Konoha kind of sucked.
At least, it sucked when you were pretending not to know any one in town or how to locate any key locations. Being under constant surveillance by an ANBU team didn't exactly help Aiko get jollied up, either. By the day before the test, her nerves were strung out.
It wasn't so bad for her genin team, as far as she could tell. Konoha must have determined that they weren't high-level plants. Or, like, higher level plants than was expected. So the three-man ANBU patrol team (she wasn't fucking bitter that she apparently didn't merit a full-team with a captain. Of course not. Why would she be bitter about that? Being underestimated was a tactical advantage that someone who was fucking stupid enough to accidentally become the Mizukage wouldn't get often.)
- anyway, the team stayed on her ass like a tight pair of pants and occasionally signaled to each other in super-secret Konoha chakra pulse code which she definitely didn't detect or understand and wasn't fucking irritated about, okay?
She may or may not have spent nearly half the day in her hotel room glowering at the staticky tv while one of her ANBU watchers pointed out something that wasn't actually suspicious in what had to be a fit of optimism that something exciting would happen soon. Apparently they had a long shift. God, she remembered that grind. Patrolling at nights, under the open sky, sprinting over the rooftops- that was fine. But daytime surveillance of some dignitary or other mildly important personage was tedious.
"Poor bastards," Aiko said to herself.
One of the ANBU's chakra honed in on her, apparently augmenting their hearing to catch what she said next. Perhaps they thought she had some kind of communication device.
That kind of ability was a clue she latched onto out of boredom- that meant there was no one on the team who had augmented hearing normally. So there no Inuzuka around. But being able to temporarily sharpen senses with chakra implied practice in a similar skillset or above-average ability in chakra manipulation. A Hyuuga? A medic? Maybe even a Nara, actually. The team was either a bit green or a bit relaxed, judging by the fact that they hadn't seen fit to go chakra dark. Someone must have pegged her as lacking sensing abilities.
To be fair, that was true- but she was attuned to the type of cues that Konoha used from years of personal experience. Still. A truly cautious, paranoid team would have gone to the extra effort. She wasn't exactly being tailed by veterans here. Again, she was being underestimated.
'Or maybe', Aiko thought optimistically. 'Maybe Konoha is intentionally pretending to underestimate me in order to slip something more covert past my attention, or to try to pinpoint my abilities. Maybe-'
She sighed.
'This is getting stupid. Those are all possibilities, but I'm just wallowing now. I've got to get out of this room.'
Telling herself that didn't make venturing out to be a pariah in her hometown any more attractive. If she'd worn nearly any other headband, the reception would probably have been less pointed. But no. She'd had to fall in with Mist. She'd pledged to protect and serve the country with the honorable distinction of producing the most basketcases per capita in the goddamn continent.
'Well,' Aiko thought with dark humor. 'I commit like a motherfucker, at least. I ruin lives like nobody's business. Mostly mine, but hey.'
That didn't exactly bode well for Kirigakure, but she couldn't possibly be worse than Obito.
Probably?
Whatever.
It was the scent of spices and heated sauces clawing their way through her window that finally drew Aiko out into the streets. She followed her nose to festival-type stands set up for the exams. Aiko slipped into the crowds with only a flinch at the press of bodies. She was aware, too aware, that proximity to strangers was made even more alarming and dangerous with her reduced vision. Her heartbeat climbed from the effort of concentrating enough to offset her blurry, dark vision with what she was hearing to navigate. More than once her reflexes were tested by the effort of quickly but smoothly retreating from the brush of fabric or the heat of skin when she accidentally stepped too close to someone else.
It was unexpectedly exhausting. Unless she was pretending to be in such a bad mood that she was purposefully bumping into people, she had to be careful. She was being watched.
'They probably can't see that much.' Aiko felt a muscle flex in her neck. She suppressed the urge to look around and pinpoint where her observers had moved to as a vantage point- they would know that she would suspect she was being watched, but confirming that she was aware enough of her observers to locate them would provide data about her abilities. They'd probably send a better team.
That would be better for her pride, to be honest, but it was safest if she could be semi-certain that she could ditch the observers if needed.
Dried fish and the scent of octopus steaming in batter rose temptingly above the crowd, but she found it too hard to pinpoint the takoyaki stand. She took a chance on a queue where the air was tantalizingly mingled with savory scents. By the time she was close enough to pick up on the warm notes of soy sauce and frying chicken, it was a bit late to duck out of the line unseen.
That was fine. Festival karaage was the best. There was absolutely nothing like it. Her mouth watered.
She was nearly at the front of the line when something changed. Aiko kept her face blank, but her attention was turned backwards.
The noise of the crowd had changed- louder, although the tone and quality of the sounds hadn't changed. It was closer? Yes. Something on the far edge of the road was causing people to crowd away, forcing the slow stream of bodies to press closer.
Aiko focused on the area, just for a moment.
'Ah,' she thought simply.
The man in front of her moved away. She stepped forward unthinkingly and chose the medium-size serving when prompted.
'Now that I've noticed him, it's hard to imagine I didn't sense him approaching before now. He's not subtle, is he?'
Seeing -or detecting, rather- Gaara as an adult, Aiko reflected, made it difficult to believe that anyone had failed to notice he was a jinchuuriki. He oozed bad news. Even civilians could tell, judging by the way the crowd parted around him as he skirted the edges of the street on the way to the training grounds allotted for the foreigners. She didn't look at him as she left coins on the counter tray, but the grip of her left hand on the steaming cup was a bit too firm.
It was quite likely that a more obvious jinchuuriki had never obvioused. Gaara was, like, the prototypical jinchuuriki. Looking up the definition of a jinchuuriki would lead to a list of his most distinct traits and a warning to stay away.
How had he slipped by unnoticed?
Gaara was a classic case study of weak sealing- the steady fog of malevolent intent incongruous with his calm-faced exterior was a bit of a giveaway. The obvious fear displayed by his teammates made it painfully apparent that something was amiss, if absolutely nothing else.
What the hell was Konoha doing? Had they all collectively forgotten how to ninja, or was there a reason that they would allow an obvious jinchuuriki to wander the streets, undeclared?
No. Konoha had to know. Maybe… maybe it was a case of him coming into Konoha unremarked, rather than undetected. That fit the evidence better. But why would Konoha tolerate that?
'Sand is a traditional ally,' Aiko allowed. She stabbed a piece of karaage with the wooden pick and lifted it to her mouth. Hot juice spilled across her lips when she bit in, hastily licked away before it could make a mess. 'Maybe they're willing to go further than I thought to preserve that relationship.'
That… that possibility certainly fit in with what had happened after the chuunin exams invasion, that was for sure. Aiko frowned.
She needed to think more deeply on that. Just in case. She'd taken Konoha's quick assent to mended bridges as proof of Konoha's forgiving nature, as well as their desperation for any ally among the great nations when the largest two countries were Fire Country's dedicated enemies.
If that hypothesis was false- if the treatment of Suna was due to something intrinsic about their relations rather than desperation- then her goal might be harder to meet. It might require more drastic action than simply leaving Suna out to flap in the wind.
Well. There was always the several hundred kilometer long conclusion about why Konoha would prefer Suna to Kiri.
Her jaw clenched. The street food felt dry and tasteless in her mouth.
'I should go make sure my team is ready to go. The exams start in 14 hours. Is there anything I can do for them at the last minute?'
Aiko considered possibilities and discarded them just as quickly. With team 7, she'd sponsored bonding time- dinner, a sleepover, and one last check of equipment. But that didn't seem appropriate now, with a team that was nervous around her. It would be counterproductive. She'd already had her genin confirm their prepared status at the local office and….
Huh. She couldn't sense her ANBU team. Aiko felt an eyebrow raise, hidden in her bangs. Had they fallen back to a distance? Had her guard been lifted- no, that was ridiculously unlikely. It was possible that the team had simply been given shift relief by a more experienced or paranoid unit.
Well. It shouldn't matter. If she didn't 'know' anything about her observers, than she certainly shouldn't react to changes in their patterns.
After the karaage, she managed to find takoyaki hot enough to burn her mouth and make the proprietor joke about her having a cat-tongue. It settled in her stomach and left her feeling lazy and satisfied. She could go back and lay down, but it seemed like the spell would break and she'd go back to feeling like a caged animal in a place that should have been hers. Aiko was already walking, so she tossed her trash and let her feet carry her unthinkingly.
She did make one errand that lifted her spirits when her wanderings took her past a bookstore. Clever, clever Jiraiya. It really was a good time to schedule a release of a special edition- people would be in Konoha from the many countries with embargoes on his work. He'd make bank, not the black market that moved his work across borders.
'To be fair, he's probably involved in the black market as well.'
Aiko admired Jiraiya's business acumen even as she purchased her copy and sealed it away in a scroll. The proprietor gave her an odd look and put away the blue plastic bag she'd offered, but Aiko was done fucking around with the security of her Icha Icha.
The Icha Icha situation was, quite frankly, becoming ridiculous.
The last copy she'd dared to carry around had been confiscated by Suna when they captured her in the desert. The one before that she'd been forced to abandon due to Obito's sudden onset of jackassery, and then it'd been taken as evidence by Konoha before she got back.
Frankly, she didn't fucking trust anyone to leave her books the hell alone. What was up with that, even? She loved her books, but they weren't that valuable or unique. There was no reason that this should keep happening to her. It was weird, that was what it was. Just plain weird.
Walking became easier as the dinner rush ended and people streamed home. She haunted the streets until curfew forced her in, although she kept to back streets to avoid the crush of bodies. Surely she was still being watched, but merely wandering the city wouldn't betray excessive familiarity, as long as she avoided shortcuts and retraced her steps to return to the hotel instead of taking another route.
Her genin were already abed when she checked in. Yuusaku stirred when she slid the door open and counted bodies, but the others were fast asleep. He blinked heavily and made eye contact. Then he made a displeased sound and disappeared back under the covers. Aiko smiled wryly and closed the door.
It was all rather endearing, but it didn't bode well for their survival odds.
Well.
'Let them rest,' Aiko decided. 'They'll need it. And perhaps they just feel safer here. They should be more alert sleeping outside. If nothing else, they'll set a watch.'
~~~
If nothing else, the following morning brought the relief that her brats were at least sensible enough to make it to the exam room. She stood outside the exam center just long enough to see the poor fools who'd failed that pre-test stream out, dejected.
It took a surprisingly long time for events to commence. She didn't remember that, but then, she'd been busy with Anko at this point in her.. She'd been with Anko at the time before.
The foreign adults mostly milled around, waiting for further information. When the jounin were finally invited to observe the proceedings of the first event, Aiko joined nearly all the other teachers. She fell to the back of the line filing into a room that resembled the jounin lounge.
There was something a little odd, though, she noticed. There were certainly Konoha jounin in the room- but most of them weren't the genin teachers. There were a few teachers for older teams, she saw, but.. Kakashi, Kurenai, Gai, Asuma… nowhere in sight.
'Why would they separate the Konoha sensei, I wonder?'
Aiko slowly unwrapped a piece of gum and bit into it. She crushed the silver wrapper in her fist before tucking it in a pocket. Genma, who happened to be standing next to her, gave her a curious look.
His lips worked where he would normally have a senbon, and something brightened in his face. "I'll buy you a coffee in exchange for a piece of gum," he offered casually. He leaned into her personal space, just close enough for her to feel the heat of his body through her left sleeve.
Aiko was already reaching for the pack when his words registered. She glanced up at him incredulously. Was he flirting-
oh.
Oh.
Her gaze fixed on his smile, slightly crooked and displaying teeth that perfectly straddled the boundary of 'white' and 'too white'. Her heart shuddered uncertainly in her chest.
He smelled like the reinforced padding in his flak jacket and the same weapon's polish she'd always favored, paired with the 'scentless' Konoha type soap that actually had some notes of pine. He smelled like home and safety.
There had always been rumors about Genma being a flirt, but she'd never seen evidence before. Of course, he was… what, fifteen years her senior? So that previous lack of evidence made sense. Only a true, Jiyaiya-level creep would be so shameless as to flirt with someone who he should see as a child.
'Well. Actually. He's not that much older than me now,' she reasoned. 'Four years isn't a significant different for two people in their twenties.' When Genma reached out to take the candy from her, warm, calloused fingers accidentally brushed over hers. He was quite attractive, actually. God, look at those shoulders.
The look he gave her was entirely too pleased. That snapped her out of it.
It was probably far too late, but she rearranged her expression back into studied disinterest. "No need. Sometimes a person really needs gum." Pointedly, she wrinkled her nose and turned away from his breath slightly.
Genma's eyebrows rose slowly. Someone nearby snickered but she couldn't see who.
That was when the lights dropped.
Aiko tensed, shoulders drawing in. She cursed the reaction immediately but it was too late to do anything about it. How dark was it? How impaired was normal vision? She had no idea from her own senses. But logic told her the room was probably only dim enough to make viewing a screen easy.
…Genma, at least, had definitely seen that reaction.
Well.
'He won't know what to think about it. He'll probably just think I'm easily startled. Maybe even that I'm on edge about sudden environmental changes when in a small room full of high-level shinobi without a single ally.'
Actually.. yeah. That was a much more plausible explanation than secret night blindness.
A screen flickered to life- no, it was wavering, undulating along a loosely hung sheet. It was a projection. Aiko leaned back against the wall and watched what she could see. The display was bright enough- the problem was more that taller jounin were blocking the bottom part of the screen. Still, she saw her genin file into view, along with a whole host of others.
Her eyes darted across the distant room, cataloging genin mostly by hairstyles and what little could be discerned of their clothing from the ceiling camera. Team 7 bounced in near the middle of the group, in a mob of Konoha shinobi. Others filed around, spilling into the corners of the room and perching on desks.
Her genin had been some of the first in, and secured a desirable position against the wall. It was pointless, since Ibiki would split them and make them move, but Aiko still felt a little proud of how sensible her brats were being.
Ibiki entered like a hurricane, sending genin scattering in fear. She repressed a snort.
'Pity that there's no sound. I wonder what he's saying.'
The genin took seats according to verbal instructions. As Ibiki paced and pontificated, Aiko felt her attention wander. Her eyes were adjusted enough that she could make out darker silhouettes in the room around her, but not much more. The assembled jounin were quiet, breathing nearly in unison with nary a fidget. She could smell-
Aiko didn't let herself still, turning her face in continued perusal of the room she couldn't actually see.
She smelled mint. Genma was breathing in her direction, which meant he was watching her even as she was turned away from him. Surely the back of her head wasn't too stimulating, no matter how much of a flirt he was. She focused her attention on him without looking over. Aiko tried to hear his breathing, to pick up on the subtleties of his chakra to guess at his level of agitation or interest. Nothing came of it- he was too good, of course he was.
'Well. Of course the Konoha jounin are here to watch us. Is he here to monitor me in specific?'
The skin on the back of her neck prickled. She had the oddest impression that she could almost hear someone talking in the distance, a voice distorted and low. Aiko swallowed. Okay, that was weird. There shouldn't be anything wrong with her hearing. Was it her imagination acting up? She was more than a bit on-edge. God, she was so paranoid that she was trying to convince herself that she was hearing things. She needed a break, desperately.
She turned her attention back to the screen, portraying obliviousness to Genma's attention.
The test had started. Ryuusei was staring down at his sheet, pencil still as if he was waiting for the answers to the universe to bubble up in the answer space. Yuusaku was making lazy, sure markings that would certainly draw someone else to cheat off of him. If she knew him at all, he was marking wrong answers. She felt her lips curl into a smile. And her last duckling, Keisuke, was-
Aiko felt a deep sigh rise in her chest.
Keisuke had flipped his sheet over and was drawing a slightly wobbly kunoichi with improbably shaped breasts and… demon horns. Her hair and clothes were uncomfortably familiar, although shocking liberties had been taken with the neckline. The hip holster was spot-on, though.
'Little shit. Honestly. He seemed so quiet and well-behaved.'
That phrase caught in her mind, ringing like a bell. Shit. That was classic, wasn't it? Textbook misdirection. Aiko tilted her head back and stared at the ceiling mournfully.
'I can't believe I fell for that crap. I didn't notice a genin leering at me because I thought he was the least troublesome one.'
Pride aside, it was… It was kinda gross, Aiko reflected. Children are gross.
"Children are gross," she said aloud.
Someone gave her an odd look. A few people might have taken a step away from her. Probably wasn't personal. Certainly they were just trying to get a better view of the projection as it cycled through camera feeds.
Her brats made it through the test, along with about half of the teams. When the screen focused on Sakura's beaming relief as results were announced, Aiko looked away.
'She's going to be dead before the end of the day.'
It would be nice to forget that. It would be really, really nice to forget that.
An anomaly in the crowd drew her eye. Genma. He was too still in her peripheral. He was definitely watching her, not the screen. Had he caught the image that had prompted her to look away? He shouldn't have, but she had shit luck. Who else had been displayed at that moment? Could her motion be attributed to boredom or distraction, given her careless statement minutes ago about distaste for children? How should she play this off?
'Deflect. Make him think that something else is going on in my head, that it wasn't about the video feed.'
Deliberately, she turned her head and made eye contact as if sensing his attention had been what prompted her to look away from the screen. His features started to shift into false sheepishness, a hand moving to the back of his neck. Aiko tilted her head minutely, let her mouth twist into a wicked little smirk, and then slowly, obviously, ran up and down his body. When she made it back up to his eyes, the pretense of embarrassment at having been caught staring was gone, replaced by something sly and hungry.
She had just thought to deflect by leering- not to actually do anything. But.
He looked like he wanted a chance to get her naked and mouth at every centimeter of her flesh. He looked like an excellent distraction.
A warm thrill simmered in her body, too low for her to pretend the sensation was in her stomach. She lifted her head just slightly in challenge, flashing her neck.
Then she broke the stare and walked for the door.
Her pulse quickened when he followed.
His gaze was towards the exit when he stepped into the hallway, clearly looking to follow her out the building. He was looking the wrong way. She shut the door and slammed him into the wall, one hand in his collar and the other curled around the wrist that had reached for a weapon. There was a tense moment, then he let her press his wrist against the wall by his head.
"Not that I mind-" his amused tone hitched when she put her teeth to his neck to shut him up, deflecting from his mouth. She didn't want to kiss him-that was too personal. She licked. He made a sound she wouldn't have heard if she hadn't been against his throat. Something fierce uncoiled in her chest even as she was pressing a knee between Genma's legs.
She could feel his pulse jumping through her lips. She'd done that. The knowledge was intoxicating. Aiko smiled, and then scraped her inhumanly sharp teeth gently against his Adam's apple. Casually, she moved a finger to the underside of the wrist she held, checking at his pulse. It was just as fast- of course it was, but that was somehow thrilling. Was he intimidated, or just excited? Did he know that she could rip out his throat with her teeth, if she wanted?
"Uzu.-" He swallowed.
She smiled against the skin. Instead of answering, she squeezed his wrist.
It took Genma a moment to gather himself. "There's a- room upstairs," he managed.
Aiko really did not give a single shit. But she liked the way that his breath hitched. "What kind of room?" She moved her hand from his collar to the zipper, pausing a moment to check his expression. Genma's pupils were blown wide open and fixed on her hand. She tugged it up pointedly, then tilted it down as if she was going unzip the jacket.
"Yes." Genma twitched against her, as if he wanted to push her off and take control. He seemed to remember that hadn't been the question. "Control room. Or something."
Aiko huffed. "Konoha," she drawled, the irritation of the last months welling up again. "How welcome am I near classified material?" She pulled the flak jacket open and pushed it halfway off his shoulders. Yes. They were as nice as she'd thought. Aiko ran her fingers up and greedily squeezed at the muscles.
Genma sucked in a breath, and that was when she realized it'd been a test. God only knows what would have happened if she'd taken the chance to get close to sensitive equipment. Little shit. It was probably a trap. She'd walk in and ANBU would drop from the ceiling, and she probably wouldn't get to get anyone naked at all. Aiko bared her teeth and pushed him further into the wall, irritated. He finally spoke up again. "Utility closet." Genma jerked his head left.
That was a better suggestion.
"Come on." Aiko tugged.
~~~
"I have to disagree with Hatake. She's definitely an aggressive personality," Genma described. He slumped against the wall , picking idly at his teeth with his senbon. A truly brutal bruise was starting to bloom above the collar of his flak jacket, but he didn't seem to care. "Maybe she was having an off-day in Wave, or sticking to a role. She's quiet enough to get the drop on me and put me against a wall. Fast enough to catch me from reaching for a weapon- the thing with Gai wasn't a fluke." He nodded in acknowledgment to the other jounin, who was looking uncharacteristically serious. "I agree that she's dangerous, in theory at least."
"You did take a long while to report. I suppose she was also strong enough to keep you captive," Kakashi drawled without looking up from his book. "Next time we'll send a rescue team into the utility closet. Did she use the mop to incapacitate you? I bet it was the mop."
Genma shrugged. "It isn't fraternizing with a target if they initiate. I was told to get close, not how." He paused. "She's fairly hot, too. How certain is the Sandaime that she's secretly fifty years old? I don't buy it. There's no illusion that holds up to that much contact, unless she's got a Tsunade-level physical transformation going on." He sucked air in through his teeth. "If so, don't tell me. I want to keep that memory the way it is."
Kurenai made a disgusted sound at the crude basis for his analysis, but didn't disagree. She wouldn't know, really. She'd been watching the real-time exam with Asuma to call out camera shots to look for while Gai and Kakashi watched the foreigners watch the time-delayed version. But she'd paid enough attention to tune in when Kakashi let out a heavy sigh. She'd watched disbelievingly as Genma had followed his target away from the cameras too eagerly for a semi-public makeout session like a horny teenager. She'd nearly laughed, though, when Genma tried to trick Uzumaki into walking into the control room. That would have been… Well. It hadn't happened, in any case.
"While I, too, am overjoyed for our comrade's wealth of energetic activities with many new surprisingly youthful friends, perhaps we might address the matter at hand?" Gai gave an incongruous thumbs-up. "The safety of our beautiful young comrades is paramount! I, for one, am not yet convinced about the presence of such a mysterious person with a demonstrated interest in Konoha's bright blooming youths."
Genma eyed Gai suspiciously. He was never certain that the younger jounin wasn't just fucking with him. "Well," he started slowly. "I'm not a miracle worker. I determined that Uzumaki-san knows I was there to observe her. I don't yet know if she knows that I know she knows I'm her watch. I need to spend more time with her to narrow that down and determine a course of action and whether it's going to be plausible to turn her."
"She isn't attached to her team," Kurenai opined. "I read her as being more dutiful last night. If she wasn't lying about having no prior commitment to Kirigakure, they have something on her now. Unless we can eliminate that element, persuasion is irrelevant."
Asuma shook his head. "Maybe she just doesn't like kids. That'd explain your impression that there's little to no team connection. I don't buy that Kirigakure sent an unknown to represent them in Konoha. Yagura's a wildcard, but he's not insane. Unless he wants to provoke war, which would be particularly…" Asuma sucked in air through his teeth. "Imprudent," he decided.
"Is there another way to reconcile those possibilities?" Genma pulled the senbon out. "What circumstance could lead to a shinobi not being an unknown that Kiri wouldn't risk sending as a representative, but still make it plausible that she told Kakashi in good faith that she had no village attachment?" He nodded in deference towards the other jounin, who was both younger and more experienced.
He didn't think that Uzumaki had slipped a direct lie past Kakashi. She was good at deflection, at making someone look the wrong way for the trick- but he didn't peg her as an especially skilled infiltrator. No. She was something else, unless this was a helluva long con in action.
Kurenai crossed her arms and hummed. "Some sort of contractor situation?" she guessed, unenthusiastic about the theory. "Uzumaki could be a free agent who has worked with Kirigakure before."
"Or she could be on the outs with Kirigakure," Asuma said. He looked out the window, clearly bored with re-hashing what they'd all witnessed and discussed. "Kiri doesn't exactly have a high satisfaction rate. It could be that she feels the current administration is no place where she belongs. God only knows there's ten or so different factions of opinion on Kirigakure's reformation."
Kurenai nodded slowly. "That would fit, but not explain why she is here now. Unless Kirigakure recently had a change of administration leadership or policy that brought her back into the fold."
There was a moment of quiet.
Kakashi sighed, lifting his head. "That's where my money is. In order to determine the level of threat and likelihood of poaching Uzumaki from Kiri, we need to find out who is holding her leash and why she's cooperating with them." He shut his book and slipped it away. "The only thing to do is wait for our agent to return with information. But in the meantime, I don't like the way she flinched when the camera was on my genin. That looked like guilt to me."
Genma snorted. "I can't say. I wouldn't have known that was what had happened from watching her. Are you sure about the volume on these things?" He indicated the tiny black machinery that had been fished out of his ear with senbon and a prayer. "She tensed up when Asuma told me which shot was coming up next. I could swear she'd heard."
Kakashi's brow wrinkled. "Extremely unlikely. An Inuzuka could at that distance. I might pick out the communication, if I was paying attention. But we don't have any reason to assume she has augmented hearing capabilities."
He let the corollary hang.
Asuma said it anyway. "Don't have any reason to believe she doesn't, either, aside from it not being an Uzumaki bloodline." He snorted, disgusted. "That we know of. Whose to say? That's not exactly the kind of fabled ability that goes down in history, and the Uzumaki that any of us have personally known could hardly be called representative samples."
Genma's mouth twisted to the side. True enough. "That raises the question again of why Kiri had an Uzumaki, assuming she's not either an independent contractor or improbably well-preserved." Distaste colored his tone. "I gotta say, the only option coming to mind is unpleasant."
Kakashi looked away. No one else seemed to want to respond to that.
Kiri'd been one of the countries that destroyed Uzushiogakure- no Uzumaki in their right mind would have chosen to go there. It made much more sense that Kiri had captured some in hopes of making a more stable jinchuuriki, or gaining some kind of sealing knowledge.
If they went by appearances, this woman was about twenty- she wouldn't have been born when Uzushiogakure fell. That meant she hadn't been taken prisoner- she'd be a generation removed. It seemed like the kind of thing that Kumo had tried on Kushina and even the little Hyuuga princess. They'd probably taken a young woman or two captive and tried to manufacture their own loyal Uzumaki.
It made the target's slightly less proto-typical Uzumaki features take on an unpleasant pallor, to say the least. One parent with white or blond hair and dark eyes could explain how her features deviated from well-recorded clan norms.
Well. Genma shoved his hands in his pockets. "This is pleasant and all, but I'll see you tomorrow." He made a face. "We have a long day of surveillance tomorrow."
Kurenai huffed agreement. "I am exceedingly fond of training ground 44," she said in a dry sort of tone that implied the exact opposite. "I look forward to the opportunity. I only wish that you were so lucky as to join us, instead of your current task. I know how you suffer watching Uzumaki."
Genma didn't manage to hide a grin. He did have the better assignment.
"That's the spirit." Kakashi ambled to the door, happy to leave the building. The genin were getting briefed, and the foreigners had all been cleared out and escorted to their accommodations before they'd dared to begin this discussion.
Frankly, it was time to go home.
~~~
The signal came during that first night of the test in the Forest of Death. Aiko startled awake, reaching for a weapon. She'd trapped the absolute hell out of her quarters, now that there was no risk of genin stumbling into them for the time being. She could hiraishin to her students without much risk of someone getting into the hotel room. At least, not without leaving signs that-
She paused in the middle of adjusting her weaponry.
The seal calling for her attention wasn't in the Forest of Death. It was in Mizugakure.
"That seems… bad," Aiko said to herself. Her tone across dubious even to her own ears.
That meant Utakata or Mei. Both options meant there was a fairly good chance that she was talking into either a disaster they couldn't deal with, or a trap to kill her and replace her.
Well. Utakata was less likely to kill her, unless he was still really hurt. He thought that she'd consciously tricked him into helping her avenge herself on Mizugakure, and honestly, that made so much more sense than what she'd really done that there didn't seem to be much point in attempting to exonerate herself.
She suited up quickly, not bothering to wear the Kiri-style uniform since she wasn't representing anyone in Konoha at the moment. It was the work of a moment to pull herself across a distance that would take a lesser woman a good week and a half to cross, if that lesser woman happened to be an elite ANBU.
"As punctual as ever," Mei greeted calmly, and that didn't make much sense. Were they pretending to have a rapport? Was that what was happening?
Mei was in a uniform, hair pulled back professionally. Two hunter-nin were standing at opposite ends of the room. The interesting thing, however, was a prisoner bound on his knees at Mei's feet.
Aiko rolled with it, nodding graciously to her nominal subordinate. "How lovely to see you. Is this a social call?"
The prisoner looked up.
'Ah,' Aiko thought, closely followed by, 'Holy fucking shit.'
"Konoha has kindly sent someone to express interest in our political affairs," Mei explained cooly. She looked as though she might give the poor man a kick for good measure. She wouldn't, though. Not her style. "I was wondering what sort of accommodations you would like to offer our esteemed guest, and what length his stay might be. It is considered most polite not to invite guests long-term without input from the head of the household," she breezed, and if that didn't sound pointed, Aiko didn't know what would. It was probably some kind of follow-up joke to a conversation she'd had with the prisoner before.
Aiko looked at the poor bastard and didn't rub at her temples. She didn't. She just really wanted to. "Have you checked for wood clones?" she asked Mei wearily.
Yamato shot to his feet in unison with the fake hunter-nin who lunged at Aiko from behind, swinging. It was an exceedingly foolish move- Yamato was damn good, but he wasn't good enough to pick a fight in a room with two kage-level kunoichi and a hunter-nin. Aiko put down the clone with prejudice, but winced when Mei wasn't terribly gentle with the real man.
He hit the ground hard, bleeding from the back of his head. He'd probably have burns around his arms from the material that Mei had used to bind his arms in front in a way that had to be painful.
Typical.
The older kunoichi scowled at Aiko, calm facade thrown off. "I can't believe that. You just happened to know this specific Konoha nin?"
She considered and dismissed several obnoxious responses, including, "I know everything," and "I always ask that question, don't you?" In the end, Aiko settled for sighing and rolling a shoulder. "Oddly, yes."
Mei eyed her suspiciously a moment before she accepted the answer as it was. The older woman sighed. She crossed her arms. "Well. What do you think?"
Aiko toed at Yamato's leg. He didn't move. "I think that this is going to be a diplomatic nightmare."
Chapter 16
"Do I have to do this now?" Aiko asked the world at large.
She actually wasn't sure what part of that she was stressing. Did she want someone else to do this now? Did she want to do something else? Did she just want to crawl back into bed and deal with the problem later?
Mei, sweet, kind Mei, answered the question. "Yes."
Aiko gave her a dirty look. Nobody asked you shit, Mei. God.
Mei didn't seem to notice. She finished personally securing Yamato's hands to the interrogation table and then patted the metal-and-gauze combination that prevented his hands from making any sort of handseals. "You really do have to do this now," she specified.
Aiko thought about the way that Yamato could channel chakra merely by clapping and sighed. She gestured. "Might wanna- yes, like that," she approved, as Mei apparently read her damn mind and turned his palms to face away from each other. She tightened the binds again.
Mei gave Aiko a wry look when Yamato's fingers twitched, not quite capable of hiding his desire to fight that movement.
Haha, busted.
Her mind caught on belatedly to what exactly she was approving of. She felt very tired and a bit resentful that she had to be here.
This would have been a great day to not get out of bed. It was only two in the morning and she was calling it now- today was a bust. There was nothing good about today.
"Here you are." Mei adjusted the lighting brighter and poured a glass of water. Just one. Were they withholding that from Yamato, then? He was going to have a dry mouth. That'd be mildly uncomfortable. That would sure show him to infiltrate Kirigakure.
"Thanks," Aiko said dully. She took the seat on the other side of the table. "I'm afraid I don't have that much time. It would be beyond awkward if someone realized I'm not where they think I am." She ran a hand over her hair, frowned, and then pulled it out of the now-messy braid she'd slept in. It took a minute to put it up in a severe ponytail. That wasn't a good look for her, to be honest, but there wasn't a lot she could do without a mirror and a shower.
Mei paused at the door. "It is late. Would you like a coffee or tea?"
Aiko nodded. Yes, did she ever want something with caffeine in it. She didn't open her mouth, because she might tell Mei that she loved her. Mei was so competent.
When the door shut, she took a long minute to just look at her former comrade. Well. Future comrade, sort of, in that she hadn't worked with him when she was 13. Past-future comrade. Future past comrade?
'This isn't productive.'
She honestly did not know what she was going to say. The possibilities were just too goddamn exhausting. She did not want him running back to make public information about the current state of Kirigakure's affairs. On the other hand, it would be difficult to become Good Friends with Konoha if their relationship started of with "here, this box has what's left of that spy you sent me. You're welcome!"
That was even before she took into consideration that she actually liked Yamato. Mostly. Some of the time.
She didn't want to kill him, anyway. He was a genuinely good person. Almost a suspiciously good person, really, considering his primary role model. How did that even happen? Kakashi was a gigantic asshole- it was one of her favorite things about him.
Whatever. That was beside the point. Aiko rubbed at her head.
Of course, the fact that Konoha had sent Yamato as a spy complicated things and prevented them from having a moral highground. Even if she killed Yamato, it probably wouldn't break an alliance if she managed to get it before Konoha knew he hadn't gotten out in time. Konoha couldn't demand him back without admitting that they'd sent him to spy on an ally nation, however tenuous that relationship might have been at the time. And he was only one soldier. That was the way it went- if you failed, you were on your own. Kirigakure would probably just get out of any repercussions by blinking and saying, "Yamato? Who?"
Metaphorically, of course. Because Konoha wasn't going to ask, 'Hey remember that guy who we sent into your city to gather information? His name was Yamato and we want him back, pretty please.'