Chapter 62:
I slid a plate of food in front of Satsuki, another in front of Yakumo, and a final one in front of Naruko. Even if the three genin were visibly refreshed from their trip, they were obviously still hungry given the way they quickly dug into the ravioli-like treats I'd prepared for them. Tenten, still on post-mission leave herself, was sitting atop one of the thick shelves jutting out from the kitchen wall, slowly working her way through a pastry.
"So... mission went alright?" I asked, picking up my own plate of food and beginning to eat.
"It was soooo~oooo crazy!" Naruko cried, reaching up to pull at her hair with the hand that wasn't deep in food. "There were a bunch of A-Rank Hidden Mist ninja running around!"
Tenten blinked, her eyes subsequently shooting open in surprise.
I nodded, unable to help myself. "So a completely normal mission for your team, then?"
Yakumo shuddered, speaking unusually candidly as she swallowed. "Ugh. I hope not."
"The swords were useful," Satsuki nodded, her cheeks pinkening just a bit as I smiled at her.
"Ha! Satsuki's only saying that 'cause she fought one of the Legendary Seven Swordsmen!" Naruko cried, grinning.
"No fucking way!?" Tenten shouted, turning back to the Uchiha with even wider eyes. "Which one!?"
Satsuki, looking pleased with herself but also somewhat embarrassed, turned her face away. "The one with the giant cleaver. Biwa Juzo."
"Kubikiribocho," Tenten breathed reverently, clasping her hands together as she stared at the other girl. "Tell me everything."
Satsuki snorted and rolled her eyes. "It was a giant slab of metal that ate the iron out of someone's blood to grow back if it got damaged. Kota's sword was better."
"Of course it was! Kota's stuff is way better than any Kiri knockoff!" Naruko enthused, grinning widely. "Like, I can't even say how cool our coats were. They soaked so much damage! Especially when I was fighting these two Kiri hunter-nin twins."
"You handled two hunter-nin at the same time?" Tenten asked, surprised yet again and looking the blonde over speculatively. "Maybe I should have tried to make a few more of the training sessions we used to have?"
"You were busy with Guy-sensei," Yakumo noted with a shake of her head. "It wouldn't have worked."
Tenten grimaced, hissing a breath as her expression flirted with a haunted and hollow appearance. "Yeee-ah, right. Ugh, we're going to be back to training in a few days."
"We've got two weeks off," Naruko grinned, smashing one of her fists into her other palm. "Because we're so awesome!"
"More like Obito-sensei and the Hokage need to figure out what the political repercussions are," Satsuki grimaced, putting another tomato-stuffed ravioli into her mouth. "We kind of... did some high-level stuff we weren't cleared for."
"Especially when we let Zabuza take the sword," Yakumo noted with a nod.
"You just gave up one of the legendary blades?" Tenten turned back to Satsuki, holding her hands up and making clawing motions with her fingers.
"Kota's blades-" Satsuki began, snapping her chopsticks together for emphasis. "-are better." Her free hand dropped onto the sheathed sword at her side and clapped it once, making the guard rattled against the metal fixtures on her belt, punctuating the sentence.
"Pfft! Yeah, who needs some Hidden Mist trash when Konoha has the best sword-maker around!" Naruko grinned, then her eyes lit up. "Oh, yeah, thanks for those knuckle-things! They were awesome!"
"You're welcome," I smiled, nodding. "Keep your mother off me and we'll call it even."
Naruko blinked as Satsuki and Yakumo's faces clouded with confusion while Tenten's previous horror at the famous Kiri blades being called 'trash' abated and she smirked. "Huh? What's my mom-I mean, we got back yesterday and she was walking, which is amazing! But, uhh... has she been bugging you?"
"Lady Kushina and Kotaro had a full-contact spar in one of the training grounds," Tenten revealed, grinning almost as widely as Naruko. "They went at it so hard the villagers thought they were under attack and it almost caused a panic."
Naruko blinked, looking unsure of how to react and tilting her head. "Huh. I guess mom was supposed to be pretty crazy back when she was active-duty. I've heard some stuff from my aunts and uncles, but..." She turned to me, curiosity plain on her face. "How was she? Fighting, I mean?"
I huffed a laugh, smiling a bit as I leaned back and grabbed my mug of juice. "I mean this in the best possible way, Naruko, but... your mom is an absolute monster. Honestly, I'd rather fight a typhoon than have to match her seriously."
Naruko's eyes sparkled at the praise, Yakumo, Satsuki, and Tenten each smiling softly as well. "Damn! I'll have to get her to practice with me now that she can walk! Rin-nee said it was some old monk who fixed her back, I'll have to find that guy and thank him..."
As the blonde looked off to the side and began mumbling about searching for my alter-ego, I noted the eyes of the other young women in the room trailing towards me in a speculative fashion. Finishing the sip of my drink, I cleared my throat and looked off to the side.
Satsuki rolled her eyes.
Yakumo's expression softened.
Tenten just nodded knowingly.
A confession without a confession.
"So, how'd the mission close out, anyway?" I asked, authentically curious about the subject. I'd seen the original 'Wave Mission' arc a few times, even read it back during high school. Which was... over thirty years ago now, if one counted the time after my reincarnation. Gods, that made me feel old. In addition to that, though, I'd read at least a few dozen iterations and variations on the entire mess of a mission in the following two decades. It was, so often, where Naruto fanfiction tended to die as it got bogged down dealing with well-trodden ground.
But... I hadn't ever seen or read an instance where Gato hired Team 7 instead of Tazuna.
I mean, under further examination, that made more sense than what had happened in canon. Gato was more of a petty warlord than a business magnate, but even he had to know that missing ninja had a well-deserved reputation for shitty work. Without a village at their back, their reputations tended to take a nosedive and with the exceptions of the S-Class monsters among them, they got desperate. That meant taking work from all sorts of lowlife scum and, more often than anyone knew, killing their employer and making off with anything that wasn't nailed down.
While I had no doubt that this world was just as full of wealthy people who were also very stupid as my last one, someone who relied on shipping as their primary source of revenue should have better risk-assessment skills than that. It wasn't as if many village-nins would blink twice at the casual poverty and cruelty in Wave.
That was cold of me to think, yes, but it was also pragmatic.
I might have scrapped my plans to run off to space, as petty and childish as they were in retrospect, but neither had I embraced the opposite extreme. This world was a complete and utter mess and I wanted none of the responsibility or blame for how either the mistakes people made or the mistakes I would doubtless make.
I'd made friends here in Konoha. Perhaps against my will and perhaps stupidly, but I would try to do as best I could for them.
Them, specifically.
The rest of the world wasn't my problem.
Oh, I knew the problems that would beat a path to Konoha's door eventually, but even in something of a worst-case scenario, that was years off. And I wasn't being idle. My own contingencies just in case the village decided to renege on its kind offer were shaping up quickly and would only grow more thorough over time.
I knew that, eventually, there would likely come a time when I needed to step out on the stage in some fashion as well. Oh, I still had no plans of being a ninja as an occupation, but as the incident with the Iwa shinobi had taught me, even being in the splash zone of significance meant you'd get trouble coming your way. Even if I wasn't going to go out of my way to turn the world into a utopia, I understood there would likely be violence of some type in my future.
But that still didn't mean I had any obligation to people I didn't know, people I'd never met, or people from other parts of the world who actively wished ill upon those who I called friends and lovers.
In some ways, that ideology was a betrayal of my past self.
Once upon a time, I'd envisioned having the power to make the world a better place entailing an obligation to do so. That idealism hadn't entirely left me, despite my best efforts. It was part of the reason why I was still in Konoha. I was a person who liked to help people. I found it hard to turn away someone asking for it as long as they were genuine in their need and sincere in their desire.
That part of me was still here, it'd just been tempered by the world I now lived in.
"...so, in the end, Gato decided it was too much of a hassle to kill all the villagers. He needs someone to do his work for him, I guess." Naruko hummed with a look of distaste on her face. "He's really scummy, but he's got the Wave Daimyo's ear and kicking his ass would upset a lot of people, so-meh."
"What Naruko means is that with the help of both ourselves and the Mist ninja, we were able to negotiate an agreement where Gato would be paid a portion of the taxes collected on the bridge as fees to have the security wing of his business protect it." Yakumo explained more thoroughly, setting her chopsticks down on the plate with a polite show of gratitude.
Satsuki did much the same, then picked up the story. "In exchange, Tazuna has to sign up as a member of Gato's company because he didn't really get the Daimyo's permission to build the bridge in the first place. Neither the Fire or Wave Daimyo, and either of them could order it destroyed for the slight. Gato's going to smooth things over for him, though and maybe set him to work creating a proper harbor in Wave to start receiving shipment from the Land of Water."
"The drunk old bridge builder was steamed. He really hated Gato," Naruko scoffed, belatedly offering her own thanks.
Satsuki snorted. "He should be grateful he's not being executed. Gato has a charter for his company from the Wave Daimyo. That means anyone who tries to conduct business between the mainland and Wave without paying him a fee is breaking the law."
Yakumo nodded sternly. "The villagers are, likewise, lucky that either Gato's ronin or a proper samurai force weren't sent in to put down the miniature uprising they were conducting."
Naruko sighed, grimacing. "Yeah, yeah... he's a jerk but he's the customer and he's got powerful friends. I know. He could at least make sure the villagers have food, though."
"Obito-sensei will be including a detailed account of the situation in his report to the Hokage. Which, considering that it dealt with a potential new trade route with the Land of Water, will likely be forwarded to the Fire Daimyo." Yakumo replied patiently, even as I rose to pick up the dishes.
Naruko stared at her for a moment, blinking, then grinned. "Ah, gotcha! Then that means Gato's boss is gonna' hear about how he's a shitheel, huh?"
"Not quite in those words, but sure. Dumbass," Satsuki stated, huffing the final insult in a way that made Naruko scoff instead of blowing her top. "But, yeah, that's probably what'll happen."
"Good." Naruko nodded. "Even if he was paying us, Gato was a major sleazeball." Naruko blinked and reached for a pocket, pulling out the watch I'd given her for her birthday two years ago. "Ah, shit! I gotta go! Mom's-ah, she's putting me and little bro through a workout!"
"I'd wish you luck, but I think it's better to wish you survive," I smirked at her.
"Ha! Good one, Kota! Seeya!" Naruko called, bounding down the stairs energetically.
For a few moments after the front door slammed closed, there was a comfortable silence between the four of us. Finally, though, Yakumo spoke up. "So. I did a lot of thinking on the mission. I think it was good, for me to get away for a while, I mean."
I turned towards her, leaning against the kitchen sink as I flexed a spark of chakra and dried my hands off. Satsuki, of course, focused on the small non-jutsu and flashed her eyes crimson a half-second too late. I smirked at her, though only got an embattled pout in response.
"I think," Yakumo started again, drawing our attention back on her. "That I'm ready. For Kokoro. If you are, Kota."
I met her gaze, brown eyes flecked with gold staring back at me.
I nodded. "I'm ready. On a personal level, at least. In terms of her body... I want a week to do some final checks, but I think I've got everything worked out."
Tenten and Satsuki exchanged looks.
"This is really happening then, huh?" The bun-haired girl asked, frowning thoughtfully. Or, at least, what I interpreted to be thoughtful.
"It's always been the plan," I replied, looking between the three of them. "Anyone have any last minute objections?"
Satsuki paused, then shook her head. "Just..."
I raised my eyebrows silently as she trailed off.
"Jealous," the Uchiha heiress bit out, looking irritated. If I had to guess, both with herself and me. "I know having a child would mess my life up right now, but part of me wants to. A lot."
Tenten sighed, nodding. "Same."
I nodded, taking in the problem before turning to Yakumo. "Would you object to Kokoro having three moms instead of one?"
Yakumo blinked and blushed, looking between the other girls as she bit her lip. "Maybe... aunts? I mean, of course you'd be involved, given... everything-" She flicked her eyes to me. "-and I'll want help. Kotaro and my parents will be watching her while we're on missions, but I'll need to run errands and train and maybe have some time for dates, too..."
I nodded. "It's probably not what you want, but Yakumo's jumping into the deep end due to her circumstances. Satsuki, Tenten? You can think of this as a training exercise. Get used to the practical reality of having a child, not just liking the idea of it."
The Uchiha and my fellow orphan shared another look, this time less sure.
Then, they both nodded slowly.
"You're right, it's not what we want," Tenten spoke first, her voice soft. "But it's the closest thing we can get without destroying our careers. Even if the village would give me a pension while I'm out, it'd pull me off Guy-sensei's team almost certainly. Plus, I wanna' be in a place where I can help raise them once I have a kid."
That wasn't something a newly-turned fourteen year old would have considered in the place I'd come from, once upon a time. But, here in Konoha, kunoichi had a very narrow window to get to the point where they'd have a reliable pension.
"Same, for the last part anyway," Satsuki stated, her cheeks slightly red. "I... well, the clan would help. A lot. But..." Her fingers clenched into tight fists. "I have a dream I want to make come true. And, for that, I have to do things in order."
Which, for Satsuki, meant getting to jounin before having kids. Just like Tenten. Unlike the other girl, though, Satsuki would likely return to some level of active field work. She had too much drive not to. That, and she wanted to succeed her brother in his (eventual) position as Hokage.
Which I'd object to the probability of but, hey Hashirama and Tobirama apparently made it work.
It's an odd thought, that if everything works out I might be the Hokage's house-husband one day.
Odd, but not unwelcome.
Satsuki could help herself to the politics. I was going to have more than enough on my plate already if that noble title worked out for me.
"So, the chunin exams are coming up in two weeks. Let's work out a timetable that everyone can agree to," I stated, snapping my fingers and producing a notepad.
Satsuki twitched, the flash of her sharingan especially telling.
I raised an eyebrow, giving her an amused smile, and repeated the process to summon a brush and ink. This time, she caught it, but was obviously dissatisfied with whatever she saw.
"If you two are quite done?" Yakumo asked tiredly, her tone exasperated but her smile amused.
"Ah, leave them alone. It's how they flirt," Tenten grinned.
Satsuki blushed crimson
Chapter 63:
Some people would think that bringing an eldritch pseudo-chakra beast into the physical world through the use of artificial infusion of arcane life force into a beyond bleeding edge piece of functional magitek would involve a lot of chanting, ritual, an elaborate laboratory setup... and probably a bit of the traditional mad scientist laughter.
I refrained from the stereotypes with admirable restraint.
In the end, it was a simple procedure.
Yakumo laid down on a table, I bound an elaborate seal to her eighth chakra gate, activated the companion seal on the body I'd built, and then activated the entire process. There wasn't even a need to throw a giant Frankensteinian master switch.
It was, after months of work on my part, more than a bit anticlimactic.
"Food is amazing!"
Even if there was no release of dramatic tension, though, it was still deeply satisfying.
I chuckled as Kokoro dug into yet another platter of curry, her third one in fact. Normally, I'd be worried about a child her size having the apparent appetite of an Akimichi. Or, at the very least, I'd be worried about her eating herself sick, but not this child. More specifically, I wasn't worried about that possibility because any matter she consumed would be broken down to be used as fuel in the complex chakra-tech reactor that made up her gut. It was, in other words, quite impossible for her to make herself sick, even if she decided to start eating dirt and rocks off the ground.
Although I would probably try to keep her from doing that anyway, social customs being what they were.
Satsuki and Tenten watched as Yakumo fawned over our daughter while she ate, the brown-haired girl cooing over the child that seemed only a few years younger than herself.
"She looks so lifelike," Tenten whispered.
"Probably because she is," Satsuki replied.
Tenten grimaced, shaking her head. "Not what I meant. You know that."
Satsuki rolled her eyes. "Speak more clearly, then."
"Fine. Kota did an amazing job on her body. She looks exactly like a real seven year old child. That's what I meant." Tenten sighed.
Kokoro did look like a 'real' child, both in terms of appearance and personality. She was, in her short time after awakening, friendly, outgoing, and happy. Her first course of action had been to hug both myself and Yakumo at the maximum value of her restricted strength. Looking at the pile of crushed chopsticks she'd been attempting to use, I might have set it a bit high.
But... I did want her to be able to protect herself, too.
Physically, though... she looked like a fusion of myself and Yakumo, which was what she'd imagined herself as. Her eyes were more of a warm honey-gold than my own brown or the Kurama heiress' yellow-flecked hazel, and her hair was both smoother than my own and better-behaved than Yakumo had often complained hers was.
I'd dressed her in a relatively simple set of shorts, shirt, and an oversized hooded-trench coat with baggy sleeves and wooden sandals for footwear. All carefully chosen to make her look eccentric, smaller than she really was, and adorable to the point those 'in-the-know' would be less likely to hold a grudge because of her origins. The coat had Yakumo's family crest on the shoulders and my own blacksmith's mark emblazoned on the back.
In almost every way, after all, she was my creation.
"You should pace yourself, Kokoro," Yakumo warned her for at least the tenth time.
"I'm fine, Mommy! Daddy built me a really good body! I can keep eating forever!" Kokoro bragged, and I chuckled at the look of annoyance Yakumo shot me.
"I would appreciate some help, Kota," Yakumo sighed.
Tenten giggled and Satsuki snorted, amusement wafting off both of them heavily.
I stepped forward, moving past the table and patting my daughter – my daughter – on the head fondly. She turned from her food, blinking, her mouth still full. "Kokoro, if you keep eating you'll run out of food and won't have any food later. And, more importantly, you won't be able to do anything else while you're putting food in your mouth."
Yakumo sighed in relief as our daughter at least slowed shoveling food in her mouth. "Anything else, like what Daddy?"
"Like meeting your Mommy's parents. Or meeting new friends. Or seeing the outside," I tilted my head towards one of the walls. "The real world, like you wanted to?"
Her eyes widened slowly as her head flipped between staring at the food on her plate and me standing beside her. An almost comically-forlorn expression blossomed on her as she put down her plate and almost seemed like she wanted to cry.
"Finish your food, Kokoro," I told her with a small smile, making her blink in surprise. "We're not in a rush and it's rude to put food on your plate and not eat it, just like it's rude to take too much food so that other people don't get enough to eat."
Kokoro's face lit up and she returned to using the surviving pair of chopsticks less as a utensil and more as a shovel. Yakumo sighed as she looked up at me and used the hand outside of Kokoro's view to make the Konoha ninja-sign for 'received/gratitude.'
"You made Mommy happy!" Kokoro squealed, her head swinging between us with a wide grin as she talked around at least one mouthful of food.
While Yakumo blinked in surprise and confusion, I patted her head. "Don't talk with your mouth full, sweetie. Chew, swallow, then talk."
Kokoro opened her mouth to reply, froze, then rapidly followed the previous set of instructions. "Yes Daddy!"
I felt more than saw Satsuki turn to Tenten with raised eyebrows and make a few signs of her own. Thankfully, Kokoro seemed to be deeply involved in finishing her meal to the point where the distance between them was enough to buffer their emotions.
Because, as I would need to inform Yakumo, Kokoro had the innate ability to sense emotions. It was something that I wasn't sure would have properly carried over in her transition from semi-imaginary personality aspect to real-world being, but wasn't incredibly surprised about. Yakumo had even seen aspects of it before, just chalking them up to our child's unusually perceptive nature and strange origins.
Simply put, Kokoro technically had three parents.
The first was obviously Yakumo. Kokoro's 'formative' years had been spent learning from and absorbing spiritual essence and memories from Yakumo herself. Then there was my contribution. Even if it was less fun than the traditional way, the Sage's Ninshu techniques were a form of insemination under these strange circumstances. I had little doubt that my actions had resulted in Kokoro gaining proper sentience and sapience.
However, there was the question as to why and how all of this had happened in the first place. Which related to... well, something so abstract and esoteric that I doubted anyone outside of the most classified archives of the fortress-temples of the monk sects or, potentially, a few of the Hidden Villages. For instance, I had every reason to suspect Hidden Sky knew of it and had personally written up the report that now sat in the Hokage's vault.
Hidden Sky called it the Zero-Tailed Leech.
The western Elemental Nations, generally viewed as the most powerful among the proper ninja villages, referred to it in many ways, usually as an 'artificial chakra beast.'
One, you will notice, is a proper noun. The other is not.
That is deliberate.
Specifically, they want to deny Hidden Sky the honor and prestige of being a peer power by virtue of holding one of the nine great chakra beasts. Because, according to the accepted texts produced by the Sage of Six Paths, there are only nine of them and any others are from a different source, which means they don't get to share the same title.
Yes, I'm not joking. The real, in-universe reason that the Zero-Tailed Leech isn't talked about is because the majority of the Great Powers consider it non-canonical to the Sage of Six Path's surviving literary work.
Sometimes I really wish I could explain a few jokes to other people so that I wouldn't be the only one laughing at them.
I also wish Zetsu wasn't around to force me to use the qualifier of 'surviving' when referring to the Sage's work, but beggars can't be choosers.
In any case, though, I think what Sky had done was to find a place where Dark Chakra naturally pooled and coalesced, likely as a result of enormous human suffering and tragedy, and either taken advantage of or forced a manifestation of those emotions into a concentrated metaphysical form. And, as the usual laws of Saturday Morning Cartoon Metaphysics go, put enough Powerful Soul Juice in one spot and it gains something close to animal-level sentience at least.
Which, because Dark Chakra was probably 'heavier' and easier to capture than 'Light Chakra' was (which I'd spent a single bit of potential in just to ensure everything I knew about it by virtue of contact with other subjects was correct), was probably promptly overcome with the urge to maim, kill, and destroy everything around it.
So they chained it up and made it run a flying doom fortress.
Yeah, that checks with the usual logic of this world.
The precautions I'd taken to ensure Kokoro did not do the exact same thing were their own separate report and roughly three times longer with an addendum of the same length to clarify the arcane bullshit I'd had to perform.
"All done!" Kokoro cried, lifting her plate up and handing it to me.
I tapped one seal on the bottom, which instantly sterilized the plate, then the other next to it that teleported it back to the cabinet where it had come from. I might like doing some chores out of a certain obsessive need for cleanliness, but Kokoro's construction timeframe had forced me to admit that some wastes of time were better left to mere mortals.
Despite the fact that I could have easily made a less extreme cleaning seal for myself (and, in fact, did use such an innovation sometimes), I wasn't giving up showers or baths.
I preferred to keep my shower thoughts, thank you very much.
"Alright, let's get you up and outside to see the world," Yakumo stated, swelling with pride as she lifted our daughter up into her arms. Then she turned to me. "How far can she go away from me?"
I snorted. Clearly someone had been a little too eager to listen to my full explanation. "I want you two to stay within a kilometer of each other for the first week as a precaution. Torune and Sai graciously volunteered to be test subjects for a modified version of the seal linking you and Kokoro. If my math is right, and it always is-"
Satsuki and Tenten snorted.
In unison.
"-then the seal should be good out to ten kilometers, but that's under laboratory and simulated real-world conditions, so... as long as neither of you leave the city independently of the other, everything should be fine," I shrugged, ignoring the disrespect that I definitely hadn't earned.
"That's just short-term, right?" Yakumo asked me, biting her lip.
This time I sighed and swept a hand through my messy brown hair. "Kumo-chan? I love you to bits and would die for you or our child if needs required it, but please for your own safety, please listen to me when I explain complex and esoteric seals that go on your body."
"I was kind of bu-" Yakumo muttered demurely, holding Kokoro tightly, who looked between us with her head cocked.
"Daddy, are you mad at Mommy? I can't feel your emotions?" Kokoro asked.
I smiled at her and released my barriers a smidge, just enough to let my mild frustration and exasperation slip free, along with a complex amusement and fondness. Our daughter blinked, looking to me and nodding before turning back to Yakumo.
"He's not mad at you Mommy," Kokoro smiled confidently with all the certainty of a child who'd just shown an adult their finger paint masterpiece on the living room wall.
"Now I know you didn't explain she would be able to do that," Yakumo pouted.
I shrugged. "Because I wasn't sure it would carry over. It didn't during the test-runs of her inhabiting the incomplete body, but I don't know whether that was because of the partial transfer of consciousness or because they weren't long enough to allow her to fully settle in the frame."
We both looked down at the apparent little girl on cue, Satsuki and Tenten joining us for that matter.
Kokoro blinked, then shrugged.
"Worth a try," I snorted.
"Let's go, Mommy! I want to see the real sun!" Kokoro whined.
"We'll talk about this more later," Yakumo promised me with a smile, my own read on her emotions telling me that she wasn't angry either, but knew that this wasn't an optimal time to speak on the subject.
Then, with a quick hop, they were out of my lab and up the ladder, where Torune and Sai would be working on something and totally not waiting to be introduced to the widdlest eldritch abomination to signal the three ANBU teams, the Uzumaki sealing specialists behind them, and the Hokage and Hokage-to-be behind them to stand down.
I was proud of the fact that I'd negotiated Hiruzen down from ten ANBU teams.
I turned to the other two girls in the relationship. "You two okay?"
I asked because, regardless of their jealousy and how well they were dealing with it (very well), it was important to verbally communicate instead of leaving things unsaid for potential misunderstandings to fester.
Tenten sighed as Satsuki grunted and looked away, Uchiha-ese for, 'I'm not happy, but I understand why and aren't mad about it.'
The bun-haired girl shrugged, stepping up to peck my lips, then gave Satsuki a look to demand she do the same. Which she did, under 'duress.' "Satsuki and I are dealing. This is Yakumo's time to shine and she needs you, so while we're envious, we're going to occupy ourselves so we don't obsess over Kokoro while you cater to Yakumo."
Satsuki gave a grunt of agreement, which had a childish petulant tone at the edges that I think was mostly performative.
Have to watch that.
"We'll give her a week to have you to herself outside of a few dinners," Satsuki stated finally, turning back to raise an eyebrow as if she actually expected me to contradict her on the condition. The tension in her shoulders relaxed a bit when I just nodded obediently.
"After that, we'll want a bit more time with you – and Kokoro if necessary – before we go back to mostly-normal next month," Tenten followed up.
I nodded again. "Yakumo knows and agrees?"
Both nodded. Satsuki took the lead again, a bit of pride mingling with desiccated frustration, likely from the talk in question. This time, her voice was coated in wry and dry observation of the obvious. "You've been kind of busy."
I snorted, giving each of them a quick kiss and hug, before pulling them both together to hug them tightly together. "Look at it this way. You're going to be helping Yakumo with a child who is going to raise the very makai itself when she gets upset. If you manage this without at least one building burning down? Raising a 'normal' child will be a piece of cake."
Both snickered, Tenten even giggling a bit before asking, "Do you really think she'll cause that much trouble?"
"No Kokoro – That's the forge! You can't crawl – Kotaro! Help!"
There was stillness for a long moment between us as I nodded calmly and turned to jump up the ladder myself. "Let's just say there's a reason I made her and her clothing nearly indestructible."
I leapt up as Satsuki and Tenten's faces shifted to thoughtful frowns.
And they'd called me MAD when I told them I'd made her body incredibly resistant to most common elemental attacks! I'll show them all! THEN THEY'LL SEE THE GREATNESS OF MY FORESIGHT!
Pushing that thought aside, I stepped past the mother of my child to lift our little abomination out of a furnace capable of melting titanium, not at all surprised to see that she had some molten metal, carbon ash, and one of the stokers poking out of her mouth. God forbid I take reasonable precautions for the exoskeleton of a shard of sentient darkness that's never encountered a real environmental hazard in her life!
...was it too late to indulge in a pinch of insane laughter?
Chapter 64:
Kokoro stared at Hiruzen.
Hiruzen stared at Kokoro.
They stared at each other.
Then my daughter turned to Yakumo and myself. "I don't like him. He's got too much darkness inside him. Is he an enemy? Can I eat him?"
The ANBU around us were too good to give tells, but I felt the atmosphere electrify like the moments before a lightning strike. While Yakumo looked downright mortified, I merely shook my head and crossed my arms at Kokoro as she wilted under the emotions I was projecting.
"We talked about this, young lady. This is the head of the village, the Hokage. He's the one who makes the rules about who can stay here and is responsible for keeping everyone in the village safe." I paused, letting that sink in. "If he thinks you'll hurt someone, it will make it really hard for your mother and I to stay here in Konoha with you. And you want to stay here with us, don't you?"
Kokoro's eyes shot wide and she turned back to the aging shinobi who watched the goings-on with a neutral expression, his pipe held carefully between his fingers. "I'm sorry! I won't eat you! Please don't make me leave or get Mommy and Daddy in trouble!"
Sarutobi blinked once.
His eyes flicked to me, then he nodded. Crouching slightly, he reached out and rubbed Kokoro's head, stilling the burgeoning tears from spilling over onto her cheeks. "There, there little one. Your... father has gone to a great deal of trouble to convince me that you're not a threat to my village. Let me ask you, though. Are you dangerous?"
I held out a spread hand, stopping Yakumo from stepping forward.
"I think so?" Kokoro hesitated, looking to me for a reassuring nod. "Daddy says I can hurt people if I'm not careful. I haven't yet, though!"
Hiruzen nodded slowly, his hand moving down to rest on her shoulder. "Your father is right, Kokoro. You have the power to hurt people very badly and kill them if you're not careful. Given that you can see the emotions I'm feeling right now... would you care to tell me what they are?"
Kokoro shifted under the old ninja's intense gaze. "I can see the part of you that wants to hurt people... and if you don't like me, that makes sense, but... they... you're... scared? But... aren't you really really strong? Why are you scared?"
Bloodlust, have to teach her what that means. The dangers of having an eldritch abomination as a child, I suppose.
To her credit, the ANBU seemed just as confused as her, even if they made no move to express that confusion obviously. I probably didn't have the same acuity or depth of perception as my daughter, but I had my own bag of esoteric tricks to fall back on. Tricks, in particular, that allowed me to understand the lack of emotional self-knowledge and understanding these soldiers were displaying.
Have to watch out for that too, ugh... being a parent is a lot of work.
"I'm scared because there are people that need me to protect them," Hiruzen looked out beyond the fence line of the small backyard. "It is my responsibility to make sure nothing places them in danger. Tell me, what do you think your father or mother would do if something tried to hurt you?"
Kokoro frowned, looking back at myself and Yakumo again, to which I gave her another reassuring smile.
"They'd... get angry?" Kokoro asked, then nodded slowly, growing more firm in her opinion.
"And we'd hurt whatever was hurting you, to protect you," I added, understanding where Hiruzen was going with this.
The Hokage gave me a tolerant nod at the assist, but added a cloaked warning look at the end before turning his attention back to my daughter. "Just like parents protect their children, I am the one who protects the people of the village."
"Like Mommy and Daddy?" Kokoro asked.
Hiruzen chuckled and I discreetly rolled my eyes at the honest, if slightly dark amusement in the sound. "Yes, like your mother and father. And you."
"Me?" Kokoro asked, blinking owlishly as she pointed a finger at her chest.
"If you want to be," Hiruzen nodded. "Everyone born in this village has a choice. They choose to be a good person or a bad person. Good people live in the village and don't hurt anyone inside it. Bad people decide to hurt each other, even while they're in the village."
Mmm, smell that warm patriotic nationalist in the morning. It's what's for breakfast.
"So I can eat people who hurt other people in the village?" Kokoro asked, the one-tracked mind of a child on full display.
I saw Yakumo silently press her hand to her face out of the corner of my eye.
If I hadn't known better, I would have believed Hiruzen's mask of amusement. "Sometimes people make mistakes and hurt each other accidentally, Kokoro. It would be very bad if you tried to eat someone who didn't mean to hurt you."
My daughter frowned, almost pouting. "That's too hard. How do I know who means it or not?"
"You should ask your father," Hiruzen stated, shamelessly making me do the job I had already accepted. "Especially before you do something you can't take back, like... eat someone. Your father has more experience than you do and... good judgment-"
My expression deadpanned at the old man.
He could have at least tried a little harder than that.
"-about things like these," Hiruzen continued. "So if you're ever not sure about how you should act or what you should do, ask your parents. That way you won't make trouble for them."
Kokoro nodded, gravely serious in the way only young children could be. "I'll ask Mommy or Daddy if I want to eat someone."
Hiruzen looked as though he wanted to push for more, but visibly decided against it as he straightened up and took a draw from his pipe. "I suppose that will have to do. I'd like to speak with your father, if that's alright young lady?"
Kokoro nodded, turning back to Yakumo and clinging to her while I stepped up to the plate.
The old man's eyes cut my way as he turned to walk towards the gate. "Young Kotaro."
"Lord Hokage," I nodded.
The older ninja breathed a cloud of smoke and ash out, pinning me with his gaze. "I have to admit, even with my reservations, now that I've met her I think you may have a point."
I nodded, "She's terrifying, but not fundamentally evil."
"Beings such as her seldom are," Hiruzen replied with a scowl. "The issue is whether or not she can control her urge to commit violence or satisfy her baser instincts. Contrary to my concerns, though, it seems as if she has bonded to little Yakumo and yourself to the extent that she values her connection with you two more than the satisfaction acting on impulse would bring."
"Thank you for your tolerance of my own apparent impulsiveness, Lord Sarutobi," I stated deferentially.
Because even exaggerated or falsified gratitude is worth expressing, if you can do so sincerely enough.
Hiruzen snorted, then took a long draw from his pipe, letting a long stream of smoke out. "You're a good negotiator, Kotaro... especially where the interests of your women are concerned. While I do not always agree with your whims, it is good to see they have the Will of Fire behind them."
I sighed, giving the old man a bit of a look over that.
He merely smiled at me and shook his head. "You're not the first cynical youth I've had the dubious honor of becoming acquainted with, you know. I'll admit that, perhaps, you're the most qualified claimant to such a title at such an age I've ever met. Believe me, though, the Will of Fire lives within the truth of your actions and the heart behind them."
"Are you trying to make it difficult to cling to my shield of cynicism, Lord Hokage, or does this come naturally?" I asked tiredly.
Well, at least he had the gall to laugh. It was enough of a joke that it was meant to be funny, after all. Even if it was true as well.
The laughter, at least, put the still-hovering ANBU at ease, though of course they didn't care to show it.
"I trust you'll keep to your part of the bargain you've made?" Sarutobi asked. "I won't be so gauche as to draft a man in the middle of peacetime right after the birth of his child. Even a birth so unconventional."
With that, the Hokage held out a curved metal band bound to a strip of cloth.
I stared at it, and him, with a scowl.
"Only while you are training your team," the Hokage stated, his tone growing more stern. "It will raise certain... questions, if you do not wear it."
"I imagine it will raise an equal number of questions should I be seen wearing it," I sighed, staring stubbornly at the headband..
"That is what masks are for, generally speaking," Hiruzen stated, smirking at me as he held the offending object out. "Anyone who knows in spite of that won't care. And anyone who cares about a new shinobi in our ranks, won't know anything beyond your paperwork."
I stopped, one eyebrow slowly climbing.
A mask, huh?
Absently, one of my hands reached up to brush against my lower face.
Hmm... on one level, I know I shouldn't. On another, there's a teenage edgelord deep inside demanding I follow through.
Now Hiruzen was staring at me, no doubt having picked up on the change in my mood. "Kota..."
I reached out and took the leaf headband with a smirk. "As Lord Hokage commands."
The old man narrowed his eyes at me, equal parts concern and irritation that his ploy hadn't paid off. "Should I be worried, young man?"
Eh... I'll take pity on them. The resemblance won't be too close, but I'll still have some fun with it. Besides, that version of him won't have ever existed here.
"No more than usual," I replied glibly, turning back to my family and smiling at how Satsuki and Tenten were cooing over Kokoro now that things with the Hokage were – for the moment – settled.
…
"Lord Hokage?"
Hiruzen turned his head to regard the mask that hid Itachi's face, then nodded as they discretely removed themselves from the blacksmith's small backyard. "Move forward with the plan. Observation at all times for three months. I don't want her out of sight for seconds, let alone minutes."
"As you say, Lord Hokage," Itachi replied, his voice muffled into an indistinguishable mess by the clever application of a bit of legacy seal work. "I take it I should begin the stand-down."
Hiruzen nodded and, instantly, a pair of shadow clones split off from Itachi to enact the stand-down orders. While he and the ANBU that had been positioned around the target had been the most immediate response, they were far from the only layer. Indeed, it was more than a bit ironic that three of the reserve teams on alert were the newest crop of sealing specialists armed with fuuinjutsu-augmented prostheses designed by Kotaro himself, on top of being armed with the fully-functional generation of shinobi gauntlets and scroll cartridges.
He would give such a collection of teams good odds at leveling a good portion of any other Hidden Village.
In another few years, they would have a sufficient force to do so without stripping Konoha of its reserves.
Normally, the influx of formerly-retired shinobi back into service would have bolstered their ranks to that point already, but storm clouds were building on the horizon. The incident involving Hidden Stone had simply been one in a long stream of mounting problems that were requiring more and more forces be mobilized far from Konoha itself to deal with them.
It was, in other words, the prelude to some kind of attack.
He doubted the slow increase of hostilities would have fooled him thirty years ago, let alone with the three extra decades of experience. Still, there was a fine line between seeing the trap being set and being able to prepare for it adequately.
In a world without Kotaro, without the incredible gates he'd built connecting the Land of Fire – and a few other regions – in a few quick otherworldly steps, the Leaf Village would have already stripped their ANBU forces to the bone putting out politically-sensitive problems without anyone the wiser.
And that was before one got into the deployment of regular forces.
Missions had seen a dramatic uptick in the past few months. To the uneducated eye, that was a good omen. However, taken in concert with the comparative lack of movement from Iwa and Kumo regarding missions meant they were likely doing off-the-books work cleaning out the more obedient bandits that were usually allowed to continue existing on the basis of justifying the shinobi's own existence.
It was why he would never tell Kotaro that his cynicism was a mistake, after all.
It was seldom as profitable to fix an issue than cut it down to a manageable size and simply keep charging for upkeep.
It was even justifiable, from a certain point of view. The bandit leaders who survived long enough to meet those qualifications were predictable and 'behaved' compared to the wilder and less-civilized ones that were quickly culled in routine missions. Those same relatively good behaviors meant they were predictable and the villages would know where to find them were they to truly fly off the handle and do something problematic.
Of course, it wasn't exactly possible to remove banditry as a problem altogether, either. Which was another reason in favor of leaving murderers, rapists, and thieves running loose in the countryside. As long as they killed, violated, and robbed the least-important people in society.
Running a Hidden Village was rarely a happy business.
Especially when the friendly neighborhood bandits went missing.
Long experience told Hiruzen the more cooperative ones would be pressed into service to bolster a given village's own troops, particularly the Genin Corps. But it was the stashes of wealth that the other villages were really after. While bandits would spend cash as easily as they came into it, many of the more 'trusted' encampments would hoard small objects of significant value. Jewels, artwork, family relics, the occasional hostage... they all went into a rainy day fund of sorts, both in case the pickings ever got slim and because there was barely ever a sufficient underground market for the rarest of prizes. The only hope a bandit clan had of ridding themselves of such important and noticeable treasure was to parlay with a rival noble.
Do that enough, though, and you earn an unenviable amount of attention for different reasons.
Just as the bandits served a purpose in the grand scheme of things, so too would their destruction. Individually, those caches of treasure might be comparatively small, but if a village were willing to consolidate all of them? Well, it would represent a not-insubstantial sum, even when augmenting a reduced mission budget.
For a short time, at least, a Hidden Village could subsist on reduced income streams.
Long enough, at least, to ensure an opponent would overreach themselves while picking up the slack in missions, putting their forces out of place should it come to a fight.
I wonder if any of the other leaders remember the Second Great War? Or if all of my contemporaries save Onoki are dead? He's stepped down in favor of that young buck Deidara... but he'd still be in an advisory role, wouldn't he? Or perhaps the rumors of his mind going are true?
It was a worrying possibility.
As Itachi gave him the signal that the troops were fully standing down, the complex machinations of the Elemental Nations filled Hiruzen's mind. Finally, as he landed in the Hokage's office, he turned to the Uchiha prodigy.
"I'll be formally announcing you as my successor during the Chunin Exams," Sarutobi stated bluntly, taking in the brief cessation of movement. "With the intent to turn over full control of the village to you inside of six months."
"Lord Hokage..." Itachi began slowly, removing his mask. "We had discussed a longer timetable."
"Circumstances with the other villages are forcing my hand," Hiruzen replied, removing his hat and easing into his chair with a long sigh, putting his pipe on its holder. "Perhaps, with the thought of a less-experienced Fire Shadow taking the reins soon, the other villages will hesitate and over-extend their finances, forcing them into a more natural equilibrium and deescalation. I will remain in a formal advisory position for as long as I am able, but with a potential crisis, perhaps even another war on the horizon, I do not want the village searching for leadership should my health fail me suddenly."
Itachi swallowed, thought over the argument, then nodded. "Of course, Lord Hokage."
The older man smiled. "And call me Hiruzen, Itachi. It will be good practice."
The normally-expressionless face soured slightly. "As you wish... Hiruzen."
The Sandaime chuckled and shook his head. "We'll work on it."