Chapter 472: If You Can't Stand the Heat, Get Out of the Random Sampling of Unfamiliar Foods in the Kitchen Business
January 19, 1070 AS (the day before game night)
"...and then they came home," Noburi said, completing his tale of the Arachnid Scroll's capture. "We're having a giant party tomorrow to celebrate." He leaned back in his chair and sipped at the tea that Shima had served when he first arrived. The chair was uncomfortable due to being proportioned for a toad, the tea was a little brackish, but he made no complaint. Shima's kitchen was airy and open, sunlight streaming through the window to brighten it up. Blond wood cabinets covered the walls in stacked tiers, many of them too high for Noburi to reach. He had wondered how the two-foot-tall toad matron used them but had carefully not asked. His curiosity was assuaged when she went to get the tea; her tongue flicked out, adhering to the door of a cabinet seven feet off the ground and tugging it open. She then bounded inside from a standing start and emerged moments later with a tin of loose tea.
"Hmph," Fukasaku (never 'Pa'!) grumbled. "Buried in the earth? That's the best they could do to protect a major historical artifact? You humans are bloody useless, aren't you?"
His wife, Shima, whom Noburi still held out hope of winning over with an array of recipes and Human-Path ingredients, poked her husband with one long finger. "They used techniques too, you old goat! Weren't you listening?" She turned to Noburi and rolled her enormous eyes. "Ignore him. He ran out of pipeweed last week and he's in withdrawal. It happens every few months when the weather is bad and the caravans can't travel."
"Oh!" Noburi said. "I almost forgot." He rummaged up the appropriate storage seal and produced a medium brown leather bag, much beaten and weathered and water-stained from traveling across most of the continent over the last two years. Inside were three smaller, much nicer pouches, which Noburi carefully placed in front of the batrachian patriarch. "These are for you, sir."
Fukasaku stared at him, gimlet-eyed, and then blinked. He sniffed the air. He tore the first pouch open with hurried fingers and buried his face in it, sucking air loudly to draw the scent into his lungs. Only when he had drawn more air than should be possible for the lungs of a two-foot amphibian did he stop and sigh happily. He pulled the long-handled ivory pipe from his robe, packed it tight with the pipeweed, and lit it with a jutsu that enveloped his head in a fireball but left him unharmed.
Noburi waited patiently, trying not to smile.
"S'not bad," Fukasaku grunted after a few moments of smoking. "Where's it from?"
"River, sir. That pouch is a kind called 'Autumn Harvest'. The others are 'Tanaka Special' and 'Blowing Smoke'. I figured I'd bring a sampler...let me know which types you prefer and I'll get you a steady supply." He carefully didn't mention the ruinous prices and small quantities available in Leaf. Even if he had to run to River to get the stuff personally it would be worth it if it got him on the good side of the grumpy Toad Sage.
Fukasaku grunted.
"That was Grouchy Old Goat for 'thank you, lad, that was very thoughtful of you'," Shima said. She poked her husband hard enough to rock him in his chair. "Wasn't it?"
"Stop poking me, you old biddy! Very thoughtful blah blah, he's the Summoner! It's literally his job to bring us stuff like this."
"Old biddy? Old biddy?! Listen you thick-witted—"
"Don't you call me thick-witted! Show some respect to your doting husband, the senior Toad Sage!"
"Ha! As if! I've put fresher sage in my casseroles! Besides, you got your certificate thirty seconds before I did!"
"I'm still senior and you still owe me respect!"
Noburi coughed softly and four enormous eyes swiveled towards him in suddenly-united irritation. "Speaking of spices and casseroles, ma'am..." From another storage seal came a pouch filled with dozens of small twists of paper, each one marked with the kanji for the cooking ingredient inside.
"Oooh," Shima said, massive purple lips spreading in a wide grin. "Look at that, old goat. I got more things than you did. I guess he likes me better."
Noburi started to sweat when Fukasaku's accusing eyes locked onto him.
"In fairness, sir, ma'am, it's about the same amount of stuff, it's just packaged differently."
"Ha! And I got mine in nice silk pouches," Fukasaku said smugly. "Yours are those natty old papers."
Shima glared accusingly at Noburi.
Noburi quailed for a moment, then forced himself to take a deep breath. Mari and Asuma had both advised him on the care and feeding of ancient and powerful Toad Sages. He straightened his spine and hoped that the Sages couldn't hear the fluttered pounding of his heart.
"Fukasaku. Shima. With respect, please don't drag me into your marital squabbles. The gifts were intended to make you both happy. I wasn't trying to prefer either one of you to the other." He forced himself not to add an apology on the end. Polite but firm, his counselors had insisted. Not an equal but not a minion either. And definitely not a chewtoy.
The two ancient toads glared at him sourly, then hrmphed and focused their attention on their respective gifts.
Shima opened the first two packages, examined them carefully, and set them aside. She paused when she got to the third, frowning in confusion. "What's a haban—"
"Careful, ma'am!" Noburi said, half reaching out to stop her from licking the small red vegetable. "That's a habanero pepper. It's extremely spicy. You only want to use a tiny amount."
"Are you telling me how to cook, boy?! Let me tell you—"
"No, ma'am!" He raised both hands in placation and leaned away, his chair creaking dangerously under him. "It's just...nothing I've eaten here on the Seventh Path has been particularly spicy. You might want to experiment a bit, just to get a sense for it."
"Hrmph. It's tiny. How bad can it be?" Before Noburi could stop her she bit half the pepper off and started chewing.
Noburi watched in horrified fascination. Yup, I'm going to die.
"See, it's fine! There's noth..." She paused and cleared her throat. "There's nothing..." She coughed, then gagged. "Ash cakes! Broken skies, boy! Agh! What"—cough—"what did you do to me?" She stuck out a tongue half the length of her body and fanned both hands across it.
Noburi dove into his storage seals, frantically searching through the meals section. Duck with orange sauce, no. Salad with vinegar and oil, no. Fish with a honey glaze, nope. Argh, where was—aha!
"Chew this, ma'am!" he said, pushing a plate of tender cubed chicken and rice in cream sauce towards her.
According to Asuma, Shima had decades of experience as a jutsu researcher. She was therefore thoroughly familiar with the old adage that when disaster was happening around you (or, in this case, inside you) it was a good idea to follow the directions of whoever seemed to have a clue. She snatched the plate from Noburi with both hands and threw the contents into her mouth in one go, her cheeks bulging out to make room for roughly a pound of food and half a pint of sauce.
Noburi pulled out a water canteen and held it at the ready but raised a hand to stop her when she reached for it. "The cream neutralizes the spice and the rice soaks it up, ma'am. Roll it around your tongue for a bit before you drink or the water will only spread it around."
Shima followed directions, swishing the food noisily around before swallowing it in one gulp. Noburi handed over the canteen and she drank gratefully.
She sucked down the entire quart of water and then wiped her wide mouth with a satisfied sigh. "Got any more of those? Little Bunty has been stroppy lately and I'd just love to make him a special treat."
"Uh..." Noburi's mind boggled. Gamabunta was larger than a house. Larger than three or four houses combined, actually, for most examples of 'house'. The number of peppers that would be necessary to affect him...
"These things aren't common, ma'am," he temporized. "Given how large the Clan Boss is, I'm not sure if there's enough in Leaf to affect him."
Shima sniffed dismissively. "You go look. Bring me enough and I'll make you something nice in exchange."
Noburi digested that. "Ma'am, I'm not sure I want to get involved in a prank war between the two of you and Lord Gamabunta. I feel like I'm already on thin ice with him."
"Nonsense!" Fukasaku said, waving one webbed hand dismissively. "He doesn't have to know where we got it from. Besides, he's not going to blame you for it. You're just the supplier."
"He's not going to be that mad," Shima said, patting Noburi on the arm. "It's just a little prank. He'll laugh it right off."
Yes, because powerful ninja, human or otherwise, were so well-known for their senses of humor and their careful and proportional allocation of blame. "Okay, but...I mean, I'm still not sure there's enough of those in Leaf to—" He broke off. "Wait, never mind. Keiko told me that the Pangolins love spicy food and have some agonizingly painful spices. I'll see what I can get from her."
"From those scaly bigots?" Shima said. "Harumph. Don't know how I feel about that. Rude bunch of stuck-up conefaces with sticks so far up their butts they come out the mouth."
"Unwad your knickers, you old prune. They may be a bunch of xenophobic jerks but we aren't going to have to talk to them. The boy will do that."
Noburi couldn't help but think about the last time the Gōketsu had traded with the Pangolin Clan and the geopolitical fallout thereof. Granted, he wasn't going to give them skytower seals. Probably not even seals at all. Metals, cloth (they had difficulty with weaving), maybe some exotic foods from the Human Path. What could go wrong?
Author's Note: Today's update brought to you by the power of chest colds and sleep debts. Sorry I didn't have the juice for the Orochimaru conversation; I shall leave it to the very capable eldritch appendages of @Velorien.
Hazō's cane beat a staccato rhythm of panic against the floor as he fled through the corridors to the main room. At any moment now, Orochimaru, a summoner and implicitly a shadow clone user as well, would change his mind and send someone after him, or see through Mari's deception and send someone after Kei. Or he might get impatient and go through the outbuildings at ninja speed, then come straight back. Or he might bump into Kagome-sensei, whose ability to sense danger was as finely-honed as his ability to handle it diplomatically wasn't.
Or Kei might not be there at all.
The main room was strangely crowded, with people and beings drifting away slowly after… they'd given the victory speech without him, hadn't they? They'd ignored his Sage-given right as host and stripped him of the opportunity to give an inspirational speech before a new and interdimensional audience. Hazō felt a twitch of irritation. Imagine how differently the evening might have gone if one of them had sought him out instead of abandoning him to Orochimaru's mercies while a lesser candidate took his place.
Then he heard Orochimaru's imaginary voice in his mind. The boy is otherwise engaged. You may conduct your puerile banner-waving without him.
No, it would have taken more than proper social behaviour to save Hazō from Leaf's Bogeyman. In the event, it took sacrificing his sister.
He had to hurry.
There!
At the far end, near the podium, Kei stood across from Neji, arms crossed and face fixed in an expression of imperious contempt usually reserved for Kagome-sensei when he refused to acknowledge Ami's greatness for such petty reasons as her being "blatantly up to something" and "tricking you so you only realise after she's gone that she never answered your question" and "using cheating social skills to get past your trap arrays instead of being blown up like a proper trespasser" (not that Kagome-sensei's trap arrays were at their finest these days, when there was a need to accommodate a constant stream of civilians entering and leaving the estate, including children liable to play in areas explicitly marked as off-limits). Neji, for his part, was glaring fiercely, if to little effect.
Hazō did not have time to break up an inter-clan diplomatic incident. He did not have time for anything. Orochimaru might already be on his way back.
He opened his mouth to remind the pair that this was one night on which the progressive and the conservative factions were supposed to put their ideological differences aside to celebrate a shared victory.
"Teleport is clearly unbalanced!" Neji snarled. "You should not be able to affect other people's figures, anywhere, without at least a crippling cost to stop you throwing it around like green confetti on Hashirama Day!"
"Your failure to anticipate potential counters to your predictable opening strategy is not the fault of the cards," Kei countered smugly. "The number of Teleports in my deck is public knowledge; the odds of drawing one on the first turn are trivial to calculate. If you did not wish to invest in an expensive warrior, only to have it cast into the depths of Snow Country where it is of no use to man or beast, you should have mitigated the potential damage by playing a cheap cultist first, or alternatively your Jashin Avatar, which is immune. In fact, an aggressive opening with a Jashin Avatar in the Fire Country in the middle of the board is a classic means of area denial, and would have inconvenienced me greatly given the warpstone distribution of this game."
"It's a matter of game balance," Neji insisted doggedly. "In any balanced board game—"
"Sorry to interrupt," Hazō said, "but Kei, I need you to come with me. There's somewhere we need to be half past now."
He didn't use any Gōketsu hand signs (Hyūga were notoriously observant even with the Byakugan off, and it would have been a dead giveaway that something was up), but clearly something about his still-shaken countenance spoke louder than words.
"The Blood God is a beginner trap, Hyūga," Kei added by way of a parting shot. "His tactics appear powerful and straightforward, but require great subtlety to execute without drastically increasing his threat rating, at which point he lacks the defensive cards to endure reprisal. You would fare better with the Plaguemaster or the Prince of Passion."
"Do you know where Snowflake is?" Hazō asked.
"Last seen following Noburi in that general direction."
Hazō tsked. "We don't have time to find her. Dispel her; we can't let her stay here on her own."
Kei frowned. "Without her consent?"
Hazō was already moving on. He wouldn't be able to run fast enough on his own. Where was…
"Akane! I need your help!"
The World's Best Girlfriend did not hesitate, disengaging from her conversation with Kei (Ruri; Hazō was starting to wonder if that clan name was another of Ami's pranks) with a polite bow.
"What do you need?"
"Kei and I have somewhere we need to be now, but I can't run. Will you…" Hazō inwardly winced. There was nothing strange about injured ninja being carried by their teammates, but here and now that didn't make it any less embarrassing. "Will you carry me?"
Akane promptly turned around, lowering her body slightly to offer him a piggyback ride. "Where to, My Lord?"
"Central Leaf," Hazō said, "and don't spare the chakra."
They were out of the door within seconds. Hazō felt a chill as he glanced back, just in case, only to see Hebifaya watching them go with an unreadable alien expression on her serpentine face.
-o-
"So where are we heading, exactly?" Akane asked. "Not that I mind wandering around in the darkness with you, Hazō, but Kei might have other ideas."
"Quite," Kei said coolly. "When I reinstantiate Snowflake, I would prefer her to be aware of a satisfactory excuse for why I violated her agency without warning."
Hazō briefly weighed his options and, in the interests of efficiency, decided to open with the big ninjutsu.
"Orochimaru may or may not be after you in order to kidnap and dissect you. Where do you think we should go first?"
Akane stumbled. Kei's head whipped around with the speed of a snake.
"Are you serious?"
"Would I joke about this?"
"The Nara compound," Kei concluded after a second's thought. "Even a demigod would hesitate to invade the Nara compound at night, and we need to be able to send messengers to locate potential allies. Shikamaru is the only one guaranteed to be home. Now, explain."
Hazō put his thoughts in order. Despite the bloodcurdling subject, the familiar pattern of making a list, with categories and subcategories, helped him clear his head a little.
"Orochimaru is interested in the Iron Nerve—from which he's been deflected for now—and in Snowflake because of her cognitively independent nature. He wants clone assistants capable of having their own independent ideas, and he doesn't think that's possible, but obviously he'll change his mind if he finds out about her."
Honestly, the idea of Orochimaru generating ideas at a "Shadow Clone Technique x demigod chakra reserves" rate added a whole new level of horror on top of the risk to Kei personally.
"How did he learn of Snowflake?" Kei asked. "Rather, why now? I did not see him at the party, and besides, she is fully aware of the dangers of drawing his attention to a Frozen Skein user."
"He was at the party," Hazō admitted. "I never expected him to come, but given the circumstances, I couldn't exactly snub him either."
"He was at the party," Kei said, in the step-by-step voice of someone figuring something out, "where he spent his time talking to you. During which time he developed a new and pressing interest in myself and my Bloodline Limit."
Hazō couldn't see Kei's face in the darkness of a village gradually going to sleep, but he could feel a cold wrapping around him that made the winter air feel like a sauna.
"No!" Hazō exclaimed. "Whatever you're thinking, that is not what happened!"
"Then what did?" Kei asked heavily.
"We talked about the Great Seal," Hazō said. "He very nearly got the truth about the Iron Nerve out of me, but Mari saved me in the nick of time with a story about the Iron Nerve recording the Great Seal because it can memorise terrain. Only…"
He stopped. Kei's relationship with Mari already hung by a thread, but he'd had faith, before, that they would eventually figure things out like a pair of adults who, when all was said and done, loved each other and had few people closer to them in the entire world. Now, his next few words would destroy it forever. There was no coming back from having a loved one sell you out to be kidnapped and torturously killed. Even Akane couldn't forgive something like that.
Would Akane be able to forgive Mari? Would the others? Hazō himself was still too much in shock to know how he felt about the fact that Mari's fallback option for distracting Orochimaru had been to betray family.
"Yes, Hazō?" Kei prompted in a voice vibrating with tension.
Hazō swallowed. "Only then it started to sound like Orochimaru was interested in that for some reason, and Mari had to distract him… and she told him about Snowflake."
Akane gasped.
Kei said nothing. Nothing at all.
"It was all my fault," Hazō added hurriedly. "I was the one who tried to get Orochimaru's attention off everyone else by talking about the Great Seal, and I was the one who didn't misdirect him hard enough, and I was the one who failed to resist when he forced me to tell him the truth."
Kei said nothing. Even her pseudo-aura had disappeared.
"She didn't have time to think!" Hazō went on. "Orochimaru was in the middle of making up his mind, and she acted on reflex. I'm sure if she'd had even a second longer, she'd have found another way."
"Directing Orochimaru's attention to me was the first thought to occur to her," Kei translated. Her voice was utterly lacking in affect, as if she were just reading out a dinner menu.
"Kei," Akane said, "I'm sure it wasn't like that. I know you and Mari are having difficulties, but that doesn't mean she doesn't love you and care about you. Maybe she panicked, or maybe she has a plan. She'd never deliberately do anything to hurt you."
"Her behaviour was entirely rational," Kei said, still in a dead voice. "Hazō was in immediate physical danger, whereas I was not. I have a wider circle of allies able to intervene on my behalf, and a less fraught relationship with the Hokage. Furthermore, it would have been reasonable to assume that Ami and/or the Nara have contingencies in place, whereas you do not. My odds of surviving Orochimaru's attention are objectively superior. In terms of solutions which could be implemented immediately and reliably, using me as a tool to ensure Hazō's safety is a more than valid approach."
"Kei, I'm sure she didn't—"
"Don't."
A few seconds passed.
"When we reach the compound," Kei said quietly, "I will participate in the strategy meeting and put forth every possible effort to ensure a positive resolution to this crisis. Until then… please leave me be."
Hazō didn't want to interrupt the hollow silence that followed those words. It hung over them, ready to devour any expressions of hope, any attempts at consolation. Hazō didn't know if it was the silence of mourning or the silence of the grave.
But there was one more important, urgent issue he couldn't leave until the compound.
"Akane," Hazō said, "when I left Mari, she was leading Orochimaru on a wild goose chase to give us time to run. When he realises Kei was never at the far end of the compound and we left in the meantime, he's going to be furious with Mari. I have no idea how to stop him from hurting her."
"Do you want to go back?"
After a second's hesitation, Hazō shook his head, and hated himself for it. "There's every possibility that Orochimaru is following us, and meeting him with no witnesses in the middle of the night is just begging to be kidnapped on principle."
"If we don't turn back now," Akane said, "there's no chance we can get anyone to him before he finds out she lied to him."
"We could send a summon," Kei said distantly. "But I do not know what they could say. Claim an urgent summons from the Hokage?"
Hazō shook his head, then realised she wouldn't be able to see him.
"Mari tried that, and he just shrugged it off. Besides, it would be coming from our summons, and he'll be on the alert for more misdirection.
"Damn," he said after a second, "I can't think of anything we can tell him. He shouldn't hurt her because she's an elite jōnin and it would upset Asuma and weaken our position in the war, and he shouldn't hurt her because she's Lady Gōketsu and there would be repercussions, but he already knows both of those things. Hearing them again when he's already angry would just make him feel like we were treating him as an idiot or trying to manipulate him."
They kept thinking the rest of the way to the Nara compound, and then it was too late.
Hazō, Kei, Akane, and Shikamaru (whose drowsiness had lasted exactly until the word "Orochimaru") sat around the Nara war council table, each with a cup of stimulating green tea brewed according to a secret Nara recipe (clearly made with acerbic tomatoes, or some other kind of lethal chakra plant, because no ordinary herb could be so throat-ravagingly bitter). Twin oil lamps cast dancing shadows onto the ceiling which did not make the night feel any less sinister to Hazō, and freezing cold night air wafted in through windows kept open in order to be able to hear any screams from the gate guards.
"Found it." Shikamaru extracted a few sheets of paper from the Nara Contingencies Folder (vol. 7). "'In the event that Orochimaru shows undue interest in a Nara kinsman or ally'. The base material is decades old, dating from before his responsibility for the disappearances was any more than a statistical inference, but needless to say, it was urgently updated.
"I would suggest that our response should be two-pronged," Shikamaru went on. "First, we require a commitment to Kei's safety from the Hokage. If Orochimaru is told that kidnapping her would constitute a violation of direct orders, it is doubtful that he would be willing to risk the consequences for the sake of a research avenue he considers long since closed."
"Not pessimistic enough," Kei snapped. "He will simply secure plausible deniability, perhaps when I am outside the village on a mission. The Hokage will not confront Orochimaru over a mere possibility, especially since by the time such a disappearance is made known to him, I will likely already be dead."
"Granted," Shikamaru said, only a slight twitch of his fingers revealing that maybe he wasn't quite as calm as he was letting on. "However, our second prong is deterrence through force, namely Naruto and/or Tsunade. It would be a worst-case scenario should the Hokage order them to stand down because he has chosen to tolerate Orochimaru's actions.
"At the present time, the Hokage could be at the Tower, at the Sarutobi compound, or, if we are particularly unfortunate, enjoying a night out with his fiancée. Tsunade could be at the hospital or, less likely, at her home."
"She's at the hospital," Hazō interrupted. "Noburi checked."
"It is a moot point," Kei replied. "Tsunade hates me. She will certainly sacrifice me rather than risk severing her bond with her last remaining family."
"What?" Shikamaru asked. "Why? I was under the impression that you barely knew her."
Kei looked down into her cup. "At our first meeting, I grievously offended her feelings when she was in the middle of mourning Jiraiya. She not unreasonably threatened me with a violent death."
"I am given to understand that she does that with everyone," Shikamaru said. "However, I take your point. We shall save her for Plan B. Plan A, Naruto, is either in bed or busy having a social life. I could not guess where those take place. Ami, also, could be anywhere in Leaf, and I cannot remember the last time I saw her in the company of her legally-mandated minder."
"Ino should be home, right?" Hazō volunteered.
Shikamaru nodded. "I would expect so. She has had a trying few days. She will certainly support us in this issue. That brings us to—"
"Message from the Gōketsu, My Lord!"
The messenger was not out of breath. This detail struck Hazō as very important, though it took him a second to realise why. A messenger not out of breath meant the news wasn't "run as fast as you can" urgent, as, say, "Orochimaru is heading your way" would be. In other words, either he'd left shortly after them and was nearly here, or…
Hazō gingerly took the note from the messenger's hands.
The handwriting was Noburi's.
Orochimaru's pissed. Said he was going home. Wants Kei to come to his compound in the morning (like hell). Mari says she's fine. She's not. Hope she's right about you being safe with the Nara. I'm going to stay here and do the host thing and pretend you two running away is all according to plan and make sure Kagome doesn't decide to march to the Basement with his biggest explosives and Yuno doesn't do I don't even know what. Please send a message back to say you're OK.
"Looks like we've got a night's reprieve," Hazō said, passing the note to Akane. "Orochimaru's stomped off in a huff, or said he'd be stomping off in a huff, and I don't think he takes us seriously enough to lie."
"Good," Akane said. "If we can wait until tomorrow morning, we'll be able to handle things with clear heads and without having to seek help from people whom we've just got out of bed in the middle of the night. Let's pick this up first thing in the morning."
They would not pick this up first thing in the morning.
-o-
"Lord Nara, the Hokage demands your presence at the Tower with all haste," announced the messenger with the red sash to a bleary-eyed Shikamaru. "Lady Nara is also required."
The woman glanced at Hazō, who'd dashed to Shikamaru's office as soon as he heard there'd been a message, technically interfering with Shikamaru's clan head right to confidentiality (shinobi had been accused of espionage for less). Her brief up-and-down look suggested she'd drawn conclusions from him already being in Shikamaru's compound at first light, looking miserable (how had he been supposed to sleep?) and wearing only borrowed pyjamas. Hopefully, she just thought they'd been drinking into the early hours.
"Lord Gōketsu? I didn't realise you'd be here. You are summoned as well."
"Did the Hokage say why?"
"It appears to be a matter of life and death, My Lord. It always is, in wartime."
-o-
The Clan Council chamber was half-full by the time Hazō, Kei, and Shikamaru got there, with more clan heads steadily streaming in. Unlike the last emergency summons, Asuma himself was absent, though an enormous map of the Fire Country was sprawled open in front of the Hokage seat. Shikamaru took a seat one away from Hazō; Kei sat down between them.
The clan heads around them were focused, but not overly tense. It did not come as any surprise to anyone that Rock had unleashed some kind of large-scale retaliation in return for the Battle of Five Clans; Asuma had just assigned heavy additional patrols in western Fire precisely in anticipation of same. What then, could constitute enough of an emergency to summon a full war council straight out of bed? Hazō leaned towards the map…
Orochimaru sat down opposite Kei.
Kei froze like a rabbit in a serpent's line of sight. Beneath the table, Hazō could see her hands tighten into white-knuckled fists.
Orochimaru's gaze was completely detached as he studied her features, as if he was not interacting with another human being, but browsing a fishmonger's stall in anticipation of tonight's dinner. Somewhere behind those vertical pupils, Hazō could tell he was already thinking about how best to fillet the catch of the day.
Finally, mercifully, Orochimaru turned away to study the map.
Hazō, unable to think of anything to say that could possibly make things better, did likewise.
The map happened to be facing Hazō, and from what he could see, the western edge seemed unchanged from before. A column of crossed-out signs still marked the destroyed border outposts from the disastrous first blow that had started the war. There were no markers to indicate a recent pitched battle, or some new cataclysm like the Great Collapse. Maybe they'd been summoned based on word from the spy network? It would be just like Jiraiya to be protecting Leaf even from beyond the grave.
Wait. Something clicked in Hazō's sleep-deprived brain. Those contours weren't quite right. He'd studied Leaf's best map of Rock only recently, in preparation for the Battle of Five Clans, and at that time, the border…
Oh. Oh, no.
The map wasn't facing Hazō. It was facing the Hokage.
He nearly jumped as the door slammed shut behind him. The Hokage strode in with the very patient, even stride of a man holding himself back from explosive violence. He sat down in his seat, scanned the room to make sure everyone was present, then began to speak.
"Four hours ago," he said in a controlled voice, "The Village Hidden in the Clouds invaded the Fire Country."
Around the little bubble of silence formed by the exhausted Hazō, the paralysed Kei, and the frowning Shikamaru, the room burst into clamour.
"Those opportunistic vultures!"
"I said we should never have signed a peace treaty with those airsick highlanders!"
"Lord Kyoshō, you were the one who insisted—"
"Silence!" the Hokage's fist struck the table. "We do not have time for the shameful bickering of our last invasion response meeting."
He paused, as if daring anyone to remind him that he was the one who'd thrown a tantrum and tried to give an order that would result in Leaf's annihilation.
But the wild rage that had consumed the Hokage that time was nowhere to be seen.
No, that wasn't quite right. It was there, in the tightness of his jaw. It was in the rigidity of his spine as he loomed over the table, his shadow somehow twice as big as that of the other ninja present. It was in the fixed stare he gave them one by one, as if to say, "The time for games is over". Looking him in the eye, Hazō felt a sudden compelling certainty that Leaf's enemies had awakened a monster that would destroy them without fail.
Yes, Sarutobi Asuma was learning his own lessons from leadership in a time of crisis. This meeting would be very different in tone.
"The reports are still being processed," the Hokage said. "We'll cover them later. What we know is that Cloud troops swarmed the eastern coast without warning and struck our outposts simultaneously—with the use of skywalkers."
"Skywalkers?" Lord Akimichi asked. "They're certain?"
The Hokage nodded. "The coastal areas are less densely wooded than central Fire. Cloud took advantage of the limited tree cover to enable an aerial assault."
"We long anticipated that Cloud would be the first village after Leaf to properly integrate skywalkers into their military doctrine," Shikamaru added. "Though I can't say I feel particularly pleased to be proven right."
"Then you think we can expect more skywalker attacks?" Lord Akimichi asked.
Shikamaru nodded. "It's a matter of psychology. We of Leaf learn to climb trees as soon as we learn to walk, and tree walking is a core part of the Academy curriculum. Even then, an unfortunate few are unable to function high off the ground without vertigo, nausea, and risk of panic. More develop such symptoms at skywalker heights, and there is a limit to how much they can be overcome with training. On the other hand, the shinobi of Hidden Rock spend the majority of their lives underground. We speculate this is the reason for why we have not seen more skywalker-equipped squads from them.
"Cloud, of course, lies in the mountains, horrifying terrain where long, lethal falls are only ever a few metres away. One would expect their shinobi to be more comfortable with the psychological elements of skywalker operation than any other."
"We can't sustain a war on two fronts," the Hokage said. "We can handle Rock, because despite their superior numbers, their movements are constrained by our ability to field more S-rank combatants. Cloud, who also have superior numbers, must not be added to that equation."
Belatedly, the implication struck Hazō. With the opening of an extra front, Orochimaru's value to Leaf had just doubled. Hazō and Kei's hadn't.
"At the conclusion of this meeting, I intend to send requests for military assistance to Mist, Sand, and Isan, as well as any minor villages we decide are likely to answer our call."
The Hokage paused.
It was as if the air suddenly grew thicker, heavier. Hazō could feel a weight hanging over them, about to fall, and when it did, something would change forever.
The Hokage's words brought it crashing down.
"We have entered the Fourth Shinobi World War."
-o-
The discussion regarding Sand was quite short. Nobody was under any illusions that the poorest village, at least a generation away from being able to call itself a great power again without scornful laughter, was going to be the trump card that saved the day. Still, the Hokage said flatly, they would contribute what they could, even if it was only speciality Wind ninjutsu that could be used against skywalkers, or they could kiss Fire Country grain goodbye forever.
There was more hope for Mist. If they could get a messenger past the Cloud-held coast, Mist could join them in a hammer-and-anvil move before Cloud had a chance to dig in with lasting fortifications. In fact, the prospect of sending Ami away for an unknown length of time was in itself a significant morale boost for some of the clan heads present.
Of course, it had the opposite effect on Kei, who had now gained one attentive Orochimaru and lost one primary pillar of emotional support. Which was why, when the Hokage finally spoke the words of doom, she was in no state to fight back.
"Lady Nara, I am dispatching you to Isan, to negotiate reinforcements with Elder Takahashi and the Isan Council in accordance with the terms of our new military alliance."
A mission outside the village, alone but for a small escort, immediately after coming to Orochimaru's attention.
Then again, surely Orochimaru wouldn't sabotage a vital mission in wartime for purely selfish purposes?
Except it was by no means beyond Orochimaru's power to disappear Kei while leaving her escort untouched. With time being of the essence, they'd forge ahead to Isan instead of turning back, and Leaf would still get its reinforcements—just without the benefit of Kei's personal influence. Or, if Orochimaru was more patient, he could just estimate her return time and catch her on the way back.
Hazō could see each of these thoughts going through Kei's head as she sat motionless next to him. He could see Shikamaru staring straight ahead, thinking desperately, looking for a way out.
At the last second, before the decision was set in stone, a flash of utter brilliance, or perhaps utter madness, found its way from beyond the depths of the Out, onto this benighted mortal plane, through Hazō's brain fog, and to his mouth, and in a single moment of suicidal courage he decided not to overrule it.
"Lord Hokage, I think we should send Orochimaru instead."
The great and the wise of Leaf turned to look at Hazō as one.
"Lord Gōketsu," the Hokage said, that simmering controlled rage somehow much less reassuring when it was pointing at Hazō himself, "are you suggesting that we should remove one of our key guarantees of survival from this country while we are under assault by two armies hell-bent on our destruction?"
"Lunacy," Orochimaru agreed. "Send the girl. My time is too precious to waste serving as a messenger."
Hazō opened his mouth to argue back. He wasn't yet sure how yet—all he could do was to try to engage his rational brain to try to follow the mad burst of inspiration back to its origin point, where it surely made some kind of sense.
Orochimaru's gaze put an end to that notion.
Tell me.
That night was over. He'd survived. But Hazō's will, bent nearly into snapping, wasn't ready to test itself against Orochimaru a second time. The idea of opening his mouth, of saying no to this creature that could and would crush him with a thought, was as out of his reach as the stars. He would recover. He would fight back. Hazō knew this to be true. But he also knew that, here and now, to even brush against Orochimaru's anger would bring him annihilation.
Hazō looked around desperately. Wasn't there anyone who could see what was going on? Wasn't there anyone who understood?
He looked to Kei's allies. Naruto gave him the usual cool look before returning to his study of the map, completely oblivious to the danger to his friend. Hazō wondered if it had ever occurred to the future-Hokage-for-certain to fear for his life outside a combat situation (or, to be fair, Akatsuki psychic torture).
Ino was looking at Kei and Shikamaru, trying to work out what was going on, but not there yet—or maybe just hoping for a cue to make sure she didn't get in the way of Shikamaru's incoming master plan.
Lady Kei was tense, unreadable.
Representative Shimura met Hazō's eyes briefly, then looked away.
Somebody, please. If it ended like this…
Hazō's eyes searched the room for someone, anyone—at this point, he'd even accept a debt to the Hagoromo—and for an instant, they stopped on the other last person he'd expect to challenge Orochimaru on Kei's behalf.
Hinata's lips had just made a perfect little "o" of realisation as she looked at the snow-white statue that was Kei.
"Actually," she said slowly, "I believe I can see what Lord Gōketsu is driving at. Adding the forces of Isan to our numbers will certainly help tilt the scales in our favour… but Lord Gōketsu is envisioning a bolder move. Isn't that right?"
Hazō nodded. He didn't know what he was allegedly driving at, and right now, he didn't care.
"Suppose," Hinata said, "that just as Cloud is growing complacent due to our lack of a counter-attack, a force of hundreds of shinobi, spearheaded by Orochimaru of the Three, suddenly sweeps up the coast from a position where Leaf has no known troops. I imagine Cloud's losses would be devastating. In a best-case scenario, we might be able to drive back this wave of the invasion altogether, leaving incoming Mist reinforcements fresh to take on Rock without delay."
The Hokage nodded along thoughtfully. "You paint an appealing picture, Lady Hyūga. I, for one, have long since had enough of foreign scum carving up Fire like a pig at market while we sit back and take occasional potshots—however effective they may be." He gave Hazō an appreciative nod.
In the corner of Hazō's peripheral vision, Aburame raised his hand.
"Lord Aburame, your thoughts?" the Hokage asked.
"Lord Hokage," Aburame said, adjusting his glasses as if in preparation, "the original problem remains. We cannot permit ourselves to send Lord Orochimaru out of the Fire Country. Why? Because our ability to field three S-rank combatants is our main advantage in this war. If Rock and Cloud ally, or even just attack simultaneously, while Lord Orochimaru is away, the Four-, Five-, and Eight-Tails, together with Grandmaster F, could overwhelm us without hesitation. They are intelligent enough to know this."
"Watch it, Shino," Naruto snapped. "I promise you, if any of them tries to lay a hand on Leaf, they'll be joining their old Kage in Naraka before you can say, 'overpowered signature technique'."
"With respect, Lord Uzumaki," Aburame replied, "even you can't be everywhere at once."
Naruto raised an eyebrow.
"You know what I mean," Aburame said peevishly. "Even if you and Tsunade can personally handle whatever is thrown at you, by the time you are done, Leaf's conventional forces could well have ceased to exist."
Naruto made to reply, but by that point, Hazō and his unlikely supporters had won enough time.
"If I may, Lord Hokage," Shikamaru spoke up in the self-possessed voice of a man who had run the calculations and would not be defied by the lesser logic of those who hadn't (Hazō knew it intimately after so much time spent around Kei and Ami).
"Lord Nara."
"I do not believe that this is a full-scale invasion analogous to Rock's in scope and intent," Shikamaru said, rising from his seat and leaning over past Kei to trace the lines that Hazō now understood to indicate territory no longer under Leaf control. That she stayed frozen even as he brushed past her spoke volumes.
"Note how they have ignored the northern border, a natural staging ground for pushing into the Fire heartlands, assuming they are able to negotiate with Hot Springs—something I believe they could manage in the current geopolitical environment. On the other hand, they have cut us off from the peninsula, which holds little military value to Leaf, at least that they know of, but is key to eastward trade."
Lord Inuzuka, unexpectedly the first to react, bared his teeth. "It's a bloody land grab! They don't care about Leaf—they just want to take our territory while our forces are busy on the western border!"
"Quite," Shikamaru agreed. "We have a surprisingly detailed personality profile for Grandmaster F—a legacy from the Fifth, who appears to have known her personally—and it does not portray her as a war hawk on the level of the Tsuchikage. If this is indeed an opportunistic act of territorial capture, then Cloud has no intent on spending forces in an assault on our most fortified stronghold deep in the heart of the Fire Country."
The Hokage nodded. "And land grabs are best dealt with quickly and with overwhelming force, before Cloud decides we look weak enough that a full invasion might be on the cards after all."
"It is a gamble," Lord Hagoromo objected in a voice somewhere between a scoff and a snarl. "Suppose the esteemed Lord Nara's on-the-spot analysis is inaccurate. Without Lord Orochimaru, we are committed to a defensive stance until this plan succeeds or fails. If, during this time, Cloud pushes and Rock continues to push, the losses we incur could be unrecoverable. Liberating the coast will not be much of an achievement if the heart of Fire comes under siege."
"In any case," Orochimaru said icily, "it is out of the question. I am always ready to do my duty defending Leaf, but I have essential experiments which would not survive a week or more of absence, and other projects which I would be forced to suspend." He looked briefly at Kei. She shivered minutely. "Send Tsunade. She is much more suited to negotiation, from a certain point of view."
"Did you leave your brain in your Basement, Oro," Tsunade snapped, "or is it still up your ass where you normally keep it? Every day I spend away from the hospital is a day people die. That's what happens when you're in a Sage-damned war. How about, instead, you stop playing with your toys for one damn second and do what your Hokage tells you?"
Orochimaru rolled his eyes. "Fine, then. The Uzumaki boy. He could do with the experience."
"S-Summoners…"
It was barely a whisper.
"I'm sorry, Lady Nara?" Hazō asked politely, but at a volume more suited to screaming, "Sealing failure!"
"Isan… reveres… summoners…"
"Of course," Hazō said, keeping his voice at the same volume because if he didn't, he wasn't sure it would come out again with Orochimaru watching. "The people of Isan revere summoners. With all due respect to Lord Uzumaki's diplomatic skills, to the Isanese he's only going to be a very charming young man, whereas Lord Orochimaru is a master summoner with obvious decades of experience."
A candle lit itself as his brain continued to stir itself from its lack of slumber. "Oh, and I should probably mention that there's an entire cult of Orochimaru worshippers which has been spreading its word among the population."
The Hokage stared at him as if he'd just asked for permission to be adopted as Mori Ryūgamine's grandson. "What."
Opposite Kei, Orochimaru visibly deflated. Hazō could feel his aura of menace waver like a giant snake turning out to be a heat mirage.
"Not more of those," he said wearily. "There is nothing more tiresome than being worshipped by amateurs who think one venomous prehensile tail or a handful of flesh golems makes them worthy of apprenticeship. Even killing them only encourages the rest to work harder. I had to move my laboratory three times."
The Hokage shook his head. "I'm going to forget I ever heard that. Now, with that option on the table, I want to hear alternatives."
-o-
"Lord Hokage!" Hazō caught Asuma as the exhausted leader finally crossed the threshold of his office. "Would you mind if Kei and I had a word?"
"Hazō," Asuma said in low tones of resignation, "are you about to make my already-atrocious day even more difficult?"
"Yes, sir."
Asuma sighed. "Come in."
Asuma sat down behind the Hokage desk, stacked higher with paperwork than ever. He raised his hand and snapped his fingers.
"How may I be of service, sir?"
Secretary Isobe was a civilian. An elderly civilian, at that. Hazō, with chūnin-level threat perception combined with the knowledge that Asuma wasn't an idiot, would stake the Gōketsu fortune on it (especially since the Gōketsu fortune was currently in the negative). How, then, the man was already at the door with a pot of hot tea was beyond Hazō's ability to imagine.
"Ah, Isobe. Thank you. That's all I need."
Asuma accepted a cup. "Strong willowbark, Hazō, Keiko?"
Hazō shook his head. "I get a strictly rationed amount each day. Tsunade says more would be bad for the liver."
Kei took one with a mute nod of gratitude.
"So," Asuma said, "what can I do for you that's more important than urgent countermeasures to an enemy invasion?"
Hazō took a deep breath. He was acutely aware of the stakes, which might not be life and death for Leaf at large, but were with 100% certainty life and death for him and/or Kei. With her in no state to sway Asuma with her eloquence, it was down to him to get this right, and this was probably his only chance.
"Sir," he began, "we have strong reason to believe that Orochimaru intends to kidnap and dissect Kei, and possibly myself. I'd like to ask you to order him not to."
Asuma took a very large swig of willowbark tea.
"Why," he asked of no one in particular, "is it always the Gōketsu?"
"Sir!" Hazō said, temper flaring. "We are in no way the aggressors in this situation!"
"I know, Hazō," Asuma said. "The fact remains: the Gōketsu have been responsible for about two thirds of the crises that I have had to deal with in my time as Hokage, in one capacity or another."
He took a long, deep breath, looking between Hazō and the slowly-recovering Kei.
"You two are not going to like what I have to say."
"Sir?" Hazō asked, bracing himself. Kei did not seem at all surprised.
"I'm going to be honest with you," Asuma said, "and what I'm saying does not leave this room. Is that understood?"
Hazō nodded reluctantly, not like he had a choice. Kei did as well.
"My father," Asuma said, "loved Orochimaru as a son. But when he received proof that Orochimaru was kidnapping and killing fellow Leaf shinobi, he did not hesitate to declare him guilty of treason and attempt to arrest him for trial and execution. There is no greater crime against the Will of Fire than to betray a comrade, or be complicit in the betrayal of a comrade. My father understood this."
Hope soared in Hazō's breast.
"I am not my father."
Asuma wasn't simmering with rage. Not anymore. That beast was still in there somewhere, Hazō was sure, waiting for Leaf's enemies, but right now, Hazō was just facing a very powerful, very tired man.
"If I could, I'd put Orochimaru on trial this very day. I don't have any proof that he's back to his old ways, but I'm not a fool. If that man goes through the justice of the Will of Fire, I very much doubt he'll come out unburned.
"But this village needs Orochimaru to survive. The second he turns on Leaf, for any reason, we become objectively weaker than our main threats. In a worst-case scenario, he will be adopted as you were by fools who have no idea what they're getting into.
"Today, his military value doubled. If he goes missing, and Rock and Cloud find out, they will not hesitate. With Fire's bountiful farmland as the prize, an alliance of convenience between them is such an obvious move that it's almost surprising they haven't made one already.
"For all we know," he added grimly, "they have.
"Until now, I've painstakingly avoided a confrontation between the Tower and Orochimaru. The Final Gift Programme was a blessing from the Deva Path, and I'd sincerely hoped that between that and the occasional missing-nin, we could keep Orochimaru in his Basement long enough for Leaf to stop needing him. That is still my objective, because every day Orochimaru goes without clearing his name or being punished for his crimes is a day that this village drifts further from the Will of Fire."
Hazō felt cold inside.
"Sir, if you give Orochimaru tacit content, we will be killed. And then, Leaf will riot."
"Yes," Asuma agreed. "It will. A clan head. The Nara consort. A KEI co-ordinator. I will have half of Leaf at my door, demanding that I rein in Orochimaru at once."
Asuma took another gulp of willowbark tea. It didn't seem to help much.
"You are the Hokage," he said to Hazō. "What do you do next?"
What did Hazō the Hokage do next? His instinctive response was just to say, "Rein in Orochimaru", but he suspected that if it was that simple, they wouldn't be having this conversation.
"In a direct confrontation with the Hokage," Asuma said, "Orochimaru has every reason to push his luck. If he wins, he's established the precedent that nobody in Leaf, not even a clan head, is beyond his reach. It's a prize beyond imagination. If he loses, he already knows that he can live a satisfactory existence on his own—again, assuming the taste of civilisation doesn't incline him to join one of our enemies, and sell our secrets in exchange for more corpses or whatever it is Orochimaru wants from life.
"So what do you do, Hazō the Hokage? If the clans are unhappy, the worst they can do is depose you. If Orochimaru is unhappy, the worst he can do is doom Leaf to destruction at the hands of its enemies."
Silence.
"You are asking us to die," Kei whispered.
"I order shinobi to lay their lives on the line for Leaf every day, Keiko," Asuma said. "You signed yours away when you joined the Leaf military.
"But no," he went on, "that is not what I am doing here.
"This is not, and cannot be, about Orochimaru and the Tower. This is about Orochimaru and you. In this instance, you have options the Tower does not. There are two people in this village with both the raw strength and the moral code to stand in Orochimaru's way. If they do stand in Orochimaru's way, as private individuals, I strongly doubt his pride will let him run crying to the Hokage. Even if he does, making me choose him over Tsunade or Naruto is a very different thing to making me choose him over you."
Hazō didn't know what to say.
"My advice to you," Asuma said, "is to cooperate with him to the fullest extent possible. Let him examine you, or whatever it is he wants to do, in a place of your choice, with witnesses. If you want those witnesses to be officers of the Tower, I can arrange it. Maybe he'll decide that's good enough. Maybe he'll lose interest. Maybe new opportunities will arise. Deaths happen during war, and sometimes there isn't enough left of a body to recover, and Kurosawa and Mori are no exception.
"If you have any solutions of your own, I am prepared to be flexible. As long as you don't make me choose between you and Orochimaru, and as long as you don't do anything so stupid that I have to execute you myself, and as long as you talk to me before any Gōketsu-brand shenanigans, there may be room to prioritise the spirit of the law over the letter."
His voice softened. "I know this isn't fair, and it isn't what you want to hear. I dearly wish I could act to protect you, and damn the consequences. I'll even forgive, once and once only, the fact that you tried to base Leaf's military strategy on your private interests. But I am the Hokage. As my father warned me, no Hokage gets the luxury of doing what they want."
-o-
You have received 7 + 2 = 9 XP.
-o-
The gaming night ended without (further) incident. Mari claims Orochimaru didn't do anything to her, but her fingertips are trembling and she is spending the day in her bedroom re-reading Icha Icha novels.
-o-
It is the afternoon of the same day. What do you do?
You may include Hazō's final recommendation regarding the Isan mission in your vote.
Voting ends on Saturday 6th of November, 1 p.m. New York time.
Mari was the last into the meeting; Kei's lips tightened at the sight of her, but she said nothing as Mari slipped into the last chair, the one between Akane and Noburi.
"Thanks for coming, everyone," Hazō said, looking around the table at his family. Mari, the brilliant schemer and political operative. Noburi, the silver-tongued charmer. Kagome, the insightful and remarkably violent teacher for whom this meeting needed to make clear that wanton destruction was not a good solution. Kei, the other person facing Orochimaru's not-so-subtle threats. Snowflake, Kei's sister who would cease to exist when Orochimaru tore her progenitor's brain apart. And, finally, Akane, the light of his life and the pillar from whom he drew strength when his own was not enough.
He needed her strength now. Badly. His own body and mind were fragile, fractured glass on the verge of total collapse.
"To start, let's make sure we're all on the same page," Hazō began.
"Hang on," Noburi said. "Where's Yuno?"
Hazō barely resisted smacking himself in the head for forgetting his sister-in-law when he summoned the others. "I'm not sure," he temporized. "I guess she hasn't gotten the message yet. Mari, would you mind finding her?"
The redhead had been leaning forward, elbows on the table, staring rigidly at the cat's-cradle tangle into which her fingers had knotted themselves. At Hazō's voice she jumped and looked up. "What? ...Yuno. Yes, sorry. I'll go find her." She slid out of her chair and vanished.
"Noburi, could you grab another chair?" Hazō said. "I didn't think to count when I called people in. There's one in my office."
Noburi gave him a speaking look that made it plain he knew Hazō was covering, but he got up and left the conference room, stepping across the hall to Hazō's office and returning with another chair that he wedged in next to his own.
"What about Haru, Atomu, and the others?" Akane asked. "Should we be inviting them too?"
"I want to keep it close," Hazō said quickly. "Big meetings move slowly."
"Won't they feel excluded?"
"I find it unlikely," Kei said. "Clans do not typically invite every ninja to a command meeting. The others are the newest and therefore most junior members. They will be unsurprised that they were left to pursue their other duties."
Snowflake nodded. "What she said. Although it wouldn't be a bad plan to bring them in on other meetings at some point. Smaller ones where the stakes aren't quite so high. It would be a good way to get a handle on their leadership abilities."
"Noted. Assuming we're all alive in a couple days, I'll make that happen."
"Speaking of things that should be made to happen," Noburi said, "you remember that Yuno's birthday is tomorrow, right?"
Hazō rubbed his face and considered once more trying to lie. "Honestly? No, I didn't. Things have been a little hectic. I already got her presents but I didn't remember it was tomorrow."
"S'all good." He laughed. "Honestly, I figured you might be a little distracted so I bought some stuff you can give her, but now I'll give it to her myself."
Best. Brother. Ever.
"In all sincerity: You are the best brother ever, you know that?"
"Glad you recognize that, Mr MEW. And don't worry, I promise not to mock you endlessly because you remembered to buy presents but not when they were for. I won't call you Mr Forgetful or—"
"Be nice, Noburi," Akane scolded. "He's badly injured and dealing with a lot."
Noburi nodded and made an apologetic gesture.
The door opened and Mari slipped through, closely followed by Satsuko and Yuno. Mari took her former position to Akane's right, Yuno sat beside her husband, and Satsuko sat on the table.
"Right. Thanks for coming everyone," Hazō began again.
"You are our Clan Lord," Yuno said, puzzled. "When you summon us, we come. At least, that is how it is in Isan. Is it different here?"
"He's just being polite, honey," her husband said quietly.
"Ah! Apologies." She nodded to Hazō. "Thank you. It's very good to be included."
Hazō bulldozed straight through the awkward moment. "Just to make sure we're all on the same page, here's what happened last night: I invited all of the summoners who participated in the Battle of Five Clans to the party. I included Orochimaru purely so he wouldn't feel snubbed, but I never expected him to actually show up. When he did, I became afraid of what he would do if he engaged with the family. In an effort to distract him, I asked him to play a board game. He refused. I suggested that he consider it an intellectual challenge. He ignored it again. I heard some of the family right around the corner"—he wasn't going to potentially hurt Kagome-sensei's feelings by saying that he was the inciting force behind the current disaster—"and so I went with the only thing I could think of that might possibly interest him: talking about the Great Seal. Over the course of the conversation he came to the realization that the Iron Nerve allows me to instantly memorize seals. His comment was 'this is something I require' and before I could say anything he hit me with a psychic attack in order to force me to give him all the details of my bloodline."
"Isn't that super double plus illegal?" Noburi asked.
"I think the usual response is 'ninja', but in this case it goes up a step to 'crazy-ass snake Sannin that everyone is terrified of." Hazō nodded down the table to where his trusty red-headed witch was tangling her fingers together in fascination. "Fortunately, Mari saved me."
Mari glanced up upon hearing her name, smiled and nodded, and then went back to examining her fingers.
"She came in just as I was starting to spill my guts and distracted Orochimaru. She told him that I had been urgently summoned by the Hokage. Orochimaru waved this off and made clear that I would not be allowed to leave until he was satisfied. As a second attempt, Mari told him that my bloodline ability wasn't actually to memorize seals, it was to memorize terrain as an enhancement to my taijutsu abilities. That made him lose interest for a few moments but then he decided that he might as well follow up anyway."
Here came the hard part. He took a deep breath and continued. "With no further option to bail me out, Mari looked for a distraction. The only one that was available was the fact that Kei's Shadow Clones are cognitively independent of her."
Kei and Snowflake glared across the table at Mari. Her shoulders hunched for an instant and then she sat up straight and smiled regretfully at her estranged daughters.
"I truly am sorry, both of you," she said. "It was the only thing about any of us that isn't common knowledge and might have been interesting to him."
"Note that she signalled me to extract you and then led the Snake Sannin on a wild goose chase while I did," Hazō said. "This is after she put herself in the line of fire trying to save me. I think you should cut her some slack."
Kei and Snowflake's lips tightened in perfect synchronization. "She threw us under the wagon, Hazō," Snowflake noted.
"I'm sorry," Mari said again. "I did my absolute best not to hurt anyone, and then I did everything I could to buy you time."
"And here we are," Kei said. "Trapped in a nightmare."
o-o-o-o
"She should be just in here," Mari said, holding the door open for the monster.
"She was supposed to be in the last three buildings as well." The words were too calm. She would far have preferred that the monster be hotly angry. Hotly angry people lashed out clumsily. People—monsters—whose fury had gone cold were far more dangerous. Worse, the air was murky with needles and blades and skin peeled away from bone.
The monster looked around the small and very empty function room. It was a multi-purpose space, a training dummy against the wall making it suitable for close-range taijutsu practice while the tiny suspended bucket-and-bamboo-pipes water element made it excellent for meditation or writing. Fortunately, no one was using the space at the moment.
"I'm truly sorry about that. I really thought she was here. There's one more place—"
"Stop."
Mari turned to face the monster, looking straight into his corpse-white face and snakeborn vertically-slitted eyes while offering a friendly smile and her most open and helpful face. "Truly, I'm very sorry. If you'd like I can find her and bring her to you instead of you having to traipse around? It shouldn't take more than a minute or three. I know she's—"
"I dislike it when people lie to me," the monster said. He wasn't still, instead swaying slightly from side to side like the snake he was.
"Lord Orochimaru, I'm not lying. I apologize for not knowing—"
Orochimaru: Intimidation (?) + multi-tag ? + 0 (dice): ?
Mari: (?) + multi-tag "The Hidden Flame" + tag "Prepped for This" + tag "Team Mom of Uplift" + 3 (dice): ?
Mari is Taken Out. Orochimaru pulls his punch, so she only receives a Mild ("Jumping at Shadows") and Medium ("Conflict Avoidant") Consequence.
The murk in the air collapsed down on her, a collection of blades that rent and tore at her mind to create access for the slithering oozing monsters that followed in their wake. She was ready for it and a shield of flame erupted around her inner self, melting the first daggers and scorching the tentacles of the horrors.
The slit-pupiled eyes glittered and she found herself trapped, a mouse staring into the eyes of a hungry cobra. Her shielding flames flickered, receding as her mental grip on her power slipped under the pressure of those eyes. The knives tore through her barriers, peeled her skull open and flensed away the layers of her brain. Her body dissolved, the pieces separating into conveniently-sized chunks that arrayed themselves on the monster's wall for easy review. Her heart was beating in the open air, her lungs were gasping with no body into which to send the air, and her naked eyeballs, removed from the protection of bone and meat to float helplessly, watched it all happen. There was no mouth, no throat, nothing with which to make sound, and so her screams were locked away in the tattered remnants of her brain as—
The knives vanished and the world coagulated into existence around her. She was on her knees, bowed forward with her arms wrapped around her body the way she had been after each time her uncle finished their games. The taste of blood was on her lips; at first she thought she had bitten them but no, there were sanguine tears dripping from her ears, across her cheeks, to gather in fat drops on her lips before plummeting to the sanded wooden floor.
"Tell your daughter to report to my lab in the morning," the monster said, disinterested and remote. He turned and left.
o-o-o-o
"A nightmare, yes," Mari said faintly. "I've already apologized, so may I suggest that we focus on waking up?"
Kei and Snowflake glared for one more moment but then they nodded and sat up straight, watching Hazō attentively.
Hazō couldn't help but raise his eyebrows in pleased surprise. That had gone well. No blood on the floor, not even any shouting. Maybe this situation wasn't completely beyond salvaging.
"Now, the priority is to protect Kei," Hazō said. "We can't let Orochimaru kidnap her for experimentation."
"Or you," Akane said.
"Or me, yes. Still, I refuse to lose family to this. Kei, Snowflake, Crystal, Winterlight, Scalpel, Prism, Constellation, Spiral, Moonlight, Soar, Kitten, Whisper, Prayer, Kiss, and any other sisters that I might get in the future—you are all precious to me and I'm not willing to lose you."
Kei's eyes went wide at the recitation of other-self appellations that had only been spoken a single time, at Snowflake's tumultuous first reification. "How did you remember...?"
Hazō smiled and winked at her. "I care about you, O Smartest and Also Dopiest of My Sisters. Of course I remember. Now, as Akane said, I don't want to be kidnapped either. Still, I think you're at more risk than I am. I have the protection of being an actual Clan Head instead of a consort. Kidnapping me would bring down enough of a shitstorm that even Orochimaru might not want to engage."
"Why can't we simply go to the Hokage?" Akane asked. "Surely if he tells Orochimaru to back off, Orochimaru will back off."
"That option is not available to us," Hazō said carefully. "Please do not pursue the topic further."
Silence hung in the air as heavily as any jōnin aura.
"The stinker wouldn't help us, would he? I knew this place was evil."
"Sensei, don't leap to conclusions," Hazō said. "I only said that the option wasn't open. Let's move on.
"Diverting Orochimaru's interest from myself and Kei should, I hope, be relatively straightforward. We simply tell him that the divergence is due to the fact that Kei's bloodline affects her cognition and that bloodlines are not duplicated via the Shadow Clone."
"What if he doesn't believe you?" Noburi asked.
"Then we blow him up."
"Sensei, Konan tried that at the Battle of Nagi Island. It didn't work then and she had even more tags than you do."
"This time he won't have that Pain fellow's cheating tricks," Kagome-sensei said. "Also, we don't do it to him directly. We trap his lab and collapse the whole place on him."
"Do you really want to try breaking in there?" Noburi asked in disbelief. "Do you even imagine that we could?"
"If it means saving Kei and Hazō? Sure. Besides, we've already been in there once."
"Yeah, but—"
"Let's call that Plan B," Hazō said, cutting across the debate. "Unfortunately, Leaf is in the middle of a World War right now and Orochimaru is a major fraction of our combat power." He leaned slightly on the possessive as a reminder to his teacher that they were, now and forever, loyal Leaf ninja. "I'd like to find a way of resolving this that doesn't damage Leaf's military capacity. That would be trading one problem for another since Asuma would be pissed with us."
Kagome-sensei sat back in his chair, glaring angrily around but not arguing.
"Like I said, I'm not willing to lose family to this. We'll lead off with Snowflake's idea; it's solid and will probably do the job. What's our backup plan if it doesn't?"
"I believe my value may be higher than you expect," Kei said carefully. "The summoner trade network, the ability for Noburi to refill summoner chakra at a distance in order to enable the summoned wave assault...these things are dependent on having a collection of summons in one place on the Seventh Path. Right now that coalition is in the heart of Pangolin territory. I will tell Pantsā of the risk I face and ask that he commit to disband the gathering in the event of my death or incapacitation. Although Orochimaru himself will not care about these things he should recognize the importance to others and the resulting issues he would face if he endangered them."
"Interesting point," Noburi said. "Asuma has had me moving chakra around a lot lately, mostly from back-line genin into jōnin who needed to be sent out again, or simply needed a lot of chakra so they could learn an expensive technique quickly. I can make it clear to whomever seems relevant"—he carefully did not specify 'the Hokage'—"that if any member of my family disappears then I stop doing that. No chakra transfers. No summoned wave attacks, no fast recharging, no enhanced training. Nothing. What's Orochimaru going to do, kidnap me?"
"That's a very risky play, Noburi," Hazō said carefully. "I appreciate it, but I think I might have an answer that doesn't put you in as much risk.
"I let Orochimaru dissect me."
Everyone's mouths dropped open.
"Hazō," Snowflake said carefully, "are you having another of your episodes?"
"My...episodes?"
"Yes. One of your episodes where you make insane speeches in front of all the Kage, or talk back to an insane murderer, or burn your brain out looking at a hypermagical artifact, or—"
"Hey! Every single one of those things turned out to be useful." He thought about it for a moment. "Well, maybe not the Kage thing. That mostly just caused trouble. But talking back to Itachi kept him from killing everyone and got us the Porcupine Scroll. Looking at the Pangolin Scroll taught me—" From the back of his brain blared a voice screaming about what Kagome-sensei would say if he knew that Hazō's rapid advances in sealing ability came from staring into the unbridled Out and then returning to the Paint with the patterns of chaos still embedded in his brain. "—taught me a lot about how to manage risk. And looking at the Great Seal meant that I was able to give the Leaf sealmasters what they needed to work on it."
"Hrmph. Bunch of useless arguing no-skill stinkers who don't even know the dances. They oughta..." Kagome-sensei's words trailed off into inaudibility.
"Look, I'm not crazy. We think that Orochimaru wants to kidnap me so that he can dissect me in order to learn more about my bloodline. Fine, I'd like to learn more about my bloodline too. Orochimaru can do his examination, but on our terms. First, we get Naruto and Tsunade to watch the procedure and ensure nothing goes wrong. If we can't convince at least one of them then we don't make the offer. Assuming we can, then it takes place in Leaf General, not in Orochimaru's lab. He doesn't share the information with anyone except me and he doesn't do anything that I can't recover from in a few weeks. Finally, Naruto and Tsunade commit to destroying my body if I die on the table. That way there's nothing to be gained by 'accidentally' killing me."
"In what possible universe do you imagine he would accept these terms, and why?" Kei demanded.
"For a couple reasons. First, if he meets us halfway like this then I'll actively cooperate. I'll stay conscious for the procedure and share whatever useful information I can. I'll—"
"Are you insane?!" Noburi shouted. "You're going to let him cut you open while you're awake? Dude, seriously. What the hell is wrong with your brain?"
"I appreciate the concern, Nobby. I'm not anxious to experience this either, but it's the best way." He looked around the table, studying the universal expressions of disbelief. "Look, if he kidnaps me and does all this then he learns this much." He held his hand up, thumb and finger spread as wide as they would go. "He also takes the risk that someone finds out it was him in which case everyone in Leaf goes berserk. They can't afford to establish the precedent that he can kidnap and murder Clan Heads. He'd end up having to go missing again, and he plainly doesn't want that or he wouldn't have come back. I'm not some nobody. If I disappear there's going to be a massive manhunt for me, and Orochimaru's lab is the first place people are going to check.
"On the other hand, suppose he accepts my deal? Then he eliminates all of his risk in exchange for learning only this much." He moved his thumb and forefinger an inch closer together.
"There is no possible way in which you can know how much he is giving up," Kei complained. "Your argument is completely irrational."
"Heroic," Yuno said. "But, if you will forgive me, it seems unwise."
"Honey, it's okay, you can call him stupid."
"I would never!"
"If we could come back to the point, please," Hazō said, acid in his tone. "Sure, it's a risk. This entire situation is a risk and I'm looking to defuse it."
"It won't start with knives," Mari said quietly.
Everyone turned to her in surprise.
"What?" Hazō asked.
"He thinks that you have the ability to memorize terrain, because I told him that you have the ability to memorize terrain. He wants to know what it is about you that gives you that ability, but he's going to start by investigating exactly what the limits of the ability are. He'll tell you to memorize a certain chunk of terrain by looking at so that he can quiz you on it, or have you walk across it blindfolded without having been on it before. If you were able to do that, then he would start cutting into you while asking more questions so that he could see how different procedures impacted your answers. You won't be able to answer the very first questions, so he'll know that your bloodline is actually something else and that I lied to him." A shudder went across her shoulders; she twitched it away angrily and her voice firmed. "He'll know that it's something related to seals and that will be a lot more interesting."
"...Oh," Hazō said after a moment. "Yeah."
"So Hazō isn't going to be volunteering for dissection. That's good," Noburi said. "We can't go to the Hokage, for some unnamed reason that I will not speculate on. What about the other clans? ISC are on our side, can we leverage that?"
"Perhaps the other clans?" Yuno asked. "As Hazō said before, they don't want to be kidnapped either. Surely they would band together to prevent it."
Mari shook her head. "Maybe, but I don't think it's a good idea. Right now we've got a situation that is dangerous but straightforward. All of our allies are on our side, obviously, so any other clans that we invite to the table are either neutral or hostile. If we invite everyone then some of them have conflicting agendas—they want to hurt us while protecting themselves. If we only invite some of them then we're snubbing the others and opening ourselves up to accusations that we're throwing them to the Orochimaru wolf as a way to protect ourselves."
"Erm," Hazō said. "Fair point."
Silence fell as everyone thought about it.
"Can we please just leave?!" Kagome-sensei burst out. "Honestly, what does it take to get through to you people? They're all stinkers here. They're mean to Kei, they're mean to Mari, they stab us in the back and send maggot worms to ruin our food and glare at us in the streets and bully Honoka and why can't we just leave?! The woods are fine! They're all busy killing each other, let's just take everyone and go back to those islands down south. It was nice there and there weren't any stinking ninja stinkers threatening to kidnap Hazō and kill him."
Hazō smiled sadly. "Sometimes I wish we could, Sensei, but it wouldn't work. Kei and Noburi and I are in exactly the wrong part of our careers to be able to run. We're Summoners with heads full of top secret military information and clan secrets of the Nara. Noburi is possibly the single most important ninja in Leaf right now, what with his ability to enable qualitative changes in warfare by way of chakra transfer. Leaf absolutely cannot afford to let us get away and deprive them of that, much less take a chance that we might give it to another Village. Unfortunately, we don't have the raw power to take on all comers.
"When we ran from the Swamp they sent Zabuza after us, but in a half-assed way. He went home after a while and only came out when there was more information. If we went missing, Leaf would have Inuzuka and Hyūga and Aburame scent-tracker bugs after us and they wouldn't stop until they found us and killed us. Jiraiya once said to me that we couldn't afford to run because they wouldn't stop coming after someone with his knowledge and he wouldn't be able to survive the ambushes and also protect us."
"Stupid stinker didn't know how to set a proper perimeter," Kagome-sensei groused, folding his arms angrily.
"Sure. How do we deal with rocks being dropped on us by skywalking Hyūga? Or, if we go into town to get paper, maybe the lunch stall that we stop at is poisoned?"
Kagome-sensei had no response but much muttering.
Hazō sighed. "Okay, here's what we've got: Inform Orochimaru that Kei and Snowflake have personality drift because Kei has the Frozen Skein and Snowflake doesn't. Kei asks Pantsā to hold the embassy hostage against Kei's disappearance. I do not volunteer for dissection. I also don't call a meeting of all the clan heads and try to get them engaged on this."
"So we blow them up, right? That was Plan B. You said that was Plan B and you didn't find a Plan A so now Plan B is Plan A. Right?"
"Still Plan B, Sensei. Sorry."
"Stupid stinking stupidhead apprentice with his stupid not blowing people up..."
"Anyway. That's what we've got. Orochimaru told Kei to report to his lab this morning and now it's this afternoon so he's probably not in the best mood. At this point I think our best option is—"
What does Hazō think the best option is?
XP AWARD: 1 (Scene too short for a full day's award.)
Brevity XP: 0
"GM had fun" XP: 0 No strong feelings.
Vote time! What to do now?
Voting ends on Wednesday, November 10, 2021, at 12pm London time.
It was (now) a quiet morning in the Gōketsu compound. Akane, still sitting in the snow where she'd finished her morning training, reflected on the valuable lessons she'd learned today. First, be careful what training methods you use after spending all your chakra on shadow clones. Second, younger KEI genin are mischievous little imps. Third, if you fail to specify "no ninjutsu", somebody will notice.
"Lady Gōketsu? Hello? I was told that Lady Gōketsu could be found over here?"
The courier, standing right in front of Akane, peered around in confusion.
"Good morning!" Akane said perkily. "How can I help you?"
The courier jumped, then spun around, finally noticing her.
"Lady Gōketsu! Are you... are you all right?"
"Never better," Akane confirmed with an unsuccessfully attempted nod.
The courier gave her the look of a man struggling to refrain from comment because if he said what was on his mind it could get him killed.
Finally, he produced an envelope from his bag and held it out in her direction. "I have a message for you from Lady Nara."
"Oh." Akane briefly reviewed her situation and found that it hadn't changed at all. "Would you mind reading it out loud?"
"The message is sealed," the courier said. "Would you like me to open it anyway?"
"No," Akane said quickly. "No, that's fine. In that case, would you mind helping me up?"
After a second's hesitation, the courier reached into the enormous mound of snow occupying pride of place in the middle of the Gōketsu compound. It took a while of feeling around to locate her arm (she could tell he was being extra-careful lest his hands locate some execution-worthy part of her body first), then more time for him to clear away snow until he could pull her out. Akane, quite frozen at this point, wished he'd been a bit bolder (and she could surely weather a little embarrassment), but since freeing chūnin from involuntary entombment wasn't part of his job description, she could hardly complain.
"Sealing failure, Lady Gōketsu?"
"Not today," Akane said with a reassuring smile. "Just a valuable reminder that ninja cheat."
Next time, it would be her turn to deliver a valuable lesson, Akane decided. Koyuki might be an ace with the Water Element, but she suspected the girl still had a lot to learn about trapmaking (which, as it happened, didn't come under "no ninjutsu").
Akane didn't recognise the seal on the envelope, which, in context, was enough of a clue to tell her who it was from. If she'd needed more, 雪華, "snow flower", was the poetic term for "snowflake". The sender had used a variant second character—one which evoked a sense of the fantastical rather than the merely botanical—but after reading the message, the last thing Akane felt up to was literary analysis.
Dear Akane,
I realise such a request should properly be made in person, and that you are bound to have better uses for your time already scheduled, but if you are amenable, would you be willing to go on a date with me today?
I will humbly await your response outside the Hokage Tower.
Snowflake
P.S. I would appreciate it if you kept this proposal between the two of us.
-o-
Over the entire journey, Akane had wracked her brain over the right way to respond. In principle, it was only rational for her to follow Hazō's lead and try to be open to new discoveries about her sexuality. Certainly, she was already technically dating another girl—though, to be honest, not much had changed between her and Ino since then, including the frequency of Hazō as a conversation topic. Come to think of it, they'd barely even gone on any three-way dates. Getting schedules to line up when two of the partners were overworked clan heads, and the third was the second-in-command supposed to take over when one of them was busy, was enough of a logistical nightmare that it was almost tempting to welcome Snowflake into the polycule just for her specialist training. On the other hand, Akane had never felt any attraction to what Hazō referred to as the "Keiko base model", and, unfair though it might be, she didn't know if that was something that could change just because it belonged to a different mind.
Between Akane's dark days as a bedridden bookworm and, later, the general public's inexplicable failure to appreciate the Spirit of Youth, Hazō had been the first and only person ever to ask her out. She had no experience of letting suitors down gently, or preserving a friendship afterwards without crippling awkwardness or increased emotional distance (she cringed when she thought about how badly she'd handled their original breakup). Should she at least attempt some kind of romantic engagement with Snowflake, just to establish for a fact whether it was impossible, or would that only make things worse when it turned out it was? If not, how was she to say no in a way that didn't hurt Snowflake's shaky self-esteem and do lasting damage to their relationship?
Snowflake waited for her answer under the eaves of the Hokage Tower, her namesakes blowing past on the breeze as she raised a hand to keep her elaborately lacy blue ribbon in place. For some reason, in Akane's vision, the Tower briefly became a great tree, and the snowflakes cherry blossoms.
Faced with Snowflake's unwavering gaze, both shy and alert, Akane tried one last saving throw. "Are you sure you didn't mean an instance of two individuals spending a day together in order to facilitate greater mutual knowledge and familiarity, arranged in anticipation of a potential long-term relationship?"
"Akane, just how bad do you believe my handwriting is?" Snowflake asked with an amused smile.
"No," she went on before Akane could respond, "my purpose with regard to inviting you on a date is not greater mutual knowledge and familiarity, valuable bonuses though they may be."
"It's… not?" But what were dates for, if not getting to know each other better? It wasn't like Snowflake of all people would be after a purely physical relationship.
Or would she? It would be unyouthful for Akane to be closed-minded when a friend was clearly experimenting outside her comfort zone. Snowflake had, after all, apparently cleared the "holding hands" stage back in Isan. It wouldn't be that strange for her to want to go further with someone she trusted. But if that was the case, why Akane? And how was Akane to respond? She wished that she'd taken more lessons on dating etiquette from Mari while there was time, instead of letting herself grow complacent just because she was already in the relationship of her dreams.
"It is not," Snowflake said. "Rather, I was hoping to avail myself of your expertise as the most, shall we say, experienced person of my acquaintance, at least of those I am prepared to ask. You must surely have learned much from your time with Hazō which could be of aid to me given my profound inexperience."
"I understand some of your activities may have been quite personal," Snowflake went on, "and perhaps I am being too forward in requesting a physical demonstration, but I honestly believe that hands-on experience would be a better teacher than verbal descriptions and diagrams, or indeed lists."
"…"
"Naturally, I will endeavour to make it as enjoyable for you as I can. I may be untrained, but I do pride myself on my creativity."
Akane's head was starting so spin.
"But…" she tried, "but aren't you only attracted to girls? A lot of what we do simply wouldn't apply to you!"
Snowflake frowned. "First, I have never made any definitive statements about my sexuality. Second, are date activities really that segregated by gender? It was my assumption that all couples (for argument's sake) would have access to the same options, barring perhaps the public baths."
"Wait," Akane said slowly. "Exactly what is it that you want to do with me?"
"Receive live training on how one conducts a romantic date," Snowflake said as if it was obvious. "The fact is, nobody in the Snowflakesphere has much knowledge of conventional dating at all. Kei's romantic success is inversely proportional to her adherence to convention. Tenten tends towards passivity. Shikamaru considers dating a pathological social construct and avoids it like the plague. Shiori is… not a viable source of guidance. Yuri and Minori until recently limited themselves to activities which could never be construed as romantic by a hostile public. The literature, too, has proved to be most unreliable."
"The literature?" Akane asked. "Do you mean Icha Icha and the like?"
"Appalling, all of it," Snowflake replied. "Hoary tropes that were geriatric before the invention of the printing press, language that is overwrought yet lacking in depth like a wedding cake made of papier-mâché, characters next to whom a paddling pool is the Abyss itself, clumsy dialogue intended to rush the reader from exposition to exposition like a heavily-concussed genin trying to follow an evacuation drill, virtually no lesbian relationships, and those that are bestowed upon us like crumbs dropped from the mainstream reader's table are cringeworthy caricatures written by overexcited straight men. Or so I hear."
"And so… you want to go on a date with me."
Snowflake nodded firmly. "I have a notebook, a map, a pocket abacus, and a set of concealed kunai. I am ready for romance."
In the face of such youthful determination, how could Akane say no?
"My wife is in danger, as is my brother-in-law who is the head of a clan that the Nara consider an ally. Why would I not come?" He paused. "Oh, and also Leaf might literally be destroyed as its component clans leave and return to the wilds. That deserves my attention as well."
"'Its component clans leave and return to the wilds'?" Hazō asked, surprised. "I get that the precedent 'Orochimaru can kidnap Clan Heads' is a major problem, but are people likely to care that much if it's just me, the upstart from Mist that they don't like because of all his wacky status-quo-threatening ideas? Especially now, in the middle of a World War?"
Shikamaru studied Hazō for several long seconds, then turned to his wife and cocked his head in inquiry.
"Yes, Hazō," Kei said patiently. "You or I being kidnapped and dissected would be bad. We should not let that happen."
"Cool. I'm for it. So, first question: Do we loop Ami in on this conversation?"
"Regrettably, she has already departed for Mist." An outsider would have thought that Kei's voice was calm and her face blank but, as someone who had spent two years in the wilderness with her, Hazō recognized her expression as that of a puppy left behind when the people went for a walk.
On the one hand, Kei was unhappy. On the other, Ami wasn't here to introduce her particular brand of chaos. Hazō found himself conflicted on the good/bad status of this news.
"Pity. Well, between you and Shikamaru we have roughly 20% of the Elemental Nations' brainpower in the room, so I'd say we're fine."
"Your estimate, while flattering, is exceptionally inaccurate," Shikamaru said. "Kei accounts for 18% on her own merits and I would like to believe I offer more than 2%."
Hazō snorted. "Kei, you should check his ears."
Shikamaru raised an eyebrow.
"I will explain later," Kei told him. "In brief: lupchanzen."
"Ah, yes. Those imaginary bugaboos of your mad-bomber uncle."
Snowflake glowered. "There is no reason to believe that Kagome is—"
"Moving back to the topic," Hazō said. No way was he getting drawn into that discussion. "Allow me to preface this with an important disclaimer: Our situation sucks and we're at risk no matter what we do. I have a plan, I'm going to explain it, it involves risk. This does not represent a lack of concern on my part, nor—"
"I stipulated to this concern earlier," Kei reminded him.
"Right, okay. Thank you. So, here's what I'm thinking we should do..."
o-o-o-o
"Ai tells me I need to give you little brats fifteen minutes because you promised to throw money at the hospital if I did. She also nagged me about eating something, so I guess it works. Talk fast." Tsunade dropped into her heavy wooden chair with a widely-aimed glower and started spooning up the steaming udon soup that had been left on her desk as part of a heavily laden food tray.
"Thank you, Lady Tsunade," Hazō said, bowing deeply. "I'm sure you recall telling me that the best way to deal with Orochimaru was to not be interesting. Sadly, I failed at this task."
Tsunade snorted.
"Through a series of events that I can explain if you like—"
"Nope," Tsunade said around a mouthful of noodles, not looking at Hazō.
"Right, uh...well, anyway, he's interested in my bloodline and in the fact that Kei's Shadow Clones are cognitively independent of her. And when I say 'interested', I mean 'I am confident he intends to kidnap and vivisect us.'"
"Why?" Tsunade demanded. She finished slurping up the noodles and picked up the bowl so she could glug down the broth before pushing the bowl aside and tearing into a platter of sushi and sashimi. "He's got all those Final Gift ninja, plus the Rock ninja he collected on that Scroll-hunting trip of yours."
"Lady Tsunade," Shikamaru said sharply. "I am paying a significant amount of money for fifteen minutes of your attention. I would be very grateful if you would give us your attention."
Tsunade's chopsticks paused, and then she set them down and shifted her chair around to face the three chūnin. "All right, Nara. You have my attention. Now, what scrap of evidence do you have that my former brother-in-arms is intending to kidnap these two?"
"He was in the process of successfully pressuring details of my bloodline out of me when Mari walked in," Hazō explained, struggling not to show his utter shock at the absence of a Shikamaru-shaped hole in the wall. "In an attempt to divert him she stated that I had been urgently summoned by the Hokage. He refused to let me leave."
Tsunade frowned. "He what?"
"Mari told him that the Hokage had summoned me to an immediate meeting. His response was 'The boy can wait'."
She shook her head in tired annoyance and muttered, "Oro, what the fuck?" Hazō dared to hope.
"Okay, fine, that was off the trail," she continued. "He shouldn't have done that and I'll have a couple words with him. Still, it's a long way from there to 'intends to vivisect me'."
"After he refused to let me depart, he ordered me to continue disclosing clan secrets. It was not a simple request; I could feel a psychic pressure backing it up, and it caused me to begin divulging.
"Mari"—he pretended not to notice the irritated tightening of Kei's lips in his peripheral vision—"attempted to sidetrack him by claiming that my ability was nothing more than to memorize surrounding terrain. He seemed to lose interest for a moment but then he changed his mind and began to follow up. Mari distracted again by pointing out that Kei—" He broke off, a horrific thought crashing through his mind: He had never actually seen Tsunade use the Shadow Clone.
"Ma'am," he said, "I need to ask...are you familiar with the details of the Shadow Clone jutsu?" Shit, shit, shit, when he first came in he had already spilled the beans about Kei and Snowflake being independent! Holy burning shitballs, if she didn't know then he had leaked a major secret of Leaf! Or at least a major hint to it. Ohcrapohcraphohcrap.
"Of course I'm familiar with it, you nitwit," Tsunade said impatiently. "My Uncle Tobi invented it."
"Right, sorry. Anyway...Kei? You want to take this?"
"My bloodline, the Frozen Skein, interferes with my cognition. The Mori think differently than others—in some ways better, in some ways worse."
"And because bloodlines aren't copied to your clones, the clones think like normal people," Tsunade said, nodding. "Interesting. Did you tell Oro that?"
"I did not have the opportunity. Mari offered up the fact of our differing mentation in an effort to distract Orochimaru from Hazō. She then led Orochimaru on a fool's errand around the estate 'looking for me' while actually dispatching Hazō to extract me."
Tsunade snorted. "Bet that went over well."
"He blasted her psychically."
"Wait, he did?" Hazō asked. "She didn't tell me that part."
"He did. You did not notice how jumpy she was?"
"I—" Hazō cut himself off as the Slug Princess snapped her fingers at him impatiently.
"Oy. You're running short on your fifteen minutes. What's all this got to do with me?"
Kei looked back to Hazō.
"We're going to go talk to Orochimaru," he said carefully. "We're hoping to talk him down from kidnapping and experimenting on us. It would be a huge help if you would go with us."
"You want me to babysit you."
"They are asking you to help rein in the destructive impulses of your former comrade in arms," Shikamaru said. "At the risk of stating the obvious, what do you suppose the outcome would be were he to actually kidnap a Clan Head for medical experimentation?"
"He wouldn't do that."
"With respect, Lady Tsunade, I believe it to be more probable than not. I say this based on a minimized-bias examination of the evidence available to me and I say it with the full weight of my office as Clan Head of the Nara. I also state, for the record, that if Orochimaru does this thing, or if I become convinced that he has done this thing, then the Nara Clan will depart from Leaf forever, as is our right under the Founding Charter. Before leaving, I will inform all of the other Clan Heads of the reasons for the Nara's departure. I will not advise them on what course of action to take, but I am essentially certain that the Yamanaka and the Akimichi will go with us. I am confident that at least the Aburame and Inuzuka will go as well. If you would like me to perform a full analysis of the probable actions of the other founding clans then I will need twelve hours."
Tsunade raised an eyebrow. "Orochimaru expresses interest in your wife and you're going to destroy Leaf."
"No, ma'am. He may express whatever interest he wishes, provided it is done in a polite and prosocial manner. What he may not do is cause her to feel threatened, either for her own safety or that of her loved ones."
Hazō could see the muscle in Tsunade's jaw jumping as her teeth ground together. He thanked his lucky stars that Shikamaru had vetoed the idea of telling Tsunade about Noburi's threat to stop providing chakra-transfer support, or Kei's threat to disrupt the Seventh Path embassy. The Nara's far deeper political credit and reputation gave Shikamaru more room to maneuver without getting crushed.
"I will note," Shikamaru continued, "that I have left contingency orders at the Nara estate. These orders will be opened four hours from now unless I have returned to the Nara estate with Kei and Hazō beside me, and all three of us have passed a battery of tests intended to demonstrate that we are mentally competent and not under duress. If any of us do not appear or do not pass the tests, those orders will be opened and the Nara clan will be gone from Leaf within the week."
Tsunade's face was absolutely blank and unimaginable tons of granite shimmered on the edge of visibility, a mountain range lowering its enormous weight closer by the moment.
"Are you threatening my birthright, boy? Are you seriously threatening, to my face, the destruction of the village founded by my grandfather?"
Shikamaru was sweating and hunching as the unseen force of Tsunade's incipient anger crushed him like an ant beneath a boot.
"I am not," he gasped. "I am ensuring that you are aware of the seriousness of the situation."
"Ma'am, please," Hazō said, struggling for breath. "Please, are we wrong? Tell me that Orochimaru would never do something like this in pursuit of research he found sufficiently interesting."
The mountain shuddered uncertainly and then faded gradually away. Tsunade said nothing, sitting motionless with lips pursed as though biting a sour fruit.
"Honestly, I want to work with him on this," Hazō said, leaning hard on the Iron Nerve to keep his tone even and prevent himself from gasping in heaving breaths of relief. "I want to know more about my bloodline and how it works. I'm happy to submit to examinations if they can be done in a safe way and if we can work out an OPSEC protocol that doesn't leak Gōketsu clan secrets everywhere. If he's willing to work with us in a reasonable way then we can all win. But, like Shikamaru said, we aren't willing to be intimidated."
"And you want me to loom in the background so that he doesn't get pissy."
"I wouldn't have said it quite like that," Hazō said with a smile. "But, yes."
She sat back in her chair, studying him with an alarming intensity while drumming her fingers on her knee. Hazō started to sweat.
"Fine," she said at last. "Come on." She stood up and pushed past them to get to the door...and then paused and turned back to Shikamaru.
"I admire your balls, kid, but you'd best be very careful about when you play that card with me, and even more so with Asuma. It's dancing right on the line of treason."
"With respect, Lady Tsunade, it is not. Leaf's founders were dubious about the experiment and were very careful to write the Charter such that founding clans have the option to depart. Were I to advise other founding clans to leave, that might be considered treason, but leading the Nara out of the village is my right. As to informing the other clans of the reason for our departure without explicitly advising them to follow...that is a legal gray area, but there is textual support for the position that it is in fact a requirement of triggering the departure clause."
"And you think you could pull that off? Just pick up stakes and leave? You honestly believe the other clans would let that happen."
"Lady Tsunade, I say this with the greatest respect for you and for the other clans of Leaf: Who do you think is going to stop us? All we would need to do is explain why we were leaving and the people attempting to bar our way would join the exodus."
"Leaf cannot be held together by force of arms, ma'am," Hazō said quietly. "Only by the Will of Fire. Jiraiya taught me that."
Tsunade harumphed. "That old skirt-chaser was giving advice on governance and political theory? We'd best keep an eye out for flying pigs." She yanked the door open and stomped out, bellowing for Kon Ai.
o-o-o-o
It took twenty minutes for Tsunade to arrange things such that she could leave the hospital without endangering patients. Once outside she jumped for the roofs and took off on a beeline for Orochimaru's estate, the three chūnin (and one Shadow Clone whose official rank was a legal grey area) struggling to keep up.
Tsunade stopped only when they stood atop the wall surrounding Orochimaru's estate. She pulled a handful of small, paper-wrapped pellets from her pocket and hurled them up along the path that led to the front door. An instant later the paper wrappings revealed their true nature as they detonated in a rolling shockwave that sent gravel flying everywhere and broke many of the paving stones.
"I'm not fucking around with whatever bullshit he might have set up," she said to Hazō's surprised look.
They followed her up to the heavily-reinforced door of the main house and then through it after she kicked it off its hinges without breaking stride.
"Oro! Get your snakey ass out here!"
Orochimaru did not instantly materialize from thin air, so Tsunade picked up the broken door, ripped it the rest of the way apart, and hurled the top half up the corridor towards the living room. Within ten feet it passed through some unseen grille that effortlessly diced it into thumb-sized splinters.
"For fuck's sake, Oro! Don't make me tear through this shit! I'm already pissed, you don't want to test my patience!"
The owner of the house sauntered around the corner and leaned one shoulder on the wall, arms folded over his chest. He was wearing a blue robe with a white haori over it, the jacket tied casually closed with a simple loop of rope. On his face he wore an expression of insouciance that made Hazō's heart sink.
"How lovely to see you, Sunny."
She hurled the second half of the door at his head and he slapped it away with a flick of an eight-foot tongue. Forty pounds of iron-reinforced oak embedded itself in the wall, hung there limply for a moment, and then thumped to the ground.
"Hm," Orochimaru said, eyeing the fallen missile. "Not even hard enough to stick firmly? You're slipping, dear sister."
"Don't fuck with me, Oro. I'm not in the mood."
"You are never in the mood. It was the cause of much of Jiraiya's sadness."
"Piss off." She grabbed Hazō's shoulder and pulled him forward. "Say your piece, kid."
"Uh...hello, sir. Lord Orochimaru."
"Hm."
Hazō took a breath and flipped back through his Iron Nerve library. He had practiced this speech in front of the others, back in a place of safety where he could focus. All that was necessary now was for his lips and tongue to shape the words as they had then while his body maintained the same calm and relaxed appearance it had worn.
"At the party you coerced me into disclosing clan secrets to you. You psychically attacked Mari. You made myself and Kei believe that you intended to kidnap and vivisect us as part of your research. It is possible that this is not and never was your intention, but it is what you conveyed to us.
"I find myself confused. You are more than intelligent enough to realize that the consequences for such an action would be catastrophic. No clan can abide a precedent that you are allowed to force the disclosure of clan secrets, much less kidnap Clan Heads and clan consorts for your research. Leaf would devote its full resources to arresting and eliminating you as a threat. Perhaps you feel that this is impossible. Perhaps you feel that no one in Leaf is a threat to you."
"Nah, he's not that stupid," Tsunade growled, her eyes locked on those of her former brother in arms, who was ignoring her in favor of staring at Hazō.
Hazō was too rattled by the Snake Sannin's gaze to adjust the replay of his speech, so he ended up wincing internally as he overtalked Tsunade. "From my viewpoint you would need to either fight all of Leaf or go missing-nin again, neither of which seem like things you would want. I need to ask you, sir: Do you believe that you could evade all consequences for forcing me to divulge clan secrets or for kidnapping myself or Kei? Alternatively, do you believe that I have misjudged the consequences?"
"I have no idea what you are talking about," Orochimaru said with a smirk. "The way I remember it is that you brought up the topic of the Great Seal and boasted that you had memorized the entire thing in seconds. I asked how you had done so and you began to tell me before we were interrupted."
"You pressured me!" He couldn't help that the words came out as an indignant yelp. "I even started off by saying that it was a secret ability!"
One pale shoulder shrugged. "You are far from the first to attempt to impress the Snake Sannin by offering private information, or jutsu, or money, or so on. Honestly, it's quite banal. Much rarer that someone then tries to cry coercion...I suppose your goal is to get me in front of the Hokage, histrionically detail your version of what happened, and then demand that the Hokage force me to pay reparations of some kind?" He cocked his head and looked at Tsunade. "We worked that scam a few times, didn't we, sister? What was it called...?"
"The badger game, and don't be an ass."
He very visibly craned his neck to look at her posterior. "Speaking of which, have you been working your glutes enough? They aren't quite as firm as I remember them."
"Look, Ooh-boo-hoo, I'm having a shitty day. I've had two patients die on me, I've had to amputate four limbs, and this one"—she jerked a thumb at Shikamaru—"threatened to take the Nara's ball and go not-home unless I put a muzzle on your spike-nosed face."
"'Go not-home'? What might that mean?"
"It means, sir, that if I become convinced that you have harmed my wife, anyone she cares about, or any other Leaf ninja, then I will invoke the Right of Departure held by all founding clans under the Leaf Charter. The Nara will depart from Leaf forever. I will—" Shikamaru's voice, already shaking as he struggled to get the words out, failed him completely when Orochimaru's face went blank and the air became heavy with the silent screams of tortured souls.
"Cut it out, Oro." The mountain was present again, more perceptibly than it had been, but this time it was a shield around their souls and a pillar beneath their feet instead of a promise of destruction poised above their heads.
Orochimaru didn't move anything except his eyes. They drifted lazily from Shikamaru back to Tsunade and lingered there for several seconds. Finally, the murk cleared away and the world was once more home only to the sounds of nearby pounding hearts and far-off chirping birds.
No one spoke as the Snake Sannin and the Slug Princess continued their staredown.
Hazō needed to do something, say something, somehow prevent the situation from escalating, but his brain was a jangled, shrieking mess of fear. He opened his mouth and out came words.
"I need to ask you, sir: Do you believe that you could evade all consequences for forcing me to divulge clan secrets or for kidnapping myself or Kei? Alternatively, do you believe that I have misjudged the consequences?" Too late he realized that he had replayed the end of his earlier script and it had come out with all the duplicated precision of the Iron Nerve. Was there any chance that Orochimaru would miss that fact?
No, he had not missed it. The interest was clear in his eyes. Damnit.
"Those are very impertinent questions, boy."
"Answer him, Oro. Do you think you're too good for Leaf? Think carefully, because I already said I'm in a bad mood."
"As Jiraiya used to say: 'Unwad your panties, Sunny.' The question is moot, since I would never force anyone to divulge clan secrets. I am shocked, shocked, that you would believe otherwise."
That was a lot less sincere than Hazō had been hoping for.
"If I may offer a point of information," Snowflake said nervously. "While it is true that I am cognitively independent of my progenitor, that is solely because the Mori bloodline renders them incapable of agency. Since bloodlines are not copied by the Shadow Clone jutsu, my mentation is of a more baseline-human style. In short, our independence would not be useful to anyone who lacked a mind-crippling bloodline."
Orochimaru studied her carefully and then grimaced sourly. "How unfortunate."
"Oro, you were a slippery snake long before you got that scroll, so I'm not letting you slide on this one. Promise me that you will never extract clan secrets from a Leaf ninja without their full consent."
Orochimaru studied her.
"See this? What is this?" Tsunade said, pointing at her own face.
Orochimaru sighed. "It's your 'not kidding' face," he said in the same tone with which schoolchildren recited the Pledge of the Waters.
"What does it mean when I've got my not kidding face on?"
"Yes, yes. I remember, Tsunade."
"What does it mean, Oro?"
"It means that we should be serious and focus on the mission or you will make us wish we had." The words were purely rote. "You know, you never did clarify what exactly that meant...?"
The mountain returned, overlapped with the six of them and so reality-adjacent that Hazō could barely breathe around the sensation of stone in his lungs. The almost-tangible rocks trembled, the power of an earthquake restrained on a leash made of thread.
"Do you want to find out?" Tsunade asked, her voice perfectly calm.
Orochimaru thought about that for a very brief moment, then waved at the sprawling manor around them. "Not particularly. Rebuilding this place in the winter would be annoying. Hard to get work crews onsite when it's cold."
"Good. Then repeat after me: I, Orochimaru of the Sannin, promise that I will never extract clan secrets from a Leaf ninja without their consent or against their wishes."
Orochimaru sighed, long and drawn out. "Very well. I, Orochimaru of the Sannin, promise that I will never extract clan secrets from a Leaf ninja without their consent or against their wishes."
"I, Orochimaru of the Sannin, promise that I will never kidnap a Leaf ninja, nor cause a Leaf ninja harm for reasons the Hokage would disapprove of."
"Really, Tsunade? A bit underspecified, don't you—yes, yes, fine. I, Orochimaru of the Sannin, promise that I will never kidnap a Leaf ninja, nor cause a Leaf ninja harm for reasons the Hokage would disapprove of. Are we done here?"
"Yup."
"I'll send you a bill for the door. Oh, and for the driveway. Those were your path bangers I heard, yes? They tend to be hard on the slates."
"Send me a bill and I'll make you fucking eat it."
"Ah, lovely to be back to our normal pleasant banter. Good day, dear sister."
He turned and walked back into the house.
Author's Note: Senju Tobirama was Tsunade's granduncle, not her uncle. The fact that she refers to him as 'Uncle Tobi' is a familiarity left over from her childhood.
You sent a letter to Asuma in which you suggested the Summon Army as a defensive tactic. (The tactic is: If Leaf is attacked, Noburi gives chakra water to a summoner, probably Asuma, in order to let them call in all of their summons at once. This is distinct from the offensive Zoo Rush, which is where summoners go out in the field and send in waves of summons to destroy a target, returning to the Seventh Path to recharge from Noburi as needed.)
XP AWARD: 3
Brevity XP: 0
"GM had fun" XP: 1
+1 for scene: Orochimaru vs Tsunade. The original version of the plan had Hazō show up and give Orochimaru a 'reasons you suck' speech. That probably would have been worth +10 QM Fun XP but this version wasn't completely awful.
It is now about 4pm.
Vote time! What to do now?
Voting ends on Wednesday, November 17, 2021, at 12pm London time.
The battle was over. They had all survived, though if Hazō closed his eyes, he could still hear hungry whispers from the abyss gaping open where Orochimaru's soul should have been. Tsunade had brushed off their effusive thanks with her usual impatience and headed back to the hospital without delay. Shikamaru had run back to the Nara compound at ninja speed to start disabling contingencies. The rest of them, in no state for much of anything at all, had limped after at the best speed that Hazō could manage, meaning that it took thirty minutes to reach the estate. After another thirty minutes of investigation from various serious-eyed Nara they were pronounced unfettered and free-willed, at which point Shikamaru was able to reclaim and burn the orders that would have destroyed Leaf. With the final stress of the engagement released, they retreated to a discreet distance (which was to say outdoors where there were multiple escape routes and ninja witnesses within line of sight), and paused to catch a breath. The sun was still in the sky, and its sparkly reflections in the icicles hanging off the eaves of the surrounding buildings were exactly the kind of life-affirming Hazō needed after being crushed between the wills of two titans.
"So," Hazō said with an exhausted smile, "who wants to go back to the compound for some celebratory hot chocolate? Shikamaru can let the Keikosphere know that you two are OK, but Mari and the others must be worried sick—"
He cut himself off, but it was too late. Kei's expression shut down. Snowflake's didn't, but her eyes narrowed, and the warmth in them that had been directed at Hazō disappeared instantly.
"You are welcome to inform her of our survival in the face of her efforts," Kei said coldly. "I find no appeal in the idea of interacting with her, directly or indirectly."
Oh, yeah. That. Hazō was happy to take on wars, apocalypses, and fundamental laws of metaphysics anytime, but he had no idea where to even begin fixing what Mari—no, what Orochimaru had broken.
"She's not your enemy," he tried anyway. "You know she placed herself in serious danger by distracting Orochimaru so we could get away. I think it's obvious from looking at her that he did something, even if she's still got all her limbs."
"As is only fair," Snowflake countered, crossing her arms as if to block any attempt at connection on Mari's behalf. "Not that she was hurt, specifically, but the fact that after she sentenced us to death without our knowledge or consent, she took a fraction of the risk back onto herself, thus rendering our doom merely probable rather than certain. By rights the entirety of the risk should have been hers—she is not our Kage, nor even our clan head, and has no right to sacrifice anyone but herself—and the fact that this was not possible in practice does not mean that there being some risk to her was somehow heroic. Or do you feel we should sing songs of praise that she did not deliver us to Orochimaru with her own two hands?"
"She treated me as a tool," Kei said quietly. Her voice wasn't angry so much as weak, the way you'd expect from one who'd been stabbed in the back only the previous night and barely survived. "First a tool for her ambition, then a tool for her redemption, and now a tool for the survival of her preferred child."
The words sunk into Hazō, only a minute ago exhausted but triumphant, like venom settling into flesh. Mari had chosen Hazō over Kei. It was simple, factual, and could not be denied. Events had proved it to be the correct choice, the path on which both of them ultimately survived—as opposed to the alternative where Orochimaru might have taken Hazō there and then, and broken or killed him before any countermeasures could be enacted. Kei had already admitted that it was a rational decision.
But how would any child (or whatever Kei was to Mari), never mind one struggling to believe that she was worthy of love, feel on seeing their parent choose, unprompted, for them to die so that the family favourite might live? The decision could be rational a thousand times over, but how would it feel?
"I am aware that you are more valuable, Hazō," Kei said with the even rhythm of a Mori laying out her thoughts step by step. Once, he would have been fooled. "I have more on my shoulders now than I could once have imagined, hundreds whose paths will be darker without me, but still, when the stakes are Uplift for the entire world, I am expendable and you are not. I wish to believe that, weak as I am, I would have made the choice to sacrifice myself for you had one been offered.
"I am also aware that there is a rift between Mari and myself which further decreases my value to her. Still, until now, I had believed that there was room to mend it, that even if neither she nor I nor Snowflake could see a way out of this miserable stalemate, some brilliant third party, or some shift in circumstances that I lack the imagination to foresee, would offer a new way.
"But Hazō… I do not wish to be a tool. That path has taken me as far as it can, if it ever took me anywhere at all, and to persist would be a betrayal not only of myself but of all those who need me to be better. I cannot be Mari's playing piece, to be deployed at her convenience and maybe not sacrificed if somebody else happens to come to the rescue. Mori Keiko would have trusted in Mari's judgement and allowed it. Nara Kei does not have the luxury.
"And beyond that… I cannot live this way. I was born into a life where everything about me was conditional, where resources were invested into me to the extent that a return on investment was expected, and where when it was rational to transfer my share of parental attention to Ami, transferred it was. My clan would have sacrificed me the instant it judged it necessary. To do otherwise would have been to fail in its duty both to the village and to the welfare of its other members.
"You showed me another way, Hazō. Even Ami was unable to shift the will of the clan at large, but you gave me a life where my value was unconditional. You came back for me, you chose to risk your life against the Liberator's finest in order to save me, and though the voices in my mind whisper that Akane and Noburi were your true priorities, I know now that is not who you are. Even if one day you choose to sacrifice me for the sake of Uplift, it will be with tears in your eyes, not as a result of efficient resource distribution."
"Sacrifice us," Snowflake corrected, with less sorrow and more vibrating fury in her voice. "I wonder if I even entered Mari's calculations, or if not, just how many she was prepared to sacrifice for Hazō's sake. You, Hazō, recalled and listed our many sisters as yet unborn, at least as cognitively independent beings. It is, perhaps, unfair to weight our existence based on a possibility that might never materialise, but I would bet the Nara coffers to which I have no claim that the equation never entered Mari's mind.
"Kei had not yet been able to process the blow when we last reintegrated, so I do not have access to her conclusions, but I believe I speak for both of us when I say that it is impossible for us to see our would-be murderer as family. That, too, is something Mari sacrificed on our behalf."
"Her choice was rational," Kei said, reaching out so she could take Snowflake's hand. "Perhaps in her place, were your welfare my ultimate priority, Hazō, and another girl's non-critical but important, and sacrificing the girl sprang instantly to mind and there was no time to seek alternatives, I would have done the same. For that reason, Mori Keiko cannot declare Mari an enemy. But Nara Kei is not strong enough to reach towards the light while loving someone who sees her torturous death as but another weight upon the scale.
"I am severing ties with Mari, Hazō. Perhaps, in time, I will be able to see her as I see Mai or Reo, whose emotional weight is insufficient to impact on my activities at the Gōketsu compound. Or perhaps Mari and I, rational beings both, will come to some arrangement where I can visit without crossing paths with her unless clan business explicitly demands it. At the limits of my imagination, perhaps one day we will both be mature enough to become pleasant acquaintances, as former lovers might. Until then, however, I fear I must refuse your invitation. Snowflake, do as you will. I would prefer not to be alone, but if Tenten or Shikamaru are available, perhaps we can while away an hour or two at a café within tether range of the Gōketsu compound."
Snowflake shook her head. "I… I don't know what I want. Not yet. However, even if my intent was to plumb the very depths of forgiveness, this is not a mood in which to face her, for both our sakes. Hazō, at some point soon I would like to thank you properly for your role in this series of events, but for the moment I feel it would be better for both of us to be somewhere… emotionally safe."
"I get it," Hazō said even though he wasn't sure he did. "I'll drop by the Nara compound soon anyway to do the same with Shikamaru, so at minimum I'll see you then."
Kei and Snowflake bowed. Then, they turned around, taking each other's hands again, and walked away, leaving perfectly parallel tracks through the snow.
-o-
Watching his family tear itself apart had done nothing good for Hazō's celebratory mood. He'd been at enough of a loss when Kei and Mari had fought over the Swamp of Death, and, like Kei, he'd had faith that somehow, at some point, things would sort themselves out. Now, Mari had, for the very best of reasons, committed the ultimate betrayal against someone whose existing anger had been the flip side of deep love. How did you come back from something like that? How could Hazō fix things when Kei had just shown him feelings too complicated to identify with, and he didn't even dare try to step into Mari's shoes? And if not him, who else?
And then there was self-care, so to speak. Twice in twenty-four hours, Hazō had been struck by the soul-deep violation that was Orochimaru's pointed will. Tsunade hadn't helped, or rather, she had—Sage's blood, she had—but getting caught in her aura hadn't left him unshaken either. He'd had all the stress of knowing Orochimaru might be after him—not for a fact, like Kei had, but it didn't take a high probability to stress you out when the possibility was of being kidnapped and vivisected. The world war, while honestly an afterthought right now, also preyed on the back of his mind, because he knew for a fact that Leaf would do better with his active involvement than without. He also knew that if Operation Clean Sweep led to catastrophe for Leaf, it would all be his fault, sending hundreds to their potential deaths so that he and his sister could live.
Right now, the Hagoromo could turn up at the gates with torches and pitchforks, waving conclusive scriptural proof that the Gōketsu were traitors to the Will of Fire, and he'd still have to delegate dealing with it. He was just in no condition.
Maybe he should head to the Seventh Path and borrow some puppies. According to both Akane and Ami, puppies made everything better, and when both extremes of common sense agreed on something…
But first, Mari. He had to deal with Mari. He'd left her in Akane and Noburi's care, and if those two between them couldn't cheer someone up, it could not be done. But Hazō was still her clan head, and he was her friend, and he'd be doing a poor job of either of those if he didn't at least check in on her and do what he could.
Mari. Oh, Mari. He had no idea what to say to her. He didn't even know how he felt himself. There was an argument for dismissing the issue and moving on—the consequences had been resolved, and the damage done—but at the same time, there was still a certain emptiness inside him, and any man who could see one loved one sacrifice another and remain unmoved just because it was rational was a man who didn't deserve either of them.
Mari had probably saved his life, so he could hardly call her decision wrong (though his inner Kei muttered that, had events gone differently at any of a dozen points, all it would have accomplished was certain death for her in addition to the potential death for him). But on the other hand, even as the beneficiary rather than the victim, he couldn't not look back and wonder what it said about a person that they could sacrifice a loved one, within seconds of having the idea, just because it was rational and right. He knew Mari well, or thought he did, and the image of a woman who'd rebelled against a lifetime of cold pragmatism to dedicate herself to nurturing a family didn't quite line up with that of a woman who'd throw some of that family to the wolves in a heartbeat if it improved the rest's odds of survival.
It did line up with the Heartbreaker.
The Heartbreaker wouldn't hesitate to throw away the queen to protect the king, nor, once the king was safe, to rescue the queen at the last second with a calculated risk.
Mari hadn't reverted to the Heartbreaker. Hazō had far, far more faith in her than that. But still, what had just happened left him cold. If Mari would sacrifice Kei for the greater good, any greater good, what would she sacrifice during the next emergency? Or during what she decided was the next emergency? Or, on a level less extreme than the juggling of loved ones, what would she sacrifice for the sake of the clan?
Could he trust her to make such sacrifices, when Gōketsu Mari, the Lady of Lies, the Queen of Cunning, the Mistress of Misdirection and the Doyenne of Deceit, who mere minutes earlier had pulled the wool over the eyes of a demigod, then came up with nothing better than to turn Kei into that same demigod's dinner?
No, it wasn't fair to think that way, with the benefit of hindsight, without an unstoppable monster looming over his shoulder. If he was going to have faith in Mari at all, then he had to have faith that the elite jōnin, who'd been running rings around master manipulators when he was still in the Academy, had made the best choice available to her under the circumstances—and if it wasn't perfect, well, she was going to have to live with the consequences more than anyone.
Gōketsu Mari had made Orochimaru want to kidnap and vivisect Kei (and yes, Snowflake) in order to save Hazō. Hazō could be as grateful or as forgiving or as distrustful as he liked—none of it would stop that from being written into the Gōketsu Clan's history forever.
-o-
"Mari."
Hazō's stepmother/cousin/sister/Mari looked up at him from the depths of the armchair into which she'd sunk like a sky squid hiding inside a cloud. This wasn't the standard-issue Mari who'd attended the clan meeting earlier, but a model rarely seen in the wild, with no makeup and wrapped in a chakra alpaca-fur dressing gown big enough to serve as a tent if you unfolded all the layers. A mug of hot chocolate stood on the table in front of her, together with Icha Icha 4: Kissed With a Loving Seal, open at that awful scene she loved to read bits out of whenever she felt like messing with Hazō but couldn't be bothered to get up.
"Thank the ancestors you're all right," Mari said, a warm smile finding its way onto her face to replace a hollow, distant expression. "I take it everything went according to plan?"
"More or less," Hazō said. "Orochimaru promised to behave, and while I doubt that promise is worth the paper it wasn't written on, he got the core message that Tsunade would wipe the floor with him if he laid a finger on me, Kei, or anyone else. I'm tentatively optimistic.
"But forget that. I didn't get a chance to say this earlier, but Mari, I'm so glad you're safe. You have no idea how worried we were last night."
"Thank you, Hazō," Mari said.
"No, thank you. Mari, you saved me from Orochimaru's maw, and in his case that's only barely an idiom. You saved my life. More than my life, even, I suspect. Again. For the zillionth time. I can't thank you enough."
She un-sunk a little. "All in a day's work for the Gōketsu Clan matriarch. Although… I guess Kei might not be so happy, huh?"
Hazō looked at Mari again and made a snap decision that it wasn't the time.
"She's happy to be off Orochimaru's grocery list," he said, "and less happy otherwise, but I don't think that's something you should worry about right now. Orochimaru's going to be off to terrorise the Isanese by tomorrow morning, which I have to admit I don't feel as bad about as I probably should, given how they treated you. We have a little time to feel like ourselves again before we get word back from Mist, or Cloud does whatever it is Cloud is plotting to do next, or some other disaster happens out of nowhere as they always do."
Mari raised an eyebrow pointedly.
"You know what I mean, Mari. We take our rest where we can find it, so make sure you take a rest. Clan head order."
Mari smirked. "Well, I was going to complete my cunning master plan to take over the Hagoromo and pave the way for our ideological conquest of Leaf, but a clan head order's a clan head order. If you need me, I'll be right here enjoying Supreme Sealmaster Raiji's passionate encounters with his long-lost love Dr Natsune."
"Mari," Hazō asked as she picked up the book, "is there anything you want to talk about? No pressure, obviously—if you just want me to leave you alone to enjoy your dubious literature, that's fine—but given everything that's happened, if you want a friendly ear…"
Mari hesitated for just a brief second.
"'Oh, Natsune,' Rai declared in his booming manly voice, 'only the thought of your limpid mahogany eyes kept me alive in the hell that was Hidden Promontory. I would imagine your gaze travelling down my body as I reached for my'—"
"ONE LAST THING."
"—enormous, throbbing—"
"How do you feel about affectionate puppies?" Hazō nearly growled.
"Your ideas are intriguing to me and I will call Noburi in to top up your chakra."
-o-
To be continued by the powers of @eaglejarl. Voting is closed.
"Good morning, Hazō. Is there an imminent threat or would you like tea?"
Hazō smiled. "No and yes, respectively. Thank you."
Shikamaru nodded in appreciation of the efficiently-worded reply and poured the tea, offering Hazō the choice of which cup. Hazō took the one on the left and sat down in the chair that Shikamaru nodded him towards. The two teenage Clan Heads raised their mugs to one another in silent toast and sipped.
It was an unseasonably warm day, slightly above freezing, and the two young men were on a back patio at the Nara estate, sprawled on separate loungers while a well-stoked firepit kept the chill off. Hazō's cane was looped over the back of the sinfully comfortable chair he was relaxing into. He was watching the slow drip...drip......drip..drip...drip of water coming off one of the larger icicles that hung from the gutters. There had been an ice storm through last night, encasing the entire world in a rime of frozen diamond, but today the warm temperatures were stripping away the diamonds while the cloudless skies allowed the sun to turn those diamonds into glitter and glory.
"This chair is ridiculously comfortable," Hazō said. "Compliments to the maker."
"Shikapama will be pleased. She carved it to your measurements."
"Say what now?"
"You are half-clan and a frequent and valued guest. Of course we have furniture made to your measurements."
"How did you get my measurements? I don't remember any...never mind. You're the Nara, that kind of thing is your particular flavor of bullshit."
"I have no idea what you mean."
"Hang on...I see that sneaky look. Is this chair actually made to my measurements or are you just yanking my chain?"
"See for yourself. Place your arm on the armrest."
Hazō checked; yes, annoyingly, the armrest was precisely the correct length to provide optimal support.
"You Nara are so completely bullshit, you know that?"
"Are you insulting the honor of my husband's clan again, Hazō?" Kei asked, arriving from the house with a plate of scrambled eggs in one hand. "I should note that such things tend to lead to intergenerational feuds that destroy vast areas."
"Uh-huh. Nice to see you, sis."
"You as well. To what do we owe the pleasure?" She settled in the chair that had been left open for her so that the three of them were evenly distributed around the firepit, feet facing inwards.
Hazō shrugged and sipped his tea. "Nothing super important. After all the stress lately I decided I was going to take the morning off. Affairs of state can wait until after lunch. I want to relax and be calm, with people I like, for four hours, no emergencies allowed."
"I find it either bold or foolish, and most definitely troublesome, that you would express such a wish while sitting on my patio," Shikamaru said. "Are you not aware of the perversity of the universe? I grant you, your expressed wish could have been worse—you did not say 'good thing that old enemy of ours is dead', or 'it's an easy mission', or 'what's the worst that could happen'? Still, was it wise to tempt fate in such a fashion? Especially when your current location indicates that it will be my estate, not that of the Gōketsu, that will be targeted by whatever an angry universe sends?"
"Eh." Hazō waved a hand in grand dismissal. "I don't care. Everything is fine, everything is going to stay fine for at least four more hours. After that we can have another...I dunno, invasion from an enemy village, attack of extradimensional horrors, runaway gerbil swarm, or whatever. For now, breakfast and light conversation." He picked up the mostly-cooled plate of cheesy eggs from beside himself and scarfed a few mouthfuls before setting it down again.
"I find your recklessness most foolish, but your presence is nonetheless welcome," Kei said, turning her nose playfully up on the first words.
"Actually, there was one thing I wanted to say..."
Shikamaru raised an eyebrow in invitation while sipping at his tea.
"I can't tell you how much I appreciated what you did yesterday, Shikamaru. Your political acuity is the only reason we're all here right now, and you showed guts for days doing it."
Both eyebrows went up. "Thank you, Hazō, although I fail to understand why my actions are worthy of praise. They were merely—"
"Sage's ballsack!" Hazō shouted, throwing his arms in the air. "No wonder the two of you get on! For the sake of the Sage, Shikamaru, take the compliment and don't go on about how obvious it was and how anyone would do the same and blah blah blah. That's Kei's schtick and I cannot abide you copying it. Just take the compliment."
Shikamaru blinked, started to say something, stopped, and then settled on, "Thank you, Hazō. I am grateful for your words of praise."
"Thank you. See, was that so hard?"
"Although I will say that the choice was indeed readily apparent given the—"
Hazō flicked a bit of egg at Shikamaru's head; the Nara lord batted it aside with a faint convulsion of his face that on a normal person might have been a tiny smile, but for a Nara it was obviously some form of highly-condensed communication that would take paragraphs of italicized text to properly record. Right? No Nara would simply smile at being complimented and pelted with breakfast foods. They were far too stiff and reserved.
"Is there anything the Gōketsu can do to repay you? Or that I personally can do?"
"Nothing springs to mind, but I shall let you know when something occurs."
"Okay. Let me know. You've got a big Gōketsu marker for whenever you want to cash it in."
"Thank you, Hazō. It is most appreciated."
"Sure." He thought about it for a moment, then took the plunge. "Actually, there is one thing I thought I would offer. How do you feel about puppies?" He looked back and forth between them.
"Personally, I am more affiliated with the feline species," Kei said. "They are more graceful and independent. Puppies, however, are an acceptable substitute when the actual article is unavailable."
"Shikamaru?"
"They are squirmy slobber machines that have an unpleasant habit of nipping."
Hazō laughed. "I see. Bad childhood experience?"
"My third birthday. I note that I am uncertain whether I most dispreferred being bitten in the face or having my birthday cake splattered everywhere."
"Uh...okay, I'm going to move right on by that for now, since if I don't then I'll lose my train of thought. You know that I have a couple dozen summoning contracts with various puppies. It's for military communications, mostly, but I have them. I was going to ask if you guys would like to have some puppies here, now? For company and cuddles, no military stuff. Anyway, given Shikamaru's reaction I suppose I shouldn't offer."
Shikamaru's face spasmed in revulsion. "I—"
"Husband, I believe you were the one encouraging me to engage in uncomfortable activities in order to, quote, expand my comfort zone, unquote. Were you not?"
Shikamaru glared daggers, then sighed and muttered about the troublesome nature of marriage. "Very well, Hazō. Do your worst."
That wasn't quite the ringing endorsement of his idea that Hazō had been looking for, but it was better than nothing. He pricked his thumb and slapped it on the frozen ground.
Five blasts of colored smoke marched around the patio, each resolving itself into a dog.
Actually, 'dog' wasn't really the right word. Nor was 'young dog'. 'Puppy', while chronologically appropriate, didn't properly convey the reality. No, what Hazō had summoned were five instantiations of the Platonic ideal of adorableness. Five fuzzy, big-eyed, floppy-eared, bundles of love balanced in ungainly fashion atop oversized paws.
Also, five carefully-selected fuzzy, big-eyed, floppy-eared, bundles of love balanced in ungainly fashion atop oversized paws. Most of Hazō's puppies were excitable and energetic, altogether unsuitable for providing the form of lurrrrvvvv that a Nara needed.
Cantred and Cannula, a brother/sister pair of low-slung basset hounds, lolloped over to Kei and pressed their heads against her knees while looking up with soulful eyes.
"Hello, Miss Summoner Sister Ma'am! We're very happy to meet you and may we please come up?"
Kei was, as the moment required, a brutal assassin, a scathingly rapier wit, and a plan-optimizing machine. What she was not, however, was immune to those eyes. She was unable to keep a smile off her face and instead simply nodded. The two pups galumphed up onto the lounger and had a brief and relatively cordial pushing and shoving match to see who got to claim the best bit of lap. The question settled, they floomped on their backs, paws waving in the air as they wiggled slightly in a silent and highly effective plea for belly rubs. Kei was happy to oblige, her crushing haptophobia apparently inapplicable against the power of adorable tummies.
Shikamaru had no time to take all that in since he was receiving his own dose of weaponized cuteness, delivered at the deadly paws of Canmono, a three-month-old Saint Bernard, and Cantsuru, a young sheepdog that looked like a pile of blond and grey hair with soft eyes and an importuning look.
"You must be Lord Nara! Hello!" Canmono said, his voice surprisingly deep and Nara-unobjectionable for a canine of his tender years.
"Our Summoner says that you're one of his favorite people and that he owes you his life and that we should be real quiet and calm and polite around you! Can we please come up for pets?"
Shikamaru shot Kei a scathing look that promised violent retribution at some unknown date in the future. She merely smiled back, both hands still engaged in belly rubs.
With a sigh, Shikamaru turned back to the two dogs. "Do you intend to bite, slobber, defecate, urinate, or destroy my food or beverage?"
"Nuh-uh!" / "We would never!"
"Very well. You may come up."
"Yayyy!" The two climbed, with carefully-restrained sedateness, onto Shikamaru's lounger and floomped on either side of him, squeezing tight as the chair wasn't that wide. They dropped their chins on his chest and gazed into his eyes with no specific demands but infinite longing.
"Kai," Shikamaru muttered, making the handseal for breaking out of a genjutsu. When reality failed to reassert itself he gave in and began to stroke his fuzzy visitors.
Hazō watched all this in amusement as Canshō, a young beagle, pushed her way onto his chest and bumped her head under his chin in a demand for petting.
Quiet descended on the Nara patio. Quiet, and a sense of peace and comfort that brushed aside the very concept of stress. Within ten minutes Shikamaru was asleep with a smile on his face and his hands loosely draped over his visitors.
Author's Notes: You spent a couple hours with the puppies at the Nara estate, then visited Hinata. The two of you had a relaxed and enjoyable light lunch / high tea that included small sandwiches with the crusts cut off. You kept the conversation light, asking after the tea, her teammates, the architecture, and other simple topics. She thanked you for the offer of puppy therapy but turned it down without explanation. You did not push.
XP AWARD: 10
Brevity XP: 2
"GM had fun" XP: 2
It is now about 5pm.
Vote time! What to do now? Voting closes tomorrow at 5pm New York time.
"Hello, hello, boy. Sit, sit, sit! I've got a casserole coming out of the oven and it's a brand new recipe."
"Run, boy! Run for your life!"
Shima thwapped Fukasaku over the head with her wooden spoon on her way back to the kitchen, leaving Noburi standing bemused in the doorway.
Fukasaku rubbed his head and glared balefully after his wife of multiple centuries. "Grouchy old bat, I oughta—"
"What's that, dear?" Shima called from the kitchen. "Something I need to hear?"
"Nope! Come on, boy. Come sit." The ancient Toad Sage, currently lounging at the dining table, kicked another chair out from underneath it and waved Noburi over. The young Toad Summoner followed directions and sat. He couldn't help looking into the kitchen to where Shima was busily pulling the casserole out of the oven. She was using a kitchen cloth to shield her hands from the heat, which Noburi thought had to be performative. Fukasaku routinely lit his pipe with a head-engulfing fireball and Noburi had trouble believing that Fukasaku's wife wasn't at least as tough. On the other hand, it was a bit hard to remember that because the purple-haired, lipsticked toad was wearing an apron with frills and the words 'Kiss the Cook, Get a Princess!' on the front. The lettering was faded from many washes and the lower hem was badly frayed.
"It was a gift from Jiraiya," Fukasaku said quietly, seeing the direction of Noburi's gaze. "The apron."
Noburi swallowed as simultaneous stabs of nervousness and grief hit. "He was your Summoner for a long time, wasn't he?"
"Forty years? Something like."
The Toad Sages' apartment was built long and straight, the front area containing a couch and chairs intended for toads, the middle being a dining area with the kitchen T-ing off to the left, and shoji screens hiding what was presumably the sleeping area in the back. The windows were high and wide and the place was filled with good smells, natural light, and the solidity of a home lived in for human generations. One could almost feel the memories soaked into the walls.
"I miss him a lot," Noburi said. "I'm sure nothing like as fiercely as you do, but I do." He pulled out a storage seal and unsealed a bottle of hot sake and three cups. He filled the cups and offered the choice to Fukasaku.
"He was a good boy," Fukasaku said calmly, sliding one of the cups over to his placemat and then engulfing himself in fire in order to light his pipe. He drew on the pipe a couple times to ensure it was well lit, then took it out of his mouth to stare blankly at it. "And yes, I do."
"So do I."
Noburi jumped in shock at Shima's quiet words. Somehow she had emerged from the kitchen and was standing at his elbow with the casserole dish in one bare hand, a trivet in the other, and a sad expression.
"He liked my cooking," she said, the sadness being replaced with a glare at her husband.
"I like your cooking just fine! I just don't see why you have to go changing it around all the time."
"I like to experiment, you dried mudpuddle! Not all of us are stuck in the past!"
"Listen, you old biddy! Don't you be disrespecting me like that! I'm very much here in the present—hah! I'm ahead of the present! I'm leaping into the future with my research, no matter what you say!"
"Hah! As if! No one understands your ramblings and no one wants to! Do you, boy?"
"Sir, ma'am, I asked you before to please leave me out of your marital spats. Also, that casserole smells amazing."
"Hah! See, he likes it!"
"He hasn't tasted it yet! Don't be counting your chakra before it's molded!"
"He'll love it!" She set the trivet down, placed the casserole on it, and pulled a steel spatula out of her apron string. She twirled it like a kenjutsuka performing an advanced kata, slashed the casserole into generous portions with a few rapid strokes, and flipped one of them onto Noburi's plate without splattering a morsel of sauce.
The two ancient toads stared furiously at Noburi as he nervously sliced off a segment with his spoon and tasted it.
"Is it awful? Did she use rotted flies again?"
"They weren't rotted, they were fermented! It was one time, and it was three hundred years ago! Let it go, you old fart!"
"I'll let it go right after you let go of the driver ant thing!"
"This is excellent," Noburi said, inserting himself before things could escalate further. "Thank you." He raised his sake cup in salute to the chef, then knocked it back. Both toads returned the toast.
"Thank you, boy," Shima simpered, immediately before rampaging into Smuggington to claim the mayorship from Smuggley Smuggington. Fukasaku glowered and grumbled but spooned up his casserole quickly enough.
Noburi raced through his casserole—which honestly was delicious—and then leaned back, replete. After a moment he chuckled. "It's funny, the differences and similarities between the Human Path and the Seventh Path."
"Oh?" Shima asked, still nibbling her way through her portion of the casserole.
"Yeah...casseroles aren't really a thing I was expecting to see here. I was prepared to eat really weird stuff in the name of politeness, but my mom made casseroles twice a month or so, and this is as good as her best. Thank you, Shima. Health!"
The two toads returned the toast again. Being frail and two feet tall, they didn't have much of a capacity and were already developing a glow.
"Another thing that I knew but still feels weird," Noburi mused. "You guys are all...well, 'ninja' is the wrong term, but you use chakra like us." He produced another bottle of warm sake from a second storage seal and poured another round.
"Hah!" Fukasaku said, thrusting a long finger at Noburi's face. "We were here first, so you use chakra like us, boy! And not as well, either." His pipe had gone out so he packed and lit another one.
"Fair," Noburi said, nodding and raising his cup in apology. He knocked it back and the two Sages followed. "Although...Jiraiya once mentioned something about the chakra on the Human Path being different from the chakra on the Seventh Path?"
Rapport is the stat used for making a good impression on others and extracting information from them in a casual way. It can be defended with either Rapport or Presence. Presence would be used when trying to overawe the other person or shut them down based on seniority/power/etc. Empathy would be used when trying to keep the conversation light. Unfortunately for the Toad Sages, that's where their heads are at right now. Everyone is mellow and relaxed with a few drinks in them and plenty of good spirits and positive feelings. I say 'Unfortunately' because Empathy isn't their strong suit. They would normally lean more on Presence.
Weirdness of the social combat rules: An Invocation is specific to one roll, whereas sometimes it should be persistent throughout the conversation. Noburi has the Aspect "Planned this with Mari" and is fishing for specific information that he thinks might be useful for the family's survival going forward, which would allow him to invoke the "Team Uplift" Aspect on his character sheet. A character Aspect can only be used once per scene and invoking "Planned this with Mari" over and over feels like the wrong way to do it. Instead, I'm going to charge him 2 FP and give him a CM of 5 (instead of his full 6 for two Invocations) on his first roll and 3 on all following rolls. This has been factored into his effective Rapport throughout, meaning it's shown as 29 on the first roll and was treated as 27 thereafter.
Noburi: Rapport (29) + 6 (dice) = 35. That's solidly in the 'Good' range.
Fukasaku: Empathy (?) -6 (dice): ? Oooh, feelin' chatty, are we?
Shima: Empathy (?) -3 (dice): ?
I've gamed the rest of the combat out. The Toad Sages win but after that first round and the general tenor of the combat I'm saying that they are at least willing to share the basics of Sage Mode.
"Different?" Fukasaku said, snorting and puffing importantly on his pipe. "Of course it's different! Nature chakra is way better than your weak-ass human stuff. Sure, it'll kill a human dead if you get so much as a drop in you, but it's great stuff."
"Really? Just a drop?"
"Well, okay, I suppose you lot can handle a little bit. Jiraiya-boy sure used plenty when he went into that Mara nest with me."
"Pa," Shima said. "Shut your fool yap. The boy isn't ready for this."
"Don't you tell me to shut my yap, you old biddy! Obviously he's not ready! Look at that!" He reached over and poked Noburi in the arm, then in the ribs. Noburi eeped and jerked away. "Barely any muscles on him! I made sure that Jiraiya-boy had chakra for days and was built like a brick before I taught him the first little thing, but I still had to whack him most days! If I tried to teach this one he'd be a statue before you could croak out half a snarky word!"
"Pa!"
"Oh, fine, fine, whatever. What's for dessert? You made a dessert, didn't you?"
"Look, you old dingus! I'm not your kitchen slave! I don't have to make you dessert every meal. Why can't you make the dessert occasionally?"
"We agreed that cooking was your job when we first got married! I defend the house, you cook the meals!"
"I never agreed to that! We're supposed to be splitting the chores! And if you think you can defend this house better than I can, you'd best think again!"
Noburi leaned back and listened to the two of them bicker like the extremely old married couple they were. He allowed a small smile to rest on his lips; there was a secret to be had here, and he had gotten part of it. Best of all, he had undoubtedly gotten more than Mr Socially-Clueless-Hurdy-Hurr Hazō would get.
o-o-o-o
"Ma'am," Hazō said, "I was thinking about the nature of chakra on this Path and how it differs from chakra on my own. Pantsā once told my sister that the people who live here absorb 'nature chakra' as they age."
"Truth is. Asking are you why?"
"I think the Human Path chakra is different. That makes me nervous when I start thinking about the Great Seal, since if the chakra is different then it might interact strangely with sealing. Is there anything you can tell me about nature chakra? Is there a way for me to sense it, or interact with it in some way?"
Not shown, if they were even rolled.
"Not a question that come up has, I fear. Few Summoners interest have and no cause have I had to the question study. Problem will this be?"
Drat. "Probably not, no. The Seal has enough general similarities to seals I'm familiar with that it likely works on similar principles. The sealmasters of Leaf have made a little bit of progress deciphering it, so I think we're on a good general track. I just wanted to be sure."
"Excellent news is this. When repairs you can make?"
"I'm afraid we're a long way off from that. Months, if we can do it at all. Still, the mere fact that we can make any progress is more than I was hoping for."
o-o-o-o
"Summoner."
"Cannai. How goes it?"
"It goes well. And for you?"
"Better." He looked down at his legs. "I'm working on my physical therapy. I lost a lot of muscle lying around in hospital for so long, but I'm starting to put it back on. I expect I'll be back to full in a few weeks. Is there anything I can help with that doesn't require a lot of running or fighting?"
Cannai shook his massive head. "You have done much already. The sleds are working well and have rendered it far easier to move pups over long distances." His tongue lolled out. "Indeed, most of them seem to enjoy it enough that they are constantly begging for rides. I have had several complaints from tired parents."
"Oh. Um..."
"Have no fear, Summoner. The occasional grumble is to be expected. Overall, people are delighted, and even the grumblers are grateful on balance. I have suggested to them that it could be an efficient parenting tool. Older siblings growing into their strength can be tricked into pulling their youngers."
"'Tricked'?"
"Did I say tricked? You must have misheard me. I feel certain that I said 'graciously permitted'." He cocked his head to the side in consideration, then nodded firmly. "Yes. That does sounds more like me, don't you think?"
"Absolutely." The Iron Nerve allowed him to keep a completely straight face.
"Excellent. Come, enjoy the grass with me." He lowered himself to the prairie and wriggled around on his back a bit to get comfortable before turning to his side. Hazō sat down, propped himself up against the Alpha Dog's back, and allowed the tension to drain away. The sun was bright and warm, the grass was soft, and this might be literally the safest place he could possibly be. It was fine to let his eyes drift shut and his muscles go loose.
"I've been thinking about your poem," he said, the words a bit tumbly due to their speaker being a third asleep.
"Oh?"
"Yeah. It claimed that the Sage went 'beyond the trees' to rest, and that 'truth or death' could lead to him. A few months ago I passed through a portal to what I think was the afterlife—what we humans call the Naraka Path. I came out on the beach of a massive ocean, but there were a lot of trees there. Stretched as far as the eye could see."
"Fascinating. What do you conclude from this?"
"Maybe people go to the Naraka Path and turn into trees after they die?"
"I suppose it is a possibility," Cannai said. "Stranger things have happened. Still, I'm afraid I have little insight to offer on the topic. I know that thoughts of death and the afterlife are a major topic of speculation among humans, but we Dogs think little on them. This life is sufficient for us."
"Really?" Hazō demanded, opening his eyes and twisting around to look at his pillow in shock. "Seriously? You don't care about what happens after you die?"
"Mmmm, I suppose it's an overstatement. Still, what is a person save the memories of them? Dogs, wind, sound, lightning...all of these things have a speed. Perhaps even light itself does. If that is the case then there is no 'present' for us to experience, only the memories of it."
"...You lost me there."
"Sound takes time to travel, as knows anyone who has seen lightning and waited for thunder. Therefore, you do not hear me when I speak, you hear me a moment later when the sound reaches your ears. Lightning has a speed—if you pay attention you can see the flash travel from the clouds to the ground. If lightning has a speed then perhaps so does light itself, in which case you don't see me when I laugh, you see me a moment later when the light reaches your eye. I exist in your past, if only by the fraction of a moment. Existing in your past means that I am to you a collection of memories, as are you to me.
"When you die, you will continue to be that same bundle of memories. I will recall sitting here with you, in exactly the way I experience it now. How then are you truly dead? What is the difference between you no longer existing and you simply not returning from the Human Path? True, I am no longer making memories of you, but the ones I have are no less you."
"Huh. That's actually...sorta close to some ideas I had a while back." A while back when he had been out of h!s h#ad .n Ou7-ju!ce. No. Fo<us..;.. Bre47he. Remember Ak4ne's scent anD the beaaat of her heart. Remember that your t0es are in the dirt and the sun is On your face. You are here, now, in this m.ment, with Cannai. You have a position in space and in time.
The world shuddered around him but failed to crack. His mantra stilled it like a calming touch stilled a frightened animal and after a moment he was able to speak again without fear of sounding like a crazy person.
"Have you ever heard of 'the king of hell'?" Hazō asked. "I heard a reference to it in a mission report from a while back."
"I fear not. Who or what is the king of hell?"
"It's this...monster, I guess? It got summoned when Pain resurrected a bunch of super dangerous, super violent ninja."
"Well, that sounds like a thumping great tale." Cannai thumped the ground with his own posterior appendage. "See what I did there? Eh? Eh?"
Hazō groaned and knocked his head against Cannai's back a few times. "You're terrible."
A long, gusty sigh blew across the prairie. "No one appreciates me," Cannai lamented. "My comedic genius, unrecognized."
"Would it be inappropriate for me to blow a raspberry at this point?"
"It would indeed. Also, I find myself disappointed that you fail to have the proper degree of respect a summoner should have for their Clan Lord."
"After that joke, I think I do have the proper degree of respect for you."
"And thus I am schooled on the fine art of comebacks. I shall retire from the field, defeated. Now, tell me the tale of this 'king of hell' that is capable of resurrecting people."
Hazō related the story of Nagi Island in Cannai-approved levels of detail. The sun had moved a noticeable arc by the time he was done.
"Fascinating," the massive dog said. "I shall arrange for a visit from Canaria and Canting. You must share that story with them."
"Uh...okay. Aren't they your bards? I don't think I have nearly enough storytelling ability to impress them."
"It is not your job to impress them, it is your job to tell them the tale and answer their questions. They will take charge of making the story fit for a taleswap."
"Right, got it." He let the conversational thread drop and simply sat for a few minutes, enjoying the warmth of the air and of Cannai's furnace-like body. The wind was soft and cool on his face. It smelled of water and rich soil and the occasional hint of wet dog from where some of the youngers were learning to water walk on the nearby river.
"Going back to the poem," he said, jerking back from the very edge of sleep. "The Sage also said that he left 'seven rocks with seven locks.' The Great Seal is, basically, a giant lock made of rock. There're seven paths... are there six more Great Seals?"
"I have no reason to believe either way, since I know little of the other Paths. Aside from the Human Path, they haven't been terribly relevant to my life."
"Feh, that was my next question. How about the Lost Ones? Does that refer to the Sage's Five companions? Or maybe to Lord Jashin?"
"Lord Jashin?"
"He's this god that Hidan worships. God of massacre and sacrifice, but also of sex and love and rebirth? It's weird. There was this one time when my family and I visited the Todoroki Shrine on O'uzo Island..." He spun the tale of Hidan and Itachi and the giant snake, doing his best to make it entertaining. Partway through he had to break off and sit up because Cannai was spasming in laughter.
"Your pardon," Cannai said, gathering his composure together again after a moment. "I imagine that was quite frightening, but the bit about 'do you read a lot of Icha Icha' got me."
"Thanks. Anyway, after that happened..." He finished spinning the story out.
"Another that you shall need to relate to Canting and Canaria. At this rate there shall be an entire cycle, 'The Adventures of Gōketsu Hazō Whom Fortune Favored'."
"'Whom Fortune Favored'? I mean...kicked out of my clan, tricked into being missing-nin, lost my Clan Lord..."
"Indeed. She has been granting you favors from all four paws."
"Ah. Yes, I think I take your point, but what do you mean by 'all four paws'?"
"Lady Fortune dispenses good fortune from her 'on' paws and ill fortune from her 'off' paws. Her forepaws grant fortune in your own dealings and her hind paws grant fortune in the world's dealings with you. She clearly adores you and has been showering her favor upon you most generously."
"Are you making a pee joke?"
"I am not. Such humor is beneath me."
"Uh-huh. Moving on, maybe you know Jashin by another name? His symbol is an upside-down triangle inside a circle."
"I regret having nothing to offer." Hazō's backrest shifted as Cannai looked up to check the position of the sun. "Ah, the day grows old and I have other people I must meet. I fear we must, as Kakashi used to say, 'put a knife in this' and come back to it later. It has been a pleasure speaking with you, Summoner."
"Oh, rats. I still wanted to ask you about the Sage's companions."
"You may ask Canaria and Canting. They will likely know as much or more than I, as both have assiduously sought out every Summoner during their lifetime and dragged stories from them, via tooth clamp where needed."
"Okay. Any idea when they'll be available?"
"I shall have to track them down...I believe Canaria is west of here now, near Falling River pack. Canting is south, residing with Rolling Waves. To find and gather them both will likely take not less than a week but not more than two."
Drat. That was a long time. Well, it wasn't like the information was urgent. "Thank you, Cannai."
"You are most welcome. Now, if you would be so kind to get off of me so that I don't drop you on your teeny little head when I stand up?"
"Oh, right! Sorry." He sat up and then climbed awkwardly to his feet, leaning on the cane with his right hand and using a jet of chakra repulsion from his left to get the process started.
Cannai rolled to his feet and turned to face Hazō, saucer-sized golden eyes not two feet from Hazō's head threatening an unpleasantly literal example of 'eye contact'.
"Be well, Summoner. I look forward to your next visit."
"Thank you, Cannai. I do too." He bowed, then made the handsign of release and disappeared through the dimensions.
Author's Note: You are gathered around the dinner table with the full Team Uplift roster. You, Kei, and Noburi have all shared the details you extracted from your various conversations on the Seventh Path. It didn't take long, since Kei struck out just as hard as Hazō did, but everyone was interested in what Noburi discovered. Kei was only in the room for about five minutes, just long enough to relate her experince, and left the moment she was done. Throughout her time there, she studiously ignored Mari's existence.
XP AWARD: 4
Brevity XP: 0
"GM had fun" XP: 1
+1 for the scene with Ma and Pa
It is now about 9pm.
Vote time! What to do now?
Voting ends on Wednesday, November 24, 2021, at 12pm London time.
Yuno's birthday was a complicated affair for the Gōketsu Clan for multiple reasons, and not just the fact that all the "clan elders" were still feeling aftershocks of bloodcurdling terror. First, the Isanese didn't do birthdays; it was just another weird barbarian tradition which Yuno pretended she understood, but which didn't hold any emotional resonance for her. Second, Yuno was not a happy Yuno. The revelation that she'd joined a clan that sacrificed its less valuable members for more valuable ones had plenty of emotional resonance. She'd said very little to anyone since hearing what happened, and nothing to Mari or Hazō.
Noburi's own feelings were complicated. Everything had worked out all right, and in the end that trumped everything. Mari had made a hard choice in an awful situation, and had paid a price, and would, he suspected, pay a lot more in the traditional Mari currency of beating herself up. At the same time, he couldn't help feeling little flashes of irrational rage every time he imagined Kei being taken away to be tortured by a monster because Mari had put Hazō first. Guilt, too, and frustration. Why had Mari not chosen him instead? Yes, Kei had political support blah blah blah, but Noburi was the lynchpin to Leaf's military strategy. To the Hokage and the village at large, he was worth way more than his weight in gold. Was he not important enough, even now? Was he still not good enough?
Or was it something worse? He'd paid extra attention to Mari ever since she came back from Isan not quite herself, of course he had, and to the rift with Kei which he was in no way qualified to do anything about. The mistress of infiltration who could memorise a dozen people's names, appearances, and mannerisms in the blink of an eye should not have been having more trouble than Kagome when it came to the Keiko-Kei conversion. Also, while he couldn't swear to it, he was pretty sure that in Mari's more unguarded moments he'd caught a subtle undercurrent of anger when she used the name. If Mari's decision to sacrifice Kei instead of him (or instead of a better option) had been even 1% determined by a grudge, that was a thing Noburi could never forgive. It was lucky that he'd probably never know.
No, forget Mari, who'd put herself on the line to make it all work out in the end. Where had Noburi been, obliviously playing games while around the corner, his best friend and brother was being crushed into submission, one of the most precious people in the world was being lined up for murder, and the woman who'd kidnapped him from a life of mediocrity and into a life of infinite possibilities was being psychically ripped to pieces? Maybe she'd been right to overlook him. Who cared about besieging fortresses when he couldn't even protect his own family?
Even in the aftermath, all Noburi could do was sit at home and look after Mari while Hazō and the geniuses went off to save the day with brilliant political manoeuvres he wasn't cleared to know about.
But not the point. Noburi would bounce back. He always did. It was Yuno that mattered right now. Yuno had been promised that the Gōketsu weren't like any other clan. They were a family and a team, united by a determination to do better than the society around them, and not to stop looking until they found better solutions to humanity's problems than the ones that society had settled for. As far as she was concerned, that promise had been broken. Like the Kannagi, the Gōketsu hadn't hesitated to sacrifice a lesser clanswoman for the sake of the clan as a whole. There was no point arguing that they'd done the best they could in a difficult situation—the Gōketsu had promised to be smarter, not just kinder, and if they descended to the Kannagi's level out of incompetence rather than immorality, that would hardly make her feel much better.
The Gōketsu throwing away the life of Yuno's holy of holies was bad enough. But in Yuno's mind, she didn't have even a sliver of the Pangolin Summoner's pragmatic value, because in this blind pre-Uplift world, chakra powers and political standing mattered so much more than straight-up being a good person. How long before it was Yuno who got the short end of the stick, because that was what clan-Yuno relationships were like?
Obviously, Noburi wouldn't let this stand. He couldn't rebuild Yuno's trust in the clan overnight. Even as her husband, who'd be damned if he let anyone hurt her just because the clan had no better ideas, there was only so much he could do to help her start feeling safe among the Gōketsu again. Luckily, in addition to being her husband, he was also Gōketsu Noburi, the clan's master of support, and he'd started laying groundwork for this very day months ago.
-o-
As far as Hazō was concerned, Noburi had outdone himself. It had been a horrible shock to learn, in the throes of planning Yuno's birthday party, that Yuno did not do birthdays, did not see the point of birthdays, and would in all likelihood look down on anyone who had taken so little care to learn about her as to try celebrating her birthday. Indeed, he had a feeling she'd somehow got wind of the plans already, because she'd been acting distant towards him ever since yesterday.
That was the moment that Noburi, the hero they didn't deserve, had swooped in and saved the day by changing the event to something almost the same but tremendously more meaningful: the coming-of-age ceremony that Yuno had never received.
It got better. Noburi had somehow managed to extract all the key details of the ceremony from Yuno without her knowing, had quietly custom-ordered copies of various religious implements (which, now Hazō thought of it, accounted for certain bizarre rumours about the clan's sexual preferences), and had planned out the whole thing down to who would play what role (although there'd been some last-minute adjustments after Yuno had made it clear that Mari Was Not Invited). Hazō's own contribution, and he was moved by the fact that past-Noburi had trusted him to be in Asuma's good books at the right time rather than teetering on the edge of the killbox, was to burn some capital to buy special Hokage dispensation for "a dramatic recreation for the purposes of cultural exchange", or more precisely a blatantly pagan ritual that would give Hagoromo Ritsuo conniptions. Since they were inviting Yuno's friends(!), there was no way of escaping rumours that would further trash the Gōketsu's religious reputation, but for some reason Noburi was adamant that Yuno shouldn't spend the event locked into interacting with just her clansmen.
They had set the stage and run through last-minute rehearsals while Yuno was in the Chamber of the Honeybee undergoing ritual purification (an extensive process she was engaged in even now), and Hazō was finally in position to take a breather while Akane confirmed that the kami invocation sigils on the ground were drying properly and Noburi helped Kagome-sensei put on his outfit the right way up.
It was then that Kei approached, garbed in ominous red priest robes—having the Pangolin Summoner officiate was apparently holy enough to cancel out the fact that the tools and actors were about as authentic as Kagome-sensei's Classic Don't-Ask-What's-In-It Stew made with recognisable animal meat. She was trailed by three unfamiliar figures: a slender girl with shoulder-length brown hair and a blank expression, an older woman in Inuzuka formalwear with a vivid diagonal scar across her cheek and a Cantelope-sized dog by her side, and a boy Hazō's age with sticky-up red hair and a wide, sparkling smile.
"For reasons best known to herself," Kei said drily, "Yuno delegated the social interaction element of preparations to yours truly. Please allow me to introduce Fujisawa Miyuki, Inuzuka Raika and Yatsuzakimaru, and Kichi Gai."
For reasons Hazō couldn't guess at, Kichi gave Kei a wink, at which she gave a bone-freezing glare he completely ignored.
The Inuzuka stepped up to Hazō first. "Inuzuka Raika, Lord Gōketsu."
Yatsuzakimaru gave a friendly woof. Hazō did some quick maths and realised that with that age gap (adult Inuzuka dogs were huge), Inuzuka must have lost her original partner, and not that long ago. It was said to be like losing a particularly beloved sibling.
"I was on close terms with Captain Kakashi," she said in a husky voice. "I would be very interested in learning what it's been like for you as his heir, if you have the time."
"My condolences," Hazō said. "It would be my pleasure—maybe you could find me during the feast? For now, I'd appreciate it if you made your way over to Akane"—he gestured—"so she can fit you with the basic minimum of ceremonial decorations."
"Of course, Lord Gōketsu."
Inuzuka began to head off. Yatsuzakimaru delayed, apparently more interested in sniffing Hazō all over, but she gave a low growl, and he turned to follow her with a reluctant whine.
Fujisawa bowed to Hazō next, but did not speak. Instead, she reached into a thigh holster and pulled out, of all things, a pocket notebook. She quickly flipped it to the back page.
My name is Fujisawa Miyuki. I am pleased to meet you. [a small doodle of a person bowing] I am unable to speak. Please do not ask about this. In every other way, I am an ordinary ninja. Thank you for your understanding. [a small doodle of a hand making the Seal of Reconciliation]
She flicked back to the front, where another readied message awaited. It is nice to meet you, Lord Gōketsu. I have heard many interesting things about you. [a whole series of doodles, including a figure with pointy teeth half its body in length holding a sword with a hole in it, a figure running vertically up a cloud, an explosion, a happy dog, and a figure in the Hokage hat with steam coming out of its ears] Thank you for being kind to Yuno. I appreciate it very much.
"Addendum," Kei said in a disinterested voice, "Yuno wishes you to be aware that Fujisawa is the heir of the Falling Star Style, extraordinarily gifted, and Leaf's finest axe-wielder after herself."
Fujisawa's expression remained blank, but there was already a yatate writing set in her hand, and a brush flickering across a new page. This is an exaggeration. Leaf just doesn't have that many axe-wielders. After a second's pause, she added, That said, the Falling Star Style is Leaf's strongest axe style. That means it is probably the world's strongest axe style, but please don't tell Yuno I said that, and a doodle of an axe hovering in mid-air with rays of light shining off it.
"It's a pleasure to meet you, Fujisawa," Hazō said, giving her a broad smile that hadn't seemed right when talking to Inuzuka. "I hope you enjoy the ceremony."
As Fujisawa followed Inuzuka towards Akane and the Tent of Three Colours, there was an almighty crash from the direction of the banquet tables.
Kei facepalmed. "Fractal, no! I told them we did not need 'adorable clumsiness' as an experimental trait!"
With that, she ran off, leaving Kichi blinking in confusion.
After a second, he gave a casual shrug and turned back to Hazō.
Hazō: Empathy 11 - 6 = 5
Kichi Gai: [Hazō can't tell if this is Rapport or Deceit] ? + ? = ?
"It's great to meet you, Lord Gōketsu," Kichi Gai said with a beaming smile nearly worthy of his namesake. "I love what you've done with the place. The whole granite thing? Very modern. My name's Kichi Gai—I mean, you just heard that, but any good thing is worth saying twice."
"It's good to meet you too, Kichi," Hazō said. "So I take it you know Kei as well?"
"Kei? Oh, you mean Lady Nara. Sure do." Kichi's smile narrowed a little, but that just meant it returned to what Hazō considered the normal spectrum. "I work with her sister on the Final Gift Programme as Chief Procurement Officer. Nothing like not getting kidnapped and vivisected to motivate you to give back to the community, am I right?"
"Tell me about it," Hazō muttered.
"Sorry, didn't catch that."
"I said, what does a Chief Procurement Officer do?"
"Oh, it's not as big a deal as it sounds," Kichi said with a dismissive swipe of his hand. "Sometimes you get a ninja who could really benefit from signing up for the Programme, but they're afraid of pain—and who can blame them?—or they have religious compunctions or what have you, and they just need a bit of guidance to encourage them to take that last step."
Hazō felt a chill go down his spine. "And… Ami's OK with that?"
"When she first found out I was doing it, I thought she was going to kill me," Kichi said airily. "But then we had a major shortfall one month, and Dr Yakushi turned up and warned us that Orochimaru was losing interest in the arrangement, and she saw the light pretty quick. There's no greater virtue in a leader than flexibility, am I right?"
"I-I think you'd better go get your costume sorted," Hazō said weakly. "Wouldn't want to delay the ceremony."
"You got it, boss."
Kichi gave him another quick bow and sauntered off after the other guests, leaving Hazō staring at his back.
-o-
Having finished chewing out Fractal, Kei eventually returned to Hazō.
"Hazō, I believe there is one more thing of which you should be aware earlier rather than later."
"Oh?"
"The Hokage summoned Shikamaru earlier this morning."
"What did he say?" Hazō asked. And if it was about the Orochimaru incident, why only Shikamaru?
"He began by congratulating him on successfully navigating a challenging crisis without collateral damage," Kei said. "However, he went on to note that while citing obscure Leaf laws, or intending to invoke them, is not in itself illegal, blackmail most certainly is. He reaffirmed his promise to prioritise the spirit of the law with regard to this incident, but also stated that, should Shikamaru ever use this particular matter as a means of leverage again, he could expect to meet the same fate as Amori Goemon."
"Why," Hazō asked, "what happened to Amori Goemon?"
"When I asked Shikamaru," Kei replied, "he said only that I had already suffered through a traumatic enough couple of days. Naturally, I checked the records, but no shinobi of that name has ever existed as far as Leaf is concerned—not that Leaf recordkeeping is anything more than an embarrassment to any well-structured mind."
"Well," Hazō said quietly, "that's nice and terrifying."
Then he brightened. "Oh, but speaking of recordkeeping! Kei, there's actually a chart I wanted to show you."
The chart was a masterwork, the fruit of hours of focused labour after he'd decided to use the night productively in lieu of Orochimaru nightmares. Disappointingly, Kei took it with the same banal reluctance she displayed with most of his lists or diagrams. Well, she would soon learn better.
Yes, after only a few seconds of study, her world-weary expression was replaced by the stunned, wide-eyed stare of a newly-graduated genin facing his first chakra marmoset.
"Hazō," she said slowly, "what is this?"
"Can't you tell from the list of names?" Hazō asked. "It's a shipping chart. There's a key in the top right."
Kei stared at it for a few seconds longer. "Please tell me you are not serious."
"As a ninjutsu malfunction," Hazō said. "It was going to be even more detailed, but I ran out of colours."
"Why would you create such a thing, Hazō?" Kei asked, a note of pleading in her voice. "And having created it, why would you show it to me?"
"Honestly," Hazō said, "it seemed like a good idea at the time."
Kei put her hand to her forehead. "Hazō, I am ever so grateful that you showed this to me before anyone else, especially anyone in a position of authority. While you are correct in assuming that the state of the war is severely interfering with our usual import routes, we cannot reroute naval traffic through Haran Bay. With Cloud having entered the war, we cannot simply assume that Hot Springs will remain neutral, or, for that matter, that Cloud is not monitoring approaches to it in anticipation of exactly this workaround. Your proposed detour through Degarashi Port, meanwhile, ignores the practicalities of foodstuff spoilage. As for Wave, if we can reliably get a messenger to Wave, we can reliably get a messenger to Mist, at which point we will in any case have assistance in expelling Cloud and restoring shipping to normal. I realise you are seeking new ways to be useful to the Hokage, but please trust that the Logistics Corps, much of it Nara or Nara-trained, has such mundane problems well in hand. This attempt would only have cost you respect from professionals unimpressed by ultracrepidation."
Hazō could do nothing but nod in contrition and return to carrying out Noburi's winning plan.
-o-
"…and thus does Ui's blessing descend on the conscientious."
Hazō suppressed his thousandth yawn as he watched the opening rites with Akane from their appointed place in the Tent of the Ocelot. As any former student of the Mist Academy of the Ninja Arts knew, there were few greater sources of suffering than having to listen to hours of religious instruction while pretending at all times to be attentive, alert, loyal future ninja. This was just as bad, only it was also being delivered in rhythmic monotone by a girl notable for her low-affect speech, and was more soporific than anything Tsunade could concoct with a full alchemy lab. Of course, it was even worse for Kei, who'd had to memorise this gibberish from Yuno's personal holy texts, and who was now having to recite it in fake Isanese lorekeeper robes—in other words, while dressed as an Inoue for the entire ceremony.
Fortunately, Hazō's own suffering was now over. The interesting part was about to begin.
"Next," Noburi said from his seat on a tree branch just outside the ritual space, "the Watcher raises his mirror to show that it does not reflect any of the Old Gods, and the ceremony may proceed."
They'd had trouble figuring out what to do about Asuma's sole stipulation, which was that there had to be an element to the ceremony that made it screamingly obvious that the whole thing was fake and not a challenge to the spiritual monopoly of the Will of Fire. Snowflake's solution had been inspired: they'd appointed Noburi the narrator, who would guide the audience through the bizarre goings-on in front of them, and also conveniently make sure that everybody involved in the ceremony itself was able to stay on track.
"I said," Noburi repeated more loudly, "the Watcher raises his mirror to show that it does not reflect any of the Old Gods."
The Watcher, naturally, was Kagome-sensei. His duty was to stand there for the entire ceremony and watch for incursions by the Old Gods, for which purpose he held the Mirror of No Reflection in one hand and the Bell of Panic in the other. The outfit was completed by a long, weirdly cuboid fake grey beard (mandatory) and by the Vestments of Injunction, elaborate black robes with countless designs traced on them in red ink: a sword through a figure of eight, a circle binding an equilateral triangle, a spiky eight-pointed star, a series of concentric circles with four commas around the rim… Hazō had been salivating at the prospect of Forbidden Lore until Yuno admitted she didn't know what most of them represented.
"Bwuh?!" Kagome-sensei snapped into wakefulness and thrust the mirror in front of him as if batting away an incoming sky squid. "The, uh, elder seals still hold!"
"Now," Noburi went on, "the Maiden Beneath the Stars brings forth the Thrice-Bound Cage containing the Chicken of Innocence."
Noburi had unilaterally declared that, as the one by nature most suited to repetitive manual labour, his clan head would be the one to spend hours weaving the Thrice-Bound Cage, a complex, irregularly-shaped wickerwork construction that had to be crafted completely underwater so that its eldritch powers wouldn't escape before they were sealed in during the final step (and that had ended up recording a variety of movements like nothing Hazō had ever made into the Iron Nerve). Happily, Noburi hadn't realised that this would leave him with the worst part, which was painting a live and angry chicken.
The Maiden Beneath the Stars, a.k.a. Snowflake, swathed in layers of white cloth with a dangling red obi that made her look like a Sagemas present waiting to be unwrapped, proffered the fruit of Hazō's labours to Yuno, together with the silver Implement of Oracular Exsanguination (which looked like a spoon and a fork had been caught in multiple sealing failures together, and which Kei was planning to donate to T&I afterwards as thanks for their stellar customer service). The Thrice-Bound Cage quivered alarmingly, but Yuno kept a solid hold on it.
"The Youth frees the Chicken of Innocence from the Thrice-Bound Cage, and beseeches it for guidance on her future path."
In a swift, violent series of movements, Yuno slid the lid off the cage, pulled the striped green-and-purple Chicken of Innocence out by its neck, and stabbed it viciously with the Implement of Oracular Exsanguination, before casting it away so the initial spurt of blood wouldn't get on her yellow kimono.
Everyone watched in silence as the Chicken of Innocence ran to and fro, bleeding heavily, until its panicked energy ran out and it collapsed in the far corner of the ritual space.
"The Priestess has observed the dance of the Chicken of Innocence, and uses it to divine the future."
Kei, of course, didn't know the first thing about Isanese immaculate poultry augury, but as Akio's Chosen, her authority in religious matters was immutable, and her intuition beyond reproach (as far as Yuno was concerned, murdering the High Priest was not a punishable crime and therefore Elder Takahashi's verdict could go hang).
"With Ui's endless vision in my eyes and Ui's deep conviction in my kidneys," Kei proclaimed with a completely straight face, "I declare that the Chicken of Innocence promises Gōketsu Yuno a life of passion and joy. She shall slay many foes, know true love, bear many healthy children"—she glanced at a squirming Noburi as if to say yes, this was revenge for the Inoue robes—"and die bathed in the blood of her enemies in defence of her family and her village."
"Now," Noburi declared, at extra volume as if to distract attention from his crimson face, "the Youth must face the Four Banes."
Akane Red Spider Lily, Akane Freesia, Akane Tiger Lily, and Akane Sakura lined up between Yuno and the priestess's podium, each dressed in her namesake's colour and standing in the angular, coat rack-like Stance of Temptation. After carefully placing the Implement of Oracular Exsanguination in the Thrice-Bound Cage and closing the lid, Yuno stepped in front of Akane Red Spider Lily, on the left end of the row.
"The Bane of Dependence."
Akane Spider Lily shimmied forward, arms open to embrace Yuno.
Hazō forced himself not to flinch as Yuno struck her down with a single blow, making her disappear. Yuno took a step to the right, in front of Akane Freesia.
"The Bane of Irresponsibility."
Akane Freesia shimmied forward, offering Yuno a brightly-painted doll.
Yuno struck her down with a single blow, making her disappear. She took a step to the right, in front of Akane Tiger Lily.
"The Bane of Rebelliousness."
Akane Tiger Lily shimmied forward, offering Yuno a crochet hook.
Yuno struck her down with a single blow, making her disappear. She took a step to the right, in front of Akane Sakura.
"The Bane of Childish Dreams."
Finally, Akane Sakura shimmied forward, offering Yuno a scroll with a child's drawing.
Yuno struck her down with a single blow, making her disappear. Then, she straightened her fingers and made the Sign of the Stone Coffin (which was not to be made against a living person on pain of blood feud) over the leftover props.
"Having proved that her spirit is worthy, the Youth must face her final challenge: a battle with her master."
Kei tossed Yuno a simple wooden stick, not an Implement of anything.
Hazō tensed, because with the little time they'd had to rehearse, there was every possibility this wouldn't work at all. However, after a few seconds, Satsuko, the only possible candidate for the title, rose into the air in front of Yuno as if by her own power. Yuno gasped.
Hazō could see Kei and all the Snowflakes frowning in concentration as they strove to keep their Zephyr's Reaches coordinated.
Satsuko wobbled uncertainly towards Yuno, more like a drunk student trying to prove she was totally sober by walking in a straight line (legend said that Hoshigaki Rin had actually broken into Old Lizardbreath's stash and lived to tell the tale) than like an attacking evil-looking black axe with special grooves for the blood. Yuno raised her stick defensively.
"First, the Youth proves her resolve in the face of her weakness."
Satsuko careened downward, powered solely by gravity, and Yuno deflected her with a simple sideways sweep. Satsuko collapsed to the ground, then rose again after a brief delay, this time a little more steadily.
"However, the Youth's weakness is too great."
On the second chop, Yuno raised her stick to block, and Satsuko cut it in half. Yuno stepped aside at the last second.
"Finally, the master slays the Youth's weakness."
Satsuko rose a third time, nearly fell to the ground again, but eventually got as high as Yuno's chest. She fell aggressively at Yuno, turned to strike with the flat of the blade.
Yuno staggered at the impact, pain written across her face, but, crucially, stayed on her feet.
This time, when Satsuko fell to the ground, it was Yuno who picked her up.
"The Youth has earned her adulthood weapon. Only one thing remains."
Akane stepped out from the Tent of the Ocelot. Taking position behind Yuno, and well away from Satsuko (not for ritual reasons, just common sense), she gently undid and took off Yuno's yellow kimono. Beneath, Yuno was wearing the simple green trousers and jacket of the Gōketsu.
"The clan consort"—standing in for Yuno's mother—"strips off the Binding Garment of Youth."
Hazō made a note to tease Akane about this later, but right now it was also his cue.
"The clan head dresses the Youth in the Empowering Garment of Adulthood."
Stepping out of the Tent of the Ocelot, Hazō walked forward in the slow, stately fashion of a paternal figure on Serious Business, pausing every third step so that the ghost of Yuno's father, whom he was representing, didn't fall behind. Taking Akane's place behind Yuno, he helped her into a red Gōketsu haori adorned with the clan crest.
"Gōketsu Yuno," Kei intoned. "With this, you are an adult and a full-fledged shinobi in the eyes of Ui Isas, your clan, and your village. Serve faithfully, and may Ui guide you in the footsteps of the Chicken of Innocence until your destiny is fulfilled."
"And so," Noburi concluded with a grin you could see from the moon, "the coming-of-age ceremony is complete. You can cheer now."
Hazō was the first to obey (maybe a little too loudly, given he was standing right next to Yuno, but it was the thought that counted), but only by a second.
"Hell yeah!"
"Congratulations, Yuno!"
"Welcome back to the joys and horrors of adulthood from which you were granted such a brief reprieve!"
Inuzuka smiled proudly, arms crossed, while Yatsuzakimaru barked incessantly. Kichi hollered congratulation after congratulation. Fujisawa looked like she was watching paint dry, but was also holding up a notebook page which could barely contain an enormous exclamation mark.
Before Hazō knew it, Noburi was holding Yuno in his arms, and Hazō might have been the only person close enough to see that she was crying.
-o-
Despite Fractal's best efforts to be true to her assigned self (and Hazō found it noteworthy that the girl with the hexagonal hairpin was still present and not dispelled), the tables in the Chamber of Responsible Jubilation were still covered with a cornucopia of food, from a wide selection of Leaf favourites, to ominous-looking attempts at traditional Isanese cuisine (hopefully, the civilian chefs had taken Yuno's feedback from her last two parties on board, and there wouldn't be another Unpeeled Hedgehog Incident), to...
"How long has Leaf had a traditional Mist-style seafood restaurant with authentic ingredients, and why was I not informed?!"
"Since Ami," Noburi said, sliding a sausage into the wobbling stack of food on his plate as if playing a reverse game of Tower of Inescapable Doom. "And that's 'traditional Eastern-style cuisine', if you don't want to kill their business after it's already been royally screwed by the Cloud invasion."
"Noburi, have Gaku start making the arrangements. I'm going to marry that woman."
Noburi gave Hazō the look the clan heads had given Asuma when he ordered the annihilation of Rock. He opened his mouth several times, as if trying to pick a response, and finally settled on, "Bro, you know that Kei is right over there?"
"Fine," Hazō said, "I'll buy her a lifetime supply of Frost-style shaved ice or something."
Noburi added another sausage to his stack, which teetered alarmingly.
"Actually," he said, "speaking of narrowly-averted disaster, you know how I went down to the hospital last night to thank Tsunade for saving all our asses?"
Hazō nodded. "I don't like the start of that sentence."
"You'll like this even less," Noburi promised. "Apparently, she's just got round to collating the reports from the Battle of the Five Clans, and all those summoners who were feeling sick afterwards but didn't say anything because you don't make jōnin by being able to show weakness and it was probably just a sign that they weren't exercising their chakra coils enough anyway? Same symptoms."
"And you're about to tell me that it's not because they weren't exercising their chakra coils enough," Hazō guessed.
"Nope. Water poisoning."
"What?" Hazō demanded. "But it's water! Pure water, the least poisonous thing in this Sage-blessed world! And besides, if drinking your chakra water was bad, everyone in Team Uplift would be with the ancestors ten times over by now."
Noburi sighed and put his plate down. "Don't yell at me, yell at the world's greatest doctor. No, actually, do yell at me, because this is all my fault. I bet you anything, the second a Wakahisa hits chūnin, they get told about this weakness of the Vampiric Dew that they didn't need to know about before because their reserves weren't big enough anyway. I was so proud of myself for figuring out that other Bloodline Limit ability that I'm not going to mention in public because I'm not an idiot, but I didn't even think of something so simple. Of course if it was that easy, every Wakahisa in the field would be followed about by a gaggle of genin at a safe distance. Ugh."
"But—but wait!" Hazō exclaimed, reaching out to grab at the future as it slipped through his fingers. "The body absorbs chakra faster than it absorbs water, right? Couldn't you just keep vomiting up the chakra water before it could poison you?"
"I asked Tsunade the same thing," Noburi said. "After she was done giving me her 'Have you ever unfurled a medicine scroll in your life, boy?' look, she said if you vomit over and over, your stomach juices will rip up your throat and just generally do all kinds of awful stuff I won't repeat.
"Long and short, we're lucky the Battle of Five Clans was such an overwhelming curbstomp that they got the summoning done early—probably thanks to Orochimaru taking down the gate, much as I hate to admit it. The Hokage's going to be hopping mad when he hears we nearly hospitalised most of Leaf's summoners in one fell swoop. Hopefully, the fact that Tsunade knew the plan and didn't catch it either will make things easier on us—though, again, as a Wakahisa, I should've known better. Ugh."
"Ugh," Hazō agreed. He sincerely hoped the Summoner Army proposal he'd recently sent Asuma hadn't included his musings about having the Hokage drink all the chakra water they could make.
-o-
The afterparty was over. Kei was finally free from people. Whether it was Yuno's tearful thanks for the second-best day of her life, or Akane bizarrely being even more bouncy after acting as an agent of anti-Youth, or Kichi attempting to make advances in the full knowledge that she was gay and married and not looking and completely immune to his dubious charm, or Fujisawa sticking to her like glue after finding out that Kei was more comfortable around speech-impaired people than around the incessantly-blabbering masses… enough was enough.
Mercifully, Fractal, Moonlight, and the "newborn" Horizon (who had been assigned a sense of awe at the majesty of creation, and had yet to decide whether her entire existence was one cruel joke) were doing a sterling job maintaining a perimeter around Kei, preventing the three guests from attempting to socialise with her directly as they all walked back to Leaf, and leaving only her and Snowflake in a bubble of companionable silence.
Would that such relative bliss had lasted longer, as the absolute last person Kei wanted to see in the world (who wasn't a literal snake) suddenly barred her way.
"Kei, Snowflake," Mari began, shivering in her winter coat even though the temperature was barely below zero, "can we talk?"
Kei and Snowflake exchanged glances.
With an unspoken understanding, the other three sisters carried on ahead, screening the scene from the guests as they went.
"Mari," Kei said coldly.
"I want to apologise," Mari said. "I had no choice, but what I did to you was still unconscionable."
"You have already apologised," Kei said. "You may consider your social obligations expended and return home."
"Kei," Mari said, "even if you doubt that I'm sincere, please don't doubt that I'm worried about our family. This rift between us has dragged in Yuno, and that means sooner or later it'll drag in Noburi, and if things get any worse, I'm scared that it'll split our family right down the middle. I've seen it happen before—I've made it happen before—and as soon as people start feeling they have no choice but to take sides, it all escalates, and people start saying things that can't be taken back."
"What would you have me do?" Kei asked. "Lie to them? Pretend that I am still capable of trusting you? I, whose social skills put the most gregarious sea turtle to shame, could not maintain such a deception for a minute in the face of those who know me best."
She closed her eyes. There was nothing she could say here. Nothing she could do. Even her anger, the life-giving anger that propelled her forward when everything else about her failed, and exacted no price she was not used to paying, refused to stir to life.
"Was there seriously no other solution?" Snowflake demanded in her place. "Did Gōketsu Mari, the virtuoso of manipulation whom even she once looked up to as a superior, really have to resort to human sacrifice to distract a spoiled, self-obsessed manchild from a toy he only mildly wanted?"
"You weren't there," Mari said. "I could see the sand pouring out of the hourglass. I thought we'd won—I'd pushed myself to the limit to make sure we won—and then he started to turn around and think about whether he wanted Hazō after all, and with every second, the odds of Hazō getting out alive dropped like a rock. I did my honest best under pressure, and frankly, it's a miracle that I outraced Orochimaru's thought process at all."
Kei soaked this in. Words finally came.
"It was not a certainty, then? You offered Orochimaru our lives not to save Hazō, but as a form of risk mitigation? Your objective was only to distract Orochimaru, not specifically to divert him from a prize within arm's reach, and for that you gave him our lives?"
"I did everything I could," Mari insisted. "I took the path with the highest odds of survival for everyone, each time, even when that meant deliberately calling his anger down on myself."
"I can appreciate the reasoning behind your actions," Kei said. Of course she could. A Mori was not permitted to turn away from the facts, had she but the wherewithal to recognise them in the first place. "I can appreciate why, once our lives instantly sprang to mind as a convenient sacrificial piece, you weighed the odds and found it the optimal way to proceed. Certainly, it is a fact that I hold by far the most political influence of those in the clan, however richly undeserved. An enemy pointed at me will find it far more difficult to act than one pointed at Hazō, with his few allies and mercurial relationship with the Powers That Be. Let us be clear that a lack of intelligence on your part is not among my grievances.
"With that in mind, Mari, do but one thing for me. Look me in the eye and tell me that if another such situation should arise, where a grave danger to the Gōketsu—or merely the Gōketsu clan head—can be offset by sacrificing me and trusting in my superior protections, you will choose my well-being over the good of the clan."
Mari hesitated, only for an instant, but after what she had done, any hesitation was enough.
"No? Then I am but your tool, bereft of my own agency and at the mercy of your personal risk assessment. I do not deny your skill at navigating crises, Mari—indeed I envy it—but I hope you understand why I will never be able to trust you again."
"I understand why my life means nothing to you," Snowflake spoke up as Kei fell silent. "It's a shallow, weightless life, and ours is a shallow, weightless bond. But Kei is supposed to mean the world to you!" Snowflake's hands clenched into fists. "All she wants, all she ever wanted, was for you to love her for who she was—not a tool, not a way to be a good person, not a jigsaw piece to fit into your picture of your perfect world, but her, this precious, fragile individual. You could not even do that. 'Team Mum' couldn't see her needs if seeing them meant having to face herself for real.
"What have you done about it, Mari? How far have you gone to fix what you broke, you, who aren't locked in by the Sage-damned Frozen Skein or by the mind of a girl who doesn't understand people or how they work? You are not perfect—I understand that, and I have no idea of your true capabilities because I am stuck seeing you through a borrowed prism of adoration—but you had one job. Did you have to do this? Could you not have stepped in Orochimaru's path yourself? Could you not have tempted him with Truth Lost in the Fog, a unique, extraordinary bribe that would probably not require anyone to be dissected? Could you not have drawn his attention by asking him about his research, or the Basement, or Jiraiya, or Akatsuki, or whatever? Yes, it would have been less reliable than throwing the mouse to the snake. He might have rebuffed you, even lashed out if you were persistent. But it was…" For a second, Snowflake choked up. "It was what a mother would have done!"
"Snowflake, enough."
Kei did not want to be defended. There was no point, and it was too late. Kei had not chosen to bare her soul, and though she was moved—perhaps even a little shaken—by Snowflake's actions, it was not Snowflake's place to do so for her.
"Mari, as part of your optimal scenario, you chose to sacrifice my trust in you. I do not have the power to undo that sacrifice any more than I do the other events that transpired, even should I conclude it to be the rational course of action. Our relationship is no longer a problem to be solved, or a scale to be rebalanced through apologies and atonement. It is over."
Kei walked away, and Snowflake with her.
At the last moment, before Mari was too far away to hear, Kei had two final words she could not make herself not say.
