Chapter Text
“...and the boy falls. But he lands, and he lands with grace, because he is shinobi. And shinobi do not stumble.”
— The Falling of the Kunai Blade, Hasegawa Hiroka [BANNED]
—
Kaori has never felt fear like she has now.
It is visceral, tangible, and so suffocating that she can feel every muscle movement she makes to inhale and exhale. This, she realises, is true fear.
There are Kumo-nin sitting at the dining table where her family should be; her parents are instead kneeling on the floor as Kaori stumbles into the kitchen, heart pounding wildly against her chest as if it wants to run away without her. Her hands are shaking as she reaches for a bowl, almost dropping it the first time she gets her hands on it.
It clangs against the counter as she fumbles to catch it, and the shaking gets infinitely worse. One of the Kumo-nin snaps around, eyes piercing.
Kaori has to bite down on her lips so she doesn’t burst into tears. With the leering gaze of the Kumo-nin, it takes her three goes to get the tap open. She prays to any god still out there that her hands remain steady enough as the water slowly fills the bowl, threatening to spill over the edges.
She can see her own terrified expression in the reflection. She quickly looks away, and closes the tap.
When Kaori turns back around to head into the dining room, her eyes are naturally drawn to where her parents are. Her mother is sobbing, quietly, and her father has his eyes trained on the ground. Kaori only hopes that these nin are merciful—but the hope wanes further and further, and she steps towards with a wobble.
“Here, shinobi-san,” she says, voice trembling. She places the water on the table.
There are only four Kumo-nin in the room, but they still somehow take up the majority of the space. The biggest, who sits in her father’s chair, stares down at the water like it personally caused the massive lash that reaches from his shoulder across his chest and to the opposite hip.
He sneers. Kaori tries to will away her quivering.
“I want food,” he declares, unimpressed. “Get me food.”
Kaori wants to point out that it is currently four weeks before harvest season, everyone is living on the last bits of rations they have. She wants to point out that because of the war that these Kumo-nin have started that their usual trade routes have been cut short—usually when they’d be getting food from the village a couple of hills down, everyone’s been too terrified to leave the village premises in fear of being cut down indiscriminately.
But then she realises that if she does anything that these Kumo-nin don’t like, she’ll be accused of being a Konoha loyalist, and be killed right then and there.
Kaori has never liked shinobi. All they do is kill, and their career is simply needless violence. But now, she wishes with everything that Konoha is still standing because at least they’d never treat their own people like slaves.
But Konoha has been razed to the ground. There is no more Konohakagure.
So Kaori nods, breathing shallowly and quickly to placate her thrumming heart, and she turns to head back into the kitchen. They have some rice left, and some seasoning that looks mildly moudly. There is no meat, and only a few herbs that Kaori herself grows on her windowsill, but that means she has to go into the bedroom to get them and she doesn’t know what the shinobi will do when they see her try to leave.
“Captain,” one of the Kumo-nin says, evidently impatient, “we need to move. Raikage-sama is waiting for your report.”
The captain laughs, as if he doesn’t have bloor pouring out from his front and staining the floorboards of Kaori’s childhood home. “There is nothing to fear—why, do you believe what they say about the tree-huggers? That they still live?”
“Of course there’s still some alive,” the other hisses, “I’m not stupid enough to think that all of them were in the village when we invaded. But that’s not it—I know you’ve heard about them.”
“The zombie ANBU,” another adds.
The captain laughs again. “No ANBU will remain when their village is gone. What could they possibly do?”
Kaori returns. The rice is haphazardly warmed with the use of some boiling water and a ceramic bowl, so the bowl is burning her palms, but it keeps her hands steady as she places it in front of the captain.
She places a pair of chopsticks to the right of the bowl. She tries not to think about how easily the man could kill her with the two sticks. “Here, shinobi-san,” she says.
The captain shifts, and she freezes. He sniiffs at the air. “Girl,” he drawls, and it makes Kaori’s shoulders seize in tension, “tell me something. Have you ever meet Konoha shinobi before?”
She has. She can’t say it was a pleasurable experience. “Yes.”
“Do you think that they are loyal?” The captain leans forwards, the scent of his sweat and blood slowly encasing her. “Do you think that they are,” he hums, searching for the word, “sentimental? Weak?”
“I don’t know,” Kaori says, and she’s surprised to see that it comes out comprehensibly.
Her hands are trembling uncontrollably. Her mother whines louder from where she’s kneeling on the floor, arms bound, but the kunoichi lands a solid kick in her abdomen that shuts her up real quickly.
“Do you think,” and he gets closer, so close that Kaori can feel his breath in her ear, “that they would survive without their precious village?”
Kaori doesn’t answer.
The captain laughs again, booming. He leans back in his seat, and Kaori takes massive gulps of fresh air as inconspicuously as possible.
“I have my food and water,” the captain says, amused, “you can kill them now.”
Kaori freezes. The other three Kumo-nin draw their swords, one even sighing in what Kaori swears is relief. Her mother’s screams from behind the rags rise exponentially, but her father’s head still remains low and defeated.
Kaori should’ve known better. After all, they are Fire citizens, and even if they aren’t affiliated directly with Konoha, all these foreign nin see the Land of Fire and Konoha as synonymous.
It’s absurd. Kaori wants to screech to the heavens, to anyone that would listen, that the shinobi world is separate—that her family are not fighters, they never have been, and all they do is keep their head down and lay at the mercy of the rich who hire such shinobi. They are civilians; but, Kaori realises, these nin already know that. That’s why they derive such pleasure out of stalking towards Kaori’s parents, intentionally making a show of their shiny blades and the crackling of their chakra.
If only Kaori knew how to mold chakra. Then she’d be able to catch these bastards off-guard, rip open a couple of throats, and perhaps survive.
“Night-night,” one of the Kumo-nin sings, and Kaori is horrified to find out that he’s probably no older than a boy. Suddenly, all her bravado gone—the boy, who is younger than her, would be able to take her down within the blink of an eye. There’s no way she stands a chance.
Kaori is a coward. She closes her eyes as her mother’s screams reach the highest volume even behind the gag, and she turns her head away.
A knock echoes on the front door. The Kumo-nin slices, a head thuds on the ground, and Kaori knows its her father’s head because her mother continues to scream.
The knock comes again, this time more insistent. The captain waves a hand, as if to say, answer it, and the kunoichi walks to the front door. Kaori watches, not looking down, and watches in abhorrent terror as the woman takes on Kaori’s face, suddenly splitting in a smile as if she were Kaori herself.
The boy-nin flicks the blood off of his blade, and turns to Kaori’s mother. “Hi there,” he grins.
“Delivery!” A voice calls from outside.
The kunoichi opens the door, voice pitched just like Kaori’s. For a moment, it’s as if there is no real or fake Kaori—there simply is a Kaori. The kunoichi’s smiles spreads even further as she looks outside. “Hello—!”
Her head goes flying. While Kaori’s father’s head had just dropped to the ground with not so much as a roll, the kunoichi’s head flung across the room and landed on the wall opposite with a disgusting squelch.
Vermillion blood smears down the white wallpaper, and Kaori screams.
The kunoichi’s headless body wavers, and then crumples to the ground. There is a foot where her head had been, and the foot lowers to reveal a white porcelain animal mask, with something red glowing behind the eyeholes. The animal mask is unmistakable—since the fall of Konoha, it’s on every wanted poster in the country.
“Oops,” says the Konoha ANBU.
Things blur. One moment, the captain is lunging for the Konoha-nin with his own sword in hand, the next he is staring into those alluring red eyes and then promptly killing his own men. Kaori rushes for the table—she darts underneath, hands closing over her ears, barely catching one of the Kumo-nin screeching for vengeance for their kunoichi before she squeezes her eyes shut.
It happens in seconds. Kaori’s pretty sure it didn’t even get past ten or so seconds, and the sounds of fighting and lightning are over. When she opens her eyes, boots are moving in her line of vision, circling the entire house with a foreboding rhythm.
Kaori follows one set of boots, head pivoting as it walks around her, and she finds herself staring at her mother’s face when the boots walk past her. Her mother’s face is stricken with tears, sobbing through her gag with such big heaves that Kaori suspects that her mother will die of suffocation if someone doesn’t release her soon.
The boots disappear. Kaori is not stupid enough to believe the Konoha-nin are gone, but it’s her mother.
She needs to do this. She can save her.
Kaori crawls, slowly but surely, towards her mother. The table is a long rectangle, and Kaori has to crawl the long way underneath it to reach where her mother is lying on her side, arms still bound. She’s within an arm’s reach, and Kaori moves.
When Kaori leaves the canopy of the table, there is someone waiting. Looming.
She looks up. It is a porcelain animal mask. It looks like some kind of bird with red glowing eyes, eyes that have some sort of hypnotic quality to them—they glow in the darkness of the evening, and Kaori cannot look away.
Another porcelain mask appears in the other side of her vision. She opens her mouth, to say something like thank you, or where have you been when your village is gone?, or even is your village truly gone like everyone says it is? but the bird mask beats her to it.
His red eyes swirl. “You are the sole survivor of a Kumo genocide.”
Kaori’s mother screams. It’s cut short when the second porcelain mask moves, blade winking with rapid movements.
The eyes. The red eyes. Her mother is no longer screaming.
Kaori forgets—and then remembers—and now—
She is the sole survivor of a Kumo genocide.
—
Kakashi arrives in the Land of Woods at around four AM, four days later than expected.
On his back rests a chuunin, and beside him, the chuunin’s daughter who sleeps steadily in Yuugao’s arms. He sends Tenzou ahead to deal with all the security first, ignoring the chuunin’s awkward patting of his shoulder because there’s no way Kakashi’s going to put him down only to pick him back up again.
Kouhei leans tiredly against the closest tree, having already put down his chuunin. He sends Kakashi a look through his ANBU mask that Kakashi can only really decipher as can Tenzou please hurry the fuck up, but he’s mostly guessing because no one can read shit through those porcelain masks. He signs a soon with his free hand, only triggering a sigh from the Hyuuga in response.
The chuunin pats his shoulder again, this time more insistently. Again, Kakashi pretends he doesn’t exist, and the chuunin deflates.
After four minutes of waiting, Tenzou finally appears from between two trees. He’s undoing his arm-guards—they were a size too small, if memory serves right—and he looks up as he steps closer, nodding at Kakashi.
The confirmation is all he needs. “Let’s go,” Kakashi says, spurring his team into action.
Kouhei bends down to haul his chuunin onto his back again with a grunt, and Yuugao darts forwards with the child in her hands, eager to get inside base. Kakashi waits for Miura to move in first, before following after her. Tenzou takes the rear, falling in line after Kakashi, and they step through the barrier with a small shiver each.
The genjutsu gives way to show a bustling, although small, campsite. Tenzou obediently takes the chuunin off of Kakashi’s back, much to the chuunin’s chagrin at being carried everywhere, and Kakashi waves them off to head to medical. Miura lingers because she doesn’t carry anyone, but Kakashi motions for her to go with the rest of the entourage.
“Captain,” one of the guards say, saddling up to him. “Welcome back. The Commander requests your presence post-haste.”
Shrugging a shoulder to Miura as if to say, see?, she responds with a hand sign that technically means forward but can also mean whatever. Kakashi smiles behind his mask, turning his back to signal a clear dismissal, turning to look at the guard who had addressed him.
It’s not a face he recognises. “You from Konoha?” Kakashi asks, accepting a piece of cloth from the other guard, who he does recognise.
“No sir,” the man straightens, “I was rescued by Team Yo a couple of weeks ago. Uhm, I heard it was just a few days after your team had left for the Land of Earth.”
Kakashi wipes at the blood on his armguards and chestplate. “Right.”
“He’s a big fan,” pipes Nakamura, the other chuunin guard. “Apparently you saved his sister, from Water.”
The guard in question beams. “You did, sir. She’s very grateful. She says you and your team ran across the water from the island back to mainland. That’s insane, really.” Then he seems to remember he’s talking to his superior, and adds hastily, “Actually—er—very impressive, sir.”
Kakashi studies the guard’s face. He’s young. Still has the baby fat around his chin. He does kind of look like that tokujou from that last mission to the Land of Water. “Nakamura,” he says, turning away, “do you want this back?”
The now-bloodied cloth must’ve been used hundreds of times before, probably to clean blood and dirt off of armour pieces, and so it doesn’t seem any more sullied than it had been before. Nakamura shrugs, moving to stand back in his guard post. “All good, sir,” he replies, “I do know that there’s some strict rules about littering though. There’s a recycling bin on the way to Commander’s.”
Kakashi eyes the gaps between tents that acts as pathways, the furthest one the one leading to the External Commander’s tent. Even though sprawling, there’s a certain kind of order to the layout; the result of years of carefully mapped routes, countless dead informations, and three separate civilian covers that Kakashi personally maintained. Somehow, the addition of a recycling bin makes his lips twitch in a smile.
“Then.” Kakashi nods at the two of them.
“Sir!” They stand to attention, heels clicking together, and salute.
Kakashi waves them off as he turns around, meandering through the tents as he prepares his mission report in his mind. Chuunin saved, he muses, covers maintained, but civilians dead. Although it leaves a bad taste to need to kill civilians to maintain secrecy, it’s an acceptable cost that the Commander will take.
The recycling bin hangs from a post in the midst of a few tents, glowing as it reflects all of the campfire lights since it’s made out of a white Kumo flak vest. Kakashi finds a grim pleasure in tossing the flimsy piece of cloth into the white jacket, which is already half full with all sorts of scrap material. There’s traces of blood on the white reinforced canvas, probably because no one tried too hard when washing it, and Kakashi wonders what happened to the nin who was wearing it.
He doesn’t think too hard about that one.
The guards stationed around the Commander’s tent are silent and unmoving, but they turn to salute at him when Kakashi walks up to them. Kakashi nods back at them, letting them ease back into their previous stance, before flaring his chakra rhythmically to signify his arrival.
“Hound-04,” he calls, before glancing down to make sure there’s no massive splotches of blood on his chest.
“Come in.”
There’s none. Relaxing, Kakashi pushes the flap open, eyes quickly adjusting to the bright candles that illuminate the interior. There are two ANBU still in a meeting with the Commander, so Kakashi waits near the entrance patiently as the meeting wraps up.
“Take this,” the Commander orders, pressing a scroll into the hands of one of the ANBU. “Don’t open it until you’re out of Wood.”
“Yessir.”
“And don’t have your hopes up, Jiraiya-sama says that this information is flimsy at best.”
“Yessir.”
Inoichi’s eyes flicker to Kakashi. “You’re dismissed,” he says, finally.
The two ANBU nod. “Yessir.”
Then they turn, masks fitting back onto their faces before Kakashi can glimpse who they are. They seem to blink for a second when they see him leaning against one of the posts holding the tent up, registering who it is who is waiting.
“Captain,” they chorus in unison, saluting in perfect synchrony.
Kakashi nods in return, the two ANBU falling into a more relaxed stance at his acknowledgement. Chakra flaring respectfully as they slip around him to thei outside, Kakashi waits until they’re fully gone before he moves, pushing himself off of the post and reaching up for his own mask. Feeling for the seal’s pulse as it recognises his chakra, Kakashi gently peels it off of his face and breathes in fresh air.
Inoichi doesn’t look up from his desk when Kakashi approaches, gesturing vaguely to the seat opposite. Placing his mask gently on the desk, Kakashi clears his throat, not taking the seat.
He stands to attention, posture straight. “ANBU Captain Hound-04, designation Ninyu, reporting for mission debriefing.”
Inoichi nods just once, still not looking up, fingers moving purposefully through the precisely ordered chaos of his desk. “Yes, yes, welcome back. Sit.”
Kakashi sits. Inoichi then looks up, giving Kakashi full view of his deep eyebags, going for a smile despite his exhaustion. He pauses in his movements, taking in Kakashi’s appearance. “Did you just return?”
“A few minutes ago,” Kakashi confirms.
The blond nods, going back to his rummaging. His moves are economical despite the fatigue weighing on his shoulders, and Kakashi’s eyes track his motions carefully. “Your team?” he asks, genially.
“At medical. There were more survivors than we were expecting.”
“More than two?”
“Imagawa had a child,” Kakashi replies. “A daughter, two years old.”
Inoichi pauses. Then he seems to find what he’s looking for, and reaches out to get it. The scroll is closer to Kakashi though, so Kakashi picks it up to hand it over to him instead. “You keep it,” Inoichi says, “it’s for you anyways. Do we have a mother?”
“Died from childbirth.” Kakashi inclines his head. “We should double-check.”
“I’ll send over a clan member,” Inoichi agrees. “But overall, you were successful?”
Kakashi straightens. “Yessir. Iwagakure ANBU occupying the Duokoku bridge and surrounding areas have been successfully eliminated. It was later rearranged to make it seem as if Suna-nin were the perpretrators.”
Inoichi hums, indicating for him to continue.
“Then we continued onto the Land of Silence, where intel said Imagawa and Mizoguchi were last stationed. They had escaped out to the Land of Flowers, adopting a cover from their post as Konoha-nin in Silence. We followed their trail, and found them. Civilians were caught in the crossfire.”
The Yamanaka continues to nod, probably to convey his understanding in the least amount of words possible. He reaches up to rub a thumb at his temple, probably working through the story in his mind.
Kakashi waits. Something seems to work out in the man’s head, and so when he opens his pale blue eyes once more, he changes the subject swiftly. “Team status?”
“Low chakra,” Kakashi nods, “but still working.”
This time, Inoichi’s question is accompanied with a raised eyebrow. “And you?”
There’s a beat. Then, “Mild chakra exhaustion,” Kakashi admits, because he knows better than to lie to the man in front of him. “Travel will be possible within a few days, though. Do you have our next mission?”
Inoichi smiles, amusement filtering into his face. The smile is fatigued, like every expression he sports, but it’s warm. “I do. It’s something a little different though. Have you been back to the village yet?”
Kakashi blinks at the sudden new topic. The village. Konoha.
He hasn’t thought about the village of Konohagakure in a long, long time.
“Once,” Kakashi answers, after a moment of thinking. It had been after the news had reached Kakashi’s ears about Konoha’s invasion, and he and the Team Ro at the time had flown through all the continents to see if it was true. They had been up in the Land of Earth though, assassinating some kind of civilian merchant, and so it had taken weeks to get down when it should have taken days.
Kakashi still remembers the rubble and the smell of burnt corpses even now. It’s an experience that he still can’t pair with the knowledge of survivors, who are currently living underground of all places.
Inoichi eyes him carefully. Kakashi tries not to squirm to hard underneath the gaze of the previous Head of Torture and Interrogation.
“You’ve been summoned back to Konoha,” Inoichi reveals, and Kakashi’s hand twitches. “Orders directly from the Hokage,” he continues, pretending not to see the rookie-level lapse of control and glances towards him knowingly, “you’re holding the request in your hand right now.”
Kakashi doesn’t need another cue to tell him to open the scroll. It unfurls with a distinct scent of stale air, brushstrokes careful and economic as if to use the least amount of ink as possible.
The first thing he notices is that it is a team transfer request. Then he notices that Team Ro is swapping with another team, which is Team Wen—Team Wen, who has been on Hokage protection duty since the invasion three years ago. The captain is Finch-06, a familiar callsign.
Then Kakashi notices who submitted the report. Nara Shikaku, writes the calligraphy.
“I thought he was in a coma,” Kakashi says, without thinking.
Inoichi does not seem disturbed by the mention of his best friend barely surviving the invasion. “Yes, he was,” Inoichi confirms, “but he woke up a few months ago. In good time, too.”
Kakashi stares at the inked signature for one more prolonged second, before tucking the scroll away. Inoichi watches his movements with a curious but observational eye, and Kakashi offers an eye-smile in response. The two of them are at a brief impasse. Then the moment passes, and Inoichi looks back down at his desk.
“The only people who have the power to alter posts are the Hokage, the Internal Commander, and the External Commander.” Inoichi’s tone makes it sound more like a warning than information. “Do you know who the Internal Commander is?”
The Internal Commander. Kakashi does remember hearing about the self-appointed head of defense. Whilst Inoichi, as the External Commander, is tasked with slowly and discreetly driving unwanted foe out of Fire Country as well as rescuing the last of the stranded Konohan operatives, Shimura Danzou controls everything that goes in and out of the village.
He’s second only to the Hokage. That means he would be Kakashi’s superior.
“Yes,” Kakashi says, when he realises Inoichi is waiting for an answer.
Inoichi watches him. A reaction, maybe? Kakashi does not have any opinions on who his superiors are, because they are, after all, his superiors. He is just an ANBU captain, a soldier following orders. And he likes it like that.
“Take some time to rest before leaving,” Inoichi says, finally, when it is evident Kakashi isn’t going to say more.
“Yessir.”
“When do you plan to leave?”
Kakashi considers. “Sundown tomorrow.”
Inoichi nods. “Okay. Come find me before you go. I have a gift I’d like you to deliver, if you’d like.” Sensing Kakashi’s curiosity, he admits with an infinitely heavier smile, “It’s for my daughter.”
“Ah.” Kakashi knows that’s his cue to leave. “Then,” he says, standing to bow respectfully, waiting for his dismissal.
“You may go,” Inoichi says. “Goodnight, Kakashi.”
Kakashi straightens, and reaches for his mask. Outside, the chakra signatures of weary nin bleed back into his peripheral. “Goodnight, sir.”
—
As expected, Team Ro is sitting in the medical tent, ensnared by the med-nin who probably refused to let them go after they put down the newest additions to camp. When Kakashi steps through the entrance, he almost runs straight into the legs of a med-nin who has thrown themselves on the bed closest to the entrance, barely managing to sidestep and not look like an idiot.
The med-nin snores loudly. “That’s Saisu,” Yuugao says, helpfully.
“Right.” It’s not unusual to see passed out nin, but typically someone would move the body away from entrances. Kakashi decides to gently nudge the man’s legs out of the walkway in case someone else comes in and does trip, before looking up at his team.
Yuugao is perched on a stool beside Tenzou’s medical cot like a cat, heels on her seat and knees tucked up underneath her chin. There is a bandage wrapped around her shoulder, peeking out from underneath her sleeve-less armoured plate. Tenzou, from beside her, has a frown hidden by his mask, but Kakashi can read his annoyance from across the room at the med-nin who is wrapping his knee with a stark white bandage.
“So,” Kouhei prompts, from his own cot beside Tenzou’s, “what’s the plan?”
Kakashi jerks his head to the side, leaning against the foot of Tenzou’s bed. “What’s wrong with these two?”
“Mild chakra exhaustion and a hairline fracture,” Miura reports, from where she sits on the floor between the two cots, legs crossed, motioning at Kouhei. From Kakashi’s higher angle, he’s awkwardly reminded of an Academy student. Then, oblivious to his random remembrance, she points at Tenzou. “Severe chakra exhaustion and chondromalacia.”
“Knee pains,” Yuugao chirps, leaning dangerously forwards on her stool. The back legs lift, but she doesn’t topple over.
Kouhei raises a finger. “Captain, you haven’t answered me yet.”
“Will you be able to run tomorrow?” Kakashi asks, settling onto Tenzou’s cot beside his legs. His second-in-command is too well-mannered to snap at anyone unless he’s running on less than two hours of sleep per day on average, so Kakashi takes the brunt of his dissatisfactory gaze as the med-nin keeps working on his knee. If his mask was off, Kakashi’s pretty sure his right eyebrow would be twitching.
“Who do you take me for?” Kouhei sniffs in typical Hyuuga fashion. “How far are we going?”
“Far enough,” Kakashi acknowledges, before waiting expectantly for Tenzou’s reply. He is, after all, the other one with his own cot.
When Tenzou keeps sending Kakashi his imploring look, evidently trying to convey a message via telepathy, Kakashi just shrugs and says, “Next time, don’t wait until you can’t stand properly on one knee to tell me you can’t carry the chuunin.”
Tenzou crosses his arms petulantly. “How’s your knee?” he shoots back, snidely.
The med-nin’s head snaps around so fast Kakashi’s momentarily afraid she’s going to give herself whiplash. “What about your knee?” she demands. Kakashi’s almost impressed by the way she doesn’t cower underneath the stare of his ANBU mask.
“It’s fine,” Kakashi lies through his teeth, and makes Tenzou’s glare intensify. When the med-nin does not look convinced, Kakashi adds, “If it wasn’t, then I’d be the one dropping the chuunin instead.”
The med-nin’s eyes narrow. “You were pretty close to doing it there to the end,” Miura says, dryly, peering up innocently from her position on the ground.
“Was I?” Kakashi replies, airily, shooting her a look. She responds by putting her hands up in a mock surrender.
The med-nin evaluates him carefully, whilst tightening the last wrap around Tenzou’s knee. His knee jerks upwards as a reflexive response, to which, without looking, the med-nin catches swiftly so it doesn’t smack her in the face.
Kakashi meets her gaze steadily. The veins in her temple bulge and her pale-white eyes sharpen, and Kakashi tries not to react aggressively to her Byakugan scanning his interior system.
She seems to be satisfied with whatever she sees, turning away to gently place Tenzou’s knee back on the cot. Her chakra flares a gentle green-blue as she gives it one final check, movement clinical as Tenzou waits impatiently for the medical attention to be over.
“Well,” Yuugao pipes, “it’s not the first time someone’s dropped a chuunin, so you’ll be alright, guppy.”
Tenzou’s eyebrow definitely twitches behind his mask. “We’re the same age.”
“It’s okay,” she coos, this time leaning backwards in fun, “we know that you’ve had a traumatised childhood and all. The fact that you’ve never had ramen before enlisting or how you’ve actually never accidentally stabbed an Academy classmate gives you an excuse for dropping the chuunin.”
“I didn’t drop the chuunin,” Tenzou grumbles, but is resigned to his status as go-to target for team banter. He glances at Kakashi, as if to say look at what I put up with for your team, and Kakashi pats his leg supportively. He sniffs in response.
Once the bandage is secure around Tenzou’s chronically in pain knee, the med-nin steps back, a clear sign that she’s stepping out. She nods at Kakashi, keeping her head low, and quickly scurries away to leave the team alone, darting out of the tent to the next medical tent, probably.
Miura looks up from where she sits on the ground, shifting her legs gently. “Captain,” she calls, and he turns to look at her. “Both chuunin are psych-cleared.”
“The mother died from childbirth?”
She nods.
Yuugao reaches up to unseal her mask, a small hiss of air escaping as she moves it to rest on the side of her forehead. Her grey-brown eyes seem black in the darkness, and she sighs quietly, glancing past Tenzou and to an unmade cot on his other side.
“How’s his daughter?”
Yuugao inclines her head tiredly at Kakashi’s question. “Exhausted. I don’t think she understands what’s going on.”
“Any longer, and he would’ve been discovered.” Kakashi’s tone is firm. “Iwagawa will have to figure out what to tell her.”
Yuugao hums non-committally. There are mixed thoughts when it comes to rescuing operatives from across the continent, particularly those who haven’t triggered their SOS response—like Imagawa and Mizoguchi, whose mission was public knowledge and filtered through the information network without them knowing. Yuugao and Kouhei is of firm belief that they should hunt down every last Konoha affiliate, just to make sure that all of them are accounted for and no potential traitors lie in waiting; Miura and Tenzou are less passionate, and tend to simply do what they’re told.
Kakashi likes to see the evidence. Typically, Inoichi’s or Jiraiya’s word is evidence enough for Kakashi to accept a mission, even on the edges of the continent.
“Captain,” Kouhei whines, toes wiggling underneath his white sheets. “Where are we headed next? Guppie’ll be able to run for sure—if not, I’ll fuckin’ carry him.”
“You’re not going to carry me,” Tenzou says flatly.
“You said that last time, but then Captain had to carry you home!”
“That was two years ago and it wasn’t you—”
“We’re going home,” Kakashi announces, before they can get into another sprawl.
Tenzou and Kouhei turn to look at Kakashi with an eerie synchrony. Kakashi decides to pat Tenzou’s leg once more, and it twitches underneath his hand as if restraining from kicking at him. Kakashi can’t help but smile.
Before Kouhei, Tenzou had never really risen to bait before—in fact, Kakashi found it hard to elicit any sort of response that was supposed to come from a kid his age. But now, having a peer of similar age who wasn’t afraid to crack jokes amongst the tense atmospheres of the ANBU, Tenzou seems to have made an exception for Kouhei, and now he was being pulled into insubordination through the sheer annoyance he experiences from their resident Hyuuga.
Yuugao says, stool settling on all four feet as she takes in the information, “Shit.”
“That’s fucking crazy,” Kouhei agrees, bewildered. “We’re not going home, are we?”
Kakashi shrugs with one shoulder. “That’s what I said, yes.”
Tenzou is wordless. Miura is similar, but Kakashi can feel the tension in her frame as she watches, her shoulders no longer languid and with a tension that mirrors the ANBU operative she is. Yuugao and Kouhei turn to exchange looks through their respective eyeholes in their masks, before a sparrow and a beaver is looking back at Kakashi, incredulity clear.
“This is not because you hit triple digits, right?” Yuugao says, accusatory. “This is not their roundabout way to reward you, right?”
Kakashi has no idea what she’s talking about. Kouhei does, though. “Hitting one hundred and—” He does the maths quickly in his head. “—two rescued personally operatives across the continent is cool and all, but surely it’s not it?”
“What are they going to give me?” Kakashi deadpans. “A medal?”
“They don’t have the metal to spare,” Miura supplies. “I’ve been told that they’re barely scraping enough for kunai. Also, if we factor in the smuggle route that Captain set up, then he would have long gone over three digits.”
Yuugao snaps her fingers together. “Maybe it’s like a belated congratulations? One of those who got shipped back to Konoha started talking and the higher ups were like, we should totally give this guy a reward.”
Kouhei brightens. “Could be a team of genin. Bright-eyed little brats. Isn’t that what they used to do to captains who retired from the ops?”
“I don’t think Danzou would like that,” Tenzou mutters.
“I wouldn’t like that,” Kakashi replies, quickly moving to dissipate the tension around the name before it can build. “They’re not going to give me genin. We’re on protection duty.”
He doesn’t have to say who it’s for. If it were for anyone other than the Hokage, Kakashi’s pretty sure the order wouldn’t even have gone through.
It’s not that their team is well-suited to guarding—not at all. Team Wen is, from memory, a tracking and recon specialist team, and Team Ro is a purely infil and assassination team. Neither team should technically be on Hokage duty.
It’s probably because of the invasion, and the sheer loss of numbers that all forces have sustained. Still, it’s strange that Team Ro is being pulled from the frontlines; the sheer success they’ve had in the past three years has put them as one of the most pivotal teams in setting up external base, whilst still managing to maintain the record number of operative saved across the continent. Speaking honestly, Kakashi doesn’t think there’s another team with better statistics.
“We’ll be working under Danzou,” Kouhei realises, and Tenzou stiffens. “He’s the Commander there.”
“What?” Miura’s tone is sharp.
“Yeah. He’s the—whatever Commander that Konoha now has. He’s like their Yamanaka-san, but worse.” Kouhei turns to stare at Kakashi. “We’re not…directly under him though, are we?”
Kakashi remembers what’s written on the scroll, and the Nara Shikaku signed on the bottom. “No.” They’ll be under the Hokage’s direct command, since they’ll be a part of his security. Kakashi doesn’t know how much power the Hokage still has now with military autonomy in the hands of the Commanders, but the security detail should be only altered by the Hokage himself. At least, that’s what it was back in Minato-sensei’s reign.
“Shit,” Yuugao repeats. “That man gives the heebie jeebies.”
Kouhei snorts. Kakashi raises a hand, and everyone falls silent. “This isn’t probably what you were expecting, but we need to place personal judgements aside. It’ll be a mission that isn’t like anything we’ve done in the past few years, the closest being camp rotation—and we haven’t done that in a year.”
The team nods together. Kakashi continues. “At most, there’ll be three on the charge at once, so when you’re off-duty, I expect you to be brushing up on sensory skills and defensive jutsu.” He pauses. “Are there any complaints?”
His team is quiet. Yuugao shakes her head, and Kouhei just wiggles his toes again. Miura almost blends into the shadows with her lack of movement and black hair and uniform, but Kakashi knows she’ll voice any disagreement.
Tenzou raises a hand. Kakashi nods at him.
“You’ll be accompanying us?” he asks.
“Yes,” Kakashi says. I’m your captain, goes unsaid.
Tenzou shrugs. “Okay. I’ll follow you.”
Kakashi pats Tenzou’s leg once more, and this time, there is no twitch. They must look like a funny group, masks still on despite being a private tent. They never do take it off unless ordered to, too used to living with the mask on like a second face.
Still, they’re a team. Kakashi can feel it.
“Fuck,” Kouhei says, slightly breathless, “Konoha, here we come.”