Chapter 60
The rain ended as suddenly as it had begun, shifting from torrent to drizzle to sunshine in a matter of minutes after hours spent pouring down. Another couple of hours after it had ended, Sumire, Kiba, and Akamaru returned to Hokage Tower, looking strangely incongruous, damp and bedraggled as the sun shone down. Light glittered off of the many puddles now lining the streets. People had begun to emerge from their shelters soon after the sun came out, and carried on with their interrupted business, happily unaware.
Tsunade paused in issuing orders to a group of chuunin to look at them as they reentered the tower. She frowned, waiting. Sumire shook her head, and paused to wring some water out of her ponytail and onto a potted plant.
“The rain ruined the trail,” Kiba said, scowling. “We were able to follow them just past the edge of the village, but we lost it there. It got washed away before we were anywhere near them.”
Tsunade swore aloud. “Fine. Go... Go back upstairs and see if you can retrace their steps,” she said, waving a dismissive hand.
Kiba and Akamaru stalked past the Hokage and down the hall, Akamaru's head bent low to sniff at the ground before them. Sumire paused to have a word with one of the chuunin in the lobby, but he had nothing new to tell her. At a distance, she followed after Akamaru, giving him enough space that he wouldn't be distracted by her scent.
To her surprise, they had already reached the stairs at the opposite end of the second story, and were continuing their ascent. Sumire thought for a moment of what was up there, having visited only rarely. Before she could ask to confirm, though, they were outside and heading up the stairs to the archive library. She leaned against the railing to wait as the others entered the door ahead of her. After giving them several minutes to search, she joined them.
“What did you find?” she asked Kiba.
He turned to look at her, frowning. “Their scent is all over the place up here. I think it was their main target. Still, it's strongest over here, like maybe they spent a long time reading the file.”
He pointed to a shelf off to one side, and she walked over, scanning the labels on the files to see what was there. Most of the files were for missing-nin, and most of those missing-nin were clearly labeled as being dead. Her breath caught, however, as she spotted a familiar name.
Sasuke Uchiha.
She pulled the file from the shelf and scanned the contents. None of it was new to her. She knew every inch, the information there summing up everything they had been using to track Sasuke since he left Konoha. She put the file back on the shelf and took a deep breath, steadying herself.
“We need to speak to the Hokage,” she said, her voice neutral as she turned around to face him again.
They trooped back down the long flights of stairs to the front desk, pausing only when they found a lost-looking genin. Sumire scribbled off five identical notes and handed them to the genin.
“Deliver these messages. The recipients' names are on the outside,” she said, and the genin nodded, looking pleased to have something to do.
Soon after, they returned to the lobby. Sumire waved Kiba off, and caught Tsunade's eye. The Hokage frowned and took her by the elbow, leading her back into the empty hallway where she had just been.
“What is it?” Tsunade asked.
“The intruder or intruders seemed to be focused on the archive library, Hokage-sama. Kiba said their scent was strongest there. And they seemed to be interested in one file especially, ma'am.”
Tsunade waved for her to continue.
“Sasuke Uchiha's file, ma'am. I took the liberty of sending messages to the rest of the members of the search group, informing them of the foreign agent's... interest. I imagine they will want to meet with you soon.”
Tsunade groaned and rubbed at her temple, but she nodded.
“I understand your rookie class is very close knit, and I do sympathize,” Tsunade said, looking wistful for only a moment before continuing. “So while I'll allow you all to continue looking for Sasuke, you must understand that the village comes first. The moment the search interferes with Konoha's welfare, it gets shelved.”
“I understand, Hokage-sama,” Sumire said. “But ma'am, what do you think the intruders would want with him?”
“Oh, I have a few ideas,” Tsunade said darkly, though she did not elaborate. “You're dismissed. Go tell everyone in the lobby that we're done looking here, but have them double the patrols.”
“Yes, ma'am,” Sumire said, and left.
Once she had informed the others of their orders and she knew she wasn't on patrol that evening, she stole back up to the archive library. Sometime during the afternoon, the librarians had returned. They bustled around her, making sure nothing was missing, and spoke to one another in whispers. Sumire pulled Sasuke's file from the shelf and found an empty spot at a table near the back, far from the windows. She read through the slim folder half a dozen times, trying to find anything she might have missed, before the library closed and she was forced to leave.
---
“Put him down over here,” the shinobi in medical scrubs said, walking over to a long metal table in the middle of the morgue.
Ishitaro hefted the body, still in its long straw cloak, onto the table and backed away. Blood soaked all down his back from carrying the corpse. Ino wondered if he realized.
“Thanks,” she said, nodding to the medic.
He held up a hand as if to say it was nothing. “We'll let you know if we find anything interesting.”
Ino slipped out of the cold, sterile room, and Ishitaro followed after her.
“Thank you,” he said, once they were out in the hallway. “For defending me, and for healing me. Your medical skills are quite impressive.”
She shrugged. “It was just a break, it wasn't that complicated. You're welcome, though. And thanks for shielding me during that wave, I guess.”
He nodded, his ears going red.
“We work together well enough, I suppose,” she said, enjoying the slow creep of color onto his face. “I'd better go report in now, though.”
He nodded again, silent, and she left the hospital for the Hokage's office.
---
Iruka waved at Naruto from across the street. A passing cart delayed Naruto from crossing, and Iruka waited. Behind him, he could hear a pair of shopkeepers gossiping.
“I knew that rain wasn't natural. A real spring storm woulda made my bones ache like the dickens for days, but this came on real sudden. I just stayed in bed the whole time, the pain came on so sudden,” the dry goods merchant said.
“Do they know who was behind the attack?” asked the tailor.
“Nobody's said a word to the likes of us, but I bet it was that rain village. I mean, they attacked us that one time, blew everything to hell. Then they sent that agent last month to talk to us, and we get this weird downpour? A little too suspicious, if you get my meaning.”
Iruka stopped listening as Naruto jogged across to join him. Word had somehow gotten out to the entire village that the rainstorm two days previous was part of a plot, though no one seemed to know any concrete details except for the handful of shinobi who had been on hand to try and thwart it.
“Hey, Iruka-sensei,” Naruto said, grinning.
Iruka smiled in return. “Are you ready for some ramen?”
“Always!”
They set off down the street, Naruto chattering on happily about his latest training. Iruka listened, nodding at the appropriate times. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see someone moving toward them, and turned to look full on. When he saw Reikoku hurrying toward them, he didn't quite relax, but nodded to her.
“Rei!” Naruto said, spotting her. “We're going to get ramen! You should come have lunch with us!”
“Thanks, I think I will,” she said, ruffling Naruto's hair affectionately as she slipped past him to link her arm around Iruka's.
She fell into step with him quickly, leaning on him as she chatted with Naruto. Iruka's mind drifted as Naruto told her the same story he had just heard.
“That sounds pretty cool, you should- OW!” Reikoku stopped, putting a hand to her head. She let go of Iruka's arm. A small rock dropped to her feet. “The fuck?”
“What happened?” Naruto asked, leaning in to look at her with concern.
A second rock flew at them from somewhere on the street, crowded with the lunchtime rush. Reikoku pushed Naruto away, and the rock passed between them.
“Who threw that?” she snarled, turning to face the direction the rock had come from. A few people stopped walking to look at her, but no one spoke up, though a murmur ran through the crowd.
“Show your face, you god damned coward! You nearly hit him,” she went on, gesturing to Naruto. “He saved your village at least twice! He is your fucking hero, and if you don't develop better aim because of that, I'll-”
“You're bleeding,” Iruka said, touching a spot near her hairline.
Reikoku ignored him, pulling away and glaring out at the crowd. “Face me! Don't throw a rock and then hide! Are you a child?” she yelled.
“Come on,” Iruka said, taking her arm. He could make out some of the words being muttered in the crowd, and just wanted to get them all away from there before a bigger incident could erupt. “You need some first aid.”
He tried to catch Naruto's eye, but he was looking out at the crowd with an expression Iruka hadn't seen on him in years. Iruka ignored the way it tore at his heart and took Naruto's arm, too, and just started walking toward Ichiraku again. Naruto followed easily enough, but he had to tug at Reikoku before she would come, and she kept glaring back at the villagers.
“Welcome to I- Oh,” Ayame said, blinking when she saw their faces as they slipped under the curtain into the shop. “What happened?”
“Just a little incident on the street,” Iruka said, keeping his voice light. “I'm sorry to trouble you, but do you have a first aid kit we could borrow?”
“Of course,” Ayame said, ducking into the back as they sat down.
Reikoku scowled, casting mutinous glances back toward the entrance. From what they could see of the people outside, they were just going about their normal business. Iruka took a napkin from the dispenser on the counter and blotted at the cut near Rei's temple. Before long, Ayame returned with a small metal box. She set it down on the counter near Iruka, and he nodded his thanks.
“You seem more upset about them almost hitting Naruto than about getting hit yourself,” he said as he swabbed on disinfectant.
“Yeah, well, I'm used to people not liking me,” she said, her scowl softening now that she looked at him. “I mean, they have terrible taste and they're wrong, obviously, but I've had plenty of time to get used to the idea. But the thought of anyone hurting you or Naruto just pisses me off.”
Iruka glanced at Naruto. He was, to all appearances, studying the menu posted on the wall, though Iruka knew he had it memorized.
“I mean, you're my guys,” Rei went on. “You're good, and kind, and loyal, and I've got to look out for you. You should let me go back and-”
“And nothing.” Iruka shook his head. “You don't need to get in trouble over attacking a citizen of Konoha. Especially not on our behalf.”
“Hmph.” Once he had applied a bandage, she crossed her arms and looked away.
Ayame spared a smile for the girl, even if she didn't see it, and put the box away. Iruka could hear Teuchi bustling around back in the kitchen, and wondered if he was listening, too. As Ayame took Naruto and Rei's orders, he thought about the crowd, and about the shopkeepers he had heard earlier. Everyone had heard about the attack. The Akatsuki was, as far as they could tell, gone. Unless some new group had sprung up to take their place, the village's most likely enemies were other hidden villages. He wondered if the rumors had picked up on that, or gotten out of hand. He worried about Reikoku and her teammates, and their other foreign visitors.
---
Shikamaru avoided making eye contact with Ino, even as he checked his house to make sure both of his parents were out. After a very thorough search, he finally sat down across from her at the kitchen table. She grumbled something about him not even making tea, and sighed.
“What do you want?” he asked.
“I think you know,” she said, frowning. “I happened to see way, way too much of your thoughts when I found you during the storm. I... really didn't want to see any of that, but I did, and so here we are. First of all, ew. Second, what the hell? You know how Chouji feels. You've known for ages! He's your best friend. What the hell do you think you're doing?”
He sighed and rubbed at his temple. Already, a headache was forming.
“Nothing happened,” he said after a long pause. “Nothing is going to happen, either.”
“Those were thoughts, then, and not what you were seeing?” Ino asked, leaning forward to narrow her eyes at him. “Are you sure?”
“I think I'd have noticed if any of that actually happened,” he said dryly. “Anyway, Sasaeko knows about Chouji's feelings now. She may be kind of annoying and troublesome, but she wouldn't do that to him, either.”
Ino leaned back. “Yeah, well, maybe you should avoid being alone with her for a while. At least until something happens, or you can get your own feelings sorted out.”
“They're sorted. The plan is, as it always has been, for them to become a boring, happy couple and have a bunch of children that you will hopefully babysit so I don't have to.”
Ino snorted. “If you say so. But remember, I heard an awful lot of what was going on in your head. I know you think there's a chance she was feeling the same way as you were.”
He still couldn't meet her eyes, and found himself wishing he had made tea just so he would have something else to look at.
“I'll say it again, since I really mean it,” Ino said, standing. “Ew.”
She gave a jaunty little wave and let herself out of his house.
---
Ino stood at attention across from Tsunade, her massive desk between them. From the look on her teacher's face, Ino could tell Tsunade was troubled. She rubbed at her forehead as if developing a headache. Probably she was too distracted to treat it, if it were still there. It would only take her a moment once she turned her mind to it.
“Tsunade-sama?” Ino asked, when she said nothing.
“You dropped the dead agent off at the coroner's after the attack?” Tsunade asked. Ino nodded. “Well, apparently the dead guy had a massive poison sac embedded in his body. It ruptured during the autopsy.”
“Is the coroner all right?”
Tsunade waved a hand. “He's pretty sick, but he'll recover. He was wearing a surgical mask during the procedure, so his exposure was lessened, but it wasn't meant to keep all that muck out. He's looking at a week in the hospital. His assistants are continuing with the autopsy, with proper gear, but it's not looking hopeful. I think they're worried that one of the poisons was corrosive on contact.”
“So anything else we might have gotten has probably dissolved by now,” Ino said, frowning.
Tsunade nodded. “That's it for now. I guess keep Shikamaru, Sai, Sumire, and Kiba apprised. You were all there when this happened, you might as well be assigned to the follow up.”
“Yes, ma'am.”
Tsunade waved a dismissive hand, and Ino left.
---
Shikamaru climbed the stairs up to the archive library. As he entered, he nodded to one of the librarians. He had been here often enough that they were familiar to him by face if not by name. In the silence and the artificial light of the space, he felt himself calm down, and made his way to the Amegakure section. As a small village, it was already doomed to be limited, but the close-mouthed nature of the place meant they had little more than a shelf's worth of files on the village and any of its inhabitants they knew about.
Furthermore, several of the files were out of date. Hanzou, Pein, and Konan were all dead. Hanzou's file had been compiled during his lifetime, but Pein and Konan's only came into being in the aftermath of Pein's attack on Konoha. The archive had been one of the few places to survive the attack undamaged, so at least nothing had been lost, not that there had been much he needed here to begin with.
He pulled out the file on the village itself and sat down to reread it, passing Sumire curled up in a chair with a file of her own. The papers in the folder looked well-thumbed, due in large part to the response to the attack during the rain. Shikamaru scanned the words, letting a part of his mind relax, to work on the information in the background.
One of the few known facts was the village's specialty in assassinations. No one had turned up dead in the aftermath of the attack except for one of the intruders. Shizune had been organizing identity checks throughout the village, to be sure no one had been quietly replaced in the chaos. It was slow going, as they were trying to keep the details and suspicions about the incident quiet, and not to panic anyone. Still, the woman was efficient. She was nearly done already.
Ino had told him in passing, earlier, of the poison sac in the dead shinobi. He remembered reading something similar in Hanzou's file. The court of popular opinion had all but declared Amegakure guilty of the attack, and he had to admit it looked likely. Between the poison and the rain, it was as if someone had written their name all over it.
Still, a part of him felt the connection was too easy, too obvious. They were shinobi. Surely they knew how to hide their tracks better than that. He had considered a few possibilities. A frame job, perhaps, though he couldn't think of who would want to make it look like Ame did anything. He knew of no particular enemies, or of anyone who would benefit more than any other from them being in conflict with a larger power like Konoha. He had also considered the idea of it just being a distraction. An attack that looked quiet and subtle, but carefully tipped off to give Konoha something to worry about. After all, Sai had come to them with nothing more than suspicions as to the nature of the rain. Anbu had since inspected him and said no genjutsu had been cast on him, though. Perhaps he really was just that paranoid, and they simply benefited from it this time. Either way, he was reluctant to trust to the feel of the attack and go charging off at Ame. It felt too much like something somebody else wanted them to do.
“Shikamaru-san?”
The silence broken, he looked up from his reading. Shiho stood in front of him, blushing, carrying an armful of files.
“Shiho. What are you doing here?” he asked.
“Ah, I'm dropping off some old files for my department,” she said, nodding down to her burden. “What about you?”
“Research,” he said absently.
“Let me take care of these, and I can come back and help you for a little while. It's technically my lunch break, after all.”
“You don't want to eat?”
“I had a big breakfast,” she said, blushing darker, and he suspected she was lying. He didn't press it.
“All right, if you're sure.”
He went back to reading for a few minutes while she completed her task. When she returned, he could see she had made an attempt at smoothing down her flyaway hairs.
“What are you looking for?” she asked.
“Information on Amegakure,” he said.
“Ah, about the attack?” she asked, nodding. He wondered if she knew officially, or if she had simply heard the most prevalent rumors going around. “If you think you've exhausted the Amegakure section, you could always look for past missions where shinobi have encountered Amegakure ninja. They might have something on individuals that was overlooked when they were compiling the location or agent files.”
“Thanks,” he said, standing.
The motion put him closer to her, and she looked up at him, her color once more returning to red. Some part of him in the back of his mind wondered what she looked like without her glasses.
“I-I'm up here sometimes,” she said, fidgeting with her glasses. “Filing things for work, or pulling out additional information. If you see me up here, please feel free to ask for help.”
“You have your own work to do, don't you?” he asked.
“Yes, but I can usually spare a moment to tell you where things are. I know the archives pretty well, and I'm happy to help.”
He refrained from mentioning that he could always ask the librarians themselves those things, and nodded his thanks.
“I'll go check the other files,” he said. “You should go have your lunch.”
She seemed a little disappointed, but she nodded and left.
---
Ino spotted her target sitting alone on a fallen log in a seldom-used training area. Her lunch was spread out a napkin beside her, half of a sandwich in one hand. Ino watched for a moment before revealing herself. She sat down on the girl's other side.
“Hello, Ino,” Sasaeko said, smiling.
“Hey.”
They lapsed into silence again, which seemed to alert Sasaeko to the fact that something was wrong. She watched Ino out of the corner of her eye, not eating her meal.
“Shikamaru told me you know about Chouji's feelings,” Ino said after a while. Sasaeko nodded. “But you haven't done anything with that information, have you? How do you feel about the whole thing?”
Sasaeko considered for a moment, putting her food down on the napkin.
“It's not that I haven't done anything with the information,” Sasaeko said. “It's what spurred me to make my confession, after all.”
“You know what I meant.”
Sasaeko nodded. “I know it may not seem like it, since I haven't done anything. But I am taking the matter seriously. I'm... considering him. Seriously. I've been waiting, actually. I didn't hear about his feelings from him, and I don't think he knows that I know. I wanted to give him the opportunity to tell me himself. After all, my confession to Lee was important to me. I... I wanted to know that I could do it, if that makes sense.”
Ino shrugged. The idea made sense to her, but she had always been confident. The idea that she couldn't just tell someone what she wanted still felt a little strange to her.
“You haven't seen Chouji much since then, though, have you?” Ino asked. “I mean, it's not like he's had a lot of opportunities.”
Sasaeko blushed faintly. “I admit, I have been avoiding both him and Lee a little bit lately. My feelings aren't going to change overnight, and I wanted to give myself some time to sort them out.”
“Fair enough. What about Shikamaru, though?”
“What about him?” Sasaeko asked, her voice strange.
Ino shot her a look. Sasaeko sighed.
“Things are a little awkward between us,” she admitted.
“That's one way of putting it.”
“I'm not really sure what to do there, so I'm just waiting to see what happens.”
“Waiting for what?”
Sasaeko shrugged, not looking at her. “I'm afraid he'll start avoiding me completely. That he won't want to be my friend, or be around me any more. He's... He's important to me, whatever happens, and I don't want him to just disappear from my life.”
Ino frowned. That felt vague enough to be a non-answer. She wanted to push, but she knew it would only get less helpful if she did, and she wasn't sure she would get any answers, let alone ones she wanted.
“Look,” Ino said, and she did. “You're all right. I like you and all, but please don't go messing up my team.”
Sasaeko paled slightly, and nodded.
---
“Mirai is down for her nap, and there's some soup in the fridge, Sensei.”
Anko could hear the voice faintly through the door. She considered for a moment knocking loudly, waking the baby, and laughing as a surely frazzled Kurenai had to deal with the aftermath. But she had other things to do today. She tapped softly. A blonde girl a few inches shorter than her opened the door. She saw Anko and blushed, bowing, as she edged out the door around her.
“Anko,” Kurenai said when she saw her, her voice low so as not to way her daughter. “Come in.”
Anko kicked off her shoes and entered, leaving the girl to close the door for her. Without invitation, she sat down on the couch.
“To what do I owe the pleasure?” Kurenai asked wryly.
“Just some routine business. You got any snacks for me?”
Kurenai actually rolled her eyes, and Anko grinned in triumph.
“No sweets at the moment, I'm afraid,” Kurenai said, sitting. “What do you need?”
“I want your opinion. Do you think the rain cover from last week could have been a genjutsu?”
Kurenai sat back, considering.
“I mean, either the storm itself being a fake, or a genjutsu to keep people from questioning it?” Anko elaborated.
After a while, Kurenai shook her head. “I didn't notice any of the telltale signs of a genjutsu, and at that volume, a ninjutsu to create the water might actually be easier than convincing a village of people, without eye contact, that it's raining. Look at the rain that gives Amegakure its name. It's near constant, but reports said it would usually stop on Sundays, or at certain other intervals. It could be stopped at will, much as it seems our rain was. As far as we know, it was real. A major jutsu, yes, but well within the realm of possibility.
“I think whoever did it was smart, that's all. They timed it well, knowing that the weather here in spring is very unreliable, and they knew that for something as mundane as a rain shower, people's tendency to explain things away would at the very least buy them some time.”
Anko grunted, scowling.
“What, not what you wanted to hear?” Kurenai asked, raising an eyebrow.
“Like that Nara kid's been saying, it just feels too neat, is all.” Anko shrugged. “Anyway, look at you. You've been all busy with the whole mom thing. You could use a night out. You should go drinking with me soon. After all, you've got that civvie babysitter now. Let her watch the kid for a night and come hang out with me.”
“You're just bored,” Kurenai said. Her smiled disappeared, though, her eyebrows knit in confusion. “Wait. What civilian?”