Hazou eyed the new arrivals carefully. Standard genin squad: two boys and a girl, their jounin instructor behind them. The jounin was tall, solidly built, with a thatch of carefully-styled black hair and a neatly trimmed beard on his jawline. A thin cigarette dangled from the corner of his mouth and a pair of fighting knives were strapped to the insides of his forearms. The most notable thing about him was how such a tall and powerful man could seem so...invisible. There was an inner calm to him that gave nothing for the eye to catch on.
The genin were far more noticeable. The girl was blonde-haired, blue-eyed, and starting to develop in ways that made Hazou a little uncomfortable in his skin. The boy on the left was fatter than any genin Hazou had ever seen, with two horn-like tufts of hair and an amiable smile. The boy on the right was thin but athletic and must have spent a great deal of effort practicing in order to master an expression that loudly proclaimed him both Bored and Smug.
"Team Asuma reporting, sir," the jounin said, looking at Jiraiya. "These the ones we're escorting?"
"Yes," Jiraiya said. He leaned forward, hands folded on the desk. "Allow me to introduce you. Ladies and gentlemen, these will be your escorts while you're here in Konoha. Miss Yamanaka and Misters Nara and Akimichi will be your primary contacts. Their jounin-sensei is Sarutobi Asuma, son of the Third Hokage"—he pointedly ignored Asuma's irritated sigh—"who will also be available should you have any questions.
"Asuma, the leader of our little band of misfits is Inoue Mari. She is a taijutsu champion and a brilliant spy. She is also known as Mari the Heartbreaker; she gets that name not from her heartbreaking beauty or highly-developed and quite exhausting seduction skills, but from the fact that she is one of the best genjutsu mistresses I have ever met. She has apparently literally killed people with her genjutsu."
Asuma raised one eyebrow and flicked his cigarette to the other side of his mouth. "Hm."
"Sir, I didn't think that was possible," the Yamanaka girl said, studying Inoue-sensei carefully while taking care not to make eye contact.
"It's not," Inoue-sensei said, smiling. "Not just with genjutsu itself, anyway. Still, if someone has a weak heart and you frighten them enough...."
"Troublesome," Nara muttered, only to be shushed by the Yamanaka girl.
"Beside her is Mister Kagome of the unknown given name," Jiraiya said, sounding amused. "He is an expert sealmaster—"
"No I'm not!" Kagome said. "I don't know anything about seals! What's a seal, anyway? Never heard of them!"
"—an expert sealmaster," Jiraiya continued, "with a penchant for explosions. He should definitely not be underestimated, but he should also be treated with the respect due his skill. Miss Yamanaka, as a professional courtesy from one sealmaster to another I am ordering you to stay out of Kagome's head unless he gives you strong reason for suspicion. Should you need to go in, you will do nothing that could endanger his mind."
"Yes, sir."
"You better not, you stinker!" Kagome said, his eyes wide. "You stay out of my mind! And my friends' minds! I'm not going to let you—"
Inoue-sensei put a hand on his arm and he cut off. "It's okay," she said, smiling at him. "I promise, it'll be fine. We're valuable to them, they're not going to do anything unless we give them cause."
"Why not? Stinkers could just rip our brains apart and put them back together sideways," Kagome said, honestly puzzled and clearly not thinking about the fact that the stinkers in question were right there. "Why they haven't put lupchanzen in our ears already I'm not sure, but the minute that Yamanaka has us alone, she'll—"
"She will do nothing as long as you don't blow your cover or try to harm Konoha," Jiraiya said loudly. "Moving on! Next in line we have Wakahisa Noburi."
"No barrel," Nara grunted.
Jiraiya nodded a compliment to the boy. "Indeed. Which is actually a thing I had meant to bring up. Wakahisa, you'll need a barrel in order to be fully functional. The one that was brought in was damaged—do you want it back so you can repair it, or do you need to build a new one?"
"Uh," Noburi said, flummoxed. "I could repair it."
"Fine," Jiraiya said. "Asuma, that's your first stop after you leave here. Go pick up his barrel from Secure Storage, and also get him whatever supplies he needs to repair it. You can draw against the Materials and Equipment account for that."
"Yes, sir."
"Mister Wakahisa uses a mid-range Water Whip as his primary combat tactic. As with other members of his clan he can suck the chakra right out of you as long as you're standing in the same water he's standing in, so I suggest not sharing a hot tub with him unless he likes you. Also, note that his head is full of clan secrets and scanning him would be an act of espionage unless he was clearly acting against the interests of Konoha. I leave it up to you to define what might constitute Konoha's interests in this case.
"Beside Mister Wakahisa is his teammate, Mori Keiko. At the tender age of thirteen she is already a special jounin focused in long-range weapons use. Oh, and she's the Pangolin Summoner."
Asuma's cigarette fell out of his mouth; he caught it before it had dropped more than a few inches and stuck it back between his lips.
"Very troublesome," Shikamaru muttered.
"Please note that the Pangolins and the Toads are allies," Jiraiya said seriously. "She is here under my protection; any unprovoked attack on her will cause me political difficulty, so be polite."
Yamanaka preemptively elbowed Nara before he could say anything.
"Finally, Miss Mori's bloodline may represent a cognitive hazard," Jiraiya said. "If she gives you cause for a mind scan, call for help. The entire group will be taken to a secure cell and a Yamanaka elder will perform the probe. Clear?"
"Clear, sir," Yamanaka said, her eyes wide.
"Troublesome," Nara muttered. His teammate was too busy staring at what she clearly thought might be an eldritch horror to bother hushing him.
"And, last but not least, Kurosawa Hazou," Jiraiya said. "Like his young friends he's got a head full of clan secrets, so be discreet. When it comes to a fight young master Kurosawa is an expert at taijutsu, as well as having been taught the Earth Clone and the Multiple Earth Wall by a handsome and incredibly talented ninja master. Oh, and he's also a burgeoning sealmaster in his own right."
"No he's not!" Kagome yelped. "He doesn't know a thing about sealing! I wouldn't have taught him sealing, that would be crazy! He's dumb as a box of rocks, so teaching him anything about making seals would be crazy, and he definitely hasn't made any or done any research or anything! He's so stupid that he can hardly write his own name, let alone create brand new seals, so there's absolutely no reason you should chain him to a desk in your seal factory!"
Hazou facepalmed.
"Kagome, I assure you that none of you will be chained to a desk," Jiraiya said, using the tone that one uses to tell a child that it was just a nightmare and they should go back to bed. "I promise. No lupchanzen, no seal factories, no mind alteration. You're more valuable to us as willing allies than as prisoners. So long as you and your friends are honest with us and don't work against our interests we will treat you with respect. Even if you do decide to go against us, I promise that the worst we'll do is kill you."
Oddly, Kagome seemed to find that comforting. No one else did.
Team Asuma and Team Uplift sat, looking at each other in silence. Seconds ticked past until Jiraiya waved his hands at them like a farm wife shooing chickens.
"Well?" he demanded. "What are you waiting for, an engraved invitation? Go on, git! I've got work to do!"
"Troublesome," Nara muttered, turning for the door. Hazou couldn't help but agree, although he kept the thought to himself as he followed his...guide? escort? captor?...into the hall.
As soon as I finished reading this bit, I
knew I had to write an omake related to it.
Omake: Why we can't have Explicit Meta Knowledge
Hazou: "Wow, okay, what a one-sided introduction; it's like you deliberately left out their combat specialties for some reason. Don't worry though, new allies, I can set this right. After all, allies should treat with each other on equal ground lest the aggrieved party becomes bitter, right,
Yujin?"
Mari: "For the record I have no idea what he is talking about."
Hazou: "So! Let's start with you, fa- oh, I'm sorry,
big-boned boy:
Chōji Akimichi, heir of the Akimichi clan, son of the fifteenth head of the Clan, Chōza Akimichi. You like potato chips, shocking, I know, and use the Multi-size technique as well as Human Bullet Tank and some clan-made soldier pills. So long as you don't start popping those pills you shouldn't be much of a threat, at least, on your own."
Mari: "You knew he was the heir of a Konoha clan and you said all of that anyway?"
Hazou: "Next up is
Ino Yamanaka, another clan heir and daughter of Inoichi Yamanaka who owns a... flower shop? Whatever. You use typical mind-body transfer techniques from your clan and as of this point in time prooooooooooobaby don't have medical jutsu yet. See barrel-less boy over there? He's got ya beat on that front already, slacker."
Mari: "I am legitimately starting to believe this kid has a death wish."
Ino: "I AM NOT A SLA-"
Hazou: "WOW, girl could you please let me finish and then use your inside voice? No wonder my cousin doesn't like you: too loud."
Mari: "WHAT"
Kagome: "WHAT"
Keiko: "WHAT"
Noburi: "WHAT"
Jiraiya: "WHAT"
Asuma: *drops cigarette* "WHAT"
Ino: "WHAT"
Choji: *pauses eating chips* ?
Shikamaru: "Troublesome"
Hazou: "Do you not see the family resemblance? Meh. Stop trying to change the subject though we are talking about our new friends' combat abilities. Which leaves
Shikamaru Nara as the last of the genin... Wait... the voices say that you should have been promoted to chunin by now. Huh, I guess things did change more than they thought. Oh well, you still use your clan shadow techniques which bind your opponent's shadow to yours which
for some reason links their nervous system to yours. Of course, you can do more than just bind people, like using shadow stitching to make the
absence of light act like puncturing tentacles or form into a hand to strangle people as they can't move. The best part--and this is making the voices
so excited--is your super genius level intellect which makes your time honored formation of Ino-Shika-Cho actually work. Of course, you try to hide your brains by putting forth the minimal effort required to be a ninja so that people overlook you, but don't worry: the voices are unanimous that they will find a way to motivate you to spar with me sooner rather than later."
Shikamaru: "Most troublesome"
Mari: "It's like watching an explosion in slow motion: I can't look away but I know this only ends badly."
Hazou: "And that leaves the jonin-sensei,
Asuma Sarutobi, former member of the twelve ninja guardians for the Fire Daimyo, or did that not happen either? Eh, you use wind techniques to increase the cutting ability of your custom made chakra blades and have an "ash" technique that looks like a simple smokescreen but actually engulfs its victims in a swathe of flames. That means you have at least two chakra natures: wind and fire, respectively. Some friendly advice though: if you ever meet someone talking about a god named Jashin, who is not a member of my team, do yourself and your unborn child a favor and call for back-up. Oh, right, you knock
Kurenai Yūhi up eventually. Have fun with that knowledge."
Asuma: *statuesquely stares forward in silence, cigarettes scattered across the ground*
Mari: "Wait, are the 'voices,' entities from outside of time? That's the only way I can think of to preserve my sanity."
Hazou: "That should be about everything. Doesn't it feel good to be on even tactical footing? No? Well, deal with it. Where is my cousin anyway? For some reason the voices really want me to ask him to "go bowling." Their words; not mine."
Mari: "Is he really just going to act like nothing happened?"
Hazou: "Come on guys; we have stuff to do. I hear there is a wonderful clothing shop somewhere around here that I can pick up a genuine green spandex onesie to complete my Most Youthful look. Oh, are there any barbers available too? I need a bowl cut. YOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOUTH!"
Mari: "Yup. Completely ignored."
