Work Text:
Tenten’s been in ANBU for all of six days before she runs into someone she definitively knows.
Okay, she probably knows a lot of the Konoha ANBU. Most of them, by now, with the war over, are all her generation. She’s pretty sure she’s on the same squad as Ino. But “pretty sure” is way different than “completely positively absolutely sure,” and all the Yamanaka have that same long beautiful hair. So Tenten can’t be sure with Ino.
It’s a joint mission with Suna—and boy oh boy had her commander made it clear what an honor this was, how she wasn’t allowed to fuck up, how this was a big deal—and Tenten tries desperately not to adjust her mask or play with her hair. It’s in a ponytail for this, some escaped silk strands itching at her neck. Her buns are distinctive. The mission is simple, really. Circle around a samurai compound up in the Land of Iron and kill them all. They aren’t a notorious house. It’ll be like killing civilians, really, her captain, Neko, had said. Just civilians with swords. Don’t worry about it. “Tori,” her captain (Ino, probably) whispers. Tenten isn’t in love with the name Bird. But it’s better than Lizard or something. “You and San are going to circle around the back.”
Tenten glances over at San, at her long black sleeves and almost completely hidden face. Suna ANBU wear black kimonos with hoods and cloth pinned to each side of their faces, hanging over their noses and mouths. The only visible part of them is their eyes. Tenten’s been told while Konoha ANBU take on a name for the entirety of their service, Suna ANBU are assigned a new number for each mission. San is tall, with tanned skin and green, green eyes. She is also Sabaku no Temari.
After the chuunin exams Tenten had nightmares about those eyes. She dreamed of them, laughing at her, of three purple dots and flying backwards, head cracking against concrete, of her body limp and broken balanced on a fan like a war trophy, her spine aching. Bleeding and angry and humiliated and in so much pain she bit her lip to keep from crying with Temari watching her, all sharp green eyes and tanned skin, laughing.
“Yes, sir,” Tenten says and she and San break from the group, seamless, spilling around the left side of the building in silence. Her feet are soundless.
Tenten isn’t that girl anymore. She’s older now. She and Temari fought in a war against gods and somehow came out alive. She’s come so close to dying so many times, watched friends cross that line she’s only ever tiptoed and gone to their funerals after. Tenten didn’t die. Tenten lived. She’s a woman now, a shinobi and a kunoichi both, and she won’t let the losses or victories of children matter now.
She still stands up a little straighter beside San, sliding her tanto out in the silence and adjusting her grip on it. She flushes a bit behind her mask. She’s fucking preening, peacocking, basically, for a girl she hasn’t talked to in over a year.
Tenten peeks over at San. Those eyes are definitely Temari, but it would be really embarrassing if they weren’t.
“Move in,” Neko says over com. Tenten leaps easily up the compound wall, silently slipping in through a window. She breathes, adjusts her footing. When she glances back behind her, San is floating soundlessly up, fluttering in through the window. In her ANBU gear she looks like a ghost or a monster.
But she’s flying, so. Probably definitely Temari.
It’s a smaller squad, and not really a necessary joint mission. That’s more for unified appearance purposes. The Land of Iron and the samurai within it have forgotten to fear shinobi. The consequences there are death. Suna and Konoha are allies, coming in together for the purpose of fear. The Land of Iron has forgotten to cede to shinobi.
This particular house, this particular compound? Tenten doesn’t really know the why on that. Something about a botched trade deal. She supposes killing them all silently is a better option than another world war. She and Temari slide through the compound and when she sees the first victim—a younger man, probably even younger than her, with bright eyes and a clean sword held between unsure, clumsy hands—she does not hesitate. In one swipe of her hand, his throat’s slit, and her tanto is bloody.
Blood’s gotten on her bird mask and flecked into San’s black kimono before they’re done, and San’s turning to her, saying, “You’re pretty good at this for a Konoha shinobi,” when a woman—face all twisted and looking at the dead bodies like she can’t believe they exist, hair loose around her shoulders and the wakizashi half of a daishou clenched in her grip—nearly guts her. Only nearly, because in one flick of Tenten’s wrist there’s a kunai in her head. She falls, not yet dead but getting there, her expression faltering as though confused.
San’s still standing frozen when Tenten picks her way over the bodies and pulls her knife out. It comes free with a slick, wet noise. She wipes it off on her pants. It’s sick, sure, and disgusting, but a part of her—maybe all of her—
Tenten isn’t that little girl anymore. She’s all grown up and no one will ever beat her again. She’s all grown up and being a murderer makes her feel good.
“Impressive,” San says.
“Without me you’d be dead,” Tenten says just for the satisfaction. Her gloves are damp from the blood now. Sticky. It’s a mess she made and one she’ll be rewarded for. Tenten never became a legend but she’s not that little girl anymore.
“I guess so,” Temari says and there’s blood on the cloth covering her face and she can sort of see the outline of Temari’s mouth and nose through the thin fabric and Tenten wants desperately to kiss her through it, to taste the blood and Temari at once. “Looks like you grew up, huh?”
She wants to take her mask off and kiss her. Instead when she gets home she applies to be a diplomat.