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"That could be our new slogan," Emiko mused, totally serious. As she'd been silent for a while, her fellow genin and the Chuunin treating them to breakfast at her house gave her strange looks. Then she clarified. "I was just thinking about our mission. I think I know how we should advertise to clients." She held out her hands expansively. "Konoha nin! Providing permanent solutions to temporary problems since the first year of the ninja."
Aiko choked on her breakfast muffin, hacking and banging lightly on the table with her palm. By the time she could breathe again, the genin had dissolved into hysterical giggles. Ken held up a hand to catch the milk leaking out of his nose, glaring weakly at Emiko for her poor timing. Luckily for him, his hatred of the (incredibly flattering and practical) masked outfit had led him to getting a lower-cut shirt that didn't get any of the milk spray. The girls had also gotten new clothes, but they had kept what she'd gotten them for wear outside the village and still wore them occasionally.
"No. 'You get what you pay for'," Akira deadpanned with a pointed look at Ken. He looked offended.
'Not the worst way to deal with the problem of first mission death.' She joined them in giggles that were as dignified as she could manage. 'Humor is a great coping mechanism.'
A door banged open down the hall, and Karin stumbled out in her blue pajamas, rubbing at her eyes. Akira managed to stop laughing long enough to give her and up-and-down and raise one eyebrow. Probably at her seriously impressive bed-head.
It also could have been the other girl who followed behind her from the master bathroom yawning, short black hair wet and wrapped up in an oversized fluffy purple bathrobe and white bunny slippers.
"Good morning, Aiko-san," Hinata managed, finding herself a seat at the table and flopping over weakly. She wasn't a morning person. "I didn't expect to see you back so soon." Karin grunted unhappily, finding herself a teacup and putting water on to boil. Aiko wordlessly pointed at the highly caffeinated tea she already had ready. Hinata poured herself a cup lightning-fast, dragging it to her body as if to protect it from the interlopers.
"So, this is your team?" Karin drawled, eying them. She looked unimpressed. Ken gave her a stink-eye in return, mopping up milk with his napkin.
"Hai. Emiko, Akira, and Ken. This is Karin and Hinata." Aiko gestured as was appropriate, raising to let her cousin take her seat since she was finished. "Dishes?" Akira wordlessly stood to help her gather them, taking up the job of rinsing while Aiko washed them in the other side of the sink. She handed the clean dishes to Ken to dry and put away in the cupboard. Emiko stretched, before checking the time and yawning. "It's late enough that I think I can go home."
"Alright," Aiko noted. "Have a good nap." She slid back into her chair, ignoring Karin's incredulous expression at her dirty mission fatigues.
The older redhead made a face. "I just thought of something. Aiko, please tell me you'll let me pick out your kimono for the spring festival."
She furrowed her brow. "Is that really coming up already?" Hinata managed to drag herself far enough off the table to nod, thoroughly unbecoming bags under her eyes.
The other two genin filed out soon after Emiko. They had made it to the village at about four in the morning. Shinobi had been out and about, along with several artisans and bakery workers, but not that many of them. Their mission report wouldn't be given until much later in the day, after the genin had a chance to rest. But no one had wanted to try to sneak into their house past hyper alert, sleeping parents. That didn't end well even when the parents in question weren't armed. (and almost everyone is armed in a shinobi village).
Aiko didn't take the chance to sleep. She was used to going without for longer times, and she was relatively certain that she would be meeting the person her shishou wanted her to meet today. As soon as her genin were gone, she took a long, luxurious shower. It may have been foolish and wasteful to do so directly before she went to the training grounds, but she wasn't fond of sticky day-old clothing.
Said clothing—all dark grey this time—hit the tile in a stiff pile. Since she wasn't planning on leaving the village, she indulged herself with Karin's scented shampoos and body wash.
It really was an indulgence for a ninja… they were scented like vanilla and contained glitter. It was shameful. Her normal soaps were harsh and had scents like 'forest', 'earth', and 'ocean'.
She used the glittery stuff anyways, and felt inordinately content. If she'd had more time, she might have painted her nails and gotten a mani-pedi.
'Thank all the kami for Hinata,' she mused when she stepped out and discovered the pile of luxurious jewel toned towels clean and ready for use. Since Naruto had left, someone else had to pick up the chore of laundry, and she was terrible about it. Karin was willing to do most of the housekeeping, like scrubbing and dusting. Aiko did most of the cooking and stocked the kitchen. Hinata had naturally slipped into the other chores as if she had always been there to water herbs and scrub out bloodstains.
Barefoot and clean, she toed the dirty clothes into the hamper before pulling out her own bathrobe and tossing her towel over the rack. Much happier now that she felt fresh, Aiko found one of her most definitely 'off-duty' uniform combinations- a still demure grey set of leggings with a short-sleeved pink tunic. She tugged her hair into pigtails with pink elastics, her black boots on her feet, and grey fingerless gloves over her hands before giving her reflection a grin and a thumbs-up.
"No stupid Chuunin vest today," she decided. She wouldn't need it to work on her chakra chains anyway. She did strap on her practice sword over her back, but didn't take any other weaponry or sealing equipment with her before she flounced out the door (tucking her lunch money into her bra for safekeeping) and headed straight for her usual training grounds.
She was less than surprised to be the only person there. Although she would normally start working out on her own, Aiko stretched out on the grass and tucked her hands behind her head. Then she cloud-watched, barely awake and content.
Time passed out of consciousness. It could have been minutes, but it must have been hours before she felt the flicker of two chakra signatures arriving via shunshin. One of them was very familiar. One was not.
"Hey shishou." She waved lazily with her index and middle fingers, cracking one eye open to peer up at his companion.
'Hellooo, nurse!' some voice from a far-off place in her brain called.
The hunk next to her sensei… just, wow. Dark, soulful eyes, messy brown hair, and a chin that could have been carved from marble peered down at her from its perch on broad shoulders. She grinned stupidly. 'Shame about the unflattering face-framing metal piece.' He also looked like he had dressed out of Kakashi-shishou's closet, which appealed to her for some reason.
Aiko stood up hastily, brushing off her clothes. "Hello, I'm Uzumaki Aiko. Please take care of me." She bowed politely to complete the traditional introduction.
Her sensei snickered rudely.
"I know." The man who could only be Yamato eyed her critically. "Yamato. I will be helping you today." He wasn't particularly impressed. He'd heard a lot about this kid second-hand, and he'd expected more. This was the girl that his senpai had left ANBU for? Bit underwhelming. She had pigtails and glitter all over for Kami's sake. He clenched his jaw imperceptibly. 'Kakashi-senpai, I won't let you down! Even if this is all I have to work with. I will impress you somehow.' He was, after all, senpai's best student.
The somewhat chilly reception took her aback. When she looked to her shishou for reassurance, she saw nothing helpful there, though she did note that her new training partner's expression tightened further. She scowled. 'Fine. I don't care if you're a hunk. You're going down.'
Aiko took a moment to construct a profile of the man in front of her. He was somewhere between 17 and his early 20s, had been a member of ANBU for most of that, and was socially impaired. He was highly skilled, and of above average intelligence
.
'This is going to be like taking candy from a baby. Slightly morally dubious, but hilariously easy and easily hilarious.'
"You'll remember what we talked about?"
Yamato nodded, giving Kakashi his full attention and a sheepish smile, rubbing at his neck. "Hai, senpai!"
"Superb. Play nice, kids." Book already out, her bastard of a shishou just abandoned her to an eighteen year old who looked to have a grudge against her for some reason.
'Shishou, I will get you back for this.' He knew what was going on, she was sure of it.
"Alright then. Let's see what you can do." Yamato clapped his hands together, businesslike expression on his face. "Wood style!" The two pillars that rose above the tree line were probably supposed to impress her.
She twitched. 'Why do boys always shout out what they're doing? I mean, I know it's supposed to be a mnemonic device to make learning jutsu easier, but at his level this guy should really be able to do that without telling everyone and their dog what's going on. How embarrassing.' Wordlessly, she visualized two shining chakra chains coming from her back, wrapping around her arms and shooting out twenty feet to pierce the pillars he had summoned, splitting them in half with a terrible crack.
Aiko grinned up at his mildly surprised expression. "You'll have to do better than that," she taunted. "What's the idea here? I thought you were going to teach me to be gentle, Yamato." She faked an innocent posture (with calculated adorable pointed-in-toes) and an ever-so-slightly breathy tone, interlacing her fingers and tilting her head to pout up at him. "Is shoving all that hard wood at me really the best way to teach me restraint?"
He sputtered incoherently.
'Point one to Aiko.'
~~~
"Anko…" Shizune groaned, rubbing at her head, and wishing that Tsunade-sama was around to deal with this. "You frightened the Academy students… and teachers."
It was a bit unconventional to have this conversation in her office at the hospital, (especially since the only chair other than hers had been borrowed from pediatrics) but she didn't really want to have the younger woman disciplined through official channels. She was somewhat fond of the snake summoner and a little protective—poor Anko had been poorly done by so far as Konoha was concerned. After her traitorous sensei had abandoned her, Anko had been looked on with suspicion. Official reprimands would hurt her more than they should.
Besides, she was waiting on results from some bloodwork from an academy student of dubious parentage who had displayed symptoms of a certain rare genetic disorder. She didn't want to leave her office for too long. That paperwork could corroborate her hypothesis. It would explain so much…
The other woman scowled irritably. "Well, Hokage-sama told me to find a child!"
Shizune blinked wearily. "What?" That… that didn't sound like something Tsunade-sama would say.
Anko nodded seriously, eyes closed and arms crossed. "Yes. She told me this morning that I needed to find a student to teach snake-summoning and my special taijutsu. I only know one child in person, and I'm not going to fight Hatake for her. So I went to the place where I knew children could be found!" She held up a finger. "I wanted to find the best one!"
'Why me?' Shizune bemoaned. Outwardly, she just sighed in understanding. "I don't think that's what she meant. First of all, it would take years to get an Academy student up to the level where they could hope to use summoning. That takes a lot of chakra. Therefore, you'd be better off with a student who is already a genin, ideally one without a regular sensei so they have plenty of time to work with you. If you do pick a student who has a sensei, make sure they're one who doesn't spend too much time working on a family style or something. Secondly, that's not how you find a student." She deadpanned. "You're going to have to talk to one. Not just stare silently and test their reflexes with senbon."
After a moment's thought, she added, "and it tends to unnerve people when you don't blink. Remember to do that."
She looked thoroughly unimpressed, but Anko seemed to have absorbed the lecture. "Where am I going to find a child if I can't use the Academy?" she whined. "I don't work with any, I don't know anyone with one I can borrow, and I've never seen one in the places I frequent."
Shizune shrugged helplessly. 'That may be because you spend all your free time at the bars and adult bookstores?' Then there was a knock on the door. Before she could call out for the person to enter or wait, the door flung open and Uzumaki Karin stomped in, a stormcloud practically visible over her head. "Here," she said brusquely, tossing a clipboard onto Shizune's desk with a clatter. "Enjoy. I'd stay and chat, but apparently I need remedial instruction on bedside manner." The sneer that accompanied this statement was vicious.
The door slammed shut before the two adult women could blink.
"Sorry about that," Shizune laughed. Poor grumpy Karin. She was-
"She's perfect," Anko breathed. She stood jerkily, letting her humorously undersized chair fall over with a clatter. She moved with enough speed to confuse an unwary observer into thinking she'd used shunshin, pinning Karin against the wall with one hand and grinning ferally into her face.
A lesser genin might have frozen in the face of a larger, mentally unstable predator. Karin reflexively head-butted the other woman and bonelessly relaxed before twisting to the side and nearly escaping before Anko slipped around and pinned her again with one hand under Karin's chin, the other on her shoulder. Karin might have kept struggling… if it weren't for the black-scaled snakes twisting around her torso.
A wise woman knew when she was outmatched by someone dangerously crazy. Karin went limp, tilting her head up and exposing her vulnerable throat.
The crazy woman who had assaulted her licked her lips slowly, leaning in so close that warm breath (scented like candy apples) washed across Karin's face. "I want you," she crooned, stroking Karin's face. Karin blinked, straining to look down and investigate the softness she could feel pressing against her chest. "To be my student." She relaxed. That made much more sense. But it was mildly disappointing as well.
Karin was an equal-opportunity pervert.
"Would I get to use snakes?" At the affirmation, Karin shrugged. "Sure, I guess."
Anko froze. That wasn't what she'd been expecting. First, the teacher made vaguely sexual advances on the young girl who needed to learn the ways of the world. Then the student blushed and demurred, maybe struggling a little. Then-
'Ah,' she realized. 'I'm getting this mixed up with Icha Icha Teacher's Pet. I think this is okay.' Anko nodded decisively, remembering to blink after a few more seconds. She'd never had a student. She had been asked to test a genin team once, but it hadn't worked out.
Something about quitting the shinobi force to get away from her or something.
"But," the redhead she had recently accosted added. "I have two conditions. "Firstly, you have to teach my friend, too. Secondly…" she paused. "Tell me who the hell you are, and why should I want to learn from you."
It was the beginning of something beautiful, Anko just knew it. She grinned toothily. "The beautiful, busty and talented, Mitarashi Anko, your new shishou and personal hero!" she struck a pose. The redhead blinked, glancing down at the snakes unwinding from her body.
"Sounds good." This Anko person was pretty busty. She could be telling the truth about the rest, and it was the first offer Karin had gotten from a potential teacher with combat abilities. Being a medic was all well and good, but it wasn't what she had envisioned when she had joined the ranks of shinobi.
~~~
It was almost time for the lunch break, and she was working as efficiently as possible. Tsunade had the short warning of her secretary making an alarmed sound on the outside of her closed door, but she wasn't entirely prepared to have her door slam open. Sasuke jerked from his position curled up on the couch with a book, doing his best to look alert.
"I have arrived, triumphant once more!"
She groaned, rubbing at her forehead and wondering just how her sensei had dealt with these lunatics for so long. No wonder he'd gone around the bend. She envied his retirement.
"Hi, Sasuke-san!" was quickly followed by a squeaked, "Hello, Uchiha-san."
She didn't want to look. She didn't, really. But she had to. There was Anko, standing with her legs wide apart and a girl over each shoulder, torsos hanging down her back and held up with one arm across each of their thighs.
Her poor student stared dumbly, perhaps unduly interested in all the adolescent booty on display, nicely framing Anko-chan's cans. Then he stiffened like someone had hit him across the face with a brick, turning away and concentrating on his book like his life depended on it. His only reply was a grunted "Hn".
The poor thing was feeling hormones hit him like two tons of rock. He was at that age. Tsunade, however, was less easily distracted.
"Kai!"
When nothing changed, she had to abandon the hopeful idea that she could solve whatever the hell this was by hitting Jiraiya.
"Hokage-sama! I found not one but two students!" She grinned cheekily. "How's that? Shizune-chyyaaaan told me that I'd be better off with a student who was already graduated from the academy."
Tsunade stared flatly. "I'm afraid to tell you that I can't identify my kunoichi by ass," she deadpanned. "Jiraiya never taught me that forbidden technique." 'He did offer, multiple times.' "Who exactly have you found to be your student?"
'And did they actually agree? It's not normal to physically carry them around like sacks of rice.'
"Um…" Anko glanced down. "I never asked their names, actually."
'Idiots, one and all.' She groaned, exchanging a sympathetic glance with her younger student.
"Uzumaki Karin!" emanated from the vicinity of Anko's back. She vaguely noted the long red hair hanging down around by the jounin's hip. That still didn't answer… "Um, um… Hyuuga Hinata, Hokage-sama," came a much quieter voice, rising in slight panic towards the end.
Anko dropped the girls onto the floor, spinning around to check. "What, really?"
Tsunade peered over her desk, mildly interested. She'd heard a fair bit about this girl, but nothing that indicated someone like Anko would take interest in her.
It was actually a bit scandalous—the first Hyuuga heir in recorded history ever actually being declared unsuitable to inherit and marked for the Branch clan to prevent her from ever inheriting. It was an unnecessarily vicious blow. Like many other ass-backwards clans, the Hyuuga were sexist. They allowed women to inherit, but not to form Branch clans. Normally, neither of the girls would have been branded. The girl who didn't inherit would have been married off to another main family member.
'Actually,' she mused, 'that makes some sense. Anko-chan might have sympathy for another outcast.'
The Uzumaki rubbing her ass fit the same pattern as well, in a way. She'd come from outside the village and stayed on the grace of her 'cousin' and the Sandaime.
"Alright," she said, eager to get these people out of her office. "I approve. I assume you've talked to Kurenai about borrowing her student?"
Anko opened her mouth and took a breath, eyes flickering around the office as if looking for an escape. Sasuke made a rude noise, curled up as he was like a cat in between the cushions of the couch Tsunade had made him bring from her home. (It made nap time much more pleasant).
"Take care of that," she said dryly, turning back to her work. "I expect to hear good things about you two." Then she thought better of that. "You too, Anko. Behave. Don't think I didn't hear about you attacking a group of Academy students on recess break this morning."
Hinata shot her new teacher an alarmed look. Anko rolled her eyes, twisting a kunai around her fingers.
~~~
"Good god, what happened to you?" Temari blurted out when she bumped into her target by coincidence outside the Hokage tower. Then she winced. That wasn't how she had intended to start subtly gathering information. (Her reconnaissance yesterday had been inconclusive).
Luckily, the other girl didn't seem to care. She shrugged, tugging her fingers through a pigtail and dislodging what looked to be woodchips. "Training," she said matter-of-factly before nodding at each of them. "Temari-san, Gaara-san, Hare-san." The ANBU member on the wall twitched, relocating before Temari could turn and catch sight of her escort.
"Hello," Gaara said, somewhat unexpectedly. It was abrupt and awkward, but hell if it wasn't a try. Temari resigned herself to a Konoha in-law, stomach sinking when the girl smiled at him.
"I didn't expect to see you again." She crinkled her nose up at him. "Ah, sorry about what happened last time." She clasped her hands and fidgeted in a way that Temari was disgusted to notice was absolutely adorable. "Kiba-san has good intentions, but I'm afraid he can be a bit… abrasive."
That was a polite understatement. Aiko had been too disgusted with his ham-handedness to maintain conversation with him for long, especially when he tried to take her up on her offer to sit with her. She'd mostly said that to pacify him, not because she was interested. Kiba was such a flirt—all the girls in their age group knew not to humor him. So she had left.
"I'm afraid I don't know your name." Temari gave a thin smile.
It was reciprocated. "How rude. Uzumaki Aiko, very nice to meet you." She winced slightly, one hand drifting over to her left hip. "If you'll excuse me, I was actually on my way to a medic nin."
Well. Sasuke might not technically have that title yet, but she'd rather let him practice on her than go to the hospital. She didn't dislike it like many older ninjas did, but it was much easier to cut through all the bureaucratic crap. Besides, Sasuke was always at least accommodating when she offered to be used as a practice dummy.