Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Chapter Text

Seiko comes home from a long shift in the tower one day to a tiny, bristly little dog with an attitude. Oh, and she also met Pakkun. 

“He’s adorable,” Seiko says, absolutely delighted. “Look-- he looks like he can fit on Biter’s head!” 

“Don’t test that,” Pakkun states, voice comically lower than what his little pug body should be able to produce. “Kakashi, tell her to leave me alone.”

“Dad says he’ll grow bigger,” Kakashi says, hand gestures growing sweepingly large as he demonstrates Pakkun’s potential size to her. Bigger than Biter, with sharp teeth and a heavy weight to him. A dog for ripping throats and guts and viscera.

“Uh huh,” Seiko says. 

Biter has consented to a modified harness, a simple one with a strap that she can grab on to. He hadn’t wanted it-- something like that is a terrible weakness in a battlefield, a handhold your enemy will use against you. 

But he loved her more than he loved battle, so she wrapped her shaky hands around a harness. 

“He will.” 

Her little brother is so defensive. What’s he got to prove to anyone?

“Okay,” Seiko says. “Sure. He’ll be big and tall. Taller than me.”

Pakkun looks between the two of them, lost and slightly confused. 

“Kakashi...” he says. “I.. that’s not...”

“He’s going to be perfect,” Kakashi says, scooping the little pug up and holding it in his arms. 

Seiko smiles at him.

“It’s not enough that he’s a genius?” She says, voice gentle. “That he can talk? Most ninken can’t do that.”

That only makes Kakashi angrier.

“I bet Biter can talk,” he mutters, shaping his fingers against Pakkun’s back. “He just doesn’t do it when I’m around.”

She doesn’t recognize the sound of her own laughter until Biter joins in with her, both of them shaking with it. 

“Don’t worry, genius,” she says. “Everything Biter says about you, he says to your face.”

Genin aren’t allowed to sit at the main desk and hand out missions, owing to issues of life-or-death responsibility, classified information, and the ability to abuse your position to unfairly inconvenience anyone you don’t like.

“D-Rank Mission: Clean Training Grounds 14-17,” Seiko says, indifferently shoving the scroll in question towards the waiting band of genin corps staring down at her from the other side of the table. 

“That’s the ranged target areas!” The man shouts at her. “That’s going to take ages .”

“Have a nice day,” Seiko says, and goes back to attempting to find whatever arcane system of a bygone era her ‘supervisor’ had used to organize the scrolls. So far she’s managed to eliminate the idea that he had done it by rank, and now she was almost certain that it also hadn’t been alphabetized, or color coded. 

“Don’t tell me to have a nice day, little girl--” The man pauses, perhaps realizing the terrible end that comes from yelling at someone who could not more clearly not want to hear it.

But that dim hope quickly fades. 

“You’re a genin ,” he says, managing to sound both deeply betrayed and smug at attaining the higher ground. “You’ve got less seniority than I do! Why don’t you run along and clean the training grounds, and I take a look at those missions, hm?”

Seiko hears a vague growl from below the desk. 

“The form to transfer from the genin corps to working in the tower is around her somewhere,” Seiko says, eyes not even shifting from where she’d been scanning through the filing system below the desk. “We're very short staffed at the moment. I was ditched-- sorry, I was offered an emergency momentary promotion-- because the coffee machine exploded upstairs and took several files with it. But the transfer form was not in that file, I promise....”

Strangely, there’s no response-- the man in question appears to have taken his mission and left while she wasn’t paying attention. 

“Biter,” Seiko says, voice mild. 

Biter’s tail thumbs back and forth as it wags. 

“Good boy.” 

“Good job, Hatake.” Ensui Nara’s hand claps her shoulder as the man stares down over her with unbelievably stereotypical Nara arrogance and laziness, for all the world a ninja unaware that he’d left his newest and least experienced recruit to handle the front lines for over 5 hours while he sat and contemplated the pros and cons of attempting to requisition a new coffee maker. “I knew you could handle it.”

“I signed your name on all the forms,” Seiko says. “Hope your handwriting is illegibly bad.”

Her hands still shake, after all.

“Oh, it is.” The jounin rummages around in one of his many pockets until he finds a new pack of bubblegum to pop into his mouth and blow out an obnoxiously large pink bubble. “You know, if you went and got a chunin promotion, you wouldn’t need to put up with all this blowback.”

This guy.

“I wouldn’t have any blowback if I wasn’t doing chunin jobs.”

The bubble pops.

“We’re understaffed, you know,” the guy who does no work says. “No one works here all the time. Not Tonbo, not Chobee--This is just what you do while you wait to do something else.”

Seiko glares at him. 

“You run the whole tower,” she says. “What are you waiting for?”

He fakes looking hurt. 

“Now, Hatake. The Hokage runs the--”

Alarm bells erupt through the building. 

Asuma Sarutobi is almost two years older than Kakashi, but what he lacks in her little brother’s natural talent at being irritating, he makes up for in practice at being snotty, angry, and extremely petulant. His spiky brown hair both sticks straight up and manages to fall into place to form a sort of mullet, which is the sort of look that should make him very glad indeed that photography is a rare commodity not to be wasted on keeping funny pictures of your children. 

Which is a shame, because Seiko has seen Kakashi do some truly humiliating things to his hair. 

“All I did was take one thing from dad’s office,” Asuma mutters, scuffing his foot as he stares at his new entourage of several ANBU, all three of the current mission desk staff members who’d been working today, and the very displeased glare of the Yamanaka head of T&I, since they sometimes used the upper offices. “What’s the big deal?”

Seiko’s grip tightens on Biter’s harness as she sways slightly, the stairs she’d needed to climb to get up here now making it feel like someone had jammed a whole new set of poisoned needles through her knee. She looks at Ensui in the vague hope that he’ll take charge so everyone can go home, but he’d just gone right back to loudly chewing gum the minute he realized they were in no real danger. 

The ANBU, too, seem more than content to just stand there, blank faced behind white masks. Bastards.

“Oh, only a matter of security that will involve me manually resetting all the seals specifically designed to warn me of thievery in the office,” The T&I person says, airy voice not at all gentling the irritated cadence of his delivery. “Please, young master. Don’t pay any consideration to the effort of protecting our precious village’s secrets.” 

“What secrets?” Asuma demands, crossing his arms. “There’s nothing interesting in here! Just a bunch of boring old junk! See!?” 

He tosses an old kunai at the ground, causing both ANBU agents to quite suddenly dive for it, one closing their fingers over its handle seconds before it hits the ground. 

Ah.

Seiko distantly notices she’s shifted back into a sword stance only when her hands close around nothing, not having brought her weapons to the tower. She blinks, awkwardly slinking a little further backward out of embarrassment that she’d been the only one to have such a noticeable flinch. 

“I’ll head back downstairs,” she says, voice flat. “We left the desk unattended.”

“Oh, no...” Ensui drawls, and she suddenly realizes that the shadows itself in the room have curled uncomfortably close to young Sarutobi, with one of the ANBU not moving to grab the kunai but instead, possibly, protect the kid from the edge of a startled jounin or two. “I couldn’t possibly leave you to do that. Shouldn’t kids be able to talk to each other? No, I think... I’m going to go head down there with Chobee. Have fun, all of you!”

She hopes he swallows his gum and it clogs his intestines and gives him constipation for the rest of his life. Chobee’s half apologetic glance behind his tiny spectacles just makes her wish the same fate on him as they both escape, leaving her behind. 

“I’m not a kid,” Asuma says, voice sullen. “And who are you , anyway!? I thought ‘kids weren’t allowed in the Hokage’s tower’” The sing-song tone of his voice as he looks back at his ANBU certainly conveys a well-tread argument. 

“I’m not a kid,” Seiko says. “I’m a ninja.”

Did she remember to wear her... ah, yeah. 

She points at the head piece slung casually over Biter’s head, watching both the ANBU and T&I inspector’s gaze latch onto the scars on the back of her wrists and not the forehead protector. They should guess what her elbows look like. 

“See?”

“That looks like the dog’s the ninja, not you,” Asuma says, not at all convinced. “I bet that’s your dad’s ninken. Okay, you two. You can kick her out of the tower as well!” 

Now that the only people left are his guards, her, and the now mostly silent T&I guy, he’s a lot more courageous, huh.

Biter growls a little, a low, unhappy sound. 

“I’m glad it wasn’t an emergency after all,” Seiko says politely. “Looks like I’ll also be heading back down. I have... files. Letters. Numbers, even.”

“Hey!” Asuma’s voice raises sharply. “Why aren’t you guys kicking her out!”

The ANBU on the left-- she’s never bothered looking at one for this long. Is her mask supposed to be a.. Lizard? Clears her throat. 

“You’re... Sakumo’s eldest, right?”

Seiko freezes. Unfortunately, the Yamanaka also looks in her direction.

“Eldest and heir,” Seiko says, voice dead. “If that’s all--”

“I’ll escort her downstairs,” Lizard says. “Bullfrog, you take the kid for a bit.”

“Hey!? Hey! I’m not--”

Seiko kind of wishes she was back in that room. A stairway with an overly interested ANBU is almost a downgrade in circumstances.

Almost. 

“Heard your team went down fighting Chiyo Poisontongue and her team,” Lizard says. “Most don’t walk away from that.”

Seiko snorts.

“Wasn’t walked. Dragged.” She gives Biter another scratch behind the ear, then clings even tighter to the halter strap as she takes the first of hundreds of steps. 

“She probably targeted you because of the hair,” Lizard says, voice casual. “Her son died last year to the White Fang.”

Don’t let Hoheto hear that, or he’ll really kill her for getting Kiyomu killed and him crippled. 

“It’s not common knowledge who I was up against,” Seiko says, eyes flickering from the dog to the stairs to anywhere except her new conversation partner. “Don’t think dad knows.”

“I’m something of a poison expert myself,” Lizard muses, voice completely unchanged from her original mild cadence. “No one thought you were going to make it, due to Lady Tsunade not being available to counter the poison.”

“Thanks.”

Seiko doesn’t know why this lady is so interested, and can think of absolutely no good reason. 

“And yet here you are, whole and hearty.”

“I’m not hearty. I take daily medicine.”

“You’re well enough to work,” Lizard says. 

“I’m sickly. I’m injured. I’m frail.” Seiko is, in fact, about to lose her grip on the harness because her hands are shaking so badly. It works much less well as a balancing aid when going downstairs rather than upstairs, due to the cruel laws of gravity and all that. 

“Yes, yes...” There’s a strange, indulgent cadence to her tone. A mother speaking to a recalcitrant child.  “If you ever tire of the doldrums of the tower, you could always visit the hospital. They're always on the lookout for people with poison resistance.”

“I’m not poison resistant. I’m still poisoned.”

Seiko closes her eyes for a second to resist a migraine spike that risks sending her tumbling into a neck breaking fall, and when she opens them, she’s all alone in the stairwell.

Typical. 

Sakumo means well.

She knows that. She does. That’s why it’s good, and not frustrating, that he’s managed to be home for almost a month straight. She wants him to be home. But-- she and Kakashi had their little, terrible routine. It was never obviously an issue that neither of them were ever home during daylight hours because both of them were busy, him with his new Jounin-sensei and her with the mission desk. 

But it makes their dad sad that his children don’t play. 

Even so--

Even so--

Seiko swallows an ugly swear word as the frisbee Biter had jumped for and missed hits her square in the face, knocking her on her ass as Biter runs up to her, tail wagging back and forth. 

“Nice catch, Seiko!” Sakumo yells from the other side of their yard. It’s late evening, the setting sun jealously dyeing all of their silver hair in its own brilliant gold light. On the side lines, Kakashi scoffs, too cool to play until it becomes something he can show off and beat her at. 

“Let me do it instead,” Kakashi says, right on schedule. “Pakkun can catch that.”

“Hmm...” Sakumu says, the deep tiredness in his voice slightly lifted as he pretends equivalent indifference to Kakashi’s little play. “I don’t know... I think Biter and Seiko were just getting into the moment.”

What moment? The moment of asking a 180 pound dog to jump after a frisbee?

Biter whines as he rubs against her knees, apologetic that he let her get hit. 

“Me and Pakkun can do it,” Kakashi says, loyally supporting his tiny dog. Honestly.. She thought he’d have tried summoning more by now, but he appears to think that if he summons more that would imply that he thinks that Pakkun is less awesome than Biter, which, while obviously true, is unpalatable.

Biter came with the agreement that as long as she had him, she’d never summon another. That she would spend the rest of her life permanently hosting in him enough chakra that he would never have to de-summon. 

Pakkun, has, like, pack-mates back in the Spirit World. Hopefully he’d talk to Kakashi about it.

“Catch!” Pakkun does the yell instead of Kakashi, just in time for the frisbee to hurtle over Seiko’s head and bury itself with a solid thunk several inches into a tree trunk.

“That could really hurt someone,” Seiko observes, not getting up off the ground.

“Not if you’d caught it,” Kakashi says. “You used to be good at this game.” 

Kids.

“Kids,” Sakumo says, voice exasperated. “Let’s try to get along for five minutes, alright?”

“Yes, Father,”

“Yes, dad.”

“Excuse Me! Young Maiden of Valor!”

Oh, no.

Seiko blinks up from where she’s been taking a short nap on the mission desk to see a true vision of green and black peering down at her.

“Yes...?” She says, scrambling to sit up straight. “Can I help you? Sir?” 

There’s a bit of an odd expression in his eyes, like he hadn’t expected to get any sort of willing response at all. 

“Sir?” Seiko repeats, trying to rub the sleep out of her eyes. It doesn’t work. 

“There Is No Need to Refer To Me as ‘Sir’, Young Maiden! After All, Are We Not the Same Rank?”

Oh, yeah. He’s a genin.

“That’s okay,” Seiko says. “I don’t use sir for higher ranks anyway. Can I help you?”

If people who work at the mission desk have baggage about how they're referred to, they don’t last very long at the village’s one and only place to receive complaints. 

Another slight shift of his eyes underneath his very thick eyebrows. Is it.. What? Embarrassment? 

“The Springtime of Youth is Eternal! Unfortunately, the Fleeting Nature of Meeting and Parting with My Fellow Man Has Lead Me To Constantly Be Searching For New Wonderful Training Partners!”

It’s kind of him to pause long enough for her to parse out what on earth he’s talking about.

“You... don’t currently have some other genin working with you, and you need them because all D-ranks are team assignments,” Seiko says, checking to make sure.

“Truly, Your--” he pauses, coughs. “Truly, the young maiden is both valiant and wise beyond her years.”

“Thanks. Well...” Seiko rolls out the word as she shifts through various scrolls, pausing her and there for her fingers to quit twitching as she looks for what she needs. She doesn’t envy whoever does this work when she’s not in the office, because Ensui’s organizational system based on time of arrival has now been thoroughly overlaid by her supplemental sort of rank qualification. Basically, where previously only Ensui could find things, now no one can.

“Got it.” She slaps a couple of different scrolls onto the table, drama ruined by a twitch of her finger sending one to roll off the edge of the desk, which Might Duy scrambles to catch and put back on the table. “Let’s start with that one.”

Might Duy opens it and scans the contents, brows wrinkling. 

“I’ve never seen this before...” he says. “Is this a brand new assignment!?”

“It’s not.” It’s just usually not the first option. “This is an open ended list for qualified ninja with a certain number of years of seniority to volunteer to field test any new seal that Konoha’s hospital or any other department would like to be put through its paces. Payment and rank scales according to danger, and as a genin you’d only be allowed to work with the relatively safe ones. It’s not exactly what you were--”

If his taijutsu was normally as fast as the hand that reached out to put brush to paper, there was no reason at all for him to have not made chunin. 

“Not a maiden, but an angel!” He says, staring at her with burning eyes. “Helping Konoha Learn and Grow Is The Greatest Honor Imaginable!”

Seiko just blinks.

“Yeah. So, if you’ll open the next scroll--”

He nearly rips the parchment he opens it so fast, eyebrows flying up across his forehead.

“Again, this isn’t exactly what you asked for. This is a C-rank mission that the client sent back to us as failed. Naturally, the team that failed the task should be the ones to properly apologize and restore Konoha’s reputation, but since the team in question promptly went on to die, there needs to be someone else. One of the T&I guys came down and investigated whether it really was a C-rank and not a missclassed B; he said yes but Tonbo from tracking said no, and Ensui believes Tonbo. So an apology but no refund.”

Seiko pauses for breath. 

“Unpopular as that will be,” she tacks on. 

Really, a solo job is just a job that no one wants to do.

Might Duy takes her warning in stride, eagerly accepting that scroll as well. 

“An important mission...” he breathes. “I shall venture to deeply apologize and give all possible consolations!” 

“As long as you don’t give them money. The third one is--”

She stops talking as Might Duy frantically shakes his head back and forth. 

“This is... more than enough,” he says, cradling the one mission scroll in his hand while earnestly bobbing his head up and down. “I have just one last question-- I need the name of my most gracious benefactor!”

All she’s done is offer him unwanted tasks that didn’t even fulfill what he’d wanted from her.

“I’m Seiko.”

The pause stretches on. As if most people couldn’t tell just from looking at her. 

“Hatake.” 

His eyes round out until they could be mistaken for the bottom of exclamation points.

“Hatake-san,” he starts.

“Just Seiko.”

“Seiko-san! What an honor to meet my son’s rival’s older sister!” 

Is that.. Anything?

“I didn’t know Kakashi had made any friends his age,” Seiko says. She should probably have tried to encourage him more to hang out with the other kids, but she’d been gone a lot of the only year he’d been in school. “What’s his name?” 

Duy nearly explodes with pride.

“Guy! I named him Guy. He’s such a hard worker that they allowed him to enter the academy as a substitute candidate on his taijutsu alone! I know he has it in him to graduate and become a genin-- no, become chunin-- no, jounin! That’s what it means when you’re willing to work hard and embrace your passion! When you’re spurred on by your Rival!” 

“He sounds like a good kid,” Seiko says, unaware of how it looks for a nine year old to say that. “I’m glad that--”

A jounin plus her genin team enters the room. Two of the genin graduated the same year as she did, though both of the girls are a little older than her. 

“Oi, Seiko!” One of them yells. “Quit talking to that loser, his lack of potential’s gonna rub off on you. We need a new mission-- a hard one. Who knows, the next time you see us, it might be at our promotion ceremony!”

Seiko ignores them. 

“I’m glad that he’s doing so well in school,” she says. “I’ll look into if any genin groups have an available slot. Ensui’s the one who has final say over teams, even if he lets everyone sort it out among themselves.”

If Ensui cracks down on a group, they won’t dare tell Duy he can’t be part of their team just because he’s a little clumsy and talentless. That’s nothing short of defying the will of fire. 

Duy bows so low he’s perpendicular to the floor.

“You are the everblooming rose of victory!” He announces. “Truly my son has new heights to aspire to!”

“Kakashi’s pretty short, though,” Seiko says. “It’s all hair.” She finally turns to the next team, who’s jounin watches with indulgent indifference as the genin fidget and twitch. “Hi. How can I help you?”

“A hard mission,” repeats Iwana, voice rising a little in frustration. “I just told you, Seiko!”

“A C Rank,” their jounin says. His hands tap out the parameters behind his student’s back-- Land of Rivers, or Land of Hotsprings if that’s available. 

Land of Hotsprings is never available. You want those, you had better be best friends with Ensui himself. Hells, forget Ensui. You’d better be friends with the Hokage. 

Seiko pulls up a mission scroll. 

“Congrats,” she says. “Someone’s fish has just recently gone missing.” 

“Seikoooo....” 

She should’ve taken it as the huge warning sign it was when Sakumo had started trying to connect with Kakashi through helping him summon. Even though the dog contract was from their mother, just the act of supporting Kakashi’s tiny little chakra reserves enough to get a few more little puppies to bounce through the summoning circle and chew on the furniture was enough to really make their house echo with nostalgic, long forgotten noise.

That nostalgia--

If only it had prevented Sakumo from offering her a sword. 

Seiko stares at him, trying not to feel ambushed after coming back from walking Biter at the crack of dawn. 

“Hi, Seiko,” he says. 

“Hi, dad,” Seiko says. “You’re up early.” 

He smiles down at her, weary lines deepening below his eyes at her observation. 

“I actually have a mission coming up later today,” he says. “Biter keeping you in shape?” 

“He likes this time of day,” Seiko says, hoping that if she continues to ignore the sword, he’ll eventually drop it. “It makes him frisky.” 

Biter nuzzles into her side. 

“I see,” Sakumo says. “I thought you hated it, when I woke you up to train.”

Seiko smiles at him helplessly. 

“You get used to it,” she says. “It was fun.” 

Don’t ask her, please don’t--

He brightens up so fast. 

“We should run through a couple drills,” he says. “I notice your hand tremors have been getting better, lately!”

...

There are many ways she can be more subtle about her injuries. Instead of using a bandage the way she’d done against Hoheto, for example, she could manipulate chakra to ‘stick’ the sword to her hand, allowing for a certain level of leeway whenever her fingers convulse around the hilt and she’d otherwise drop the weapon.

She could modify her stances to give up some level of stability in favor of positioning her knee in a way that hurts less. She could use Biter as a distraction whenever she needs to fall back. She could--

Kakashi should still be asleep right now. Good. 

Seiko grabs the sword out of his hand and then throws it through a window, listening to the glass shriek and crack as the sword hits the ground outside. 

“Oops,” she says, voice flat. “My hand slipped.” 

“Seiko--”

Her stomach feels curdled, and her throat and neck is hot. She hates upsetting him. 

She walks back out of the house. There’s nothing wrong with showing up to the mission desk a few hours ahead of her normal shift-- Chobee runs it at this hour, and he’ll have brought breakfast. 

He squints at her through his spectacles, warm red swirls on his cheeks highlighting his walrus handle mustache as he offers her a full bowl of rice, still warm. 

“Seiko-chan, you’re limping,” he observes, pulling out a chair for her. “Waking up too early can impact the chakra balance of the young mind.”

That sounds like complete nonsense.

“Hi, Chobee,” Seiko says. “What do you even do at this hour, anyway?”

He looks awfully busy for someone working at a place that doesn’t receive any major traffic for another few hours. 

“Oh, you know...” Chobee says vaguely, before very obviously looking around and checking for evesdroppers. “You know we're understaffed, so this is actually supposed to be jounin only. And kept in the upper offices. Ahem. Anyway, we keep a record of every ninja who’s been killed or gone missing in the line of duty on file, as well as what mission they died on, known family, all of that. Someone’s requested a look through and record of age of academy graduation versus known age of death in the past 5 years, I think because there’s some pushing back and forth on changing the academy graduation requirements again? Honestly, it feels like they change that thing every year.” 

“I can help,” Seiko says.

Chobee does a big show of hemming and hawing, but in the end he pushes a huge stack of papers in her direction.

“All of these need to be back under lock and seal in an hour,” he says. “Or Ensui’s going to kill us both.”

“Isn’t this his job to begin with?” Seiko sighs, feeling the tremors in her hands start up immediately as soon as she tries to put ink to paper. It’s fine, no one cares if the marks are illegible.

“Technically, either Tonbo or Yakumi are qualified as well...ah, have you met Yakumi yet, Seiko?”

“No, I haven’t.” 

Raido Namiashi, graduated age 10, current rank: genin. Still Alive. 

“I think you’d like her. But she’s Uchiha, so she’s not allowed to work here full time. So she’s over in the Police right now. But she’ll come back next month!” 

Aoba Yamashiro, graduated age 8, current rank: genin. Still Alive. 

“Oh, wait... I think she might’ve been the one on duty when I asked to transfer here.”

Kiyomu Fukuda, graduated age 9, current rank: genin. Died age 9 on Rank C mission upgraded to Rank S mission. 

“Oh, is that so? That’s wonderful! She usually gets a ton of complaints from the desk about not being helpful enough.” 

Iwana Akame, graduated age 11, current rank: genin. Still Alive. 

“It was Ensui who wasn’t helpful at all,” Seiko mutters, quietly inputting more and more of the data points while doing her best to keep her rice and chopsticks away from everything. 

Hoheto Hyuga, graduated age 9, current rank: genin. Still Alive

“It’s his job to make sure everyone who works here can be trusted,” Chobee says, voice matter of fact. “The Hokage trusts Ensui-san completely, and that means Ensui takes responsibility for all of this.” 

Yoshino Nara, graduated age 10, current rank: chunin. Still Alive. 

“Responsibility? Ensui ?” 

Tsume Inuzuka, graduated age 9, current rank: jounin. Still Alive. 

“He’s actually quite young for this position, you know,” Chobee says. “He just seems so old to you because you’re so young yourself.” 

Kakashi Hatake, graduated age 5, current rank: genin. Still Alive.

“Why’d he come here, then? Surely there’s better places for an up and coming young jounin.” 

Chobee gives her a rather sad look.

“Surely there’s better places for an up and coming young genin,” he says, voice gentle. 

Seiko gives him an ugly look in return. 

“You’ve made your point,” she says.

“What’s this?” Ensui’s voice floats down the hallway as he wanders into the room, summoned from some cushioned pit of hell by Chobee’s defense of his character. “Gossip? So early in the morning?” 

“Data analysis is boring work,” Seiko says.

“Wow!” Ensui yawns. “Sure glad that you two are so on top of that, then. A great day for you to pitch in and come to work ahead of time.” His own hair is halfway falling out of its own ponytail, looking a lot like he’d done it in a hurry, blindly, in a windstorm. 

Seiko glowers at him, then looks down at the sheet. What was--

Ah. 

Seiko Hatake, graduated age 9, current rank: genin. Still Alive.

Chapter Text

“Heard your dad started another war,” someone says to her, ugly look in their eyes as they storm up to the mission desk. 

She’d thought she’d have more time. 

“Excuse me,” Seiko says politely, then gets up and walks upstairs, leaving the guy to stare at an empty desk. “Ensui, you have to take the mission desk. I’m going home.”

“Ah, Seiko,” Ensui says. “Bad news. We’re back on potential war footing, so Tonbo and Chobee are both back on active duty, starting tomorrow. Start trying to recruit some more people, ‘kay?” 

“I--” Seiko stares at him blankly. 

“I need to go home,” she repeats. “Right now.” 

“Seiko-chan,” Ensui says. “We’re understaffed.”

She’s growing to hate that phrase.

“I need,” she repeats, “To leave. Ensui, everyone at the front desk is coming in with a grudge.” 

It’s not normal for a mission failure to spread this fast. Did his teammates immediately come back and start talking? Who are Sakumo’s teammates anyway? He’s never brought them home. 

There’s something close to pity in Ensui’s eyes.

“Leaving isn’t going to make them hate you less,” he says. “You’re good at this job, Seiko. Don’t show weakness now.” 

He doesn’t get it. 

“Who cares about them!?” Seiko tries to keep her voice even. “I’ll be back in an hour. I need to go find--” She stops short. Who does she need to find? Sakumo, whose death might be closer than her vague memories had ever warned her... or Kakashi. He’s used to Sakumo being the coolest guy. Someone you can brag about. Should she try and brace him?

You used to be good at this game.

Kakashi will be fine. 

“I need to go find my dad,” she says. “He’s going to take this badly.” 

“He knew what the consequences would be,” Ensui’s voice is flat and cold. “He made his choices, and now we all get to live with them.” 

The only people in the entire village who would be happy about something like this are the old warmongers and the young and ambitious. This is Hoheto’s ticket up the ranks, if he lives through his second war. 

“Ensui-san,” Seiko says. “He made his choices, and now I get to live with him.” She bites her lip, stress inflaming her aches and pains until she’s swaying where she stands. 

His laughter is sharp. 

“Take your hour, kid,” he says. “The only place you’re going to be living from now on is at that desk.” 

He’s never looked younger than today, the laziness stripped away from his nature to reveal the honed edge of someone who twitches whenever someone new enters the room that he doesn’t know. 

“You’re only eight years older than I am,” Seiko says. A seventeen year old who talks like an old man. 

“Kid, I’ve been a jounin for longer than you’ve been alive.” 

That’s not true. She’s seen his file: He’s only been a jounin for six of those years. Just long enough that every year of it happened during a war. 

“I can’t recruit anyone without your approval,” Seiko says, instead. “There’s no point.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Ensui says, contradicting himself without a sign of shame. “There’ll be newly injured chunin and jounin trapped here soon enough-- if they can get through you, I’ll give them a chance.” 

And what was that supposed to mean?

She hasn’t attempted any kind of body flicker in the last month, and the rust nearly sends her falling off a rooftop as her foot slips and she collapses, Biter’s jaws firmly clamping around her sleeve the only thing that stops her from a second hospital visit as he pulls her back onto solid ground. Well. Solid roof. 

Seiko just lies there for a second, panting. 

“This used to be easy,” she tells Biter.

He gives her a somber nod. 

It’s never going to be easy again. 

She climbs back up to her feet, and properly readies herself for her next flicker. She can do it. She can do this-- she just. Needs. To go home. 

And then...

Sakumo is weeding in the backyard. The garden often goes to hell when he’s on long missions, the yard being a non necessity that Kakashi doesn’t tend to and Seiko hasn’t tried to deal with. Weeds creep up everywhere, waiting for the dip of the spade. 

She breathes out a sigh of relief. 

“Hi, dad,” she says. “Welcome home.” 

His back stiffens, even though he’d known she was there.

“Seiko..” he says. He sounds soft, uncertain. Either Kakashi’s already talked to him, or he just has low expectations. “I’m back.” 

“Yeah, I heard.” 

His face tightens. 

“Seiko,” he says again. “I...”

The mission had come before Kakashi’s graduation, her birthday, and their mothers funeral, but it hadn’t come before his teammates' lives. Well, that’s how it is. 

“I’ve never met your teammates,” Seiko says. 

She always gets the most bitter of smiles out of him. 

“I’d always intended to introduce you to them when the time was right...” he murmurs. “But young children always made them quite skittish.”

Seiko snorts, crossing her arms. 

“They should’ve been forced to do more D-ranks when they were genin, then.”

“And how many D-ranks did you do, Seiko?” Sakumo says, voice almost teasing.

Living with Kakashi qualified as a D-Rank, though she bet Ensui would’ve been willing to reclassify it as a C. 

“Enough.” 

She rolls her eyes. 

“I gotta head back to work soon,” she says. “I just...”

Got really worried.

“Forgot something at the house.” 

A bit of the light fades  out of his eyes. 

“I am sorry, Seiko,” he says. 

For what? For breaking the rules he raised her and Kakashi by? Or because she’s about to bear the brunt of a lot of public dislike?

She gives him the benefit of doubt. He probably hasn’t even realized what her being at the mission desk is going to mean. Well, she certainly isn't going to tell him. He needs to be-- helped. Stabilized. Something. 

Her foot hurts where she had taken a final plunge off a roof to get here. 

“Kakashi’s going to be a little annoyed,” she says. “He doesn’t mean it.” 

He does mean it.

“I know. He’s a good kid.”

He’s a good ninja.

“Dad...” she swallows her words, unused to sounding so young. “It’s... I mean...” 

The thing is, her teammate is already dead. 

And he had died-- slowly. Screamed. Begged. Chiyo Poisontongue had strung him like a puppet and the strings themselves were poisoned. She’d had one of those strings hooked into each of her arms. Only Hoheto had been without them, gentle fist cutting through the chakra threads. 

So why should her dad’s teammates get to live, when Kiyomu is dead? That’s what she wants to know, but, most precisely, that’s what everyone in Konoha will want to know. And there’s no answer: only that the will of fire burns its upholders. 

“Are you coming with me to clean the grave?” 

It’s probably going to depress him more: it’s probably going to make him worse, and be all her fault. But still-- 

He nods. 

“Yes.. that’s coming up, isn’t it.” 

He always takes bad missions this month. 

“Yes,” she says. “Glad to hear it.” 

She’s got to go back to work. 

“Genin currently aren’t authorized to go past the Land of Fire’s borders without specific permission,” Seiko says, carefully not looking at Hoheto standing behind his new teammates. His new jounin-sensei is a lady named Uroko Kurama, who stares at Seiko with an anxious purse to her lips. “Do you have that permission? It would be in the form of a written exception. Or an oral one from the Hokage.” 

“Just let us take it, Seiko,” Hoheto says, nearly spitting the words. “No one’s going to hold you responsible.”

She ignores him.

“I have a different C-Rank available if you no longer can fulfill the requirements for--”

“No, I’ve got it,” Uroko mumbles, digging around in one of her storage seals until she finds the right scrap of paper. 

Seiko looks at it.

It is, indeed, signed by the Hokage.

I have every faith these young genin can handle themselves. 

The Hokage had signed one of these for her team, as well. 

“Here you go,” Seiko says, and hands over the C-Rank. “Next in line?”

Kakashi is sitting on the front steps of their home, arms crossed. 

“Hey genius,” Seiko says to him. “Did you forget which side of the door had food behind it?”

Kakashi wrinkles his nose at her. 

Then, he hesitates. 

“My jounin-sensei is getting called to the field,” he says. 

Ah.

He’d been delaying so she’d tell Sakumo for him. Wonderful. 

“And he’s taking you?” 

Seiko sits down next to him, ignoring how her legs give way slightly before what should have been a dignified sit and end up letting her fall the last couple of inches until she thumps into the wood. Ouch. 

Kakashi nods, hunching his shoulders. 

“He says I’m good enough.” It’s almost defensive. “Chunin good.” 

“He thinks he can get you a promotion?” 

The thing is, she knows that the jounin will mean this as a kindness. Being a solo genin is rough; being a solo chunin is vastly preferable. It will mean Kakashi has more control over his missions; his housing; his pay; his life. It will guarantee him stability that’s not dependent on Sakumo. 

“He thinks I can get myself a promotion.” 

Okay.

Her gaze slides over to his direction. 

“People respect chunin,” she observes. 

He knows what she’s digging at.

“I don’t get it,” he mutters. “The mission comes first. Mission, then teammates. Everyone knows that.”

He’s able to say it like that because he hasn’t lost any teammates yet. She’s glad for him. 

“There’s never only one path forward,” Seiko says. 

“There’s one path,” Kakashi says. “War. Duh.” 

She elbows him, hard. 

But he makes an important point. There are people who will be mad at their dad for not following the mission, and there will be people mad at him for causing a war-- and while those are overlapping stances, they aren’t the same stance. Something to watch out for. 

“War’s gonna end eventually,” she says.

She knows it doesn’t mean anything to him. 

“He’s been avoiding me,” Kakashi says, abrupt. Hurt. “He won’t train with me.” 

“Maybe he’s injured.” 

“He doesn’t smell injured.”

“You mean he doesn’t smell like blood,” Seiko sighs. “Don’t rely on Pakkun for this kind of thing, genius.” 

“Pakkun’s super smart,” Kakashi says, grumbly. 

“For a puppy,” Seiko says. She uses Kakashi’s shoulder to push herself back up to standing. “Okay, I’ll go talk to him. When are you leaving?”

Another, worse flinch of hesitation, stiffened up with some good old sullenness around the eyes. Uh oh.

“Tomorrow,” he says. 

She’s going to kill him. 

“Sorry,” Seiko says. “I don’t have the authority to accept mission requests. You’ll have to talk to the senior jounin on site, who--”

The man bangs his hands on the desk. He looks civilian, which makes this slightly unusual. Hopefully he’s just gotten lost.

“I don’t care who I have to talk to!” He yells. “I want to pull my child out of the Academy.”

That’s definitely not in her purview.

“This isn’t the Academy,” Seiko says. “And I don’t have any say over Academy students, since they aren’t registered ninjas. You’ll want to talk to--”

She doesn’t know any of the teachers over there. 

“-- Uh. Just a second.” She starts rummaging through her stuff, ignoring the way Biter yips when one of the scrolls accidentally falls on him. “I’m sure we have a list of teaching staff in here. Somewhere.” 

“I wasn’t implying that you had any say over it,” the man-- father, probably-- says, disbelief evident in his voice. “You’re barely a year older than my son!” 

Great. 

“I graduated over a year ago,” Seiko sighs. She pokes at Biter, who casually lifts his head up to show where her forehead protector hangs around his neck. “The good news is that we do allow withdrawals all the way through the moment when you graduate and are assigned a registration number. Did something happen to your son..?” 

Aha. Not a mission so it’s not in Ensui’s insane filing system, teaching staff sounds like a list that Chobee would have made, and Chobee puts his own files in a specific seal underneath the table to keep them out of Ensui’s way. Got it. 

“Not yet,” the man says, voice dark. “But he’s being bullied, I know it.” 

This is unsurprising. 

“I should warn you,” Seiko says, pulling out the list and looking through it. “Children are allowed to attend the Academy without parental permission when they are age 12 or older. And if he really wants to be a ninja, he won’t appreciate this at all.” 

She taps a name that Chobee had circled.

“This is the teacher in charge,” she says. “Say the mission desk sent you.” 

“If he wants to go back at twelve--” There’s a stony look in his eyes. “Well. That’s a long time away.”

Not long enough for the war to be over. But how could this man know that?

“If there’s any--”

A blur of legs bolts into the room and barrels past the man to duck behind the desk.

“I’m not going!” It yells. “I wanna talk to my dad! Right! Now!” 

Oh, dear. 

“You should go,” Seiko says, losing track of whether the man follows her advice as her limited attention falls onto her next problem. 

Unfortunately, the brat recognizes her voice. 

“You! I thought the ANBU had taken you away! Why are you back here!” Asuma Sarutobi whines, voice loud enough that whatever had driven him here surely wasn’t a fear of being chased. 

“I work here,” Seiko says, watching the man leave with a pace so slow that she could almost hear his ears straining to eavesdrop. “I thought that your guards kept better track of you.” 

The kid huffs, tucking some of his hair behind his ear as he continues to crouch behind the desk. 

“Those guys got called away,” he says. “The new ones are wayyy easier to ditch.” 

How charming. 

“And why would you do that?” Seiko wonders. “I wasn’t aware there was something interesting over here.” 

She nudges Biter with her foot. If she’s going to be stuck here during her normal lunch break, the dog needs to go bring her some food. The dog huffs at her. He’s getting lazy, just sitting under her desk all day. 

“My dad comes here!” Asuma proclaims. “I know it, and so do the teachers at the Academy!”

She’s heard that, too.

“He hasn’t been here once in the months I’ve worked here,” Seiko says. “Get lost.” 

“You can’t say that to me,” he says. “And that’s not true! He used to be down here allll the time.” 

“Your information is out of date, kid,” Seiko says. “Better work on that.” 

The kid growls at her. 

“You’re wrong,” he says. “My dad says that it’s important that the Hokage sit at the mission desk. So he can listen to the village.” 

That sounds like a direct quote.

“He hasn’t been here,” Seiko repeats, voice patient. “Since I started working here. If you would like, I can go call Ensui and ask him when the Hokage is next going to take a shift. Perhaps he could fill out the calendar that Ensui d--”

“That won’t be necessary,” a leather-worn voice tells her as an older man with the beginnings of a beard and deep, deep crows eyes walks into the room. 

Should she kneel? That would hurt her knees, and she doesn’t want to. 

“Hello,” she says. “Can I help you with something?” 

The man smiles at her, either amused or approving. 

“Seiko Hatake, was it,” he says. “I’ve heard a great deal about you.” 

She stares at him blankly. 

It’s difficult, really. Most of the time she’s happy in the village, and most of the time she’s okay with working here, and most of the time she’s aware she volunteered to be a ninja and all that. 

Many things in this world are his fault, but most of them are unspecifically his fault, in a way that killing him would do nothing. Which she knows for certain: because when he dies, nothing is improved, and in fact much is made worse. 

And she can’t kill him anyway, so there’s no point in thinking about it. 

“I can’t help you with that,” she says. 

“No?” the Hokage says. “I always felt the best way to learn about people was from their own lips.” 

Crouching behind the desk, Asuma looks furious. 

“It’s not my job to help you with that,” Seiko corrects herself. “Is there anything else?” 

She can feel the weight of the stare of the unseen ANBU who are, somewhere, listening to her. Judging her. 

“You can’t talk like that to the old man,” Asuma says, hurling himself around the corner of the desk to argue with her. “It’s rude!” 

The Hokage makes a pained grimace at being called an old man by his own son. 

“You shouldn’t constantly threaten to send ANBU after me,” Seiko says. “It’s rude.” 

Kid clearly doesn’t like being embarrassed in front of his dad.

“I only did that once!” He insists. “It’s your fault for being so suspicious. I talked to Lizard, and she said she’d put you where you belonged!” 

“Lizard was kind enough to escort me downstairs,” Seiko says. 

“How responsible of her,” the Hokage says. “Now, Asuma. I’d like to speak to Seiko here in private. Would you mind waiting outside for a little bit?”

It’s not really a question. 

Seiko laces her fingers together, trying to ignore their trembling. She shouldn’t have sent Biter away. 

“But, dad--”

“Later, Asuma. I promise.” 

He’s never going to like you more than he does right now, Seiko considers saying. You should prioritize speaking to people who want to be around you. That’s how you maintain relationships.

But what would she know about that?

She stays silent, and eventually, the room echoes her own silence back at her. Until, of course, the Hokage shatters it.

“Now then,” he says. “I’ve been meaning to talk to you, Seiko.” 

Great. 

“I’m not going anywhere,” Seiko says.

“Yes, quite.” 

The Hokage moves around the desk to sit down beside her. 

“Working at the mission desk is quite a big responsibility for one so young,” he says. There’s a kind sympathy in his smile. “I was quite worried when Ensui told me the age of his newest recruit.” 

“Ensui didn’t recruit me,” Seiko says. “I wanted to be here.” 

In a sense of ‘wanting’. 

“That’s a relief to hear,” the Hokage says, smile deepening the beginnings of his crow’s eyes. “It’s actually quite hard to find people with the proper mindset to work here.” 

“It’s not hard work,” Seiko says. Her hands shift over the various scrolls that cover the desk, though they can offer no information on what this man wants from her. “Anyone could do it.” 

She can’t read anything from him. 

“Any chunin could do it,” the Hokage says. It sounds even worse on his lips than when it came from Ensui’s mouth. 

Seiko doesn’t respond. 

The silence drags on until the Hokage clears his throat and continues. 

“Your family has faithfully served Konoha for generations, and your own generation has shown nothing but true talent, faithfully devoted to the village and the Will of Fire.”

Her wrists hurt. 

“Ensui saw that potential, and that’s why he accepted your request to do this important work-- and why I allowed it to continue. But security protocols tighten during war time.” 

“You didn’t talk to Ensui about this,” she says, hoping. 

He probably won’t care that much. 

“Seiko-chan.” She knows it's not uncommon for higher level jounin to be disrespectful, but coming from a genin from a currently disgraced clan, it’s probably less accepted. “I see your potential as well. And I’ve seen your mission track record-- an excellent showing for your age and experience. Many of our most esteemed members can’t claim to have a completed Rank S mission, let alone your well rounded number of C and D ranks.”

Seiko nods. 

“My brother hopes to make chunin shortly after his next birthday,” she says. “Now that the war has started back up, the C-Ranks for genin will become as plentiful for him as they were for my team.” 

Pain, slashed across his face as it so often hurts Sakumo. 

“If your jounin-sensei had survived, both you and your fellow teammate should have been promoted off the back of that mission alone,” he tells her.

Seiko bites down hard on her lip, swallowing before replying.

“Hoheto would be glad if you passed that on to his current sensei. Her name is Uroko Kurama.” 

She doesn’t have to check her papers to remember a simple thing like that. 

“We are talking about you, Seiko Hatake. And your current supervising jounin-sensei is Ensui Nara.” 

“No he’s not.” 

The words just slip out of her mouth. 

It’s the Hokage’s turn to give her an almost baffled look. 

“I don’t have a jounin-sensei,” Seiko says, voice definitive. “I’m unassigned.” 

Another long pause. 

“I see I haven’t been straightforward enough,” the Hokage says, finally. “Seiko. I don’t like a policy of exceptions. You must be a chunin to do the duties you are doing-- so you can accept the idea of Ensui as a jounin-sensei, and act on his requirements to climb to chunin, or you will no longer be allowed to work at the mission desk.” 

Seiko feels her world suddenly turn dizzyingly narrow from the force of her own rage. 

“Thank you for telling me that,” she says, reaching into the desk to pull out the bundle of mission scrolls that she’d organized down there. While it had come in handy whenever she was trying to help Duy, the reason she’d had all that knowledge on hand was much simpler-- she had been doing research on what she, herself could do if she ever stopped working here. “I’ll take one of these as my new mission for the week, then.” 

She stands up, hands grimly clinging to the edge of the table to keep her balance, bows to the Hokage, and walks towards the door to the office. 

It’s actually relatively good timing; she needs to be at home more often to make sure her dad doesn’t--

“Oi, oi,” Ensui drawls from his position in the doorway, one of his hands curled around Biter’s harness to prevent him from shoving into the room. The lunch that Biter had gone to retrieve for her also now dangles loosely from his hands. “I thought you’d at least be a little mean about it, Seiko. That was more boring to watch than you handing out directions.” 

He’s blocking her way. 

“Ensui.” 

She abandons her lunch as a lost cause.

“Let go of my dog.” 

Ensui’s lip quirks up, but there’s a type of death in his eyes. 

“Make me.” 

She blinks at him, and slowly, unwillingly, she looks back down at Biter. 

Leaving a Nara room to plan is inadvisable; the best way to take him down would be a quick strike from an unexpected direction. Ensui gets freaked out by sudden noises and movements, which could be good or bad for her. She doesn’t carry her sword with her in the office. 

The Hokage is still sitting at the desk, watching her.

Biter is waiting for her command.

She’s felt like this before; has walked into traps before. Chiyo Poisontongue had a genin team, and she’d had them round up her and her teammates, drive them into a specific area where all the dead bodies had been replaced by puppetry. The entire field glinting with chakra threads, and invisible web of malice. 

She couldn’t see them. Only Hoheto could. But she could feel them, and she can feel them now. The shadows in this room are dim, but present. 

“Ensui,” she says again. She knows he can hear the warning. But his aim was this moment, so naturally it doesn’t phase him. “I’d like to go home.” 

“You know how it is, Seiko,” he says. “We’re understaffed.” 

She gets it. She gets it she. Understands. 

A chunin exam. 

She could fail it. All she has to do is fail to get past him, and she’s unqualified. It’s the type of exam most could only dream of having-- no risk of dying. A simple task. 

Ensui did it like this as a kindness. Because he knows she doesn’t want to.

She hates him. He doesn’t understand at all-- she has to go home. There’s no option. Kakashi’s birthday is next week. He could make chunin any day after that. Their dad is .. waiting. 

To die. 

“Biter.” Everything in this world. Why can’t she have good things? Is the only thing left just...childish jokes. “No biting.” 

Biter snaps his head back and howls, a spine chilling, mourning sound that sends a pure shockwave of force out, staggering Ensui back and sending every loose paper in the room flying. 

Expecting her to be able to run past a jounin is far too much, unless Biter is willing to drag her corpse somewhere. She pushes herself towards Ensui, the chakra edge that would normally drag across a blade instead dragged along the chopping side of her hand as she lunges towards him--

Only to grind to a halt as his hands form into the seal that stops her hand inches from his neck. 

“You shouldn’t get so close to shadow users, Seiko,” Ensui says. “I’m disappointed.” 

It’s a cruel joke. Of course, she knows plenty of those. 

“I’m trained for close combat,” Seiko says. “What about you? I thought Nara preferred to stay away from people. Set them up, not knock them down.” 

The thing is. She doesn’t actually have any feeling in her left hand. It’s all a chakra-fueled illusion, from start to finish. Even the shaking, the pain, is all an illusion-- with her mind being the only control she has, and well. 

She’ll be the first to tell you her mind’s seen better days. 

Hoheto had called them out, string by string. Cut left. Further up. Keep going. 

“You know me,” Ensui says. “I’m a lone wolf.” 

Cut them out of your flesh. Keep going. 

“Wrong metaphor,” Seiko says. 

Her hand isn’t real. The strings aren't real. The blade that runs along her hand is made of chakra, and it’s real. It’s just like her sword is here with her. Her sword would never abandon her, never leave her. It would cut them extend beyond her and break the strings that keep her here and--

Ensui coughs up blood as the chakra blade stabs through him, his change in movement enough to let her yank free of the shadows and lunge forward again-- only to feel the slick darkness curl around her wrist as the shadow tendril coils around it and lifts her completely off the ground to dangle. 

“My, my,” Ensui says, rubbing the bit of blood off his lip. “You can’t just attack someone without finishing your sentence, Seiko. Now I’m curious.” 

Her wrist hurts.

“You’re a Nara,” Seiko says. “Deer run in herds, so they don’t get picked off.” 

He doesn’t like that she keeps putting him alongside the rest of his family. 

“I could be a wolf.” 

He’s so defensive about it. Maybe he was in ANBU, and he used a wolf mask. That would be...

Hilarious. 

Seiko whistles sharply between her teeth. Then she swings, legs kicking the air until they find safe purchase on the ceiling. Her free hand slams down on the surface of the wooden beams. Her hand isn’t real. Her pain isn’t real. The blood is real. 

“Summoning: Earth Release: Bloody Fang Technique.” 

Biter’s teeth glow with flickering red energy as he leaps at Ensui, only for his fangs to close around nothing but shadow as the clone dissipates, leaving Ensui standing on the other side of the dog. 

“You still haven’t explained the metaphor, Seiko.” 

He’s staring up at her, only to freeze as Biter howls again and lunges at Ensui’s shadow, biting and ripping it as if it were flesh and blood. And the shadow bleeds. 

Now. 

Seiko bolts across the ceiling, scrabbling on all fours to make up for her various limbs failing her. She spots the Hokage’s face as she slips out the open window behind the desk. 

Honestly. Shouldn’t he be happier? 

She drops to the ground, her knee collapsing on itself as she forces even more chakra into another jutsu. 

“Summoning Technique: Return!” 

Biter re-emerges from the ground in front of her, seizing her shirt in his teeth and pulling her back up to her feet as they both run back towards their home. 

It’s not a victory. It’s a loss. 

She knows it, she knows, she knows. 

But--

Still--

“Congratulations, Seiko,” Sakumo says, smiling at her with a confused sort of happiness as she arrives at home, Ensui having made it there ahead of her. “This young man, ah your jounin-sensei...?”

“Direct supervisor,” Ensui corrects. She’s never seen him so uncomfortable. No gum, no papers-- just the stiffness of some injuries to keep him company. 

“Your supervisor,” Sakumo says. “He was telling me that the Hokage himself oversaw your promotion. I’m so proud of you. I knew you could do it.” 

She gnawed off her own limbs to escape one cage. If only doing that again would get her out of this one. 

“Thanks, dad,” she says. “I guess Kakashi will have to wait one more promotion to get ahead.” 

There’s a peacefulness in his eyes. 

“Yes, you and him.. You’re both doing so well.” 

No, no, no... 

But they have a guest.

“You can go now,” Seiko says, voice flat. 

“Seiko!” Her dad sounds kind of horrified.

“Candid as always.” Ensui also looks ready to chew off an arm if that’s what it takes to leave. But, for some reason, he stays where he is. “Seiko, I’m a curious soul. You know that.”

He’s incurious about paperwork. 

“You said I got the metaphor wrong.” 

He’s so insistent. Why does he even care?

“You did. When a deer falls behind the heard, they abandon them. But when a wolf falls behind the pack, they bring them back to the den.”

Her father takes a sharp breath.

“I see,” Ensui says.

She doubts it. 

Chapter Text

She and Kakashi's birthdays are only a week apart, her turning 10 as he turns 6. So it goes like this; he has a birthday; she gives him a notebook. For writing down all of your half baked jutsus. It has an embossed paw print on the cover. She has a birthday; he gives her a modified harness for Biter, customized to look like the chunin vest she doesn't wear. At least the dog has some pride. The stitchery on the leather has such a vast array of quality it is impossible not to notice which parts Kakashi did, and which parts Sakumo had taken on himself.

She goes home from work, and Sakumo is there, weeding their garden. He hasn't taken another job since he got back. There's a quietness in him.

"Hi, dad," she says. Biter barks from behind her legs.

He looks up, greets her with a gentle smile.

"Hello, Seiko," he says. "It's good that you got back. I wanted to talk to you about your brother's promotion gift."

He'd tried to give her a promotion gift. His own saber. It's still there, sitting on his desk. Waiting.

"He's already got everything," Seiko says. "Just give him the saber."

Sakumo looks hurt.

"That's for you, Seiko. Your mom would have wanted you to have it."

She is never going to touch that sword.

"Another dog then. Pakkun's meant to have a pack."

Seiko already knows the issue even as she suggests it. That's something Kakashi's going to need to do by himself. Not much of a gift, telling someone that they need to go out and do something that they'd been putting off.

"I was thinking we could do something a little more.. Celebratory," Sakumo says, the word fitting oddly in his mouth. "Invite him and any of his friends out to a restaurant."

Seiko stares at him. Birthdays had been family only for forever, and now this?

"Friends? Who?"

"He has friends," Sakumo says, optimistically. "I met one of them. Young Might Gai. A remarkable young man."

Kakashi may be permanently scarred from this exercise of fatherly devotion. Thank the gods Sakumo had not tried this on her. But if he's going through with it, then... sure. Why not.

In her head, files start to flip back and forth. Let's see... genin who would have overlapped with Kakashi's one and a half years in the academy.

"Aoba Yamashiro," She says, eyes going distant as she taps her fingers against her numb wrist. "Shimon Hijiro." Is there anyone else...? Not Obito or Rin, they haven't graduated yet. "Daen Nara."

She'd given out their D-ranks so recently. A babysitting one for Shimon and his group. Lost pet tracking for Aoba's group. Training grounds clean up for Daen's group. He'd complained the loudest.

"Seiko-chan?"

"Graduated Genin or chunin who may have overlapped with Kakashi's schooling who aren't completely out of his age range."

He's still staring at her.

"Aoba Yamashiro was first in his class when he graduated. He's currently my age, so a little old..? Forget him. Shimon Hijiro is much better, he's only like 9 months older than Kakashi. Just made genin earlier this month. Daen's also part of that same last month graduation.... He's out on a C-rank, though. Return time unknown."

Shimon is also civilian born, making it unlikely that he'd turn down an invitation due to Sakumo's reputation. Nara is much more risky.

"Invite their parents as well," Seiko says. "Might Guy's and Shimon Hijiro's. I'm heading in. See you."

"Congratulations on making chunin," Seiko says to Hoheto, sitting across the table from him as his white eyes attempt to burn through her skull. One of his new teammates had been an early loss in the new war, but he'd earned a battlefield promotion out of it.

That's one sensei and two teammates in three years.

"You--" Hoheto spits out, back rigid and straight even as his anger ever consumes him. "They're letting you just hide behind that desk while the rest of us die in the field!"

His voice is clipped and low, even with all that rage. He can't endanger his new rank.

Biter growls anyway.

"Aw, come on," Seiko says, voice shifting into the drawl that she used to use all the time. Strange... where did it go? "Someone's got to live, 'Heto. It might as well be me."

That gets him going. He slams his palm against the desk, breath hissing in behind his teeth as he struggles to take a deep breath.

"They promoted you," he says, voice full of disbelief. "For what? Dereliction of duty?"

Seiko nods along.

"Yes, exactly," she says. "They were so proud of me that the Hokage came down in person to proctor my trial."

From behind her, another set of footsteps that can truly only be summoned through having an unpleasant discussion lets itself be heard.

"What's this about your pride, Seiko?" Ensui Nara says, popping a huge pink bubble of gum as he peers over her shoulder at Hoheto Hyuga. "I didn't know you had any."

She'd liked it better when he used her last name.

"I don't,"

"She doesn't," Hoheto says at the exact same time. "And who are you?"

Ensui wouldn't get this reaction if he bothered to do any shifts down here.

"I'm her..." There's a long pause. For some reason, Ensui has a worse reaction to the words jounin-sensei than she does. "Supervisor."

"You should fire her," Hoheto says. He's more comfortable around hierarchies than anything. Or maybe just more used to a specific form of torture.

"I can't fire her," Ensui says mournfully. "All of the rest of my staff is back out in the field. Who would do the work?"

Even Chobee has finally left the office, though not for anything Seiko would define as field work. He'd been pulled to cover the required Akimichi guard duty shifts and free up whoever had been previously doing that for actual fieldwork. But it worked out the same for this office, in the end.

"Can't you just requisition some Nara?" Hoheto says.

She should care more that he's trying to get her fired. It's dangerous, being an unattached chunin in wartime. Doing messenger duty with a limp? It might not even be her brain that gives out first.

But instead--

Her eyes are caught on the shadows that swirl around Hoheto's feet.

Ensui leans forward, and Hoheto leans forward too, so naturally that he doesn't even realize he hasn't done it of his own free will.

"I know who you are," Ensui says softly. "Hoheto Hyuuga, age 11. Branch family member. Recent chunin. Maybe I should arrange for your next assignment to be a full Hyuga clan brigade. Since you're so enamored with clan arrangements."

Hoheto's face goes so white that his skin matches his eyes. He tries to step back, but can't.

"I--"

"Shut up, Ensui," Seiko says. Her scars are pulsing, or maybe that's just the headache. "If you've got time to do that, then you've got time to fill out that calendar that I keep--"

"I get it, I get it," Ensui mutters, taking a step back and breaking the shadow's hold. "Oh, look, something just came up. I've got to go."

He ducks away, leaving them both as quickly as he came.

"I hate that guy," Seiko says. The only thing worse than talking to Ensui is fighting with him.

Hoheto's fists clench.

"Your chunin trial," he says. "What was it."

"Here's your next mission," Seiko says, pulling out a scroll and handing it to him.

Kakashi bolts into her room and looks around for some place to hide, eyes wide.

"He ambushed me," he says, perhaps to her, perhaps to the unjust world at large. "He invited some random kids to the restaurant, and he ambushed me. He disguised his scent so Pakkun wouldn't be able to tell he was there! Why would he do that?"

"Did you stick around long enough to find out?" Seiko asks, yawning as she stays sitting on her bed.

"I'm not good enough to outrun dad," Kakashi says, as if this is obvious, and not something that will cease to be true in the coming years. "And there was barbeque."

So he'd kept his complaints bottled up until that party was over. That's good.

And their dad seemed to be... doing better...?

"He told me you told him you had friends," Seiko says instead.

Kakashi scowls.

"I do have kids I play with. Sometimes. Occasionally. It's none of his business. Not that I do much of that anymore...."

He looks away from her, arms still crossed.

"You don't have friends at all, so you wouldn't know."

Ouch. There's this odd pain in her left wrist, where she usually can't feel anything.

"I saw you got assigned a new jounin-sensei," Seiko says. She's technically not supposed to be able to see jounin files, not that that matters.

Kakashi hesitates.

"He's still out on a long-term mission," he says. "Something super secret. And cool," he adds, a bit defensively. "It'll be official when he gets back. Soon."

While most of the village hates their family right now, the Hokage has gone out of his way to ensure that Seiko and Kakashi are taken care of. Her promotion, Kakashi's promotion and subsequent attachment to Minato....

Giving her brother a direct mentor to student lineage claim on the Hokage's seat is not a small matter. He is doing everything in his power to assert that the Hatake clan is still a part of Konoha. To reassure Sakumo the village remains behind him.

Biter thumps his tail on the floor.

"Where's dad now?"

Kakashi gives her another annoyed look, as she's lost track of whatever he was ranting about.

"How would I know? Probably doing boring stuff in his study. I didn't walk home with him."

It's late, and she doesn't want to have to walk up the stairs...

Seiko groans.

"Did you tell him you need to get a bigger uniform size...?"

Blank look in his eyes. He sinks his chin a little further into his scarf.

Great.

"Don't mind me, limping all by my lonesome..."

Kakashi huffs and ignores her. Brat.

Halfway through her painful climb up the stairs, Biter howls, bounding ahead of her to burst through the closed sliding door.

There's a rope, hanging from the ceiling. When his hands twitch, is it a phantom twitch, like how hers---

On her lunch break, Seiko makes her slow way up to the second floor of the tower, where Ensui hides from people with schedules and urgent requests. Tragically for him, she has both.

"I'm busy," Ensui says, before she can even knock on his door. "Talk to my secretary. Downstairs. Can't miss her."

"I'm taking the afternoon off," Seiko says, one hand clenched around Biter's harness. It's been strangely difficult to stand up today. Her balance is off.

"You can't do that," Ensui says. "There's no one to replace you."

"I have to attend a funeral," Seiko says. "I was just informing you that no one would be downstairs. I'll be back tomorrow morning, usual time."

Biter has a black ribbon wrapped around his neck.

She's halfway back down the stairwell when the door swings open above her.

Ensui follows her down, the creep of his shadows almost strange in his absence as he keeps them tightly controlled, not even a hint of his constant paranoia allowed to shine through in the space.

However, he doesn't sit down on the desk, following her to the front entrance and out into the sunlight before he turns around and sets his hand on the wall, a huge seal appearing and twisting into the air.

No one is entering the tower today, it seems.

"You're on the wrong side of the barrier," Seiko says. "The people are on this side."

"Oh, whoops," Ensui drawls. "I guess I'm stuck out here."

He's got bags under his eyes.

"It's easy to get confused when you're stupid," Seiko agrees. "I'll be going, now."

A hand on her shoulder.

"Wait. you might.. Get lost on the way to the cemetery. It's kind of hard to find."

They're burying him next to her mom. She knows the way.

"You--"

It's weird seeing Ensui outside the tower. The only other time was when he was at her house. Talking to Sakumo.

In daylight, his twitching eyes that track the civilians that mill around them, his ticks-- his youth. He's eighteen. She always forgets.

She lost track of her sentence somewhere along the way.

"Yes?" Ensui says. The longer they just stand here the more uncomfortable he gets.

Seiko blinks, coming back to her body.

"Why not," she says. "Dad liked you."

Perhaps that's not what he wanted to hear. His hair doesn't pineapple-spike like some Nara, always drooping as it's forced to obey the laws of gravity within the confines of a ponytail. The rest of him drops now alongside the hair, as if she's told a man standing on the edge of a cliff that the rock's already fallen out and he's got no support but the air.

She lets him lead her to the graveyard.

Kakashi had been sitting by the grave when they arrived, hastily standing up and brushing the dirt off his knees as he sees she isn't alone.

"You're late," he mutters, eyes low. He hasn't been sleeping well, it seems. Pakkun peeks out from behind his legs.

"Hello, Biter," Pakkun says quietly.

Biter ignores him. He doesn't speak to other dogs. Or anyone, really. He noses at the dirt around Sakumo's grave before his ears twitch, picking up on heavy steps over loose soil as a black clad ninja approaches, funeral urn wrapped in white cloth held in both hands.

She watches them bury it beneath the small stone monument. Receives the smaller box of ash for the house. Feels the wretched pause in the expected ritual as neither she nor Kakashi say anything about their father.

What's she going to say?

'He was a man who couldn't abandon his teammates, but easily managed to abandon his family...' No. 'I should've missed the funeral the way he missed my graduation'. A little tacky.

She doesn't have anything kind to say about Sakumo right now.

Kakashi's face is hidden behind his mask, but his shoulders have begun to shake.

Seiko touches the stone.

"Bye, dad," she says.

Her eyes hurt.

She spends the next day listening to people complain about the fact that the tower was closed without notice.

"I had my full mission report filled out, you know!" A special jounin tells her. "Fully filled out! Ready to go!"

"You can put it over there," Seiko says. Her hands have been visibly shaking so badly that she has to keep them tucked under the desk. She's smudged the single piece of paper she attempted to sign this morning so badly that over half of it somehow became harder to read. More work for Ensui, then.

"You know, I remember when Chobee was doing this," the guy says, staring down at her. "He was really good. Helpful."

"He's out doing gate duty," Seiko says. "You could join him there."

"You're such a rude kid. What are you? Twelve?"

She's ten.

"I'm eighty three. You've fallen for my illusion."

He almost brings his hands up to form the Kai seal before realizing she's joking.

"You-- ugh. Whatever. It's not my fault that the reports are late, alright! Note that down!"

And behind him, more and more.

Kakashi takes a longer mission, and doesn't come back for three weeks.

No reason to take vacation days.

Except--

Academy Student Asuma Sarutobi ducks behind her desk.

"Tell them I'm not here!" He whispers furiously.

A year has not done much to improve his personality. But the gaggle of girls and boys that bolt into the room after him is almost enough to endanger sympathy. If she wasn't the one who had to talk to them.

Dozens of high pitched voices spike through her skull as they all desperately try to convey to her that they-- and only they-- are looking for their classmate, the young, handsome, talented, only living son of the Hokage. A bit young for this, no? Seriously?

"There's certainly no one like that around here," Seiko states. "I think if I'd seen someone young, talented and handsome, I'd know it."

Asuma glares at her from his position of cowering behind the dog.

It takes almost half an hour to kick them out.

"Thanks," Asuma mutters, an embarrassed read tinge not well concealed by his floppy hair spikes. "I was just messing around at the Academy training grounds and I-- I don't know what happened."

It's normal that he's an Academy student at 7. Or is that still oddly young? Seiko had become a genin when she was 8. It can't be that young.

"I remember you bragged you were good enough at stealth to dodge ANBU," Seiko observes.

Beet red.

"I-- well....!!"

"Hm?"

But of course, eventually, you always have to go home.

"Hey, genius," Seiko says, one handedly dumping some rice into a pot on the stove as Kakashi shifts uncomfortably at the edge of the room. "You're blocking the door."



He hadn't used to flinch at the title, but she can see it settling in around him. Nothing like humility, just a sensitivity to her own tongue. As if he's lost the shield that kept her words from harming him. Poor baby.

"No I'm not," he mutters, hands buried in his pockets.

He straightens up.

"I've got to tell you something."

"You forgot it was your turn to do the laundry this week," Seiko says.

There's a scent of burning in the air. Come on. Not this pot too. She can't wait until Chobee comes back and brings his food back with him.

"I'll get around to it," the little liar says, before coughing again. "Not that."

"You found a secret scroll that was an inheritance of one of the old Hokages," Seiko says. "You've received a divine revelation and need to go hide in your room for two decades to think about life."

"Seiko."

She scrapes some of the burned rice off the bottom of the pan.

He takes advantage of her turning her back on him to speak.

"I'm moving out."

Her hand jerks, the pot falling to smash onto the tiles, pottery shards barely missing her feet as Biter surges into motion to bat them away.

"What's wrong with this house?" Seiko asks, before she can really gauge the question.

Kakashi stares back at her, shoulders rigid. Unwittingly, his eyes creep towards the stairs.

But they're all from the same stock, him and her and their parents.

Rather die than admit weakness.

"The chunin dorms are closer to the training grounds," Kakashi says. "I don't want to be late."

The laughter catches her by surprise.

Biter curls uneasily around her legs as the chuckles burn her throat on the way out, and seem to burn Kakashi's ears as well.

"What!?" He snaps. "I'm-- I'm not some slacker. You're the one who always dozes off in the afternoons!"

The surge of laughter finally subsides as quickly as the flinch of her hand that dropped the pot to shatter.

"I know," she says. Slowly, she knees down, and begins to sweep up the shards with the edge of her sheathe. "So. When are you leaving?"

There's no need to ask him for help, with the shards or with standing back up or with washing the dishes. She's going to have to do all of this alone, soon enough.

"Academy sign ups don't open up until next month," Seiko repeats for the second time to a nervous looking mother and her really excited kid. "Please come back in a month. We don't do advanced reservations."

"Yes, but..." The lady mutters. "Are you sure there's going to be room in her year?"

Seiko flips through clan-submitted quotas in her mind, since doing it manually would probably mean she'd drop them. There'd been a push for more teachers for the school recently, due to the increasing number of clan kids who would automatically receive a spot.

"I am positive, ma'am. Konoha has always prized its children highly."

The woman seems at least a little bit settled by this blatant lie.

"Next month!" She says sharply turning around. "Don't forget me! My name is--"

"Is that Seiko?"

Suzume's voice cuts right through whatever the lady had said as two kids from Seiko's own year both stepped into the room. Well. They were a year or so older than Seiko, since she'd graduated a little young. Potato, potahto.

"I thought you'd quit working here for sure," Akame says, his arms crossed as he follows Suzume up to her desk.

Suzume has black, curly hair and glasses. She ignores Akame along with the lady.

"You're a chunin already?" She says. "Wow... I mean, I can believe it, I saw you in the Academy and all. Maybe you could help me up the ranks after you're discharged from this place."

"Poor Suzume. Always out of the loop," Akame scoffs. "Seiko's--"

"What happened to your third teammate?" Seiko asks.

Akame's glare turns venomous.

"None of your business."

"He's dead," Suzume says. Her hands wring a little. "Do you have a sink somewhere around here, Seiko? I need to wash my hands."

Her hands are cracked from harsh scrubbing. And perfectly clean.

"You're fine," Akame snaps. "Knock that off, already. Ninja's don't let a little dirt bother them."

Seiko was going to ask them if they had mission parameters, then changed her mind. They would take whatever she pulled out.

The scroll slaps down onto the table, instantly drawing Akame's ire back onto her.

"A D-Rank? You want us to--"

There's an explosion of green from behind them.

"A Direct Request from the Youthful Maiden of Valor!" Might Duy announces, cheerily taking the scroll from Akame's loose grip. "Might I have the honor of taking this, young lady?"

"No, I've got a better one for you," Seiko says. "That's for them."

"You can't..." Akame trails off. There's a world of difference between getting in an argument with someone you went to class with and someone who's your dad's age, even if he is, technically, the same rank as you.

"We'll take it," Suzume says, voice tight. "Come on, Akame."

Sour faces fade from memory easily. Every day people come here and leave unsatisfied.

But Might Duy is still giving her a very intense look indeed.

And then he gets down on both knees, hands braced on the floor, and bows.

What--

"I! Am! Sorry!"

He's crying tears that seem to echo as they hit the floor, there's so many of them.

"To have such a cruel thing happen to you!"

What?

"To have been forced to stand on your own!" A fist smashes down at the floor as his own anguish grows ever louder. "TO HAVE LET MY OWN JOY BLIND ME!"

Seiko shoves her way around the desk, letting stuff scatter everywhere. Her knee clips a corner and pain curdles in her as she slumps down in front of him.

"Please, stand up," she mutters. "Sir--"

"To have spoken with him at his own son's wonderful birthday party! To have stood next to him, unable to understand his pain!!"

Ah.

Seiko hasn't felt the visceral failure of her ability to truly grip things in her hand for years in the way that she can't manage to pull this man off the ground.

"It's not your fault," she says. "It's--"

Hands grasp onto hers.

He stands up, helping her back to her feet with a charisma that implied he'd had no doubts at all about her ability to stand back up without assistance.

"Young maiden," he says. "Last year... why did you help me?"

Seiko stares at him.

"No reason," she says.

He hasn't let go.

"I am proud of my son," he says. "I believe him when he says he will break through his limits to become an outstanding warrior. But that's not why I wanted him to believe in youth. In spring."

From the corner of her eye, shadows twitch.

"Even if he couldn't become a ninja. Youth is about joy! It is about faith! It is about keeping spring in your heart! It is about working as hard as you can at the things that you love!"

He's crying again, loud sobs that can safely conceal her as his back blocks the view of the door.

"It is about persistence, even if you are mocked," he says. "I am sorry that the nobility that he so successfully passed onto his children could not see him through the winter."

He presses a black funeral pouch into her hands.

Seiko breath rasps on the way out. What's with that? Her throat isn't one of the many places where her injured nerves are. It should know when to stay quiet.

"... I set aside an appropriate mission for you a few days ago. Let me find it."

Without Kakashi or Sakumo at home, no one weeds. She can't grip the plants to pull them out by the roots, so the garden is... ugly, now. She was going to add Sakumo to the family shrine, but the shrine is in his office, which is--

Seiko closes her eyes and then opens them again.

Anyway, it's upstairs, which is already asking a lot of her. There's no rail on the staircase, making it in many ways more dangerous for her than the stupid one in the tower. Only it's much shorter, nothing truly would happen to her if she fell aside from a few bruises. Or she could make Biter carry...

She looks at the dog, then at the box of ashes that sits on the kitchen table. A stick of unlit incense is propped up against it. Seiko puts the black pouch on the other side of the box and sighs.

It can just stay down there. She doesn't eat at that table anyway.

Biter sneezes at the dust and gives her a sour look.

"You clean, if it bothers you so much," Seiko mutters back. "I'll tie a dust rag to your tail."

The dog butts his head against her shin.

"Yeah, that's what I thought."

She's hungry, but not in the mood to cook. Biter's food is always put out ahead of time, so he can eat whenever he wants. He's a smart dog. She believes in him.

There's a chair at the edge of the porch where she can stare out at the grown over grass where she'd gotten into a fight with Hoheto more than a year ago. Biter rears up, putting his paws all over her lap as if he thinks he can pull off the lap dog effect.

"You'll break the chair, idiot," Seiko says.

With a whine, he sits down on her feet instead.

He's been stressed lately. No one except her around the house means he's constantly on alert. No one in close range for him to summon through a sharp bark if she drops something. No one else to keep watch while she sleeps. No one too--

"I've got a hospital check in next month. Hope Ensui gets off his ass and finds more staff before then, because I'm usually in there for at least overnight while they all stare at me. Last time it took three days."

The sun slowly fades into twilight as she sits there, dull voice interweaving with the beat of Biter's tail against the floor as she speaks of nothing and remembers nothing and feels...

Her head snaps up at the same time as Biter's as an almost distant scream seems to be coming closer and closer.

"IFIDONTMANAGETODO5000LAPSTHENIWILLWEEDMYRIVAL'SSISTER'SGARDEN! IF I DON'T MANAGE TO TO 6000 PULL UPS THEN I WILL SCRUB MY RIVAL'S SISTER'S HOUSE TOP TO BOTTOM! IF I--"

There's a small green hurricane in front of her, breathing heavily.

"Hello, Sister of My Rival! I am Might Guy!"

He's very short.

"You can just call me Seiko," Seiko says, mind still catching up. "I know you. You're Kakashi's friend. He doesn't live here right now, though. I can give you his ad--"

A bow making his waist parallel to the ground as he continues to pant for breath..

"Miss Seiko! It would! Be an honor! To help you! Weed your garden!"

It's...

"Did your father tell you to do this?" Seiko asks. "You don't have to. I can just--"

Well. She can't, really. She can just sit here and have the garden not be taken care of. It's not like anything terrible would happen if she did that.

Or she could have help.

How odd.

"It's kind of a mess out there," Seiko says, quietly. "And you have to watch out. There are flowers somewhere underneath the weeds. I don't want those gone." She'll have to figure out some way to pay him.

Might Guy's eyes practically burn with fire.

"My months of D-Ranks have prepared me for this!"

It's--

He runs through her whole garden, and then he heads inside her house while she's still staring at the neat rows, the lines that had already grown distant in her memory restored.

It's--

He'd dusted the table where she keeps Sakumo's ashes, and lit the incensce, and left a freshly cut flower there. And underneath the flower, a note.

To: Seiko Hatake

If you're anything like my great Rival, you probably don't remember this at all! But I remember when my dad came home the day after he met you. He was smiling so brightly that I thought he'd blind the sun with his brilliance. He picked me up and danced around and said see! You could become a wonderful ninja just like her! Someone who fights for the dignity of the human spirit! Someone who carries spring in her heart!

In some ways this goal was so much harder than my goal of beating my Rival that I was shocked. But Goals are How We Improve!

And lastly, written in the same awkward, stilted hand:

I wanted to challenge you to a match as well, but my father said that wasn't appropriate. But! If it Ever Is!

--Might Guy, Genin of Konohagakure.

The paper crumples in her hands as she stares at the box of ashes.

"You hear that, dad..."

Damn it all.

She wouldn't be crying if she'd remembered to eat.

"I should start calling him the genius, instead of my stupid brother," Seiko sighs. "What do you think, Biter? Too much favoritism?"

Biter wags his tail.

"Yeah. That's what I thought."

Chapter Text

From a rational standpoint, Seiko Hatake was the best kind of subordinate one could have. She did not take days off, she did not lose any records or scrolls she was given, she rarely ever stood up from the desk, let alone climbed the stairs to bother him.

Complaints about her were many, but they were always vague, meaningless things. She was rude, she was apathetic, she didn't speak with respect to people who were older or of higher rank.

Her coworkers-- when they were around, spoke highly of her. Chobee said he wished his nieces were as sweet as her. Tonbo wasn't around much, but he liked her. And hell, Yakumi was the one who'd hired her, even if her clan circumstances meant she'd ditched the tower soon after for the field.

He often left his shadow to hide in the footsteps of her dog as it watched the incoming and outgoing traffic. A safety measure. The minute the dog's shadow crossed another, he could grab them, lock them down. Kill them from a full storey away, no eyes needed on the target.

He doesn't really need to work. All he needs to do is guard.

It's something he'd discovered early on. It's not really necessary to work. A lot of Nara laziness is a carefully cultivated lie. It's hard to relax when you can't stop thinking. But some of it isn't. Shadows are strongest in twilight. You only really need to be awake for the five minutes that count, and the rest is just... waiting.

His gaze drops to the dark pouch resting on his desk.

If he'd planned ahead he could have given it to Seiko before the short funeral ceremony, and then never had to think about it again. But he hadn't known her father was dead until the morning she showed up, because she'd come to work the day after he died. The records only move so fast.

So it was too late.

He'd had to go get the pouch from the Nara clan storage, so everything was slow. And then he'd had it.

And then months passed.

Biter wears Seiko's black ribbon the same way he wears Seiko's forehead protector and Seiko's vest and Seiko's sword. Perhaps he still wears the ribbon because Seiko's hands aren't steady enough to untie it without help, and she won't risk cutting so close to her dog's throat.

She's basically given up on any paperwork that requires more of her than either a checkmark or an illegible signature. All of that lands on him, now.

He'd not used the Shadow Imitation Shadow Bind Technique on her during her "chunin exam". That was his personal variation of a clan technique not even permitted to be taught until you were a jounin.

The Hokage had been testing him as well, after all.

Restraint. Control. Judgement.

He had passed, but in the end he had still failed to see what she was so afraid of. He can only see it now that she is no longer afraid. No one had thought The White Fang would kill himself rather than simply re-devote himself back to the battlefield. Re-earn his honor.

But she had.

She'd been terrified.

And, slowly, she'd relaxed. But never by that much. There was a futility in it. She couldn't always be with him, so she could only hope that he would center himself. Because there was nothing else she could have done.

He could have done something, though.

He could have left his shadow in Sakumo Hatake's. It wasn't a difficult thing to do, to be shadowless while you wait. If she had only--

There is a knock on the door.

"Ensui." Seiko's voice is flat and tight. The flatness is inherent. The tightness is from pain, since she must have walked up the stairs. "I've got more stuff to drop off."

The funeral pouch vanishes into his seals.

"Come on..." Ensui drawls, dropping his feet from where they'd been kicked up over the desk back down to the floor so he can crack the door open. "You better not be handing me a calendar again."

Seiko steps past him to drop the pile of reports onto his desk. They plop down right over the imprint his shoes had made on the previous top of the pile.

She's put on another growth spurt. A few inches. Or maybe it's just that her gray hair is spiked more than usual? Since she doesn't wear her chunin vest.

No. It's not that.

Growth has stretched out the scar tissue that covers her wrists, elongating them alongside her. He hadn't noticed at first, but with time comes closer observation. It's not actually scar tissue from one wound. It's two wounds. The deeper one snarls right over the wrist joint. The one that looks like someone yanked a giant fish hook out of where it had been caught in her bones.

And on top of that one, the ragged sword slices that run from practically mid forearm to over the top of her hands, stopping just short of her knuckles.

The cut is deeper on her left arm than her right. Obvious, from how she has scars on both arms but only one of them still feels.

Seiko Hatake used to be left handed.

The shadows in his mind paint an inky picture. She'd done the first cut with her already damaged wrist, shaky but proficient. No long term damage.

And then she had had to hold the blade in her off hand, one already shaking and bleeding heavily from the wrist wound.

Fighting a Suna puppet-master when they have strings on you is suicide. She'd made the right choice.

"Quit spacing out," Seiko says. "You're not busy."

"Seiko-chan," Ensui says. He opens a new gum packet, pops it in his mouth. "How long do you think you'll be working in this place?"

One of the things he doesn't know about Seiko is if she can still use the Body Replacement technique. She didn't use it in their fight. He's seen ninja with injured legs pull it off before-- it should work fine.

No, perhaps it's... a hand seal issue? Has he ever seen her go for a technique that needed more than simply slapping her hand on the ground? If he were to fight her again, the first thing he'd need to do is lock down the dog. Biter is where her mobility comes from. Shadowbind the dog, and then--

"Until I quit," Seiko says. "Whenever that is."

His endless chain of thoughts crashes to a halt.

"You can't quit. We don't have replacements."

"That's not my problem," Seiko says, even though it is, since it's her who's doing more work. "I'm just answering your question. I'll be here until the war's over. I don't want to go fight."

That's the type of answer that explains why her former teammate acts up so much whenever he's forced to come here. If she were in ANBU, an answer like that might get her killed by her own teammates for disloyalty.

Other than her disloyalty, she'd have been a great agent. He's supposed to be recruiting for them as well...

He's got ANBU casualty records in one of his seals. Somewhere. Maybe he can start pushing the upkeep for those onto Seiko as well. Most of the records come straight to him from the team captains before being passed up to Danzo Shimura and the Hokage-- though both of them also have separate reports that go straight to them. So it seems kind of pointless.

"Looks like you're stuck here for a while then," Ensui says. He'd been fourteen when the second war started, and now he was eighteen and they'd started the third. Jounin betting pool says that this one'll be even longer than the last, and the Jounin Commander is his uncle. He's got the inside scoop.

He should've put more money down on five years, but it had felt a little too depressing at the time. More fool him for letting that stop his hand.

She's staring at him. Or more accurately, staring past him. Not a person prone to meeting someone's eyes, Seiko.

"You don't usually linger up here," Ensui says.

Is she going to ask him for something? She never does that.

"I'll be in the hospital for my annual check in. You'll have to cover shifts until I get back."

...

There's an odd twist inside of him.

"That shouldn't take more than a day. You can take a day off without coming up here and telling me."

Mockery in the gaze that doesn't meet his.

"Last time I was in for three days. You going to be fine with that?"

Three days?

Shock drags his inquiries out of the twilight of his mind and into the air.

"A check-up shouldn't take that long."

Biter growls around her feet, a low thrum. That dog doesn't like him very much. Or maybe it's the stairs that piss him off. She never seems to mind it, but she's not the one responsible for catching herself when she misses a step, is she?

And she has missed steps.

"Mine do."

Seiko turns to leave, conversational goal achieved.

The shadows always crawl around the corners of his vision, even when he's not actively controlling them. Careful, careful.

"Seiko-chan."

When she turns to look back at him, for one second her blank hostility is lost to a more genuine confusion.

"Yes?"

"You can do wall walking. Why don't you just walk down the side of the building, instead of taking the stairs?"

Seiko looks at him. Then slowly, exaggeratedly, looks down at her bad knee.

"Pain disrupts chakra cycling," she says, voice slow like she's speaking to an idiot. "And Biter doesn't like wall walking."

It kind of sounds like the second point has higher priority. Though, what does pain have to do with anything? Just ignore it. They have pills for that, don't they?

Or at least. ANBU do.

Ensui pops the bubblegum he'd been blowing and gets started on another bubble.

"We're technically under the Intelligence Division, so I'll see if I can grab one of their people for a bit. That's how we used to get Tonbo." The Analysis team is... rather busy, though. Maybe T&I has someone sitting around.

Their headquarters aren't directly in the tower, but instead down the street a bit. At least, that's where the building that's got the jail cells is.

"That's fine then." Seiko gives a sharp nod, and shuts the door behind her.

Is it?

A sharp knock on the door of his apartment deep into the night wakes him more thoroughly than his much battered alarm clock ever could.

"What is it," he snaps, badly hidden killing intent not at all concealed by the way his sleep tangled hair keeps falling in front of his eyes.

A blonde woman only a year or so older than him stares back, rectangular glasses firmly in place across her nose. She bows to him politely, hands clasped.

"I'm Nono Yakushi, a senior med-nin," she says. She's not wearing a jounin uniform, but to be at that rank, she'd have to be one. "You are Seiko Hatake's jounin-sensei, are you not?"

He isn't.

It's revolting. Having that level of responsibility--

"What if I'm not," Ensui mutters.

"Then we would have a problem, Ensui-san. Because Seiko's only other registered contact is her brother, who isn't in Konoha currently. So I would be in quite the dilemma."

What a useless little brat. Though it's more than likely Seiko deliberately picked a window where he wouldn't be present to go to the hospital-- she's got access to chunin missions. She knows where he is.

His hands tighten behind his back.

"She's fine, right. It was just a routine check in."

He doesn't like the way she smiles at him.

"Why don't you come with me, Ensui-san."

....

Seiko is sitting in a wheelchair when he gets there, boredom plain on her face. The leggings she usually wears are rolled up to show the knee she's always limping on, while both of her sleeves are pushed up to let a Hyuga med-nin stare into her chakra networks with fascination.

What was the midnight wake up all about? She's fine.

Seiko raises an eyebrow when she sees him.

"They gave me a pill that numbs all pain," she says to him, eyes a little dilated. "I told them I could just do the whole thing standing up in that case, but they insisted on the wheelchair. Useless thing, there aren't any ramps in this place. Do they expect Biter to pick the whole thing up?"

Ensui blinks, taken aback by the rapid fire commentary.

"Please stay still," the med-nin who'd been staring at Seiko's knee mutters. "Do you think draining poison is easy? It's practically a part of your bloodstream by now."

Poison!?

"Someone poisoned you," Ensui says, voice flat while his paranoia spikes. Saboteurs? In the village? What if--

"Yeah, by Chiyo Poisontongue," Seiko says, eyes still blankly roaming the room. "I've got one of her needles in my knee. The needle's not coming out without my joint coming with it, so they do this whole clown show instead. Well, they didn't use to. This seems new."

It's funny. There he'd been saying that if only she'd told him one problem she had, he could have done something, and now she has told him of a different problem he can do absolutely nothing about.

Why is he even here? He narrows his eyes at Nono.

"This has nothing to do with me."

She smiles back at him, eyes out of focus behind her glasses. Wait.. that chakra... this is on him for not paying attention. ANBU Designation: Lizard.

"If we'd realized the poison would retain its potency for so long we could have done more..." She says, voice regretful. "But there were many poison related injuries during the second war. It seems that the power Sasori of the Red Sand wielded against our troops didn't come from nowhere."

"This still has nothing to do with--"

"Seiko-chan hasn't been very communicative with us about her encounter," Nono says. "We were hoping that you knew more... though it seems like that was a false hope."

There's a weird sound.

A hacking, coughing thing. In the wheelchair, Seiko is bent forward, wheezing with laughter.

"You already know," Seiko says, voice slurring from the drugs she's under. "It's written on my skin. It's in my hair. Nosy bastards. Strung us up on hooks and made us dance." Her voice slows down into a croon as she stares down at her dog. "But they couldn't get you, Biter. Bit him, chewed him, spit him out."

There's a smile on her face that he's never seen before.

He remembers, suddenly, Biter's ability to bite into shadow and have it hurt the real thing. Would that work on puppets? Could that dog bite wood and chew flesh?

"They just want the poison," Seiko whispers to her dog, loud enough that everyone in the room can hear it. Her wrists don't shake, but her hands still hang stiffly, unable to close properly as she attempts to scratch Biter's ears. "Good thing Dad didn't survive the first attempt, or this place would have made him do it again." She pets the dog's nose. "Isn't that right, Biter? Who's a good boy."

Biter howls.

This is--

"I'm her jounin-sensei," Ensui repeats, a heavy sense of disbelief in his heart even as he speaks. "I'm... responsible, here."

"Ensui-san?"

Every single ninja in the room stops moving as the shadows shiver under their feet.

Ensui carefully picks Seiko up, flinching at the giggle she makes as he does so.

"I think she will recover better at home," he says, voice firm.

Then he jumps through the window, the dog fast at his heels.

Kakashi's new room is kind of small. That's okay, though, as it's just somewhere to sleep. No long hallways that are always getting dusty, and the line to hang his laundry is just outside the window, instead of way far out in the yard, for some reason. And it's right next to the training grounds!

He doesn't even understand what the other chunin complain about. Who cares that there's no kitchen set up? Seiko didn't cook anything good, and-- and Father couldn't cook anyway!

But anyway. It's going to be two years since he became a genin. He hadn't wanted to mention it to Seiko, but his old jounin-sensei-- he'd died. So that's why he'd gotten a replacement.

...

Gaku-sensei had been a good guy. He should've brought Kakashi with him on that mission, so then--

Kakashi takes a deep breath and begins to do his morning pushups. He can't fall behind. He can't be weak. He's going to meet his new jounin-sensei today! He's done his research, this time. Minato Namikaze's jounin-sensei was Jiraya the Toad Sage's jounin-sensei, who learned from the Hokage himself.

He has been given a great opportunity. It's finally time for him to get out into the war. He just needs to show that he's ready. That he's not like the rest of his family. That he wants to be out there. Serving Konoha.

He's been told to report to training ground seven.

Carefully half an hour early, Kakashi debates whether it would give a better impression if he slipped into hiding, only to emerge when his instructor arrived, or to remain perfectly visible, so as to make sure he knows Kakashi got here early--

His cheeks flush a little as he hears Seiko's mocking laughter in his ears. He doesn't need to try so hard. It will be fine.

...

He's late. No, maybe it's Kakashi who got the location wrong. Or the date is wrong. Or he just missed something. A test? Is it a test? But he's already a chunin, he shouldn't need to take one. But it wouldn't hurt to reinvestigate the area around the main open space. That's just being proactive, which is good.

When you look underneath the underneath, that's when you're safe. Otherwise, all you see is--

A slight shadow in the bushes.

Kakashi whirls, hands shuriken spinning in his hands as a tall, yellow-blonde young man trips on a root and stumbles his way into the clearing.

"That came out of nowhere," he says, hopping a little before settling down as he sees Kakashi. "Oh, wow... you're tiny."

He is not.

Kakashi bristles a little.

"Kakashi Hatake, Chunin!"

There's a trace of a wince across the man's face.

"Hey, there," he says. "I'm Minato Namikaze. I've never taught anyone before, so I'll be in your care, okay?"

He gets a stiff nod from Kakashi for his troubles.

"You just need to get me on the battlefield," Kakashi says. "I can take care of myself."

Minato does not look reassured.

"Well!" he says, clapping his hands together. "If it's a mission that will get us really understanding each other, then a mission it is! Let's head over to the mission desk and get--"

"No."

There's something tight and frantic in Kakashi's chest. There's no need to go all the way over there, right?

Minato tips his head.

"No? Is there something--"

"There's nothing wrong," Kakashi says, very rapidly. "I didn't know you also got your orders from the mission desk."

Minato laughs.

"Oh, is that it? Yeah, wartime missions are given by the Jounin Commander, and sent directly to the recipient instead of using the medium of the desk. But I've been given a mo-- well, definitely at least a week away from the frontlines to pick you up!"

A week...

"Then we should just train," Kakashi says, determined. "If you want to. Sir."

Sensei? Should he be using Sensei?

Minato stares at him for an uncomfortably long time before nodding.

"One of my buddies is also on leave for a bit. She's also a jounin-sensei! We can go do joint training with her group!"

Joint training isn't... It's much more efficient to train alone.

But it's not the mission desk. So Kakashi just nods.

He shouldn't have agreed to it.

"Minato!"

The friend Minato had been referring to was Uroko Kurama, a dark haired lady who gives Minato a weary smile as he approaches her.

"It's good to see you, Uroko," Minato says. "It feels like it's been years."

"It probably has been," Uroko sighs, pushing a strand of hair out of her face as she stares down at Kakashi. "Oh, it's the youngest Hatake. You've made chunin already?"

Behind her, Hoheto Hyuga stares out with dark eyes. He's wearing a chunin vest as well, but he doesn't seem happy about it at all. Or maybe it's just Kakashi who's making him unhappy.

The last time Kakashi ever saw him was when he'd picked a fight with Seiko and somehow lost, and then Seiko had never talked about him again. Father had also never talked about his teammates...

But before all that, Kakashi has vague memories of Hoheto and... the other guy... Sometimes being at the house. There's a picture of the three of them in Seiko's room. They'd used to play cards in there and then lock him out when he tried to see what was going on.

"Around four months ago," Kakashi responds after a bit of a delay.

Had it only been a few months ago...?

Everything had seemed so bright.

"Oh, Hoheto just got his last week!" Uroko says, voice bright. "He really went above and beyond the call of duty."

Hohteto's lips curl into a cool sneer.

"Promotions are promotions," he says. "It doesn't matter what you did to get them. Even if you didn't do anything."

"Now, now," Minato starts. "That isn't--"

Kakashi's eyes narrow.

Is he implying Kakashi didn't earn--

"You must have crushed someone who was already injured," Kakashi starts talking before he can really register what he's saying. "As far as I know, that's how you deal with all your problems."

Rage flashes behind Hoheto's eyes, cool disdain sliced clean away. That's right, just start making a hand seal and Kakashi can show what he's made of.

But he should have known the type of people who Seiko had used to like.

"Oh yeah?" Hoheto whispers, the taunt clear in his white eyes. "She always called you a genius. You must have used that superior mind of yours to figure out the best way forward was to abandon your famil--"

There's a kunai in Kakashi's hand before he knows it. And Hoheto smiles, the veins around his eyes growing obvious as he smoothly shifts into the stance of the Gentle Fist.

"Eight Trigrams Sixteen Palms," Hoheto states, hands smoothing beginning to glow with a green chakra.

Kakashi smirks. He can handle something as weak as that. He darts forward, covering the disadvantage from fighting a taller opponent. The edge of his kunai begins to spark, as he focuses for his own counter.

"Lighting Release: L--

A far more intense smell of ozone flashes through the air as Minato materializes between them, spinning so that one leg trips Hoheto while his hand grips Kakashi's wrist. There's a slightly worried look in his eyes, like someone who thinks they might've forgotten to take their drying laundry back inside before it rains.

The gap between their ability....

"That wasn't very nice, Kakashi," Minato says, lifting him up by the wrist to dangle a few inches above the ground as he keeps his other eye on Hoheto. "We are supposed to support our fellow ninja."

He'd made him look bad in front of Minato!

"He started it," Kakashi says, sullen.

"Kakashi." Minato's voice is hard. "Fights begin not with actions, but with words. You both-- and, in fact, all ninja of Konoha-- have earned your promotions honorably."

He doesn't know.

Kakashi's stomach sinks as he nods.

"I understand," he says.

But he doesn't understand, and he sees that same thing in Hoheto's sardonic eyes. He doesn't understand how Seiko, who hasn't left the village since even before the current war even started, earned her promotion.

Minato sighs.

"Well, we all learned something today," he says, and cheers right back up as if nothing happened. "Looks like we should catch up another time, Uroko."

Uroko sighs as well, giving Kakashi a meaningful look.

He looks away.

"Yeah, that's for the best. We should meet up sometime the next time Kushina has some time off!"

Kushina? Who's that?

Kakashi keeps his curiosity firmly sealed for the five minutes it takes to distance themselves from Hoheto's gaze.

"You seem to know a lot of people," Kakashi says.

Minato laughs.

"Is two people a lot? Though I guess you're right, I do know a lot of people! I like to keep in touch. It's easy to start drifting away from people when you're no longer a genin...But it's important to know the people you're working with. Konoha is separate from our rival villages because we are more connected! That's what makes us strong."

It hadn't felt like his father was connected to the village.

"If you say so," Kakashi says.

Minato ruffles his hair.

"I do."

Kakashi crosses his arms. He's too old for someone to do that to him.

"Hey, since you didn't want to go to the tower to pick up a mission for us, I'll go do that before we meet up tomorrow. Got it?"

Kakashi freezes.

"I'll go."

"Huh? You don't have to."

Nice going, genius. What's next? Going to burn down the house?

"I'm going with you."

Ever since the war started, Kakashi has only ever seen Seiko sitting alone at a long desk wide enough for three people to work comfortably. Biter always sits in front, dark eyes watchful of all who enter even while Seiko's own remain dull and indifferent.

She wears her hair longer than he does, sloppily tied back in a low ponytail, and she doesn't wear a mask. So, sitting there, at that desk, she always looks

Like their father.

Her hands both rest on the desk, awkwardly clawed. Even as he watches, one of her fingers does an awkward little spasm as she reaches for an already prepared mission scroll.

"Hi there!" Minato says cheerfully. "I'm Minato Namikaze and this is my new teammate, Kakashi Hatake. We're just looking to help out the village a little while we're on downtime."

Seiko raises an eyebrow at Kakashi.

Kakashi hunches his shoulders a little.

"Not a lot of in village missions for jounin at your level," Seiko says, ignoring Kakashi completely. "I know the guy who's organizing all the outer guard rotations if you want to do that instead."

Gate guarding. He'd rather die.

"Just give us a D-rank, already," Kakashi mutters. "You've already got it in your hand and everything."

A crinkle at the very edges of her eyes. Not the normal ones, an extra one. The one that says she's laughing at him.

"A young Might Gai has been going through my whole D-rank roster at a lightning pace," she says. "They're going to have to put him out in the field just to make sure there's any left for the rest of the genin."

He can't be worse at something than Gai.

"I'll show him what lightning looks like," Kakashi says.

Seiko snorts and tosses it to him.

"Okay, genius. Let's see you design a jutsu capable of constricting the space-time continuum."

Kakashi glances down at the scroll.

Babysitting. Three hours.

"Seiko." He can hear the whine in his own voice.

Minato intervenes, carefully taking the scroll out of Kakashi's hands.

"Wow, taking care of triplets! How exciting! This is going to be great."

Kakashi spares a second to look up at Minato, incredulous. He doesn't appear to be joking.

"I love kids," Minato says sheepishly. "They're so cute."

He can see the snide joke beginning to form in Seiko's head before her lips even start to move. He grabs Minato's arm and frantically drags him back out of the room before she can say one more thing to his new teacher.

"We shouldn't go back in there," Kakashi says, definitively.

Minato just blinks his eyes down at Kakashi.

"No? But she seemed so nice. And she looked... hey, now that I think about it... was that your cousin, Kakashi?"

Kakashi stares back up at him, blindsided.

"No. That's my sister."

...

"We have to go back in there," Minato says. "We should invite her on the mission or something!"

"We can't do that."

Kakashi can't go back in there. He hasn't gone to visit Seiko once since he left.

"Huh? Why not?"

It feels like his mouth isn't under his own power.

"She's always exaggerating her injuries so she doesn't have to do any work."

"Her injuries?"

Kakashi can hear Minato's voice rising, but he can't stop talking. He's had no one to talk to. He needs this man to understand.

"And she's got this slow limp, but I've seen her run. Most of the time she just doesn't. And she's strong enough to beat Hoheto, but not strong enough to even spar with me!? She may have some wrist problems, but she-- she can still hold a sword!"

Dead silence.

"Kakashi..." Minato says, voice slow, bright eyes hooded.

Then he shakes his head, and his smile returns to normal.

"I'm glad you told me this, Kakashi. Let's head over to complete the D-rank, okay? The whole three hours."

That's right. The mission comes first.

Kakashi blinks a little, himself a little uncertain about the words that he'd just said. Hopefully Minato didn't take them too seriously... It's all in the past. He and Seiko don't have much to say to each other these days.

"Okay."

He watches Minato take a left.

...

"Minato...Sensei," Kakashi says. The word is weird in his mouth. "That's the wrong way."

This is his village. These are his familiar streets.

No noose hangs behind Seiko's desk.

He will be strong enough to redeem their name.

Chapter Text

"Asuma Sarutobi, reporting for his first mission as a Genin!"

Seiko rubs her eyes with the palm of her hand as she stares blearily down at Asuma, closely flanked on each side by a young Kurenai and a... Raido. She thought he was about to hit chunin... had the Hokage asked him to let his promotion slide in order to make sure his son had a better than average team?

Asuma's hand slaps the desk, jerking her out of her thoughts.

"Give us an A rank!" He says. "Something awesome!"

Behind him, his jounin sensei gives her an apologetic shrug.

She glances down at Asuma's records casually. Graduated at nine years old. Pretty standard for this war.

"I've picked out something suited to your abilities," Seiko says, which already makes Raido wince. The jounin, being far older and wiser and not having to do anything but supervise, just looks annoyed.

No need to stretch out the joke.

"A D-rank!?"

It had been much funnier when she'd done this to Kakashi. But that had been months ago.

..

She watches another genin team file in as Asuma is dragged back out.

"Seiko-san!"

A green force of nature bolts towards the table, forehead protector proudly hanging around his neck. Hm? Maybe it's not the Hokage's special treatment that Asuma got a more experienced genin, if Gai is also being put on a team with two new graduates. Or maybe the Hokage just pushed for every team formed this year to get an assembly like that.

Ebisu and Genma stumble in behind him, both of them staring up at her nervously. Ebisu adjusts his glasses. Genma rolls his senbon onto the other side of his mouth.

Behind them, Chouza Akimichi, patriarch of his clan, crosses his arms and gives her a nod.

"Hello, Gai," Seiko says. "Looks like you've got a strong team behind you, this time."

Gai nods eagerly.

"Seiko Hatake," Chouza says, voice soft and deep. "Chobee says good things about you."

"He should come back to work at the desk," Seiko says. But it's sweet of him to say.

"I'll tell him you said so. So, what have you got for us today?"

Seiko keeps her elbow carefully on the table so that she doesn't randomly lose and scrolls as she fans out the options.

"Bunch of D-ranks," she says.

She looks at Gai, doing his best to hide disappointment at another year of this.

"Or, a C-rank just came in. There's an annual event in the Land of Tea."

All three of them jerk up in sudden excitement, while Chouza smiles. The Land of Tea is a notoriously softball assignment. If you aren't in with the tower, you'll never see it in your entire life.

"I don't know..." Seiko says, lip twitching quietly. "Are you really ready for that?"

"Yes!!!" Three different voices chorus up at her, little hands grabbing at the scroll.

Her eyes flip up to watch Chouza. It's not like she doesn't know that first time C ranks are notoriously cursed. Hers certainly had been.

Chouza's hands flip through seals behind the backs of his genin.

They've got the potential.

She already knows that.

"Okay, then," Seiko says, releasing the scroll. "It's all yours."

"We won't let you down!!" Gai says.

As if he could.

Grocery shopping is one of those things that the devil invented to convince people that the earth was already worse than hell. The bag that Seiko had grimly sandwiched between her elbow and her waist makes its final little flirtation with gravity and then falls to its death, scattering fresh fruit and cups of ramen all over the sidewalk.

One can of soup bounces and manages to hit Biter before rolling into some gutter.

This is--

"Do you need help!?"

Seiko glowers a little.

"The bag's already ripped," she mutters, not bothering to turn around. "You don't need to pick those up unless you're willing to carry them all the way back to my house."

A hand reaches down to catch the soup can before it can get any further way. Her gaze tracks up, following that hand all the way to the bristly black hair held back by oversized orange goggles.

Obito Uchiha gives her an anxious smile as he sets about trying to pick up as much as he can.

"It's okay, I can be a little late to the Academy," he says. "It's my last year, you know! I'm going to graduate this time for sure!"

Already...?

"Forget about the fruit," Seiko sighs. "It's already touched the ground. Get the packaged things. Careful--"

Obito follows her all the way back to the Hatake estate, eyes tracing over the makeshift altar she still hasn't moved off the dining room table as he carefully sets his burdens down.

She hasn't retrieved the photo of her mom from the real shrine, so a scrawled piece of paper with her name sits beside Sakumo's box of ashes, both slightly hidden behind the framed photo of Seiko and both her old teammates.

Maybe it's cursing Hoheto a little to have his picture in there with the rest of the dead.

"Are you going to be alright putting all of this stuff away," Obito says, eyes skittering away from all of that.

Seiko waves him off.

"I do this every week. It's fine. Go get back to your class."

Obito yelps, clearly having forgotten where he was supposed to be.

"Sorry! I have to go!"

He dashes away, only to collide headfirst with an incoming young Hyuga.

...

"Watch where you're going," Hoheto says coldly, brushing invisible dirt off of his clothes and Obito dazedly shakes his head and staggers back to his feet.

"Uh, sorry... Oh, I am so late!" Obito darts off again, barely avoiding a second collision.

Seiko leans across the table and pushes the picture frame to lie face down before walking back out to the porch.

Kiyomu doesn't need to see this.

She sits down on the edge of the porch. This isn't going to be worth standing for.

Hoheto stops some feet away from her, arms crossed and mouth tight.

"Fancy seeing you here," Seiko says, when it becomes clear they'll be stuck here for hours if he isn't prompted to speak. "Thought you'd had your fill of this place."

"Got into a fight with your brother," Hoheto says.

Oh?

"I'm sure he deserved it," Seiko says. "Unless you hospitalized him or something."

"His teacher stepped in," Hoheto says. "Minato Namikaze."

So that's what this is about.

"Minato Namikaze," Hoheto says, voice soft and precise. "Whose teacher was Jiraiya the Sage."

"Jiraiya the Sage," Seiko says. "Whose teacher was the Third Hokage. Yes."

Hoheto was very direct when she had known him. Point A to Point B, straight as an arrow. It had made him dangerous, though it also made it dangerously easy to manipulate his thought process.

"He's being put in line for succession," Hoheto says. "An eight year old idiot."

"We all start somewhere," Seiko says. She yawns. "What do you want from me, Hoheto? Right now you're just stating facts."

"I thought you'd be a little angrier," Hoheto says. "You're being skipped over."

Skipped over?

Seiko's eyes for the first time stop flicking around and settle squarely onto Hoheto's face.

"Aw, 'Heto," she says, voice soft. "You still believe I could beat him down?"

Biter gives a little snap of his teeth.

Hoheto's lips tighten.

"You stopped training," he mutters. "So of course not."

She was going to say something mean to make him go away... But she could always explain things properly. Listening to her go on about Konoha's complex inner politics could be considered its own punishment.

Seiko scoots Biter's head so it's a bit more onto her lap.

"The Hokage," Seiko says mildly. "Is doing several things at once. First of all, he is attempting to make sure Kakashi doesn't go off the deep end. Before he's a terrifying ninja, Minato Namikaze is a very kind person. He's well suited to the task. Or as well as anyone. Second. From an optimistic line of thought, Kakashi's qualifications will never matter. Minato is a shoo-in for the next Hokage, and he and Kakashi are barely a decade apart in age. Should Minato live even to his thirties, it won't be Kakashi who becomes Hokage-- it will be Minato's potential children, or Kakashi's own students."

It's clear Hoheto is caught remembering when she used to give these kinds of lectures all the time. It had bored Kiyomu silly.

"Ignoring, of course, that the other current Hokage candidate for the next line after Minato is Asuma Sarutobi, who is also around Kakashi's age."

Seiko smiles a little, though there's no trace of joy.

"And compared to how talented my little brother is, is there really a comparison? I'm not sure if our Hokage should be happy or sad his son will likely be spared."

There are other factors as well, of course. But what's important isn't the future, but why the choices being made are already set into place.

"Spared from such a high position," Hoheto spits back. "Of course that's how you'd see it."

His fingers reach up to the forehead protector he wears rigidly over his forehead, yanking at it and throwing it to the ground.

Seiko hisses in sympathetic pain as she sees the new scars that nearly cover the caged bird seal, scar tissue so widespread that the green of the seal itself seems ill and discolored.

"I tried to cut it off," Hoheto says, voice conversational. "The seal."

It hadn't looked like this when they'd fought--

"'Heto..." Seiko whispers. "Why did you do that?. You managed it, you made chunin. You can make jounin. I didn't crush your dreams or anything."

"Yeah, I made it," Hoheto says. His formality has slipped over time. He used to be so careful with his wording. "I was naive back then. I thought that making jounin would be enough. But I understand now. Even gaining recognition from my clan would do nothing but tighten my prison."

"Not even the Hokage has the authority to tell a major clan how to protect their own secrets," Seiko says. Her thumb brushes behind Biter's ear, soothing him as Hoheto meanders ever closer to her during his rant. He won't attack her... probably.

"Do you understand, Seiko!? It hurts. And they can make it hurt whenever they want. Sometimes I feel it twinge even when I've done nothing wrong. My whole life it's hurt!"

"Wow," Seiko says dryly. "I wonder what it would be like going through life with something that always hurt."

Biter snuffles a little. He thinks she's funny.

"You--" Hoheto is about to curse her for real. "That's exactly it. I was already dealing with this when you weren't injured at all! Still fighting to improve myself, get myself a better lot in this caged life. And then you just quit? Do you know how much I want to quit, Seiko! But... no matter what, it's impossible for me."

He's being sincere with her, in his own way.

Seiko pats the porch next to her.

"Sit down, 'Heto."

He stares at her, agonized.

"No. I can't do that. I need to go train."

It's quiet after he leaves. Seiko stares out at her freshly trimmed grass, grown slightly longer in the weeks that Gai has been out on his latest mission.

"Training...huh."

She'd been given various hand exercises by the hospital that she'd done for a bit, and then quit. Doing it around Kakashi was embarrassing. Doing it in front of Sakumo had made him have expectations.

She doesn't want to train because she doesn't want to go back into the field. Hoheto was right, she's not like him. She has more choices, and she lives alone and not in the Hyuuga clan sector with a bunch of people who can see through walls.

Biter nudges his head against her stomach.

Seiko tilts her head up to stare at the sky. The sun is setting, spilling orange and red across the streets.

"Biter," Seiko says. "I think we're going to take an evening walk today."

After she goes and fixes the pictures on the altar.

Without her dog, she'd never have been able to find the place at all. With Biter, it still turns into a surprisingly long trek across the width of Konoha, Seiko limping along as the shadows spread from house to house and the entire city becomes illuminated by lamplight and the soft moon overhead.

A carefully maintained single room house sits nestled in the outskirts of the town. And outside, in its own yard, Might Duy doesn't notice her approach, too engrossed in his own training routine.

Seiko coughs.

Might Duy blinks, staggering a little as he comes out of whatever trance he was in.

"Young maiden! What brings you all the way out here!? Come in, sit down..."

He goes to the extent of bringing a stool out of his own house for her to rest her leg. Seiko sits down with relief. She hasn't walked so far in... over a year. Going back is going to be even worse.

"My son is still out and about," Might Duy says, dropping a towel around his shoulders as he stares at her worriedly. "Is something wrong?"

"Nothing's wrong," Seiko says. "I know he's out. I wanted to talk to you. I didn't realize you'd still be exercising this late at night."

"Oh, it's an old habit," Might Duy says, relaxing. "No time for it in the day, after all! I've got work to do, a son to raise."

"You must not sleep very much."

Might Duy laughs that one off.

"My spirit keeps me young!"

His spirit keeps him a genin.

"Why do you do that?" Seiko asks, hands gripped onto Biter's harness as the stool wobbles. "Train so much."

"Well," Might Duy says. He looks around, checking once again that no one else is around. "Keep this a secret from Gai, alright? He won't need to know this until he's much older."

Seiko mimes sealing her lips and throwing away the key.

He heaves a huge sigh of relief.

"Alright. Have you ever heard of the Eight Gates?"

She nods.

"It's a sacrifice technique. It would be classified as a Forbidden Jutsu if it were a jutsu in the first place."

His jaw drops as he stares at her.

"Knowledgeable and wise! That is not common knowledge, young lady!"

She does have an explanation... though it's not as if he'd demand one from her.

"It was one of the theories they were testing when they were looking at my left arm, since my chakra system replaced the nervous system and it hasn't shown any signs of reverting, and I still don't have much feeling in that arm. The thought ended up being discarded."

Might Guy nods deeply.

"I see! Then I will skip some parts of the explanation. I'm training like this because I want to be capable of using all eight gates-- I can feel it! I'm already on the seventh gate.. I'm so close to a breakthrough!"

"That's a death sentence," Seiko says.

Perhaps something in her voice worries him. He kneels down in front of her so that he can look her in the eyes as he speaks.

"Seiko. You asked why I'm doing this. Well, the answer is simple. I'm not good at ninjutsu or genjutsu, though I do my best. My ability to contribute to the village is--

"Your contributions are valuable."

He beams at her.

"--Limited. So, I am happy to do what I can. But, out beyond the bounds of Konoha, sometimes your best is not enough. Sometimes there are enemies that are simply a wall forever beyond your reach."

The first thing she'd felt had been the needles.

Seiko nods.

"But!" Might Duy continues, "With the Eight Gates Activation, that changes. Your taijutsu becomes a hundred-- no, a thousand times stronger!"

"Is that why?" Seiko says. "To reach for power?"

He shakes his head so hard his hair flips out and momentarily looks like some strange black frisbee.

"You know... I started training this technique almost eighteen years ago. Gai wasn't even a twinkle in the eye! I was fifteen. Back then, I really thought-- 'with this, I'll be able to be a jounin! That was my motivation, for those early years. First I thought just the first gate would be enough, and then I thought no... I should keep working till I mastered the second gate... Then the third...Then the fourth..."

There's a fondness in his eyes.

"Then I ended up as Gai's only parent. Holding him in my arms... I swore then and there that I wouldn't stop until I reached the eight gate. Nothing less would do."

"So he'd be proud of you?"

"I don't need him to be proud of me." She's seen this look in her father's eyes. "I need him to live. It doesn't matter if the fourth gate would be enough for basic missions. I need to be able to put my life on the line to keep him safe. And I need it to work."

He lifts his chin.

"And I hope he learns this technique as well. I'm sure that he'll be much better at it than me. So one day, when he's all grown up... he'll be able to make that same choice. He'll be able to protect something more precious than his own life."

"So you train..." Seiko says slowly. "Because you want agency." In the end, wasn't that the same thing that Hoheto wanted?

He pats her shoulder.

"Do you want me to escort you back?"

"...No," Seiko says. "Do you mind if I keep watching you train, tonight?"

He makes a grand pumping up fist.

"Your presence will only spur me onwards!"

She falls asleep with her back resting against the wooden planks of the house, and wakes up with a rough blanket draped over her.

She could always ask Ensui awful questions that he will hate. It's this cheery thought that makes the staircase even mildly bearable as she decides to take the next hour as a break and go up to bother him.

"Ensui," Seiko says to his door. "You in there?"

"No," Ensui says.

Seiko opens the door.

"I'm not filling out the schedule," Ensui adds. His feet are up on his desk, neatly covering whatever documents he had or had not been working on. "We're getting more work assigned to us next month anyway. It would be pointless."

At this point, she's given up on that.

"Who even gives you more work? I've never seen you answer to a superior."

Ensui gives her a flat look.

"The Hokage. The Jounin Commander. Who do you think?"

Seiko sits down on his desk since there isn't another chair in the room.

"Thought that the Jounin Commander doesn't assign missions through us."

"He doesn't. Other way around, we pass statistics on to him."

Ensui's hand drums on the desk. Bad sign, only does that when he's got something to say that she won't like. Her fault for coming up here instead of waiting the weeks it would have taken Ensui to walk downstairs and tell her then.

"I've been trying to get you cleared to work on ANBU stuff," Ensui finally says. "It's usually limited to former agents only, but most of those types don't do paperwork."

He's as good as admitted he's former ANBU without saying it. Should she be surprised? Maybe he's not even 'former'.

"I don't need to be cleared," Seiko says. "You can do that stuff."

Ensui ignores her great point.

"You're going to need to go before the Hokage and one of his advisors whenever they find a clear spot in the schedule. It's just a formality."

"What if I don't go?"

Ensui looks at her.

"I wouldn't recommend that."

Of course.

"I came here because I had a question," Seiko says instead. "Do you think sacrificial techniques are suicide?"

The chair that he'd been precariously tipping backwards onto two legs nearly falls all the way to the ground.

"No," Ensui says, once he's no longer at risk of sudden adult death through stupidity.

"Why not? Do you have any?"

"...No." Ensui's fingers unconsciously curl into an approximation of the Rat seal as he stares at her. "But any technique can be a 'sacrifice technique' if you use up all of your chakra to cast it."

Seiko tips her head forward, interested.

"So that's not suicide."

"No. That's just using all the weapons at your disposal."

"So it's using your own life as a weapon."

Ensui crosses his arms.

"You know, technically a 'sacrificial technique' doesn't have to be fatal. Sometimes it's just damage. If what you did to escape Chiyo Poisontongue was repeatable, it might meet the definition."

He sounds almost defensive. But what's he even defending?

"I didn't mean to lose so much," Seiko murmurs. "I guess I was too optimistic."

"Seiko," Ensui says. "Why are you asking about this?"

That's a good question. She doesn't answer it.

"Do you still train?"

A pause.

"...I'm still combat operational," Ensui says, voice now very, very edgy. "Most Nara techniques are trained within the mind."

"I used to do sword katas," Seiko says. "Every morning. At sunrise."

She still gets up at sunrise and walks Biter. She likes the dawn, and sleep is not something that treats her well.

"That doesn't sound fun."

She blinks.

Fun? Was that something she forgot to ask about?

"Was it fun for you? Learning the Nara stuff."

Ensui shrugs.

"While I was doing that I didn't have to do chores."

"Lazy bastard."

"Hey."

One of Seiko's hands reaches out to press down on the squishy ball she'd brought to work before it rolls off the table and hits Biter on the way down.

Hand exercises... they certainly didn't feel good.

Maybe that's a sign that they were working?

She glances down at the scroll telling her to report to the Hokage's office.

So soon... he should just come down here. To talk to her.

"Isn't that right, Biter..."

Resigned, Seiko reaches down and pulls the forehead protector that hangs around his throat off, wrapping it around her wrist instead.

She's already limping heavily by the time she reaches the office and gives a dull knock.

"Come in."

The Hokage sits at his desk, a pleasant smile on his face beneath the shadow of his red and white hat.

Standing next to him behind the desk is Danzo Shimura, white bandages covering half his face while he wears a dark gray yukata with one fully white sleeve.

Seiko tilts her head forward in a vague approximation of a bow, and refrains from kneeling. Her leg hurts.

"Ah, Seiko," The Hokage says. "It's good to see you again."

She can't say the same.

"Ensui said you guys needed to see me."

Danzo gives her a cold glance, not appreciating her lack of formality.

"Seiko Hatake," he says. "Your career path has been... unusual."

"Genin at age 9. Four C-Ranks, all completed," Seiko says. "One S-Rank, also completed with significant casualties. No further missions. Promoted to Chunin at age 10."

She's eleven now.

"Promoted to Chunin through a trial overseen by the Hokage," Danzo says. "I can only assume your performance was more than satisfactory."

"It was quite enlightening," the Hokage says. "Seiko, do you know why you are here?"

"I need a higher clearance," Seiko says.

Hopefully she won't get it.

"You are here," The Hokage says, "Because I am impressed with you, Seiko. The mission desk is-- pardon me for saying this-- a thankless task with a very high turnover rate. Much the way that ANBU's secrecy requirements mean that ninja who go that route often go years or decades before getting their incredibly earned promotion and public recognition of a jounin of Konoha, the desk restricts upwards mobility. Recognition is a hard thing to sacrifice."

"It wasn't a sacrifice," Seiko says.

"Recognition is an unnecessary thing for a shinobi to begin with," Danzo says. "All it does is give information to your enemies."

That's a rich thing to say from someone forever pissed off he wasn't chosen to be Hokage.

"It wasn't a sacrifice," Seiko clarifies. "For me. I am sure there are many who struggle every day not to be overlooked for their efforts."

Danzo sneers.

"Quite so," the Hokage says. "In any case, you've remained loyal to Konoha even under deeply trying personal circumstances."

It's strange to think of 'just living day to day' as 'showing loyalty'. What should she have done instead? Left the village?

She supposes she could always sell village secrets to an enemy in exchange for moving there. But why would she do that? There aren't any villages better than Konoha. And she'd have to go there. On foot.

"It's the least I could do," Seiko says.

The Hokage smiles at her. There's that same tinge of sadness as she saw when he'd forced her to make chunin.

"I wanted to ask you something, Seiko. A few months ago, two different genin teams of the same composition came to ask you for missions. The first, the one with my son in it, received a D rank. The second received a C rank. What was your thought process?"

She liked Gai more.

"I'm not familiar with the jounin-sensei in charge of Asuma, Kurenai, and Raido, and so had to work with the fact that based off my previous experience with Asuma, I think some time improving teamwork and having a few in village mishaps under the team's belt before their first more dangerous assignment would be best. On the other hand, I know who Chouza Akimichi is, and I think he's more than capable of handling a C Rank gone wrong. In addition, Might Gai, who was added onto the team, is incredibly talented and skilled at working in groups. He'll be able to cover for his teammates until they improve."

Danzo's eye sharpens. It's clear he disagrees with some parts of her conclusions, but not with the information she used to make those judgments.

"So Asuma's status as my son didn't factor into your decision?"

Seiko nearly rolls her eyes.

"It factored in because he's been in the tower more often than most Academy students due to his status, so I already know his personality."

His personality: annoying brat.

"I see." The Hokage settles back into his seat. "One final question, and then you can go. Under what circumstances would you betray Konoha?"

..

Seiko stares at him, to check that he's serious. And then she gives it some thought.

"If I was tortured. I'm not good with pain."

Or if Kakashi defected, but like... her brother isn't going to do that.

"She doesn't need the seal." Ensui's arms are crossed as he looks over at Lizard.

Lizard looks back at him, and then down at Seiko.

"I wasn't told this was for you. My apologies. It won't work anyway: we've tried putting seals on her left arm before and they don't work. Nothing can connect into her system."

Seiko's eyes flick between the two.

"Just put it on," she says. "It's fine if it doesn't work."

"It might explode," Ensui says.

"So we won't do it next to you."

Lizard goes silent. It's hard to see anything beyond the mask, but there's an odd edge of contemplation in the air.

"You'll owe me a favor," she says to Seiko.

"For putting on a seal that doesn't work?"

"For lying about it in my report."

...

She honestly doesn't even really know what the seal should do.

"The rumors about ANBU seals are that they're like.. Dead man's switches. Meant to prevent enemy capture."

Ensui snorts while Lizard lets out an amused huff.

"While I can't speak about what seals ANBU do or do not have," Ensui says drily. "You're not getting the full version either way. Some of our files have seals on them that resonate with the seal you're getting and prevent you from speaking about anything you read in that sealed scroll."

So, just keep her mouth shut.

Lizard pushes Ensui several feet back before she pulls her inkbrush back out and gently paints the seal onto Seiko's arm.

Seiko, naturally, feels nothing. She watches in fascination as the seal flares a little, black ink almost seeming to struggle to settle onto her skin before it stops moving.

"It failed to take root," Lizard says. "I'll find you when I need you."

She leaves as fast as she came.

Seiko looks over at Ensui.

"I didn't realize getting clearance would be such a pain," she says.

Ensui scowls, looking almost guilty.

"Clearance and authority are how you stay here. In the tower," he says. "Or else they start pulling you into the analyst or tracker divisions."

More authority, to give her the option of staying here, which she had said she wanted. But the result is a binding seal. Less agency, as she'd put it in front of Might Duy.

She'd been thinking about it ever since 'Heto dropped by. Why not quit the ninja corps entirely after the third war ends and they allow people to quit again. Unlike Hoheto, she can do that. There's no longer even any awkward familial encounters to avoid at home.

Her dad had chosen to sacrifice his honor for his teammate's life. She's sure, at the time, that that was something he thought he could live with.

She'd chosen to sacrifice her mobility because she wanted to live. She'd known as she sliced down that it was going to be bad. Maybe that's what he'd felt when he failed to turn back. He'd known it was going to be bad, but not how bad. Not how long.

So, then. In Might Duy's eyes, a sacrifice technique is a blessing, because it allows you to protect something that without it, you would be too weak to protect.

Kakashi will be fine without her.

She shouldn't not train just because she's scared of being requalified. That's losing something for nothing. A binding seal that does nothing.

Biter buts his head against her knee and she fumbles to scratch him.

...

She wants to protect the life she sacrificed her stupid sword arm for.

Her dad had sacrificed his reputation and what he'd ended up with hadn't been enough. She's not like him, she wants to have--

She wants to have a good life. One that's fun. One where she didn't cut away her friends along with the chakra strings.

Ensui cuts through her thoughts.

"Something on your mind, Seiko?"

She sighs.

"I need to do more wrist exercises. I can't scratch Biter's ears like this."

Chapter Text

It feels like deja vu.

Just as she’s pushing Ibiko and Tokara and whoever else back out the door with their first D rank mission in hand, some more new genin tumble in through the door. Obito’s hands are laced behind his head as he walks in with a little bit of undeserved swagger, while a young Rin slips in behind him. And then, behind her--

Kakashi meets her eyes from his position almost behind Minato Namikaze. His eyes flick away uncomfortably and twitch around the room.

Obito and Rin had both made genin at 10. It’s a pretty impressive graduating age, though of course, nothing compared to Kakashi’s. And if the graduation exam had been held even a few months earlier, then maybe Rin would have been able to say she graduated at 9.

Not that that’s anything to brag about. Her twelfth birthday has come and gone without fanfare, and soon her thirteenth will do the same. She’s old enough to leave the village for work at a distant outpost, if she ever grows too weary and tired. Though maybe her injuries are too distinctive?

“Hey!” Obito yells, and his young voice overlaps with Asuma’s, and Gai’s, and more from people whose names she doesn’t even recall. “We’re here to take a real ninja mission!”

She looks at Kakashi, who’s slumping into his scarf, mask not enough to hide his embarrassment at being associated with his own peers.

“Is that so?”

She turns her gaze to Minato.

He’s watching her, smile fixed in place.

“Hello, Hatake-san,” he says. “It’s a pleasure to see you again.”

So formal.

“You’ve got a full group, this time,” Seiko says. She could speculate on the politics of the choice, if she wanted to. But there likely hadn’t been anything too drastic. Maybe Minato had just wanted Kakashi to have friends.

“Yes, it’s so exciting! Do you still have that mission we did last time?”

Obito immediately brightens up.

“Anything Kakashi did, we can definitely do!” He proclaims. Then he peers more closely at her. “Hey, wait a second! You’re that lady from...”

She’s been promoted to adult so easily in his eyes. It must be the grey hair.

Obito claps his fist into his open hand.

“The grocery store! I told you guys I wasn’t lying about why I was late that day!” He eyes her anxiously, as if she’s about to drop his mission scroll like she had her vegetables. To be fair, she might.

Kakashi starts a little, as if the idea that his sister is also now doing the same things that he is doing is baffling to him. They both live alone, after all. What does he expect?

“The same mission it is, then,” Seiko says. It’s not like she’s ever going to be short of D-Ranked babysitting missions. She hands it over to Obito, who rushes back to Rin, cheering and showing it off due to the fact he hasn’t opened it yet. Rin gives the scroll a wary look.

“Kakashi already knows the place,” Minato says, smile still present on his face. “Why don’t you guys go ahead?”

Kakashi looks between Minato and Seiko with deep reluctance, but it’s not like he’s going to disobey Minato’s request.

He nods, and slips out of the building, Obito and Rin at his heels.

Seiko tilts her head a little.

“Did you need something else...?”

The smile on Minato’s face instantly cramps up.

“I wanted to apologize for last time,” he says. “Kakashi didn’t mention you were his older sister until after we’d already left the building.”

It still feels like she’s missing something.

“It’s not an important piece of information,” Seiko says. “I’ve heard good things about you from Hoheto. He’s a pretty good judge of character-- Kakashi is lucky to have you.”

Minato’s shoulders shrink a little, which only makes his spiky blonde hair stand up straighter.

“I don’t mean to pry,” he starts, which is a prelude to prying if Seiko’s ever heard one. “But Kakashi mentioned you were... Injured.”

“I don’t think he said it like that,” Seiko says dryly.

“Ahem. No. But, I wanted to ask if there was anything specific you were struggling with. I talked to my girlfriend--” He blushes a little as he says this, which is incredible-- “Because the Uzumaki have a lot of knowledge on healing that other clans don’t. And she said, basically, that healing seals aren’t really meant to heal people, they're meant to... Compensate for something the body wouldn’t do naturally. Which is a fascinating way of looking at sealing that really helped me with my own work, but anyway-- ah, I’m going about this all wrong.”

Minato takes a deep breath.

“Do you have something that you can’t do that you want to do?”

She’s never gotten hit by a truck before. She imagines it must have some of the same level of disbelief, a normal person walking across a crosswalk and seeing a truck and thinking ‘surely they are going to stop, aren’t they?’ There’s lines painted on the ground, after all.

But lines are social, trucks are physical.

She sucks in a deep breath, complaints piling up against her teeth, and swallows them all back down.

Biter shifts at her feet, sensing the plummeting of her mood.

Does she have something she can’t do that she wants to do.

“Namikaze,” she says.

And now Minato also catches on to the wobble in her voice, because he looks even more alarmed than Biter.

And that’s finally enough for her to laugh at him instead of cry.

“You’re more similar to Kakashi than I thought,” she says, after that’s done. It’s not really a compliment, but it’s not not a compliment.

She tilts her head a little.

“Crutches,” she says. “I can’t use the ones they have around here. Can’t grip onto their handles.” She can get them under her armpits, sort of, but then the grip... they should make more things for people whose hands don’t work.

Seiko blinks a little.

“Not that you have to do anything,” she tacks on hastily. “It’s not--”

“You should come over for dinner sometime,” Minato says happily. “Uhm, I’ll be cooking and not Kushina, in case you’ve heard any substanceless rumors about her cooking habits. Let’s do it when I’m back in the village in a few months! Alright.”

He’s out of the room before she can decline it.

Seiko slowly sinks back down into her seat.

If this is anything like whatever Minato’s enemies feel when they see him on the battlefield, it’s no wonder why he’s such a terrifying foe.

When she turns thirteen, the biggest news in the war is that Sasori of the Red Sands-- 15 this year-- has abandoned his own side to become missing nin. It’s good for Konoha, but it’s an ugly type of news. It’s put next to Tsunade of the Sannin, who’s gone on extended sabbatical from Konoha, and the news Zabuza of the Seven Swordsmen of the Mist, who killed every other genin in his brutal graduation.

But he’s still with the Mist.

And Zabuza hadn’t been directly in line to be the next Mizukage, unlike Tsunade or Sasori.

The White Fang is dead. The Raikage is dead. The Uzumaki are destroyed, the country of Rain pillaged.

The war at its tipping point, where all the villages have definitely lost more talent than even ten years of peace could recoup.

Seiko stares down at the newest little genin in her office.

Shisui Uchiha, age 5, stares back at her. His hair is a bit curlier than most Uchiha.

There’s a bit of crumpling in her chest. It’s going to be a bad year.

“You’ve got a jounin-sensei?” Seiko checks in with him. “I don’t see one with you.” Mostly Uchiha have Uchiha jounin, which is theoretically speaking because they can train the younger ones to use the sharingan, and practically speaking, a bad idea.

“It’s my second uncle,” Shisui says. He’s got a reassuring smile on his face, which fails to reassure her. “He’ll be here in a second.”

Fugaku Uchiha does, indeed, show up within five minutes. He looks deeply harried by life and not particularly happy to be here, which is fair. Well, at least he’s older than Minato. By a little bit.

Seiko reaches for her D-Ranks and hands it to him. Not babysitting, she’s not putting a baby through that. They can go chase cats.

Fugaku glances at the scroll and grimaces.

“No,” he says. “We’re not doing that.”

“Okay,” Seiko says, deciding if she wants to get into a fight with someone while in front of an impressionable kid. Sure, why not. “Goodbye, then.”

He stares at her.

“We’re not taking the mission,” he repeats himself. “I’ll do a C-rank with him.” He stares at her pointedly. “Chouza Akimichi got a C-rank.”

Gods preserve fools and idiots.

Shisui looks between the two of them with an increasingly forced smile.

“I can do a C-Rank,” he promises her.

“Great. Go do this mission and then come back for one.”

The conversation stalls out again as Fugaku clamps his mouth shut, arms crossed as he stews up his next argument.

The silence is sadly fleeting.

“I don’t need to take missions from the mission desk,” he starts next. “He can accompany me on police patrols.”

“You’re right,” Seiko agrees. “You don’t have to do this. Here are some alternatives. You can operate within the Uchiha Police roles. You can go over my head and talk to my boss, Ensui Nara. You can go over Ensui’s head and talk to his boss, the Hokage.”

Shisui looks between the two of them, smile finally faltering.

“Uncle...?”

“You’ve made the wrong choice,” Fugaku says crisply, holding the D-Rank in one clenched hand.

The next week, Yakumi Uchiha is back to working alongside Seiko at the front desk.

“Hey,” Yakumi says. “I thought you were never gonna stick around this place. Glad I was wrong.”

It seems like the Uchiha weren’t so busy they couldn’t spare her from the force afterall.

“It’s nice to see you back,” Seiko agrees. “What were you doing over there?”

Yakumi rolls her eyes.

“I was doing Fugaku’s secretary work, what do you think? The Clan Head before him died a few years ago and he’s been running the Police, then getting deployed out for combat missions, and also supposedly running the whole clan-- but you know how it goes. It’s okay, the clan is large enough to mostly manage itself. Thought I was never gonna get out of there.”

Yakumi leans her head on her hands.

“But, like, Seiko. I have to be in charge of handing out the Uchiha missions. I used to do that, but I guess somebody thought it was fine until he ran into something he didn’t like.”

“You know this feels... Very blatant,” Seiko says.

Yakumi shrugs.

“You think the Nara get nothing from having Ensui run this place? Well. Honestly, they probably do get nothing, Ensui is like that. But everyone thinks they get something, so it all shakes out.”

It’s a very Uchiha perspective.

“He isn’t going to go after me personally?” Seiko checks.

“What? Oh, no. I mean, you’re Clan Head, right? He’d have to argue with a twelve year old orphan in front of every Clan Head in Konoha. Over a single mission assignment? His first ever interaction as a jounin-sensei? That would be humiliating.”

“I think it’s too late for it to not be embarrassing for him,” Seiko says. And she’s thirteen now, not twelve.

Yakumi sighs.

“As long as he just drops it,” she says. “It’ll be fine.”

The months that Minato had promised he’d be back in the village for had vanished as he remained stuck as the anchor that Konoha’s battle plans relied on, needing to be everywhere at once and so unable to actually be within Konoha.

And so, instead of doing that, Seiko goes back to the hospital under Nono Yakushi’s watchful eye.

“We’ve been doing some more consulting with Ensui,” Nono tells her. “We’ve been focusing more on your knee than the rest of your issues, but aside from asking Orochimaru to come in and consult about the poison, it’s a bit of a dead end. And not worth the village’s time due to both Chiyo and Sasori no longer being active combatants.”

“No Orochimaru,” Seiko says very quickly. “It’s not necessary.”

Nono stares at her from underneath her spectacles, but says nothing more about that..

“Moving on to your left arm. You have no sensation at all, correct?”

“Phantom pains,” Seiko says. “Sometimes it will twitch without my conscious will.”

“That’s actually a good sign,” Nono says. “The more the chakra can be convinced to act like nerves, the better off the arm will be.” She makes a check mark on her clipboard. “Can you form hand seals?”

“Not...really.”

“Well, make an attempt.”

A brutal hour later, both of Seiko’s hands have started to shake so badly that she can’t hold a basket handle.

“A range of five to fifteen minutes for the formation of one non-functional seal,” Nono says. “That’s unfortunate.”

“You’re telling me,” Seiko mutters.

Biter whines a bit next to her, tail thumping the floor.

“Yes.” Nono gives a simple nod. “Not all is lost, though. You’ve heard of one handed sealing?”

She’s got to be joking.

“I know what it is.”

“Yes, it’s a rather difficult technique. But if you’re ever going to be using jutsu again, it won’t be with your right arm. Or, if that seems overwhelming, you could work on developing chakra strings,” Nono says. “Like the Suna puppet masters. They don’t need their hands to fight.”

Seiko’s mouth tenses a little. She’s not doing that.

If she’s ever to use proper jutsu again...

“Okay,” Seiko says halfheartedly. “I’ll work on it.”

She gets up to leave, only for Nono to press a bundle into her hand. Her right hand, so she actually notices.

“Pain suppressants,” the healer says. “Emergencies only.”

Seiko clumsily tucks the bundle away, surprised. An emergency...what type of emergency would Seiko ever have? She doesn’t leave the village. Though, of course, some dangers you just learn to live with.

“Thanks,” Seiko says. “If that’s all--”

“You know,” Nono says, large glasses partially obscuring her eyes. “I recently got my application to open an orphanage accepted.”

The vague sense of recognition that Seiko had firmly ignored finally blooms, whispering unwanted information alongside it. Such an unpleasant piece of knowledge. So is the orphanage deliberately a recruiting pool for ROOT, not any more of a recruiting pool than any other orphanage, or a genuine hope that will eventually become poisoned?

“Congratulations,” Seiko says. “Are you going to be stepping down from your current job?”

“You know how it is,” Nono says, hand on one cheek. “I’ll be going onto lessened duties while I take on my new responsibilities. Konoha may be short on med-nin... but it’s also rather overflowing with orphans.”

Having Yakumi back at the desk has caused Seiko to re-remember that she can take days off, mostly through the fact that Yakumi’s take on it is so absolute.

“In the field, you work and you work, and then you go home and you don’t take a mission for at least a week,” Yakumi tells her casually, the evening before she takes two days off in a row. “That’s common sense. So why the hell would I be here every day of the week!? Only a sucker would do that. And Ensui. See you, Seiko-chan~”

And, true to her word, Yakumi simply doesn’t come back for another couple of days.

It feels completely different to work everyday when it's just her and Ensui than working everyday when Yakumi obviously doesn’t have to. But... what else would she do? If she eventually leaves the desk completely after the war... what will she do instead?

...

Also, why doesn’t Ensui take breaks?

Seiko stares across from Ensui as he hands her ANBU restricted files to sort through. Because her seal isn’t properly set, she has to deliberately trigger the chakra in her arm in order to read them. Such a pain.

There isn’t any written record of what ANBU do. That would be absurd... So instead, these are stripped down to code names and success and injury records. ‘Lizard: 20 Mission success. 15 Missions as lead. 1 personal injury. 3 team casualties as lead.’

It’s almost nothing, but if you have the right context, then it means everything. It’s a pretty good system.

“You’re always here,” she says to Ensui. “If you hate work so much, you could be like Yakumi.”

Ensui snorts.

“She’s the weird one, wanting to go back to the Uchiha district so often. It’s not like she’s older than me, you know? Hanging out there is just asking for her elders to give her more stuff to do. Oh, you look like you're free, why don’t you go out and train some more? Why don’t you run down to the store and pick up a couple of things for me? Oh, I was speaking to your aunt the other day and she said her son had just been promoted to special jounin, what about you?”

He clicks his tongue, eyes half closed.

“Does that sound like resting to you?”

Seiko rolls her eyes.

“You’re already a jounin. You’d be the son of the aunt that was bragging, right?”

“I wonder...” Ensui mutters.

Again with his dislike of his own clan. But that’s his business.

“I told you before, didn’t I?” Seiko muses. “I used to do sword katas every morning.”

Ensui glares at her.

“You’re talkative today.”

She ignores him. She actually used to be very talkative, now that she thinks about it. She’d talk to Hoheto and Kiryomu about anything. About the war, about her family, about the fact that Kiyomu and Hoheto both blatantly cheated at any game they played.

And then talking to people had gotten very tiring.

“It was fun,” she says. “Doing sword katas. I was good at them, and it was fun.”

“...How admirable,” Ensui says. Though he doesn’t sound very admiring.

“Isn’t it?”

She’s still going through the paperwork while up in Ensui’s room. Even though Chobee used to bring classified documents down to the main desk all the time, she’s not that careless.

“I can’t leave,” Ensui says, answering her earlier question. “My job is to guard the building. If it’s open, I’m here.”

He’s mentioned something like that before, but it’s still strange to hear. It’s like her, probably. He could leave if he recruited someone to hang out here on his days off.

“You could--” Seiko starts, and then both of their gazes snap over to the new urgent knock at the door.

Yakumi looks completely bewildered.

“Seiko-chan,” she says. “Minato Namikaze and Kushina Uzumaki. Here to see you.”

Her eyes say ‘get them out of my normal day. Right now.’

Minato waves at her as she finally emerges back into the front room.

“Look, Kushina!” He says, slinging an arm around the shoulders of his girlfriend. “Doesn’t she look just like Kakashi?”

Kushina Uzumaki tucks her bright red hair behind her ear and gives a huff. She pulls away from his arm, hands on her hips as she stares down at Seiko. Her eyes are darker than Seiko would have thought, the wear and tear of life that Minato withstands so brightly trapped within them. Or maybe that’s just the demon fox.

“Her chakra’s even pricklier than his,” Kushina says, snorting a little. “A family full of little hedgehogs.”

She’d forgotten Kushina could do that.

“You guys didn’t have to come here,” Seiko says. A tinge of wariness creeps through her. They wouldn’t be acting so casually if something bad had happened to Kakashi, so it’s not that. “I’m not difficult to find.”

“Yes, but we’re here to pick you up!”

Kushina says, brightening up.

Huh?

“It’s almost dinner time,” Minato says. “If Kushina hadn’t sensed you still in the building, I’d have assumed you’d already long gone home.”

“I don’t...”

Biter makes a small pitiful whine at her feet. He wants dinner.

Seiko sighs. If he wants to put up with helping her walk across the village, who is she to argue?

“Well, it looks like I’m free,” she says instead, not even attempting to disguise her rapid change of mind.

“Wonderful!” Minato says, clapping his hands together. “I’m so glad this all worked out. I was worried that without enough advance notice, you might have already had plans with other friends!”

Seiko stares at him for a second, trying to see if he’s joking. He doesn’t appear to be.

It ends up being much less of a walk than she’d anticipated, due largely to the fact that Minato lives with Kushina in one of the very central town mansions that had previously been reserved for any visiting Uzumaki.

Now, of course, it’s completely empty except for the two of them, Kushina’s clan almost entirely dead.

“It’s a little big,” Kushina says, half heartedly apologetic as Minato moves ahead into the kitchen. “We don’t really use half of the place, and I just got back from the Mist... my grandmother got sick of it and personally went way overkill, putting even anti-dust seals everywhere to keep it nice, so at least there’s that.”

“That’s fine,” Seiko says politely. “My house is like this as well.”

A dead silent beat in the conversation drops before Kushina snickers, giving Seiko’s shoulder a friendly slap.

“Yeah, I’ll believe that! Well, then, we’ve gotta swap tricks!” Her smile is bright and cheery and Seiko blinks for a second, dazed by her resemblance to her own son. “Come on, Seiko-chan, sit down while you talk.” She pulls out a chair around the small table set up near the kitchen. “You gotta help me out! What do you do, living in a giant cavern like this?”

Biter butts his head against Seiko’s leg, and she reaches down to clumsily pet his head as she tries to think.

“Uhh...” Seiko sits up straight, unused to being in other people’s homes. Oh no, wait, what if Minato cooks something that’s going to show how difficult it is for her to use chopsticks... “Well, I don’t spend a lot of my time inside. I have-- I mean, if you ever for some reason need to visit my house, my mother used to work very hard on our garden, so the best place is actually on the porch. Um, there’s two layers-- there's the outer facing part, but most of the prettiest parts used to be in the inner courtyard...”

“Ohhh,” Kushina breaths out, leaning forward with both elbows on the tables. “That’s a good idea! There’s an inner set up in this place too, but it’s just another place to set up targets for practice. And I don’t need that anymore...” She laughs again. “Actually wait, I need somewhere I can really blow things up. Sometimes you just gotta do that, so maybe not a great spot for some flowers! But I like it, I like it. You can’t just hang seals everywhere and call that decoration.”

Kushina waves her hand at the room they’re sitting in dismissively.

Seals hang from every door and window, black ink on beautiful scrolls of fabric and parchment. Though perhaps for someone who can actually read the various symbols, they lose a little bit of mystique, and might instead feel more like living in a world where every window has a giant label that says WINDOW: DO NOT OPEN. Which might lose a little charm after a while.

“It makes a statement,” Seiko says.

Kushina rolls her eyes.

“It’s boring as hell, believe it,” she says. “Maybe--” she cuts herself off as Minato comes back into the room with a bunch of steaming bowls carefully balanced in his arms. “Minato, this isn’t the grocery store!! You don’t need to take everything in one trip!”

He’s wearing an apron.

“That’s because you already take all the bags yourself,” Minato says, casually setting down his various burdens, which thankfully include soup, which she probably won’t drop in her lap and burn anything with. “So there’s nothing for me to hold.”

“That’s what the chains are for, Minato!!”

He sits down at his own place setting and they both dig in, tactfully ignoring both that she puts a bowl of food from the table down on the ground for Biter, and that she’s occasionally forced to use chakra to stick her utensils to her hands to avoid something falling to the floor.

It’s delicious, way better than what she eats when on her own.

After she finishes eating, she once again feels Minato’s eyes fall on her, heavier than before.

“Seiko-chan,” Minato says.

She had been trying very hard not to have hopes about this.

Seiko stares back at him, mouth suddenly glued shut. At her feet Biter stops eating his own seconds, going still and watchful, though not quite wary enough to stand up from sitting.

“We put a lot of thought into your requests,” Minato says. “Me and Kushina both.”

Kushina nods definitively, still chewing.

The devices he sets down on the table seem oddly small for what she’d asked of him, almost like strange archery arrow guards, where instead of the main amount of leather being used to protect the soft inner arm, that leather has shrunk to a smaller strip etched with countless seals.

As Minato helps her put them on, that leather strap settles to cover the outer part of her forearm, following the bone from pinky to elbow. It’s completely smooth except for an odd metal patch halfway down.

Seiko examines both of her arms carefully. Even if whatever they’re supposed to help her with doesn’t work, at least they're not bad as a fashion statement.

“Okay,” Minato says, sounding excited. “I first came up with a way to trigger this effect through seals, but then I-- well, Kushina,-- realized that might not work out. For you. Might even make it completely useless! So with enough practice, you should just be able to trigger it with pure chakra and will, just like anyone--”

That does sound like something a genius specializing in chakra manipulation would say.

“But before that day comes, I came up with a different solution. You just need to slide your fingers across the metal plate and press down. Try it!”

Seiko carefully took her left hand and dragged it down the hard leather until her fingers finally connected with the cool metal. Even if the magnitude of how much her hands were shaking couldn’t stop her from a simple weight distribution.

As she presses down, there’s a soft click, and then all of the seals light up, for a second, a light blue glow sparking out of them and then--

The metal cap jerks to the side and a long wooden rod, every inch papered over with more seals, extends down to the ground from her mid forearm.

Seiko tentatively stands up from the table as she clicks the other one, and then stills as she’s finally able to take some pressure off her stupid, uncooperative knee. Her hands flex and tremble with no effect, as the ability to keep herself balanced and upright is no longer contingent on her having working hands.

“It’s still a prototype,” Minato says immediately. “I wanted to have some ability to adjust the length on the fly, or change where exactly along the forearm the wood can come out of. Actually, my initial first idea was simply to try and manipulate gravity so that there wouldn’t be a physical crutch at all, but I just couldn’t get that to work in such a short period of time. I’m already working on a better version-- ah, a lot of this is just a modified storage seal with some weight corrections and sensors thrown in--”

Biter’s tail is wagging so hard that he almost knocks over Seiko’s abandoned chair. He bounces up to his feet and then rears up, paws landing up on Minato’s shoulders as he starts licking the man’s face.

Seiko blinks, then blinks again as her eyes go damp.

She tries out the crutches again, testing her new walking pattern. She doesn’t even have to use her left leg at all-- she can completely lean on the left crutch and then put the right crutch forward and then simply step forward with her right and drag the other leg with it. She doesn’t have to put any pressure on it at all.

Seiko swallows.

“B-biter,” she mutters. “Don’t do that to him, you’ll knock him over.”

As if to contrast that statement, Kushina herself flies over to Seiko’s side, picking her up and twirling her around as if she weighs nothing at all.

“Do you like it!?” Kushina says, beaming. “Oh my god, you’re smiling! You have such a pretty smile, Seiko-chan!”

Is she? Does she?

“I-” Seiko’s voice is rough. “Thank you. So much. Both of you.”

She’d bow if she were on her own feet.

“I don’t know how I’ll repay you for this.”

It’s hard to focus even after Kushina sets her back down. Biter has completely ignored her order in favor of sticking his giant wet nose in Minato’s throat.

“Oh, you don’t need to worry about that,” Kushina says, eyes still glowing with warmth. “Designing this was soo much fun! We used to use seals for all sorts of stuff back in Uzushiogakure-- lots of stuff that wasn’t just warfare. This brings me back... even if I had to reinvent a lot of stuff that I couldn’t quite remember...”

“I’m serious,” Seiko says quietly. “You didn’t have to do this. I’ll remember it.”

“No, you really don’t--”

Minato puts a hand on Kushina’s shoulder.

“Just pay us back by being nice to Kakashi when he’s older, okay?” He says. “I know he doesn’t really want to burn all the bridges he’s set on fire.”

At that, Seiko finally has to laugh.

It’s a sweet sound, barely bitter at all.

“I know,” she says. “He’s not a bad kid.”

And she does love him.

Chapter Text

Ensui set a weird looking package down on her desk. It’s a green bag that’s been kind of sloppily sealed with some wire.

Seiko looks at him. Had he waited for Yakumi to take a day off to make absolutely sure it was her that got saddled with extra work? Now that she’s finally gotten people to keep a schedule, it’s become her own misfortune?

“This had better not be your new way of delivering forms,” Seiko says.

“It’s not,” Ensui says. “Open it.”

He’s not chewing any gum, which is kind of weird.

The wire is easy to undo even with her hands, and Seiko opens up the cloth to blink in confusion at the clink of carefully packed pill vials branded with the Nara seal. It’s a good thing that none of this broke in transit, if these are real Nara medicine balls. The clan’s healing knowledge is as valuable as it is secretive.

“Your clan has finally started treating this place like the home address for your mail...?” She suggests.

Ensui scowls, looking testy.

“It’s for you,” he says. “You’re fourteen today.”

There’s a gap in her understanding of the world for a second as her fingers clench around the bag.

“This is...a birthday present?”

Ensui’s been making a vague attempt at growing stubble lately, which in her opinion looks absolutely terrible. It also emphasizes how dark his eyebags are, how fast his eyes skitter away from her.

“My aunts have been nagging and nagging at me about never having gotten to meet ‘my genin’, even though that’s none of their business, and you stopped being one of those right away. They pretty much forced me to take those.”

Seiko blinks at him.

Ensui gives an edgy one shoulder shrug, which fails to expand on his lacking explanation in any way.

“Anyway. Never go visit the Nara compound. But also you should if you ever need refills. Those are-- you shouldn’t need them. But one of my aunts was just like... what if--”

Ensui swallows and licks his lips.

“If you ever get poisoned again, or take another injury that wrecks the current equilibrium you have with the poison in your body, take one immediately. And another if that one doesn’t work. Just... keep them on you, hey?”

There’s real fear somewhere underneath his skin. Even though nothing like that can happen while Ensui guards this building.

The joke Seiko had been going to make at his expense dies in her throat.

“Alright,” she says.

Underneath Ensui’s gaze, she tucks them into a pocket of Biter’s vest right next to the emergency pain pills that Nono had given her.

It’s only after she’s done this that Ensui pops out a new piece of gum and starts chewing, a loud, obnoxious, normal sound.

Maybe that moment of relaxation is what makes Seiko willing to talk to him.

“Ensui,” she says. “I feel like I’m surrounded by ghosts.”

It’s been something that she has to ignore. The fact that everyone she talks to is doomed. Obito and Rin will leave sometime in the next two years, and never return to her desk. Minato and Kushina will follow them to the grave, and then Nono will die one day, on a ROOT mission far from home, and then Shisui will rip his eyes out and seal his fate, and then even Fugaku will not long outlive him. The Hokage will die fourteen years from now, and Danzo will die in sixteen years, and Hoheto will probably die long before then, and then--

“Everyone I talk to,” she says. “They don’t even know they're dead yet. They don’t even know.”

She starts a little to feel Ensui’s hand awkwardly rest on her upper arm, giving it a couple of pats. It's so terribly out of place that she starts to laugh a little, covering her mouth with her hand.

“Seiko--” Ensui starts.

“No, I know.” She can’t really hear him. “They’re not dead yet, fate might be kind to them, the war will be over soon. But that won’t save them. They’ll--”

“Seiko!”

Ensui’s voice cracks in her ear. It jolts her out of her disjointed ramble, shocked at the emotion in his voice the way she couldn’t hear it in her own.

He’s kneeling by her chair.

“Seiko,” Ensui repeats for the third time. His pink bubblegum has gracelessly popped, leaving a remnant on his lip and cheek, but his eyes are completely focused up on her. “I’m not a ghost, I’m alive.”

Seiko nods slowly. That’s right, she doesn’t know Ensui. He’s alive. Even though he haunts this place, he’s alive.

“Hoheto is a driven young man. You think he’s going to die before he comes back here and complains one last time? Don’t be silly. He’ll drag himself back here just so he can die at your feet. Don’t go writing him off just yet.”

Despite herself, Seiko manages a wet snort.

...

She doesn’t know Hoheto’s fate. He could live. It just seems unlikely, since--

“And what about Chobee? Or Yakumi? You think people like that are just going to drop dead? Seiko, people like them are really committed to slacking off! If the Pure Lands start calling their names, they’ll just roll over and pretend they can’t hear anything!”

Hypocritical bastard.

And-- it’s not going to save Yakumi.

Seiko shivers a little, then determinedly shakes her head, scrubbing at her burning eyes. Naturally, her wrist also picks that moment to twitch and shake, and she ends up hitting herself square in the face.

That--

Burying her face in both hands, Seiko begins to laugh.

Ensui’s desperately uncomfortable silence only makes it funnier.

“Ah...” Seiko mumbles, aware that she seems completely hysterical. Not seems. Is hysterical. She is hysterical. She’s having a fit of hysteria. “Ensui. Thanks for the present.”

The silence somehow seems even louder and funnier, broken only by her quiet wheezes of laughter and Biters keening whine.

“No, seriously. Thanks. By the way, when’s your birthday?”

She’s known him for four years and never cared to know, but today seems like a special day indeed.

“You’re... What. 22?”

“... Something like that.”

Seiko finally reaches down to pat Battler. Sorry, sorry. She’s back to normal now.

“So your birthday would also be a mystery. Well, that’s fine.”

She shakes her head once last time to knock loose the rest of the sadness. It’s like a sinus infection. You just need to have a fit and then get back to your life.

“Do you--”

A genin team bolts through the entrance of the tower, jounin in tow. One of the boys is proudly waving a scroll over his head.

Oh wait, not just any boy. Asuma grins as he runs towards her.

“That’s our first C rank clear!” He yells. “We did it!”

In the seconds it’s taken him to make it to the desk, all remnants of weakness have vanished into the shadows alongside Ensui, everything back in its proper place.

“Congratulations,” Seiko says, staring down at one of her youngest ghosts. “It seems you have a bright future ahead of you, young man.”

“This is a joint gift between myself and my Rival, Kakashi!” Might Guy declares, just like he’d declared last year. It’s not true, of course, but she understands why he does it.

Thankfully she’s gotten him to agree that in the case that he was also giving presents to Kakashi, that her name would not be involved.

“Thank you, Guy,” Seiko says.

Last year he’d gotten her the rocking chair that she’s sitting in now. It’s a little large for her, built for a full grown adult, but that in itself was its own gift. He’d given it with the hope that she would keep it for a long, long time.

This year, he’s got dog treats for Biter.

“These are Special Springtime Biscuits!” He announces loudly, waving it in front of Biter as the dog gives the jar a suspicious sniff.

“Yeah?” Seiko says. “Hear that, Biter? They're special. Maybe if you eat one you’ll turn into an alley cat. Or maybe a huge green frog on a lilypad.”

Biter’s ear flicks in her direction, annoyed. Calling her a traitor just for having a little fun? She can’t have a little fun with the fact that this is a few weeks after her birthday, because Guy had been out on a mission?

One of her arms swings out from the chair, the tiniest delay between her trigger of the crutches and the thunk onto the soft wood of the deck as she uses it to stand up before triggering the other side.

It would be mean to call Guy dog-like for the way his head swivels to face her at the same time as Biter’s does.

“Have you actually fought my brother yet?” Seiko asks Guy, leaning back onto her crutches as she slowly walks down into the yard. “Or still working up to that.”

“I have fought him!” Guy declares proudly. “My Rival will not stay ahead forever!”

“That’s good.”

She disengages the crutch, then reingages it. The weight is not that bad, really. About the same as carrying a heavy dagger in a wrist brace.

Seiko looks back at Guy.

“Hey,” she says. She’s a slow speaker, much like her brother. Perhaps speaking to her is Guy’s training for how to understand Kakashi. Though she likes to think she’s more straightforward than him. And nicer. “There’s a short sword in my dad’s office. Upstairs.”

Sakumo had kept it up there after she’d had that tantrum and threw it through a window.

Her mouth is oddly dry.

“Could you go get it for me?”

It’s no wonder that he’ll eventually manage to join ANBU, not with how quiet he got when he went to get it and give it to her. You’d think he was a thief in the night, not a vision of spring.

It’s not a particularly distinctive blade, for a piece of family heritage.

Seiko uses her right hand to take it from Guy, the one that will still let her feel it. A solid leather wrapped handle. Nothing special.

As she moves to change it over to her left hand, she drops it in the grass.

An odd flush of embarrassment hisses through her as she sighs, shaking her head when Guy moves to pick it back up again. That’s what she gets for not immediately sticking it to her palm with chakra.

She still has so much pride left.

Since kneeling on her left knee would be agonizing, she drops down onto her right knee to reach it. She’s thought about it. Whether she wants to learn how to fight with her right hand instead of her left.

But, honestly--

She doesn’t want to. This is going to be something she’s doing because she misses doing it. There’s no need for practicality to enter into it. She wants to use her left hand, so even if she drops this stupid thing a thousand more times, she’ll do it left-handed.

She reaches out and grabs it, then faces her next issue.

Triggering the crutches when one hand is full is annoying. She’s going to need to practice doing this purely through chakra, because it’s simply not workable doing it like this. Maybe if she had chosen to emphasize to Minato that her fingers themselves were not nimble--.

But she had not done so.

It’s taken her a full ten minutes to simply be standing with the sword in the right hand.

Seiko sighs.

“Sorry about that,” she says. Alright, onto the starting line. Time to start rolling this stupid boulder.

Guy is still watching her, fists clenching and unclenching as he resists the urge to help.

“I didn’t give you a birthday present when you turned ten,” Seiko says.

She’d just forgotten. Her fault, that’s the kind of thing that you’re supposed to stay on top of.

“That’s fine!” Guy says immediately.

Okay, now she really feels bad.

“So I thought...” Seiko trails off awkwardly. “Well, this is helping me more than it helps you. So it’s probably not a present at all. I thought... I’d start doing sword katas again. If you want to do those with me. And keeping in mind I will be going. Slowly. Turtle speed.”

“I love turtles,” Guy says. His eyes are gleaming. “Turtles are my favorite animal. A noble beast whose persistence overcomes all obstacles! Who’s mighty shield defends the weak! A green Champion of peace and prosperity! Springtime’s Ultimate Form!”

He gives a huge thumbs up as he says this.

But, on top of all of that... he looks like he’s crying.

“...Right,” Seiko says.

She knows he thinks it’s cool and not rude that she and Kakashi are so restrained in their words. Even though it is... not precisely something she’s proud of.

Seiko slowly brings her sword up to her waist for the first form, and then has to halt immediately as she figures out an adjustment for only using the right crutch. Medical advice would tell her that if she were to only use one crutch, she should use the crutch on the left, but that’s not any good...

She stops, curses, and repositions again.

Then she looks up and sees Guy staring at her cluelessly. Because she hadn’t told him what she was doing.

“So...the opponent for this form is first going to be standing directly in front of you. The first slash is targeted towards the stomach.”

Speaking like this reminds her of when Sakumo first taught her how to do this.

“I’m going to drop the sword for now. Anything a swordsman can do with a sword, they should be able to do bare handed. A killer kills with anything. Never fear enemy steel.”

Her back straightens as she speaks, intonation changing into an intense, flat monotone as she continues to talk to Guy as she remakes the form.

“Step forward. The second strike requires a pivot of the foot, and then a second step to the side. To do that--”

Seiko breaks off, hissing with pain as she fails to achieve the pivot. She grabs onto Guy anyway, recklessly yanking his shoulder off balance as the edge of her palm slides across his neck.

“To do that, I’m going to need to widen the second step, which will heighten the risk of me being pushed off balance by my opponent. That’s the price of adaptation. After that, reverse the blade and plunge up the throat through the base of the jaw.”

She steps back and shakes her head, knee throbbing from the failed turn, seeing the modified form in her head and hating it. Biter gives her a sharp bark from his seat on the porch.

“No, Biter’s right, that’s not good at all. Too risky. I’ll have to start again from the beginning.”

She speaks a lot when she’s happy.

...

Guy has been quieter than she thought.

“My apologies for using you as a test dummy. I understand that I’m not properly--”

“You’re having fun,” Guy says.

Seiko blinks at him.

“... Yes,” she says. “This is a hobby.”

“Training,” Guy says. “You like training.”

“It’s not training, it's adapting forms to circumstance,” Seiko says absentmindedly. “A set of moves can never be perfect, it can only be tested. Repeatedly.”

It’s something she’d actually used to argue with her dad about. Traditional forms were designed for a reason, but they weren't designed with the knowledge of more commonplace jutsu. The beauty of swordsmanship was precision in the face of change. It’s like calligraphy. The same word can be written endlessly, and be different every time.

He’s practically shaking.

“I’d like to challenge you to a duel!”

Huh?

“A.. duel?”

“A Turtle Duel!” Guy proclaims. She has to take him seriously, even though he is over three years younger than her and has an unflattering bowl cut and is wearing green spandex.

“And what... is a turtle duel.”

“A slow motion fight! Taijutsu against taijutsu! I am gaining in skill just from hearing from you! Just from watching you! Please!”

She’s just very bad at saying no.

It becomes an almost clown show in front of the sunset, every move proudly declared beforehand and then painstakingly arced out.

“Strong Fist Style!” Guy proclaims over and over, inventing different strange turtle names for moves that he’s obviously never formally bothered giving names to, and in true combat will never use.

And in place of that is Seiko’s precise, endless muttering as she continues to stumble around in her own backyard.

“Sword strike slicing down left to right across the chest,” She says, leaning heavily onto her right crutch as she pauses mid move and realizes an error. “No, that’s inefficient.”

Her left hand shivers in the air from an uncontrollable jolt as she sighs and attempts a vertical downwards slash. “Adaptation of the 2nd kata, third movement. Neck to sternum.”

She can almost see it. She used to be able to see where to make changes so easily, because she could just do the correct form.

Guy’s vulnerabilities are obvious. If she had two legs she could kick in his knee. If she had better aim she could target his elbow joint. If she had--

In the end, it simply gets too dark to see.

“I need to go home,” Guy says apologetically. “My dad will worry.”

Ah, she’s going to regret doing all that tomorrow. Everything that didn’t hurt so much while she was having fun is going to keep her up at night.

“Kakashi goes back into the field in two days,” Seiko says. “You should catch him before he gives you the slip.”

“My orphanage officially opened a few months ago,” Nono says, green eyes dull behind her spectacles as she holds Seiko’s wrist in her hands. “It’s a shame you missed the grand opening.”

“I don’t need a grand opening to see some orphans,” Seiko says. “I do that every day.”

Nono snorts, thumb pressing sharply down on one of Seiko’s scars for a second.

“Nevertheless,” Nono says. “You should come.”

It’s unlike Nono to imply that Seiko should do something for her. Almost unwillingly, Seiko begins to slowly circulate facts and knowledge, always linking together towards something greater. As always, she hates what she understands, and understands what she hates.

The only remarkable orphan to be produced from Nono’s orphanage is Kabuto. There’s nothing else to see.

“Nono,” Seiko says, staring past the woman who has likely been ROOT for her entire life. Nono’s appearance is always bland, light brown hair tied back into a low ponytail. “Have you ever thought about adopting one of the kids as your own?”

“That would be irresponsible of me,” Nono says.

She sets Seiko’s hand down and kneels down to begin a diagnostic of Seiko’s knee.

“But,” Nono repeats, for the third time, “You should see them. Make note of their names. Speak to them of the dangers of the life they will live.”

Looking down at her head, Seiko has to acknowledge it again. It’s not just how Ensui was so, so scared when he gave her those medicine pills. It’s not just how she’s scared, all the time.

Nono is afraid, too.

But unlike her and Ensui’s paranoia, Nono’s fear is as real and concrete as the bricks of the orphanage. Her good deed in caring for children will come to naught as Danzo recruits her best and brightest. She cannot stand up against him, and cannot prevent him speaking to Kabuto behind her back.

This will kill her. Kabuto will kill her, or Danzo will kill her through Kabuto. Her desire to fix a small portion of the world will result in her unable to drag her own leg out of that bear trap called an orphanage.

Seiko sits in silence as Nono finishes up.

Well. She has an inkling of what Nono wants from her.
Though of course, there’s more than one way to approach it.

“I’ll head over on my next day off,” Seiko says. Whenever she feels like taking one.

Nono is too controlled to look relieved.

That makes one of them.

...

There are more kids in that place than she’d thought. Most of them give her side-eyed glances, eyes stuck on her crutches while they pretend to be absorbed in their chores. She’s halfway to fifteen, so it’s not like she’s a prospective adopter.

But at the same time, there aren’t any kids her age living here. Ninja academy graduates can get different housing... so anyone her age here would have been unable to even become a genin.

Or maybe they were adopted by civilian parents. She shouldn’t assume.

Biter approaches each and every child of the orphanage, and sniffs their hands. Even though he doesn’t like children.

Nono has called her here to prevent these children from entering ROOT and being erased from the world.

So she asks their names.

“I know you,” one of the kids says. She's got blank brown eyes and spiky dark hair tied up in a ponytail. “I’ve seen you. You buy lunch from that ramen place outside the academy.”

It’s strange how the things that you do so much that the actions themselves become invisible to you are still visible to other people.

“That’s me,” Seiko says. “And you are..?”

“Anko Mitarashi!”

Seiko stills.

So, it was arrogance on her part to think that only one person mattered. That was her fault. So Orochimaru’s genin had also been orphaned. Anko had a last name, even. So likely not orphaned from birth.

“It’s nice to meet you, Anko,” Seiko says. “And you’ll be a ninja soon, I presume?”

The girl's face lights up.

“Hell yeah I am! I’m gonna pass the test next year, and become the greatest ninja ever! And then I’m out of this dump!” She pauses. “No offense!”

“None taken,” Seiko says. A spark of light catches in her throat, so, for some reason, she keeps on talking. “I’m in charge of genin missions,” she says. “I’ll ask Nono if you’ve been doing well here. Helping out. And... if she says yes...”

Her crutches make the floorboards creak as she leans forward to whisper in Anko’s ear.

“There will be a super fun mission for your first outing. Alright?”

Seiko presses a shaking finger to her lips.

Anko gasps, and then mimes zipping her lips shut, eyes blazing with excitement, joy for being treated for even a moment as a unique and special existence.

“I’ll do super well!” Anko shouts. “I’ll be the most awesome helper ever!!”

Biter snuffles a bit against Seiko’s legs.

Showing bias like that. Well. It’s okay. Anko’s life will be hard in the future. Her reputation will tank the same way Sakumo’s did, and for something completely out of her control, and it will never, ever recover. Not for decades. Her achievement will be smothered in Orochimaru’s shadow, never to be untainted.

She’s been thinking about it. Retiring from the desk in two more years.

But if she does...

It will be just her and Biter in that big house.

What if Biter gets lonely?

There's another kid tucked away in the corner with a book. He has soft white hair and oversized round glasses that don’t fit him properly.

This will be the last one.

It would be appropriate to kneel down to talk to him, since he’s so much younger than her.

Of course, she can’t do that.

“You’ve been talking to everyone,” Kabuto says. His voice is wavery and faint. “My name is Kabuto. Are you... the friend that Miss Nono said would come?”

Had Nono said something about her?

“Probably.”

Kabuto sits in silence with that for a moment.

“You’re much younger than Miss Nono,” he says.

“And how old do you think Nono is?”

His eyes widen, clearly not having thought about that at all.

“Old,” he says.

“And how old is old?”

He has to give this some thought.

“30.”

Incredible.

“And how old am I?”

“Miss Nono said you are fourteen and a half,” Kabuto says immediately.

It’s no fun if he already knows.

“She’s not thirty,” Seiko says, amused. “She’s still in her twenties, you know...”

This difference clearly doesn’t mean very much to the kid. He can’t be more than five years old himself. A year or so younger than Shisui.

“Kabuto,” Seiko says. “What are you going to do when you grow up?”

It’s something she’s asked most of the kids here. The answer is usually very simple, since they all want to be ninjas. Except for the girl that wanted to open a sweetshop, since then she’d be able to eat as much candy as she wanted.

“I’m going to help Miss Nono.”

Her wrists have started to hurt. It’s because she’s been standing up more than usual. Her forearms also burn. Because of the weight of the crutches that she’s still not used to.

“Really? That’s a good goal. How are you going to do that?”

There’s a pause.

“Miss Nono said I shouldn’t brag,” Kabuto says, voice quiet. “But you are Miss Nono’s friend. So I’ll tell you. I’m studying healing.”

He still has a bit of a lisp in his voice. He sounds a lot like Kakashi had at that age.

“Miss Nono makes money healing. So I will help her. She says I will be very good in the future.”

“Is that so?”

She extends her shaking wrist to him.

“Then, can you tell what’s wrong with this little thing?”

Small fingers grasp her wrist, and his eyes narrow in concentration before suddenly widening.

“There’s needle holes in your bones,” he whispers, both horrified and amazed. “You’ve got scars on your bones.”

She can tell him now. The problem is that he is too skilled. He was born with a weak moral compass and too much skill, so what can be done about it? That’s the kind of prize that people simply can’t let go of.

And she cannot prevent him from agreeing to join ROOT. Because his levers are too easy to move. Danzo will say this: you joining me will help Nono. You not joining will hurt Nono. So he will agree.

Nono already knows this.

When she was with her own genin squad, she had used to entertain them by drawing out entire scripts. You will say that, so then they will say that, and then in the end, this will happen. And then Kiyomu and Hoheto would bet on if it would happen or not.

She’d said it to Kiyomu.

Because you’re clanless, you will always be targeted first. It will never be good for you to be at the front.

Come on, Seiko, that’s great! No matter what, I’ll always be able to protect you guys!

“Because you’re clanless,” Seiko says to Kabuto. “Your ties to life are thin. They can be cut off easily, leaving you as a ghost without a name. You’ll be left wandering the living world, whispering to yourself ‘who am I?’ ‘What am I?’”

Her voice has not changed from its quiet politeness. Even someone only yards away from her could not tell the difference between the tone as she spoke to every other kid in the orphanage, and the one she was using now.

“Eventually, your glasses will fall through your own form, because a ghost can no longer use mortal devices.”

There’s a stillness when he looks at her. His hands have not let go of her wrist.

“However,” Seiko says. “I see ghosts all the time. So naturally, should your ties to the living world be cut, I would still see you. Keep that in mind, yes? No matter what happens.”

She rarely uses her own authority. Because it’s not something someone who’s planning on retiring from the world of ninjas should do.

“My name is Seiko Hatake,” she says. “Clan Head of the Hatake Clan. I expect that when you are older, you’ll be talented enough to be able to help me out a little bit. With that in mind, I will sponsor the orphanage.”

Everything has to be reasonable. There can be no acknowledgement of ROOT’s existence. Seiko can never imply that Nono asked her to do this in case Danzo retaliates against her.

“In exchange, you should come visit my house every few months or so. To update me on your progress.” To make sure that you do not one day vanish from the orphanage.

Overtime, the innocence in his eyes will become more and more of a facade as he gains more secrets that he thinks she doesn’t know.

He will become arrogant, because he is trusted by so many schemers who all believe he is a loyal and obedient person.

And he will go off course, because his goal is simply to help Nono. But by his very existence, he pushes her hopes for Danzo to leave the orphanage alone further away.

“Alright,” Kabuto says obediently. “I will do my best.”

She doesn’t think her dad will mind spending a bit of the family money on an orphanage. But even so, she has to go to the shrine at the end of the dining table and talk to him.

“I know you thought I’d be fine,” she says.

Another long pause.

“I really thought about it. Why did you do that?”

Wind whistles through the air.

“Isn’t it because you ran out of hope. So, occasionally. I should do something. Even if I think the kid is going to be fine without me. Because...”

Her voice trails off.

“I don’t really think it's true. That a kid can be fine if left alone just because they're a little smart.”

Biter rears up, putting his paws onto her shoulders so he can lick her face.

“Right?”

Seiko’s voice is gentle.

“They don’t have you, Biter. So they wouldn’t be fine at all.”

Chapter Text

Minato sent Seiko a letter the other day. He was putting Kakashi up for consideration for jounin candidacy, though it would probably be a few months before that went through.

He’d told her so that she could prepare a gift in advance.

She’d been intending to give him the chakra blade.

Unfortunately, she didn’t want to. So she’d have to give him something else.

Her fingers twitch on the table as she sits at the desk, just thinking while she sorts through missions on autopilot. He already had the family spirit contract. He was making his own signature jutsu. She was unwilling to give him the sword.

She’d given him a journal for the birthday right before Sakumo died, so even if it was convenient, she shouldn’t do that again.

He doesn’t wear jewelry.

What else--

Her eyes snag on a familiar name.

Unusually for him, Might Duy is on a team mission. He seems to have been going out more lately now that Guy is also away from the village a lot...The other names aren’t familiar to her outside of being in the genin corps.

It’s only a few days away, on the border with the Land of Waves. The mission is barely a C rank.

Something stirs in her memory, tense and uneasy. A long vanished fragment, a footnote of a footnote.

Silently, she begins to page through the rest of the mission scrolls. She knows Might Guy is also out of town with the rest of his chunin team... he’d made chunin just this year, hadn’t he? Catching up to Kakashi just before Kakashi makes his next jump. He’d been pretty happy about that.

It’s a slightly more high-level mission, but the location is the same. Land of Waves. Possibility of an infiltration by one of the Seven Swordsmen of the Mist. Scout and then report back.

There’s a sharp crack of wood splintering under her hands.

Biter growls as he jumps onto all fours, tensely sweeping the room for what may have upset her.

But it’s too late, they’re all gone.

Seiko stares down at the mission form again.

Then she grabs it and bolts up the stairs, pain piercing through her knee, Biter anxiously dogging her heels as she bangs on Ensui’s door and then lets herself in.

Ensui’s head snaps up at the noise in his own unconscious flinch.

“Seiko? Did something--”

“I need to submit a jounin level mission,” Seiko says, eyes slightly out of focus. “Urgent.”

“Seiko, what’s wrong?”

At least he’s not laughing it off.

She points at the two missions she’s brought up with her.

“I think... Ensui, I think that we need to call the genin team back. And the chunin team as well. Send someone to get them back. There’s an S-class in the vicinity.”

She should have been more careful.

“Traces of one of the Seven Swordsmen?” Ensui mumbles, checking through the papers himself. “Ah. Looks like the genin team was sent out before the chunin team got that report. That’s unfortunate. But... Seiko, we can’t send a jounin out for something like this. I can send a hawk to notify them of the increased danger levels in the area, of course--”

It’s not one swordsman. It’s all seven of them.

Seiko shakes her head back and forth almost unconsciously.

“No,” she mumbles. “Have to bring them back.”

Ensui looks so tired.

“There aren’t any jounin available who would take a mission like this, Seiko. Even if you could make one. And look... it’s not guaranteed that a mist swordsman is there at all. They could all be perfectly fine.”

Might Duy will die. Guy’s going to watch his father die.

She can’t ask Ensui to go. Because he can’t leave the tower.

It churns in her head, beating on her, making her joints feel freshly pierced. She’d asked him, right. What’s the point of training. What’s the point of sacrifice.

What’s the point of living.

“I’ll go,” Seiko says. “I’m going. I’m a chunin. I work here. I’ll assign myself a secondary scouting mission.” She relaxes a little as she says this. Committing to it.

She’s never seen this look on his face before.

“Seiko--”

She’s going to need to sprint. That means she can’t save pain pills for her destination, she’ll have to burn them just to be able to run at speed, and then she’ll have to keep using them without breaks otherwise she won’t be able to use the knee at all. Or concentrate through pain. No using the crutches for the run, that will slow her down. Biter carries her stuff with her even when she’s at work, so there’s no need to go home.

“Don’t go,” Ensui says.

It’s a hoarse noise, his words. They sound painful. It makes her stop, pause, see him. He looks like she’s stabbed him again, right through his jounin vest. She remembers the blood staining her hands after that. She’d left smears on the walls.

She hadn’t meant to do that.

It would be cruel of her to kill herself in front of him.

“I’ll be back in a few days,” Seiko says. It comes out more sincere than she’d thought it would. Even now, she doesn’t intend to die. “Yakumi will just have to cover my shift.”

“That’s...”

Ensui is pale as a sheet, dark circles under his eyes even more visible than normal. She watches him fold his hands into the rat seal to avoid them twitching.

Biter barks sharply, indignant. As if Seiko can die while he’s there.

Ensui’s eyes fall on Biter as well, and then he pauses.

“I can’t go,” he mutters, even though she already knew that, and hadn’t asked him to. “I have to stay here.”

He reaches out his hand, and the entire room begins to darken. Shadows that usually just shift and squirm underneath his desk pool together, swirling and condensing into something heavy and thick. It shivers, amalgamates-- and pours suddenly into Biter’s shadow, blurring into it and disappearing without a trace.

“Shadow Imitation Shadow Bind,” Ensui says. There is not a trace of pride on his face. “My own advancement of the Nara techniques.”

His hands remain clasped together as he stares at her. It’s likely that for the days this will take her, he will not move from this desk.

“It works at an extreme distance,” he says. “Though my senses will be weakened. Yell, or I will not hear.”

It is a sign of immense trust, and vulnerability.

Seiko nods, downs her first pill, and begins to run.

It’s odd, being without pain. The throbbing in her knee vanishes, and her gait evens out. The agony of her wrists subsides, the tension that she carries in her neck from being in pain softens, the mild headache caused by the tension in her neck is erased.

Everything seems doable, and bright, and easy.

She hiccups a short laugh in between strides as she makes it out of the village and, for the first time in five years, beholds the wide world beyond the gates.

It wouldn’t do to grow addicted to such a way of existing.

“Alright, Biter,” Seiko says. “You know what to do.”

Slowly, she performs the seals. It's shocking she even remembers which ones to use.

Tiger. Snake. Dragon. Dog.

“Earth Style: Fanged Pursuit. Find Might Duy.”

Biter howls, a blood curdling warning sweeping through the trees and rattling the branches.

And then he dives forwards into the night, Seiko at his heels.

...

The Land of Waves had forests much the same as the Land of Fire, with one interesting twist: the heavy fog from the sea resulted in heavy moss hanging from the tops of most branches, a parasitic feeder on the dark green branches.

Seiko has had to take her second pill, and then her third and final one.

But, ahead of her, she can sense it.

The change in the atmosphere as chakra hangs heavy, and violence thickens the air.

A roar.

And then the three of them, Guy and his two equally terrified teammates-- Ebisu and Genma. None of them notice her approach, too caught up in staring ahead.

Seiko’s eyes flick between all of them.

“Fall back even further,” she says.

The toothpick falls out of Genma’s mouth as he whirls in her direction, startled and terrified.

“You three,” Seiko says. “Fall back further.”

It’s as if Guy can’t hear her at all.

“W-we can’t do that,” Ebisu says. “What if he...”

As long as she can prevent them from being inspired by her example to join in the fight.

“My jounin-sensei is with me,” Seiko says. “He doesn’t like variables, so stay back. No matter what.”

“Wait, you don’t mean--”

Even as Seiko had stopped to talk with the kids, Biter had not stopped running. At his next howl, Seiko flickers forward onto the battlefield.

Six swordsmen of the mist stand arrayed against one man with fire in his eyes. The seventh one isn’t so lucky to still be standing. His corpse is fallen next to his blade, a bandaged double-handed sword.

But it’s not them Seiko is focused on. She only cares about Might Duy. How many Gates has he opened thus far? He’s got bulging veins, but isn’t yet releasing a visible aura. So... at least three, but not six.

The fifth gate, then. Relief sears the insides of her eyes.

There is still the possibility of saving him.

Duy’s eyes widen even further as he sees her.

“Seiko?”

Even now, her last pain relief pill is burning away. But still, she really can’t help but smile at him.

“Hey, Might Duy,” she says, a cheery, almost lazy greeting. “I somehow ended up on a stroll in this direction.”

She sees his eyes blaze even brighter.

“I will not let your walk be interrupted!”

Seiko slowly lifts up her left hand, chakra shortsword carefully held as she takes her first stance.

“There’s nothing wrong with taking a break during a late night stroll,” she says. It’s nostalgic, speaking like this, being like this.

Looking back on this will hurt.

“I think there’s quite a few issues with that,” one of the Swordsmen speaks up, long orange hair and green face markings declaring him to be Fuguki Suikazan-- Samehada’s current wielder. “Just stand back and wait your turn to die, girlie. Letting a member of our seven die unavenged simply isn’t our way.”

Beside him, a rake thin individual wearing a white mask that does nothing at all to conceal the vast mane of hair sprouting out behind it, another of them bursts into mocking laughter.

“Don’t be so selfish, Fuguki,” he says. “I’ll never say no to a little fun. Come on, little lamb. You should be honored to be killed by me, Kushima Kurirare.”

His sword also glistens in the light, long and sharp in its needle-like form.

Even though one member of them has already died, it’s clear that none of them are taking the fight too seriously.

That’s fair. Being asked to put six S rankers against 2 chunin isn’t the type of thing to overthink. Even if she’s not so young as they are acting like she is. She’s 15, afterall. That’s practically middle age.

Seiko feels the pain in her wrists begin to come back, settling her with its familiarity as she stares at her first challenger. Then her eyes flick to another of the men behind him.

Killing them one by one isn’t favorable long term. Time is against her. And... she can’t afford to give warning.

“You and Jinpachi,” she says, a sharp tilt of the chin towards another of the crouched swordsmen. A shorter guy, who holds an incredibly large cleaver completely wrapped in explosive seals. “They call you the Heartless Duo. Fight me together.”

Jinpachi laughs.

“You think you’ll die better with both of us? Don’t spare thought for your reputation, idiot. You’ll just be a stain in the grass either way.”

But he comes forward. Not too good to team up on the weak.

Beside her, Might Duy revs up for his own next fight. Unfortunately--

“I’ll also fight two!” He declares. No, he should still go just with one at a time...

But she isn’t in any position to tell him that. And the Gates are open. Maybe he, too, is on a timer, even without opening the last one, the guaranteed fatality.

Juzo stands in front of him, red horizontal stripes covering the bottom of his jaw. He fights with the sword that will one day fall into Zabuza’s hands. Another one she doesn’t know also jumps out, the so-called ‘sword’ looking a lot like a hammer and axe connected by a chain.

A giant needle whizzes past her ear, burying itself into a tree behind her.

“Don’t look away from your death, rookie!”

Might Duy will simply have to live on his own.

Seiko puts on a burst of speed as the weight of the explosive sword crashes down on her former location, and jumps; not towards either of her opponents, but towards the needle sword.

“Oh, no you don’t,” Kushima snarls as her hands wrap around his sword. He yanks the wire wound through the hilt of the blade back, yanking her and it both back into his range. “I’ll cut your hands off one by one.”

She needs to be close to Kushima. Explosives and wire fighters are long range; she’s short range. She has to hope that Jinpachi will be slightly reluctant to blow up his own comrade.

“Down, boy,” she mutters, letting the needle slip through her fingers and instead lifting her own blade to surge forward.

Her sword clangs against his and the first slice of true pain manages to slip through the painkiller. She gasps softly, unable to stop bracing herself with both legs.

It’s not a good sign.

“Who’re you talking to?” Kushima says, masked face staring down at her. “That better not have been directed at me.”

“Do people often speak to you like you’re a dog?” Seiko wonders, and enables her right arm bracer, length of wood hitting the ground in order to give her the balance to kick up and lash out at him with her foot.

Unfortunately, it just hits his prepared forearm, and his hand quickly wraps around her ankle before shoving her back, forcing her to follow the momentum and kick up with her other foot, moving into a full backflip that brutally jars her knees as she lands the move.

Beneath her, Biter yips a warning and then hits her in the side, pushing them both sideways in order to get out of range of the landed explosion of the next blow.

Seiko pants harshly.

She’s not accustomed to having to think so quickly. Having to make so many quick judgements, quick compromises.

“Not anyone who’s kept their tongue in their head,” Kushima says softly. “Nobody speaks down to me.”

There's an almost invisible line between her and him, and it’s not their chasm of skill. It’s ninja wire, threaded from his blade. She imagines that for every strand she can see, there will be six she cannot. If Hoheto were here, he could take care of them with ease. But as it is now--

She’s lost the chance for an unprepared kill. She used to be faster, better.

Seiko spells out instructions against Biter’s fur. He understands.

“Unfortunately, that’s probably just because you’re too tall,” Seiko says. “Your legs are too long. Someone should cut them down a bit.”

Kushima laughs, a tinge of disbelief in his voice.

“You sure have a mouth on you, kiddo,” he says. “It’ll be nice to hear you start screaming with it.”

Her hell consists of hooks and wires.

Behind her, she feels the shift in the air as Jinpachi launches his next attack. He’s herding her, pushing her into the wires in front of her as her only escape route from the explosion.

Hidden by the billowing dust cloud, Biter dives back into the ground as Seiko stumbles forward, one foot and one cane tripping forward only to tangle. But that doesn’t truly save her. Cuts rend open across her arms, her legs, her sides, her face.

The warmth of her own blood is everywhere on her skin.

Seiko freezes quietly, feeling the bite of the razor wire around her ankle. Her eyes trace over to Might Duy as he also pants, and then screams as he opens up another Gate, his punch smashing through the skull of his opponent and spattering it onto the stone. Green flames flicker around his body and glow in his eyes as he turns towards his next opponent.

One more gate to go before he dies.

Sacrifice.

Kushima notices her freeze and sneers as he finally feels comfortable enough to approach her.

“You’ll die like this,” he tells her. “I thought you’d be stupid enough to try and pull your foot out, but it looks like you know that a ninja without a foot is as good as dead. Shame. Well, explosions aren’t the worst way to die, are they?”

“There’s worse ways,” Seiko says.

Her cane thumps the ground once, and Biter surges out of it, right beneath the fall of Kushima’s shadow on the blasted dirt.

“Ensui!” Seiko’s voice cracks on the yell, so utterly unused to calling for help. “Ensui-sensei! Now!”

Kushima blinks in confusion, head swinging side to side before he stares back at her.

“There’s no one there. Nice prank, girlie. But you’ll pay for that. Jinpachi, show her what we do to little liars.”

While he speaks, his hands start to move, throwing the needle blade back and forth across a larger area than he’d previously bothered with.

“Don’t tell me what to do, bastard.” The voice comes from behind her once more as the huge barrel of tags lands in between her and Kushima, close enough that any ninja not ensnared would be able to easily escape.

..

“--Hey, this isn’t funny.” Jinpachi stares at his own arms caught in the wire trap.

“I’m not,” Kushima says, a pale sort of awareness beginning to trickle into his mind. “Hey. Who did you call, Seiko. What did you do!?”

“This is no time for questions, Kushima. You need to undo this. We need to get out of here!”

There’s an odd tick in Kushima’s shoulder.

“Get out of here?” He repeats slowly, the words coming across as slightly slurred. He takes a step even closer towards the bomb, Biter dogging his heels. “I just got here.”

“Don’t set that off while I’m still--”

Seiko reaches down and cuts her foot out of the wire, feeling a few that she missed cut deeply into her flesh as she throws herself backwards. She’s thrown even farther back by the strength of the blast, back hitting hard against a tree that groans and snaps behind her.

Blood is pouring out of a deep cut into her ankle, and the crutch itself is broken on that side, worsening her struggle to stand back up as the smoke begins to clear.

She can see one man standing over the other. A needle sword, pierced down into a burnt corpse.

Kushima has taken fatal damage. Covered in burns, and one his arms is missing completely. Half of his face is destroyed.

He still looks in her direction.

“Sensei?” He says softly. “Really, Seiko-chan?”

Ugh.

He’s grandstanding because she doubts he can pull off his possession technique more than once and there’s still-- ah, there’s still a whole three Swordsmen of the Mist alive.

Seiko looks over at them, Fugaki who had stayed out of it while the last man aside from him had gone to make sure that the battle against Duy stayed 2v1.

He stares back at her, long orange hair twisting behind him. He looks at Duy, who still, despite it all, has so much more in his tank.

And then he gives a sharp whistle to the other two with Duy.

“Retrieve the swords and go,” he says sharply. “We’ve lost enough here, there’s no need to stick around.” He shakes his head in disgust even as he speaks the orders.

“Two unknowns and Ensui Nara. I--”

His voice grows indistinct as Seiko’s head begins to buzz. The last of the pain pills are gone.
Agony spikes through her like another physical blow. Her knee has not hurt this much since the needle first went in. Her ankle is on fire. One of her ribs is broken. Or, if one of her ribs isn’t broken, something else is seriously not well back there.

Her forearm is pounding with the same sensation as a heartbeat. But still, she has to keep standing up. And the cuts, everywhere...

Biter growls, not budging from his spot in the shadows in order to preserve Ensui’s link. It’s obvious he wants to go over to her, but he doesn’t. He’s such a good boy.

There’s a layer of dizziness over everything, like the world itself is dancing under her feet. She doesn’t know how much time has passed. Two seconds. Five minutes. A hundred years.

She can see a sort of green smudge in front of her.

Ensui’s voice cuts back in.

“The pills. She has pills in Biter’s harness. You need to get her--”

She hears another even larger thud beside her. Perhaps the sound of a large adult man being unable to walk due to the effect of using the sixth gate, if she were to be overly precise.

It’s odd, she really feels like she should be able to see. And yet, everything is somehow without depth, so it's not really working out for her right now. She opens her mouth, forgets what she was about to say, closes it again.

She makes an awkward, stumbling attempt to pull her foot out of the wires, only to then remember that she’d already done that.

“I already did that,” she says, out loud, and then everything goes quiet.

For most people, waking up in a hospital with no memory of how they got there would be an extremely disorienting experience.

Unfortunately, Seiko has spent enough time in this stupid building over the course of her short life that the ugly wooden beams on the ceiling instead bring nothing but a disgusting level of familiarity.

With a groan, Seiko turns her head to the side, and finally gets confronted with a sight that was truly new to her.

There’s a white haired kid with a too-big medical textbook and too-big glasses sitting on the floor. It seems like Nono has been using the old “double babysitter” trick, where the kid stays out of trouble due to the patient, and the kid stops the patient from escaping the hospital.

Or maybe that’s something she just made up.

“Hey, Kabuto,” Seiko says. “Looks like you’re still alive.”

Kabuto looks up at her.

“You look very close to dead,” he informs her, solemn with a childish sort of seriousness. “And then I would have no one to remember me in this world.”

Seiko laughs, and then immediately regrets that as her world explodes with pain and the laughter abruptly ends in a hacking cough.

It sounds much more pretentious when echoed back at her than when she’d said it.

“Very close to dead is actually completely alive,” Seiko says.

Her eyes are already drifting closed again, but unfortunately, the pain is making it hard for her to immediately go back to sleep.

“Miss Nono says I can’t go to the Academy this year,” Kabuto says, his own voice reminding her of Kakashi’s with that diffident ‘I don’t really care if you’re listening’ type of speech. “I’m too young.”

“You are too young,” Seiko says.

“Your brother went to the Academy when he was my age.”

“There was a war on.”

“There’s a war on now.”

Seiko decides she can’t hear him. And, quietly, exhaustion defeats pain and makes her decision true, dragging her back under its spell.

People seem to come and go as she falls back into dreams, until a horrible noise like a broken coffee machine starts to drill its nails into her skull.

She tries to drag her hands towards her ears to block out the sound, only then to realize that there’s something heavy on one of them.

Huh...?

A green jumpsuit. An ugly bowl cut. A relatively short--

Might Guy jerks up from where he’d been sleeping on her arm to stand bolt upright. “Valiant Lady! I did not mean to fall asleep at your side!”

“Hi, Guy,” Seiko says, and then feels her stomach tangle. “Why are you here? Is your dad alright?”

Surely he’s alright. But if he is, then why is Guy here? Was it all for nothing? Shouldn’t he be--

“My father has fractured many of the bones in his body,” Guy says, eyes becoming solemn. “But he will recover in time. He was much more concerned about you, Seiko. Since you...”

There’s an unbearably long pause.

“Me and my teammates had to carry you two back to Konoha,” Guy says finally. “My dad was awake, just injured, but you...”

“Nearly lost the whole foot,” Nono says, stepping through the door and placing her palm on Seiko’s chest. Her hand begins to glow green as the diagnostic survey of the Mystic Palm Justu unfolds. “Not that it matters that much, since you already can barely use that leg properly.”

“Hi, Nono.”

Seiko gets a cold glance for her trouble. She always forgets that painkillers make her more talkative and cheerful-- and yet, nobody appreciates it!

“You made a very foolish decision,” Nono says. “And you’ll be paying for it for the rest of your life.” Despite the fact that she’s saying this while doing diagnostics, Seiko doesn’t think that she took any injuries worse than the ones she already had.

Nono takes her hand back off of Seiko’s body and gives Seiko a severe look before also scowling at Guy.

“And what are you doing here, young man?” She says. “Your father isn’t in this wing of the hospital. This is for high risk cases only.”

Guy stares back at Nono.

Now that Seiko is more awake, less consumed by dizziness, she can see dark circles under Guy’s eyes. His hands fidget restlessly back and forth behind his back as he attempts to give Nono a polite bow.

“I needed to tell Seiko something!” Guy proclaims. “But Seiko was asleep, and so I decided to wait! But then I was lulled into slumber as well!”

He pauses a little, eyes widening further.

“Which means my announcement is even more urgent! Seiko! My Rival has returned to the village!”

Seiko blinks slowly, her memory of Kakshi’s schedule slowly filtering back into her head. When she’d left, Kakashi had still been in the village, due to turn 12 very soon. How long has she been in the hospital, that the news is instead that he’s returned?

He’ll think she forgot his jounin promotion gift on purpose or something.

The next memory clicks into place, and she jerks in her bead, trying to push herself upright and failing miserably as her entire left arm is locked in a cast.

“My brother... he’s fine?”

She sees Nono give him a very threatening look.

“.... Yes!” says Guy, unconvincingly. “He is completely fine. There is nothing wrong with him. His new eye will aid him in becoming an Even Greater Rival! The Trial he is going through right now is nothing to someone so Cool and Excellent.”

Seiko stares at him.

“So shouldn’t you be hanging out with him, then?” She says. “Unless you got sick of him.”

Wait. Trial?

“My Rival has been caught in Clan affairs,” Guy says quietly. “I can only assure myself that his talent, cleverness, and stalwart spirit shall see him through.”

“That’s enough out of you,” Nono says. “Seiko needs to be left to her rest.”

If she’d really meant that, she would have kicked Guy out before this.

The events spill out in her mind. Kannabi Bridge. Oboro’s parting gift. And there was something about that, wasn’t there? The Uchiha clan hadn’t been happy to see Kakashi with a sharingan. Their bloodline, their pride.

Seiko thinks about it a little. It had gone fine without her previously, the events resolved. Fugaku had dropped it. Minato wasn’t irresponsible enough to let Kakashi deal with that all alone--

Except it was clan business, and Minato wasn’t from any clan. Except she’d already pissed Fugaku off because there’s nothing he can do to her.

She can feel a new headache begin to form, and groans a little, dragging her right hand up to rub her bandaged hand against her forehead. Her fingers twitch in their familiar, discordant echo of her will.

“Now’s as good a time as ever to give him his present,” Seiko says, finally. She looks around, for the first time noticing a second glaring problem. “Hey,” she says. “Where’s Biter?”

A low, rumbling growl from the corner of the room. Biter looks more like a pool of shadow with flashing teeth as he pads back over to her and rears up to put his paws on the bed.

He’s mad at her.

“Sorry,” Seiko sighs. “Ensui’s kind of an annoying guy, huh? Overly needy.”

He sticks his cold nose in her neck.

“You won’t have to stay stuck away from me again, alright? We’ll make Ensui do his own business.”

Another growl.

“I’ll buy you the really nice bones from the Inazuka shops. After we go check in on Kakashi, alright?”

“You quite literally cannot do that,” Nono says. “Seiko, do you think you’ll be able to walk there? You are not well, and you should not be putting any weight on your left leg. Or on your right leg. Or on your back.”

“Well, you must have at least one wheelchair in this place, right? It’s not like I got poisoned again. All of this stuff just needs time to heal.”

Nono stares at her with pursed lips, and then stops arguing.

“Or I could carry you!” Guy offers.

No.

“A wheelchair,” Seiko reiterates.

“I could carry the wheelchair!”

Biter whuffs a little. Laughing at her.

“No.”

Chapter Text

“You’re going to be alright,” Minato reiterates, crouched down in front of Kakashi with his hand on his shoulder. “Konoha doesn’t abandon its ninjas. You’re a fine, upstanding young man who received a precious gift from a teammate. The Uchiha will understand.”

Kakashi stares at him with his one working eye, an eyepatch covering his other, newer one. It doesn’t help at all, Obito’s sharingan seeing right through the paltry cloth.

It hurts, a dull, aching pain that he’s been assured is entirely psychosomatic-- Rin did a good job in the transplant, a great job.

If it hurts then it’s his fault.

“I understand, sensei,” Kakashi says. He swallows. “Will you-- will you be there? In the room?”

He asks even though he already knows.

Even though it just makes Minato sad.

“I’m sorry, Kakashi,” Minato says. “This is a clan affair. Kushina will be in there, though. You won’t be without support.”

She’d told him. He’d been reassured that everything would be fine by Kushina, and even by the Jounin Commander, the Nara guy. It’s a big deal, but it’s nothing that Konoha isn’t equipped to handle. The Uchiha just want to follow their own procedure. Everything will be fine.

The more they come to assure him, the more Seiko’s absence stands out.

Which is fine.

He doesn’t want her to come and make fun of him for getting his teammate killed even though he’d always acted like he was better than her. He’s even older now than when it had happened to her, and you didn’t see her ever having nightmares about that.

Of course, unlike Obito’s death, her teammate’s death hadn’t been her fault.

He wishes he’d gotten injured like she had. Some proof, some physical evidence that he’d tried his best, that he’d reached his limits trying to save his teammate. Instead, nothing.

The scar over his lost eye twinges.

Minato’s words fade away to a buzzing in his ears as he heads into the hall to face judgement.

The spread of a bloodline outside of the clan is no light topic, and many clan heads that would otherwise be out at the front sit or stand against the walls of the circular room, eyes narrowed in his direction. Not all of them are here, thankfully.

But a lot of them are.

It is a plain space, undecorated and without fanfare. There’s nowhere for anyone to look but straight at him. Unable to turn off the sharingan, every face is etched into his memory.

Hiruzen Sarutobi, the Hokage himself, sits with a tired expression in his eyes. He gives Kakashi a slight nod. Next to him, Danzo Shimura is scowling, arms crossed. Jounin Commander Shikaku Nara stands next to Chouza Akimichi and Inoichi Yamanaka. Hisashi Hyuuga looks deeply unhappy for something that’s got nothing to do with him.

Kushina waves at Kakashi from her position near the Hokage.

And, finally, Kakashi makes eye contact with Fugaku Uchiha.

He looks like he’d like to rip the eye right back out of Kakashi’s skull, and take the head off with it.

Kakashi stops himself from flinching.

He salutes the Hokage, then stands directly in the middle of the room.

“Kakashi Hatake, heir to the Hatake clan, jounin of Konoha,” he says, forcing his voice to stay steady, his fingers not to twitch. “I have been called here to defend my honor, and the honor of my clan. Whoever has maligned me, step forward.”

Whatever honor his clan has.

Kushina had told him what to say, stopping to mumble on and off again about how different things were in Uzushiogakure. How different things had been in Uzushiogakure. Minato had stayed silent, shaking his head when Kakashi looked at him-- Kushina had had to drag him aside to whisper that Minato was a clanless orphan. There’s no way he’d know what to do.

Fugaku steps forward almost before Kakashi had finished speaking, Uchiha fan on the back of his robes prominent and bright.

“I am Fugaku Uchiha, head of the Uchiha,” he declares. “It is not malignment when it is a horrifying truth. You have stolen the sharingan, the bloodline of our clan. Taken it from the cooling corpse of our kin! Not even the body returned to us! The eye must be returned to its rightful place.”

A hush falls over the audience.

Fugaku has done everything short of accusing Kakashi of murdering his teammate, murdering Obito for his sharingan. Hot tears burn inside Kakashi's eyes, but he defensively blinks them back. He’s not giving the eye back. Obito gave that to him.

“I--” He starts. There are so many unfriendly eyes on him. He can’t bear to look at Kushina. “I didn’t steal it. Rin Nohara was there to perform the procedure, she can corroborate--”

“Worthless assurances from a collaborator,” Fugaku states sharply. “Her statements cannot be trusted.”

What?

Kakashi stares at him, flustered and furious.

“Rin is an upstanding member of Konoha,” he says. “You can’t just--”

“Had she attempted to do that with a Hyuuga eye,” Hisashi says softly. “I would be forced to ask for her death.”

It looks like supporting the Uchiha causes him physical pain, but apparently not as much pain as not standing up and saying the stupidest thing Kakashi has ever heard.

Kakashi’s first response, well, I hope you die too, dies before it reaches his lips.

“That’s enough out of you, Hisashi,” Kushina snaps from her side of the room. “We wouldn’t be having this discussion with your clan because of your ugly little seal. Let the Uchiha dig their own graves.”

Hisashi flinches back a little as if struck, then straightens to hide the weakness.

“I’m merely informing the young Hatake the weight of his actions,” Hisashi states, voice freezing over. “Through consequences never were your strong suit, Uzumaki.”

From the other side of the door, Kakashi hears an argument, slowly escalating.

“Now, now,” Inoichi says, lifting his hands up in the air. The way his long blonde hair covered his eye had always made him seem kind of weak, but right now Kakashi wished his hair could do that. “Let’s all calm down for a second, shall we? There’s no need to throw more grudges in the pot. I believe it was the Hatake clan’s turn to speak before we all got a little off track, wasn’t it?”

“Yes,” Fugaku says, eyes narrowed in annoyance. “Quite. In fact, I--”

The door flies open and crashes into the wall.

Behind it, Seiko Hatake sits in a wheelchair, face, hands, and feet haphazardly covered in bandages. Two ANBU stand next to her, clearly still trying to argue while Biter growls at them.

“If no one but clan can come in to push the wheelchair, then I’ll just walk,” Seiko snaps, clearly the one who had kicked the door. Her head jerks in Kakashi’s direction, cold eyes meeting his. “Kakashi, get over here. One of my crutches is broken.”

Kakashi is moving almost before he realizes what he’s doing, fear lancing through him at her obviously recent injuries. His sister never left the village! She didn’t spar! What could have happened?

Her left elbow crooks around his neck as she pulls herself up, and he nearly staggers before hastily grabbing onto her left hand. It convulses in his, clearly not under her control, and she sighs deeply, the sound cutting into him like a saw blade.

The last time he’d had to help her up she’d been lying on the grass with a sword bound to her hand.

The world had been so much larger when he was five.

“Alright,” she says, as he carefully helps her back to the center of the room, sharingan memorizing every trembling catch of her breath. She can’t really straighten due to the fact that she’s actually more than half a foot taller than him, but she slowly looks around the room, eyes tracing over every present scion as Kakashi stands on her left and Biter occupies her right. “Now, I must introduce myself.”

There’s a kind of hush in his head.

“My name is Seiko Hatake, head of the Hatake clan,” Seiko says. “I must say, I am quite shocked to not have been invited to such an affair, Fugaku.”

“An attempt was made,” Fugaku says stiffly. “You were unconscious, so we decided not to wait for you.”

Unconscious?

“Ah, yes...” Seiko drawls out. “‘We’ decided such a thing, did we?”

Her gaze turns towards the Hokage, who’d remained largely above the proceedings. Beside him, Danzo looks back at them with narrowed eyes.

“This was your judgement?”

The longer Seiko stands next to him, the more certain Kakashi is that she really needs to be sitting down in that wheelchair.

The Hokage looks back at her, eyes grave but committed.

“Yes, Seiko,” he says. “We were uncertain as to how long you would remain comatose, and it serves Konoha not to leave wounds to fester.”

Seiko laughs at that, and then wheezes hard as something in her ribs fights back.

Isn’t anyone going to offer her a seat?

“I’m fine,” Kakashi mutters to her. “It was going fine.”

“I’m sure it was,” Seiko says. “So? Can he go now? We’ve got everything cleared up?”

“No,” Fugaku says. “My demands have not been answered. The stolen eye must be returned.”

“Why?”

Kakashi jerks his head around to stare at his sister. Was she crazy?... Was she more crazy than usual?

Fugaku sputters.

“It’s not his!”

“It’s Obito’s,” Seiko agrees softly. “Tell me, Fugaku Uchiha. What kind of kid was Obito? Your kin.”

Kakashi goes quiet. He knows a couple things about Obito. One of the major ones is that Obito didn’t really get along with his clan. Though Obito never really talked about the reason...

“He was Uchiha,” Fugaku states. “That’s enough.”

Kakashi sees Shikaku Nara slightly shake his head.

“You know,” Seiko says. “I met him back when he was still in the Academy.” She’s got a tinge of fond reminiscence in her voice. “I’d just dropped my groceries all over the road, and he stopped to help me pick them all back up. And then, because the bag was broken anyway, he escorted me all the way home, to make sure I was alright.”

Obito hadn’t mentioned that part to Kakashi. Shame claws through him, biting at his insides.

Seiko’s fingers once more convulse and claw in Kakashi’s grip.

“Your various issues with clumsiness having nothing to do with---” Fugaku starts.

“The next time I met him he was on Kakashi’s new team. An adorable young man, I thought. It's unusual to see an Uchiha outside of an Uchiha jounin team, but Minato is very talented. It’s an honor to see him receive that level of trust from one of Konoha’s founding clans.”

This time, Fugaku’s jaw remains firmly shut.

“So, Kakashi,” Seiko says.

She hasn’t called him genius once since she came in. He wonders if she knows. If she thinks about it. If she thinks that geniuses don’t lose teammates.

“Tell me-- no, tell ‘us’. What kind of kid was Obito Uchiha?”

Obito’s death is engraved in his mind.

“He was-- kind of annoying,” Kakashi says. The words cut his tongue on the way out, like spitting out precious gemstones. “He was always late to team practice because he got distracted helping cats out of trees. He was an orphan and lived with his grandmother, so he was jealous that I lived alone. He liked dogs.”

Kushina’s eyes are wet, and Fugaku’s own gaze is a sunken, tired thing, wind cut from his sails.

“He worked hard to catch up to me,” Kakashi says quietly. “He wanted to be Hokage. He ripped the eye out of his own head.”

Now it's Hiruzen’s turn to look down.

“So, Fugaku,” Seiko says. “Do you think Obito might have willingly given his eye? Konoha respects death wishes.”

Fugaku closes his eyes for a moment.

“Obito’s character is without question,” he says, finally. “His deeds honor the clan. So I’ll demand this of you, Seiko. What examples do you have of your brother’s honor? Surely they did not both rescue kicked puppies.”

“Let us stay courteous, Uchiha,” Danzo Shimura murmurs. “Lest you call your own eyes into question.”

“Stay out of our business,”

“This is not the Shimura clan’s purview,”

Both Seiko and Fugaku speak at the same time, and then stare at each other.

“--Anyway,” Fugaku says. “Continue, Hatake.”

Kakashi’s gut twists. Wait, is she really going to do... What? Bring up an embarrassing childhood story? Lie about how much he helps her? Why would she do that? Why is she doing this?

“There is no need to speak on all the times my brother has helped me,” Seiko says. “That is what is expected of family, so it would prove nothing of how he treated his teammates and fellow ninja.”

Kakashi shifts uncomfortably.

“Instead,” Seiko says. “I will point out his devotion to the Will of Fire.” Seiko’s voice is hard. He’s never once heard her speak positively of the Will of Fire in his entire life. “My brother volunteered to enter the Academy as early as possible because he wished to serve in the Second War, and nearly managed it-- graduating during the last months of the effort.”

There are nods around the room. Every person here-- including Seiko-- had been an active Second War combatant. Some were probably old enough to have been in the First War.

“Once the Third War started,” Seiko continues, every word slow, crisp, and precise, “He immediately took the most dangerous tasks he could, and continued to do so for the entire war up to this point. His combat record tells of missions which would have normally called for a full team of jounin being left to his team of three chunin.”

Had he not been watching, he wouldn’t have seen the wince cross Shikaku’s face. It’s almost relieving, knowing that Seiko’s biting undercurrent of spite is aimed at more than just Kakashi himself.

“And, it seems Kakashi was promoted to jounin directly before this... Incident,” Seiko says softly.

Kakashi’s head jerks up to look at her. She’d known? She was tracking his missions!? Was she even allowed to do that!

“Some people will never be satisfied with any amount of ambition,” Fugaku states, eyes remaining cold. “Promotions merely fueling the delusional desire for more power.”

Kakashi’s cheeks are beginning to burn from rage.

“You don’t know anything about me,” he says. “Why do you want Obito’s eye back so much, anyway?? Don’t you already have two!”

Seiko’s hand bites down deeper into his shoulder.

“I have to agree with my brother,” she says. “Projecting such impulses onto fellow members of Konoha is something I’m going to have to take as a personal slight to the clan.”

Her tone is so flat that Kakashi nearly misses the implication. Is she serious? She’d duel him or something? She’s going to fall flat on her face just standing here.

“Oh?” Fugaku says, and Kakashi doesn’t understand why he looks like he’s trying to backpedal. “That’s taking my worries too far, Hatake.”

He takes in a deep breath, lines around his eyes deepening as he stares down at Kakashi.

“The Sharingan will be nothing but a curse for you, child,” he says, and his eyes are somber. “You will remember that which you should forget. You do not have the right chakra type to ever have the eye settle properly as it should. All its strengths will come at a price that you were never meant to pay.”

It’s the first time Kakashi has ever thought about it. He’s going to have Obito’s eye forever. It’s going to hurt this much forever.

But he has to bear it.

He straightens up as best he can while still bearing Seiko’s weight.

“I can do it,” he says.

Fugaku nods once, and the atmosphere in the room slowly exhales, tension dispersing as the inevitable end settles into place.

“You’ll have to,” he says. “Foolish boy.”

“I’d like to sit down, now,” Seiko says, voice remaining flat and conversational. Kakashi wouldn’t really know how pain alters her voice. “I need to sit down.”

She raises her voice when no one moves.

“I’m bleeding through my bandages,” she says. “I need to--”

Kushina’s chains spring out everywhere, gently wrapping around Seiko and keeping her suspended as she’s yanked out of Kakashi’s arms and carefully moved into the wheelchair that had been kept out of the room.

Kakashi’s runs after it, and then stops as he sees Gai in the hallway, holding onto the wheelchair.

Gai looks at him and smiles in pure relief.

“My Rival!” He says. “You emerged Victorious!”

It doesn’t feel like any kind of victory. And. Kakashi does know, obviously, that Gai knows his sister. He loudly mentions it whenever it's Seiko’s birthday in the vain hope that Kakashi has this year bought a gift for her. He brings up, in his weird way, that Seiko and Gai’s own dad have a lot in common, due to the fact that they’re slackers who don’t do very much and are always in other people's business.

So obviously, Kakashi is aware of all that.

But it’s weird seeing him holding onto the wheelchair handles.

And, most of all, it's weird seeing Gai so scared.

Might Gai woke up at 5 am sharp and checked that his father was still breathing in his hospital bed. And then he did 50 push ups, 50 sit ups, and 100 pull ups in the hallway outside of his father’s room, where he wouldn’t wake anyone up.

And then he went back to sleep.

Might Gai woke up at 6 am sharp and checked that his father was still doing well in his hospital bed. And then he did 75 push ups, 75 sit ups, and 125 leg lifts in the stairwell outside of his father’s room, where he wouldn’t wake anyone up.

And then he went back to sleep.

Might Gai woke up at 7 am sharp and checked that his father was still healing in his hospital bed. And then he did 100 push ups, 100 sit ups, and 150 laps around the hospital grounds outside of his father’s room, where he wouldn’t get in anyone's way.

And then he went to Hatake Seiko’s house.

He swept the porch. He made sure that the food in her fridge hadn’t gone rotten. He would weed the garden, but he’d already done it yesterday evening, and weeds didn’t grow back that fast.

The main feature of Seiko’s house was the shrine that sat at the end of her dining table. It had quietly changed over the years that he’d been here-- a black cloth now lay beneath everything, and she’d had him bring down the proper things that had all used to be in the shrine upstairs. Incense sticks were in their proper place next to an old picture of Sakumo and his wife, and the dual urns that Seiko kept. Her old genin picture of her teammates was set upright and not pushed down as she sometimes did.

It was as good as a shrine that was set on a dining room table could ever get.

And Gai imagines a twin to it.

In his own humble home, far smaller than Seiko’s but no less empty. An urn that replaces his father’s warmth. A picture of his teammates, which ever one failed to make it home from an attack of seven S ranked enemy ninja.

...

No, he is a proud ninja. He will admit it! He will say it. None of that would appear within his home, because he would do what His Rival did, and move into the chunin housing.

It would probably be Ebisu who died, since he wasn’t as fast as him or as Genma.

Gai shivers a little. He’s been feeling cold for days, as if winter has found Konoha early this year.

All of this is just imaginary, because his father is alive.

He had shown Gai what it meant to be a Warrior of Spring! He had shown Gai what it meant to be Strong! To Save people.

He does not think he could stand being saved like that again. He might die from it. Not just his father, but also Seiko Hatake, who needed someone else to weed her garden because she couldn’t grasp the weeds.

And he had seen it. He was supposed to run, but he had seen it all. She had been fighting while struggling to hold her own sword. His father, slowly breaking through the 8 Gates, each Gate breaking him from the inside, and Seiko, who had already broken through her own set of Gates long ago.

Her sensei had met them at the gates of Konoha, though Gai understood that he had been there in spirit for much of the way.

So Gai had had to ask him.

How did he know to send back-up? Why was Seiko that back-up?

And her sensei had said this.

No one knew anything. She was scared.

That’s not what her sensei had said.

“There were some unfortunate connections between reports in your area that Seiko brought to our attention. Due to the lack of clarity, Seiko personally decided to investigate, as is her right as a senior member of the tower staff.”

Seiko hasn’t left the village since before Gai became a genin. She’d prioritized the mission over her brother’s jounin graduation ceremony.

Kakashi had come back one day and he’d had a new eye. He’d lost a teammate the way that Gai hadn’t.

It’s the type of victory over his Rival that he absolutely never wants to have.

Obito had been a kind soul. Gai had liked him. He was always up for a challenge, always wanting to train more, be better.

He’d hoped they could be friends.

But everything was just. Awful. He didn’t know how to tell his Rival that Gai’s own dad was in the hospital. He didn’t know how to tell his Rival that his sister was in the hospital because she’d gone to help him. And then there was that thing with Kakashi’s trial, which he didn’t know about and couldn’t ask anyone about because the people he knew were Seiko and Chouza-sensei, and he couldn’t ask Chouza-sensei for anything more when he’d already offered Akimichi clan medicine to help his father, who was--

He couldn’t ask his dad for advice. He couldn’t ask Seiko for advice.

He sniffles a little, trying to push it back in even though his father said that crying was good! Crying was Manly! Crying was--

He hears footsteps outside the house and whirls, hope rising in his heart despite all odds that Seiko and Biter have come home.

That hope dies, yanking more tears out of his eyes as it once more runs away from him.

It’s not Seiko. It’s one of the people from the picture frame in her shrine, bone white clothes and pale Hyuuga eyes. Gai could almost believe him a ghost come to life.

“Who are you, and why are you--” The Hyuuga breaks off his speech when he realizes Gai is crying. “Is Seiko here?”

Gai cries louder and uglier than before.

“I-- don’t cry, kami help me. I’m not good with kids. Where is Seiko? Is she alive?”

Gai nods his head at that, finally hearing a question he can answer.

“The hospital,” he says slowly, tears still dripping that he tries to brush away. “She’s in the hospital. With my dad.”

He didn’t mean to add that part.

He also didn’t mean to hurt this man, but it looks like he’s done that anyway, the news of Seiko’s circumstances filling this stranger with eerily similar emotions to the ones he sees in the mirror.

“But she will be Okay!” Gai hastily tacks on to that statement, throwing in a huge thumbs up for good measure.

Pure bafflement replaces the misery for one second before it returns.

“How could she have gotten hurt?” The man asks him quietly. “Did she fall down the stairs? Finally trip over that damn dog of hers?”

“N-no.” Gai chokes a little as he tries to talk through the lump in his throat. “She got-- she was fighting. The Swordsmen of the Mist.”

Maybe he can think of this as training for how he’s going to tell Kakashi. That thought gives him a little bit more wind.

“She went out because she was--” He has to pause again, since he still doesn’t really know how she came to her own conclusions about what needed to be done. “She went to investigate the area, and arrived to see that all seven of the current swordsmen were present, arrayed against-- against my father, who was covering my team’s escape. Due to her timely arrival, no one died.” He blinks, adds another modifier. “No one from Konoha died. But my dad used the Eight Gates, and Seiko was... on her feet a lot.”

He’d seen the way she fought. The same moves she’d used against him in their turtle spars, but done at full speed. She’d used her own weaknesses to lure her opponents in where her sensei could kill them. A knife’s edge game.

The amount of trust you would need to have in someone to pull that off.

“So she’s back in the hospital, then? Along with your old man.” Gai’s thoughts break apart.

“Yes.” He says.

“Alright, I’ll take a look at them, then. There’s no point in a wasted trip.”

Huh?

“I’m sorry...?”

The man looks at Gai like he’s stupid.

“I’m Hoheto Hyuuga.” He rolls his eyes a bit. “Seiko’s old teammate, for what that’s worth. The only one she’s ever had. The hospital has an open request for any off duty Hyuuga or Uchiha with active Byakugan or Sharingan to come over and take a look at some high risk patients, but almost no one does it who isn’t already working at the hospital. Which isn’t that many. They're probably both on the list already...”

Gai should have known that Seiko’s teammate was a man of great honor and character!

He can’t help it. He keeps talking, filling in Hoheto on what the Eight Gates technique entails to the best of his ability.

“A limit-breaking technique...” Hoheto says slowly as he walks beside Gai. “I see. If it was fully taijutsu inspired, it shouldn’t have strained his chakra system too much at all. I doubt you have anything to worry about from that front.”

Gai takes the reassurance in the spirit it was meant, and does his best to ignore the implication that the problems will simply be out of Hoheto’s ability to help.

“We can go to Seiko’s room first,” Gai suggests, only for Hoheto to strongly shake his head.

“She’s fine,” Hoheto says coldly. “I’m not worried about her.”

Gai suppresses the urge to ask if Hoheto and Kakashi get along at all. Maybe this is even better training for how he’s going to tell Kakashi than he thought.

But still, dread creeps through him as he opens the door to his father’s room. He can’t get it out of his head, the idea that the worst might still be still to come. That his dad could have made it home only to die there.

Hoheto slides open the door while Gai is stuck, outstretched hand unable to connect to the wood.

It’s a normal room. It’s a normal bed.

Hoheto stares at his dad, veins around his eyes deepening before he sighs and reaches down to press a pressure point in his stomach.

“More chakra intensive than described...” He mumbles, eyes intent. “Intense damage to some of the smaller paths near the lungs. Did this get derived from a breathing technique?”

He doesn’t know where his dad learned it.

“He fought three of the Swordsmen,” Gai says. “Not all of the damage... came from his own technique.”

“That would explain it,” Hoheto says. “Mist users always target the lungs. That’s something you should watch for, kid. Mist goes for lungs, Sand goes for the eyes, Rock goes for your feet. Can’t stand those guys.”

He doesn’t usually get to meet his direct seniors like this. Hoheto’s only five years older than him, but the chasm of experience those five years have...

As he stares at it, his dad stirs, slowly opening up his eyes.

“Gai...?” He mumbles, clearly disoriented.

Gai bolts over there.

“Good morning, dad!” He says. “I--”

A weak hand grasps onto his.

“Gai, you’re alright,” his dad repeats. “Did you see it?”

“I.. I saw all of it, dad. You’ll have to teach me that! It looked really Cool. You were super Cool!”

There’s a creaky cough in Duy’s laughter.

“You know, son...” There’s an unsettling rattle with his throat. Like something that might not ever heal properly. “I was thinking, when she showed up. Seiko.”

Gai is willing to nod along with anything his dad says.

“This was years ago. She came wandering up to the house one night. Shouldn’t have been walking so far with that leg of hers, but she’s a stubborn girl. Just sat there and watched me train the whole night.”

Everything feels new today. He hadn’t known that happened.

His dad pauses for a little, energy flagging as sleep starts calling him back.

“When I first had you, I thought, now I have to live. I have to come back. I’m so lucky to have him, I need to always come back.”

Gai’s wounded gasp does not manage to fully hide Hoheto’s sharp flinch.

“I was prepared to do whatever it took to make sure you grew up.” Duy squeezes Gai’s hand. “I’m sorry, Gai. I thought I was as committed to living as I could possibly be, but it looks like I have much more work ahead of me!”

His breathing evens out as he drifts off again on the pillow.

Neither Gai or Hoheto speak as they move on to Seiko’s room.

Biter’s head lifts as they enter, but he doesn’t even growl. Instead, he delicately picks up a scroll with his teeth and tosses it over to Gai, who nearly drops it when he opens it.

Hi! This is Minato Namikaze. If Seiko is awake any time in the next few hours, can someone tell her that her brother’s hearing is today at noon? I know she wouldn’t willingly miss it. Please don’t endanger her health in order to wake her up, though !!!!

He raises his voice to tell Hoheto that, then falls quiet.

Hoheto is slumped by her side, long hair hiding his face from Gai. But it can’t disguise his voice.

“I know you keep track of when I’m off duty, so why didn’t you--”

It’s too private for Gai to be hearing.

“You’ve got new wire scars, Seiko,” Hoheto whispers. “I’m sorry. That’s my fault. I’m the one who’s supposed to see those things coming.”

He leaves long before Seiko wakes up.

Chapter Text

She hadn't expected for Kakashi to still be there on the next day after she got back to the hospital.

But he was, the mask on his face unable to hide the dark circle under his eye from her.

"Hey, genius," she says, doing her best to rub the sleep from her eyes without jabbing herself with a twitch of an unruly finger. "Did you get lost?"

He twitches a little bit.

"No," he says, then stalls out.

She's too tired to figure out what the right prompt would be. To calculate through the hoops and gears churning in his stubborn head.

"Congrats on your promotion," she says instead. She isn't sure she means it.

There's a sick look in his eye. The one that she can see.

"Gai's dad got promoted as well," Kakashi says. "He's no longer the Eternal Genin. He's a chunin."

That's...

Seiko suddenly feels more tired than before.

"Congratulations to him as well."

Her eyes are so heavy.

"Seiko," Kakashi says.

There's a sharp, gasping edge in his voice, just for a second.

"Dad started that war because he couldn't stand having a teammate die."

Seiko's eyes slide shut.

"Dad couldn't bear the weight of his choices," Seiko says. "You get it, genius-- We just gotta do things we can live with. It's that easy."

Kakashi snorts.

"Liar."

Ensui never comes to see her, so weeks later, after she's finally cleared to limp around under her own power and her one working crutch, she has to go track him down.

He's not at the tower.

Yakumi is, though. She gives Seiko a brief nod, and scratches Biter's chin.

"Ensui?" The idea that Ensui might have a place to live that's not napping in his office seems to baffle Yakumi as well. "Well... wouldn't he have a place in the Nara compound?"

Wouldn't he indeed.

"No, he definitely doesn't live there," Nono says, adjusting her glasses as she makes corrections to Kabuto's homework. "Some old disagreement. He's in the jounin apartments."

"With Kakashi," Seiko observes, mildly surprised.

"I used to live there for a few years," Nono says. "They try to encourage jounin to buy their own homes. Since they can definitely afford that."

Her finger taps one of Kabuto's answers.

"This one is inaccurate," she says. "The chakra system is most dense around the stomach, not the lungs."

Kabuto has been making a reasonable pretense at not listening in on their conversation.

"Really?" He says. "But the diagram I read--"

"You're getting oxygen transport and chakra transport confused," Nono says. "Chakra is spiritual, not physical. It doesn't need to follow the same routes."

"But Ensui's definitely still there?"

"Unless he bought a house in the last couple of years. But I don't see why he would've done that."

Seiko never sees why Ensui does much of anything.

"Thanks for the help," Seiko says. "And you wanted...?"
Nono never offers anything for free.

"Kabuto keeps asking me if he can take a look at your arm," Nono says. "You don't mind, do you?"

Seiko raises an eyebrow at the kid, who doesn't even have the grace to look abashed.

"Sure," she says. "Though I can't imagine this will help you memorize what a normal chakra system is supposed to look like."

He's a remarkably stubborn young man to have such vacant eyes.

And, in the end, because they don't give out information on which jounin lives in which apartment to just anyone, Seiko ends up back in the tower.

A different floor, though.

So she also had to climb up an extra two sets of stairs.

Biter at least knows where the guy she's looking for is, even if she doesn't, so through the deliberately winding corridors folded into the tower, she does eventually find his desk.

Jounin Commander Shikaku Nara stares at her. There's a bottle of sake on his desk, but it doesn't appear to be open-- just sitting there, full of the idea that he could be drunk instead of fulfilling his responsibilities.

"Hatake," he says. "This is... unexpected."

"I don't know where Ensui lives," Seiko says.

She gets another slow blink from him.

"You think I would do that?" He says. "Just release private information of one of my clanmates-- my dear cousin-- like that?"

Seiko stares at him.

"Please?"

Ensui lives in a very small shoebox very high up in one of the jounin apartment buildings. But his building has an elevator, so she doesn't care about that at all.

The tower needs an elevator.

She'll file a formal complaint. To someone.

To Ensui, maybe.

It's almost by instinct that she hammers at his door in the same way she always does to his office. Loud, and continuous, so he can't claim he didn't hear her.

So it's not her fault when the door opens incredibly fast, and her fist collides with his chest.

"Sorry," Seiko says instinctively, then pauses.

Ensui looks awful.

The slight stubble that he usually has has patchily grown into a scraggly mess. His hair is down, and stiff with tangles. His skin is pale, his eyes are dark, and the whole place smells incredibly strongly of old cigarettes.

Which is strange, because Ensui doesn't smoke. He chews bubblegum.

"You look bad," Seiko says, when he doesn't do anything except stand there. Standing there isn't very good for her, personally. Her ribs don't like it. Her legs don't like it.

There's a pressure building on her right forearm as she leans on that side of the crutch more than it was designed for.

Biter doesn't like it.

"Seiko..." Ensui says slowly. "You're here."

That is an observable fact about her, yes. Though she supposes she kind of deserves that for her previous comment.

"You didn't come to see me," Seiko says.

That sentence comes out more heavy than she was expecting. A cold, icy weight.

There's another, even longer pause, and then Biter growls at him.

"Ah," Ensui says blankly. "Seiko, you shouldn't be standing up. I'll get a chair."

Something's wrong with him.

Instead of waiting outside, she follows him in. There's only one chair in his small little breakfast nook of a table, so she takes it.
Sitting down like this, she can afford to be the bigger person. It's almost funny, how much more patient she is when not on her feet. Imagine, she used to be this easy going all the time.

"Thanks for your help," she says. "You saved my life."

The words make him shudder.

But then, like a magic trick, she watches him reconstruct himself before her eyes.

"Aww, how sappy, Seiko-chan," He says. "I didn't know you had it in you."

She's seen this trick so many times he might as well be playing where's the ball with three glass cups.

"I'm talented like that," Seiko says.

She can tell jokes too.

Ensui sighs a little, slumping back to lean against his own kitchen counter. But his eyes stay fixed, staring at her.

"You know," Ensui says. "I invented that technique so that I could use it on corpses."

"Long distance corpse puppeteering," Seiko says.

Ensui scowls a little.

"Don't make it sound like that. It was going to be useful. Slip my shadow into a summon animal or a teammate, grab the first corpse that drops, and then use it for the rest of the battle. I could be in two places at once. Be there while also acting as a long range scout."

He's waiting for her to disagree with him.

"It was a good idea," he repeats.

"But it's so much more useful to use for its first purpose, right," Seiko says softly. "For its original purpose. The bridge between shadow and living opponent."

"It empowers people," Ensui spits out. "To take risks that they otherwise would think better of. To take odds that are too great for them. To act as if they have another jounin beside them, when they don't. I'm not there, not really. They're on their own. They'll die alone."

She wonders how many had died.

A single teammate? An entire team?

"Fighting is not really in my future, Ensui."

His eyes are empty.

"You're a ninja, Seiko-chan. Fighting will always be in your future. There will always be another chance to pick up your sword."

"Speak for yourself," She says. But of course, he is. "The war will be over soon, Ensui."

Such mockery in him.

"That will comfort the bereaved of those who died right before the end, then."

Kushina crosses her arms, a scowl on her face as she contemplates the broken crutch.

"Sorry," Seiko says again. She's back in her rocking chair on the porch.

It's good, not being in the hospital.

"No, no, it's not your fault, Seiko-chan!" Kushina says hastily. "I was just thinking-- well, there's a reason it broke, we didn't want to make it any heavier for you. But if we just fix it the way it was, then if something like that happens, it will just break again--"

"That's fine," Seiko says. "I don't want it to be heavier."

This doesn't make Kushina any happier.

"Seiko..."

It's wearing on her more than she'd thought, the constant concern. Is this the devil's bargain or something? Complain too much that no one takes your pain seriously, and then end up wishing they'd all stop caring and go away?

She doesn't have the heart to tell Konoha's one and only jinchuriki to go away. Kushina has been nothing but kind to her.

"It's not your fault that it broke," Seiko says. "I made my own choices."

She'd do it again.

"Yes, but..."

Kushina suddenly sits down on the floor, dispirited.

"My aunt talked about stuff like this," Kushina says quietly. "What it means to make seals for other people, never knowing what that person would use the seal for, what legacy you'll leave that will far outlast you."

It's an odd feeling, being able to look down at Kushina, see her fiery red hair from above.

"When my mother was still alive," Seiko says.

This is a distant memory indeed, because Seiko's mother had died when Kakashi was two.

Ten years ago.

Seiko's fingers twitch.

"She was the one who helped me sign the family summoning contract," Seiko continues, as if she'd had no break in the sentence. "That's how I got Biter."

Biter snaps his teeth.

"Yes, exactly."

Seiko reaches down to rub her fingers over Biter's head.

"The Hatake Clan is not traditionally associated with dogs," Seiko says. It's an odd thing, having to explain it. But Kushina isn't from Konoha. How would she know? "Our father's title is from his sword. That's what the clan is known for. Swordsmanship."

She checks to make sure Kushina is still paying attention to her wandering explanation, and blinks as she registers the intense interest with which Kushina is listening.

"I made an oath to Biter, when I contracted him."

It's a peaceful, beautiful memory for her.

"He didn't have any packmates. He didn't want to be in the Spirit World for one moment. If I wanted him, I would keep him summoned forever. I would never call another dog."

..

"In my contract, it says this: the chakra to summon Biter will not be cut off when I'm unconscious. That's a violation of the safety mechanism that most summons have to prevent a close to death summoner of dying from chakra loss."

Kushina's breath catches.

"I doubt my mother thought that Biter would become so necessary for my day to day life," Seiko says. "But...most things don't seem so important when you give them to people. You can't really foresee all outcomes, but..."

Seiko doesn't know how to prevent her death.

"Generosity lingers in gifts, I think," Seiko says. "You don't need to rebuild the crutch for fighting, Kushina. That's not what I want to use it for."

"I get it." Kushina nods, fire burning in her eyes for a second before she pauses again. "Seiko... I like thinking about it that way. I do. But... my great-grandmother invented something I think is now called the Caged Bird Seal. Do you know it?"

It's Seiko's turn to halt.

"Yes," she says. "I know it."

"She wanted to help," Kushina says. "That's what my aunt insists, at least. It's a good thing, not being worried about your eyes being plucked from your head. She even offered to make a variation for the Uchiha, though they refused."

Seiko can imagine why.

"But... after it was out of her hands, and after she gave over the ability to modify it purely to the Hyuuga, and did not pass the knowledge down among the Uzumaki... It became such a terrible thing."

"If I became Hokage," Kushina says, before suddenly faltering, looking embarrassed. "Well, that's how I used to think about it when I was a kid. If I become Hokage, I'll do something about that. I'll take responsibility for my family's legacy. But of course... well, it's not going to be me who's next."

She manages to not sound bitter at all, which is a genuine miracle.

"I'm sure Minato will do all he can," Kushina says. "I believe in him. Definitely!"

Her father's legacy was the needle in her knee, shoved in by someone who couldn't forgive the White Fang for killing her son.

The poison had outlived him.

"Definitely," Seiko says.

All of her carefully organized files were completely disrupted when she came back to her desk, even though she'd barely been out for two months.

Yakumi just shrugs, the forehead protector she wears around her upper arm flashing in the early morning light.

"Ensui said he'd take care of it," she said. "Uh. Then he sort of didn't. I did my best."

Wonderful.

"We need more people," Seiko says. By this point, it's more of a ritualized complaint than anything else. She has no expectations.

"We need the war to end," Yakumi says.

It's an ugly, haunting spectre over everything. Konoha simply cannot sustain the war for much longer. They are running out of bodies. Their only satisfaction is that Mist and Cloud, too, have faced far too much attrition. And the border countries between them all? Mud and ruin.

It will take decades to recover.

The door bursts open while she and Yakumi are still trying to exchange information and straighten things out.

"Ms. Uchiha!"

Seiko looks up from the scrolls as Asuma bursts into the room followed by Raido and Kurenai. Raido, different from his previous outfit, has a chunin vest on, and a rough scar across his right cheek. He gives Seiko a quick nod before fading back into the background.

There's a coldness to him that didn't use to be there. If she bothers to check the ANBU records, he might have already made his way on the books. Stands to reason, if his team's been treated like Kakashi's and been expected to operate without their jounin whenever he's needed somewhere else.

Kurenai gives a shy wave from behind him.

"Ms. Uchiha! Is S--" Asuma finally catches sight of her. "Seiko! Why were you hiding last time I dropped by!"

He's caught up to Kakashi, heightwise.

"I was busy," Seiko says.

Yakumi snorts, quickly ducking away to another table before Asuma refocuses on her.

The only remnants of Seiko's long stay in the hospital is the new weakness in her ankle, the new twinges in her back, the new wire scar that cuts across her cheek.

Compared to all her other scars, that one is basically invisible.

"You're never busy," Asuma says. He seems almost offended at the idea. "Anyway, did you see? Raido made chunin! Tell her, Raido!"

"I made chunin," Raido repeats on cue. It's good that they get along.

"She already knows that, Asuma," Kurenai murmurs. "I'm sorry for all the commotion, Ms. Hatake. We're just here to see if there's a short term mission we can take while we're back in the--"

"While we're stuck back in the village," Asuma grouches. "Other teams our age aren't stuck back here."

"You should be happy, Asuma! You managed to make it to your little brother's birthday party!"

"I don't care about--"

Seiko wishes more teams had been called back in.

Rin's capture looms. But there isn't--

All that will happen will be far from her, where she will not be able to reach. She has no timeline, except that it will be before the war ends. No location except that it's closer to Mist than here. There will be no reports, because it will be a kidnapping and then a death within days of each other.

It's not even the fact that greater firepower will help.

Rin doesn't die from being overwhelmed. She commits suicide via Kakashi. She refuses to risk a tailed beast disaster.

It's the optimal move. It's what all jinchuriki should do if they feel their control slipping.

It's something Seiko thinks about constantly. How everyone treats Sakumo's death so differently from everyone else's, even though it's exactly the same. The death of hope kills the mind, then the body.

"Seiko?" Asuma repeats. "Uh. Did you hear what Kurenai said?"

Seiko blinks, shaken.

"A mission," she repeats. "Well, there's always the c--"

"We're not going after that cat!"

Being back at the desk seems to have opened up the floodgates. Over the next few weeks, old faces appear and disappear as quickly as they came.

Suzume and Akame have also made chunin, and are in the middle of applying to work as instructors at the Academy. Akame's down an eye since the last time she saw him.

It hasn't improved his personality any.

Ibiki and his team drop by. All of them are still genin, much to her relief. It's grounding, seeing people go at better rates. Stay younger longer.

Shisui shows up one day, all alone.

The chunin vest fits his seven year old self just as poorly as it had suited Kakashi.

"Hello, ma'am," Shisui says awkwardly. "I'm only supposed to give my forms to Miss Yakumi."

Fugaku is. So annoying about this.

"It's Yakumi's day off," Seiko says. She and Yakumi never actually schedule their days off. They just don't show up sometimes. "You can come back tomorrow."

"I'll be out of the village tomorrow..." Shisui says. For a second, she sees a hint of mischief flicker behind his eyes. "I'll just leave it here. For her. Then."

"You do that," Seiko says.

She watches him turn to go.
"Shisui," Seiko says. Good luck. I know you can do it. I don't hate you or your uncle.

Don't kill yourself.

"Have fun out there," she says.

Shisui flashes a brilliant smile at her.

"I will!"

The next month is the Academy graduation ceremony; thus, new genin graduates.

Anko Mitarashi bounds in with all the energy in her stride of someone who's just won the lottery. Behind her, two more eager genin file in, and behind them--

Orochimaru ducks underneath the doorway as he, too, steps inside.

He has a deep pallor about him, offset by his long hair and his slit pupil eyes. But none of that is particularly unusual for a ninja of his power and status.

There is the steely amusement with which he regards his new genin, but that, too, is normal. He is old to be receiving his first batch of genin, but that, too, merely speaks to his status. There are few jounin of Konoha who can truthfully say that their talents on the battlefield were deemed more important than training the next generation.

"Seiko!" Anko cries. "Look! I told you I was gonna do it!"

So she did.

"And have you been good for Nono," Seiko says, peacefully, and watches Anko's face fall for a second.

"I have!" She insists, anxiously looking over her shoulder at the rest of her team. "And so we're gonna get a super. Awesome. Mission!"

Had she already bragged to her team that she had an in with the desk.

That's not the type of thing that Seiko should reward.

...Ah, well.

She looks up to meet Orochimaru's eyes, and, just as always, checks for permission. It's a little unusual to give these early, but he's a Sanin. He can cope with a C Rank if it goes wrong.

The amusement in his eyes increases. He nods.

Seiko slowly reaches down into her seals and snags one without even looking at it.

"This is a lot for a new team," she says, and watches Anko lean in.

She'd meant to go visit Might Duy sooner.

But they'd been in for similar amounts of time, and then she'd been out without the ability to walk all the way to his house, and he'd been out without the ability to walk to hers without risking further damage.

So it's taken her this long to walk to his house, the way she hasn't done in years. Time always catches her off guard like that. Always it's been longer than she'd like since she's last spoken to someone.

It's a slow walk through the evening hours, the sky ripening from a cool blue all the way to a dark red, then purple, then black.

She hears them before she sees them.

"WHAT TIME IS IT, GAI?"

"IT'S SPRINGTIME, DAD!"

"THAT'S ABSOLUTELY RIGHT, MY SON! And you know what that means! It's--" Might Duy breaks off his lecture as he spots Seiko. "IT'S THE VALOROUS MAIDEN HERSELF!"

Might Duy is still on crutches as he animatedly cheers his son on through his training regime, though Gai instantly breaks off his attempt to do 1000 pushups in favor of running to go get Seiko a cushion and blanket from inside the house.

He's achingly, wonderfully, alive.

"I was in the area," Seiko says.

She's now sitting on a turtle shell patterned pillow on a stool. Biter has his own blanket and bone. That dog likes Gai.

"And how lucky we are that you were!" Duy says, cheerfully sailing through the fact that the only reason she'd be out here was to see them.

Then, a trace of seriousness on his face.

"Lucky twice over," he says.

"It's part of the duty of all people who work in the tower to keep an eye out for patterns like that," Seiko says. "It was an oversight that either of you were sent out there at all."

Might Duy's face is gentle, yet resolute.

"I know you keep an eye on mission patterns, Seiko-chan," he says. "Especially for some. Even though that is not your job, we are grateful."

Seiko bites her lip, but doesn't want to argue with him further.

"I didn't come here about that," she mumbles. "Gai's told me you're doing well."

Gai beams at her.

"He is going through physical re-training so he can teach me the Eight Gates Technique!" Gai announces, obviously bursting with pride. "It is an impressive technique, one that he has been working hard on for his entire life!"

"That's... good." Seiko goes with. It's more difficult speaking to these two than she's used to. Everything feels stiff, out of place. "And you even got out of the hospital earlier than predicted?"

"That, too, is all thanks to you!" Gai says cheerily, white teeth flashing in the light.

Huh?

"Your honorable and reliable teammate, Hoheto," Gai repeats, seeing her confusion. "Not only did he agree to look in on my father and check that he was well, he found it in his busy schedule to return several more times!"

Did Hoheto have a nice twin or something?

But no, that made even less sense...

Seiko looks at Biter, who tilts his head back at her.

The dog is playing innocent.

"I don't really keep track of what 'Heto does in his spare time," Seiko says. "He can be a little..."

How to phrase this. She's sure that Hoheto is capable of being nice to other people that aren't her, though she's never seen it. Not even when she was eight, and he was desperately trying to seem cool in front of their jounin-sensei.

He's made jounin since she last saw him: Surely that's calmed him down somewhat.

"Rough around the edges." Like a handless blade.

"Not to worry!" Gai proclaims. "That is also training! For my friendship with My Rival!"

He seems proud of this fact.

If Kakashi is being mean to Gai she'll kill him.

...

She hasn't once gone to see her little brother since he moved out. Seven years ago.

"If you're happy," Seiko says.

Gai looks between her and his dad.

"WHAT TIME IS IT?" He suddenly calls out.

Might Duy laughs.

"IT'S THE AGE OF ETERNAL SPRING!!! THE BEST TIME IN THE WORLD!"

And, just for a second, it was.

Rin died only a month before the war officially ended, taking with her the 3-Tailed Beast and with it Mist's last hope of winning.

The news had been flooding in all day that day; a legendary fight! A and Killer B versus the Yellow Flash. Minato had put his all into fighting both the Raikage's heir and the 8-Tailed Beast, and come out even.

A worthy feat, but at a cost.

When his students had needed him, once again, he had not been there.

And so.

Mist, nothing but a bloody pile of corpses that had once called itself a village. Cloud, pulling back as its Raikage died, and A rose up alongside his sworn brother, the jinchuriki, Killer B.

They called him that because he was their hero. A true shinobi killer.

Konoha pulled back to match it. Their new Hokage would be married to their jinchuriki. The balance of power would swing, but not so far.

Only enough that everything is even. Enough that few survive who care for war.

There is one person at Nohara Rin's grave when Seiko arrives.

Minato stands alone, eyes tired.

His eyes flicker to her for a second, rising in hope before falling again.

But, for her sake, he tries a smile.

"Hello, Seiko," he says. "Have you seen your brother around? He was late for the funeral. He's... not usually. Late."

"Maybe he got lost," Seiko says.

Rin is buried in a different graveyard than Sakumo is. Konoha marks battlefield deaths separately from suicide.

...

"Where is Rin's family?"

It's the wrong thing to ask him.

"She was an orphan," Minato says quietly. Carefully. "Clanless. Like me."

The funeral pouches that Seiko had brought with her weigh heavily in her seals. She'd brought three, in case Rin had any siblings, like Kakashi. Grandparents, like Obito. Anyone.

"She was a sweet kid," Seiko says.

Minato's fists clench.

"She was talented," he says. "And strong willed. And--" He draws in a ragged breath. "I know seals that help with Tailed Beast extraction. And suppression. It's why I decided to learn sealing. Did you know that, Seiko?"

She hadn't known that.

There's a devastation she hasn't seen in his eyes since her father died.

"I was young. Younger than you right now-- but I'd already fallen in love with Kushina. I wanted to be able to live with her, raise a family with her-- I've never had a family before, but I want one."

There's a wildness to him.

"So I thought, since I'm a genius, why don't I simply figure out how to do that? Isn't that so simple?"

His eyes are red.

"Once I become the strongest ninja alive, then I'll be able to have that. Once I become the best at sealing in the world, then I'll be able to have that. That sounds reasonable, doesn't it?"

"I'm sorry," Seiko says.

The energy falls away from Minato as fast as it came.

"I was going to make them all do nothing but D-Ranks of babysitting my kids," he says. "As a full team of chunin and jounin. It would have been... Even with just Rin and Kakashi, it would still have been... and then each one of them could be a jounin-sensei for one of them..."

There's something terrible in her throat.

"Enough kids to fill three teams?" She says, dryly.

"No! No. One for each. Or I mean... well, I want a girl, but Kushina wants a boy, so... At least two, right?"

His gaze falls back to Rin's grave.

"She kept asking me about advanced medical ninjutsu I had no idea about," Minato says. "Post-surgery healing...is not something I'd normally look into. I ended up having to nearly pick up a third field of study so that I could always be the wise teacher who knows. Finally made me realize what I'd probably put Jiraiya-sensei through."

Biter nudges the side of Seiko's leg.

Ah.

Seiko digs into her seal and pulls out the funeral pouch.

Then she pulls out another.

Standing up right, even at the price of not leaning forward onto her crutches, Seiko hands both of them to Minato.

"My condolences for the loss of your family," she says, tone stiff from unused formality.

She's not someone who speaks respectfully.

"May they find peace in the Pure Lands."

May they know peace in this life and the next.

Minato slowly closes his hand around them.

"Seiko," he asks, very, very, softly. "What's it like having a family?"

...

"It's like dying," Seiko says. "But afterwards, you're still alive."

Chapter Text

Minato Namikaze was crowned the next Hokage less than a month after the war officially ended. It was a huge, public affair, and the streets were awash in the kind of joy that only being told that everything was over could offer. Seiko hadn't taken a day off work to go and see it, or anything, but...

Truly, people were happy. Even the ones who still kept running missions that week.

Seiko was happy, too, but unfortunately she had her own trials to consider.

"We're getting married!" Kushina says brightly. "Seiko, this is so exciting, I mean, me and Minato are sort of already married, but we never had a ceremony or announced it or anything. But now it's kind of urgent." She laughs awkwardly.

"..Congratulations?"

"Thank you! Oh, you and Kakashi will both be there, won't you? Now that Minato's Hokage, he can finally force Kakashi to show up somewhere! And I know you and Fugaku had that.. Issue, but his wife is so fun and charming! It's not like I could only invite her. Also, my aunt was friends with Biyako-- that's Biyako Sarutobi--,"

"The Third Hokage's wife," Seiko says dryly. "Yes."

"It's so weird," Kushina says. "Having to say Third. But I'll get used to it, definitely! Ah, what was I saying? So it would be rude not to invite her, so that means that the Third Hokage will be there as well, and of course Jiraiya needs to be there, he practically raised Minato-- so even though it's supposed to be private, there's gonna be a ton of people there. But I guess it's private-ish!"

Is it possible to decline this invitation.. This sounds like a nightmare.

Seiko looks at Kushina's shining eyes and immediately buckles.

"What day is it?"

"Oh, Seiko, it's going to be so lovely!"

Kabuto looks up at her with eyes made huge as he holds up a giant medical scroll.

"It's too loud to study at the orphanage," he says. "It was so much better when you were in the hospital. I can be quiet. Miss Nono said that you counted as adult supervision."

Did she say that in this context, though. Seiko is kind of thinking she didn't. She also notices that he appears to have miraculously picked a day where Yakumi is off duty to try this little stunt.

"Kabuto," she tries. "I don't think that the desk--"

The doors slam open.

Usually, when Anko's team is in here, they're a rambunctious crew. Unfortunately, neither of Anko's teammates seem to have come with her-- Orochimaru stalks in behind her all alone. His eyes seem even colder than last time, and a stench of chemicals envelops him like a shroud. Less effort to seem unthreatening. Less interest.

Anko's smile twitches a bit as she sees Kabuto in the room.

"What're you doing here, creep?" She says. "You're not even in the Academy yet."

"I'm attending this year," Kabuto says, closing the scroll quickly and hugging it towards him. "Soon."

"Unfortunately, applications for Academy placement don't open for another month," Seiko says to Kabuto, as if that's what he'd been here for. "You don't need to worry, though. I'll hold a spot for you."

He clearly hadn't been worried, but he does look genuinely relieved now. A little chameleon of a six-- no wait, he's seven now. Eight? A chameleon of a seven or eight year old. He ducks out of the room very fast, Orochimary's slit eyes focused on his every twitch.

She doesn't like that Anko's other teammates aren't here. There shouldn't have been any deaths, especially on a Sanin's team.

Actually, didn't both of Minato's teammates die when he was under Jiraiya? But she's pretty sure that was during war time, which is at least slightly different.

She waits for them to ask for something, but it just results in a long drag of silence, Anko getting twitchier and twitcher but always looking at Orochimaru and then closing her mouth whenever her impatience gets to be too much.

...

Orochimaru hadn't taken being passed over for Hokage very well, had he. Even though anyone could have told him that it would go to Minato.

She'd honestly thought he'd already have left Konoha, but that's her memory... betraying her. Putting her expectations over reality. He's not going to leave Konoha until forced out--

And he's forced out for extensive experimentation on children. Or maybe it's the same level as it always was, but Minato has different standards. She hopes he does.

"Anko," Seiko says, "How are your teammates? They're usually so... boisterous."

"They couldn't make it today," Orochimaru answers for her, smoothly interjecting his own voice into the mix. "Anko finished her training earlier than them."

Seiko just nods.

"And you are here for a mission...?" She prompts.

Orochimaru stares down at her.

"No," he says. "We're here to submit a report for a classified mission. You're not qualified to receive it."

That's...he shouldn't be bringing it to the desk, then.

"Classified reports aren't submitted here," Seiko says slowly. "There's no need to stop by here when you can go straight to the upper offices...?"

She doesn't think even Ensui actually gets those reports directly. If it's too classified for her, then its meant for either the Hokage, the Jonin Commander, the head of Torture & Investigation, or the head of ROOT. And then they hand it back down to Ensui, to add to his filing system. Or they burn it, probably.

So, Minato Namikaze, Shikaku Nara, Inoichi Yamanaka, or Danzo Shimura.

Orochimaru makes a vaguely disgusted face, and Seiko blinks. Does he not want to go talk to Minato. Is this all because he doesn't want to report to Minato as his direct boss.

Does she want to make this easy on him.

She hesitates.

No, but...

"Anko, maybe you could run this report upstairs?" Seiko offers. "Directly to the Hokage's office. I'm sure he'll be delighted to get a report directly from the next generation. Biter can show you the way."

Anko brightens up at that, but the look on Orochimaru's face when she said next generation...

Biter also looks none too pleased to leave her alone with Orochimaru. But after Anko gives him a tentative scratch behind the ears he's more willing. She knows he likes her.

It's interesting. She's been spending all this time lately thinking about what she's going to say to people. Cling to life a little harder. Shisui, why don't you have hope for just a little longer? Think about your kid. Minato, can't you find a way to seal the nine-tails without dying? Resist a little more. Kabuto, are you really going to accept Danzo's offer?

But instead, the one ninja who's absolutely determined to outlive anything is the ninja that's right here in front of her.

Maybe she should ask him about it, while Anko's gone.

"This is a personal curiosity of mine," Seiko says. "But what do you think about self sacrifice techniques? I've never been able to ask a Sannin for their opinion before."

His eyes had narrowed a bit when she started talking, but clearly the topic isn't what he'd been expecting.

"They have their place," he says at last, tongue hissing around the last syllable. "But if you ask me if I'd use them? No. It's a guarantee of your own death without the guarantee of your opponent dying as well. And my life is too valuable for almost any kind of trade, let alone one like that. But I suppose, for the weak and desperate, they may see value that I do not."

"So what you're saying is," Seiko says. "That you've never felt desperate enough to even think of using one."

His lips curl into a facsimile of a smile.

"I have always been a prodigy, yes," he says. "Limits that exist for others are not limits for me."

Seiko idly considers how loud she can be on hinting to Minato that he needs to run an investigation. Well. Hopefully he'll consider it a favor to her. If not... since she's decided to be responsible, then she'll simply have to take responsibility.

The other explanation for why Orochimaru does not use self sacrifice techniques is much simpler: he doesn't want to die. Since any option is better than death, there is no amount of desperation in battle that would lead him to conclude that a self sacrifice technique would improve his situation.

In many ways, it is just as brave a deviation from Konoha's ideals as her father's choice was.

"That was very informative," Seiko says, and means it. "Thank you."

She remembers, a full week out from the date Kushina gave her, that she doesn't have any formal kimono that fit.

Kakashi might be willing to show up in his normal gear, but she's... the clan head. And 17 years old. She can't just pretend like she doesn't know you're supposed to dress up for the Hokage's wedding.

Seiko looks down at her crutches and then looks at Biter.

"It's a shopping day," she informs him.

Excited. Tail wagging.

"Not grocery shopping."

Much less excited. That's the spirit.

Since she doesn't know which of the kimono shops are good, she just picks the one that looks the most expensive. Close enough. And then, on top of everything else, she needs specific customization so that she can wear her crutches with it. Of course. Why would she simply be able to wear a normal kimono?

So if she's already been forced to order a specifically customized kimono, then why not ask for a customized obi design? Why not ask for a customized little jacket for the dog? Why not request that they deliver straight to the tower so she can just get changed after work? It's not like she'll be able to get dressed up without help, and she can't ask Gai for that. She'll have to force Yakumi to do it.

At least all of the women in the shop were deeply enamoured with Biter.

"You could try being more friendly to the people at the tower," Seiko tells him. "Then they'd all like you too."

He snaps his teeth at her. She's never seen a dog look so smug.

"Incorrigible," Seiko says to him, only to see him suddenly rear up his head and sniff.

Hm..?

Seiko looks in the same direction and sees Hoheto.

He'd clearly been in the middle of doing his own version of all the mundane chores ninjas have to do-- or at least, that's the obvious conclusion of seeing someone walk out of the shuriken and basics shop. But being an actual sensor, and not just someone with a wonderful dog, he'd sensed her first, and then turned into a statue.

His hair is longer than the last time she'd seen him, though most of it is pulled back into a ponytail.

"Hi, 'Heto," Seiko says blankly. "You're standing directly in the door of that shop, you know?"

He starts, flushes, and then stomps over to her. Back when they were kids, he'd been convinced he'd end up taller in the long run. Well, guess what. If she stops with the leaning from her limp, she's actually still got an inch of height on him. So there.

"Seiko," he says, then stops.

Biter gives him a little snap of teeth.

Hoheto glares at the dog.

"Seiko," he repeats. "I... you're not usually out and about."

"Not at this hour," Seiko says casually. She usually goes out in the mornings and the evenings, when there's less people. "Unfortunately, expensive kimono shops are not open in the mornings and evenings for people who give a single weeks notice."

"Kimono shops?" Utter confusion. Yeah, exactly. "Why would you need that?"

Seiko rolls her eyes.

"Kushina's getting married," she says. "I felt too bad to tell her I couldn't make it. Even though I know it was a deliberate guilt trip."

Hoheto stares at her.

"She's marrying the Hokage," he says. "The Hokage is getting married."

Isn't that what she had said?

"Next week," Seiko says, and then pushes past the pulsing pain radiating out of her knee in order to look a little further. Why does Hoheto care?

He's already a jounin.

But... of course. He's made jounin, and he's still trapped. The childish dream of escaping his cage has hit its ceiling, despite him making it to the top of the pile.

She could hand him a present so full of sharp razors that he'd bleed to even touch it, but he'll take it anyway. That's how it could have been all those years ago, and even though he's now higher ranked than her, it's still how it is now.

"You could come with me," Seiko says. "Minato and Kushina would be thrilled to meet my old teammate." And she's not even lying. They will be.

He opens his mouth and then snaps it shut, white rage around his eyes.

'I'm better than you... so what?'

That's what she'd said to him when they fought, hadn't she. Well, that was eight years ago...she can make excuses for how graceless and clumsy the taunt was.

The limits on him are physical, spiritual, and social. He will never get any further in his life without connections. He's a genius, but he's forbidden from learning sealing. Like a dog chained to a post, he's finally found the far edge of how far he can go. Anything further will strangle him.

Unless.

"It'll be fun," Seiko says. He can hear it in her voice, the same goading bite that she uses for no one else. She knows he can. "C'mon, 'Heto."

He can't really turn her down, not when every day the collar bites down deeper.

She thinks he would forgive her more if she were, perhaps, less capable of helping him.

"I should be getting paid extra for this," Yakumi says flatly, taking in the kimono package. "I need to submit the fact that I undertook an A rank mission on zero notice and should be properly compensated."

"But you do know how to tie the obi, right," Seiko says.

"Of course I do. Imagine an Uchiha not knowing how to put on a kimono."

So it's fine.

"Turn around so I can do this right. What about your hair, Seiko? Tell me you have a hairpin. You can't possibly wear such a nice kimono and still keep your hair in a low ponytail. Can you. Seiko."

"It's easier to keep out of my face."

Yakumi groans.

"Fashion is not about maintaining eyelines. Kami help me." She gives the obi a final tug before reaching up and getting rid of the hair tie. "There. Well, at least it's better than it was before. If you were going with someone I'd expect them to provide a gift, but since you're not, then we'll just have to--"

"I'm going with someone," Seiko says.

"What?"

"I don't think they'll bring a hairpin."

"Seiko, should I order an assassination?"

Okay, Seiko should let up on the joke. Yakumi did not act like that was a hypothetical question.

"No, he--"

Biter gives a sharp bark from the front desk where he'd been sitting guard, telling her that Hoheto was here.

"He's here right now," Seiko says, giving up on further explanation. Hoheto can fend for himself.

Seiko and Yakumi emerge from the smaller office to see Hoheto staring at Biter's new look. Clearly he doesn't appreciate how dapper Biter looks in his new haori. It's much more basic than Seiko's look of course, Biter only wanting a solid blue... though since it's custom, that means blue with a silvery embroidering of the Clan symbol.

The Hatake Clan symbol is a three by three grid positioned so that it's not a square, but a diamond. Since it's based on the hiragana in the name, Seiko can only assume that it's meant to be a patch of farmland-- that it is meant to represent peace.

Seiko and Kakashi and Sakumo were all named in that way.

Sakumo, 'crops'. Kakashi, 'scarecrow'. And Seiko herself, 'clear weather'.

The decision to paint with your own names an idyllic world. That type of arrogance is something beyond even the Sannin. Beyond even the Uchiha. Beyond even the gods.

But not beyond her father.

Seiko's own kimono is the same shade of blue, but is covered in intricately embroidered waves of silvergrass, with only the obi left to deceptive plainness-- its embroidery is silver on silver, clan symbol carefully hidden in every geometric twist.

She's mostly relieved that they fixed the sleeves, though. Trying to figure out how to enable her to use her crutches without damaging the silhouette had stalled out the situation entirely until Seiko offered to just cut open the bottom of her sleeves with her knife, whereupon her tailor had gotten a lot more willing to contemplate alterations.

Now, you'd almost think the choice to slash open a portion of the bottom of her sleeves was a new fashion choice, what with the new special adornment along the edges.

Whatever works.

"You're not going with him," Yakumi says, horrified. "The fact that he dresses up nice is not enough Seiko, dump him right now."

"We're not dating," Seiko says.

Hoheto looks incredibly uncomfortable. It can't all be from his own outfit-- just a normal off white yukata. It's probably due to the fact he had to swap out his forehead protector for a simple ribbon, making it that much more obvious that he has something to be ashamed of.

"We are most certainly not," he agrees.

Seiko rescues him from spending another few minutes receiving a suspicious stare from her coworker by moving outside.

"You came early," she says.

Half shoulder shrug.

"You don't walk that fast," Hoheto says. "If I'd waited til when you said, we'd probably miss the whole thing."

If only.

The actual wedding ceremony is beautiful. It's fall, so orange maple leaves fall around the outdoor ceremony. Kushina is beautiful, the red and orange of her kimono making the crimson of her hair somehow even brighter in the sunlight. Kakashi's been given pride of place in the first row, more important than even Hiruzen.

Minato looks misty eyed the whole time.

Seiko had been terrified they wouldn't have chairs, for some reason. It's a stupid idea, but it's one that would have really haunted her if it had happened.

So instead, when the wedding turns into an open air reception, Seiko stays in her seat even as Hoheto frowns at her.

"Seiko," he says. "It's rude to--"

Biter growls at him, curled up under her chair.

"They'll come to me," Seiko says casually. "Or you could go get me some food, if you don't want to stand there."

Hoheto opens his mouth to continue the argument only to close it as Minato and Kushina both head over to them, bright smiles on both of their faces.

"You both look lovely," Kushina says. "I'm glad you brought a friend, Seiko!"

"Seiko-chan!" Minato says. "It's so nice that you could make it. And you're with Hoheto!"

He looks pleased about this, too. She didn't know he even knew who Hoheto was.

Hoheto gives a very stiff bow towards Minato.

"I offer my congratulations for the wedding, and I apologize for the previous circumstances of our meeting," he says. "It was... unbefitting."

Seiko raises an eyebrow at him.

"You've met before?" She says. "You didn't mention it."

Minato coughs a little.

"Oh, I took Kakashi to train with his team," Minato says.

Ah.

Seiko laughs.

"But you haven't met Kushina yet, right? Kushina, this is my old teammate, Hoheto Hyuuga." Seiko's still got laughter lingering in her. "He's interested in learning about some family history."

Kushina's eyes widen for a second.

"Oh," she says. "I actually have some-- Seiko, do you mind if I steal your friend for a bit?"

Hoheto's head jerks in Seiko's direction, confusion jarred through any form of hope.

"Go right ahead," Seiko says. She's not moving. Honestly, standing up is going to be rather bad. Ever since she got out of the hospital, sitting down hasn't been as much of a respite as it used to be. Some issue with her back, she thinks. "Have fun, 'Heto."

Kushina yanks him away, leaving her and Minato to stare at each other.

Minato's smile is so, so bright.

"She's wonderful, isn't she?"

Seiko smiles at him.

"Still wondering how you got so lucky, Hokage?"

There's a tint of sorrow as well, but it can't diminish him.

"I would have picked her over the position, you know. I know it bothered her."

Seiko reaches down to scratch Biter's ear as the dog shifts its position.

"But then we'd have Orochimaru as the next Hokage," Seiko says. "That's not a very popular offering."

Minato grimaces at her, like it's her fault she's going to be talking about politics on his wedding day.

"Orochimaru has a lot of war contributions," Minato says softly. "He's responsible for sabotaging the Eight Tails so that it rampaged through its own land instead of ours. That's quite the feather in anyone's cap, on top of his legend as part of the Sannin."

Seiko shrugs.

"I don't like him," she says. Since she's being clear, there's no reason to state things in a way that could be misunderstood. "I think you should have someone look into his current research."

"Seiko." Now there's a genuine flash of anger. "Orochimaru is my sensei's teammate. Speaking ill on him is speaking ill of Jiraiya."

"Okay." Seiko nods. "Can you send him over here? Jiraiya."

Minato sends her a look of deep exasperation.

"Since apparently we're doing serious topics right now, I have one more thing to discuss with you," he says. "It's about Kakashi."

The smile fades from her face.

"What about him."

"He's not doing well," Minato says.

She knows.

"He just needs time," Seiko says.

"He doesn't need time, he needs people." Minato's eyes flicker to make sure that Kakashi is far enough away and occupied that he can't hear them. Then she watches him cast an illusion to distort his lips and prevent lip reading anyway. "He needs a team, but I can't put him on a team. He's a jounin who's too young to take students."

"There are other options," Seiko says.

"Other options that he can decline," Minato says, voice dry. "There's only one part of our system that puts jounin on teams."

He can't be serious.

"You aren't putting him in ANBU."

"I've put a lot of thought into this, Seiko. I'm only telling you because you already have ANBU access- which is shocking, by the way, I didn't realize you even had that until Hiruzen started showing me all of the ropes."

Clearly not enough thought.

"It won't be good for him," Seiko says. "Anonymity within a group will not help him. Hokage."

"I know. He's not going to be sent out, Seiko. He'll be a bodyguard. He's not quite qualified to be a Hokage guard-- not enough defensive jutsu-- but he'll be perfect for Kushina. And she'll be good for him."

...

"And I had another thought," Minato adds. "You know his friend?"

Seiko slowly closes her eyes and then opens them.

"Gai?"

"Yes, such a brilliant young man. I'm very impressed with him in deeds, character, and attitude."

She supposes it's her fault for deciding to be unpleasant at a wedding. Now this wedding is going to be awful in her memory forever.

"If Kakashi joins ANBU," Seiko says, weary. "Gai will join. You can put them together, since ANBU lets you assemble teams without caring about jounin ranks."

She can see him willing her to see how clever he's being. How he really has found the solution. It will be safe, it will be peaceful, it will force Kakashi to be around his friend and around Minato's family.

"And then Kakashi can babysit your kid," Seiko sighs.

Minato beams at her, relieved.

"We actually have a name picked out already," he says.

She knows.

Seiko struggles to pick out the arguments. Putting Kakashi in ANBU is dangerous because it puts him also semi into ROOT, but she's not honestly worried about that. Kakashi is too high profile to be "disappeared," and her brother is really good at surviving assassinations. So it's not the safety that Minato is claiming it is, but it's not... she doesn't think it's going to kill him, or anything.

Asking him to guard Kushina will be fine as long as Kushina is alive.

Getting Gai all wrapped up in this--

Everything will be fine as long as Minato is alive to make it all fine. The facts are simply that Minato is planning for a world where he'll live more than another ten months.

What is she supposed to tell him? Don't do that?

She tries to soothe her headache with one hand, only for the jittering of her own wrist to make her nearly take an eye out. Ow.

"Hokage--"

"Minato," Hiruzen says, walking up to him from behind. "I wanted to offer my congratulations."

"Oh, of course," Minato says, giving Seiko an apologetic smile. "I was just catching up with Seiko. I'm so glad you and your wife could make it, Hiruzen-sensei."

That's right, this is Jiraiya's teacher. Everything linked into hell.

Seiko looks around. Hoheto's still with Kushina, which means he's gotten stuck also speaking with Fugaku while Kushina giggles with Mikoto. You couldn't pay her to be over there.

Kakashi is brooding in a corner conveniently near the food. Jiraiya is straight up reading a novel in front of the food. They're both being terrible guests, but at least it's convenient for her purposes.

Great.

Seiko engages her crutches, giving a slight nod to Minato as she grimly focuses on standing up out of the chair without having an embarrassing fall.

One step at a time, and all that.

Jiraiya doesn't look up as she approaches close enough to read the book title-- yes. Inappropriate for the occasion.

He looks up as she approaches, white shock of hair loud and frizzy around his face and down his back. She thinks his great contribution to being "dressed up" for a wedding is that he's not wearing a face protector. Which is, she guesses, something.

"Yo, girlie," He says. "That's some nice sealwork on the canes. Old style Whirlpool stuff."

They're even better than they used to be, once Kushina fixed them the second time.

"I like them," Seiko says. "I don't know much about sealing techniques."

"That's a shame," Jiraiya sighs. "It's a dying art."

Because all of Uzushiogakure is dead. Yes.

"I was trying to talk to Minato about something, but he kicked it over to you," Seiko says.

Jiraiya snorts.

"Way to make a man feel wanted," he says.

She knows he knows who she is, so there's no need to introduce herself further before getting to the point.

"It's about Oro--," she says.

Where Minato had dropped an illusion that simply covered his lips, Seiko sees the twitch of Jiraiya's fingers as a seal flares out from behind the cover of his book, their entire area covered in a subtle privacy bubble. Jiraiya could probably kill someone in a bubble like this and no one would notice until he walked away.

Well, the people in this room being who they are, someone would notice. But under other circumstances.

Biter's teeth peel back a little.

"What's he done now," Jiraiya says, unamused. "Because if this is another complaint about his attitude, then I got it. Noted. Understood. But Orochimaru has sacrificed a lot for Konoha. It's not right to turn on him just because he can be a little arrogant. Not all genius can be held to Minato's standards. And even if he doesn't have clan backing, he's got me. That's plenty."

What's he done now.

Seiko changes track.

"He's misusing resources," she says. "I think there needs to be an external investigation now that the war's over and it wouldn't be an absolute disaster."

Jiraiya still looks annoyed, but less so. Hopefully less so enough to actually do something. Let's see... she needs to show she doesn't just hate Orochimaru because he's annoying and pretentious.

"I met one of Orochimaru's genin," Seiko says. "Anko."

"Oh, little Anko! The spitfire!"

"Yes. The Hatake Clan sponsors the orphanage that she came from, so I got to meet her. I'm thrilled she's doing so well."

Jiraiya gives an approving nod.

"I always said they should give him genin years ago," he says. "Him and Tsunade both."

That's right, only he of the Sannin had them.

"He got three clanless," Seiko says. "So did you. On purpose?"

Jiraiya's eyes narrow a bit, but he takes the question in good humor.

"Yeah, it's not like sensei forced me. Sometimes it's better for them to not have to deal with all that extra shit right off the bat." He laughs. "Though me and Orochimaru turned out just fine!"

Biter makes a whuf that Seiko hopes Jiraiya can't tell is a laugh.

"Actually, I had a chance to talk with him recently," Seiko says. "It reminded me I needed to bring up the resource issue, but I also had an interesting conversation with him about something else. I asked about self sacrifice techniques."

"Hm? What about them?"

"It's something I like to ask about," Seiko says. "What people think of them. Under what circumstances they'd use them."

"You're not very interested in light topics, are you?"

Seiko stares at him.

She's had to have this entire conversation standing up, so her ankle is like, killing her.

"It's important to me," she says. "Helps me understand why people do what they do. I used to do that as a party trick."

Jiraiya snorts.

"Alright," he says. "Do the party trick and then I'll answer your question."

That's backwards, but when she gives him another dead look he just smiles. Okay. Her old party trick that she'd used to make her teammates uncomfortable back in the day.

"After this conversation you're going to go over to Minato and Kushina, and you won't mention anything I said. You didn't congratulate them earlier because you like being approached, not doing the approaching. But now you will because I've made you uncomfortable. Then you'll talk about Minato's childhood, and embarrass him, and try to embarrass Kushina but fail."

Seiko leans into her crutches.

It's pretty easy to do, once she gets into the swing of things. People are predictable, especially when you know them as well as Seiko does. She does this trick for politics as well, but it makes people even less happy.

"Then you'll excuse yourself from the party. You don't actually like places like this. Too fancy. Somebody might make you do something. Scary. You'll have to go look for Orochimaru, but you don't know where he is."

She does, though.

"Normally you'd dismiss it, but because I'm being annoying right now, you'll actually use some tracking ability to find him." She rolls her eyes. "See? Party trick."

"I think sacrifice techniques are a trap," Jiraiya says. "The only reason to ever use one is if for some reason you want to prevent yourself from being captured, or you want to make sure that the enemy can't retrieve your body."

His eyes are locked onto her.

"Hatake," he says. "I don't like that someone who does that kind of 'party trick' thinks that Orochimaru is abusing village resources."

"So you should soothe your anxieties, then," Seiko says.

Jiraiya laughs, but it's a deeply, deeply unhappy thing.

"Right after I embarrass my student, Hatake. All things in their proper order."

Chapter Text

"What were you talking to the Toad Sage about?" Kakashi demands.

He must have been trying to eavesdrop.

"I had complaints," Seiko says. "I'm ruining the party."

Kakashi scowls.

"I don't like this party," he says. "I know Minato-sensei has other friends. He should've invited them."

Seiko agrees.

"Been a while since you went to a party, genius?"

Kakashi's glower gets even worse.

"Yeah. When dad threw my birthday party."

"When dad-- Kakashi, that was when you were turning seven."

His one eye does an excellent dead fish impression.

"So? When was the last party you went to?"

Terrible question.

"I'm sure it was more recent than that," Seiko lies. Wait, if you start reframing a party as being events of only three people, she's not even lying. No problem. She leans more heavily into her crutches, tired by her own thoughts. "Anyway, I was going to--"

"Let's sit down," Kakashi says abruptly.

"Hm?"

"Look, there's chairs right over there."

Kakashi stiffly walks over to them like he's seeing a new animal for the first time.

Weird, but alright. Seiko grabs some food from the table and brings it with her to sit down next to him, Biter nearly knocking the chair over as his oversized frame settles underneath it.

"I made jounin," Kakashi informs her.

"Yes... I know. I'm sorry I missed your promotion." Ah, now she really sounds like Sakumo. She can't bear to finish the apology, too uncomfortable with how closely it aligns with what her dad had said to her about her own graduation.

"It wasn't anything to celebrate," Kakashi says bitterly. "I'm beginning to think those things are cursed."

Seiko snorts.

"Well you're in luck, then. Short of promotion to Hokage, you'll never have another."

Kakashi shudders.

"I'm never doing that," he says.

Seiko lets that one lie.

But, letting that lie, she doesn't know what else to say. What else did she used to talk to her brother about...?

"Why'd you bring him here?"

Seiko looks behind her to see Hoheto still talking to Kushina.

"Why not?"

Kakashi grits his teeth.

"He's said... stuff behind your back," he finally mutters.

"Really? What'd he say?"

Biter perks his head up.

"He..." Kakashi hesitates. "Said you didn't deserve promotion to chunin."

She's only surprised that he'd said that where Kakashi could hear him. But that doesn't explain why Kakashi had gotten into a fight with him?

"You could ask the Third about it," Seiko says. "He's here."

"I'm asking you."

Technically, he hadn't asked her anything.

"I got promoted because--"

Because I freaked out and was terrified of Sakumo dying, which he did anyway. Because Hiruzen wanted me to have higher credentials, more access. Because Hiruzen was making a gesture of support towards dad that ended up making suicide even easier for him. Because--

Seiko breaths out a long sigh.

"The Third Hokage thought I could give more to Konoha with a higher rank," Seiko says. "Same reason anyone gets promoted."

Kakashi goes quiet.

"Did you?"

Her brother's certainly in a mood.

"Did I what?"

"Did having a higher rank mean you gave more to Konoha."

She can't imagine the expression on her face.

"Kakashi, the Hatake clan has given everything to Konoha," she says. "And in the future, it will continue to do so."

...

"Seiko," Kakashi says quietly. "I'm tired."

Seiko slowly lifts up a trembling hand and lets it rest on his arm.

"Stayed up too late trying to invent new jutsu, genius?"

"No!" Kakashi says. "I was... Helping a dog out of a tree."

Seiko starts to laugh.

"Oh," she says. "My mistake."

She is sitting on her porch when Guy comes up to her, too lazy to take the extra step of moving to actually be in the comfortable rocking chair.

"Seiko-san!" Guy says, loudly declarative, and then pauses.

"Hello, Guy," Seiko says.

It's winter, so most of her flowers are dead or hibernating. But the grass is at least still green.

She watches him furrow his brow, open and close his mouth a few more times without saying anything before it clicks.

"Help me up," Seiko sighs, and offers her left arm so she'll feel it less. "Let's talk inside."

He goes so far as to pull out the chair for her to sit down at her own table before taking his own seat-- after pausing to give a small bow to the shrine. And a treat for Biter, who takes it as his due.

Seiko really had meant the table shrine to only be a temporary measure.

"First things first," Seiko says, and pulls up the sleeve of her jacket just long enough to flash the ANBU symbol.

The relief on Guy's face wars with a different dismay.

"You..." He says. "I didn't realize, you as well--"

"This was a while ago." No need to get into all that. "You weren't here about me."

"You are Wise and Cool as always, Seiko-san."

Don't think she can't hear those extra capitalizations.

She hasn't thought she should make tea for anyone in a long time, but now she feels kind of bad that she doesn't have anything for guests. Ah well.

Guy waits for nearly a full minute before he finally speaks further.

"My Rival has recently become much more difficult to find," he says slowly. "I am sure that no one except me has noticed. But once seen, the signs become obvious. So, the path to match him remains clear."

Join ANBU. Yes.

Seiko's hand drops down to Biter's head as she stares at Guy.

Such a hideous, selfish choice.

"If you follow him there, the Hokage will put you on his team," she says. "He's already made plans."

Guy isn't stupid. He understands, breath catching in his throat.

"He.. wants...?"

Seiko tilts her head to the side.

"You will be one of Konoha's greatest strengths," she says. And it's true, so it's easy to say. "Your efforts are not unnoticed. You are skilled, hard working, and kind. I am only sorry that all of that should be placed on the line to offer support to my brother."

Guy grabs her hand.

Is he going to--

"Seiko-san," Guy says. He is crying after all. "Why do we get stronger? Why do we train? Why pursue the Springtime of Youth!?"

"I--"

"It is so that one can accompany one's comrades! It is so that companionship strengthens all that it touches! Like you, I will be someone who is strongest when protecting others!"

Like her??

"What are you talking about."

He squeezes her hand tighter.

"How long do you think we will have peace, Seiko-san?"

It's a heavy question.

"More than a decade," she says. "Maybe fifteen years. A long time, unforeseen complications notwithstanding."

There's deep wonder in his eyes.

He's not that old, after all. That peace would be longer than his entire life.

"Fifteen years..." Guy whispers. "I would be older than my own sensei. I could have genin."

Seiko smiles softly.

"You and Kakashi could both have genin."

"Seiko-san," Guy says. "I don't know if I would have considered joining... there, on my own. But as long as my Rival is also there, it's definitely the place I have to be! After all.. This is how I can protect everything I need to protect."

His eyes have been a bit heavier since his father's close call.

Seiko stares past him to the picture of her teammates.

Because you're clanless, you will die first.

"You are a genius, you know," Seiko says abruptly.

Guy blinks at her, genuinely flabbergasted for a moment before he recovers.

"Yes! I am a genius of hard work!"

"There's no differentiation," Seiko says. "Genius has no qualifiers, only results."

"Seiko-san, I--"

"My teammate's name was Kiyomu Fukuda," Seiko says. "He was extremely talented at..." She struggles for the right word. "He wanted to be a seal master like Minato. Though Minato wasn't even famous for that yet when we were out there... Heh. Wanted to be a seal master like Jiraiya, since Jiraiya is famously clanless and yet made it so far. He would have been very good-- But he would never be as good as Minato. Because he does not have the Toad Sage teaching him, and he's not married to Kushina."

Her fingers drum on the table.

"That's just what I can say now, though. Who knows? Maybe he'd be better after all. If he'd lived. So, Guy. Was he a genius?"

Guy has a very grave expression on his face.

"I'm sure he was."

And what gives him that surety?

Seiko closes her eyes for a second, tired.

"Hey," she says. "Have you talked to your dad about this?"

Silence.

"He'll understand," Guy says.

She wonders what Sakumo would have thought about putting Kakashi into ANBU. He'd probably be at least a little proud... right?

...

Somehow, she can't picture it.

Seiko breathes out a long sigh.

"I'm going grocery shopping. Do you want to spend your precious afternoon helping me carry stuff, Guy?"

"It would be my Honor and Joy, Seiko-san!!"

In the middle of the night, the entire village shakes as if struck by an earthquake.

Seiko jerks awake, heart spiked and pounding as Biter peels back his head to howl.

Everything aches. Her wrists throb and betray her as she pats around for her crutches so she can put them on. Her knee burns and twists under her weight as she drops them and Biter has to nose them out from where they fall and bring them back to her.

The handle of her blade is freezing cold.

The village shakes again as a roar echoes through the trees and rattles her windows. A siren begins to blare calling all chunin and above to report for duty. Defend the village from attack.

"OROCHIMARU!"

Thud.

The stomp of a giant foot shudders alongside the endless keen of the sirens as Seiko drags herself out of the house, the cold air frigid around her as she feels every moment of how painfully slow she moves.

She'd never replaced all the pills she used up. Why didn't she do that? Why didn't she bother? She gives Biter a grim look and he whines before darting ahead far enough that she can initiate a swap.

There's a change to the keen of the siren.

No one under jounin should approach the encounter. Chunin need to-- fuck. Report to the tower for more detailed orders.

There's a crowd around the desk when she finally arrives, forced to stumble and shoulder check her way in.

"Out of the way," Seiko mutters, then has to say it louder. "Move!"

Biter isn't so polite. He bites at the person directly in front of her, jaws clamped around his leg and dragging him off his feet so that Seiko can get through.

Ensui, Yakumi, and even Chobee are all already in there, grimly handing out assignments.

"Seiko," Ensui says. "Good. You made it."

Seiko steps behind the desk.

"So, what do I need to--"

Ensui's fingers form hand signs low enough to be kept out of sight.

"You're requested to debrief with the Jounin Commander."

The siren blares again, louder than ever due to originating from within this very building. It spears through Seiko's ears.

She stares up at all the stairs to Shikaku Nara's room.
They spiral around, dizzying her.

"OROCHIMARU! HOW COULD YOU!"

She really hopes all that pain in Jiraiya's voice is mental and not physical.

Seiko digs one hand into Biter's vest and gets going.

The door to Shikaku Nara's office is ajar from all the people running in and out of it when she makes it there. The only person not running around is the man himself, who looks godawful, doesn't have his hair up in a ponytail, and is actively smoking in the room.

It makes him look a lot like Ensui.

His eyes snap to her as soon as she gets through the door, and he flicks his eyes at the others, signaling them to all get out. He's picked up two more scars since the last time she saw him, parallel slashes on his left cheek and forehead.

"Seiko Hatake."

"I'm here."

Seiko gives a vague wave to the notion she should be showing respect and then ignores it.

There aren't any other chairs in this room aside from the one the Jounin Commander is sitting in, so she puts more weight onto her crutches and prepares for a long haul.

Shikaku puts out his cigarette, grinding it into the pockmarked wood of his own desk.

"Ah.. what a drag."

He grimaces before finally leaning forward in his seat.

"I'm in a rather awkward position right now," he says, not really talking to Seiko so much as talking to the wall behind Seiko. "I like to think I'm someone who generally knows what's going on in my own village, yes.... And yet, when my wife and I are woken up by the sirens, when she turns to me and says 'Shikaku, what's going on?' I really don't know what to tell her. So, Hatake, I'd like you to pretend like my lovely wife is here, asking that same question of you. What exactly is going on?"

That's not something she wants to be asked.

"I was woken up by the sirens the same as everyone else, and I came straight here," Seiko says. If she's been called in it's because Jiraiya name-dropped her while he was poking around Orochimaru's research. Pointless to conceal it. "But presumably, what's going on is that Jiraiya discovered Orochimaru is misusing village resources."

There's a quick knock on the door behind her, and then Inochi Yamanaka slips through. Unlike Shikaku, he looks completely put together and awake, even having the longer red vest he normally wears over his vest hanging properly. He gives her and easy smile and nod as he moves over to lean on the desk next to Shikaku.

"Sorry I'm late," he says. "Orochimaru's escaped past where anyone except Jiraiya-sama would feel confident chasing... unfortunately, there's a shocking amount of clean up to do."

Shikaku grimaces.

"You said he was 'misusing village resources'," he says to Seiko. "That's the exact same wording that Jiraiya used. So, you were the one who tipped him off?"

Hm?

"I did not have concrete proof," Seiko says softly. "Just a bad feeling. I thought his teammate would be able to talk to him and clear up the misunderstanding."

"So you went to Jiraiya as your first option, Hatake?"

Oh, she gets it. She messed up the hierarchy. This is actually on her. She feels bad, but not bad enough to not make Shikaku's life worse.

"My apologies, Nara-san. I actually went to the Hokage first, but he told me to talk to Jiraiya."

Now Inoichi is wincing as well.

"When did you do that, Hatake?"

Seiko meets his eyes.

"At the wedding," she says. "I told you, it was a personal problem. I didn't want to risk damaging Orochimaru's reputation over nothing." She smiles at him coldly. "That kind of thing can really hurt someone."

Shikaku looks older every second.

"For the future, you can just report hunches to Ensui Nara or myself, Hatake," he says. "I understand... that unfortunate--"

"What he means is that we are sorry that the rumours of your father's actions spread, but that leak didn't come from our office, Hatake," Inoichi says, much more blunt. "It came from his own teammates. You've made your point."

She hadn't been intending to make a point, but now that she has she's rather inclined to be stubborn about it. What are they going to do? Fire her?

"I don't understand what you mean," she says.

"Your hunches, Hatake." Shikaku resumes the conversation. "First the incident with the Seven Swordsman, and now this. Neither of which you passed up the chain prior to drastic action."

"This and that were different," Seiko says.

Biter growls a bit.

"..Anyway," Seiko says. "The Hatake Clan has been sponsoring an orphanage for the past few years. One of the children, Anko, ended up as one of Orochimaru's genin."

Seiko pauses staring at Shikaku.

"It's my job to keep track of people," she says, not quite sure what she's defensive about. "Most jounin will always come to accept and turn in requests with all three members of their team present, because it's the responsible thing to do for team cohesion. Only exception if some of them are dead. Orochimaru certainly followed the pattern. I gave him a super cushy first C rank, you know? There are teams who will go their whole career and never set foot in the Land of Hot Water."

But she'd given it to them because she wanted Anko to have some good memories.

"He comes in last month," Seiko says. "Anko's the only genin present. She's scared."

Inoichi's eyes are so focused on her.

"There are lots of reasons for a girl to be scared," he says.

It's true. Seiko had been scared all the time when she was Anko's age.

"I separated her out so I could talk to Orochimaru alone," she says. "Sent her up with Biter to report to the Hokage. Biter says she relaxed the minute she was out of the room."

"You talked to him alone."

"I had some questions. It's a rare opportunity to talk to a Sannin."

"And this conversation made you suspicious enough to risk accusing him to his teammate's face."

Seiko's knee hurts.

"Look," she says. "Some people don't know how to live in peaceful times. Orochimaru distinguished himself well in the last war, but he wasn't chosen to be Hokage, because the people want a new era. Death clings to him too tightly. He's not idealistic enough."

She snags her thumb underneath the forehead protector that Biter wears as a collar.

"He stands at the peak of his career, and ahead is the precipice," she says. "It's time to start jumping off cliffs."

Silence.

"So you understand that I really felt this was a personal matter," Seiko says. "No actual evidence."

"Hatake," Inoichi says. "If you transfer to T&I, I'll get you promoted to special jounin."

"That will just get her officially on Mist's Bingo list, Inoichi," Shikaku says sharply. "Stop nosing in-- and besides, weren't you retiring?"

"Mostly retiring," Inoichi says, giving a close eyed smile.

Shikaku groans.

"Report accepted," he says. "Get out of here so I can smoke."

Seiko blinks at him.

"It's fine if you smoke when I'm in the room...?" She says.

"What, really?" Shikaku blinks. "I thought you were the reason Ensui quit. Ah, well. Still a better habit to get into now that I can't smoke around my wife, either..."

"Congratulations," Seiko says.

"Thanks, I-- hell." Shikaku slaps Inoichi as he bursts out laughing. "Keep that a secret, Hatake. I need to pretend to be surprised when my wife tells me. Shush, all of you."

She hears a vague snippet of their conversation as she shuts the door behind her.
"Do we have any Nara her age...? I can't think of any. Shame."

"No Yamanaka either." Inoichi sighs. "Though that orphanage... she's probably going to adopt, anyway."

...

"Everything's straightened out," she informs Ensui.

All she gets for her troubles are a raised eyebrow and then an entire day of hell. So much of the cleanup is classified above chunin that most of these people are just sent home while people far overqualified are sent into Orochimaru's lab.

There are kids there. Not just Anko, quarantined due to the lack of understanding around a strange seal they found on her. Other kids. Some of them are clan, so they should have been missed.

Though it seems that some clans keep better track than others. There's not a single Uchiha or Hyuga in that mix.

She stares down at the names some more. She never should have accepted that ANBU tattoo. She could be like Chobee and Yakumi, who are both much better than her at dodging responsibility.

"Ensui," she says vaguely. "This can't possibly be my job."

She doesn't have time to sort this out, she's already done her good deed for the next six months. All of this and Jiraiya came back poisoned for only a few days before taking off again to go do his own thing. She'd hoped he'd stay in the village after all this, but of course not.

Ensui blows a giant bubble of hot pink gum.

"If you don't want to do it," he says. "The easiest solution is to put them all into ANBU and pretend like we never lost them in the first place. 'Oh, we didn't lose your child, they just got recruited into an awesome super secret program to help improve their skills! Shame that the place they were training in got disrupted by Orochimaru's betrayal of Konoha'' Doesn't that sound reasonable?"

Maybe it's fine if Konoha blows up.

"How many of them do you think are orphans?" Seiko says. "Maybe I can make Nono do some of this..."

"Since they are all officially genin per the Hokage's statement, you could get them into the genin housing area," Ensui says. "The orphanage is for Academy and younger, yes..?"

But there's no supervision for the genin housing, which is a different problem.

It's frustrating, sitting in Ensui's office with all of this paperwork. The inclusion of a single extra chair that isn't his is new, but everything is so messy in here.

"Some of the kids are too young to live alone," Seiko says. "There's six year olds, Ensui."

She points down at her file where the words 'Yamato, 6', are hastily scribbled down.

Grim silence for a second.

"Maybe get your orphanage designated as alternate genin housing," Ensui says. "Nono's still technically a med-nin and she's got good clearance."

"You can do that?"

Ensui gives Seiko a very droll look.

"Seiko," he says. "I don't know if you've noticed this, but Konoha is a very young village. No one's ever done this specific thing before, but that just means that if you do it and no one stops you, then it will be normal for the next person to do it in a couple more years."

"Is that supposed to be reassuring."

"No," Ensui says. "It's been so long without peace that noone remembers what it's like. So that means that everyone who runs Konoha-- that's the Hokage, that's the Council, that's the Clan Heads, that's T&I, the Jounin Commander, me, you, everyone-- is now deciding what life is going to be like."

He laughs abruptly.

"So we better hope everyone picks things that aren't terrible, yeah?"

Hoheto's status has shifted to being "permanently assigned to the aid of the Uzumaki Clan". It's a sweet thing to see noted down on her files. It's at least cheerier to think about than the news of Zabuza's Bloody Graduation, which is what everyone at the desk was gossiping about.

She's been thinking about Naruto's birth more and more, what she can do. And she does have some ideas.

It would have been easier if the problem was lack of sealing proficiency, which could be rectified. But that hadn't been the problem at all, so.

There's an unpleasant tingle in her left arm, and Seiko looks down at what Kabuto's been up to.

She'd been trying to focus on other things and not on the fact she was letting a seven year old mess with her former dominant hand.

"I'm almost eight," Kabuto says, a logic that only serves him due to the fact that he picked his own birthday. Though if it were her, she wouldn't have chosen to have a birthday in February.

"And you have some new ideas that no one else has ever thought of," Seiko says.

"If you'd let me use the needles--"

She's never letting anyone use needles.

"No."

Kabuto almost pouts.

"You won't let me use the needles, and you'd rather I visit at your house than at the desk," He mutters.

"What's wrong with my house?"

She looks around.

"I even have a kotatsu," she says reasonably. It's new. "That's not something that's there at the desk. It's nice."

Though she doesn't know if Biter would appreciate anyone else sticking their legs where he's resting.

"I'm attending the Academy next year," Kabuto says. "I'm making profiles on all of my future classmates. I can't do that here."

He casts a different diagnostic jutsu on her arm. That one definitely does something, forcing her fingers to twitch without any input from her.

"It's rude to stare at the people who come to the front desk," Seiko says.

"You do it."

"Well, it's my job."

Kabuto looks at her.

"You didn't want me talking to Orochimaru," he says.

Seiko stares up at the ceiling.

"Making a profile for me as well, kid?"

He's moved to staring at her upper arm, where the ANBU seal is. If he's picking that up, he better keep his mouth shut. Well, it's not like anyone he could spill the secret too wouldn't already know.

"Everything would make sense," Kabuto says. "If one operates under the assumption that your goal is to have first call on your own healer. In that case, the profile becomes simplified. You are an injured clan scion--"

"Kakashi is a scion," Seiko points out. "I'm the head."

Kabuto scowls at the correction. On a cuter child it would be a pout.

"Injured clan head seeking a cure to a long term affliction. You want to create a debt with someone who will be a great med-nin in the future, and ensure the priority of your own care. You've used your connections to the best of your ability and found someone with potential, and are sponsoring them. It's very straightforward."

"Is it?"

"It makes too much sense," Kabuto says. "Nono has a saying. 'People who have a logical reasons for everything they do are not more logical than you-- they are just better at finding reasons for their desires.'"

Seiko gives a surprised burst of laughter.

"That's very Nono," she says. "So, I make too much sense? I'm too explicable?"

"You're too careful," Kabuto says.

He's looking up at her, eyes guileless in a deeply practiced way.

"I'm supposed to be practicing looking 'underneath the underneath'," he says. "But what I just said about you-- none of that is true. Your priority isn't healing."

It's odd to hear that said out loud.

"I would like to be in less pain," Seiko says mildly. "And to have more use of that hand again."

She's been in pain for so long that her life before the knee injury sometimes seems like a blurry dream-- that there hadn't really been a time before she'd struggled. And then sometimes it's the opposite, and she's still attempting to hold a sword with her left hand because that's how she's always done it.

"It's a secondary benefit," Kabuto says. "The fact that I'm going to be the best doctor Konoha will ever have is a secondary benefit to you. I just don't get it. What would be more important than that?"

The primary benefit of having Kabuto around is the hope that his life will be better for it.

"Do you have any friends in the orphanage?" Seiko asks him. She's not hopeful.

"I don't need friends. But I'll do my best to be a proactive and helpful teammate."

So no friends.

"Kakashi didn't have any friends when he was your age, either..." Seiko sighs, mind falling into the mental sorting of people that she'd once used for Kakashi's birthday. That time had been poorly done, not paying enough attention to detail. Sloppy.

...

Wait, she does actually know someone else Kabuto's age. Several people.

She stares at Kabuto, contemplative.

Well, once she gets through this year, she'll see what she can do.

"You really think you can get feeling back into my fingers?" She says. "Enough to make hand seals?"

"I don't think." Kabuto mutters. "I know."

Kakashi's birthday is September 15th. She's not sure... if she should still be getting him presents. But the conversation with him at the wedding keeps sticking in her head, so...

Basically, if he doesn't want the present, then he can just throw it away. But if he did want a present and she doesn't give one to him, that would be awful. She's making the right choice.

"I'm out of practice at this," Seiko sighs to Biter.

What would Kakashi even want?

He'd seemed kind of impressed with Biter's outfit for the wedding, but getting clothes for his ninken would be difficult without having them available for measurement. And also he's sensitive about her opinion of his dogs. So he might somehow take that badly.

Clothes for him, then?

She doesn't even know what size he is anymore. Probably pretty close to hers, but...

A new mask? But they're all the same color, and boring.

He wears his forehead protector over his eye, and the mask to meet it-- wait.

"I've got it," Seiko informs Biter, who wags his tail back at her.

It'll take a little more time to get it custom made, but she's got time. And it's a double excuse to talk to the Hokage.

The summer is bright and cloudless, the markets are bustling with life, and--

"VALOROUS MAIDEN!"

Duy waves at her from his own crutches, smile brighter than the sun. "How wonderful to see you breathing in the beautiful morning air, Seiko! Myself, I have just found the most juicy tomato plant here in this store!"

Biter gives a firm yip in response, moving faster than he usually ever does out of combat in order to stick his nose in Duy's stomach.

"Aha! The mighty Biter as well! Wonderful! Truly there could not be a more mighty champion of dog-kind!"

"Hello, Duy," Seiko says, lump in her throat. "It's good to see you up and about."

Duy scratches Biter's ears as he looks down at her.

"I never got the chance to thank you so directly for coming to my aid," he says. "I am only glad that your injuries seemed to recover more quickly, and you didn't face any reprimands for your actions."

She does notice the 'seemed'.

And she is mostly all better. A little more weakness in the ankle, some more scars on her back-- that's basically nothing.

In a very real way she had prioritized this man's life over Obito's. Even though she'd then went on to praise and sincerely speak about Obito's memory as if she had that right.

It wasn't the logical thing to do.

It's...how did Kabuto put it?

It's inexplicable.

Yet...

Seiko smiles at him, a huge, brilliant grin.

What was that again? People who break the rules are trash, but people who abandon their comrades are worse than trash? She doesn't even think it's wrong to break rules at all.

She kind of understands why her dad decided it was fine to risk re-starting the war.

"I'm so glad that you're alive," she says, and then starts forward, awkwardly patting his shoulder as he bursts into tears.

Chapter Text

Seiko watches Minato carefully work on her birthday present to Kakashi. He'd looked incredibly pleased to be asked to help, which is nice. She'd have asked Kushina except Kakashi's bodyguarding her meant that wouldn't work for having this be a surprise.

"There's one more thing," Seiko says slowly.

Minato gives her such a weary look.

"It's not something big like last time," Seiko says. She feels kind of bad that now Minato feels bad about brushing her off at the wedding. It's good that he's inclined to think well of people.

He doesn't believe her.

"I'd like to be with Kushina during her isolation."

She does understand why Kushina is going to be out of the village for the last days of her pregnancy. Because they're scared of the nine tailed beast breaking loose.

How many times will fear ensure its own doom...

Minato suddenly smiles, face lighting up with relief.

"Oh, is that all? Of course you can, Seiko. I'll make sure you're on the list. Kushina will be thrilled, especially since Biwako has been making such a fuss about only having female guards and medics present..."

Seiko's smile goes a little bit more rigid, but she nods.

"And you'll be staying close?" She says.

Minato nods firmly.

"Just a single teleport away. I'll be there the minute I sense anything going even slightly wrong."

Seiko hesitates a bit, words still stuck inside of her.

Cling to life a little harder, Minato.

She knows it's not going to be the last time she talks to him-- but it feels like it. She can't even remember what her last words to her dad even were. Something mundane. Unimportant.

And Kiyomu had died screaming, and listening to them scream. So that didn't really count.

"I really do like the crutches," she says to him. "They help me a lot. Thanks."

Minato reaches out, hand tracing across the braces on her arm with the same care as if he was touching a baby.

And then he looks at her.

"Seiko," he says. "Is it alright if I put the Flying Thunder Seal onto them? I understand if you'd prefer not to have it."

Seiko's eyes widen.

Minato's Flying Thunder Seal has a specific reputation, which is that any enemy marked by it is essentially marked for death. Doomed. For the rest of their life, at any moment, Minato could kill them in a second.

It's the type of lethality that not even Orochimaru's cursed seals will be able to match.

So even most people in Konoha aren't marked. Having your life hang on the edge of one person's whim? It's too scary. Even if he's trusted and well liked. Even though he's the Hokage.

She doesn't even think Kakashi has one, though that's got more to do with Kakashi's own chips in his shoulder.

That's why he's offering the crutch. So she can take it off.

Seiko shakes her head, and watches Minato's hand flinch away.

"Sorry," he says.

"Not on the crutch," Seiko clarifies. "Put it on my left arm."

She holds out the arm to him, other wrist shaking as she pulls up the sleeve. Minato quickly reaches out and taps her arm, creating a band of letters that runs around her arm just underneath the ANBU seal.

"Thank you, Seiko," Minato says. It seems to mean a lot to him.

Seiko's smile is...complicated.

It would be bad to admit to the Hokage that her ANBU seal only works when she wants it to work. But she can't have him put the seal on her if he can access it at will, because she's afraid he'll use it to forcibly teleport her to safety.

"I hope you'll never have to use it," she says.

Minato's eyes crinkle into a smile.

"You'd have to stop getting into trouble for that to work out, Seiko-chan."

Hey.

Seiko had memorized the files rather than walk around with an easily droppable scroll on a day when her tremors were unusually bad. Kabuto swore that the fact that her left hand was shaking more than usual was a sign that what he was doing was working, but it really wasn't great for, well.

Eating. Drinking water. Living her life.

Nono had slipped her some more pain suppressants, but those weren't for day to day use. Such as congratulating Guy's teammate Ebisu on his chunin promotion.

Or looking properly authoritative in front of experimented on children.

One of the main issues she'd ended up running into was simply that many of the children were in the hospital from Orochimaru's experiments, and so didn't need to be re-homed as much as extensive bed rest and medical care. And the hospital didn't have enough long care facilities, something she was familiar with due to having been in what they counted as long care facilities. If you needed to be taken care of for more than three months, the hospital was not for you.

Seiko only had so many solutions, though.

She looks down at the brown haired, blank eyed kid in front of her.

"You're Yamato, right?"

He nods.

"I don't have any family on file, but if you've remembered more since--"

He shakes his head violently.

"Alright." Seiko wishes she could kneel down to talk to him. "You're officially a genin of Konoha, but I've arranged for you to be living at an orphanage that's run by a talented med-nin for the next couple of years, yes? To make sure you stay healthy."

"W--"

He's got a curious gargle to his tongue, like he's trying to speak underwater. He stutters for several more seconds before just moving on to the next word. "The others. W--"

"What about the rest of them?" Seiko waits for his nod before she continues speaking.

"They're in intensive care in the hospital. Once they stabilize," Or die, "I'll be deciding based on their age. Below twelve they'll be going to where you are, over twelve I'm putting them straight into regular genin housing."

He looks scared.

"If I forget," he says, and then repeats himself when she fails to understand. "Forget. Them. I've forgotten. Stuff. Before."

As far as Seiko knows no one is clear on what experiment Orochimaru was running on the kids, largely due to the fact that the only way they'd find out is if Yamato used his powers. And the kid seems to have not done that. If he'd done that she'd be pressured to find him a jounin sensei, so at least that's one problem that if delayed long enough she can avoid taking responsibility for all together. Though it's not great that Yamato is so... scared.

He's got a lot to be rightfully afraid of, but it would really help her if she knew which one he thought was the problem.

Even the fear that if he just lets her say this, all of the kids will just disappear into thin air once he looks away is not unfounded.

Hm. She can't have Kabuto look after him, Kabuto's not reliable for stuff like this. She doesn't trust him not to forget his whole life and join ROOT, let alone stopping someone else from doing that. It would have been nice if Anko had been here... but of course, the girl's not here either.

Someone who can't forget things.

"Actually," Seiko says slowly. "I know what we're going to do. Do you want to go on a quick trip with me, Yamato?"

He gives her a very tentative nod.

...

She's never actually been to the Uchiha police station.

It's odd to say it, but it's actually a very cheerful building, painted a pretty yellow and standing out well from the buildings around it.

The looks she gets when she knocks on the door, though...

Yamato's basically trembling by the time she gets properly escorted inside and greeted.

Fugaku looks deeply unhappy to see her, but he has otherwise cleared out the room, so it's a win some lose some scenario.

"Yes, Hatake?" he says. "You've come in person to lodge a complaint?"

Wow, what an incredibly familiar turn of phrase.

"No," Seiko says and tugs Yamato forward. "I wanted to introduce you to someone. Yamato, this is Fugaku Uchiha."

Yamato stares up at him, terrified.

"Fugaku, this is Yamato," Seiko says. She waits for recognition that he does not have. Either he's been left out of the fallout from the Orochimaru incident or he's careless. She's betting left out. "He was," Seiko says slowly. "Previously under a Sannin's care."

Fugaku's eyes snap towards the kid. Okay. Back on the same page.

"You were talking to the Toad Sage during the wedding," Fugaku says.

She'd forgotten he was also there.

"Yes," Seiko says.

"About this."

Does he have to discuss this in front of the kid.

"Yes."

"If you'd come here, we could have investigated."

"I've already been through this with the Jounin Commander as well. It was a personal, no evidence suspicion, and no you couldn't have. Orochimaru was in ANBU, you'd have been blocked."

Fugaku gives her a deep scowl, but it's truly not her fault that his jurisdiction doesn't cover anything classified by ANBU.

"Anyway," Seiko says. "Yamato, do you know what Uchiha eyes do?"

Yamato shakes his head.

"They memorize," Seiko says. "Everything seen once can be seen forever. Isn't that cool?"

The kid looks at Fugaku with wide eyed wonder.

"Cool," he says decisively.

"Precisely. So if you tell an Uchiha something, you won't ever have to worry about it being forgotten, even if you yourself forget," Seiko says. "Now, this guy runs this whole place, but you don't have to tell him. There's lots of other people you could talk to. And if your own memory ever gets blurry, you can come back and talk to them about it. This place is meant to help people like you, kid."

She looks at Fugaku expectantly, waiting for him to agree with her, but he seems...

"Isn't that right. Fugaku. Yamato can come here and be safe."

He starts.

"Yes," he says. "That's right."

"They'll never forget me?" Yamato asks, one more time. "Or my friends?"

"Never," Seiko promises him. "Not as long as they live."

"That's a long time," Yamato murmurs.

Seiko hopes so.

She's never actually been to Kakashi's apartment. Not when he was a genin, not when he was a chunin-- never.

And when he became a jounin, and moved into the jounin apartments...

Naturally, she never visited then either.

Maybe it's because of the stairs. He's on the fourth floor of the same building Ensui's in, and in the years since she visited him, the only change is that the elevator has completely broken down.

The stairs are cramped, narrow, dusty, and full of harsh turns. Built for people who get everywhere with body flickers and wall climbs.

A coughing fit hits her on the third story stairwell, and she staggers, hand slamming out to stick herself to the wall rather than risk a tumble. It's stupid. The coughing made her back muscles hurt, which made her weight shift, which fucked up her knee, which fucked up her ankle. If she gets one more injury they're going to invent a stupid campfire song about how all of her different problems interweave.

Biter whines from behind her. Yeah. It's better to keep going.

She's always had Kakashi's apartment's number memorized, so finding it isn't the problem.

Knocking, though.

Maybe he's not even home.

Biter gives her a look. Okay. She knows he's home.

If her knee were less painful, she might have stood there for hours. Instead, her patience with herself wears thin in only a minute.

Seiko raps on the door.

It takes him longer than it should take to walk through the whole apartment to open the door.

And then when he does, he freezes.

"I--," he says, starting and stopping. "I, uh--"

Seiko raises an eyebrow at him.

He's not wearing his vest, meaning she's actually caught him by surprise. All he's got is his long sleeve turtleneck and mask, though it seems he put his forehead protector back over his eye when he went to answer the door.

"Hey, Kakashi," she says. She stands up as much as she can with the crutches, not too old to be willing to let go of an old fashioned loom. "I was in the neighborhood. Thought I'd stop by."

He doesn't let her into his room as much as doesn't stop her from walking in, his own single eye seeming to see everything in his own home for the first time as she looks around.

There's honestly not a lot to look at.

It's a small dormitory room, same size as Ensui's. It's big enough for a bed, neatly made, a desk with nothing on it, and a reasonably large window that looks down onto the street. He's got his team photo set on the windowsill next to his alarm clock, a single healthy looking plant, and a couple books he lunges to step in front of before she can read their titles.

She steals the solo chair-- it's literally identical to Ensui's chair, so she knows he didn't even replace the one that came with the room-- and settles down while Biter jumps onto his bed.

Kakashi doesn't budge from standing in front of his books.

"Nice place," she says.

His shoulders hunch.

"It's fine," he says. "...Why are you here?"

Why is she here? Obviously, to give him his birthday present. But she has to think it through a little more than that. If she goes and gives him his present, she can't die. It's something she's had to accept, now that she's the same age Ensui was when she met him.

She's far too like their dad.

The goal is to have Minato and Kushina live. But the worst case scenario is that she dies alongside them. It would be unthinkably cruel to do that to him. She'd curse herself more than she ever hated Sakumo for his own choices.

"Not that you can't be here," Kakashi adds.

Oops, the silence must have lingered too long.

"I don't really like to visit this place," Seiko says. "There's too many stairs."

"Oh," Kakashi says. "I. Usually just use the window."

Yeah.

Seiko just keeps looking at him. She doesn't have a sharingan, so she has to memorize her brother's face the normal way.

What little of it she can see.

"It's your birthday tomorrow," she says. "I didn't want to show up then in case you were actually doing something for it."

He gives her a look like the idea that he'd "do something" for his birthday is absurd.

And, to be fair, it is absurd.

They are barely two weeks out from Sakumo's death anniversary. She's never been back to the grave since, but she thinks Kakashi has.

"What do you even eat in this place?"

"There's a communal kitchen at the end of the hallway."

Yes, but does Kakashi actually use the kitchen. Maybe Guy feeds him.

Probably he just buys ramen from the ramen stand and pork buns from a corner store and then eats them every single day.

Well, that's enough older sibling disapproval of his life for one day. It's not even what she'd come here to do.

She pulls a simple storage scroll out of the pocket of her jacket and contemplates how badly it would go if she attempted to toss it to him.

Pretty badly, she's thinking.

Even though it would be cooler.

"Here."

You'd think she'd handed him a live snake.

He opens it with a jerky rip.

It's a small thing. There's a dark blue eyepatch. He flips it over in his hands, instantly spotting the seal on the inside that can be triggered to make the entire thing into a portable hot pack.

"It can go underneath your forehead protector," Seiko says, after a moment.

His hand is shaking a little, and she knows he doesn't have nerve damage. But he tugs the little Konoha symbol up to his forehead and slips the gift on before he tugs everything back into place.

See? You can't even tell that anything is different.

"I should get going," she says.

"...you just said that the stairs sucked."

"And? There's only one way down, genius."

"I could. Carry-- help you down."

It's not actually less rough on her knee than using her crutches. But still-- her brother's bony elbow is surprisingly warm.

Biwako Sarutobi is a tall and thin woman with harsh lines around her eyes and her hair kept perfectly up in a tight bun.

"You're not a qualified med-nin or jounin, but unfortunately you've been added to the line up. I'm not one to disobey a direct order." She says, mouth twisting a little bit.

Beautiful start.

"It's a pleasure working with you," Seiko says, voice slightly muffed from behind the mask. Ensui had handed over an actual ANBU mask to her to wear for the duration of the mission, which was kind of ludicrous for her. What was an enemy going to do? Mistake her for some other ninja who uses custom built crutches and a signature clan weapon?

The requirement for all female med-nin and/or female ANBU had made for an interesting task, though one Seiko thinks is stupid and going to result in more people dying than otherwise necessary, but is saving Kakashi and Hoheto's life. Also Biwako's the most skilled midwife currently in the village. So pissing her off is the exact thing that nobody wants to do.

Seiko slips to stand alongside Kushina, who's normally cheery demeanor has faded away into a grim silence as her hair twists a bit in a way more reminiscent of the nine tails of a kitsune than anything to do with gravity.

The safehouse is at the very outskirts of Konoha, past even most of the training grounds. If you walk too far away it'll be uninterrupted trees for days.

It's quiet.

"Seiko-chan," Kushina says, voice barely above a whisper. "Do you want to feel him? He's kicking."

Seiko slowly shifts her weight so she can offer her right hand.

She does feel the kick.

Kushina has a very thready giggle.

"He's going to be strong," she says. "I hope you know how to hold a baby!"

She'd held Kakashi when he was very small.

As she is now-- a baby isn't a sword. She can't take the risk that she'd squeeze something, twitch at the wrong moment. That she'd drop him.

"I know how to," Seiko says.

With every day they spend in the safehouse, Kurama's chakra becomes more and more prevalent in the air, burning and roiling.

She overhears one of the medics as they complain it feels like they're frogs, slowly being boiled alive.
Minato flickers in and out through the week, calm and reassuring.

He's set up the best protective seals he knows.

...

"Do you think I can go in now?" Minato asks, voice a bare whisper of almost amusement as Kushina's loud screams during the birth die down. "I want to hold him."

It's time.

"You should," Seiko says.

Minato disappears from her side to be by his wife.

Biter lifts up his head, one ear pricked up by the faintest amount.

And then he howls.

"Intruder!" Seiko yells out, but there's no... response.

Death had been so close that only Obito's decision to not pre-alert Minato had saved her. And yet, look at all she has to do tonight.

Seiko takes her first pill, and almost feels no pain.

It's already less effective than it was last time.

She bursts forward, running towards the door where Kushina and Biwako had been only to have the door blow out from the other direction, Minato moving as a yellow blur with a small bundle cradled in his arms.

Ignoring him, Seiko runs into the room, hand grasping onto Kushina's wrist just as she feels the yank of a cold, otherworldly force.

A disorienting moment later Seiko tumbles out and falls onto the surface of a strange lake, hands and knees braced against the rippling surface of the water as she stares up at where Obito is placing chains onto Kushina's arms.

Kushina's eyes are slitted and red, and she screams as the seal also appears over her stomach.

"You're not meant to be here," Obito says, Tobi's cold and yet cocksure tone not doing well with unforeseen variables. He's right to be worried, though. Every second he's delayed from releasing the nine tails is a second for Minato to teleport in.

It's better for him to focus on extracting the beast than spare one backhanded blow to deal with her.

Even so, she wishes he was foolish enough to make that kind of mistake. Aside from that one sentence, Obito has completely refocused on Kushina, a black hole of the seal opening up in her torso as reddish aura surges from the spiritual into the physical.

Seiko slams her palm into the water, summoning Biter back to her side.

"Go get him," she says.

Biter howls again, an ever more bitter call before he runs forward.

"You damn dog," Obito spits out, unable to move from his position as he focuses on the Kyuubi extraction. The teeth sink into his leg, drawing blood.

But it's too late.

"Now come out, Kyuubi!"

The roar of the fox makes her ears bleed. Even the echoes of its presence hurt to feel as the water from the lake evaporates around her feet.

Rage and pain of being confined, tortured, looked down on, hated, despised, used--

That's right, she should at least use its name.

Kurama manifests.

Ten times taller than Konoha's forest, each claw the size of a person, each tooth sharpened on his own prison bars.

"Behold!" Obito yells up at it, red eye whirling behind the mask as he points at Kushina, still alive yet collapsed on the makeshift altar. "Your--"

'Your jinchuuriki'.

But he never gets to say it, Minato's kunai whirling through the spot where he'd been forced to go intangible.

Minato's eyes flick between Obito, Kushina, and Seiko, blue eyes cold and worried as he takes in the scene.

Well, time to do a bit of theatre.

"Behold who?" Seiko asks softly. "Your sensei?"

Silence.

"What?" Minato says.

"Biter says he smells familiar," Seiko says.

Biter gives an affronted yip, since he'd said no such thing.

"It's odd," Seiko says. "That the mask only has one eye hole. It's strange. He's an Uchiha, obviously, and more powerful than any--"

Kurama's claw falls onto her location and only Minato's skill with the Thunder God Seal brings her to safety.

She sees Obito make the easy choice.

He seals Kurama with a twist of his hand and then vanishes.

"You can't seriously think that's Obito," Minato says. "I'd be more inclined to believe it was Madara resurrected from the dead than that he's..."

An equally dead fourteen year old come to kill everyone he'd previously held dear? Minato is right. At least Madara would have the motive.

"There's no reason for Madara to be only using one eye," Seiko says. "Though you're right. My assumption also was a large leap. Only one way to find out." She's panting, trembling even though the night has only begun.

In the distance, Kurama is resummoned within the village, a calamity resurgent. It would destroy the village even without Obito's commands.

Kakashi's over there. And Guy, and Duy, and Yakumi, and Chobee, and Ensui, and Kabuto, and Yamato, and Asuma, and Hoheto--

How had she come to know so many people?

Each one of them equally vulnerable to Kurama's spite.

And yet.

She watches the very second that Minato concludes that his best option is to die. Right there, right next to her. It doesn't even phase him.

It's logical.

"I'll teleport you and Kushina back to where Naruto is," Minato says. "Then I'll deal with the Kyuubi."

Kushina is grey in the face as she watches them, slumped where she fell without the energy to get up. Asking her to exert more chakra is asking her to die. If she weren't Uzumaki she'd be dead already.

"I can help," she offers anyway. "Against the Nine...tails...You'll need my chains."

"You need to protect Naruto," Minato says, firm in his refusal. With a single curl of his fingers, he attempts to activate the seals on Seiko and Kushina and teleport them both back to where he'd left Naruto.

She has to actively make the ANBU seal do anything. She had to let Minato use it on her earlier. It's easier for things to fail than to succeed.

Only Kushina vanishes.

Minato doesn't even bother with startlement. That was for a lighter moment, when he thought he was going to live.

"Take me with you," Seiko says.

The next moment, they overlook Konoha.

She's never seen it from this high up.

She's also never seen it burn.

Every swish of one of his tails devastates a house, and every swat of his paw kills a ninja. There are screams rising up from civilians, and even from this distance she can see a sight that she'd avoided for eight full years.

A field full of corpses.

Beside her, Minato's face furrows into concentration as the giant purple bomb of energy Kurama had thrown out is carefully sealed, redirected. And then--

Obito's kunai appears, sending a trickle of blood down her throat.

"Don't interfere anymore, or she dies," Obito says.

Got him.

Seiko's limp left hand curls into a simple seal.

Bloody Fang Technique.

Obito goes insubstantial as Minato ignores the threat to her, prioritizing attacking Obito over her life-- the obvious, correct choice. She's not his newborn baby, she's a two war veteran. A three pronged kunai whistles through Obito's head, leaving him untouched.

Then Obito screams as Biter's teeth bury themselves in his shadow.

She has to draw blood from the opponent before the technique works. It's picky like that. But Obito's blood is already in Biter's mouth. It couldn't be easier.

Bite the shadow, hurt the body.

Just like with Ensui.

As Obito screams, Kurama roars. It, too, is fighting him. She wonders what Kurama wants more than to destroy Konoha. To kill Kushina, probably. And hidden by Kurama's roar, Minato flashes once more, Rasengan smashing into Obito's back and sending him into the dirt.

Obito teleports away from Minato, the one red eye behind the mask flicking between the two of them.

"He doesn't value your life at all," Obito says to Seiko as he pulls the sickle and chain weapon out from nowhere, chains clinking as he begins to settle back into a feeling of supremacy.

She is still bleeding from a cut across her throat, which is helping his case.

"It's not up to other people how valuable my life is," Seiko says.

Seiko drops to one knee-- her right knee, thank kami, so she still has a shot of being able to stand back up-- and slams her hand into the ground.

"Gnashing Fang Technique!"

Biter dives underneath the ground.

"You're the one who doesn't value life," Minato says, voice cold. "The village is burning because of you! You're an Uchiha-- that's your own family!"

Obito laughs.

"Trying to understand my goals? You don't understand anything! The world is better off if all of Konoha disappears."

Without the shield of Minato assuming him to be Madara, he's a bit more directly resentful. She wouldn't be able to do anything if he simply ran away. He has to try to talk to Minato, or it's all pointless.

Biter emerges from the ground not beneath Obito but several steps away from him-- in his shadow.

"Sensei, now," Seiko says.

Obito's head immediately jerks to Minato, but of course she isn't talking to him.

Nothing happens except that Minato looks a lot more horrified than he did a second ago.

"Take the mask off," Seiko says.

"I'm not going to--"

One of his arms lifts up outside of his own control and yanks off the mask, ripping the spiraled orange thing off and tossing it away.

Seiko sucks in a breath.

He looks...

Like he'd been crushed to death by falling rocks. Half of his face, the side with the sharingan, is covered in scars to the point where even that side of his mouth seems paralyzed. And the 'undamaged' side of his face's eye is covered with a simple white bandage, no replacement yet taken for the one he'd given to Kakashi.

"I am so sorry," Seiko says to Obito. And she means it. "But thank you for taking care of my idiot brother."

Obito's left hand rises up out of his own control as he stares at her, seemingly more stunned by the apology.

"Ensui, he's controlling the Kyuubi through his right eye. Is there some way for you to--"

The hand rips into his eyesocket and pulls it out.

Ensui only controls through symmetry. She'd meant for him to close Obito's eyes, not rip his own eye out--

Minato flashes in to snatch the eye out of Obito's hand, sealing it away into a different pocket dimension before looking between the now immobilized and teleportless- but still not actually powerless-- Obito and her, and then at the newly freed Kyuubi.

Obito screams, and the trees around him creak and elongate as they send out attack tendrils that force Seiko to hastily rise to her feet and back away.

In response to his scream, the Kurama's head yanks in this direction and its teeth bare as it jumps from the village, aiming straight for the one who had been controlling it.

"We have to get all of this farther away from the village," Minato snaps, mind working faster than she's ever seen him go.

"Teleport back to the safehouse you already did all the sealing in," Seiko says fast.

"Kushina and Naruto are there!"

"If you do it outside of there you'll die!"

"If I do it in there they'll die!"

"I'm going to kill you both!" Obito yells.

"[I AM GOING TO DESTROY EVERYTHING YOU LOVE]," Kurama roars, Biter faithfully translating for her.

I am going to fail you, Seiko's knee murmurs. And then it gives out.

Chapter Text

Minato has certain expectations from his own life. For example, he's been in love with Kushina since he was a young teen, and has always hoped to marry her and have a family. He's always loved seals, and every time he invents something new it's a type of excitement, but it's also-- matter of fact.

He'd expected to succeed, so it's good that he succeeded, but not surprising.

There's no one faster than him, so when he outpaces an opponent, that's natural.

He's a friendly and well liked person, and he's Jiraiya's apprentice so even being the Hokage, while certainly an honor, was not a surprise.

He'd even expected that some day he'd die for his village.

Just not... like this.

Kakashi's older sister is an oddity in many ways. In turns she is cold and empathetic, tired and yet intense, without close friends and yet full of deep attachments.

Her only consistency is the value she places on life.

She clings on to it so tightly that it must hurt her in ways he can barely comprehend.

So much of his own dreams have already been chipped away that it astonishes him. It feels like his ambitions have been in freefall all night-- he had woken up this morning thinking about if it would be appropriate to make Kakashi babysit three nights a week, and now he's thinking that Kushina will need at least that, raising their son on her own. That his decision to make fall back plans that pulled Kakashi's generation out of the front line and into safety would be more important than he'd thought.

No.

That's not what he's thinking 'now'.

That's what he'd been thinking a mere second ago. 'Now', In the time between seconds, he sees the giant flare go up from the safe house where he'd sent Kushina and knows she'd done that on purpose, to call the Kyubei to her and away from the village.

'Now', he doesn't have a choice about what he's going to sacrifice at all.

He can't leave his wife and son alone. He can't leave a threat to the village bound in place while he runs off. He can't kill his student who's just come back from the dead.
Gods, he can't bear to survive this night.

"Send me ahead," Seiko says. "To where Kushina is. You need to take care of him before he runs off."

It's the right choice. Obito needs to be captured, if not killed.

"They won't die," Seiko promises him, and it's something she cannot promise him. If the first Hokage had also returned from the dead right here and now and promised him that same thing he'd still not believe it. Can't she see that her own knee is still in the dirt, that she cannot walk, that her hands cannot hold kunai without assistance, that she is the face of the Will of Fire?

The ability to prevent his seal from working and all she'll ever use it for is to keep herself in the fray.

He's out of time.

He hopes Kakashi will forgive him enough to visit his grave.

With a sharp gesture of a single hand, the Thunder God Seal he'd stuck onto his student triggers alongside the seal on Seiko's arm, and the two of them make their final teleport to the violated safehouse, the place where they had all begun the night.

He's sent Obito as far away as he can, and he's the Yellow Flash. Without his teleportation ability, Obito is weeks of travel away. No one would be able to catch up to him except Minato himself.

It would have been the right choice to kill Obito and then leave Seiko behind. But he couldn't do it.

The smell of blood hits first, the same smell that has now linked itself with Minato's first sight of his son. His student had stained his hands with med-nin, with bodyguards, with the lifeblood of Hiruzen Sarutobi's only wife.

He'd hurt Kushina, he'd unleashed the Kyubei, he'd undoubtably gotten more ninja killed besides due to Minato's own negligence. Sins deeper than Orochimarus', each and every one.

It's why Minato couldn't bear to bring Obito in alive. His student had severed any mercy that could be given.

Except, of course, by Minato's own hand.

But the blood is... fresher than it should be.

Beside him, Seiko suddenly jerks around, a shocked look crossing her face.

"Hoheto?" She says. "What are you--"

"I'm Kushina Uzumaki's assistant," Hoheto snaps. "So of course I'd go find her as soon as she went outside the concealment seal. What the hell are you doing back here? Why didn't he send you back to Konoha!?"

The coppery scent is coming off of him. He must be helping reinforce Minato's setup with his own blood.

"You need to get out of here," Seiko says, ignoring Hoheto's words. "The Kyubei is heading back this way--"

"Of course I know the Kyubei is heading this way, I'm the one who helped Lady Kushina send out the signal!"

Maybe it would be alright if Seiko's teammate died for the crime of endangering Minato's wife.

Or maybe Seiko is going to kill him right now.

"Where's Kushina?" Minato gets out before Seiko can lay into him.

Hoheto hastily steps away from Seiko and towards Minato.

"She's inside," he says. "I told her I'd do all the moving around, since she needs to rest. And conserve chakra."

First sensible thing he's said.

"You two both need to head inside as well," he says. "I've got a plan to deal with the Kyubei. The reinforced seals will help a lot. Thank you, Hoheto."

Hoheto nods, but Seiko looks back at him as he drags her off towards the shelter, stumbling a bit at the speed with which she's being pulled.

There's something very cold in her. He's always known that. Both of the Hatake siblings had frozen over when their father died. She'd-- she'd lightened up, over the years, and he knows she likes him, but...

Those are the eyes she has when she looks at Hiruzen.

"I won't help you die," Seiko says.

Something lances through him. More anger. He's been so angry ever since this all started, and he hates being angry. He doesn't want to die angry, and he's angry that he has to die. Does she think he wants this?

"I don't need your help at all," Minato says. Even as he says it, he remembers that its a lie, that she's going to be left to deal with the fact that he was a coward who couldn't kill his own student and then left his problems in her hands, that he'll have done everything to her that he'd looked down on the others in her life for doing.

That he'll have let down Kakashi one last time.

It's acidic, that instead of dying in war he has to die a hypocrite of peace.

Seiko is silent, and all there is is the Kyubei's roar. It hits and it burns, the chakra from the nine tailed fox burning his skin and heating his blood as it bursts into the clearing, teeth bared.

Minato activates the sealing the second it enters, finally, finally getting to use his sealing techniques for their intended purpose.

His hands snap together.

"Four Elements Seal!"

The ground itself turns into a crimson swirl, the spiral of doom that had once made people so afraid of the Uzumaki. A whirlpool that drags anything down into the depths.

The Kyubei screams as its paws sink in, tails thrashing against the seal.

Minato staggers under the pure weight of its chakra.

Even reinforced, the seal is not strong enough to hold for long. He has to summon the Shinigami now.

Snake. Boar. Ram.

The air goes quiet around him, cooling down even as the Kyubei's efforts to escape the seal begin to frantically escalate.

Rabbit. Dog. Rat.

Even though this was an Uzumaki technique, Kushina hadn't been the one who taught it to him. It had been Hiruzen, who had been taught it from Tobirama, who had been the one who learned it from the Uzumaki of his generation, the Uzumaki who had lived before Uzushiogakure had been founded.

People who do not understand the necessity of sacrificing everything, even your peace in the next life, for a better future for the people of this one--

They can never become Konoha's Hokage.

Bird. Horse. S--

"MINATO!"

Behind him, the safehouse explodes, a giant, raging beast bomb equivalent in strength to the one he'd had to seal away.

Minato's hands falter as he sees the Kyubei suddenly smile through teeth longer than his femur.

He'd forgotten. Freed from Obito's brute force control, the Kyubei is clever. It had waited before it came to him.

He hears the drum of feet as Kushina staggers out behind her, senses her presence always, even weak as it is now.

Her son-- their son-- is cradled safe in her arms.

And chasing her, a second clone of the Kyubei, equal in crawling presence to the one which he had almost given his life to seal.

"Minato!" Kushina yells again, voice ragged and frantic. The hem of her dress is still wet from when Obito had abducted her to a watery altar. But around her, the chains have begun to form. She can't do that, she doesn't have the chakra to spare. "It's split itself in half to avoid capture! We need to--"

He cuts her off, too afraid of her suggestion.

"It will kill you to have it resealed," he says. "There's another way-- I was just about to cast it."

It would have been terrible if he'd done that and still had half of the fox free, though. Kushina would have died taking it down. Though, maybe with Seiko and Hoheto to die in her defense..

... Where are they?

His eyes fall on Naruto. Does he believe Jiraiya enough to do that to his own child? To Kushina's only child?

Kushina is panting even as she clutches him tightly. Her chains are out, draining her life as she lashes out at the nine tails, locking it down right across from its twin.

"Minato," she says, like his name itself is part of a jutsu. "You don't get it. This is an opportunity! I'm sure I can take half the Kyubei back, and then the other can go to Naruto! Having only half will be much better for him than all of it..."

Minato looks at her hopelessly. Sealing half of it back into her will still kill her.

"You're right. It won't require as strong of a seal since it's split apart. It's possible."

She looks so relieved.

Not a true lie. He wouldn't ever truly lie to her.

Both foxes roar again, madened. It means nothing to him.

"We'll do it together," he says.

Two layers of the Four Elements becomes the Eight Trigrams. The whirlpool, symbol of the Uzumaki, has a second meaning, that of a spiral of yin and yang. The obvious choice is then for Minato to take the yang side and Kushina the yin, as all divisions become either yin or yang, but--

The Kyubei half that Kushina is sealing with her chains is the yin half.

He grabs a hold of it instead, and ignores the wild look Kushina throws him as she then grabs the yang half and gently begins to force it into Naruto.

"You can do it, Naruto! Definitely! You're going to be so strong!"

The baby blinks big blue eyes up at her and begins to wail as the same whiskers that had gotten Kushina badly bullied when they were kids etch themselves across his cheeks.

Through a horrible lump in his throat, Minato bends down, hovering a finger over Naruto and watches as the kid grabs onto it even as he wails.

Such a strong grip.

Will he not even get to hold--

Nothing to put off.

Minato feels the second seal solidify, and then presses it into his own chest.

He gasps, suddenly, in more pain than he's ever been in his life. How could anyone do this?

He shouldn't have asked Kushina to help seal the Kyubei into Naruto. When she'd known how much it would hurt him!

And then he hears it for the first time. The distorted roar of a beast forever now to appear as the words of a human.

You. Miserable. Wretch.

Minato folds over and collapses, both hands over his stomach. It feels like the beast's claws are inside of him, trying to rake their way out. He can sense the texture of fur on the inside of his lungs.

It's all your fault.

He's still got enough of a mind left to finish off the seal properly. He can't-- he can't act as if he intends to die from something that will surely kill him. He can't quite remember why, but he has to act as though there's a possibility he'll live.

I hope you--

It feels so bizarre, but it feels like he's lost in his own mind. How can he be listening to foreign echoes, this endless rootsystem. But he can hear people talking who aren't him.

Everything is slipping away, fading from his memory as soon as he hears it. His throat hurts. His tongue hurts. His teeth hurt, like their growing up and piercing into his skull--

.

A whisper. Not at him.

Kurama.

He doesn't know who that is.

Kurama, please let him live.

YOU.

Shhhh. I'll tell you a secret if you let him live.

HOW DO YOU HAVE THAT NAME?

He feels like he's forgotten something important.

Hoheto has certain expectations for his own life. In fact, when he'd been a child, he'd had more than "expectations," he'd had a plan. He remembers it vividly.

He was never going to be sealed.

The Caged Bird Seal was traditionally placed on branch member heads not in accordance of what age they were, but whenever the next clan heir turned three. He had been born-- deliberately, because his parents could count-- in between generations of the main house. The current Hyuuga clan head was 12 years older than him, and his wife was still, now, in her last trimester of pregnancy. The child fated to rule over him hasn't even been born.

So, according to tradition, Hoheto would still be unsealed for the next three years. He would be in his twenties before it happened to him.

He could have abandoned Konoha before his time was up and never returned.

Hoheto reaches up and presses a hand against his forehead.

That was the peacetime tradition. The Second War had started when he was six, and already in the Academy. That was when his three years of freedom had begun to count down.

They'd sealed him the evening he became a genin. He'd actually been excited to wear the forehead protector around his neck, or his arm. Just once.

Just once, couldn't he have done it?

Seiko puts hers on her dog.

Can't he at least--

He had been a genius on a team of geniuses. Just as soon as his hope of being free had been crushed, it had been relit. If there were two people in all of Konoha who could get it off of him it would be them.

Kiyomu would do it as soon as he got better, got older. Seiko would protect Kiyomu from the consequences of going against the Hyuuga.

He should know better than to have plans.

She must think he's stupid.

Moving on from their genin group to trying for jounin alone. Grasping on to Kushina and deciding that he'd just learn the seals for himself.

He'd claw his own eyes out if he thought the seal would go with them.

He'll still do it if he runs out of other plans.

He doesn't want to die with it on his forehead. He can't die like that.

So why does he still run towards Kushina, towards the shelter? It's because his plan is in jeopardy, at risk. Kushina is going to die on him like Kiyomu did, and take his hope with him.

He suppresses a laugh.

If only that were true. If only he could stop tugging on the chain. He's already thinking of what's next. If Kushina dies, he'll need to find another sealmaster. Attempt to ingratiate himself closer to the Hokage, if that's possible. If it's impossible, then...

Ask Seiko to assign him a mission to find the Toad Sage? Volunteer to look for Lady Tsunade?

Ask Seiko to--

"I hope she's alright," Kushina says, son clutched in her arms while she leans against the doorframe of the safehouse and gives him instruction. She's too weak to stand. "Seiko. I hope Minato has her properly teleported back into the village. That girl works too hard."

He accidentally cuts too deep into his arm, and more blood spills on the ground.

Stupid.

He'd thought, when he didn't see her body with his eyes, five kilometers in all directions--

That she'd flaked out. Decided that coming out to be with a jinchuuriki when they gave birth was a bad idea.

She's got a sense for when things are a bad idea.

"I'm finished up," Hoheto says roughly. He examines the site with his Byakugan again, to make sure. It's as faultless as he can make it, everything lined up with the invisible lines of chakra that she and the Hokage had laid down. It hadn't saved anyone present, or kept the intruder out, or the fox in.

But hopefully, this time...
Kushina claps her hands together and a pillar of light erupts from the center of the seal.

"KYUBEI!" She yells. "COME HERE, YOU STUPID FOX! I'M! RIGHT! HERE!"

For a moment, Hoheto is confused by the yelling. Why bother when that's what the seal is supposed to be broadcasting?

And then he hears the resulting roar echo through the trees, as if it's not the seal at all, but the words that had summoned the greatest of the cursed beasts.

It's just that he's familiar with the tone.

Not her tone.

The fox's.

Gods, is it possible to give up on your own imprisonment? To not heel when called?

"What are you doing here?" Seiko demands, and he feels the chain bite into him.

He might as well kill himself.

Hoheto doesn't stop moving until they are back inside the safehouse, hand firmly clamped around Seiko's arm. Kushina gives them both a nod, though she shoots Seiko a very concerned look.

"You're.. Still here?" She says. Pauses. "And your dog?"

He stills.

Where is that damned dog.

She's never without him.

"Biter didn't get teleported along with me," Seiko says, voice calm and unworried. As if it's nothing. "I'll need to do a jutsu to get him over here. One second."

She doesn't get one second.

If it had been anyone else except for Kushina Uzumaki with them, they would have died instantly.

One arm flung up so she can still hold the baby, an inky black spiral seal flashes across the air as the tailed beast bomb detonates, doing its best to redirect and absorb the blast.

Even so, the accompanying roar of rage causes blood to trickle from Hoheto's ears as his bloodline eyes show him something it should have been impossible for him to miss. Even so, the safehouse that had been a charnel house of the dead when he'd arrived collapses around him, hungry for more. He gives up on shielding his head so that he can lunge towards Seiko.

If he'd looked, he'd have seen it. But who would dare say that the Nine Tails would ever hide, ever lurk in ambush?

That was for beings that were afraid.

He sees through walls, sees its eyes.

Hatred.

Unwillingness.

He can see every angle, so while looking straight at it as it chases after Kushina, he is also forced to look straight at Seiko, off to the side of him, below him.

"Seiko!" Hoheto gets out, struggling to move the collapsed wood and stone that had fallen on him. It's not that he's not strong enough, but if he sets off a chain collapse while Seiko is still in there...

Her eyes are closed.

"Seiko!"

Her lips move, but his ears are ringing. Bleeding. He focuses, veins darkening around his eyes. He'll just have to lip read.

"Biter," Seiko murmurs. Her hands twitch up and then fall again as she fails to complete the summoning.

She's always calling for that damn dog.

He'd been unable to walk when Chiyo Poisontongue was done with him. Unable to lift his arms. Unable to do anything except-- how had that bitch said it-- watch and beg.

That's when she'd moved onto Seiko.

She'd been calling for Biter then, too, but not to summon him. It had been a fakeout. To make Chiyo think that Biter wasn't there, when in fact, he was present and working to get Hoheto out of his state.

All part of the plan.

Seiko only calls for people who won't answer. Played the puppetmaster like she was a shadow in her own show.

What would he do if she ever called for him?

Ever admitted to the world that she didn't think he'd come?

He'd have to kill himself, right.

He can't do that, he has to take care of his parents. Has to get rid of his prison. So it's left to Seiko to call for her missing dog forever.

He pushes aside a piece of splintered wood, and then another. Sticks his feet to the wall and walks sideways to make his way through. The ruin is just like a seal. He just needs to learn its pieces, understand it, manipulate it.

He flashes forward into an open gap and stands on a collapsed ceiling, finally close enough to Seiko to start lifting some of the wood off her.

If only he did not have these cursed eyes, he wouldn't know when she looks his way and smiles, bitter and sardonic and fond. He wouldn't have been able to see into her house when he'd visited and seen her dining room table set up with their genin picture. He wouldn't be able to see the cracks and weaknesses in her bones.

He wouldn't be able to see the broken needle in her knee.

"Slacking off, 'Heto?"

"Shut up."

He has to concentrate on this.

"Don't move. Everything will shift around and fall on you. Just stay there while I figure out how to get this out."

Even though he'd just said not to move, she starts to laugh, coughing and choking on sawdust and dried blood.

"Is this funny to you!?"

"Isn't it?" She says. "Look at you, offering to do all the work. I knew being lazy would eventually pay off."

"I'll leave," Hoheto snaps down at her. "Then what will you do?"

She's still laughing with her eyes.

"Biter will come get me," she says.

"I hate that dog," Hoheto says.

He manages to get another piece into a more stable configuration as a roar from outside causes the entire place to shake again. He's not expanding his vision range further until he's got this perfectly under control.

"Minato!? What are you--"

It's so loud that it overpowers the titanous ringing in his ears for a moment and replaces it.

Hoheto stalls out at the pure grief in Kushina's voice, horror slipping through him. Then he stares down at Seiko, who's eyes have once more drifted shut.

"Biter," she repeats again. Once more, her hands convulse.

He'd told her where to cut.

If he'd been able to use his hands, she wouldn't have had to make the cuts in the first place.

"Biter," Seiko sighs. "Go to him first."

His stomach rebels against him and he swallows acid back down his throat where it belongs, stitches everything back into place, lifts and lowers his arms just to prove he can. She's hallucinating, she's not talking to him.

The dog isn't here.

He can do it alone.

"Seiko, stay conscious," Hoheto says, tongue clumsy in his mouth. "Stop calling for the dog."

Her eyes open the tiniest bit.

"You should use his name," Seiko murmurs. "Rude. You should treat your savior better."

He couldn't bear to.

"Why don't you have other dogs, Seiko?" He's trying to keep them both in the present.

She feels very far away.

"Don't need them."

Of course.

"Your younger brother has a lot of them."

A trace of a frown on her face.

"Biter is..." she trails off. "The last survivor of his litter. So there's no other members of his pack for me to call on. I knew that going in."

"Oh."

She snorts.

"Well, that's not true now. I'm pack. So're you."

Because he's lip reading and can't truly hear her, he doesn't know what tone she might have. When she says that.

He changes the subject.

"Seiko," Hoheto says slowly. "I know you must have deliberately put Biter somewhere. What the hell are you doing this time?"

"It's a secret," Seiko says.

"A secret?"

Is she committing treason or something?

"Didn't think it would end up like this," Seiko says. "Better than worst case. Hope Minato lives."

So Biter's being her eyes on the Hokage's sealing.

"Didn't sound promising just now," Hoheto says.

"There's still a chance," Seiko sighs.

"You don't know anything about sealing or medical jutsus."

Even though he really thinks she should learn as much as she can of both.

"He doesn't need that," Seiko says, eyes fully opening. "Though this isn't really about him, it's about the Nine Tails."

She's being cryptic on purpose. He's falling for her trap by becoming invested in a puzzle she won't give him enough pieces to answer.

"The Hokage's life depends on the Nine Tails?"

Knocking loose more dust, Seiko nods.

"Mmm... that's accurate, yeah. Not what I meant. What do you think that the Nine Tails wants above all else, 'Heto?"

He'd listened to all sorts of stories of the capture of the Kyubei when he'd been small.

How Madara had found it and forced it to fight at his side against Hashirama, their battle rending the land to the extent that sliced mountains in two.

How Mito Uzumaki, Hashiriama's wife, chose to become the first jinchuriki of the village era.

How her power, alongside her husband, had made Konoha the most peaceful and prosperous of all the villages. Never fearing war, never fearing famine.

And still, the answer slips from his lips with ease.

"Freedom," he says.

She meets his eyes for the first time.

"Do you think it can both live and be free?"

"No," Hoheto says. "It's too dangerous."

"I believe it can," Seiko says.

Does she--

"Ah, there you are, Biter."

The dog wags its tail as it tunnels up from the ground and through the loose rubble to arrive by her side.

Then it looks up at Hoheto and smirks at him.

"With both of you here, I'll be out in no time," Seiko says.

Even though she says that, the dog does no work either, simply curling up by Seiko's head as Hoheto finally gets the rest of the most dangerous stuff out of the way.

He ducks down and extends his hand to her.

"Come on," he says. "You've been lying around long enough."

She eyes him with dark amusement.

"You think you're done, 'Heto?" She says. "My pain pills ran out a while ago. I can't walk. Or, well, it's fine. Biter will do it."

She's uncomfortably light in his arms as he finally makes his way out of the ruin of the safehouse to see what's become of Kushina and her baby and the Hokage.

Kushina looks up at him, face drawn into a terrible pallor, holding the baby like it's her only lifeline.

"Hoheto," she breathes out. "Seiko."

"Put me down," Seiko says, and Hoheto hastily obliges, setting her down to sit by Biter.

Then he realizes why.

Minato is crumpled and fallen onto the ground, but he isn't dead. Instead, it looks like Kushina had repeatedly tried to pull him onto her lap, only for him to immediately thrash and fall back into the dirt, further staining his white overcoat. And--

Hoheto nearly takes an unthinking step back.

The baby has the telltale sign of a jinchuuriki-- whisker marks on the cheeks.

Minato's mouth can't close due to the emergence of vicious fox fangs that cut into his lips.

He groans, and it barely sounds human.

Kushina hastily casts another frantic seal on him, and then curses at him when it doesn't immediately fix the problem. He thinks there are dried tear tracks on her face.

"You'll need to carry him back to the village," Seiko says.

Hoheto stops for a moment.

She's right.

Kushina can't carry both her child and her husband, and honestly shouldn't be expected to carry either. It's not like Seiko can do it.

But--

"I know you were joking around earlier, but Biter really can't carry you places!"

"So I'll just sit here," Seiko says. "The danger's passed."

If she'd just ask him.

Hoheto kneels down and carefully picks up the Hokage.

Because he'd begged Kushina, because he was so sure that he was going to lose his chance, that something would go wrong, he'd actually been much closer by than he should have been. The safehouse was far away from Konoha for a reason.

Otherwise, backup would have been here already.

Now, he's got to escort a woman who should be on bedrest and a man who should be dead through endless forest.

And--

He's a Hyuuga. He doesn't ever need to look back to see what's behind him.

...

"I wish I'd gotten to have teammates," Kushina says quietly. "They didn't think a jinchuuriki needed any, but.."

She looks down at Naruto.

"He's going to have them," she decides. "Reliable people like you and Seiko. Definitely!"

Chapter Text

"You will start from the top," Shikaku says. "A succinct and streamlined timeline of events, and then we can dig into specifics, starting from the moment something happened to interfere with the safehouse."

Seiko doesn't like how familiar she's getting with Shikaku's office.

At least this time there's a chair. And a dog treat for Biter.

"Wouldn't this be easier if everyone was gathered together to tell you what happened?"

"Yes," Shikaku says. His eyes longingly drift towards the bottle of sake that still sits unopened on his desk, and then lights a cigarette instead. "Now, let's get started."

"I was with the Hokage when he sensed something was wrong," Seiko says. "The attacker had killed everyone incredibly fast."

Shikaku does not look like he's slept much lately.

"The Hokage went into the room, I went after him. The attacker looked like he was trying to kidnap Naruto, but his goal was Kushina. He grabbed her and teleported out to a pre-set up altar location. I described this earlier."

"You did," Shikaku says flatly. "We've been unable to find it."

Not her fault.

"The attacker freed the Kyuubi and teleported it over to the village. The Hokage teleported Kushina and Naruto back to the safehouse, while me and him went back to the cliff nearby the village with the intention to help against the Kyuubi."

"This is when the Hokage sealed the beast bomb," Shikaku says.

"Yes. The attacker moved to attack him when he noticed. The attacker could teleport and become insubstantial."

"And did you get a glimpse of this attackers eyes, Hatake."

Seiko really wishes she could coordinate her answers with Minato. Unfortunately, in the days since she'd been helped back to the village, Minato has remained comatose.

"He was wearing an orange spiraled mask with only one eye hole," Seiko says slowly. "It seemed like he had some sort of eye kekkai genkai."

While she was more than willing to use Obito's past against him in battle, she's not exactly excited to worsen accusations launched against the Uchiha. If Minato wakes up and gives different testimony, she's more than prepared to bite the bullet and just say that she's no longer qualified to be an active ninja for lying to her superiors.

Shikaku closes his own eyes then opens them again.

"Interesting," he says. "This is when my dear cousin made his move."

"I didn't think he'd rip his own eye out."

He'd had an eyepatch on when she went back to work! Even though he claimed it was just a temporary thing while the eye rehealed... There were now scar marks above and below the eye where his own fingers had dug in to flesh.

"And yet, it appears to have been the right choice," Shikaku says softly. "Is that not so?"

"The attacker lost access to both his teleportation and his insubstantiality the moment the eye was removed. The Hokage sealed the eye away into his personal storage immediately."

Seiko sends another mental apology to Minato for kicking the can down the road. It's going to be very hard to pretend it's not an Uchiha eye if he ever shows that to anyone.

"And then?" Shikaku prompts.

"...In a heroic effort to get the Kyuubi back out of the village, Kushina and Hoheto sent up a locator beam that caused the Kyubei to abandon its attack on Konoha and go after her. Taking advantage of the Hokage's distraction, the attacker escaped, and the Hokage and I teleported back to the safehouse."

She'd been so painstricken she'd barely noticed that Minato had more than let Obito go, he'd helped him escape until much later. But it is the main reason she's putting the extra work into lying about it. That and the fact that if Minato doesn't want to track his student down, he needs to be able to claim it's impossible. Which it isn't, because she knows he teleport tagged him.

She sends Minato another telepathic prayer that he'll somehow figure out her precise spin on the story and go with it.

"The rest..." It had all been so confusing at the time, but it's very simple to say. "The Hokage sealed half of the Kyuubi inside himself and half into Naruto, meaning Kushina is no longer a jinchuuriki. Hoheto helped the Hokage and his family back to Konoha while I stayed behind to... guard the area."

Shikaku snorts.

Alright. So she'd been sleeping when people had arrived. It had been a long day.

"Let's dig into some of what you've just said to me, shall we?" Shikaku says, and Seiko takes in a deep breath.

"When giving her own testimony, Kushina mentioned remembering that you seemed a lot more intent on digging into the attacker's identity than you are right now. Do you have any further opinions as to their identity?"

Kushina had been there when she'd accused Obito of being, well, himself, but Kushina had also been on the verge of death, so you could brush a lot a way. And it seems Kushina had, in fact, brushed a lot of it away.

Ugh. She should just commit.

"I'm a lot more willing to take swings at an opponent's mind when I'm not implicating other people alongside them," Seiko says plainly. "I believe that the Hokage even briefly entertained the idea that he was fighting Madara returned from the dead. However, that definitely didn't seem to be true, and I am unwilling to contribute to baseless rumours. There are more than two eye bloodline limits in the world."

There are even more than two specifically red eye bloodline limits.

Shikaku doesn't press her further.

"There's some other matters to address," he says. "Now that you're back out of the hospital."

Seiko tips her head to the side.

"You know, the habit of playing dumb is a lot less charming when it's non-Naras who do it.." Shikaku mumbles. "I'm talking about your promotion. To jounin. For your services to the village."

Genuine shock slips through her.

"You should have been promoted earlier, after you were so successful against the Swordsmen, but I-- and the Hokage--were worried that it seemed like a fluke, and it is always unwise to promote someone based on a single out of character event."

Shikaku is really prone to tacking on 'and the Hokage' after his sentences. Scary. She really understands due to the fact that she'd just finished doing the exact same thing that what he means by that is 'this was my sole judgement, but I expect to be backed up if called on it'.

"It was a fluke," Seiko says immediately. "I'm not reliable in field combat."

He gives her a sardonic look.

"You were reliable enough that the Hokage decided to keep you by his side," he says. "Or are you going to change your statement?"

Seiko closes her mouth.

"That's what I thought. Congratulations, Hatake. I thought I'd warn you ahead of time, so you're not surprised when Mist puts out their new Bingo Book-- we've already got an information leak on their planned title for you."

He pulls out a document and slides it over the desk towards her.

Biter began to wheeze, a forceful breath in and out as his tail beats against her chair.

He's laughing at her.

Even though it's right in front of her, she struggles to read it.

Seiko Hatake, "The Shadow Fang."
Rank: A
Fights alongside summon (dog). Engages as part of a duo with "Black Spider Lily, Ensui Nara". Avoid shadows.

"They just swapped one descriptor out for my dad's title," Seiko says, disbelieving.

"As someone whose father was also in the Ino-Shika-Cho trio," Shikaku says. "You should be lucky that they swapped anything at all."

The Kyuubi's attack on the village, however short, had been brutal.

It hadn't seemed so bad when she'd eventually been escorted back in the dull light of the evening, but everything had come to an abrupt halt when she saw her own house.

There were deep burn marks like claws in her front garden.

The chair that Might Dai had given her had shattered from some sort of blast, and its splinters stuck out at odd, uneven angles from the wood of her porch.

So, even a week later... she's been unable to sit around and look out at the garden. She doesn't..

Gai is a jounin as well, now. He's busy helping other people who lost family, who's entire homes burned down. It's the right thing to prioritize those things over the fact that she came back home and realized her favorite chair got broken.

Seiko shivers suddenly. Hopefully Dai's house didn't get damaged. It's out on the outskirts, which Kurama had largely ignored in favor of trying to damage the heart of the city, but...

She's in no state to walk that far. She doesn't have access to data on civilian housing, if anyone even keeps records of that kind of thing. So she can't go and check.

...

It's a bit early in the morning even for her to go and head over to the Tower for work. She'd tried to stop doing that after Sakumo died because it made Chobee look at her too pitifully and try to feed her too much.

Seiko sits at her dining room table and tries to be happy.

She'd been successful beyond her wildest hopes. Her persistence had been rewarded. Kushina, alive! Minato, alive!

He still hadn't woken up, but still. Alive! Even Obito was still alive, even though she wasn't sure if that was good or not.

..

Nothing. It feels about the same as whenever she gets a promotion. Okay, that's a bad example, she actively hates getting promoted. It feels like when she'd first become a genin.

All that build up, and then, nothing.

And then her dad hadn't even shown up, so at least there was no mood to ruin.

Seiko glances at the shrine at the end of the table and sighs uncomfortably. It's time to move it back upstairs.

It's not like she can't climb stairs with a bad knee. Well, it hurts, but that's not what's wrong with the stairs in her own house. It's just that she'd been halfway up them when she realized Sakumo had died.

So walking up them...

Always feels like walking towards death.

But she'd just been stuck under all that rubble, looking up at Hoheto, and he'd been old. Even though she'd seen him not eight months ago, somehow he'd been nine in her head forever.

Hoheto's 18.

And Seiko..is about to be twice as old as she was when Sakumo died. She's going to have spent more of her life without him than with him. Kakashi's already past that point.

Lips twisting uncomfortably about how maudlin she's getting, Seiko pushes herself up from her seat and starts carefully gathering up her mother and father's portraits. This isn't going to be only one trip, or she'll drop something.

There's no dust upstairs. Because Gai still goes up here.

Not a single speck of dust on the empty family shrine. She sets up the portraits, realizes she'll have to reset them all anyway because she didn't take the black cloth up first, and sighs.

She ends up sitting on the top of the stairs, looking down.

Just a bit of rest for the knee before she does it again.

The Shadow Fang, huh.

"You like the name?" She asks Biter.

He gives a sharp yip.

"Doesn't it seem like it's referencing you more than it's referencing me? Well, that makes sense. You're the one with the forehead protector and the vest, after all."

He butts his head against her arm.

"A shared name is shared protection? That's a cute sentiment coming from you, Biter."

She hugs him.

"Thanks for agreeing to do that for me with Kurama," she says. Quiet. Conversational. She feels the muscles tense beneath her touch. "Yeah, I know. We're not in any position to talk him down from that much hatred. He just needs to think that there's an easier way to take vengeance than killing him. In some ways it's a much better sell than if Kurama'd been resealed into Kushina-- there's no way she would have survived."

A low growl.

There, at the top of the stairs, Seiko starts to laugh.

"Isn't that going to make Minato live a miserable life?" She says, voice soft. "Wouldn't death be better? Well, that's the thing, Biter. It won't be better for my brother, now, will it?"

She looks behind her down the hallway.

"We've all got to make sacrifices. I only helped him live through his."

Kabuto's there, ducked behind a desk when she steps into work, eyes large behind his glasses.

It's an oddly familiar pose, but it takes a while for her to make the connection. Slowly, her gaze sweeps past him out towards the Academy.

"Popular with the girls, Kabuto?" She says, helplessly amused. That's right, this had happened to Asuma.

"No," Kabuto bites out. "I don't get along with the rest of them. They don't understand anything."

Is he getting bullied?

Presumably not physically, or he'd already have made them regret that.

But still... he's a smart kid, he'd know enough to be able to blend in and not stand out. What on earth would have made them target him?

"I can have a word with the teachers," Seiko says, even though she's already expecting the strong shake of the head she gets from him.

"It's nothing," Kabuto says. "This place is better for doing actual work anyway."

Well, it's not something she'll unravel with one conversation. Seiko settles into her seat and waits for the jittering in her wrist to subside a bit. The academy's promotion cycle won't result in more genin for a few more months, so a small break at least on that side of it while she works through the ripple effects of Kurama's rampage.

So it's to be expected that she's immediately interrupted by the same man she'd just been reminded of.

Asuma peers in through the door before strolling in, hands tucked into his pockets and a cigarette in his mouth. Wow, grown up enough to start ruining Seiko's lungs with that shit.

"Ah, Seiko!" He says. "Back on duty?"

He's been really trying to act like she doesn't remember when he was four and had a very ugly haircut lately.

"Young master Sarutobi," Seiko sighs, and watches him do a full body flinch. "What an honor."

He puts out the cigarette incredibly fast, a mortified flush crawling up his neck.

"The one advantage of the old man being retired is that no one uses that anymore. Please don't."

Seiko shrugs.

"How can I help you?"

His eyes trace over Kabuto behind the desk and then clearly dismiss him as a security leak, which is a huge mistake.

"Oh, you know," Asuma says. "I'm thinking maybe it's time for me to take an extended break from Konoha. Go see the world."

"You don't need a direct mission from the main desk to do that. We're in peacetime, after all. You could just leave."

Even though it would be considered irresponsible. He wouldn't be declared a missing nin or anything.

Asuma slowly shakes his head.

"I want it to be an official thing, so I can't be called back. I've already done my own research, more or less. Did you know the Fire Daimyo is hiring?"

That is a respectable thing for someone who really doesn't want to be in Konoha to be doing. But why on earth is he doing it now?

"I'm sure we have a letter from the Daimyo around here somewhere saying that," Seiko says. Not somewhere. She'd marked it so that she could find it if Asuma ever asked for it. Though, she'd thought he'd stay in the village for a few more years..

He's just a little too desperate during a time when nothing is wrong. He hasn't even had any loud fights with his father that have made it through the gossip chain lately. And his mother just died.

She feels his eyes on her as she fumbles around for the sealed scroll and pulls it out for him.

"Seiko," Asuma starts again.

So he had deliberately come here to tell her something.

"Yes?"

"I've been hearing some weird stuff, since the Hokage is still unconscious. People talking about picking another candidate while he recovers. People asking about if being a jinchuuriki should disqualify you from the position."

Seiko slowly looks up at him. Back when it had been Orochimaru and Minato competing for the spot, Asuma had not even been a candle. He's still not really a candle now-- he's what? 14? And he doesn't have the power or the reputation to go with his bloodline. But...

"I think it'll be good for everyone if I'm out of the village for a bit." Asuma says. "I'd been considering this for a while anyway, so it only makes sense, right?" He laughs awkwardly. "I'm starting to get why Jiraiya's never here..."

She doesn't want Danzo to start feeling both like he has a chance and that he has competition.

"The young master is wise," Seiko says, and Asuma groans.

"Gods, Seiko! I'm really sorry I was a brat when I was five! I barely remember any of that! I'm sorry! I'm sorry!"

Yakumi comes to work one day and just keeps looking at Seiko and then looking back down and then looking back up.

"What?"

Yakumi spills some ink over herself and curses.

".. Seiko," she says.

Very ominous way to start a sentence.

"Yes?"

"Do you have any idea why my Clan Head would want to talk to you?"

Both Seiko and Biter suddenly look over at her in unison.

"Does he want to talk to me," Seiko says.

Yakumi scowls.

"I don't know. He's not willing to come in here to talk to you, or to make a formal request or anything, but he's been sort of in his own way implying that he wants to talk to you. I think."

Seiko stares up at the ceiling.

"I already did go to visit his office last year. He can't pay a house visit?"

Yakumi bites her lip.

"The main desk is a very public place compared to the Uchiha Police headquarters."

It is. And the last time Fugaku had dropped by had been incredibly annoying. He was overly self conscious, incredibly ambitious, and saw the youth of his own clan as a sign that the Uchiha Clan was fated to rise. A terrible combination of personality traits to have.

"It's either here or at my house," Seiko says. "He's welcome to drop by. Or send someone."

Yakumi sighs.

"I'll... convey that."

"Sorry you have to deal with this, Yakumi."

Yakumi shakes her head.

"It's important," she says. Her eyes shift around, low and uneasy. "You know, the last time the Kyuubi attacked Konoha, it was at Madara's side. Under his command, maybe."

Seiko knows.

"It's impossible for any of us to do something like that," Yakumi mutters. "Everyone knows it. But... Do you think our Clan Head will ever publicly say that the Uchiha are too weak to achieve such a feat?"

Never.

Nono meets her at the door to the orphanage.

She's not wearing her glasses, and Seiko finally makes the connection back to Kabuto.

"Eyesight suddenly improved?" Seiko asks.

Nono gives Seiko a half smile.

"These things come and go," she says. "I've officially retired."

Seiko steps inside, Biter at her heels.

"Congratulations," Seiko says. "But what's the occasion that you wanted me over here for, then. Unless this is to nag about my regular hospital visits."

"I don't nag," Nono says, smile sharpening. "I merely inquire. And besides, with Kabuto keeping an eye on you, you could cut your visits to be even further apart and lose nothing."

"So, how is Kabuto doing at--"

Seiko blinks as there's an almost scuffle of small feet behind Nono before Yamato bursts out onto the scene, nearly sprinting before he skids to a halt in front of her.

"Lady Hatake!"

Seiko has a full body flinch while Nono very clearly fails to muffle a laugh beside her.

"Hi, Yamato," she says. "It's just Seiko."

He looks so downcast.

"Lady Seiko," he mumbles. "Thank you so much for when you came to talk to me. I asked one of the Uchiha how I was supposed to address you, and--"

Ah.

"The Uchiha are a very formal clan," Seiko says. "I don't need to do all that stuff, since it's just me and my brother."

He looks upset.

"But I'm glad you put in such an effort," Seiko hastily tacks on. "Thank you."

Narrow avoidance of making a seven year old cry. Another victory for jounin Seiko Hatake.

Yamato takes a deep breath and continues what he was going to say before she unbalanced him.

"I'm going to be attending the Academy in a couple of months," he says, words practically slamming together as he speeds through something he'd clearly rehearsed in advance. "Instead of going directly to genin."

He stalls out.

"That's great," Seiko says sincerely. "You know, I didn't graduate until I was eight myself, and I would have preferred to stay even longer."

"You..." She's thrown him off course again. "Then why didn't you?"

Why hadn't she?

Seiko tries to remember what she'd been thinking. It feels like such an odd and hazy place, the vague memories she still has of a world without pain. Surely it can't actually have been like that, right? But no, it really had been. She'd... wanted to graduate before Kakashi did. Just to prove that she could do it. Was that really it?

"There was a war on," Seiko says vaguely. "I hope that the Academy spends more time with all of its students now that it has some breathing room. I'm sure you can learn a lot."

Yamato nods rapidly.

"So I wanted to ask," he says, voice dropping even quieter. "I've been... I mean, I sometimes remember... Orochimaru's genin, is she alright?"

Seiko looks over Yamato's head to Nono, who gives a slight shrug. If she's got info she's not telling. Great.

"She's...alive," Seiko says. "I'll see if I can find out more."

Ensui might know. Or.. No, it's a T&I jurisdiction thing, right. So Inoichi Yamanaka unless he's actually retired the way he's been saying he's going to for close to a year. She doesn't know him well, though. She'd ask Minato, but...

Seiko slowly tilts her head to the side.

Couldn't she ask Kakashi to look into it? Her little brother isn't incompetent when it comes to stuff like this.

"Yeah," Seiko says. "It might take a bit of time."

Nono raises an eyebrow at her.

"That's wonderful to hear," she says. "Yamato, I think you shouldn't mention that Seiko is looking into that until she actually manages to find her, yes? Let's have it be a surprise for the others."

Yamato nods firmly, looking almost offended that Nono had to say it.

"I'll be quiet," he says. "Thank you again. I mean it. I'm sorry that I had to ask you for something else..."

Seiko carefully reaches up a shaking hand and places it on his head. She'd kneel, but she's trying to come across as reasonably adult. And reasonable adults don't do things that will result in them hurting their knees and then embarrassingly grabbing onto a kid to get back to their feet.

Probably.

"I'm really glad," she says. "That you're still brave enough to ask for things you want. You should give lessons to most of the people I know."

"Starting with you, Seiko?" Nono says. She's still smiling.

Biter knocks his head against her hip. Hey. Now they're ganging up on her.

"I never said I was brave," she says.

She does remember a bit of what she'd been like before Chiyo Poisontongue got to her. Is the thing. Is it more painful to think that her memories of painlessness are truly illusory because she'd had problems before then? Her mother had already died, and she'd been the one who was carrying Kakashi at the funeral. Sakumo had handed him to her at the grave and then not taken him back until everything was over.

For a two year old, he'd been very heavy.

Talking to Hoheto seems to have knocked loose all kinds of memories she'd prefer not to have.

"I'll offer you the same deal I offered Anko," Seiko says, voice idle. "Do well in the Academy and I'll make your first ever job a C rank."

His eyes light up.

"I'll work hard," he promises.

"Don't work too hard," Seiko says. "I think twelve is a good age to be a genin."

Much better than six.

...

Gods, is she really still going to be at the desk in another five years?

"SEIKO-SAN!"

Seiko looks up from her desk, startled for a second as Gai's image overlaps with his dads. The kid's hitting a growth spurt. She slides the scrolls she'd marked out for Iruka and Hayato's genin teams whenever they drop by in the coming weeks into their correct storage seals.

She'd been trying to teach Chobee her storage system and he just kept laughing blankly and ignoring her-- ah, she's ignoring Gai.

"Hi, Gai," Seiko says. "Need something?"

"Only victory over My Rival!" Gai says cheerfully. "But that shall only be granted through Hard Work and Persistence." A slight darkness seems to fall across his face. "I only wish I could have contributed more during the Kyuubi's attack. I am not accustomed to being sent to evacuate, rather than remain..."

Minato's choice to have everyone below a certain age, regardless of rank, forced to remain away from the fighting was the firmest declaration he could possibly make that he didn't want his era to be one where kids under thirteen were sacrificed. As a decision, it was very controversial, but mostly controversial with the ninja kids kept out of the fight. She'd never once heard an older ninja speak up against it.

Both because loudly protesting the Hokage was very inappropriate and because people liked the conscious reminder that they weren't on wartime footing.

Poor Kakashi, always just too young for everything except the one war he lost two friends and an eye in.

"Next time it'll be your turn to protect the younger generation," Seiko says. She consciously cranes her neck up. "Also, are you planning on beating Kakashi in height as well as prowess?"

Gai almost bounces on his toes.

"I am already taller than My Rival!" He announces, incredibly loudly. "This is the product of Spring Training!"

Incredible.

"I see," Seiko says.

"Indeed." Gai gives a very firm nod. "Though I have also come to you due to a slight problem. I must consult with you! I am sorry to have come to talk about personal matters while you are Working, but my own missions seem to be very numerous these days!"

She's pretty sure he's been trained as ANBU entourage for the Hokage, which is a no doubt fascinating process.

"You wouldn't believe how many people come to me at the desk to talk about their personal matters," Seiko says honestly. "But anyway, of course I have time for you."

Is it something about Kakashi?

"I am looking to go on a journey to the Spirit World to find my Summon Animal," Gai says. "I am aware that doing it this way is Dangerous, but I know it's the right path for me. Do you have any advice?"

Biter looks up from his spot underneath the desk.

"I think you're more suited than most to the task," Seiko says slowly. "Because you are straightforward, honest, and goodhearted, you will be drawn to animals that share your own characteristics, and the most danger will simply be spirited duels. The warnings for such a journey are for people who don't understand themselves, or people whose hearts are fragile and bitter."

She'd actually struggled a lot simply getting to Biter, even when her mother had literally escorted her there.

The grasslands had been endless, the air had been freezing cold, and the sun had never once risen. Ghostly howls in the distance.

"You have such faith in me," Gai says, tears pouring forth from him for a second before he dramatically wipes them away. "I see! I shall depart confidently!"

She stares at him.

"Gai," she says. Slowly. Almost rustily. "While you're here. Is Kakashi... doing well?"

She doesn't tend to ask after Kakashi. At all.

Gai hesitates.

"Seiko-san,"

Oh, no.

"Yes?"

"I believe he has gotten into another fight with your valiant teammate, Hoheto Hyuuga."

Seiko pauses, baffled.

"Again?"

"They are both assigned to guard and assist the esteemed Lady Uzumaki," Gai says carefully. "And yet, only one of them was present the night of the Kyuubi's attack."

Seiko nearly buries her head in her hands.

"Gai," she says. "It's peacetime. Why do I have more problems than ever?"

Silence for a second.

She looks up to meet his eyes, and sees him consciously restraining himself from saying something that might hurt her. He'd done that even when he was younger, and he does it more now: he's stronger so he's more aware of how delicate most people really are.

"You can speak freely."

"You don't have more problems," Gai says carefully. "You have more ability to care than you used to. So things that you previously ignored are now things you think you should solve. It is an admirable sign of your strength! I still have much to aspire to!"

Seiko goes still for a second, before sighing.

"It's not such a good thing, having such a clear look at the heart as you do," she says. "Being understanding of why people hurt you doesn't make it hurt less. And you hang out with my brother all the time."

Gai smiles at her.

"It is because My Rival is a bright and shining beacon that I am able to be like this!" He says, teeth a brilliant white in his grin. "With the sharingan, he sees through the actions of people! Thus, with my heart, I must see through the thoughts! Every loss to his talent brings me closer to victory."

...

"Just like every loss to your swordsmanship brought me inspiration," Gai says.

Seiko blinks slowly. Does he..want to do that? Again?

"I'm sure you've far surpassed my taijustu," she says. "You've worked hard."

"If I want to gain victory," Gai repeats to her, "It's not enough to work hard. I need to work harder than you, Seiko-san! I need to work harder than my father, harder than My Rival, harder than the Hokage, harder than the Kyuubi itself! That's how much farther I have to go."

"The Eight Gates will take you very far down that road," Seiko says.

Gai shakes his head.

"I don't want that kind of victory," he says, voice steadier than it's ever been. "I need to work hard enough that I won't ever even need the Gates at all."

Oh.

Seiko glances down at Biter, who nods and springs up, his paws landing on either of Gai's shoulders as he licks a giant smear down Gai's face.

Biter wags his tail.

"That's a scent marker for the rest of the Dogs that stay in the spirit realm," Seiko says. "One of them will come to escort you and aid you should you need it."

Gai stares at her, eyes wide.

"You won't need it," Seiko says. "But since you wanted some reassurance."

Biter gives another sharp bark.

Is that even allowed?

"Biter says," Seiko says. "If you're lost, go north."

"This is more than I ever..." Gai says, for the first time she's ever seen him without words.

"You are going to have to be unthinkably powerful, to do all that and not use the Gates," Seiko says. "Better get started, yeah? And summons are useful. You can pass them down to your genin, to your kids. It's a generational link."

Gai swallows before meeting her eyes.

"You mentioned, once," he says, voice slow. "What a peaceful world was going to look like. How long this era would last."

She had said something about that.

"I gave it a little less than fifteen more years from now," Seiko says.

Gai's fists clench.

"I'll make it be longer than that," he says to her. "I'm going to fight to make it longer than that!"

Isn't that an oxymoron? But she does understand.

"Peace really gives you something to lose, doesn't it?" Seiko says. She remembers the short gap between the 2nd and the 3rd War, though she knows that Gai doesn't, really.

"It gives me something to protect," Gai says.

Seiko feels her shoulders ache, an unusual location for her as she rarely carries heavy things. The problem, like always, is that she doesn't even know what's worth protecting.

"Good luck," Seiko says.

Chapter Text

"Skipping class again, Kabuto?"

"No," Kabuto says. "I'm keeping my word to help you with your hand."

"During school hours."

He gives her an empty eyed stare. Her insistence that he not use needles on her has forced him to get a little creative, but he's a genius. So even the previous symptoms she'd previously had from him messing around have subsided as he's gotten better.

"I don't need it," he says.

"I thought you were going to make profiles of all the people in your class?" Seiko says.

She's back to sitting on her porch after she'd posted a D rank to get the wood splinters cleared out. And look, there had been little Iruka out there with a scowl on his face and his fellow genin-- what were their names, again? Misumi and Yoroi. They'd done a good job, though. Not as good as Gai, but that's jounin quality for you.

And now Kabuto gets to sit there and scowl at her instead.

"Already done," he says. "They are all talentless and insecure people who will never become important."

Seiko laughs, and goes through the mental files she also keeps on the recent genin.

"What about the newest entries?" She suggests. "That's a more interesting crop, right?"

Kabuto gives her a very suspicious look.

"You mean the Uchiha heir?"

Of course he'd noticed that Itachi had been put into the Academy this year.

"There's got to be more people than just him," Seiko says. Would it be more appropriate for her to straight up instruct him to befriend Yamato as if it was a mission, or try and make him do it of his own free will.

Mission it is.

"In fact, there's someone I'd like you to keep an eye on," Seiko says, moving on. "You know Yamato, right?"

"He's new this year," Kabuto says slowly. "Nono also said to keep an eye on him."

Did she.

"Well?" Seiko says.

Kabuto crosses his arms.

"He's very quiet," Kabuto says. "Doesn't really do anything outside of schoolwork. He seems..."

He's not normally so hesitant to say rude things about his fellows.

"Anxious?" Seiko suggests.

He shoots her an annoyed look.

"He forgot who I was," Kabuto says. "Then he tried to cover it up, but I think there's something wrong with him."

So the memory issues haven't magically healed.

"Do you think he's been unable to remember most of his classmates?"

A shrug.

"Probably. I did try to look it up," Kabuto adds on quickly. "I don't know if he's really forgetting whole people, or just unable to link memory to faces, or something else."

So Kabuto had been uncomfortable around Yamato for obvious reasons.

"Having the glasses will help," Seiko says.

"What?"

"It's why Nono must have given them to you. Glasses will make you more distinctive and easier to remember." Seiko pauses. "Also useful for if you want to take them off and become unrecognizable, of course."

She makes a vague gesture to her own crutches and dog.

"I don't need to worry about that."

A much longer pause.

"He asked me if I was your brother," Kabuto says.

Kabuto's been growing his own grey hair out, but it's still only at the point where it doesn't even hit his shoulders. Not worth putting in a ponytail.

She can understand how Yamato got confused.

It's not like she doesn't know about other clans wondering if she's going to adopt an orphan due to how little interest she's shown in dating or marriage. Aside from the gossip about her and Hoheto, of course.

That gossip never goes anywhere because the idea that the head of the Hatake clan would marry a branch family Hyuga is ridiculous. So most of that type of thing just ends with a pitying headshake towards 'Heto. If there'd been a main Hyuga line member around her age they would have been on Seiko's team instead, and then none of this could ever even be talked about.

Unpleasant people.

Seiko stares up at the sky.

"I think it might be fine for the clan to die out with me and Kakashi," she says. "It's fine if the clan techniques die out, even...But then, I'd still need to find someone to carry on the Dog contract."

Biter barks beside her.

She shakes her head at him.

"Haven't found the person yet. I don't know."

"What type of person would you want to take on that contract?" Kabuto asks, hands cold on her wrists.

"Don't know," Seiko repeats. "The Dog contract is the most precious thing I possess in the world, more precious than my life, so I have high expectations. The least of which is liking dogs, of course."

Utter stillness.

Seiko gives a one shoulder shrug.

He'd wanted knowledge, after all.

"Your brother's been by," Ensui informs her dully.

He's taken the eyepatch off, but the pockmarked scars above and below his eye very much still remain.

"Did he want to talk to me?"

Ensui snorts.

"He's your brother. Even if he did want to talk to you, dropping by your work desk would be a bizarre way to do it. Is that how family members behave?"

She knows he's directing his ire at Kakashi, but it still hits home to her as well. Deflating her the same way his bubblegum falls apart.

"He's upset," She says anyway.

"World's an upsetting place," Ensui says. "I'd still be pissed if my cousin dropped in on me to pick a fight when I was here, and my cousin does also work here."

Whatever Kakashi had said or done must have really set Ensui off.

"I imagine he's back at the hospital with Kushina," Seiko says, trying to head off anything else Ensui has to say on the matter of her family problems, but Ensui is incredibly hard to shake when he actually feels like saying or doing something.

"He's an immature brat--"

"He's fourteen!"

"--who is having an unpleasant realization," Ensui says. "One of many, I'm sure. This isn't even my first run in with him this week, since that thing with the jounin apartment building."

Seiko stares at him.

"Oh, you don't even know what I'm talking about, I thought you were keeping a closer eye on him. He's trying to move to a ground floor apartment."

"What?"

"Trying, but they're obviously all taken, especially with the ongoing Kyuubi rampage aftermath. Does he think he's the only jounin in the world who has relatives that struggle to climb stairs? Honestly, he--"

"Why do you know that all the ground floor apartments are taken?" Seiko says. "You don't live in one either."

Ensui pauses awkwardly.

"Anyway," he says, finally seeming to want to move on from the conversation. "I saw the new Mist Bingo Book."

Seiko lets him move on from whatever point he'd been trying to make.

"Known duo," she says dryly. "Well, information's already out of date. I think that's the last time I'm ever going to pick a fight. It's all over. They'll never see me again."

Ensui gives her a droll look.

"Until they get the Chunin Exams program up and running," he says. "I've seen some of the plans for that. Ridiculous amount of work for overseeing chunin and jounin. And you know who they recruit for that type of thing."

He pats his desk.

Nightmare.

"I'll retire," Seiko says.

She can, now. It's such a strangely freeing thing, the fact that she can leave the desk if she wants to without it being treasonous or disloyal. She's served Konoha for almost ten straight years.

"I'll retire," Ensui mutters, and then he smiles too.

Seiko doesn't much like visiting the hospital. It's something about the smell... even though she's been trapped here so many different times, it's always that same low level grief and resentment that pollutes the air.

Or perhaps that's just her projecting.

Getting admission to where Minato is being looked after is a bit different than just showing up. Not even her very own ANBU tattoo is enough to clear her through the last layer of security and she ends up carefully with her hand against the wall to keep balance as her crutches are removed and thoroughly checked for unknown seals, and finally, the true hang up.

"I can't dismiss Biter," Seiko says.

The ANBU on duty doesn't speak, but the rejection is clear. She nods.

"He can stay out here," she offers.

Looks exchanged between the masks.

Without her crutches and without her dog, Seiko limps into to the carefully sealed off room where Minato sleeps, bandages and seals painted around his mouth and throat to try and repair the visible damage.

Pulled up to the chair next to him is Kakashi, who's head immediately snaps around as she enters.

He looks like shit.

"You--" He starts, and then glances guilty down at Minato and quiets down. Even though she's sure no one would mind if a loud noise managed to wake the Hokage from his slumber. "Where's Biter?"

Is that the first thing he's going to ask her?

It's not a bad question, she supposes.

"They're not letting summons in," Seiko says.

She glances around to see if there's a second chair. There is, thankfully. She's going to guess that's the one Kushina normally uses when she's here.

She pushes away from the wall and into the chair.