"Keiko, got a minute?" Hazō asked, rapping carefully on his sister's door.
Very carefully. It wasn't yet a week since Keiko had, possibly, maybe even probably, tried to kill him.
"What do you want, Hazō?"
"I'm worried about Mari-sensei. She hasn't been coming out of her room."
Keiko studied him calmly. "Indeed."
"Uh...Well, there's some things that I think you and Noburi should both know. I thought you probably already knew, but—"
"I feel certain that if Mari-sensei wanted us to know these things, she would have told us herself."
"I...don't think that's true, actually. Or, at least, I think that these things are...let's say surprising, and that it's important we all learn them under controlled conditions so they don't come out at a bad time."
Keiko digested that one. "I suppose this makes sense. Very well. I assume that this is about our mutual history?"
Hazō nodded. "Specifically, the whole 'suicide mission' thing. I really think we should talk about this somewhere more secure."
"Very well. Let us collect Noburi."
That proved easy enough, since Hazō had checked that Noburi was in the house before approaching Keiko. The other boy wasn't terribly sanguine about getting up from his nap, mumbling about how he was still tired from his exciting mission that he really couldn't talk about but oh boy it had been amazing. And important. Probably one of the most important missions anyone had gone on in the last few weeks and he really wished he could tell Hazō all about it, but Hazō just didn't have the clearance that his slightly-younger brother did. So sorry.
Unless you had access to Jiriaya's various tunneling jutsu there simply was no spot in Leaf that could be trusted as truly secure, and Hazō was not about to risk Mari-sensei's secrets on half measures. Accordingly, the three teens headed out the Konoha gates long before the sun was high, intending to find a quiet patch of wilderness for their long-overdue conversation.
"Morning," the guard captain said, stepping away from the fire that he and his squad had going in a large metal firebox in order to keep back the biting cold. "Headed out?"
"Yes sir," Hazō said politely. "We'll be back in a couple hours."
The guard captain raised an eyebrow. "Short mission, huh? What, message delivery to one of the villages?"
"Uh, no sir. Just need to have a private talk."
The guard captain looked at him as though Hazō had spontaneously grown a second head. "Yeah, no. Nobody leaves without a mission stamp."
Keiko cocked her head in surprise. "Does this mean that civilian merchants require a mission stamp in order to take their goods to market outside the city?"
The 'brand new second head' look was transferred to Hazō's sister. "Who cares where civilians go? Ninja don't leave without a stamp."
The three Gōketsu exchanged looks.
"We shall return shortly."
o-o-o-o
"Good morning, sirs and ma'am," said the genin manning the mission desk. He was in his early twenties and lacked his chūnin vest. There were no significant visible scars or missing limbs, meaning his failure to be promoted was not due to medical incapacitation but, presumably, some catastrophic personal failure—perhaps he lacked the will to train hard enough, or was simply too stupid to be trusted on solo missions.
The word 'skinwaste' flickered through Hazō's mind, but he pushed it away and refused to allow his face to respond to the thought. It was a Mist word and had no place in Leaf.
"Good morning," Keiko said. "We would like a short C-rank. Do you have any messenger missions?"
The man smiled. "Itchy feet, huh?"
"Something like that. Missions?"
The man consulted the mission book, lips moving slightly as he ran his finger slowly down the page. "Let's see, messenger, messenger...I've got a caravan escort mission going to Lightning."
"Pass," Noburi said.
"Bodyguard for—"
"Pass."
"Till'n'fill?"
Hazō frowned. "I don't know that term."
"Till'n'fill is when you go out and help some civilians with infrastructure issues. Usually it's farmers, and it's things like setting some explosive tags to clear out tree stumps, using Earth jutsu to build walls or Fire jutsu to burn off fields, that kind of thing."
The floor tilted under Hazō and the firmament shook above him. This was his own concept of Uplift, already being implemented. How had he not known about this?
"I've never heard of such a thing," he said, almost stumbling over the words. "How...I mean, what...I mean...."
The genin chuckled. "Yeah, weird, huh? I mean, ninja doing farm work? Bizarre. Anyway, it's a new mission category. Lord Hokage directed that everyone should suggest it to any village they pass through. It's catching on; farmers like it and it's easy money. Not a lot of money, but it's light work. Good for people who are convalescing, or for anyone who wants to pick up a little extra pocket change."
"How many of these are there?"
The genin looked down at the mission book again, his finger sliding slowly down the page, lips moving as he silently counted. Seconds dragged by as the man worked his way through the kanji, until all three Gōketsu were struggling to conceal their impatience.
"Six," the skinwaste finally said. "One burnoff, three wall jobs, one plowing, and a land clearance thing."
"We'll take one of the wall jobs," Hazō said excitedly. "I've got Multiple Earth Wall."
"Don't you want to know how much it—"
"Don't care," Hazō said. "We'll take it."
The man's eyebrows went up but he shrugged. "Your call, sir. Here you go." He shuffled through the pile of papers in front of him, extracted one, and handed it over. "And what would you two like?" he asked, looking at Keiko and Noburi.
"Hang on, I said 'we' would take it," Hazō said.
"Sorry sir, it's a one-person job. Can't be wasting multiple ninja on something this trivial, after all."
"I will take the plowing," Keiko said. "My pangolins will make short work of it."
The man frowned. "Pangolins, ma'am? I'm not familiar with that jutsu. Is it long-ranged? The ground is frozen solid and full of sickweed spores. It needs to be turned over so that the starlight can kill the spores. You don't want to be in the middle of it when the spores get kicked up."
"She's the Pangolin Summoner," Hazō said impatiently. "You know, big scaly things with huge claws? Really good at digging? Totally immune to poison?"
"Oh," the skinwaste said. "Huh. Okay, well, I guess that's fine. Here you go." He made another mark in the mission book, tongue sticking out the corner of his mouth in concentration, then shuffled through the papers with frustrating slowness before passing the relevant sheet to Keiko.
"I'll take the land clearance," Noburi said quickly. "It's that one." He pointed to the relevant sheet where it sat half-exposed in the stack.
The skinwaste shot a surprised glance at Noburi, then picked up the sheet and read through it slowly. "Wow, you've got good eyes, sir. What do you have for the job, sir?"
"Excuse me?"
"Policy is that I can't give these to people who can't do the job. Unprofessional, sir."
Noburi sighed in aggravation. "They need some land cleared, right? Trees knocked down, rocks moved, that kind of thing?"
The stupid idiot desk minion bent over the sheet again. "Let's see...there's brush and, um, threehorn dens and...grappler oak—" Waiting for him to puzzle through the kanji nearly drove Hazō to scream.
"Yeah, whatever," Noburi broke in. "Look, I'm carrying about a hundred and fifty explosive tags on me right now, so I doubt there's anything there that'll be an issue."
Three heads turned to Noburi in shock.
"A hundred and fifty?" Hazō asked.
Noburi shifted in mild embarrassment. "Yeah, I realized on the way over that I forgot to restock after the mission."
"You forgot to restock?" the skinwaste said faintly. "A hundred and fifty tags and you forgot to restock?"
"I know, right?" Hazō muttered. "Idiot." He ruffled through a belt pouch and passed over a wad of seals. "Here, this should cover you for a short thing like this."
Noburi collected the pack from Hazō and the one that Keiko offered, the edge barely clasped between her fingertips.
"Thanks," Noburi said. He turned to the desk minion and held out an expectant hand. "Mission page, please?"
"Uh, sir," the skinwaste said, holding onto the page. "You know that you won't be comped for the tags, right? It's going to lose you money if you use more than one or two."
"Just give me the damn mission, okay?"
"Yes sir. Here you go." He passed the sheet over and bent to make the relevant mark in the mission book.
The Gōketsu were out the door before his brush touched ink.
o-o-o-o
Mission stamps in hand, there was no trouble leaving the city. Unfortunately, this left some logistical issues. Hazō's job was in a town an hour to the northwest of Leaf and Keiko's about forty miles east of it. Noburi's unfortunately, was three hours to the south of Leaf. Noburi grumbled all the way out the gate, both at needing to spend most of a day out in the freezing cold and about having to do it solo. Still, he went along gamely enough.
The three teens traveled west for half an hour before stopping to talk. They found the stump of a fallen tree and brushed the snow off so that Hazō could unseal a firebox much like the ones the gate guards had been using. They put up a sound-blocking Air Dome over themselves, pointed a Purifier at the smoke from the fire, and crouched around the flames, hands extended to the welcome heat. Both boys made sure to keep their hands well away from Keiko's.
"Okay, what's so important that you had to drag me out into this miserable weather?"
"Mari-sensei was the one who chose all of us for the Swamp mission," Hazō said bluntly.
Noburi jerked, eyes going wide.
"I figured you should know because I didn't want it coming out at a bad time," Hazō said. "And because she's been miserable lately, and I think the three of us should go talk to her, try to cheer her up."
Noburi paused to consider, then looked over at Keiko. "You don't seem surprised."
Their sister shrugged. "I suspected, and she confirmed it the other day."
"Why am I always the last to know everything?" Noburi complained. "I mean, seriously. What is this? And, back on topic, why did she pick us? And why did the mission happen in the first place? And...argh!" The frustrated noise suggested that the number of questions piling up in his throat had been more than could be efficiently managed.
"As she mentioned previously, Shikigami wanted to found a village," Keiko said. "He wanted power, but wanted to use that power to build something better than Mist. He was responsible for logistics, destination, and defense plans, but he wasn't a social spec. He outsourced member selection to Mari-sensei. Hence why she had researched us—not only to obtain blackmail material, but also to locate appropriate candidates."
"And by 'appropriate candidates'," Hazō interjected, "she means young ninja with significant potential who weren't receiving the training they needed to fulfill that potential. She chose us because she saw diamonds in the rough."
Noburi shifted, shrugging his shoulders slightly to settle the weight of his barrel more comfortably as he thought. Keiko and Hazō waited, watching him in silence.
"Huh."
"'Huh'?" Hazō asked carefully. "What does that mean?"
"Well...if I look at it honestly, it's worked out pretty well. She lied to me and took me away from my family, and I think I would have been pretty pissed about that before the Exams, but now.... Well, after the Chūnin Exams it's clear that Water and Fire are going to be getting closer, so I can go back and visit the Wakahisa whenever I want. And I've got a new family now. Keiko, Jiraiya, Kagome, Mari-sensei...even Fifi is pretty cool."
"Ahem."
Noburi grinned. "Yeah, okay, you're not bad either, Mr. Mew. Not cool, but not bad."
Hazō gave his brother a disgruntled look.
"Like you said before, I was always second choice back in Mist, even after my brother died. I feel like I've really grown since we left. I've gotten better training, I'm way stronger, and I'm actually appreciated. I've been selected for the Chūnin Exams, although I grant that was partly political. Still, we kicked so much ass that we probably got an entry in the bingo books. I've been chosen for really, really important missions that I sure wish I could tell you about, Mr. Mew, but you just aren't ready for such amazing info. We're the kids of the Hokage and it's even possible that one of us could end up wearing the hat.
"Honestly, I'm not sure what there is to be mad about. Like I said, I'm sure Jiraiya will let me go back to Mist to visit the family if I really want, and I'm not even sure I want to. Cousin Kiri is a raging bitch that I'm finally over. My parents...well, I don't want to break ties completely, but if I'm being honest I think that Mari-sensei has done a better job."
"Wow," Hazō said, "I was really worried that you were going to be all pissy the way you were af—the way you have been in the past."
Keiko's cheeks, already rosy from the cold, reddened further.
"Smooth, Mr. Mew. Anyway, no. I'm cool. And yes, we should talk to Mari-sensei." He paused, frowning in thought. "I'm not sure about going all three of us at once, though. On the one hand, it shows that we're all onboard with the forgiveness. On the other hand, it might seem a little intimidating."
"I leave it to the two of you to decide on issues of social interactions," Keiko said. "However, in the spirit of sharing things that could otherwise come out at inopportune times: Hazō, the reason that Mari-sensei is so miserable is because Kurosawa Hana tore her down. I do not know what she said, but it was sufficient to leave Mari-sensei crying for hours, possibly days."
Hazō blinked. "What."
"Your birth mother said or did something that destroyed Mari-sensei."
Several seconds dragged by as Hazō struggled to integrate that fact into the world around himself. "I'll talk to her," he said at last. "I'm sure it was some sort of misunderstanding."
"It was not," said Keiko, utter finality in her voice. "I spoke to her. I do not know the precise words that were exchanged, but what I infer is that Mari-sensei attempted to claim she had done her best to take care of us and then Kurosawa said something to the effect that Mari-sensei had merely used us throughout, that we had been nothing but tools to her. Mari-sensei told me that she 'had nothing to say in reply' and was left desolate. She was crying when I found her."
Hazō and Noburi exchanged worried looks. The idea of their confident, laughing sensei in tears seemed as impossible as fish hopping up the front lawn and asking for tea.
"Okay, I will
definitely talk to Momma," Hazō said, his voice grim. "The only question I have is how we do this—talk to Mari-sensei, I mean. We could go in one by one, or the three of us could go, or we could bring Kagome and Jiraiya along so it's the whole family. Either of you have thoughts?"
Silence fell.
"I don't think we should do the five-on-one thing," Noburi said at last. "If it were me, I think I would feel ganged up on. I'm inclined to say that the three of us go in as a group so that it's clear we're all in the know and in agreement. We say our piece, then one of us stays while the other two leave. Not sure, though. Thoughts?"
Hazō and Keiko exchanged looks and then shrugged. "I don't have a better plan," Hazō admitted.
"Nor do I," Keiko said. "And the Frozen Skein is not reliable for optimizing social situations, so I cannot check our plans the way I normally would. I trust your judgement, Noburi."
The other boy snorted and shook his head, smiling. "See, there's a thing that no one would be saying to me if Mari-sensei hadn't chosen us to be marked for death in the hellswamp."
Keiko's eyebrow arched. "A poetic turn of phrase."
"I'm a poetic kinda guy. Unless there's anything else, I'm freezing my butt off out here. Let's go do these stupid missions so that we can get home where it's warm. Oh, and one more thing: With the travel time on this plus the time to set all the charges they'll probably need, I'm not going to be home until late. We can talk to her tomorrow."
"Works for me," Hazō said. "Oh, one more thing—Keiko, I want to talk to Jiraiya about the Pangolin situation. Are you okay if I go ahead with that when I get back to Leaf, or should I wait for you to be there?"
"I find myself delighted at the knowledge that I shall be dozens of miles away when you have that conversation."
"So...that's a no on waiting for you to get back?"
o-o-o-o
Hazō's mission was trivially easy—an hour out, ten minutes to find the village head and ask where they needed the walls, two minutes to create the walls, an hour back. Keiko and Noburi wouldn't be home for hours, so it was time to check off the next item on today's task list.
"The Hokage is busy, sir," the ANBU guard said. "Unless this is another case of urgent news?"
"Huh?" Hazō asked.
"Never mind, sir. He's busy right now."
Hazō digested that. "When was the last time he ate?"
"Some tea was brought in about two hours ago. There were rice cakes with it."
Hazō nodded. "He's got a habit of forgetting to eat when he gets focused. I'll bring him something." He rummaged in his pouches until he found the relevant storage scroll, then unsealed a heaping bento box and a piping hot pot of tea.
The guard considered the casual use of storage seals—and, more relevantly, the sheer number of them that had been revealed as Hazō rummaged.
"He didn't want to be disturbed..." the man said dubiously.
Hazō shrugged. "Look, I've got one quick question to ask him, and he needs the food. I'll drop the tray off and be out of there within two minutes."
The guard glanced at the closed door of the Hokage's office, then back at Hazō. His mask concealed whatever expression he might have had, but his body language was uncertain. After a few moments, a tiny nod indicated a decision made.
"Please set the tray down and show me your hands, sir."
Hazō frowned in confusion but did as he was told. The guard grabbed Hazō's hand and stabbed him in the thumb with a pin that Hazō had not realized he was holding.
"YOW!" the boy said, shaking his hand out before putting pressure on the injury. "What was that for?!"
The guard shrugged unrepentantly. "Standard procedure, sir. No idea why—probably something like a traitor would react faster because he'd be more nervous. Anyway, you pass. Mind that you don't take too long. Two minutes, you said."
Hazō picked the tray up and shot the ANBU a dark and promissory look, grumbling under his breath about how Keiko hadn't mentioned this happening to her so it couldn't be
that standard. Painful experience, however, kept him from saying anything out loud that might even vaguely sound like a threat of dire and horrific vengeance. Instead, he rapped on the door and pushed it slightly open.
"Jiraiya? I mean, Lord Hokage? I've got some tea and food for you."
"Come in," growled the Toad Sage.
Hazō stepped inside, allowing the door to close behind him.
Jiraiya labored at the Hokage's desk like a man chained to the wheel at a mill. Stacks of paper were piled around him, the stack on his left twice the height of the one on his right. There had been a few small changes since the Fifth took over from the Third: Several lantern seals on the desk and the ceiling lit the room brightly, and the bookcases that bracketed the desk had changed their contents substantially, although Hazō couldn't make out the titles from where he was standing. The Third's lightly-immolated hat was in a shadow box on the wall by the door, right where Jiraiya would see it every time he looked up. Aside from that, the room was identical to the way it had been when the God of Shinobi had met them so long ago.
"Set it here," Jiraiya rumbled, pointing at the one empty part of the desk in front of him. "What do you want, Hazō? I doubt you came just to bring tea."
Hazō set the tray down and then, mindful of Jiraiya's imperfect mood and the ANBU's time limit, straightened to attention. His pre-rehearsed speech reduced his stress marginally, but only marginally.
"Sir, I won't take much of your time," he said. "I understand that we can't do anything to curtail the Pangolin activities at the moment, and I won't do anything without your say-so. I just wanted to ask one question: What would need to be different before you would be comfortable allowing us to take concrete action?"
Jiraiya set his brush down with a sigh and rubbed his face. "Look, I get it," he said tiredly. "It obviously bothers you a lot, and I sympathize. To answer your question: Messing with the Pangolin Clan could destabilize their relations with the Toads. It would almost certainly lose us their financial support, and it might even cause them to break the Summoning contract with Keiko, drastically reducing her combat power and therefore safety. If things did get sour between the Clans then the Toads would get me and Keiko involved as intermediaries, which would require a lot of time that I can't spare right now. The Clan Council is going to be voting on my ownership of the hat the day after tomorrow. I've spoken with Shikaku and he's going to get the vote tabled until after the Chūnin Exams tournament, on the grounds that we would look weak if we changed Hokage before then. That will buy me a little more time before the vote, but only a little. So far I've done an okay job—I've secured Leaf some great trade deals. I've created a new mission category that's bringing in more income, although only a little. I've settled three diplomatic incidents before they became serious and without giving away too much. What I haven't done is find Naruto.
"The absolute minimum that would be required before I would be willing to act against the Pangolin would be that our clan had income equal to what we're currently getting from them, we would need to have Naruto back or conclusive proof that he was dead, and the clan would need to have a reasonable degree of physical security. In practice, 'physical security' probably means that I would need to have a secure grip on the hat, because if I get ousted then I can't predict what would happen and I'm not willing to risk Keiko losing her biggest combat asset in such conditions. Finally, we would need to have a plan that had a real chance of working."
Hope surged in Hazō's eyes and Jiraiya raised a warning finger. "That's
at a minimum. I'm sympathetic to your concerns, but our family comes first. I'm not promising that it would be enough, but it's what I can think of off the top of my head while tired and hungry. Speaking of which, thanks for the food. You're a lifesaver." He reached out and grabbed a sandwich off the tray in his left hand, a winter apple in his right, and started wolfing both down with alternating bites.
"Thank you, sir," Hazō said, bowing deeply and backing out of the room. "You won't regret it."
Jiraiya's mouth was stuffed full of three-quarters of a sandwich, so he forebore to comment.
Author's Note: I'm sorry for cutting this update where I did; in particular, I was really excited to write the scene with Sasuke, although slightly dreading the one with Mari. Sadly, both of those scenes are long, it's almost 4:30pm, and I'm tired, so I will leave them for my better-at-social-scenes-anyway co-author.
@Velorien will take care of XP and/or FP awards. There will be no voting.
