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"Anko!"
Anko jars awake at the sound of her sensei's voice, a little disorientated to see the roof of a canvas tent above her — but not very. Shikako-sensei does a lot of Wake-Up-Very-Fast drills and Anko has slowly become used to them, even if she's groggy or tired. They're usually followed by awesome new training or jutsu, too, so she can't even complain.
"Get up and be ready," is all Shikako-sensei says, terser than usual, before ducking away out the flap of the tent. They're at one of the outposts — on their last mission Shikako-sensei had said they'd found 'critical intel' and they'd had to stop off and tell someone about it fast.
The Jounin Commander hadn't seemed very impressed, and Shikako-sensei had been stilted and weird about it, but when Anko had asked her, sensei had just distracted her with new chakra tricks until she'd forgotten about it.
Anko rolls out the cot and slides her feet into her shoes, making sure they're on tight, and grabs her kunai pouch. Shikako-sensei hadn't told her to grab all her gear, but she had been using her listen to me during the fight, I mean it voice, so Anko grabs her extra barrier tags and scroll of extra weapons, but leaves her camping gear behind.
"Incoming!" Shikako-sensei's voice screams, breaking the silence of the night outside the tent. It has to be a jutsu, because there's no way her voice is that loud without one. "Incoming! Enemies from the North-East!"
Anko's sensing isn't anything like her sensei's but even she imagines she can feel the sudden flurry of life that bursts through the camp. When she ducks out of the tent too, it's starting to show — a ninja stumbles out of the tent next to theirs, arms trapped in his shirt as he tries to tug it over his head. Another one, further away, is fumbling as he tries to pull a sword-belt on over flannel pyjamas.
Anko ducks past them, trying to catch up to her sensei who moves fast even if she's only walking. There's a stuttered pause before the camp siren flares to life stand-ready, stand-ready warnings sounding. Up the signal station, signal flags are being hoisted — only a low alert level, though, like no one believes Shikako-sensei yet.
Then the pattern of the alarm changes.
"What's that one?" Anko asks, because it wasn't one they'd covered at the Academy.
"Radio's down," Shikako-sensei says, a little absently, most of her attention fixed off onto the distance. "They probably tried to raise the outer patrol or another camp and got no answer."
A different flag goes up Enemy Action Anticipated.
"Anko. Have the chameleons agreed to reverse summon you?" Shikako-sensei asks.
"Yeah," Anko says, and tries not to be too disappointed about being sent away before the fighting even starts. It isn't that Shikako-sensei never lets her fight, but she's definitely really careful about when Anko fights. Still, she goes through the handseals and Okugi-chan crawls out of her sleeve to perch on her hand.
"Good," Shikako-sensei says, voice brisk. "We're about to engage the enemy. Deploy your barrier seals as much as you can. If you get overwhelmed, get your summons to reverse-summon you and wait for me to come get you. Otherwise— contact the Great Toad Summons and ask for Minato Namikaze. He'll be able to get you back to Konoha. Don't summon yourself back here."
Anko blinks, half thrilled to not be sent away and half—
"Sensei?"
"There'll be plenty of time for you to fight later," Shikako-sensei says, and stops to put a hand on her shoulder and look directly at her face, with her full attention. "When you're a badass. You just have to survive to see it. Use your summons if you need them, okay? I might not be able to keep an eye on you the whole time."
Anko swallows, stomach churning. "Yes, sensei," she says. The idea that sensei won't be there is somehow more terrifying than knowing they're about to be attacked.
Then the Jounin Commander and a bunch of Jounin are there, snapping orders and getting people moving around — Anko is shuffled backwards, in a guard position around the camp and she loses track of Shikako-sensei almost immediately.
Then the attack happens and she loses track of pretty much everything. There's so many people moving and jutsu's being thrown around and it's only the white flack jackets that identify the enemies as Cloud ninja and let her tell them apart from all the other ninja. One of them throws a lightning jutsu at her, and Anko blocks it with a barrier — but by the time she's done that, someone else has attacked him and the fight is already moving on.
And then there's a great clash like thunder and a tall Cloud ninja charges through a bunch of Konoha ninja. He looks like he's glowing, almost, like he's surrounded by chakra.
"Oh, no," says pyjama's-san. "That's the Raikage."
That's.. Probably bad, right? Anko can't imagine the Hokage in the field, but everyone says he's the strongest ninja in the village, so the Raikage is probably equally strong. And no one seems able to stop him— he has some kind of lightning jutsu on his hand, like Kakashi-senpai's Chidori, that seems to be able to slice through everything, even swords or other jutsu.
Then Shikako-sensei drops down behind him, her shadow extra dark, even against the nighttime. It flashes across the ground and when it connects she raises one hand and, with lightning swiftness, slashes it through her own neck.
"Sensei!" Anko cries, though it's lost in the clamour of battle and then beneath the other shouts because—
The Raikage has taken his Chidori-hand and slammed it through his own throat. His chakra-glow goes out and for a second, Shikako-sensei's jutsu is the only reason he remains standing. Then she lets go and the body falls to the ground.
The Cloud ninja try to retreat, after that, but the Konoha nin don't really let them go — but Anko isn't part of the pursuit. She regroups with her sensei — or, more accurately, Shikako-sensei finds her in the chaos and asks if she's okay — and they ride out the aftermath of the attack on guard duty around the camp. Nearer to dawn, the Jounin Commander sends for them and Shikako-sensei leads them to the command tent.
"Explain," the Jounin Commander orders, voice sharp. He still doesn't look at sensei.
He's kind of a jerk, Anko decides. She doesn't like him, even if he is technically her boss.
"The Third Raikage's Hell Stab is the only technique known to be able to overcome his saikyō no tate defensive capabilities," Shikako-sensei says, voice flat. "Utilising the Shadow Possession variant of Shadow Paralysis allowed this fact to be used to our advantage."
It's weird. Sensei has no problem arguing with Minato-sensei, even though he's a jounin too and apparently some kind of big deal, but she'll just let this oji-san be rude to her?
"Shadow Possession," the Jounin Commander says. "So. You learnt that from the boy." He pauses, like sensei is supposed to say something, but she doesn't, so Anko doesn't either. "Hmph. I suppose even tricks can come in useful if the situation is convoluted enough."
"Yes, Shikano-sama," Shikako-sensei says, still mild. "I was lucky to possess the perfect counter technique for the situation. It's a pity more people didn't."
"Indeed," the Jounin Commander says, but not really like he agrees. "Report back here in an hour. From there you'll return to Konoha with updated intel and situation reports. Dismissed."
Shikako-sensei puts one hand on Anko's back and nearly pushes her out of the tent.
"What a jerk," Anko huffs, when they're probably far enough away that he can't hear her.
Shikako-sensei gives her a little, tired looking smile. "You're not good enough to get away with that yet," she says. "C'mon, we have an hour. We should probably get something to eat and take a rest. I don't think we'll be stopping once we head back home."