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When Inoichi gets an urgent call for duty to have a ‘chat’ with a potential Uzumaki impersonator and what may or may not be an infiltration team, he expects many things.

Just… not that.

One look traded with Shikaku had said it all; if the three kids who can’t be older than five are a Genin team composed of little geniuses, he’s ready to swallow a kunai whole.

They’re so obviously civilians it’s almost painful. Part of him would want nothing more than to send them away, somewhere… relatively safe, he supposes, but the adult won’t let them be parted from him. According to Shikaku, attempts at discreetly waylaying him away from the children were all rebuffed. They cluster around him like ducklings and it’d be cute if the situation wasn’t so serious.

He wonders briefly what they are, exactly. Hostages? A (good) cover to enter the village unsuspected? Doesn’t match up with the fact the stranger straight up asked for Uzumaki Kushina, though, and the kids themselves… They clearly love ‘Hari-jisan’, given the way they tug at his pants to be picked up or hide behind his legs. They’re not afraid, they’re not under a Genjutsu (someone tried ‘kai’ without effects) and more than that, the stranger clearly cares about them.

And the girls have the same green eyes as the man. They’re family alright, Inoichi thinks. Briefly, he wonders if he’s the father – he’s not so young he couldn’t be – and the girls have the same eyes, sure, but well, they call him ‘Uncle’ so there goes that theory. Close blood relation, though. The boy… hum, there is no resemblance Inoichi can pick at first glance, but who knows?

They’re little kids. Bored, hungry little kids who want to be fed and something to play, ‘now Hari-jisan’!

“Sorry, you don’t mind if…?” the young man asks, smiling ruefully as he nods toward his backpack and the kids.

“Not at all,” Inoichi answers smoothly as the man leaves the table and rummages through the bag the security detail allowed him to keep.

Which would have been a breach of security itself, still is one in Inoichi’s opinion, and if Shikaku isn’t having words about it with the responsible, Inoichi will.

If he had to guess, whoever urged ‘Hari’ in the interrogation room had been in a hurry, or had judged that whatever was inside couldn’t be dangerous.

… Funny. If he hadn’t been looking at said bag, Inoichi would have forgotten it was here. Not only that but… he could have sworn that bag was too small to hold three water bottles and a metal case full of jam sandwiches the kids are delighted to bite in. Or a handful of color blocks AND two notebooks and color pencils. The pencils and paper would be alarming IF Inoichi wasn’t already certain the children were civilians.

All the same, it makes him frown and do a discreet ‘kai’ sign while the stranger’s back is turned but… nothing change and he eyes the bag speculatively. He hopes the Hokage and Shikaku caught it too. He’s not an expert on seals, true, but he has a good understanding of the basis and while he has never heard of a backpack able to function like a storage roll, it wouldn’t be out of possibility for an Uzumaki…

Wild speculation. He needs to stop here and stay impartial.

He needs to be wary of that bag, though.

“Sorry for the wait,” the black-haired man says as he comes back to sit after making sure all the children have something to occupy themselves with. The girls are easily distracted but the boy – Tedi, is it? – keeps watching them with a frown. “So, uh… I’ve been told you wanted to ask me questions?” He sounds bit nervous, but no more than the average civilian when asked a question by a ninja on duty.

“Indeed,” Inoichi replied smoothly. “I hope it’s not a bother, but we need to clarify a few things with you. Tea?” he offers, waving at the teapot and cups an assistant brought in earlier. Just because he may needs to go digging for answers if the man is an hostile force doesn’t mean they can’t be polite first, especially if their… guest… is really who he claims to be, as slim as the chances are.

“Oh, uh, yes. Thank you,” the black haired youth replies with a nod and Inoichi fills two cups.

He observes the other man like a hawk despite his easy smile as he pours tea and honestly, he’s not sure what to think at first. The young man shows no suspicion, no hint of paranoia, doesn’t check for a moment that his drink hasn’t been tempered with. The children, who plays on the floor as if nothing is wrong – and for children so young who aren’t trained, there probably isn’t -- distract him and Inoichi can easily read and catalogue each expression on the stranger’s face before feeling satisfied. It’s easier than reading a book.

The man is no ninja, of that he’s certain.

But, he thinks, he’s not exactly a civilian either.

“Thank you,” the green-eyed man smiles as he takes his cup and drink without a care. Naïve of him, Inoichi thinks, but it also shows the man is either very confident in his ability to lie… Or that he has nothing to hide at all. Whichever it is remain to be seen, but that’s why he’s here, and that’s why Shikaku and the Hokage are listening in on the conversation.

Claiming to be an Uzumaki to infiltrate the village is ludicrous, given how Uzushio was destroyed and no member of the clan made it to Konoha.

Except… The man never said he was an Uzumaki, only that he was blood-related to Kushina. It is a pretty big claim in itself, but not completely impossible, Inoichi mentally concede. Fleeing, shedding the name, marrying into other clans, other families and hiding their heritage… if Inoichi had survived the fall of his village and had thought it too dangerous to rejoin an allied village or worse, hated said allies for not getting there in time to save them, he thinks he may have done the same.

Who knows how many survivors of the Uzumaki clan or of one of the other Uzushio clan might still be running around unbeknownst to Konoha?

If Hari is one, or descended from one, then he has to be heavily taking from his non-Uzumaki parent. Inoichi mentally compares him to Kushina and can’t find much in the way of physical resemblance. The nose, perhaps, if that. But then again, young Naruto also takes after his non-Uzumaki parent in term of colorings…

“You’re welcome,” Inoichi replies easily. “So… how do you relate to Uzumaki Kushina, exactly? You said she was your cousin? To what degree?” He doesn’t stop smiling, but his face grows more serious. He’s not in Interrogation mode, but he’s not having a full friendly chat either, even if there are kids in the room, kids younger than his little Ino and fuck it, but he hopes the situation doesn’t go south, for their sake.

Hari sighs as he puts down his cup. “Ah,” he says, passing a hand through his hair. “Honestly, Sir…?”

Belatedly, Inoichi realizes they haven’t really been introduced to each other. “Yamanaka Inoichi,” he says smoothly, watching for any reaction to his name. Infiltrators would try to flee or become afraid, knowing a Yamanaka was on them, but Hari just blinks and nods as if it was nothing. Hmm, interesting. Expecting it or really not recognizing the name? “You can call me Yamanaka-san. And you are… Pottaa Hari?” he says slowly, trying to repeat the name the man gave to the Chuunin manning the Konoha’s gate through which he came. It’s hard to pronounce, unfamiliar and he’s certain he’s butchering it.

Such a strange name. A… very foreign name.

Uh.

Would have Uzumaki survivors run so far as to leave the Elemental Nations?

“It’s ‘Potter’,” Hari says but he looks resigned about the mispronunciation. “Maybe it’d be easier to use a direct translation. I think it’s uh, ‘Toukou’. Though a friend of mine said ‘Kamamoto’ might be correct too, but she doesn’t know enough of the language to be certain.”

“Toukou,” Inoichi repeats, humming speculatively. It really sounds like a civilian name, taken from one’s occupation. “Is your family comprised of potters, Toukou-san? Pardon me for asking, but are you foreigner? You don’t speak with an accent I recognize.”

He had no accent, period, not like the handful of traders Inoichi may have met in the harbors off the coast of the Land of Fire or on the islands of the Land of Water during missions. He’s not sure what to make of it. An obvious accent might have given further credence to whatever the man’s story is supposed to be but it would have also been too outlandish. The children don’t have an accent either, Inoichi realizes dimly.

But they’re also speaking a foreign tongue while they play on the floor with each other, totally oblivious to the conversation, as if they don’t understand it, and the only time Inoichi clearly heard them speak in Japanese is when they directly address their Uncle.

Conclusion: the children probably don’t speak Japanese at all but something around their Uncle makes it understandable for listeners.

Curiouser and curiouser. A ninja technique, perhaps? But if so, it’s nothing like what Inoichi might have encountered before. It makes him both giddy and wary.

It is tempting to raise the issue already, tell the other man Inoichi could spot the disparities, the incoherence but if he did, he’d probably lost the man’s cooperation and he doesn’t want to do that just yet. Not when he doesn’t know what the man’s true goal was.

“I think we might have been potters once, but if so, that was a long time ago,” the young man shrugs. “You can call me Hari, you know. It’ll probably be easier. And you’re right, I’m… not from around here. I’m from Eregesu,” he puts in helpfully – or at least he was probably thinking it was helpful, but Inoichi’s mind draws a blank. Shikaku might know what that country was – the Nara had many, many maps at their disposition. “It’s… very far,” the green-eyed man adds awkwardly. “A friend helped me to learn your language but, uh… I’m not sure I’m doing so well.”

“Oh, you’re doing perfectly,” Inoichi states helpfully. There were things he wasn’t saying. A friend? Who? A ninja? Another foreigner? A trader? Another potential Uzumaki clan member? And how did it relate to the children? “You must have been a diligent student.”

“I tried, but I had to cheat my way through,” Hari replies. Weird phrasing; how does one ‘cheat’ at learning language? Unless it’s with a specific technique, in which case the young man is showing his hand too easily. Unless he thinks it’s of no consequence? Hard to say for now, but Inoichi keeps it in a corner of his mind. “So, Yamanaka-san; you have questions and honestly, I wouldn’t mind getting the kids settled in an inn before tonight so if we could go forward…?”

“Very well, Hari-san,” Inoichi replies pleasantly, but mind racing. Planning to check at an inn meant Hari isn’t expecting to be greeted by Kushina. Either he already knows she is dead, or he doesn’t think he’d be welcome. Unless it is because he thinks him plus three kids would be an inconvenience. Has he been planning to stay several days? Or is it only for one night? He wouldn’t go to any inn in a hurry either way, Inoichi knew. “So… about your link to the Uzumaki’s family?” he prompts. “I must admit, given how long ago the fall of Uzushio happened, it’s weird to see a member of your family coming to Konoha now.”

As in, years after Kushina’s death. Kushina who would have been able to identify any of Uzumaki or Uzushio blood. Kushina, whose son was the new jinchuuriki for Konoha. Kushina, who he claimed to be related…

But never spoke of as having passed away.

What does it hide?

The other man’s shoulders sag. “Yeah, I saw the ruins,” he says bitterly and Inoichi takes note of it as well. “Thankfully the kids didn’t get it but…” he shakes his head and Inoichi’s interest perks. Hari had taken the children to Uzushio? When? Why?

“It must have been hard,” he says impartially. Green eyes looked up and straight in Inoichi’s own blue ones.

“I… wouldn’t call it hard, exactly,” the other man says slowly, sounding pensive. “It was easier than seeing my parents’ ruined house, for sure.” Ruined house; parents dead? Was it from someone who had gone after remnants of the Uzumaki blood? Or something else? “I didn’t know anyone from Uzushio, after all, and even if I know it was my grandmother’s home, it’s not like…” he trails off, making Inoichi raise an eyebrow.

“Like?” he prompts calmly. So far, he is getting more questions than answers. But that’s alright; getting answers is his job and he enjoys being thorough. Plus… well, call it a hunch, but Inoichi doesn’t think it’ll be hard to get the tale out of Hari.

Wherever the tale is true or not remains to be seen, of course.

Hari takes his head in his hands. “Frankly, I don’t even know where to start.” He looks dismayed. “The whole Uzumaki thing is new for me and it’s not like I was expecting to still have alive relatives on my mother’s side.”

So that ruled who was the Uzumaki parent, Inoichi decides, but the way it had been said… He assesses Hari again. Late teens to early twenties, not very big, big green eyes hidden behind thick spectacles, unruly black hair and a strange, lightning-shaped scar on his head. He looks exhausted. Not physically, not really, but his eyes remind Inoichi of some of his fellow clanmates and Konoha ninjas who kept going despite having a lot on their mind. He doesn’t move like a ninja and doesn’t look for traps or poisons or seals, but he moves in a way that suggest he had seen action.

It can mean… many things. The Elemental Nations are rife with conflicts, even when ninjas weren’t involved. Wherever Hari grew up might have been similar.

“Your mother never told you about her clan?” he inquires.

Hari breathes in. “My mother,” he said slowly, “died when I was not even two years old.”

Truth, Inoichi knows it immediately. “My condolences.” He makes sure his face conveyed sympathy. “So you didn’t know you had Uzumaki blood?”

That could explain the late research for familial ties, Inoichi supposes.

Hari nods. “I had never heard the name and I didn’t even know about Grandma Erika not being British until I had to sort through Aunt Petunia’s papers after she died and… Oh, God. I’m not explaining it right, am I?” He looks distressed, close to hyperventilate.

“Not really,” Inoichi carefully doesn’t snort, but he lets some amusement pierce in his voice. Aunt Petunia. Grandma Erika. He fills the names away for later. “And you still didn’t say how you were related to Uzumaki Kushina exactly.”

“Oh, uh, the degree of relationship? If I have it right, then she’s my cousin. First cousin. We have the same Grandmother,” Hari replies, sounding a little more confidant before hesitating. “At least if she’s Uzumaki Kaede’s daughter?”

“She… might,” Inoichi allows, because he has reread Kushina’s file before coming. It had included a list of prominent names of the Uzumaki clan, especially those who were the closest relations to Kushina in case one of them showed up in Konoha someday. The fiery redhead had never fully lost hope someone might have survived, somewhere. Has she still been alive, she would have been delighted – or ready to murder any potential imposter. Inoichi puts his elbows on the table and intertwines his fingers. “What I find interesting is that Kushina never mentioned having an Aunt.”

Now he sounds drier, more suspicious, but Hari takes it in stride.

“Aunts,” he corrects, to Inoichi’s surprise. “Plural. My mother and her older sister. And given she never met them, she probably wouldn’t have,” Hari sighs.

“Sounds like you have quite the tale,” Inoichi quips. So, Aunt Petunia is probably Hari’s mother’s sister, if he claims she was also Kushina’s Aunt. “Why don’t you tell me all of it?”

The dark-haired youth passes a hand in front of his face. “It’s… complicated. A lot of it actually happened before I was born. I’ve only learned about it about six months ago and I’m not sure I have the whole story straight. That’s kinda why I was hoping to see Kushina or, by default, any others who might be living here.”

Wait. Had he just said…?

“Others?” Inoichi asked blandly. “You mean… other Uzumaki?”

Surely, he had heard it wrong. Hari couldn’t be so naïve as to think…?

Hari blinks, suddenly wary, as if surprised Inoichi would even ask. “Well, yes. Uzushiogakure might have gotten destroyed but surely all the family members who survived whatever destroyed the village moved here first. Right?” he asked.

“So you’d be fine with meeting any other member of the clan asides of Kushina?” Inoichi finds himself asking.

“Of course,” Hari replies, sounding surprised. “I mean… if they want to? They’re… they’re family. But I can understand if they’re not interested either,” he adds in quickly. “People are rarely happy to meet a backwoods cousin they never met or potentially heard of before.” He sounds wistful saying it. “Though perhaps if any of Grandma Erika’s siblings made it here, they’d know me? Aunt… aunt Kaede at the very last. If she joined Kushina here. Her last letter to her mother was a bit vague about what was happening and wherever or not she had already moved or was planning to shortly after writing,” he scratches the side of his head.

Oh, for the love of…!

He is, Inoichi realizes with amazement. That man – boy, really – thinks there were others Uzumaki in Konoha beyond Kushina who, apparently, he had only specifically asked for because she was (supposedly) his closest kin in the clan. Well, there is Kushina’s son, but that is beyond the point.

That… put a twist on things, he supposes.

“I think,” Inoichi says slowly, “that you better start at the very beginning. Don’t worry if it’s long,” he brushes off whatever the green-eyed man was about to say. “There’ll be lodging for you and the children when we’re done. For security purpose, however, we need to have a clear answer out of you.”

“Security? But… Oh, right,” Hari mumbles. “Foreigner, which is already suspicious, and you’re basically army type, Hāmaionii told me…”

“Hāmaionii?” Inoichi repeats slowly, the name rolling awkwardly on his tongue as he tries to repeat it. Weird name, but… Hari himself is weird, and his family name is near unpronounceable.

“The friend who helped me learn… Never mind. She’s not exactly important right now,” Hari shakes his head. He looks over his shoulders at the children, among whom voices have started to rise. “Tedi, don’t bother the girls! Sorry, he’s a bit unnerved by the travel,” he excuses himself when he returns his attention to Inoichi.

“No worry, no worry,” Inoichi waves. He knows how young children can be. “Now… story time, Hari-san.” His voice breaks no argument.

“Alright,” Hari nods. “But where to start, there is just so much to tell and I’m not sure how much I’m allowed to tell thank to the Statute of Secrecy…”

“Statute of Secrecy?” Inoichi asks sharply, eyes narrowed.

“Yeah, good place to start,” Hari grumbled, eyeing him warily. “I’m not from around here but… you ninjas… you have some special abilities, right? And everyone knows it and you can show them off to everyone and there is no problem about it, even when you show them to people who don’t have those… those powers?”

“… I suppose that it’s a way to summarize it, yes” Inoichi says slowly. Damn, he wishs Shikaku was in the room too; his old teammate would keep the conversation on rail more easily. They were getting nowhere. Should he be subtle or… Oh, fuck it, he decides. “May I speak bluntly, Hari-san? I can tell you’re not a ninja, but you’re not powerless, are you? And,” he looks at the children, “they’re not either, are they?”

Hari tenses. There is fierce protectiveness in his eyes the moment you mention the kids before him. “You let them out of…!”

“Whatever questions I have aren’t for them,” Inoichi replies bluntly. “Personally, I do not wish to get them involved at all. But if you don’t start making sense, then the decision will be out of my hands.” He pauses and breaths deeply. “I will add that, as a father, I do not understand why you took them in what may possibly be harm’s way, especially when everything you say or do doesn’t add up. It has not escaped me that backpack of yours is a sort of perfectioned storage scroll,” he points silkily, making Hari startle “nor the fact that the children aren’t speaking our language, even if I can clearly hear them when they speak to you.” He pauses, face hard before easing his expression. “I do not believe you to be an enemy,” he says truthfully, “but I can hardly trust you at this point and you’re not giving me a good reason to. Now, what do you have to say, Hari-san?”

“… I’m not powerless, no,” Hari finally concedes, looking both angry and resigned. “But I don’t do… ninja stuff either,” he waves. “Not that I’m sure what you all can do, I just know the broad strokes. But from what I gathered, seeing some of you people in action, my power is… different. Where I come from, those like me are a minority. What we can do… it scared people. A lot. We were getting persecuted – hunted and killed – because of it.”

If that doesn’t sound like Kiri’s attitude toward bloodlines, Inoichi doesn’t know what it was, but he holds his tongue.

“A couple of centuries ago,” Hari continues, “it grew so bad that our leaders decided we needed to hide from Mug… normal people,” he corrects himself, stumbling upon a word. Translation issue? Something he’s not allowed to share? “I won’t go in details but by the end of it, we had formed our own, parallel society, with our own Ministry, leaders, police force, laws,…” he lists on his fingers. “And the most important of those laws is the Statute of Secrecy. Basically, we’re to make sure… normal people… never get a hint that we exist. But it’s not always easy.” He looks briefly over his shoulder.

“Children like to show off, don’t they?” Inoichi hums thoughtfully, thinking of his little Ino, his various nephews and nieces and cousins, and most of the clan children he knows.

“If it was only showing off,” Hari says bitterly, which Inoichi took note of; painful experience somewhere in childhood? “Kids don’t know how to control their power and it’s even worse when they come from families who are normal and they don’t realize they are the ones causing whatever happen around them. And when normal people catch on, some of them get scared and angry and…” he pauses, shaking his head. “I think you get the picture.”

Yes, Inoichi gets it.

“It must be hard to keep things under wrap,” Inoichi says evenly though he was thinking hard about the implications. Like a Kekkai Gekkai going out of hand amidst unprepared civilians, he thought grimly. It doesn’t usually happen in Konoha, but in countries where clans were hunted down, like Kiri? It is a recipe for disaster.

“We got people to deal with that. People who can… modify memories,” Hari allows, “and repair whatever damages was done. I don’t do that!” he added quickly as Inoichi’s startled look. “Honest! The memory thing, I mean, I do repair the damages though!”

“Let’s say I believe you,” Inoichi said after a moment, really hoping the Hokage and Shikaku weren’t missing anything. Modify memories… Even if this Hari doesn’t practice this skillset, something Inoichi prefers to reserve his judgement on, the fact he mentions it so casually is concerning to say the least. “How do those children with… normal… upbringing get… recruited… in your society?”

“… when we reach the appropriate age, we’re invited to school to learn how to control our abilities,” Hari says, lips forming a thin line. “But I take offense at the ‘recruited’ part. We’re not… we’re not a military organization or an army or anything of the like,” he insists. “The school delivers letters and we’re given the choice into going or be homeschooled. Parents who are normal are told about our existence and made to keep it secret.” Made to, uh? Inoichi wants to ask ‘how’, but he doesn’t want to interrupt the flow just yet. “That’s when the government really takes notice of children and start really tracking them and the way they use their… power. Most schools are boarding schools where we stay most of the year and only return home for the holidays. We study for a couple of year, until we graduate, then we seek jobs, get married, have kids,…” Hari shrugs. “What everybody does?”

“I see,” Inoichi murmurs to himself. It sounds… anti-climactic, especially to any ninja worth its salt. Learning to control a form of chakra and just blend in a civilian life? The land Hari heads from must be very peaceful, for letting its people have such a luxury. “So… are you breaking this Statute of Secrecy right now?”

“Yes and no?” Hari shrugs helplessly. “I asked friends and it’s iffy. Elemental Nations aren’t like home and you people aren’t Muggles – normal people,” he corrects himself, “so technically I’m not breaking any law admitting I have special powers, but the line between whatever I can say and not is thin.” He pauses, face twisting. “I have been… allowed to share some things, but I’ve been forbidden to share a lot more. Emphatically. So please, do no pursue that line of questions, I won’t be able to answer past a certain point anyway.”

Oh, but Inoichi wants to! However, the way Hari had spoken, his choice of words… He supposes there might have been powers akin to sealing involved. If so, then no matter what, he’d never get straight answers out of the man. A pity, but that wasn’t his priority here unless the Hokage decided otherwise.

“Very well,” he nods amiably. “Perhaps we can go back to your link to the Uzumaki clan?”

“I guess we can,” Hari says warily. “Though I think I need to finish a few explanation first, so you have a full picture. If I may?” At Inoichi’s nod, Hari closes his eyes and sighs. “It’s actually a very old argument, one dating back from even before we cut tie with normal society. There are… families in my country, in my world, who have held their powers since centuries. In order to keep it, they always other people with powers themselves and they started to think of themselves as better than those who were first generation users. Looked down on them, gave them names and epithets and started to discriminate after them; I think you get the idea?” Hari comments, sounding tired, which Inoichi can’t begrudge him.

Clan shinobi looking down on civilian-born shinobi, Inoichi thinks with distaste. Oh, he is familiar with it, even if he had never subscribed to the idea himself. Being born in a clan gave you an advantage in most situation, true, but ninja born to civilian families had a knack for dealing with clients and helped to bridge their society together.

“It was bullshit, by the way,” Hari says, looking quickly at the children as if to make sure they hadn’t heard and Inoichi snorts. “Your origins never mattered. One of my best friends was from a normal family and she was the best student in our year. Anyway, about ten years before I was born, things… really went downhill. A powerful wizard rose to prominence among those discontents with the Statute. He started to advocate the killing of anyone with powers born from normal people – and the subjugation if not the eradication of normal people, too, while he was at it.”

“Was he insane?” Inoichi blurts out, unable to help himself, because such a reasoning? It’s simply too big, too fucking stupid! This is like… going after civilians and exterminating them until none were left. It makes no fucking sense!

No matter how little they may like treating with civilians, even the most hard-hearted ninja or the most bull-headed clan member knows they need civilians and their money and funds their lifestyle.

Hari… Hari laughs. “Oh, totally, but he had many supporters among the bigoted, and unfortunately for us, there were plenty of them. They weren’t all in for the extermination thing, I admit; most were just pricks who fancied themselves better than everyone else, but… Psychos gathered around him all the same. The few who tried to backdown and leave usually didn’t live long.” He passes a hand through his hair, grimacing. “The authorities tried to stop him, but…” he shakes his head. “Lack of training in guerilla warfare, terror campaigns, assassinations, random attacks,… The Ministry was overwhelmed. From there, it devolved into a civil war. A civil war we had to try and hide from normal people, which was even worse. The Ministry was losing ground – and that’s how a vigilant group started to rise in answer, to try and protect those they could.”

“And how do you tie in that?” Inoichi asks, looking at Hari over his fingers. As interesting as it was, it makes Inoichi no closer to the answers he sought.

"Through my parents,” Hari explains, passing a hand in his hair again. “My mother… I don’t know if she ever had powers like yours. Maybe she had, I’ll probably never know. Anyway, what she definitely had, was power like other people in my country. Might have gotten it from her father’s side of the family, for all I know. When she got old enough, she received a letter for our national boarding school and went. She met my father and after finish their schooling, they both joined that vigilant group I mentioned. They were… They were good at what they did.” He sounds proud, but also very sad and Inoichi doesn’t need to hear more to guess.

“And they got killed for it,” the blond man states, not without sympathy as Hari nodded briefly.

“When I was 15 months old. They… they were supposed to be in hiding after my birth,” Hari murmurs. “But the person who was supposed to help hide them ended up betraying them and then he showed up. The leader of the other side,” he explains. “Personally murdered them.”

“But not you,” Inoichi noted. Mercy from an enemy for an infant? Or something else?

“He tried. He missed,” Hari replied in a clipped tone. “It’s not important right now. What’s important is that after my parents’ death, they had to put me somewhere. Since my father had no family left, I got handed to my mother’s – specifically to her older sister, Petunia. She was the only one left at the time; my maternal grandparents had both passed away some time before,” he explained further, Inoichi just nodding along as Hari continued. “Unlike my mother, Yuri, my Aunt had never showed any inkling of power. She had badly wanted it, though, and when she learned she’d never be able to do what my mother could… she grew… jealous?” he finished lamely.

“Just so we’re clear, neither your mother nor your aunt were trained as ninja? Despite being part of the Uzumaki clan, according to you?” Inoichi prompted.

“No,” Hari shook his head before pausing, frowning. “Well… I’m practically sure they weren’t. My Aunt had an almost supernatural talent to pick gossip, sure, but I don’t think that counts. And my mother might have read those scrolls and she might have used those seals but…”

“Scrolls? Seals?” Inoichi jumped in. Could it be? Uzumaki Sealing Techniques Scrolls? Still intact?

“Well, yes,” Hari blinks, reaching for his backpack and rummaging through it. “I found them in Aunt Petunia’s attic when I had to clear her house. Ah, there is,” he says triumphally as he took out a scroll. Inoichi’s heart beats faster and oh, he hadn’t thought he’d ever see a genuine relic like this one again. You don’t find scrolls bearing the symbol of Uzushiogakure proudly displayed on the outside that much since the Uzumaki clan fell.

“May I?” he asks, offering a hand to receive the scroll.

Hari hesitates, but not for long, thankfully. “Sure,” he says after a moment, “but don’t try to open it, please? When one of my friends tried, he received an electric shock that took him out for two hours. I wouldn’t want you to end up like him.”

Inoichi almost drops the scroll. “Electric shock?” he blurts. That’s… scrolls don’t do that.

“Well… my other friend theorized it’s a sort of anti-thievery system?” Hari replies meekly. “I could open it just fine but I was the only one who could. I mean, asides of Anna and Naomi,” he looks at the kids again. The girls, recognizing their names, look up as Hari waves at them. They chat, but Inoichi doesn’t pay attention, all eyes on the scroll in his hand, thinking furiously.

“Did you read them?” he asks intently, watching the younger man like a hawk.

Green eyes blinks. “Well, yes? With some help because I couldn’t understand all the technical terms, but I did read them. Uh, I tried to replicate the drawings inside, the… ‘seals’, as you put it,” he confesses, looking embarrassed.

“And did you manage?” Inoichi asks, heart beating a little faster, wondering if he’s locked in with a fuiinjutsu master after all. Even if your chakra control is mediocre, you don’t need much in order to draw and power a Seal.

Hari bites his lip briefly. “Mostly?” he offers and fuuuuuuck, Inoichi briefly thinks. “I can do the simplest ones easy enough but the rest…” he shakes his head. “It’s not that I can’t make them work, because I can, if I really applies myself. It’s more like… my writing isn’t precise enough to activate them? Or I don’t have the right way to activate them? My friends who helped me test it out are confident I can pull it off with enough practice, however. One of them compared it to high-level Runes; if I had known it’d come in handy in my life, I would have picked it at school,” he rambles a bit, leaving Inoichi feeling bemused. “Ah, well. They’re fun to study, if anything. It helps to pass time when I’m not looking after the kids.”

The way he smiles would be sweet, if not for the situation.

“Right,” Inoichi replies faintly. Fuuinjutsu study as a pastime for a… what, exactly? A househusband? That was a new one for him.

If it had been anyone else, Inoichi would have called it a lie. But the problem is… it is no lie. Hari is too earnest, too embarrassed. Either he’s the best liar Inoichi has ever encountered (he isn’t; the guy doesn’t feel like he could lie convincingly to save his life), or he just thinks everyone knows fuiinjutsu.

Given Hari is a civilian as well as a foreigner who has no idea how ninja skills work, it’s probably the case.

“… would you mind if I showed to someone else?” he asks after a moment of silence. “I’d just like to confirm its authenticity. It would be returned right to you once we’re done, of course.”

He’s honest about it. If it is an Uzushiogakure scroll – an Uzumaki scroll, even – and Hari is indeed related to the leading clan, then it should be his by right. Even if he isn’t from Konoha, or isn’t a ninja.

Hari shrugs. “Sure. I got plenty of others too, if you’re interested.”

… Kami-sama, that young man has no idea what he’s offering.

The Hokage was going to choke. Or Jiraya was going to have an aneurism. Perhaps both, Inoichi thinks faintly. There is a chance those aren’t genuine Uzumaki scrolls, but the chances they still came from Whirlpools Country were pretty high all the same.

To get one back, freely offered? Inoichi knows fuiinjutsu Masters who’d kill for a glimpse of what might be hidden inside!

“I thank you, Hari-san. Now, you were saying about your Aunt…?”

Because they still haven’t reached the part where Hari explains how he’s an Uzumaki by blood, even if all Inoichi has learned so far IS interesting.

“Ah, right.” Hari grimaces, as if he doesn’t really want to talk about it but knows he has no choice. “My Aunt. There are still things I don’t understand about her, or about the way she acted. I have plenty of questions without answers because she took them to her grave.” He shakes his head. “If I had to resume, I would that that she and my mother… they didn’t have a good relationship. By the time my mother died, I think they only communicated by letters. She was married and she had a son barely older than me, both of them normal. She wanted nothing to do with my parents and the secret society they belonged to, but she still took me in and agreed to raise me. For a certain value of raising,” he adds under his breath, which Inoichi usually catches. There is a history there, one he could dig with a little more time and the right questions, but not yet. “I am my parents’ son; while there was always a chance I wouldn’t, I showed signs of power all through childhood, though I didn’t necessarily pick on it.”

“What sort of signs?” Inoichi inquires, tearing his eyes away from the scroll he keeps turning in his hand.

“Hmm? Oh, things like… my teacher’s toupee turning blue when I was stressed,” Hari shrugs, unbothered by the way Inoichi looks at him. Is he serious? “Or a hideous pull I didn’t want to wear shrinking without reason. My hair grew back on one night once, too, after being cut too short. And there was the time I ended up on the school’s rooftop while running away from my cousin and his friends.”

“Did you… teleport?” Inoichi asks incredulously. Was it the Hirashin?

“Perhaps?” Hari replies helplessly. “I’m still not sure of what happened. I may have simply flown. My mother did fly, when she was a kid,” he adds, looking thoughtful.

“Your mother…?” When this conversation would be over, Shikaku’d better hand him sake – the best he could find. Flying! If the process could be replicated… But it probably relied on a specific form of chakra use, Inoichi reminded himself sharply. One that had been stumbled on accidentally and may not be reproduced. Unless it was tied to a bloodline? So many questions, and so little answers… “No, never mind,” he waves. “Please, continue.”

“When I was old enough, I went to the same school as my parents,” Hari picks up his story. “Midway through my schooling, I… the man who murdered my parents… came back.” He swallows. “And the war started anew. Except this time… I was the one he was after. You see,” he breaths, “after his disappearance, I had become a… a symbol. He had failed to kill me, despite trying. People attributed it to me but I was a baby. If anything, it’s my mother who did something. Using things she learned at school, or things she learned in her mother’s scrolls, perhaps mixing both. Not that anyone knew about that part,” he mumbles. “All they saw was that he was gone, potentially dead, and I was there, having survived something which should have killed me. And that guy… you can say he took his personal failure very, very badly. So he went after me. My Aunt and her family went into hiding, since they were… civilians… and I went off to fight. We… we had to run for months before managing to find a way to bring him down, but we did.” He swallows again. “By then, I was a legal adult and I had no reason to return to my Aunt’s house. I went back to school to finish my last year. My relationship with her husband and her son had never been good either, so I was surprised when my cousin actually sent me a card to let me known he had become a father.”

“The boy or the girls?” Inoichi asks. Hari has said the girls were able to touch the scroll without harm, but what of the boy?

“The girls. Took me by surprise,” he shakes his head, “and I don’t want to imagine what his parents said. Being a father at barely 18 is not exactly common where I come from. The fact his girlfriend was… like me… probably made it worse. Tedi, him, is my godson – his father was one of my father’s best friends,” Harry explains. “He and his wife died during the last battle of the war, Tedi was barely a month old.” He bites his lip. “His grandmother was raising him until recently, but her health took a turn for the worse and…” he looks down. “I’m his guardian now.” He pauses. “Just like I’m the guardian for Anna and Naomi. My cousin and his wife got into an accident, alongside my Aunt and her husband. They were the only ones who made it.”

“My condolences,” Inoichi states. He tapped a finger on the table, trying to resume what he had learned.

Hari had powers – probably a weird chakra mutation specific to the people of the country he grew up in, either in its form or its molding. What it entailed was uncertain, but he could ask later. Hari had not received a shinobi education and not a military education either, given he had used ‘vigilant’ to define the combatants on his side. Despite this, Hari had survived a war he hadn’t been prepared for but still fought in because he had no choice – and probably wouldn’t have backed down from anyway, if it meant protecting his precious people – and had obviously lost people he knew and/or cared for in, such as the parents of his godchild. Barely back to his feet, he was saddled with raising not one, not two, but three children under five (with what income?) while dealing with the loss of the last few family members he had, even if their relationship had apparently been poor. Then he learned he may have still relatives alive in another country entirely while also stumbling on unfamiliar familial history and previously unknown ninja skills. And now that boy was out to try and find more family to either support him or at least let him known he wasn’t completely alone.

A true sob story… If it is real.

Personally, Inoichi thinks it was at, oh, at least 80%, give or take. Let’s say 85%, to be generous. There are still details that didn’t add up, things Hari hasn’t told him (or couldn’t, if he was Sealed to not divulgate more than the barebones) but the story feels genuine. Using his Clan jutsu to dig into the younger man’s mind and confirm it would be necessary, of course, but Inoichi feels reasonably certain Hari’s memories would align with is claims.

Now, there is still one detail to deal with.

“So, now we have your story, do you mind to tell me how it links back to the Uzumaki and Uzumaki Kushina?” he asks lightly.

Because that’s what Inoichi has been asked to dig up, and now they have the background out of the way, perhaps Hari will finally answer the true question.

“Ah, that.” Hari bites his lip. “As I said, my Aunt and her family died suddenly, asides of the twins. As I was one of the last relatives they had, asides of my uncle’s sister, I was asked to handle the funerals and start emptying their house.” He pauses, as if searching his words. “Growing up,” he says slowly, “I was encouraged to never ask questions, so I never did. I knew neither my Aunt nor my Uncle would have answered me anyway. I didn’t know anything about my grandparents until I found the boxes my Aunt had kept with papers and pictures and other... mementos. That’s where I found the scrolls,” he nodded toward the one Inoichi still held, “and the family archives, including my grandparents’ marriage contract, their pictures and uh, the letters. They were in Japanese, so I couldn’t read them at first. I had to bring them to friends who could help me translate and it took a while. You mind if…?” he asks, gesturing at his bag.

“Go ahead,” Inoichi replies evenly, looking as the other man’s hand disappeared inside. How deep was that thing, exactly, and how much could it contain? Such an item would be a true boon to have on mission; the amount of things one could pack, especially since the bag didn’t seem to be weighted down by the content…

An ideal tool to complement Sealing scrolls, if used right.

Hari puts down a heavy-looking album, a couple of other scrolls, and a stack of envelopes neatly tied up by a ribbon. “Let’s see,” he murmurs, opening the book. “This one is a good one to start,” he said, turning the album and pushing it toward Inoichi, who leaned down without a comment, scanning the pictures.

They are old, that much was certain. He looks nonplussed at the middle-aged couple in what had to be wedding gear on the first double-page; a blond man with graying temples and blue-grey eyes, a woman with long, bright red hair and intense green eyes. He can’t decipher the names under, but he doesn’t need them. It had to be ‘Grandma’ Uzumaki Erika and her groom, whoever he had been. He flips through the pages, pausing as he sees one picture of a much younger looking Uzumaki Erika with a little girl on her lap, her hair as bright as the person who was obviously her mother. Her eyes, though, are nuance of violet that makes Inoichi freeze.

Kushina had had the same eyes.

“Uzumaki Kaede,” Hari says quietly. “My grandmother’s first child by her first marriage, according to what I found. I’m not sure when she got widowed and moved over to Eregesu, though, or why she left her daughter behind. My grandfather probably wouldn’t have minded raising her. Granted,” he said after a moment, lips twitching, “it probably wouldn’t have been an issue by the time my grandparents met.”

“Oh? Why is that?” Inoichi asks, still examining the picture, taking in the details. He’d have to ask to borrow the album for analysis too.

“Because my grandmother had her first child when she was in her mid-twenties,” Hari smiles, but it’s mirthless. “And when my grandparents married and my mother was born, they were both well over fifty years old.”

Inoichi raises his head, startled. “You’re kidding,” he says flatly, going back to the wedding picture. Uzumaki Erika didn’t look that old… but then again, Uzumaki tended to keep youthful looks for long, if he remembered right. Mito-sama hadn’t looked very old when she died, and she had to be pushing a hundred.

Having children past fifty, though… it is hard to swallow.

His doubts must have shown, because Hari smiles ruefully. “I know, I was startled too when I did the math, but I’m not kidding. Grandma Erika was 52 years old when my Aunt Petunia was born, and 55 when she had my mother.”

Later, Inoichi forces himself to think. Questions later. He progressed further into the albums, searching for more interesting pictures.

And he finds it.

It is a family portrait. He doesn’t care much for the man in it – the father, Uzumaki Erika’s second husband. Uzumaki Erika doesn’t look a day older than on her second wedding day. But the children… oh, the children at their side!

The girl on the right has inherited her father’s blond hair and blue eyes. She is thin, almost painfully so, and had a long neck neither parents had (but that Inoichi remembers seeing on other pictures of Uzumaki clan members). She has her mother’s nose, though, and wears a pinched expression. Had she been unhappy? Preoccupied? Had the picture been taken at a wrong time? It is hard to say. But the way she looks at the objective reminds Inoichi painfully of the way Kushina looked at idiots – when she wasn’t blowing in their face.

The girl on the left… She takes a lot after her mother. The big, green eyes, the thick red hair. Hers were at least two or three shades lighter, though, and she has a skin tone more akin to her father.

She looks a lot like another little girl Inoichi had known. The hair are paler and shorter, the eyes are green instead of violet. The face is thinner than Kushina at the same age and the jaw isn’t quite the same but…

The resemblance is astounding.

The kind of resemblance you easily find between various clan members with close relatives in common.

Inoichi looks up, and mentally compares Hari to his mother as a girl. He has the same eyes and the same nose – an Uzumaki nose, apparently – and her cheekbones. For the rest, he probably takes after his own father. “Your mother and her sister around ten years old?” he asks, voice strangely croaking.

He hopes the Hokage and Shikaku won’t mind, but seeing a Kushina look-alike, even in a picture, is something he was unprepared for. Even with Hari claiming they were close relatives, Inoichi hadn’t expected the resemblance to be so strong.

Hari just nods in silence.

That isn’t a definitive proof. But it certainly is one more proofToukou Hari could actually be Uzumaki Kushina’s cousin.

Well… fuck, he thinks desperately. “And the letters?” He asks, eyes wandering on the stack. The envelopes are in different colors, he notices right away. It was probably significant in some way. Different senders, most likely.

Or mission orders, maybe.

“Received from different relatives of hers,” Hari supplies, removing the ribbon. “Most of them are from Kaede. There is one when she’s telling her mother she’s pregnant; that’s how I learned I had another cousin,” he explains, “and another where she mentions Kushina left for Konoha and that’s how I knew where to search for. Those are the cream colored envelopes. The blue ones seem to have come from the village administration; things about her house and uh, her salary? The red ones… Honestly, I have no idea what they’re about,” he confides, embarrassed. “Hāmaionii and I weren’t able to translate them all, sadly. It just… it’s nonsense when we tried,” he explains, “as if they were coded.”

Definitely mission orders, Inoichi thinks. Sweet Kami, did that boy had any idea what he might be holding?

… No, no he doesn’t, the blond ninja thinks painfully, not for the first time. Hari is civilian; whatever training he might have undertaken to participate in a civil war, it didn’t hone him to think like a ninja. For all he must have known the Uzumaki were a ninja clan, Hari doesn’t seem to have made the connection his grandmother had been a ninja too. Naivety? Willful blindness? He doesn’t know the other man enough to hazard a guess. But Inoichi had seen the Uzushiogakure forehead protector tied on young Erika’s arm in her picture with little Kaede, and he entertains no illusion.

“I need to take them all to verify your claims, you realize,” Inoichi says, breathing deeply. If they’re in Uzushiogakure codes, they may be able to translate them and verify the content. Even with the village destroyed, Konoha kept the cyphers. They may be still of use.

Hari grimaces but doesn’t seem surprised. “It’s okay. I made copies. But the album…” he hesitates and look at it with worry.

“It’ll be returned to you in one piece,” Inoichi promises. It isn’t an heirloom, but he knows when an object is precious regardless. “I’m going to drop them off with someone, I won’t be long.”

“Sure,” Hari nods as Inoichi rises. “Uh, Yamanaka-san? About Kushina… I know you have security procedures and all that, but do you think I can see her soon?” he asks and Inoichi tries very hard to ignore the helpful tone in the younger man’s voice.

He doesn’t answer as he leaves the room.

He doesn’t think he could have lied convincingly anyway.

“Do you believe him?” the Hokage asks Nara Shikaku as they muses over the ‘conversation’ between Inoichi and Toukou Hari. The Hokage has taken out a bottle of sake and they’re on their second cup already.

“Hmm, I do, yes,” Shikaku replies, deep in thought as he stares down at his half-empty cup, wondering if he shouldn’t go for a third already. Now isn’t the time to get drunk, not yet, but damn if it’s not tempting because the presence of a blood relative of Kushina here and the potential ramifications are making his head hurt, and that’s only as the Jounin Commander of Konoha. He doesn’t want to imagine what’s going on in Hokage-sama’s head.

“Just like that?” the old man asks, not quite smiling, and Shikaku waves.

“Oh, don’t get me wrong. I don’t trust him; there are too many things he hasn’t told us, too many blanks in his story for my taste. But if you’re asking me if I believe he’s really of Uzumaki blood, the answer is ‘yes’.” His lips twitches upward briefly. “And I think you believe it too, Hokage-sama.”

“Hmph,” the old man grumbles. “Let’s just say that if he’s an impostor, he’s the most convincing I have ever seen.” He put down his cup. “Some of the things he said…” he trails off.

Shikaku nods slowly. “The supposed age difference between the oldest and youngest sister? That’d be thirty years. It seems… impossible.” Not in their world, where people tend to die young, except when they’re the best. Plus, no kunoichi Shikaku knows would still be able to safely bear a child past the age of 40, never mind the age of 50. It’d be easy to call it a lie.

Then again…

Everyone knew the Uzumaki’s clan had had large chakra reserves and a great vitality. Uzumaki by blood aged well in their old age. What people never stopped to consider was how deep this vitality run. Sure, they know the Uzumaki have long lifespans if they don’t die in combat and they age a little more slower than the rest of the world but… it goes further than that.

It’s a little known fact and one Sarutobi Hiruzen is only privy to thank to chats with his former pupil. Tsunade had often bemoaned the fact she hadn’t inherited ‘the good genetics’ of her grandmother’s clan.

The Sandaime hums and looks at his Commander as if imparting a big secret (and in a way, it is). “Uzumaki Mito’s own mother was near 60 when she gave birth to her last child, that child being Mito-sama. Her oldest sibling was near 30 years older than her and had a child of his own when she was born,” he informs him quietly, seeing sharp calculation in Shikaku’s eyes before his glance turns contemplative. “She was far from being an exception, even if it wasn’t completely usual either.”

Fact, pure fact that gives some credence to the tale of young Hari, Shikaku thinks.

“Ah,” he murmurs, adding it to the list of details that end up making the stranger’s tale more credible, after all. No wonder the Hokage is inclined to believe their ‘guest’.

Still…

The Hokage hums. “It just seems… very fortuitous that such a man shows on our doorsteps now. Especially with Uzumaki heirlooms.”

“Good thing he warned us about the shocks, eh?” Shikaku chuckles, but the Hokage doesn’t smile. Given three Chuunin and two Jounins have ended up in the hospital trying to open the scrolls, he can’t blame him. No one has managed to so far and the Hokage has considered recalling Jiraya to Konoha immediately to take a look.

Personally, Shikaku doesn’t see the hurry. It is obvious that the scrolls are genuine and that they are protected. If he had to hazard a guess, he’d put his money on the scrolls reacting to chakra signatures; any non-Uzumaki who tried to get their gritty fingers on their secrets would be lucky not to die.

Truthfully, it surprises him nobody had died yet. Fuuinjutsu masters should have been able to make deadlier traps to protect their secrets. But, he thinks with a mental kick, if those scrolls have been written by, oh, an old lady who had a civilian husband, one who could have gotten his hands on them accidentally and she didn’t want to see him dead on accident,… Yeah, that’d explain the ‘low’ security.

He turns more serious when he speaks next. “Intelligence is still trying to decode the letters he handed us. So far, they’ve confirmed they match the old Uzushiogakure cyphers Mito-sama used and that we kept, but the level of encryption is giving them trouble. The personal, non-encrypted letters were rather… interesting in themselves,” the scarred man adds with a hum.

“Report,” the Hokage says, all business now, and Shikaku inclines his head.

“It’s half guesswork on my part, Hokage-sama, but… Uzumaki Erika was probably sent on a long-term infiltration mission,” Shikaku replies flatly. “Get to Eregesu, insert herself in the civilian population, watch and report what she could. Not sure of the finality, I admit; searching for allies? Watching for a potential threat? Testing the water for opening diplomatic relationships?” he shrugs. “Could be anything and everything. Uzumaki made herself scarce and furthered her cover by marrying a local and maintained the contact with her village through her letters to her daughter Kaede, which was as good a cover as any and would have been innocuous to potential watcher.” There he frowns. “I’m unsure if she had planned to have other children, truth to be told.”

A grunt of acknowledgement. “An accident?”

“Or wistful thinking on her part; she was isolated from her countrymen and her own child, after all,” Shikaku points out. It could happen with long term assignments and Shikaku, while he doesn’t approve, can understand why it happens. On a practical point, it helps to further covers – you’re often less suspicious when you have a spouse and a child at home than when you are a loner with few attachments. Sometimes, it’s just an accident, because dealing with the stress of a long undercover work makes you slip. Shikaku doesn’t judge; ninja they may be, but it takes a particular mindset not to ever flinch.

The problem is always when the mission had to end… and the family the agent created be left behind, because more often than not, a village can’t afford to extract them. And given how far Eregesu seems to be, it’s unlikely it was ever considered for Uzumaki Kaede’s second family. Something Shikaku and the Hokage both know and suspect, if the glance they exchange in that moment means anything. Shikaku has to cough. “Anyway, it’s the most likely reason why she didn’t train her daughters as ninja, though probably not the only one.”

“You had Hyuga Hibari watch Toukou Hari-san, I take?” the Hokage asks with a raised eyebrow and Shikaku nods in confirmation.

“All the way from the moment he was brought from the gates to the end of his interview with Inoichi,” he confirmed. “According to Hibari-kun, Hari-san has very large chakra reserves – and the girls too. His godson’s are average.” He intertwined his fingers. “While large chakra reserves aren’t a proof he is of Uzumaki clan per se, it adds a little more credence to his history.”

“But?” the Hokage asks, raising an eyebrow.

“On the whole, Hibari-kun says that his inspection of Hari-san and his charges do match with what we know of foreign traders. Like them, Toukou Hari-san has a chakra system, but the coils are… warped, which would make it hard to use chakra,” Shikaku enunciates carefully. “However, the way they’re warped isn’t quite the same as the traders we hava encounters with. In their case, the disposition of their tenketsu and the natural way their chakra flows would stop any possibility for active molding and release. In Hari-san’s case, however, the coils are open enough to let chakra through, but with limited effects.”

“So he can mold chakra and uses jutsu?” the Hokage asks sharply.

“He could, if someone taught him how to properly do so,” Shukaku confirms. “Which we already knew through Hari’s own admission that he tried to draw and activate Seal with moderate success. But if you’re question is actually ‘can he use offensive jutsu?’, my answer would be ‘no’. His condition isn’t a true problem to use Seals, I guess, but when it comes to combat jutsu, even with training, it’s unlikely Hari could do more than C-ranks techniques. Perhaps B ones, if he’s pushing it. He could take up taijutsu or kenjutsu instead, of course; on that front, he has no physical limitation.”

All in one, Toukou Hari has the markings of an average shinobi, no more, no less, just like most shinobi coming from a civilian background. Ironic for an Uzumaki, Shikaku thinks briefly, but then again, all clans are average members among them.

“Ah,” the Hokage muses, lighting his pipe. “And the children?” He doesn’t ask if Hyuga Hibari checked them over, because of course he did.

“Hmm, that’s where it becomes interesting,” Shikaku smiles. He loves a good mystery, and Toujou Hari was very kind to provide. “The boy, first. Little Tedi-kun has warped chakra coils too, but not quite in the same way as Hari-san. The way chakra flows through him is… different. If I have to take a guess, I suspect that it’s the true source of whatever ‘power’ Hari-san’s society use. An unique way to mold and use chakra through alternate use of their tenketsu.” And oh, the possibilities there! Shikaku burns to ask just how they managed to do it, and what they can all do. He’ll have to wait for that, however. “But that’s just a guess. Tenketsu and chakra coils like that are not really suited for ninja training, though; the quantities of chakra they can mold at any given time are too small to power more than D-level jutsu. Hari-san is probably an outlier thank to his Uzumaki heritage, which his godson is lacking.”

“That doesn’t mean the boy can’t become a ninja,” the Hokage points out, and Shikaku concedes the point easily. You don’t need to be powerhouse to be a successful ninja; you just need to know how to play your strengths right. “And the girls?”

“Uzumaki through and through,” Shikaku chuckles more warmly. “We compared what we saw with Kushina’s medical records as well as Naruto and Mito-sama. Large chakra reserves for them both, though smaller than their ‘Uncle’. Might be because they’re still very young, however, and with potential for growth. One of them has very warped chakra coils, so I’m not sure she’d be suited for shinobi training, but the other…” he pauses, measuring his words. “That one has near perfectly normal chakra coils. Perfectly suited to become a kunoichi, and a powerful one at that.”

A light if interest dance in the Hokage’s eyes.

“Interesting. Your analysis, Shikaku?”

The scarred man shrugs. “I’m not a medic-nin, Hokage-sama. She probably just inherited the good genes – which, honestly might be a miracle.” He taps a finger on the table. “Let’s get back on Hari-san’s family, yes? Assuming the chakra coil warping is a genetic mutation common to all inhabitants of his country and a dominant trait, Hari-san’s Mother and his Aunt might have suffered the same ailment as him, rendering them unsuitable for ninja training – especially given their mother was supposed to play harmless civilian. Wherever Uzumaki Erika chose not to train or teach her daughters by herself or was ordered not to, now, that’s the question.” He shakes his head. Maybe, if they could decode the letters, he’d have more answers, but he doesn’t count on it. Anything too incriminating would have been burned a long time ago. “Chances are good that his cousin either suffered the same chakra system warping as Hari-san – or, alternatively, he had a good chakra system but never knew he could use it, since foreigners don’t use chakra. It would, hypothetically, explain why one of his daughters has a ‘normal’ system by our account.”

“For someone who’s not a medic-nin, you have given it much through,” the Hokage comments dryly.

“Since you ordered me to allow only the less people possible in the decoding and study of the letters, I had plenty of time to think, Sir,” the Jounin Commander replies. “And I have a few theories about this man and why he came now. I just need a way to test them.”

Because Shikaku had time to think, of yes, and plenty of it. He has carefully listened to Hari’s explanations during his interrogation/interview with Inoichi, and pondered. Because…

Why Kushina?

Why, really, even with the close relation put asides?

“Hmm, I suppose you want to talk with him directly, then?” the Hokage looks at him sharply.

“With your permission, of course, Hokage-sama,” the scarred man bows.

“Granted,” the old man replies. “Shikaku? Just… be careful. If he’s truly an Uzumaki, as we both think he is, then he could become a precious ally for the village. One I’d prefer not to antagonize if it could mean…” he trails off, looking out of the window at the streets sprawling around the tower. Shikaku follows his gaze, spotting a dash of orange disappearing among the walkers.

Ah. Of course. It would be killing two birds in one stone, Shikaku thinks, if they could actually trust Hari-san with the care of one Uzumaki Naruto.

Oh, there would be plenty of objections, of course, and Shikaku can formulate a few of his own. Toukou Hari was a wild card, not someone loyal to the village. Can the care of their Jinchuuriki really be entrusted to him? Could he teach the child loyalty to Konoha? No, Shikaku doubts it. But is Toukou Hari loyal to family, and willing to take him yet another child under his wing? That, he definitely is, Shikaku thinks, already drawing plans.

Kami know young Naruto could use an actual adult looking after him. Which reminds him…

“… Should I mention Uzumaki Naruto in our conversation?” he asks cautiously.

“If you feel you have no other choice,” the Hokage nods after a moment of pondering. “But there is no need to share anything but the essential if you have to.”

“Of course, Hokage-sama,” Shikaku bows.

Well. He has his work cut for him, hasn’t he?

“Thank you for the tea,” Harry says simply with a small bow toward the man who’s sitting in front of him. Nara Shikaku, Nara-san as he wishes to be called, is at least the fourth person Hari has met so far, after Yamanaka-san and two men with white masks who accompanied him to the bathroom when he had asked to go, one time for him and five times for the kids (what? Kids needed it more often than adults!) and it’s starting to get old. At least Nara-san doesn’t look aggressive, despite the two scars on his face that looks like someone tried to cut his head off and missed.

Which… might actually be what happened, he muses as he tries not to grimace. Ninjas are… bodyguards at beast or assassins at worst, Hermione had drilled into him. Of course people try to kill them on regular basis.

“Uncle Harry, are we going home soon?” little Naomi asks, tugging on his sleeve, and Harry smiles down at her as calmly as he can.

“I think so, sweetie,” he says, reaching to ruffle her hair with his free hand. “I still need to, uh, process paperwork,” he says, giving Nara-san a look that conveys his hope he won’t be contradicted. Naomi pouts but seems okay with the answer. She’s growing bored, just like Teddy and Anna, but Harry had pulled more games for them out of his bag so they still have something to do.

He’s not here because of slow-going paperwork, though. Harry isn’t THAT naïve.

Something is wrong.

Something has been wrong since Harry mentioned the name Uzumaki in addition to Kushina’s.

“Go back to play. I’ll be finished soon and then we’ll go find a restaurant to have dinner, okay? One where they’ll have ice cream for dessert,” he says slowly, not looking at Naomi but at Nara-san, who watches him impassively. Naomi, blessed be her little heart, giggles. And go, enthusiastic with the promise of ice cream. Harry just hopes he can actually pull it because the chances he’s going to be tossed in a cell are… pretty high.

At least nobody tried to kill him so far, he thinks dejectedly, which is… something.

Not for the first time, he was starting to regret taking the kids with him. But he couldn’t leave them behind, especially not when…

“Ice cream sounds good,” Nara-san comments lightly. “If we have to stay in late and order takeouts, I’ll make sure to place an order for it.”

“How nice of you,” Harry replies on the same tone, eyes on Naomi as she returns to play with her sister and the dollhouse he pulled from his bag. Not really discreet but… well, they already know the bag is near bottomless, so why hide longer? “Nara-san… let’s cut the slack, okay?” he says flatly, rubbing his temples. “If I ask you a question, will you give me a straight answer?

Nara-san nods slowly. “I might, depending on the question,” he replies evenly.

Harry squares his shoulders. “Who did Kushina kill exactly to make us all criminals by association?” he asks and was rewarded by a blank look.

“What?” the man asks flatly.

“Well…” Harry stammers, suddenly less sure of himself. “Isn’t that why you’ve been running interferences? I mean,” he adds quickly as Nara-san keeps staring himself with a flat look, “I thought… I thought it was like Sirius…”

“Sirius?” Nara-san repeats and unlike Yamanaka-san, he didn’t seem to have trouble pronouncing it.

“My godfather,” Harry finds himself saying. He could share that much, couldn’t he? “After my parents died, he was suspected of being the one who had betrayed them and got tossed in jail.”

“And he wasn’t the traitor, I take,” Nara-san states more than he asks and Harry gives him a weary look.

“No, he wasn’t. It was… someone else,” he mutters, trying to smother his loathing when remembering Pettigrew and what was destroyed by his fault. “Another of their friends. Framed Sirius for it after setting things up to make it looks like he had been killed alongside a dozen of innocent bystanders.”

“And nobody saw anything?” Nara-san raises an eyebrow.

“No,” Harry replies in a clipped tone. “It was… Everybody knew Sirius and my father were as close as brothers and everybody thought he had been the one hiding my parents. Sirius suffered a, a nervous breakdown at the worst moment possible, after realizing what happened, how much they had been fooled. By the time he recovered, he was already in prison and the guardians couldn’t have cared less wherever he was innocent or not.”

He rubs his forehead nervously, feeling a headache coming. Speaking of Sirius has never been easy and he doesn’t want to dwell too much on the subject. He still misses his godfather fiercely even if with time, he had come to realize just how… damaged Azkaban had left Sirius. He misses having an adult who cared for him, a father-figure to lean on.

There is a reason Harry has stepped in so readily for every child of his family, by blood or adoption, who has needed him so far.

“Aaaah,” Nara-san hums noncommittally, looking thoughtful. “As enriching as it is, I’m afraid the situation is… not quite the same where Kushina is concerned.”

Harry’s heart sinks.

Not a criminal, then.

That could only leave one reason for everyone to be toeing the line around him.

“She’s dead, isn’t she?” he asks in a softer voice, finally acknowledging the fear that had gripped him for hours now. He hadn’t wanted to admit it, but he had suspected… “And… the rest of the Uzumaki too, right?”

Because if anyone had been alive, then they would have sent someone to check Harry’s claims by now, someone who could have recognized the pictures of Erika and Kaede as a child, someone who could have read whatever secret code was used in the letters to his grandmother… Harry had seen the ruins of Uzushiogakure and still he had hoped, despite knowing how thorough murderers could be when trying to wipe out a family. The Bones, the McKinnons, the Prewetts,… Hagrid had told him, the first time they had met, when Harry was barely eleven years about, about those families that Voldemort and the Death Eaters had hunted down for opposing them. His classmates had filled the details later, just like the members of the Orders who had known his parents.

He wonders briefly if it’s what happened to the Uzumaki, too; if they opposed someone who took revenge on them in the cruelest way possible.

He mourns, briefly, for the extended family he never had a chance to meet. He had hoped… even if it had been a frail hope and Hermione and Ron had warned him, but…

“They are,” Nara-san says, voice calm and almost gentle. “The clan was massacred when Uzushiogakure fell. Konoha wasn’t able to send reinforcement in time. We let our doors open, hoping survivors might make their way to us, but… none did. Until you,” the dark-haired man states, looking up and down at Harry.

It makes him feels vaguely sick. “And… and Kushina? And my Aunt? They… didn’t make it here? Kaede had written Kushina had been sent ahead to live with an older relative, did she…?”

Nara-san examines him closely. “Uzumaki Kushina arrived here safe and sound. She died only a few years ago, during an attack on the village.” His eyes soften. “I am sorry for your loss.”

It makes Harry sags. His cousin had lived past the fall of Uzushiogakure… but he had still been too late to meet her. It was unfair. He had been so excited to learn he may still have family after all and…

“Right,” he murmurs as he rubs his face. “Well, that settles it then. No one here I could ask…”

“Ask what exactly, Hari-san? Secrets of the Uzumaki clan? Or… ways to deal with a child’s chakra outbursts?” Nara-san asks levelly and Harry stiffens, stomach plummeting. How does the man…?

“No, don’t be alarmed and remain sitting, please,” Nara Shikaku says with the voice of someone who’s used to be obeyed. The man looks at him wryly. “I’ll give you that, you’re not easy to get a full read on. You know we’re dangerous and you know we weren’t going to trust you at face value, even if you were reasonably confident no-one in our village would do you harm. Reasonably confident doesn’t mean certain, however. And still you brought children with you. Three children, with whom you share blood or kinship, when you have no other family left and their security should be tantamount to you,” Nara-san drawls. “You took them half a world away at the very least, to find a relative you had never met and you couldn’t be certain was still alive OR willing to greet you with open arms. It’s risky – no, it’s reckless. And for that, I can only see one explanation. You’ve come because you need help with them – or at least one of them. One of the twins in your care, unless I miss my mark. Am I wrong?”

Ninjas were sneaky bastards, Harry thinks, lips pulled in a rictus as he thinks. “Clever of you,” he forces out, desperately not looking at Teddy and Anna and Naomi.

“You just need to pick the right clues, and you weren’t really trying to hide them,” the ninja replies evenly. “Every ninja is trained to look underneath the underneath. You skipped on it rather fast, but you did mention people in your society having to repair damages and modify memories of bystanders when witnessing ‘incidents’. And when you did… you started to turn before steeling yourself. You wanted to look at the children.”

“You caught that?” Harry asks, nonplussed. “I could have been talking just about myself. I did blow up my Uncle’s sister, once,” he points out and Nara-san doesn’t seem phased.

“You could have, true,” he nods in acceptance. “Only, you tried to keep the children mostly out of the conversation – too insistently, I must add. Trying to make them look less important, harmless. But at least one isn’t quite harmless, isn’t she? That’s why you wanted to speak to an Uzumaki. As to why Kushina specifically…” he trails off. “I think I know, but it’d be good to hear it from you directly.”

Harry looks at him and his shoulders sags, feeling as if a heavy weight settled on them.

“Do you know,” he starts, “how hard it actually is to take care of a magical child when you have no training for it? I don’t know how my best friend’s mother did, with her seven children, but they all grew up in sheltered society and were used to accidents happening. Me? Not so much, especially since I hadn’t expected…” He pauses, breathing in. “When Naomi showed signs of magic, I was surprised but not in a bad way, you know? I was mostly surprised because I didn’t think whatever cause magic could have survived contact with my Uncle Vernon’s DNA. But Naomi and Anna had my mom’s, my grandmother’s eyes and I thought, ‘well, perhaps they took more heavily after our side of the family’. I started watching Anna, wondering if she was going to make her dolls dance too, or blow up the pantry when I refused her more cookies for snack time – Teddy did it once,” he justifies himself under Nara-san’s questioning look. “I was expecting anything really – including the fact nothing weird or unexpected would arrive around her. Despite being siblings, my Aunt never had the same kind of power my mother did, you know? And at first, there really was nothing and I thought I would have to deal with two kids growing jealous one of them could do things the other couldn’t. It would have been easier,” he sighs.

Shikaku nods slowly, but doesn’t speak, and Hari continues.

“Then one morning, I entered the twins’ bedroom to find Anna walking to the ceiling, trying to catch a butterfly.”

“She got enough chakra control to stick to surface already?” Nara-san questions sharply and Harry gives him a look. It makes Harry laughs helplessly.

“I wouldn’t call that control; I’d call that momentary intent. She wanted to catch that butterfly and she run after it so much she hadn’t even noticed she was on the damn ceiling. I startled her when I entered and she fell – I caught before she hit the ground, but I was so scared… And relieved. I thought she was like Naomi, that everything would be fine. But I was wrong,” he states. “And I didn’t understand how much until she started walking up a tree to pick a flower while in full sight of normal people. I couldn’t modify people memories myself – as I said, I don’t do it; it’s delicate work and I’m not trained for that, I would cause more harm than good – so I had to call in the Ministry’s Obliviators. They did their job while I tried to coerce Anna down. When I couldn’t, someone from the Ministry lost patience and tried to…” his lips purses and he pushes down a wave of fury at the memory. “Whatever. His attempts at making Anna ‘unstick’ from the tree didn’t work, and neither did his colleagues’ or mine’s, much to their collective puzzlement. But Anna came down and we decided not to mention it, thinking it was a stray incident, easily put under wrap.”

“But it wasn’t,” Shikaku nods slowly, sounding like he understood and Harry wonders just how many shenanigans little ninja get up to.

“No, it wasn’t,” Harry confirms. “The first incident was only that, the first. Then it happened, again. And again. And again.”

“You didn’t manage to make the kid obey you?” the ninja seems surprised and Harry laughs joylessly.

“Oh, Anna did obey me about the tree or wall-walking thing. But then the chains started to appear…”

“… Chakra chains,” Shikaku sucks in a breath. “It’s one thing to suspect it and another to hear it. Your little cousin inherited quite the ability, you know.”

“I had gathered,” the green-eyed man retorts. “Do you have any idea how scary is it to see chains appears from nowhere, somehow sprouting out of a little kid’s body, because she got startled or angry or scared while playing with other children? And how desperate I grew when nothing I did could make them disappear? Or when it only did when she fainted, apparently out of exhaustion? The Accidental Magic Reversal Squad wasn’t able to do anything either, and they tried everything they could think of. The Obliviators had to be called in each time. People who should never have come close to her in the first place started to take her asides and scold her for ‘wasting their time’ – and I may have lost my nerves and punched one for that,” he admits.

He had almost gotten arrested, too, but on the moment, Harry hadn’t cared. All he had seen was an Auror abusing his position to bully a child, his child, and he had just reacted. Good thing a lot of the present Ministry workers had been parents themselves and had understood why he had snapped, else it would have escalated further.

“Anna was growing upset and it only worsened the situation, because it amplified Naomi’s own accidental magic incidents. And that when Ministry workers started to mention St Mungo.” His eyes are hard as he says it; even now, the very idea they suggested he put Anna in a permanent room there fills him with rage and he understands, at last, why the Dumbledores did what they did, why they preferred to hide Ariana.

“Given your tone,” Nara comments, “I don’t suppose it’s a good place.”

“It’s a hospital,” Harry answers, teeth clenched. “They have rooms where they keep permanent residents. People too injured to return to their families – or who represent a danger for the Statute but don’t deserve prison.” His hands clenches in fists. “They basically told me it’d be better to let my barely three-year old niece rot there than let her ‘continue to compromise’ the Statute of Secrecy, and never mind the fact none of them offered to help figure out a way to make the incidents decrease. If I hadn’t had so much pull with the current government, I have little doubts they’d have tried to take her away already! And that, I will NEVER allow!” he growl as he finishes, staring at the ninja in a defiant way, daring to try and put a finger on Anna.

But Nara-san just nods, as if he had expected it. Probably had, in fact; the man is… very clever, in a way that makes Harry uncomfortable. But he doesn’t seem to disapprove, so it’s something, Harry supposes.

“But you found a way to make her stop, didn’t you?” he asks simply and Harry deflates. “After studying your family’s scrolls, I take?” He eyes Harry speculatively. “I think your grasp on fuuinjutsu is actually much better than you pretended; am I wrong?”

“I’m NOT that good,” Harry insists, because there is no way he could show up to one of those ninja with how little he knows, but he hesitates. He can afford to tell a bit more, he supposes. He doesn’t want them to think of him as a threat. “I don’t understand most of the technical details; that’s Hermione’s thing. But she can’t make the Seals work when she draws them, unlike me. Perhaps because she doesn’t have enough… chakra… to make it works on her own. So… she gives instructions, I draw or she does and I… activate, I guess?” he gestures helplessly. “It’s a partnership.”

“Interesting,” the ninja murmurs under his breath and the way he eyes Harry is a lot more appraising. “She sounds like a very smart woman. I take she’s also the friend who helped you translate your Grandmother’s letters?”

“Smartest student in our year,” Harry says with a hint of pride, like he always does when he speaks of Hermione’s achievements. “And yes, it’s her. I don’t know what I would have done without her. It’s her who came up with…”

“With the Barrier talisman your cousin wears on her belt?” Nara-san supplied ‘helpfully’ and Harry grimaces.

“I suppose it was too much to hope you wouldn’t notice,” he mutters, looking at Anna briefly, worry and fondness in his eyes. He loves that little girl with all his soul, and he’s not the only one. Hermione had worked so hard with him, to try and find a way to help Anna. She had done so many researches, helped him translate so many letters, dug with gusto into all those scrolls Harry opened for her, did so many experiences and went through so many trials and errors,…

Without her, Harry would never have gone so far, and he knows it, and he doesn’t think he’ll ever thank her enough for her efforts, even if ultimately, they may have been in vain.

Well, not totally in vain, he amends. At least Harry knows what happened to that side of his family now. And the bits of… fuuinjutsu… they learned together were helpful.

Case in point, the Barrier talisman they made for Anna, to stop anyone not related to her from touching her.

Harry had lost count of the number of times he had woken in the middle of the night, almost screaming and running into the twins’ bedroom, scared to death that someone might have Appeared in the house and snatched them to take them to Ste Mungo by force.

So, so many Calming Draught, and so many late conversations with Mrs Weasley in the wake of it…

You’re a parent now, Harry, the mother of seven had told him with kind, understanding eyes, and stuffed him with tea and hot cocoa and homemade cookies as she related her own experiences with young children during the first war against Voldemort.

It had been… insightful. And terrifying.

And Harry, in the wake of it, had invested a fortune in books on wards and how to properly cast them. And he doesn’t regret it the slightest.

“It’s cleverly incorporated, I’ll give you that,” the ninja on the other side of the table nods with a small smile. “But Uzumaki were known for their use of fuuinjutsu. Anyone who pretends to be one will be scanned to see what he may hide.”

Well, that explains why the scrolls of Grandma Erika held nothing else, when Hermione’s researches had showed ninja had a lot more than that in their arsenal. “You didn’t say anything before, though,” Harry points out, puzzled.

“Because it’s clearly defensive – and in the hands of an untrained child,” Nara-san replies. “In yours…” Harry winces. It’s not a threat, but he understands well enough what it means. “So you wanted to see Kushina because you knew she could shape Chakra chains, I take?” he continues on.

Relieved for the change of subject, Harry smiles weakly. “It is in one of the letters we were able to translate with Hermione and Ron – another friend,” he explains at Nara-san’s raised eyebrow. “Aunt Kaeda mustn’t have thought it was risky to talk about, because that was in the normal correspondence; I guess many family members could do it back then? Anyway, when we understood that Uzumaki Kushina could make chains like Anna, I…” he hesitates.

“You thought she’d agree to help little Anna control her own ability,” Nara-san finishes for him, unsurprised.

Harry gets the feeling really little can surprise that man. In a way, he reminds him of a strange mix between Ron and Hermione: scary-smart, always planning ahead, leading people where he wants to… It makes Harry swallows as he wonders if all ninjas are like that.

He knows that… that they kill people for money, though it’s not the only thing they do; Harry wouldn’t have come – Ron and Hermione would never have let him come – if ninja were just murderers. Ninja are also bodyguards, occasional thieves for hire, and… they do all sort of odd jobs. Gardening, babysitting, weeding, farm work, animal taming… Whatever. You need an extra pair of arms, just hire a ninja.

Perhaps it’s just a good publicity stunt, but Harry doesn’t think so. It’s just… a form of economy like any other, he supposes.

Not that he really cares; he’s not a native, so he’s biased either way, and should he really be critical of their system when he doesn’t think the Wizarding World is much better in the way it applies justice and runs on so many prejudices?

Harry is just… tired. So, so tired, physically and mentally.

It’s not just Anna’s chakra thing, or gaining custody of Teddy so soon, or Naomi’s random bits of accidental magic. It’s not even dealing with three children under five at once, though it can be exhausting.

It’s all the rest. The constant expectations heaped his way, the people eagerly trying to shake his hand or rush him when he tries to just go shopping with the children, the endless questioning on when he intends to take up his responsibilities and join up the Ministry as an Auror, chase down any remaining Death Eaters who intend to cause trouble, or wannabe Dark Mages on the rise, and keep the order as it is without causing a fuss and calling for modernization or dragging the wizard into the 21st century.

They never stop and ask themselves wherever Harry wants to be an Auror. What if he wants to go into professional Quidditch, uh? Or gain a teaching position at Hogwarts? Or go on and study Dragons and join a reserve like Charlie Weasley?

What if Harry is tired of fighting other people’s battles, uh?

And. He. Is.

He’s not a teenager with a maniac after him anymore – and he’s a single Dad to three children. Harry has no reason to keep fighting, when he has enough money to live peacefully as a stay-at-home father and give those kids, his kids, all the love and care he wishes he had received himself when he was younger.

He had hoped… silly as it is… that is he had living, adult relatives, maybe he could… not catch a break, per se, but at least lean against someone’s shoulder, and just… unload the burden on his shoulders for a little bit.

Of course, Harry is never that lucky.

“Was I wrong?” he finds himself asking aloud. “To at least try?”

Nara-san hums contemplatively for a moment. “I understand your reasoning, and why you sought out the Uzumaki. But in your place… I do not think I would have attempted what you did. Of course,” he scratches one of his facial scars, “I am not a civilian with no clear understanding of the ninja life and no-one else to turn to.” He looks at the children, and Harry fights the urge to tense as his eyes turns considering when they land on Teddy.

He… cannot faults him for that, though, because Teddy changed hair color again. Oh, and hairstyle while he was at it.

“I am strongly tempted to do a hand seal and try and break what appears to be partial Henge,” the scarred man comment idly, “but somehow I don’t think there is anything to break. It’s not an illusion, is it?”

How does he knows? Harry thinks briefly, also looking at Teddy and at the strange haircut he now spots – and which looks remarkably like Nara-sama.

“It’s not,” he admits after a moment of silence, weighting the pros and cons of admitting so. But… it can’t hurt, in the situation he’s in. He’s too acutely aware that he’s… well, he doesn’t think he’s under interrogation, but it’s a very pushy interview, and there is no family member in Konoha who can vouch for him. At the point, it would probably best to just grab the kids and Apparate away from there, then create and take an emergency Portkey to home, but…

Even if there is no Uzumaki remaining, perhaps there is still someone here who could help Anna. Surely, the Uzumaki weren’t the only one able to produce those chains, were they? And if Nara-san knows what they are, perhaps he knows of techniques or ways to control their apparition.

It’s a gamble, and one Harry is displeased to take, but… he needs to do what he can for Anna.

“Teddy is what we call a Metamorphmagus,” he explains. “He can change appearance at will, completely or partially. And whatever changes he makes are real, so long he wishes to keep them. He… tends to do it a lot,” he admits after a moment of consideration. “I think he started to do it barely a few hours after birth.”

Nara-san’s eyes shine. “Interesting. So, it’s a variant of Henge, but it’s not illusionary, and it doesn’t drop with chakra exhaustion… Hmm…” he murmurs, head tilted to the side. “And you said he has it since birth?”

“Inherited from his mother,” Harry confesses reluctantly. “She was… our equivalent of a police officer. She…”

“Kekkei Gekkai, then,” Nara-san cuts him off, looking satisfied. “I expected it to be. And I imagine perfectly what she did with it.”

Yeah, Harry doesn’t doubt he does. His heart skips a beat, because he doesn’t like that kind of interest on Teddy, just like he doesn’t like it on Anna and Naomi. “He has nothing to do with our current discussion,” Harry warns the man, and Nara-san…

Bows.

“I know. Forgive me, I do not wish to appear impolite or forceful. I was only indulging in personal curiosity.” Yeah, no; Harry might be naïve, but not that much, and he knows Nara-san knows he knows. But Harry says nothing about the lie.

Instead, he takes a deep breath. “Look,” he starts, trying to keep his voice steady. “I may be asking a lot, considering none of them can vouch for me and I’m a foreigner, so not really trustworthy, I know it, but… do you think I could have access to any remaining Uzumaki paperwork you have that could help me with Anna? Or speak to someone who knows how to control those chains, so he can teach me how to help her?” He tries not to sound too hopeful, but he knows he must be failing, given the way Nara-san looks at him.

“Hari-san…” he starts softly, and Harry’s heart starts to think. “How common do you think the ability to produce Chakra Chains is?”

“I… It cannot be that rare,” Harry deflects, because oh God, he never seriously thought about it. “Grandma… It’s mentioned several people in her family…”

“Yes,” the ninja nods. “Her family. The Chakra Chains were a trademark technique of the Uzumaki clan, Hari-san.”

And Harry… Harry has a painful realization. “You mean no one else knows how to make them, or control them.”

He… He had expected it, but to hear it all the same… He feels dizzy. “So I can’t do anything…”

Nara-san looks at him with sympathy. “It isn’t what I said. I’m merely stating that you will not find a living soul in Konoha to teach you what you seek. And I cannot say what may or may not be written in the personal archives of Mito-sama.”

“Mito who?” Harry blinks, because he doesn’t know that name.

Nara-san gives him a look before chuckling. “No, I imagine you wouldn’t know. Mito-sama was a great-aunt of Uzumaki Kushina – though I think there were actually cousins several times removed. Like Kushina, she was able to produce Chakra Chains. Mito-sama had lived in Konoha since its very foundation, and is known to have kept an extensive collection of scrolls and letters with her clanmates.”

“But?” Harry asks, because there is always a ‘but’.

“Anything she left behind would have been entrusted in the care of her closest family members – in this case, her granddaughter, the Princess Tsunade,” Nara-san says calmly.

“I… is she… a relative?” Harry asks slowly, because… “No, never mind; at this point, I suppose any blood connection is too tenuous to count,” he immediately correct himself.

“Hmm, you’ll find that for some people, clan is clan, no matter how small the links, but you’re likely right,” Nara-san notes calmly. “If you wish to consult Mito-sama’s archives, you’ll need Tsunade-hime’s permission, and I’m afraid that she is currently out of the village.”

“Ah. A good reason to make me stay here until you’re satisfied that I’m… what? Not a threat?” Harry can’t help himself but snort bitterly, because he sees things for what they are. He doesn’t know what sort of hornet nest he accidentally kicked, but he has definitely kicked one.

“We already know you’re not a threat, Hari-san,” Nara-san placates him, and it’s silly, but Harry really wants to believe him. “That being said, Uzumaki by blood or not, you’re still a civilian, and there are plenty of sensitive information to be found in the scrolls and books of Mito-sama. Sensitive information you have no clearance level for, and which will need to be thoroughly checked and redacted before you can access whatever you’re hoping to find.”

“Assuming there is even anything on Chakra Chains,” Harry points out bitterly.

“Assuming there is even anything on Chakra Chains, yes,” Nara-san nods easily. “Understand that we aren’t insensitive to your plight, Hari-san, but we cannot answer your demands right away. I hope you understand?”

“Red tape,” Harry mutters under his breath, but reluctantly nods. “I do understand, yes. But what would you want me to do in the meanwhile? If that Tsunade lady is out of the village, I imagine it can take days, if not weeks, for her to come back. I hadn’t exactly planned a long stay. I…” he trails off, swallowing. “I have money, of course, but I can’t make the children live in a hostel room for weeks on end. Not to mention, Teddy and Anna and Naomi need to go back in school soon and…”

“We can easily find you a place to rent for a couple of weeks,” Nara-san sets asides his worries. “And I’m sure that a few days or weeks of missed schools aren’t too much of an issue at your wards’ age. Or is it?”

“… No, I suppose not,” Harry reluctantly admits. He can homeschool them for a bit – he has taken a lot of Hermione-approved school books with him, at her request, just in case the trip lasted longer than intended. Once again, she had been right. The moment he was alone and able to use his pocket mirror to contact her, he was going to fall to his knees and thank her from the bottom of his heart. “But you understand I cannot let the situation stew for too long?”

“Indeed,” Nara-san nods. “But I’m confident we will find a way to resolve the issue in short order.” He carefully rises from his seat, and Harry follows suit. This interview is over, he can feel it. He’s not sure wherever it won’t happen again or not, but for now, Nara-san and whoever may have been listening in are satisfied, and that’s what counts. “I’ll be taking you to the Administrative center to have you registered and help you find a place to lodge until we can get in touch with Tsunade-hime.”

Harry bows, because it’s the polite thing to do and Hermione drilled it into him. “I thank you for your trouble, Sir,” he says politely even as he calls out for the children to bring back their toys, they’ll be moving on, now, and wow, those drawings are really pretty, I’ll make sure to hang them on the fridge as soon as possible. “You, uh, wouldn’t know a place I can take them out to eat too?” he tries not to blush.

Nara-san laughs and the fondness in his gaze as he looks at the children seems very real. “I imagine they are; it’s getting very late. There is no lack of restaurants in Konoha, do not worry. I know a couple of good addresses.” He tilts his head, pensive. “Hmm, maybe Naruto knows a few as well. You’d have to ask him.”

“Naruto?” Harry inquires politely.

“Kushina’s son,” Nara-san drops casually, and Harry…

Harry chokes on a very high-pitched WHAT?! that made Nara-san winces.

“Ow! Not so loud!” he scowls, but it doesn’t hold any heat.

Harry doesn’t care; he’s too busy calming the ringing in his ears as his brain processes the words Kushina’s son. “You said… you said… Kushina died… and no living soul could…!”
Lies, lies, lies!

“Kushina died shortly after the birth of her child,” Nara-san says calmly. “She was the last known Uzumaki able to use Chakra Chains; her son, as far as we know, didn’t inherit the ability. And Naruto is a child himself; he wouldn’t be able to teach you himself,” he points out, sounding so reasonable that Harry has to mentally correct himself.

Not lies, but selective truths, and retention of information.

Kinda like learning the truth about Sirius being his Godfather or the truth about how his father saved Snape’s life from a potentially deadly situation. Or learning Snape had been a childhood friend of his mother, which NO ONE ever saw fit to mention to Harry. Not that it would have changed anything between his old teacher and him, but… It would have been nice knowing.

Suddenly, Nara-san seemed a lot less sympathetic – or at least a lot shrewder than Harry had thought him to be.

But also…

Kushina had a son. Kushina has a son. Which means… Harry has another cousin, after all. A young cousin. He swallows. “How… how old is he?” he stutters.

“Naruto? Hmm, he’s my son age, so he’ll be turning nine soon,” Nara-san hums, and…

“Does he… does he have… anyone?” Harry asks, because they said Kushina is dead, but perhaps…

“No,” Nara-san kills his hope in the bud. “Naruto’s father died in the same attack as Kushina. He’s been put in the care of Konoha’s orphanage ever since, thought I was led to understand he lives on his lonesome since he decided to join the Ninja Academy.”

That’s… Too much to take in.

Harry has another baby cousin. Another orphan baby cousin.

Ron has often teased harry about his luck, or lack thereof, but really? It’s becoming ridiculous.

Fuck, Harry thinks, passing a hand in his hair even as he gives the three children gathered around his legs a glance.

What were the odds he was going to be taking care of another orphan boy soon?