Tsunade read another three lines of Tenten's damage report before stopping.
Shizune stood on the opposite side of the office, holding Tonton against her chest and trying very hard not to smile.
Tsunade finally stopped reading and lowered the damage report. "How far did she fly?"
Shizune checked a secondary note attached to the back of her clipboard. "Eleven meters."
Tsunade placed the paper flat on her desk and let out a long, exhausted breath. "Bring her here."
Twenty minutes later, Tenten stood in the center of the Hokage's office. She carried the damaged prototype launcher securely under one arm, her jacket smelling faintly of ozone, with a fresh streak of black soot smudged across her cheek.
Tsunade tapped the report. "Explain."
Tenten immediately began listing everything that had gone right. The chakra mechanism had fired properly, the target had been obliterated, the shortened power unit held its charge, and the portable frame hadn't cracked. The only problem was that Tenten had gone flying with it.
Tsunade pointed a single finger at the line stating the exact distance of her unintended flight.
Tenten crossed her free arm. "Ten and a half meters, actually."
Shizune checked her notes again. "Eleven."
Tenten shot the senior medic a deeply betrayed look. The original Snow equipment had been built around heavy powered armor, which absorbed most of the kick. Tenten was trying to fire the same kind of blast without wearing the armor. The launcher handled it perfectly. Tenten did not.
Tsunade leaned back in her chair. "I want another test tomorrow. But I am not letting you fire that thing unsupervised again."
"I was supervised!" Tenten argued.
"Where is the supervisor?" Tsunade asked.
Tenten hesitated, her eyes darting toward the floor. "Medical leave."
Silence stretched across the office. Shizune cleared her throat and gently suggested Kenji, pointing out that he could survive the prototype malfunctioning and was fast enough to actually catch Tenten before she broke her neck.
Kenji was summoned to the tower. When he walked through the doors and saw Tenten holding the half-scorched metal tube, he immediately knew why he was there.
"What happened to that?" Kenji asked, eyeing the soot.
"It worked," Tenten answered proudly.
Tsunade simply slid the property damage report across her desk. Kenji picked it up, read the summary, and looked back at the Genin.
"Violently," Kenji noted.
Tsunade gave him exactly one job. "Keep her from destroying another part of my village."
Tenten muttered under her breath that the western wall was already old anyway. Tsunade heard her perfectly.
Kenji arrived at the weapons workshop the following afternoon. Tenten was already buried in her work, surrounded by scattered tools and blueprints.
The prototype launcher had been stripped open on the heavy wooden workbench. Tenten had shortened the bulky Snow weapon until it could actually be carried in one arm. A metal brace locked it against her forearm and shoulder, while the rear vent could now be angled by hand.
Several rejected, blackened parts lay piled near the edge of the table. Kenji picked up a small, complex gear assembly from the pile.
"What does this do?"
"Put it down," Tenten ordered, not looking up from her wrench.
He put it down and touched a different polished cylinder.
"That too."
Kenji dropped his hand. "Why am I here?"
"Tsunade made you come," Tenten said, tightening a bolt until it squeaked. "Grab the spare targets. We're going to the range."
They relocated to the western outdoor test range. The freshly damaged stone wall from yesterday's disaster was clearly visible in the distance.
Kenji looked at the rubble.
"Don't," Tenten warned sharply before he could even open his mouth.
She stepped up to the firing line, locked the heavy metal brace securely around her right forearm, and settled the stock against her shoulder. She squared her stance, bent her knees, leaned into the stock, and fed a surge of chakra into the firing mechanism.
Her target was a thick, reinforced wooden dummy standing several dozen meters away.
She pulled the trigger.
The air cracked. A massive blast of concentrated chakra smashed the wooden dummy into splinters. The brutal recoil immediately threw Tenten off her feet, launching her backward through the air.
Kenji blurred into motion using the Body Flicker. He caught her mid-flight before she could slam into one of the support structures behind the firing line. The momentum carried them both back a few steps until he managed to plant his boots, leaving Tenten caught hard against him.
His left arm wrapped securely around her waist, her back pressed flush against his chest. His right hand had caught her lower down, resting firmly on her ass.
Tenten ignored the position entirely. She immediately raised her right arm, inspecting the smoking weapon strapped to her forearm.
"Brace held," Tenten announced, sounding incredibly relieved.
Kenji squeezed her ass once. "So did mine."
Tenten drove her elbow backward into his ribs.
"Hands."
Kenji released her with a laugh. Tenten dusted off her trousers and immediately went back to checking the launcher's internal temperature.
Tenten spent the next twenty minutes swapping out internal exhaust vents, trying desperately to completely eliminate the weapon's massive recoil.
Kenji watched her adjust a heavy valve for the fourth time and finally asked, "Why?"
Tenten stared at him as if he were an idiot. "Because getting thrown backward through the air is generally considered bad in a fight."
"You don't need the weapon to stop pushing backward," Kenji explained, leaning against a crate. "You just need to know where it pushes you. If you can control the angle of the exhaust, the recoil could move you instead of just knocking you over."
Tenten stopped turning her wrench. Her gaze moved from the adjustable rear vent to the open range, then back to Kenji.
Kenji recognized the look on her face immediately. "I regret saying that already."
She ignored him completely and started rapidly changing the angle of the exhaust vents. When she fired the third test shot, the rear force angled sharply downward. She still absorbed a massive push backward, but instead of tumbling helplessly through the air, her boots slid a few feet across the dirt while she remained perfectly upright.
It was vastly better. She adjusted her grip, dropped into a lower stance, and fired again. The movement decreased even further.
Then she lowered the weapon and asked the inevitable question. "What if I actually want it to move me?"
"That's exactly the sentence Tsunade told me to prevent," Kenji reminded her.
Tenten wasn't listening. She took off at a sprint toward a distance marker, jumped high into the air, and twisted her body. She aimed the launcher downward and slightly behind herself, pulling the trigger. The blast didn't give her sustained flight, but the sudden, violent recoil kicked her forward, extending her jump dramatically across the range.
She landed badly, rolled across the dirt, and came up covered in dust. Tenten looked back at the distance she'd crossed, then down at the launcher.
A grin slowly spread across her face.
"Again."
Tenten brushed herself off and began preparing for a precision shot, angling her stance to see if she could maintain accuracy after a jump.
A blue interface suddenly appeared in Kenji's vision.
[Sudden Mission — Distracted Gunner]
[Make Tenten miss one test shot because of you.]
[Reward: +1,000 SP.]
[Failure: Become the next test target.]
Kenji read the prompt, closed the window, and immediately looked at Tenten. She was focusing intently on a new wooden target, her finger resting lightly near the trigger mechanism. Kenji walked slowly up behind her under the perfectly reasonable excuse of checking her firing stance.
"Don't touch the vent," Tenten warned, keeping her eyes on the target.
"Wasn't planning to," Kenji said. He rested his hand casually on her hip.
Tenten ignored him, making one final adjustment to her aim. Kenji waited exactly one second, slid his hand backward, and squeezed her ass firmly.
Tenten's shoulder jerked in surprise just as she pulled the trigger.
BOOM.
The chakra blast went completely wide and obliterated a completely different training target twenty yards to the left.
Tenten remained frozen in her firing stance.
[Mission Complete.]
[Reward: +1,000 SP.]
[Current Balance: 50,890 SP.]
Tenten slowly turned toward him—and stopped. She looked down at her boots. Instead of being thrown backward, she'd slid several feet sideways.
Her glare disappeared almost immediately. She shifted her feet, recreated the angle, and looked toward the next target.
"Do that again."
Kenji blinked. "Grab your ass?"
"The shot, idiot."
She modified her stance and tested the new theory immediately. She fired and slid left. She fired again and slid right. She tried a short jump, fired mid-air, and redirected her momentum before she hit the ground. It wasn't perfect. Sometimes she landed hard on her ass, and sometimes Kenji had to catch her before she hit a crate.
During one particularly ambitious airborne redirect, the angle failed entirely. Tenten crashed directly into Kenji, and they both tumbled hard into the grass beside the firing line, ending up with Tenten sprawled directly on top of him. The launcher was still strapped safely to her arm. She immediately checked the metal casing for dents before looking down at him.
Kenji had caught her by the hips, and both of his hands were currently resting firmly on her ass.
Tenten noticed his grip. "Move your hands."
Kenji squeezed the soft Kenji squeezed her ass once. "You move first."
once. "You move first."
Tenten deliberately ground her hips against his lap. Kenji's expression changed immediately. Tenten smirked, pushed herself off his chest, and went straight back to the firing line.
Tenten inspected the latest scorch mark on the target, then turned toward Kenji. He saw where she was looking and immediately shook his head.
"No."
"Stationary targets don't dodge."
"Tsunade told me to supervise."
"Great. Supervise from over there," Tenten said, pointing toward the open field.
"Supervise," Kenji countered. "Not become ammunition."
She eventually pestered him onto the dirt.
"No teleporting," Tenten said immediately.
Kenji sighed. "Anything else?"
"No clones either. Just dodge normally."
"You really know how to ruin a good fight."
Tenten raised the launcher. "Move."
She opened with steel instead of the launcher. Kunai cut across Kenji's right side while three shuriken forced him away from the center line. A length of wire snapped tight behind him as he shifted left. Only then did Tenten raise the heavy weapon.
Her first shot missed him badly. The second was much closer, singeing the grass near his boots. Kenji kept reading her aim, easily dodging the heavy blasts.
Then Tenten started using the recoil boost.
She threw a volley of kunai toward his right side. Kenji shifted left to avoid the steel. Tenten immediately fired the launcher downward and behind herself, blasting her body into a new angle vastly faster than a normal leap. She aimed and fired the second charge directly toward where he was moving.
Kenji's forearm flashed black with Armament Haki. He brought it across the incoming blast, and the impact shoved his boots through the dirt before the chakra burst tore away to his side.
Tenten lowered the launcher as the black coating faded from his arm, a smug grin already spreading across her face. Kenji saw it and immediately frowned. "Don't start."
"You used Haki," she said, clearly far too pleased with herself.
"I noticed."
That only made her grin wider. For the first time since the test began, Kenji had been forced to stop casually dodging and actually block one of her shots.
After the final test, Tenten sat on the edge of a wooden crate with the cooling launcher resting across her thighs. She immediately started listing the remaining problems aloud.
The weapon still overheated after rapid firing. The chakra consumption was far too high for extended engagements. The rear exhaust vent loosened after repeated heavy shots, the arm brace needed severe strengthening, aerial redirects were dangerously unpredictable, and her precision dropped terribly when using the recoil for movement.
Kenji listened to the massive list of technical failures. "Why do you look so happy?"
Tenten turned the heavy metal tube over in her hands, tracing a soot-stained weld. "Because now I know exactly what's wrong with it."
Tsunade and Shizune arrived at the test range just as the sun began to lower.
The Hokage surveyed the area. She noted the demolished wooden targets, the heavy scorch marks burning the grass, Tenten completely covered in dust and dirt, and Kenji looking suspiciously entertained.
Tsunade glanced toward the damaged western wall, then back at Tenten. "At least you didn't make that worse."
She looked at the weapon resting on Tenten's lap. "Is it usable?"
"For me? Almost," Tenten answered honestly.
"For normal deployment?"
"Not yet." Tenten wiped a streak of grease from her forehead. "Right now? They'd need very good chakra control, strong balance, and enough experience to handle the recoil without hurting themselves."
Tsunade gave the launcher another look. "Keep working on it. You're the only one firing it until you can make that recoil predictable."
"One condition," Tsunade added.
Tenten waited, bracing herself.
"Nothing gets fired within fifty meters of a village building."
Tenten opened her mouth.
"One hundred," Shizune corrected smoothly from behind the Hokage.
Tsunade smiled. "I like one hundred."
Tenten let out a long, defeated sigh.
Kenji left the test range alone as evening settled over the village. Tenten had already started taking the launcher apart on the crate, completely absorbed in her engineering notes.
Walking down the main road through the village, Kenji spotted a familiar flash of bright orange ahead. Naruto was doing a terrible job of pretending he had simply stopped beside the wall for no reason. He was wearing clean, casual clothes rather than his usual training gear, and while his shoulder was still healing, the bandaging was noticeably lighter.
Kenji slowed his pace as he approached. Naruto immediately looked at him, his face tightening in panic.
"Don't," Naruto warned.
"I didn't say anything," Kenji replied, keeping his voice perfectly even.
"You were going to."
Kenji glanced farther down the road and noticed Hinata approaching. She wasn't wearing her usual combat jacket either, dressed instead in a simple, casual top.
Kenji immediately understood. He walked straight past Naruto without slowing.
"Have fun."
"Shut up," Naruto muttered, his face turning red.
Kenji kept walking down the street. A little farther down, he heard Hinata's soft, slightly nervous voice greet Naruto behind him.
Kenji didn't turn around.
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