband, she offered Mari little clues as to Aburame Shibi's character and points of vulnerability. Mari would have to make every one of those clues count today.
"Thank you," Nara said. "Lord Hyūga observes that the Fifth broke with a number of traditions in allowing you, Lady Gōketsu, and your adopted children into Leaf."
He gave a brief pause. "As a point of order which I regrettably neglected to mention earlier, rather than the Fifth, it was of course the Third who made that decision."
Mari was starting to think she'd been underestimating Nara's social acumen. He'd decided to ignore that fact during Hyūga's original presentation, when it would have unravelled under scrutiny (insofar as the Third had merely accepted a proposal made by Jiraiya), and instead introduced it now, when Hyūga's position was already being undermined and there was no easy opening to challenge that one point without seeming petty.
"Regardless, Lord Hyūga notes that the decision was largely inspired by the great value you and your adopted children bring to Leaf in terms of knowledge, skills and Bloodline Limits. He argues that, given said value and the effort invested in acquiring it, the Fifth displays poor judgement by sending the children to the Chūnin Exam in Mist, an inherently dangerous event in a place that is particularly dangerous to them personally. Rather, they should be kept at home, and their role will be more than filled by the two genin the Hyūga Clan is sending, together with Leaf's other clan ninja.
"Lord Hyūga further cites the possibility of hostility against the perceived traitors being extended to the general Leaf contingent, and expresses concern that, given the fundamentally violent nature of the examination, various valuable clan ninja may receive injuries and/or be eliminated as a result of Team Gōketsu's involvement.
"To conclude Lord Hyūga's presentation, he questions the Fifth's right to represent Leaf in negotiations with Mist, asserting that as head of a newly-founded clan, and one who has not previously held a related formal post, he lacks the necessary respectability. Lord Hyūga also refers indirectly to the Fifth's well-known pastime of writing bestselling novels, with the implication that it is inappropriate for a leader. Most importantly, he observes that the Fifth should not be representing Leaf before the world since, by the very nature of his temporary leadership, negotiations and their outcomes would be gravely undermined by his loss of the Hokage title at the end of the trial period."
Nara paused to allow this to sink in. Mari didn't know what Hyūga's original wording had been, but she could hear him inwardly wincing in pain.
"With the major issues so laid out, allow me to conclude by summarising the positions taken by myself and my fellow clan heads."
In other words, Nara had prepared the battlefield, and now he was going to prepare her, in accordance with the objectives he must have decided at the start of the meeting.
Mari didn't like being underestimated, at least when it wasn't part of her plan.
"Actually, I think I can do this part myself," she grinned. "Lord Hyūga set out his case, and then told everyone that because Leaf was still vulnerable, we'd need a Hokage candidate ready for a smooth takeover in a month's time."
Obviously, the meeting wasn't binding, but as soon as the clan heads had agreed to put the matter to a vote, they'd accepted that vote's legitimacy by definition. Anyone who later went against the consensus would end up losing face before the rest.
"Yamanaka and Akimichi instantly volunteered Nara. Nara just as instantly refused.
"Inuzuka suggested Hyūga." Jiraiya had badly miscalculated by offending that woman. Inuzuka Manaka had what she thought of as a strong sense of honour, and she wouldn't easily forget having her pride trampled on in front of everyone whose respect she cared about. It wouldn't have been hard for Hyūga to get her on board.
"Kyoshō went along straight away." They had deep financial ties with the Hyūga, so it must have been a no-brainer for him to invite them to the meeting.
"Kurusu hesitated, but ended up supporting Hyūga as well in the end." Kurusu Ginichirō was a life-long fence-sitter, but also a traditionalist, and Hyūga would only have needed to emphasise Jiraiya's lack of lineage, lack of clan membership (until recently) and conspicuous irreverence for tradition as deadly traits in a man entrusted with the future of the village. Kurusu wouldn't have nominated Hyūga on his own initiative, but he also didn't have any better ideas, especially now that Nara was out of the running.
"Minami would rather explore the possibilities of Hyūga's overtures of peace than throw her support behind the man who failed to save her great-niece." She'd never pegged Hyūga as that much of a diplomat, but she couldn't deny what her eyes were telling her. Hyūga had brought in a known enemy, making everyone think she was there to give the appearance of fairness, and must have suddenly revealed her new loyalties when it would most skew everyone else's game plan. Still, there had to be more going on behind the scenes. A Hyūga Hokage ought to be a disaster for the Minami.
"Motoyoshi backed Hyūga." The Motoyoshi had a reputation for neutrality when it came to political conflict, but she knew from Jiraiya that Hyūga had very generously yielded a portion of the luxuries market to them a little over a month ago.
"Sarutobi decided to…" Mari made a show of glancing around the room. "Oops, I guess the Sarutobi Clan's invitation got lost as well.
"And Aburame abstained, no so much because he's a big fan of Jiraiya but because he sees that this is a terrible time to shake up the political order."
"Very good," Hyūga said condescendingly. "I commend how well you've come to know our politics after so little time in Leaf."
"Thank you," Mari said demurely. She could see Hyūga doing the maths in his head. Six on his side, including himself. Four on Jiraiya's, if she voted. Aburame was abstaining. Not a landslide, but given that Ino-Shika-Chō always voted as a bloc, and the other clan heads didn't have any noteworthy relationships with each other that could lead to coordinated voting (another touch of legitimacy prepared by Hyūga), a victory would still be compelling.
This was Hyūga's moment for a counterattack. She and Nara had dominated the floor for long enough, and the flip side of that dominance was that they'd given him plenty of time to think. She should be bracing herself for the storm.
But Gōketsu Mari had been denied her long-awaited bath. Screw conventional warfare—Hyūga was going to pay.
"Still," she said, "I admit that I'm too new here. There's a lot I don't understand about Leaf politics, and I have a long way to go before I can truly embrace the Will of Fire like everyone else in this room. That's why I don't think it would be appropriate for me to express my opinion on this matter."
Whatever Hyūga had been about to throw at her, it caught in his throat. The one thing he hadn't been expecting was surrender.
Mari concealed a predatory smile, and went on to surrender some more.
"Which is why I'm going to humbly defer to the wisdom of Aburame Shibi."
Hyūga's confusion was starting to spread to the rest of the room. Even Nara looked intrigued.
This was the moment of Mari's great gamble. She was betting on everything she knew, everything she'd guessed. It wasn't enough, and it felt like bluffing with an empty hand, but if anybody could go all in with nothing but ephemeral hints and win, it would be Gōketsu Mari.
"It may be presumptuous of me to say this, Lord Aburame, and please correct me if I misunderstand, but it's been my impression that one of the Aburame Clan's distinguishing traits is its clear-eyed pragmatism. It's obvious when I think back to whichever of your honoured ancestors first did what everyone else considered unthinkable, and invited insects to live in their body, a move which benefited both parties enormously. It's not that I am proposing your candidacy as Hokage, though maybe under other circumstances I would, but I think if it was you in Mist right now as the Fifth, you would want to be judged by your success or failure—if you succeeded, that would be proof enough that you had what it took, and if you failed, then you would accept the consequences without excuses."
Aburame studied her silently.
Everybody else studied Aburame. Even Hyūga was waiting for his response.
"I believe I've heard everything I need to," Aburame said sternly.
The coin was in the air, spinning too fast to see. How was it going to land?
"Now that our new arrival is in possession of the same information of the rest of us," Nara said before Hyūga could take control of the meeting again, "let us resume where we left off. Move to vote."
Mari hastily took a seat on Aburame's right.
"I obviously support my own candidacy," said Hyūga.
"Against," Nara, to his right, said coolly.
"Against," Yamanaka, next in line, surprised nobody.
"Against." Akimichi.
"For." Inuzuka.
"For." Minami, ever so coldly.
"…Abstain." Kurusu.
Hyūga's eyes narrowed slightly.
"Abstain." Motoyoshi. If this worked, Mari owed Nara a drink. For, you know, likely saving her husband's career.
"For." Kyoshō.
The coin landed on its edge, spun wildly…
"Against."
Hyūga's façade of aristocratic disdain shattered. He stared at Aburame, aghast, and Mari could see the force of will it took for him not to interrupt the voting with an exclamation.
Mari gave Hyūga her sweetest smile. "Against."
"You've already waived your right to vote, Gōketsu," Hyūga snapped with barely-repressed fury.
"Not at all," Mari said. "I told you I was going to defer to the wisdom of Lord Aburame, and that is exactly what I'm doing. He voted against, so I voted against. I hope to continue receiving his guidance in the future." She gave Aburame a respectful nod.
"The motion to approve Lord Hyūga's candidacy fails by one vote," Nara said.
It was all in their hands now. If Jiraiya brought back victory, if the kids proved his judgement right with exam results worthy of the Gōketsu...
Nara rose from his seat, signalling the meeting's end.
"Well, then," he said, "I bid a good day to you all. Chōza, I believe you owe me a cake."
