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The link is also in the synopsis
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The three local newspapers on Shibi's desk in his home office told a story with no ambiguity. The smallest publication of the trio had an editorial who had a long-standing reputation of being an outspoken, harsh critic of the large clans and their practices. The second was the largest newspaper by circulation, leaning pro-clan and often lenient in how it reported clan-related stories. Finally, the last was a newspaper with a healthy reader base who read every day for their fair and nuanced critique and were often considered the gold standard for journalistic reporting; it was the newspaper Shibi personally read despite financially supporting the second with advertisements.
Despite their different standings, all of them reported the Aburame inquiry with surprisingly similar coverage. Even the pro-clan publication could only do so much with how they framed the facts without getting themselves into legal hot water and risking losing their reader base to another competition.
The third day had been a bloodbath. Just the fact that an ANBU-nin had spoken was enough for the newspaper to print big illustrations—images weren't allowed—on their front pages, but the operative's words were so tantalising and provocative that if the newspapers had enough space, they could've printed the full transcription of his words.
Shibi was aware that the operative would be speaking in front of the inquiry panel and knew it would be damaging to the clan. To counter the damage, he planned to give interviews to many newspapers and had even connected publications to experts who were willing to present points against ANBU's claims, but the operative had gone beyond Shibi's wildest expectations.
It was so wild that Jōnin Toridasu was forced to call an end to the session early and then later send a message declaring that the inquiry's next session, which was scheduled after a three-day break, was extended to a week because the panel needed more time to discuss how to proceed.
ANBU's preparations had been top-notch in how they conducted their investigation, which he expected after how they conducted their raids and arrests. Just from how they knew about Shigeki's deeds before him, the clan head, showed that they were ahead of the clan from the very start, and were doing everything in their power to remain ahead.
They arrested Shigeki and his accomplices for days to restrict the clan from gaining information. And given that they were facing a public fact-finding inquiry instead of a court trial, ANBU didn't have to turn over any evidence or findings to the defence; otherwise, they would've prepared a thorough rebuttal of the pest-origin report on the spot, which they could've then used to discredit ANBU and the operative's words floating in the media, significantly reducing their impact.
However, Shibi hadn't expected the operative's provocative words that teetered on revealing information protected by the very powerful hiden jutsu laws. If not for the cons outweighing the pros in the current situation, Shibi would not have objected as animatedly as he did in the middle of the inquiry. That way, if the operative had said anything over the line, it would've given the clans a reason to crucify ANBU.
It was utterly bizarre, and he struggled to wrap his head around such a drastic shift in Arborist leadership. For a long time, the line of lieutenants heading the Arborist had been great diplomats; they knew how to get what they wanted while working in relative peace with the clans under a mutual understanding based on an established set of unspoken rules.
The position was so important that choosing the new leadership for the Arborist was the first major task for the captain in charge because ANBU wanted to maintain the delicate status quo with the clans for the village's sake.
So, he couldn't understand how ANBU had allowed such a drastic change that stabbed the status quo in the heart and buried its corpse in the cemetery under an unmarked grave.
Though none among the Leaf's shinobi clans would term the Arborist clan falling under the control of the Uchiha clan, they at least expected the policies to soften under the new leadership, but instead, everything blew up. How could the Uchiha clan, whose prized dōjutsu was coveted by those shinobi all around the world—even their allies within the Hidden Leaf—allow the laws that protected their eyes without as much as a word of support? He wondered whether the Uchiha clan was trying to strengthen its position by targeting others, and the Aburame was the first target. But that didn't seem to be the case because Arborist's actions were too aggressive and would cause revolt from the other clans.
The ANBU commander would've made moves to change the leadership, but there hadn't been any news from within ANBU about any such dissatisfaction—which also told Shibi that what he had seen in their first meeting with ANBU had been a performance to fool them.
The Uchiha clan head, Wicked Eye Fugaku, had attended the first day of the inquiry. Shibi expected him to reach out after that, but the Uchiha side had been mostly silent. He couldn't allow that to stand because if the captain in charge, the Uchiha scion, wasn't going to stop his rabid dog, then it left Shibi no choice but to go above his head.
Fugaku was a smart individual and would surely understand that this had to stop.
Moreover, he needed the support of the clans if he wanted his clan to emerge relatively unscathed. At this point, they were going to get hurt; the real question was if they would get out of this with all body bruising and a broken bone or if they were going to lose an arm.
Fortunately, there was a perfect opportunity to meet the Uchiha clan head.
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The largest hall of the shinobi academy was impeccably decorated for the graduation ceremony. Just last week, the final-year students did their best to pass their tests, and today they were going to graduate and officially take the first step into their lives as shinobi.
In the corner of the hall, Iruka narrowed his eyes at the chairs prepared for the students and their guardians. "Don't the chairs look fancier than other years? I swore they barely had a seat cushion last year." The chair before him not only had fluffy seat cushions, but also comfortable backs.
"They certainly cost more to rent," Mizuki replied, unsurprised. "But that's to be expected. We might forget because at this point, they're just kids to us, but this graduating class is made up of an inordinate number of children of the clan heads of major clans."
"Ah, that's right…"
Iruka looked around and immediately noticed some of the most powerful Leaf shinobi around the room, all dressed in luxuriously appointed clothes. He sometimes forgot how special this graduation class was because, to him, most of the children, even the good students, had given him trouble in the years he had been teaching them. He had met with the parents during parent-teacher meetings, but they seemed no different from other parents. Not to mention, he mostly dealt with mothers instead of fathers.
His eyes found Aburame Shino, one of his students, and he was glad to see him sitting beside his parents; though he couldn't see a smile on either of their faces, the family had a harmonious atmosphere. The entire mind space of the village was taken away by the Aburame inquiry, and he was truly worried that it'd come in the way of Shino enjoying his graduation. He was sure there were tensions at home, but it was admirable of the Aburame parents to put aside their clan troubles to give their son the love and attention he deserved.
Thinking of his students enjoying their graduations, Iruka looked at a different corner of the room, and it took him a moment to spot Naruto because he, for once, was not wearing his bright orange tracksuit, and instead donned a kimono gifted to him by the Hokage for the occasion. It was blue and orange in colour, with the former as the primary colour.
Though he still sported his goggles, Iruka smiled, thinking that today, he would replace them with the Leaf's forehead protector.
Naruto wore a bright smile and fidgeted in his chair. Iruka watched as Naruto stood up from his chair and walked to the front, where his face dissolved into a gooey smile upon the sight of the table of shiny forehead protectors, not a single scratch on them.
However, as Naruto headed back to his assigned seat, he passed by one of his classmates and her parents, and that seemed to sap his energy. He gazed at them for a moment before looking around at other joyous families as a shadow settled over his face while he trudged his way back with his head held down.
Iruka's eyes widened as, just for a moment, Naruto seemed to be replaced by an image of another young boy he recognised from his past. Iruka's jaw tightened because that young man was no one other than himself. He had admired his parents more than anyone in his life—they were his heroes, and in his eyes, the greatest shinobi—and he wanted nothing more than to be just like them. But they died before he could make them proud by becoming a shinobi just as brave as them.
"I'll be back," Iruka said to Mizuki.
What would his parents do in this situation? They would see that lonely child and try to give him a smile on a very important day of his life, making it a day that he would always remember with fondness. And they would be fantastic with it.
If Iruka could do that as they would, maybe his parents would be proud of him.
———
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After making sure Shino was settled down, Shibi took the first moment he saw Fugaku alone to approach. He felt many gazes on him, but he didn't pay them any mind because events like these were common opportunities to network and catch up with people. He didn't need to hide his meeting with Fugaku; even if people knew, what could they do but gossip about it?
"Jōnin Shibi," Fugaku said upon spotting him. The man had a perfect poker face that betrayed nothing, but his onyx eyes seemed to have a gaze that felt like it could see through everything.
"Jōnin Fugaku, you're the envy of all the parents—another 'Rookie of the Year' son. Your children are blessed with talents, truly worthy of the Uchiha name," Shibi said. No father would dislike having his ego stroked by praise for his children.
"Thank you for your kind words." No emotion reflected in Fugaku's eyes as he gazed in the distance at his wife and youngest conversing with the parents of a civilian-born student. "My eldest would correct you by saying he wasn't the Rookie at his graduation. They don't allow early graduates to be considered for that honour."
Shibi turned his gaze at the ANBU captain who was responsible for his clan's current problems. The Uchiha prodigy was conversing with an academy instructor.
"I'm sure the Rookie that year felt completely eclipsed by your son," Shibi said.
"I've heard much about your son from Sasuke as well. He says that he dislikes sparring with your son because he can never tell what your son is thinking or what he'll do next. That's a spectacular compliment from an Uchiha; you should be proud," Fugaku said, returning the compliment.
Shibi was right. No father disliked their children receiving praise. "I'll be sure to let Shino know that," he said.
"You look tired, Jōnin Shibi. I assume you'd rather be at war, facing enemy jōnin, than what you're going through right now. I don't imagine it being easy to be under such open public scrutiny… All eyes are currently on the Aburame."
Shibi stood firmer, knowing that it was time to get to business. The Uchiha clan head was ready to hear what he had come to say. Given their location, the severity of the topic, and what was known about Fugaku's personality, he decided to be rather direct.
"You'd be right. Deadly combat would be more agreeable than this. That's strange, is it not? To face such scrutiny from one's allies. Don't you think ANBU are overstepping their bounds? I understand that the new leadership is eager to prove themselves, but to make it public has turned all of it into a bit of a farce."
"You think so? I do agree that it has escalated rather fast," Fugaku said.
"I agree. We are getting mocked by all our enemies, the Daimyo's court, and even by our own shinobi who certainly think less of the village for handling this rather poorly despite being the seat of shinobi power. These things need to be thoroughly considered and handled carefully. I think those in charge would benefit from your advice."
"Then you should've thought about that before all of this," Fugaku said in a harsh whisper.
"Pardon?" Shibi said, taken aback.
"He doesn't like to talk about his work at home, but seeing how quickly this blew up and how close things came at the inquiry, I decided to say something because I could see it getting out of hand and doing more harm than good—that there were more ways to handle the situation that could be equally—and that it could have negative outcomes for our clans. I made it clear that I didn't agree with the approach and would oppose it if it continued."
Shibi felt some anger from Fugaku, and that was expected because the clans had suffered losses, reduced profits and Shigeki's actions were arguably traitorous. It was normal for them to draw ire. However, that didn't matter as long as they had the Uchiha's support over putting pressure on ANBU to at least change their approach. All the important players were waiting for someone to make a move, and once the Uchiha made one, the others would fall in line.
"But it seemed we've grown too predictable in our old age because the operative whose reckless actions I didn't agree with foresaw this talk of ours because he sent something for me through my son." There was still no expression on Fugaku's face, but there was now something burning in his eyes. "I don't know if you remember this, but a substantial amount of our fields were in the infected area. We were hit hard by the chakra pest, and I personally requested you to prioritise us. Do you remember how that went?"
Shibi couldn't say anything. Those early days of the infestation were wild. Even after they revealed the pale beetle, it took some time to scale production to meet the demand. And during that time, the Uchiha clan had made a request that they weren't able to fulfil because they worked with the Hokage and the Daimyo's court to prioritise high-value targets. The Uchiha clan's fields weren't a high priority, but Shibi still had passed on that personal request to Shigeki and asked if they could do something for the Uchiha clan; alas, they couldn't spare anything for them, which had resulted in the Uchiha clan losing most of their harvest.
Shibi had personally apologised even though he made no guarantees that the Uchiha clan would be given priority. He could understand anger after finding that the Aburame clan was the problem in the first place, but there were more things at stake.
"Then, the next harvest, there was some distribution issue which resulted in another failed harvest," Fugaku continued.
Shibi remembered that. In the early days, they had to train people to distribute the pale beetles properly for effective results, but problems arose because the distributors lacked experience. The farming village with the Uchiha clan's fields was among the few areas where mistakes had been made.
"We went without harvest for a year, and for some reason our fields were intensely infected, so the successful harvest we did get eventually was of poor quality. I accepted that as bad fortune and moved on. We're blessed to have borne that trial and emerged from it more resilient… But then, I was shown some intelligence logs that showed Aburame Shigeki met quite a few times with Shimura Danzo during that year, even though they didn't have much connection with him before that."
Shibi's blood ran cold. "I assure you I don't know about that, Jōnin Fugaku."
He didn't even know about the chakra pest; there was no way he knew anything about any dealings with Shimura Danzo. He disliked that man deeply after seeing the damage ROOT had done to Torune; they were still trying to put the child back together, and the progress was excruciatingly slow.
"This could be ANBU's ploy—"
"Even if he's my son, you think I'd just take his word for it? The operative, an expert on ROOT, dug into the vast material confiscated from them that ANBU would be sorting through for years to come, and it still won't be enough—but he managed to find a mention of those meetings, and guess what, it's all true. That swine asked, and your clan was more than willing to oblige to sabotage us."
Shibi couldn't help but look around to make sure no one was nearby to listen.
"Jōnin Fugaku, I—"
"You take me for a fool?" Fugaku cut him off. It may have been a trick of Shibi's vision, but he briefly saw the sharingan flicker in the Uchiha's eyes. "You expect me—anyone—to believe there was something so big going on in your clan and you didn't know about it? You may peddle that nonsense in public, but don't expect me to fall for it. What an utter disgrace. You can forget any support from us or our allies. You've failed your clan, Aburame Shibi. I hope you'll raise your son to be a better leader than you are; otherwise, I foresee a dark future for your clan.
"Have a good day, because I don't see many anytime soon."
Fugaku walked away, leaving a stunned Shibi behind, who caught himself staring into space after a few moments and instantly became more conscious of the gazes on him. He quickly gathered himself and walked back to his wife and son, a calm mask pulled over his face as always; his mind, however, was anything but that.
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The link is in the synopsis!