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Chapter Text

Generally speaking, one does not personally meet the King of Hell after death unless one has fucked up tremendously in life.

This One holds firmly onto this belief, despite the ox-headed and horse-faced escorts on either side reassuring this one of one’s relative innocence.

Language is made obsolete in death, but the mortal mind attempts to grasp at the dregs of it anyways for the comfort of familiarity. Yama, or Yanluo-Dawang, or Yeomra-Daewon or Enma-Dai’O. Slightly different connotations for each name, but the reference remains the same.

This One thinks oneself would laugh at the sight of a deity of epic proportions buried up to the armpits if said deity were not so pants-shittingly present.

This One is not here for punishment, oneself is told, and This One believes that that’s what The Great King believes at least because death strips words down to intent and not the meanings given by any societal language. The intent here is not to punish.

Death should also remove oneself’s frame of reference along with oneself’s memories, but here This One stands, still capable of human language and structured thought by the Great One’s decision. This One does not know whether it is a mercy or This One’s penance, because with a frame of reference comes the knowledge that what is considered punishment by oneself may not be construed as such by another.

The Scribe notes that This One did not feel reassured by Ox-Head and Horse-Face’s equivalent insistence on This One’s way here either, and The Great King simply repeats the statement with all the patience of the long-existing and the addendum that This One was brought forth for an honor.

This One attempts not to let oneself’s skepticism show. This One must not be very successful, because the Scribe makes another note and Horse-Face produces a noise that one cannot identify somewhere between indignation and amusement.

This One really, really hopes it’s the latter. One should wisely not piss off one of the eastern cultures’ equivalents for a grim reaper.

The Great One impresses the importance of this honor. Indeed, This One acknowledges the perceived weight of a mantle and a title. The Arbiter, the Judge, the Yan is a position that the Great One holds for all who come to the Great One’s domain, and all who live and breathe become subject to the Great One’s dominion in time.

This makes interlopers a minor issue; a paper wall in the sands of time. Those who would claim the name of Death are no more than an inconvenience, and The Great One does not mind the slight grating of an inconvenience.

This makes mortals who would flaunt against it insolent. The Great One does mind insolence.

There is a list and a world where the Great One is chained by purple-ringed eyes and grated with many inconveniences who are not similarly chained. Specifically, there is a List of the insolent in such a world where the Judge who needs no Jury cannot also play the Executioner. The title and the job are honors, the Great One insists, and this is true as what is true, is true, is true. It does not mean that This One is eager to accept or even understands why.

This One is told that one has conducted oneself with integrity in This One’s previous life, and the life before that. It is said that the Great One values honesty, but in actuality the meaning found in the context of death reveals that what was meant is Honesty of the Self. Those who lie in life for a purpose chosen are not equal to the damned who lie in life for a purpose assigned, though the lie may be one and the same.

It is a Concept that does not quite fit what words This One still has to offer. Nevertheless, This One internalizes it with not-fresh eyes and believes.

There has been more than one Yan to assist the Great One, and there have been many, many Executioners, but this List and this world have not yet been subjected to one. The Great One invokes the ultimate respite in the form of a pure land, outside the bounds of Samsara’s cycle, at the end of one's life if only This One succeeds.

In the end, it is not a choice because there is no second option, but This One now carries the mark of belief and hopes and prays that it is enough.

The Great One allows it to be.

Perhaps there is irony to be found in praying to the void when there is a deity directly before oneself.

Ox-Head, Horse-Face, and the Scribe step aside, and the blackness of the Great One’s mouth envelopes all.

::::::

58年, February

It’s itchy.

Folds and folds of fabric, fuzzy where it touches in most places and scratchy in the rest. 

Blink. The world is blurry. Cooing noises?

Blink. A woman in a robe-like dress, pspsps-ing like she wants to get someone’s attention. A middle-aged man at her side, standing behind a cloth-covered contraption with three legs sticking out from underneath. Something red, even farther back, with a presence that’s big in a way that words fail to describe.

A bright flash. A scrunched up nose and a high-pitched noise of complaint, one that heralds tears except not really. There’s no pain. Just a vague want of, hold me?

And that’s about the earliest memory that the soul reborn as Tensei of Sunagakure has.

In most worlds, he is never born at all. In this one, the low fertility rate of kunoichi in the Land of Wind is just a little bit more in their favor, and a young woman buries her fear under a mountain of received congratulations. Her nineteenth birthday is barely two months away but her child's birthday is now, so she listens to the doctors and pushes— the doctors, and the two med-nin on standby, because torn muscles and spilled guts they could handle but skies forbid any of them learn how to deliver new life into the world.

Tensei. ‘Heaven’s voice’, for the kanji, but also a homophone for another life cut too short. Violet-grey eyes and wisps of auburn hair, with his mother’s bird bones and his father’s tanned skin. A not-accident, his birth only a blip of life one hundred days prior to the occasion of getting his picture taken for the records, months deep into the Third Great War. 

His coils cannot stand the One-Tail. The council murmurs warily when Chiyo-sama claims that something else had already staked its claim, but they believe. No infant should be so utterly silent, eyes already open wide. Observing.

The council watches carefully right back, and the child’s first few months pass by in complete silence. Rasa holds him. Karura feeds him. Yashamaru coos at him. 

Sarou looks upon his protege's child with a stern, tired face after a long absence, the smallest of tilts to his mouth.

"Suna," Tensei burbles one day, half a year in. Sarou blinks. "An' Konoha. Friends."

"Allies," The Sandaime Kazekage corrects automatically. The ink of their contract is barely dry. And then, because the baby is mouthing the word ‘allies’ like he understands what it means and there are really no fitting reactions to that: "How… astute of you, Tensei-chan."

The baby bursts into delighted babble.

The council watches as the child begins walking unassisted by five months, reading and writing in six. The council watches, sick to death of the explosion in membership from Iwa's Demolitions Corps, of unheard mastery in Kumo's jinchuuriki, of Kiri's Swordsmen and Konoha's litany of rising legends. Our very own prodigy, they murmur.

Good. Considering the historical precedent for how long the last two wars lasted, they may very well find some use for the child may in this one.

 ::::::

59年, February

Tensei is a year old when the world starts coming into focus. Mostly because it’s hot and he’s miserable, and then it’s cold and he’s miserable, and the teeth in the back of his mouth are coming in and he’s miserable. Tensei does a lot of crying for a while, great heaving breaths and tears streaming down his face because everything sucks.

Also, there’s sand absolutely everywhere. He learns how to say ‘shawl’ early on and uses the word liberally, because he would rather the light cloth stick to sweaty skin than the sting of whipping sand. All of the shoes Tensei has are open-toed, which is fine, but even the headscarf that people drape over his head and shoulders before taking him outside doesn’t always help if the wind is feeling lively.

He says ‘people’, by the way, because there are a lot of them in the house. The other two kids, Ainu-chan and Reki-kun, call the women he thinks are their mothers by different things that sound too similar to be their names. He’s picked out three different variations, so far, and has settled on the shortened Kaa for his mother, a woman who, to be honest, still looks like a teenager. Not that Tensei is in any state to judge, but she can't be more than twenty or so.

It isn’t until Tensei sees his own hair that he connects the dots to the man who must be his father, especially considering said father is not home very often. Their shared red-tinged hair makes him giggle, because along with his ash-blonde mother and golden-blonde uncle, they’re the only ones in the household without the dark brown or black hair that seems to be so common here.

His father, whom he’s been taught to call Otou-san, checks in with him every morning and every night when he’s around— which, again, he usually isn’t— and honestly, his mother’s not much better. She has a very hands-off approach to raising him, one could say. The other people in their house, who he's realized are servants— is it called a house? It’s really, really big, much bigger than he thinks a house should be— more than make up for it, because there is always someone with an eye on him, so he can’t really fault her for. She’s young, and it seems like Tensei’s her first kid. It doesn’t match hazy impressions of a dark-haired couple trying their best in a foreign country, or a doting set of grandparents who’ve been there and done that across an ocean, but it’s not bad by any means.

Okaa-san. Not ‘Mom’. The separation helps, a little.

Her name is Karura. The servants call her Karura-dono, and his father Rasa-dono, and someone else who also lives here Sandaime-sama. It’s easy to see his relation to his mother in their wide, violet eyes, and even more so with his father in their tan skin and reddish-brown hair, but Sandaime-sama? He doesn’t look anything like either of Tensei’s parents. Definitely not old enough to be Tensei’s grandpa, but his father looks to the man for direction, so maybe an older cousin or something?

Whatever. The soft folds of regal blue and white robes make his lap Tensei’s favorite to sit on when Sandaime-sama happens to be home, so it’s all good in his book.

Book. Ha. He's not sure if his little baby brain just doesn't have the mental capacity to freak out or what, but Tensei finds himself trying not to think about the cross-dimensional aspect of his rebirth too hard.

Even without the foreknowledge, there are signs of his family's importance everywhere— the artisan-carved wooden chairs in the dining room when they live in the middle of a desert, the detailed embroidery on his mother's dresses, the glint of gold on the decorative buttons on some of his own clothes. And, he thinks it's very important to repeat, the servants. Gods, that's definitely a rich-people thing, right? He really, really hopes that they're servants and not slaves or anything, but it does occur to Tensei that they might be. Barring the short-sleeved shirts and shorts that he and the other two kids are dressed in and his father's hoodie, of all things, most of the people around him dress in a fashion reminiscent of Arabian culture— sandals and robes and headscarves.

Or maybe he's jumping to conclusions. Not like he knows much of anything about that. 

A boy named Sasori takes the occasional task of babysitting him, sometimes. Tensei doesn't really understand why, since there are literally so many servants around the house to watch him, but his father introduces the redhead as family. So.

Sasori is being held back from the field by some injury or the other, anyways, and also barred from doing anything productive with his time on the hospital’s orders. Or so Tensei figures, from the snatches of conversation that he can understand. He does his best to follow along when the almost-teen rambles about tradition and tries not to touch anything when he's fiddling with puppet parts. Today's topic is on the ridiculousness of how combative puppetry is an art only fifty-something years in the making. Tensei finds it quite interesting, for all that Sasori doesn’t dumb it down enough for him to comprehend the entirety of the rant.

Tensei remembers being introduced to an old woman with graying hair, one Chiyo-baasama. Not his grandmother, despite the title, but Sasori’s. And Rasa calls her O’oba-sama, ‘honorable great aunt’, making her Tensei’s great-grandaunt, and Sasori his… second cousin, once removed?

“Oji-san,” he tries, just once, to see what the other will say. Uncle. It’s only proper, after all, with the redhead nominally belonging to Tensei’s parents’ generation.

He gets a chakra-thread attached to his forehead that pulls him face-first into a pile of sand for the trouble.

“Sasori-nii,” he amends cheekily, and the older boy snorts.

He could panic. He should, even, because Tensei can recognize most of his family the moment that he’s introduced to them, and he’s not sure what to do about the fact that he knows what will happen to them. Sasori-nii is going to kill Sandaime-sama, his mother is going to die, his uncle is going to die, his father is going to die, Chiyo-baasama is going to die— not that people don’t all die eventually, but none of his family are going to live long enough to enjoy a happy ending. They’re all going to die just like another version of them already have in another world of ink-on-paper, and the contract branded onto his soul whispers that Tensei won’t be able to do a single thing to change that.

But right now, Sasori-nii is asking him to pass the fine-grit sandpaper as he works on his newest puppet, so that’s what Tensei does. There’s still time to judge how much stock he wants to put into that fever dream of a purgatory afterlife, and it’s always a good idea to look before you jump.

Chapter Text

59年, April 

He doesn't say it out loud, because it sounds kind of rude, but Tensei means it as a compliment when he thinks, Karura actually uses her words like a proper human being.  

She tells him things like what she’s going to do and where she’s going to go, and asks him to do or not do something in plain language. She’s modeling for him, Tensei realizes, since he’s still iffy with grammar and the nuances between formal and informal speech and the nightmare that is a semi-tonal language. He finds himself very thankful of the fact when otherwise surrounded by people who move their hands too fast for him to parse out or exchange looks that he is still in the process of categorizing. Words are relatively easier, now that he’s gotten past the mental block that Suna’s mishmash of ‘standard’ Japanese and dialect have to offer. It’s more than a little frustrating, because here he had put in all this effort only for the most important things to go unsaid, like how he’s pretty sure he doesn’t remember nursing because he was weaned as soon as possible, or how his mother is more comfortable with his father or uncle around to act as a buffer between her and Tensei, and she never says why. Tensei doesn’t know the exact reason, struggles to put it to words like a hypocrite, but he is honest enough with himself when he thinks of a great gaping blackness that left him extra memories— not as a mercy, or as penance to be paid, but to be wielded as a tool.

He doesn’t think it was intended for the way he uses it, cutesy in his Okaa-han instead of the Okan used by the older boys or even the more common Kaa-san , tugging on her robe-dress thing with her beloved younger brother’s violet-grey eyes set into Tensei's round baby-face, being a touch more clumsy than he could be when he plays with Ainu and Reki.

Maybe it works. Maybe it doesn't. Tensei learns from sure-footed placements and efficient movements that look just different enough from the other older women that Karura is either a ninja or a dancer, and from gentle hands she drapes a piece of cloth around his head before they go outside that Karura is trying to learn how to be a mother.

Occasionally, she lets him sit in her lap and ask questions with his ever-growing archive of words. Children are homeschooled to whatever degree their families can manage until they either are enrolled into the military academy, or… acquire an apprenticeship? Tensei, personally, is already halfway through the basic reading and math that mothers are supposed to teach their kids, and was ceremoniously shoved at a tutor in fancy robes to start calligraphy and socio-politics. In baby-steps, yes, but also, what the fuck. He’s one. Why in the world does he have homework already? Tensei thought he left this behind when he got his bachelor's degree— or, at least, that he had a couple more years left before it caught up to him again.

Eventually, his mother starts tacking on -chan to the end of his name even when no one else is around and telling him stories of her and Yashamaru-oji’s ancestral family home. He listens to her recount how Tensei’s great-grandparents on her side ventured here from the edges of the desert, where blonde hair and light eyes and fair skin are the norm and people spin art out of glass. She shares a story her own parents used to tell her, of an ash-covered girl who is gifted beautiful glass slippers by the earth for her kindness to a dying scorpion. It is quickly recognized and requested often in the slow hours of many afternoons, before she disappears into the kitchens to help make dinner.

“Okaa-han works hard,” Tensei acknowledges out loud politely, and she smiles and says she doesn't mind.

He knows what they actually mean is, I don’t know how to love you, but I hope I can learn to.

At least he doesn’t have to wonder what kind of world he’s been assigned to. There's an hourglass and a line above it engraved into the metal plate in his father's belt, not a stylized leaf, and Tensei doesn't know if he should be grateful or frustrated. 

“This is not for playing,” Rasa tells him, removing exploring hands. Gold dust shifts with the movement, as natural as breathing. It picks Tensei up, holding him level with his father’s black-ringed eyes. “Everything we have in the desert must be taken from its sands. You will earn your own, as a shinobi.”

“I have to?”

His father snorts. “I’m not giving mine away,” he says, and Tensei notes the slight lilt at the end of the sentence that means amusement. Which doesn't answer the question that he meant to ask, but Tensei supposes the response is telling in and of itself.

Once every other week, his mother takes him to visit his father and Sandaime-sama in an office building, a building that towers above all the other structures in the immediate area, and the military people who he toddles by on slightly unsteady legs don’t exactly bother to censor themselves in front of a baby. There’s a war going on— that much, Tensei has figured out. He catches snippets of reports about missions, about supplies, about water rations, pretending like he’s not trying to piece together the bits of their sentences he can understand into cohesive ideas while waiting in Sandaime-sama’s office later, staring at the giant painting of a map on the wall.

It’s not a map of Earth, obviously. Not unless the continents looked like one giant, wonky, non-Pangea landmass at some point during humanity's recorded history.

Inevitably, his father and Sandaime-sama will finish up their work and bring him into a bigger room where they hold meetings with a table full of about a dozen robed people. They’re all representatives for… ‘families’? Not clans, the word for that is different. ‘Tribes’, kind of. One or two of the middle-aged councilors will smile at him before they start asking questions: How has he liked the scrolls and books they’ve been giving him so far? Does he think the shinobi in them are cool? He wants to be like them when he grows up, right?

It’s propaganda, Tensei knows, but he's genuinely not interested in re-reading Ainu and Reki’s picture books now that he has the phonetic characters of this world’s language figured out. So he smiles widely at the dozen elders in front of him and tells them that he likes the wind shadows the best. They’re clearly written to be the heroes, after all, and Tensei wants to see where they’re going with this. He supposes the blatant prodding towards the ‘third shadow’ is because they don’t want to miss with a baby by being subtle, but dear gods is it obvious.

Obvious enough to realize what they want, but not necessarily for Tensei to decide what to do. He’s here for a different reason, right?

…Something to worry about when he can run around without the fear of tripping over nothing, probably.

Chapter Text

59年, August

There’s a lot to learn about this new world.

First of all, living in a desert. Inside of a canyon, in the desert, because those high layered walls of stone surrounding the entire village as far as the eye can see are, in fact, natural. Not built.

His house isn’t round. The corners and edges are rounded from the outside, sure, and there’s a sunroom with a glass dome that’s technically circular, but the buildings in the distance, beyond the sandy plateau that marks the edge of their… property? Those buildings are round, like cylinders and spheres rising up from the ground, and the small face-sized windows that line the circumference of many of them are round, too. It doesn’t take a genius to understand why, not with the sandstorms that sweep through the canyon every once in a while. More often in the spring months right after his birthday, but they’re not uncommon in the summer.

It’s at the beginning of one such storm that Tensei meets his tutor. Aiya-sensei’s not bad, even if she’s a bit of a snitch. Look, Tensei gets that it might be a little concerning for a kid of whatever his social station is to be more awed by a leader of a country other than his own, but the Second Hokage of Konohagakure is just plain cool, alright? The face tattoos and fur mantle make him stand out, even in the black and white rendition of the traditional painting, and after a year and change of living in an environment where Tensei has to slather a thick cream all over his skin every morning to keep from drying out, the ability to summon giant dragons made out of water from thin air sounds really, really neat. It is just a phase, he just needs to get the fanboy-ing out of his system before Aiya-sensei switches him from oral learning to textbooks or something. Honest. 

In the meantime, his teacher is impressively unfazed by how quickly he picks up her lessons. Foremost are the little details that have fallen through the cracks of his mother’s homeschooling curriculum: that the unit of money in this world is called ryo, that his new home is located in the first district out of the eight total which make up his village, that there are three major holidays, and that food is never, ever to be wasted. And maybe the details slip through his fingers sometimes, and maybe his tongue doesn't twist around the Japanese sprinkled with not-Japanese words correctly, but Aiya-sensei only ever gives him a critical look and corrects him before they move on. Thank the heavens Tensei has the excuse of being a child. Total language immersion is exhausting.

In the meantime, his uncle comes home from the frontlines for some kind of celebration called the Sunartistry Festival, delighted that Tensei recalls him enough to call out, “Okaeri, Oji-san!” to his tired greeting of, “Tadaima.”

Tensei finds great joy in turn by dragging his mother and uncle all around the markets and the plaza and other places that they surely know better than him. Yashamaru is so young, and it shows on his face when he hums blankly at Tensei’s abrupt subject changes and random questions and demands. His mother had guided his hand into clumsily signing his fingerprints onto a letter full of well-wishes for Yashamaru's sixteenth birthday a few months ago— the age of legal adulthood in Sunagakure, apparently— and also a field promotion to chunin. It makes Tensei feel bad that he keeps forgetting the man's name until someone else inevitably offers it, because Yashamaru comes and goes for months at a time.

Tensei ends up riding his shoulders to see above the sea of people, except that’s not the only reason. His mother is smiling whole-heartedly for once, and Tensei… hadn’t realized that this is what it should look like. He’d think crowds would make her more jumpy, not less, but maybe having her younger brother here just makes everything infinitely better. Tensei stuffs his face with street food that he wheedles Yashamaru into paying for until his father and Sandaime-sama finally join them and put a stop to it. They must not be serious, though, because his uncle sneaks him a custard imagawayaki later and neither call them out on it.

He wakes up the next day and all of it is still there. Not Sandaime-sama, he’s back to doing work, but everything and everyone else. Tensei gets to try a few different flavors of kakigori— something halfway between a snow cone and ice cream— and his father humors him by playing one of the shopfront games. Well, ‘humors him’. Really, it turns into a three-way target practice competition, except the latter two leave his father in the dust.

“Are you sure that’s what you want, Tensei-chan?” Rasa asks him when he picks out a handful of glittering hair clips. His mom and uncle smack him lightly as one and pick out hair clips of their own.

“It’s either letting him grow it out enough to tie up or this,” Yashamaru-oji informs his father, tugging on Tensei’s strands playfully.

Karura laughs. “You should have given him your spikes, dear.”

The third day, Aiya-sensei even comes around to lead him through the streets and put names to everything. From the brassy-sounding two-toned bamboo flutes made in the southern wetlands near the capital of their country called a yarghul and the many-stringed, avocado-shaped guitar called an oud, to the tiled board games of black and white pebbles called go or the slightly more familiar mahjong. She gestures for his attention with her folding fan, as if there was any way to ignore the lively line of arm-in-arm dancers to their right. Tensei blinks at the rhythmic kicking and jumping incorporated into elaborate footwork, but mostly, he notices the sharp barks of laughter from the scarred individuals who are clearly shinobi.

Aiya-sensei says something about learning and an academy that he only half-understands. He nods along regardless, offering her a gap-toothed grin that comes easily because he'd honestly love to, as soon as his pudgy limbs decide to start cooperating with his brain.

It’s only on the fourth day that everything is different.

Tensei’s been here before, he knows. The servants usually steer him away from this part of the compound’s north wing, but he’s willing to bet that his parents have presented him in front of the family shrine at least once before.

There is no dust buried six feet into the ground, no ashes resting in an urn, only a wall of names. Each Kazekage has the additional memorial of an ornate headstone, but no one is exempt from being taken back by the desert's sands. It's a philosophy Tensei can appreciate, he thinks, head bowed and hands clapped together like Aiya-sensei taught him in their etiquette lessons. Returning the body back to the earth, nurturing the growth of others— specifically, cremated with their ashes scattered to the desert winds to pepper the sands, but some people don't love that tradition.

It doesn't mean they're not honored, though. Once a year, on the last day of the eighth month, the dead are held close and cherished before they are let go.

There are more names written behind the picture that Tensei turns his attention to, but all of them are for long-gone ancestors. Even Chiyo-baasama and Ebizo-jiisama only knew a few of them, never mind the rest of their group. “Sho,” he says, more a statement than a question as he points to the portrait of a man with spiky brown hair in a ponytail, all the way at the top of the shrine.

“Shodai,” Ebizo-jiisama corrects. ‘First’. “That is your great-great-grandfather, Tensei-kun.”

Tensei chews his lip, sounding out the name written below the frame. “ Reto.”

Great-great-grandfather Reto had wide, green-grey eyes and brown hair done up in a ponytail, with Rasa’s tan skin and strong jawline. The short eyebrows, too, but that’s shaping and not really genetics— Tensei just got his own done with his father and Sandaime-sama before the festival. Regal in his robes, there are lines from brows too-often furrowed and the beginnings of crow-feet on the face of the man who gathered their village.

Two levels lower, Sasori-nii's parents have a joint picture. It makes sense— Hina and Kazuo died together on the battlefield of the Second War, felled by Konoha’s White Fang. Like Tensei, Sasori-nii has his father's coloring on top of his mother's delicate features. He curls his hand around Sasori-nii's loose fist and tugs him away when the teen lingers too long, and gets a half-hearted twitch in return before they move on with the others. There are plenty more pictures of relatives who Tensei will never meet because they’re dead and gone, and while it’s interesting to trace the path of reddish-brownish hair descending from Chihiro and Reto, no other faces ping at his fuzzy memory of characters from a story of ink-on-paper.

His mother’s family has no shrine within the village, because they hail from far in the south, halfway to the border. Tensei nods as his mother and uncle tell him by word of caravans and camels and a village called Hari-mura spun out of glass, because there are no cameras or painters for the merchants that come and go.

They go back to celebrating, afterwards. At least, Tensei does. His father joins Sandaime-sama in the office again and his mother stays home, so Yashamaru-oji follows close behind or carries him in turns. He makes his way through the streets a little slower this time, taking in the laughter and smiles and a moment of peace when the lines gentle on some of the more weathered faces.

The eighth and final day of the festival sees a winding performance moving across the village. Tensei hears Sasori-nii’s voice being thrown across the street, narrating the story of a prince who moves a mountain for his people as three teens in pointed hoods part the crowds for a giant of a puppet with red crescents painted on their faces.

Tensei may not be from this world, but he is tied to this land of wind and sand by generations upon generations of blood, shed to make his home what it is.

He closes his eyes at the show’s end and holds this moment close to his chest.

::::::

59年, October

There is something wrong with the world, and it takes Tensei embarrassingly long to figure out what it is. Mostly because he’s not allowed to leave the house alone, or the property without an adult accompanying him, and so he doesn’t actually get out all that much. Which is perfectly reasonable and logical considering he’s not even two years old yet, but doesn’t change the fact that he’s bored.   Aside from studying and being chased by Ainu or Reki in turns around the house in their favorite game of ‘hide-and-run-or-be-hit-by-my-rubber-kunai’, he’s identified exactly what kind of wood most of the wooden furniture in the house is made of and assigned all of them numbers based on size (the answer is cypress, by the way, although the drawer of his mother’s vanity table might be black walnut, and there’s a few decorative sandalwood hair combs that she uses a lot and smells nice). 

But sometimes, if Tensei promises to behave, Reki’s mother— Nemaya-obasan— and his own will take him out with them while grocery shopping, or even just to a coffeehouse where he gets to try really, really hard to make the owner’s unfriendly cat let him close enough for petting while Karura meets up with another blonde woman who’s introduced to him as Maya-obasan .

Anyways! Back to the point: there is something wrong with the world. Beyond the war, beyond the hard stress-lines on the faces of the people in the streets and the way that some of them narrow their eyes at him, beyond the signs in the market talking about rationing and the quiet sobbing in the crowd around the announcement board in the plaza, beyond the bandaged people limping around the village, beyond the magic of walking on walls. It's watching a genin jump down from a three story building instead of blurring into a shunshin that finally makes it click.

Falling is slower.

Nine-point-eight-one meters per second per second. Tensei has the number drilled into half-buried memories, written over and over again for a good chunk of his life. Nine-point-eight-one meters per second per second, except he watches the ball carefully while playing with Ainu and Reki and none of them know how to use chakra to make the ball fall slower after they throw it straight up, so it can’t be nine point eight one meters per second per second.

Tensei asks his father over breakfast, "How fast does the ground pull things?"

"Gravity?" Ah, that's the word he's looking for. "It's been a while since I've had to do that kind of math.” 

“He could ask one of the Academy teachers," Karura suggests. “I remember needing help on the projectiles unit.”

“Students learn such things at the Academy?” Sandaime-sama wonders. A servant comes and takes his empty dishes away. “Whatever for?”

Did Sandaime-sama not attend the Academy? Tensei turns the question onto the man, but Reki’s mother steers him away from the table and wraps a shawl around his head and shoulders even though the sun isn’t up yet. Ainu-chan and Reki-kun are playing outside, wouldn’t Tensei like to join them? Maybe Reki-kun can take Tensei with him to the Academy tomorrow, even! 

There is no public library in Sunagakure, so Tensei takes the suggestion and toddles halfway across town to accost the kunoichi overseeing the stream of students through the front doors. It’s normal for little kids to get around the village on their own during daytime hours, in this world, although he clocks the feeling of something jumping around above him and Reki. Not directly above, but definitely within a close radius, like how when people can just tell that they’re being stared at even if they can’t see it. 

Which he’s not. Being stared at, that is. There’s a few well-wishes from people who recognize him, but Suna’s general populace is mostly polite enough to keep lingering gazes and comments to themselves. Until he’s out of sight, at least.

It’s not the first time Tensei has noticed the feeling, but nothing’s ever come of it, so… eh. He’ll ask Aiya-sensei during their next tutoring session, and she’ll either notify someone to look into it or model a delicate way to wonder out loud if a conversational partner has gone crazy. 

"Tensei-chan," he's greeted by the kunoichi-sensei at the gates. "A little early for the Academy, isn’t it?"

It is early. The school day starts at six in the morning and lasts until noon, when it starts getting too hot— but that’s not what the kunoichi was referring to. Tensei looks to Reki, who nods at him with a small smile before slipping inside. 

Okay, then. "What's your name?" Tensei asks. And if Haru-sensei is surprised when he hits her with his real inquiry right after her introduction, it doesn't show. 

"It depends on what you're dropping,” she explains, the pitched baby-voice that most adults outside of his family talk to him with only half-there. “A feather falls much more slowly than a kunai, for example."

Tensei shakes his head. "If there's no air, how fast?"

"You mean, in water?"

“No.” Does the concept of a vacuum like space even exist here, yet? "A person," he decides. "If you drop a person really high, how fast does it fall in one second?"

"How far," Haru-sensei corrects. "Did you see someone fall, Tensei-chan?"

Well, yes, but that’s not really the point here. "How far?" he insists.

So Tensei learns that multiple someones in the far-away capital named Kannan-shi figured out a couple years before the Second War that the rate of the acceleration of gravity is somewhere between three and a half and four meters per second per second. None of them can agree on an exact number, but at least now Tensei knows that it’s not nine point eight one. He doesn't feel any lighter than he did in another life, but of course he doesn't, this body was born and grown here. It's already used to it.

How, though? Gravity is dependent on mass and density. Tensei has seen the map of the world painted onto the wall of Sandaime-sama's office, and it must not be very big because he’s heard that a shinobi could run from one end to another of Wind Country in a week. And yeah, shinobi are fast, but it isn't like they can run non-stop. That’s a week with breaks included.

So this planet must have a super, super dense core to make up for it?

It explains why he remembers seeing kunai and shuriken fly so straight and so far on a brightly-colored screen, why he remembers watching people fall so dramatically in slow motion. Except it's not only for the drama, because gravity is different . 

On one hand, that's pretty cool. He doesn't have the muscles of someone from a higher gravity world, though, so he's stuck jumping at regular heights until he learns how to boost his movements with chakra.

“Thank you,” he says with a bob of a bow, and then turns toward home. Maybe he’ll stop by the plaza first, actually. The puppeteer he and Reki-kun passed by on the way here should be done setting up now, and he wants to see what stories the Mat has to offer today before he starts nosing into why Sandaime-sama didn’t go to the Academy.

Chapter Text

60年, March

Sandaime-sama takes him aside after a lunch that started with three people and ended with two after Rasa volunteered to deal with whatever sent the jounin commander barreling towards them, and drops a small mass of iron sand at Tensei’s feet.

Tensei obligingly gives it a go, despite doubting that he’s inherited the bloodline limit for doing so. It's cute that the adults are still hoping he has, but he's seen the way that Sandaime-sama's iron and Otou-san's gold simply react like an amorphous fifth limb, rattling at the shoulders to make them bigger when they're angry and swirling around their feet when they're in a good mood. It's a better indicator than their faces, anyways. If there's one thing other than magnet release that got passed down the legacy, it's Sandaime-sama's stoicism. Tensei doesn’t have that— neither the kekkei-genkai nor the stoicism. He's never so much as made the sand beneath his feet jump even when he’s surprised or angry. That’s what Gaara gets from their father.

Will get. Eventually. Hopefully. If Tensei hasn't fucked up the timeline entirely just by being born, that is.

Sandaime-sama's insistence to keep trying shifts to the occasional advice to project his core outwards when Tensei starts to get bored of waving his hands, then to scolding admonishments for him to focus. Something, something, expectations and self-fulfilling prophecies and believing in himself. Tensei bites his tongue and shuts up the part of his brain that keeps offering sass because that would be rude, and god forbid Sandaime-sama tell Tensei's mother that he's been rude later. He kicks at the air above the pile out of frustration, no longer finding the endeavor amusing, and—

A cluster of filaments pull together in the same direction.

Tensei blinks in surprise, dropping his foot after a beat to keep his balance. The cluster falls apart. It could be a trick of the light, or just wishful thinking, but then Sandaime-sama says, “Your eyes. No surprise you have Rasa’s markings, then.”

Tensei reaches up to touch, but he can’t exactly feel the sudden appearance of black pigmentation, can he?

"My blood is iron, as are my kin— stronger than even a desert storm," Sandaime-sama tells him, and Tensei wonders if the saying came first or if Sandaime-sama's epithet did: Testuarashi no Sarou, Sarou of the Iron Storm. "This is a technique that only your father and I know how to use. It will hurt a lot of our people if anyone else learns it. I'm trusting you with a secret, Tensei-chan, because those of our legacy line are to become strong shinobi so that we may protect the village."

He says, a technique. He says, our legacy line. He doesn't say, magnet release is a Hiden jutsu, but it’s a near thing, and Tensei is very, very aware that he is being watched very, very carefully for the near minute of silence he takes to process it all.

Magnet release is not a kekkei-genkai. Tensei thinks this fact bears repeating, if only screamed in the privacy of his own mind. Magnet release is not a kekkei-genkai.

Tensei isn't sure what possessed Sandaime-sama to reveal this S-rank military secret to a toddler . Maybe the security blanket of an ANBU escort is enough to ensure his silence, but. Still.

Magnet release is not a kekkei-genkai.

Tensei decides he needs to sit down right now. It lands him directly in front of and partially atop the small pile of iron sand, detached from the shifting mass underneath Sandaime-sama’s shawl. Maybe being closer will help him understand the absolute landmine that his leader has just dropped. This doesn't make sense! Magnet release was always supposed to be a combined nature-transformation of wind and earth, even if it was never stated so in pages and pages of blank and white ink, because that was the only combination left that made sense.

That aside, aren't Sandaime-sama and Rasa only tangentially related? Sandaime-sama is called a lot of different things, most of which are from Tensei's father. His title, most often, but occasionally Sensei , and even more rarely, Oji-san . ‘Uncle’. Which makes sense to everyone else, he supposes— look at the Sandaime’s legacy student, of course his nephew would also inherit his kekkei-genkai— except after visiting their family shrine, Tensei knows that Sandaime-sama is family by marriage, not blood. Ah, shit, no one else outside of their family knows that, do they? Great-grandmother Ami had black hair like Sandaime-sama, and he’s about the right age to have been born just before she died along with Shodai-sama and great-uncle Kanza.

The caveat, then, is this: New instances of kekkei-genkai are usually passed down directly from the common ancestor who develops said ability, according to what little Tensei remembers about the matter. Sandaime-sama is the first human person in history to have magnet release, nevermind in their family. Great great grandfather Reto-sama, for all his accomplishments, did not. Rasa, somehow, does .

"Sandaime-sama," he affirms, and it only comes out a little shaky. "I understand."

There is maybe a twinkle in Sandaime-sama’s pale golden eyes and a soft swirl of black around his feet when he says, "We'll have to see if we can't rescue your poor father from his meeting the jounin commander, or I might be 'Sarou-sensei' one day." It's in a daze that he watches the older man summon the pile back to rejoin its brethren, one hand holding the remains of his father’s interrupted lunch and the other extended in his direction.

Later, Tensei smothers his face into his pillow and screams, because a normal fucking child would have reached for it with their hands and maybe have tried the sand-sticking exercise that legacy kids and second-year students at the academy run around the streets showing off. Tensei tried to move it like his father does, like Sandaime-sama does.

It's stupid to be disappointed in himself for not recognizing the ploy. A two year old, even a very smart one who knows a lot of things he shouldn't, is not going to win mind games with a thirty-something year old who lives and breathes politics and war strategies.

Still.

Tensei kicks the sofa on his way to dinner and tells his mother that he stubbed his toe. So what if Sandaime-sama caught him at it, half a step through the threshold and right behind him? Tensei tells those lifted eyebrows to shush because now he has thinking to do, dammit!

Even disregarding the not-blood relation, magnet release cannot be a kekkei-genkai combination of wind and earth because Tensei got tested and has lightning as his primary, with wind as his secondary, just like Yashamaru-oji. It can't, because Tensei has managed to move a small clump of metal without applying any physical force to it at all.

Oh, he's going to have to learn earth release to keep up the facade, isn't he? People used to be under the impression that magnet release was a kekkei-tota of wind, earth, and lightning until it got out during the Third War that Rasa of the Gold Dust couldn't pull off a lightning technique to save his life. Tensei knows. He listens when people talk like they forget he can understand, spends the weekends wandering in and pouring over the archives because who's going to restrict the Kazekage's heir's son from dusty records? Especially since it’s all a very carefully organized mess, because no one but the archivists knows the organization system that Suna uses to file things for security’s sake.

Tensei understands that they’re shinobi and no one likes to keep anything written down and-or easily accessible because knowledge is as much of a hazard as it is a tool, but he wishes he weren’t two so he could go and demand answers from someone old and important enough to know about it.

Tensei mimics Sandaime-sama’s quiet ambiance as the older man watches them. His father is leading him through the beginnings of a kata that Sandaime-sama came up with called the Dune series. He doesn’t have to run his mouth with stumbling questions when it’s all just a pattern of move, move, adjust, move, adjust, repeat. Observe and copy, with the occasional tapping on a joint that’s angled too low or a limb extended too far. It reminds him a little of tai-chi, only faster and with black and gold particles swirling around in the air.

Not Tensei’s black. Right now, Tensei’s only moving his flesh and bones to get a feel for the kata itself. He’s determined to see his own material dancing in the air alongside his father's gold and Sandaime-sama’s iron someday soon, though.

The thing about Hiden techniques is that there has to be, at some level, genetics involved. Tensei got the idea from Aiya-sensei, with whom he’s currently trying to memorize all the important people associated with Sunagakure, when she brought up the Hoki family. In the same way that medical ninjutsu could theoretically be taught to anyone but a family specializing in it would produce kids who also have an affinity for it, due to inheriting suitable variables like good chakra control or a neutral signature with no strong elemental leanings, the passing on of Hiden techniques was the same. It would be a good explanation why so many of Suna's ninjutsu-centered legacy lines stayed stubbornly within the family tribes, with any non-blood branches tending to die out after the first or second generation unless they married in. Which he hadn’t known about, but he’s just going to trust his tutor on those facts because a major point of the lesson was that asking primary sources about this topic is a big no-no. Not even a taboo, but a crime, punishable in a court of law. So, yeah.

Unlike kekkei-genkai, one doesn't have to be genetically related to another carrier to use a Hiden technique, but compatibility is a factor. And a compatibility test is exactly what Sandaime-sama’s little excursion was meant to be, one which Tensei suspects he passed. Fucking Sage on a broomstick sideways, alright. Tensei kind of assumed he wasn’t going to be terribly plot-relevant since he didn’t take over Gaara’s role as the jinchuuriki, which he physically can’t. Even if he wanted to deal with the sleep deprivation, the spiritual psychosis, and being the social pariah and hunted by terrorists— which he doesn't— his chakra coils aren’t compatible with the One-Tailed Shukaku. But having magnet release? Not only is Tensei pretty sure he could count the number of people who have it in the series on one hand, but this is going to be a big part of his arsenal.

His arsenal, that he needs to be able to kill people with. Because the King of Hell has carved a list of names into Tensei’s mind that he sees whenever he closes his eyes, and it’s. Whooo, boy, it sure is. Uh. Something that he will deal with later, when he has better hand-eye coordination. Yep.

Good gods, what the fuck is he even doing. Tensei trades that train of thought in favor of trying to sneak into the Playhouse to bother Sasori-nii again. He’ll manage it one of these days, he’s sure.

::::::

60年, August

A flick of a wrist, a one-handed sign, and his mother steps back from lighting the incense sticks slotted into an ornate holder. Tensei thinks he’ll never not be impressed by that.

Another Sunartistry Festival, another memorial day, another trip to the family shrine. Sandaime-sama's iron sand flutters underneath his robes, the only indication of… something, as they stand before the picture of a fierce-looking kunoichi. Great-aunt Hibiki shared her brother Natsu’s coloring, judging by the beady dark eyes, the tan skin, and the short brown hair cut into a standard kunoichi’s bob.

Their son Tenoi looks a lot like her, except for black starburst markings around honey-gold eyes the same shade as Sandaime-sama's. Tenoi would have been ten when he died in fifty-seven, two years after his mother and one war apart. Tensei could've had another older brother-figure, and from the way that his cousin-uncle-babysitter holds his bow a little longer at the portrait than some of the others, he wonders if maybe Sasori-nii had been this boy's friend.

This time around, Tensei can actually apply the development of his two-and-a-half-year-old brain to being more inquisitive of his ancestors— or, as Aiya-sensei has reminded him enough times to drive her to exasperation, his ‘lineage’. The eldest child of First Kazekage and his wife was likely one of the earliest Suna-born shinobi, only two years after the village’s founding. Great-grandfather Koshiro's hair looks much closer in color to Tensei's than his Uzumaki mother’s does; a sort-of ginger with Reto's green eyes. Chiyo-baasama and Ebizo-jiisama spend a moment longer than the rest with their older brother, never to grow wrinkled and bent like they are.

The picture beside Koshiro’s is of a fair-skinned, raven-haired woman standing in what he recognizes as the compound's south courtyard at home, appearing the same decades ago as it does now. The slightly sheer shawl wrapped around her head looks like it could be made from silk, by the way the lilac fabric drapes around her shoulders. Ami is written beneath her likeliness, her beauty for which she was named now frozen in time. Tensei frowns at her dates, one to twenty-eight, because that matches with more than one other family members' numbers. He’s starting to see a pattern here.

Great grandfather Koshiro and great grandmother Ami had twins. The first, going by the order of pictures, is Kanza— a puppeteer like Chiyo-baasama? He's wearing a pointed hood through which some of his mother's dark hair peeks through, with a round, pale face. Purple paint travels in a stripe across his nose, and a purple crescent rests on his chin. He looks every bit his age in the picture, years twenty to twenty-eight, and Tensei bows lower than is perhaps necessary before moving on to the second child, his grandmother. Hana, her name reads, one of the few kanji he can recognize even without the verbal introduction. Not conventionally pretty, unlike her mother, and there’s something about her picture that makes Tensei feel like he’s being watched. Her hair is brick-red, with green eyes that look out sternly from between curtain bangs. It’s a familiar expression that Tensei sometimes finds on his father’s face when he comes home with gold rattling around his shoulders. He looks at the numbers underneath her name— twenty to fifty-three, killed during the Second War. Only five years before I was born, he notes with a sigh.

Her husband and Tensei’s grandfather, Natsu, has familiar narrow brown eyes and stiff-spiky hair. It looks like an effort had been made to tame it for the camera, unsuccessfully, and Tensei can't tell if the deadpan expression was the man's default or just unamused. If an echo of Hana could be found in his father, though, then Natsu is a dead-ringer.

Dead-ringer. Ha. No, actually, that’s disrespectful. Tensei apologizes as a part of his prayer. 

“Why are the numbers the same for so many of them?” he asks after everyone raises their heads. “The twenty-eight, I mean.” The First Kazekage, his wife, his eldest child, his daughter-in-law by said child, and even one of his grandkids. That doesn’t seem like a coincidence.

From the way that multiple expressions immediately sour, he knows that he’s touched upon a sensitive subject. “That’s a story for when you’re older,” his mother tells him.

Chiyo-baasama scoffs. “I say if he’s old enough to ask, he’s old enough to hear it. What else did you hire that tutor for?” 

His mother looks to his father. His father looks to Sandaime-sama. Sandaime-sama lowers his gaze to rest consideringly on Sasori-nii. 

Tensei huffs, feeling like he’s missing out. Fine, whatever. He’ll just ask again next year or something.

Chapter Text

61年, January

Things are easy when his world revolves around five people and five people only. Or three, really. Sandaime-sama, Yashamaru-oji, and Sasori-nii only count as a third of a person each because it’s great when they’re in the village and Tensei can get them to pay attention to him, but usually one or the other or both requirements fall through.

No, really, it’s ridiculous. Sandaime-sama might as well live in a whole other world instead of just a different wing of the manor, which definitely has the space if Yashamaru-oji ever wanted to move in. And there’s no reason for Sasori-nii and Chiyo-baasama and Ebizo-jiisama to live so far away, either, even if the two elders are pretty boring people.

Everyone’s busy with their own things. He gets it. Yashamaru spends more time being deployed than not, and even Rasa was sent out onto the frontlines last week. They don’t talk to him about the war, but they talk about it around him, and he’s not a dumb baby.

His mom— the first one, from his other life— was never much one for sending real smiles in his direction, to be fair, but at least his dad did when he was around. In comparison, Rasa of the Gold Dust has a face that was carved out of the sandstone canyon that they live in, much like the other people who bear their village’s hourglass insignia. Tensei asks very nicely to tag along whenever he catches wind that one of the staff is going out on a grocery run, because at least the household servants and the vendors in the street are more normal about facial expressions. 

“I’unno if Okaa-han wants me to grow big fast or stay little forever,” he tells Sasori-nii one day. Sasori-nii is in the hospital again and in trouble this time, the kind where Sandaime-sama or his father have particles rattling that let Tensei know he should stay away for a while. He does it too, now, except the iron only jumps a little around his feet like there’s a wind when there’s actually not. It’s just Tensei and his inability to float around more than a couple handfuls at a time, even when he’s angry about something.

And he’s not angry about that. Not really. Disappointed, maybe? It sounds dumb because no one else but his father and the literal strongest shinobi in their country can do what they do, and he’s only this little. A little guy. Tiny.

Which brings him back to his predicament.

“I have things to do,” he insists to his uncle-cousin-brother. Not babysitter. Tensei rather feels as if he’s the one babysitting Sasori right now, because if no one is paying attention then they won’t know the teen has escaped until he's been gone for hours and someone will have to drag him out of the Playhouse’s workshops. “Important stuff. An’ I need to be grown-up to do them, mostly, ‘xcept being grown-up is bleh and Yashamaru-oji says he likes that I’m small and cute.”

“Does he.”

“Mm-hm. He says I don’ need to be big to do things, really, 'cuz he’s kinda on the small side and he’s the Glass Hawk of Suna, and you’re also not big or all the way grown-up yet but everyone knows how Akasuna no Sasori holds our defensive line the best.”

Those who still remember Chikamatsu's days on the battlefield have revived his old epithet for the teen— ‘of the Red Sand ’ . It’s supposed to be the red of spilt blood, he knows, but Tensei thinks at least a little bit of it is because of the hair. Rasa's sun-bleached burgundy and Sasori's vibrant crimson are both shades of red, just in opposite directions. 

Tensei can only see the latter’s hair because he does not wear a puppeteer's hood. It’s not really dependent on how long you’ve been a puppeteer, like he originally guessed. Sasori passed his Apprentice Trials before Tensei was even born, but no, the Playhouse where all puppeteers become puppeteers just offers the choice of being traditional or not. Wearing the bunraku hood gives away your skillset— a puppeteer has to be really confident or just really dumb to willingly put themself at a disadvantage like that. At least, that’s how it was explained to him. Considering Chiyo-baasama is the big boss lady of it all, Tensei figures she knows what she’s talking about.

Sasori-nii is Looking at him now, in the way that tells him he said too much. And, yeah, the average three-year old probably doesn’t know much about holding defensive lines, but the great thing about Aiya-sensei is that she doesn’t care what an average three year old should learn so long as Tensei can learn it and knows when to keep his mouth shut. “‘Xcept then you do dumb things like not tell ‘nyone you got your leg chopped off and replace it with a puppet limb,” he adds quickly. It's not even the first time, or so the whispers say. There are a handful of shinobi who have amazing prosthetics made by the teen in front of him without prior authorization from the medics. And, well, the medics are professionals for a reason, right? “I think it looks cool, though. You should paint it like how everyone drew on Reki-kun’s cast when he broke his leg. We can make an art project out of it, sou, then you won’t be bored anymore.”

His word vomit is rewarded with a sharp exhale. That’s basically laughing for most shinobi in this godforsaken, emotionally repressed military force. “It’s already art,” Sasori-nii says. “I can bend it farther and in more directions than a human leg could, and it holds a dagger in the heel. What can you do?”

Point. Tensei shrugs. “Right now I’m just small and cute. Are you hiding your leg because it freaks the nurses out, or are you hiding your leg because the nurses say it’ll freak me out?” It goes unsaid that Sasori would hide it because he thought it would upset Tensei. Half the time on his unofficial D-ranks babysitting Tensei is spent trying to send him running with weird puppet stuff. Jokes on him, though. Tensei is now a thoroughly desensitized toddler. 

Sasori-nii flips the blanket up with a chakra string in a dramatic flair, because puppet masters are all theatre-kids by requirement. Tensei leans in, inspecting the limb as he's learned to with his eyes and not his hands. The seams are pretty fine— even the toes have joints, wow— and the color matches with the skin it connects to. The way it bounces the harsh hospital lights makes him think that the material doesn’t have much give, though. It looks like it would hurt at the connection while running or jumping— anything that generates enough impact, really, which is basically most things a shinobi needs for a fight.  “Sou, d’you need cushions?” Tensei asks out of curiosity.

Sasori-nii follows his train of thought and gets that Tensei's talking not just talking about more pillows. “I don’t need cushions for what I’m going to do.” Well, it’s his body, so he would know. The teen trades his answer for a question of his own. “Do you enjoy being small?”

Tensei shrugs again. “People underestimate you when you’re small an' cute.”

Sasori-nii gives him another Look. A lot of people have a lot of Looks. Tensei has a working theory that the number of Looks they have is conversely proportional with the number of words they’re willing to share. It’s a recurring nightmare of his that someday, he’s going to meet someone with no Words and only Looks. “I could keep you small like this forever if you want,” Sasori says. It’s a statement, but it almost sounds like an offer. “Or I could make you bigger. Huge. It would take some work, but I could do it.”

Sasori-nii is being considerate. It’s sweet. Tensei pats the edge of his shoulder pauldron to encourage this. “I have to do the growing myself, I think, or it doesn’t count,” he tells the older boy. Sasori-nii nods as if to confirm this. “Growing is kinda like an art, too, actually. All the steps you gotta do to take care of yourself, except now the steps to growing your puppet arm are different from the rest of your body.”

“You think it’s a weakness.”

Tensei squints at the ball-joint, as if that will help him figure out its mechanisms. “Not really? Maybe for the others, but you know what you’re doing ‘cuz you created it. An’ it won’ bleed, an’ it’s much harder to cut through. An’ it looks real enough from a distance that I don’ think an enemy would think to target it right away, ‘specially if you cover it in sleeves or bandage it up. Or something.”

“Or something,” Sasori echoes, something pleased in his expression. “Do you want one?”

A knife shooting out of his limbs? Tensei flexes a hand, still pudgy with baby-fat. Wolverine claws— now there’s an idea. Alas, all of his extremities remain intact, if not wholly functional. Stupid toddling kiddie body. “If I ever lose an arm, you gotta add knives coming out of my knuckles when I make a fist, please,” he decides. “Ne, can you show me how to do chakra strings again?”

::::::

61年, November

His mother has been entrusting Tensei to run some of their household's easier errands lately, like buying fresh eggs every morning. He doesn't know why Reki and Ainu suddenly can't do them anymore— he doesn't like waking up at the crack of dawn just to do a grocery run.

There’s quite a bit of cooing from a lot of people that he has to wait through patiently, the occasional encouragement of Ganbatte! that he bobs his head politely in thanks at. It's just a bento lunch for Sandaime-sama and his father, and also one for Sasori because his mother and the servants made too much again. Besides, it’s not like he’s alone. His ANBU escort, as Aiya-sensei called the niggling feeling in the back of his mind about being followed, is undoubtedly with him now as well, even though there’s nowhere more secure than the Kazekage office building.

The office he’s making this delivery to has clearly been informed, because Minoru-san— the elderly secretary— blinks and waves him in without a second glance. His father puts his hands on Tensei's shoulders and smiles when Sandaime-sama remarks how Tensei should be able to keep up with the other first years now, even if they enroll him early. It's a small thing, but no less proud for its quiet delivery. Besides, Tensei makes it up by beaming a grin back.

Sasori is much harder to get to. The Playhouse doesn't let anyone in who's not a puppeteer, and a master with blue and scales on his face has no qualms about dangling him by the collar when he's caught trying to sneak in through a ground floor office window. “Sasori-kun’s not here,” the master tells him.

What? Sasori-nii was released from the hospital two days ago, and he’s not due to be deployed for another two weeks according to Chiyo-baasama. Tensei pouts. “What’s your name?” 

“This one calls himself Dragon, Tensei-dono.” 

That would explain the scales, then. Tensei shoves the boxed lunch into the man’s hands with a giggle. “Okaa-han made it, so you have to like it or else. Give it to Otou-san when you’re done!”

“I— what?”

“We don’t waste food in Suna,” he reminds Dragon, and then sprints away. Honestly, his father could use a few friends his own age.

When he makes it back home, his mother has been kicked out of the kitchen by the servants again, and it’s really, really, really obvious that she’s bored. Tensei can sympathize. He would be bored, too, if all he could do was lie down or sit for hours without end. Yashamaru-oji spends his visits home from the frontlines hovering, and the servants won’t let her even lift a finger to embroider Tensei’s new festival clothes with Sunagakure’s symbol this year for fear of Rasa's wrath.

They’re not helping, though. At the rate his mother is throwing whatever’s nearby at people who talk to her in a soft, neutral tone of voice, she’s going to break another one of her few glass statuettes that Tensei's grandparents left her. And then she’ll end up crying for an entire afternoon again.

Tensei doesn't exactly have a ton of experience with women who are eight months pregnant, but this is supposed to be his mother. So he marches up to her seat on the couch and asks, "Can Okaa-han teach me something fun? The Academy is being all boring about safety and stuff."

"Safety is important," she chides him, but it’s one of the few times he gets to see her look sly. And because Yashamaru-oji is only an enabler when it comes to the harmless or petty things, he runs in half an hour later yelling about how she can’t just do her fire-starting jutsu indoors, Karura-nee, skies above.

Tensei shares a mischievous grin with her and mouths from behind Yashamaru-oji’s back, ‘later’.

::::::

Marigold slams the traitor down onto the roof. "Who do you work for," he snarls.

The other man lurches desperately, to no avail. Marigold might be spindly, but he's tall for his age, and his knee on the assailant's back doesn't budge. "Someone with the village's best interest in mind," his captive snaps back. "Sarou and his line will lead us to ruin."

They say that the war is still going. It probably is. Marigold hasn't been paying attention to it, though, because all of his focus is on one thing and one thing only: the job.

"Long live the Kazekage," Marigold says. There's not a doubt in his mind that this is a multi-pronged attack like the one that reportedly killed the Shodai's son and then the wife and one of the kids. The Sandaime's personal guard rotation should be dealing with this guy's partner as they speak, and probably a third assassin intended for Rasa-dono, too. Two grown men who are perfectly capable of protecting themselves, unlike Marigold's charge. 

Marigold palms a kunai, and then drives it into the roof next to the man's head. Blunt blades be damned, Marigold will gladly bloody his bare hands if he has to. "You can tell me, or you can tell T&I. Only one of us ends things quick."

But he doesn't have to. The tell-tale crack of a false tooth provides just enough warning for Marigold to get clear of a dark mist— poison.

The assassin spasms once, twice, and then goes still.

Marigold clears the air with a minor wind-release while waiting for the chakra signature to completely extinguish before he approaches, and then unceremoniously rolls the corpse on top of the body scroll's seal with a kick. The autopsy guys won't mind a few extra bruises, probably. 

It's just his luck that a familiar presence picks that moment to start moving. Which, what. Why? At this hour? Marigold seals the body away hastily, tucking the scroll into his weapons pouch just in time to avoid traumatizing the kid climbing up the iron trellis on the side of the wall.

"Oh," Tensei-chan says, eyes wide. "I didn't know someone was here first. Sorry."

Protocol says not to interact with his charges, so Marigold shakes his head, taking a step back. The kid must see that as an invitation, though, because he pushes himself up with a heave and scrambles the rest of the way onto the roof. "I'm Tensei!" the Kazekage's great-nephew chirps. "Son of Rasa, kin to Sandaime-sama— oh, wait. You know that already, I think. You're one of the Anbu who follows me and Okaa-han around, right?"

Who the fuck— oh, the etiquette tutor, probably. Marigold offers a nod.

"Cool. Wait, no. I meant," Tensei bows, a middling dip of thirty degrees, "nice to meet you. And thank you for taking care of me."

Marigold stares, hardly daring to move. His charge blinks back with big, violet eyes that Marigold hasn't had the chance to see up close like this before. "Can you… I mean. Um." Tensei-chan pats at the slight ledge that he just climbed over. "Wanna sit?"

No. No, no, Marigold is not about to let his charge who can't even shunshin or wall-walk just sit with his legs dangling off of the edge. He takes another step back and points at the solid, stable area of the roof. "Sure," the kid agrees readily, walking over to sit right next to his feet.

Skies above. Marigold takes a deep breath, but the kid's not done.

"Are your hands okay? They look a little red. I think there's a med-kit in the bathroom down the hall, if you need a bandage."

Marigold does a quick check for blood splatters— nothing. The skin is a little scraped up from the earlier tussle, maybe. He shoves his hands into his pockets and shakes his head again.

"Don't hide them," Tensei-chan frowns. Is Marigold getting scolded? "My Sasori-nii got in trouble for hiding his hurt, and he— um." The kid pulls his legs in, curling up into a ball. "You're not supposed to," he finishes half-heartedly.

Marigold has heard of the news: Akasuna no Sasori, missing in action. They're the same age, even, although Marigold can't claim any familiarity past the handful of times that he was on guard duty while the puppeteer would watch the kid for Karura-san. 

Marigold considers said kid on the roof, with his arms around his knees and his chin tucked in against the chilly night breeze. It looks a little like he's trying not to cry.

Marigold knows a thing or two about trying not to cry. He takes a seat, crossing his legs.

Together, they sit in the hush of the night, waiting for a new dawn.

Chapter Text

62年, July

Tensei suddenly wishes life had continued to be boring when he stops seeing Sandaime-sama. Everyone stops seeing Sandaime-sama because he’s gone , and Tensei’s world shrinks down to just three people for real. 

A search party is sent out and returns with a request, because there’s a scattering of iron mixed deep into the sand that no one else has the technique to separate in a timely manner. Rasa growls orders and argues and has to concede in the end, because he’s never been good with his sensei’s choice of material, either. Tensei leaves the canyon walls of Sunagakure no Sato for the first time in his life from the safety of his father’s back, because everyone is thinking the same thing: The curse of assassinations on the Kazekage lineage has felled its third victim, and when the hat changes hands for a third time, Tensei's blood will place him in a very, very vulnerable position.

“It was during a routine check,” he hears Saon-san tell his father. Just a formality of a tour around the village borders that the Head of Security takes the Kazekage on once a year. There are signs of a battle, a trail of dead bodies leading from the north-east edge and pricks in the ground from Sandaime-sama’s Scattered Showers technique that he just showed Tensei how to do last week.

A tracking-specialist with a scarred weasel summons insists that there’s a hint of something other than blood beneath the sand and iron, but no one dares to disturb the area where the trail goes cold. Tensei unearths and hovers a black cloud of particles not much bigger than his head in the air but low to the ground, as still as he can manage.

The summons grumbles about blood and poison, about sawdust and chakra-laced wood. 

The entire party pointedly does not look at the single puppeteer ANBU agent in their midst as the iron is sealed up inside of a scroll. His father hands it to him. “Keep it safe until we get him back,” he’s told.

Tensei thins his lips and looks away.

::::::

62年, August

“Mountain Mover!”

“Siege of Eighteen Moons!”

“Princess Shinkokami!”

The clamor is a gale of high-pitched children’s voices; cute, especially after the polite silence during the last play. The puppeteer manning the Mat Against the Wall that morning hums to show that he's listening, despite busy hands moving behind the curtain of the miniature stage. His eyes flick up periodically to scan the audience, and, not for the first time today, they land on Tensei.

And linger.

Yukimura of the Ten Faces, Tensei doesn't ask, small hand enclosed within the much larger one of an adult’s. Ainu and Reki are sitting cross-legged in the very front, always unanimously reserved for younger kids around their age— Reki with a group that Tensei recognizes to be Academy students, specifically, from their brand-new blue sandals that haven't been worn long enough to be truly sun-bleached. He was going to sit up there, too, like he always does, until Ainu’s mother placed a hand on his shoulder and pulled him up onto her hip with a smile and, You can see more from back like this, anyways. Ne, Tensei-chan?

No, he can't. But he doesn't protest.

The curtains open again. The puppeteer’s gaze slides away. 

There are eyes on his back when he walks the streets and sneers at his face from hooded and painted figures, these days. Tensei hasn’t even done anything.

Well, actually, that might be the problem.

Tensei thinks of Sasori-nii and his puppets. He’s not going to tell— but Sasori did, and he didn’t say anything because what then? If he does say something and by some miracle Rasa and the Council believe him with no specific evidence, Sasori-nii is still from the Playhouse, for all that they would disavow him so that he’s not of the Playhouse anymore. And if he doesn’t say anything, all eyes would still turn to the puppeteers, who all but surely were responsible for Shodai-sama’s death as well. 

So Tensei keeps his mouth shut.

His father gets even more busy. Exponentially more busy, even, because “Sunagakure no Sato requires a strong leader at the helm in these times,” and “Dammit, Rasa, it's been weeks! We are not going to find him anytime soon!” 

So Tensei stays out of the way a lot. 

In light of recent events, Aiya-sensei finally gets around to telling him about the not-so-coincidental timing of the many deaths in his ancestry. Or rather, not just deaths, but assassinations.

“I thought it was just Shodai-sama and Nidaime-sama who were killed like that,” Tensei says quietly. 

“There is no ‘just’ when it comes to the history of your lineage,” Aiya-sensei chides.

According to the lengthy lecture that she launches into, the First Kazekage’s decision to back their country’s daimyo in wanting more land was extremely unpopular with the majority of the village. It had only been sixteen years since the hidden village system replaced the Warring Clans era at the time of the first ever Five Kage Summit, and no one wanted to ruin the tentative peace that had settled throughout the nations, even if Suna wasn’t exactly prospering. Fast forward ten years and tensions erupted into the First Great Shinobi War, and Reto was an obvious target to pin the blame on.  

His personal advisor and guard was named the Second Kazekage in the year twenty-six— Shamon of the Playhouse, rather than any one of Reto’s three kids, even though all of them were adults by then. Koshiro-ojiisama because he died on the battlefield only two weeks after his father, Chiyo-baasama because her mentor, Chikamatsu, had abdicated his and everyone in his legacy-line’s right to the hat, and Ebizo-jiisama probably because he wasn’t all that strong of a fighter.

Tensei can connect the dots from there. Supposedly, if a big political figure got killed and everyone knew who was all for it— cough, the Playhouse, cough— then the family should go into hiding, right? Koshiro-sama’s death is a little suspicious in its timing, accident or not. But Ebizo-jiisama was the village’s chief strategist and Chiyo-baasama was making a name for herself on the frontlines, so… so what if the facts get fudged a little? That not only did Koshiro’s daughter survive but a second, infant son as well? “The village thinks that Sandaime-sama is Shodai-sama’s grandchild by blood,” he concludes.

“And that is what the village will continue to think so long as it remains standing,” Aiya-sensei says primly. Tensei takes the unspoken warning to keep his mouth shut for what it is. “Now, recall your prior lessons: when did the First War end?”

He winces, knowing from experience that his tutor is looking for a specific date. Tensei enjoys learning about the history of this world, especially all the details that were never shown in ink-on-paper, but memorizing dates has never been his forte. “In the thirtieth year and… um, the autumn season of the new age?”

“The eleventh moon,” Aiya-sensei corrects with a stinging whap of her folding fan against his hands before moving on.

There were two decades of peace before the world saw its Second Great Shinobi War. Right at the beginning, Suna experienced a huge loss on the north-western front against Hanzo of the Salamander, and majority opinion of Shamon’s ability to lead the village through another major conflict in his old age plummeted. Tensei remembers watching a swirling green shadow be struck down during the second act of a play at The Mat Against the Wall in the central plaza, directly after a scene with many fallen soldiers against a backdrop of rainy skies. Wind to Copper is a romanticized historical retelling of the First and Second Kazekage’s respective reigns, and while the ending is usually left open in anticipation of adding a third act, it’s a little tricky to paint Sandaime-sama in a kind light when he was the one who killed Shamon. Suddenly, everyone was claiming that the man who came out of nowhere to study the One-Tail’s power alongside the Second Kazekage was actually the Shodai’s grandchild, and therefore the perfect candidate to be the Third— because obviously, it was Shamon’s lack of blood ties to the strength of their first leader that made him a weak leader, only suited for peacetime. Great-grandfather Koshiro’s lineage only survived him through his daughter Hana, who had Rasa before she died facing Hanzo in the very battle that kicked this chain of events off. Chiyo-baasama’s kids had Sasori and then died to Konoha’s White Fang in the same war, and Ebizo-jiisama supposedly never had any kids.

Tensei makes a face at the emphasis that his tutor places on that last statement, and then he blinks because wait a second. “Aiya-sensei is fifty-two years old,” he says carefully, to which she inclines her head in confirmation. “So then, you lived through all of this.”

“My childhood was spent in the old capital, before your honorable great-great-grandfather brought my family here,” she says. “The desert is not so empty that my life has been uninteresting. I am sure that yours will be as well, Tensei-dono.”

Yeah, well, maybe he wishes that it wasn’t.

His mother squeezes his hand from where they stand at the forefront of the crowd. His father looks so far away, standing alone on the roof of the central office building. Everyone is all dressed up for the inauguration and it feels like a pretty little lie. It feels like Sasori-nii all over again. 

How is Tensei supposed to make his people stay?

A little sister enters his life barely a week later. Tensei’s not sure if Temari counts as a whole person yet, because even though she’s there all the time unlike some people, she also doesn’t do much other than cry and eat and throw up and poop, as babies do. Her eyes are blue-green, like they haven't quite decided what color they want to be yet. Tensei thinks of his mother and uncle's violet-grey that he shares, of his father's dark brown, and wonders about it for all of a week before the date takes him to stand before their family shrine again. 

“Oh,” Tensei mumbles to himself at the First Kazekage’s green-grey irises— and great-grandfather Koshiro’s, and grandmother Hana’s. Green is a recessive color, duh. So much for acing high school biology, all those years ago.

He notices that they haven’t added Sandaime-sama’s picture to the shrine. Otou-san won’t let the servants add Sandaime-sama’s picture. Tensei’s not sure how he feels about the blank space next to Hibiki-obasan that’s always been there, because now it feels like it shouldn’t be. 

His new little sister is singularly uninterested in opening her eyes to greet their ancestors in the well-lit northern wing, and even less so for her own picture to be taken when she discovers the flash. Tensei wonders how his own first Sunartistry Festival went, the one that he can’t remember.

“Be gentle,” his mother tells him as she passes Temari over. And he is, he is gentle, but it’s also kind of really awkward to cradle a baby when he’s only four and also really little. It feels like his arms can barely wrap around her swaddling all the way, and Tensei’s eyes dart around for someplace to sit down before plopping his butt down on the steps. 

There’s a second where he remembers three little brothers from another world, and Tensei bites his lip. “You’re my first little sister,” he tells the bundle in his arms, and she makes some snuffling noises in return. But there’s no sudden rush of affection or protectiveness or anything, just… Temari was supposed to be the oldest, and now she’s not. That was supposed to mean something, and Tensei has taken it away from her. I’m gonna try my best, he promises the version of her that will never exist in this world, in the privacy of his mind.

The council is very disappointed when it turns out that Temari’s chakra coils aren’t compatible to be a jinchuuriki, either— they’re not even looking at other family’s babies. Maybe they’re just really banking on that Uzumaki blood showing through. Maybe they think that Kumo’s method of tying their jinchuuriki down by blood to the village’s leader is the best one, after Iwa’s two jinchuuriki who have no such ties turned up as missing-nin with bounties on their heads from their own village. 

Probably not the first one, actually. Five generations down must see the genes pretty diluted. Their father has pretty large reserves, yeah, but Tensei? He’s not sure if they’re puny from being a child or from his mother, because both she and Yashamaru-oji are weapons specialists with barely a handful of lightning and wind-release techniques each.

She loves Temari, though. Probably. Not like how she loves Tensei, or maybe this is how she loved him in that fuzzy time he can’t remember, back when he was still really little and didn’t do much other than cry and eat and so on. Which is fine! Tensei loves her back, and things are good. He’s happy with what they have—

No. No, he’s not, but his family has enough to deal with right now. He can suck it up for a while.

Chapter Text

62年, September

Tensei lets his shoulders sag when he spots another figure on the roof. The other anbu guards always flit away, leaving the roof feeling empty even before Tensei finishes the climb up the decorative iron trellis. Marigold is the only one who ever waits, and while Tensei doesn’t want his guard to get in trouble if it’s against proper protocol, he’s grateful for it.

“I don’t want to use sand anymore,” he says to the painted golden flower in his periphery. He tries not to look at Marigold directly too often, in case his guard turns out to be shy on top of quiet and decides to join his comrades in their disappearing act one day. “Iron sand, I mean. I dunno if it’s a secret, but Sandaime-sama uses— used— a type of wrought iron called black iron that has a higher melting point than raw iron. And also a lil’ bit of resistance to water damage. I guess he had enough of it rusting after fighting water-release users.” Marigold shifts slightly, as if to acknowledge Tensei’s words. “Right? Sou, the idea is good, and you wouldn’t think a bunch of tiny metal grains would be the same as getting a family heirloom, but it does and I don’t want it. You know I bumped into Councilor Masafumi at the offices today? He said that he’s ‘expecting great things from Sandaime-sama’s legacy’.”

It’s a stupid thing to get worked up about. Of course Tensei wants to be great, wants to live up to the set of hands that guided him through his Dune katas and showed him how to defend himself using curling tendrils and hails of sharp black rain. But there was this look on his father’s face when Tensei unsealed Sandaime-sama’s little cloud of iron for the first time during their first training session since… since everything happened. Instead of mixing it with his own material, Tensei grabbed a pouch and put it in there to hang from his waist, and from that came the idea to coat that bit in poison and keep it separate from the mass that he carries around on his shoulders sometimes.

It's the very same pouch that he takes out now, cradled carefully in both hands. A sudden gust of wind blows by, working in tandem with the desert's cold night to send a shiver down his back. Tensei scoots forward as he curls his limbs in closer, only to blink at the hand that shoots out in front of his face. A quick glance to the anbu agent beside him, and the blink turns into a huff of a laugh. It's not like he's going to fling himself off of the roof, but Marigold has always been a bit of a worrywart.

“I’m going to melt mine down,” Tensei tells Marigold. “And then… and then shape them into tiny senbon needles, because that’s what I use it most for anyways and it’s easier if they’re already pointy, right?”

There’s another shift to let him know that Marigold is listening. Tensei blows out a steady stream of air.

“Is there anything I could have done to make them stay?” He’s half-joking and half-serious. Unless there are others like him that he just doesn’t know about, then Tensei’s the only thing that’s different. The supposed catalyst. The only thing separating this world from another timeline just a stone’s throw away. The only one that could have changed things, but whatever he did wasn’t enough to actually do so.

Marigold says nothing.

::::::

As if taking particular care to heed Sandaime-sama's words now that he's gone, Tensei's parents have finally enrolled him into the Ninja Academy. There’s introductions to his sensei and classmates, a syllabus handed out, and a list of appropriate clothes and equipment shoved into sashes and under shawls. Lunch is held in and delivered to each classroom, because apparently the Academy doesn't do cafeterias, and then they’re shown around the building. Six floors encompass four circular lecture halls and sixteen classrooms in all, plus the open courtyard on the roof, and also a break room and staff room for the instructors that students aren’t allowed in unless it’s to run an errand or message. There are no kunoichi lessons for the small population of girls that make up around an eighth of each class, but weapons, poisons, and puppetry are offered as optional extracurriculars in the individual classrooms on the fifth and first floors.

His regular classes are mostly meh, but poisons and puppets sound exciting.  Tensei plans to test out of math the first chance he has and take both.

“I’m sure those of you who have civilian parents were told to learn just the basics and then quit,” their sensei says as she leads the way. “This is, after all, a 'ninja' village. Second-born children are more likely to gain an apprenticeship outside of the family trade if you can bring shinobi skills and a standardized education to the table. It’s also largely the reason why we have many more students who enroll than students who graduate.”

Haru-sensei, Tensei learns, in her thirties and a little grumpy for it. Tensei supposes a dozen years of teaching brats would do that to a person.

Everyone and their mothers are the most excited for the singular class covering ‘ninja stuff’ allotted in the first-year curriculum, and Tensei is no different. They get a rotating batch of injured or otherwise village-bound shinobi acting as assistants to demonstrate and guide them in basic trapping, projectile weaponry, a few beginner's meditative chakra exercises, with occasional pointers on recognizing pop-quiz genjutsu and a small variety of kata. Tensei finds a particular joy in the last one. Otou-san has him running the Dune series that Sandaime-sama created specifically for magnet release, efficient movements mostly focused on planting one’s stances firmly, directing and redirecting motions in a way that reminds him of tai chi and maybe aikido. The Academy adds into his repertoire a stamina-intensive Sandstorm kata, offensive strikes and retreats in Scorpion, and defensive counters from Thorns. Together, the three create the basis for Suna’s standard taijutsu style, and if you string them in a pattern, it almost looks like a dance.

Taijutsu days are the best days, even if his instructors call him out for being a bit sloppy sometimes, because Tensei needs to move and not sit at his desk all day, please.

Apart from the shinobi stuff, a lot of the curriculum is surprisingly similar to that of an heavily watered down elementary school. There's the math class (that he absolutely tested out of with flying colors only to have to choose between poisons and puppetry because first years don’t get an extracurricular time-slot), general theory (which he pays great attention to since it covers everything from anatomy to terrain handling and survival to chakra natures and hand signs), language (they use pencils instead of calligraphy brushes like he has to at home, which is a Political and Rich People thing in Sand because ink needs water but Tensei is technically a Political and Rich People), and history (that he mostly reads various upper-level textbooks through because first year only covers geography and environments, and Tensei is very familiar with the huge wall-to-wall map of their world painted in the Kazekage’s office). 

Theory and bookwork are things he can excel in, at least, and Tensei tears into his books like a starving desert hawk. The history ones especially will have to be updated in a few years when the Third War finally ends, but a fairly comprehensive if biased record of the village's founding and geopolitical conflicts is worth more than its weight in gold to him. A timeline! Names! Places! Details! Tensei fills two notebooks interspersed with his own details from Before, written in nonsensical hiragana and katakana that could be decoded into heavily accented English when read out loud. He doodles plenty in the margins and pretends he's just weirdly dedicated to practicing his characters.

But back to the main point— classes drag the days on and on, longer than Tensei feels they have the hours for. The Academy is well-ventilated and at least the lower floors are fairly cool, but Tensei catches onto the concepts taught much faster than the actual five, six and seven year olds around him because, y’know. Thank the skies he never has to sit through another rehashing of carrying the one to the tens’ place, because for that first week there Tensei felt like he was going to die. 

While being named a prodigy would surely draw unwanted attention, it’s a little too late to do otherwise. Tensei doesn’t have the benefit of infantile amnesia past his first year and not enough patience to play at being dumb. Besides, he belongs to Sunagakure’s equivalent of a royal family. He’s going to draw attention whether he wants to or not, and it isn’t exactly unheard of for some children to skip a level or two and graduate early. A nine year old civilian children might graduate by the time they're fourteen, whereas a five year old legacy kid would take a bit more time and graduate at twelve for maturity’s sake. It probably wouldn’t hurt to ask for advanced classes in theory and stick to his legacy for training, Tensei mused. And there’s no Danzo here to whisk anyone into the roots of a Foundation. Skipping a few years of this would be nice.

“You're gonna leave me all by myself, then?”

Ah, shoot. “Sorry,” he huffs. “Jus' thinkin' out loud. I don’t even know if Haru-sensei would let me.”

“But she might,” his older deskmate and usual kata practice partner sulks, “She might, an’ I’ll be all 'lone with this bunch of babies an’ no one will compete with me properly.”

“It’s not really a competition when you lay me flat on my back every time we spar."

Jaku gives him a few condescending pats that he swats away with a scowl.

When it comes down to it, Tensei doesn’t quite know what he’s going to do with himself. Rather, he knows what he was tasked to accomplish– it’s the matter of getting there that’s giving him trouble. His hit list is filled with a smattering of civilians and a whole lot of S-ranked shinobi even the Suna's best jounin have a do-not-engage order for, and one person alone can't stop the Fourth War from happening.

The fact that Suna has never won any of the previous Great Shinobi Wars and is spending most of this one on the defensive is danced around in the lessons, but can largely be attributed to their lack of resources to produce and support a sizable population out of which would emerge a greater number of frontline fighters. Nidaime Kazekage Shamon-sama attempted to solve this issue with the Puppeteer Brigade, two or three non-living soldiers for every flesh and blood puppeteer, and it had brought some measure of success. Chikamatsu's legacy line were absolute units on the field, with Chiyo-baasama and her son and daughter-in-law carrying the offensive in the Second War, and her grandson Sasori-nii kicking ass and taking names on defense in the latest.

But Chiyo-baasama is nearly sixty now, her children dead by the White Fang's glowing chakra sabre and her grandson lost to the winds. There’s Pakura of the Scorch Release, who's made a reputation for herself in the last two years against Iwa, but again. One person. Whole-ass war.

To be fair, Tensei is not responsible for anyone’s happiness except his own, and maybe his family's. He doesn't owe it to the village to become a frontline fighter, like his father is, like Gaara and Temari eventually will be. With how his legacy training is going, he’s not sure he could even if he wanted to. The worst that would happen to the physical village of Sunagakure is the Tsuki no Me in, like, twenty years (which Team Seven could deal with by themselves, thank you very much) and only a couple times of the Shukaku letting loose his very valid insanity on their infrastructure.

Maybe he could go the traditional route. Gather information, get in, get the drop for a surprise kill, get out. Wham-blam-thank-you-ma’am. Infinitely easier said than done, but at least more probable than a direct confrontation?

Maybe. Huge ‘if’. Tensei can feel the creeping sensation of someone watching, and it could be Marigold who hovers the closest when on shift— it could be.

It could also be Enma-Dai’O , a 

                                                   niggling reminder that

 You are not acting urgently enough.

Tensei pouts. What can he do at the moment, other than grow and learn? Not much. Still small and cute and largely useless. He has time. He’ll work out the kinks later, he will. He promises.

When he’s not attending class, Tensei is either sat in front of the Mat Against The Wall with his classmates or at home watching his little sister. Babysitting is far from a riveting activity, so he hands her off to Ainu or Reki sometimes when there’s something better to do. They’re older than him and probably more equipped to babysit anyways. Is this how Sasori-nii felt, watching him when he was a literal baby and not even getting paid for it? Boo. Tensei owes him an apology when he sees him again. He’ll try making friends with Temari when she’s a little older.

...Tensei wonders what Sandaime-sama would have thought of all this. 

Chapter Text

63年, January

“Take him back,” Tensei shoves his wailing younger cousin at his aunt. What he’s doing wrong, he can’t tell. His little sister is perfectly fine with the way he holds her, and he’s not doing anything different now. “Please,” he adds belatedly. “He doesn’t like me.”

His aunt assures him that he’s perfectly fine, Kouji-chan’s just being a little fussy today. Tensei holds back the urge to roll his eyes because that would be rude and this is his first time visiting his aunt’s house since he was a month old, apparently. Well, his first cousin once removed, or so he thinks his mother’s first cousin would’ve been called in another world. In this one, Tensei calls her Mana-obasan, and her good-for-nothing baby daddy ‘the fucking bastard’ in the privacy of his mind. As the Yondaime Kazekage, Otou-san isn’t going to void their alliance with Konoha just because one of the ambassador’s escorts couldn’t keep it in his pants, but mission babies don't usually lead to happily ever afters for either party. 

His mother is pregnant again, too, not that it’s visible yet. Tensei is a little worried for her, especially since she still has her hands full with Temari. It’s uncommon for any woman in Wind Country to have more than one kid, and not just because of economics. Fertility rates are lower, here, relative to any other great nation, and gender roles are definitely the standard. Not that women aren’t treated well and respected— they’re venerated to a degree, even, for being able to bring life. But gender equality is not really a thing here, especially in the shinobi career field. His mother was retired from the active duty rosters the moment she married his father, and Tensei sometimes wonders if she misses being a kunoichi.

There are two conflicting movements surrounding the female population of their shinobi force. One he’s heard from the saying that kunoichi have studier constitutions and are therefore better at bearing children, which would require them to retire because skies forbid the men spend more time at home raising their kids. The other, though, is a wave of feminism. Which, heck yeah, more power to women who know what they want and are willing to fight for it, but the number of kunoichi who are willing to give up their career to settle down doesn’t exactly meet the demand.

It’s not fair, but there’s not much he can do to change it. Mana-oba is perfectly happy with being a civilian and that’s fine; the status quo doesn’t make life harder for her. Karura and all of her neighbors will help out with raising her son, and the markets are more than willing to mark down prices for new mothers, but for others? 

His mother, who’s going to prove the sayings right by having four kids if Tensei hasn’t utterly fucked the timeline over. Ainu, who he’s just caught up with at the Academy. And— Tensei sighs in the direction of Kouji-chan’s blonde hair and violet eyes, thinking of a blonde little sister with green eyes who will surely have a long road to walk.

::::::

The edges of the scroll in front of him are slightly crinkled from his hands, but the contents do not change no matter how he wills it. Rasa squints in the dimming daylight and absently frees a hand for his wife’s unique half-sign to light a lantern.

The civilian representative of the council has expressed distrust with the current handling of the Academy and are demanding extensive revisions to the curriculum. They were pressing for reforms while the elders’ faction pressed back for things to remain unchanged, and the shinobi faction continues being generally unhelpful in such matters. Rasa feels like one of the street performers in the capital, trying to balance the desires of the first generation forces making a push and the elders trying to hold on to tradition in desperate attempts to ease the growing tensions.

To some degree, he knows the elders agree with the reasoning of the civilian council. Unfortunately, that doesn’t stop them from being difficult about the Academy curriculum, unchanged since Nidaime-sama had worked puppetry extracurriculars in all those years ago.

Despite efforts to entice civilians into enrolling their children to the Academy, there were few that actually made it to graduation. Legacy students, who are trained since birth to be shinobi, easily and often overpower civilian children. The pass rate of the latter is only one in ten. A couple months and one failed chunin exam later, odds were likely that even those passing first-generation students now work a mundane job or apprenticeship after having retired from active duty.

Those same people were starting to be called on from Sand’s reserves, five years deep into the war— essentially cannon fodder, and Sarou-sensei refused to depopulate Suna of its craftsmen and merchants when their population is already so small compared to the other Great Nations’ hidden villages, barring perhaps Kirigakure. Rasa, obviously, agrees, but they really do need more manpower.

Refused. Refuses. Damn the skies, but Rasa knows his sensei is still out there and he will not be moved from sending out team after team of search parties, no matter what the council says.

Anyways. Children. 

Genin, really, once they’ve graduated the Academy, and legally adults in all but access to liquor and marriage. Rasa is well-aware of the fact that children remain children until they turn sixteen— or fourteen in Water Country, or fifteen in Earth and Lightning, or seventeen in Fire, skies know that the five great nations are very much different cultures— a fact which Konohagakure seems to have forgotten for all their moral posturing. His own child is slated to graduate in two years.

Seven. Tensei would be seven, if the instructors’ predictions held water. Rasa sometimes regrets exposing his son to Sasori’s influence, his wayward cousin who holds the current record for graduating at that same age.  

He pulls up a copy of Tensei’s file. Rasa does not have enough space in his head to mind every little inane thing Tensei brings up in conversation over dinner—

“Ainu-chan’s in my new class, Otou-san, can you believe that?” 

He can believe that, yes. She’s a year older than his son, and Rasa hadn’t been very subtle about dropping hints to the servants when she became old enough to take the entrance exam, especially after Reki-kun began proving himself talented in poisons. It makes sense that the Academy’s instructors would put Tensei with a familiar face, after successfully testing out of the Level One classes just the other day. 

“And of course the first thing I get to see her do is explode the fire-starting jutsu— the Academy one, not Okaa-han’s. But she’s not dumb, you know, I’m fighting her for marks in Theory, she’s just got more of it than she knows what to do with.” 

Tensei doesn’t have the highest marks in General Theory? Rasa frowns. Since when? 

“Sou, doesn’t Suna have some kind of fireball jutsu like the Uchiha that we can teach her instead?"

"If something bigger with more direction will help you not come home covered in soot, it would be worth looking into,” Karura agrees with a smile.

—but the announcement that his son had chosen poisons and puppetry for his extracurriculars next year managed to pierce through the sandstorm Rasa feels like he’s living in these days. Tensei has been quiet since Sarou-sensei was kidnapped, and that small burst of color… well. Rasa hadn’t found it within himself to say no. 

His arguments are as logically sound as any five year old can make them, and Rasa finds himself echoing his son’s words to the council when they throw a fit. Tensei simply doesn’t have the reserves to progress his magnet release as Rasa hopes of him— as the councils expect of him– so he needs something else in his arsenal. Iron senbon, yes, sharp and deadly shapes refined by Yashamaru and himself when they can spare the time, growing accuracy in starts and stops if not precision. But his son is no Prince Shigemura moving mountains anytime soon, or possibly ever, judging by the rate Tensei’s reserves are growing.  

Steadily, slowly, nowhere near the leaps and bounds Rasa has come to proudly associate with his son. Apparently, his visible improvement during their bi-monthly spars are to be attributed to his advancements in chakra control , a common necessity for those with smaller pools to draw from. Tensei must have known, subconsciously, when he chose iron out of all the options to wield. Iron is the least dense, followed by copper, silver, and finally, gold. Rasa had assumed his son was trying to emulate Sarou-sensei, enraptured as he had been by the shifting black sand in his toddler years, even if he’s changed his own material to needle-like filaments since.

Did Sarou-sensei have a similar problem? Had that been his reason for choosing iron as well, even back when the village was prosperous enough to provide more precious, denser metals?

But Sarou-sensei is no longer here to ask. Rasa puts his son’s file back down.

Suna needs more manpower, as it always has, as it has always lacked. Perhaps some of the younger children of Roran can be spared and raised as Suna’s own in their orphanages— The kingdom has escalated their non-compliance in being Suna’s weapons manufacturer into outright revolting, after all. Negotiation or assimilation would only be another front to fight while Iwa attempts to push Bird Country’s northern borders, another front that Rasa would rather not have to manage. 

Admittedly, Roran might be less hostile if Rasa had maintained his family’s contact, but communications are two-ended. According to archive records, great-grandmother Chihiro had a younger brother, who had a grandchild that married into the matrilineal monarchy of Roran through the late Queen Seramu. 

Rasa has met the current Queen Sera all of two times in person. He can admit his dislike for his second cousin fairly readily, but he’s not so crass as to personally lead the offensive against his own blood. Wasn’t Chiyo-o’obasama eyeing that one jounin puppeteer with the dragon paint and bento box as the next Troupe Master? Might as well get someone to write an eval, see if he’s suited to leading a platoon or two to quell a rebellion. Cut off the supply routes from Wind’s farming communities in the east with a couple squads of genin and chunin, give them a chance to surrender, and kill every non-specialist dissenter over the age of two or so at the first hint of an attempt to contact another nation for help. He’ll have to coordinate the scattering of any surviving medics and craftsmen to locations such that they’ll find it difficult to collude further civil unrest, but that’s a problem to be dealt with as it arrives.

Rasa’s eyes focus on the scroll before him again, and he pinches the bridge of his nose in a sigh. Just this last thing, he assures himself, and then he can go home. Home, where he will make his rounds to check in on his children before collapsing into bed with Karura for a few hours. Will he wake up to the sunrise and his wife’s hair in his mouth? Hopefully. Will he be woken up before that by some emergency or the other before dawn, subsequently also resulting in Karura grouching at him to sleep in one of the guest rooms again? Not unlikely. 

The civilian populace accounts for sixty percent of Sand’s stationary population. If they could get a fraction more of those children past the graduation exam, there would be an increase in the numbers from which back to back wars are taking their due. 

He begins to leaf through the files of this year’s graduating class, his secretary having separated out the few first-generation graduates to be nominated for a legacy. Unlike Konoha’s four-cell teams with one jounin given to every three genin from the top thirty graduates of each trimester, anything earned from Wind Country’s deserts must be taken.  Firstborn legacy students carry on the traditions and techniques of parents, while first-generation graduates and second children are often left to seek out a teacher best suited to themselves or else wither away without secondary instruction, should they prove to have drafts in their heads. It’s not so much that Suna can’t afford any more genin casualties as they can’t afford any more genin casualties. 

Maybe stricter entrance guidelines will weed out those most likely to stick it through to graduation, and survive after that. An aspiring shinobi who could not meet a baseline for all three major branches of the ninja arts— ninjutsu, genjutsu, and taijutsu— might as well be dead weight. Yes, an entrance exam, didn’t Konoha have one of those as well? Not that the council would allow for any kind of collaboration, allies or not.

When the desert bears little in quantity, one learns to strive for quality. Since the Sunagakure's founding, mentors have been allowed to file no more than two students at a time; a habit Rasa doesn’t expect to change even if the laws do. 

Nevertheless, he adds the approved proposal to his complete pile and makes for the next set of documents with a sigh, wishing fervently for his sensei to reappear and take the damned hat back.

Chapter Text

63年, September

First Level Puppetry Class is wild.

It’s engineering and geometry and design stripped down to their very basics for a bunch of seven, eight, nine year olds. Once a week, they focus on the performance aspect of puppetry instead of its combat applications. It's a little bit sad but mostly hilarious, watching a bunch of kids bumble around in what is essentially an elementary school play. This is how the Playhouse earns its funding, he knows, its members performing wherever they go and sending what they earn outside of the mission pay back. The occasional visiting dignitary would commission private showings, specific classics not in season or even an original story, and that’s where the big money is made.

Some of his classmates have the flair for it, the voice, the showmanship. Others… will have to learn. Tensei thinks Sasori-nii probably didn’t start out as a theatre kid, even raised in a puppetry legacy as he was, but he sure learned to be one by the time they’d met. Puppeteers, even in combat, are first performers by trade.

Tensei is surprised at first by the relative safety and mundaneness of it all, considering the regular classes hand out barely-dulled blades for them to try and stab things with and his Poisons class has two entire cots in the infirmary reserved for kids who mess up their batches. Or mess with someone who has access to them, like how he overheard Reki’s mother scolding him for poisoning a classmate who made fun of him for being first-generation. Idiots. And Reki’s not even first-generation, his dad died a shinobi’s death in the Second War, so idiots squared.

Tensei stands by his first statement on puppetry being wild, though, because one month into his third-but-technically-second year they start on fuinjutsu. That’s when he learns who really keeps the school’s iryo-nin busy. No one gets to try explosion tags until they can get to a point where no one explodes the non-explosive seals.

Tensei ignores this and promptly tries to reverse-engineer one. How hard can it be? If overloading the release for a regular storage seal ends in spontaneous explosion, then it stands to reason that explosive tags are simply stored units of volatile chakra, activated by a remote trigger-command to release. Every seal-mark has chakra in it already, on the basis that they have to be written with purposefully chakra-laced ink or naturally chakra-laced blood, both of which are stable elements.

There must be a component in the seal itself to make it volatile, then. Tensei draws the shorthand for ‘retain’ followed by ‘while the fire dances’ in English, because he doesn’t know Suna’s shorthand for the latter yet. It’s not how you write something that makes a seal, it’s the intent you write it with and where its components are placed, which is why there are so many different styles in the first place. He’d use kanji instead of English if it wasn’t for the fact that kanji are reserved for higher-level seals and he really doesn’t want to blow up the entire courtyard.

Suna-style sealing is the only one he knows enough about to attempt this with, and it looks pretty different from what he thinks he remembers of Konoha’s. If he had to describe it in a nutshell, then Suna-style fuinjutsu is poetry. Lines and stanzas and blocks of poetry written around but usually under a character representing the main subject. Tensei locks everything in on the paper with a trigger-border of the word for “contain”. He then backs up a safe distance, tries to sense the chakra he injected into the ink, and tells it to release.

Nothing happens. He reaches out and pokes it with a chakra thread to activate it instead .

It… still doesn’t work? Tensei counts a full minute before approaching again, then yanks his hand back on reflex when it comes into contact with heat. 

He hesitantly reaches out for a third time, and feels a pulsing but steady warmth against his palm. Huh. Not what he was going for, but neat.

Fuinjutsu is a bit of a misleading name, really. Fuinjutsu— the art of sealing, as in literally putting something into storage and taking it back out. This is not to be mistaken for jutsu-shiki, the actual written seal itself, which is like… a technique formula? Programming, sorta. Fuinjutsu uses jutsu-shiki, but not all uses of jutsu-shiki are for fuinjutsu— just most of them, thus the confusion.

If jutsu-shiki is like programming, then different styles of shorthand script are like the different coding languages: Java, Python, the like, all vaguely similar in what they can do if not how they do it. Mostly. The part not covered by ‘mostly’ is why everyone was terrified of Uzushiogakure no Sato, to the point that all that’s left of it are ruins.

The Uzumaki had a very specific style that no one could make heads or tails of, and aside from the fact that their people were the ones who weaponized the art of putting things away and taking them back out in the first place, they supposedly then looked between their scrolls and themselves and went, “Hey, what if we put seals on bodies, too?”

Followed by, “Wait a second, what if we take the techniques that we seal stuff with and do something else with them?”

At least, that’s how Tensei thinks it went, because then they did and it worked. Tensei tracks down as many samples of Suna’s fuinjutsu as available to him and has no idea where he would even begin with their jutsu-shiki style to do things like summon a minor death god and make it do what you tell it to, or imprison a sentient quasi-living collection of condensed chakra into a single person, or create a hammerspace with access to unbreakable chains in the small of the back that can be passed down genetically.

Thinking about it, Tensei has no doubt that Uzumaki Mito could have created a seal that passes a tailed beast down to a growing fetus in the womb over time instead of one with the fault of weakening during childbirth, if it weren’t for the fact that she probably didn’t want that for her own kid.

With the exception of jinchuuriki, having seals permanently tattooed onto your skin sounds really convenient. It doesn’t take long for Tensei to discover why everyone doesn’t keep their weapons sealed on their wrists or clothes, though. Whatever the Uzumaki did to manage the last two feats he listed completely ignores the Law of Conservation. You probably couldn’t seal more than a single brace of senbon into your clothes at once, and getting your clothing damaged enough or a chunk taken out of your flesh near the tattooed area would render the seals useless because there’s not enough stuff to anchor the seal anymore. Not that fuinjutsu doesn’t already fudge the Law of Conservation quite a bit, but there are still universally accepted proportions for how small of a thing you can seal a given mass of something else into. At least, for normal, non-Uzushio seal masters.

It’s straight-up terrifying. Tensei makes a note to see if he can’t pop by and raid whatever’s left in the Uzushio ruins, someday.

Puppetry class definitely doesn’t go any deeper into the uses of jutsu-shiki beyond literal fuinjutsu and explosion tags, but it does go way into history. If it weren’t for the amount of math and hands-on material working required by the first level, Tensei would say that he traded his math class for a second, more puppetry-specific history class. Most of the stories they’re made to recite are romanticized retellings of historical events, after all.

The Playhouse was founded by Chikamatsu-sama, whose style can be traced back nearly sixty years to the very day he wrote his resolve to help his brethren on the battlefield with the only ability available to him. Frail in body but a fantastic playwright, he made himself sturdier avatars to act through, storming onto the scene with a self-taught parody of bunraku ningyo-joruri and life-sized soldiers who couldn't bleed. The teacher asks for examples of shinobi from their general history class who fall under Chikamatsu’s banner and everyone clamors to shout Chiyo-baasama’s name and titles the loudest.

Then, around fifty years ago, a branch of bunraku ningyo-joruri practitioners were inspired by Chikamatsu's work and split off to pursue combat puppetry as well. They brought with them their signature black attire of hoods and gloves, worn to divert the audience's attention from the one behind the strings, yet often contradictorily paired with painted faces to better communicate their thoughts and intentions from its sister-art of kabuki theatre. They called themselves Bunrakubuki puppeteers, and Tensei would say that whoever named the school was highly uncreative in simply mashing the two names together, but it isn’t inaccurate. Even if the legendary puppeteer for whom bunraku puppetry is named after wasn’t real, the character for bun is one of two needed for the word ‘culture’, raku is a nod toward ‘comfort’, bu for ‘dance’, and ki for ‘skill’. Bunrakubuki-style combat puppetry is therefore a skill in which puppets are made to dance on a battlefield, yet rooted in the cultural comfort of entertainment. That left only kabuki's ka for ‘song’ out, which, valid. Not like anyone did their best singing in the middle of a fight.

The Playhouse welcomed the latter school into their ranks with open arms, and by present day the main differences between the two are that Chikamatsu's original group tends toward more aesthetically humanoid puppets, whereas Bunrakubuki's school places more value on their customs and traditions such as stage names, painting their faces, and wearing black while fostering the creative nightmare fuel of more monstrous-leaning puppets.

The teacher tells them that at a headcount by the end of the Second War, there had been three hundred seventy-two puppeteers in the Brigade worth a thousand regular shinobi, with a hundred twenty-nine of them hailing from Bunrakubuki origins. Considering a brigade can be classified as anywhere between three hundred to six hundred shinobi in war time, Tensei wonders how many puppeteers there had been at the start.

More importantly— six years deep into the Third War, Tensei wonders how many of them are left.

::::::

64年, February

Tensei furrows his brow at the report laid out neatly on his desk. "Isn't this classified information?"

Aiya-sensei extends her folding fan with a thwip. "Soon to be unclassified," she says. "Now, tell me why there won't be any official announcement."

The densely-packed words on the scroll in front of him detail the reason why his father has been out on the field for the past half a month, despite the unspoken agreement between every major hidden villages that no more Kage will be appearing on the battlefield. Well, Kumo technically broke it first when the Third Raikage solidified himself as a legend four years ago, standing off against nearly ten-thousand Iwa-nin on the border between Frost and Lightning for three days to allow his own forces to retreat, but his death and Kumo's subsequent withdrawal from the war only proves the point— dead leaders are bad for maintaining a cohesive and efficient military. Eight dead Kage solely within the span of the First War really drove the point home.

But reading the report written in his own father's hand, Tensei gets the feeling that there wasn't nearly as high of a risk for recent events. Konoha had chosen the northern border of Wind Country as the location to offer Iwa a peace treaty, and as their allies, Suna was asked to mobilize a platoon to back up the three representatives. The current generation of the Ino-Shika-Cho trio and their own men weren't meant to appear as a combative force, ergo the posturing was left up to Rasa— a stunt to preserve what little of their 'nice' image that the war hadn't yet stripped away. "There's a high chance that the Tsuchikage will take the compromise," Tensei works through his thought process out loud. "Konoha's Yellow Flash did a number on their manpower recently, and the mission of Kannabi bridge in Bamboo Country cut off a major supply line. Finding a financially feasible workaround would be difficult."

"Yes," his tutor agrees, "but that was not what I asked."

No official announcement... "Because Kiri and Konoha is still in the game," he concludes. "Meaning, so are we, by proxy of our alliance, even if the fighting ceases on every front that our shinobi are involved in, because the shipments between Minami and Kannan-shi are going to continue." 

Aiya-sensei gives him a pleased nod, and Tensei tries not to feel too proud that he's lived up to her expectations of a six-year-old when he isn't really six.

In the same vein, everything in the Academy's curriculum that isn't puppetry or fuinjustu remains boring as all hell, mostly because he's learned all of it already. Aiya-sensei has always been big on teaching him history and formal language arts, and basic algebra is kind of hard to forget even between two different lives. Tensei has to choose between not attracting too much attention or keeping his sanity, and it's not a difficult decision. Hell, he managed to sit through two-thirds of his Level Three classes before he got antsy again, even!

And by antsy, he means testing out of his classes into the next level for a second time. The Academy kicks up a little bit of a fuss, but the amount of content that he’s skipped in his short academic career so far is not completely unprecedented— his instructors mutter something about Pakura of the Scorch Release and Sasori of the Red Sands having done the same, years and years ago. 

It’s a compliment, but all things considered, he’s not sure he likes the comparison.

Chapter Text

64年, April

There’s a significant amount of work that Tensei has to trudge through in order to catch up with his new Level Four cohort mates. He's 'missed' the trimester where chakra exercises are introduced for the first time, and even though Tensei has demonstrated decent control over his iron— shaped into senbon needles now, instead of small shrapnel-like particles— that doesn’t excuse him from starting at the very beginning: getting grains of sand to stick to his hands. 

It’s not a difficult thing to wrap his head around, considering Tensei has been trying to walk on the stucco walls of his home for ages even though he doesn’t have the core strength to keep himself upright yet. Word spreads quickly that he manages the first exercise within a day, and Haru-sensei catches him on the way out and tells him that the next step is to see how long he can keep the sand there with his chakra alone, despite the fact that he didn’t ask and she’s not his teacher anymore.

Constantly having his chakra doing something small will keep it cycling, and therefore stimulate the growth of his reserves in the same way that constantly wearing weights does for muscles. For a passive exercise, it takes a rather annoying amount of space in his brain. Not as in requiring a lot of focus, but its mere presence is grating in a way that Tensei is glad to be rid of before dinner every night. 

Speaking of dinner, the auntie who runs a stall that sells the beef stew his mother has been craving recently beckons at him on the way home. Ainu’s mom has given up trying to recreate said dish after several attempts that his own mother deemed ‘not the same’, so Tensei swings by to pick up a bag of it every day after school.

There’s a distinct lack of a worried spike in the signature of his shadow for the day, so Tensei doesn’t wait for the single-tap of code of <all-clear> that he usually has to when it’s Marigold on shift. “Good afternoon, Ema-obasan,” he greets as he steps forward. “Kaemon-ojisan.” 

“Got your usual,” the retired shinobi says gruffly. His wife passes over the plastic bag with a smile that Tensei returns and with thanks, because he’s not sure how often she gets them. From Kaemon-ojisan, anyways. The man is only one of many casualties from the Third War, dismissed from active duty on account of being blinded in both eyes, as well as his right arm being missing from halfway down the bicep. Family takes care of their own in Suna, though, and Tensei is sure that Kaemon-ojisan will be receiving a decent pension for the rest of his life, by association to his mother’s current favorite food stall. It’s something that Tensei hopes will improve for the others out there who are getting short-changed for their contributions to the war— he’s not stupid enough to miss the way his guards’ signatures tense when Tensei’s around certain veterans, for all that he can’t catch their eyes on him. Maybe they think he’s stupid for the way he never takes his change from the couple, but it’s been going on long enough now that Ema-obasan has stopped fighting him on it, and Kaemon-ojisan never uttered a single protest in the first place. No more public scenes, as promised. The scathing lecture from the combined forces of Otou-san and Aiya-sensei was more than enough to drill into his brain that Tensei is a representative of their family when he’s out and about, that a confrontation of any tone is unacceptable at his age. 

“Respect,” his father says. “A shinobi must earn the respect he is given, but there is also respect that is due.”

“To us?” 

“To your elders. To the councilors. To your family. If you allow yourself to be disrespected, Tensei-dono, you are also condoning the disrespect to all those that come before you, and all those who come after. It is a social construct,” Aiya-sensei shoots him a Look when Tensei lifts his head as if to speak. “Yes, I know you enjoy employing that word. Recall that we have them for a reason. Your action and inaction will reflect upon your household, and may very well dictate how others view Temari-dono when she’s older.”

Oh. That feels distinctly unfair. “You said to my elders,” he points out. “But it’s… not comfortable. When they have to bow deeper to me than I bow to them.” Or figuring out how far the angle of his own bow should be to different people.

“Will you value comfort over protection, when the time comes to walk on the battlefield?” Rasa scowls. A light breeze from the open windows ruffles his Kazekage robes, a flutter of white and blue. The texture of the fabric is different. Not soft, like the Sandaime’s. There’s some kind of starch, making the drape fall stiffly. Tensei has run his fingers over the cloth enough to notice even from a distance— not that he’s at a distance right now. The office isn’t big enough to run away from his father’s beady stare. “I wear my mesh and vambraces for the same reason I wear my titles. I post anbu to stand guard around my family for the same reason I stand tall among the public. Do you understand?”

It’s important that every single interaction he walks away from is to be with his head high and somehow in his favor, more so than it used to be when he was another degree removed from the hat. That’s why the smile he gives Ema-obasan is small enough that it’s only obvious from the front, and that’s why she has to bow deep and say, “Have a safe walk home, Tensei-dono,” when her husband refuses to say anything else. Tensei has done nothing to deserve the new weight behind the old honorific, but he understands now that it’s not really about him. The bow is for Okaa-han and Otou-san, for Yashamaru-oji and Temari, for the way Hana-obaa and Kanza-ojii had to hide from the village and even a little for great-great-grandfather Reto. 

So Tensei accepts it with a shallow dip of his head, and goes on his way. 

::::::

64年, May

“Ready?”

"Ready," Tensei says, sliding into stance and eyeing the newly set five meters of space between them. A voice that sounds suspiciously like one of his Academy instructors whispers that it’s a disadvantage, considering the distance his father’s gold dust can cover compared to him or his iron in the same amount of time. 

Tensei curls his fingers into the seal of confrontation and watches his father do the same.

The big, flashy fights shown on the brand-new invention that is their TV are lies upon lies. Any real shinobi knows that the outcome of most one-on-one confrontations are determined within less than a minute. It’s only their fifth round, and already Tensei is flagging because his father insists on dragging each bout out until they hit the thirty second mark to simulate real battle. 

As he is now, Rasa could finish him in a second flat if he wanted to. Maybe five seconds, if Tensei had some forewarning and full reserves.

Nominally speaking, the results were the same in either scenario. Technically speaking, though, even Tensei can see that he’s improved from their first few spars. The wonders of kids beating each other up for a few trimesters, he snarks internally as they leap at each other.

Pointed black shapes fly from his side, a cluster directed at a vital point, two to the left and right, and another a bit higher. His father humors him by moving sideways into the path of one cluster before bringing up a wall of gold and returning the attack from a steep angle. Tensei flips backwards, using his hands to propel himself away from immediate danger, and then launches a ball of sparks from a modified fire-starting jutsu into his father’s face before following it with a flying kick coated in iron spikes.

Rasa deflects it upwards with a mass of gold mimicking vambrace armor, spinning quickly to grab Tensei from mid-air. Small feet kick out as he struggles in arms that seem like they could hold the world.

Give up? Rasa’s gaze asks for the millisecond he catches it with his own. Tensei feels a laugh he doesn’t have the breath or the time for bubble up.

A kawarimi— oof, his reserves— and his father’s hand quickly slaps a plain kunai away from his neck by the hilt. “Your form’s a little sloppy,” his mother comments from the sidelines when Rasa sets the flowerpot he switched out with next to her. Ugh. He heard enough of that from the Academy instructors, and the phrase continues to haunt him past the colosseum’s walls because it’s true . 

His father nods. “It’s a surprise to see you on the close-range offensive, though. Unpredictability can be key in a confrontation. Now,” he motions, and Tensei takes the cue to position himself again while grinning at the praise. “From the top.”

The space that their family takes up is a far cry from the proper training grounds at the edges of the city— the ones used by actual shinobi, that is. No, this is just a courtyard attached to the front of their home, grainy walls erected years and years ago for privacy.

Or rather, a semblance of privacy. Not like Marigold or whoever is on shift today isn’t watching the members of his family twenty-four-seven, what with Sandaime-sama still being disappeared. That had given him a clue as to what part of history he’d landed himself in, though it took Temari’s birth to seal the deal. The calendar in the kitchen reads the sixty-fourth year, fifth moon and second day— a number that didn’t mean much when Kishimoto never introduced a proper dating system, but now signaled a countdown. There’s supposed to be another month and change before he gets to meet his little brother in Okaa-han's belly, but the doctor-sensei want to take him out in two weeks because of something-or-the-other. His little brother is going to be a preemie-baby.

Somehow, that doesn’t sound right. 

Fourteen years before the Chūnin Exams. Tensei wonders how many more years it will take until his father allows him to chase his own promotion to chunin.

His train of thought is broken when he has to jump to avoid a sweeping blow from his father. “No distractions, Tensei.”

He shoots back, “Yessir!” and proceeds to refocus. He reminds himself to be patient. Planning will happen later— sparring with his father is now.

Rasa teaches him how to walk on and run with and fight beside gold with his handfuls of iron. Yashamaru smiles slyly and shows him how to crackle lightning in a circle around his feet just a little above the ground. Temari has finally managed to call him Nii-san on a consistent basis and her latest favorite word is, “Up!” 

His mother takes him to the markets and lets him help her and the servants in the kitchen. She likes cooking, he can tell, wants to share her hobby with him. They make bento boxes together and Tensei insists on giving the rice silly faces using seaweed to make her laugh.

Then the doctors and med-nin come to their home.

Tensei stays to watch, this time. His father was against it, but the mother gets the final say in these matters, and Karura ended up agreeing just before her water broke. The entire process is kind of gross, but his mother doesn’t seem to mind the way he averts his eyes while she nearly tears his sleeve off. Tensei would rather have a permanently warped piece of clothing than a crushed hand, obviously, but it should be Rasa in his place. What was so important that his father couldn’t stay the entire five hours? Or rather, what was deemed more important than this? If it’s the council’s bullshit again, Tensei’s going to be properly pissed at them during his next progress report. Those old farts can go suck on a lemon or something.

He’s pretty sure a six year old doesn’t make for fantastic emotional support, but Yashamaru-oji is looking kinda green and hasn’t opened his mouth for a while. The two of them will just have to make do. 

Chapter Text

64年, September

Not to sound like a whiny little rich kid, but Tensei has a problem with his classmates. 

Establishing a good rapport with the people that you spend half the day with is foundational-level social basics, but it’s a little difficult when his reputation comes mostly pre-built. Not that parents have a huge say in who their kids interact with and how for the first few years of school, but Tensei is technically part of the Level Five class now. His classmates have largely just hit double digits or are nearly there, and that's about the right age for children to start picking up on the undercurrent of social implications.

The thing about Suna's largely Arabic-Asian culture, though, is that seniority plays a large role in dictating the distribution of respect. Tensei is the youngest of his cohort by a fair margin, but he's also of significantly higher social standing. It doesn't stop him from being able to doodle in the sand amidst other kids or wandering around from desk to desk during lunch, and it doesn't hinder him when the instructor assigns groups for joint activities, but there is something of a disconnect. 

"Jaku was talking about you again, today," Ainu-chan pants from above, "to a bunch of firsties in the courtyard."

Tensei wiggles a little, testing the pin, and huffs through his nose when he finds it pretty solid. With his face this close to the ground, pinned as he is, it stirs up a small cloud of sand. “I give.” Four to six, in Tensei’s favor, but she’s catching up. A tap-tap prompts his sparring partner to let him go. "Same old?"

"Yeah. Like, at least he's not outright lying, but it’s not that fun to listen to. You didn't even have your iron back then."

Even though she’s still only in Level Three, Tensei's former classmate is not the only person in the academy who has bested him in a taijutsu match. Frankly, his cohort being comprised entirely of kids who are older than him means that Tensei goes into most spars at a physical disadvantage. In strength, in reach, in weight— barring disarming practice where he might have a kunai while his opponent doesn’t, there’s no way to even it out, either. The very nature of the exercise requires each participant to be on equal ground concerning available resources, not equitable ground, and making an exception for Tensei to use his iron sand immediately and severely skews the result in his favor every single time while taking away his opportunity to practice empty-handed close combat. By that logic, Tensei should be losing pretty consistently.

But he’s not. Rarely does he ever lose to the same person twice, and Tensei knows that it’s not because he suddenly outstripped them. For all that he’s quick on his feet, skipping levels means his reflexes and instincts haven’t gotten as much time to be honed as most of his classmates. There’s always a moment of hesitation when Tensei approaches someone who put him down in a previous match for round two, always a hushed whisper from behind a hand passed from person to person until eyes blink and either widen or furrow in comprehension. 

Tensei tends to hope for partners that do the latter. He doesn’t know what implied threats his reputation carries, doesn’t know what his classmates’ parents are saying when their kids come home bragging about a win against the Kazekage’s lineage, doesn’t know what to do with classmates who should win when they look at him apprehensively before yielding.

“You should just tell him to just stop already,” Ainu grumbles. “Or challenge him. If he really meant half of the things he says about your last match, he won’t even get beat up too bad.”

“You have a lotta faith that I’ll win,” Tensei snorts. Ainu is safe, in that they can spar together and Tensei doesn’t have to worry about the social consequences. Also, unlike Reki, the two of them are in similar enough weight classes to roughhouse on even ground. 

Ainu was the one who first invited him to their game of catch-but-actually-I’m-going-to-pelt-you-as-hard-as-I-can-if-you-don’t, who laid down the extremely arbitrary rules of playing ninja, who dodges and kicks and punches like she’s aiming to win every time they fight. “Uh, yeah? Just make sure it’s with kunai. His grip gets loose sometimes, but you have, like the grabbiest hands I know.”

Point. Tensei had to apologize profusely when he wouldn’t let go of her shirt a few weeks ago and tore it. “I’m not gonna beat him up just for blabbing, though,” Tensei snorts.

“‘Cuz you’re scared you’ll lose?” Ainu offers no resistance when he tugs on her ankle, going into a messy tuck and roll. “ Bibiri-dana ,” she grins. 

It takes him a second to place it the translation, but he knows a taunt when he hears one. ‘Scaredy-cat’. Tensei rolls his eyes and goes to tackle her into the ground properly, this time.

They greet Reki’s mother together when they go back inside. Most of the adults hate it when they track sand into the house— which they don’t usually! Not when his own mother sometimes lies in wait to check their clothes with a weaponized wooden spoon in hand— but Reki’s mom especially, since she’s in charge of cleaning. No spoons this time, though. Instead, Kankuro sits in the cradle of her left arm, tiny baby hands outstretched like he’s reaching for something. 

Tensei offers a finger. Kankuro takes it. 

“I’d say he’s grabbier than me,” Tensei says in Ainu’s direction, to which she shrugs. Kankuro chooses that moment to start babbling, like he wants to put his two cents in. “Hm?” 

“Maybe he’s hungry.” Ainu suggests, leaning forward and nudging her head against Tensei’s arm for a second. “I’m hungry.” She says, a clear confession. 

“Mm!” his little brother adds.

Reiki’s mother lets out an amused puff of air as she herds them down the hall, insisting that they look too scuffed up to be presentable at the dinner table, what if Kazekage-sama is joining them tonight?

Yeah, right. If he rushes through his clean up routine, it's because Ainu likes making everything into a race, that's all.

::::::

65年, January

As Konoha’s ally in the war, Suna’s Kazekage is invited to attend the Fourth Hokage’s inauguration. Marigold gets the feeling that Tensei-chan being brought along, as an Academy student not even made genin yet, is meant to symbolize something. Trust, likely— ‘Look how I bring my defenseless basically-civilian heir into your country,’ but possibly also as a show of strength. ‘Look how Suna has another magnet release user lined up,’ despite the Third War shaping up to be the deadliest one in history as each country finishes tallying up their losses. At least, he can’t think of any other reason why Yondaime-sama would instruct the boy to keep a cloak of iron draped across his shoulders for the duration of their stay. Their ally hadn’t been informed prior to their visit that the late Third Kazekage’s kekkei-genkai has a new successor, even if they might have suspected, and revealing the fact publicly? Oh, the mind games of politics. Marigold can, admittedly, appreciate it, even if he doesn't enjoy partaking in it himself.

Speaking of politics, the Third Hokage seems to be taking the blame for Konoha’s casualties onto himself and using that as his reason for stepping down. Clever— Konoha could have pushed, could have kept the war raging and taken more than they had at the rate they’d been going, and yet they chose to compromise in a peace treaty instead. There’s a sizable group of unhappy shinobi even aside from Suna, bitter in the name of their dead comrades for having to settle for less.

So he takes that onto himself and puts the hat on the young, bright-eyed war hero instead. 

At twenty-three years old, Namikaze Minato is the youngest Hokage in history to be passed the mantle. He looks even younger, Marigold thinks as the blonde crouches down before Tensei and offers a hand. 

“I hope we’ll be seeing each other many more times in the future,” the new Hokage says.

Tensei starts to respond, pauses, and then quite obviously thinks better of what he was about to say. “Sand will stand with the Leaf,” Marigold’s charge agrees instead, with Yondaime-sama’s hand on the child’s shoulder. Marigold watches the exchange tersely, manually keeping his breathing level. It doesn’t matter how well-spoken Tensei-chan is right now. Hell, it doesn’t even mean much that Marigold is perched on the side of the building not ten meters away, and being any closer or farther wouldn’t change that either. Not when it’s the Yellow Flash before them, with the instantaneous Flying Thunder God in hand. It's laughable to think that the trio of Konoha anbu on the adjacent wall— three guys in a rat, a ram, and a tanuki mask— are actually there for protection.

Beside him, the Uzumaki laughs. “You’re very solemn for a six year old, ‘ttebane,” she says. “Ne, Kakashi-kun, doesn’t he remind you of another kid?”

“I don’t know what you mean, Kushina-san.”

Sharingan no Kakashi, to Marigold’s surprise, is a slightly dorky looking preteen boy with three quarters of his face covered up. It doesn’t match the image in his head of a B-rank jounin in the Bingo Book with his own epithet or the son of Konoha no Shiroi Kiba , the White Fang, Hatake Sakumo, who killed master puppeteers Kazuo and Hina of Chikamatsu’s legacy in the Second War. Marigold can’t be much older than him, but he supposes that age doesn’t mean much for the two of them. He keeps that in mind as Tensei-chan tilts his head and offers his hand to the older boy, and through the awkward reciprocation of the ensuing shake. 

<Hold,> his mission partner flickers at him in code, and Marigold ducks his head in embarrassment. If a non-sensor like Iris can feel his anxiety, then it’s definitely noticeable to an Uzumaki. Hell, if anyone, Iris should be the one losing it. For all that it’s against protocol to share their identities in the black ops, it’s a bit of an open secret that their newly-promoted anbu commander is the Kazekage’s younger brother-in-law, and thus, Tensei's uncle.

“Suna has heard of your student’s accomplishments,” Yondaime-sama inclines his head slightly in his counterpart’s direction. “Hatake-san is very talented for his age, as well. I’m sure my son could learn something from his feats.”

“He’ll have plenty of time to grow into his own,” the Yondaime Hokage smiles. It’s bright, like he’s trying to say, ‘Isn’t that the point of peace?’

Marigold doesn’t know. He was born during the Second War, lived and breathed it until his promotion in the very beginnings of the Third to guard a baby with wide violet eyes that seemed to see too much. But skies, he hopes the answer to that question is a resounding yes. The little kid who asked him not to disappear from the roof one night, who makes the whispers in his head just a little easier to block out with his rambling, who walks around the village with such a variety of expression on his face despite his best efforts— Marigold hopes that kid can grow into his own without ever having to step onto a battlefield, for all the ones who couldn’t.

Chapter Text

65年, March

Tensei has no idea how his mother managed it, but his father is going with them to the shops today. ‘Them’ being Karura, Tensei, Temari, Kankuro, Yashamaru-oji, Mana-oba, and little Kouji who refuses to answer to the -chan honorific anymore. Tensei pretends to slip up a lot more than he does to tease his little cousin, and Mana-oba is definitely hiding a smile behind her hand.

When was the last time they were all together like this? Tensei honestly can’t remember if there ever was a time. Excluding Mana-oba and Kouji, most of his family gathers together for Memorial Day during the Sunartistry Festival, but…

Well. Sasori-nii has been gone for years now. He’s clearly not looking back for the sake of a family outing to the shops.

The shops, not the open-air market. Wouldn’t want to give any foreign merchants cause for a heart attack with the entirety of the Kazekage’s family roaming their stalls.

His father won’t carry him, bodily or with his gold dust, which Tensei understands. There’s a lot more people bowing and lowering their gazes to the ground than even the usual amount that Tensei has gotten used to when alone in public; the Kazekage has to be regal in front of his people and he can’t do that with a kid dangling from an arm or his shoulders or something. Tensei gets it.

Still, Kankuro is in their mother’s arms, Temari is being carried by their uncle, and even Kouji hitches a ride with Mana-oba after an hour of meandering despite insisting that he’s a ‘big boy’ now. Tensei may or may not be feeling a little left out.

Beside him, his mother pauses in her stride. “Did something catch your eye?” 

“Mm.” Tensei turns his attention to his parents and the storefront display they’ve stopped in front of. His father leans in, examining a purple-grey top. “I could have sworn… There’s a picture of my mother and my uncle as kids,” he elaborates. “The shirt looks like the one she wore in it.”

“Well, are you going to get it for Temari-chan or not?” Yashamaru-oji bounces his niece to rest higher on her hip, and she giggles. “You’re making the poor shopkeep nervous.”

“It’s too big for her.”

His aunt hums, a singular musical tone. Tensei noticed recently that it’s a habit she shares with his mom and uncle, which makes sense if they grew up together. “She’ll grow into it in a few years. Why not take it now?”

“It looks dusty,” Kouji grumbles from her arms, and Mana-oba scolds him lightly for being rude just as the shopkeep comes out to greet them with copious amounts of bowing and blushing. Tensei hopes she didn’t hear the comment, but judging by the blush that’s visible even on her tan skin, she probably did.

They end up getting the shirt, and a commission for a lilac dress off of the other mannequin in the display case as well. Not that there’s anything wrong with the spring-green model, but purple has a special connotation in Suna. His mother wears shinobi strap-sandals in a similar color, Tensei got violet hair clips that match his eyes during his last birthday, and Kankuro’s baby sling is something close to magenta. His father is the odd one out of their immediate family for today— it’s usually the blue and white Kazekage’s robes, but he’s dug up his old mesh undershirt and black hoodie for their outing. 

No one else but the counselors and their main family members wear purple in Suna, which is why it’s so rare to find clothes of that color at the shops. It’s quite bold of this store to display the top that caught his father’s attention so blatantly, actually, but that’s probably the point. News of the Kazekage and his family roaming the shopping district probably traveled fast enough for someone to set it up in the display case before they passed by. 

Tensei coaxes Temari to stand still for her measurements with a staring competition. His little sister has developed a competitive streak and he takes full advantage of that so they can tailor the dress to her size. He thinks he sees their father chuckle silently at their antics from the corner of his eye.

It’s a good day.

::::::

65年, August

The Academy Graduation Exam consists of a written test on Suna’s Shinobi Code of Conduct and Regulations, followed by general theory and history, a short portion on the theory for and a demonstration of your chosen extracurriculars, as well as a practical for the application of ninjutsu, taijutsu, and genjutsu. A student must complete an obstacle course in a given amount of time and show proficiency in at least two out of the available categories for each, with a passable attempt in the rest.

Tensei's hand cramps less holding a pencil compared to the posture required for brush calligraphy, and he takes full advantage of his choice in writing utensil. He gives names and dates and accomplishments like a good little boy who has eaten up the propaganda they've fed him, and doesn't dare throw in more than a few nods to all the books he's read that hint of more between their lines.

Using the definition, ‘an armed conflict including three or more Great Nations’, describe the first of the Great Shinobi Wars.

He writes, The First Great Shinobi War began as a resource war in the eighteenth year of the new age. Suna fought against Iwa, who fought against Kumo and Kiri, with Konoha aggressors in the geographic middle as the battleground. The marked difference from the Warring States era can be found in the mass mobilization of shinobi groups that, before the founding of the villages, held little to no affiliations with each other. The First Great Shinobi War was also the only Great Shinobi War that saw no usage of the Tailed Beasts, due to the lack of maturity in the majority of each nations’ jinchuuriki.

He doesn't write, As a gesture of goodwill, Konoha divided the captured tailed beasts to the other nations during the first Gokage Summit, based on how much each was willing to pay. Due to Suna having already captured the One-Tail on their own, the Shodai demanded a plot of fertile land and thirty percent of the monetary value from what the other nations would pay instead of a tailed beast. This was frankly unreasonable from an international perspective and enraged several of the other attendees to the point of threatening war. Which broke out six years later anyways, and Konoha was obviously fighting defensively because the Land of Fire was caught in the middle of it all as the battleground.

List at least two achievements that Suna no Shiroi Shiro are known for.

Tensei writes, Chikamatsu-sama became known as the White Castle of Suna for his many accomplishments. His repurposement of ningyo-joruri from an entertainment art to an applicable form of combat led to many victories in battle for Sunagakure, and he founded the Playhouse to nurture his legacy. Later, Nidaime Kazekage-sama would expand the Playhouse to take in more apprentices and refine the school of combat puppetry.

Tensei doesn't write, In the year twenty-two, the Playhouse entered a feud with Shodai Kazekage-sama and the council for their continued support of the Wind Daimyo after his refusal to compromise national interests and consider peace talks with Konoha and Kumo. Maybe a good choice in hindsight, what with the Gold and Silver brothers attacking in the middle of the meeting. Definitely a rocky one, though, because it ended up with the Shodai assassinated.

Needless to say, Tensei aces the history portion of the written exam. He might be a bit of a nerd that way.

He wonders what the questions for the Third Great War will look like in a few years, now that it's over and done with completely. The thing about a war fought on multiple fronts is that there's more than one 'end'— Kumo held out until just before the summer in the year sixty-two. Iwa signed the peace treaty in the middle of spring last year, after Team Minato's mission at Kannabi Bridge in Bamboo Country to sabotage Iwa's supply lines. And Kirigakure, cut-throat bastards that they are, kept going until the beginning of the winter just a few months ago— rumor has it that they only surrendered because they were quite literally running out of bodies to throw onto the battlefield. Tensei is willing to bet that it didn't take much manipulation from Madara's side to make the Sandaime Mizukage try something so risky and desperate as turning one of Konoha's chunin field medics into a Trojan horse.

He sighs. It's not like Tensei wants to fight in a war, ever, but being born too late to really change any of these important events is a bit annoying. Seven years old and taking a standardized test in a classroom when people barely a few years older were fighting and dying on the battlefield just a few months ago doesn't sit right with him. Teenagers. At war. 

He turns in his papers and puts the thought aside for the time being. Not like he can do anything about that now.

Tensei identifies two poisons and three paralytics and their antidotes, then blinks at a third poison that he… doesn't think they've ever covered in class? The inspector, a chunin sensei he never studied under, notes something down on his clipboard with a click of his tongue. They move on.

He's given five seconds to identify and latch chakra strings to every connection point on a standard mannequin puppet, and then demonstrate their tensile strength by pulling a couple of kunai towards himself using only the threads while the inspector takes a chakra-coated kunai of his own and attempts to cut them. His iron rattles around his ankles when six out of ten snap, and Tensei fumbles to re-attach them with a scowl. The same six snap when tested again, and that is how Tensei learns that he needs more practice with both sets of the last three fingers on each hand.

The general practical starts with a spar. Tensei stares down the inspector, and Haru-sensei stares at him from the side with a small gathering of her peers. His evaluators.

Tensei doesn’t have to win the spar to pass. He shouldn’t go all out, because then he’ll tire himself and there’s still the entire rest of the practical left to go.

They make the seal of confrontation as is customary, and Tensei realizes something: He doesn’t have to ‘go all out’ to win this fight, does he?

Tensei takes out his iron. It only takes two tries to crush the instructor into the far wall.

He’s not sure how to feel when the school nurse on standby announces bruised ribs and a concussion. There’s trepidation, there’s some kind of rush, and yet it feels… Not enough. Like maybe he went too far; like maybe he should have gone further.

He tightens his fists and shakes the feeling off.

For taijutsu, the panel requires a proficient demonstration of the student's choice in two kata, plus one projectile-type weapon and optionally one form of kenjutsu. Tensei doesn’t practice the yataghan, nor the ild, nor the tessen— the standard weapons of the Sand— so he goes straight into the Thorns kata and flows into the Scorpion series. The projectile stage is part of an obstacle course, and Tensei goes through the motions of running across regular sand and weathered sandstone alike, clearing nonuniform walls and hitting several stationary targets as close to dead-center as he can manage with both standard kunai and his senbon-shaped iron.

For ninjutsu, he lights a fire the way his mother taught him with a half-sign and sparks, makes a clone, and performs kawarimi with it. He leaves the henge out, willing to take a zero on that rather than face the alternative. Tensei knows his henge is terrible because his chakra only ever seems to want to mold him into one thing, and he doesn’t need anyone to see a half-remembered face from a life he’s left behind.

For genjutsu, three are cast over the course of the entire exam, all of which must be detected and two of which must be broken out of before the student is ordered to showcase a basic illusion. Tensei has caught and broken out of one during the written portion only to see his last answer written over the one before it in the same space. He caught and broke another when an audible ‘pmf’ told him that his projectiles hit sand instead of a target.

He makes the world hazy with the mirage genjutsu, one he learned back in level two classes.

He… never spots a third illusion.

Tensei is smaller than any other student taking the exam, but he's competent for his size. He knows this, and so he tilts his chin up and glares at the panel of his instructors and the genin commander, daring them to say otherwise.

Haru-sensei meets his eyes and gives him the smallest of nods.

Tensei is seven when the Academy churns out its second youngest graduate in Suna's history, and he is blindingly grateful that he will never even have the option to serve on a battlefield as a fresh genin, but there is also the issue of a pile of expectations on his shoulders and nowhere to point it at. No tailed-beast in his navel, a ‘kekkei-genkai’ that he can’t use ‘properly’, nothing but an affinity towards learning quickly and an unusual skew in his chakra's yin-yang ratio.

Boo-hoo. Tensei likes not having to share his headspace with a screaming incarnation of insanity, and he thinks his legacy training is going pretty okay for what he has to work with.

He has a theory on why his ratio is so skewed and holds that close to his chest.

So, yeah, an issue exists, but it’s not an issue, and Tensei is left well enough alone about it. Things are just fine how they are.

Chapter Text

65年, September

Unlike Konoha, Suna doesn’t have a system to assign fresh graduates with jounin-sensei. There’s a two-week break between the end of the school year just before Sunartistry Festival and the beginning of the next one afterwards, during which new genin are expected to take advantage of more shinobi coming back to or staying within the village for the celebrations and convince one to become their mentor. The desert is very much about survival of the fittest, and those who can’t find a teacher are deemed probably not worth teaching anyways and shunted into the Genin Corps— although, that applies more to first-generation shinobi. The majority of students who stick it out long enough to reach graduation have family members who are also shinobi and can therefore take their pick of older relatives depending on what they want to specialize in, also known as a ‘legacy-line’.

In a kinder world, Tensei would have been expected to ask his father, or maybe Sandaime-sama. This is not that world. 

“I know it’s not the same, but your uncle would love to be a mentor,” his mother whispers quietly when he tells her about his dilemma, trying not to wake Kankuro from his nap on her shoulder.

That’s pretty much a given— Yashamaru adores him and his siblings, obviously— but there’s a reason why Tensei hasn’t gone to him already. “Isn’t Oji-san usually pretty busy, though?”

“No more than any other jounin, I’d say.”

It’s fuzzy, but Tensei still remembers signing a happy-birthday-and-also-congratulations card for Yashamaru’s chunin promotion years ago, when his uncle was only sixteen. It’s kind of telling that there was no such announcement when Yashamaru made jounin early last year, though, and Tensei pulls a page out of his father’s book when he levels a pointed Look at the ceiling of the sunroom where his gut tells him another person is lurking— a chakra signature that he’s come to know as his mother’s personal shadow, like how Marigold is Tensei’s. He hasn’t been able to get a good look at him-or-her-or-them yet, though. “Isn’t he busy with other stuff,” he emphasizes.

A crease forms between his mother’s brow as she hums, rocking his little brother slightly when Kankuro twitches in his sleep. “Other stuff,” she echoes, then sighs. “Do I want to know how you learned about that, Tensei?”

Uh, no, probably not. Tensei doesn’t need to seem like even more of a prodigy than he already does, considering what may or may not happen to Pakura of the Scorch Release in a few years.  “I’mgonnagofindYashamaru-ojinowbye!” he tosses over his shoulder on his way out.

Or, has it already happened, and he just hasn’t heard about it? For such a publicly lauded hero in the Third War, it’s extremely weird and probably not a coincidence that Tensei has never even seen Pakura, let alone met her. Something to keep his ear to the ground for, then.

He can’t sense his uncle nearby, but it’s obvious where he should start looking first. Tensei waves cheerfully to the paper-chunin manning the mission desk on his way up to the top floor and greets his father’s secretary with the utmost politeness, because Minoru is the kind of old man who gets grumpier and stricter with age rather than soft and grandfatherly. “Can Otou-san spare a minute?” he asks.

Minoru glances at the mess of papers on the side of his desk. “Not until noon.” 

Supposedly, the reason why Minoru is unwilling to train a younger secretary to take his place is because no one can understand his very sophisticated and extremely efficient organization system, and at this point, he’s been around so long that the central offices would probably grind to a halt without him. Which seems like a security risk to Tensei, but there must be a reason why both the Second and Third Kazekage kept the man for the entirety of their respective terms. “Could you spare a minute, then, Minoru-san?” A grunt. Tensei takes that as an affirmative. “Do you know where Yashamaru-oji is?”

Another glance, this time at a different set of papers. “On duty. Will be ‘till twenty-three hundred.”

So, basically midnight. He should let the servants know that there will be one less person at the dinner table later, then. “And what if I wanted to speak with the anbu commander?”

Minoru gives him a Look. Tensei offers a perfectly innocent smile in return.

A set of confusing directions and half an hour later sees him being held up by the scruff at the entrance to some kind of facility, carved into the face of the canyon on the outskirts of District Nine. Tensei sighs, heavily reminded of the days when he used to try to sneak into the Playhouse to see Sasori-nii. “Done with your shift, I see,” he grumbles at the owner of the familiar chakra signature that he thought he’d left at home with Karura.  

Dark eyes squint at him from atop a flutter of cloth as the breeze picks up. It takes Tensei a second to place the flowers on this anbu’s mask: yellow blossoms from a macchia shrub. “Why are you here?”

Huh. “Did you just talk?”

“I’m off-duty,” Macchia says wryly, “as you’ve so helpfully pointed out.”

So the no-speaking thing is a rule after all, and a circumstantial one at that, rather than a blanket order. Meaning, if he could just track down Marigold’s chakra signature outside of the whole guarding-thing, then Tensei might finally be able to have a proper conversation with his rooftop buddy. Good to know! “Sorry for bothering you, then,” he says, turning up the dial on his I’m-just-a-little-kid charm. “It’s just that I’m looking for my uncle. I have an important question to ask him.”

“And you thought you could find him here?”

Tensei blinks innocently, wisely choosing not to say anything else. Macchia squints harder, this time at his shiny new hitai-ate in particular, and then drops him with a chuckle. “Oi, Iris! Your nephew’s asking for you!”

Iris? Oh, like the blue ones in the pot on Yashamaru’s windowsill! Tensei remembers his uncle saying that it was a gift when he asked about it, which is probably true. But, again— that seems like a security risk. “Does everyone already know who he is?”

“Kinda hard not to, with those glass senbon of his,” Macchia sighs as Yashamaru-oji comes barreling out of the double-doors, bare-faced. “Hey. Found something of yours.”

“Tensei?” He finds himself being picked up again, but properly this time. “How did you— actually, let’s table that for later. What did you need?”

Tensei gauges the distance between his dangling feet, the ground, and Macchia’s suddenly very kickable masked visage. “Oji-san,” he pouts, “I’m seven and a half. You don’t have to carry me around anymore.” No matter how fun it was to feel taller than the rest of the crowd while riding on his uncle’s shoulders just the other day, during the festival.

“Enjoy it while it lasts. You’ll get too big for me to do this, soon,” Yashamaru huffs as he starts heading away from the mystery entrance with a coded flicker of his chakra— probably to tell Macchia that he’d be back in a minute. Tensei wiggles, testing his uncle’s hold, before slumping back when he deems it too solid to feasibly break out of. “Now, seriously, what got you running all the way out here?” And why didn’t your guard stop you, is the unspoken question, to which Tensei can only guess that whoever Marigold has been replaced with today enjoys a bit of chaos. It’s not like he was trying to sneak out of the village or anything, although the southern gates are only a ten-minute walk from here. If this is the anbu base that they’re standing in front of, then whoever chose this spot was pretty logical about it. 

But anyways. “Can you be my mentor?”

Yashamaru chokes on nothing, which means that Tensei’s mother was a bit off on how prepared she’d implied her little brother would be. “ Me? What about your father?”

Tensei shrugs. “It’s not like I could drag the esteemed Yondaime-sama away from his desk every time I wanted to take a mission outside of the village.” Which he kind of wants to do as soon as possible, considering he hasn’t ever been past Suna’s canyon walls. “Also, what did that anbu mean by ‘glass senbon’? I thought you and Okaa-han worked with kunai traps and explosives.”

“You haven’t heard of my nickname?” Tensei chews his lip in thought, running through what little gossip he’s heard about his uncle, and shakes his head when he comes up with nothing. “Ah, well, I did only get it just before Iwa threw in the towel. Figures that it hasn’t caught on back home yet.”

“What is it?”

Yashamaru grins. “ The Glass Hawk of Suna,” he whispers theatrically. “Pretty cool, right?”

“Could be cooler if the Glass Hawk said yes to being my sensei.”

His uncle hums in thought. “I think I could make that work,” Yashamaru says. “We really should clear it with your father first, but if he agrees… give me a month to delegate some of my workload, and then we can try taking a D-rank and see how that turns out?”

That sounds great. “You’re the best,” Tensei informs his uncle, and staunchly shoves away any thoughts of Yashamaru dying anytime soon. 

::::::

65年, October

Memories from another life allows him to compare Suna’s time-honored traditions with what little is shown of Konoha’s, and Tensei has to admit: his village’s sucks. “I can’t believe I didn’t get bit,” he mutters venomously— pun somewhat intended. “Or stung.”

“I had the antidote prepared from the start,” his uncle reassures him for the umpteenth time, which continues to do nothing for Tensei’s rattled nerves. “Besides, your mother would have killed me if I let anything happen.”

Which begs the question of how often something does go wrong on this kind of mission, especially to cocksure genin without supervision, although it’s pretty likely that the people manning the mission desk straight-up don’t offer scorpion capture or snake milking to younger genin without mentors. That’s what the herb-picking D-ranks are for— although, between the various greenhouses within the village and the scarcity of medicinal flora in the desert, those assignments are few and far between. Which also leads him to wonder, “Why do we need to do this when we have venom farms?”

Yashamaru holds up the small vial of snake venom that they’d managed to get. Tensei shudders at the leftover sensation of holding one of those nope-ropes by the base of its head, forcing it to bite down on the glass collection jar before throwing it as far away as physically possible. “Something about guidelines and production parameters,” he says, then gestures at the container trapping a scuttling scorpion in Tensei’s hand, “and the low success rate of breeding domestically.”

Suna-nin are well-known among the five major hidden villages for their use of poisons, but Tensei decides then and there that he would like to be as far removed from the process of extracting them from animals from now on. He’ll stick to plant- and metal-based toxins from now on, thanks very much.

In more important revelations, though: Konohagakure has withdrawn from their trade agreements amid whispers of a tailed-beast containment breach and en masse destruction. Tensei almost wishes he didn’t understand when his father comes home with darker and darker circles around his eyes. 

Sunagakure has fought in three great wars with very little in the way of spoils to show for it, and plenty of casualties. If he remembers his canon correctly, the Land of Wind’s daimyo started outsourcing shinobi missions to cheaper nations like Konoha, or even cheaper mercenaries. Like the Akatsuki. 

Tensei marks the tenth month and the tenth day on his calendar with a doodle of a swirly fishcake.

On the kind-of plus side, that means his father isn’t as present to hover annoyingly over his mother this time— or maybe a fourth pregnancy after the first three all went relatively well isn’t as anxiety-inducing anymore. And besides, he’s busy, so it falls to Tensei and Yashamaru-oji to prevent the lady of the hour from getting bored enough to start seeing how intricate a pattern her senbon can make on their blackout drapes. 

As with the last two times that their family has been expecting an addition, they turn to training. Tensei is more than happy to give his mother the excuse of teaching him so she can have a break from Tem-chan and Kankuro, even if Yashamaru-oji makes her sit in the shade on the side of the courtyard to provide commentary and advice most of the time while he leads Tensei through the process of to sending a field of lighting and sparks crackling around himself. Tensei is a largely stationary, mid- to long-range fighter, Yashamaru explains, so he needs something to defend himself from close-combat in case his iron is ever incapacitated. Tensei points out that the electric current only runs across the ground and doesn’t do anything against projectiles, to which his uncle shrugs. Lighting Release: Crackling Circuit isn’t traditionally a defensive technique, more something Yashamaru-oji uses to paralyze targets after he’s already swooped in close. 

Well, it’s not gonna hurt him to learn it anyways. Tensei has been meaning to add a lightning release to his repertoire ever since he was first tested for his chakra nature. Now if only he can stop shocking himself and get his uncle to say that it hurts instead of tickles when he tests the range, that would be great.

Chapter Text

66年, January

Tensei is not quite eight years old when someone decides that he, his little sister, and his little brother need to die. Which, honestly, the audacity of some people.

It happens in the afternoon, because of course it does. The village is alive at dawn and at dusk, in the mornings and evenings, and the village sleeps in the nights and afternoons. Tensei knows that the village his maternal great-grandparents came from, Hari-mura is fully nocturnal, where they have the light of furnaces that they make their glassware with to see by and enough trees to spare wood and sap for torches. Suna doesn't have a reason to burn lantern fuel and keep the lights on all night except for at the hospital, and it's just not great to be moving around when the day is hottest. Their mother had run out to the markets for a quick moment to escape the inevitable chaos that three children bring and possibly also her younger brother's hovering. Yashamaru-oji was kicked out after lunch for trying to do everything that needed doing in the house and giving her middle pointed Looks, like they don’t have servants and also an anbu guard looking after her around the clock.

So, nights and afternoons. It's a fifty-fifty chance and the assassin chooses the wrong one, because he may have killed their guard, but he is expecting a first-generation kunoichi housewife as the last line of defense— not someone who might have matched the Glass Hawk of Suna if Karura had stayed on the field.

Maybe the afternoon was chosen on purpose to avoid her, actually. Tensei doesn’t know if he would have reacted in time, because when he wakes it’s to the slam of a door and what sounds like a miniature sandstorm. 

His mother is dangerous in her own right, pregnant and several years into retirement or not. He can’t count the number of times the former weapons specialist has nailed him in the forehead with her stirring spoon before he could even duck for not shaking the sand off his clothes at the welcome mat, so Tensei would call the assassin a sucker, but turns out the guard he had killed was Marigold. Marigold, whose real name and face he didn’t even know, Marigold who actually stayed on the roof when Tensei climbed up there on nights when he had too much energy to sleep through, rambling about anything and everything to solemn eyes and a sun-bleached face-drape painted with orange and gold.

The sucker is him, really, because Tensei nearly slept through the whole ordeal and came out the other side with only two numb arms from where Temari and Kankuro's had been using as a pillow for their naptime.

Marigold… wouldn’t blame him, he’s sure. 

Marigold also isn’t alive to tell him so, though, and Tensei. 

   Tensei never—

      He didn’t get to—

It was time. 

But that doesn’t make it any better. He can't even pay his respects properly, because he never got to find out who Marigold was under the mask.

So Tensei is seven when someone fails to kill him and his siblings and ruins their dining table, and he is still seven instead of the eight he should be when his mother dies anyways. The stress of the whole situation sent her into labor early, he supposes. Maybe he should have read up more on how pregnancy works.

Tensei never even got to move on to calling her Okan like the older kids do.

Suna's funerary traditions are slightly different from the world that he originally came from. Aiya-sensei has given him lessons about them before, and also a crash course at dawn in preparation for this one. Temari and Kankuro sit in, but they're too young to really comprehend any of it, so Tensei tries to distract himself with the responsibility of guiding them through the steps.

First, the dead are usually buried on the same day that they take their last breath, or on the next day if death came late in the evening. Civilians are washed and dressed by their spouse if they have one, or their parents, or someone else of the same gender. Shinobi who pass on as a result of battle or some other aspect of their service receive a different treatment, in that their bodies are preserved in the same state that they died in. Both are then wrapped in a white shroud, perfumed with incense, and allowed to be viewed by family one last time before the cremation.

Karura spent several long hours in labor and passed three hours before midnight. Yashamaru is silent as he leads Tensei and his siblings through the process of dipping their hands into indigo dye until their arms are submerged up to their elbows. It will take ages before they dry enough to not stain everything that they touch, but the black robes that they changed into beforehand are well-suited to take a bit of staining, so long as they don't get it on the white grass cords tied around their waists. Tensei suspects he knows where his father disappeared to in the aftermath, because not even the council would bother a grieving man fulfilling his final duty as a husband.

They have Gaara, now, and even the council is happy, because finally there is a child with the proper chakra coils for them to shove a sentient mass of energy into. He even has his great great grandmother's Uzumaki-red hair, clearly that's a sign! And hey, they only had to wait seven and a half months instead of nine to see if the seal transferred, because his littlest brother is a preemie, too—

Oh. That’s why it didn’t sound right. It was Gaara that ink-on-paper said was premature, once upon a time. Not Kankuro.

He had forgotten.

Tensei hasn’t even done anything to change the timeline yet, and already some of his not-mercy-not-penance memories might be useless because they were gone and he wouldn't even know it.

Shit.

He panics for the entire three-day mourning period during which they're more or less confined to the boundaries of their home, wearing the same groove his uncle does when Yashamaru needs to pace in the house and he doesn’t mean to but his nervous energy must rub off on his other two siblings and now everyone in their family is buzzing on the inside for some reason or another. 

That, of course, is when the world gives him something else to panic about.

Because two days later a giant tanuki appears inside the village and two anbu who are not Marigold show up in their flower masks. They take Tensei and his two older little siblings deep, deep down into the emergency bunkers that the village has never had to use before.

Tensei tries his best to settle them and Temari valiantly tries her best not to cry too loudly. Kankuro is a little slower on the uptake, but he isn't even two yet, won't be two for another four months. What is he supposed to do, not cry when startled awake by a sweep of corrosive chakra and a scream like nothing else in the world?

At least, Tensei doesn't think normal-sized tanuki can scream like that. He’s only ever heard them yowl and grunt a little like cats do and he would like not to be proven wrong, please.

The anbu standing guard with a yucca flower painted on his mask-drape shoots Tensei a Look before nodding at his little brother pointedly. Tensei rocks him and decides that he doesn't like anbu agent Yucca very much, and also that Yucca has pig lips underneath the drape because Tensei deserves to be cranky too and that would actually be hilarious. 

Poppy is a little older than Yucca, he thinks. Tensei eyes her warily when she takes Kankuro to rock for herself, patting his little brother's back.

“It’s cold,” Temari whines. “I wanna go to bed. Where’s Kaa-san?”

It's not the first time Tensei spends the entire night awake, but it is the first sleepless night he learns to hate.

They're lucky to go back home in the morning. A lot of people don't have homes anymore, half of the lower markets are gone, and the hospital… skies, the hospital is rubble. 

Gaara had been in that hospital. They took him there after their mother— after Karura died, because he was too early and too little and too weak. Logically, Tensei knows that his baby brother didn't do this, but that doesn't stop the next thought from coming: That doesn't look weak at all.

And so everything changes.

Yashamaru’s visits become a rarity. The servants leave, and with them, their kids— Ainu and Reki who Tensei used to play with and could rely on to watch his siblings when he didn’t want to, so now he has to. They were dismissed from their posts and replaced by a rotation of anbu who bring food twice a day, once in the morning and once in the evening. Temari-chan and Kankuro-chan are too little to understand why everything is different, now.

When someone goes looking for the first missions he ever takes as a genin on Tensei’s record, they will first find a steady stream of one or two D-ranks per week, usually shifts of delivering materials, running messages, and fetching shinobi in-village— except for the occasional “milk run” for scorpions and snake venom. Someone will chuckle at the occasional vulgar insert in his mission reports, because it’s practically a rite of passage for new genin to swear and panic about milking their first snake, and that’s how the record reads from his graduation until the following year, first month and twentieth day.

Someone will then squint at an uncharacteristic spike and see thirty completed D-ranks logged for the next two weeks, and then they will remember what happened in Sunagakure no Sato at the beginning of its sixty-sixth year. When the village calls for all-hands-on-deck, no one is exempt, even the Kazekage’s son— not that he would have wanted to be in the first place.  

Tensei is the oldest of his siblings, which means that he has to show Temari and Kankuro that change is natural; part of life. Everything will be okay eventually, and in the meantime sweets and shiny objects and hugs will have to do. Tensei will have to do, because Yashamaru-oji and Gaara are all the way on the other side of town and their father leaves early and comes home late if he comes home at all, and their mother is gone. 

Temari and Kankuro are maybe, hopefully, too little to remember. Tensei is too old to forget. 

…Tensei cannot afford to forget.

::::::

A large man with bulging eyes and a scowl beneath his long beard waits for this one beside a well. More accurately, the upper third of him waits.

This One perceives the features, details one has not known of nor Seen before, and slows one’s ascent into a stop.

There is no need to swallow in this land of in-between. This One does so anyway when they understand what they have just inadvertently asked for; what has just been done. This One musters up the courage to be so bold as to inquire about the price. 

The Great One allows this. The cost of Sight is an eye, the eye on one’s left over one’s heart, because one has no need for one’s heart to See all that one's fragile mortal mind cannot hold to keep.

It is not a hard bargain. A bargain requires two parties and a back and forth and a mutual agreement. Much like when This One took the mantle of Executioner, it is not a choice at all. 

This One kneels before The Great King, and is breathed back into the world of the waking.

Chapter Text

66年, February

"Nii-san?"

Tensei looks up from his desk to see his little sister, with a handful of broken hair ties clutched in her fist. "Tou-sama says kunoichi can't have hair in the way," she says. "But I can't— it doesn't fit into a ponytail like yours."

It's true that only the most capable kunoichi can leave their hair both long and loose, but Temari's not even in the Academy yet. Besides, her bob only falls to her shoulders. 

Like their mother's used to.

Tensei reaches out to ruffle her hair a little. "Because you have more hair than me," he explains, threading his fingers through the thick volume of dirty blonde strands. "Tell you what, though— let me go grab my comb, and I'll see what we can do."

He ends up tying it into two high bunches, and the hairbands don't snap. No need to split them into four, then. Easily solved, unlike some of the other things going on in their lives.

Rasa either does not have the time or energy to question why his eldest son is running through notation scrolls like water through sand. Tensei is eight, now, and he deems that to be old enough to ‘invent’ a ‘new’ coded language, pencils and calligraphy mixing and adding another layer of irregularity to the alternating plain print and looping cursive letters that he used to hate practicing. The hourglass on his desk is one that measures every third of an hour, forty minutes of work for twenty minutes of something else. Like going running and trying not to bang into people and things, or target practice on stationary objects, or checking in with his little brother napping or quietly drawing in the corner, or eating— and then another forty minutes of work, and so on.

He has one working eye only and he’s going to take care of it because this world has not invented contact lenses yet. He has only one working eye and he is determined not to wear glasses for two lives in a row. He only has one working eye and while that’s not completely debilitating to his predetermined career, it’s an issue. Stupid wonky depth perception and stupid inanimate objects not being where he thinks they are.

The anbu catch on quickly, because there’s no way for Tensei to hide the fact that he has just gone blind in one eye, and anbu are basically professional snitches so his father Hears About It. Rasa takes the time out of his busy, busy schedule to sit with him in the hospital as a med-nin interrogates him, and Tensei tells them a truth— it just stopped working. No one is satisfied when the medic can’t find any indication of trauma and Agents Yucca and Orchid corroborate his claim, because sometimes what’s true is like that.

Tough. Tensei doesn’t like it either.

He kind of wants to show Kaemon-ojisan and Ema-obasan. Would that be insensitive? Kaemon-oji was blinded in both eyes at once, though, so he might not have any applicable advice. And, uh, Rasa gives him a hard ‘no telling’ rule, so.

Temari and Kankuro notice, too, even if it’s only to giggle at him when he swears a blue streak after clipping his hip on their new dining table and then pleading with them to Please Not Repeat what they just heard or else Yashamaru-oji will have all their heads when he visits.

Tensei is eight and his little sister starts coming home a little crispy because no one else is around to remind her to wear a headscarf, nevermind sunscreen, which this world has invented but is only really used by the people in the capital. There’s nothing for her to do at home, so she spends her days playing outside with the other girls despite the rubble and debris, and the anbu guards certainly are not going to herd her back when she stays out well into the afternoon if it's not in their job description. Which it isn't.

There’s a clock on the living room wall. Tensei explains that the sun can kill just as surely as poison and lectures at Temari and Kankuro until the minute hand has traveled two notches out of twelve. Then he takes them to the marketplace for chilled chestnuts in a street cart as a bribe to actually wear their headscarves from now on, which only works because Temari is still two years away from having access to her allowance funds. Together, they pick out a bigger hourglass with a time-release seal. Temari has to flip it after she tells Tensei she's going out so it will flash at him to pick her up before their afternoon bedtime.

She introduces Tensei to her playmates with the proper etiquette, the way Aiya-sensei taught them. Sen and Yome giggle at the overly formal way she speaks but apologize when Temari blushes and scowls, so Tensei brings shaved ice for everyone with Kankuro the next day.

The rubble in their preferred play-areas are a cause for concern, and apparently so is any uncarpeted stucco floor in their house. Tensei has never had to clean and bandage any scrapes or cuts other than his own. Thankfully, the experience translates well, and he doesn’t have to drag either sibling to the newly rebuilt hospital for an infection even if Kankuro whines dramatically about not being able to walk for the entire time it takes the scab to fall.

Tensei has never had to wheedle and coax a toddler in his terrible twos into finishing his vegetables, and to be fair they are a little dry sometimes when Tensei is rehydrating packaged meals and eyeballs the wrong amount of water to add instead of plating takeout that he can just slap one of his warming seals over. He settles for swapping the better ones on his plate with Kankuro’s and hopes that counts for something.

And, silly as it sounds, he has to learn how to do basic household chores all over again. Yeah, he's been spoiled by virtue of having servants to manage the household, but also, things are done differently in the desert. Compost instead of garbage, getting water from the pump to heat manually before coaxing his little siblings into a wipe-down because the concept of a bath is laughable here, scrubbing dishes in the sand to clean them... skies above, which cabinet are the washboards and drying lines stored in, again? He's never had a reason to pay attention to things like that.

It's not that he can't do it. Tensei remembers being an adult, once upon a time. He has the mental facilities to figure things out, or improvise when he can't. And he's not completely alone— Sometimes he'll turn around and hastily scribbled tips on a scrap of paper will be lying atop the nearest surface, or he'll head inside from a short training session in the courtyard only to find the laundry folded. Sometimes the anbu even hover close enough to let him spot them, and he’ll greet them by their flower.

They still don't talk— not Yucca, not Poppy, not even Macchia, who doesn't come by nearly as often anymore for obvious reasons. The one-sided conversations don’t come as easily as they did with Marigold.

He still leaves them water on the windowsill.

::::::

66年, March

Rasa gets a plain scroll delivered to the mission desk by Poppy, one of the anbu most often placed onto his children’s guard rotation, and opens it to find a mimicry of a mission-format report for a completed D-rank that the mission desk can’t find on file. It’s for clearing and restoring a playground near their residential district, and lists a fresh coat of paint in the additional mission costs area.

Forty-three dash zero-zero-three. If the registration number and handwriting didn’t make it obvious enough, there is a somewhat pointed note at the bottom asking the reader to relay Tensei’s thanks to Agent Yucca, Temari’s usual guard, for nothing.

It’s petty.

He is eight. You need to name him as your hier already. Banish the lingering uncertainty from anyone's minds.

Rasa slips it into his personal drawer on the bottom right. On this one thing, at least, the council can go screw themselves.

::::::

66年, April

“No," Kankuro huffs. “Anigo, no." 

“No, what?”

“Not me,” Kankuro elaborates exasperatedly. It’s a funny tone, coming from a baby-faced toddler. “Don’ wanna.”

They’re in the courtyard that Tensei used to train in, before the scale of his practice demanded something with either greater structural integrity or less structural worth. It’s nostalgic enough to make up for the fact that he can’t take Kankuro to the semi-public spot that Sandaime-sama had taken Tensei to test him for magnet release, years ago. “Wouldn’t it be cool to move things with your mind, though?” he wheedles. Rasa has carried Kankuro around on floating golden platforms once or twice, and his little brother seemed to like it well enough. Considering how busy the adults in his life are, maybe the Kankuro of another lifetime just never got the opportunity to learn? “Come on, just a little more. Don’t you wanna see if you can?”

“Why!”

Temari pokes the back of his head to get Tensei’s attention, easily reached from her standing position compared to his sat one on the ground. Tensei’s fairly certain she’s trying to finagle a way into connecting the two messy braids into a crown— not that he’s allowed to look until it’s ‘done’. “Maybe he can’t do it with the iron,” Temari suggests. “Tou-sama’s stupid dust don’t listen to me either. But maybe Kankuro can try?”

Getting their hands on gold dust would require informing their father of this little endeavor, which Tensei had kind of been hoping to avoid. Not forever, no, just long enough to surprise the man into making it home in time for an actual family dinner on Kankuro’s upcoming birthday. 

Or Yashamaru and Gaara. All three of them, ideally, but Tensei has seen neither hide nor hair of the latter two for the past three months, now.

Tensei loves his two siblings. Temari calls him Nii-san and Kankuro insists on using Anigo, skies know where he picked that up, but Tensei loves it. Loves them. 

He wants the chance to love his third sibling, too.

Chapter Text

66年, April

Here is a fact that the average shinobi could do with periodic reminders of: a gathering of soldiers makes a military. It is the common people who make a village, a village.

While the First Kazekage and his company did the work of hollowing out the canyon in which Suna would be built, his bodily frailer friend Chikamatsu entertained those too young, too old, too sick to help. He did this by sitting on a mat and telling stories, articulated with the help of puppets that he moved around by his hands and a rod and a makeshift stage out of whatever the children could gather. Now, that mat holds its own corner in Suna's marketplace, known affectionately by people and nin and puppeteers alike as the Mat Against The Wall.

Not the same one, of course. The original is ragged and threadbare and displayed proudly in the halls of the Sun Theatre.

The Sun Theatre holds a big production three times a year around the same time as the major holidays, alternating between original works and the classics. In comparison, there is a puppeteer working the Mat everyday. Not the same puppeteer, and not always a master, but someone from the Playhouse will come and perform ningyo-joruri for hours. It’s been this way every single day longer than Tensei has been alive.

The Tale of Master Chikamatsu comes into rotation every once in a while, and Tensei is spending his twenty minute eyeball-break outside for some fresh air when he catches a rendition of it at the tail end of the puppeteer-of-the-day’s shift.

A hooded figure in black approaches a collection of smaller figures in the foreground, draping onto every other head a version of his own hood with two points instead of a fold. A small figure in bright red enters hovers on the edges and accepts the cloth, but ties it around the lower half of his face instead.

Bunrakuken is a legend in the sense that no one is quite sure if he was a singular person, or even a real one. Tensei is of the opinion that if a character has a whole entire style of a performance art named after him, then he's real enough to count.

The people in the foreground give way to a man wreathed in a cloak of green shadows. There is nothing but desert in the land of wind, but the green shadow would have it otherwise. He raises a paper village out of wandering grains and seeps into the land, wishing the people of the gathered tribes to survive.

The small red figure returns, taller than before, and attempts to bring joy to a paper village for its sandy grains to thrive. The green shadow bids him to rise from his mat on the ground, and crowns his heart with a promise of greatness.

The sun and moon chase each other across the sky, and the world turns.

A blue dragon comes and rains destruction from the sky. Its scales shine with a well-groomed gleam, and it shakes its flowing mane against the winds. It will be buffeted around by nothing and no one. Not the winds of a distant land, not the forests of its home, and certainly not the red shadow who had played and fought and grown at its side.

It flies above all that it has wrought, proclaiming superiority and demanding subservience all in one breath of fire. High and far from prying eyes, the blue dragon blinks red, red eyes against the tears threatening to fall.

The grainy paper village crackles underneath the burnt of the dragon's might. Tips char and buildings fold, but in the end, the village holds.

They do not frighten the dragon. Nothing and no one frightens the dragon, not even the red shadow who would bid his friend to return.

The village of grains of sand and high winds holds its breath.

The blue dragon makes his way back home.

The man in bright red looks up at the tail end flying away as his brother in heart, cloaked in swirling green beside him, says that something must be done. They must ensure that, should the dragon come again, the village would not fall. Would never fall. Would hold the desert across the sands of eternity, if it had to.

The man in red nods, his black face drape and the scrolls in his arms bobbing with the motion, and speaks of life persevering against the gale as art perseveres when given life.

The dragon never does return, swallowed up by its forest as it is. But the sun and moon chase each other against the sky, and the world turns.

The forest grows. White wolves and brown dogs, pigs and deer and giant butterflies come hurtling out of the thicket. Mountains and thundering clouds join the trees as they edge onto the stage, encroaching into the soft background of a grainy paper village.

Soldiers in beige and gray stand, and soldiers in beige and gray fall.

The green shadow does not stand down.

The man in red cradles a doll on the ground, keening in sorrow. One doll becomes another, and another, and the more dolls he makes the more he rises until ten dolls tied to two hands of one man march forward and paint the ground dark red.

The man shadowed in green is cut down by a knife in his back, and the mountains and clouds and forest pick themselves up and move. Not out of sight, but pushed to the corners of the stage. The village breathes, and grainy paper buildings straighten up taller than they had been before.

A silhouette in the shape of a house rises among them, and the hero in red takes his army of ten and disappears into it.

Tensei smiles at the building. He would recognize the shape of the Playhouse anywhere, even if he’s never been allowed inside.

A second man in swirling green with a black dragon painted over one eye rises from the red ground. He is different in size and shape from the first green shadow, who had stood beside the hero in red. He takes his blade and cuts a door into the house with a mighty slash, opening it for a flood of figures with masked or painted faces to pour out. Each one holds dolls of their own and looks up at the second green shadow.

And thus, the Playhouse breeds art for war. It’s supposed to be a happy ending, he thinks, but Tensei knows more than the clapping children in the audience about the aftermath.

The Tale of Master Chikamatsu is a neat little performance with many moving parts. Tensei can tell that it requires a deft hand and good accuracy in detaching and attaching chakra threads to said parts, as well as a bit of genjutsu work for the false-burning of the paper village and the moving shadows on the Kazekage puppets. Tensei knows the story well enough by now that he only keeps one an appreciative ear on the lyrical narration, eyes reserved for the flicks and sweeps and twitches of half-gloved fingers and invisible threads.

The backgrounds are attached to rolling tracks, barely an instant required for a measured tug to draw them onto and out of the stage. For the moving puppets, the characters with articulated mouths and unique clothes, Tensei finds three points of connection on average– one at the head, one at the hips, and one wrist or the other as needed. Those ones aren't bolted to anything, able to drift across the stage or leap into the air. If the puppeteer needs three fingers for each moving puppet and one for each crowd-block in motion…

People have ten fingers each, usually, and Tensei finds that the math doesn't add up. "How do you keep the puppets upright when you're moving the others?" he asks the performer once the show is over.

The puppeteer on Mat duty today is an apprentice, judging by her hood. She doesn't pause in her motions of packing up, but the corner-marks of her mouth paint twitch. She beckons him closer, and, knowing that his guard is hovering in the alley not four meters away— not Marigold, never again Marigold— Tensei approaches.

"Watch," she says, and flicks two visible, shimmering blue strings out from her thumb and little finger. They latch onto a piece held up in her other hand and a puppet in the case. In an obvious motion he's sure is slowed way down for his benefit, she joins her fingers and thus the strings together, and the puppet is pulled taunt into an upright stance, hanging from the set piece in her hand by a thread not at all connected to her fingers anymore.

"Oh," Tensei breathes, and yeah, that makes sense. He waits a few moments, counting down the seconds, but the thread doesn't fade. "I thought the strings had to be touching you to keep going."

"It'll lose its shape with time, jan," the apprentice confirms, and at twenty-seven seconds in she has to stop the puppet from falling to the ground. "Time you can buy with practice and skill, and the Mat's good practice for me before I try it on the field."

That's so cool. That's really, genuinely so cool. Tensei peers up into the hooded face. "What's your name?"

"This one calls himself Ontori, Tensei-dono," the apprentice says.

Tensei blinks. A male bird. Judging by the three red, black, and green swoops of paint on the other's cheeks… A rooster?

It's pretty common knowledge in the Land of Wind that puppeteers are known by their stage names, which usually coincide with the name of said puppeteer's first or favored puppet. Tensei expects the archaic koitsu, 'This one', to start the phrase as per tradition, but ontori is kind of an odd distinction to make for a puppeteer name where Tori by itself would have sufficed. Tensei tilts his head a little, facing down a Look. It's made more intimidating than the usual by the sharp painted angles of a puppeteer's Face, but still a familiar Look that Tensei knows to mean Waiting and Judging.

Oh. Duh. "Rooster-nii," he tries, stressing the last syllable clearly for ‘older brother’ rather than the 'eh' of nee for ‘older sister’. The eyebrow goes down and the corner-marks on the mouth go up again.

Yes!

Tensei happily natters on about his stumbling foray into the Academy's puppetry extracurriculars and the blueprints that he never got the chance to do anything about on account of his early graduation while dogging Rooster's stupidly long teenage legs. He makes it all the way to the Playhouse—

Up the steps—

Into the building.

…Huh.

This. This is pretty notable on two accounts.

One: the Playhouse is the base of operations for Sunagakure’s Puppet Brigade, and the thing about the Puppet Brigade is that they don't answer to anyone but the Troupe Master, and that's only sometimes. The Troupe Master in turn answers only to whoever they feel like, when they feel like it, or no one at all. They are the one who runs the Playhouse, who oversees Trials, who hones an artform that doubles as a blade— the Troupe Master hold some sway, yes, but what the Playhouse’s puppeteers choose to do with their craft is ultimately up to the individual. The Brigade’s performance art makes the Playhouse a cultural touchstone and earns them funding completely independent of Suna’s government, and their combat power gives them a firm political handhold. There’s some kind of saying Tensei half-remembers from the Academy— Konoha has their Twelve Guardians, Kiri has their Seven Swordsmen, Iwa has their Demolitions Corps, and Suna has their Puppet Brigade. This, obviously, makes the leader of a military that relies a significant amount on the Puppet Brigade’s manpower reasonably nervous.

Two: as said military leader's kid and heir presumptive, Tensei has an incredible amount of leeway in passive-aggressively bossing his way around his elders— and absolutely none with the Playhouse and its affiliates. Even back when Sasori-nii was still around and Otou-san wasn’t the Kazekage yet, a hand would snatch him up before he could walk in through the doors or crawl in via the windows to get his cousin-brother-friend for whatever it was, shaking him by the collar until he settled for passing the message along instead.

So Tensei's not quite sure how this works; if Rooster is breaking several taboos by letting him inside, or if he’s Tensei's pass. A living, breathing human pass, who gives him a fond-sounding huff when he very pointedly Does Not Touch anything in the workshop.

Sasori-nii called his puppets art, and in the play, Chikamatsu-sama likened art to life if one granted it. Tensei thinks it’s possible that Chikamatsu-sama might have been looking for the word, ‘soul’.

Puppets. Pretty, symbolic, creepy amalgamations of non-living lives. They’re not something that he needs to care for, or about. There is no life to keep alive and no life to order death upon. Tensei is quiet as he studies some of the works in progress hanging on the walls, a slant to his closed mouth.

"Beginner's section is over on that side," Rooster gestures. "I mean, we all start somewhere, jan? Knock yourself out."

Chapter Text

66年, June

Rooster looks on as Tensei assembles his things at the little nook he’s claimed as his work station. Not permanently, no, there's not enough space for that, just a two hour time slot most afternoons. Tensei had to fight a sponsee still in the Academy for it. “That’s very material-intensive. Any further and you’ll have to pay for it out of pocket.”

“The small stuff isn’t gonna cut it for what I need,” he informs the apprentice.

Rooster takes another pass at his blueprints and snorts. “What, war? You were born a couple years too late for that. What you need is a lil’ guy to help you pass your Apprentice Trials, jan.”

He’s thinking a little further than his Trials, actually.

Tensei is eight when Pakura of the Scorch Release is killed in action on a mission in Water Country, and still eight when Orochimaru of Konohagakure's Legendary Sannin finally snaps and goes nuke-nin.

That one.

Yep, gotcha, so sorry for the wait. Tensei’s working on it.

Prodigies, the council murmur, shaking their heads, and Tensei can feel eyes on the back of his head that never really left.

His father is twenty-eight, and there are lines on the corners of his eyes now. Tensei sees him less and less and wonders how he's supposed to continue a legacy when all he does is practice alone.

::::::

67年, February

Tensei is just barely nine when Gaara's seal gives out again.

Gold is denser than sand, but so is iron. "I can help," Tensei insists. Rasa motions for the anbu to take him away, and this time it’s a sleepless afternoon that he’s subjected to instead of a sleepless night.

“Why,” Kankuro demands, his new favorite word. Tensei’s not even sure his little brother understands more than a quarter of anything being said outside of the tone of voice, but Kankuro’s learned that he’ll be indulged as long as he keeps repeating his query and held more often than not, so Tensei pastes a half-hearted smile onto his face to coo nonsense and tickle him instead.

It’s only when Temari adds her own, “Why?” that Tensei inhales slowly to stall for time.

Why. He could play dumb, poke and prod them to practice using their vocabulary to elaborate like he often does. He could. But Temari looks around the bunker room with recognition in her wide teal eyes, and Tensei prepares a different response. “When our mother had us,” he says, “We came out very healthy, but we didn’t fit with this giant tanuki that the village needed a container for.”

“Like dishes,” she nods.

Tensei ruffles her bangs. “Like when we stack our dishes,” he agrees for the heck of it. “Sou, when Okaa-han had Gaara in her belly, they put a special mark on her that would stretch Gaara from the inside so he could fit it, except things went a little wonky. Gaara has to fight really hard to keep the tanuki inside, but sometimes when he’s tired, it comes out, and then we have to hide so it doesn’t hurt us.”

Kankuro smacks his chest to get his attention. “Whassit?”

He hums. “We call it the Shukaku,” Tensei tells them, “But some other people call it the One-Tail, because it has eight other brothers and sisters with more tails, and not everyone knows all of their names.” The only reason why Suna knew Shukaku’s was because the kaiju screamed about himself in the third person while great-great-grandfather Reto-sama fought him, and likely also intermittently between all the infrastructural destruction in present day. “It’s a big tanuki made out of sand, even taller than Otou-san’s office building.”

“Taller than the office??” Temari says, as if the very idea offends her.

To be fair, the central offices are one of the tallest buildings in Suna. Tensei’s glad he sent her on her first errand to deliver a bento lunch for their father last month, because reconstruction is going to take a couple weeks again and he doesn’t want her navigating the streets when there’s rubble and debris everywhere. “Maybe twice as tall,” he suggests. “But remember, it’s not Gaara’s fault, okay? He’s trying very hard, but he’s only one year old. Even smaller than you,” he says to Kankuro, blowing the brown spikes out of his little brother’s face and making the younger giggle.

“And he’s our littlest brother?”

"Mm-hm."

“Then why haven’t we seen him?”

Oh. Oh, dang, his siblings don’t even know what Gaara looks like, do they? “Because Otou-san is scared that he’ll get tired while we're around and the Shukaku will come out and hurt us.”

“Why’s it hurt us?”

“Because the Shukaku wants to be free.” At least, that’s part of it. “Because it got hurt when our great-great-grandfather caught it, and we keep hurting it by keeping it in such a tiny container. Sou, it’s angry at us, and it wants to see the sky and feel the wind and sand again.”

“But we can’t see the sky when it comes out.”

Tensei sighs. “The Shukaku doesn’t care whether we can or not.”

“Oh.”

Yeah. Not sure what he can do about that, though.

Tensei runs a hand through his hair. It’s cathartic to tug at it, little pinpricks of pain on his scalp a momentary distraction from the cold, grainy stone bench carved into the wall of the bunker. The bed is dusty and Tensei is letting himself be lazy because none of them are sleepy, anyways.

Yucca and Poppy stand silently at the door. There’s a tunnel system that connects them to a series of rooms for the counselors and their families, and even farther sees six giant caverns that should hold most of Sunagakure’s people. He’ll have to ask Yashamaru-oji if Mana-obasan and Kouji are alright, later.

Actually, sleep is sounding pretty good right about now, even if he has to beat the dust off of the futon and find the blanket for it, first. “Who wants to cuddle pile?” he says, injecting cheer into his voice before dragging his siblings up with him. Something, something, growing kids needing their sleep and all that. Not like he can do anything else about their situation at the moment.

::::::

In the days that follow, the anbu who bring takeout and pre-packaged meals start adding fresh groceries to their deliveries. Rasa gives a somewhat pointed Look to Temari when he finds them untouched at the few dinners he makes it to, which, hell no. Is that how things would go if Tensei wasn’t here? 

Temari isn’t even five yet! That she knows how to heat up leftovers on the stove because she was hungry and their father is never home and Tensei sometimes stays a little late at the Playhouse is exceptional and to her credit. 

And to Tensei's guilt. He only starts noticing when Temari-chan comes to him in a flutter of pigtails and wide teal eyes, recounting how their father keeps telling her that 'noy even our family is allowed to waste food' when she knows that and finishes everything on her plate always and she doesn’t get it, Nii-san, why does Tou-sama keep reminding her?

For maybe the first time in his life, Tensei is disappointed in their father. He understands busy and he understands not having enough time, but he thought— he thought Rasa was better than that.

Or maybe it’s because Karura used to cook even when they still had servants, and Temari looks so much like their mother. But that was because both Karura and Yashamaru liked to cook as a hobby, even before their mother got married and retired to have kids. Temari— and this bears repeating however many times Tensei needs to say it— is not even five. Tensei wasn’t allowed to do more than slice a few things and arrange bento boxes under Okan’s supervision when he was five. He tells his father as much the next time Rasa gives his little sister that Look, and it’s the first time Tensei lands a blow that has the man flinching.

It’s little more than a spasm in his left cheek, but Tensei takes it for what it is with only a little regret. He's a shinobi, not a samurai, and shinobi can and will kick a man while he's down.

Temari is slowly clueing in to the language of Looks that the adults around them use instead of thrice-damned words,  but not quite old enough to figure out what they mean yet. In this life, Temari has the railing of an older sibling to lean on and ask for help, but only if said railing bothers to be there, and Tensei finds that he's disappointed in himself, too. 

There's a proverb, in the Land of Wind: There are four things you can be in the desert. 

Tensei is going to teach his little sister to be a survivor.

Chapter Text

67年, April

"Why the disappearing act?” Rooster asks when he finally returns to his latest mini-project a week later, because skies forbid Tensei have the focus to only have one project running at a time. He’s making up for skipped classes at the Academy by carving his own set of miniature ningyo-joruri puppets for The Fox and the Hunting Hound. Genkuro the Fox has a very distinct pattern painted onto its Face that he recognizes from a little brother many years in the future. "It can't have taken you that long to practice your version of The Wanderer, jan."

The two crimson stripes of paint hardly count as much of anything. While his senpai's gift is appreciated, Tensei doesn't have the time to shade and blend the more complicated patterns in the Playbook into something presentable every single morning. “I was working on something else,” he answers truthfully, because he has been. His past memories are less of a help than he’d hoped, considering the foreign spread of ingredients and lack of convenient technology like pressure cookers. It took work to figure out how his mother made half of their usual dishes because people don't keep written copies of their recipes here, and people will start gossiping if he asks literally anyone outside of the family. The family, of which their father certainly doesn’t have time to show him and their uncle spends all his time with a baby brother that they’re still banned from approaching.

And Mana-obasan wants nothing to do with them anymore. Tensei hasn't seen her or little Kouji-kun for… almost two years, now? Sunagakure's big, but not that big. Tensei can tell that she's avoiding them, and Yashamaru-oji hasn't brought them to visit, either. “They’re okay,” his uncle assures when Tensei finally manages to bump into him at the markets one day, and hums ambivalently when pressed for details.

Lank hair. Eyebags. A half-hearted smile.

He takes in the sight, a far cry from the teenager that his uncle used to be in his earliest memories, and then lets the man go.

So Tensei wings it and makes sure his little sister is nearby and listening as he narrates what he's doing and why. He's thankful that Kankuro and Temari eat the results of his experiments without too much teasing, even when it doesn’t taste right. Cooking is a lot like poison-making in the Academy classes, actually.

What a life he leads that the order of comparison goes like that and not the other way around.

::::::

67年, November

Tensei is well into the autumn season by the time he finishes his main project. White Bear is a huge, hulking monstrosity of a puppet, big and unwieldy enough that the masters have a little mercy and don’t force him to lug his creation around by bandages on his back. Most apprentices are expected to, for the sake of developing the stamina and muscles that no one really expects of a stationary fighter. It’s a fair assessment— the average puppeteer doesn’t put a ton of practice into taijutsu. The whole reason why Nidaime Kazekage Shamon-sama invested so heavily into the Brigade is because puppeteers are rarely doing the fighting themselves, not when they have anywhere from one to three avatars at a time to act through, and therefore are at much less risk to lose their lives. Lives that Suna's numbers can't afford to lose, compared to much bigger villages like Iwa or Konoha.

But White Bear measures a little under two meters even when on all fours— three meters when standing upright— and Tensei is only nine.

What he does instead is buy the biggest scroll he can carry comfortably on his back, carefully trace and copy an enlarged version of a standard puppet-storage template into it, and flare his chakra to make sure his anbu guard is watching closely when he attempts to seal White Bear into it.

He’s nine, yeah, but not stupid. He knows he wants supervision for this, hopefully had supervision the first time he decided to mess around with fuinjutsu and stumbled into discovering warming seals, too.

The sealing part goes just fine. Even if it hadn’t, the worst that could have happened was White Bear getting a chunk taken out of him. No, Tensei has been thorough in his measurements, the volume input given a small margin in the case of dirt or blood or embedded projectiles and the mass input given a wide range. The Playhouse has a gigantic scale for this sole purpose of which Tensei took full advantage, marking down the weight of his puppet when empty of all non-projectable weaponry, then when fully stocked with kunai and senbon and his back-up pile of iron filaments, and when fully stocked while holding an adult male plus Tensei in its hollow torso cage for just in case.

That last one had been a fun evening spent dragging Rooster-nii along while chasing down older puppeteers, coaxing thirty and forty-year-old somethings like they were street cats to please come sit in his non-activated death trap so he can get the numbers for a storage seal, pretty-pretty-please with a cherry on top, he’ll even go in with them so they don’t have to be scared about the internal guillotine!

Honestly, what a paranoid lot. He brought it outside to the Playhouse steps once to show his siblings, would he let them crawl around in there if he wasn’t absolutely one-hundred percent sure they wouldn’t be hurt? He told the masters that the mechanisms were locked down, and they just gave him varying degrees of a Look that let him know his father will Hear About This if he doesn’t get Kankuro out of there right now, feud be damned.

Like he said, Tensei knows when he’s about to do something dangerous. Letting his siblings play inside White Bear isn’t dangerous.

Unsealing it for the first time… might be?

The most basic of storage seals have a stasis component on the 'space' variable, set relative to the seal, which means how you put something in is how you get it out: in the same position, with everything facing the same direction and carrying the same inertia or momentum. There are variables you can tweak to change that for a more advanced seal, which a shinobi needs if they’re going to be unsealing anything from various positions mid-combat. Puppeteers don’t always have the luxury of setting up before launching their avatars at an enemy, and if Tensei hasn’t botched anything, White Bear should appear on all fours in front of him with an open mouth at the ready for a spray of poisoned senbon, connection points all conveniently in range of his chakra strings.

Tensei takes a breath, builds up his chakra, and presses a hand to paper.

The immediate pain at the back of his head is not the greatest sign, and neither is the oversized cloud of white smoke. His strings latch onto something, but it’s not the same snapping feedback that a hitting a connection point would offer.

Tensei coughs once, waving his hand to clear the smoke faster and calling out, “I’m okay!”

The near-silent shuffle of feet not two strides away from his face is telling of his guard’s confidence in him. Point to them, then; Tensei has definitely fucked up.

First order of business: it doesn’t matter how good your chakra control is if you don’t know how much you need to use. It’s not something that Tensei can just ask around about, either, because everyone has a different amount and different ratio of chakra, combining into a result more or less unique to the individual performing any given technique. Tensei made an educated guess, calculated off of the amount he uses to kawarimi with something of equal size, and then scaled that up to match White Bear. It was supposed to be a conservative estimate for him to change later if it wasn’t enough, in which case the seal would simply not activate.

And if it was too much? Well, he would be in the hospital for minor explosion burns. Eyeing the slowly dissipating smoke with a groan, Tensei knows which side of the spectrum he’d fallen closer to. Smoke is a by-product of unnecessary chakra, expelled into the air as heat and very fine debris from wherever things go when they're sealed away. Since when does his puny reserves ever overcharge anything?? Maybe he’s hitting a growth spurt? Skies, he hopes he is.

Second order of business: looks like the assailant on his head is actually just one of White Bear’s upper hind legs. Tensei may have failed to account for his own position relative to the seal, when he wrote the formula to spit his puppet out with its center of mass directly above the seal.

Okay, only minor fuck-ups, then. He can fix that with some practice and by… nudging the formula a little bit forwards? Tensei takes a kunai to the end of the scroll with the first draft of White Bear’s seal, already mapping out the second iteration in his head.

Chapter Text

68年, April

Tensei is ten, and he has never been more nervous in his life.

He knew that this was coming, of course. The Playhouse wasn’t going to let him stay as Rooster-nii’s sponsee forever, even if he did end up paying for all the materials he used for White Bear with his allowance, accumulated as it has over the years. Because he felt guilty about using them while not being an apprentice.

Which the Playhouse is currently trying to amend.

At least, Tensei can’t see any other reason why Rooster-nii interrupts the rare training session he and his father can manage to deliver the message, Arrive at Training Ground Five at five hundred hours tomorrow. Bring at least one puppet suited for combat and a selection of your creations.

Very formal. Very ominous.

"Tensei," Rasa says, a warning to his voice. His father has been tetchy as of late— some kind of political turmoil in the captial city down south, if the rumors are true.

"It's fine," Tensei answers hurriedly. He thinks he knows what's going on, and it's not a poorly disguised assassination attempt. "Just the Trials, I think, and I won't be going it alone. Right?"

“Perfectly safe, Yondaime-sama,” his friend confirms. Tensei doesn't like the steely gaze aimed at Rasa's feet from where Rooster kneels in the sand, nor the way his father's brows have gained a furrow. “Although I’d pack light for lunch, jan. Dragon-sensei can be pretty rough, depending on his mood—”

"Dismissed."

...right. Okay. Tensei directs his own gaze downward as well, long having picked up the fact that it's disrespectful in Suna to look people in the eyes, in certain contexts. He catches a loaded glance from his friend before Rooster flits away, already knowing where this will go.

Rasa has just put him through his paces trying to teach him earth-release, but Tensei definitely has no affinity for that chakra nature. All of his earth pillars keep crumbling or rising up as blobs and he’s tired. Looks like they're going to have this conversation anyways, though. "You know what that person is," his father asks without asking.

Ah, the benefits of gender neutrality in the Japanese language. It's not super common to use third person pronouns like 'he' or 'she' outside of writing, but unfortunately, Tensei understands what his father is trying to imply anyways. "Rooster's mentor is next in line to become the Troupe Master," he offers. "It would benefit us to strengthen our ties to the Playhouse." Not that he knew that upon meeting the older boy initially, but it makes for a decent justification. 

"Is that so."

It's never truly silent in the Land of Wind, but by the skies if the lack of speech isn't loud.

He's kind of surprised that Rasa didn't confront him about this sooner, actually. Tensei doesn't doubt that the anbu ran a background check on Rooster once they started interacting regularly. Rooster is his first friend since Ainu and Reki, if he's being honest, and one that he doesn't want to push. Where Rooster's parents are, what led to his current presentation, how he plans on going through with it in the coming years— Tensei hasn't asked about any of that, and his friend hasn't offered. It's not a thing that Tensei keeps in the forefront of his mind with every interaction, after all.

"We stop here today," his father says, robes sweeping behind him as he turns. "I suggest you go home and meditate."

"...yes, Otou-san."

It's fine. Tensei spends most of his time with Rooster in the Playhouse, anyways, where most people who are judgy about this kind of stuff can't enter. Plenty of puppeteers know how to modulate their voices to better embody characters of various genders, and everyone wears the same neutral black clothing that Tensei has also taken up besides. His friendship isn't the problem at hand— what in the heck do Apprenticeship Trials entail?

Tensei feels like he has a good reason to be nervous. Chunin Exams whomst? At least he has a general idea of how those are supposed to go, whereas he's is going to be stepping through the training grounds gate metaphorically blind. Literally half-blind, even. Tensei thinks it’s an open secret among Suna’s shinobi that the Kazekage’s eldest brained himself on something a few years back and only has one working eye, but he has no idea if the Trials are tailored to the individual such that they’re going to target his blind side from the get-go.

He should assume so, paranoia be damned. When in Rome and all that.

Only, the sight waiting for him when he gets home is a little concerning. “Oh, skies,” Tensei says, and it does not come out in a giggle. This is not funny, he shouldn't be laughing. “Why?”

Temari froze the second he came into the room, scissors in hand like she was caught trying to sneak into the candy jar, but Kankuro looks perfectly happy with his current situation. “I’m more spiky now,” his little brother informs him with a grin. Which, yes, but by virtue of his hair being uneven all over.

Tensei sits down, right then and there on the now-carpeted ground. He's tired, that’s the only reason why he’s laughing, he swears. “Aiya-sensei is going to kill you guys if Otou-san doesn’t get to you first,” he wheezes.

“I just— our hair is getting long,” Temari defends herself.

“Then we go to the barber’s, Tem, why didn’t you just wait until I got home?”

“Because!” And apparently, that’s all the explanation he’s getting. “And your hair is long, too. Longer than mine!”

It is, actually. “I’m not letting you cut my hair.” Tensei has been growing it out ever since the first time he tied it up and Counselor Masafumi commented how he looked like Shodai-sama and Sandaime-sama like that.

“No,” Temari huffs. “I only cut Kankuro’s ‘cuz his is already short. I’m gonna braid yours later.”

Tensei almost regrets letting his little sister run free with Sen and Yome so often. What he had assumed was just a phase bounces between the three girls like an echo chamber with no end in sight— supposedly harmless, only he's become Temari's choice of a practice dummy. “Uh-huh.”

“I will.”

“Mm.” Temari scrunches up her face, and Tensei laughs again. “Use your words.”

“Please can I braid your hair, Nii-san?”

Tensei has her put the scissors away and sweep up the mess of Kankuro’s hair, first, but he makes sure not to move his head while reading his random selection of scrolls nicked from the archive at the dining table that night. Wouldn’t want his braids to turn out crooked, after all.

::::::

His Apprenticeship Trials go… erm.

They go?

It takes all damn day, that’s for sure. At least he’s not alone, a handful of other kids around his age pardoned from their classes at the Academy for the undertaking as well. Some of them have mastered their poker face well-enough that Tensei can’t tell if they’re just that prepared, or really good about hiding any jitters. There are more shuffling feet and sweaty hands on the others than not, and Tensei doesn’t bother keeping any of his feelings off of his face.

Kazekage’s son who? The Playhouse certainly doesn’t give a shit.

There’s no bias against him, though, for all that they have a rocky relationship with Suna’s government. He waits for his turn to spar against a jounin in front of Chiyo-sama and Dragon, the fact that their opponent is holding back made quickly apparent when each match is drawn out for exactly one full minute before each challenger is finished off.

…Tensei got bored watching the one-sided matches and started counting, okay?

It’s a good thing they’re doing this outside, because when Tensei steps up onto the stage, he doesn’t hesitate in sliding back the panels on White Bear’s shoulders and launching sheafs of exploding tags at his opponent. They want a show, so Tensei performs.

Unfortunately for the jounin, Tensei doesn’t use standard tags. His own variation flashes with light and heat, and the resulting smoke is a highly flammable aerosol. Just when the jounin reaches the edge of the cloud, wisps still following him and probably thinking it a dud, Tensei takes great glee in forming his mother’s half-sign for a spark.

The air burns.

White Bear’s jaws unlatch to spray a shower of senbon at the figure leaping out of the fire, continuously repositioning to remain between the jounin and Tensei at all times. Tensei smirks when all ten of his threads are still shimmering in the air after a barrage of shuriken before promptly having to duck the follow-up.

He counts sixty-four seconds before the jounin finally puts him on his back, and crows in small victories.

After everyone gets their moment in the spotlight, the group of apprentice-hopefuls are divided into three and told to read the scrap of paper they’re given.

It’s a roleplay scenario. There’s suspicion that village intel is being leaked, and Tensei is assigned to a three-man cell on a covert courier mission to alert another base with updated orders for the new situation— and their team isn’t allowed to read it. One of them has been given the message scroll, although the paper doesn’t specify who. Tensei’s objective is to read it and relay its contents to Dragon when they deliver it to the Playhouse in three hours without either of his teammates finding out.

So he’s the leak. Likely, his teammates are aware that there's a spy and have to identify who without Tensei noticing. “Did they give either of you a scroll?” he asks, and they have to pat themselves down before one of them discovers it in his weapons’ pouch.

“You should take point, as the one with the most experience,” the one girl on their team says to Tensei. “I’ve seen you running messages in the village before. I’ll bring up the rear so we can protect Arui-san in the middle.”

Arui grips scroll tightly as he eyes her. “Why don’t you take point, Haka-san?” he suggests. “We have to take the streets since we’re pretending to be civilians, right? So as the tallest you’ll see better over the crowds.”

“Sure,” she agrees, and it’s too easy until she says, “'s long as we all keep our hands off the scroll. Wouldn’t want to accidentally open it before we reach our destination.”

‘Accidentally’. Tensei is reminded of the heaven and earth scrolls from the second stage in a future Chunin Exam, how opening one without the other would summon a proctor to knock you out. He’s suddenly struck with a thought: if the village is aware that there’s a leak, and his teammates are looking for a spy— who’s to say the message isn’t a dud? A decoy? A trap? Why else wouldn’t his team be allowed to read it?

What if he just… doesn’t go for it? He’ll fail his mission, yeah, but he also already knows that the village suspects there’s a leak. The risk of being found out isn’t worth it when he could just keep his head down for a while, see how the base responds, and 'continue' spying later.

Three hours and an inane walk filled with wary glances through the village’s winding streets later, Tensei says exactly that to an expectant Dragon.

The master huffs. “This is the Apprentice Trials, kid,” he says, and Tensei can feel his ears burning. “You over-thought it, but the reasoning is sound. I’ll make a note.”

Rooster is waiting at the Playhouse's doors to take him out for lunch and laughs himself sick when Tensei bemoans his stupid, stupid brain, but two days later sees Dragon waiting for him at the steps to the Playhouse with an apprentice hood in an outstretched hand. It all works out, somehow, and Rooster is a bastard for laughing at him again.

Now if only he can apply that kind of luck to the rest of his life.

Chapter Text

68年, May

Rasa congratulates him on passing his Trials by finangling Chiyo-baasama into tutoring him.

In poisons, not puppetry, because no way would the council ever agree to someone from the Kazekage’s lineage crossing over to Chikamatsu’s. The implication is there, though— Tensei knows that he’s walking a paper-thin line. Personally, he would be fine with swearing Chikamatsu’s oath of abdication from the hat. Heir presumptive, blah blah blah, Tensei’s well aware that he would probably hate being the Kazekage even if the hat wasn’t destined for Gaara’s head. The fact that he’s one of the Playhouse’s now is already a point of discontent with many of the counselors, for all that his father didn’t stop him from taking puppetry as an extracurricular in the Academy.

Or from studying under Dragon and Rooster, although he’s not sure if his father knows about that. Suspects it, at the least. He hasn’t asked.

Tensei appreciates it; knows his father must have pulled or now owes more than a few favors. But he and Chiyo-baasama haven’t really seen each other since Sasori-nii… since Sasori.

For two people who have reputations of being talkative, there's not a lot of talking happening when Tensei goes to present himself as her student. It goes something like this:

Tensei enters left, bows as low as is befitting of a Kazekage's feat-less heir to a veteran of two wars and a venerated elder on the council. "This one calls himself Bear," he offers his stage name, language formal and archaic out of respect. It’s also the first time he gets to use it, sue him for wanting to be a little dramatic. “Please take care of me.”

And Chiyo-baasama says, "He spoke of you often."

The room doesn't fall silent, because nowhere in the Land of Wind is truly silent, but there is a hush and it stings because neither of them need names to know who he is.

He is a man with porcelain skin and a hard golden gaze, the underside of loose blue robes lined with the iron that now rests around a child’s shoulders. He is a grandson and a brother-figure with ball joints instead of muscle and bone, hair the same shade of crimson painted in an amateur hand onto a child's face.

He is either and both the shadow and the puppet, resting in the eaves of a hush.

"He's not coming back," and Tensei isn't too proud to admit that his voice cracks from the very beginning. He knows it for a fact, and yet that doesn’t stop it from coming out like a question. Like a plea.

Chiyo-baasama sighs. Tensei knows he's not a replacement, could never replace the revered leader or the genius grandson found only once in a generation. He knows. "You must fix your Face," she harrumphs, waddling away. "No oshiroi base on your first day? For shame, boy, for shame!"

Tensei wants to point out that she doesn’t paint her face at all, but he also has enough presence of mind to know when to bite his tongue.

Tensei quickly learns that rarely does he like hearing what Chiyo-baasama has to say, because what Chiyo-baasama has to say is rarely nice. She yells at him and calls him a fool for playing with poisons he hasn’t built up an immunity to yet, and then doesn’t let him touch White Bear again until he learns how to run a basic diagnostic jutsu. It’s surprisingly easy to perform, but memorizing what all the returning pings mean eats up so much time. The fume hood and drying racks see no use from Tensei, arms sore from keeping them raised for hours on end and too many aborted expressions of frustration that Chiyo-baasama doesn’t want to hear.

Not that Tensei doesn’t appreciate the fine art of healing, but having A Comprehensive Treatise on Iryo-Ninjutsu; Level Two chucked at his person isn’t exactly the kind of instruction he was expecting. Chiyo-baasama tuts at him for catching the text with his iron rather than by hand and lectures him about keeping his bodily reflexes sharp, otherwise he might as well quit puppetry.

…harsh. But she does have a point.

Tensei has always been one to improve in alternating stutters and leaps. Chiyo-baasama tells him that he’s not old enough or skilled enough that he can afford to do that.

“Hyakusen Renma,” she says. ‘To be trained by a hundred battles’.

Tensei would rather have the idea of something hashed out before utilizing it in the field, but there’s something to be said for live testing conditions.

“What do you mean, no one ever taught you the poison detection jutsu!?” Chiyo-baasama screeches in his face. “Are you lookin’ to die early?!”

Well. At least Tensei can rest assured that any gaps in his education are being filled.

The treatise is a dense read. An interesting one, though. Tensei can see why Chiyo-baasama assigned it— there’s a couple of techniques that could be applied to change the liver’s metabolizing of certain poisons, or manually activating the adrenal glands to either keep a reaction at bay or speed up the process. There’s a couple terms and concepts that he has to hunt down the first book to clarify, only to get sucked into the theory and step-by-step for chakra scalpels and the Mystic Palm then and there in the store.

At first, Tensei pays no mind to the presence that enters the aisle he’s in. That changes when she heads straight for him, though— pale skin, painted lips, blue eyes, black hair, well-dressed. Tensei would guess that she’s about half a head shorter than him, but otherwise around the same age. Without the entrance restrictions that this particular bookstore employs, it would be difficult to tell by physique alone that she’s an Academy Student. “Good afternoon, genin-san,” she greets him, and—

Wait, what?

“Good afternoon,” he echoes on autopilot. Genin-san. A foreigner? “Are you… looking for something?”

“Ano, I was wondering if you could direct me to the place where you got your book?”

Tensei holds up the treatise to confirm, and when she nods, gestures upward. “It’s on the fourth shelf.” Right above him, actually. He goes to move out of the way before realizing that the girl doesn’t have a step-ladder or anything of the like with her. “Need an assist?”

“Oh, I wouldn’t want to bother you!” Definitely foreign, then. Tensei’s only ever heard those kinds of pleasantries from outsiders in the open-air market— Usually, it would just be a ‘Yes, please,’ or ‘No, I got it’. Wind Country is too hot to bother with anything longer than necessary. “I’m always forgetting to look up, you know how it is. Is there a stool nearby?”

“Nope.” Tensei raises a hand, aims, and launches a chakra string at an identical copy of the book he’s holding. A gentle tug is enough to send it falling into his reach, where he nabs it to offer to the stranger. “I think the cashier has one, though. For future reference.”

“You’re a puppeteer.” She takes it from him cautiously. “But you don’t wear a hood?”

Don’t laugh, don’t laugh, don’t laugh. “It’s a preference thing,” Tensei says. He wears it inside the Playhouse, but that's pretty much it. “Sou, you’re new in town?”

“Yes.” She smiles. “I’m Hoki Yua. And you?”

Hoki.

Oh, shit. The previous Hoki matriarch’s sister is looking to step down as Director of the Hospital, isn't she? Of course, the clan would send someone to replace her. Not the girl in front of him, duh, but likely her mother. This close, Tensei can see the light eyeliner, the artificial blush, the heavy foundation— not something that most kunoichi wear, with the exception for those of the Hoki clan.

Tensei has several diplomatic introductions memorized and at the ready, but when will he ever get a chance like this again?

“This one calls himself Bear,” he smiles back. “Welcome to Sunagakure, Hoki-san.”

Tensei manages to hold in his laughter while paying for his book and throughout his entire journey home, but once he crosses the threshold? Maybe his anbu won’t snitch on him this time, but even if they do, the chance to mess with someone who doesn’t know who he is worth whatever lecture his father and Aiya-sensei can come up with. Ow, ow, stitch in his side, where’s Rooster? His senpai going to find this hilarious.

::::::

68年, July

Being entrusted with Mat duty is a rite of passage for apprentices. Like Rooster said, the Mat Against the Wall is good practice— The manipulation of chakra strings, multitasking, getting the timing right, et cetera. Some of the less combat-inclined puppeteers voluntarily sign up for regular shifts so they can test their material before performing streetside shows outside of the village.

Sometimes, the noon shift is assigned as a punishment for masters and apprentices alike. Tensei doesn’t envy them. His first ever assignment is early in the morning, around the same time that students start making their way towards the Academy. Tensei isn't the youngest apprentice to ever work the Mat— that would have been Sasori-nii, he suspects— but he's young enough that some of the women passing by coo at him directly, despite the hood. Thank the skies for Rooster, who stays for the entirety of his shift even though he probably has better things to do now, freshly promoted to chunin as he is. His senpai catches his eyes and holds them, past the small stumbles and the blush he can feel creeping up his neck. The audience doubles in size when people realize who's sitting on the Mat today, whispers about the Kazekage's eldest carrying even from the back by the morning breeze.

Rooster's tap on the throat reminds Tensei to project his voice when he falters.

Aiya-sensei mentioned during his last etiquette class that visiting dignitaries might request a show from him, now that he’s both passed his Apprenticeship Trials and reached standard Academy graduation age. Chiyo-baasama promptly put him on Mat duty once he told her, because entertaining nobles and dignitaries used to be her job when she was younger and she's not about to let him 'sully her legacy'.

It's easier to pretend like he's only performing for one person. Tensei knows he can't always rely on the crutch of his senpai's presence, but it is his first shift. "You did fine," Rooster-senpai insists afterwards, shaking him as if to work out his jitters. "Come on, you baby, we don't want to make Dragon-sensei wait."

"Give me a second to pack up," Tensei huffs, scrambling to put his sets away because Dragon is expecting them for training in about ten minutes, according to the hourglass he brought along.

Speaking of the master, what’s the point of painting your face to exaggerate your expressions if you’re not going to express anything? Seriously, Dragon doesn’t so much as twitch as he watches the two of them. “Too stiff,” he says impassively, not even bothering to clarify who.

Some mentors will take on a second student for the sole purpose of pitting them against their first. Tensei will admit that competition can definitely drive improvement, but he and Rooster have bonded out of mutual frustration at their mentor instead. Silent mutual frustration. Apparently, they talk too much, and need to develop better intuition based on each others’ reactions. Rooster promptly rolled his eyes and started using Suna-standard field signs and tap code instead, depending on the formation they’re assigned. Dragon is insistent on drilling them until said formations are more muscle memory than conscious thought, but aside from that…

<New development negative,> Rooster taps onto the side of Tensei’s belt, which basically amounts to a declaration of boredom.

They’re back-to-back, one puppet out for each of them against Dragon’s two. Rooster’s second one is still a work in progress, but Tensei knows from experience that his primary combat puppet is absolutely vicious, despite being a knee-high chicken. So long as they don’t give the master an opening, they can just about hold their own. <Commander-puppeteer pleased negative,> Tensei hazards a guess. They’re in one of the open arena-type training grounds today, so it’s not like Dragon can’t see them tapping away.

<Send commander-puppeteer down and out,> the teen grumbles, and Tensei has to fight back a snicker. If Dragon caught his student telling him to fuck off in code, he doesn’t say anything. They do have to defend against a string of attacks rather suddenly, though, so Tensei shuts up because he really does not want to be flattened by the giant twin lizards circling them.

Chapter Text

68年, September

“They’re so ugh," Temari tells him. At least, Tensei’s pretty sure that’s what she says. Her voice is muffled by her refusal to disengage from his shirt, and he can feel a wet spot growing near his collarbone. Tensei smooths back her bangs and tucks his chin over her head, humming. Her pigtails are loose, the two bunches uneven in the back from being tugged on. He’ll have to re-tie them in a moment. “I know you said using words is better than using only my face,” Temari says, interrupting herself every other word with hitching breaths, “but all of their words and faces are mean.”

The kids in her level one class are all five, six, maybe seven years old. Tensei calls bullshit on that carte-blanche idea, because people aren’t born with a developed sense of empathy. They have to learn that, and because these kids haven’t yet, his little sister is getting bullied. Fuck small children. “I’m sorry that happened to you, Tem-chan.”

It doesn’t even hurt when her fist collides with his ribcage. The way that the dark material of his shirt instantly swallows her hand only serves to remind him how small she is in comparison. “I don’t want your sorry. We never even see Gaara, anyway! Why is it my fault!"

Tensei closes his eyes. What use is the protection their family’s reputation supposedly provides when the thorns face inwards? “It’s not,” he says. “They’re scared, and little, so they can’t do anything about it other than be mean to you. It’s not your fault and it’s not right, but it makes them feel better.”

“It makes me feel better to hit them in their faces."

Honestly? Good for her. Less good for Tensei, who’s in prime ‘I-need-to-talk-to-you-about-your-sister’ position when he sends her off every day at six and picks her up at noon. You know, in lieu of their father, who’s too busy sitting at a desk to grant an audience to a mere Academy teacher. “It’s easy to be cruel, for some people. Harder to be nice. Even harder to be kind.” He smooths back her hair again. “Sou, we shouldn’t be kind to people who don’t deserve it, but sometimes we need to play at being nice to not get in trouble. Besides, they’re not all mean, are they?”

“Sen is nice. And Yome.” Tensei hums, and Temari looks up with a challenge in her eyes. “You’re not gonna punish me.”

“I’m not gonna punish you,” Tensei agrees, because if she can handle the idiot boys in her class, surely he can take a bit of heckling from the Academy instructors. “Stick with Sen and Yome, then. Don’t be kind to people who aren’t kind to you, Tem, but don’t let them think you’re easy. Hit them back, hit them hard, and give as good as you get.” That’s how his little sister is going to survive. “And if you meet someone who’s too big to hit, you get your Nii-san, ne? You get me, and I’ll be right behind you to look scary and step in if you ever want my help. They’ll learn to stop, eventually.”

“Promise?”

That he’ll be there for her? Always. “Promise.”

::::::

68年, December

It’s coincidence that places him on the outskirts of the village that day, close enough that he can feel the chakra of the guards stationed at the one and only entrance and exit flare up. <—–—, external breach, heading north-east. Brown-hair-black-eyes, approx. height one-point-five meters. Requesting nearby units for genin-level takedown.>

Tensei doesn’t recognize the first word, but it’s easy enough to figure out from the context: one of Sunagakure’s own has gone rogue. Nearby units, though... “Does that include us?” he asks Chiyo-baasama. The two of them together might be a little overkill for a genin-turned-nukenin, but he'd rather that than the alternative.

They’re riding on White Bear’s back, a decent pace set by Tensei’s chakra strings towards the mekishiko-hanabishi grove. The plant doesn’t play nice with others in domestic environments such as Suna’s greenhouses, but its anti-inflammatory properties make it worth foraging for. He’s not sure why she’s accompanying him personally to the location, actually, seeing as she was more than happy to shove the responsibility of showing him around said greenhouses off to a random medic passing by last week. “I suppose we’re already heading in that direction,” Chiyo-baasama grumbles before leading them to intercept.

So it's with strings and a puppet under Chiyo-baasama that Tensei is blooded instead of a legacy of iron and his father. There’s yelling, because of course there is. Just a first-generation genin who wants to go back to Grass Country, where his parents supposedly immigrated from before they died in the Shukaku’s first rampage.

"Please, please just let me go. Doesn’t your damned family owe me that much?"

It’s such a stupid—

He knows what he’s been preparing for. In a way, Tensei’s no less a weapon than Gaara is to the village, just one less likely to stop being human-shaped. A bad allergic reaction to a mild paralytic meant to slow his target down, that’s all that happened. A defector, yes, but the green glow around his hands sputters and dies even as he cries out for Chiyo-baasama to do something.

She tells him that Sunagakure has no use for the return of living traitors and makes a body scroll from a blank on the spot. Tensei barely holds himself back from asking her what she thinks her grandson has become.

They don’t exchange a single word the entire way back.

::::::

69年, January

Gaara’s seal loosens, again, and the Shukaku tries his level best to lay waste to as much of Sunagakure as possible.

This time, Tensei screams at his father to let him help, and Rasa doesn’t say no. Whether it's because last month resulted in the first B-rank under his belt or because he can finally manage a floating platform now, Tensei doesn't care. “Do not leave my side,” Rasa says instead.

A little ways in the distance, the giant tanuki screams. “Another one?!” The sound pierces through the night like nails on a chalkboard. Tensei thins his lips, willing his shoulders not to bunch up. “A little one, a little one! Come and play, then! The Great Shukaku-sama will kill you all!”

Tensei tries to keep in mind that the kaiju is very much not of sound mind when he mutters, “Would you, by any chance, be willing to renegotiate that?”

He doesn’t duck in time to avoid a swat to the back of his head, via one of his father’s golden tendrils. “It can hear us, you fool child!”

…what?

It takes Tensei a moment to realize that the hacking coughs are supposed to be laughter. “It wants to talk! Fly over here, little birdie. This way, this way— I want to hear you sing.”

Hoooooly shit. On second thought.

Together, he and his father try to drown Shukaku’s beige in gold and black. Tensei is nearly eleven and hitting a growth spurt, which means that his chakra reserves are hitting a growth spurt, too. And maybe Rasa of the Gold Dust never needed a second magnet release wielder at his side to curtail the One-Tail in canon, but all Tensei can think when their combined materials just manages to hold a wave back from crushing the hospital again is thank the skies.

Even so, there’s sand flowing over the top of their wall and creeping around the edges. Rasa tells him that they’re going to push on three. His father is the type to at least count all the way there instead of just shouting, "Three!" like some people, Rooster-senpai.

His father stands still on his golden platform, arms crossed and floating in a manner that Tensei might call serene if it weren’t for the furrowed brow and bulging veins in his neck. And also the yelling and crashing in the backdrop. Can’t forget that. But between it all, Tensei finds the time to be jealous. He’s still reliant on the boost to his yang-chakra that physically moving his limbs gives him to manage the bigger stuff, like what they’re doing right now, and—

And what the hell is taking their sealing division so long? Either they’re all asleep or pathetic because it’s been half an hour.

“If you’re at your limit, leave,” his father tells him.

Tensei’s not at his limit, yet. He stays.

He stays, and together they prevent the central plaza from being destroyed with sand by flooding it with gold and iron first. He stays, and none of the masters guarding the Sun Theatre and Playhouse end up a bloody smear beside broken puppet parts.

Tensei stays, and the sealing division gets around to trapping Shukaku back into Gaara eventually. And then his father carries him home because he’s dead on his feet, and that’s how he makes Rasa stay while Tensei screams at him. Because Gaara is three and they are isolating him from the positive human contact that he so desperately needs, Chiyo-baasama’s seal is a masterpiece of bullshit that won’t let him slip into more than a half-conscious doze while the maniac chakra construct inside of him ensures that Gaara doesn’t die of sleep deprivation, this cannot be the best way to go about doing things.

For the second time that night, Rasa doesn’t say no. “I’ll talk to Yashamaru about moving in,” he says instead, and Tensei dares to hope.

Chapter Text

69年, March

"Watch," Yashamaru-oji tells him. Tensei looks on dutifully as his uncle runs lightning through the sand falling in a trickle from between his fingers. A crackle, a bright flash, and then there are multiple slivers of glass held delicately in his hand.

"The Glass Hawk of Suna," Tensei nods to the tune of his uncle’s epithet. Despite the high quantity of silica and quartz or whatever that must be in Wind Country's sand in order to make glass in the first place, there's still plenty of impurities to render the material dark and opaque. "But they're not very strong, are they?"

"You don't need everything to be big in order to be strong," Yashamaru-oji hums, an echo of a conversation from when it was just Tensei with no little siblings yet. "It helps, but there are other ways." He passes one of the glass senbon over for Tensei to inspect.

Much like any other shinobi, testing the point first-thing is instinct. The tip tapers well enough by appearance, but personally, Tensei thinks it could do with some manual sharpening. It weighs differently from the standard-issue senbon loaded up in the back of White Bear's mouth. If force equals to mass times acceleration, though... Tensei holds it up to the light, twisting and turning to see how it refracts. "Shrapnel," he guesses, licking at the bead of blood that appears from the puncture site. It would be convenient if he could heal it with a thought, but unfortunately, the Mystic Palm is a bitch to learn. So far, all he has are a lot of baby lizard corpses that stay very much dead. "Hurts either way whether it hits you intact or shattered to pieces, as long as you put enough muscle behind it. How, though?”

Yashamaru-oji pulls out an explosion tag. “I don’t get to use it often anymore, but that’s what your mother and I had these for. Did you think you got your love of pyrotechnics from your father?” he laughs at the look on Tensei’s face.

A safe distance away, Gaara giggles right along with their uncle. There’s nothing daunting about a three-year-old whose sandcastles are just a touch too neat to have been made from a metal bucket and a shovel in the light of dawn. “You’re squiggly,” he says, touching his nose.

What, his face paint? Tensei scrunches his face up again, more exaggerated this time, and earns a snicker from Kankuro as well. Temari huffs at their apparent immaturity and goes back to sculpting flowers out of sand.

The tall shape of a yucca blossom. A poppy. And, the latest addition to the most regular of their retinue, a desert primrose. Tensei has only managed to catch glimpses of Gaara’s most regular guard, so he’s kind of surprised that Temari’s seen them all already. Maybe he doesn’t give his little sister enough credit.

Tensei spends a good part of the next hour carefully gauging the amount of chakra he uses and running lightning through handfuls of sand. No way Yashamaru-oji manages this without being in at least the ninetieth percentile. Last Tensei checked, his own was in the eighty-seventh— high enough to take to the massive amounts of pure shape transformation that is essentially all magnet release is like a bird to the skies, but this?

By the time Tensei manages to produce slivers of glass that have points on either end instead of being encircled in lumpy rings, his siblings have turned to making sand-food. A bowl of cherries, a lobster, a… pile of poop. Eh, sure, why not. Yashamaru-oji keeps a wary eye on Gaara’s swirling particles all the while, but other than that, Tensei could almost pretend that they’re a normal family at the playground.

Almost. It’s a good day, regardless.

::::::

69年, August

For people of their station, dressing up for the Sunartistry Festival is always a feat and a half.

There’s the expectation to have a different outfit every day. Not as in blank-slate completely, but ‘this accessory can’t be worn three days in a row’ and ‘that set of robes can’t be a repeat’ and it’s all very tedious. This year, Tensei gets the once-in-a-blue-moon experience of having Aiya-sensei on his side when Rasa suggests changing his Face for the Festival. That’s not how it works for puppeteers— you have to go through a personal trial, or some kind of life-changing event. Tensei’s not going to paint a Princess Shinkokami on himself for shits and giggles, no matter how pretty it looks.

Also, depending on what jingles and jangles have been picked out for them by Aiya-sensei, it can be a real chore to wrestle his siblings into their heavy jewelry. Gold, obviously. Out of the Five Great Nations, the Land of Wind is most abundant in that specific precious metal, which in turn makes it widely available in Sunagakure. It’s not uncommon for shinobi to return from C-rank posts guarding the mines in the west with raw ore instead of ryo.

Even so, he knows that a majority of their people simply rent their jewelry every time the festival rolls around. Tensei’s fortunate enough to own his own collection— Each of them, even Gaara, receives a new piece every year on their birthday, smelted out of their father’s personal stores of gold dust. They’re not exactly spoiled for choice.

Tensei is sporting a simple pair of arm cuffs today, matching with their father. Temari, too, but her main piece draws the eye to an intricate chain of gold clovers lining the bridge of her veil to match the embroidery on her jalabiya. Aiya-sensei rattles off a quick explanation of what the four leaves symbolize— the first is for faith, the second for hope, the third for love, and the fourth for luck.

Tensei catches his little sister’s eye with a grin. She’s hiding it well, but he can tell that all she wants to do is bolt into the streets and start stuffing her face with sweets.

Likewise, Kankuro is sulking in the middle of the doorway, trails of golden beads dangling from his keffiyeh standing out from the dark blue beads that their curtain is comprised of. His little brother had fun with the way they followed his movements for maybe two minutes before it started to get annoying. Compared to him, Gaara and Yashamaru have it easy. His baby brother has multiple delicate threads that join into one necklace with implications that Tensei is trying not to think too hard about, and Yashamaru-oji is a clear pair with the same kind of threads woven into his hair.

At least, there will only be a very short window for the rest of the village to notice the symbolism. After the Kazekage’s opening speech, Gaara and Yashamaru-oji are going to be completely out of the public eye. For 'safety', of course.

“You’ll be fine with watching Temari and Kankuro by yourself?” his uncle says. Says, not asks, because both of them know that Tensei has been doing exactly that for the past three years.

Besides, he won’t be ‘by himself’. “The anbu will be around,” Tensei shrugs. “You don’t have to worry, Oji-san.”

“Aa.” Yashamaru gives his shoulder an awkward pat. The past few months of living together saw both of them dancing around the topic of their absence from each others’ lives— Tensei can’t help but notice that his uncle no longer looks as young as he had during their first Sunartistry Festival together. “Your father should be grateful that you’re so responsible, ne?”

Right. Responsible. His being mature for his age is a given to him, but...

Tensei definitely doesn’t cave to the combined forces of his little sister and little brothers’ pleading in less than a day. Or scare anyone with the puff of smoke from unsealing White Bear in an alley. Or draw a lot of unnecessary attention puppeteering said puppet around as his siblings’ personal ride. Tensei is totally, very responsible.

Ah, who is he kidding.

The initial rush of the Sunartistry Festival dies down after the first few days into a simmering bubble of content, like it always does. There’s still missions going on and grouchy old shinobi scowling at all the noise and decorations, of course, but all goes quiet for Memorial Day.

Chiyo-baasama and Ebizo-jiisama are already halfway through their rounds when the rest of their family approaches the shrine, so Tensei merely dips his head respectfully when he catches their eyes and leaves them be.

He looks up at the picture of Sandaime-sama, the two kanji that make up his name written beautifully underneath. Sa-rou. When the lines of a puppet’s panels start to overlay across pale skin and golden irises, though, Tensei slams his blind eye shut and keeps it that way.

There’s a stick of incense already lit in front of his mother’s picture. Tensei hopes that his uncle had a nice moment alone with her— or maybe, he brought Gaara with him. He suspects that Rasa comes back after their family's little procession each year for that very same solitude; some amount of privacy with the woman that Tensei will never get to know any better. Their father doesn't linger before Okaa-han's portrait in front of them, anyways, often staying behind under their grandmother's flinty eyes while Tensei leads his younger siblings in paying their respects. 

“What were Hana-obaasan and Natsu-ojiisan like?” It’s not the first time he’s asked, but his father says something new every year. Stern, calculating. Fierce, strong.

“Steady,” Rasa nods at his mother’s picture. Tensei can’t see it, but then again, he never got the chance to know her. “Passionate,” he gestures at his father’s. “They would have liked you, I think.”

A pity that they’ll never get to test that theory, but it's a nice sentiment all the same.

Chapter Text

69年, September

The new place does not feel new anymore.

Gaara thinks that’s strange. When did that happen? How long does it take something new to become something old? As long as it takes blood to dry. Maybe this place hasn’t been new for a long time, then. Yashamaru did say that Gaara was born within this house’s very walls.

The sky is grey today. Not grey like rain, just grey from all the sand. A dust storm, Yashamaru calls it. Gaara likes the blue better. Or red, but Yashamaru hates it when he comes home covered in red, so Gaara tries to stick to blue.

Gaara doesn’t like storms, rain or sand or dust. They’re noisy, and already there is so much noise. Even the blue is not quiet, but at least there is less noise in the blue.

There is also less noise in the black.

Gaara is watchful when the black is around because no no no get away stay away kill it but the black makes things small. Because he has to watch the black, so everything else quiets.

The black’s name is Tensei. Sometimes. To Yashamaru, and to Tou-sama. To Temari and Kankuro, he is sometimes anigo and sometimes nii-san and sometimes aniue. There used to be nine, aniue and aneue around a fire who is this aniue not the black you twerp.

Oh, okay. Gaara only likes fire when it’s nighttime because the sand isn’t warm it’s cold. But not really in the daytime. That would be too hot.

The black is not hot. Or cold. The black is here kill it kill it—

Quiet. Gaara looks up.

“How’s your bug-catching going?” Tensei asks, sitting down next to him. The stairs are wide. Yashamaru always sits right next to him, too. The sand stays still because it likes both of them. “Looks like you’ve got a good couple of them.”

Gaara looks down. “Nine.” It’s a special number. Like how one is Gaara’s special number, and four is Tensei’s, except Gaara doesn’t know who nine is for. “Not mine.”

Tensei hums. Like Yashamaru, except different. “Yeah. I saw Kankuro and his friends round some up earlier— bug-jail, they were calling it. Are you their warden?” Warden. Gaara knows that word, even if he does not know what it means. He nods, because he is a warden of one. “Yeah, it looks like your sand is doing a great job making sure they don’t escape.”

Feet on the steps, only these ones go all the way down instead of stopping and sitting down. “Wanna know why they’re in there?” Kankuro asks him.

Gaara blinks. “Mm… because?”

Kankuro leans in. The sand likes him, too. “‘Cause they’re criminals. Look,” he points at a long one. “He has too many legs. And this one has no colors, which is boring, like Anigo.”

“Hey.”

“What? You wear a lotta black!”

“Because I’m a puppeteer, you dolt.” Tensei has colors other than the black, though. Gaara sees purple in his hair and blue around his waist and also red on his face, but it’s not red. It’s paint. “At least you guys left some leaves in there. Maybe we should let them go?”

But Gaara has spent all of the night sleeping-time keeping them in the pit. The sand grabs them and puts them back down when they try to climb up the sides. “Why? What will they do?”

There is black— not black, but black. The sand is not angry when the needles rustle around and pick a round rolling bug to carry. Gaara looks back up again, and he sees eyes like his. But not really, because most of the time, they’re not. Like Tou-sama. No one has eyes like his. “Well, it’s not really their fault that they were born with so many legs and a boring coloured shell, right? Sou, there’s no reason to keep them locked up forever. They can just go and enjoy being free, I guess. It’s supposed to be exciting. Or maybe just a nice feeling.”

Like looking up at the sky.

“Well, I was excited, but then you decided to be a slowpoke.” Kankuro grabs a fistful of Tensei’s shirt and yanks, to no avail. “Come on, Anigo! If I miss a cool jutsu just 'cuz you wanna walk me then s’gonna be your fault!”

“The Academy doesn’t teach any ‘cool jutsu’ on the first day, Kankuro.”

“Yeah, yeah, but I can write my name and numbers and stuff already. What else am I gonna learn?”

Gaara dissipates the hardened sand around the pit, raising each bug up and over the walls on little platforms. The floor of the jail sags a little.

“Hey, Gaara? Yashamaru-oji taught you how to write your name, right?”

"Mm-hm." Yashamaru makes him practice with a pencil and paper most times, but he doesn’t have pencil or paper right now. He raises a hand, tracing out the katakana in the air as thin streams of sand follow. "Ga-a-ra."

Only the floor starts sinking, and then it keeps sinking—

“GAARA!”

Gaara blinks.

It’s dark again, even though the sun was starting to come up. The sand is all around him. Gaara is a marble in a bottle.

Or maybe he’s a bug in a jail.

He glares at one of the walls until it crumbles. Now all the bugs are gone, and he doesn’t know where all of them went because the dust is all over. He even more can’t tell when hands grab and lift him, because now he’s far away from the ground. “I forgot about your automatic defense for a second there,” Tensei says, his voice very close to Gaara’s ears. Which is weird. Yashamaru only ever carries him on his back, since babies go in the front and Gaara’s not a baby anymore. “Skies, you scared me.”

Oh. Gaara blinks up at two masked people, all of them with kunai out and pointing towards the smoking hole right next to them, where the stairs used to be. The sand bristles at the gleam of their weapons so close to him. “Sorry,” Gaara frowns. The sand scares a lot of people, he knows.

Kankuro looks scared, too. “Was— was that a bomb?” he asks. “Was that a paper bomb? I swear me and Asa and Botan didn’t put it there!”

A paper bomb? Gaara cranes his neck. “Where?” he says. He’s never seen a paper bomb before.

“Gone, and don’t touch that, Kankuro! The heat melted part of the ground.” Gaara’s world tilts when Tensei bends over to swat Kankuro’s hand away, and then rights itself again just to turn around so that Gaara can’t see the masked people anymore. “Otou-san left for work early again today, right?” Gaara shuffles in place, catching the end of a nod from the corner of his eye. Then, he hears a long string of words that Yashamaru made him promise never to say. “Of all the days for Oji-san to be out— no, that’s probably the point. Poppy left to get Otou-san?” Another nod. “Great. Hey, Kankuro?”

“I’m not going to school today, am I?” Kankuro groans.

Gaara copies the sound, but it comes out a lot smaller. Like a chuff. It doesn’t feel like much more than air leaving his lungs. “My bugs,” he says instead, and that feels like something. Too bad he’s probably not going to be able to find them again. He hopes they enjoy being buried in the warm ground, though, because Tensei’s arms are kind of warm and that’s nice, at least.

::::::

What’s the use of being chakra-sensitive if he’s not a sensor?

Tensei scowls at the sand beneath his feet, kicking up a small cloud for the heck of it. Of course he’s chakra-sensitive, his mind remembers a world where chakra was more of a spiritual concept than literal fucking life energy. He’s been sensing his anbu retinue ever since he was a kid, but he just kind of assumed that everyone could do that?

“Yes, and no,” his father sighs. “Most shinobi have some level of sensory ability, but usually, it’s through a technique that requires the user to stay still in order to devote all their focus to it.”

Whereas Tensei is a passive sensor, apparently. Obvious in hindsight, and he’s thankful that it enabled him to catch the buildup of chakra beneath Gaara’s feet in time to react. His baby brother would have been fine, yes, but the same can’t be said in confidence for Tensei and Kankuro at near point-blank range. They’d discovered a tunneling technique beneath the melted remains of the ground, afterwards, already hours old by then. That freed Kankuro’s friends of any suspicion, at least, but they still have no idea which party is responsible for it. There’s not even that many people in Suna that would benefit from the Kazekage’s kids dying— history has shown that Rasa only gets more stubborn about getting his way when emotionally compromised.

Speaking of their father, all four of them are given a hard curfew to obey. “Treat those around you with caution,” Rasa orders them grimly. “If you are unsure of anyone’s motives or actions, strike first and ask questions later. I’ll handle the fallout.”

“Like, hit them unconscious, or hit them dead?” Kankuro asks.

Their father snorts. “I was unaware that you were capable of ‘hitting someone dead’ yet.”

Kankuro nods. “Oh, yeah, I dipped a couple of my kunai into Anigo’s poison stock a little bit ago. You know, those pots in his walk-in closet?”

What.

“I have one, too,” Temari adds.

That Gaara has an accessible method of murder goes unsaid. Tensei shuffles the baby brother perched in his arms, something that has been ignored in favor of getting things done when Gaara didn’t seem inclined to be set down. His arms haven’t started burning yet, so it’s fine for now, but Tensei has questions that Gaara probably doesn’t have the vocabulary to answer.

He shoves said questions aside as their father turns the full force of his Look in his direction. “I didn’t know,” Tensei says quickly. It’s not like he keeps the door to his room locked when he’s not in there, or trapped to high hell like most shinobi. Popping by Rooster’s apartment had been enlightening. “I’ll set them up properly after this.” He has more than one type of poison in there, so they’ll have to figure out which one in order to match an antidote up in case of emergencies. And then exposure therapy to start building up their immunities.

Rasa nods. “It’s not a bad idea, but a weapon that you don’t understand is a weapon easily turned against you. Ask your brother before using his things, next time.” Next time? Yeah, no, Tensei’s buying a lock for his closet after this. Or maybe a seal. “Right now, however, I need you all to understand the consequences of our situation.”

Tensei doesn’t like that tone. He doesn’t like that tone at all, or the way three presences have appeared on the other side of the office door. “We’re in danger,” Temari says, “so we have to be careful.”

“Someone wants you dead,” their father corrects none-too gently, “And you must be willing to protect yourself.”

And then two anbu bring a woman in.

No, Tensei thinks when she looks up with a glare. Not just a woman— A kunoichi. She looks terrible, from the dark bags under her eyes to her emaciated form, but the steel in her spine is unmistakable. Tensei winces when the anbu toss her at their feet, gagged and bound.

“Border patrol found this person poking around the desert much too close to the village gates several months ago.” Their father steps to the side, closer to the kunoichi. She props herself up on a shoulder in order to glare at him. “It’s time-consuming to check the validity of the documents for each and every visitor to Sunagakure, yes, but not overly difficult. Her supposed hometown on our northern border shares conflicting stories— paid off to offer up a false history, likely. However, she remains unreceptive to our specialists in T&I.” Here, their father looks at each of them for some length of time. Tensei barely takes in enough air for it to count as breathing. “Sunagakure is not looking for war at the moment, and no extraction efforts have been made for her. To continue feeding and housing her would be a drain on our resources.”

The kunoichi looks somewhat offended at that. Tensei almost wants to laugh— clearly, they’re not feeding her much, anyways.

“So we get rid of her,” Kankuro says.

And here, Gaara finally chooses to speak. “So we kill her.”

Tensei closes his eyes, only to open them again when he feels a hand on his shoulder. It’s hard to look his father in the face when both of them know how this went for Tensei last time. Much easier to catch a flash of his siblings as they would have been, in another world, all three with cold, cold eyes, and hands all-too willing to draw blood. It makes sense. It makes too much sense.

“Not you,” Rasa says to the baby brother in his arms. “You, child, need to learn some restraint. Skies know you’re capable of protecting yourself.”

No. No, no, no— “Wait,” Tensei says, mind running a mile a minute. “Temari and Kankuro haven’t even beheaded their first chicken yet or anything, much less been blooded. You know what the Academy guidelines are for correct development.” Too many students dropping out after that unit unless they experience the proper amount of build-up beforehand. That Tensei blew through that portion of the course can be attributed to extra memories of a grandfather who preferred to feed his family with as fresh ingredients as he could get his hands on, including skinning fish on their porch and leaving still-living chickens in repurposed trash bins to drain the blood from their bodies by a cut to the throat— people are another matter entirely.

Not that Academy guidelines really apply to this family. There was never any other path for the four of them.

Still, Tensei steps forward. “The sensei might take this as an attempt to tamper with the curriculum,” he plows ahead. “And they’ll alert the other parents. We nearly had an uprising on our hands when you revised entrance requirements a couple years ago, remember? And a significant fraction of our higher forces will throw their weight behind the Academy, because you changed the mentorship system, too.”

“Aniue,” Temari says quietly from his right. It's, admittedly, a little jarring. She rarely ever calls him that.

But not enough to divert him. Tensei stands his ground. “Haru-sensei used to talk about it in class sometimes.” If throwing his old teacher under the bus is what he needs to convince his father, then so be it. He’ll just find some way to spin a positive about her later.

But Rasa shakes his head, a slight uptick to his eyebrows. “Will you value comfort over protection, when the time comes to walk on the battlefield?” he says, an echo of another conversation that Tensei remembers well.

Which is why Tensei knows how to respond. “I wear mesh beneath my blacks for the same reason I carry my status proudly, but what use is that when I hesitate to finish a traitor?” He takes a deep breath, a full one, and then lets it go. “I know you probably asked Chiyo-baasama not to spread that around, but I know it. So let me try again.”

“And relegate your siblings to mere observers?”

Skies, it’s bad enough that he has to; that he can’t hide them from this. “They can hunt for their firsts in the field like I did,” Tensei says. “And, if you keep them in the Academy until standard graduation age, they’ll do better than I ever could. Don’t you— shouldn’t you know a lot about investments, as the Kazekage?”

His father stares at him, and so do his siblings, and the anbu and even the kunoichi on the floor. Tensei doesn’t know how they got here; how everything went from zero to a hundred so fast. Too fast— he needs an emergency brake to pull, only his hands meet nothing but empty air. He wants his uncle, his mother, even, someone who will come through those doors and yell at his father that he’s being too drastic. Right? Why would any of them need to murder anyone within the village walls when they have anbu looking out for them twenty-four seven?

Only there had been anbu with them today, and they hadn’t noticed or stopped the explosive tag before it went off.

Only there had been Marigold, and Okaa-han had to step in because Marigold died.

“I don’ wanna go to school until I’m twelve,” Kankuro mutters from his left, and if Tensei had an ounce less decorum and free hands he would shake his little brother.

“I’m supposed to set an example for them, right?” he says. He wonders if another Temari in another world would have offered a similar justification. “Because I’m the oldest. So let me do that, Yondaime-sama.”

The change in address gives Rasa pause, he can tell. Tensei has never called his father by anything other than what he was taught to as a baby, and he’s absolutely banking on that shock factor to play in his favor right now.

It takes an age and a half, but finally, Rasa nods.

There shouldn’t be pity in the fading light of the kunoichi’s eyes as Tensei drives an iron spoke through the side of her head.

There should be something in his baby brother’s eyes as Gaara watches from Tensei’s arms.

Tensei makes sure there is nothing but resolve in his own when he looks back up. “A syringe full of air between the fingers or toes is a cleaner way to do it,” he tells the two yet-unblooded members of his family, keeping his voice steady, steady, steady. “Because it will look like a heart attack. But a headshot almost always gets the job done. Your teachers can go over all the methods in more depth, though, so it’s important to pay attention in class. Okay?”

Temari and Kankuro share a look. Together, slowly, they nod, and only then does Tensei turn back to their father.

“Dismissed,” Rasa says.

Chapter Text

69年, October

Tensei has been dropping hints that he’s ready for a longer out-of-village C-rank for a while, but now he pursues it with a vengeance. He doesn’t care what that says about him, plays it off as going stir-crazy about the curfew when Rooster asks. There’s nothing wrong with the standard supply and message runs with various random genin that he can nab maybe three or four times a year, and he knows his family doesn’t really need the income, but Tensei wants out of that goddamn house.

Yashamaru-oji returned a few days ago in a flutter of concern and frowns and silence towards their father. The tension between the two adults in their home is palpable, and his siblings are not helping.

“I could’ve,” Temari tells him. “I know Oji-san is mad, but if I did it then everyone wouldn’t be so dramatic and then no one would have told him about it.”

“Poison makes cleaning easier,” Kankuro says. “Your way made a whole puddle. Is it like that every time?”

“I like red,” Gaara smiles. “Yashamaru doesn’t, but you’re not. So it’s okay.”

They’re not— there’s no one way to react correctly, Tensei realizes, but they’re not responding appropriately. Gaara, he could understand, but the other two? The Academy doesn’t start conditioning this early, does it? Temari’s only finished one year, and Kankuro's not even two weeks in yet.

Strike first, ask questions later. Yeah, right. Tensei pointedly doesn’t spear Dragon through the heart when the master shunshins an arm’s length away to ask why he’s not focusing. Out in the field, yeah, it’s a good lesson to keep in mind, but Sunagakure is home. Ema-obasan and Kaemon-ojisan aren’t going to poison his stew, that shopkeeper is dipping at the waist to bow and not to grab a hidden weapon, those bitter old veterans have other things going on in their lives than plotting against his family, look how easy it is to not kill people on the off-chance that they might want him dead.

Tensei’s being monitored, he knows, eyes and flower masks that he can sense even better now that he’s actively honing his skill. He gives them nothing, because that’s what they want.

“He’s always like this,” Yashamaru-oji fumes in the privacy of their living room, one afternoon. Temari and Kankuro are sleeping, Gaara is on the roof, their father is at the office like he always fucking is. “Overreacting. It’s always all or nothing with him. What Karura-nee saw, I can’t tell.”

Tensei thins his lips. “He thinks it over, though. The reason behind it was…” not enough, but understandable.

“Him thinking it over and then still making these decisions only makes it worse. Making his own child a jinchuuriki? Firing all the servants? Separating Gaara and I from you three? Sending me on an S-rank mission after three years on the inactive roster?” His uncle clenches and unclenches his fists. “Sandaime-sama chose wrong. I may not have known him well, but he chose wrong. Or maybe it was Karura-nee who chose wrong. Your father is not suited for leadership when something as simple as priorities eludes him.”

Tensei blinks at the sudden switch to formal language, but he doesn’t try to defend Rasa any further. You weren’t there, either, he doesn’t say, because that wouldn’t be fair.

Skies, what Tensei wouldn’t give for everything to go back to normal.

::::::

69年, December

Rasa has been calling him to the office before their training sessions, lately, and having Tensei stand at his side while he goes over the documents or files related to whatever. Some of them are important, like the biannual report on the structural integrity of the boulders that are supposed to help with sand erosion. Others are less so, like Counselor Jouseki’s request to amend his son’s promotion from tokubetsu jounin to full jounin on the basis of ‘because-I-said-so’.

Tensei follows along for as long as his attention span will allow, and inevitably his father will set the papers down and lead Tensei to the training grounds for a couple hours.

They don’t… talk. Not really, not about anything that needs to be talked about. Maybe Tensei is a coward, but he thinks he prefers it this way.

The mission desk must finally have gotten annoyed enough with his ‘hinting’ to clear it with the Kazekage, though, because the next time he walks in, Asahi-san all but shoves the mission scroll into his hands.

Tensei wants to be able to point at his mission record proudly someday in case he ends up as a paperwork chunin, is his other justification. It’s a valid worry that a lot of genin have, unlike his need to get the hell away, even just for a little bit.

Not that there’s anything wrong with being a paperwork chunin. Asahi-san, for example, is perfectly nice and more or less happy with his job, Tensei thinks. It’s just that he needs to move and sitting at a desk all day sounds like the Academy all over again, except without the learning aspect.

He’s teamed up with two older Suna genin to show him the ropes of how an escort works, but also because it goes way far out of the village and the powers that be need some kind of insurance to make sure he doesn’t get himself killed. They slow their pace for his shorter legs, making the journey to Hari-mura near Wind’s southern border a six-day run. Along the way, he learns that Niyu and Kota are fourteen and fifteen respectively, cousins from the same family legacy that practices the suruchin. It’s very similar to what Tensei remembers of the Chinese meteor hammer, only there’s a metal chain instead of a rope and weighted kunai nearly twice the standard size on either end. It looks pretty cool, if a little impractical, a notion that he quickly discards when they nearly tag team him thirty seconds into a no-ninjutsu light spar. They’re fast, and it takes him a moment to figure out the unfamiliar attack pattern before he tries going on the offensive.

He hadn’t recalled the name of his maternal great grandparents’ home until he saw the open-air glass workshops dotting the area, lighting up the night. The houses are carved into the canyon walls, far above the river that surely must have carved said canyon. It's so different from Suna, the sandstone layered in stripes as red as his auburn hair and colorful glass wind chimes dangling from swinging wooden bridges.

Tensei finds that he’s caught a second wind that allows him to explore. There’s a crevice on the western side of the canyon that’s just big enough to leave him some wiggle room, high up enough that he can see nearly the entirety of Hari-mura, and the sunrise is breathtaking.

Niyu and Kota have already checked into the inn, and Tensei follows their lead maybe an hour later. The matron has a toddler perched on one hip as she signs him in, and Tensei lets the kid touch his painted Face while his mother apologizes for her curiosity. “We’ve had ninja stay with us before, although our regular clientele are tourists from Kannan-shi or another nation,” she says, “But Akira-chan is too young to remember the last time a puppeteer stopped by.”

Akira-chan just turned four last month, and she’s in her ‘why’ phase. It’s all too easy to start on his own siblings and their antics, one little brother a year older than Akira-chan and the other a year younger, while he sets up his first ningyo-joruri puppet show outside of his own village right on the inn’s doorstep. The Ash Princess and The Scorpion is, of course, his play of choice, and he performs it as faithfully as possible to his mother’s retelling for the crowd that gathers. His eyes flit around for Rooster's instinctively when he stumbles, but there are only strangers here.

Tensei inhales, pushes aside the few chuckles that drift forth from the adults at the back, and forges on.

They’re quick to ask him who his family here is afterwards, skipping over the ‘if’ entirely. The village is small enough that everyone knows everyone by virtue of knowing someone else, and Tensei learns that the great great aunt on his mother’s side who stayed when his great grandparents moved to Suna only had one son. Great uncle Genji continues to dedicate his time to the art of glass-blowing these days, despite needing a cane for his bad joints.

For some reason, Tensei is startled to learn this information. Of course, his mother's relatives wouldn't die so young as to never overlap lifetimes with Tensei, they're civilians. That he didn’t get to meet his maternal grandparents was due to a particularly aggressive strain of the flu that some of their shinobi accidentally brought back from the frontlines of the Second War— an exception, rather than the norm.

He performs an altered version of the well-known Rabbit Princess classic and then one improvisation where he asks for audience participation from the kids sitting near the front to make the story up as he goes. It’s getting late by Hari-mura’s standards, though, so Tensei gathers his earnings for the Playhouse and crashes into bed right along with the rest of the locals.

Before they set out again that evening, the matron gets Akira-chan's friend's older sister to lead him to Genji-jiisama's workshop. His great uncle has been waiting for Tensei since he heard the news, and it's— hmm. The only physical feature they share are their violet eyes, but they're related all the same.

"I'm sorry to hear about Karura-chan. She was a bright girl," Genji-jiisama sighs. "I haven't seen Yashamaru-kun in such a long time, either. Not since he was about as old as that one, I'd say," he points at Kota, who’s chatting with Niyu at the edge of the property line.

Between serving in the war and then having to take care of Gaara, Tensei supposes his uncle hasn’t had the time for the lengthy missions that would take him near Hari-mura, latest S-rank aside. So Tensei demonstrates his uncle's technique to make glass senbon with some of the quartz sand in the workshop for a comparison, and Genji-jiisama regales him with the odd properties of the Prince Rupert's drop, which Hari-mura has dubbed 'Scorpion Tears' in this world.

Tensei wants to laugh at that. Yes, it does look like a teardrop, ten out of ten for the naming scheme, but that’s not the part of it that nearly sends him into hysterics. A Prince Rupert’s drop— his mind chooses to retain the most useless fucking information from his past life. It’s too bad about his depth perception, really, but Tensei knows he would trade it for having Sight a million times over when relevant events start coming into play. The blanks and margins in his coded notation scrolls certainly appreciate not being blank anymore.

A small statuette not unlike the one that his mother broke years ago catches his eye. Tensei is prepared to haggle a little for it, but Genji-jiisama straight up just gives it to him.

Which is not how it's supposed to go? Anything gained from the desert sands must be taken— But Hari-mura is located on the very outskirts of said desert, and Genji-jiisama tells him that distant family is still family, and family does not sell trivialities to each other.

It's so nice here, this little place suspended above a river. Tensei feels like this could be just another rural village in a different world where shinobi only continue to exist as ink on paper.

Hari-mura has a biannual contract with Suna for their merchant's C-rank escorts. "I'll come bearing gifts next time, then," Tensei promises with every intent to do so.

The journey back to Sunagakure takes two weeks. He paces himself at light jog that matches the caravan easily, and Tensei finds that he still has the breath to spare to chat with the merchants riding on camel-back when he’s not learning from Niyu or Kota about what to watch out for when taking point or bringing up the rear. They call him 'cute' and offer a ride every hour or so, like they're scared he'll get tired at the tortoise's pace they're moving at. Canteens clank and wheels creak without a care for stealth— Tensei is shown how each glass piece is wrapped to prevent breakage and the padding between panes of mosaics, soldering materials stuffed away for on the spot commissions.

Apart from their standard ration bars and supplements, they eat the same thing— various bags of dried fruit and jerky and even a handful of fresh vegetables that they make sure to finish within the first two days of travel. "Is that safe for you?" they ask when he knocks back the various pills and powders that comprise his dietary supplements and immunity regimen before eating, which is how he learns from Niyu and Kota about the many impressions civilians have about 'ninja'. It's kind of funny how they think he's on hard drugs to keep up— yes, soldier pills are the shinobi equivalent of steroids, and he's heard that the crash in the aftermath is terrible, but it's not like Tensei can or even needs to take them at this age.

The lives they lead are so different from either of the two he knows, always on the move in an arid land that would sooner kill them than keep them alive. Tensei plans on doing some people-watching when he gets back home; there’s more to the world than just what shinobi have to offer.

There has to be. Tensei doesn’t know if he can settle for the life he’s heading back to, otherwise.

Chapter Text

70年, February

Is it controversial to show an outdated play?

Tensei tugs at his bangs and huffs at the thought. Aiya-sensei or Dragon or someone would have stopped him if so, and it's too late to change it now. No one ever said that your political debut had to be a classic, anyways.

Tensei has been watching other puppeteers put on shows in the central plaza for as far back as this set of memories can go, has sat on the Mat himself, but performing for the daimyo’s court?

Yeah, he might be a little nervous. Thus, the practice audience.

He’s borrowed a couple puppets from the Playhouse’s library, wooden creations and mix-and-match outfits to get the aesthetic right. There’s a certain weight to them that he’s not sure how to feel about, these once-beloved leftovers of dead puppeteers. At the very least, Tensei makes sure to paint his own backgrounds, blending the colors of the sky at different points of the day to roll back and forth on the track for the passage of time.

A pale-faced lady glides steps forward in dainty, tiny steps. She stops at the edge of the stairs, the edge of light of the man across from her. The Moon is barely a breath out of reach when she asks The Sun what he knows of love.

The Sun tears his gaze away from the distance and raises his head to meet her gaze. He tells her that it burns, it brightens, that it’s something you make and then give away.

The Clouds scoff, perched atop the skies. They beseech The Moon not to listen to him, the big ball of fire does not know of what he speaks.

The Sun retorts that he surely does, who else but he makes the akaibara roses grow?

The Clouds claim that they do. Love nourishes, like the rain. They would turn the hills green and fill the creeks to sing for love.

The Sun asks why The Moon wonders.

The Moon replies that she thinks she might be in love. She is trying to understand, you see, so she goes to gaze upon the deserts where The Sun burns.

They are dry and hot and empty. The clouds crow, seemingly proven right. The Moon shakes her head, for she finds the desert beautiful.

The Sun smiles, seemingly proven right. So The Moon goes and observes the creeks in their beds, cool and wet and full. But they are beautiful, too.

The Moon turns to her father, The Sky, and asks what he thinks: if this feeling that rests inside is love. He tells her to ask her mother, The Earth, and so she presses her lips to the ground and whispers.

The Earth says that The Clouds cover her, that The Sun warms her, and together they make her bloom. Without the both of them, she would be cold and dry.

The Moon raises her hand, as if to catch the rain, or perhaps the last rays of the daylight. Does The Earth mean that she would be ugly without them? Is that what love is, to give and have beauty?

The Earth rumbles gently. She would be cold and dry, but not ugly. Just as her little one is cold and dry, but The Earth thinks her beautiful all the same.

The Moon turns. She is not beautiful like her mother.

The Earth replies that no one is like her, and no one is like The Moon. Who is it that her child loves? What kind of love does she wish for?

The Moon wonders that there are different kinds of love, so The Earth explains. The sun warms her and pulls her in. The clouds cover her when they can, and The Sky turns every color for her. How does the Moon and her beloved love?

The Moon’s dainty steps turn sweeping as she describes a dance. She pulls and the ocean pushes, she rises and sets while the waves rise and ebb. They go around and around and The Moon watches the tides. She feels loveliest when her light is being reflected off of the waters, and she does not think she will ever tire of calling the ocean beautiful. Is that, then, love?

The Clouds scoff. It is her own reflection that The Moon sees on the ocean’s surface, they claim. It is like when The Sun sets and calls us beautiful, but it is only his own colors he loves. Has The Moon fallen in love with herself?

The Moon cries out, denying such cruel words. She loves the ocean even when she shines no light to reflect. Perhaps that is even when she loves the most.

The Sun frowns and asks if The Moon only loves the way the ocean follows her lead. The Clouds accuse her of being arrogant.

The Moon cries out that it is a dance. The ocean is the heart of her orbit, she will live by the water until all is gone and The Moon herself is dust.

The Sun and The Clouds quiet, and The Stars come out from where they had been listening. The Moon turns to them, falls to her knees in her desperation and asks if this is love.

The Stars tell her that she is not asking the right questions.

The Moon has asked The Sun, who burns. She has asked The Clouds, who cover. She has asked The Sky, who stays forever, and she has asked The Earth who made her.

The Stars inquire if she has asked the ocean, who loves her.

The Moon’s voice breaks when she responds that she has not.

Her hands tremble. The Moon holds one close to her pale face as The Stars clasp the other and tells her to see the world for what it is.

So The Moon goes down to the ocean and asks if this is love.

And the ocean says, “Yes.”

Tensei breathes, bows his head, and then he opens his eyes.

The first time is for a small gathering of family at the front of a crowd before the Mat. Dragon leads strangers and familiar faces alike in polite applause as Chiyo-baasama harrumphs that the court is exactly the type to eat up a sappy story like this. Ebizo-jiisama tells her to be glad to have another entertainer in their family; she is much too old to make the trip to their capital for such platitudes these days.

Rooster-senpai shoots him a thumbs-up. Temari and Kankuro pelt him with questions about what happened to The Sun and The Clouds and where The Stars came from, alongside all the rest of the younger children.

Yashamaru-oji offers Tensei a smile from the back, where he hovers with Gaara clutching his pants leg away from everyone else.

Tensei may or may not have picked the story of The Moon because he knew this would be his baby brother’s first time watching a Mat show from start to finish, without being steered away by their uncle or interrupted by the audience dispersing as soon as they saw him. It’s not Tensei’s place to explain what love is, but that doesn’t mean he can’t provide an addendum.

The second time he opens his eyes after the finishing lines, it is to a smattering of polite applause and the declaration that such a beautiful, moving performance deserves a feast in its honor. Tensei offers up some token protests, but what the daimyo wants is what he will get, obviously. Besides, Tensei has been really looking forward to trying fresh sushi for the first time in this life.

His father’s gaze bores into him. Tensei meets it quickly before looking away, because there’s something about the Look that feels like it’s not him that his father is seeing.

Out of all their kids, only Tensei has his mother’s violet eyes. Tensei sees them in the mirror every morning when he applies his paint, he knows how very close they are to her exact shade. His parents’ union hadn’t been a political arrangement— no one in their direct family line has ever married for anything but love.

Tensei may or may not have picked The Love of The Moon in part because of The Moon’s espousement of her love for the ocean. Sandaime-sama led Suna to conquer the land on which Wind Country’s capital now stands during the Second War, a wealthy city that sprawls along a river from the southeast border of mountains. The city and river both go right up to open waters, and the Land of Wind’s sole university houses numerous scholars who famously write poetry about the ocean’s beauty. Watching the daimyo, though, Tensei can’t help but think that his consideration has gone unappreciated by the most important man in the room.

They’ve been invited for his coronation, the previous daimyo finally having passed at the age of seventy-three. Tensei’s not sure why the throne went to his younger son, for whom he can now confirm the rumors of being deeply religious and notably eccentric. He looks much like the rest of his family with pale skin, squinting eyes, and dark hair that stands out as a goatee, but where said family are in variations of traditional east-asian clothing, the daimyo wears a purple haori over a heavily embroidered wine and pink kimono, with a purple cap to match. Buddhism is more popular than Shintoism in this area, so close to River Country as they are, but from what Tensei knows about it… he doesn’t think the daimyo’s hedonistic tendencies are doing the faith much justice.

The other son, two years older at thirty-nine according to the file Tensei had to memorize, is a much bigger, more rotund man than his younger brother. Tensei tries his level best not to stiffen, dipping low at the waist when said man approaches him. “Beautiful backgrounds,” Mimaki-sama says. Tensei stays in the bow as he murmurs his thanks. “Do you play mahjong?”

“No, Mimaki-sama.”

“A shame.” The noble smooths a thumb over one half of his mustache. “Not a very practical skill for shinobi, I’m aware, but then the story you chose has morals with little use to your kind.”

Is Tensei being profiled? “Life is harsh in the deserts, Mimaki-sama,” he tries. “I see no harm in treasuring softness where I can find it.”

Mimaki-sama chuckles. “Then you must find all of us very soft, Tensei-kun.”

What is happening. Tensei needs help. Where is his father. “Not so much soft,” he hedges. His anbu guard that Tensei hasn’t managed to catch sight of yet is surely listening, and Aiya-sensei is going to hear about it if he puts his foot in his mouth now because the anbu are all snitches. “Only having the grace to be far removed from the earth that many are condemned to walk on.”

The other man nods to himself, takes one last look, and then… drifts away.

It’s a strange thing, to be treated sometimes like an adult, sometimes like a child, and sometimes like a performing monkey by the court. The ladies don’t dare to come close and pinch his painted face or any sort of manhandling that he can see the other children around his age have to suffer through— the closest they get is a length away to compliment the weave and pattern of his clothes, specifically commissioned for this event. Where Suna’s formal wear consists of robes and shawls, Kannan-shi’s style is much closer to that of the traditional Japanese. Tensei finds the many pleats of his hakama pants mildly annoying to move around in, but the haori is neat. It reminds him of Shodai-sama and Sandaime-sama’s pictures on the family shrine— he might even incorporate one into his everyday wear, after this.

“What did you think of the capital?” Rasa asks on their way back.

Towering concrete buildings and spots of lush greenery. A thriving seafood market that he didn’t have the time to sneak away and explore properly. A public library of books, the first that he’s seen in this world.

A little too close to a home in his memories that he can never go back to, actually.

“Big,” he hums. “Bright. Busy. But I think I belong to Suna’s sands and winds, you know?”

“The Moon shakes her head, for she found the desert beautiful,” his father quotes, and Tensei realizes with a start that Aiya-sensei is old enough to probably have been Rasa’s etiquette teacher as well.

“I’m working on making Okaa-han’s Ash Princess and the Scorpion into a proper play,” he offers.

“I’ll see if I can’t make some time for a viewing,” his father replies.

It’s still not talking.

It’s better than nothing, Tensei tells himself, and leaves it at that.

Chapter Text

70年, March

“You really didn’t make him change it,” Chiyo huffs, the action disturbing the surface of the tea in her hands. “Honestly! One would think that my counsel goes in one ear and out the other with barely a moment to enjoy the draft in your head.”

“A joint realization is hardly the wisest counsel I’ve ever been offered,” Rasa says wryly. “You should have heard the lecture Aiya-sensei treated me to the last time I tried.”

“And I assume you still haven’t told him?”

Bah. “You’ve had just as many chances as I,” he reminds her, but in truth, they both hold some amount of responsibility for this.

Despite his son’s uncanny tendency to catch onto spoken subtext from near-infancy, there is no possible way he could be intentionally wearing his uncle’s First Face. Aside from the fact that Tensei hadn’t even been born when Rasa’s cousin made his one-time venture into bunrakubuki practices, there are no pictures of Sasori-kun wearing his two stripes of red paint, and no one to voice the comparison besides. Unlike Iwa, Sunagakure’s people are not one to hold on to the dead. How are their spirits expected to pass on in peace if they aren’t let go of?

It’s obvious in hindsight that Tensei wouldn’t carry the signs of mourning for a boy he must barely remember, but that’s what Rasa assumed from the first morning he was met with amateur efforts on a small face in the dressing room. Until Tensei, no one has touched the vanity table since— since Karura. The nostalgia must have buried his common sense.

And grief must have buried Chiyo’s. Rasa is surprised that it took his great-aunt so many years to reach such a conclusion herself, but it was well-known by many that his eldest idolized Sasori-kun to some degree. One of his most notable memories of that time includes a bewildering experience with a puppeteer called Dragon returning a familiar empty bento box, and a request to please reign in his son before Tensei actually manages to break into the Playhouse looking for Sasori, or break himself trying. Imitation is a form of respect, after all, and an explanation that both Chiyo and Rasa may have jumped to too readily.

“I’ll try again before we leave for the Chunin Exams,” Rasa sighs into his tea.

Chiyo snorts. “You'd consider that enough of a landmark event to justify changing one’s Face?”

“You tell me, Troupe Master.”

Much to his frustration, his great-aunt merely cackles. “It depends on the puppeteer, boy. Suppose there’s no use trying to curve the winds.”

It’s not often that Rasa gets a moment to sit down with any of his children’s instructors for a progress report— not that this conversation is a formal progress report by any measure. No, Rasa has learned his lesson about ink on paper appearances after seeing the results of his eldest’s farce of an Academy education. And what good are high class rankings if Tensei can’t keep his composure in the face of a little bit of death?

That issue, at least, has been tentatively amended. Rasa is thankful that he caught it early enough to have had no consequences for his son on the field, but the experience has taught him caution. Just an hour ago, he’d held a private audience with Temari and Kankuro’s Academy instructors. He makes a note to look into commissioning something if his daughter’s proclivity towards the tessen holds up— the artisans of the House of High Currents scorned his mother, and so will receive no business from her lineage, but the House of Orange Winds seems to be doing decently for all that their history is younger.

His second son, on the other hand.

“It appears that Kankuro has expressed interest in attending puppetry extracurriculars next year,” Rasa starts.

“No,” Chiyo-o’obasama says.

Well. Not unexpected, but she could have let him finish. “The council already has their perfect heir,” he says. He knows very well what those bastards see when they look at his eldest— there is the Shodai in the tied-up auburn hair and tanned skin and the slope of Tensei’s shoulders, there is the Nidaime in those articulated hands and classic Playhouse blacks, there is the Sandaime in the swirling mass of iron and the way that curtain bangs frame Tensei’s face. There’s some resentment towards the council in his chest still, for pushing his son into the mold of a prodigy. Just look at what they did to Pakura.

What they don’t see is the way that Tensei lets his hair down the moment he’s past the threshold of their front door, or the graphite marks and ink splatters lining fingers that splay across notation scrolls the same way Karura’s used to, or the sharpened filaments reminiscent of Yashamaru’s glass senbon instead of rounded iron sand. Rasa might not be home very often, but he spends enough time with Tensei to see a boy forging forwards as bull-headedly as Rasa once did, with all the direction of a hawk underground to boot.

Rasa understands what it's like to have an implied responsibility suddenly shoved upon you all too well. A soft heart without callouses is ill-suited for leadership. Placing him under Chiyo, adjacent to Chikamatsu's oath, is all Rasa can do to offer him an out from the path to the hat should another of his children find the strength to step up one day.

”The council already has their perfect heir,” he repeats himself, having gone slightly off track, “and so there will be much less scrutiny should Kankuro carry Chikamatsu’s legacy.”

"I said no."  There's an edge to her tone this time. "I am old, Rasa, not blind, and neither are you. Look upon the ruins of my lineage and tell this aging woman why it shouldn't end with me."

Because much like a kunai, the collective forces of Suna matter little without a sharpened point at the forefront. It was the Shodai and Chikamatsu-sama in the First War, then Chiyo and her children in the Second before Hina-oba and Kazuo-oji died and Sarou-sensei stepped up. Rasa himself has spent time on the frontlines of the Third, single-handedly changing the tides of the battle to Suna's favor wherever he went while Sasori held Wind Country's borders. But in reality, two people can't be everywhere at the same time. "The White Castle of Suna's line has always been our best bastion of defense," Rasa says. "I understand your loss, but we can't afford weakness by its absence."

"Tell me that Chikamatsu-sensei would not be ashamed of the mountain of corpses I hoped to be survived by," Chiyo spits bitterly. "Every single student— even little Kanza-kun who did not carry my blood. I refuse to subject myself to Hana's bitching in the afterlife when I get her grandson killed on top of her beloved elder brother."

If Rasa were the poetic type, he might have found some way to spin his children's legacies elsewhere. Temari to continue Reto-sama's artform of mastery over the winds, Kankuro to finish the path that Kanza-oji started down, maybe even Gaara to succeed where Tenoi could not. Skies know that failing Tenoi-kun was Sarou-sensei's greatest regret.

But Rasa is not the poetic type, so he sighs and puts his tea down. "I presume that Chikamatsu-sama would have preferred his castle to be guarded long past the day when both of us have been scattered to the winds."

"You presume I'd spend my last year before retirement meddling with a castle that was built to stand alone," Chiyo mutters. "Let the younger generation meander however they wish. Your sons will be no legacy of mine."

::::::

"Skies a-fucking-bove, that's cold!"

"Sorry," Tensei says reflexively, biting back a grin despite the fact that Rooster can't see him. "You asked for this, though."

"For a hand? Sure. For a chili bomb in my face? No!”

Not to make everything about himself, but he wonders if Rooster had been challenged on the basis of being Dragon's student, or because of their connection. Apprentice puppeteers do occasionally sponsor new trainees into the Playhouse, but Tensei's situation is... well. His paternal grandparents were best known for their feud with the Playhouse for a reason. 

He sighs. "Where's your hood, by the way?"

Rooster scowls as Tensei ladles more water over his head. "Still in the dirt, I think. Unless Spider and his cronies took it."

Took it? What, like a trophy? “But you said you won." 

“It got yanked off during the fight. They were being assholes about my mohawk, jan." 

Ah— it hadn't occurred to him that other people in the Playhouse would… know? Aside from the inherent misogyny in thinking that women shouldn't have hair this short, it baffles Tensei that there are people who expect Rooster to look like one. And not just because his stage name makes it obvious that he isn’t a girl, but because the traditional bunrakabuki blacks provide full coverage in a very ambiguous sort of way. Hell, Tensei looks more like a girl than his senpai does, considering the ponytail that he's slowly growing out. “I think your mohawk looks cool,” he offers. 

“Dragon helped me cut it.” Rooster says quietly, the water dripping from his hair to the tub providing a steady plip-plip-plip in the backdrop of his declaration. 

Tensei pours another ladle, running his fingers thoroughly between gritty brown strands. It feels kind of like he’s just switching the chili powder out for sand. The water in the wells inside the Playhouse aren’t particularly clear, despite about a hundred puppeteers living in the basement dormitories. It’s a little difficult to believe that no one has done anything about it in the six decades since this building was constructed, but then again, he supposes that the communal funds must be more than enough to keep buying cotton filters. “Recently?”

“I mean, we trim my sides every other week, but if you’re talking about when I chopped it all off… it was just before we met, I think.” A hitched breath. “And you just— I thought maybe you couldn’t tell, at first.”

That isn’t too far from the truth, really. “I don’t really think about it?”

Rooster laughs shakily. “Fuck, that’s even better. Why does everyone else have such gigantic sticks stuck up their asses about it, then?” 

“Being in the spotlight tends to draw criticism, invited or not. Your choices have consequences.”

Tensei startles, eyes darting around until they meet the painted gaze of another puppeteer, perched atop the rafters. It’s easy to sense the comings and goings of different chakra signatures, but much harder to notice a motionless one if he’s not actively searching for anything.

“That's not—” Water splatters against the tiled floor as Rooster wipes his face and jerks his head up. “Do you choose every single thing you love and hate?" he demands.

"I choose what I'm willing to make known,” comes the reply. “If you want to stake your claim on a hill in plain sight, then be prepared to die on it." 

Even if the advice is well-meaning, the wording rubs Tensei the wrong way. "The fuckin’ hill was mine in the first place,” Rooster snarls, one hand lighting up with chakra threads.

Neither of them are good enough to settle this with a spar, and Tensei really doesn't want to get in trouble for using his iron within the Playhouse halls again. "Senpai,” he hisses, tugging on Rooster’s sleeve, “it's not worth it."

"It really isn't," the other puppeteer chuckles, and dammit, he didn't mean for that to be overheard. The entire conversation should have been private, regardless of eavesdropping being a shinobi’s bread and butter. “But you’ll wanna repaint your Face first if you wanna challenge me anyways, brat.”

Rooster’s chicken puppet clatters to life, wings flared, and Tensei takes a deep breath as he reaches for White Bear’s storage scroll. “I’ve got your back,” he murmurs. Might as well get this over with.

Chapter Text

70年, June

The Chūnin Exams are held twice a year: once locally in January, and once internationally in a rotation between several countries from July to August. The international ones came about as a part of the peace treaty signed for the Third War, to encourage positive international relations and hopefully prevent another from breaking out only a year or two afterwards like the Third did after the Second War. It started with Amagakure hosting in the year sixty-four, then Iwa, Kusa, Taki, Kumo, Kiri, Konoha, Suna, and then back around again.

Tensei is twelve when his father brings up the upcoming international Chūnin Exams over the rare dinner that he’s home for, to be held in Konohagakure of the Land of Fire this year. You know, the hidden village known for being the ‘nice’ one. Suna’s ally. The safest international option there is, minus their own country.

He signs up.

‘Jounin-sensei’ are welcomed to watch the proceedings. Rooster's not a jounin, and Dragon can't afford to leave the Playhouse unattended for a month. Chiyo-baasama is a mentor, so he tells her that he’s going to take the international exams this year. Chiyo-baasama tells him that under no circumstances is she stepping foot into Konoha.

Yeah, he figured, after what they did in the Second War.

His father places a bundle of ceramic jars at his vanity table one morning. “You’ll be representing our family,” Otou-san tells him as he stares at the new paint. "Your international debut. Surely, that's a suitable situation?"

Tensei pauses, brush in hand already dipped in crimson. It’s not uncommon for him to catch his father in the dressing room if he wakes up early enough, but they mostly just leave each other be. “Otou-san,” he says, grasping for every ounce of decorum Aiya-sensei has ever winded into the cracks of his brain, “I sometimes wonder if my current paint is offensive.” No pointed statements, no questioning tone. Just a thought put on display.

“It's not.” Tensei stays quiet, hoping for further elaboration. “Not that I'm aware of,” Otou-san amends, “but I’ve been told that you might be ignorant of the connotations that it carries.”

That’s… a little insulting, actually. Rooster helped him pick it out, flipping through pages upon pages of artwork to show him the various meanings behind each color, every shape, and the different locations on which paint can be applied. A line across the bridge of the nose for ‘new beginnings’. A stripe down the chin for ‘aspirations’, or ‘unfulfilled desires’. The older apprentice shuffled him off to Dragon for the master's seal of approval, and Dragon had nodded and dubbed his Face a simplified variation of The Wanderer. “You’ve studied the Playbook before?”

He’s asking genuinely. Copies of the Playbook are available to peruse in the Sun Theatre, displayed not too far from the original Mat Against The Wall. Tensei just never pinned his no-nonsense father as the type to be interested in that kind of thing. “I’ve studied my predecessors. Nidaime-sama was a puppeteer,” Otou-san reminds him. Ah, that makes sense. “I was discussing your progress with Chiyo-o’obasama when we…”

The sentence trails off into the void. Tensei watches the way his father's eyes flick between three jars of different shades of red and five jars of various purples. He was surprised when Rasa didn't bring this up when they were bound for Kannan-shi; objectively, the daimyo's inauguration seems like a much more important event than the Chūnin Exams. Maybe this is one of those 'pick your battles' situations?

"You know what purple represents," his father asks. Tensei nods. "Good. Then I expect you to wear it with dignity."

It sounds like an order.

Tensei says nothing as the Kazekage sweeps out of the room in starched white robes and picks his battles wisely. He doesn't need to refer to the Playbook for a new Face— Rooster has teased him with one in particular, sharp lines in a teal blue-green several shades lighter than Temari's eyes. It was meant as a joke, he knows— the far-seeing Hawk for a half-blind kid.

A blind eye for an ink-on-paper future. Tensei had filed it away for another time, but maybe that time could be now. 

He starts with the eyelids and immediately pauses. The new purple paint makes it look a lot like the markings on another supposed prodigy, from another village, and Tensei kind of wants to laugh. He nearly forgot that this pattern is commonly found on three different animals— raptors. Foxes.

And snakes.

Ah, screw it. His father wants to show off Suna's prodigy in Konoha? Might as well give them something to talk about.

He’s teamed up with Niyu and Kota again, due to Konoha’s three-man team requirement. The familiarity saves them from potentially giving their abilities away in having to figure out team cohesion on a Konoha training ground. Tensei spars with them every day in the weeks leading up to their departure. They should be chunin already; he remembers recommending them for a promotion in his last mission report.

Maybe that’s the point.

They’re… close. The two have themselves figured out, a rarity in most teenage boys, with no insecurity about a twelve year old stretching his metaphorical legs as their team leader.

They have each other to lean on, and there’s no room for a third wheel.

They pause their roughhousing on the carpeted floor of their hotel room when Tensei makes for the door. “Gonna see what novels they have in their library,” he explains. It’s not code for anything. The split will force their Konoha anbu escorts to separate as well, and Leaf shinobi are well known for being soft. No one is going to attack him in the public library, a civilian idea housing other civilian ideas that mostly draws civilians because shinobi are shifty and sketchy and protective about information as a rule.

His guards in all but name nod and go back to tussling.

The trip from Suna to Konoha took five days at their relaxed pace, and now that he's here, Tensei's not tired enough to willingly sit pretty in the hotel room. He takes his time wandering the streets, scouting out an entire street of food carts along a wall painted with the Akimichi Clan mon, noting a bookstore with some neat stationary on display, and maybe hoping that he'll bump into a familiar face. Seeing Minato, Kushina, and Kakashi that time when he was four had been a wild experience, for sure.

Said streets are largely straight lines that make up blocks of infrastructure, not built to confuse like Suna’s rounded buildings and randomly placed open-air plazas among narrow, curving alleyways. With the exception of the four main streets that divide everything into eight districts, his village is admittedly difficult to navigate from the ground.

To discourage spies, probably. No other reason for Shodai Kazekage Reto to do that, since being surrounded by desert for days in all directions means Suna has never been invaded in its entire history.

Speaking of infrastructure, though, Tensei is incredibly curious about the seals slapped onto various buildings. Sometimes walls, usually support beams, and only ever on wood. It’s incredibly rude to travel via rooftop in a village not your own, according to Aiya-sensei, but the singular one he allows himself to climb up and peek at has a seal in the center, too.

Sunagakure has seals on their rooftops as well, one on each corner or four lining the circumference to enhance the light and thus heat-reflecting properties of the chakra-infused white paint. Obviously, that’s not what’s going on here.

Seals. Wood. Infrastructure.

Hashirama?

There’s a saying in Suna to invoke patience: It’s not Konohagakure no Sato. The village surrounded by a jungle is even noted in the history texts to have seemingly sprung up out of the ground over the course of a month or so. Sunagakure took years to establish itself as a well-built physical location, with apartment buildings and storefronts instead of tents and caravans and carts. If your leader can spear enemies to death by spontaneously sprouting branches from the ground, why not slap him over the head with some architecture texts and put him to work? Tobirama would be the type to do that, Tensei thinks with a huff of laughter.

And then the seals— well, the giant forest around Konoha is made up of what the locals call 'Hashirama trees'. If his creations continue to grow without his input, then they had to figure out some way to contain the buildings he made.

Enter Uzumaki Mito, seals master and essentially First Lady of Konoha.

Tensei runs a nail along the edge of one more easily reached at street-level as he studies it. It doesn’t come off, obviously. There’s a character that looks similar to Suna’s shorthand for 'stasis' in the area where the space variable goes, and a recurring one in seemingly random places that he thinks might be the Uzushio jutsu-shiki’s shorthand for 'wood’, but that’s about all he recognizes.

…and if it works on living plants, then hypothetically, an Uzumaki seals master might be able to modify this to a person and extend their life.

“Red-headed bastard geniuses,” Tensei breathes like a curse. Oh, genetics and a large chakra pool definitely played their part, but that can’t be all or else Chiyo-baasama wouldn’t look every bit her sixty-two years as a half-Uzumaki. Also, the last leader of Uzushiogakure until its destruction, Uzumaki Ashina, was also the name of apparently the same person who saw through the alliance with Konoha back during its founding. He used to assume from the history books that maybe the Uzumaki had a naming scheme like how the europeans would have the children named after the parent with a number tacked onto the end, but that's not the case, is it?

Closing his good eye, Tensei searches until he Sees an old white-haired man clasping hands with Hashirama for the alliance. Uzushiogakure was destroyed in the year fifty-seven, ramping up tensions between the great nations and triggering the beginning of the Third Great Shinobi War. And look, Uzumaki Mito wasn’t even white-haired in the flashback where a young Kushina met her, sometime before or at least around the year fifty-seven when other flashbacks showed her as a grown woman in Konoha’s early years. That means Uzumaki don’t go white until after their seventies at the very least. Uzumaki Ashina would have been around and possibly well over a hundred thirty years old when Uzushio fell. That’s—

Unnatural.

He was going to say amazing, actually, but holy shit. Every Uzumaki seals master would have been on the List if they were still alive, or if Tensei was born earlier. Along with Senju Tobirama as the inventor of the Edo-Tensei, too. Oh, skies. “I’m so glad they’re dead,” he mutters under his breath, and then abruptly backtracks. Isn’t Senju Tobirama in the Pure Lands? He double-checks with the Sight in his blind eye, and yep, that’s one of the requirements to be summoned by Edo-Tensei. Why wasn't he thrown back into the samsara cycle for his impudence, what gives?

The impression of various inconveniences and shinigami in this world slams into him with a snarl, and Tensei has to physically brace himself on the wall against the intensity. Ah, right. That. He’s gonna have to— oh, boy.

“Gotta love having low blood sugar,” he croaks in response to a palpable spike of alarm from his anbu escort a roof over. Or, you know, the air. He can’t usually pinpoint their exact positions, not yet, at least. Haha, now he’s going to have type one diabetes or something like that written on Konoha’s file for him. Three whoops for planting false information.

Chapter Text

70年, July

The Chūnin Exams begin three days after their arrival.

Act one: It goes exactly like Tensei remembers another Chunin Exam in the future will. It’s easy enough to set up a couple of his more polished bits of iron into a mirror system to study other people’s answers, and then send a scattering of his smallest filaments to his teammates in the shape of the answers across their laps.

Act two: The survival test is a joke. His team breezes through the Forest of Death with nothing worse than a bandaged cut from a tree branch for him and kikaichu bites on the others’ arms within the first day. They scour each other for a queen that an Aburame might be able to track while Tensei makes sure each of them gets a dose of the general antivenom. The various antidotes he carries in case they had to resort to foraging is never even touched, thanks to their clear time of eight hours. They open two Heaven and two Earth scrolls at the tower in the middle of the testing site and out pop two disgruntled-looking proctors. Cutting back on the competition and all that— shinobi have no need for sportsmanship.

Interlude: information gathering. That’s not how it’s presented, of course, but what else could a month-long recuperation period mean when their finals match-ups are displayed via only a picture? No name, no village affiliation, nothing but two faces under a bracket. Tensei sees his first opponent staring at him from his right, an older teen with spiky dark hair and a strip of a bandage running across the bridge of his nose. It's easy to place him, thanks to his emo-looking other half stepping out of formation to scold him for being impolite and staring. “Hagane Kotetsu, Kamikuzi Izumo,” he nods at each of them in turn, keeping the mirth from showing on his face when the two visibly pale. Tensei has to get his kicks where he can, because the next person he’s up against after Hagane-san and either of two Kiri-nin he doesn’t know for the second round? Pale skin and black hair tied back in a low ponytail, and black eyes with long lashes and small creases on the inner corners. Tensei stifles a groan.

The daimyo will be watching, a letter from his father reminds him, and Tensei spends the month dragging his teammates and other teams and their mentors into sparring with him while he handicaps himself with a pair of blinders. He knows what is expected of him.

Tensei treats Niyu and Kota to dinner at Ichiraku’s, something he’s been dying to try since forever. It’s not a premature celebration— they did well as a team; Tensei is just acknowledging that.

As for the ramen... well, he wouldn’t want to eat it every single day for the rest of his life, but it’s pretty good. Tensei coos at how cute Ayame is despite only being two years older than her, and tells her to dare to dream bigger when she says that she’s going to turn the six-seater counter into the most popular food stall in Konoha one day. Why not a proper restaurant with booths and actual employees?

“Don’t make fun of me,” Ayame frowns.

“I’m not,” Tensei reassures her. “You just need an enthusiastic customer base and an investor to back you.” And then he winks, because why not be obvious about it?

Teuchi laughs, and then quickly stops laughing when Tensei deposits enough money for about fifteen bowls of ramen and tells him that it’s for the blonde, blue-eyed little orphan boy with the whisker marks on his cheeks. He can’t do much more than that without being brought in for questioning, probably, but he holds a finger to his lips and Teuchi-san seems to understand.

<Caution advised mirror-wheel eyes clan new-development incoming,> comes a tap-code message against his right sandal.

Tensei doesn't look down, obviously, but there's nothing immediately visible in his periphery even when the message repeats itself. Sometimes, the anbu can be really impressive. <Acknowledged,> he taps back with his big toe. He has a pretty good idea of where in the timeline he’s in, considering how far out of the way he had to go to pass by the Uchiha Compound— thank the skies he prepared the materials back in Suna. Now, how to get them from point A to point B?

::::::

Sunagakure no Tensei, Itachi notes, is not exactly what he expected.

Or, as much as he could expect something when he didn't have that many experiences to base them on. Inuzuka Hana and Sarutobi Hideaki are the only two clan heirs that are old enough to have any proper interactions with, considering the rest are all Sasuke's age, but the Inuzuka clan has never been one to stand for formalities and Hideaki-dono is old enough to be getting married later this year. Although, Suna no Tensei isn't technically part of a clan. Suna, Iwa, and Kumo all have familial nepotistic-type successions to the Kage line, but most of the people in those lands lack surnames. It's a relief that most shinobi are accepting of being called by their hidden village followed by the proper suffix, only Itachi is at a loss on which one.

Suna no Tensei offers him a small smile while Itachi hesitates. "I can sense that you have a very polite nature, so let's speak as equals, Uchiha-kun. Call me by my name. Nothing ‘underneath the underneath’ to see."

He doubts that, but the invitation does set a line for him to work off of. "Then you can call me Itachi."

Itachi apologizes for the reflexive attack, and the other returns them with apologies of his own for mangling his shuriken and knowing better than to sneak up on people. It's obvious that he was being tested, but his father is going to be so disappointed in him if he offends a foreign dignitary. "Tensei-san," he says carefully after all the platitudes, "What business do you have with my parents?"

"Private business that I would rather not discuss in front of the roots of these trees." An idiom from Wind Country? Itachi doesn't recognize it. "Sorry for the short notice, but it's hard to ask for an audience subtly. I'm here off-record, so I understand if you feel the need to deny me, but the topic also holds some importance to your clan specifically."

That suggests a skill level capable of slipping away from Konoha's anbu that are supposed to be trailing every foreign nin. If Suna no Tensei isn't under supervision right now, then the responsible course of action would be to alert his father, right? "Follow me," he says, launching himself up onto a branch and wondering if someone from the desert can keep up through the trees.

It barely takes two seconds for Tensei to match his pace, but not in the conventional manner. Itachi makes a note that the iron renders the other shinobi flight capable. "I know we're probably going to be fighting each other in the finals, but I'd rather you take a peek at my hand than crack my head open trying to hop around like that," Tensei laughs.

Why it’s funny, Itachi can’t tell. The older boy reminds him a little of Shisui, actually. “That would be unfortunate,” he agrees. “Tou-san is at the Police Station right now, but I think that’s too public for you?” A nod. “Then, I hope you don’t mind waiting for him in the compound.” Sasuke is attending class in the Academy right now. His mother can handle the situation in the meantime, surely.

Only, his mother decides to approach the situation as a homemaker rather than as a jounin. That’s right— without any noticeable markers of her kunoichi status, it would be in their favor if Suna no Tensei were to underestimate her.

Itachi counts down the minutes it takes him to find Shisui, send him off to get Tou-san, and then rush back into his house. “Think we'll need to put a team on standby?” Shisui asks.

His instinct says no, his common sense says yes, and his training says it's not his call to make. Itachi shoves at his friend to get going. “Just hurry.”

Getting back, he’s greeted with the sight of a semi-formal tea ceremony at the chabudai. It’s… a little odd, but Itachi knows what his mother’s well-practiced ‘we have guests over’ smile looks like. “Why don’t you join us, Itachi-kun?” His mother says. “We were just talking about Sasuke. Did you know that Suna-san here has three younger siblings, himself?”

“Forever getting underfoot and barging unannounced into my room,” Suna no Tensei sighs, but there’s nothing angry about it. “Cherish your time with Sasuke-kun while he’s still smiley and cute, Uchiha-san. My imouto thinks it’s embarrassing to hug her big brother these days, and the other two are quick to follow suit.”

Ah. Itachi finds it hard to think about a grown-up Sasuke whose eyes don’t light up when greeting him, but it’s true that people can change.

They get through half the plate of rice crackers and into a discussion about the different cultural connotations of street performing in Fire Country and Wind Country before Tou-san arrives, still in uniform.

And that’s when the atmosphere changes.

“Sunagakure means no offense in my presence rather than Kazekage-sama’s,” Suna no Tensei says.

“The Uchiha Clan takes no offense, and means no offense in our reception of said representative,” his father replies.

Itachi sits as still as possible in proper seiza and watches carefully. His mother is going to take her time picking this interaction apart for him in their lessons, later.

“The lack of notice was incredibly rude of me, I realize, but I did want to give Uchiha-dono the option of keeping this meeting off-record,” Tensei says. “In fact, I’d be so bold as to claim that neither of our respective leaders know that we’re talking as of this moment. Uchiha-san gave me permission to employ a privacy seal against Hokage-sama’s scrying glass— I have sixty such tags on my person, one-time use, if you should choose to accept such a gift.” Here, the Suna-nin telegraphs his motions clearly, reaching into the sash around his waist before placing a sheaf of inked paper down onto the chabudai. “A personal gift, really.”

There’s a moment of silence while the adults study the offering. For the length of a night, be there or not the moon’s light, may nothing be known, Itachi reads the opening prose, followed by lines of characters that he doesn’t recognize. Each tag has a blue border of half-circles with the word ‘time’ written in every other one. It’s very pretty, but what do his parents have to hide?

In a slow movement, Itachi’s father picks them up. “What is the meaning of this?”

“Sunagakure no Sato is allied with Konohagakure no Sato, and thus was unable to provide any support to the Uchiha Clan directly after the attack of the Nine-Tailed Fox.” Tensei pauses, and Itachi compares the expression on his face with the one his mother adopts before saying something that the other person doesn’t want to hear. “The capital city of Roran lies abandoned after my father conquered it in the Third War,” Tensei says. “Apart from a single farming community a ways apart, it’s relatively isolated and left alone. I’m sure the Uchiha would find it a simple endeavor to reclaim it from a couple bandits and find another purpose for it, should the plans that you’re making fall through.”

“Itachi, if you’d leave us,” his mother says.

Itachi takes that as his cue to go find Shisui.

Chapter Text

70年, July

Genma doesn’t bother with the customary greeting ping. “Hey,” he says, dropping out of a shunshin directly into his target’s path. “Your father’s been looking for you.”

Suna no Tensei blinks. Either the kid has no startle response, or his poker face is just that good— or maybe Genma is biased, but that face paint pattern in unsettlingly familiar. A few shades darker to match violet eyes  rather than tattooed around golden ones, though, and the contrast between tan skin instead of porcelain white is helpful to focus on. Sage knows Genma still has nightmares about that man's lab, even four years after the raid. “Formal summons, or informal?” the kid asks.

Neither, technically. As if they’d tell the Kazekage that they’d lost his son. “Informal,” Genma picks.

“Wrong answer, Anbu-san.” A test, huh? The kid attempts to step around him, but Genma matches the movement. “You’re very visible right now, you know. Also, is that a tanuki on your mask?”

It takes him a second to place the reason for the genin's incredulous tone. That's right, Suna's tailed beast is a tanuki, isn't it? Oh, the irony. “You have a tendency to wander, Suna-san.” Raidou has been complaining about this kid’s habit of poking around all over— Genma wasn’t surprised when his friend barged into his apartment begging for a search-assist. Although he is curious as to how Raidou was shaken off when the library only has so many points of exit. “State your business here.”

The kid sticks a leg out. “I thought I’d take the opportunity to practice water-walking while I’m still in Konoha,” he says, showing off the waterlogged hems of his pants.

Not a bad idea, especially since Genma is pretty sure Raidou mentioned that the sole injury Suna no Tensei sustained throughout the Forest of Death was a laceration from tripping while tree-hopping. But then, shouldn't the kid be practicing that, instead? “There are plenty of ponds in Training Grounds Five through Eight,” he points out.

“Still water has a certain kind of surface tension, though. Easier to walk on. The river back there was,” the Kazekage's son cocks his head. “Well. Not fun, but I’m glad I tried it anyway. It’s called the Naka, right?”

Sage, what a character. “You’re lucky that the Uchiha didn’t catch you at it.” Considering their shrine is nearby, it’s a wonder that Raidou isn't picking the kid up from a jail cell guarded by an offended officer. “Please return to your rooms.”

Suna no Tensei offers him a smile, and Genma can’t decide if it’s sheepish or amused. “Would Anbu-san mind if I had lunch, first? I’ve been meaning to try Yakiniku Q for a while.”

Another tally in the ‘yes’ column for the theory that all teenage boys think with their stomachs. Genma stifles a laugh. “Try the salted beef tongue with onions, kid.” He seems the type to like that sort of thing.

::::::

70年, August

Act three: the tournament.

Tensei tries his best; puts on a good showing for their and the other hidden villages' daimyo. Hagane Kotetsu will make a terrifying pair with Kamizuki Izumo someday, but alone and armed with only his mace and a handful of techniques? Tensei draws the match out, lets the other teen get his moment in, and then doesn’t even break a sweat when he puts his opponent down for the count. It looks more dramatic than it is, really, there’s no reason for Kamizuki to be glaring from the stands as hard as he is when the teen had the good sense to withdraw ten seconds in from fighting his own opponent. Head wounds just bleed a lot.

It would be more impressive if Itachi were not two years younger and also in the last stage of the exam. Without Kamizuki, Tensei watches him essentially skip the first round and go into his second with a genjutsu specialist from Kumo.

Skies, but the results are so much more brutal than Tensei’s own. For one, the Kumo teen’s jutsu is just plain weird— sleep-fighting? What the hell? The slow build up is no doubt less than exciting for their civilian audience, what with Itachi being unable to land any physical attacks, but whatever Itachi shows the other genin every time he leaves himself open for a genjutsu produces a mess of a scene the likes of which Tensei has only seen once before— There’s the same haunted look, the wild panic, eyes darting around with a desperate kind of feeling, even if the person in his memories wasn’t practically frothing at the mouth like the Kumo genin is.

…Or maybe Tensei is looking too far into it. Rapid eye movement is pretty common during seizures.

Tensei’s next opponent is a scrappy combat medic from Kiri who can’t be more than fourteen. Like the Land of Fire, those from the Land of Water carry family names, the only two great nations to have the tradition. Yamada Enmei is one that he’ll try to remember, because the boy holds his own while Tensei toys with him with White Bear for a good three minutes against poison-tipped senbon before ultimately collapsing. Tensei makes sure to administer the antidote himself when the other boy’s hands lose their green glow and fall limp, eyeing the Konoha medics with caution. Tsunade’s not around anymore to pull miracle counters to Chiyo-baasama’s concoctions out of her ass, and Tensei isn't about to just hand over a sample of an antidote that they may or may not have access to.

Tensei is aware that he’s going into his third and final round at a disadvantage. He’s fresh off of a battle and fought twice today, whereas Itachi only fought once and had a recuperation period on top of that. Of course, he has more cards than just magnet release and puppetry in hand, but those were his main plays. He doesn’t regret sacrificing the secret of their extent, iron to the Uchiha and White Bear in order to impress the audience, but Tensei hopes it was worth it because Itachi has surely been watching with those sharingan of his.

The wide-eyed boy in front of him raises two fingers in the seal of confrontation. His own follows, a little apprehensively.

Itachi’s fluid blur of movement flitting around the arena compliments Tensei's efficient ones from a stationary stance, pitting shurikenjutsu against his puppetry before trading wires and projectiles for fireballs instead. His iron doesn't quite melt against the fire release, but it does take on a menacing glow as he sends red-hot senbon to chase the younger boy. Itachi attempts to close in for taijutsu, so Tensei throws a technique from Yashamaru-oji to dance defensively in a field around him. Lightning Release: Crackling Circuit does its job.

It doesn’t help him avoid the genjutsu. Tensei knows not to look into activated sharingan, but their fancy eyeballs aren’t the only hallucinogens the Uchiha have to rely on. He Sees—

A half-remembered face, handfuls of dark hair clutched tightly in white-knuckled fists. Oh, you poor thing, the mouth sneers, once so familiar in the mirror. What is this all even for, huh? A bunch of wasted effort to play house with people who aren't even real.

That's not true. They're real to him. Real enough to matter.

Only because you're insane. Do you really think you can change anything? One little boy who read too much manga in another life against a world full of killers?

Fuck off, he's trying his best. Besides, he's just as much of a match for more than half the people in this world already.

Yes, honey, you sure are.

He furrows his brow, not liking the taunting lilt to the voice that used to be his, in another life. The other's face starts to melt in the middle of a laugh, splitting the mouth open too wide, and he puts his hands up defensively only to blink at the sheer amount of blood dripping from them—

Breathe.

Tensei snaps out of it in time to block a kick, too low and too high all at once. It sends him stumbling out of his Dune stance even as he redirects a series of paw-like blows from curled half-fists. He coats his forearms and knuckles with jagged iron before bare hands switch to kunai and regains enough of a foothold to counter with an illusion of his own that shifts the world on its axis. It works just long enough that Tensei can leap back and get some breathing room, sending his iron forward in hot pursuit.

Itachi escapes to the nearby treetops with a kawarimi, and then they're back at playing tug-of-war with kunai. Tensei is careful to redirect them straight back when he catches the glint of razor-thin wires tied to their pommels, and in response, another fireball comes flying at him. White Bear flings itself in front of Tensei in a swift movement that simultaneously brings shaking hands in close to cut himself free before red-red-red eyes are on him. It’s instinct that has him lashing out blindly—

His next inhale sees a kunai at his throat.

One thing that Tensei has learned, after working on White Bear’s internal wiring rather extensively, is that copper and blood smell different. Not entirely, but just enough that practice has brought him to the point of being able to tell them apart. And even if he couldn't feel the drip-drip falling hot onto his face, a steady rhythm coming from what must be rivulets above him, Tensei has eyes. If he moves even an inch, he’ll slit his own throat open. If he waits for Itachi to keel over from Tensei’s iron-coated claw of a hand buried into the younger’s left shoulder… well. Would it really be so bad, a thought whispers, to have an enemy disabled preemptively?

But the kunai against his throat carries a tremor, and the shaky breaths coming from above sound barely a hair away from a sob. The drip-drip onto his face is blood, his nose tells him, but Tensei can’t help but be reminded of another little kid trying to hide her tears in the collar of his shirt.

…Damn it.

“Hey,” Tensei whispers, trying not to deepen the cut on his throat. The iron crawls back down his arm, away from the bloody mess of a shoulder. Underneath, a glowing green hand is revealed, tan skin over pale ivory with red staining both. His fingers shift against something hard, and oh skies that's bone. Those are shards of a splintered collarbone, holy shit. “I forfeit. Ease up, yeah?”

No response. Tensei knows what the ping-back will be even before the diagnostic jutsu finishes running. A wound like this would likely send an adult into shock, nevermind a ten year-old kid. Ten. And Tensei is twelve.

Skies, what the fuck are they doing?

“I forfeit!” he calls out, loud enough to be heard— loud enough to feel the kunai slice through skin and scrape against something hard in his neck. Fuck. “Medic!!”

Adults dressed in off-white uniforms flood the area, and proctor gently grasps Itachi’s wrist and says, “It’s over, Uchiha-kun.” Then, and only then, does the kid pitch forward like a marionette with cut strings.

One hand is bloody enough to risk cross-contamination. The other is smeared with dirt. Tensei hauls himself upright into a sitting position and lets the Konoha medics prod at his neck.

He looks up. Rasa is a splotch of blue and white in the VIP podium, too far away for Tensei to make out any expressions. Great.

Gaara is stringing words together into full sentences, now. Kankuro has taken to speaking in Wind's local accent more often than not, and Temari is starting to whine about being too old for her snot-nosed little brothers. All this and more are thrown at him in worried, excited, accusing kid-babble upon his return to Suna. Tensei is so grateful that they’re still using words at all, because his father isn’t. Rasa doesn't say anything at all on their journey back to Suna, but Tensei can guess that he’s not happy.

The Council whispers, our prodigy isn't as good as Konoha's.

Rasa calls him to his office, alongside Niyu and Kota. Tensei’s the last to arrive, and suddenly he can’t tell if his teammates didn’t wait for him to try on their new-looking chunin flak vests, or if maybe they’ve had them since the local exams in January.

They didn’t win their matches, either. He offers his congratulations anyway.

Tensei doesn't need to be as good as Konoha's, he tells himself as he trudges out of the Kazekage’s office without a vest. Which is fine. The pauldrons would look stupid on his prepubescent shoulders anyways. He accomplished the main goal that he set out for in Konoha, which will hopefully bear some Uchiha-shaped fruit in the future— Tensei just needs to be enough to do what needs to be done.

Chapter Text

70年, September

“I wanna paint my face, too,” Kankuro says, right after the Playhouse’s roaming performance closes for the Sunartistry Festival. “Can I borrow your paint when we get home?”

There’s nothing in particular that sets this year’s celebration apart from any other, but Tensei finds the atmosphere different anyways.

“Anigo?”

“Sure,” Tensei agrees on auto-pilot.

Home. Wipe sandals down on the welcome mat before toeing them off, shake out clothes for sand and dust, remove jewelry—

A half-remembered face, handfuls of dark hair clutched tightly in white-knuckled fists. “Where’s the time gone,” comes a sing-song tone from its mouth, once so familiar in the mirror. And then it starts to ri-i-ip—

“Tensei?”

Tensei blinks, and the dining table comes into focus. “Sorry,” he offers, employing the gentle smile that he originally copied off of the very man in front of him. A gentle smile for a nice happy family, for the sunlight filtering through half-drawn blinds, for the ambiance of a still-cool dawn. Get with the aesthetic, Tensei. “Got lost in my head. What did you say?”

In contrast, Yashamaru-oji frowns. “Did you go to bed late again last night?”

No. “Yep,” Tensei says, going back to his miso and chicken strips. Maybe he’ll try to recreate dino nuggets. When he has the time. And energy. “I shouldn't, I know. Any plans for today?”

“My paint,” Kankuro says, hands tapping away at the table. His little brother’s bowl is more or less empty already— did he just inhale his breakfast or what? “Hurry up, Anigo.”

Yashamaru places a hand on his shoulder, and Tensei has to tilt his head up and onto the back of the chair to meet worried, violet eyes peering down at him. His uncle's eyes. His mother's eyes. Both of his, once, now only one. "Want help with the dishes?" he offers quietly.

"Anigo!"

Yashamaru-oji huffs. "Another time, when your little brother isn't intent on yelling the house down." He ruffles Tensei's hair, and then Kankuro is dragging him down the hall and toward their dressing room before releasing his hand to vault onto the vanity’s bench.

“Everyone else is doing red,” he whines when Tensei reaches for the crimson paint that he started out with. “You have purple."

He does. Rasa is aware enough of the culture surrounding face paint in Suna that not only does Tensei has five shades to choose from, but matching oil sticks as well. All different shades, from lavender to mauve to magenta to violet to indigo. Tensei hasn’t touched the last one, yet, the color just a hair too close to blue.

Red for the hero. Purple for nobility. Blue for the villain. If it wouldn’t draw so many questions, Tensei thinks he might have chosen green or brown, for the supernatural, even if no one but him could appreciate the irony.

Tensei rattles all the basics off as he hands Kankuro one of his wider, firmer brushes. Not the biggest one that usually sits in a drawer, unused unless a rare occasion calls for the oshiroi base, or even the second biggest that he uses for the setting powder. Just a brush slightly bigger than his usual, better suited for bigger, bolder strokes— or a beginner’s hand. “We'll go through the Playbook for your own design later, but let’s start with a stripe across the nose,” he suggests, setting the magenta jar onto the vanity table between them. A single line for ‘new beginnings’, flowing over the bridge of the nose, and then split ends to represent a wealth of paths to walk. Kankuro’s is lower and wider than Tensei’s, their eyes are different colours, and there’s nothing similar about their hair, but they’re brothers all the same. Kankuro looks a lot like their father, Tensei notes absently. Or, more accurately, their grandfather. Natsu-ojiisan's portrait is still fresh in his memory, after Memorial Day.

He sets the mauve jar down, next, but only for Kankuro. “Blend it out.” Tensei takes his usual lavender himself for higher contrast to better demonstrate. “Only suckers don’t blend, and then they look stupid while thinking they’re making some big kind of statement. They’re not.” It’s a mistake that he fell for once and never again, after Dragon took him aside and helpfully pointed it out.

Kankuro frowns. “How do you do it without messing up the edges?”

Tensei hands him a tightly rolled-up paper stick, with a dull tip on one end and a round half-sphere on the other. Its layers are wrapped tightly around each other in a way that can be peeled off to reveal a new surface. He does just that, then swipes it with a steady movement using his shoulder as the point of rotation and not his wrist. It erases the spillover blending into a clean edge. He turns it, then does the same for the other edge, before handing the still half-clean blending stump to his little brother. “You try.”

The resulting line tapers unevenly on one side, but overall, it’s not half-bad. He follows Kankuro into the living room, proudly showing off his first Face to Yashamaru-oji and Gaara.

Yashamaru tells him he looks dashing. Gaara looks between his two brothers with a confused look at their same-but-not-same paint. Temari enters through the door, visibly sweaty from early-morning training with her friends, and promptly bursts out laughing.

“It takes some practice,” Tensei pats his little brother’s shoulder. Kankuro scowls and turns around to re-do it.

::::::

70年, October

As if to add insult to injury, his father takes on another student.

Hoki Shigezane is a little gremlin from hell, sent to test Tensei’s patience. On an intellectual level, he gets why the kid is here. Rasa is one of the rare few who has a water nature in Wind Country, and Shigezane has unheard of talent in shape manipulation on top of his inclination towards water release. He hasn’t graduated from the Academy, yet, but already there are plans to put the cutting power behind his geysers to work in the mines.

“Your iron smells,” Shigezane tells him the first time they meet. “Not— uh. Just, it has a smell.”

“That would be the copious amounts of poison on it,” Tensei deadpans. Which is entirely false if they're talking about his main supply, metal does actually ‘just have a smell’, but it’s funny to see the way the other’s face drains of color.

More and more of his afternoons are spent in the workshops of the Playhouse instead of sleeping. He knows what that genjutsu is called now, after several weeks of being haunted by the illusion: the Hell-Viewing technique. Something triggers the victim’s own mind to turn against itself with intrusive thoughts and whatever fear is at the forefront of the mind at the moment of being caught, but how it works exactly is still a mystery to Suna. The only reason Haru-sensei knows about it is because the technique was heavily utilized by Konoha's Yuuhi clan against their forces back during the Second War.

Haru-sensei tells him that she’ll ask around when she has the time, some friend of a friend of a co-worker specializes in genjutsu and might know something. Sadako-san in turn points him in the direction of several theory scrolls and post-war recovery accounts in the archives, and a couple intermediate illusions to try. His chakra ratio is already skewed heavily towards the yin side; might as well take advantage of it.

A half-remembered face, handfuls of dark hair clutched tightly in white-knuckled fists. “To do or not to do,” its mouth laughs, once so familiar in the mirror. And then it starts to melt—

At this point, Tensei doesn’t care that the flare of his chakra spooks any shinobi that might be nearby. Either he dispells it or he lets it drive him insane like it’s been trying to do for almost two months now, and Tensei knows which he’d prefer over the other. Stupid recurring hallucination.

He doesn’t need any combat puppet other than White Bear, but now that he’s getting assigned Mat duty a lot more often, it would be nice to not have to borrow all his sets from their library of miniature puppets. Including The Fox and the Hunting Hound, because he made those years ago and absolutely had no idea what he was doing until about half-way through the process.

People keep showing up before his time slot is over. The minutes he wastes trying to defend his right to the public workspace adds up. ‘Trying’, because there's some close shaves with a couple apprentices before he gets frustrated and reaches for his iron, and in the Playhouse? That's what spells his doom. That's Tensei basically saying to come at him not as apprentice puppeteer Bear, but as Tensei-dono, the Kazekage's eldest son.

So the masters start showing up.

Someone figures out that his iron can't seep into joints and send puppets grinding to a halt if the seams are finer than his needle-like filaments, and that he can't disable them if there are more segments to move than he can feasibly override.

A stupid paralytic that he hasn’t built an immunity to is what puts him down, in the end. He’s not entirely sure how long he spends curled up on the floor, the hand less affected by involuntary spasms glowing green and pressed to the point of entry. Not that long, probably, but by the time he gets enough of it out of his system to make his way to the labs, testing for what it is will be pointless, anyways.

Something, something, poetic irony about his apprentice hood he only ever wears in the Playhouse getting knocked off of his head. The metal plate of the hitai-ate with Sunagakure's symbol looks dull on the sawdust-covered floors, just out of reach.

You know what? Dismissing his anbu guards might have been a mistake, because Tensei spends however long it is on the floor a little paranoid about how easy it would be to— well. The Playhouse doesn't actually want him dead, he hopes.

"Take a couple weeks off," Dragon suggests after Rooster helps him up from the floor.

"Is it because I lost, or is it because I lost to an Uchiha," Tensei grits out.

Dragon says nothing, which is an answer unto itself.

Tensei thins his lips, dusts off his apprentice hood, and shows up the next day anyways. Section nineteen is his, dammit.

Back in the Academy's extracurricular puppetry class, several assigned plays that they had to recite featured red or white-eyed demons painted in green and blue, and it doesn't take a genius to figure out why. The Uchiha Clan had been absolute menaces to fight during the Second War; puppeteers must have had a hell of a time against dojutsu users who could see their chakra strings, and The Playhouse suffered heavy losses against the Uchiha and the Hyuga. That Tensei would wear his puppeteer blacks and paint The Hawk on his face and then be defeated by one?

On top of that, Tensei lost in front of the daimyo. Not just Wind's daimyo— the daimyo, plural. Eight of them. There are less mission requests coming in lately and a lot of people are pissed.

It only means he has to be more stern about standing his ground, right? But he doesn't blame the Playhouse for taking it out on him, even if it is inconvenient as all hell. Just— he hopes his choice will be worth it, in the future.

Because to be completely honest, Tensei kind of blames himself, too.

Chapter Text

70年, September

While working through a myriad of theory scrolls recommended by Haru-sensei’s genjutsu-specialist friend hadn’t done much for a permanent dispelling of the Hell-viewing technique, a face-to-face meeting gave him a step to jump on. Said technique wasn’t an uncommon affliction on veterans who fought against Konoha shinobi in the Second War, and a distinct pattern emerged among records of the affected.

“The problem with genjutsu-types like you and I,” Sadako gestures between the two of them, “is that not only are we naturally inclined to find casting genjutsu easy, but we’re also more susceptible to the mental type. Area-of-effect genjutsu is its own topic, but in essence, more yin-chakra to mold means more yin-chakra to be turned against us if it gets through our guard.”

Which is the whole point behind psychologically targeted techniques. It’s a common misconception that genjutsu-types are also naturally resilient against genjutsu, when in fact, most of them are simply specialists in the field with the training to better detect, deflect, or break any illusions they come into contact with than non-specialists. It’s when they don’t have that training that antagonistic techniques become a major problem, id est, Tensei’s exact scenario. “And the two conclusions mentioned in your recommended reading?”

Sadako sighs. “You’ve been working on your yang half?”

“Taijutsu and iryo-ninjutsu,” Tensei nods. According to several different sources, the effects of long-term genjutsu can be countered through a sudden unbalancing of one’s usual yin-yang ratio in the latter’s favour. He has to admit that literally any of the three Suna-standard katas provide a more intensive workout than his preferred Dune stances— the Sandstorm series in particular leaves him covered in sweat by the end of two or three chains. As for iryo-ninjutsu, most medical techniques are yang-based, which is why he had so much trouble getting the Mystic Palm to work.

It's kinda stupid, actually. Women are usually born with yin-leaning ratios and better chakra control, and men are born yang-leaning with larger reserves, but it's not a hard rule and Tensei's situation is an exception besides because yin-energy is also an embodiment of a person's mental energy. Now that he’s a little older than when he first tried, though, he’s managed to get his success rate of baby lizard revivals to about fifty-fifty. Which is enough to heal the most superficial of wounds, but nothing that really goes down into the muscle or bones. Yet.

Sadako shuffles over to grab something in her bag, and Tensei wrestles down the urge to ‘strike first, ask questions later’. The Playhouse has really been testing his conviction to not do that, lately.

She pulls out a cylindrical block, with a wooden spiral carved onto one face. Jutsu-shiki line the glass tubing running through the spiral’s path, and an unactivated preservation seal lies on the curved top. “The control test?” he asks. “I already know mine.” He’s at the eighty-seventh percentile, last he checked.

Looks like he spoke too soon, though, because Sadoko-san turns the spiral face-down such that the curved side without the seal faces him. “It’s a two-in-one. See the slits?” She points them out. “Go ahead and feed, say, enough chakra for a henge into there. Slowly.”

Terrible point of reference, considering Tensei’s never pulled off a successful henge before, but he can just about guesstimate. After a couple seconds, Sadoko-san flips it over again so that the spiral is face-up. “Huh.” Tensei blinks at the appearance of the black and white filters, each laid over a semi-circle of the entire spiral. While the black half is filled all the way, the same can’t be said for the other. “Meaning no offense, Tensei-dono, but a three to one ratio is quite… drastic.”

Yeah, he kinda figured. “It’s a work in progress,” he sighs. “What about the mental block?”

She shakes her head. “A temporary measure. Again, I highly advise against it, Tensei-dono.”

Which the scrolls did, too, he knows. Only it’s a little hard to see the red flags when this stupid hallucination tints everything red. Metaphorically. His actual colour vision is fine. He thinks. “I’d like to try it anyways, Sadako-san.”

She deactivates the preservation seal, resetting the device back to its original, empty state. “And you’re sure Yondaime-sama understands the ramifications of this?” she demands.

“Why else would the hospital set aside a private room?” he says lightly. Which, mind you, is not a yes. His father knows nothing about this. Tensei just came in through an open window from the staff’s break room to avoid the reception desk, found a less-grumpy, civilian-looking intern or nurse or whatever, and asked if they could set aside VIP room twelve on the third floor for a couple hours so that he could take his afternoon sleep-cycle without being hounded by his siblings. And what do you know, the sympathy card does wonders. Thank the skies his anbu guard rotation was mostly called off after he came back from Konoha, or else someone might come in at the wrong time to the entirely wrong conclusion. “Feel free to not watch over me for the aftermath, though. I’ll come find you tomorrow morning for a check-in?”

“If you’re sure,” Sadoko murmurs. “Lie down. First bit’s going to be rough, alright?”

Rougher than having to watch the skin and muscle slough off of the original version of himself from another world, while said version tries to tear their hair or eyes out? Yeah, hopefully not.

::::::

70年, October

A few days into their acquaintance, Shigezane warps the cloth of Temari’s new tessen when the two try to compare their respective ninjutsu prowess in the courtyard. At least, that’s Temari’s excuse when Tensei is sent by his uncle to investigate the commotion outside and finds her whacking him with the butt of her weapon. There are puddles all around, and various bloody cuts litter his little sister’s skin and clothes.

“It’s just a fan,” Shigezane whines. “Why aren’t my water shuriken cutting through it?”

The House of Orange Winds is known for their sturdy handiwork, in comparison to the House of High Currents’ elaborate pieces. A spot of water shouldn’t be enough to warp the cloth, nevermind damage the stainless steel spokes. Tensei raises his eyebrows at his little sister.

Temari raises hers back.

Tensei ruffles her hair with a laugh, heals her cuts using the Mystic Palm jutsu that he finally got around to figuring out, and tells Yashamaru-oji that the two are just playing ninja like all the kids at that age do.

Rasa has them spar all of one time. Tensei tries not to take too much relish in beating someone four years his junior into the ground, and from then on, Shigezane avoids him as best as he can manage.

Good. Tensei doesn't need more shit to deal with.

Yukimura of the Ten Faces is his current project, and Tensei finds that he enjoys reciting it to himself while anchoring joints and sewing outfits and painting backgrounds. The story is supposedly grounded in historical basis, as many plays are, featuring a man named Yukimura and his nine disciples. Except each disciple is actually a ‘life’ of Yukimura’s, who is reborn nine times to serve as a leader in various capacities every time. It’s told starting from the man himself, then the Ninth Disciple, working backwards to the First where he finds peace in the desert sands and is finally allowed to rest.

Tensei has heard other apprentices teasing the older puppeteers in the troupe with the prospect of wearing Yukimura’s Face, citing how their long-lived tendencies should be reflected in their paint. Tensei used to laugh along with them, but not entirely for the same reasons. No one else has the same dots to connect that he does to conclude that Yukimura of the Ten Faces is, in fact, a botched retelling of the Sage of Six Paths and how he scattered the tailed beasts. Yukimura wandering the world is the Sage, the Ninth born in the forests is the Nine-Tails, and so on, all the way down to the First as the One-Tail and ending in the desert. He wouldn't exactly call Shukaku's current situation as peaceful, but it's a nice story, all the same.

Tensei keeps the same humanoid base and makes ten different heads and ten different sets of clothes instead, painting slanted eyes and whiskers on one, giving another pupiless white eyes and washed-out horns, another pleated and shimmering orange skirts, another a glaze finish, another strong golden brows over a red fur haori, and yet another licks of black flames climbing up the sides of a blue yukata.

He doesn’t make the One-Tail’s customizations as obvious, settling for beige robes and dark rings around its eyes. Anyone else might acredit those to the tell-tale marks he and his father share when they use magnet release, or the dark pigmented skin settled permanently onto Gaara’s lids. No one comments anything strange about his first set when he performs Yukimura with them on Mat duty. Why would they? The last person to have seen every tailed beast was probably Senju Hashirama, and he’s certainly not going to be watching Tensei perform ningyo-joruri anytime soon.

There’s a couple afternoons, though, that he spends with Gaara instead. His baby brother doesn’t sleep in the afternoon like most people do, like Yashamaru-oji needs to every other day in order to keep up with Gaara. Tensei doesn’t have to wonder what he does with the extra hours in his day, because at least once a week sees Gaara getting Tensei to carry him up onto the rooftop while their uncle conks out in the living room below.

It's not that Gaara can't wall-climb the trip himself— his baby brother is scarily efficient at a lot of things he was never taught— and it's not laziness, either. He's not sure when it happened, but Tensei carrying Gaara around just became a thing.

Tensei hesitates to call their time on the rooftop cloud-watching, though, because Suna usually doesn’t have much in the way of clouds other than a few white wisps. Bird-watching, maybe, for their thriving falconry industry? So he opens his mouth to ask one day, and Gaara tells him he just likes looking at the sky.

“The blue makes it not hurt so much, in here,” his baby brother says, clutching at his heart beneath the shawl. 

Except the Japanese word for blue and the word for some shades of green are one and the same, including the seafoam color of Gaara’s eyes that Tensei suddenly finds hard to meet. “Does anything else help?” he asks softly.

“Yashamaru. And you, and Temari, and Kankuro. But not, not when he paints his face weird.”

That's… sweet. "Kankuro's still experimenting to see which one fits right," Tensei shrugs. His strange baby brother is still so little. “Has Yashamaru-oji told you about the Ash Princess and the Scorpion yet?” he asks.

Gaara perks up. “Storytime.”

“Use your words, Gaara. Yes or no?”

“Maybe? Yashamaru has a lot of stories. Tell me?”

Better, but skies, their uncle must be spoiling him. Tensei spins a world out of their mother’s echoes for his baby brother anyways.

::::::

71年, January

Gaara's seal loosens again for a fourth time, and you know what they say about the number four.

If you don't, that's okay. Tensei had to outright ask why there were no rooms marked four, forty, or forty-four in the hospital to make the connection. People in this world are a superstitious lot and don't like a number that can be pronounced the same way as the word, ‘death’.

There's no objections this time when Tensei steps up to work his iron needles alongside the Kazekage's gold dust. He nods at little Hoki Shigezane, who is only eight and yet allowed to help due to his affinity for water release, weighing the Shukaku’s sand down. At least the kid knows how to be serious when the gravity of the situation calls for it— even if he was pulling on Temari's literal pigtails the other day until she made him eat dirt.

Anyways. There's nothing wrong with the number four, he's sure. Tensei's just due the poor luck in general to be knocked off of his platform by the Shukaku's sand from his blind side.

The combined hurt of a sudden wrenching in his gut and the sand skinning the left side of his body pulls a scream out of him like no sound he's ever made before. It's just— pain.

And then everything

                                fades

                                          to

                                                black.

Chapter Text

X.

It hurts.

There’s wet on his face, but it’s not tears. He knows it’s not tears, because there’s the same wet running down his arm, down his leg, stuck to his side.

There’s wet beneath him, too, but a different kind. Cold. It’s seeping into his pants and mixing with the hot dripping down his hand.

There is orange beside him, white above him, and black all around. The King of the Dead has two people in One’s mouth, and there is no chakra signature coming from one of them.

And the mouth opens.

He thinks of a life in the past, with long tables and bunsen burners and goggles. With classmates and clipboards and pencils scratching away. The young man locks eyes with him, an expression of surprise, and his hand notes something down without even needing to look at the paper. ‘

"Names."

He immediately doubles over in a cough. Who— the word was ripped from his throat. What is this? Where is he?

"The one who calls you is named Pain—"

"No." He can feel his chest vibrating with the bass of it, and oh, he recognizes that voice. His throat is not built for Enma-Dai'O's rumbling tones— it makes sense, though, since the mouth that these words belong to is currently occupied. "Is your daughter born yet?" He is prodded to ask of the man with the clipboard, platinum blonde hair barely a few shades away from white despite how young he looks.

"My what?" the assistant blinks. It is not the answer that This One is looking for. The Great One understands, anyways.

Still, none of them offer their names. This One will have to do it for them. "Sanzo Amado," This One calls out. "Uzumaki Nagato. Konan. Danno." This One turns to each one as they are listed, in order of youngest to oldest ages that one didn't know one knew until that moment. It's just a formality, of course, because Enma-Dai'O knows all. Three of those names appear on the List, although two have lives yet to bring into the world, and only one will be executed today. What a pity that another isn't here to even those numbers out— four, two, and two are much more auspicious. "State your purpose in truth or begone."

Konan inclines her head. "The legends say that the dead can be brought back to life. We would have you do so for our friend Yahiko, kami-sama."

Even if he died at the very end of the Third War, Yahiko would have been gone for six years and counting. His soul has already been reincarnated into the cycle of samsara, a chance to try again after he turned on his own truth. To claim the world unfair and then kill himself by his friend's hand without allowing for another choice, Enma-Dai'O would not have sent his soul to the Pure Lands.

Still. This One cradles the stiff, emancipated face with the only hand that’s responding at the moment, ever so gently. One thing that most of a world lost to This One does not know: the eyes are windows and doors alike to the soul, but when there is no one left inside, they remain forever open. To pass a hand over the lids and see them stay shut is a lie, is a lie, is a lie.

This one lays the hand unbloodied over unseeing eyes, anyways. It is such a young face.

“He was seventeen when he died,” Nagato says.

Ah, had This One been speaking out loud? "He has been lost for too long," This One tells them.

“Please.” A breath. “I would have called for you ten years ago if I’d known how.”

This One glares at the pair in lab coats, surely the ones responsible for making it known instead of leaving the knowledge forever lost. They, at least, have the sensibility to take a step back. "Repairing the vessel is all that can be done."

"Do it."

"He will be empty," This One cautions.

"Do it," Nagato repeats himself.

This One feels a twitch through Enma-Dai'O's tongue. It’s an odd feeling, for one’s lord to be made to submit. This One finds it leaves a bad taste in the mouth. Fine, then. "A life for a life."

This One reaches into a pouch of poisoned iron sand and drives a stake through the heart of the scientist named Danno before anyone can blink.

There is some amount of satisfaction from The Judge before black envelopes the world once more.

Chapter Text

71年, January

Tensei  wakes up gasping underneath a pile of rubble.

Skies, everything hurts. Like chakra exhaustion but worse, like raw flames pouring out of every single pore in his body. His limbs still work, though, and so Tensei pulls out his bit of iron sand and heaves at whatever is crushing him until he's free again.

The pain gets worse. Tensei drops the iron with a spasm, and can't find it in himself to pick it back up. He takes a deep breath, instead, and runs a diagnostic jutsu.

It tells him that several of his major tenketsu points are hemorrhaging chakra.

Well, fuck him, he guesses. Judging by the position of the moon in the sky, it must be around three in the morning. Another couple of hours until people are awake enough to be out and about, then. Great! Tensei will just. Drag himself to the hospital. Because Chiyo-baasama never taught him anything about treating hemorrhaging chakra.

“Hello?” he tries to yell, but it comes out as a half-wheeze, half-whisper. Figures his voice would be utterly shot.

Up. Up and at ‘em, come on. If you can’t run, walk. If you can’t walk, crawl. No one is around to hear the sob that escapes his lips, a quiet thing that he half-bites back to preserve the sanctity of the quiet. It’s a good sign that he can’t hear Shukaku screaming, right?

It takes both forever and no time at all to be spotted by a patrolling anbu, and Tensei is only a little disgruntled about the yucca flower on the mask.

The hospital staff is very professional about their panic as they slap seals over his tenketsu before holding him down to clean the sand out of flayed skin. Much more professional than he is, anyways, passing out screaming and waking up still screaming until someone with the expertise arrives to knock him out properly with a glowing green hand to his temple.

If he had the breath, Tensei's not sure if he would have said finally  or thank you.

::::::

He wakes to his father at his bedside. Tensei hopes someone had thought to wipe his face so he looks less like he'd been a sobbing mess. Or maybe Rasa had been there for all of that, too. Tensei wouldn't know.

"You're alive," his father whispers. "Blessed skies, you're alive."

"Road'f life. Got l'st," Tensei mumbles. He's on the good stuff, he can tell, because apart from being floaty he can't feel much of anything.

Also, because there’s no way his father just laughed. Not happy-haha, more like oh-my-god-haha, except there’s only one god that matters and he’s not really the funny type. Tensei hasn’t heard his father laugh in the happy-haha way since Sandaime-sama, he thinks. “I thought— no one could find you for days.”

Right, right, that can happen if you get lost. Also, wait. "Days?"

"Seventy-three hours," his father elaborates. Tensei's brain sluggishly does the math to tell him that he must have gone down three nights ago at… two in the morning. He's very grateful that Enma-Dai'O brought him back at all, nevermind in the same week. Time must be very difficult for the long-existing to measure. "I thought he killed you," his father breathes like a prayer.

…Like a prayer?

There's something about the Look in his eyes that Tensei doesn't like.

"Where," Tensei says, making an effort not to slur his words, "is Gaara."

::::::

Gaara is… fine.

Physically. Supposedly.

In every other way, Gaara is absolutely not fine, because their father took advantage of the fact that people were already evacuated and the Shukaku was back inside Gaara to send their uncle to kill him.

An S-rank mission for The Glass Hawk of Suna, top anbu agent of the Sand, formally speaking. But Tensei doesn't care for fancy titles and epithets when Yashamaru-oji is dead.

He doesn’t know when he’d gotten his hopes up that playing at a happy family would change things this time, but the sting in his eyes feels like betrayal regardless.

He signs his own discharge papers because he is not spending another hour in the hospital when his baby brother is at home alone, and drags his IV stand with him by hand because Rasa won't let him take the drip out and he's not allowed to use his iron or anything else that needs chakra for the next few days. It's just as well, because that means he can threaten to shunshin all the way home when his father attempts to forbid him from seeing Gaara.

He gets past the closer doors of the old servants' entrance in the west wing and makes it halfway through the house before his knees buckle. Tensei doesn't hit the ground, though— he looks beneath him and sees gold.

Tensei blinks as the gold twines around him to pull out a chair from their dining table, and then gently deposits him onto that instead.

Oh. It's been…

There's an hourglass and a line above it engraved into the metal plate in his father's belt, not a stylized leaf, and Tensei doesn't know if he should be grateful or frustrated. “This is not for playing,” his father tells Tensei, removing exploring hands. Gold dust shifts with the movement, as natural as breathing. It picks Tensei up, holding him level with his father’s narrow eyes. “Everything we have in the desert must be taken from its sands. You will earn your own, as a shinobi.”

“I have to?”

His father snorts. “I’m not giving mine away,” he says.

…a while.

"Thank you," he mumbles. Would've been embarrassing if he concussed himself on the table. Skies, but Tensei feels like an invalid. He is an invalid. "Can you— five scoops of rice an' water up to th'middle line. For porridge." Because they apparently have three days of unused water rations and he wants porridge, dammit, with eggs and soy sauce stirred in. His father can manage making some tamagokake-gohan without him, even if they're technically not supposed to do any cooking for three days after...

For three days. The mourning period.

Tensei takes a deep breath and resolves not to think about that right this second. "When are Temari-chan an' Kankuro-chan getting back?"

"I relayed orders for the evacuees to be returned upon exiting the hospital."

The weird feeling in his chest dissipates into the air as quickly as it had appeared. Why is his father like this. "When are your daughter and son coming home, Otou-san?"

Rasa considers him with a Look that he's too tired to puzzle out right now. "They'll get home when they get home," he's told.

Tensei is not too tired to recognize the warning in his Kazekage's voice, though. He quiets— he's pushed his luck enough for one day.

Gaara’s door doesn’t open to his knocking. Tensei sees a thin film of sand on the handle and decides to leave him be for now.

'When they get home' turns out to be in three hours, just long enough for the porridge to finish cooking. He calls out when he hears them come in, and they come barreling down the hall straight at him.

Their father puts an arm in between them and Tensei before they can knock him over. "Your older brother is injured," he cautions, and Tensei's siblings nod. Which, oh, yeah, he's not supposed to be sticking his feet to the ground with chakra to brace himself. Tensei releases it with a wince, disguised by opening his arms in welcome.

The care that they use in hugging him is adorable. Tensei snorts and pulls them in so that their torsos are actually touching and not hovering a hand-length away. Having one pressed into each side makes it difficult to tuck his chin over both their heads, and in the end he picks Temari's. Her wavy hair is softer and also loose, for once. Good thing he only needs one hand to put up her pigtails, even if he hasn't had to since she turned eight a few months ago and started bunching them up herself in four instead of two. "Missed you," he tells them. "Tem-chan, do you have your hairbands?"

"They're in my room," she mumbles against his neck, but makes no move to go get them. Oh, well. She can't blame him when she gets hair into her food later, then.

"You look like a mummy," Kankuro informs him, poking at the medical tape all over his left side.

None of his wounds are at risk of reopening, but the medic wanted insurance against the seals falling off before his tenketsu points healed up. Peeling back a bit of the poetry-like jutsu-shiki reveals puckered white skin. He sighs, because the slightly pockmarked, ropey white scar tissue on his left hand is going to be a problem for his signing speed, nevermind puppeteering.

"You're alive."

Several heads turn at once to face the new arrival. Gaara stands in the doorway, hands hanging loose by his sides. Tensei thins his lips at the dried blood around the kanji for ‘love’ etched onto the skin of his baby brother's forehead. "Yashamaru told me you were dead," Gaara continues blithely.

Worried violet eyes, peering down at him. A hand running through his hair.

"He thought I was dead," Tensei corrects, and feels a pang at the notion that his uncle died thinking his sister's first child was lost to him— by her youngest's hand, no less. He hopes the man has moved on and isn't waiting in Limbo or anything. "And… and now he's gone. But you didn't kill me, Gaara."

He means it as a comfort, because he's not sure what their uncle would have said in this timeline of events. It comes out more like a statement of fact.

Tensei can only hope that Yashamaru's betrayal has not unhinged his baby brother enough for him to take it as a challenge.

Kankuro picks that moment to pipe up. "You should apologize," his little brother says, with a hard edge that shouldn't belong to his childish voice. "Yashamaru-oji's dead and Anigo's hurt and so are a lot of my friends. You should— you need to apologize." Which would fix approximately none of the things he just listed, but at six years old, Kankuro doesn't exactly have the frame of reference to know how to handle these situations. Even Tensei doesn't, and evidence goes to show that neither does their father. "Doesn't it hurt on the inside?"

Sand swirls around Gaara's feet, and Tensei would know even without the sudden presence of their father's hand gripping Tensei's shoulder that it no longer means what it used to. He eyes the slight shake in the three glass statuettes on a nearby shelf, souvenirs from each C-rank he’s taken escorting merchants from or back to Hari-mura. Genji-jiisan told him that they were imbued with the power to ward off sandstorms, but what do you do when the sandstorm is in your home? "How about we all have breakfast," he suggests to the room at large. The hand on his shoulder tightens, chiding. Yeah, yeah, Tensei's also stupid, moving on. "Otou-san made tamagokake-gohan for all of us."

"Tou-sama can cook?" Kankuro switches tracks like the child he is, and Tensei snickers. Imagine being a grown man and not knowing how to make your own food.

Their father seems slightly aggrieved, but the undercurrent of tension in the air recedes. "Of course I can cook," he says, striding into the kitchen to plate everything.

Just. Breakfast. And then they'll take it day by day and figure it out from there.

Chapter Text

71年, February

According to the scientific texts that Aiya-sensei managed to acquire for him from the university in the capital, the upper limit for fire is twelve-hundred degrees. That's about how hot it takes to burn a human body to ash, but it's not exactly easy to reach temperatures that high.

Cremation. Tensei is talking about cremation.

Temari and Kankuro are old enough that the information actually sinks in, this time, when Aiya-sensei somberly walks them through the steps of a funeral service. Tensei is the one to lead them through the dyeing process this time, indigo staining the skin up to their elbows once more, and he tries not to think too hard about how the man who herded them through this process the first time is now gone. "Don't touch the cord," he reminds his siblings softly, because the white, braided grass around their waists stains infinitely easier than the black of their mourning robes.

Their father joins them halfway into the journey across the village, drawing even more eyes as they walk through the streets to the crematorium. Four flights of stairs takes them down to the viewing chambers, because hot air rises and why waste the opportunity to heat houses during the cold, winter nights in the desert when they can lay pipes and redirect the energy? But for now, the air is heavy with incense to hide the scent of  decay that might otherwise stem from Yashamaru's body on the stone ledge, wrapped in a white shroud. Tensei is thankful that it's common practice to drape a cloth across the eyes of the deceased, because one thing he hadn't learned in the world before this one is that the default state for eyelids to be in after death wide open. It doesn't to anything to hide the dried blood crusted over his uncle's chin, and Kankuro's lip wobbles a little like he's about to start crying out loud again, except then Rasa places a hand atop his shoulder in warning and the wobbling stops.

To be fair, Tensei was about the same age as Kankuro is now when their mother died, and he hadn't cried. That doesn't mean he doesn't wish that Kankuro were free to do so, if he wanted.

Afterwards, there’s a large ceremony like there always is after a rampage, this time for eighteen civilians and eleven shinobi lives lost. He can’t help but wonder if the event organizers had a different number in their original plans, before Gaara survived and Yucca ‘found’ Tensei amidst the rubble.

Speaking of Yucca, their family’s regular guard rotation all show up for the smaller ceremony, among a score of other masked agents that Tensei only recognizes vaguely. The former anbu commander was well-regarded, and his successor is the one to set a spark to a faded piece of cloth with a blue iris flower on it. Tensei is surprised to see the half-sign that his mother taught him instead of the standard fire-starting chain. He wonders how many people her younger twin brother taught it to, or if maybe she was the one doing the teaching. Tensei makes a note to remember the bright yellow blossom of a macchia shrub, painted on a mask with slightly damp edges.

It’s not fair that his siblings aren’t allowed to attend, supposedly on account of being both legally civilians and too young— they weren’t too young to attend their mother’s funeral. It’s an excuse to exclude Gaara, he knows. If it weren’t taboo to separate the ashes, he would have saved some to scatter with his siblings in their own private goodbye.

So on his birthday, Tensei takes his siblings out to Okinaniku for dinner.

Custom dictates that the grieving family of the deceased aren't supposed to prepare any food during the three-day period of mourning directly after the service. Distant relatives or close members of the community are supposed to do that, so he assumes the food that appears on their doorstep is from either Mana-oba or their anbu. 

Yeah. So. He's not making dinner tonight.

Also, Rasa ordered him to make a public appearance at his own discretion within the week. A good amount of their shinobi have taken a turn on the rumor mill that Tensei is actually dead, or disabled, or in critical condition, and that the higher ups are covering it up. He has to show them that he's fine.

Unlike their uncle. Skies above, but he's grateful for the public ceremony, otherwise it would be up to him to tell people that as he makes the rounds for groceries. Which he hasn't, yet.

I grieve a future lost to the winds as I grieve for ashes laid to the sands. May his soul find peace in the skies.

If Tensei has to hear the mourning condolences one more fucking time—

Tensei's not going to lie, he feels like shit. But unlike eleven people burnt to ash and scattered to the winds, Tensei will be fine. This isn't even as bad a setback as his eye, and he got past that. Mostly. His father has told him that their training sessions are going to focus on defending his blind side more often, too. Not the end of the world or anything.

So here they are at Okinaniku, reopened after a few days of minor repairs and sand removal, and Tensei has a point to prove. He walks in through the restaurant doors under his own power, medical tape off and still-pink scars partially covered by longer pants and field-bandages, but the ones on his neck and face are otherwise bared for the world to see. A wreath of iron around his shoulders doubles as both a way to show that he’s still fighting-fit, and to emphasize the resemblance between him and Gaara with the rings around their eyes.

Gaara had frowned when Tensei moved to pick him up like he always does, sand rattling until Tensei slowed down to telegraph his movements. Carefully, carefully. Gaara, who now sits in Tensei's one-armed hold on his less tender right side.

The worker at the kiosk pales.

Tensei gives him a sharp smile and asks for a four-seater booth.

::::::

71年, March

Their father still doesn’t come home until late at night, even if they do manage to have breakfast together some days. And most of Tensei’s left side still feels as if he's just woken up, skin thick and muscles sluggish. Temari, bless her, has taken over rehydrating and heating up the prepackaged stuff for lunch more days than not, because Tensei can't get his stupid limbs to cooperate—

And then Aiya-sensei retires.

As someone who has not made it to that point in either life, Tensei has always associated the concept of retirement with grandchildren and having your own place; with a small party and desserts with co-workers; with a period of peace and quiet.

This, Tensei thinks, is neither peaceful nor quiet.

“I have served your lineage well,” Aiya-sensei seethes. Tensei's tutor is never not dressed well, but today sees finery in draping links of silver. Not gold— he recognizes the snub to his father. “For four generations, my legacy has served it with honor and I have served it with pride. Tell me why I should not take this request as an insult, Rasa, and perhaps I will consider my time on you not entirely wasted.”

Tensei… understands. He doesn’t like it, but he understands. Throughout the years, there have been three anbu agents to wear the Primrose mask, and a handful of dead civilians besides. No matter how much Gaara does or doesn’t mean to do things, there’s no denying the fact that getting assigned to be in his proximity is something akin to a suicide mission.

It only makes their uncle's position all the more incredulous. Tensei had read through reports written in Yashamaru-oji's— no, in Agent Iris' neat hand in preparation for this meeting. More things regarding Gaara make sense in hindsight, now. He hadn't known that there were this many killings even before… before.

“The boy is five,” Rasa says. He looks so calm in comparison, voice quiet and impassive. Tensei knows that this is only a facade— Aiya-sensei scares his father as much as she does the rest of them. His father spent an hour rehearsing this conversation in their dressing room this morning, muttered under his breath while Tensei painted his Face. “Far past the age to begin lessons, and unable to join his peers in the Academy besides. You stepped up to teach my mother when our family was in danger, against your own mentor’s wishes. You took on my eldest when the elders claimed his spirit tainted with the otherworldly. That you have served the Kazekage line with not only honor but courage does you credit, sensei. I would only ask the same to be shown to my youngest.”

“And in all of them there was spirit.” Aiya-sensei spreads her folding fan towards Tensei and the two older of his younger siblings, lined up at his father’s right in seiza. Gaara, the question at hand of this entire meeting, is notably absent. Tensei catches the eye of one of the older girls in a similar line-up on the other side, mutual apologies on behalf of their respective people unspoken. “My mentor agreed to teach the son of the Shodai because she claimed Koshiro-dono’s heart to be bright. Hana-dono had a will that could cut as our land’s sharpest winds do, and Tensei-dono a drive that looks far beyond either of us. That you stand before me and compare that vessel with nothing behind his eyes but a beast to be equal does you shame.”

Kankuro shifts, and as one, Tensei and Temari pin him with a side-eye. It’s nothing against their little brother, really, and more the fact that Kankuro has had the least amount of time studying the language of politics with the woman before them. This is not the time to lose face— on a third side of the room, the entirety of Sunagakure’s Honoured Advisory Council lies in wait.

But he empathizes. Sitting in seiza for this long is doing his left leg no favours when it already feels like cardboard. Getting up will be a pain and a half.

“And what will we do with a kunai lacking a handle but bleed by the blade,” Counselor Masafumi sighs. Beside him, several others nod in agreement. “The jinchuuriki killed his own caretaker with no remorse.”

Yashamaru was more than a caretaker.

“And what will we do without a blade when each of our enemies have two,” the Kazekage counters.

Gaara is more than a blade.

Tensei bites his tongue.

There is a lull. His eyes drift back towards the girl from before, one finger moving silently between the ridges of her hand fan, then three, and then one again. There’s nothing to be gleaned from the others near her, but Tensei would bet anything that it’s a code of some sort. The core of shinobi life once originated from courtesan women, after all.

And, as if sensing his attention on her, she meets his gaze again.

“Compensation will match the price, and the price will match the risk,” his father says. “I will not have my child denied an education for the circumstances of his birth that, if all relevant parties in attendance will recall, was not only authorized but called for by the very council in this room.”

“I would value the life of me and mine over fair compensation.”

Rasa faces the challenge evenly. “There are no others I would entrust my son to than you.”

Aiya-sensei narrows her eyes. “And if I choose to withdraw my legacy's employment entirely?”

Oh. Oh, shit. His father’s request for her to tutor Gaara had to have been perceived as an insult on massive proportions if she’s willing to go as far as withdrawing her whole legacy. As in, not only herself, but all of her students lined up beside her, and all of their students, too. Tensei has most of his bases covered, but Temari and Kankuro? It would take months to find, screen, and hire another tutor unaffiliated with Aiya-sensei and the path she's threatening to swear.

Tensei measures his exhales with caution, careful of anything that could be taken as a reaction. The girl across from him continues to stare. Why, Tensei can’t say. An equal challenge? Or is it at the patch of scars on the left side of his face?

He knows her only vaguely. Aiya-sensei has had most of her students at present watch their lessons from the sidelines before, at one point or another. He knows her only vaguely, and that very lack of familiarity makes itself known like a goat in a greenhouse when she folds her fan shut with a click. “Aiya-sensei,” she murmurs. “I would speak.”

Aiya-sensei withdraws her own fan, hidden once more by the billowing material of her wide sleeves. “Denied.”

“Overruled,” Head Counselor Hiroshi says. “For the timekeeper, announce your name and for whom you speak.”

She raises her head. “My name is Rio,” she says, “Second daughter of Ren, first son of Ken, second seat of Sunagakure no Sato’s Honoured Council. I will speak for myself,” she clarifies. Tensei would sit up straighter if he wasn’t already stiff as a board. Counselor Ken’s face remains impassive because everyone who’s anyone in the political sphere is allergic to showing emotions. What sort of power-play is going on here? “I would like to discuss the terms and conditions for taking on all of Yondaime-sama’s children, as a private tutor.”

Oh.

And so Aiya-sensei retires amidst the chaos of Conference Room Three, and Tensei slightly bemoans the fact that of course the first official proceedings that Temari and Kankuro bear witness to goes completely off the fucking rails.

Chapter Text

71年, April

“I don’t even want to know what vapid thoughts you've stuffed your head with,” his father growls at him. “Focus. Maintain it.”

Easy for him to say. Rasa’s not the one being stared down by three floating gold eyeballs right now. Doesn’t performance anxiety get the better of something like one in five people? That’s a lot. In fact, that’s Tensei, right now. “There’s no visual to maintain,” he mutters, dispersing yet another Third Eye back into iron filaments. No luck with his bit of back-up iron sand, either, so he can cross off the shape of the particles as the independent variable. Poison-coated or non-coated, too. Maybe the wavelength of whatever shape transformation he uses to control iron just isn’t suited to transmitting images. “Could Sandaime-sama do this?”

Rasa sighs, an angry-sounding expulsion of air. “I invented the Third Eye technique independent of Sarou-sensei. He never had the chance to learn it.”

You do, goes unsaid.

Tensei thins his lips and runs through the hand signs again. Snake-Monkey-Rat-Monkey-Bird-Monkey-Dragon-Monkey-Rat— Monkey to Bird doesn’t even trip him up anymore. The motions are familiar enough, at this point, that he can pull off the whole chain in about six seconds even with the mess of scarring on his left hand slowing him down. Pointer finger outstretched to the ball of iron needles, a touch is enough to build the connection. He closes his one working eye, a dangerous move in the field but absolutely non-negotiable for the learning process, and tries to will an image of the landscape before him into focus.

Like always, there is only ever static. He rotates the Third Eye to the left, then to the right. Up and down results in much the same. Black-and-white TV static, actually, is the best way he has to describe it. Their home is one of the first in Suna to have one installed, last year, not that they use it much. “I am focusing,” he tells his father preemptively upon hearing an inhale.

“Clearly not hard enough, if you’re still paying attention to me.”

Tensei is just about ready to throw his arms up and call it a day. “I’m sorry, I thought we shinobi valued having a basic level of situational awareness at all times.”

“Tensei,” Rasa snaps.

The reprimand is sharp enough for him to instantly regret his words. “I was wrong to take that tone,” he says quickly. The phrase is one of many apologies that he has loaded and at the ready for a multitude of situations, these days. Even the activated black pigment around Rasa’s eyes doesn’t hide the effects of too many nights with too little sleep. “But I really do think that this jutsu isn't compatible with iron, Otou-san.”

Outside of sparring, this is the one lesson that they keep coming back to. It was dumb luck that had Tensei trying the Third Eye technique for the first time using gold, because that’s what Rasa had been using. He’d come straight from the Playhouse, so his iron was still sealed away into a scroll, and the gold was in easy reach— it was instinct to go for it.

The whole purpose of teaching him this technique is to remove the disadvantage that his blind side offers, and to a degree, it works. He was excited to discover that the optic nerve in his left eye wasn’t broken. Or rather, not ‘discover’, since Tensei has been Seeing things out of said eye ever since it was blinded, but he hadn’t really expected the jutsu to work on it just as well as his right eye.

After the first few weeks getting over the initial learning curve and upping the resolution to something worth looking at, Tensei thinks he would dare to use a golden Third Eye for basic scouting in the field. But ask him to try it with iron, and, well. Nada, zip, zilch. He’s willing to bet that it’s at least correlated to his ‘iron and gold have different types of magnetism’ theory, but the data pool is too small for said theory to ever become anything more.

“You need to learn this, Tensei,” his father tells him under no uncertain terms once their time is almost up.

"I already have, though. With gold." Which he carries a small pouch of now for that very purpose, right next to the pouch full of Sandaime-sama's iron sand that he coated in poison.

"And if you find yourself without any to work with?" Rasa narrows his eyes. “Don’t think I won’t push you to keep at it through dinner.”

But training for longer isn't really going to have any more benefits than training consistently, apart from building up endurance— not that he's going to voice the thought out loud. “But you said you had a meeting after this?”

His father flares his chakra, and an anbu agent with a blue clematis flower on the mask drops down next to him. “Keep him here for as long as you see fit,” Rasa orders, ignoring the incredulous raise of Tensei’s eyebrows. “You’re authorized to use force, if need be.”

He’s joking. Seriously?

The anbu inclines his head, and Rasa shoots Tensei a look of warning before making for the exit of the training grounds.

He's not joking. Alright, then. He greets Clematis with a sigh and a half-hearted smile. "Any chance you can tell me how long you see fit?"

Clematis settles into a seated criss-cross position and offers him nothing. Well, fuck. He actually is kind of getting hungry, considering all the chakra he's burned today, and between Tensei and their un— and Yashamaru-oji, Temari's not great at making dinner by herself. "Can you at least tell Yucca or Poppy to drop off some takeout at home?" Not Primrose. The chakra signature behind that mask changes too often for him to really trust whoever's on shift.

Clematis nods, not that he makes a single other movement to do so. Tensei decides to trust the mysterious workings of the anbu for now, sighs, and goes to run through the chain of signs for the Third Eye once more.

::::::

Admittedly, there’s plenty of irony to be found in the way that history is repeating itself— once again, a legacy student goes against her mentor for the Kazekage’s son.

As it turns out, Rio-sensei is a good teacher, despite only being a couple years older than himself. Aiya-sensei left notes on his progress behind, of course, but there’s something to be said for the way that each lesson feels like a continuation of a previous conversation. She demures that her true talent lies in embroidery, made obvious by the fact that Temari has started coming home waving pricked fingers in his face to heal. Any good shinobi worth their salt can patch their clothes, even if Tensei has to throw away his ruined ones most of the time for appearances sake, but he’s thinking more about the miniature clothes for his performance puppets when he asks if he can learn, too.

Kankuro grumbles about supplementary homework on top of what he already gets from the Academy, but considering how they’ve kept up the habit of gathering at the table to do their assignments every evening before dinner, everything gets done in a more or less timely manner. As for Gaara— well. There’s a lot of independent assigned reading. Aside from that, one of the conditions for Gaara’s instruction is that their father remains present at all times. Tensei wonders what Yashamaru-oji would think of his nephew turning the Kazekage’s office into a classroom, even if it’s only once a week, with a miniature desk to match.

…He wonders what his uncle had been thinking at all.

Tensei sighs.

Anyhow, neither his etiquette instructor nor his dead uncle are people he can go to with his current problem. You know how there’s this weird transition period between knowing of someone and then actually getting to know the person?

Yeah. Tensei is currently trying desperately to get unstuck from that phase.

Hoki Yua, the girl he’d met a while ago in that bookstore, stopped him in the street last week with an, "Excuse me. Bear, right?” and pulled him aside to slather a dull-smelling salve over the giant road rash on his forearms. Or whatever it’s supposed to be called. He’d been wearing a plain blue t-shirt in lieu of his usual puppeteer blacks, a rare occasion in public for the sake of letting the wound air out. It was from pulling up his iron vambrace-mimics too quickly to block, which was why he'd been passing through the markets on his way to get fitted for actual vambraces. Other than that, it had been one of the better training sessions with his father, one that he didn't leave with iron prickling defensively around his shoulders and black pigmentation around his eyes.

A completely understandable stress response, Tensei tells himself. Watching your son get carried away by a wave of sand and finding nothing but his blood trail for days afterwards is traumatizing. It’s practically a given that his father would push him even harder now. There are good days; there are bad days— Tensei will be able to keep up again once he’s fully healed.

The only indication of her surprise at the myriad of uneven scars all over his left side had been a sharp inhale, and nothing else. When he smiled and tried to pull away, assuring her that he could have taken care of it with iryo-ninjutsu, she shot him a sharp look and asked why he didn’t.

Well, he was going to. After another day or two, maybe, because ‘pain is an instructor unto itself’. Tensei wisely didn’t quote his father out loud, and instead of letting the silence build, she simply plowed right through it and asked him how he's been since they last met.

Hoki Yua is one of the few people in Suna with a family name due to her clan originally being from Fire Country. Most of them, including the main line, run a small-scale mercenary shinobi service out of a village named Chukan-mura at the border between Wind and Fire, but they’re closely affiliated with Suna. He knows that the branch closest to the main one traditionally upholds a small compound in Suna as one base of operations, and the current matriarch trained and served as a member of the anbu here in her youth as part of the two villages’ ongoing contract. Yua is part of the matriarch’s younger sister’s branch line, who had relocated here along with a couple servants to take over from the previous Hoki that ran Suna’s main hospital.

Or at least, that's what Tensei manages to piece together, between his father's distracted half-answers and Yua's chatter.

Their next interaction starts out as greeting each other in passing, her with a furious blush amidst apologizing for not recognizing him twice and Tensei failing not to laugh while apologizing for messing with her in turn. Then they realized that they frequented the same stationery shops, which turned into popping by each other's seats at food stalls or in restaurants sometimes.

They just… keep bumping into each other. Never often enough to be suspicious, but maybe Tensei is tired of watching his back all the time.

Skies forbid he end up a loner someday like his father, right?

Chapter Text

71年, July

Tensei is thirteen when he tries for chunin again, and this time, the Exams are held in Suna. Half a year is just enough time to restore the village to some semblance of normalcy— meaning, make it look like they weren’t subjected to a tailed beast rampage twice within the span of a week not too long ago— but certain sections of the village have a distinctly unpolished feeling. Tensei has taken enough construction-related D-ranks that he muses about attending a couple lectures on architecture in Kannan-shi’s university, just to compare.

As one of the weaker Great Nations, Sunagakure cannot afford to show anything but strength. The arrivals from other villages don’t ask too many questions, and that’s enough for now.

Act one: a three-day long survival-battle-royale in the desert. Tensei ekes out a corner for himself next to a sizable liquid-holding cactus, traps it to high hell, and spears anyone who manages to get past the perimeter.

Act two: the written exam. There are trick questions and a hidden message to be decoded from the answers worth several points for each correct character, accumulatively half of the total points. It’s meant to discourage them, Tensei thinks, because the way some of the questions are phrased are open-ended enough to have multiple correct answers, thus making it near-impossible to decode the hidden message with full marks. But then again, no one told them that the standard passing score of eighty out of a hundred applied here, so hopefully all those genin around him are freaking out over nothing but a scare tactic. Tensei definitely gets a couple characters wrong— ‘There’s a kunai on the raise’ sounds a bit off. It’s held right after the survival-battle-royale, though, and everyone is sleep deprived and dirty and definitely not at their best. Tensei trades the effort required to sit up straight in favor of keeping his handwriting legible.

Interlude: it’s all very straightforward, in that the people who are moving on to the next round are discreetly notified of their status while who-fights-who is kept a complete mystery. Suna likes to use its month to let their hospitality services and street vendors milk the foreigners for all they’re worth. His father takes the time out of his busy, busy schedule to drive him into the ground twice a week with gold dust against iron needles, and Tensei makes sure he doesn’t complain. He’s getting a second take— not many things in life offer that so freely. Might as well take advantage, haha.

::::::

71年, August

So. Act three, take two: the finals.

This time, his first opponent is a scruffy Konoha teenager who he immediately clocks as Umino Iruka by the scar. It would be wrong to say that competition is easy this year, considering he knows that the other Suna genin waiting for her match in the wings is a decent puppeteer, but he's kind of confused how Iruka ended up in the quarter-finals. Tensei counts fifteen seconds to let the teen do… something with ninja wire before he reaches out to tear the whole set-up apart. Because steel wire is just an iron-carbon alloy, after all, and the attached kunai are made from wrought iron. His action prematurely triggers what he thinks would have been an explosive tag trap far away from his person, and from there, he decides to try engaging the other in taijutsu.

Not in the Dune stance, obviously. The Scorpion series would be well suited for this fight, considering his lack in height and reach compared to the older teen, but Tensei blurs into the more familiar Sandstorm instead. All in all, it's a pretty straightforward win, and Iruka offers him a rueful smile before Tensei knocks him out with a blow to the temple.

His question is answered when a Uchiha genin steps up to fight the puppeteer next. Tensei's eyes flit between the two Konoha genin present. Ah, a high-scorer, a low-scorer, and a support-type trio-system? Even without the team requirement, Konoha likely sent a three-man squad. Looks like their third didn't make it.

It takes the proctor's introduction of both participants to put a name to the face for the puppeteer, but he recognizes her as one of his earlier challengers from the Playhouse. It's a poor match-up, though, considering Aya is a pure puppeteer who doesn't dabble in anything else—

Oh. No, he's right about it being a poor match up, but wrong about the favoured party. Uchiha Naori only has two tomoe spinning in her eyes, and seems like a genjutsu-type besides the katana and wakizashi strapped to her side. The whole reason why puppeteers were placed on the First and Second War's front lines against the Uchiha in the first place is because puppets, being non-living, are immune to genjutsu. The pathways in the puppets that their chakra threads travel through are supposedly similar enough to human anatomy at first glance, as long as said puppet is humanoid like Aya's. Fool your enemy into thinking that the puppet is a person while keeping the actual puppeteer hidden… yep, that's a smoke bomb to cover for a kawarimi.

He watches with rapt attention as Aya allows her puppet-self to be 'captured' by an illusion, and when her opponent approaches with her wakizashi to finish it, cuts the Uchiha kid into ribbons with the blades in her puppets forearms. That's… huh.

The two Kumo genin that made it into the quarter-finals are next to duke it out. Two from Konoha, two from Kumo, Two from Suna. Pity about that one Grass genin who made it past the second round just to be annihilated by that blonde Kumo-nin in the prelims, but even numbers make things so much easier. "Who's your mentor?" he asks Aya upon her return.

"None of your business," is the clipped reply. Tensei can respect that.

He pops by the medical tent to check on the two downed Konoha-nin and is immediately greeted by, “Izanami wept, I thought I’d never be able to get this to you.”

Tensei blinks. The Uchiha girl is looking at him expectantly, why is she looking at him like that. “Pardon?”

“Come here, please. I was advised not to move too much.” She rummages around her pouch on the stand next to her bed and produces the smallest scroll he’s ever seen. “Mikoto-dono has a message for you, to be burned immediately after reading.” Tensei raises an eyebrow and gestures at her companion, to which she sighs. “Don’t worry about Iruka, he’s out like a light. I checked.”

Well, his stupid-quota must not be filled for the day, because Tensei launches a chakra string to nab the thing from her hand. He tugs pointedly when she doesn’t let go the first time, and she releases it with a small smile. Huh. Weirdly not-grumpy, considering how her clan is infamous for its shinobi population being a bunch of grouches.

He inspects the scroll carefully to find it sealed. An empty space in the center, surrounded by a spiral of ink— hey, he recognizes some of the shorthand. Blood, something something, if negative… fire? A blood-key seal. He nicks his thumb with one of his canines, manually sharpened, and presses it against the blank space.

The seal disappears in a puff of smoke. Well, shit, how did they get ahold of his blood? Clearly, Konoha’s medics are not to be trusted if they’re just keeping samples of foreign-nin blood around. For the eyes of Suna no Tensei only, he reads. In case the fan is burnt by the fire, its ashes will fly to the hawk with a song to tell.

He memorizes the message, and then makes his mother’s half-sign then and there. There’s something solemn about the way that the flecks of grey drift up, as if they know where they’re headed. “Uchiha Naori?” he asks, just to be sure.

“That’s me,” she confirms. “You have a return message?”

Nothing so coded. Skies, this is really happening, isn’t it. “Just that her sentiment has been acknowledged.” He offers her a shallow bow in return. “I know you took a risk in passing this on, so thank you.”

She waves it aside. “Oh, it was no problem. Mikoto-dono spoke highly of you, you know. Said you were a very cultured conversational partner, and everyone heard how competent a shinobi you were against Itachi-kun." Everyone?  "It was kind of you, to forfeit when you did. His shoulder made a near-full recovery.”

Unbidden, something comes loose inside of his chest. What was the phrase that she’d used? ‘Izanami wept’? Then Izanami wept, has Tensei needed to hear something of that vein for a while now. “So he was lucid during those moments,” he murmurs. “I’m sorry to have been cause for unnecessary pain.”

She shrugs. “Better a proxy war through a bunch of genin than the real thing though, ne? Let Aya-san know that there’s no hard feelings on my end, either, if she’s a friend of yours. We’re allies, after all.”

They aren't friends, but Tensei hears the subtext. “Allies,” he echoes, sealing the deal left behind by drifting ashes. He gives Uchiha Naori a genuine smile. “Yes, we are, Uchiha-san.”

Chapter Text

71年, August

He barely makes it back to the wings of the arena in time to hear his own name be drawn, right before Aya’s. Because of course it is. Which one of the Kumo genin won, again?

They don't look at each other as they enter the field. Ten paces apart, seals of confrontation raised, and only then does Aya address him properly. "This is going to be different from last time, Bear."

It sure is. Last time they fought, Tensei hadn't resorted to using the full extent of his arsenal, yet. Also, he's taller, now— he barely has to look up to meet her eyes. "Is that a personal challenge, or a formal one on behalf of the Playhouse?" he says lightly.

"Personal," she says.

Oh, great. That means he has to avoid specifically damaging the Playhouse's sigil on her front too badly, or else Tensei will be the one to turn this into a political debacle.

The arena is enveloped in smoke. Tensei uses the cover to slap down one of the enhanced privacy seals that he originally customized for the Uchiha and tap it twice to light it up, before activating and tossing five of his personal explosive tags around using his chakra strings. The aerosol is indistinguishable from the smoke, in fact appearing to have only made the cloud bigger, but Tensei knows what he's doing. Mostly. There's a measured amount of gunpowder in the aerosol this time, and he might have been a little lazy about the extent of testing this variation in multiple at once.

There's clicking, coming from his ten o'clock and slightly above. Searching. Tensei has faith in his work, though. As long as Aya stays at a distance, it doesn't matter if her puppet enters the perimeter of the privacy seal or not, since it's not like the puppet itself can see or hear.

There's a possibility of a microphone, though, so Tensei hurries it up.

White Bear appears with a smear of blood against paper and ink. Tensei nudges it to sit back on its haunches before crawling into the cavity inside. He's careful to avoid the guillotine blade as he locks himself in, activates the jutsu-shiki lining the insides, then checks that each of his five chakra strings are still connected.

A thnk-thnk-thnk tells him that a spray of projectiles has just hit White Bear's flank, alongside a much longer series of muffled shnk-shnk indicating more misses. A wide attack since she can't see him, likely. Tensei takes his hand connected to glowing blue threads, closes his eyes, and makes his mother’s half-sign for a spark.

The world disappears in a boom of noise. Ah, fuck, looks like he needs to tweak the soundproofing in his seals later, because that is loud. "Ow," he mutters to himself, rubbing his ears. This is what he gets for irresponsible live-testing, he supposes.

The six whole seconds that it takes to run through the sequence for a Third Eye feels longer outside of training. He really needs to do something about the scarring on his left hand before that becomes a liability in a real battle.

The angle is awkward, but a twitch of his fingers opens up White Bear's mouth a crack to sneak the golden Third Eye through. Sand, dust, debris, more sand… oh hey, the silhouette of her puppet on the ground. Tensei turns White Bear to face it, aims for where he thinks the joints should be, and then has his own puppet spit a brace of pre-loaded senbon.

…that's not the sound of senbon against metal. Or wood. In fact, there’s no discernable sound at all, despite the lack of ringing in his ears and seeing the senbon definitely hit their marks.

Oh, shit.

Tensei scrambles to remove himself from his puppet's insides, pulling his collar up as an improvised mask as he does. The sand on the ground is still hot, so he makes a platform of iron to carry him to the edge of the arena where Aya's still form lies. Pulse, check. Breathing, laboured. The proctor probably can't see them amidst all the debris floating around, so Tensei curses and goes to clear her airways by hand.

Only her eyes fly open and he nearly gets shivved in the thigh. Ah, fuck, he's such a dumbass. “You have a lot of second and third degree burns,” he tells her, only releasing her wrist after part of his floating platform breaks off to wrap around her like a straightjacket. Not like he needs the diagnostic jutsu to ping what his eyes can manage just as well. “A concussion, too,” he adds. Her position suggests she slid down from getting thrown into the wall, and her eyes are distinctly unfocused. “I’m sorry about your puppet. Let’s go find the proctor, yeah?” Oh fuck, Tensei hopes he didn’t accidently blow the man up or anything.

“You suck," Aya wheezes empathetically. Fair enough.

A weak wind release technique blows through the arena pit, then, and Tensei diverts just enough iron to shield both their faces. That’s handy; he should probably do something with his second chakra nature when he has the time— oh. Man, he really fucked up the field, didn’t he? Thank the skies for the barrier protecting the audience from any potential blowback. “I may have been a little overenthusiastic,” he smiles sheepishly at the proctor glaring daggers at him.

He wonders what that looked like to everyone else. Probably not a very entertaining showcase, huh? That’s fine. He has the final match to make up for it.

“Heard you lost out to Wicked Eye Fugaku’s brat,” Hikaru says with mock sympathy. “Rough luck, buddy.”

His last opponent can't be more than three or four years older than him, not unlike Aya, but Tensei can tell by the slight swagger that he's walking into the ring way too confidently. Tensei has been using his iron very reservedly this time around to conserve his chakra, utilizing only as much as he usually carries on his shoulders with the rest sealed away into two separate standard scrolls on his belt. He’s aware that he doesn’t look very intimidating, but trash talk? Does he really warrant that?

“Heard you got your sword broken two minutes into the first round,” Tensei shoots back in the same tone. Which makes it impressive that his opponent still managed to get into the finals, yes, but Kumo-nin are also notorious sticklers about their weaponry. “Rough luck, buddy."

Although that quip earns him a middle finger in response, it clearly doesn’t faze the brunette as much as Tensei intends it to. Because Hikaru spends their traditional opening moments of trading taijutsu by winking incessantly at a cluster of spectating kunoichi.

The daimyo are laughing.

Tensei hums in thought as he disengages, scooping up a handful of sand. Fine then, he’ll just cut the phase short.

He launches into a flying kick, and when the other genin makes for a side-step and deflect, a flash of lightning shoots through the sand trickling through his knuckles. The pass-by makes for fantastic momentum to score the ends of two glass senbon into one of Hikaru’s eyes.

“WHAT THE FUCK,” his opponent screams, first at Tensei, then towards the proctor. There's a gush of red, of course there is, head wounds bleed a lot. “My eye, holy shit my eye," and then his tone turns rancid. "You lizard-eating sonuva half-cocked bitch."

First off, don't knock it until you try it, the fried lizard tails that Rooster used to sneak him from the lower markets are great. Secondly— oh skies, Tensei is so glad that they're not mic'd up, because his father— Karura may not have been the perfect mother, but she tried where it counted.

This would be a good time to unseal his iron and finish things, probably.

But.

Tensei flips the senbon responsible for the damage between his fingers like he would a pencil during a particularly boring class, and then tosses them at his opponent. They rip a tear each through the other's shirt despite the stumbling attempt at evasion. "You'll lose that eye for good if the medics don't get to it in the next thirty seconds or so," he offers. No, not offers. Taunts. That it’s his uncle’s senbon defending his mother’s reputation is fitting, in a way. There's a thrill in his veins that he hasn't felt since— a long time, nothing that he can place through the rush right now. "You should forfeit, Kumo-chan."

Being glared at through one eye just doesn't have the same effect as two, but the Kumo-nin gives it his best shot before turning to the proctor. "Why are you just standing there?! Disqualify him, get me a medic— do something!!”

The proctor blinks impassively. “Do you yield?”

“Do I y— what the fuck!?”

On one hand, Tensei is toeing the line a bit with an intentional maiming this serious. On the other, there are in-case-of-death clauses in the participation contract that all genin subject themselves to by signing up and Tensei needs something big to make up for his first impression. Hikaru’s hand is doing a rather poor job of staunching the bleeding; that little move showed off how easily two senbon could have dealt a decisive blow, if Tensei had stabbed inwards to the brain rather than held on to his grip.

Top of the head, temples, eyes, diagonally upwards into the neck from right below the chin: all applicable ways for a standard-length senbon to get at the brain. Tensei crouches down to scoop up some more sand, and a delicate application of lightning results in three glass needles in each hand, positioned in between his knuckles like the wolverine claws he once asked for years ago. He closes his own blind eye and lets his lips pull the painted corners of his Face into a grin. The Kumo genin wouldn't get it, but he hopes Anbu Commander Macchia is watching in the crowd. Painting The Hawk as his Face wasn't originally intended to be a tribute, but with the combination of explosives from earlier and the glass in his hands? Well.

Skies, he has never felt so alive.

The asshole stops underestimating him, then, so there must be something other than a draft in his head. Tensei is momentarily affected by a flashbang and casts out a Crackling Circuit to stall while he checks for genjutsu. But no, he's just paranoid. He doesn't need his sight to feel the buzz of a chakra signature somewhere in the direction of his four o' clock, at which he unseals a scroll’s worth of material for a sweeping wave. “Magnet Release: Scattered Showers!” Tensei makes sure to call out the name of the late Sandaime's attack for spectacle's sake. The nobility in the audience that this event is targeted towards are largely of the mind that bigger is better, after all.

There's a clang of iron against steel, and Tensei has to duck a bolt of lightning aiming for his head. Did his competition just try to deflect the attack with his sword while newly half-blinded? It took Tensei forever to adjust to the new depth perception, and he doesn't expect his opponent to be having much better luck. Better safe than sorry, though. Hikaru has no one guarding his six, so Tensei offers a frontal distraction in the form of one hand of glass while he drags a foot backwards to coax any iron that missed the first time in reverse.

The pained cry he hears in response is satisfying.

He makes a show of unsealing a yellow vial of liquid, dipping the senbon in his hands one at a time. The other is still struggling to get up— He stops the desperate trajectory of a few shuriken in mid-air. Iron is iron is iron, after all, no matter how it’s shaped.

The space in between them is crossed in six easy strides. He adds to the black pincushion by stabbing his glass senbon into both of his opponent’s calves, right into a space between the two bones there so that moving is a fruitless endeavor. "Forfeit," he hisses.

“What was that,” the teen demands. He says nothing, lets the short, panicked breaths wash over him along with the roar of the crowd. “What— what did you just dip those senbon into, you bastard!? Who do you think you are!?!”

A rumble in his chest. “Death,” he sighs, and then—

Wait. Hold on a second. Tensei blinks against the haze and takes the yellow vial out again. Definitely a paralytic, fast-acting, should kick in soon and wear off in another ten minutes. No death involved. Where did that come from?

There’s more noise coming from beneath him, something along the lines of begging and you-can’t-do-this and Fuck, fine! I forfeit! Are you happy now, you nutcase? Give me the antidote!

Another blink, and the proctor has his hand. It’s raised into the air. The roar of the crowd swells.

He’s losing time, Tensei realizes. Maybe the mental block is wearing off? Sadako did mention that it was more of a stopgap measure than anything.

Another blink. He’s in the medical tent for a standard post-fight scan. Tensei offers a smile to a question that he didn’t quite catch and assures the medic that he’s fine. Looks like he’ll just have to deal with the consequences as they come.

Chapter Text

71年, August

The Kazekage calls him to his office. Tensei is thirteen and right that the pauldrons look stupid on him.

His father grants him a hand on his shoulder. “You fought well.”

Tensei doesn't lean into it, but he doesn't remove himself from the situation, either. There’s no pretending that things can go back to how they used to be, but if he closes his eyes for just a moment— well, there’s still no pretending, but it feels kind of nice, so there’s that.

Yua accosts him outside of the office building, and Tensei is relieved to find that the smile he pulls out isn’t forced whatsoever. “Congratulations on your promotion, Tensei-dono,” she murmurs, voice quiet and eyes bright in the morning din.

Something about the fact that she’s technically the first person to tell him so draws a laugh out of him. “Thank you,” he says. “Your graduation is coming up, right?” She nods, and then Tensei makes a spur-of-the-moment decision. “Mind if I come?”

A pause. There’s some tension in her shoulders that wasn’t there the first time they met; hesitance now that each and every interaction between the two of them is politically charged. Tensei might not care about that right this second, but it’s clear that she does. “Nevermind,” he starts to say, but the rest of his sentence is bowled over by her sudden, “I’d love that, actually!”

Another pause. Yua’s hand goes up to cover her mouth, as if she can’t believe she just interrupted him. Tensei tamps down the second laugh itching to bubble up, in case she thinks he’s laughing at her. Which he isn’t— or, he is, but more so at how bad the two of them seem to be at this despite their diplomatic training. “I’ll see you there, then,” he says, and then blurs into a shunshin from a standstill.

He lands on a rooftop not too far away, still close enough to look back at Yua and let his smile grow into a grin. His method of ending their conversation could be considered rude enough to override any breach of manners that came before, and by the crinkle in her eyes, Tensei knows that Yua got what he intended out of the unspoken exchange.

And then he receives a summons to the Playhouse.

Chiyo-baasama waits not two paces into the building, skips right over any platitudes as per usual, and brings his mood crashing back to earth when she says, “He would have wanted you to have something.”

And still, Tensei needs no clarification on who He is. Tensei simply lets himself be led to an old storage room and looks upon the last three puppets that Sasori-nii ever made within Suna’s walls, and wonders.

Crow, a brunette humanoid with a pointed chin and three sets of arms. Black Ant, a black haired humanoid with a long face and round, hollow body. Salamander, a wide, blocky, lizard-like thing with stubby legs and an opening mechanism splitting a seam across the sides of its head.

They don’t look like how he Sees them, several years into the future of a world where Tensei never was. “Why did he name them all in the bunrakubuki style if he made those two look like people?” Tensei asks. Sasori-nii was of Chikamatsu's banner, he knows, because his parents were, and his grandmother was Chikamatsu-sama's own student— the most direct branch of the lineage.

“Dragon mentored him for a while, when he was young,” she answers, and oh. Tensei didn’t know that Dragon mentored anyone other than Rooster before.

“I’m not sure I want to use them,” he admits. Not just because they’re destined for someone else, but because… well. It’s always uncomfortable when what he Sees and what he remembers of a person doesn’t quite match up. Tensei is only two years younger, now, than Sasori-nii had been before he 'disappeared'.

“And I know that I don’t,” Chiyo-baasama says, sweeping out of the storage room and leaving Tensei with a key still sharp in its newness.

::::::

"Tell me you saw it," Sadako accosts her at the Academy gate. "Haru. Please."

Haru extracts her wrists from her friend's grasp. For a retired kunoichi, Sadako hasn't lost any of her grip strength. "One personal inquiry isn't going to produce the same results as a follow-up," she says. "But you knew that."

"And I told you, I can't— you know what I have at stake, here," Sadako hisses.

Haru fights the urge to pinch the bridge of her nose. She has enough wrinkles as it is.

Nearly a year ago, an old student had approached her looking entirely too harried for a twelve year old. Haru can hardly claim to know him well, considering he spent all of two trimesters in her classroom, but to ask for information on long-term genjutsu? Plain evidence that her initial assessment was an accurate one.

Dissociative periods, random phantom flares of chakra— she'd directed him to Sadako, of course, retired or not. And the little brat was desperate enough to trick her, because of course he would. 'Show no weakness' apparently applies to each other as well, in that mess of a family unit.

Haru's not surprised; kids are smart enough to lie to get what they want just like adults do. Usually, they're less good about covering their tracks, is all, but the uptick in Sadako's pension afterwards seemed legitimate.

And then, during the final check-in a month later, a slip of the tongue.

"We were talking about how his father was glad to see him employ some maneuvers he used to be more hesitant about in training," Sadako told her afterwards, "And then he implied— he caught himself before he finished his sentence, but I pushed the point and he led with an apology. Haru, Yondaime-sama doesn't know."

And Sadako isn't willing to put herself in a position that might risk her new pension, not with her husband's on-and-off gambling habit and Daichi to raise. "He seemed normal." Awkward, but what boy wouldn't be about giving flowers? Imagine her surprise when she bumped into him in the Academy halls, a small bundle of blue irises in hand on his way to the graduation ceremony on the roof. "Nothing else."

"But you saw the same thing I saw."

The International Chūnin Exams only comes around to Sunagakure once every eight years, an open affair to any citizen who wants to watch if they manage to snag a ticket. Family, mentors, and old instructors of participating genin have reserved seats, along with an entire section for three upper-level Academy classes to show them an example of what they should be aiming for, but Sadako had found it particularly hard to get in this time. After all, everyone wants to see the latest of what the Kazekage lineage-legacy has to offer.

Sunagakure is well-known for their vicious breed of shinobi, as Iwa is known for their stubbornness, Konoha for their strength, Kumo for their pride, and Kiri for their insanity. But the effects of a mental block on a mind not yet finished developing… well, it looks like not even prodigious talent can negate them.

Or maybe, instead of solely acting as a block, the barrier provided a release for something else.

Haru has heard the talk on the street of her old student. A doting older brother; quick with his words and even quicker to offer a smile; a well of potential. Not quite the same as the quiet child in the back of her class, so often with his nose in a book unrelated to their lesson or else doodling nonsense in his notation scrolls. She doesn't blame the public for their conceptions. She fell for the veneer of politeness just as much as anyone else before she saw him standing over her coworker, looking through Goro's bloodied and concussed state with a thousand-li stare.

She may not have ever had the youngest of that family pass through her classroom, but Haru knows enough to draw her conclusion. The oldest and the youngest are cut of the same cloth, only one is a chameleon in hiding, and the other a monster in plain sight.

Maybe the mental block replaced whatever inhibitions lay before it. Or maybe the other nations are right, and that's just how those with kekkei-genkai are born.

In lieu of saying all of that, Haru sighs. "I saw."

"Think they'll give me a medal or toss me into T&I when his father finds out?" Sadako asks bitterly.

Honestly, one is just as likely as the other. "You did what you thought best at the time under false pretenses," she places a hand on her friend's shoulder. "He's been educated in the court-style, remember? He'll know that he owes you and yours."

"But if he talks—"

"Then we'll deal with it," Haru says firmly. "You and Mio-kun will be fine, alright? We'll deal with any consequences as they come."

Chapter Text

71年, September

Tensei drags himself to training with Dragon and Rooster with a sheepish look and an apology for flaking on the master. Not that his father had given him much choice, but it’s the principle of the matter.

Well, ‘training’. Dragon diagnoses him with network burnout when maintaining his chakra strings for longer than ten minutes or so results in shooting pain down his arms. Tensei startles when Dragon grabs his wrist to stop him from trying again, an instinctive reach for his iron defense made useless by the fact that he keeps it sealed away in a scroll whenever he enters the Playhouse. “What the hell are you doing to yourself,” the master demands gruffly.

“Getting better,” Tensei snipes back on instinct, then backpedals. “Resting, I mean. After the Exams. I worked hard for this flak vest, you know, and it doesn’t even have the decency to look good on me.”

There’s no stand-off, because Dragon doesn’t usually deign to lower himself to their level.

Tensei thinks Dragon probably just finds him too pitiful to push. Whatever. The ground is feeling pretty comfy, and he could really use a nap. A lot has been going on lately, okay?

Not that he’s actually worried about the vest. News just arrived of some minor feudal lord on his way to Suna from their northern border in two weeks’ time; passing through while en route to meet the daimyo in Kannan-shi. Tensei’s expected to have a litany of classics ready to perform on demand for the opening round of entertainment. No tampering with the ‘traditional’ version of the Rabbit Princess and The Moon, this time, so he needs to put in a bit of extra practice for the original lines and stage directions. Except how is he supposed to do that when his chakra strings keep sputtering and dying out?

Rooster, however, has no such reservations. “You gotta get away for a bit,” he tells Tensei. “Full offense meant, your old man’s a slave driver.”

'Old man'. If Rasa counts as old, now, he sure doesn't act it when they're sparring together. “I think he would have a conniption if I ever started calling him Oyaji,” Tensei mutters wryly. 

“That’s the point.”

He rolls his eyes. Rooster has never liked his father, and the same goes for vice-versa. Both think the other to be a bad influence on him, which is hilarious in its own right. “He means well.”

“Bear, I barely saw you for months.”

That’s… yeah, they don’t hang out as much as they used to, but Rooster’s an actual adult now. Seventeen and taking missions on the regular. It makes sense that their schedules don’t line up. “I was busy training, you were busy making bank. It happens. Besides, how the heck am I supposed to ‘get away’ when this,” he tugs on one of the steel gears from the workbench so he can gesture at the black rings that appear around his eyes, “follows me wherever I go?”

Not the pigmentation, obviously, but everything that it carries. The Shodai’s lineage; the Sandaime’s legacy. His father’s reputation and his siblings’ public perception and an echo of a dead mother and her dead anbu commander of a brother.

Tensei regrets the stunt he pulled during his finals. He’s caught Macchia’s chakra signature on his training ground a half-dozen times since then— the dead need to be let go of in order to rest, and Tensei is not helping with matters. Whoever Macchia was to his uncle doesn’t really matter anymore, does it.

Speaking of brothers, Tensei almost expects to actually feel something on his eyes from the way that Rooster locks onto said rings. It’s a reminder to all of Tensei’s own baby brother as well, markings that Gaara has no way of ever turning off.

Rooster has never met Gaara.

Rooster lives alone.

Tensei is too much of a coward to ask if those two things are connected at all.

He sighs as Rooster nabs the gear back from its trajectory towards Tensei’s hand. “I kinda have an idea,” he starts, and then pauses. Looks over at Dragon.

The master looks entirely uninterested in their conversation, having taken out a handful of paperwork to chip at. On his lap. Without an ink or brush or any other writing utensil.

It’s times like this when Tensei is grateful that Dragon gives very few shits about his second student. Aiya-sensei was too good to ever let him slouch, of course. But in the workshops of the Playhouse, with a hood over his head that encourages eyes to pass over him, Tensei sometimes lets his shoulders lower by an inch.

Rooster stares for a moment, but when Dragon doesn’t acknowledge them in any way, he shrugs and takes out a hand-held mirror. Tensei has an identical one, a gift from their shared mentor before his first long-term C-rank to Hari-mura so he could fix his paint on the go. “I have an idea,” Rooster says again, “but you’re really gonna have to work with me here.”

Well, Tensei has never been one to knock an idea before he hears it. “All ears, senpai.”

::::::

Tensei has been barred from taking any ‘official’ D-ranks on account of his new status— read: still an errand boy for anyone important enough to order him around, but now for free. Skies forbid he turn down Head Councilor Hiroshi’s request to go fetch him this or that when they bump into each other in the halls of the office building.

Which meant he had to turn Yua down when she suggested taking a joint mission together. An excuse to hang out, probably, since he knows she has friends aplenty. They made such a big deal out of a few stalks of flowers— his uncle’s flowers. Tensei can only appreciate the irony that is Yashamaru-oji growing blue irises in the house now that the man is dead, but his uncle isn’t here anymore to mind if he snips off a couple blossoms. An apology gift, since he overheard that his father had a meeting with the director of the hospital that morning. It’s Rasa’s fault that Yua’s mother couldn’t make her own daughter’s graduation, and Tensei knows that his own presence wasn’t nearly enough to make up for it, so. Impromptu flowers.

On the other hand, they’ve ended up at the stage where accidental meetings become wandering the markets together, pointing out things that they find interesting. Yua has a seemingly endless supply of anecdotes to connect to each one, and listens when Tensei goes on whatever tangent catches his fancy in turn.

And, now that she's legally no longer a civilian, Tensei offers to spar her.

Her wire-work is much less subtle than Uchiha Itachi’s, and she explains that she’s trying to be less predictable about her placements. “I learned how to weave dreamcatchers from my grandmother when I was little,” she tells him. “So my patterns tend to be repetitive and predictable, even when I’m trying not to.”

Fair enough, but Tensei can’t help but admire how pretty the results are. How pretty Yua is, too. Fair skin like his notation scrolls and silky black hair like ink and blue eyes like the sky— also, the fact that she doesn't ever avert her gaze from the exposed scars on his left like most civilians have started doing out of some misguided sense of politeness. Just because they came from his baby brother, honestly, it was an accident. Tensei will never be ashamed of them, but walking side-by-side with Yua as a relatively unblemished comparison, he does wonder if they stand out more.

And yeah, it’s obvious what the Hoki family are gunning for. The matriarchal legacy-lineage of healing in their clan is both legit and a cover for their other activities— what little Rasa did have to say featured a lot of political meddling. But Yua's nice, and it’s impressive how flawless her full face of makeup is every time Tensei sees her, and…

“You have a crush,” Rooster snorts. “My kohai has an itty-bitty crush on an itty-bitty girl, what will he dooooo—”

Tensei tries to whack the older puppeteer, mostly unsuccessfully. “Stop— stop it, shut up, skies above. You might as well announce it to the whole Playhouse.”

Rooster stands up, hands cupped around his mouth.

“I regret telling you anything,” Tensei deadpans, scrambling to tackle him back down.

His father has him in the office more and more often. Mission reports that are clearly classified and foreign representatives alike are delivered to the Kazekage with Tensei present, who doesn’t even need his one good eye to see where this is going. No reason to panic— that seat behind the desk is Gaara’s fate. Not Tensei’s. So it won’t matter how the Kazekage tries to mold his head to the hat if Tensei just doesn’t take it, right?

And then Rooster-senpai catches his little brother lurking in the shadows of the Playhouse without a sponsor and makes noises about, “Not being responsible for a second Kazekage kid, jan.”

Tensei is hit with sudden clarity on where future-Kankuro gets his verbal tic from.

Present-Kankuro is nearly the same age as Tensei had been when he first followed Rooster in— eight— and a few years older than the last time he’d tried to sneak in without permission. He’s impressed, really, so he takes it upon himself to lead Kankuro into the Playhouse for his second time through the proper entrance. Which makes Tensei, Kanuro’s sponsor, as far as he can tell. Family sponsoring family is more common than not, actually, so they should be in the clear.

"No," Dragon says when he spots them.

Or not.

"Why," Tensei stands his ground, all-too aware of the small hand fisting the hem of his shirt.

"He looks too much like his grandfather."

Natsu-ojiisan? Tensei makes a note to go digging in the archives later for whatever the man did to offend the Playhouse. Skies above, his family history is a mess. "Neither of us are our grandfather," he says, exasperated.

"Never even met him," his little brother adds.

True, for the both of them. Natsu-ojiisan died years before Tensei was born. "Come on, Dragon," he wheedles. "I'm not asking you to train him or anything. He's under my sponsorship."

Dragon taps his nose— a warning. But he doesn't stop Tensei from moving past him with Kankuro trailing behind.

Tensei ushers his little brother into the corner of Section nineteen and takes a moment to consider the folding wall divider that he's never really used.

He closes it.

Tensei starts his little brother off on making the miniature ningyo-joruri puppets used for performances on the Mat, and when the younger is drawn by the pull of deadlier things, Tensei takes off his own apprentice hood and places it atop Kankuro's head like the whisper of a promise.

“It’s less frustrating to scrap your work when you start small than with the big stuff,” he cajoles. He knows that intimately.

Kankuro grumbles dramatically but tugs the too-large hood out of his eyes and goes back to following along.

Chapter Text

71年, December

Tensei is not about to die so if his instincts can stop screaming that about his not-quite six year old baby brother, that would be wonderful, please and thank you.

“Why don’t you kill people,” Gaara asks him. No small talk, no lead up, just a question of his moral functions at two in the morning.

“I do kill people,” he replies instead of holy Jesus and mother of Mary when the fuck did you get here. For one, they don’t exist in this world, and for the other, it isn’t his brother’s fault that the Shukaku can play at concealing chakra signatures with the best of them. “But I don’t think that’s what you mean, is it? Try using better words.”

“Why don’t you kill people who hurt you?”

The runaway genin, headed towards Bamboo Country. A tied-up kunoichi, forced to her knees. “I do that, too," Tensei says. "Come on, try again.”

Gaara takes a moment, mulls it over. “Why don’t you kill people who hurt you in the village,” he decides.

“Because then, someone stronger than me is going to kill me for it.” It’s not the only reason, not even his main one, but it’s the easiest to start Gaara off with. “Or if I run so they can’t, then there will always be someone trying to hunt me down and I can never feel safe in my home, ever again. But also, even if someone hurts me, there’s usually another reason behind it— and not that they want me to die or bleed.”

“The children at the Academy hurt each other,” Gaara says, “No one tries to kill them for it.”

“True,” Tensei hums. He can see how that might set a contradictory example, from his baby brother’s point of view. “Two people can do whatever they want with each other if they both agree to it, and as long as they have all the information about what they’re agreeing to, then it isn’t anybody’s fault when one or both of them end up hurt,” he tries to explain. “This is called consent. Can I give you an example?”

“Yes.”

“Okay. Can I touch your shoulders?”

“...yes.”

Tensei reaches out, slowly, carefully, the way he always moves around Gaara these days. The thin layer of sand underneath his hands scatters by the time he places them on his littlest brother’s shoulders. “I just asked for consent,” he tells Gaara, “and you gave it to me by saying yes. You can also take it away by saying you don’t want my hands on your shoulders anymore, and you can refuse to give it in the first place by saying 'no'.” Gaara blinks, and Tensei can see that he doesn’t quite get the point of his demonstration. He sighs. “Here’s a better example, then: I’m going to ask you if I can give you a hug, and you say ‘yes’ if you want it, or ‘no’ if you don’t. Gaara, can I give you a hug?”

“No.”

“Then I won’t hug you right now, even if I really want to, because you said ‘no’. It would be the same thing if I asked you to give me a hug, and you said ‘no’.” Tensei withdraws his hands. “At the Academy,” he continues, “two kids will agree to hurt each other a little bit with the knowledge that the instructor is there to stop them from going too far, like breaking a bone or killing the other. This is called a spar, and shinobi do it a lot because it’s one way to practice something like an ability or technique. The same way Kankuro had to practice painting his Face when he wakes up before Temari stopped laughing at him,” he adds, trying to draw a relevant connection, “because he couldn’t paint it very well or very fast at first without practice.”

Gaara furrows his non-existent eyebrows. “They practice hurting each other,” he says slowly, “For when they kill each other later?”

Fuck. “They practice hurting each other so they can hurt anyone who tries to kill them later,” Tensei corrects. “And so they know what the other can do and how they can help each other, if they have to work together.”

“Tou-sama says I have to work with Kankuro and Temari on a team one day.”

“Mm.” That was always the plan. “What do you think about that?”

“No.”

Oh. This is… a predicament. “The kind of consent we were just talking about is called ‘explicit consent’,” he says, scrambling for the right words to amend his first demonstration. “Explicit consent is pretty clear and applies to specific situations, but there’s other kinds of consent, too. Non-explicit consent is harder to figure out because there’s different types and a lot of them rely on social cues, which is why I didn’t tell you about it at first. It’s like how you didn’t say you wanted me to stop touching your shoulders but I took my hands away anyways,” he offers as an example. “That’s called ‘implicit consent’, which is one type. Another type is ‘blanket consent’, which is what our father has as the Kazekage. Everyone who’s a shinobi or training to be a one gives him blanket consent to tell us what to do, because that’s what we agree to when we become Sunagakure’s shinobi. Otou-san especially has blanket consent over us, because we’re his children, even if he shouldn’t.”

“Why.”

“Use your words, please.”

“Why, ‘he shouldn’t’.”

“Because we’re human beings, and we deserve to be asked for our consent sometimes even if there’s already blanket consent.” Then Tensei sighs, because this is complicated, godammit. “But we’re also shinobi, which means a lot of the time other people won’t care about our consent. We hurt and kill other people and are hurt and killed in turn all the time without consent, which is really called ‘assault’ and ‘murder’, even if only civilians talk about it like that. That’s why we make our homes with people who do care about our consent, and people who don’t are the enemy that we try to keep away.”

The furrow deepens. “People don’t care about mine,” Gaara says. “So I don’t have a home.”

Fuck. “Gaara, can I hug you?”

“No.”

So Tensei doesn’t, even if the urge is there, and it proves his next point. “I care about your consent,” he says fiercely. “You will always have a home with me. And we can explain it to Temari and Kankuro and Baki until they do, too, okay? I promise.”

“People try to kill me here. Sunagakure no Sato is not my home.”

“Sunagakure no Sato is your home,” he counters, and maybe fucks around a little with treason when he says, “The people who try to kill you are enemies, and you have my blessing to kill them if they try.”

“People try to hurt me, too.”

“And you shouldn’t hurt them when neither you nor they have all of the information.” Tensei runs a hand through his hair, still searching for the correct words to get through to his baby brother. “You’ve heard them call you a monster before, right? People who try to hurt you without your consent either don’t understand your situation because they’re scared of you, or because you killing and hurting other people makes them feel like they’re right for trying to hurt you. Most of them aren’t bad people, just confused and mistaken and hurting on the inside, which makes them want to hurt other people. Like you. And we shouldn’t kill the people in our village if they’re not actually bad or actively trying to kill us, okay?”

Gaara stares at him. Tensei would appreciate some verbal confirmation, a nod, even a ‘no’.

His littlest brother leaves the room. Tensei sighs.

::::::

72年, February

A plus about keeping your Face painted in public at all times that no one really tells you is how unrecognizable you are when you take it off.

Not to himself, obviously, and probably not to his family or their guards either, but paired with the disguise he has on? It’s enough.

He walks into the Playhouse as Tensei of the Kazekage legacy-lineage, and he walks out as Tomoko, an apprentice puppeteer.

It’s good infiltration practice, he tells himself. Hair let down and parted three-fourths to the left; bangs combined to cover one side of his face almost entirely; dressed in either one of two yukata that he told the shopkeep was a present for Temari when she got older; wearing his mother’s old strap-sandals from the depths of the dressing room closet; the slightest bit of red paint on his lips like great grandmother Ami has in her portrait on the shrine. If he keeps his head slightly bowed at all times and the stride of his walk small, hands clasped or close to his sides— Tomoko is a nice, quiet girl who occasionally shops for her grandparents in the lower markets when they have a hankering for something unusual.

It’s different from a henge. Tomoko’s habit of playing with her fingers and the way she stands and the relaxed way she speaks feels like slipping on a skin that he’s outgrown, but a familiar, comforting one nonetheless.

“Here again, Tomo-chan?” the stall owner greets him. “Give me a minute, just did a change. Oil needs to heat up first.”

Tensei smiles into his knuckles. “Don’t bother rushing, Ryota-san. I got permission to be here.”

“Oiya, no threat of your ma charging through those doors, then?”

“This time,” he says. Because Tomoko has a stern mother who disapproves of girls on their lonesome in a place like the lower markets of District Four, and all it took was one genjutsu of a put-together, middle-aged brunette ducking under the flaps on a slow day to fetch her wandering daughter before Tomoko had an established excuse for being so shy around strangers. “Okan got nothin’ in the face of Jii-san when he’s craving for your fried tails.” A treat that he used to have to get from Rooster like some kind of contraband, since lizard isn’t exactly considered the most socially conventional food.

“You gotta get ol’ Kotaro-san to hobble his way here someday,” Ryota snorts. “Tell him how lucky he is to have a granddaughter braving the afternoon heat at his beck an’ call.”

Tensei waves it aside. “Nah, better this than the dark. Blind as a mouse and cold to boot.”

And that’s when Rooster walks in.

“Tomoko-chan,” he whines, aggrieved and disgruntled and not at all serious as he slides into the seat to Tensei’s right. Ryuto-san greets him with the same cheer that he greeted Tamoko-chan with, because the rule of the lower markets is to give zero fucks about other people’s business as long as it doesn’t interfere with yours. His hood is off, and so is his Face that he insists on never changing despite what tradition would dictate. Tensei can still see a hint of make-up, though, if he’s looking for it; some contouring around the cheekbones and jaw to make everything look sharper. “You didn’t wait for me.”

Tensei shrugs. “You were late,” he tells the man that’s supposed to be Tomoko’s unruly boy-next-door type of family friend. Dark brown hair, combed back in a grown-out mohawk— not unlike a rooster's crown. A combination of dyed chalk in his hair and the shadow cast by his apprentice hood gives the impression that Tensei is a brunette, too. The black contacts are doing their fair share of work as well to make him look more local, covering up the 'exotic' western eyes that he got from his mother. “What took you so long?” 

“Got caught up in one of the Triple Terrors’ pranks. Had to give them a good beating.”

Those three new sponsorees that he keeps hearing about? Oh, skies, he’s so glad he hasn’t run into them yet, especially today of all days. Tensei would have waited, but the past couple of hours sitting at a desk has been grinding away at his patience on both ends. “Sounds eventful.” It’s a good thing that he doesn’t need Rooster’s help for Tomoko’s transformation anymore— barely needed it the first time, really, the introductory lesson more of a reminder than anything. “Still down to visit Kotaro-jii after we’re done shopping?” Meaning hanging out in Rooster’s housing unit while Tensei whips up something with green in it for the two of them, because both his senpai’s diet and cooking is a travesty and Rooster likes having someone to talk to while he does the cleaning.

A little boring of them, he knows, but Rooster took him to the underground fighting rings where people placed bets on various genin competitors all of one time before Tensei nope’d out of there. Not that it made him uncomfortable or anything— he has no problem with how his senpai spent the first couple years of his shinobi career— but watching made him feel… itchy, and Tamako definitely cannot afford to try her hand out in the ring.

Besides, Rooster’s place is pretty cool, stuffed with weird knick-knacks and a polished collection of semi-precious stones. Tensei had only been there once before Tomoko was an option, mostly because the anbu that followed him around everywhere before he came back from Konoha were all snitches and his father banned him under no uncertain orders. Temari’s brought Sen and Yome over to their compound plenty of times, and Kankuro has even had dinner at Asa and Botan’s homes before. It’s not like Tensei’s doing anything wrong.

“Only if he doesn’t try to feed me bell peppers again,” Rooster says.

Tensei grins, because it’s his birthday and there are absolutely plans to shove a chicken salad at Rooster later while his senpai can’t say no. "No promises."

Chapter Text

72年, April

"Why are you so loud?"

"Well, it doesn't matter if Anigo's not home, jan."

Gaara stays in his corner, shadowed by the dark. Temari and Kankuro are trying to be sneaky and silent, like the flowers that follow them.

The only thing they are succeeding at being is small. Like ants.

…Gaara kind of likes ants, though. They’ll crunch if you crush them.

He's not supposed to, though, if they're not trying to kill him him. Temari wants him alive. She makes food for him, sometimes, with or without the black.

Kankuro. Kankuro wants him to apologizahahahahaha! Kankuro doesn’t talk to him, most days. But the black likes him, and the sand likes him, so Kankuro will stay.

Only both Kankuro and Temari are trying to sneak into the depths of the black’s den, and they need red on the lock.

Gaara has the key. He has a vial of red for the lock. It can be a safe space, okay? See, here’s a lamp so it’s not so dark— ta-da! And the picture books are on this shelf. As long as you don’t touch inside those pots, you can come in here anytime, and Primrose can’t follow you. No one can get in except for me, or if you let them in. So there’s no one to hurt you, here.

No one hurts him. Ever. But they try. And no one tries in the heart of the black’s den.

“You’d think ours would work, too.”

“Just because we’re related doesn’t mean it does the same things!”

“But you can tell this is where you’re supposed to put it! See, that’s a fingerprint, jan.”

“Duh, the shorthand for ‘open’ is right there. I’m starting to think that this stupid closet isn’t worth it.”

The black used to keep the entrance to his room locked, too. Until he gave the red to Gaara. Before, everyone had to knock. Everyone still has to knock, when the door is closed. And it was closed like it always is when the black is not in his den, except Temari and Kankuro didn’t knock.

“Do you have a better hiding place? If Tou-sama finds out we broke Hana-obaasan’s vase, we’re dead.”

They’re hiding? They’re being hunted?

“You know, I almost wish Shigezane-teme were still here. Two against one— we could’ve blamed it on him.”

The sand rattles. Temari and Kankuro do not belong to the prey that are hunted.

He clutches the vial of red in his pocket.

Tell me when this runs out, and I’ll get you some more, okay?

Why.

Use your words, Gaara.

Why would you make yourself bleed?

Well, I don’t mind bleeding a little for you if it’ll help. Or Temari, or Kankuro. We all share a bit of this stuff running through our veins, you know— actually, you’ve never seen your own blood, right? But we share some, too, because you came from our mother the same as the rest of us siblings.

Kaa-san.

Gaara remembers Yashamaru’s last words to him. He remembers them well. He carved the most important one into his flesh, even. And Yashamaru lied, because the black is still here.

All she ever wanted for you was love— to love, and be loved, and look at what you’ve done to her own flesh and blood.

You killed her son.

There’s no love for anyone but yourself in that heart, is there?

So Yashamaru must have been wrong about the other thing, too.

He clutches the vial of red in his pocket, and drops down from the corner of the wall.

“Gaara?”

The door is open. He knocks, anyways, on the doorframe. Rio said knocking is better than not knocking.

“No, it’s okay, he can be in on it too if we just— wait, what’s that?”

There is a seal on the vial, but not a lock. He peels it back, and the red almost smells fresh. It almost feels fresh, too, warm and wet. If he looks at his hand like this, he can pretend that the red is his, even.

But now is not the time for looking. He takes his finger out of the glass and presses it against thick paper on the door.

“That’s— why do you have so much of Anigo’s blood?” Kankuro moves to take the red from him, but Temari swats his hand back down.

“Look at the seal, you idiot, obviously Tensei-nii gave it to him!”

“For hiding,” Gaara says. Because that’s what the closet is for. “And reading.” Tou-sama makes him read the things that Rio gives him, but Gaara likes the picture books better. There’s a new one on the shelf about giant black and white birds and white bears that live in a cold, white desert. He knows it's new because it only appeared the last time he was in here, a week ago, when the black came back from a mission outside of the walls. It doesn't have the names Ainu or Reki or Tensei scrawled on the inside of the cover. Gaara is going to write his own in it after he finishes.

It's too dark to read right now, though. Gaara steps inside and clicks on the lamp.

Temari and Kankuro stare at him.

Temari takes a step forward, and then stops.

Gaara blinks slowly at them, and the sand settles against his skin. Maybe he needs to use his words. “Ta-da,” he tries.

This time, it's Kankuro who moves. "You're complicit now," he's informed as Kankuro heads straight for the pots that he's not supposed to touch.

Gaara doesn't know what that means. He looks to Temari. "We won't say anything if you don't," she tells him.

Oh, good. Gaara is just about done with words for the day.

::::::

Tensei would very much like to scream right now. Unfortunately, he happens to be sitting next to a rather pretty girl and the renewed presence of an anbu guard who would definitely be alarmed if he did.

To elaborate— Tensei had shown up at ten-hundred hours that morning to Training Ground Eleven with agent Orchid on his tail, because he’s not going to cancel his plans on account of a failed assassination attempt on the Kazekage. Yes, Otou-san, he’s being careful, no, he’s not interacting with any suspicious individuals, why does he still need a guard as a chunin?

So Tensei is pretty dang aware that the iron mantle on his shoulders and dark rings around his eyes might not make for the most easy-going sight, and he doesn’t blame Yua’s mentor for instinctively chucking several kunai at him when he drops out of a shunshin. Saon-sensei is a respectable tokubetsu jounin that Tensei has seen a handful of times at the mission desk before, but mostly, he remembers the man from one incident in particular. A tracker and a weasel and the damning scent of sawdust on iron, buried in the sand. His father wouldn't have assigned Saon to the search team all those years ago if he weren't a capable shinobi, although Tensei’s not sure if Rasa knew that Saon-sensei comes from an offshoot branch of the Hoki clan. It took some digging to find the evidence for Yua’s claim upon introducing them to each other— Saon is the second cousin once-removed of the retired former director of the hospital, whereas Yua is the grandniece, meaning the student-teacher duo share a set of great-grandparents. Considering the fact that there are nearly ten thousand shinobi in Sunagakure’s active forces among a population of thirty-something thousand, Tensei was kind of surprised to find records of about sixty people with confirmed ties to the Hoki clan. Which doesn’t sound like a lot, but much of those sixty are in favorable positions among the chain of command either in the hospital or as commanding officers of bureaucratic roles. Rasa’s peeved mutterings about said clan makes a little more sense, now, in hindsight.

But that’s not what he wants to scream about.

Tensei would not identify himself as a gentleman by nature, considering a past life lived in a western, first-world nation. A gentleman by nurture, more like, lectured into the crevices of his brain by Aiya-sensei. So he shows up a little early to training ground eleven with an extra canteen of chilled water in his bag, an extra copy of A Comprehensive Treatise of Iryo-Ninjutsu; Level Four that Yua asked if he could get for her while he was buying his own, and no intention of letting her pay him back. There’s a bench and a table underneath a small outcropping of sandstone at one end of the training ground, rough and unpolished with all the signs of having been yanked out of the canyon walls with an earth release technique. But the curve of said wall surprisingly directs a cool breeze into the space from time to time, making it a great outdoors study area, because— and Tensei is still pissed about this— Sunagakure has no public library. Honestly, he needs to find a mission or some excuse that will send him back to Kannan-shi one of these days; the two and a half days he’d spent there for the daimyo’s inauguration hadn’t been nearly enough time to really hunker down and see what the scholars of the capital had to offer.

Anyways, Tensei agreed to a study session because he’s been meaning to read the rest of this series for a while now. Yua’s curriculum has her going in order from the first to the sixth, but more often than not, Chiyo-baasama specifically chucks whatever relevant edition she has about the topic at hand in his direction with vague instructions to read from “somewhere in the middle” to “thirty pages from the end”. Tensei is grateful that the table of contents actually outlines said contents, because what Chiyo-baasama usually means is the part pertaining to the theory behind some aspect of biology or chemistry that her explanations skimp on. Under her legacy as a poison mistress, Tensei’s education has been greatly skewed towards the what-can-kill-you-and-how part of medicine rather than the fixing people part.

Which is why he’s never read the fourth book in the series of treatises, a deep dive into the history behind the discovery of diseases and the technological advancements that this anachronistic world has to offer. Which is why Tensei locks onto the katakana characters of two specific kanji, and nearly stops breathing because if he doesn’t then he will scream.

Sai-kin. ‘Small fungus’. The microscopic bacteria and viruses and whatnot that can cause a living being to fall ill, discovered only one measly decade before the end of the Warring States Era. Or, as the author adds how the discoverer originally named it, jyaamazu.

Germs. Germ theory. There are hints of scientific English terminology in this book from a world that has never been exposed to a language other than Japanese, beyond a smattering of slang from the depths of Lightning Country. And it’s clearly not a one-off, because the very next paragraph notes that jyaamuzu theory suggested that it was not miasma of bad air that caused inflammation and sickness in wounds, but inufekushon, also known as kansen, the ‘dyeing of feeling’ with the kanji for ‘dye’ having connotations to spreading and being the same as the one used to describe contamination.

Otherwise known in English as an infection.

Holy shit. Tensei is not the first person to be reincarnated into this world with intact memories from a previous life. Holy shit.

“Ano, Tensei-kun?” And any other time, Tensei might cheer at the reminder that he’s finally managed to get Yua to drop the -dono honorific, but right now he’s busy scouring the citations like a madman. “Did you find something?”

“Just curious about a source, is all.” There. The General Manual on Good Health by Yamada Makoto. He’s read excerpts from it before, since it’s considered the leading text in the medicinal field. If Tensei is remembering the preface correctly, the first edition would have been published a few years before germ theory became widespread. So he flips to the index and tracks down the pages that mentions the manual, skims down from the heading titled kouseibusshitsu, as in ‘antibiotics’, and—

Penishirin is an antibiotic invented by a civilian healer of a village in the Land of Fire called Chiyuku, hailed at the time as a miracle. The first samples were grown in the shed behind the healer’s practice with a carefully-maintained environment…

Penicillin.

Tensei braces himself against the table and lets out a long stream of air. The ramifications of not being the first, of not being the only one in his situation— Tensei has so many questions. A civilian healer in the last years of the Warring States era, in the Land of Fire. Too far-removed from the action to influence either the Uchiha or Senju and make a difference to the plot? Or simply unknowing of a story told in ink on paper? But no, they wouldn’t have been one of Enma-Dai’O’s if the god mentioned that he hadn’t gotten around to siccing an Executioner on this world before Tensei— but no, an Executioner, this person was a healer—

“Not to be rude, but I’ve been wondering whether that expression you make means that you’re lost in a lot of thoughts, or if they’ve all suddenly left.”

He blinks.

Yua is fiddling with the corner of a page, but even with her eyes on the text, Tensei can tell that she’s not actively reading. “It’s usually the former,” he says, one hand coming up to scratch the back of his neck. Rio-sensei is less strict about demanding his full attention at all times during a conversation than Aiya-sensei was, but Tensei is aware that he has a bad habit of zoning in and tuning out whenever his mind latches onto a particular stream of thought. “Was I making a face?”

“Oh, no, not really!” Yua holds her hands up, palms facing him as if in a placating manner. “It’s just your eyes. They kind of glaze over, a little.”

“Huh.” Good to know, actually. It’s not the most obvious of tells, but he should probably get a handle on it. “Sorry, I got us off track. Did you still want to compare our Mystic Palms?”

“If you don’t mind.”

Not really. Tensei’s got a new block of researching shoved unexpectedly into his mental schedule and not a whole lot of hope that he’ll find this civilian healer when they weren’t even named in a book dedicated to historical documentation, but he’s not going to ditch Yua for that. He removes his vambraces to tear a shallow line down his forearm with his sharpened canine just as her hand lights up with a blue-green glow. “Oh, you need to filter more of your nature-type to neutralize your chakra,” he catches onto the problem right away. He ran into a similar issue the first couple times that he tried it without a correct point of visual comparison. “See how the green is more turquoise than mint, right now?”

Yua opens her mouth. Closes it. Opens it again, and squeaks, “You didn’t have to do that.”

What, the nick on his arm? “Well, it had to be one of us.”

“No? I brought a lizard!”

She rummages in her bag for a second and pulls out a small cardboard box with holes in the lid, and Tensei watches incredulously when she presents a tiny baby reptile. Even without complex facial muscles, Tensei can’t help but think that it looks distinctly disgruntled. “You kept a living, breathing lizard in your bookbag for the past several hours?”

“Better than ripping into your arm at a moment’s notice for a demonstration,” she says defensively. Both options are kind of ridiculous, actually, and Tensei doesn’t bother to try holding back the laugh that pours out of him. “Fine, give it here, but you have to tell me if I’m messing up! Kaa-san hasn’t let me try this on humans yet.”

Eh. Depending on her chakra nature, the worst she could probably manage to do is make the process feel one of five different types of uncomfortable. “This humble practice dummy has every faith in the great Yua-sensei,” he tries and fails to go for a serious tone, and Yua dissolves into nervous giggles right alongside him.

Chapter Text

72年, May

Kankuro has had a day.

A good day, to begin with. Temari had let him sleep in for an extra quarter of an hour because Anigo woke up early enough to make breakfast— the one meal that he usually leaves them to prepare themselves, now that they’re old enough to be ‘trusted in the kitchen alone’— and Kankuro is wearing his favorite shirt with a hood that he sewed on all by himself. All of his homework had been finished last night with time to spare half an hour of practice making chakra threads under Anigo's supervision, and he even put a few bills into the oud player's way to the Academy. Good karma and maintaining his family's image and their duty to Sunagakure's people, blah blah blah. Just because Aiya-sensei's lessons are boring doesn't mean that Kankuro isn't listening.

Class is okay, too. Roma-sensei leads them through several sets of the Thorns kata in the courtyard while the morning is still cool, even if they're not allowed to spar today, and they get to hear about the Niclaime after suffering through an hour of multiplication practice. His puppetry extracurricular is the last class on his schedule before lunch, and Kankuro spends it swapping sketches of creeping, crawling puppet designs with Asa while the instructor lectures about segmentation and range of motion.

It's only when they're lining up in the cafeteria that things go bad.

"He didn't even get to use it," Arui complains from a few places ahead. "I mean, if I made a whole new kind of puppet that no one else ever made before, and then someone takes it to kill me? I'd be so mad!"

“You would be so dead, actually," Kankuro mutters under his breath, and Botan snickers.

"What was that?"

He turns around to face the others, and tilts his chin up. "I said, ‘you would be so dead, actually’. Since it killed you and all.”

Arui rolls his eyes. "It was a metaphor. What, too good to pay attention in class like the rest of us?"

“It was a bad metaphor, jan."

"And you can't really compare finding someone with magnet release to making a puppet," Asa points out. “Sandaime-sama was a person.”

"No, it was a great metaphor, 'cuz Nidaime-sama puppeteer!" Arui's friend rounds on them. "You're just stupid and jealous that you can't figure your lineage’s kekkei-genkai out.” 

"Could if I wanted to," Kankuro retorts. "I just like puppets better, is all."

"Then— then you're just mad that Nidaime-sama handled the Shukaku better than your dad did!"

Botan tucks the loose hem of his top into his shorts. Asa sighs and rolls up his sleeves.

Kankuro says nothing, palming the snake puppet in his pocket that he'd snuck outside the classroom. Arui lets out a smug huff, turning back around.

And then Kankuro shoves the puppet down Arui's shirt.

::::::

“Tensei-dono.”

"Haru-sensei," Tensei greets his former teacher at the Academy gates. Usually, an exchange of nods from across the courtyard is all that passes between them when Tensei comes to pick his siblings, but there have been a few exceptions before— namely, when Temari gets in trouble. “What can I do for you today?”

Haru-sensei gives him a long-suffering look. “Kankuro was involved in a fight.”

Huh. That’s new. “Is everyone alright?” he asks, falling into step beside the older woman as she turns to lead him into the building. 

“Nothing that couldn’t be handled with a spot of gauze. The injured child’s guardian insisted on holding your siblings in the office until you arrived, though.”

Meaning, Temari was nearby and jumped in to help. He wouldn’t have expected any less. “Sitrep?”

Petty insults in the lunch line led to tiny bite marks from the sharpened teeth of a snake puppet, shoved down a classmate’s shirt. Supposedly, a child named Nemaru threw the first punch on the victim’s behalf, and Kankuro, Botan, and Asa had responded in kind before Temari and her friends left their table across the cafeteria to join in. The four-versus-six tussle was probably exactly as one-sided as it sounds, so Tensei takes a deep breath, straightening up to emphasize all one hundred fifty-eight centimeters that his thirteen years in this world has granted him, and prepares to play at being a reasonable adult again.

On the bright side, the mother seems to have lost some of her steam in the time that she’s been waiting for him. Tensei offers Sen and Yome a quick smile in greeting and purposefully addresses their parents first, keeping in mind that they’re civilians and thus more easily rattled by things like this. The ice pack on Yome’s forehead probably isn’t helping their impression of a shinobi education. 

“I apologize for not being present to resolve the situation sooner,” Kankuro’s homeroom instructor says.

“No one can be everywhere at once. I’m sure the students are a handful whether or not they’re within the walls of your class— Kankuro definitely can be, sometimes.” 

“Anigo,” his little brother starts, but Tensei cuts him off with a shake of his head. Better to let the opposition air their grievances, first.

The fact that the mother seems unfazed by his presence instead of Rasa’s suggests that she’s been warned, and yet she still chooses ‘unacceptable behavior coming from someone of the Shodai’s line’ and ‘what would Yondaime-sama think’ to be her leading point. Look at these bloody marks on her son’s back, isn’t that just terrible, how is he expected to learn in an environment like this, hawthorns really do grow in clusters—

“Would you like to repeat that,” Tensei says testily to the last statement.

She hesitates, then decides to plow ahead regardless of the warning in his tone. “Perhaps not yourself,” she backtracks half a step, as if that will do her any favors, “but it’s evident that the Shukaku’s host has… influenced the younger members of your family.”

She’s talking about Gaara. Tensei knows that tensions are still simmering in the aftermath of the last rampage last year, but goddamnit. “What did Arui-kun say to you?” he asks Kankuro.

“Called me stupid for not having magnet release like the Sandaime and said that I was just mad that the Nidaime was better at keeping the Shukaku locked up than Tou-sama is.”

The woman pales. “I called you jealous, not stupid,” her son mutters.

Botan scoffs. “Nah, he called Kankuro stupid and jealous.”

"And I called him a sniveling idiot who whines more than a street dog does when begging for scraps, jan," Kankuro says. 

Tensei ruffles his little brother’s hair, then looks to Temari. She shrugs. “I saw them fighting. Didn’t ask any questions.”

Well, then. “We’re going to have a conversation about conflict resolution,” he tells his siblings, but there’s a tinge of pride to his voice that Tensei doesn’t bother to hide. “Asa, Botan, Sen, Yome— thank you for standing with these two as their friends. If your parents are alright with it, I’d be happy to treat you all to some shaved ice.”  

Arui’s mother purses her lips at the ensuing cheer. Tensei levels a glare right back, mentally apologizing to Haru-sensei and Roma-sensei’s exasperated sighs. They’d be biased in his shoes, too.

Chapter Text

72年, June

Every year, starting on August twenty-eighth and lasting eight days with September fourth being the last, Suna celebrates its founding and the end of summer. The street vendors will have seasonal foods and snacks on hand, shops and stalls invite customers to play a game for the chance to win prizes, and at the end the Playhouse puts on a life-sized ningyo-joruri play of a classic. It's a big production, starting on the Playhouse's steps and circling through the streets of the village before coming to an end at the Sun Theatre.

Every year, Tensei roams the streets with however much of his family and friends he can scrounge up, for however long they’re willing. He doesn’t plan to do anything different this time until someone changes his plans on his behalf.

"You're working minor paints with Aya for the Festival," Chiyo-baasama informs him in passing one day, and Tensei has to scramble to pick his jaw up off the ground. Because only puppeteers in good standing in the Playhouse get to work on the Sunartistry preparations, and that he was chosen means that Tensei has been forgiven.

Tensei helps bring color to props and backgrounds and even a couple of the characters, like his Hawk and The Dunes. "You've got an eye for it," Aya admits begrudgingly, and Tensei snorts at the definitely intentional double entendre.

A master he doesn't recognize displays a map of Suna's eight districts. A red line makes a winding, oblong shape out of the streets, starting from the Playhouse and ending poetically at the Sun Theatre. Tensei stands beside two other puppeteers, Spider and Daichi, as they study the route. The three of them make up this year's escort squad, three apprentices who clear people and snack carts alike out of the way for the play's journey through the streets. "If you're late to rehearsal, we kick you off the squad," the master tells all three of them, eyeing Daichi in particular.

"Yessir," they chorus, and Tensei doesn't bother trying to keep the grin off his face.

::::::

72年, August

The initial rush of the Sunartistry festival dies down after the first few days into a simmering bubble of content, like it always does. There’s still missions going on and grouchy old shinobi scowling at all the noise and decorations, of course, but all goes quiet for Memorial Day.

Otou-san leads their little procession to the family shrine, and Tensei hovers close to his baby brother to position his hands correctly and show him how deep to bow because Rio-sensei only ever gets through half the demonstration before Gaara’s sand defense comes up. A decently common occurrence, or so Tensei’s heard, but the fact of the matter is that everything Gaara knows about manners comes from Yashamaru, and all of those memories have been tainted. He makes sure to keep his movements slow and his hands visible, and in return, Gaara doesn’t let his sand rasp against Tensei’s skin too much.

“I have our grandmother eyes,” Temari notes, picking at the fabric of her floral jalabiya.

“I’m as old as great uncle Kanza was now,” Kankuro says.

Tensei looks to their father, who stands before their grandmother’s picture. “What were Hana-obaasan and Natsu-ojiisan like?” he asks, like he does every year.

Stern, calculating. Fierce, strong. Steady, Hot-blooded. “Fair,” his father says this time, nodding at their grandmother’s picture. Tensei can’t see it, but then again, he never got the chance to know her. “Stubborn,” he gestures at their grandfather’s. “They would have liked you, I think.”

Well, that's great and all, but now Tensei's not sure if he would have liked them back.

There’s a Look in Rasa’s eyes again, but it’s not directed at him this time. It’s not directed at their mother’s picture, either. Their father always stays a few steps away, but Tensei makes sure to walk all of his siblings right up to it and bow perhaps a touch deeper than they ought to after they light the incense. “There’s a little bit of her in all of us,” he tells them. “We carry her breath, now.”

Gaara shuffles beside him. “Is this love?” he asks, and Tensei is suddenly reminded of a much smaller version of his baby brother clutching Yashamaru-oji’s pantleg, hovering at the back of a crowd as Tensei performed the story of The Moon.

He thinks he understands Gaara’s question, then, even without elaboration. “Sometimes the greatest act of love can be to sacrifice ourselves,” Tensei says. “Sometimes, an even greater act of love is staying alive to cherish and protect our important people. And sometimes, we don’t get to pick which we would rather do.”

Gaara’s hand goes up to the scar on his forehead. Tensei sighs and picks his baby brother up. Slowly, slowly— always cautious, these days, and in return Gaara dusts his arms lightly with a coating of sand.

The ruckus of the festival is a bit more subdued after Memorial Day, and the commotion doesn’t really swell up again until the last. His friends send him off at the Playhouse. Spider and Daichi joke that Yua could do better, and Rooster cackles unhelpfully while Tensei tries his best to trip the other apprentices with a chakra string. “Don’t fuck it up,” Aya tells the three of them, and then The Steps of a Prophet kicks off.

One morning, a hunter and his friends rode out into the horizon. Hares, curlews, houbries— they expected to carry much game home in the evening. On the Hunter's wrist sat his best hawk. At a word from its master it would fly high up into the air, and look around for prey. If it chanced to see an outline of tan feathers or fur against the beige of the sand, it would swoop down upon it, swift as any arrow.

All day long the party rode through the woods. However, anything gained from the desert sands must be taken, and they did not find as much game as they expected.

Toward sunhigh they started for home. The Hunter had often ridden through the dunes, and he knew the taste of the wind that would take them home. His Hawk had left his wrist and flown ahead, sure to find its way without him.

But along the way, the day grew hot, and he found that his thirst could not be slaked by what was available in his waterskien.

The Hunter rode slowly along on his camel. He knew the ground here, more rich in clay than the rest of the sandy dunes, and small tributaries would carve up the ground from a small oasis further on. But these streams were ever changing as the sand was ever-shifting, and so the hunter broke away from his party to search.

“Get the dog,” Daichi hisses at Spider.

“No way it doesn’t move, though? If we pick it up, it might bark.”

“Then it barks! What’s the Dragon gonna do, dock us for our nonexistent points?”

Tensei rolls his eyes, lassos the small animal with the chakra strings from two of his fingers, and yanks it towards himself. It does let out a yelp, but Tensei is quick enough that he manages to pinch its muzzle shut with his other hand before it can continue barking. “Cabbage stall up ahead,” he warns his teammates, because the round vegetables are liable to roll out of the cart and into the street when the owner tugs the stall out of the way. Also, why is there a cart that only sells raw vegetables out and about during the Playhouse's parade?

At last, to his joy, he saw some water trickling down over the edge of a rock. In the monsoon season, a swift stream of water always poured down here; but now it came only one drop at a time.

The Hunter descended from his camel. He took a hollow horn from his hunting bag and held it so as to catch the slowly falling drops. It took a long time to fill the cup; and the Hunter was so thirsty that he could hardly wait. When at last it was nearly full, he put the cup to his lips, and was about to drink.

All at once there was a whirring sound in the air, and the cup was knocked from his hands. The water was all spilled upon the ground.

The Hunter looked up to see who had done this. It was the Hawk.

The Hawk flew back and forth a few times, and then alighted among the rocks by the drip.

The Hunter picked up the cup, and again held it to catch the trickling drops. This time he did not wait so long. When the cup was half full, he lifted it toward his mouth. But before it had touched his lips, the Hawk swooped down again, and knocked it from his hands.

And now the Hunter began to grow angry. He tried again; and for the third time the Hawk kept him from drinking.

"How do you dare to act so?" he cried. "If I had you in my hands, I would wring your neck!"

Then he filled the cup again. But before he tried to drink, he drew his blade.

"Now, Hawk," he said, "this is the last time."

He had hardly spoken, before the Hawk swooped down and knocked the cup from his hand. But the Hunter was looking for this. With a quick sweep of the ild he struck the bird as it passed.

The delicate package of paint hidden against its chest bursts open in a small spray of red. The puppet of The Hawk clatters in its descent, as if its strings had been cut rather than pulled taut for an artfully controlled fall. Tensei takes a moment to compare the morbid fate of his handiwork against that of the Face he’s currently wearing, brown hues on white wood versus a violet and lavender blend on tan skin.

The next moment the poor Hawk lay bleeding and dying at its master's feet.

"That is what you get for your pains," said the Hunter. But when he looked for his horn, he found that it had fallen between two rocks, where he could not reach it. "At any rate, I will have a drink from farther still," he said to himself.

With that he began to climb the steep bank to the place from which the water trickled. It was hard work, and the higher he climbed, the thirstier he became.

At last he reached the place. There indeed was a small stream; but what was that lying in the pool, and almost blocking it? It was a huge, snake, of the most venomous kind. Its mouth lay open, its eyes glazed, but most importantly— death dripped from its fangs.

The Hunter stopped. He forgot his thirst. He thought only of the poor dead bird lying on the ground below.

<Reverse,> comes the flared signal cue from the director on the rooftops, and Tensei moves with Spider and Daichi to re-clear the crowd that had closed in behind the procession before it backs up.

"The Hawk saved my life!" he cried, "and how did I repay him? He was mine, and I have killed him." He clambered down the bank, retraced his steps. He took the bird up gently, and laid it in his hunting bag. “My loyal hawk,” he mourned. “My friend.” But there was nothing to be done, for the Hawk was dead.

The Hunter found piercing eyes staring at his soul, and in his grief, plucked them out, and his own as well. “I will see far as you once did,” he murmured, “and I will do it for the sake of the blind. This, I swear on my blood in the sands. This, I swear to do in your honor.”

And so the Hunter mounted his camel, but he was a hunter no longer. For inlaid beneath a heavy brow were the piercing eyes of a friend lost to folly, and it was through these eyes that the Prophet stared onward as he made his way home.

But he did not stop at his home. He greeted his friends and he greeted his kin, and then he bade them all farewell.

All in all, they don’t fuck it up. Act one of The Steps of a Prophet travels through Sunagakure's streets without issue, and the three apprentices share a relieved look with each other as people start flooding into the Sun Theatre to see Act two. <Mission-parameters met,> Spider taps against the metal railing that they’re perched on.

Tensei thinks to himself that maybe, that’s enough.

Chapter Text

72年, October

To his credit, Rasa tries.

“Magnet release doesn’t work the same way moving your sand does,” their father says. “You have to cultivate your own power, separate from the beast inside of you.”

Gaara furrows his brow and tries again. Before him lies four different piles: iron, copper, silver, and gold. Their father uses gold, obviously, and Tensei can, too, but iron is definitely more intuitive. Whereas iron can be pulled towards or repelled against his chakra depending on how he shapes it, gold only repels. Tensei has to really think about how he's throwing around his chakra in order to make those ones do what he wants. That said, neither he nor their father seem to be able to repel sand.

Which they're trying to get Gaara to not do. So far, it seems like Gaara’s having the best luck with their father’s preferred material, but it’s by a thin margin. The gold dust isn’t moving very much.

This isn’t his baby brother’s first training session, even if it’s the first one that Tensei sits in on at Rasa's suggestion. “Try moving your feet,” Tensei says. “It’s what worked for me.”

Gaara kicks, half-hearted action that bends his knee and not much else. The gold dust makes an equally half-hearted twitch.

Their father sighs. Tensei brings a hand up, and then turns it in a painstakingly slow twirling motion to make a meat-skewer out of gold. He hands it carefully over for his baby brother to examine, because maybe Gaara is a tactile learner? Gold is distinctly heavier than his iron, and takes more chakra and finer control to manipulate. The textured detail of the meat is difficult to get right when he has to fight against his usual habits, compared to the smooth sphere of a Third Eye.

Speaking of meat. “I’m hungry,” he tells the two members of his family present in the courtyard. Tensei's going through another growth spurt and it seems like every other week that the counselors and Rio-sensei are tutting about the hems of his clothes being too short for the son of the Kazekage, what will people think?

Eh. Tensei thinks the lightning-bolt stretch marks look kinda cool. “Sou, I need to get started on dinner," he muses when he checks the time. "How about we take a break?” Progress can’t be measured in a day, after all.

::::::

73年, January

“Fucking skies,” Tensei yelps when a pair of hands appear at his sides, his own already clutching the connected arms in an aborted flip. Yua’s perfectly innocent-looking smile is anything but. “You were just over there, though?” he says, jerking his thumb in a direction adjacent to the one she came from.

“That would be a point to me,” she replies, but neither of them are really keeping track of their totals anyways. “Guess who got the vest?”

“You, obviously. Congratulations.” The local chunin exams aren’t open for public viewing, unlike the international ones, but Tensei had every faith in her and maybe also a little birdie with a painted flower mask whispering in his ear.

“Me, obviously,” even though she’s not currently wearing it. “And thank you. It’s at the tailor’s. I’m not sure if I want to keep the pauldrons, though.”

Tensei takes a step back with a considering hum. “Would adding volume to the lower half balance the silhouette or make it worse?” he says, holding up his hands to frame her. Yua gifted him mesh armor as a Harvest Season present that he currently wears asymmetrically at her insistence, one on his left bicep and one on his right shin to replace his bandage-like ankle wraps. Yua had laughed at him once she realized he knew his way around civilian fashion, but not really any of the shinobi trends. Which isn't true! Tensei has decent observational skills, he just doesn't see the practicality in lopsided armor, thank you very much. “Like, if we made your skirt longer and got a flared cut.”

Yua shakes her head. Worse, then. He shrugs and deposits his present in her hands, two scrolls with blue and green ribbon trim to tell them apart. Tensei liked the contrast in texture between the paper and cloth, and it’s a pretty way to add more mass for the anchor. He’d gotten them while shopping with Rooster as Tomoko a while back, since she didn’t have to justify what she’d be doing with them, unlike the Kazekage’s son. “Sealing scrolls? Oh!” Yua runs her hand across the lines of poetry that make up Suna’s jutsu-shiki style, dotted with references of blue eyes and paint and wires. There’s some English in there, too, to help compact things and fudge the ratio a little more. That took him a while to work in without accidentally linking the entire system or turning a portion into a dud— or worse, blowing something up. It's a chore to clean the soot marks off of the courtyard's patio whenever one of his more experimental seals explodes. “There are compartments.”

“You were talking about your painting supplies taking up too much space a few weeks ago.”

“You remembered,” Yua says, like that’s weird.

It’s not. Is it? Sure, his head is stuffed full with two lives worth of memories, but he tries to make room where it counts. “Yeeeess?”

It seems weirder to him that they end up wandering the markets again, despite not looking to buy anything. He doesn’t know why their path always leads them here. Maybe because shopping is how they met— skies, that would sound so dumb out loud.

Poetic, though. He files the thought away for later.

“I’m challenging my cousin for heir’s rights,” Yua tells him, voice lowered to make it harder for Tensei’s guards to eavesdrop. Hard to put up a privacy seal while they’re walking. He's been meaning to try and mobilize the anti-scrying seal that he designed for the Uchiha, since it's really just a super buffed privacy seal anyways.

“Shijima-dono?” he asks, but it’s mostly rhetorical. It’s not like little Hakuto-chan poses any threat, although to be fair, Tensei hasn't met either of them yet.

“Shijima-chan,” she confirms anyway. “So I’m taking the tokubetsu jounin exam in two years. Just you wait— I can boss you around on missions, then.”

The one and only mission they’d run together back in April last year had left a bad taste in his mouth. The chain of command doesn’t actually mean much on a standard C-rank supply run and personnel escort for border patrol, but the way that the other shinobi barely gave Yua a glance despite her being the one with the scroll— well, Tensei thinks it was mostly misogyny at play, but being higher ranked than her hadn’t helped. Maybe it’s just his overactive mind at play, but he thinks Yua was quieter than usual during their pitstop break on the way home. She’d declined going with him to search for a new book to bring back to Gaara, and in hindsight, Tensei kind of regrets leaving her in the teahouse alone if she had been sulking. “We should practice our taijutsu more,” he notes. She needs to hit a baseline for combat before the panel will be willing to consider her specializations in healing and espionage, and Tensei’s guilty of neglecting that aspect in favor of literally anything else these days, too. “But yeah, I’ll just have to keep up.”

“To watch my back.”

“Mm-hm.”

“Only my back?”

“Mm—” Tensei cuts himself off and splutters. “Yua-chan!” She laughs, painted lips covered by her hand in the way that Rio-sensei always scolds Temari for forgetting to do. “You can’t just— okay, but you don’t really have a, um. It’s, like,” he glances around to make sure no one is watching too closely, and then makes a motion that draws a straight line up and down in the air.

“Flat,” she says, and Tensei fake-swats her. “Just you wait,” she echoes herself, “By this time in two years, I’ll be a tokujo and have a fantastic behind.”

“Do you need one?”

“I want one.”

Tensei very valiantly does not bury his head in his hands. “I’m not sure that’s completely up to you,” he mumbles. She’s still covering the lower half of her face, which means she’s smiling wide enough that it could be considered socially impolite, so he doesn't bother to dodge when she fake-swats him back.

::::::

73年, February

After his fifteenth birthday, someone decides that Tensei’s old enough to start shoving administrative duties onto him. He gets to sift through and assign missions as well as take reports at the front desks, which are obviously handled differently than the high-ranking classified stuff that he listens to in the Kazekage’s main office.

Files of genin portfolios get dumped at his personal desk; early applicants for the international chunin exams. Tensei is being trusted to pick five genin this year, and he knows that it’s a test of his decision-making abilities because the exams are going to be held in Earth Country this year.

As in, Iwagakure.

See, here’s the thing about the international chunin exams: each host country may reserve the right to decline the participation of a single one of any of the other countries, no questions asked, no feathers ruffled. It was a sorely-needed clause in the aftermath of the Third Great Shinobi War, when the agreement for this symbolic event of international cooperation was freshly drafted and signed into existence, to prevent giving tempers and bad blood a chance to spark another incident. Considering there are eight participating countries and these international exams have only been held nine times so far, the only nation that’s gone twice as of now is Haze Country, and Amegakure denied Konoha-nin participation both times. Iwagakure denied Kumo-nin and so Kumogakure denied Iwa-nin, but, uh. Suna and Konoha both also denied Iwa. Excluding Iwagakure’s Earth Country, that’s three out of four of the other great nations.

So now it’s Iwa’s turn once more, and they’re denying no one.

Which is both surprising and not. Surprising in that Tensei kind of expected Sunagakure to be the one denied this year— looking over his father’s shoulder has garnered him some awareness of the proxy skirmishes they’ve been in with Iwa recently, in the name of their ally and the minor nation between Wind and Earth, Bird Country. Not surprising, because it’s the tenth anniversary and there are certain expectations that come with that.

Why in the world hand the applicant-acceptance process over to Tensei, though? And as his first assignment independent of Rasa, no less. To make his father look bad when he inevitably fucks this up? Because there are two ways that Tensei can approach this problem: send the weakest, least sociopolitically important genin so that they don’t lose ‘anyone of value’ if Iwa decides to make use of the in-case-of-death liability clause, or send the absolute best that Suna has to offer and put on a performance against an Iwa-aligned majority of the competition. Because every host country ensures that their own participants outnumber any other competitors sent by a lot. It's going to be especially prominent this year, what with Iwa's fifteen thousand to Suna's ten thousand ratio of manpower.

“A hundred ryo says it was Counselor Masafumi who lobbied for this to end up on my desk,” Tensei huffs to Asahi an arm’s length away, manning the missions desk as usual. Or technically, Asahi-senpai, but it feels weird to be calling someone closer in age to his father than himself by that honorific, so Tensei doesn’t. At least, not in the privacy of his own mind.

“No bet,” Asahi says without even looking up.

“Two-hundred on Counselor Ken,” Ume calls out from the other end of the desk.

Tensei raises a brow at her. That’s right, Ume usually runs with the intelligence and ciphers department, doesn’t she. “Sou, what do you know that I don’t?”

Ume cocks her head in return. “That would be telling.”

And they can’t have that, can they. Tensei will just have to go with his gut. At the very least, he knows it wasn’t Dragon— his mentor wouldn’t do that to him. “I’ll take two hundred. Anyone else want in on the pot?”

Because it is so very painfully obvious that everyone in the room has been listening in on their exchange, and probably taking peeks at the paperwork in his folders when he clocks out for lunch as well with the way that no one seems to need any context or clarification of what they’re all betting on. Tensei volunteers his father to be the one to confirm the results and everyone agrees, because Tensei is surrounded by people who know from personal experience how much of an impartial hardass Rasa can be. Ah, the power of solidarity. Rooster would find this hilarious, if only he weren’t so busy falling head over heels making a fool out of himself trying to flirt with Aya. Who’s got a crush now, huh?

He has a great string of mornings spent ambushing people outside of the training grounds, inviting them to lunch, and then interrogating them for their hopes and dreams and concise plans for accomplishing said goals.

“We have a protocol,” his father grumbles, mid-lecture about Tensei’s way not being how-things-are-done-around-here, and Tensei retorts that he isn’t going to decide who gets to represent their village on an international scale based solely on incomplete data from ink on paper.

“You’re scaring my shinobi.” Oh, come on, the Kazekage barely pays any mind to genin. Tensei’s even flaring his chakra in the customary greeting before he shunshins in front of them so that nothing bad comes of an innocent startle-reflex. And he’s the one paying for the meal! The image of politeness!

“Tensei.”

Alright, shutting up now, he knows that tone. “I understand,” he dips his head, and Rasa seems satisfied by that. There are only three people left to review, anyway, and he hasn’t approached them yet. Hopefully they won’t mind being passed over for a lunch-interview?

Chapter Text

73年, February

A report from a Black Sands agent in Fire Country comes in with a report on the massacre of the Uchiha clan, and the appearance of a snapped-prodigy in the bingo books is an easy target to point fingers at— one Uchiha Itachi, Tensei’s opponent from his first Chūnin Exams, for whom there is now a bounty both on the black market and the official one. He looks at the letter next to the soon-to-be-thirteen year old's rank on the bingo book and frowns, because Itachi is peerless and that will be his downfall one day, but the gap is growing too quickly for Tensei's liking.

In this world, though, there's a Uchiha-shaped fruit hurtling towards the Sunagakure at mach speed. Unfortunately, Tensei's not sure if it's a ripe or rotten one.

"Report," his father demands curtly.

An open scroll lies on the desk between them, a perimeter report in standard code, followed by several paragraphs in another code that he just started learning. "Classified information?" he tries.

"At six hundred hours, the tracks of a large group of people were found to have crossed our borders,” his father recites without even glancing at the scroll. Oh, boy. “At seven hundred hours, the scouting team tracked them to a contingent of thirty Uchiha, self-identified by a single member with possession of the sharingan. They claimed to be headed to the ruins of Roran, under an agreement brokered with Suna no Tensei.”

Hang on, there’s supposed to be a password. Pass-phrase. A signal. Whatever, the correct terminology isn’t important right now. “Was there any other message they wanted to pass along?”

Rasa leans forward, eyes narrowed. “Explain yourself.”

Tensei takes a moment to gather his thoughts, stalling for time with a long stream of air. “Recall that my final opponent in my first Chunin Exams was Uchiha Itachi,” he starts. The slightest incline of his father’s head prompts him forward. “I’m unaware which of our anbu alerted me to the delicate atmosphere around the clan, then, but I took it upon myself to arrange a discreet meeting with the clan head and his wife.”

“Alone.” Tensei nods. “With Wicked Eye Fugaku.”

Oh, come on. Tensei knows where this is going. “We were all civilized people, Otou-san,” he says exasperatedly.

“Clearly not, if their heir—”

“What atrocities Uchiha Itachi committed against does not reflect upon the character of hundreds of his victims,” Tensei cuts his father off, and Rasa. Rasa lets him. Skies, that’s a head rush. “He— he led me to their home, which his mother invited me into. We discussed the tentative socio-political position that their clan was driven to after the Nine-Tailed Fox’s attack, and they confirmed my implication that talks of a coup had been instigated.”

“You walked into their den and accused them of treason.”

Well, when put that way, it sounds really bad. “Not exactly. I was invited into their home for a semi-formal tea ceremony bearing a gift,” he corrects half-heartedly. “Whatever topics our discussion may or may not have drifted to had all parties involved acting in a calm manner.”

And thank the skies for the tea, because they had talked for hours. The ‘water-walking practice on the Naka River’ cover was partly because his legs had gone numb from sitting in seiza for so long, actually.

In hindsight, Tensei recognizes that he may have overplayed his cards a little. By revealing an entire slew of information that he by all rights should not have had, he’d presented the two clan leaders with a two-ended threat— like if you told someone all the blackmail material you had on them but said material was gathered illegally. Mutually assured destruction? Except Tensei had been twelve and alone, so yeah, that was dumb of him. He’s lucky that Fugaku and Mikoto were decent people at heart.

Were, because there’s no way they’re part of the thirty people. He’s being realistic here.

His father sighs, one hand reaching up to rub the furrow between his brows. “And what could a child have possibly offered the Uchiha?”

“Privacy seals.” Uh, how aware is his father of Tensei’s hobby, actually? Considering his first display of it had been during his Apprentice Trials, a private event, and the second time was mostly obscured by smoke. Although it’s not like Suna had a fuinjutsu master for Rasa to chuck him at, since Brother Bunpuku died way before Tensei was even born. He refuses to consider Chiyo even remotely well-versed in the craft, considering how faulty Gaara’s seal is. “A sheaf of sixty with enhanced customizations, which I was given permission to do a live-demonstration of. Since you warned me about the Hokage’s all-seeing crystal when you told me to behave for the Yondaime’s inauguration, remember? I thought I’d draw something up, and turns out it made for an invaluable present, considering their activities.”

Judging by the blank look he’s treated to, his father does not, in fact, remember. Which is good, because Tensei is lying by the seat of his pants. Telling them that he first got the idea to invent it because he was annoyed about a puppeteer eavesdropping on him and Rooster just sounds childish, in comparison. “Show me this seal,” Rasa demands, as if Tensei carries a copy of every seal he’s ever made on his person at all times. He can grab a tag once they get home, later.

Except ‘later’ is interrupted after almost an hour of uninterrupted back-and-forth when they’re summoned by the council. An emergency meeting of the utmost importance, the messenger stresses, and the way his father sighs is telling. There’s no way to contain a development of this scale from leaks when the council has eyes and ears everywhere in their force. A grandson here, a niece there, a friend of a friend, an old squadmate— all trying to curry favour with secrets.

Rasa sets his ink brush down with a harsh clack. “We,” his father says, “are going to present a united front.”

“It was your ingenious idea and you sent me to do the talking because there were too many eyes on the Kazekage,” Tensei volunteers. His father shoots him a look, and Tensei dips his head in a tilt— formal equivalent of a shrug. “Do you think they’d believe the truth?”

“I scarcely believe the truth,” Rasa mutters, and together, they approach the battlefield of Conference Room One.

Because truly, it is a battlefield, only with words instead of blades. Yes, the Kazekage was going to inform the council of this development, he’d only intended to put together a proper report first. No, they meant no offense in their delay.

"What do you mean, they're asking for Tensei?" Councilor Jouseki exclaims. "What would a group of rogue Uchiha survivors have to do with him?"

"Tensei-dono,"  his father corrects stiffly, and then all eyes are on him.

The outburst just serves to prove that the leaked information is spotty, though, which works in their favor. So Tensei takes a deep breath and lies for a cause that he believes in. People have the choice to walk towards a better fate, for all that they might never reach it, and he might not know these Uchiha but this is a step in the right direction for more than just thirty weary souls. This is proof— proof that Yashamaru-oji’s death was a fluke because Tensei has the power to change things. Four lives he touched from that clan, one possibly not even a character that ever appeared in ink on paper, and now, a fork in the road. A butterfly’s wings to a hurricane, as the saying from a world lost once went.

Only they get hung up on a familiar topic. “Enhanced privacy seals,” Councilor Iori says skeptically. “And you created this variation by yourself.”

Why. That’s not even the most important part of the topic at hand. Do they want freebies? Is that it? “Yes.”

“When you were twelve.”

These are literally the same people that pushed Academy textbooks at him when he was a toddler, haven’t they had a good amount of time to process his prodigy status? A status that he has, admittedly, fed, but Tensei is aware that his situation is unique. He’s going to plateau as soon as he’s no longer considered a child, because being born with memories of another completely unremarkable lifetime is obviously cheating, and then everyone will be fucking disappointed. “Yes.”

“Against Uzushiogakure’s gift upon the Sandaime Hokage’s inauguration of the all-seeing crystal.”

…okay, that wasn’t in the books. “Yes.”

A moment of silence.

“Get him a piece of paper,” Dragon suggests.

The minute-taker, obviously, steps forth and places a blank scroll in front of him. Do they expect him to just— on the spot? Tensei looks towards his father, and Rasa nods. God fucking dammit, if it’ll get them to move past this, fine. Tensei nicks the pad of his pointer finger and gets to work. No time to make the thing look nice, since it’s complicated enough to take him the better part of ten minutes to draw a single tag.

For the length of a night, be there or not the moon’s light, may nothing be seen, he writes with mostly hiragana characters. To use his copious amounts of construction D-ranks as a metaphor, that line would be the scaffolding. It doesn’t actually limit the seal’s usage to the nighttime, only outlines the intended parameters that he then builds off from. Which is different from the standard solid-foundation-first kind of structure found in sealing scrolls that his audience should be most familiar with, so he gives them the basic rundown as to what he’s putting, where, and why. The border, for example, is supposed to be a chain of half-moons drawn with a fine-tipped brush. Upon activation, the ink would start disappearing along the curved lines, indicating how much longer the seal would last. In lieu of this, Tensei blocks the border off with a thick line of blood and carves the kanji for ‘time’ into the center of each side with his nail. The alteration will make this specific seal last only six minutes instead of the nine hours like on the ones he gave to the Uchiha, he explains, due to the chakra burning through a straight line quicker and also the differences between blood and chakra-infused ink.

Activating it is a process he’s already demonstrated once before, having walked Mikoto through it step-by-step before Itachi came back in from whatever he was doing. He points out how the space variable requires an input of not only four vertices, but their approximate angles as well, given a margin of error between ten and fifteen degrees depending on how much time he’s willing to spend nitpicking the seal. And then he draws said vertices around himself and the two counselors closest to him, with their permission, thus that the shape is more of a kite than a square like Mikoto initially assumed it had to be in.

And then he looks up.

It’s a little awkward that most of the councilors are staring at him, rather than the seal matrix. Tensei catalogs the incremental wrinkles and furrows that tell him who followed along and who is probably feeling pretty lost right now. He’s a little taken aback at the slight tilt to Dragon’s brow, actually— his mentor has seen Tensei use a variety of explosive seals before. Dragon knows that he made his own storage scroll for White Bear, right? That Tensei didn’t commission someone to draw it up for him?

…actually, Tensei can’t actually answer that question definitively in either direction. “Permission to activate the seal?” he asks.

“Granted,” Head Councilor Hiroshi says.

Tensei flares his chakra, and almost immediately, the people outside of his sealed-off area straighten into various states of alert.

“They can’t see us,” Head of Security Councilor Yuma notes, probably a comment on the way several pairs of eyes sweep their area without locking eyes with any of them. “This is… you’ve reverse-engineered Iwagakure’s Hiding in the Camouflage technique?”

The— oh, in that one flashback where three children were sent up against two Iwa-nin before Obito ate dirt. Tensei kind of forgot that jutsu existed. “I suppose so.”

Across from them, Councilor Ken stands up. “Osamu,” he calls out. “Yuma? Say something.”

Next to Tensei, Councilor Osamu makes a noise of interest. “They can’t hear us, either. Curious. The standard privacy seal merely garbles conversation.”

“Is there a reason for that, by the way?” Tensei asks. “Seeing as it’s easier to nullify sound than render it unintelligible. The staggered time variable used to swap the order of each syllable seems unnecessarily complex in comparison.”

Osamu turns an incredulous look onto him, lifting the hood of his brow so that his eyes are actually fully visible. “Sound travels through air. You would have to include a physical barrier in your seal to create such silence—” Tensei sticks his arm out past the perimeter, ignoring for the moment how the rest of the room locks onto his bloody fingers. “Yes, well. I stand corrected.”

Tensei eyes the smears of blood on the table from where he bled past the edges, plus the angular marks on the floor. Someone’s going to have to clean that up, huh. Maybe the paranoia really is getting to him, because that’s his blood, and he’d really rather not have anyone else outside of his family with access to a sample these days.

“Tensei,” his father says. Rasa’s doing a fantastic job sounding calm right now, since from the outside point of view, Tensei's disembodied arm is just floating a length away from the Kazekage’s head. “You can deactivate it, now.”

Tensei flares his chakra again. “He’s reverse-engineered a stationary version of Iwagakure’s Hiding in the Camouflage technique,” Yuma shares his revelation with the others. “As well as negated the requirement for a physical barrier to block the travel of sound.”

"Chakra doesn't have to be a tangible construct to do whatever it’s intended to do, otherwise genjutsu simply wouldn't exist," Tensei reasons. If the downside of not having a teacher means tedious trial and error and seals blowing up in his face— there’s a permanent scorch mark in the courtyard that he may or may not have rearranged their potted plants to hide— then maybe the plus side is not being discouraged by conventional knowledge of limits? “Ideally, it would be mobile, but I can’t quite figure out how to factor that in unless the perimeter markings could follow the user around." A pause, but none of the councilors offer anything else. Tensei clears his throat in the silence. "If I, ah, could trouble the Honourable Council to return to the topic at hand?”

Chapter Text

73年, February

Yua leans into Tensei’s side, reveling in the slight reprieve from the heat of almost-noon. Her friend runs a little colder than most, for reasons she can only wonder. No one who fidgets and moves as constantly as he does can have truly poor circulation— a side-effect of his kekkei-genkai, maybe?

She asks, out of curiosity.

“You might be onto something,” he muses. “I don’t feel anything different from Gaara, but I’d always assumed that Temari and Kankuro run hot. And you… and Rooster.” He snorts at himself, and Yua laughs along, too, because who doesn’t read their own medical files? She thought he was aware of his condition, but apparently not. “Man, hindsight sure is something.”

“None of the nurses ever asked after your borderline hypothermia?” As much as she enjoys using him as a human cooling system after training or on hot days, thirty-five point five degrees is really toeing the line of safety.

Tensei shrugs. “I bet they chalked it up to the weird ‘possessed at birth’ thing that people used to ramble about.” 

For a supposed prodigy, her friend is kind of silly, sometimes. Even now, in the quiet of a lunch break spent on the roof of the Kazekage's office building. Yua had decided the minute she noticed the pinched look in eyes that now was a terrible time to confess. 

Or maybe he already knows. Tensei has hinted, she hasn’t asked, and the both of them keep dancing around the subject. Neither of them have formally declared a courting, as is tradition, and she knows that the village council must be getting just as antsy as her clan elders back in Chukan-mura. 

It would be incorrect to say that she’s compromised. Genuinely reciprocating any feelings that she’s coaxed out of him can only help the mission, but multiple screaming matches with Shijima and a couple talks with some friends have made her a little wary.

“You weren’t in Suna back then, so I guess you might not know,” Emi started, but Yua knew that whatever her friend said, she probably already did. The Hoki make it their business to know everything. “Things didn’t end so well for the last woman to pursue a Kazekage’s heir.”

Yua pursed her lips. “Karura-dono was well-loved.”

“Sure,” Emi agreed. “Didn’t stop the honourable council from pushing for spare after spare after spare. Everyone accredited her tenacity to her kunoichi constitution— what will they ask of you?”

And maybe Yua hadn’t known her friend as well as she thought she did. Emi’s father died on the frontlines of the Third War, and her aunt and grandfather before that in the Second. Everyone who signs up for the Academy is taught that it’s an honor to serve and die for the village, but that doesn’t mean that there isn’t resentment for the lineage that orders them to in the first place.

Except kunoichi are often expected to serve in other ways, as well. Hardier bodies better suited to survive bringing life into the world than a civilian’s, statistically proven by several years’ worth of data in the hospital’s old files. Which isn’t looking at the full picture— it’s harder for women with high stress levels to get pregnant, so most married kunoichi have to retire in order to start a family.

“They wouldn’t so soon,” Yua mumbled. “I haven’t— I just started my monthlies.”

Emi shrugged. “If this is what you want, it’s not a bad thing. Hell, he showed up with flowers for your graduation.”

“Apology flowers.”

“Sure, whatever. I can see the appeal— easy on the eyes and a cushy package deal. I mean, my cousin was in his class for a semester back then, and she used to swoon about him over dinner whenever he did ‘something cool’. Which was, like, every other day.” 

Yua sputtered. “I don’t like him just because he’s rich and good-looking!” Emi gestured for her to continue. “I get that you’ve only met him once, but he’s actually really nice, okay? He cares about what I like, he listens when I have something to say—”

“Your standards are forever broken now,” Emi rolled her eyes. “A bunch of people’s are, I bet, after that stunt he pulled with speed-dating through the Genin Corps. You know the rest of us plebians are just hoping for a man who isn’t an alcoholic or a pervert, right?”

Yua is willing to bet so much ryo that those lunch interviews really were just interviews— Tensei is the type to be a bit oblivious like that, and it was kind of funny. “Maybe your standards are too low,” she countered. 

“Yeah, yeah. I’m just saying to really give it some thought, you know.”

She is. She’s giving it more thought than she’d like, but this is her future they’re talking about, here.

“Don’t let this front get in the way of your true goal,” her mother reminds her often, fending off inquiries and requests for progress updates from Chukan-mura all the while. “Don’t forget what you’re working for.”

Yua has spent the past four years in this canyon in the middle of a desert, but the lush fields of Chukan-mura will always be her home. Childhood friends and distant cousins that she only gets to visit once a year; tatami floors and the familiar bitter smoke of herbal medicine being fired a block away. Her home thrives in a way that Suna has never quite managed to do, for all that it’s smaller and weaker, and Yua wants to keep it that way.

Meaning no offense, but her own cousin would run it into the ground or run away.

“Leadership is not a birthright,” her mother tells her often. "It goes to those who are proven worthy."

The younger sister, Hoki Aia, unable to even issue a challenge for the heirship after a debilitating injury in the field that she hadn’t been conscious enough to heal for herself. The older sister, Hoki Nahima, recalled from her post in Lightning Country to take it up instead. Yua is an only child, but with Shijima, she thinks she can understand her mother a little better. For all that she agrees, she also thinks that this older, bitter version of Hoki Aia is just trying to live vicariously through her. 

Two missions from two people, neither of which will ever be officially recorded in a scroll lest they leave a paper trail. To irreversibly attach herself to the next-in-line for the hat, or to become the next-in-line to a matriarchy herself. 

Yua is tired of having to pick between either-or. She can be a medic and an active kunoichi. She can be the next clan head and have a relationship. She’ll make it so with her own two hands.

But one of those things requires putting the other on pause, and Yua’s not sure how to go about doing that.

So here they are, on the roof of her clan compound in Suna. Leaning against each other with a bento lunch in hand, chatting about the latest and most temperamental subjects of her avian sketch series. She'll just have to save her words for another time.

::::::

It takes a little over two days to reach the border at a reasonable pace on human legs. One day, at a full-tilt run with minimal rest, but that’s really only an option for the direst of emergencies or the maddest of madmen. A few hours is enough, for a messenger hawk.

In the end, the contingent of Uchiha are detained at the border for a total of four days, and Tensei is none too happy about that.

“Might you have mentioned,” he says testily at the captain of the perimeter watch, “that the majority of your detainees are the elderly and the young?"

“Thirty Uchiha are thirty Uchiha, Tensei-dono,” the grizzled captain spits his title like a curse. Fine. Tensei doesn’t need to be universally liked. He holds his hand out for the key to the basement, and the captain drops it into his palm without fanfare. “Orders are to not let you go alone.”

“As long as you let me run this as I see fit otherwise,” Tensei acknowledges. Just because his father let Tensei go without him, doesn’t mean he’s not paranoid about it. So Tensei walks down the steps of the base with Clematis and the captain flanking either side, and when they reach the bottom, he knocks on the door.

He’s informed that it’s locked from the outside in none-too-polite language, which, understandable. “I thought a demonstration of manners was necessary after your unfortunate treatment,” he says through the door. “Has the fan been burnt by the fire?”

A shuffle, and then a smattering of unintelligible murmuring. “Its ashes have flown to the hawk with a story to tell,” another voice calls out, followed by a round of muffled cursing.

Tensei unlocks the door, and— skies. The room itself is spacious enough, a scattering of cots and wall-dividers on the far side away from the door, but it’s dark. No windows, either, being underground and all. “Why aren't there any lights?”

“Devil eyes,” the captain says.

Tensei fights the urge to say something inadvisable. For one, sharingan don’t stop working in the dark, and for another— these are old people and babies, for fuck’s sake. In a few seconds, he has a warming seal drawn directly onto his hand, and activating it bathes the room in a soft glow. He casts it around, doing a quick headcount and taking stock of the amenities. “Izanami wept,” he says, spotting the five small children behind a staunch wall of older men. The phrase seems to startle some of them, as intended. “I’m sorry it took me so long to get here,” he says, trying to figure out which angle to go at this. Come on, Tensei, that college psychology class can’t be buried that deep. “Bureaucratic business, but my father and I overruled the council with some effort.” Convinced and cajoled, more like, but that’s not what these people need to hear right now. “Alright, I know my way around some iryo-ninjutsu. Is anyone in need of treatment?”

“Shouta-kun has a sunburn,” one of the women says, only to be shushed by the others.

Skies above, the oldest child can’t be more than three years old, and the youngest looks barely six months. There’s no way all of them can sleep through this commotion. “Why are they so quiet?” he demands, trying not to think of the worst.

One of the men clears his throat. “Are you Tensei of the Sand?”

Times like this, Tensei kind of wishes he had a cool epithet to be referred to by. “I was the foreign contact that Fugaku-dono and Mikoto-dono had, yes. You’ll have several options to go from here, but first, tell me what you all need most urgently.”

A beat of silent conversation. Tensei watches as the men eye each other, and then the woman who spoke up before, and then back at each other. Tired, rumpled, harried— these people are far past their prime. And, Tensei realizes, completely at his mercy.

“I swore an oath to help,” he says quietly.

And the wall shatters.

“Breast milk. The guards only have powdered goat’s milk, and one of the children is adverse to it—”

“Shouta-kun’s skin is peeling—”

“None of us have had the opportunity to wash or a fresh change of clothes in—”

“— rash is only getting worse, and we have nothing to treat it with—”

“—half-starved, and—”

“Asylum.” The man at the helm takes a step forward, no doubt sizing him up. Tensei takes a deep breath and maintains eye-contact as deep brown spins into red and black. One tomoe— freshly awakened? “Will you grant us political asylum from Konoha, as our clan head claimed?”

There’s no hesitation in his answer. “Yes,” Tensei says, completely of his own volition. He holds up a hand when the captain moves— Clematis is a sensor. The anbu would break him out of a compulsion-genjutsu if need be, but Tensei has been practicing plenty himself, and right now? Nothing. “Is there only the thirty of you?” Nods all around. “What about Fugaku-dono? Mikoto-dono?” Silence. Ah, well. He'd guessed as much. “Uchiha Naori?”

He wasn't really holding out that much hope, but it's a shame to be on the receiving end of shaking heads anyways. “We were a clan hundreds strong,” one of the old women says defensively, and that seems to break the dam for everything else to come spilling out. “Hundreds. We were prosperous, we were family, we were a village unto ourselves. And Itachi-kun— he was such a good boy, you understand? I don’t care that you fought. He was a good boy, and he did not kill my Shisui.”

Holy shit. “Did you," Tensei marvels, "happen to know an Uchiha Kagami?”

She keens. “My husband. Oh, if he could see how far we’ve fallen.”

Holy shit. That’s Uchiha Shisui’s grandmother, right there— no. Tensei berates himself quietly and slides his blind eye shut. That’s a grieving grandmother. Multiple, and grandfathers, and mothers and fathers and sons and daughters. These are people who have lost everything but their lives and the clothes on their backs, with nothing left but each other.

“I’m so sorry for what you went through,” he says quietly. “I grieve for futures lost to the winds as I grieve for ashes lost to the sands. May their souls find peace in—” not the skies, that part of the traditional mourning condolences doesn’t quite fit for people born of fire. Then again, neither do the first two phrases. “In the hearths of their family’s flames,” he decides upon.

“What peace will they find when we have no hearth and home?” the man from before sighs.

“The kind that beats in the hearts of the living,” Tensei affirms. “Sou, which child has a sunburn?”

A boy with fluffy brown hair, cradled in Shisui’s grandmother’s arms. “A genjutsu,” she explains, brushing curls back from the child’s forehead. Knowing what her grandson looks like, Tensei swallows a pang of pity. “We keep them settled with dreams of better days.”

Oh. Oh. That’s a whole entire thing to unpack for later, but for now, he pushes it aside in favour of pressing healing green chakra to angry red splotches on the legs and the back of the neck. Even if they’ve been doing most of their traveling in the morning and the evening, the days are still blisteringly hot and the nights unforgivingly cold at the edges of the desert. “I commend you all for making the journey,” he says.

“There will be more,” the man with the sharingan tells him. “Plenty of people were off on missions when the— when we left. Those in the know will be making their way here.”

Tensei says nothing, because voicing the likelihood that Danzo’s branch of the anbu tracked down any stragglers and finished them off wouldn’t help anyone right now. Besides, it’s been four days. If there were anyone else, someone would have also reached the border by now.

Why these thirty, though? Shisui’s grandmother, he can understand, and children should always be spared violence given the opportunity, but what about these other old men and women? What is it that Itachi saw in them to withhold his blade? A lack of sharingan seems to be a common theme, with only one outlier, but what does that signify?

You scattered the seeds, Rasa told him before he left. Now you care for the garden. Which is an iffy metaphor, considering Tensei had to run the various plans that he drew up through the council first, and they only ended up approving two. Imagine caring for a garden with only two tools.

“Do you have any news of Konoha?” he’s asked, and Tensei has to wonder if he does. In no universe would the Itachi he Sees ever kill his little brother, but Sasuke’s absence from the group of thirty is glaringly obvious.

“A mess,” he chooses his words carefully. “Confusion, en masse. The anbu have stepped up to fill the Police Force’s shoes, but your clan was… well-established. To lose hundreds of active-duty shinobi in one sweep, along with the majority of its law enforcement, even the best laid of plans will go awry.”

A wave of muttering. Tensei moves on to a series of wind burns on the adults, despite their lack of pointing out any of their own injuries in favor of the children.

There’s work to be done, and a lot of it, but Tensei’s as ready as he’ll ever be to face it. There’s a reason he hasn’t changed his Face since his first Chunin Exams, after all— The Hawk sees farther than anyone else.

Now, to see what song these ashes have to tell.

Chapter Text

73年, March

Despite his original promises, Roran’s ruins aren’t really an option for twelve senior men, thirteen old women, and five small children that require around-the-clock supervision. It takes the better part of a month to get the Uchiha tentatively settled in a section of new-ish housing in the seventh district. Not towards the outskirts, of course, but relatively close to the orphanage that most of the children have been relocated to. Tensei has no wish to remind them of another relocation not even a decade prior. Rooster was a huge help in scouting out the four available choices while Tensei had been stuck plowing through the paperwork. It was a fight to give the elderly Uchiha visitation rights every weekend rather than once a month, as well as first-floor residency in said housing.

Tensei can’t help but See two similarly dark-haired grandparents huffing and puffing after little feet, climbing a stairwell up to the fifth floor in a block of apartments too old to have elevators, and— well. They’d be proud of him, he thinks, even if Hana-obaa and Natsu-ojii might think otherwise.

He learns through bits and pieces that the massacre came in the night, that the last sight of their village they had was of blood and a moon and Uchiha Itachi's spinning red eyes. All thirty survivors then awoke from a trance outside of the village borders near the small town of Tanzaku-gai, some with a smattering of supplies in hand, some with bills of ryo, and some with a child that they may or may not have known. Little Shouta-kun, for example, is the son of a neighbor from across the street. The Uchiha, Tensei has grown to realize, were a really big clan. Two of the children need to be renamed on account of no one recognizing them. The little ceremony that the Uchiha hold happens to perfectly coincide with the Spring Festival on the sixteenth, so no one else questions the bit of finery that they ask Tensei to provide for it.

Chie-chan, for one of them, after the Shodai Kazekage’s wife from a land far away. Kensei-kun, for the other.

Tensei is kind of flattered.

Uchiha Fumiko is the name of Shisui's grandmother, and the one most forthcoming with her information. She’s also taken to being called solely by her given name like a bird to the skies, compared to some of her peers. Tensei sympathizes with the culture shock, he really does, but asking them to take on another family name would be nothing short of an insult and out of the norm in Sunagakure besides. They’ll get used to it, eventually.

“We talked, on our journey here,” she tells him over tea. “Tried to figure out some sense of cohesion by putting everyone’s accounts together. Itachi-kun approached each of us sometime within the span of few months before the incident, asking for advice from us old wise ones.” She huffs. “What did we think of the Uchiha’s standing in Konoha, hmm? Everyone had heard murmurings of a coup d’etat, at that point— we old folk just had less reason to hide.”

“That you were against the coup,” Tensei murmurs. He thinks he knows where this is going.

“Uchiha Madara was cast out of the clan for such thoughts,” Fumiko tuts. “It may have been a few years before I was born, yes, but the ripples could be felt in the aftermath all the same. Shunned were those who did not love the peace our forefathers had fought so hard for, banned were the gunbai as his favoured weapon, struck were his students who attempted to stir the pot.” She takes a sip. “Ah, but what could a few old women and men do, when our leader was pressed in by all sides? The young were unhappy, the rest of the village wary, the Hokage and his council suspicious. And I don’t blame them— we burned in response, and tempers only fed the flame.”

‘I don’t blame them.’ Yes, Tensei knows where this is going, now. “Sou, the others?”

“Felt much the same,” Fumiko confirms, the final nail. “There were more who never conspired against Konoha, but I’m sure it took all he had for Itachi-kun to move us out of the way of higher machinations. I do hope that he’s alright.”

The fucker literally combed his compound for the least threatening members of his clan who haden’t fallen to the Curse of Hatred. Two requisites; a limited selection. Tensei thinks of strange, cheerful Uchiha Naori who teased him with Mikoto’s message in the medical tent, and smiles sadly. “He’s a very capable boy,” he assures her, and two taps to the center of his custom privacy seal halts the border of half-moons from disappearing. The council will have their people on the lookout for sudden flares in his chakra signature, which does work to activate and deactivate his creation, but it’s not the intended method. He wasn’t dumb about showing too much of his hand again. “Let’s talk about some lighter topics, ne? How is your herb garden going?”

As soon as things quiet down, though, Tensei is landed with a direct order from the council to head the revival of Suna’s Fuinjutsu Research Department. Apparently, his father was outvoted when it came to deciding how Tensei’s talents should be allocated.

Initially started by the Nidaime, the Fuinjutsu Research Department was promptly abandoned as soon as they figured out how to shove the One-Tail inside an old monk. Brother Bunpuku was one of the very, very few people Suna had who could both do the sealing and whose chakra coils could withstand it. Oh, they tried to steal an Uzumaki after Bunpuku died, for all that Nidaime-sama and the then-future Sandaime-sama took the opportunity to observe the tailed beast’s powers. The team they sent surprised a squad of Konoha shinobi, who were there in turn to scout out the situation at Uzushio during the siege in the year fifty-six. Hatake Sakumo cut down about a third of Suna’s agents before retreating to save his remaining men when the conflict started to draw the attention of Kiri and Kumo's camps nearby. And Konoha still allied with them in the ensuing Third War none the wiser, because Suna’s Black Sands are the ultimate espionage force. According to the history books, Suna was never anywhere near Uzushio when it fell.

Oh, hey, Tensei’s village is responsible for Sakumo’s resulting suicide in a roundabout way, aren’t they? Huh. He feels kinda bad, especially because Suna failed its objective anyway. The two Uzumaki that they managed to capture escaped while crossing through Grass Country on the way back. And now that he thinks about it— was that Karin’s mom?

He has to do a bit more digging for the mission file, but eh, he’s been down here in the archives for a good chunk of the day already, what’s a bit more. The contents take him less time to decode now than they would have a few months ago, considering the sheer amount of classified documents he’s handled in the meantime. The descriptions of the captives reads just about what he expects— pale skin, grey eyes, and long, straight, crimson hair for a genin kunoichi; tan skin, red eyes, and spiky red hair for her somehow also-genin companion. Because get this— the boy was supposedly a sensor, but otherwise nearly blind due to some kind of issue with his eyes, discovered during a standard concussion test. Not completely blind, the pupils were still responsive to light, but functionally useless in a fight.

So, both parents? Dang. That sounds a lot like The Wanderer's ability from the play Wind to Copper. The Wanderer, also known as a caricature of Tensei's great great grandmother, Uzumaki Chihiro. Which makes so much sense— why would two foreigners risk traveling the deserts, with its lack of roads and directional markings towards permanent settlements at the time, unless one of them was a sensor? There's a connection here, Tensei knows, and it takes a moment of searching with his blind eye to stumble upon the answer: The Mind's Eye of the Kagura.

Actually, it makes sense that it was both parents. If neither the Chiyo he knows nor the Naruto that Tensei Sees in ink on paper can access the Adamantine Chains as half-Uzumaki, while Kushina and Karin could, then it's probably a recessive-type kekkei-genkai ability.

The question still stands how twelve shinobi managed to bungle things up enough that the two genin managed to escape, which the report glosses over by listing ‘unfavorable circumstances’ in lieu of saying, “We fucked up bad, next question.” Except there’s no next question and the mission is listed as a failure.

Tensei wouldn’t have to go through leading the revival of their fuinjutsu department if Suna had managed to capture a sealing master instead and also successfully deliver them back to the village, but alas. No one else is going to do anything about Gaara’s severe sleep deprivation. His siblings don’t get the reference when he calls it a ‘cruel and unusual punishment’, obviously, but Tensei thinks his comparison is apt.

Anyways. Paperwork to do. A wonky seal to fix. Tensei gives himself a water break and his joints a satisfying crack before diving back in. He has dinner with Yua, Rooster, and Aya tonight at that new place in District Five advertising a grand opening to celebrate his senpai passing the Mastery Trials. If this is supposed to be a pity-date for his senpai or something like that, then Tensei will not hesitate to throw hands with the tsundere puppeteer for round three, but Rooster seems optimistic enough about Aya that Tensei is reserving his judgment for the time being. He can afford to skip lunch today.

::::::

“I have plans.”

Pain looks down his nose. One unfortunate byproduct of a quadrupedal puppet— the bastards around Sasori are all tall enough to literally look down on him. If it wouldn’t look absolutely ridiculous, he might have considered adding an extendable neck to Hikaru.

“I’m sure your extended stay in your workshop can be put on hold for half an hour longer,” Konan tells him.

Of course, Sasori knows why he’s being chosen. Unlike all the flesh bags in this room, neither Sasori’s nor Hikaru’s glass eyes are susceptible to the sharingan’s tricks. That doesn’t mean he wants to play tour guide for the Uchiha kid.

“Sasori,” the leader intones.

Sasori turns away. “Fine. Come on, then, brat.”

His partner watches the two of them leave the room with unabashed jealousy on his face. If not Sasori, Orochimaru would have been a decent choice. Being from the same village and all, Sasori would bet that the man knows a few counters to the Uchiha dojutsu, as long as he didn’t get ahead of himself in trying something inadvisable. Nevermind the fact that Orochimaru must be fifty-odd years older than their new recruit— age matters little among the elite. Sasori himself was scouted out and poached when he was only sixteen— three years older than the brat trailing behind him.

“Kitchen,” he states through Hikaru’s voicebox as they pass it by. “Everything in there is communal, and we take turns restocking depending on where our missions take us. You make a mess, you clean it up. Anything you buy for yourself has to be run through Kakuzu for approval, first, and kept in your room if you don’t intend on sharing.”

Silence, barring the echo of footsteps behind him. Sasori continues on.

“Living room. Don’t burn, bleed, or sleep on the couch. Zetsu will be tempted to take a bite out of you.”

A considering hum. “Zetsu?”

“Some kind of kekkei-genkai holder with giant carnivorous plants growing out of his sides.” At least, that’s what Sasori assumes is going on. He doesn’t know the monster’s former village affiliations, and he doesn’t care enough to ask.

The footsteps stop. Sasori looks behind him. “Carnivorous plants,” Uchiha Itachi says. “As in, wood release?”

“You’ll meet him when he gets back, along with your own partner. Ask them.”

Pairing the newbie with Biwa Juuzo seems like an interesting decision. Not that Sasori has ever worked with the swordsman, but maybe it’s for the propensity of slaughtering their own people. Kirigakure’s reputation has been bloody long before the latest civil war rendered them their new nickname.

“But you’ve worked with him. Zetsu.”

The sentence cracks in the middle, betraying the beginnings of a developing voice. Sasori allows himself a snort in the privacy of his own mind at the stone-faced teen despite the fluctuation. “Once. Didn’t see him do anything with it other than corpse disposal, though.”

Thirteen years old. Just a brat, but significantly less expressive than the only other two kids that he had any experience with. The long lashes and bangs remind him a little of that kid, who should be around the same age by now.

Sasori takes a moment to wonder what his grandmother has done with his last addition to the Family series. Locked it up in the master storage room, probably. Definitely wouldn't have shown it off; the old hag was too soft to tell the Sandaime when she first discovered his human puppets. Possibly because she'd known that Komushi had been dead before Sasori even started the process, but the same can't be said for most of the others past that.

There’s irony in the fact that the last puppet he made before leaving was also his last ethically-sourced one. The Mother, the Father, and the Little Brother that they never got to meet. A rare indulgence of sentiment to make sure they wouldn’t be left completely alone gathering dust in his wake, he supposes.

Honestly, Sasori is unimpressed with Rasa. They still don't even have confirmation that Sasori is alive, it seems, much less know who assassinated their beloved Sandaime, otherwise his bounty would be significantly higher. Or at least, his entry in the bingo books would list his name instead of just 'Scorpion' with a vague rendition of the Hikaru puppet’s masked face. Nevermind his stint studying bunrakubuki practices under Dragon, Sasori never took a stage name of his own.

It wouldn't be worth the effort to go back to Wind to kill his second cousin— why make a puppet that can use gold dust when he already has one that can use iron? Kakuzu would just confiscate the gold and chuck it in a deposit or sell it, anyways.

He stops at the entrance to another hallway. “Communal bathroom. Keep your things in your room when you’re not using it.” Then, jerking his head to the room directly across, “Your room. Keep the noise level down or buy privacy seals. Trap it however you like.”

“I see.” Does he now. The Uchiha offers him a slow blink, but the black irises stay black. “I appreciate the guidance. Thank you, Sasori-san.”

That’s so, so cool. Thanks, Sasori-nii!

No. Sasori is done with the desert, and he's never going back. “If you have questions, go bother Konan,” he says before starting in the direction of his workshops.

Chapter Text

73年, March

"Stop laughing," Tensei grumbles at his senpai. Seriously, why he even still looks to Rooster for help with anything is a mystery to him.

Well, no, it's not. But he wishes the older puppeteer wouldn't make fun of him so much before getting it together to actually do anything.

The two of them look to Dragon, the ever-impartial judge. Dragon shrugs. “You’re no longer my favorite master in the Playhouse,” Tensei informs the older man.

“I thought that was Chiyo-sama.”

“Everyone’s favorite is Chiyo-baasama until they have to meet her, jan,” his senpai backs him up. Despite never having properly met the Troupe Master for himself beyond the Apprentice Trials that she still makes an appearance for, he’s heard plenty of stories. Mostly from Tensei. A lot of them with complaining at their core. “Some of us know how to be original.”

“And asking what different kinds of wet tea leaves mean when wrapped in a handkerchief is the height of originality,” the master deadpans, sending Rooster into another fit of laughter.

“My father advised me to meditate on it after the anbu snitched on me,” Tensei mutters at the ground. Like offering up a wall in his bedroom for Yua’s latest art project is anything worth telling the Kazekage. She'd put a pause on her other project to sketch every single kind of avian that can be found in Wind Country's deserts after seeing the huge map in his father’s office for the first time, and neither her mom nor the Hoki family servants were all too eager to donate a blank surface big enough for a replica to an artistic cause.

So what if it’s his bedroom? His siblings follow them in every time Yua drops by to work on the painting, and with them, Primrose and Orchid or Clematis or Poppy or Yucca, perched on the iron trellis outside of his window. Nothing is happening that could be worth the level of scrutiny his father has been eyeing him with as of late, skies above. And what does any of that have to do with ‘used tea leaves’?

Still. Tensei has relocated a flowerpot from the corner of his nightstand to said window, and finally got around to planting something in it for the sake of making spying on them to be more annoying. Yua got it for him a while back when he wouldn't let her repay him for that medical textbook, an unnecessarily ornate piece of ceramic from Chori-mura, and Tensei had taken one look at the orange-gold colour of the pot and known exactly what to put in it. He hopes his family’s guard rotation enjoys their view being blocked by the feathery green fronds of a marigold plant.

But to digress. “He’s been eyeing me in that way of his like I was missing something important, and I called him out on it today—”

“But then the head councilor nabbed him,” Rooster finishes, his tone just shy of mocking. Tensei glares at him, because it’s true, Rasa did get summoned by Councilor Hiroshi in the middle of their conversation. “So Bear came to ask me, but I just knew that you could explain this sooo much better. Ne, sensei?”

Dragon sighs. “Delivering wrapped tea leaves that have been steeped when they’re still wet to another in a handkerchief is an old tradition.” Tensei prompts his mentor to keep going, and Dragon adopts a long-suffering expression. “It’s a marriage proposal.”

Tensei chokes on nothing. "Haha. Not funny."

Rooster is still wheezing from his spot, hunched over a workbench. "Who said we were joking?" his senpai cackles.

"I'm fifteen!" But even as he's protesting, Tensei recalls Rio-sensei's lessons. Intellectually, he gets that he's expected to continue the lineage someday, but it's not anything that he's ever given serious thought to, yet. Because, again, Tensei is fifteen. Still a year away from being a legal adult, even!

Although culturally speaking, it's not uncommon for people who haven't reached their second decade to get married and start having kids. His own mother— ah, shit, Karura and Rasa got married in the fifth month of the year fifty-seven, at eighteen and nineteen, respectively. Fuck, fuck, shit, fuck, Tensei wouldn't even call Yua his girlfriend at this point. They're not dating. Are they dating?

Dragon seems to register his mental crisis, because the master lays a hesitant hand on his shoulder. "If it's any consolation, you won't find any pressure from me."

That does help, actually, considering Dragon's on the council. "Are the others going to push this?" he says, hating how his voice cracks a bit. And, like, it's just started cracking. He's never had to go through this process before in his last life— which doesn't count towards his age, by the way, Tensei is very much fifteen and not an accumulative forty years or any of that nonsense.

He never got married before, either, for all that his family used to tease him about—

Stop.

Breathe.

And he's done such a great job not thinking about them, too, before the Uchiha came and got him all sentimental about his past set of grandparents. There's no use missing a life and a people from a world lost to him.

"Hey," Rooster says, having finally stifled his laughter. "No worries, you can always tell those old farts to fuck off, right?"

No, not really.

"I appreciate the insight to your true thoughts about me," Dragon deadpans.

"Come on, sensei, you know what I meant."

"No, no, apparently I'm an 'old fart' like all the rest of them."

Tensei's current political leverage comes solely from his status as the Kazekage's son and the brand new head of a barely-established department, the latter of which was bestowed upon him by said council. He is technically not on an equal level with any seated member of the council, at this point. The fact that he's also only a chunin with no particularly notable field accomplishments and being the most junior attendee of any given meeting doesn't play in his favour, either.

"I mean. You are forty, jan."

“Bear.” The hand on his shoulder squeezes, and Tensei looks up at dark eyes and blue paint. "Avenge me."

It's a blatant ploy to get him out of his head. Dragon frequently harps on him for having too many words and not enough action.

So Tensei swipes at Rooster’s feet and sends him toppling to the ground with a yelp.

Speaking of the Playhouse, Kankuro gets his first challenge that very week. Tensei isn't sure who sent this annoying slip of a girl to demand a throwdown when both participants involved are only Academy students with no combat puppets of their own, yet, but they sure know how to pick an inconvenient time. He’s due for a collaborative meeting with the members of his fuinjutsu department today, but it’s not like he’s going to leave his little brother now.

Tensei ruffles Kankuro's hair and stands to the side while the two Academy students square up. "I thought there were supposed to be three of you?" he asks the challenger's shadow. Another little girl with lilac hair and bangs. Sana, he's pretty sure she's called. He recognizes her from more than one of Rooster’s vent sessions about ‘shitheaded sponsorees with no sense in their tiny brains’. The three sponsors, then, must be getting a lot of flak for their choices. Maybe he'll ask Rooster for the gossip later.

Sana shrugs. "Saya-oneesama doesn't like Sayu-chan."

Kankuro yanks on a chakra thread that he managed to wrap around Saya's ankle, and the mostly-taijutsu brawl devolves into wrestling each other on the sawdust-covered floor when she drags him down with her. If Tensei didn't know any better, he might think that pitting a boy and a girl of similar ages against each other in a physical fight is unfair, but Saya seems to have filed her nails into claws and is rather unreservedly going for crotch shots. Which, fair, the Academy absolutely teaches its students to fight dirty, but that seems a bit much for an informal challenge on the basis of ‘your Face looks ugly’.

At least, that was the justification they were given. Tensei has done a bit of digging in the archives about the Playhouse for the time period that Natsu-ojiisan was alive, and he thinks he can trace whatever grudge the two parties held for each other to Hana-obaasan? Hana's older brother was a new apprentice puppeteer before he was assassinated, so Tensei is a little confused about the blame for Reto's, great grandmother Ami's and great uncle Kanza's deaths being laid solely at the Playhouse's doorstep.

Regardless, a trail of formal complaints to a now-retired councilor, multiple reports of harassment, and mission records of D-ranks to repair collateral damage paints a pretty damning picture of his paternal grandparents in their youth.

Tensei thins his lips when kunai are drawn, catching a familiar clear sheen on Kankuro's blade, and steps forward to catch Saya a minute later before she pitches headfirst towards the ground. The Academy always tints their poisons and paralytics a variety of colours for safety purposes in the earlier levels, and Kankuro is only just finishing up his fourth year, nevermind not actually being enrolled in the poisons extracurricular classes. "Is that mine?" He raises an eyebrow at his little brother.

Kankuro stills. Bad habit— Tensei makes a note to work on that with him later. Freezing up is an obvious tell, and a reaction like that in the field can easily get a shinobi killed. "Nah. Bought it a lil' while ago, jan."

"Mm-hm. Sou, how did you get past the blood seal on my closet?"

"What blood seal—? Ow," Kankuro grumbles as Tensei smacks him upside the head. He knows his little brother too well to fall for the ‘playing stupid’ act. "You said not to go snooping in your room."

"And you never listen, you little rascal," Tensei rolls his eyes and coaxes a green glow to his hands. The cut on Kankuro's right forearm looks a little deeper than he'd be willing to leave alone.

He catches Sana poking at her sister on the ground. "She'll be fine," he reassures her. He still dyes most of his concoctions for easy recognition; the only one that's clear and has the viscosity he spotted on Kankuro's kunai is the fast-acting paralytic that he used in his last Chūnin Exams. He just doesn't color it yellow anymore. "Give it ten minutes or so; she'll be left with nothing worse than a headache."

"She's bleeding," Sana says.

Tensei ignores Kankuro's exasperated huff as he considers Saya's prone figure. She has no serious wounds, and the hospital always has a few people on standby for walk-ins of this caliber. And, if he's going to be petty about it, there's a line of blood beading along a scratch uncomfortably close to Kankuro's eye.

Sana pats at some of the rumples in her sister's skirt, and Tensei sighs. "I'll patch her up after Kankuro." At the end of the day, they're all just little kids playing around with knives too big for their hands, aren't they?

Telling them not to won't work. It wasn't an option for him, it's not an option for any of his siblings, and he's sure the same holds true for plenty of other students in the Academy.

Tensei will just have to do whatever he can to catch them afterwards.

Chapter Text

73年, April

Tensei is two months past his fifteenth birthday when his father tells him, “You need more than just bureaucratic matters on your record.”

He takes the statement for what it is: an order to go out onto the field. “Do you have a suggestion,” he says instead of asking, because he already knows the answer.

Rasa proves him right when he reaches over to grab the only red-trimmed mission scroll on his desk. Tensei peels the paper back, winces at the A-rank stamp emblazoned at the head, and promptly closes it again.

His father laces his fingers together. “Councilor Yuma specifically requested you,” Rasa says. “This will be his last commission before he steps down.”

And passing on both his seat and his captaincy as Head of Security to his son, Yura, in the process. Three cheers for nepotism, not that Tensei has any ground to stand on. “The council was involved?”

His father nods. Of course, they were. It’s supposed to be an honor to carry out a retiree’s last orders, but throwing an A-rank at him when Tensei hasn’t taken anything higher than a C-rank in two years…

Running down that stupid genin trying to defect with Chiyo of the Grey Death at his side really shouldn’t have been classified as a B-rank at all.

Tensei pulls the scroll open again, reading it properly this time around. “My skillset isn’t well-suited for sabotage,” he comments.

“The expectation is that you will fail,” his father says. “Don’t.”

Easier said than done.

The mission takes him out of the Land of Wind and into Stone Country, to sabotage a meeting on neutral grounds between two clans from the Land of Earth that their Black Sands agents have caught wind of in advance. Tomoko-chan is still his best disguise since the basic henge seems utterly beyond him, but it’s getting riskier to use these days. Tensei is taller than a girl Tomoko’s age should be, even if his relatively androgynous build can still pass. If this is the last time he can be her— well, he doesn’t regret any of the sneaking around that he and Rooster did.

Tomoko finangles her way into posing as one of the teahouse’s new hires from the latest mass-recruitment batch, and Tensei is treated to the realization that customer service really is the same in every world. There’s probably some humor to be found in a bunch of old men reaching out with wandering hands without knowing that the ass they’re touching actually belongs to a guy, but it’s a challenge to bite his tongue and keep quiet when his very much female coworkers are getting the same treatment.

Tomoko cannot afford to risk her position, but she watches the older girls and learns to run false messages. This patron in that room calling for so-and-so’s service, if their esteemed guest wouldn’t mind continuing the conversation another time? It’s all Tensei can manage, and even though there’s no need to return the sentiment, it works out in his favor that his coworkers do anyways. They don’t ask about rising before dawn to bathe before everyone else or the variances in his rituals when praying with the rest of the religious girls, and that’s good enough.

His patience finally pays off on the fifth day, made obvious by the squad of guards with two boulders engraved into metal hitai-ate plates. Tomoko convinces one of the older girls who’s in charge of training her to swap rooms on the basis of a fake threat from two customers, playing them up as shady characters that might need a more experienced hand, and that lands Tensei in the perfect position to listen in. It’s an exchange of several med-nin to the other clan’s settlement’s hospital for a summoning contract— nothing so threatening as to inspire the ranking that this mission received, were it not for two Iwa-nin posted at the entrance to the room and one at the window.

It occurred to him that it might be quicker to do some investigative procedures followed by running the two representative groups down, and then disappearing the bodies so that no one can recognize the distinctive marks that Sandaime-sama’s famous Scattered Showers technique leaves behind on its hole-riddled victims. In another life with different influences and a mostly-peaceful upbringing, that’s probably the first method he would have thought of, in the theoretical context of a puzzle to be solved and nothing more.

In this life, Tensei has spent his fair share of time in the Academy and then with the Playhouse, so infiltration and poisons it is.

The mission goes smoothly until later that night, when Tensei pops by into each target’s sleeping quarters to confirm the kill. Likely, one of the victims is notorious for snoring or sleep talking or something, because a guard comments on the quiet as Tensei makes his exit. Not long afterwards, the alarm is raised, and Tensei's a little surprised at his own strength when his standard-issue senbon buries nearly its entire length into bone through an Iwa-nin's temple.

And another thing: Tensei hadn't realized until just then that he'd lost track of his kill count. It's not that many, he thinks. Definitely still within the lower double digits. He doesn't go out on offensively-geared missions often, due to the visibility that his status grants him.

It's a good thing, he tells himself. Looking out for himself, his people, and his causes are more important than morals, and he sticks by that. Has always stuck by that, even if he'd been… embarrassing, about his first accidental kill with the genin headed toward Grass. Or the bound kunoichi spy. His beliefs didn't require murder to be upheld in a previous life, so it's understandable that there was an adjustment period. He's fine now, as proven by the clean severings of the brain stem through the neck using the new wind technique his father taught him. None of them are of any renown to be worth anything, so he seals them up in a couple body scrolls to be handed off to the agricultural department when he gets home.

He's maybe less fine when he nearly gets himself beheaded as he crashes another meeting entirely on the way back.

Tensei recognizes Kubikiribocho right off the bat. Hard not to, when this one of Kiri's seven famed swords once featured so heavily in the beginnings of a story. The missing-nin, on the other hand, spares him no time to flick through another set of memories with his blind eye. Tensei doesn’t remember the name of the bandaged man with face paint and serrated teeth off the top of his head, but the red and black robes are more than enough context.

For such a lanky-looking guy, the unnamed Akatsuki member sure can cover a lot of ground. Tensei throws his voice across the clearing the way that Dragon taught him, some taunt about big swords compensating for something. Although the misdirection is usually used by puppeteers under Chikamatsu’s banner to pretend that their humanoid puppet is actually the puppeteer, it can also simply catch people off guard and offer him an opening.

He buys enough time to— holy shit, why does it feel like something is tapping on his skull from the inside?

‘Tis only I, the Scribe.

Tensei flinches so hard that he misses his landing on the next tree branch. His fumble earns him a near-hit with the aforementioned giant sword, slicing a clean line through the edge of the haori he's donned in lieu of his flak jacket for this mission. "What's wrong, chicken shit?" The nuke-nin sneers at him. "Outta juice?"

Far from it, but he’ll easily admit to being rattled. Where’s Enma-Dai’O? It’s always been the King of Hell who spoke, rarely as that happened.

The Almighty Judge has other matters to attend to.

Fantastic. What’s with the sudden contact, then?

You are progressing very slowly. This man is slated to die a similar but unimportant death in about two weeks’ time.

Which implies that Tensei should kill him now instead, to prove himself or something? He gets the impression that Enma-Dai’O cares greatly about people living past their due date, and very little about people dying before, as long as they aren’t slated to procreate or kill too many people in the time between.

Tensei wonders if this is what it’s like in Gaara’s head, except probably with a lot less formal language.

He makes an abrupt about-face and heads for the more familiar terrain of solid ground. Almost immediately, an unnaturally thick billow of mist rolls in, and of course it's laced with enough chakra to screw with his passive sensing.

Not his hearing, though. It's all too easy to catch the blade whistling through the air, and even easier to reverse its trajectory. Kubikiribocho is made of iron, so The Judge's Executioner takes the Executioner’s Blade and executes a damned man with it.

Tensei can offer better wordplay when he’s not quite so exhausted, he tells the air in front of the dying nin. Except apparently the air is not as empty as he thought, because Uchiha Itachi steps into the clearing with a slightly surprised look to his expression.

Except apparently the air is not as empty as he thought, because Uchiha Itachi steps into the clearing with a slightly surprised look to his expression.

A half-remembered face, loathing written all over it even as it starts to tear a gouge into—

Fuck right the hell off, that was years ago. Fantastic application of the Hell-Viewing technique, interesting look into his psyche, zero out of ten stars. He’s over it.

His hand is already on a scroll full of iron as Itachi starts on a chain of signs when a noise from the dying man gives them both pause. "Nah, kid, it's cool," the swordsman mumbles, slumping a little lower against a tree trunk. "Good fight. Decent way to go."

"Are you—" Itachi says, but a glare from his partner prompts him to stop the sentence before it can go any further.

Tensei retreats as much as he dares and lets them have their moment. When the man becomes a corpse, Uchiha Itachi gives him a name: Biwa Juuzo, of the Seven Swordsmen, nuke-nin of the Mist.

He picks the younger man's hands as the point to stare at, mildly noting how impeccable the nail polish is as Itachi tugs the Akatsuki ring off of his partner's finger. Maybe Tensei should start going for a colored one, too, instead of the clear reinforcing varnish that seems to be standard for most shinobi. There’s a slight twitch that he almost reacts to before realizing that it’s neither a hand sign nor a reach for a weapon. “I had an agreement with your parents,” he offers a reminder. “Suna would offer you asylum.”

The younger man shakes his head, and Tensei sighs. He doesn’t care about the other with all his heart and soul or anything, but he’s kind of obligated to try, if only for the sake of five children growing up in an orphanage back home. “I don’t know why you left Sasuke behind, but there are several dark-haired and dark-eyed kids who would love another big brother-figure with a personal stake in their well-being and happiness.”

Nothing. Alright, how about the pragmatic route? Tensei clears his throat. “My status as a field medic isn’t in the bingo books, but I’d rather let you know that there’s something I don’t have the tools to diagnose right now eating away at you than have your death on my conscience.” He calculates his words to echo their first interaction from nearly… three years ago, now. Huh. Maybe that will prompt the younger nin in front of him to go get a check up and catch whatever it was that killed another version of Itachi from ink on paper pages before it kills this version. “I can’t imagine that the Akatsuki has fantastic medical care, what with your leader being able to revive the dead with his stupidly large Uzumaki chakra reserves.”

It’s a point that Enma-Dai’O is consistently pissed about, because when he gets summoned to spit a soul back to the land of the living, the person’s death date changes. Which means Nagato’s technically not violating the Judge’s Law, and Tensei isn’t sure if he can kill him for violating Nature’s Law until he’s revived everyone that’s supposed to be revived, at which point the bastard is going to die anyway. Tensei doesn't think the Uzumaki has called for Enma-Dai'O since the last time, though, otherwise he would have been reverse-summoned again. Big whoop.

He can feel Itachi staring back in earnest now, even if he can’t see it. Tensei refuses to look up. “Where did you hear this?”

Son of a bitch, that’s what got him to pipe up? “Oh, you know. Around.”

The hand comes up in a seal of confrontation. A warning. “We both know which one of us is going to win if we fight," Tensei huffs, already tired. Judging by appearance alone, Itachi stands before him with at least one less recent battle under his belt yet again. Oh, the irony. "I don’t want to spill village secrets, but I don’t want to be put into a Tsukiyomi-coma, either, if it’s all the same to you.”

The silence implies that it isn’t. Now would be a good time to lay down a flashbang as cover and fastrack his retreat, only he'd really rather not give away his position to Stone Country's border guards that are surely on the lookout by now.

“Sou,” Tensei tries for a lighter tone, “how about I say that Suna has a lot of loyal shinobi who may or may not move out because they don’t like living in a desert, making a fantastic information network that we may or may not call the Black Sands, and then you take that as the truth. That way they can each leave with exciting news to report to our respective leaders, and—” Oh god dammit, he's under a genjutsu, isn't he. Tensei flexes his chakra, once, twice, fucking three times and he has to get particularly twisty with it before the mental suggestion shatters. He doesn’t know how he got out of mentioning his Thing with a past life and Seeing memories with his blind eye, but he probably has his Judge to thank for it. “I liked you better when you were ten years old,” he informs the teen, who is now much closer, shit. “How did you catch me? I wasn’t even looking at your sharingan.”

“You assume that you were not looking at my sharingan.” So either a high-level but standard compulsion technique that he somehow missed, or an area-of-effect that tricked him into looking into the sharingan when he thought he wasn’t. Tensei thins his lips, unable to tell. “I fought you to a draw when I was ten years old,” Itatchi muses. “I could beat you now.”

It wasn’t a draw, though. Not really. In a life-or-death situation, Tensei wouldn’t have been the one to walk away from their first match. “That’s what I was implying, Itachi-kun.”

The change in honorifics is as clear a mockery as anything. Itachi’s hand comes up again and Tensei drills his chakra into the half-formed genjutsu in the same twisty manner as before.

After a tense moment, Tensei is driven up and back onto a tree branch to avoid a fireball, and when the air clears, Itachi is gone.

Fuck if he understands the Uchiha’s thought process, but holy shit, Tensei’s in one piece and still sane. Not that Itachi should want him otherwise, but still. He probably won’t even need to stop by the hospital, though the giant tear in his haori suggests a close call with a blade that, uh. That Itachi left behind. Along with a very valuable corpse.

Huh. Financial compensation for the refugees, maybe?

So Tensei reports home with a mission success and Biwa Juuzo’s considerable bounty for Suna’s coffers, and his father awards him with a field promotion. It’s on the basis of pure luck, but hey, Tensei’s not going to complain about a bit of that when it comes his way.

"I often wonder if you're simply looking for trouble wherever you go," his father tells him flatly.

Tensei stares at the new rank on his file, underneath his name. He doesn't feel like a jounin, but maybe it's the same as not feeling your new age on your birthday. "I'm pretty sure it just finds me," he offers with a weak chuckle.

"You're banned from taking missions for the foreseeable future."

"That's fair," he agrees, and wisely chooses not to tell his father that he has plans for the summoning scroll he nicked anyways. No need to have that confiscated from him, as well.

Chapter Text

73年, April

The notion that his promotion is an undeserved one bothers Tensei.

He knows that his benefiting from nepotism is unavoidable, but after that one assignment with choosing which genin to send to Iwa's Chunin Exams, he has some idea of what gets a shinobi considered for a promotion. There are no Jounin Exams in his village, unlike Konoha and Kumo. For all that they're geographically rather distant, Suna and Kiri are alike in their merit-based— and bribery-susceptible— advancement system. Either a superior officer submits a recommendation for promotion to the Kage, or performance in the field that exceeds expectations gives said Kage cause for consideration. Self-reports on solo-missions notwithstanding, of course, because it's all too easy to embellish it without another witness to hold the shinobi accountable. By all rights, Tensei should not have gotten this promotion.

And that's not even counting the fact that he hasn't hit the usual requirements for a recommendation, skill-wise. Between his propensity for magnet release, fuinjutsu, and puppetry, Tensei's arsenal is so heavily skewed towards ninjutsu that there's no way he shouldn't be classified as a tokubetsu jounin instead. Tensei's not going to pretend that he couldn't thrash the majority of Suna's forces in a straight fight, he knows what he's capable of, but sheer battle prowess isn't what decides a rank. He doesn’t have the kind of leadership where split-second decisions can mean life or death for not only himself but any squadmates that he'd have under his command, and his mission record practically screams 'desk worker' for anyone who might care to check— except, on paper, the reason for his promotion states the recovery of a highly valuable bounty and artifact in an encounter with two S-ranked rouge ninja. And on paper, that looks like a fantastic reason. 

But Tensei should not be a jounin, and the fact that he is at the scant age of fifteen bothers him. What that says about him as a person, he's not sure. It's a shame that the only therapy to be found for active shinobi in Suna is being psychoanalyzed in T&I.

He's not even the youngest to ever attain the rank— that would be Sasori-nii, because of course it is— but the only other person who got it before the age of twenty that he knows of is Aya. Oh, skies, she's going to be insufferable when she hears about it. 

So Tensei rewards himself with a companion. He deserves a treat.

Generally speaking, anything picked off of an enemy-nin are considered mission spoils, and finders-keepers rules apply. Said rules flew out of the window when Tensei unsealed Kubikiribocho in the Kazekage’s office while delivering his report, of course, which is fine. The sword is huge and unwieldy, and Tensei is by no means a kenjutsu specialist. This version of Momochi Zabuza can go screw himself and Kiri’s eventual second failed revolution with some other weapon in hand. Tensei is happy enough with being allowed to keep the summoning scroll that he stole. Suna currently has the contracts for weasels, lizards, scorpions, and giant hawks, but obviously, Tensei holds no claim to any of the lineages that has them.

The line of summoners is rather long, in that there are barely a handful of blank spaces left. He has to pull the entirety of the scroll out to get to the very beginning, and it's... hm. He thought the terms of the contract would be clear about what animal its for, but apparently not. The language is rather archaic and written almost entirely in faded kanji, which makes reading it comprehensively rather tricky. Protection for protection seems to be a reoccurring point in more than one clause, as well as something about reserving the freedom-to-something. Will, maybe? 

He signs the contract anyways, of course, pressing a clean brush to a careful cut on his inner forearm. Tensei takes his time to make the calligraphy neat, builds up the requisite chakra, and then makes the signs for Boar-Dog-Bird-Monkey-Ram. "Kuchiyose no Jutsu," he enunciates clearly, before pressing five bloody fingers onto the paper.

The smoke clears.

It's an owl.

Immediately, Tensei knows that this will be a support-type companion. Being half a meter tall and having hollow bones doesn't make for the best battle-summons. Which doesn't mean that he's disappointed! Aerial scouting and secure communications are extremely valuable methods of assistance, if that's on the table.

It's just... owls. Owls to Itachi’s crows, both avians with connotations of death. Fucking universe has a sense of humor. At least Yua might appreciate a close-up study for her avian sketch series if— when she gets back. 

“Death whispers when you move,” his very first summons says. Asuga, as she invites him to call her, is an undeniably beautiful specimen of her kind and nearly half a meter tall. Metal extensions line her talons, and she stands stoically unruffled against the soft breeze in the courtyard. “That is alright. My method of death is silent. You will watch. You will learn.”

Skipping right past his own introduction, huh? Although she probably knows already, what with his name on the contract. "I'd be honored," Tensei says, "but what can I provide for you?" Any road goes two ways, and he's a little wary of the illegible agreement he's just signed. 

She fluffs her wings. "Shelter," she says. "The domain of owls is rife with conflict. You will care for my kin and our allies in times of moulting, if they ever ask it of you, and my young, if ever I cannot."

Sounds simple enough. Suna's aviaries are second to none, although it mostly houses kestrels and hawks. He'll just have to ask around about expanding it.

He gets a crash course in owl-politics, because of course the summons he ends up with has their own political baggage to deal with. There are two different Barn Owl clans that live on opposite ends of their... pocket dimension? Of which Asuga is part of the eastern clan, one of the few that would subject themselves to the arid climate of the desert. They're allied with the Eagle-Owl clan and Tawny clan, in opposition to the Snowy, Barred, and western Barn Owls... yeah, Tensei has to take out a notation scroll to write it all down, because no way is he going to memorize all of this information in one go like his new summons seems to expect him to. It's kind of weird that there's entire societies to keep track of, since as far as he's aware, regular owls aren't flock-birds.

"Our cousins in this dimension have yet to catch the wind as we have," Asuga tells him. "Do not mistake us for the same."

Tensei shrugs and notes that down, too. "You guys don't have one boss in charge of everything?" he asks, thinking of the toads. "I've heard that there's usually a sage of some sort, in other domains."

"There are four sages among the clans. One of many reasons for the conflicts."

"A succession crisis," he guesses. Wonderful to see that even birds aren't exempt to the flaws of society.

Asuga bobs her head. "Each claims to have been named the next Great Sage before Hitomi-sama passed."

Great. "Would the Eastern Barns happen to have a sage?"

Asuga cuffs him with a wing. "I was not finished with my previous topic."

Okay, so maybe he'll try that route again when they're better acquainted.

Seems like the fuinjutsu on the contract has some sort of factor that pairs the summoner with a clan of a similar nature, which has had the unfortunate side effect of tending towards the Great-Horned clan. According to Asuga, they're currently still contracted with the previous Kumo-nin who owned the scroll, despite the change of hands. Curious that it's ended up this far away from Lightning Country. 

Asuga guides him through summoning her children next. Kuu and Piiko are too young to talk very well, but bob their heads in agreement just as readily.

"Hungry," Kuu screeches not an hour into their acquaintance. Tensei is quickly learning that barn owls, for all their aesthetic beauty, are more liable to scream his ears off than hoot quietly like most other species of their kind.

"Hungry," Piiko agrees.

"In a moment," Tensei says, before the world plummets into utter darkness. His shoulders hitch up on reflex—

Two pairs of talons tighten their grips in response. Not the black, then. Tensei notes that he has two pranksters on his hands as he unravels the genjutsu and flicks each of them on their beaks. "Please don't do that," he says.

Asuga boffs them all over the head with her wings. Okay, so this might take some getting used to.

Tensei is told that he has to keep them with him for a few days at first in order to establish an anchor if he doesn’t want to take out the contract scroll every time he needs to call them— which is still a viable method, just inconvenient in certain situations. Worst-case scenario, the scroll might get stolen from his person, and then how would his legacy inherit it? That’s the argument that he gives his father and Rio-sensei, anyways, when they start harping on him for carrying Kuu and Piiko around on his shoulders come evening time.

In the streets. Where anyone can see.

What? For once, he has a legitimate excuse to do something fun in public as Tensei, not Tomoko, and his summons are curious about the place he considers his home. Asuga thinks herself much too dignified to perch on him, but Tensei spots her following them from a distance.

They take his offerings of dead cockerels from Suna's chicken hatcheries with all the grace anyone can expect out of a bird of prey. There's not much for them to do while he's grounded from fieldwork, so Asuga takes the opportunity to teach him how to mimic her leading feathers with the line of tenketsu points down his arms and legs. It should make him nearly completely silent as long as he can muffle his footsteps as well, but the technique takes him a while to pick up. He's hoped that his history of tenketsu hemorrhaging might actually work in his favor, here, but no. Tensei is just as bound to the points in his hands and feet like everyone else.

In contrast, Asuga is a well of patience. He is not her first ‘dumb, gangly human’, she claims.

“Slow,” Piiko tells him. “Time will come.”

“Wait,” Kuu elaborates. “And then you strike.”

“Stop,” Asuga chides him. “You see too far. We are right in front of you.”

Tensei ends up elbows-deep in Fumiko’s herb garden after that, a scowl painted across his lips as he recounts his encounter with Itachi, and the elderly lady purses her lips right back. “All you young folk are so impatient,” she chides him. “Prodigy this, genius that— I suppose it’s a miracle that you and Itachi-kun didn’t truly hurt each other. Mind you, my clan has always preferred cats, but your birds aren’t wrong in this matter.”

The next weed he lays his hands on is yanked up aggressively. “I’ve got too many eyes on me for that, Fumiko-obasan.” 

The council hadn’t intended for him to die on that mission— there are better, less obvious ways to carry out an assassination. But for him to have succeeded beyond their wildest dreams is drawing attention. Councilor Masafumi has been dropping bucketfuls of extremely unsubtle hints about his granddaughter, who is still in the Academy, and it’s probably not a coincidence that Tensei received his mission pay from Mari— Councilor Yuma’s niece— personally, because she spent the entire exchange batting her eyelashes at him. Tensei doesn’t have a problem with girls or anything, considering he gets along with Yua just fine, but being flirted with is weird. They don’t want him, they want his status, and that makes… well, less difference than it should, really. He’s pretty sure he’d be uncomfortable either way.

Fumiko hums, raking her trowel through the dirt a few times to even out the holes that he’s making. “What an interesting life you lead, Tensei-dono,” she muses.

Interesting. Tensei snorts. That’s certainly one way to describe it.

Chapter Text

73年, May

The first indication that something about today would be different happens almost as soon as Temari gets up. It's a coincidence, she knows, but looking back, it feels like that's where the recount should start. Tensei and Kankuro's theatrical tendencies might be rubbing off on her.

Out of all their family, Temari and her father are the only early risers by nature. Kankuro refuses to get out of bed until the sun is up, and Tensei-nii is simply awake whenever he's awake and asleep whenever he's asleep. Usually, she can count on her older brother to be at the table when she is, and how quiet of an affair breakfast is depends on whether he's been up for a while or freshly risen.

This morning it's just her and their father, and Temari can't decide if the silence is something to bask in or just plain awkward. 

"What's your schedule today," her father says.

"Homework." Rio-sensei has assigned her a reading of various political conflicts incited by a breach of manners, after Temari folded her toes the wrong way again for sitting in seiza. It's right over left and she knows that, she's done it correctly plenty of times before, but honestly what's the point. The only time it's required to sit like that instead of the criss-cross that everyone else uses day-to-day is during a tea ceremony, meeting with foreign dignitaries, or when they're called to attendance by the council for a formal airing of grievances. Of the three, Temari doesn't mind the first, isn't old or socially established enough for the second, and has only experienced the third once in her entire life. Temari is of the mindset that she can stand on tradition and find it stupid at the same time.  "And then sparring with Kankuro at the training grounds, when he gets up."

She could ask her father if he has the time to come and observe— she could. But she won’t, because she already knows what the answer will be, and there's no point in beating a dead camel.

"Aa. Tell him not to disturb your older brother, either. I've left his clothes at the door."

Meaning the wicker stand that's outside each of their rooms, otherwise Kankuro would definitely trip over them in his bleary half-awake state. Temari kind of wants to try sneaking into the dressing room anyways, though, just to prove that she can. Her Academy instructor specifically noted during the last practical that she was ahead of her peers, hiding her chakra signature and muffling her footsteps with a consistency befitting of a proper genin already— but that doesn't matter. Because Tensei-nii is a passive sensor, and Temari has never, ever managed to sneak up on him.

She doesn't let herself think about it too often, but every once in a while, Temari wants to snarl and snap at the unfairness of it all. She hates the gold dust and iron filaments for denying her of her birthright. Someday, she'll be so good at wielding her tessen that her wind will be able to blow them all away, just like her great-great grandfather did to the Shukaku's sand at their village's founding. Someday, she'll be able to fly for real, instead of the levitating that her father and older brother can do on platforms of particles.

But today, she hates how she wasn't the one born a natural sensor, because then maybe they wouldn't be in this mess in the first place.

"I think I'm gonna throw up, jan."

"Don't," Temari says, steel in her voice. "You'll wake Tensei-nii if you go into the dressing room to change."

Because their father had intercepted her in the hallway that morning with a bundle of clothing in hand and a quiet order to leave their older brother be where he was— sleeping, on the vanity table, which is not the weirdest place they've ever found him napping. Up on the roof with Gaara used to be the most common, but Kankuro says he's also had to get him down from a storage shelf in the Playhouse before, and Temari has fallen for the appearance of an empty office one too many times before learning to always check under the desk. They no longer only count the points of their 'who can find Tensei for dinner' game by the person who drags him home the most, but also by the place and pose they find him in. Bonus points if he's sleep-talking. 

It's good tracking practice. And they do literally have to drag him home, because otherwise they won't see him until he shows up with a sheepish smile at breakfast the next morning. Tensei has been all sorts of busy lately, and Temari can't help but think him dumb for not managing his time better, but it's not like her lecturing him will do anything more than what their father already has to say. And their father said to let him sleep, so.

"I said I think, not I will,” Kankuro grumbles. "What're we gonna do about…?"

Well, standard procedure taught at the Academy says to seal the corpse in a body scroll, but Temari doesn't have one on her. "We could leave him to the crows," she mutters, because that's what the bastard deserves. "Has Nii-san taught you the diagnostic jutsu?" 

"Why would I ask him to teach me medical ninjutsu?"

"I don't know, because you keep stealing his poisons?" She's heard that students in the upper levels of the poisons class have to know the basics of the technique, but Temari chose weaponry for her extracurricular and Kankuro chose puppetry. "Sure would be helpful right now."

"Well, we know he's not dead." Agent Orchid is breathing shallowly, but the rise and fall of his chest is pretty clear. Kankuro prods their anbu guard again with a chakra string, and like last time, there's no response. Chūnin-level shinobi and up are to be approached when unconscious or otherwise under the influence at the observer's risk, so Temari and Kankuro have spent the past few minutes waiting it out and hoping for whoever else on-shift to come get them like they're supposed to. It's a good thing that they don't have class today, otherwise they'd be late. Figures that someone would try to ambush them on their way to the training grounds.

"So, uh. What're we gonna tell Tou-sama?"

"The truth." That Orchid told them to get away before he got knocked out by the assailant, who Kankuro then tripped with a chakra string so thin that Temari had barely been able to see it despite watching him set it up, and then she caved the man’s head in with the butt of her tessen. 

“I thought we liked Orchid.”

“We’re not going out of our way to get him in trouble, though.” To be fair, their guard had done most of the work— Temari just finished the job. 

Kankuro frowns at her. “Are we going to get in trouble?” he asks quietly, and Temari knows he’s thinking about the aftermath of the last assassination attempt. The one that was either meant for him or Gaara, although Temari suspects it was probably the latter. 

They can hunt for their firsts in the field like I did, and if you keep them in the Academy until standard graduation age, they’ll do better than I ever could.

This definitely isn’t the field, but. “You won’t,” she assures her little brother, because Temari is the older one right now, and that means she has to be responsible. A headshot almost always gets the job done, Nii-san had told them, and at her feet lies proof. “I was the one that dealt the death blow, and I’m only a year and change from graduating. It’ll be fine.”

And it is. Orchid wakes up not even a minute later, and they bump into Yucca with a body slung over each shoulder when they’re whisked off to the Kazekage’s office building. They have to sit outside with the ancient old secretary while their guards deliver a preliminary report, and then Temari and Kankuro are called in to do the same. It’s just as well that Kankuro hasn’t learned how to deliver a formal oral sitrep in the Academy yet, because that lets Temari do all the talking with minimal interjections from her little brother, and everything she lays down is the truth.

And then their father gets up from behind his desk.

Temari chances a quick glance up before directing her eyes back down to the floor again, as is proper. Unlike their older brother, their father’s expression gives away nothing. 

A beat of silence.

“You did well.”

Temari blinks. Rarely does their ever-stern father sound so soft. “Thank you, Tou-sama,” she says.

“And I expect to see you follow in your older sister’s footsteps in the future, Kankuro. Strike first, ask questions later. Anyone who tries anything with our family deserves to be torn apart.”

Or have their skull caved in, apparently. This is approval, she realizes. He's proud of them.

“Loud and clear,” Kankuro mutters. “Uh. Are we telling Anigo and Gaara about this, or nah?”

“Or not,” their father corrects. It’s amazing that neither he nor Rio-sensei have given up on getting Kankuro to drop the local dialect yet. “And no. Your elder brother has much on his mind as of late, and I need you two to be good influences for Gaara.”

Temari shares a look with Kankuro. Gaara has never been violent with them— moody, yes, but not violent. And Tensei-nii has told them all about the poorly constructed jail cell that their baby brother is in charge of, which he’s doing a pretty good job at, for a seven year old. She doesn’t get why everybody expects their baby brother to completely lose it at any second when it’s clearly not the case.

“Yes, sir,” they chorus anyways, and that’s that.

::::::

Tensei is on a fucking warpath. 

It’s not the climate, he doesn’t think. Sure, Sunagakure can in no way match Konoha’s hospitable environment, and maybe their water is ‘harder’— whatever that means— but foreign shinobi and merchants alike have stayed in his village without adverse effects to this extent. And it’s not poison, either— Tensei has personally passed his detection jutsu over door handles and windows, beds and shoes, food and water, anything he could think of, and the results pinged back clear. Every anbu agent who has taken even a single turn on the Uchiha guard rotation got treated to a visit to T&I, and there’s nothing.

It’s not the public, either. Tensei has been leveraging his newfound political weight as far as he can to keep the survivors’ blood status a secret, and because this isn’t fucking Konoha where everyone knows about an A-rank secret like the identity of the Nine-Tails jinchuuriki , and Suna’s has been doing a decent job. The information is largely contained to the council, their immediate families, and those of jounin-rank— dissemination of the classified information is to be punished by demotion, suspension of active status, and incarceration in T&I of whoever was let in on said information. 

The public announcement was a feel-good story about a C-rank mission commissioned by a no-name village near their eastern border, in which Tensei arrived in the aftermath of a vicious bandit attack that left only the elderly and the smallest children alive. As far as most of Suna is aware, he took pity on them, and the thirty survivors have immigrated to Suna under his sponsorship. It’s a good enough cover, considering most Uchiha look pretty similar to the natives of River Country, and explains why they’re not used to the desert. 

His father didn’t appreciate the insinuation that Tensei could be taken advantage of through a soft-heart or whatever, so the fake C-rank was bumped up to a fake B-rank on account of fake-Tensei having slaughtered all of the fake bandits. Tensei rolled his eyes and let the addendum be, because that ship has sailed long ago. He’s a sucker for the sappy romance storylines from his extended punishment of noon-time shifts performing on the Mat Against the Wall, and Asahi-san has had to sit through maybe one-too-many updates about his siblings’ progress in this or that whenever someone mentions them in an attempt to draw him into a conversation. Yes, he knows what they’re doing. Yes, he indulges in it anyways, because skies know that Rasa isn’t home often enough for Tensei to ramble at his father these days. 

Actually, the counselors have implied a similar line of thought. And by ‘implied’, Tensei means that Counselor Iori straight-up told him, "Thank the skies you didn’t let it show during your Chūnin Exams.”

Soft. What, because he doesn’t have a perfectly maintained poker face at all times like his father? 

…he’s not sure how he feels about gouging out that one Kumo-nin’s eye, in hindsight.

Speaking of eyes— there’s the question of what to do when the children start presenting their sharingan. It’s a valid question. Tensei’s current plan involves sheltering the fuck out of them from the time they enter the Academy to the time they graduate, and then he’s going to assign them each a jounin mentor who already knows about their situation and deal with the incidents as they come. But that’s not the point— the point is, the Uchiha have received nothing but sympathy and generosity from the main populace of Suna, or at the least, neutrality. Anyone that would hold them ill will is within easy reach of Tensei’s influence.

And yes, it is the Uchiha specifically that are being targeted. There’s no reason why the other children in the orphanage would be healthy while five specific children grow more and more listless. Three of the elderly Uchiha have been hospitalized already, heartbeats slowed to catatonia. The caretakers are frantic, the Uchiha are desperate, and Tensei is getting more and more frustrated that nothing is turning up.

“You’re doing what you can,” Fumiko pats his hand in a very grandmotherly way, and Tensei marvels at Uchiha fucking Itachi’s ability to pick out people who have not an ounce of malice in their hearts. He offers her a begrudging smile, to which she smacks his shoulder. “Sit down, boy, you’ll do no good to anyone running yourself to the ground.”

He’s not, though. Tensei has a dozen people looking into this, because he understands that he can’t be everywhere at once and he’s a little useless when it comes to the finer points of forensic investigation anyways. His father has loaned him Clematis as the village’s best close-range sensor for orphanage guard duty, Rooster and Yua have been great at popping by and getting him to slow the fuck down, Temari and Kankuro have turned searching for him to call him to dinner into a competition, and Gaara kind of… presses a blob of sand against his chest whenever he comes home. It makes a mess of the welcome mat, but hey, that’s what the broom is for. 

“I told Fugaku-dono and Mikoto-dono that whoever made it into Wind Country’s borders would be safe,” he tells Fumiko, “and I intend to keep my promises.”

She pats his hand again. “Don’t we all, dear. Don’t we all.”

Chapter Text

X.

Oh. This again.

This One blinks and looks around. The Great One is, of course, half-buried in the ground before him, but the Scribe seems to have been expecting This One. Because This One is told under no uncertain circumstances that this visitation a warning. Why would the Executioner think oneself exempt to the laws of changing dates?

Changing dates. Dates?

Death-dates, the Scribe clarifies.

Ah. That had not been This One’s intention. To change fate, hopefully? To bring an offense against the law, no.

And so, the Great One rumbles, they will die, and order shall be restored.

Wait. Wait, hang on—

The Scribe would like to note for the record that the lives in question are blessed by Izanami and Izanagi. There is nothing beyond the ordinary for their souls to contribute, and they will need to be cleansed of such influences before entering the Samsara once more.

Cleansing? Blessed? So the Shinto gods are real, too, in this world?

An inconvenience, the Great One confirms, but This One's mind is already turning with possibilities.

The shinigami are an inconvenience, and the Uzumaki were tied to them. Jashin is an inconvenience, and there's a cult to go along with that. Does the power of any given god in a world rely on the quantity of their worshipers?

The answer comes in as an impression rather than a line of words. It's not only the quantity, per se, but rather the… magnitude? Which must be why Jashin's most favoured is rather high up on the List, This One realizes. Kill the vassal that holds the greatest faith and highest blessing, and a respective token of influence is removed from the world.

The mantle of Executioner holds a new weight, now. But aside from This One's reincarnation and perhaps the sacrilegious man with ringed eyes… oh, the Great One's links are held only by a few, thin pins.

What if This One could change that?

The Great One judges This One with a weight. This One is reminded that one is the Executioner, not the Preacher.

Or the Healer, right?

The Scribe checks the records. There was never a Healer in this world under the Great One’s service.

Oh. That’s… okay, alright, but wouldn't it work in their favour if This One turned the blessed of Izanami and Izanagi to follow the Great One instead? A showcase of the Great One's strength, to rob the other two gods of their charges. Why not cleanse them of their blessings in the overworld, why wait, why waste this turn of theirs in the cycle needlessly?

Inquisitive delivery and insolent intentions, the Scribe notes down, and there is no way for This One to brace for the lash that comes.

Pain.

Soul-deep, a rip, a tear, and then everything is stitched back together again.

That— The inquisitive delivery was genuine, it was a question—

A second lash. It is a fraction of a moment. It is an eternity.

The Executioner pours forth apologies, laid low. 

A third lash.

 Please. There is nothing to give that the Great One cannot already take as One pleases. This One only meant—

A

fourth

lash.

This One stills.

There is merit in the idea, the Great One concedes. The Scribe adds that such an idea has been implemented with some success in other worlds, for all that this one has been neglected of the same.

There is an impression from the ground of cracked golden-rimmed glasses a distance away, and a shattered visage lying beside it.

The Great One will allow for the newer souls to be cleansed in delay of their transmigration in return for the prospect of expansion, but the longer-lived will depart as planned.

This One thinks of kind eyes and patting hands, of tea and reassurances and a garden of herbs.

And?

This One flinches when attention is turned onto one's consideration, and voices nothing.

The Great One opens One's mouth, and the world is swallowed by black.

Chapter Text

73年, May

There are too many dead in the room, and Tensei is too spent to keep his heart off his sleeve. "I'm sorry," he says into a lap that he is much too old to be crying into, but the hand combing through his hair doesn't seem to mind. "I'm sorry."

"A cure that only works on children is no great tragedy," Fumiko hums, and smooths a tangle of auburn back all over again.

"We lived to see them delivered here safely," a man says from the next bed over. Tensei knows his name— will have to write it down on his report of the deceased— but he doesn't want to. He doesn't want to know these names. Already, he has a second list rattling around in his head, and he doesn't want it. "Maybe that's all we could ask for, in the end." 

Rooster brushes against his side and lets him know that his paint is running with a murmur, because the setting powder only lasts so long and Tensei has not reapplied any in the past eighty-four hours. He hasn't been home in the last eighty-four hours. There’s too much to do; records to take of a culture these people will not be able to share with a next generation and rites to learn for these people that have no one left to perform for them. Secrets that are noted down and pressed into his hands for young eyes that will never spin black and red, because Tensei has bargained them away for their chance to live. 

'Bargained'. There was no bargaining, not really. A suggestion and a reprimand and a choice made with no further input from him— in what world is that a bargain?

And then he flinches, because the impression of stitches on This One's soul throb with a reminder to be careful with his words.

Or rather, Tensei’s. Tensei's soul. Same difference, he knows, but fuck. He doesn't— he hopes he won't have to go back there again anytime soon. He sees it when he closes his eyes for too long, and This One— shit. And Tensei knows that this much bleed-over between his lives can't be good.

"I wish we could've done more," Yua says quietly, and Tensei chokes just as quietly on the guilt in his throat. He had the hospital's research labs in a frenzy before Enma-Dai'O spoke up about the real cause, and Chiyo-baasama has taken over a veritable chunk in order to study the 'cure' that Tensei whipped up. Just a placeholder reason for five children's miraculous recovery. Tensei is just about ready to murder the next person who calls him a prodigy, because there's nothing prodigious about creating a concoction of bullshit.

There is so much to apologize for, and so very little that he can say out loud. All of the children will be told of their roots and none will be forced into a shinobi career against their wishes, and this he swears upon his mother in the sands. But all of them will also be taught to worship a god that refused to spare their elders, and this Tensei cannot and will not burden a room of hospitalized patients on their deathbeds with. 

"I'm sorry," he sobs into hospital sheets that have been colored lavender with his paint, and Fumiko's wrinkled hand pats his head uselessly. 

"I'm sorry," he whispers to the dark earth in an herb garden the next day. There is black on his knees and red on his hands and everything is so, so fitting.

The council approves his final selection of genin applicants for this year’s International Chunin Exams in Iwa. Tensei can’t work up the effort to worry about how things will turn out. It seems like years instead of months ago that they assigned him that duty, and compared to everything he’s learned to do since, it’s almost laughable how simple that had been.

"I'm visiting my family in Chukan-mura soon," Yua tells him, and no sooner does an invitation leave her painted lips that sees Tensei nearly dragging her to his father.

"You have responsibilities," the Kazekage tells him, and Tensei knows. The fuinjutsu department and Kankuro's sponsorship and his shifts at the mission desk, he knows.

"Please," Tensei says anyway. 

"It's just for a week, Kazekage-sama," Yua adds.

Rasa levels his gaze at him. "Running will do you no good."

Is that what he's doing? Running? Probably. The Grass genin; the Sun Theatre. The kunoichi spy; Hari-mura. Now, the last few survivors of a clan he promised asylum to; Chukan-mura. Tensei is a coward who runs away every time he can’t bear to face the consequences of his actions— or perhaps, inaction.

And yet. 

"The Moon shakes her head, for she finds the desert beautiful," Tensei tells his father. 

Rasa sighs, but knows what Tensei means by that quote. Tensei is sure that neither of them have forgotten the context behind it, even years removed from when Rasa once said it to him. “You’re going with your mother, I presume,” his father addresses Yua.

“Yes, Yondaime-sama.”

“And your cousin?”

“Yes, Yondaime-sama.”

Rasa flicks through a stack of paperwork at the left-hand corner of his desk, pulls out a scroll, and then pulls out a thin packet of papers curled within it. “I’m sure Hoki-sensei will be thrilled to see that I’m returning this early,” he mutters, and Tensei blinks. “Tell your mother to commission a C-rank escort and file it as a business expense. I’ll amend this season’s budget to reflect that.”

“Yondaime-sama?”

“She may request whatever specific personnel she’d like, seeing as the safety of Sunagakure’s Director of the Hospital and the kin of a closely allied clan’s matriarch is paramount.”

Tensei can see the exact moment that Yua registers what his father has just done. The Kazekage signing off on a temporary leave of absence form for his son would encourage the curious parties to poke and prod for specifics, and potentially lead to political ramifications down the line. Tensei taking on a high-profile escort mission as an accomplished chunin of Suna, though? Nothing particularly out of the ordinary.

Tensei dips into a bow, and Yua follows suit. “Thank you, Otou-san.”

Tensei packs a bag for ‘soon’, and soon enough, he’s gone.

::::::

Shijima is not jealous of her cousin.

No, seriously, she’s not. Imagine having to deal with the mess that is the Kazekage’s eldest son right now? Mortifying. He’s older than them by a year and still hasn’t figured out that there’s no saving everybody, which is the first lesson that a medic learns. Look at me, I’m the prodigy kid of the greatest legacy-line in the country, I pulled a miracle demographic-specific cure that no one understands out of my ass to a mysterious disease that no one can identify and now I’m sulking about it at my girlfriend’s home. Boo-fucking-hoo.

Of course, Shijima doesn’t voice any of this out loud. She knows better; has been trained to know better. That’s why she sits across from her mother on their balcony with slices of watermelon and offers a few choice words instead. 

“I can and will have the stick brought out,” her mother says. 

But Shijima hasn’t been truly afraid of a beating since she was her little sister’s age. Her mother hasn’t kept in shape after she retired to be the family matriarch, and Shijima is willing to bet that she’s stronger than her now. “Are you really so confident in him that you’d have Yua see this through? You’re relegating her to this singular role when there’s more out there that would fit so much better,” she retorts. They’re not friends, she and her maternal first cousin. Rivals, maybe. They moved together, learned together, sparred together, graduated together— only, Shijima’s spare time is filled with tutors and studying, and Yua’s is spent training for and pursuing a seduction mission on the highest-classed target their family has ever attempted. “You’re not in Suna full-time like her and Oba-san and I. You have no idea how little time he actually has to spend with her these days.”

“Current events do not reflect our future, daughter mine. The council will be pushing for an early union as they did with the boy’s father.”

Out of fear for history repeating, sure, but. "The councilors have granddaughters and great-nieces galore with the exact same goal.”

“And they will fail where our family succeeds.” Her mother tilts her wrist in a smooth motion that traces Shijima’s figure with her folding fan. “Your beauty does you well, but your mouth remains ever crass. You should be thankful that Yua is similarly endowed and in a position to raise the Hoki’s status in Sunagakure, or else it would have been Hakuto-chan with one of the younger boys.”

The puppeteer or the sacrificial lamb. “But Hakuto-chan’s going to take over Oba-san’s role.”

“No reason to not pursue two paths at once.” The fan snaps closed. “At a thought, I would advise you to be more cautious of your cousin than your little sister. Yua has ambition.”

Well, so does Shijima. So does any kunoichi who lasts a year after graduating. There’s no point in soft, dainty hands when calluses serve her infinitely better with handling ho-shuriken, and there’s value to be found in the grateful nods she receives after fixing people up in the middle of a fight. Yua gets that, with her wire-scarred hands and developing mystic palm. “Okaa-san, she likes what she does. You can’t just force her to retire and play housewife.” 

You can’t force me to step back and be satisfied with running things from the shadows.

Her mother exhales. “Ah, but you see, my daughter, that’s the difference between the two of you. Yua knows where her duties lie.”

What a load of drivel. Yua’s just more well-spoken than her and less inclined to stick up for herself against her matriarch. The two of them have dreams— both of them are training with the Black Sands in mind, and the Kazekage’s son can’t afford to wait around for her cousin to come back from wherever that stint takes them.

At least, she doesn’t think he can, but when she goes to talk to Yua later that day, she finds her cousin chatting away in a clearing with Tensei-dono by her side and her little sister in between them. The canopy of wires above them looks like a pattern from their grandmother’s dreamcatcher weavings that she showed them how to do when they were younger, and the older boy has a hand tracing the air even as he responds quietly back. 

“No, no!” Hakuto interrupts whatever conversation they’re having, loud enough for Shijima to make out the words. “You went over that line already!” A questioning tone, too quiet to hear properly, and then her little sister giggles. “Tensei-nii has to start aaaaaall over again.”

Neither she nor her cousin are in a position to take two paths at once— Shijima cannot be a field operative in an exotic land far away from here and still maintain her duties as the Hoki heiress in Chukan-mura; Yua cannot go on a crusade to see the world from within the walls of the Kazekage’s compound. But Shijima looks upon the sight before her in a clearing of soft grass, and wonders if her maybe-rival might trade her dream in for duty after all.

Chapter Text

73年, June

"Tensei-dono, Rooster-san, Yua-san," the matron greets them at the gate. "It's good to see you three again— an' your friend's welcome, too, of course." 

"Aya, of the Playhouse, daughter of Taka," Rooster's tentative girlfriend introduces herself. "Just here to see what the fuss is all about."

"They're cute kids," Yua says decisively. "You'll like them."

"The cute sponsees are always the troublemakers, though."

Rooster knocks his shoulder against hers playfully. "The Sa-trio are just hellspawns. Most of the little guys just want to teeth on your hands if they're not napping, jan."

"Ew."

The matron lets out a laugh. "No, no, we've toys for 'em to chew on. A difficult experience an' all that."

And a new one for Tensei to observe, actually. Of the five kids, only Shouta has all of his teeth already. Same as Kankuro, back when Tensei first started having to take care of his siblings alone, and obviously he wasn't there for Gaara when his baby brother started teething. Between the servants and Yashamaru-oji, Tensei never really had to deal with this stage of life before these five entered his life.

He wonders what Ainu and Reki are up to these days. Reki made chunin in the local exams a year after Tensei, he thinks— he remembers hearing something about poison gas and a good showing in front of the judge panel. He doesn't know what happened to Ainu, though. 

Rooster pokes him, and Tensei leaves the thought behind for later. "How're they doing, Nalani-obasan?" he asks. 

"As lively as ever, thanks to you." Tensei bites his tongue in lieu of saying something that he might regret, and the matron continues. "Actually, you might find Shouta-kun whining about a sunburn that he got yesterday. Skies know he never learns his lesson about wearing a head wrap; thinks he'll tan like the other kids do."

"The curse of fair skin," Yua jokes, the only one out of their group of four who isn't tan. Tensei lets out an amused huff, recalling the lecture he'd given Temari and Kankuro when his little sister started coming home red and crispy. 

Obviously, none of them had been carted off to an orphanage after their mother passed, but Tensei is still a little bitter at how their situation was handled. He knows how demanding his father's job is and appreciates that Yashamaru was there for Gaara, but firing all of their servants? Even through the lens of paranoia, it would have made more sense to at least keep the senior staff that had been in the family's employ for the longest, or maybe hire new ones. The anbu are watchers and guards, not caretakers, and Tensei had been laden with the responsibility of looking after two toddlers at eight years old, apparent maturity be damned. Tensei loves his father, but he can't say that he understands the man all that well.

"Tensei-dono," one of the older children dip at the waist upon seeing them enter, and as if waiting for their cue, a swarm of waist-high children converge upon their group.

"You’re back— shove off, Mai, I got here first!"

"Bag!" 

"Your hair is messy."

"Will you take us flying again?"

"Do the eye-thing!"

Tensei shares an exasperated look with Rooster as the two of them sling their packs to the front for the children to take a look. In all honesty, a lot of these kids are rude little shits, but Tensei would feel bad if he only ever brought presents for his wards, so. 

"I like your makeup today," a little girl tells Yua, and Rooster snorts when Tensei immediately lets her have the first pick out of the goodie bag. 

Here's the thing about Sunagakure's orphanages: there’s one in every odd-numbered district, each holding give or take sixty kids between the ages of infancy and fifteen. It's easier to have four concentrated residential locations that needs way more water than the average family rather than a scattering of many more group homes throughout the village, which sounds like a nightmare for the resource allotment department to keep track of while calculating water rations. Each one is run by a staff of a dozen caretakers, one of which being the matron that acts as a sort of manager who handles the administrative aspect. Then there's the social hierarchy within each orphanage, which goes top-down in order of seniority— not age, but who's been there the longest. Plenty of bullying to be found here and not enough adult supervision to corral it, although Tensei is aware that the little he sees surely isn't the half of it when there are no guests. That had been a problem to tackle, back when he was planning how to shelter the Uchiha kids from getting their sharingan too early.

It's still a problem, yes, but a much less urgent one for the time being. He'll deal with it as it comes, like with Temari. She's currently fending off a particularly persistent boy by the name of Daimaru and hasn't asked for anything outside of a listening ear to vent to, so Tensei is holding onto his 'big brother’s here to fuck you up' moment for another time. 

"Did you get me the senbon I asked for?" one of said older kids demands. Baiu, Tensei thinks his name is, an Academy student in the same year as his little sister.

"Did you make that second swing I told you to?" Tensei arches a brow.

"Yeah. It's holding up, even though the brats keep sitting on top of each other."

The whole point of a second swing was so that the kids would stop fighting over the first and only one, but Tensei supposes there's no stopping competitive spirit. "And your report?"

Baiu scowls but trudges off to find his mock D-rank mission report. Temari had been filling out a couple as homework last month, so Tensei might as well encourage the extra practice in her peers.

Two years after the Third War ended, the council set a minimum graduation age of twelve years old onto the Academy— post Tensei's promotion to genin. It should have been right after the peace treaty was signed, Tensei thinks, but obviously, they hadn't wanted to impede his becoming one of the youngest genin to ever wear the hitai-ate. However, that also means that some of the more crowded orphanages are trying to fast-track their wards through the Academy for the legal emancipation status that automatically comes with joining Suna's active duty forces, thus giving orphanages the excuse to force them out without the half-year grace period that a civilian turning sixteen would receive. Rooster told him the gist of it while Tensei was looking at which orphanage to leave the Uchiha kids in— his senpai had spent a few months in District Nine's orphanage before he graduated, apparently.

Tensei hadn't pried any further.

"Ano, do you think we should…?" Yua starts, and Tensei follows her line of sight to two girls tussling viciously over one of the few candied apples from the goodie bag.

Rooster shrugs. "Nah. Let 'em figure it out." 

"It's going to melt at the rate you're going!" Aya eggs them on, prompting their heads to snap towards her.

Tensei rolls his eyes and unseals a scroll's worth of iron when the matron pops her head into the room to check on the noise. "Whichever one of you lets the other have it gets first dibs on a ride," he cajoles, flattening the iron filaments into a mostly-smooth surface.

And that, of course, is when Shouta decides to crash the party. "Tensei-niiiiiii," he whines. "Me first!" 

The two girls eye each other before the slightly taller one releases her hold on the stick. Joy of joys. "Both of you can go first," Yua suggests as Tensei widens the platform to seat two. It's not the space that he's worried about— two kids at once is pretty easily manageable, but usually he doesn't offer anything but solo rides for the reason that keeping more weight afloat is surprisingly chakra intensive, and there are so many kids in the metaphorical line. Even his father can't stay on his platform of gold for too long, otherwise why bother walking anywhere when you can fly? 

"Where are your cousins?" he asks Shouta as the three-year old clambers on. Because realistically, all of the Uchiha have to be at least sixth or seventh cousins— hard to share a family name without also sharing a many-times great grandparent somewhere down the line.

"Napping."

"And you're not because…?"

"Didn't wanna."

Makes sense. Kaede and Itsuki are a lazy pair of two-year olds, and Chie and Kensei just had their first birthday last month. Said birthday being arbitrarily chosen based on how old the Uchiha thought they were, that is. "You know you're not gonna grow if you don't sleep well." Tensei plans to wait until each of them are four years old before— before bringing them to the shrine that he’s just started building in the northern wing of his family compound. 

It’s a work in progress. 

"Didn't wanna," Shouta pouts. 

Tensei shrugs, having said his obligatory bit as a supposedly good influence, and picks up the now-empty goodie bag to bring this procession outside. Baiu promptly accosts him a moment later with the mock mission report in hand, so Tensei scoops up some sand from the courtyard and makes two braces' worth of glass senbon for the kid then and there, as per their deal. Probably to show off to his classmates or something, Tensei doesn't really care.

"Keep burning through your reserves like that and I might actually let you pay for the food this time," Aya comments.

"You'd only be incentivising him," Rooster sighs, already used to Tensei's antics. "I've had to fight him on splitting even more times than I can count. You know how I got him to give up last time?" 

"You picked him up like a ragdoll and carried him out the door," Yua giggles, having heard this story already, and Tensei flushes at the reminder. There's a deceptive amount of muscle hiding underneath those puppeteer blacks.

Speaking of. <If burn-out repeat, commander-puppeteer will reprimand,> Tensei catches from the drumming of his senpai's fingers.

Tensei rolls his eyes and replies back in code as well, instead of telling Rooster to fuck off out loud while in young and mostly-innocent company. <You over-and-out.>

Yua smacks him lightly, and Tensei grins.

Five out of thirty. The scar on his soul throbs, but it’s tolerable, toned down to a dull ache now. In terms of statistics, five out thirty is a terrible rate, but it’s better than zero. It’s proof that his choices actually do matter in the grander scheme of things, proof that he can change this world if he really puts the effort into it.

There are better things to do than kneeling before an unmarked grave in regret.

Chapter Text

73年, July

The head of the new fuinjutsu department isn’t really what Maki had been expecting.  

“There are a great many techniques that can completely erase someone's signature,” Captain Tensei begins the presentation. “However, there are very, very few that can completely erase someone's signature without killing them, since it's an indication of life.”

Upon her recent promotion to jounin, Maki was recruited to both the jinchuuriki containment squad and the fuinjutsu department. She hasn’t had to do anything more than run a few drills with the former yet, thank the skies, and the department head had been out running a mission for her first week, so it’s only now that Maki’s getting run through a baseline indicator. 

The fuinjutsu department presents every new recruit with the very first issue that they’d been revived to work on, breaking down the basics of an enhanced privacy seal before encouraging a free sharing of thoughts. According to the captain, the council wants a mobile variation of said seal that could totally conceal the user from all relevant senses for mass distribution among the Black Sands, which… well, the department still hasn't managed it. Sight and sound, yes, by the captain’s hand when he was still a genin apparently, but not the chakra signature. 

“But we hide our signatures all the time for stealth,” Arata says. He’d been poached from the Genin Corps only half a year out of the Academy, on the basis of his outstanding marks in general theory and an affinity for calligraphy. Maki doesn't think they knew about his propensity for talking about himself when Arata was being recruited, though. The kid had chattered on endlessly .

“Yes, and a talented sensor can still fetter that out. Think of it like breathing,” the captain explains, “you can make it louder or quieter, and you can hold it in for a limited amount of time, but at the end of the day it's still an involuntary function that you need to live. It’s why the henge is supposedly more easily applicable to complex lifeforms like other humans and animals compared to plants or inanimate objects. The only technique that I can think of that completely hides a person's chakra signature is the Six-Tails jinchuuriki's bubbles, and he’s, you know. A jinchuuriki.”

“Why do you know that off the top of your head,” one of the more established department members says, his tone curious if exasperated. Isamu, reads the dorky little nametag on his flak vest. Everyone has one— including the captain. Maki’s friends are not going to believe her when she tells them about this.

“Archival records from when we fought Kiri in the Second War, before they lost their jinchuuriki laying siege to Uzushio. The current one is only…” Tensei squints, closing one eye in the process, “two years older than me, I think, so Suna never got to engage him in the Third War, but he can do it, too. Probably.”

What?

“Anyways, it shouldn’t be impossible, but we’re going to table that in favour of working in the mobilization aspect instead. I haven’t managed to remove the angle markings from the equation— you’ll all get a chance to take a crack at that problem, but for today, we’re going to be working around that. ”

Okay, that sounds simple enough. “Put them on a frame and hang that around the waist by straps on the shoulders,” Maki suggests, already envisioning the contraption. 

“Nope. Suna usually deals in two-dimensional seals, so here’s a fun fact about three-dimensional ones: the matrix is always used as a reference for either the top or the bottom.” He makes a quick sketch of a human on the chalkboard, bisects it at the waist, and then draws the other three sides of a rectangle out of dotted lines on either end. Only the top half or the legs would get any coverage, then? Shoot. "Putting the frame at the feet is out, obviously, since that defeats the whole point of making this thing mobile. I submitted a request to the equipment design team in the resource management department, but they claim that any feasible headgear would be too unwieldy.”

“Couldn’t you or Kazekage-sama manage it with your magnet release, though?” Arata traces a halo above his head.

“Well, we’re not making this for either of us,” Tensei said wryly. “But I have to say no to that, too. You’d be surprised how much control it takes to keep our materials still in a general sense, nevermind in the relative sense to each other while I’m moving. The marks get messed up really easily.”

They’re dismissed after another twenty minutes of troubleshooting with copies of the seal to study, as well as a request for a self-analysis of how their current and planned skillset can be applied to fuinjutsu. Maki leaves the room feeling a little winded by all of the information. 

That her new department head chases her down to introduce himself afterwards doesn’t help. 

It's obvious how the Kazekage's eldest should introduce himself, for all that Maki suspects he rarely needs to: Tensei, son of Rasa of the Gold Dust, kin to Sarou of the Iron Sand, kin to Reto of the Winds. Maki has no doubt that he will earn a fancy moniker of his own in the coming years— but that's not the angle that he comes in at. 

“I'm Tensei. Bear, of the Playhouse.” Maki blinks in surprise, and the captain smiles. It’s a quick thing, there and gone again in a flash like he’s too tired to keep it up. “I could go on, but the usual spiel a bit much when there’s no one else around. Your Face caught my attention, earlier— the Banners of Kiyoshi by themselves is a rather interesting choice.” 

“Maki, daughter of Skink.” As in the lizard. "I wear this Face in my father’s honor. He never liked how much of a mouthful his full stage name was, either."

Tensei dips his head. “The Playhouse holds his stories,” he says, an echo of the slew of condolences from every puppeteer who knew her father. 

Maki has never been allowed in to see the banners that her father said hung in the Playhouse’s heart, but she’s certain they’re there. Her father’s name must be stitched in golden thread, the color still vibrant in the cool dark of stucco halls instead of sun-bleached like so many things are in Suna. The puppeteers remember every member of their brigade, all the way back to the beginning. They have their own traditions, like a single, succinct line of acknowledgement instead of the condolences that everyone else uses: I grieve for futures lost to the winds as I grieve for ashes lost to the sands. May his soul find peace in the skies.

Maki wears the paint that she does so that her father can do just that. There’s a couple people in Kiri with blood on their hands who could use a kunai through the throat.

But that’s for another day. “What can I do for you, Captain?”

“Sou, I read your file the other day, and I wondered if you might be interested in joining a side-project of mine. You’re on the containment squad, yes?” Maki nods. “I figured you might want to help with our efforts to revamp the Shukaku’s seal.”

Oh. “Are there plans for a new jinchuuriki underway?”

Instantly, she knows that she drew the wrong conclusion. His expression as a whole hadn’t changed, but something about his eyes looks… darker. “No,” he says. “I’m trying to stabilize my brother’s seal through a series of minute modifications, but the situation is a bit of a mess. Storage seals were never meant to hold sentient beings, nevermind be inked onto skin.”

That sounds risky. Maki has barely studied the seal with the rest of the new recruits on her squad, but she knows that this endeavor can’t end well. It would be so much simpler to design an entirely new array and redo the sealing on someone else, but everyone and their mother knows how attached the Kazekage’s eldest is to his siblings. 

All of his siblings. 

It's obvious in the way that his demeanor changes when Temari-dono or Kankuro-dono came in looking for him the other day, but Maki has heard her fair share of rumors. A well-corroborated one is that her captain will physically pick up and carry the Kazekage's youngest in his arms to get it away from the public, even while its sand is actively swirling around in a death rattle— shouldn’t they have anbu for that?

“I understand if you’re hesitant,” her captain said in Maki’s silence, “but just know that no one on the team except for me ever comes into live contact with the actual seal. The operation is entirely theory work, at this point. We work with graphite-on-paper copies.”

Unlike chalk, graphite can channel just enough chakra to indicate if a seal as a whole will or won’t activate, even if it doesn’t show whether or not an array will work as intended. That’s about as safe as it gets, in this field of ninjutsu. 

Still. “What if I need time to think about it?” 

He caught on to her actual question right away. “There’s no punishment for declining, of course. This project isn’t officially sanctioned by the council. You’re not obligated to agree just because I’m the one asking you.” 

There are absolutely consequences for denying a superior officer as high up on the ladder as the teen before her, but Maki knows puppeteers. Tensei wouldn’t do anything so direct as demote her back to tokujo or dismiss her from the department, she suspects, and if this project isn’t sanctioned under the council, that means he’s doing it under his own time and funds. 

For his brother’s sake. That’s… huh. “Would a trial run be acceptable?”

::::::

73年, August

The Sunartistry Festival arrives, as it does every year. The Kazekage gives a speech, as he does every year. Tensei stands regally by his side only for as long as he has to. 

Temari is eleven and Kankuro is nine, they're old enough to take care of themselves and Gaara for a few hours. Poppy and Yucca are on shift, anyways, and Tensei has gotten good enough at sensing to give a pointed look in their direction. As his little siblings’ most regular guards for years now, he places perhaps an inordinate amount of trust in them. Besides, it’s not like they’re going to miss the festivities; there’s a whole rotation set up to make sure everyone gets time with their friends and family during the holiday. 

Rooster and Aya have disappeared off to skies only know where, sulking after an argument that neither of them will talk about, so Tensei and Yua take turns pulling each other around to whichever game or food catches their fancy. They win her a shimmery pale yellow obi at one store in a competition against other duos, and she makes him guess what flavor of filling her imagawayaki has.

He guesses chocolate, and that's what she leaves on his face when she pecks him on the cheek. 

Oh. Oh. 

Um.

She's not looking at him whatsoever, face turned to the side in a brilliant flush of pink.  Tensei scrounges up the courage to return the kiss onto the knuckles of her hand, European-style. Wouldn't want to mess up her makeup, right? 

"I have something to confess."

That would have sounded better a few seconds ago rather than afterwards. "Yes?"

"You… you know how strict our families can be?"

He nods. Two workaholic single parents in an upper social rung; two kids with a fair amount of weight to their lineages. Hoki-sensei must be harping on Yua's iryo-ninjutsu progress again, although he doesn't think that's where she's going with this. 

"Right. I just felt like you should know, that…"

She's nervous. Tensei swings the hand he hasn't let go of a little, to lighten the mood, and she huffs. "I'm okay if you don't want to say it out loud right now," he offers.

"I— first, we're friends."

What. He must be making some kind of face again, because she hurries to backtrack. "I meant, regardless of anything else going on in our lives. I want you to know that I'm actually your friend, and I mean it when I say that I like you."

"And I like you back?" Not that Tensei has been confessed to a lot, but he gets the feeling that this is somewhat out of the norm. "I'm sending a 'but' in there." Yua nods. "And you… don't feel comfortable telling me about it." She nods again. Well, that's just fantastic. Tensei has an inkling of an idea, considering the very unwelcome and somewhat pointed gifts of dried, loose-leaf tea samples that have started appearing at his desk in the fuinjutsu department. "Is the council bothering you," he says quietly.

"No, it's, um. Clan business. Hoki family matters."

Aaand he's lost again. "Is there anything I can do to help?"

Yua looks down at their interlaced fingers. "This is okay for now," she murmurs, and Tensei decides not to push.

He tracks down Rooster afterwards, but his senpai doesn’t seem to be in a mood to listen to Tensei try to work out his confusion aloud. Right, the argument with Aya. Tensei is such a bad friend. “I’ll listen, if you want to—”

“No.”

Okay. Looks like it's not a great day for words, from either of his friends. "Is this a problem we can solve with physical violence?" he takes a shot in the dark.

Rooster snorts and says nothing.

Tensei places a carton of dango sticks that he picked up on the way within easy reach for them both and sits back to back with the older puppeteer, basking in the quiet.

It’s not awkwardness that drives him to spend the entirety of the next day with his siblings if they’re the ones trailing him. All three can still fit inside White Bear's cavity when he takes out the guillotine, so he takes them for a lumbering ride through the bigger streets with the side panels propped open to act as windows.

Temari, who likes to pretend she's too old to partake in anything fun these days and only got in after much grumbling and coaxing, pokes an arm out to wave him closer. "Nii-san," she says, and Looks meaningfully at the smaller figure beside her.

Tensei only has half a second to mourn her initiation into those with Looks before he registers it.

Gaara is smiling.

The open panels only provide a hand's width crack on each side, vertically, and two arms’ length horizontally. Enough to see out of pretty clearly, but shadowed enough not to be able to see into it very well. This— this might be Gaara's first time being in the middle of so many people without them giving him scared or disgusted Looks, without dumb kids throwing pebbles at him or something.

His baby brother's first time being among all the smiling and laughing and joy.

"Can we get ice cream mochi?" Kankuro breaks Tensei out of his train of thought. "We haven't had ice cream mochi since last year, jan . "

"That's because we only ever import it for the Sunartistry Festival," Tensei tells his little brother, reaching in to flick his ear. "But yeah, we can go get mochi. Any plans for afterwards?"

“Can Asa and Botan come over later?”

Ah, crap.

Temari frowns. “Tensei-nii already said Sen and Yome could.”

“ Your friends visit all the time.”

“Only because your friends drag you across town for a dust bath every other day.”

“Did you forget the part where we live in a place covered in dust and sand?”

Tensei catches a perfect replica of his own thinned lips on Gaara’s face as their siblings bicker, and he can’t help but laugh. 

Chapter Text

73年, October

Hey, baby brother. Don't mind me, just checking in. Whatcha doin' in here?

Yeah, I know training's not very fun, but Otou-san means well.

Yeah, they figured out where you keep on disappearing to, but I didn't only come to get you because he told me.

I didn't. I wanted to make sure you were okay, too.

Well, I'd like to hide in here all the time, too, but then things would never get done. This closet doesn't make for a great office, you know.

Come on, I'll even carry you on my shoulders. You like it up high, right?

Okay, fine, one book. One. And then we have to get going. Oh, hey, penguins again? Neat.

::::::

To his credit, Rasa keeps trying. With Gaara.

The way he does it, though, leaves a lot to be desired. 

"Otou-san," Tensei twirls the paintbrush slowly between his fingers. "Gaara's seven."

"Eight, in a few moons." Rasa tugs out the starched white sleeves of his haori as he puts it on. "You and I started sparring when you were much younger than that."

"That's different."

"Hm."

"I just don't think me sparring him will be as conducive as you're hoping."

"On what grounds do you doubt me?"

According to his father, Rasa's gold seems to 'incite adverse mental effects' when they spar. Needless to say, Tensei is more than mildly alarmed at that, because he had assumed that Rasa and Gaara's private training sessions was a stilted attempt at father-son bonding while his baby brother is still this young. Not baiting the One-Tail. 

"Gaara lacks control. He needs to hone his own battle instincts outside of his automatic sand defense," Rasa justifies his decision, and Tensei wishes feverently for his uncle to reassemble from the winds and smack some sense into the older magnet release user. No duh, Gaara lacks control, he never attended the Academy. All the wall-climbing and signature-suppression can be accredited to intuitive bleed-through of the tailed beast's experience.

So the next morning sees Tensei with all three scrolls of iron unsealed, ten paces away from his baby brother in a training ground on the very outskirts of District Seven. He's taken to calling each scroll by an 'act', inspired by the three moons on Temari's tessen. That he's starting on Act Three is probably telling of how he expects this to go.

Here's something that he didn't expect, though— Tensei is faster. Or, rather, Tensei is proactive, while the sand is reactive. He can see the supposed problem here, in that Gaara himself is doing very little in the mental department for this spar. "Otou-san taught you the Dune kata?"

"Mm."

"Okay. Can you try to use it?"

Gaara shifts into an opening stance, and Tensei digs into his well of patience as he coaxes his baby brother through the first chain. The goal is to have him consciously direct his sand alongside the sweeping movements, rather than just going through the motions.

Then he steps back and tells Gaara to try any one of those moves on him. "Pretend I'm a pretty bug that you're trying to catch," he suggests playfully. "But also, I'm trying to catch you back." 

And to be fair, it starts off pretty well. Tensei slows down to let the waves of sand miss by a smaller margin than they would if he were really trying, because said waves look distinctly more like amorphous blobs than they used to a few minutes ago; like an inexpert hand is trying to shape them and push them around.

So Tensei starts retaliating with simple things. Spikes and winding tendrils, piercing through the sand blobs when they get too close and testing Gaara's defenses from time to time. "You're doing well," he praises when a furrow appears between his baby brother's eyes. 

So well that it takes him off guard when Gaara falls for a feint. Tensei pulls back before it can do more than scuff Gaara's cheek, but the blobs have suddenly sharpened into claws and oh no oh fuck fuck fuck—

Beige crashes into black as Tensei tries to divert its path. He leaps backwards while gold rises up to push forwards, and Rasa's warning prompts him to lash out behind him even before he's turning his head.

His iron senbon are buried in a wave of sand, and Tensei curses as he moves to get clear.

It snags him by the ankle.

The sand envelopes him.

"Tensei!"

He directs his iron to fend off the mass of sand that's trying to smother his head, and gold dust makes a speedy arrival to assist in a messy wrestling match of particles. “Look at that, you caught me,” Tensei says lightly with a calm he does not feel. “Good job, Gaara. Please let me go now.”

“You hurt me.”

Shit. Rarely does any party walk away from one of Gaara, Tensei, and Rasa’s rare joint-training sessions with any sort of satisfaction, but usually, it can be counted on that they walk away intact. “Which you consented to, when we began this spar.”

Gaara growls, literally growls. "Will the black bleed red?"

Will the— oh. "The voice is loud today, huh," Tensei says sympathetically. "C'mon, baby brother. You know I do. We share the same red."

“Gaara.” The remainder of their father’s gold dust is swirling around the three of them, looking for an opening. Threatening. Tensei glares in lieu of tapping at Rasa to cut that out since his hands are pinned to his sides, because it’s doing the opposite of helping. “Release him. Now.”

“No.”

Tensei sighs, and then immediately regrets it when the sand follows the motion of his lungs and clamps down tighter. “No, you won’t put me down, or no, you don’t consent anymore?”

"No."

The sand grinding against the exposed areas of his skin that were once scarred by the very same material is not a great experience, especially paired with the fact that it's tightening around him. Fuck, ow, something just creaked on the inside like a plank of wood. That can’t be good. He takes a moment to focus; to keep his voice steady. This is his baby brother. Everything will be fine. "Please use your words, Gaara."

“...I take it away.”

Okay. Okay, Tensei can work with that. Not for the first time, he thanks the skies that his younger siblings can all still use words when prompted. “Then this spar is over. I won’t try to hurt you anymore unless you consent again. Does that sound alright to you?”

“Yes.” 

“Great,” he chokes out. “Sou, now that we’re done, I’m also no longer giving you consent to hurt me with your sand. Can you let me go?”

And Gaara does. Yep. See, it's fine, he's fine, nothing's bleeding, skies fucking wept. No repeats of sand under his skin again or anything, haha.

He's pulled into blue robes by starched white sleeves, and Tensei notes distantly that they belong to his father. "Are you hurt?"

It feels like there's sand in his throat, even though he's pretty sure that he didn't swallow any. <Negative,> he taps onto his father's arms. It's funny. He could almost pretend that this was a hug, if it weren't for searching hands— he hisses when they press into his side. On second thought, he might have replied too quickly.

He blinks, and they're on the rooftops. The weather is particularly clear today. Tensei hopes his baby brother is enjoying the blue skies.

He blinks, and then he flinches, because someone is flashing a light into his one good eye and there are hands he can't see on his bad side. Gold bats down an instinctive rattle of iron needles, and people decked in a familiar shade of white retreat towards the other side of the room. 

"Calm down. We're just in the hospital. It's eight-thirty in the morning. The medics are running some tests." 

Right, sure, okay, except how about they keep his blood inside of his body, where it belongs? He thinks the doctor tells them that one of his floater ribs has a small fracture. Which is fine, because Tensei can barely even feel it. Everything is fine. He wasn't pulled into the black again, so it's all good.

"A fucking miracle," his father mutters into the hand on his face once the doctor leaves.

That's the first time he's heard his father swear, he thinks. “What is?” he asks. 

His father visibly startles. Huh. Tensei must've been pretty quiet while he was losing time. “You're back."

"Never left, depending on how you look at it." He flexes his extremities absentmindedly. All ten fingers, all ten toes. Isn't that just dandy. "What're you calling a miracle?"

His father pins him with a Look before seemingly thinking better of it, and drags a hand down his face for a second time instead. "You. Gaara. I sometimes wonder if your true calling is as a wordsmith.”

A wordsmith, huh? "Try, 'an accumulation of fostering a relationship' instead of 'miracle', then. I trusted him to stop."

"He's proven his stability inconsistent."

Tensei takes a deep breath, doesn't wince, and narrows his eyes in return. "He's trying his best."

"Perhaps." Rasa lets out a stream of air, but rather than decompressing, it looks like he's just winding himself up even more. "You're not allowed to spar with him again. That’s an order."

"You said he needed to learn control. You suggested I spar him."

"And I erred in my judgment. That's twice he's targeted you, now."

"That wasn't him."

"For all intents and purposes, it was."

"That was— you know what that was. Gaara is your son."

Rasa clicks his tongue. "And you're not?"

That's not what they're— fuck this, honestly. "Unlike, say, Iwa's failures, the whole point of tying the jinchuuriki to the ruling family is to inspire loyalty to the village. We saddled him with the thing, so it's our responsibility to keep him grounded. Yondaime-sama." 

"Don't you take that tone with me, I'm trying to keep you—"  

Tensei misses the last part of that sentence when a sudden and violent shudder runs through him. He blinks, and then there’s a hand on his shoulder.

It takes everything he has in that moment to not recoil on reflex. It's fine. This is his father, not… not a god and his executioner. Not a world of black. Tensei is fine.  "My point still stands," he says, because it would, regardless of whatever his father has just said.

The hand slips off to the side. "Your point stands on quicksand," Rasa says darkly.

Tensei resents that metaphor. Desert quicksand has no water content and thus fails to trap anything past a couple of centimeters, unlike 'normal' quicksand in wetter climates like Fire Country or the marshes in the far south of Wind. “So dump some cement on it. We’ll make it work—”

"The doctor says you have battle-shock."

A stress reaction. Wow, who would have guessed? "I was too young to fight in the Third War," he says, because only veterans and shinobi from missions-gone-wrong get that kind of prognosis.

"Not from the war."

Tensei doesn't like what Rasa's implying, here. "Then I'm fine, aren't I?" It's easier to feign ignorance, easier to press a hand to his side and start up a diagnostic jutsu. The twinge in his ribs is barely an echo of what it should be— it's good handiwork. Better than he can manage, at his current level.

Still. He'd rather have handled it on his own.

His father turns away. "Gaara is not to be left alone with your siblings anymore."

That's… Tensei thins his lips. "We're not going to isolate him again. Temari and Kankuro would never hurt Gaara, so there's no trigger to be worried about."

"On purpose."

Fine. Fine. He'll just have to increase his efforts on modifying the seal, then. Everything can be normal if the question of instability is taken out of the picture, and expecting a child to master what only three out of over a dozen older jinchuuriki have managed is a fool's dream.

Maybe this week’s training session goes poorly in that Tensei is nearly crushed by a Sand Coffin, and fantastic in that Tensei manages to talk Gaara down. Win some, lose some, right?

It's fine. Everything will be fine.

Because Tensei will make it so.

Chapter Text

73年, November

God fucking dammit, Iris, your nephew’s gonna get himself killed one of these days.

Not out of incompetency, skies no, but maybe overconfidence. Neither Iris nor his older sister were ever child prodigies, for all their skill, so Macchia doesn’t have a stick to measure with, but it feels like their lineage is just as reliant on luck as he is his own abilities. 

And luck is a dangerous, fickle thing.

It’s his day off. He doesn’t have to be here, in his mask. Didn’t have to spend hours following the kid around, practicing iryo-ninjutsu with that girlfriend of his in the walk-in section of the hospital, whittling away at something in the new fuinjutsu department, grabbing extra groceries on the way home from the markets. Didn’t have to stay crouched on the roof, tapping an <all-clear> to Yucca, Poppy, and Primrose’s inquiry at his presence as they observed the four siblings in the courtyard. New orders to never leave the jinchuuriki alone with any of the others were redundant in nature, but the meaning was blatant enough. 

How the fuck are they supposed to protect their charges? The report states that the eldest is aware that he’s being targeted, and still he puts himself in such close proximity. Like nothing’s changed; teaching the younger brother how to string a person up by chakra threads in the compound’s courtyard, using their sister as a practice subject, all while a threat is perched atop his shoulders.

He doesn’t have to be here, in the aftermath of a dinner listened to between stucco walls. The window is open before he even blurs out of his shunshin. "Commander Macchia,” he’s greeted. “Am I being summoned?"

He doesn’t have to be here, clinging to an iron trellis outside of a window with golden marigolds and blue irises that are no longer in blooming season— clinging to the legacy of a dead man that he’s let go of as much as he’ll ever be able to. 

He’s made his peace with it, somewhat. Iris was never the type to want revenge or hold a grudge, not like Karura, for all that Macchia would rather see the monster dead for what it did. Those violet eyes already haunt him enough from the mismatched gaze of the boy in front of him. Macchia doesn’t think he could bear the slight crinkle of distant familiarity turn narrow and flinty, paired with a showing of teeth that Iris never bared except for in a grimace. 

‘Don’t.’  The whisper of a dying man’s last words. A warning. A plea. 

He’s seen the spats between father and son, seen Karura’s thinned lips and Iris’ hard gaze as often as he’s heard Karura’s starts and stops of laughter and Iris’ soft exhales of amusement. Never directed at Macchia, not from this echo of his two friends, but the fact that an echo lives on is enough.

Only, it seems like the anbu have their work cut out for them in actually keeping it that way. As the commander, Macchia himself is never available for something as time-consuming and tedious as guard rotation anymore, but if the occasion ever called for it? He’d be ready in a heartbeat. For Iris’ nephew and Karura’s son, if not the Kazekage’s precious legacy-line that he’s sworn to serve. That every single member of the anbu has sworn to give their lives for, in the end.

He’s not the leader of the Kazekage family’s guard rotation— there’s no one leader, not for a unit as cohesive and tight-knit as that squad— but being the anbu commander means that he could give Primrose and Orchid a thorough chewing-out after the incident. What does it matter that there’s little they could have done in the face of three titans of power? What does anything matter, when any one of them is supposed to be willing to throw themselves in the way of sand or dust or needles at a moment’s notice?

Battle shock. Not an uncommon condition in shinobi, but rare to see in those who haven’t even hit the age of majority yet in this time of relative peace. The only person he knew who fit that bill was Marigold, and look how that turned out. 

He’s pretty sure the rookie had served as a genin in the Third War, but still.

So Macchia had sent Primrose off to the infirmary with bruised ribs on the same side that the kid in front of him had a broken one for the agent’s incompetency, and then he found a single primrose and orchid blossom on his desk a day later. As in, this morning.

There’s a tradition, within Suna’s anbu. He’s not entirely sure when it started, although word of mouth traces it way back to their very beginnings in the middle of the First War. The preliminary assignment for all recruits is to take care of a floral plant through the two-week long training program, the same kind that they’ll get their codename from. And they’re expected to keep it in good health for as long as possible afterwards, as well— a rather obvious message that entering the anbu means that your life will be utterly devoted to other life. To give someone a cutting of your flower carries a lot of meanings: well-wishes, mostly; an apology, often. 

Somewhere down the line, an agent with a green thumb developed a jutsu to elongate the blooming season of various flowers. That’s how Macchia is holding the single primrose, orchid, and also a paling macchia in the hand behind his back right now.

“Is this about Yua coming over later?” the kid in front of him sighs. “I don’t know which councilor keeps getting your people to leave those care packages at my desk, but I won’t tell if they mysteriously end up in a break room or somewhere if you don’t.”

Right. Kid’s not so much a kid anymore, is he? He’ll be sixteen in a few months. Everyone and their mother can tell that the Yondaime is grooming him to take the mantle eventually, but Macchia’s fairly sure that Tensei isn’t privy to the niche traditions in the anbu yet that the Kazekage is surely peripherally aware of.

His fist tightens on the stems behind his back. The blossom-less plants on the windowsill seem to be mocking him. 

“Commander Macchia?”

Macchia clears his throat. “False alarm,” he says impassively. “Apologies, Tensei-dono.”

He’s treated to that painfully familiar smile. “Well, better nothing than something. Let me fetch you a glass of water before you have to take off again?”

“Don’t trouble yourself,” he starts, but Tensei is already up and out of his chair.

For all that Karura only had a short time with her son, she’s still managed to raise someone kind. Or maybe it’s just in the blood, like those violet eyes surely are. Macchia looks up at the sky and indulges in a chuckle. He remembers the day that the Glass Hawk of Suna flew once more in a blaze of loose hair and translucent senbon, down in the colosseum arena. “A pity he’s not blonde, ne, Yashamaru?” he mutters to the winds.

Yes, it’s easier to let his love rest when there’s still something precious left of the man in this world. Macchia has learned his lesson about getting too close— this time, he’ll watch from afar. 

And if he ever has to choose between a monster and that smile, Macchia will not fail.

::::::

Everyone in the room has a minor heart attack when a presence suddenly appears in the doorway. One reflexive kunai hovers in the air, stopped in its tracks. “Excuse the intrusion,” their department head says. The kunai makes a slow path back towards its owner, and Isamu stares at it with wide eyes even as he reaches out to take it. “Sorry, that was my bad. Forgot to knock.”

Maki can count on one hand the number of times she's seen the captain with those black rings around his eyes. There's no need for them in the office-like environment of the fuinjutsu department, after all, but before her lies a reminder of why the Sandaime used to be considered the strongest shinobi in all of Wind Country. Kunai, shuriken, wire— the most common weapons, rendered useless.

“A greeting flare would be great next time," Ume days wryly.

“Ah, yep. I’ll keep that in mind. Do you have a moment to look this over for me?”

“Oiya, what did you dig up from the archives now, kid?”

Not for the first time, Maki has to admire the rapport that the older woman has with Captain Tensei. With anyone else, she’d find it weird as heck to work under a superior officer that calls her ‘senpai’, but their department is surreal enough that she powers through the feeling most days. Maki wouldn’t have imagined the Kazekage’s eldest to be the person she’s getting to know: a slightly scatterbrained boy with an extensive amount of history knowledge that he brings up on the occasional relevant conversation, who mutters in code under his breath when he really gets in the zone. Some people in the intelligence and ciphers departments actually have a running observation set up on said code according to Ume, who transferred from there. They’ve managed to track the basis for it down to an extinct dialect from Lightning Country, which sounds about right. Maki is almost willing to believe that the Kazekage's prodigal son who somehow taught himself fuinjutsu also picked up a dead language out of thin air. 

And seriously, excluding the basics that anyone can learn from the Academy puppetry extracurricular, Captain Tensei taught himself fuinjutsu. 

There are only two legacy-lines in Suna that deal in sealing. One is the storage-scroll craftsmen who are so closely affiliated with the Playhouse that they might as well be part of it, and the other is Maki's lineage. She had begged her uncle to let her learn after those bastards in Kiri took Pakura-sensei from her as well, and it wouldn't even really be bragging to say that Maki's one of the better cloth-style sealing specialists in Suna.

But in comparison to Captain Tensei?

Well, it wouldn't be a fair comparison, because Maki's style is intended for capture and restraint while the captain's is significantly more offensively geared. Variations on explosive tags, flashbangs, cloaking— and most recently, a prototype launcher that can send a flare hundreds of lengths higher and much faster than the human hand could. ‘To prevent enemy interception,’ the notes on the margins explain, with ‘or alternatively, launched as a ranged attack’ scrawled messily in the cramped space like an afterthought. It’s not that her department is an unorganized mess, despite what some might say, but there’s definitely a sense of controlled chaos in the way that Captain Tensei runs things. Kind of like his personal style of fuinjutsu— which also features that code, much to everyone's frustration. 

“It’s not like my combination-style is a completely original idea,” is their department head's usual justification. “The core of all fuinjutsu styles are the same: intent conveyed through a geometric arrangement of jutsu-shiki. In Suna’s case, that’s blocks of poetry and a bit of math.”

Which is a vast oversimplification. Fuinjutsu is a delicate art, in that each and every spot of blood or ink can carry implications regardless of whether or not it was intentionally placed there, and where and how much negative space is present also plays a role. The medium that it’s applied with and on can also affect the seal, nevermind something as major as using different shorthands in conjunction with each other. 

“With all due respect, captain, you’re going to blow us all up someday,” is the usual reply that Ume offers.

It’s a reasonable worry— they sometimes find new scorch marks in the testing rooms when explosive tag testing isn’t on the agenda. Even well-established seals still have a natural tendency to combust, nevermind the experimental stuff that their department is working with.

So when one of their veterans from the Third War recognizes the string of kanji on the margins of Captain Tensei’s latest set of notes— "It’s the jutsu-shiki for the Yondaime Hokage's Flying Thunder God," he manages to get out in the middle of his fit— all hell breaks loose. 

Because their department head is apparently trying to reverse engineer the Hiraishin no Jutsu.

"This stupid fucking thing is going to haunt my dreams, I just know it," he grumbles unintelligibly when they confront him. Maki catches the notepad that Ume whips out to transcribe the phonetics and wishes her the best of luck, because she got none of that. "That's the uber-condensed version, not the actual technique formula. I'm willing to bet that if we had a sample to stick under a microscope, those kanji would be made up of a bunch of tiny Konoha-shorthand characters. Maybe some Uzushio ones, although we have no evidence that his Uzumaki wife was a fuinjutsu master. If you really want something to look at," he grabs a random piece of paper and flips it over for a blank canvas, "try the Nidaime Hokage's."

And then he just. Starts drawing it from memory. Right then and there.

"The original?” Ume frowns. “The Yellow Flash's version was considered superior."

"Most second iterations are, but at least this one I can actually kind of read."

Yeah, no, Maki's not touching that thing with a ten-foot pole, pencil sketch or not. ‘Eventful’ is definitely a good way to describe things.

Chapter Text

74年, January

“I'm leaving in a week," Yua tells him late one evening, the both of them gazing up at the night sky from her roof. "The day before your birthday.”

It’s a nice way to tell him that she’ll miss it this year. “That’s shit luck,” Tensei murmurs. He can see her painted lips quirk up in the faint starlight, in the dark of a new moon. She would call him a sap if she knew what he was thinking— or just a sap in general. “How long’s the mission?”

Yua sighs. That’s not a great sign. “You know how I told you that I’m challenging Shijima for heir’s rights?” Tensei nods. “It’s not like she has the temperment for it, but Oba-san was a Black Sands agent and she’s the one I have to impress.” 

Oh.

Like always, Yua reads him like a book. Tensei never did manage to figure out how to stop his eyes from giving himself away. “Earth country,” she says. “Getting through their borders is the preliminary round. The real test is Kumo, though. We still don’t know why Kiri withdrew from their treaty with them."

"Not because their Sandaime was its main supporter?" The Third Mizukage finally kicked the bucket after losing to one of his many and frequent challengers last year, according to reports from their Black Sands members. The Fourth hadn’t invited a single other nation to his inauguration, and to be fair, the paranoia is kind of justified— some of the Seven Swordsmen attempted a coup d'etat just two weeks ago, and Tensei barely batted an eyelash when they failed. What else were they going to do against the literal reality-warping powers of Obito’s sharingan? Not win , that’s for sure. Especially since only a handful were left after the Third War, during which Maito Dai of Konohagakure killed off half of them.

"Well, someone on the upper rungs must think that can't be all of it,” she points out. “Otherwise this assignment wouldn’t exist."

So, Earth and Lightning. More difficult than Fire, but not impossible, and maybe an easier extraction than the turbulent state that Water Country is in right now if she does get caught— a notion that Tensei refuses to entertain any more than that. “Solo or joint?"

"Joint. It'll be with Saon-sensei," she reassures him, and it works, a little. Tensei has only interacted with Yua's chosen mentor a handful of times, but he knows the tracker is a capable jounin. "He's done plenty of extractions before." 

"You’ll make it through," he says. Maybe he’s stupid to not consider the alternative, but if faith is blind, then he’s already halfway there. "I know you will. I’ll wait for you?”

She places her hands on either side of his face. It’s gentle, a contrast from the harsh winds whipping sand across any uncovered skin; the cutting wires and pointed iron that Yua and Tensei work with respectively. “You can’t promise that,” she says. “Market’s open season as soon as I’m outside those gates, you know. I don’t… expect you to wait, for however long it takes, if you— if there’s someone else.”

And Tensei does know, knows that she’s right on both accounts. Yua wouldn’t ask him to wait when neither of them know when she’ll be back and what kind of political atmosphere Suna will have by then. He’s never seen her mother on the council, of course, but that doesn’t mean Rasa hasn’t taken him aside and shown him all the ways the Hoki family works at pulling strings just as influential as the Playhouse’s from the shelter of the hospital's offices. “Okay,” he tells her, and the smile they share with each other has too much of a shinobi’s pragmatism injected into it, but it’s still gentle in their own way. Tensei hopes she will keep that with her in Iwa's craggy lands and Kumo's high mountains, just like he will on Suna’s windy nights.

She’s not going to join the list of people who have left his life forever, he reminds himself when he sees her off at the gates. It’s really not much of a comfort, despite Saon exchanging a knowing nod with him. 

Tensei holds onto it anyways.

::::::

Kick, twist, flip, strike— turn. Roundhouse kick, back kick, pivot, lunge, strike— 

“Drop your shoulders a little,” Tensei calls out from the bench. “Too much tension. You always want to be loose enough to duck at a moment’s notice.” 

While her older brother isn’t an unwelcome audience, his nitpicking can be a little distracting; the Academy sensei always wait until she’s finished with the exercise to make comments. It’s rare for him to have the time to watch, though, outside of their monthly spars, so she takes the constructive criticism in stride. She could use it. 

Temari’s not just aiming for top kunoichi of her graduating class— she wants her name on the top of the exam rankings next year, period. It’s stupid that she can beat any of her classmates in a spar and still only manages to shift around the top three. There’s entirely too much drivel in theory and useless information in tactics; she already knows everything that will be applicable to her position in the future, no matter what the scores say. In practicals, she’s better at Sen with a tessen, but Sen beats her out in genjutsu every time. Temari feels a little bad about Yome having to mediate between them every so often when the competition gets fierce, but there are expectations that she has to not only meet but blow past in order to maintain her father’s approval. 

Her friends don’t understand; will never understand this part of her life. Temari appreciates them for who they are, but Sen and Yome’s parents are worried enough about their daughters being ‘real ninja’ at all. 

Tensei-nii wasn’t at the top of his class— third to pass and third in rankings, coincidentally, although that doesn’t really matter when all of his classmates were anywhere from four to six years his senior. Temari couldn’t imagine going to class with a bunch of students that tower over her like her older brother does to her, and Temari is already on the taller side of girls her age. It’s a wonder that Tensei managed to grow as tall as he has on napping alone, but that’s another thing they share, she supposes. 

He’s been up early for the past few days, puttering around the kitchen with an unnecessary spread for the rest of their household set on the table before she even makes it to their kitchen. Breakfast has been an affair for four people lately, even if Gaara doesn’t stay for long— five, whenever Tensei deigns to drag their other little brother out of his bed early enough.

It’s not unwelcome, but the cause for it is. Temari is pretty sure her brother is feeling lonely, now that his girlfriend has up and left.

When she finishes her first chain of the Sandstorm series, she asks, “Care to join?” Tensei prefers this kata, she knows, right behind his legacy’s custom Dune series. She can see how practicing two polar opposite forms would be beneficial for covering any weaknesses, but the notion is still kind of funny. Unlike Gaara, Tensei’s blood type doesn’t lend itself to that kind of dichotomy— if the sayings are true, that is.

Her older brother hums, but makes no move to get up. Temari takes that as a no. “Too busy thinking?” she asks, knowing he won’t mind the sarcasm in her tone.

Tensei-nii chuckles, caught red-handed. “Reminiscing.” Temari pauses after a spin-kick to give him a look. “She used to watch me practice just like this. Our mother, that is.”

Their mother. Temari abandons the next move in her second chain, lowering her knee to the ground. It’s rare that Tensei talks about Kaa-san; that anyone talks about her. The dead need to be ‘let go’ in order to ‘rest’ and all that stupid stuff people say. “How?” she asks.

Her brother gestures vaguely at the courtyard as a whole. “Dawn. Kankuro, or Gaara later on, would be kicking away at her all night, and she’d come out here and sit on the side to get a moment’s peace from everyone’s fretting.” Everyone? Who— that’s right, there used to be servants in the house. “The Academy instructors were always poking at my taijutsu forms, calling them messy. She wanted to help, I guess. Or maybe she just missed being a kunoichi. I never asked.”

Temari faintly recalls being held up to the window to see black and gold clashing in their courtyard, but their mother… well, she supposes she’d been too small to be a part of those quiet moments with Kaa-san, for all that people tell her how close the familial resemblance is.

Tensei-nii lapses back into silence. 

Temari picks up where she left off.

Chapter Text

74年, February

Rooster ends up being the one to take him out for his first drink.

"I don't believe you,” his senpai says, steering him towards a hole-in-the-wall pub in District Four. “How have you not snuck something from your old man’s cellars before?"

"I wasn't interested," he says. And honestly, he hadn't been, not with a different set of memories of a first time at twenty-one and a miserable morning after. Now that Rooster mentions it, though, Tensei is curious to see how Suna's liquor will compare to the reds he used to prefer.

The Kazekage wouldn’t be keeping tabs on Rooster and some random puppeteer named Tomoko, but even if it were Tensei getting dragged to the lower markets where The Peaceful Cactus is located, he’s of-age now. What’s his father going to do, ground him? 

Bars in Sunagakure are given chakra-detection seals to fetter out henge from catfishes and those under the age of majority. From what he can tell at a glance of the jutsu-shiki, though, they work on the basis of detecting any and all chakra usage. Which is stupid. That would render the seals useless on colder nights when most shinobi are circulating chakra to keep themselves warm, which is most nights, seeing as how temperatures in the desert can plummet to below freezing once the sun goes down. “Wait, is this whole legal-not-legal thing mostly run on a patron-vouch kind of deal for us?” he asks Rooster, since only civilians carry identification. Underage drinking is common and not considered a huge problem in Suna that Tensei knows of; most offenders are simply kicked out if caught.

“And eyeballing it, yeah,” his senpai confirms. That… seems irresponsible.

Rooster mocks him when he makes a face at the tequila and proceeds to chase it down with water. "Let's try this one instead," he suggests, pointing to something else on the menu. "You seem the type to like that pansy shit."

Tensei does, in fact, enjoy the pansy shit. They get rice crackers with it and everything. Rooster complains about the creepy Sa-trio of sponsees causing trouble again— the fact that most of the Playhouse hates them has nothing to do with their being girls, mind, and everything to do with them being little menaces. All three are heavily leaning towards the humanoid puppets of Chikamatsu's style, which is all well and good except for the fact that they think Bunrakubuki creations are an affront to the art of puppetry and very much vocal about their opinions. Tripwires and smoke bombs galore are nothing new, even useful for keeping some of the apprentices on their toes, but setting them in the hall where banners of the dead hang is really fucking insensitive. And since Dragon is busy doing big next-Troupe-Master things, he's sicced Rooster on the task of corralling those three.

Speaking of Dragon, their mentor is being a hardass lately and leaving his paperwork all around Rooster’s workspace. It's an easy enough hint that Rooster should be reading that shit and gradually picking things up, but a lot of the scrolls are just minutes of the latest council meetings— or worse, spreadsheets full of numbers for the Sun Theatre and Puppet Brigade's upcoming budgets.

"You poor thing," Tensei shoves down an amused grin, but Rooster hears it in his tone anyways and rolls his eyes.

Tensei recounts the outrage of an old lady at his ‘superfluous’ rendition of Wind and Copper, Iron and Gold before taking a closer look at who the puppeteer under the hood was on Mat duty that day. Severely and irrevocably ironic, and also slightly embarrassing when she kicked up a fuss about apologizing without really meaning it afterwards. "'I just don't think that Shodai-sama made those decisions in the heat of the moment,'" Tensei pitches his voice in an exaggerated reenactment of the old lady's, high in the back of his throat and flat with age but shrill with misplaced fashion. Rooster laughs. "'It's obvious that he'd assumed Chihiro-dono to have been of higher background and a foot in the door to an alliance with the Uzumaki of Whirlpool.' As if both the men and women in m— in that family aren't struck senseless the second that they find someone they want to pursue. Political consequences don't even register."

Rooster leans in with a snicker, whispering, "You say that like you're exempt."

Yua. He's talking about Yua. "It's complicated," Tensei whines. "Besides, who said I was a man or a woman? Maybe I'm a god. Gender doesn't apply to me."

On an adjacent note, there is literally no polite reason for their server to be eyeing Rooster like that, and then looking at Tensei meaningfully. Or, Tomoko. Whatever. The blatant concern and worry is appreciated, but not the intent that it stems from. Do you know? 

Tomoko has the freedom to return the look with a disapproving one because yes, of fucking course he knows. Tensei is half-tempted to drop the feminine voice and saccharine smile that make up his persona just for the shock value.  

There's a whole culture on pouring and having your drink poured for you, how fast to sip or throw it back and where to face when you do. Tensei has seen people partake in it, knows about it peripherally, but it's nice to have someone talk him through step by step. He spends a lot of those steps staring at the way Rooster's painted lips move, a triangle of black between two spots of red.

"Can I kiss you?" he says, rather abruptly.

Rooster slaps his hand on the table with a laugh. "You're so obvious, jan. I thought you were gonna just go for it any minute now."

Hey, come on, he's not that far gone. "Askin' is important," he chides. Rooster and Aya are an on and off thing, and while Tensei is pretty sure that they're at an off phase and it's not really serious, he wouldn't just lean in and hope for the best like an idiot. "Also. I think I meant to ask for a date first. Or at least your name."

"You're drunk," the other informs him. Tensei nods. They finished the small bottle of sweet sake a while ago and moved back to tequila, although Tensei is still sipping on the same drink whereas Rooster is on his… actually, Tensei doesn’t know. The rice crackers made a good go-between. "Oh skies, you're drunk. Wait 'til everyone hears that you’re a lightweight. " 

"Am not," he scoffs, swatting the older man’s hand off the table. See? He didn't miss his target in the slightest. "Shut."

"But then I can't answer your questions."

Tensei rolls his eyes. “Fine. What's your name?" 

"It’s,” Rooster drums his fingers, back and forth. Tensei pokes at them, because their owner is stalling. “Midori."

Midori, like the color green? Like the melon-liquor that they import from Bamboo Country? “Midori-senpai. Midori-danna—" Rooster smacks his arm, just on the side of too hard. Not a joke, then. Tensei takes the hint and changes back to his original line of inquiry. "Can I kiss you?"

Rooster keeps his hand there, against the spot he’d hit. "You're serious. She ended it?"

"I told you, it's complicated," Tensei says plaintively. "You of all people know about complicated." 

"I— yeah." Tensei blinks at the Look on his senpai's face, but it’s only there for a moment. Ah, well, he was never any good with reading them anyways. "Oh, why the hell not," Rooster says. 

Tensei slams down a handful of ryo without even calling for their total and pulls him bodily away, because he's taller than his senpai now and also not about to win a verbal argument while drunk about letting Tensei treat him even just once. Puppeteer subculture dictates an equal splitting of the check, but Tensei has the money and they both know it. Besides, maybe he wants to make up for the latter half of wining and dining a guy first. 

They're out the door in seconds and then Rooster has Tensei with his back pressed against the wall in an alleyway. “Out here?” Tensei says in his best scandalized busy-body voice. 

“Complicated," Rooster grumbles in an echo. "How complicated can it be, jan.” He’s not entirely sober, either. Tensei can smell the alcohol on his breath. “What the fuck am I even hiding it for? Everyone already fuckin’ knows anyways. Suna’s got—”

“—sticks up all our asses, yes, you’ve said before.” Tensei knows a thing or two about social expectations. Back straight, neat clothes, iron mantle on your shoulders, cast your gaze around and don’t run into anything on your left for skies’ sake— but he can’t relate to what Rooster must go through. Not with the village, not with Aya, not with… yeah. Tensei has been just fine identifying as how he was born in both lives. And as much as it pains him, any help Tensei could provide is attached to his lineage or legacy, which his senpai is basically allergic to. 

“You can talk normally, jan. Don’t think there’s anyone else nearby.”

Tensei is feather-light in his touch as he runs his hands down the sides of a clothed torso, applying just enough pressure to feel the wrappings around the other's chest. He hums, not having considered the lack of advancements in this particular area. "You're binding safely?"

"Skies.” Why? It’s a valid question, he can’t be concerned? “I'm going to kiss you now," Tensei is informed before full, slightly chapped lips are pressing against his own.

It's firm. A welcome warmth, in the chilly air of a cold winter night. They hold it for a beat, absent of any clacking teeth like a different first kiss in another life had. Tensei leans in, before a hint of pressure requests entrance. 

Alarm shoots through him like a bolt of lightning— a warning. He can’t explain it, this tentative feeling of can I, can we? clashing with if you hold any love for him in your heart, don’t you dare open your mouth. 

It’s tempting, though. Tensei has known Rooster for years, looked up to him literally once and metaphorically still. It’s so fucking tempting because Yua is gone and this could be easy and nice but there is only  

          black  

to offer.

Wait, what?

There’s no space to back away, so Tensei pushes lightly against Rooster's front, breaking the connection before it can become anything more. 

"Huh," Rooster says. “Okay. That was… not for you?” 

No. Yes. Fuck. Tensei is still blinking spots out of his vision, because what the hell was that. “I—” he leans his weight against the wall more fully and forces his shrug to be nonchalant. Seriously, what the hell was that? “Ask me again when I'm sober. We, ah, still good?”

Rooster snorts. "You thought a kiss would scare me off?" 

Tensei gets his apprentice’s hood dislodged by a noogie for his efforts, and laughs weakly as he fends it off. They’re both drunk, so it doesn’t mean anything. ‘Friends’ is good enough for all parties involved, and Tensei can figure out whatever that was later. 

A shiver runs down his spine. God fucking dammit, but sometimes, he really, really hates his new lot in this life.

Chapter Text

74年, July

“The daimyo is outsourcing to Konoha!” Councilor Jouseki bangs his hand against the table. “We cannot let this stand!”

“We’re not ‘letting’ anything stand,” the Kazekage shoots back, and Tensei thinks that if he had his gold dust on him then it would be rattling by now.

Tensei is sixteen instead of twelve in the face of a forfeit or seven in the aftermath of their ally's devastation this time as Sunagakure’s economic situation pitches into yet another downward trend. Intellectually, yeah, he gets that the past three wars they’ve participated in were largely for the sake of land and resources, but it’s one thing to have their water rations cut because of a drought, and another thing to have to turn people he knows away at the mission desk because they’re out of assignments. 

“The Hokage grows fat on work that should be ours,” Councilor Masafumi agrees. “The people are angry.”

“The people are rioting.” 

Councilor Hiroshi sighs at that. “There is a difference between unrest and a riot, Councilor. You speak in hyperbole.”

"Not if this carries on, I won't be."

There have been dips in productivity before— Tensei remembers the year following the humiliation at his first Chūnin Exams very well, and the years before the Third War ended a little more vaguely— but never to this scale. They're holding the worst of it back by selling his father's gold dust right now, much like in the wake of Konoha's withdrawal from several trade agreements after the Nine-Tails' rampage, but that's a stopgap measure.

This is why Rasa allied with Orochimaru in canon, isn't it. Or at least, this is the start, and Tensei is not sure what he can do to head it off rather than be dragged along by the tailwind. 

Speaking of the court, Tensei has been sent a bottle of really high-quality osmanthus wine as congratulations for both of his promotions. Alongside a standing invitation to visit the capital whenever. From Mimaki-sama.

It’s not poisoned. Tensei checked it himself with the detection technique that Chiyo-baasama taught him, and then his father got an anbu specialist and someone from the hospital to confirm it. 

It’s over a year late, but then, Suna didn’t exactly broadcast an announcement about it to the world on the day of, and certainly not to the daimyo's older brother in particular. The fact that a small article about him and said promotion is running in one of the capital's newspapers is mildly concerning, and now a member of the Black Sands has been sent on a mission to investigate the source. 

The thank you that Rio-sensei helps him pen in response is one of the most awkward, pretentious things he's ever written.

This isn’t the first time that Tensei gets to sit beside his father for the entire time that the council is in session, but it does mark the reintroduction of his regular presence at the weekly meetings. For all their age and wisdom, none of them could figure out what the message was supposed to mean. "He's angling for your support," Councilor Osamu points out, but the question is why. Why Tensei, who has much less influence or international renown or just power in general than his father? 

"Standing formalities," Councilor Ken suggests. "Sending anything to the Kazekage himself would require a different procedure and more eyes besides, but a gift from the older brother of one to the son of the other has no precedent for an announcement to be made."

"An underhanded attempt to curry favour with the father through the son, then."

Councilor Iori huffs. "A discrete measure to placate us while they outsource their work."

"Yet what seems may not equate to what is," Councilor Hiroshi says. "Consider that Mimaki-sama was passed over by his father for the throne despite holding seniority over his younger brother."

A pause, as everyone reflects on the connotations of the kind of father-son relationship that had to have been present in order for such a thing to happen, and then the weight of the room seems to shift. Tensei hopes his father feels just as uncomfortable under the scrutiny as he does when Rasa says, "My son and I have a perfectly functioning relationship."

Councilor Ken calls for a comparison with the archived official missives from the court be made, which in turn reveals that the message attached to the wine isn’t the regular court scribe’s handwriting. Surely, Mimaki-sama would not put his brush to paper himself for Tensei? 

The council tuts at him when he gives the formal spoken equivalent of a shrug, but honestly, Tensei has no idea what he might have done to deserve this ‘honor’. Recounting his last conversation with the man enlightens no one of anything.

The council throws him into more advanced etiquette lessons on calligraphy and tea ceremonies, in memorizing old poetry and reading newest developments in this and that trade agreement, just in case he ever gets summoned to the capital. Refreshers on the specific posture required for brushwork are less of a pain to go through this time around, mostly because he’s kept up with calligraphy for the sake of his fuinjutsu, but Tensei finds that he appreciates the copies of texts from scholars in Kannan's university infinitely more. It looks like this world has finally managed to fill out the periodic table of elements, minus most of the man-made ones, and already there are several early breakthroughs to upgrade black and white film to colour. The world is changing, shifting, advancing in this era absent of large-scale conflicts, and Tensei finds himself smiling at the thought.

He quietly requests that Rio-sensei continue looking over his embroidery practice. Tensei doesn’t have much time to spend on making performance puppets these days, and Kankuro is catching up to him in all the small things he has to offer. Tensei needs something more advanced that’s not combat puppetry yet to hold his little brother’s attention for a while longer, and if he has to sic Kankuro on fashion and design, then so be it. 

Temari still enjoys braiding his hair, sometimes barging into his private office to do so while ranting to Tensei about her classes at the Academy or this or that thing that so-and-so said. He makes sure to spar with her from time to time, since their father— well, their grandmother was a tessen mistress, too, and Rasa is not fond of reminiscing when it’s not Memorial Day. Tensei privately bets that Temari would have been Hana-obaasama’s favorite, based on the bits and pieces he’s learned about their grandmother over the years. 

Actually, now that he thinks about it, their father is the only generation in their direct line to not have the tessen as his main weapon of choice. There are records in the archives of their great-grandfather Koshiro being a tessen master, and obviously his father the First Kazekage was the strongest wind release specialist that the Land of Wind has ever produced, even without his legendary proficiency at his tribe’s wind-surfing technique. It’s not unlikely that their grandmother picked up the discipline to honor her lineage, despite growing up without either of their presences. 

Does that make his father a line-traitor, then? To carry on someone else’s legacy when he had no other siblings to carry their family’s own, while Sandaime-sama wasn’t even related to them by blood?

Eh. It’s not like anyone else knows that particular piece of information, and besides, Temari is more than making up for it.

Speaking of his family— on the occasion that Tensei has a free afternoon, Gaara still allows him to join in on sky-watching atop the roof. He wakes up sometimes not knowing when he drifted off but in the shade of sand that wasn’t there before. Skies, his baby brother is adorable.

Gaara seems fascinated by his owls, for all that they're extremely wary of the tailed beast inside of Gaara in return. Tensei embroiders Suna's symbol into tiny cloth hitai-ate in lieu of heavy metal plates, one for each of his three summons. Even with Gaara watching, Kuu and Piiko are more than happy to indulge him in a fashion show for his siblings afterwards, who Asuga insists on calling his ‘nestmates’. 

“We live in a house,” Kankuro nitpicks, "not a nest!"

Asuga nips at him in reprimand. "I," she says stiffly, "have raised too many hatchlings to not know of what I speak."

"We're fledglings, Mama," Kuu screeches in the same offended tone as his little brother, and Tensei is careful not to laugh too hard while he’s still being used as a perch.

Maybe praying for them to stay the children they’re supposed to be just a little while longer to the king of hell is rather ill-fitting, but he might as well pray for something when he kneels before the shrine in his backyard every morning. They’re growing, yes, but all of his siblings are still just kids, nevermind the five who greet him with delighted shrieking and playful pouting at the orphanage whenever he finds the time to visit. Tensei doubts that the skies that his village swears on have any more influence over the world than his god does, and something is always better than nothing, right? Because this is what he's working to protect. This is what he'll look back on fondly as halcyon days. It's not perfect— nothing ever is— but Tensei is determined to hold onto this feeling for as long as he possibly can.

::::::

74年, August

Temari-dono graduates and Yucca goes straight from his last shift as part of her personal guard watch to the bar. Isago is already there, quick to use any occasion as an excuse to celebrate, and so are the gaggle of friends that follow wherever his little brother goes. Baki and Jimei, if he's remembering correctly. That’s fine. Yucca has Orchid, Clematis, and Poppy to commiserate with, so it all evens out.

Not Primrose the third, though. Yucca feels like it would just be rubbing it in to offer an invite when the other agent probably won’t make it to the demon’s twelfth birthday.

“Is it really such a big deal?” Jimei chuckles. “Seems like you’re all being dramatic.”

“You wouldn’t understand,” Yucca says. In fact, even though it’s a requirement to have some level of sensory ability in order to be placed on the Kazekage family’s guard rotation, the only other person who truly understands is Clematis. The constant stream of KI leaking from the jinchuuriki container is bad enough, but the Sandaime’s legacy kid? Screw the others’ teasing about their ‘delicate constitutions’, the literal guidebook that they had to hash out for dealing the Kazekage's eldest is going to save some poor rookie’s soul, someday. “Why do you think we avoid the night shift?”

“I never have an appetite after those,” Clematis sighs. Because with the night shift comes dinnertime for the Kazekage family, and with dinnertime comes Tensei-dono’s return to the house. Yondaime-sama’s first son has a chakra signature that feels like running your hand over one of those spiky bristle brushes with only a thin cloth as a barrier. Lightning-natured like his mother and uncle, if you take it at face-value. But lock your senses onto the kid for too long? There's a distinct feeling of falling that starts, like when you miss a step on the stairs, except it's also cold. Creepy as all fuck.

“Two more years before I follow you out,” Poppy raises her shotglass to him, and Yucca meets it with a clink. “Cheers, yeah? Kankuro-dono’s not bad, but this ‘long-term assignment’ has been a couple years too many for my liking.”

A sentiment Yucca shares. Blossoming kunoichi or not, Temari-dono is still a half-grown girl with all the shrill antics that come from it. What does she have to worry about? Keeping her skin whole from sunburns and scars, scaring off the bumbling boys too dumb to realize that most women don't enjoy mean-spirited attentions, practicing with her giant fuck-off tessen, and chasing after Daddy's approval. And staying alive, he supposes. He's fended off enough bitter old veterans with a blade and not nearly enough common sense on her behalf, but if last year's showing was any indication, Temari-dono is capable of defending herself now. Yucca has spent at least half of every week for the last twelve years watching Temari-dono become the person she is now, and while he's grown fond of her, he's also more than ready to be done. “To the new to come,” Yucca offers as everyone else takes a turn bumping glasses.

“To the ones we lost,” Orchid adds quietly. 

Grim, but fair. And not just Primroses one and two, he thinks as he knocks his drink back. Commander Iris would be so disappointed by their gossiping. Marigold, too, probably.

He still doesn’t understand how the two of them could stand being in such close proximity to Tensei-dono for hours on end— the commander through his sheer willpower and a sense of family obligation towards his nephew, probably, but it was why Marigold had been given a raise to be on family guard duty full-time, a couple months in. Figures that being a little cracked in the head would help. Yucca holds no ill intentions towards the Kazekage family, obviously, but neither is he their staunch supporter. It’s funny that the commander wasn’t, either, considering his relations with them, but no one on their team had the dedication to match the rookie.

It’s a shame, what happened. Eight years ago, it was Marigold sitting in this spot instead, asking them all how to hang out with the kid outside of the mask once he hits genin. And Poppy had choked on her drink laughing, because what else would you do when the baby of the group calls someone else a kid?

He'd be twenty-eight if he were still alive, but he's not. Marigold will forever remain nineteen and dead for a kid who never even knew his name. As is the fate of an anbu, Yucca supposes, and knocks back a silent toast to his old friend.

Speaking of, there’s two more years until Marigold’s callsign is to be recommissioned. Whoever gets it is going to be either one lucky or unlucky son of a bitch, considering it’ll be about time for a Kazekage assassination to succeed by then. 

Guarding Tensei-dono as the Godaime— ha. Imagine the handful that would be.

Chapter Text

74年, August

To celebrate Temari’s graduation from the Academy, Tensei takes her and her friends out on a shopping spree. “Whatever catches your eye,” he promises. 

"Are we allowed to do this?" Temari asks, a wary tone to her question. "It feels a little like painting a target on our backs."

Tensei ruffles her bangs. "It's good to be cautious," he allows. This outing was originally Sen's idea, not his sister's, and so are the color-coordinated jilbāb with two rows of asymmetrical buttons that are apparently all the rage right now. Between his stipend as the fuinjutsu department head and a member of the Kazekage lineage, Tensei has the funds to spare, but he also made sure to double-check the quality of the material once he saw the price tag. The dark green does bring out Temari's eyes nicely, though, so he's not too pressed about it. "But in this case, I think we're fine. Do you remember Rio-sensei's assigned readings on economic recessions?"

"Yes?" she tries. Tensei raises an expectant eyebrow, and she sighs. "Fear of spending only exacerbates the symptoms," Temari recites.

"And how does that apply to our current endeavor?"

"Retail businesses are some of the hardest-hit victims."

Tensei grins. "Full marks! Not that you guys don't deserve something nice, anyways, but we do have to keep things flowing to prevent foreign merchants from skipping town," he elaborates to the other two girls.

Sen huffs in amusement. "Isn’t it a bit cruel to give a pop quiz when we’re supposed to be celebrating, Tensei-nii?” she says. It’s been a while since he last saw Sen and Yome, but that doesn’t stop him from insisting that they keep calling him by the same honorific as they did from when they were younger. They didn’t have to stick by his little sister— straight up didn’t, actually, in another timeline— but he’s grateful for whatever made them stay in this one. Small victories and all that. “And here I thought we left those behind in the Academy."

"Nope,” Yome sighs. “Just you. The medical program likes to keep us on our toes, too."

Tensei eyes her white medic’s apron with something like nostalgia. Yua used to complain about how inconvenient it is to keep clean, but a spotless uniform does add to a sense of professionalism. He wonders if her undercover persona wears it as well. 

Speaking of small victories, Tensei is proud to say that it doesn’t even take a business week for Temari to drag a mentor home.

“This is Baki-sensei,” she introduces without any fanfare, like the jounin isn’t one of the best that Sunagakure has to offer. “He’s a wind-release ninjutsu specialist.”

Tensei's seen Baki in the Kazekage’s office building fairly often— standard field operative, fantastic mission record, painstakingly neat reports. Two claws of red paint belay his status as a veteran, for all that Baki probably spent most of it as a genin runner. The Third War left its mark on anyone and everyone who took part in it. 

They size each other up, more out of habit than for the sake of a fight. Baki has a little more than half a head of height on him— something Tensei has never had the chance to notice from his seated position at the missions desk, on the occasion that they interact there. 

Rasa should really be here for this— family dinner in general or meeting Baki anew as his daughter’s mentor specifically, take your pick. “You’ll do right by her,” he says with just a hint of a threat to the older jounin, who looks to be keeping one eye on Gaara at all times. Tensei would argue that his baby brother doesn’t deserve that, but shinobi are a paranoid lot and he understands that it’s a little bit justified.

Baki nods. “Upon my mother in the sands.” 

That’s a heavy oath. Good. It means the gravity of his role is clear. Not that Tensei had been expecting anyone else to fill it, really, but know one else knows about that.

"You're going to be our sensei?" Gaara asks.

"What? No. I agreed to be your sister's mentor."

Gaara turns to Tensei with a furrow in his brow. "This is Baki?” 

“This is Baki-sensei, yes,” Tensei confirms. He’s not quite sure where this is going.

“You said his name. When you talked about the team."

Everyone is looking at him now. "What team," Baki demands flatly.

When did he—? Shit, he'll wonder later. Of all the things his baby brother could have inside that head of his, of course Gaara remembers Tensei's fuck-up. And, unlike a year ago with his father and a sheaf of gifted seals, he doesn't have an excuse at the ready.

That's fine; he hasn't spent all those years on the Mat without learning how to improvise. "It was a hypothetical unit consisting of the three of them," Tensei gestures at his siblings, "as an example of Suna's finest, led by a jounin of equivalent ability. Our father mentioned it in the past," which is true, "and your name was one of a couple that came up," which is not, but it's a small enough lie to cover his tracks. Hopefully.

"Suna's finest?" Temari echos, and Tensei can tell that she's fighting to keep a grin off of her face— until it scrunches up. “Wait. With Kankuro and Gaara? But they’re not even genin yet!”

"It’s common for joint missions to be taken by family units," Baki says. "Team cohesion and similar fighting styles. Or, in this case, familiarity with each others’ fighting styles.” Here, he nods toward Tensei. “The commanding officer depends on seniority, of course."

The idea of being responsible for his siblings' lives is unpleasant, and being their mentor sounds laughable. "I'm not exactly field leader material," Tensei points out wryly. "The filing cabinets call to me.”

“Trust me, Anigo is more lame than the rumors say,” Kankuro assures the newest of their number. “You just haven’t seen him accidentally fall asleep on top of a shelf, yet.”

“Kankuro.”

Kankuro shrugs and goes back to poking at his rice. 

On the upside, Baki looks somewhat wrong-footed after that comment, and Tensei takes the opportunity to steer the conversation towards the topic of his little sister’s astounding progress. He’d underestimated the combined force of Temari and her friends when they'd challenged him to a three against one spar post-shopping, and was nearly blown off his feet as a result. Embarrassing on his part; impressive on theirs— especially considering Suna’s Academy doesn’t promote team-based exercises much. Or at least, he doesn't remember taking part in them very often during his few years as a student. Tensei isn’t shy about voicing how proud he is of how far Temari has come; surely Baki will continue to cultivate this talent?

Baki grunts and nods whenever it’s appropriate in response to his rambling. It’s the start of an uneasy acquaintanceship.

Temari won’t entrust the maintenance of her tessen to anyone but the artisans of the House Of Orange Winds. Baki lectures her about how that kind of favoritism could cause issues when she gets older. Tensei grins and buys her chestnuts that she could definitely get on her own now but still mooches off of him for, and tells her that customer loyalty is a two-way street. 

Baki comments that Tensei doesn’t cultivate bad habits in Kankuro. Tensei fires back that his little brother insists on hand-tooling the panels for his puppets when there is a perfectly good press in the Playhouse and several offended master craftsmen as a result. It’s not about trust issues, it’s about letting them be people with their own unique quirks before they are anything else.

Baki pointedly doesn’t say how, as Suna shinobi, they’re all the Kazekage’s soldiers first and foremost. Tensei pointedly does include the words ‘your daughter’ and 'your son' when talking to Rasa about his siblings.

So, yeah. Acquaintances. Tensei doesn’t need a— a handler to turn and stab them in the back. Baki should be safe to trust, or so he Sees, but any extra knowledge he can glean of the man is in the context of—

Of Rasa being out of the picture.

Not going to happen. There’s a seal in the works that repurposes the compartments he came up with for Yua's chunin promotion gift to work as a water filter instead, and he’s already in the process of getting others to show off its capabilities on their out-of-village missions to other settlements. Whatever dimension fuinjutsu uses to store things has the added bonus of being a sterilizer for bacteria, too. When the appeal goes through, Suna will be open for commissions to purify water from any and all settlements— especially those that depend largely on groundwater as their main source of hydration. The only reason the seal is still a work-in-progress at all is because Tensei needs to find a way to restrict its usage without keying it to any one person’s blood, so that Suna suffers minimal losses in the case of theft. Hopefully, his department’s production team is going to have a lot of work on their hands soon. It won't single-handedly fix their recession, but with any luck, this bit of innovation will steer them off the track of betraying Konoha for a stupid, desperate alliance with Otogakure.

Five dark-haired, dark-eyed children have proven that Enma-Dai'O is not completely against changing fate. Tensei has the outlines of several arguments for keeping his father alive prepared. None of them are incredibly appealing from an eltrich-divine standpoint, he thinks, but he still has some time to flesh them out. The Executioner can only be more reliable with some guaranteed backup, right?

Speaking of his father, Rasa comments that it’s about time for Kankuro to start working with a combat puppet. Surely, he doesn’t mean anything by it when he brings up the key in the vanity table's drawer that Tensei definitely hasn't ever mentioned. Fucking anbu and their snitching tendencies. If it weren't for Gaara, Tensei would be trapping his room by now. Rooster would love to help, he's sure. 

"Akasuna no Sasori was the best puppet craftsman the world has ever known, barring perhaps Chikamatsu," Rasa says. "It seems a shame to let his works go to waste."

"In case you're not aware," he hedges, "it's, ah, against the grain in the Playhouse to use another's creation in the field as your first. Which is supposed to be something that you build personally." Not to mention how taboo it is to use another puppeteer's puppets while they're still alive, barring a commissioned creation. Except in this case, no one else is aware that the taboo should still apply, because Sasori-nii is 'dead'.

Rasa clears his throat. "Wouldn't you agree that Kankuro deserves the best in his arsenal?"

Now is probably not the best time to correct that notion. Fuck.

So Tensei takes Kankuro to the Playhouse’s private storage rooms for the very first time, to the one reserved for Chiyo-baasama and those of her legacy, and leads Kankuro to stand before the hooks holding Crow.

“He has the same hair as me,” Kankuro says. Tensei brings it down for his little brother to feel.

The timeline trudges on.

::::::

74年, October

"Gaara," Tensei sighs. They’ve done this at least half a dozen times now. It’s getting old. "You can't keep hiding in here when you have lessons with Otou-san."

"Why."

"Because he's not going to give up on this, and all you're doing is making him angry by being late."

Gaara blinks at him. "You could tell them that you didn’t find me," he suggests.

"You know why I can't do that." They've been over this before; how there would be mass panic if Suna ever got the notion that they'd lost their jinchuuriki. Tensei raises his arms up with a smile. "Come on. Piggyback ride or up high?"

Gaara only hunkers down tighter. "I hate lessons."

Well, that's certainly a confession. Not that the sentiment is surprising, but his baby brother is more liable to sulk in silence than say anything out loud. "Hate is a strong word," he tells Gaara. "What do you hate about them?"

Gaara gathers the cloth of his shirt around his stomach into a fist. "Everything gets all over," he says. "And there's never any blood. So it stays itchy, on the inside."

It's not unusual for the lessons to end with both participants frustrated, but one of them is an adult with a near-debilitating level of self-control, and the other is an eight year old kid with an insane chakra construct screaming in his ear around the clock— or so Tensei assumes. 

Clematis has recently taken over guard duty on Gaara, since Primrose is on medical leave after an incident with two civilians and an almost-sand coffin. It's difficult to reconcile the reports with his baby brother curled up on his closet floor, in the sense that Tensei wishes he didn't have to. 

But their father is right about Gaara needing to learn control. It would be stupid to let any jinchuuriki fight on instinct alone, and Tensei knows that Gaara has several inevitable battles ahead of him. Last Tensei heard, Rasa has given up on teaching magnet release in favor of drilling basic battle tactics.

"I'm sorry to hear that you're having trouble," he says. "How about I come find you afterwards, and we watch the sky together for a little while?" Gaara nods. "Sounds like a plan, then! But we do need to get you to the training grounds now." Gaara shakes his head. "Come on. You know Otou-san will just come get you personally if you don't go."

Gaara thins his lips, an action so reminiscent of himself that it gives Tensei pause. "You said only you could come in."

Tensei drags a hand down his face. He did say that, and he’s loath to go back on his word. 

There’s something demeaning about having to negotiate with an eight year old, but he reminds himself to be patient. Gaara has had his autonomy violated since before he was even born. Tensei can afford to give a little, here. “Tell you what,” he decides to pull out his trump card early, this time. “How about we go talk to Otou-san together about not sparring today? You can practice the floating platform or try the Third Eye again— or code, even. Have you started learning our tap-code yet?”

“...no.”

Fantastic. “Knowing the tap-code is very important,” Tensei says. “Sometimes we need to use our words, but we can’t let others hear. Like telling secrets! Sou, let’s go ask Otou-san if we can work on that instead, yeah?” 

Gaara doesn’t say anything in response, so Tensei reaches forward. 

The sand rattles. 

Tensei stops— tries again slower, and makes sure not to react when a tendril winds itself along his left arm. 

It's his imagination that makes the scars tingle. There are too many screwy nerve endings for anything but movement and a vague sense of pressure on most of that limb. It's not something he thinks about often, but he knows that he's lucky to have the mediocre signing-speed that he does. 

Tensei walks out of the closet carrying his baby brother regardless. Accidents happen, and it wasn't Gaara's fault, anyways. 

"You spoil him," Rasa notes as Tensei blurs out of his shunshin.

"Baby of the family privileges," he jokes. 

Rasa says nothing while Tensei pokes and prods and cajoles the two stoic redheads into having an easy day. He knows his father well enough to recognize the silence as exasperated acquiescence, and beams at them accordingly. Skies know that someone in their family needs to be the cheerful one. Temari is 'too mature' for 'that kind of thing' now, and Kankuro is determined to be 'cool'. Adorable, but Tensei does miss seeing their gap-toothed smiles without having to suspect some kind of trouble to follow.

"I've got some training of my own to do," he tells Gaara, "but I'll be back to pick you up in an hour or so, okay?"

Gaara nods.

It’s just as well that the training ground his family frequents is located in a similar direction to the aviary. Asuga has him ferrying over as many owls as three fourths of his chakra pool can summon every day for the past week— huge eagle-owls and tiny tawny owls both, alongside her own clan of eastern barns. Of course, the aviary can only hold so many, even with the expanded space that Tensei commissioned several D-ranks to construct, and so only the owls in the most vulnerable stages of their moult are brought over. They're never rendered completely flightless, of course, just unsuitable for battle. Their absence takes a bit of pressure off their clans— a few individuals less to feed during a time when hunting is that much harder. 

The aviary workers, bless them, probably aren't used to learning how to take care of a bird from said bird, with gratuitous commentary on the side. Tensei is happy to help when he can, even if the elderly demographic of the majority of those summoned is an unwelcome parallel to the past. It's a good opportunity to do a bit of asking around about the last Great Sage of the Owls, and the situation of the current four. 

The Eastern Barns usually speak in circles until he gives up. The Tawnys, though, were standoffish to the point that one of the scruffier Eagle-Owls got irked— and proceeded to spill a decent amount of information via boasting. 

"What shame do you hold in your gullets for following Chiaki-sama? You will be by our side as she restores the Eagle-Owls' rightful greatness!" the old owl hooted sharply. "Who doubts the brood-kin of Hitomi-sama? Who doubts, hmmm?"

Tensei had gone along with it for the sake of learning more. The Scops, the Great Horned, and the Western Barn clans have the other three sages, although the Scops are less a clan and more a kingdom unto themselves, having claimed a part of the domain's eastern territories and keeping to themselves more often than not. There's a general consensus that the Scops sage isn't interested in a higher position, which is why there are only three major factions in this war. The only reason why the lone Great-Horned clan are still in the running is because of the benefits from their extensive partnership with humans, and the old eagle-owl seems divided between being pleased that Tensei is on their side and disgruntled that it was the Eastern Barns instead of the Eagle-Owls that lay claim to him.

"Prove yourself," one of said Eastern Barns clacks at him. "We may yet take the same advantages for ourselves, if you can provide a safe place to train our young in this world."

Uh. Tensei doesn't think of himself as an expert of avian matters, but bird-on-bird fights sound a lot different than bird-on-shinobi  fights— which he hadn't been planning to ask Asuga or her kids to participate in anyways. Tensei cares for his summons, but he's not sure how closely he wants to get embroiled into their civil war when he has so many of his own problems to deal with. And he doesn't appreciate the undertone that implies he's being… used?

Hm. Something to meditate on later.

Still, he told them that he'd see what he could do. Currying favor with their trifecta alliance as a whole seems like his best way to get an audience with this Chiaki-sama, and the prospect of learning senjutsu from her someday is tempting enough that he's willing to shell out some more ryo for owl upkeep if that's what it takes. In the meantime, Tensei is having a lot of fun doing sensory-training with his personal summons. 

That was sarcasm, by the way. It might be rewarding, but skies above, it is not fun. He can move silently now? Great! Here's a genjutsu that all of our chicks learn while they're still in the nest! It drapes the surrounding area in complete and utter darkness, blinding everyone! Including the user! But that's okay, because there's a way to infuse chakra into and around his eyes and ears to work around that!

Yeah, no. The Inuzuka don't know how good they have it, being born with their enhanced senses. Increasing visual or auditory ability means jackshit if the brain isn't equipped to process it. Tensei is learning, but for now, the only way he can keep up with reacting to Kuu and Piiko's surprise-attacks is by relying on his passive chakra sensing. 

It is useful, Tensei reminds himself whenever he gets frustrated. His reflexes have never been faster, and the fact that his improvement is so noticeable within such a short time is an achievement. Not quite the one that he was aiming for, but valuable all the same.

"How will you hunt if you cannot even catch one of us in the dark?" Asuga nips at him.

Ugh. He hopes Gaara's having a better lesson than he is. Learning how to be an owl sucks.

Chapter Text

75年, January

The last day of the first moon dawns bright and clear, with no choking dust clouds in sight.

It ends in a storm of sand. 

Temari equips her gear as fast as she can and dashes out into the hall, nearly crashing into Kankuro just outside her door. There’s no need for words. Temari hasn't felt this corrosive sweep of chakra in years, but there's a familiar undertone to it. Neither of them need to be a sensor to recognize the signature that drifts around their home every day, only now, it’s much bigger. Darker. 

And their father is out of the village. 

They find their older brother in the foyer, his usual flak-vest absent as he ties up his hair. Next to him, Primrose is rattling off a situation report, and Temari jumps when Orchid shunshins in with a storage scroll even bigger than the one that holds her brother’s puppet. 'Gold', the kanji on it reads.

“Hold on,” Tensei tells Primrose, and then all of his attention is on them. “Hey, guys. I've got some bad news."

There's no reason for his tone to be so— so gentle. Temari doesn't need to be babied. "Get to the bunkers and lay low, we know," Kankuro says. "But what about you?” 

"I've got a different job." Tensei brushes his lips against Kankuro’s forehead, and then smooths back Temari's bangs to do the same for her. “Look out for each other, okay? I love you both.”

Temari bites back a protest in the interest of time. "Let me help," she says. "I can assist in evacuation efforts—"

A solid torso appears to block her path to the door. Commander Macchia. There's another agent behind him, too, with a yarrow flower on his mask. "You don't know the civilian routes," the agent says. 

Temari doesn’t recognize him as part of their regular guard retinue. She glares. They don’t move.

"Kick some tanuki ass," Kankuro says. “But you’re not going to face it alone, right?” 

Tensei spares a moment to look back. “Of course not,” he says lightly. "I've got our big bad anbu with me."

As if on-cue, Poppy appears. Temari fists her hands into the material of her dress as she watches her older brother's back. There's tension in the line of his shoulders; in the way gold joins black in a rare occasion to rise and fall around them. 

“He didn’t say ‘see you’,” Kankuro notes while Poppy begins herding them towards the escape routes.

“So?" Temari scoffs. "He didn't say 'goodbye' either.”

Poppy lays a hand on Kankuro's shoulder. "Tensei-dono is very capable. He'll be back."

It’s dusty below ground, which is why her eyes are tearing up. Obviously. She’s too old to be crying out of frustration— frustration, not fear, because she’s not afraid. There’s no reason to be, not when the Shukaku has never gotten into the bunkers before. 

It's just that— Temari is a genin now, a full-fledged ninja, and still no one even turned towards her.  To do what, she doesn’t know. But that’s not the point. They don’t even consider the possibility that she should be out there, not hiding like some scared civilian kid. 

When she was still a kid, though, Temari built sandcastles with Gaara. She’s corrected his seiza posture, coaxed him to eat his vegetables, taken turns guessing at the coded symbols on the giant map in Tensei’s room with him on the rare occasion that they have nothing to do. 

At least, they’d managed to celebrate Gaara’s birthday peacefully, almost two weeks ago now. It’s always funny to watch her baby brother awkwardly slurp his birthday noodles— Tensei-nii never lets any of them bite the ridiculously long strands, a symbol of a long life, even though he claims to not be superstitious. Probably just for the heck of it, since he never fails to laugh when one of them pauses to breathe with noodles still hanging out.

The memories of rubble and dust coating blocked-off streets and broken silhouettes of buildings against the horizon just don’t fit with her baby brother anymore, because Temari knows him now. She knows the way he narrows his eyes like their father and thins his lips like their older brother. She knows that he doesn’t really understand why his rings won’t come off like Kankuro and Tensei’s paint does. She knows that he’s not actively trying to kill people when he’s startled. Temari knows Gaara.

“What did that blanket ever do to you?” Kankuro asks from his spot on the rough stone bench carved into the wall, and Temari scowls at him. The least he could do is start beating the dust off of his own futon. There have always been four in their safe room, always set two steps apart from each, even though they usually pushed them together when they were little so they could share body heat. Tensei's suggestion, before it became only her and Kankuro hiding away. The desert nights are cold, and even more so underground. 

But Baki-sensei is with them this time, escorted in bandaged and trailing sand from his clothes but otherwise whole after an hour of waiting. Temari likes her mentor just fine, but she doesn’t want to curl up with Kankuro while he’s watching them.

“Rough night?” Kankuro raises his eyebrows at the sand trail, and Temari smacks her little brother upside the head. “Ow! What?” She glares at him. “It looks like he had a rough night, I can’t ask if he had a rough night?”

“You could have some tact,” Baki-sensei suggests wryly. “But yes, it’s been a rough evening. Gaara seems to be making up for the years of quiet we got to enjoy. Your older brother is still going strong,” he adds before either of them can ask.

She hates that this is how she gets an update. Temari is the Kazekage’s daughter, why doesn’t Poppy listen to her when she demands a sitrep? 

Also, she feels the need to correct the misconception. “It’s not him,” Temari mutters. Because it needs to be said, right? She’s hard-pressed to pull off the passive-aggressive way Tensei throws it into conversation whenever people bring up their baby brother and the Shukaku interchangeably— at least, not without things devolving into something physical. Rio-sensei has scolded them enough times about public disturbances and losing face that Temari and Kankuro have learned to mark the offending speaker’s face in their memories and greatly inconvenience them later.

Baki-sensei isn’t looking to escalate, though. “We are what’s inside us,” he simply says.

"Yeah? Then I'm the two burgers that I had for lunch," Kankuro snorts.

Temari plans to have her sensei pull his weight in D-ranks tomorrow, or whenever reconstruction starts up.

::::::

“Tensei-do—”

“Unless it’s news that everyone has evacuated or that my father is back, I don’t want to hear it,” the Kazekage’s eldest snarls, batting back a tsunami of sand with a mix of iron and gold. It’s plain to see that wielding them together doesn’t come innately to him, but Primrose has the protocols memorized front to back— they need the Yondaime's material, need the weight that the denser element provides in a way that iron on its own can’t quite match.

Yarrow turns to the anbu beside him questioningly, having been cut off. Commander Macchia sighs. “Panic and injuries are slowing a lot of civilians down," the commander reports. “The last few attacks were mostly contained to the western districts, so the people in Upper Sixth aren’t used to rushing their evacuation.”

Primrose ducks his head at that. He never should have let Gaara wander that far in the first place, maybe, but the kid seemed to be practicing his rooftop traversal pretty quietly and— well, the chunin who'd tried to coral him away had a few choice words about Gaara-sama being so close to his residential area. 

That chunin is dead now. Obviously.

Skies, what a time for Yondaime-sama to be away. Statistically speaking, it wasn’t impossible that the Shukaku would break free during one of his absences, but certainly unlikely, considering how rarely business called their leader out of the country. There’s no denying that scoring an audience with their daimyo was a good thing in light of recent developments, but Suna needs the Yondaime back now. Or, better yet, yesterday.

The Shukaku screams as Tensei-dono tries to collar it with a chain of iron, a cluster of clawed constructs shooting up to tear through it. Primrose and the commander clear the ones heading in their direction with the power of a combined wind-release technique, and the Kazekage's son takes that opportunity to drive a giant nail through the Shukaku's side. “Perimeter check,” Tensei-dono demands. 

Yarrow responds immediately, blurring into a shunshin, but the commander hesitates. “You’re flagging.”

Even with the tessen specialists trying to provide backup from the cliffs, this has mostly been a one-on-one battle. Tensei seems to be trying to tear the Shukaku apart from the inside out, but there's no way to really physically injure a monster that bleeds sand. The tessen wielders can keep the beast contained to the area by constantly tearing into its giant limbs, preventing it from walking or leaping around too much, but that's the extent of it. Tensei simply has to hold it down and still for long enough that the sealing squad can shove it back into Primrose's charge, which— well. There's nothing simple about it. They've been at this for the better part of three hours now. 

“And we have so many other options right now, huh?” Man, if only Primrose could get away with that kind of snark. “I’m about to do something inadvisable to the village’s structural integrity," Tensei says. "I need to know that the perimeter remains secure.”

“Your summons are already with the patrols. Do you not trust them to alert us if there’s a breach?"

"Commander, with all due respect, I am—" he interrupts himself with a motion that drives a sheet of gold and iron into the sand, sending it spraying up and back at the giant tanuki's face. Primrose eyes the heaving of the younger's chest with trepidation. "I am going to get you demoted if you don't do your damn job."

< Quiet-caution, enemy listening, preparations above, genjutsu-concealed, > the iron platform taps into the soles of their sandals. It would be a rookie mistake to look up, but skies, if Primrose isn't curious. “Please,” Tensei says out loud. “I know I’m not as good as my father, but our people need you out there to keep the order. I’ve got Primrose to watch my back."

There’s something distinctly unhappy about how the commander shunshins away, and something equally resigned about the ragged sigh that Tensei lets out afterwards. “We’ll be fine, won’t we, Primrose?”

“Yes.” And if it turns out that Primrose is lying— well, he’ll be too dead to worry about it, so he doesn’t.

“Fine? Hah, I'll kill you!!” The monster before them bellows, crushing another series of tendrils intended to pin it down. "You'll never take the Great Shukaku! Ya hear, little bird of the black? I'll kill you before ever takin’ one step in there!"

"Maybe if the Great Shukaku would fucking shut up and listen, he'd realize that I'm not trying to kill him!" Tensei shouts back. "Suna will let you go when Gaara's time comes, so get with the program! Do you want to be scattered and spend years reforming yourself?!"

The Shukaku screams again. Primrose is going to have hearing problems after this. "Lies, lies, the black only ever takes and tells lies!!"

"Oh for the love of— Bear!"

It probably says something about how tired he is that Primrose has to do an about-face to greet the new arrival. Tensei-dono, as a passive sensor, doesn't bother. "Rooster? Wait, hold on!" A shimmering wall of black shoots up to cover the puppeteer's leap from a nearby building to their floating platform, just in time to drown a spray of sand bullets. It's smaller than the ones he was making an hour ago, and one of the projectiles that goes wide lands only a few lengths away from their platform. "Skies. What are you doing here?!"

The newcomer straightens, a grim look on his face. Her face? Primrose has trouble telling, sometimes, what with puppeteers their hoods and paints, and the infamy tied to the student of the next in line to be Troupe Master only makes things more confusing. "Dragon sent me to check in," Rooster says grimly, "since it looks like you guys are moving in the direction of the Playhouse."

“I—” Tensei mutters an unintelligible curse under his breath. It pairs well with the tri-coloured clashing going on in the distance. At this point, Primrose has grown numb to the visual of buildings being buried or toppled over. "I was trying to corral it away from the hospital." 

From reading reports of previous attacks, Primrose figures the Shukaku really doesn’t like the hospital. Why, he's not sure. Because that’s where it got loose in the village for the first time? 

"I mean, nowhere inside the village is good to fight this thing, but everyone's gonna be in a snit if you let it crush the Playhouse. Or the Sun Theatre."

"I'm trying my fucking best here, Rooster."

"No, yeah, I get that, but why are you talking to it?"

A net-like construct descends over the Shukaku, yanking it away from one of the taller buildings in the area next to a water tower as it screams. There have been so many similar close calls already that Primrose can’t even feel relieved anymore. "Figured I'd try to have a chat earlier, since my father's not here to yell at me for it. Made some progress until he got stuck on something I said. Hang on— Primrose, cover me."

There's no higher level of alert he could possibly shift to right now, but Primrose does a three-sixty scan for any potential ambush attacks while the Kazekage's son pops yet another soldier pill. He feels like he should say something. His captain has beat more than one rookie over the head with the user manual for stimulants, but Primrose has no such authority to do the same right now. 

Thankfully, he doesn't need to. "Why is your container almost empty, jan?" Rooster asks with an accusing tone. 

There are six doses in a standard pack, and it’s not like the Kazekage’s heir gets sent on the kind of missions that would warrant their use with any amount of frequency. "Because I'm running on empty," Tensei-dono snaps. "I can handle it."

Rooster looks to Primrose with a tilt of the head; an obvious question. Primrose holds up five fingers for five pills. “Skies," Rooster breathes. "Bear, unless you have a fucking death wish, give me that pack.”

"If you don't have a fucking death wish, then leave." Another net comes up on the opposite side, and Primrose braces himself against the Shukaku’s screaming even as another wall rises to shield them from the sonic wind-release that splits through the air alongside it. "Tell the— the Playhouse that they don't have to worry. I think I can finally…"

Something above the Shukaku flickers, once, twice. Primrose looks on with wide eyes as the illusion dissipates, leaving the sky filled with shimmering gold and black. 

It's beautiful.

And, like rain, it falls.

Primrose can see the ground tremble with the weight, and then again while the Shukaku thrashes against it. "Primrose," Tensei-dono orders through gritted teeth, and for the fourth time that night, Primrose flares a directive to the sealing squad to close in.

The specialists converge from their cliffside positions. It's terrifying, to see how small a human is compared to the monster they're fighting. Wide strips of cloth covered in fuinjutsu shoot out, and Primrose watches with rapt attention for any signs of failure: A bulge here, a stray wave of sand there. "Steady," he can't help but say uselessly when the gold and black start receding. His eyes are busy, but he can hear Tensei-dono panting at his side. He doesn't want to get his hopes up, skies know Primrose was ready to die at the younger man's side tonight, but…

It holds. 

The cloth-bound lump starts shrinking, and Primrose breathes a sigh of relief. 

"It's over?" Rooster asks as the platform starts lowering them onto a nearby roof.

Silence. Primrose tears his gaze away from the subdued threat to see the Kazekage's son shaking like a leaf, one hand over his face, and suddenly finds cause to worry about the structural integrity of the iron he's standing on instead of the buildings in the distance. "Tensei-dono," he tries. 

The younger man lowers his hand by a fraction, enough for Primrose to catch a glimpse of glazed eyes. The action smears paint and sweat together into something of a mess. There's a distinct sensation of falling, but Primrose looks beneath them and sees that the iron platform is just as solid as before. Fuck, what had Yucca told him about that? He can't remember right now.

"Bear— hey, easy. Lean on me, come on." Primrose moves a step closer, just in case the shortest of the three of them proves to be a lacking support, but the puppeteer takes the weight evenly over a shoulder. "We gotta get you to a medic, jan." 

Tensei-dono shifts his head in a small shake. "Not yet." They touch down on a rooftop. "Integrity check. Bunkers?"

Primrose knows that to mean he's asking about Temari-dono and Kankuro-dono. "No updates," he reports, because in this case, no news is good news. The extended casualty report can wait.

"Good. We'll just… get to Gaara, then—" 

Then nothing.

As in, Primrose is staring at empty space, and Rooster has to catch himself from stumbling at the sudden disappearance of another person's weight. The wind whistles.

"Did he just… shunshin away…?" Rooster looks to Primrose, as if he needs another person to confirm that what just happened neither looked nor felt like a shunshin.

"What did you do," Primrose says flatly.

"What did I— did you not see him disappear into thin air?!"

Shit. Primrose pops a soldier pill of his own as he flares the emergency distress signal for the second time that night. The commander is surely going to take this out of his ass later. If someone has managed to pull the same thing that happened to their last Kazekage just now with their latest magnet release user, then the village has a huge fucking problem  on their hands. 

Sage's sake, what are they going to tell the Yondaime when he gets back?

Chapter Text

X.

75年, January

The kami looks different, this time around. "It's older," Konan whispers.

There are scars where there used to be blood. Nagato narrows his eyes. "It's alive." 

“It’s what,” Madara says from behind them.

There's no headband and no flak jacket, but not many countries have shinobi with a propensity for painting their faces. Red for Wind and Blue for Lightning, he's fairly sure. The purple before him is ultimately neither, smeared so that the original pattern is undecipherable. 

"State your purpose in truth or begone," come the words that have haunted his dreams.

Nagato doesn't intend to bow this time, but Konan pulls him to his knees regardless. "A life for a life," he tells the not-kami. "That's the deal you offered last time."

"Yes." A different voice now, not the deep rumbling tones of a moment before, nor a child's unsettlingly blank register that he’d half-expected. "You want five more." Nagato supposes it's obvious, from the five bound and gagged shinobi on the floor next to five corpses. The not-kami in the King of Hell's mouth tilts its head, eyes drifting to the side as if listening to something. It hums. "These lives hold no worth beyond the usual. Where is Sanzo Amado?"

What is that supposed to mean? Are different people inherently born with varying levels of value? In what way? “Why?”

"We have need of him, still," Konan says. "What of worth might one such as yourself be seeking?"

Lives, of course, but the only names he recognizes are Amado's, Kakuzu's, and… Madara’s. 

Said man taps his foot a single time against the tiled floor. “What is it saying?”

“A list of people.” Only Nagato and those he’s connected to by his receivers can perceive the King of Hell fully. The Uchiha is, presumably, relying on a chakra visual via his sharingan, and Nagato has no plans to offer him the auditory context behind that last request. It would take the Akatsuki longer than he can maintain this summoning to find any five of those other people, though, and Nagato narrows his eyes. "I'll gather them," he bargains. "If you revive these five for me, now, I'll have five from your list of my choice before you the next time we meet."

A beat. Beside him, he can hear Konan holding her breath.

"Seven," the not-kami rumbles. "For the extra time," it adds.

"Seven," Nagato agrees easily. Fair enough. He is asking to raise the dead, however incomplete the restoration of life might be. These extra arms, these paths, will be worth much more to the world than seven arbitrary people who he’s never heard of.

"Thank you," Konan adds. Her paper flutters forward to deposit the first corpse he intends to channel his will through into the gaping blackness of the King of Hell's mouth, just like she had with Yahiko.

They'd regretted it, at first. Their friend came back with an inability to do any of the things that his body needed to keep functioning by himself— eating, drinking, laying down in a bed to sleep instead of closing his eyes and dropping wherever he happened to be. They'd tried to take care of him, of course they did, but the most Yahiko seemed inclined to do was follow them around when they led him by the hand. And that was only in the beginning— he deteriorated over time. Nagato had to put chakra rods through Yahiko's nose to breathe, manually, for the husk of his friend.

And then a reflection of his own purple rings appeared in Yahiko's eyes, replacing the empty golden-brown that used to hold so much passion. 

It took years of further research to get to this point, standing before five corpses and five sacrifices for the King of Hell and his apparently non-divine spokesperson in the present, but here they are.

And just like before, the King of Hell opens his mouth once more, and the being inside has disappeared.

::::::

What do you mean, he’s disappeared?

Yondaime-sama—

No. This isn’t happening again. Keep looking.

He’s not in the rubble, Yondaime-sama.

That’s what we all thought last time. His summons are still in the aviary?

Yes, but—

Then keep. Looking.

::::::

Try again.

Look, didn’t your other anbu guy confirm my story?

That’s none of your concern.

He’s my friend! 

Then tell us where you sent him.

I didn’t do anything, jan. He was there, and then he was gone. 

Eyewitness report says it wasn’t a shunshin.

I told you that already! You guys still haven’t figured out what it was?

That’s none of your concern. 

I’m making it my concern. You weren’t there, okay? You didn’t see what a mess he was. I just… I just wanted to help.

Then tell us where he is.

Motherfucker—!

::::::

Have they told you anything?

No.

Then we should ask Tou-sama again.

He’ll just get mad.

…

…

What if they’re not lying?

What?

I said, what if they’re not lying?

…

…

I’m sick of waiting.

Not like we can do anything else, jan.

No. I’m not going to sit around until his picture appears on the fucking shrine, Kankuro. Come on, we’re going to ask Gaara.

The fuck? No, we’re not. 

Yes, we are, and you’re going to help me get past Primrose. 

He’s— he’s dangerous, Tem.

So am I. I want answers.

What if he killed Anigo, too? What then?

…I don’t know.

::::::

History repeats, doesn’t it?

Meaning?

We never found Sandaime-sama, either.

I’m not going to listen to this drivel.

You put me in his place and expect me not to say my piece? He blamed you, you know. And Karura— oh, she would hate what you’ve grown from her ashes.

One more word and I’ll slit your throat.

Skies, of course he learned it from you. By all means! Demote me for caring, slit my throat for speaking the truth— go on, then. Let’s see if the next commander has a spine or not.

Get the hell out of my office, Macchia.

Chapter Text

75年, February

“State your identification number.”

“Forty-three dash zero-zero-three,” he recites dutifully, for the umpteenth time. Who in the hell is still expecting him to trip up on the same five digits this far into an interrogation? 

To elaborate: Tensei woke up tied to a hospital bed a few hours ago covered in seals, some familiar, others not. A lot of them are for binding and chakra-suppression— which didn’t stop him from instinctively breaking the genjutsu that someone tried to place him under, but did result in a lot of fucking pain. Fucking hell.

In defense of Suna’s reaction, Tensei would be cautious in their shoes, too. They're lacking critical information: where he’s been, why he vanished, how he vanished, what influences he might be under, what extent the village's operations have been compromised…  

That doesn’t mean he’s going to spill all the details on his other occupation, obviously— it’s easy to act like he doesn’t know what’s going on, because generally speaking, Tensei doesn’t.

There was a saying from some writer in another world that comes to mind right now: Once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, three times is enemy action. That’s twice now that he’s been summoned during a Shukaku-related crisis, but whether or not the two events are actually connected, he has no idea. Nagato couldn’t possibly have tailored his summonings like that on purpose, right? And, while his memories of the night are hazy, he’s fairly certain that he didn’t get grievously wounded this time— past experience has proven that there’s no need for him to die for a line of communication between himself and the other realm, even if Tensei can’t open it from his end. 

He didn't, right? Tensei feels like he would know if he died again, considering he's done it once before. That's not what happened, is it?

Habit has him trying to drag a hand down his face, but the pressure of leather straps on his wrists remind him that he's not at the liberty to do that. “I don’t know,” he snaps at the interrogator when prompted again. The questions sound more and more like background noise the more he hears them. “I wasn’t conscious for any of it!”

There's the vague sense that he had a conversation, most likey with the Ame-nin, followed by five bodies, and then another conversation held in the black. That his soul doesn't have any new aches to show for it is an unclear indication of how the latter went.

And he’s more than a little terrified of that.

Nagato has all six paths to fuck around and find out with now, his father’s fate has probably been decided one way or another but Tensei has no way to find out which, and the heartrate monitor attached to his chest is not giving any favourable context behind his distress to the interrogators.

It’s infuriating. They won’t let him see his siblings, they won’t tell him how Gaara is doing, they won’t let the Kazekage ‘expose himself’ to ‘a potential hazard’. Ridiculous, especially after Tensei has been given a single iron file to prove his identity, and he didn’t even try to stab anyone with his magnet release! They’ve probably taken his blood to test the privacy seals in his office with, too, while he was unconscious. What more do they want from him?

Actually, there’s an idea.

“How about a theory,” Tensei sighs. “Indulge me for a second?” Silence. He takes that as an invitation to keep talking. “You can consult with the fuinjutsu department, but there might be a time-delay component in one of the seals I’ve been trying to reverse-engineer. Skies know I miss things all the time.”

A faint crackle— of course, the interrogator is mic-ed. Tensei wonders if his father is listening. “What seal?” they ask him.

“The Flying Thunder God.” 

He’d given up on it a few months ago after realizing how condensed and incomprehensible the information in the jutsu-shiki is; left the drafts in his drawers but not quite deep enough to gather dust. It’s the best excuse he can come up with right now. No one in Suna knows enough about the inner workings of the Hiraishin no Jutsu to call bullshit on his claim, he thinks, because no one in Suna has managed to crack the method behind Konoha's shorthand. Even Tensei barely knows anything about it. 

He’s not sure they believe his ass-pull, but it’s not like they would take the truth, either. Oh, hey, sorry for ghosting you all, but my god was summoned to bring a couple corpses back to pseudo-life and needed an interpreter because his mouth was busy! Then he threw a hissy fit when his preferred sacrifice wasn’t even present to be executed before being sent back into the metaphysical ground again, and probably forgot about me still being in said mouth for a bit. 

Yeah, that would go over real well. 

On the plus side, it's not them that Tensei needs his fake-theory to convince. It takes an age and a half of waiting, but finally, finally, Rasa enters the room. Tensei doesn't let his shoulders relax just yet, but it's a near thing. "Otou-san," he greets. A faint prod with his chakra— ow, fuck— tells Tensei that this is neither a genjutsu nor a clone. He clears his throat, trying for a casual tone. "Welcome back?"

Not quite. Tensei learns that he's been missing for eight days— much longer than when Nagato first summoned him years ago, but at least it was after stopping Shukaku's rampage. He'd hoped so, but Tensei doesn’t actually remember seeing the tailed beast get sealed away again. It’s good to hear that the village wasn’t... subjected to mass destruction for however long it took his father to return from Kannan-shi. 

Less good to hear: the rumors that whoever got Sandaime-sama came back to finish off his legacy-line have been spreading like a brush fire. That there are eyewitnesses to Tensei’s reappearance on the hospital roof, unconscious and hemorrhaging chakra, only fueled the chaos. 

Tensei makes a note to send a gift basket or something to the poor medics who found him, whenever he gets out. But also— eight days? Tensei would be ragging on Enma-Dai’O’s sense of humor, if he didn’t know better. But he does, so instead he’ll think of the universe as being an inconsiderate ass. Tensei never imagined that he’d be spending his birthday in an interrogation cell.

His father takes advantage of Tensei being strapped down to a bed for the standard twenty hours of observation to yell at him for being a reckless, irresponsible, fool of a boy, because who in the nations tests an experimental seal without a spotter?  Not Tensei, but he's too deep into the lie to back out now.

“Konoha labeled it as an S-rank jutsu for a reason,” his father snarls, his white-knuckled grip on Tensei’s shoulders a definite breach of protocol. “We aren’t at war anymore. Becoming the next fastest shinobi in the world is not worth. Your. Life.”

The other convenient part of the Hiraishin excuse— if you fuck up with space-time, you fuck up bad. There are no small accidents with fuinjutsu of that sort, hence the bomb-proof testing chambers in his department. “I know,” Tensei says. “I won't work on it ever again. Promise.”

“Swear it.”

He does. Hearing Rasa actually verbally expressing how much he cares for once is nice, even if he goes at it a bit sideways, but Tensei hasn’t seen his father like this since— since his mother died. He’s not sure how he’s supposed to break the news that he’ll be called away at least once more, if Jiraiya ends up destroying the Animal Path beyond repair like he Sees. So he doesn’t. 

“I’m sorry,” Tensei whispers, wishing his hands weren’t bound. To do what, he doesn’t know. Something, anything, just not nothing— but at the same time, he’s grateful for the excuse to have them out of his sight. He can feel them shaking, a sure symptom of a soldier-pill crash.

And skies, the implications that carries. It only supports his lie about the Hiraishin, really; crash and withdrawal symptoms for a one-time incident don't last eight days. It's like time stopped for him while the world moved on.

The one-way glass window of the interrogation room makes for a limited mirror. Someone has removed his hair tie, cleaned the paint off of his face, and swapped his puppeteer blacks out for a pale blue hospital gown. Maybe he should be thankful, but it feels more like a violation of his privacy; stripping him bare just to smother him with paper and ink.

He doesn’t need the mirror to observe his father, though. It’s only up close that Tensei really sees how haggard Rasa is, the fine lines of middle-age around his eyes deeper than Tensei remembers them being a week ago. 

“I’m sorry,” he says again.

From the pained way that his father turns aside, Tensei knows that it is not enough.

::::::

The first thing Tensei does when he’s cleared is go home. 

Commander Macchia personally accompanies him across the rooftops, and Tensei can sense at least two others following from a distance. One of them has the soothing, neutral tones of a medic's signature, while the other's is compressed so tightly that he almost didn't notice them. Suna’s really not taking any chances, huh?

Tensei's sensory abilities lean more towards sensitivity than range, though, and the commander being right by his side makes Macchia much easier to read. The tight, coiled edge of a blade of wind, coated in stress. Probably because Tensei has insisted on taking the overhead route despite doctor's orders not to use chakra for the next few days, so he's gunning it on sheer free-running alone. He trusts the commander to catch him if he slips.

A familiar chakra signature flares out a greeting from several blocks away. "I know them, it's fine," Tensei tells the keyed-up commander at his side before Macchia has a heart attack or something. A man he doesn’t recognize and a pre-teen that he does approach their roof. “Baiu?” Tensei hasn’t seen the kid around the orphanage for months now, but the hitai-ate provides a good explanation as to why. That’s right, he was in the same year as Temari, wasn't he? “Congratulations on your promotion.”

Baiu makes a complicated face. “Thanks. Uh. Good to see that news of your death is bullshit.” The shinobi by his side smacks him over the head. “Get off your high horse, sensei, I told you we know each other!”

“I know him, too, but that doesn’t give me the excuse to be so informal. Apologize.”

“Why?!”

Wait. Tensei squints at the man— not that the action actually helps. Standard greys and a modified flak-vest, and the ghutra’s not uncommon enough to count as an identifying feature. Hm. “I think I should be the one apologizing,” he says. “Remind me how we know each other?”

The shinobi gives him a small smile. “Oiya, it’s been a few years. My mother used to work for your family. I’m—”

“Reki.” Tensei grins right back. Holy crap. “Last I heard, you made tokujo. Looks like you’ve been doing well for yourself. A student?”

“A nuisance, more like.” Reki places a hand on Baiu’s shoulder. “Sorry to bother you when you’ve just gotten out of the hospital, but…”

Predictably, it seems like no one knows about his stay in the basements of T&I. “Rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated?” 

“That,” Reki agrees. “It really is a relief to see you up and about.”

Baiu huffs. “Who the hell dies right after getting a badass nickname? That's, like, the biggest waste.”

Colour him curious. "I have a nickname, now?”

“I was focused on evacuation efforts, but some folks who were there the night of started it,” Reki elaborates. “It's, ah…"

Baiu rolls his eyes. "People are calling you Kuroame no Tensei.”

‘Tensei of the Black Rain’, huh? He thinks he can see where they're coming from, for all that his memories of that night are hazy. It had taken a long time to send the mix of iron filaments and heavy gold up into the sky in discrete increments, and then hold the entire mass up as it slowly grew. It's a miracle that Asuga’s genjutsu had actually worked to hide it all until he'd been ready to let it drop. 

“Tell you what,” he says, “come find me in the fuinjutsu department when you’re free. We should catch up over lunch sometime.” 

Because as nice as it is to run into an old friend, he has more pressing matters to get to. They don’t stop for anyone else that tries to approach them, for all that Tensei dips his head or flares back to acknowledge their greetings. He needs to see his siblings, first.

They must spot him coming from the windows, because Tensei hears the front door slide open with a bang before he can even see it. 

Temari hugs him crushingly tight, and then punches his shoulder hard enough to add to said hurt. “I,” she says, something thick and wet and angry in her voice, “thought you were dead. ”

“I’m sorry.” Tensei gets the feeling that he’s going to be apologizing a lot, for the foreseeable future. “I didn’t mean to be gone for so long.”

“I’m glad you’re not,” Kankuro mutters, before pushing Temari out of the way to claim his own hug. “The last week sucked. A lot.”

Tensei lays his cheek on his little brother’s hair with a sigh, noting that he got it cut. To look nice for the ceremony that took place three days ago, probably. A ceremony that hadn’t included his name or his non-existent ashes on-record, thanks to what he’s sure people considered delusional denial on his father’s part. Which paid off, in the end, although said father isn’t here to oversee the rest of the family reunion because he’s in yet another metaphorical screaming match with the council. There is literally so much fallout to deal with, and Tensei easily admits that everything feels more surreal than not.

“Good job on holding down the fort,” he says, because it needs to be said out loud. “Both of you.”

Temari frowns. “You don’t know that,” she says. “You weren’t here.”

Tensei inhales. Holds it. Lets it go. “I wasn’t. But you’re still here and nothing has spontaneously combusted, so let’s count that as a win. Where’s Gaara?”

Hands twist into fists, wringing the back of his shirt. “Why?" Kankuro seethes. Tensei blinks at the amount of vitriol in his little brother’s voice. “Do you even know what he did?!”

Tensei can tell that he’s not going to like what comes next. “You know that it wasn’t him,” he says anyways.

“I don’t care! ” Fists turn into a shove. Tensei lets go to allow his little brother the space. “Asa is dead!”

Oh.

Tensei never knew Kankuro’s friends as well as he does Temari’s. Partly because they came over less often, partly because— and he feels bad thinking it now— Kankuro just seemed like he didn’t need Tensei to worry about him as much. Sure, there's the occasional fistfight that his little brother wins more often than not, and that one incident with Kankuro's snake-puppet prank scaring the other Academy students shitless, but...

Tensei suddenly feels very, very tired. 

“I grieve for futures lost to the winds as I grieve for ashes lost to the sands,” he says, but the way Kankuro is glaring at him with wet eyes has him changing tracks. “I’m sorry you lost a friend."

“Gaara’s under quarantine in one of the old servants’ rooms,” Temari tells him quietly. “Primrose is guarding it. I’m not sure who else is on shift, though.”

Okay. Okay. One thing at a time. Tensei has a grieving little brother here and now to comfort. “I’m not going to tell you how to feel,” he murmurs. “There’s no right or wrong with this kind of thing. You’re sad and angry and hurt, and that’s normal. But it won’t be like this forever, okay?”

“What, like Asa’s coming back?”

A rhetorical question. “No,” he replies anyway. There’s no point in sugarcoating the obvious, especially when Kankuro is almost eleven, but he's aware that his own return could be taken as a basis for false hope. “We’re shinobi. We’re going to lose a lot of people in our lives, but the world won’t stop just because of that. So we face the wind and we keep going, because living well helps our dead find peace.”

How much of that Tensei actually believes has varied through the years. Suna's culture discourages people from dwelling past the traditional mourning period, possibly for productivity’s sake. Tensei appreciates that it works for him, even if he quite literally knows what happens after death. 

Doesn’t mean Kankuro needs to move on right away, though. “I’m going to make dinner,” he decides, “And you can talk about Asa, if you’d like. Then we’ll all go to bed early, and tomorrow will be a new day. And there will be a new day after that, and another after that. It won’t hurt so much, eventually.”

Kankuro nods. 

“Actually,” Temari brushes past them both to head inside, “I’m making dinner. Since you’re mummified again. And it’s— it's your birthday. So.”

Tensei is reminded once more that he’s lost over a week of time. Has Temari taken all his usual roles in the house onto herself? “You don’t have to,” he says. “I can move around just fine.”

“I said, I’m making dinner. Go sit on the couch or something.”

Tensei brooks no further argument. Maybe just for tonight. "Thank you," he tells Macchia in lieu of a proper dismissal. A gentle tug, and Kankuro follows him across the threshold.

The sun sets, and the door slides shut with a soft click.

Chapter Text

75年，Febuary

Rooster turns around from grabbing a new can of paint, and Tensei doesn’t even bother to lift his head from his own work when the other gasps dramatically. “Bear? Bear, where are you?” Tensei rolls his eyes. “Aya, we’ve lost him again!”

“That stopped being funny around the third time,” he informs his friend, even if Aya’s snort of laughter begs to differ. 

Rooster shrugs. "I feel like you need the reminder, jan. What if there's some kind of residual energy from the jutsu, since you fucked it up so bad?"

I feel like I need the humor to cope, is the subtext that Tensei pretends not to notice. He doesn’t call his friend out on it, obviously, considering Tensei is what’s being coped with here. 

Eight days. Not that it felt like that to Tensei, but Rooster really drove the point home by screaming it at him before punching Tensei in the face. Which he didn’t dodge, because he deserved that. His friend had been locked up in T&I for the entire eight days he was gone, for the sole crime of having been standing right next to Tensei when he'd been reverse-summoned by the fucking bastard in Ame.

There had been hugging afterwards, too. Some tears. A lot of cursing. Severe and intentional sleep deprivation didn’t make for a very coherent reunion, and it didn't fix the fact that Tensei's ineptitude resulted in a new population of homeless people from District Six, over two hundred people still in the hospital, and eighty-seven fatal casualties.

"Third time's the charm," Aya breaks through his train of thought. "Would be a pity if you disappeared forever."

Tensei tucks the simmering guilt aside for later, when he's alone, and lets himself be drawn into the conversation at hand.

Aya and Rooster are still in an on-phase, their longest one yet. Which, good for them. Less good for Tensei, who gets ganged up on whenever he has to face them together. "The first time had nothing to do with the Flying Thunder God technique," he protests. 

" The first time had nothing to do with the Hiraishin no Jutsu, " Rooster mocks. It would be scary how accurate his imitation is, if they weren’t both puppeteers with vocal training. 

"I was buried under rubble. And twelve. You don’t seriously think I was messing around with space-time at twelve."

"Says the guy who invented his own variation of explosion tags when he was nine because the standard ones weren't fancy enough for him. Food for thought, jan. You got to meet Konoha’s Yellow Flash before he died, didn’t you?”

Briefly. It's not like he got to see the man in action. 

Aya points her roller at him, the gesture sending droplets of paint flying. Tensei takes a step back. He might be wearing an older set of clothes, but that doesn't mean he's eager to throw them away when the paint doesn't wash out of the fiber. "Overachiever," she accuses him. 

"I'm not—" 

"No, by all means," Aya scoffs. "List all the specializations you've picked up."

Jack of all trades, master of none, better than a master of one. But that saying doesn't exist here, and the translation doesn't retain the same meaning. "It's what was expected of me," Tensei tries, and then has to dodge the paint from Rooster's brush when he copies his girlfriend. 

"I'll give you that the council pushed for your various promotions, but no one forced you to learn embroidery on top of everything else."

"It's useful!"

"It's really not," Aya says. "You realize you could have just traded painting someone else's backgrounds in exchange for getting your puppets' clothing done, like the rest of us plebeians?" Tensei shoots her a Look, and it only takes her a moment to remember what his relationship with the Playhouse is like at times. "Right," she murmurs, as if she hadn’t been one of his earliest challengers back then.

"It's in the past," he waves it aside. Tensei thinks he can call her a friend now, even if they only ever hang out with Rooster as a buffer.

And it is hanging out, for all that the three of them are getting paid to do the paint job. Reconstruction is still ongoing, as expected. Suna's forces are spread thin after Shukaku wrecked a large chunk of Upper Sixth and completely obliterated the lower markets in its attempt to escape the canyon walls, so there’s a lot of construction D-ranks available these days. 

C-ranks, too, actually, although not nearly as much. Commissions for the water filtration seals caught on quickly in the numerous underdeveloped settlements dotting Wind Country, which lack reliable power generators and continue to utilize the old methods: trapping evaporation during the day and guiding the condensation into a container at night. The filtration seal is much more convenient in contrast, being able to purify an amount equivalent to five adults’ daily water usage almost instantaneously with each use.

Tensei is not so conceited as to tout his department's creation as the foremost reason for pulling Suna out of the recession, but before the rampage, it definitely helped. A lot of the credit goes to Ume-senpai, without whom Tensei would never have looked at the old drafts of Yua's promotion present in a different context. Turning the concept of a container with dividers and many openings into to what it’s become— two chambers with one opening and a bisected metaphorical funnel— was a challenge on his part, but Ume took one look at his smorgasbord of English among Suna's shorthand, sighed, and started badgering him to translate it all into something the production department could actually mass-produce. Which had been a process of breaking the various components down and building it back up that no one particularly wants to repeat, so Tensei finally caved in to the increasing number of pleas to stop using his 'code' before he did something stupid. 

“Like, say, disappear yourself for a week,” Ume deadpanned.

Haha. Tensei is sure that joke will be very funny in a few years' time. Couldn't the council have come up with a better cover story? But no, let's milk this incident for all it's worth, our prodigy was this close to cracking the secret to the Yondaime Hokage's most deadly technique! For the village's morale, they claimed. Tensei would argue that Temari is giving a better showing on that aspect, very visibly dragging Baki around the village with seemingly very little downtime between missions. 

Tensei knows from experience that it's all too easy to pull a muscle at the rate she's going. He checks in with her often to make sure she's not overworking herself— or Baki, actually. He kind of pities the jounin; his little sister can be a terror when she has her mind set on something.

As for Kankuro, he’s… dealing. The tables have turned— Tensei is the one who has to fetch his little brother from the Playhouse, now. There are a lot more challenges from fellow Academy students and even a proper apprentice or two, but unlike Tensei, Kankuro has yet to lose a single match. Crow is a formidable puppet, but Kankuro is also quickly proving himself to be the best of the Playhouse’s current sponsorees. There’s not much Tensei can do beyond giving out a few pointers and making sure that he’s there to watch as often as he feasibly can. 

Tensei’s not a therapist— no one in this fucking village is, to their detriment. He ensures all of his siblings are eating well and sleeping alright, but that’s about the extent of it. “I’m here for you,” he’s taken to reminding his family. His father, who’s more overworked than the usual. Temari, who oscillates between checking in on him in turn and giving him the cold shoulder. Kankuro, who pastes a sneer on his face whenever he's outside of their home and has a worrying string of increasingly bloody victories under his belt.

And Gaara. 

Tensei had woken up during his first night home to a flicker of something off on his senses just before Gaara entered his room.

“Can I tell you a secret?” Gaara asked.

Tensei sat up slowly. "Hey." Gaara hadn't come down to eat dinner with them, so Temari made up a plate to bring to his temporary room while Tensei sat with Kankuro. Primrose couldn't be budged from following orders to keep everyone out and Gaara in, and Tensei had been too tired to fight him on it. What changed? “Yeah, of course. You can tell me anything.”

There was no rattling sand that night. Just his baby brother's blank eyes as he said, “I don’t like you, sometimes.”

Oh. That’s— oh. “Okay.” He thought they were getting along really well before— before. But then again, the world must look very different from Gaara’s eyes. “That makes me sad, but it’s okay. You don’t have to always like me.” He waited, but his baby brother seemed content to let the silence stew. Tensei wasn’t. “Is there anything I can do to make it better?”

Gaara stared at him blankly. Tensei still wonders if it had been directed at the scarring on his face, or if he’d imagined it.

What he didn’t imagine was going looking for that feeling of something ‘off’ afterwards and finding a pool of blood in a hallway. Doctor's orders be damned, he'd flared the signal for man down before he was even close enough to the body to see the shards of bone and flesh mixed in.

Tensei had thrown up afterwards.

It's not the same as with a desperate genin headed for Bamboo Country, or a bound and gagged kunoichi spy, or twenty-five elderly refugees relying on him for a peaceful home. There's a visceral kind of regret that comes from knowing a comrade is dead. Specifically, someone he's fought side by side with; someone who had watched his back. Someone he's felt in his periphery day in and day out for the past multiple years. 

Tensei regrets— a lot. Not going to Gaara first, not putting up a fight to get Gaara out, not checking on the lack of Primrose's chakra signature in the servants' quarters sooner. If only Clematis had been the other anbu on duty that night— if only Poppy were a better sensor— if only the check-in intervals were shorter. 

God fucking dammit, if only. But what's done is done, and Tensei has many long nights pouring over copies of his baby brother's seal in his near future. The fourth Primrose makes his debut soon after, alongside a new addition to just outside each his, Temari’s, and Kankuro’s bedrooms. 

Skies, their family is so fucked up. Tensei will never stop trying to keep them all together, but times like this, he understands why canon turned out how it did. It feels like he’s missed a lot more than just a week— the people around him have changed, and the world spins on just like he told Kankuro it would.

Maybe that’s why he’s been clinging to Rooster lately. Or rather, he’d been trying not to cling. Somehow, his friend has remained a bastion of normalcy, barring their initial reunion.

"Wanna go grab dinner after this?" Rooster asks the two of them.

"Sure," Aya says.

Tensei declines. "I'm good, thanks." He would rather not be the third wheel— would rather not get in the way of a hopefully happy couple and give his friend an ‘actual’ cause to hate him, since an eight-day stay in an interrogation cell apparently doesn’t count. There aren’t enough phrases in the Japanese lexicon to describe how sorry he is, or how thankful that Rooster continues to stick around. Tensei promises himself that he’ll find a way to make it up to the other puppeteer.

And his family. And the whole damn village, really, for his incompetence. What a fucking mess he’s made of things, but the timeline doesn’t stop moving towards the true beginning.  Tensei just has to keep up, and he’ll drag his village and friends and family with him. 

No matter what it takes.

::::::

75年, March

"Please don't put that in your mouth."

"I wanna."

"My hair is not a chew toy, Chie-chan."

"Mmmmno."

Shouta laughs at the way that Aniki looks to the skies. Either he saves himself by putting Chie down, or he keeps her from crying by letting her do what she wants. Can't have it both ways. 

"She likes your hair 'cuz it's red," Kaede sighs. "And pretty. Black hair is bor-ring ."

"Aw, don’t say that." Aniki shifts Chie higher up on his hip. "I've always thought your family's hair is very pretty. You know they cared a lot about taking care of it properly?"

Shots perks up. It seems like no one but Aniki knows much of anything about their lineage, which was actually secretly a clan of ninjas. Not that he's allowed to tell anyone that. "Really?" 

"Aa.” Aniki smiles. “A lot of them would keep it long as a sign of how strong they were, because only the strongest shinobi can fight with their hair long and loose without getting hurt because of it. And all of them had black and brown hair, too, like you guys."

As he speaks, Aniki makes a ninja-sign with his free hand, and a spark jumps from his fingers to the candle wick. "Woah," Itsuki says.

Ha. It might be everyone else's first time seeing that, but Shouta has been coming here twice a month for the past year. 'Cuz he was old enough first. And then Aniki takes him somewhere special for breakfast, because they have to do the stuff super early before the sun is even up, and a lot of shops aren't open then. Shouta gets a whole entire cup of anmitsu to himself that he doesn't have to share with anyone. It's great.

But this time, it's late in the morning, because Aniki said Kaede and Itsuki are old enough now too and they're not used to waking up super duper early. Shouta's glad he doesn't have to deal with them being even grumpier than usual.

He doesn't get why Chie and Kensei had to come along, though. Kensei reaches up for the candle before Aniki lifts it out of reach. "Hot?"

"Hot," Aniki confirms. "No touching for you. It's dangerous, okay?"

"Ouch."

Aniki ruffles Kensei's hair. "Exactly. Very smart."

Itsuki scoffs at that. "Fire is hot. Even dumb babies know that."

"Don't call your cousin dumb, please, Itsuki."

"Where did you learn that from?" Kaede asks.

Oh, oh, Shouta knows this one! "From his mom!” he tells his cousin. “She was a ninja and she blew people up."

Aniki laughs. "I've only ever heard stories about that, but yes, my mother taught me this jutsu. She was a trap and weapons specialist, but she wasn't very patient, sometimes. The regular way to light a fire takes more signs, so she found a faster way."

Actually, the regular way to light a fire is with matches, but ninja are just so awesome that they don't need those. "Will you teach me how to do that?"

"Even better: I'll teach you how to blow a fireball out of your mouth— when you're older!" Aniki adds hastily. "It's a coming-of-age rite in your lineage, to be able to do that. Trying it while you're still little can be bad for your chakra coils in the long run."

Shouta pouts. "But I'm in the Academy now!"

"Talk to me when you can do the sand-sticking exercise, and then we'll see. Now, here," he hands the candle off to Kaede. "Be careful of the wax— remember what you have to say?"

"Mm-hm." Kaede lights the first stick of incense, puts the candle aside, claps her hands together, and then bows. "Enma-Dai'O, great king of the Samsara, judge of souls… um. Thank you. For your blessing. And cleaning me."

Shouta snorts. "Did he give you a bath or something? It's 'cleansing my soul'."

"Hn."

Aniki flicks his forehead, chiding. "Kaede-chan has the right intent. Besides, it's her first time." 

"Uh-huh." It's also a lot shorter than the prayer that Shouta gives. Aniki added a bunch more lines after his first time, and Shouta has to offer a story about something that happened in the week in between each visit to show his thankfulness for being alive. Which he doesn't mind, but it's kind of awkward when Enma-Dai'O doesn't say anything back, even if Aniki says the god is listening.

Itsuki is up next, saying his prayer with less mistakes because he's going second. Shouta bounces on his feet until it's his turn, and then he tells Enma-Dai'O about the wad of ryo bills he found under a creaky floorboard.

"Shouta," Aniki sighs, but Shouta can tell that he's not really mad. "What did you do with it?"

"Bought these!" He holds up his wristbands to show off. The ninja shops wouldn't let him get any armor-gloves like Aniki's, but the wristbands are the same shade of blue and long enough to go almost up to his elbow. "Which I'm very thankful for finding," he adds to his prayer.

Aniki shakes his head and kneels down next to them, ignoring the way Kensei tries to climb on his back. Instead of lighting an incense stick, he cuts his finger on his teeth and lets it bleed into the hole in the ground. "I see life, and I see death," he says, before switching to words that Shouta can't understand. He wonders when he'll learn this code at the Academy.

While Aniki finishes the ritual, Shouta looks up and around. Sometimes, he'll see Aniki's real little brother watching them from the tops of the walls or the roof or a window. He doesn't go to the Academy even though he's older than Shouta, because the Kazekage himself teaches him. 'Cuz family and blood and lineages and stuff.

There's a tell-tale tuft of red on the roof, redder than even Aniki's hair. Shouta double checks that Aniki's eyes are closed before sticking his tongue out in that direction. Everyone calls Gaara-dono a demon, but what demon is such a scaredy-cat? Shouta tried being nice, but Gaara always ignores them when Aniki asks if he wants to say hi to Shouta. Which is good! Because Gaara has Aniki for all the other times, but these mornings are for Shouta.

And Kaede and Itsuki and Chie and Kensei now, he guesses. Because Aniki is a super-big-important-busy person who doesn't have a lot of time, Nalani-obasan says. These trips are special.

"Can we go get anmitsu now?" He asks when Aniki stands back up.

"Hm. Why don't we let Kaede and Itsuki pick the treat, this time?"

If he has to share, it might as well be with his cousins. But still. Ugh.

Chapter Text

75年, April

April is an exciting month for Tensei. 

In a good way, mostly! Asuga is egg-bound, something that she usually wouldn’t risk with Kuu and Piiko not being mature yet, only now she can leave them in the aviary with a guarantee of safety. The chakra drain of maintaining the two juveniles is negligible compared to the combined toll of nine others, who made their thoughts thoroughly known after he recovered enough to re-summon them. Tensei has been frustrated about his exceedingly average reserves for as long as he can remember— by all rights, eleven summons should still be too much for him. And it would, if Tensei weren't taking half of a soldier pill two or three times a week to keep things balanced. 

He can’t afford to lose all the progress he’s made with them. Some of Asuga’s clan members actually deign to answer his questions, now. Steps upon small steps are his best shot to get to Chiaki-sama, and Tensei is all too-aware of the red-headed bastard that he wouldn’t stand a chance against as he is right now.

His Tomoko-chan disguise has been retired for good, having made one final round to tell everyone that she's going on a long-term assignment out of the country— Ryota-san had gruffly given her a stick of lizard tails on the house and wished her good luck. In her place walks a young man named Arui, a career chunin who works in the archives. Black contacts, hair gelled back and hidden under a ghutra, face paint off; Arui wears his hitai-ate as an armband and standard greys instead of puppeteer blacks under a modified flak vest, obviously without Tensei's usual tell-tale blue sash. Arui drops by the hospital every other week to pick up copious amounts of field dressings and salves and soldier pills for his stupid friends who keep avoiding proper medical treatment after their missions, and he's an insatiable flirt with the women manning the pharmacy— not that it ever leads anywhere.

The bandages and medicine end up in the private anbu medical facilities that are forever being raided, because he wasn't lying about dumbasses who won't go see a medic unless their lives depend on it. Maybe they’re not his friends, per se, but they could be Poppy’s. Clematis’. Orchid’s.

Maybe they were Primrose’s. 

...It's not like Tensei needed the extra supplies, anyways. It's so easy to tweak the budget allotments to divert the funds for that to a few retired anbu's pensions, with his level of clearance, and even easier to forge a paper trail and give Arui a documented history. Tensei shudders to imagine what someone more susceptible to bribery could do in his position— these days, the only signatures with more power than his are the council's and his father's.

To everyone else, though, nothing seems particularly out of the ordinary. Tensei's chakra reserves have shot up? Would you look at that, even the prodigy is a late bloomer in some areas. As long as he keeps himself from getting injured enough for another hospital visit and the pills out of sight, he should be in the clear.

The prevailing theory among the summoning community is that Tensei’s Uzumaki genes are showing. Barring Saon— Yua’s sensei— every single shinobi in Suna with a summoning contract had been consulted during his, ah, period of absence, and all of them agreed that the connection would have been severed if he was dead. Tensei is grateful for the support their testimonies provided his father, and also the invite to come to them with any questions he might have about their shared skill. He probably should have started making friends with said community earlier, rather than trying to figure things out on his own. Especially with Arata-san, who holds the contract to the hawks. Both of them had been surprised to discover that their summons share territory— Arata’s red-tailed hawks aren’t capable of human speech, so Asuga had to explain that the hawks lost the ability along with their sage a few centuries ago. There is, however, a giant hawk the size of a vending cart wandering the south that the owls call Garuda, who they’re pretty sure is a leader of some sort?

“You know, I always forget that they live in the same dimension as us,” Arata scratches the top of his summons’ head. 

“Just really far,” Tensei nods. “You said it would take you three weeks or so to fly here from your home, right, Asuga?”

“The world is not so distant on wings, I suppose. Although, even with your human legs, I would think Mount Myoboku to be only a month’s travel away.”

“Wait, seriously?”  

“No.” Oh, come on. “The journey is not one that can be made by foot. Perhaps if you train very hard, you, too, may fly someday.”

That one, Tensei recognizes as a joke. His summons often tease him for his interest in learning everything they can do. He knows that Kuu and Piiko have been doing some of their own investigating of their own, because Tensei has to listen to them regurgitate whatever they hear.

“The Great-Horned clan’s human doesn’t ask to learn things,” Piiko informs him. The two nestmates are much better at speaking now than when he first summoned them. “He just makes them send messages. The elders say his name is Motoi.”

“That’s nice, Piiko.”

“He’s older than you.”

“Mm-hm.”

“How old are you?”

“Seventeen.”

Kuu makes a clacking sound, usually reserved for notifying others of incoming danger, but nothing more than a joking taunt in this context. “Ancient.”

“No-no,” Piiko argues. “The elders say, ‘young and brash. Flies too high in the thin air’.”

Do they, now. “Your mother mentioned that we’re at similar stages of development,” he points out. “Meaning if I were one of your kind, I’d be… three and a half years old, I think.” 

“We’re almost three.”

“So you’ve said.”

“You’re not old?”

“Nope.” 

His summons exchange a look. “I want to see what a cat tastes like,” Kuu says slowly, enunciating every syllable with an undertone that Tensei can’t quite place. 

“I can get you one?” Ground rules for any owl he summons includes no hunting inside the village, after an incident with one of Councilor Hitoshi’s great-granddaughters’ pet rabbit getting eaten. Tensei would like to point out that it was dumb of her to let it roam her house’s courtyard freely anyways, considering Suna’s many, many messenger hawks flying around. “The streets can afford to spare a stray, I think. Not right now— I’ll write up a D-rank for you to deliver to Baiu later.” According to Reki, who he’s met up with for drinks a handful of times now, Baiu is rubbing the fact that he gets direct assignments from the Kazekage family in his old Academy bullies’ faces. Which, good for him, but Tensei and Reki both agree that it’s funny to see a genin take so much pride in essentially being an errand boy.

Back to his summons, though. Kuu fluffs up her wings. “And you can’t tell Mama about it.”

Tensei snorts. Nevermind, he knows what this is— he’s being tested. “I won’t.”

“Swear it on your flight feathers?” Piiko asks.

Kuu bops her brother on the head. “He doesn’t have any, pellet-brain.”

Unsurprisingly, they remind him a lot of Temari and Kankuro. The older two of his younger siblings have only gotten closer, lately, ever since his little brother stopped hanging out with Botan and the rest of his friends. Or maybe it was Botan who stopped hanging out with Kankuro? Either way, isolation seems unhealthy, so Tensei had chucked him at Rooster and given his friend the best puppy-eyes he could manage to pull off. Where Tensei is ‘lame’ and ‘dorky’, Rooster’s ten-year age gap with his little brother supposedly makes him ‘cool’. 

“He copied your verbal tic on purpose,” Tensei pointed out. “He adores you.”

“ Why,” Rooster had groaned. “You know I hate kids, Bear.”

“Lies.” Tensei knows for a fact that his friend occasionally visits the orphanage to see the Uchiha even without Tensei. “You hate the little shits that our fellow puppeteers decide to sponsor, but come on. Kankuro’s obviously better than them.”

“I’m not taking him on as a student, jan.”

“I’m not asking you to,” Tensei assures. Besides, that’s not his call to make.

Which leads him to the second big event.

Tensei waits for his little brother on the Playhouse steps, legs bouncing for lack of anything to do. The scroll in his lap that he filched from the archives moves with the motion. Eight paragraphs in and he hasn't retained a single scrap of information, so he doesn't bother to keep trying.

"Quit that," Temari snaps at him. "What are you so nervous for? It's not like it's your Trials."

His sister still hasn’t dropped the cold shoulder. Or maybe it’s just puberty. Tensei was a little snippy with everyone around her age, too, wasn’t he?

"Your honourable older brother wasn't even like this while we were waiting for his results," Rooster tells her. 

Tensei knocks their shoulders together with an exasperated huff. He'd been so convinced that he didn't pass after his monumental blunder, Tensei hadn't even bothered being anxious about whether or not he got an apprentice’s hood. That Dragon had one in hand for him anyways was a surprise and a minor miracle.

For all that they've only been waiting on the steps for ten minutes, Tensei has been waiting since Dragon asked him to relay a time and place to Kankuro yesterday. Waiting since he sat with Kankuro in the halls of the Sun Theatre, flipping through the Playbook for a new Face. Waiting since he made up a simple onigiri bento for his little brother that morning. Waiting since the hour hand hit eleven and still, there was no movement from the entrance of the Playhouse. Someone must have it out for Kankuro, because Tensei heard that newly-appointed Head of Security, Captain Yura, was dragged off the streets by a master this morning in the direction of the Playhouse. Tensei knows for a fact that former Councilor Yuma's son has no younger siblings, no children of his own, and no students to his legacy. What would Yura know about sparring with a bunch of Academy kids, and puppeteer apprentice-hopefuls at that? Nothing. 

This matters to Kankuro, who went out last night and bought a new jar of paint for the occasion. Poisoned, as a throwback to the old traditions. So yes, Tensei is nervous, he has every right to be, thank you very much.

Footsteps. Several heads from friends, family, and of course sponsors in the crowd shoot up as the Playhouse doors creak, then out comes a flood of kids, ten and eleven and twelve, maybe one that could be fourteen at the most. Some have shadows casted over painted faces by pointed hoods and a self-satisfied grin. Some hold a scrap of black cloth that few under Chikamatsu's banner actually ever use for their intended purpose as masks with equally bright smiles. Some have their eyes glued to the floor, putting one foot in front of the other until they make it past the crowd of joyful celebration.

Tensei holds his breath.

There in the doorway stands his little brother with a pointed hood on his head and Genkuro the Fox on his Face. Crafty, quick; an escape artist.

"This one calls himself Crow," Kankuro introduces himself anew.

Temari groans in embarrassment and Rooster laughs when Tensei lets out a loud whoop of congratulations. It would be nice if Gaara were here, too, but their baby brother…

Well, it’s complicated. Temari does her hot-and-cold act with him as well, and Kankuro outright ignores Gaara unless a situation forces them to interact. Tensei has no idea what to do about that other than to give it time.

His own relationship with Gaara, on the other hand— there’s no other word for it. Gaara is stalking him, and Tensei can’t figure out why. Not perpetually; he’s mostly left alone if he goes into a populated area like the office or the Playhouse, but at home? On the training grounds? In the aviary? Yeah, it’s getting a little disconcerting, not to mention the increasingly obvious distress his father is being put through. Tensei’s guard retinue is back in full force, this time consisting of a rotation between Clematis, Orchid, Yarrow, and Comfrey. The new Primrose, too, if he counts Gaara's constant watcher. It's getting harder and harder to ditch them on the rare occasion that he goes out as Arui, even with all the tips and tricks Asuga has taught him. At least they haven’t said anything to his father, or else Tensei would have been subjected to an insufferably long lecture by now. Instead, the anbu have started getting groceries again, if the perpetually stocked state of their kitchen is any indication. 

Macchia makes an appearance while he's doing the dishes one night to radiate disapproval at him. "Take the hint, Tensei-dono."

"I'm being smothered," Tensei rolls his eyes. "So what if I want to slum it in the lower markets from time to time without your men cataloging my every step?"

"That's not where you're going."

Tensei calls his bluff. "You don't know that. With all due respect, Commander, there's nothing wrong with wanting a bit of privacy."

Macchia points at the hint of red hair and porcelain skin in the doorway to the kitchen, the very motion disbelieving. "You're being hunted— "

He cuts himself off to catch a kunai from his own thigh holster. A palm intercepts the pommel on its way to his throat at the same time as a scroll's worth of iron unsealed to swirl around the two of them.

And then it stops. Like a black storm that was frozen in time, deadly iron senbon hovering in place. There's the barest hint of movement, a slight up-and-down motion in time with the steady rise and fall of Tensei's chest as he breathes.

"Gaara," he calls out. "Do you mind leaving the room for a minute?"

"Why."

"I want to talk to the commander alone."

He doesn't hear anything, but he also doesn't turn to confirm that Gaara is gone. Not because he can sense it— not even Clematis can sense Gaara with his chakra suppressed, which it often is these days— but because Tensei chooses to trust.

Macchia turns the blade around so that the tip is facing its intended target. “That was the wrong end to kill me with, Tensei-dono.” 

Tensei sighs, his actions misconstrued— and reasonably so. The worst that the blunt end of the kunai would have caused is a spot of bruising, unless Tensei had the time to build up more momentum. Maybe he could have led with his words, but he has something to prove. “I wasn’t trying to.”

“Your point, then?” 

He takes half a second to wonder if that was supposed to be a pun. What a shame that he didn’t get to know the man outside of the mask first; maybe as a family friend instead of a pseudo-adjacent subordinate. “You’ve stood at my lineage’s side for a long time,” Tensei says quietly. He’s read the black ops contract front to back. True retirees from the service are rare— once the pledge is made, there’s only one way out. "Sou, my point is that I appreciate your worry, but I'm not helpless. Have a little faith, Commander."

Whether or not his exhibit succeeds at convincing the anbu is up in the air. Whatever Gaara gets out of stalking him, Tensei refuses to believe it's because his baby brother wants him dead. It seems more like a test— like Kuu and Piiko wondering if he'll endorse their troublemaking, except with a slightly more ominous atmosphere.

He takes his lunch breaks with Gaara staring at him from across the expanse of the office building's roof, and several paranoid black ops agents perched below them. Tensei starts packing two bentos instead of one— the Shukaku might not need to eat, but Gaara does. He thinks he knows why another version of baby brother looks so short and small when he closes one eye to See. "I'm going to find a way to make the Shukaku quiet," he tells Gaara, "so you won't have to share the space in your mind with him anymore."

"There's already a way."

"...what?" His brother gestures at Tensei, which clarifies nothing. "Use your words, please."

"You make him quiet."

A spike of alarm from the anbu, ready to interfere. Tensei flares the order for them to stand down. "How so?"

Gaara blinks. "I don't know." Which might not help his argument, but Tensei can be patient.

Like with any good show, they’ll just have to see how it all plays out.

Chapter Text

75年, May

Danzo hums, sipping at his tea. It’s one of his few indulgences, and besides, there are no important documents that an accident might ruin on his desk right now. The only thing on the polished mahogany wood is Iwa’s bingo book— the latest edition, if his sources aren’t mistaken, and they rarely ever are. 

Danzo is old enough to remember when these small black books first became a staple of the upper ranks. Before Tobirama-sensei, there were no standard formats for bounties. If a man was wanted, he was wanted, and the black market kept excellent ledgers behind widespread posters. They still do, of course, but Konoha was the first to consolidate it all into a single convenient reference, each record simplified to only the necessities: Name. Affiliations. Threat level. Known abilities. Worth.

Appearance, as well, but those can be difficult to obtain. There are just as many sketches of approximate accuracy as there are pictures copied from official files, a common secondary objective of high-ranking infiltration missions. Not incredibly vital for his forces, of course. Danzo is sure the other nations borrow just as gratuitously from Suna's bingo books as Konoha does, on the rare occasion that one is found intact on a jounin's remains. That Sunagakure agreed to share this aspect of their intelligence as part of the alliance is, ultimately, a moot point. There is nothing Suna's espionage force can do that his Root cannot, especially after he reclaimed Yakushi Nono from her self-imposed retirement. No, Danzo is much more interested in intelligence on Sunagakure itself.

What a shame that Yakushi had failed to sneak in. Not that anyone he's ever sent were able to, but he expected better of the best.

He taps on the Kazekage's face with a noncommittal hum. Does Rasa of the Gold Dust know that the Uchiha live on within the borders of his country, Danzo wonders? Or did he, perhaps, welcome them with open arms?

Such information was not the goal of interrogating Konoha's latest turncoat, but the Yamanaka are very adept at what they do. Hide one secret, and another will inevitably come spilling out. 

A shift on border patrol. A plea. A bribe. Thirty undocumented survivors of a ‘razed village’, allowed passage by a weak-willed man instead of being subjected to screening through a checkpoint. Thirty Uchiha survivors, by the Yamanaka's recognition. Following the lead resulted in vague, scattered accounts from low-life locals, mapping a westward journey through River Country. Tracing the path past the location of the last eyewitness they could find makes for a destination at the ruins of Roran, although Danzo does not think that the seniors seriously thought themselves capable of surviving  and raising children in an unfamiliar wasteland. 

At least, not without help, and who conquered Roran but the Village Hidden in the Sand?

Hiruzen, the bumbling buffoon, is too cautious to accuse their ‘ally’ of line theft outright. Danzo will find a way to work around him regardless, as he always has, for the good of the village. In the meantime, he is much more interested in the why and the how. Why Suna, whom many of the thirty Uchiha grew up knowing as monsters of the Second War? Why Suna, Konoha's ally, if they reached the reasonable conclusion that Itachi had turned on them by the village's order? How did they escape with a seemingly well-prepared stock of supplies? Did Itachi warn Kagami's widow, for her connection to his deceased friend, only for her to spread the message? Sage knows that the boy has proven himself to be a sentimental fool for his little brother, a prideful little brat undeserving of his natural-born gifts.

Danzo moves his gaze to the other page. At least Konoha has a proper picture of the Kazekage's son, albeit slightly outdated, from his application to the Chūnin Exams several years ago. Much better than Iwa's pathetic drawing, although he supposes that the two images are reconcilable as the same person.

He thinks back to the exams. A memorable showing between two children of elites, with a satisfactory ending by a victory on Konoha's part, and a vital reveal on Suna’s. Until then, no one had realized that the second coming of the Third Kazekage could not only manipulate his own iron particles, but iron-based weapons as well. A deadly evolution of Suna's one and only kekkei-genkai, and one that their ally appears not to be taking advantage of on the field— there are no records of any violent encounters with the younger magnet-release wielder from any country that produces bingo books. 

And yet the bounty remains high. The book notes an estimated A-rank threat level and a significantly higher reward for live capture, which is not solely due to the ransom potential from his political ties. It only takes a glance at the list of known abilities for the reason: Suna has somehow fostered a fuinjutsu specialist. Even territories outside of the Land of Wind have started commissioning Sunagakure for some kind of filter through a seal that cleans water and leaves behind a mineral-rich sludge that makes for a decent fertilizer, including villages in Stone Country and the Land of Earth. All accredited to one 'Kuroame no Tensei', a strange epithet with no discernable origin. Iwa seems none-too happy about the outsourcing, despite them being unable to provide a similar service to the degree that these seals do. 

Hiruzen had a sample obtained and sent to Jiraiya, for whatever that's worth. Konoha has sent their foremost seals expert far out and abroad to be their spymaster, instead of holding him close and sheltered like Suna seems to be doing to their asset. Time will tell which choice is wiser, he supposes.

What a shame that Namikaze and the previous Uzumaki jinchuuriki are dead. Jiraiya refuses to take on another student, and so all that remains of Tobirama-sensei and Uzumaki Mito’s skill in fuinjutsu lies with Hiruzen and Danzo. None of the others— Torifu, Kagami, Koharu, and Homura— had ever developed any significant skill in that field.

He turns the page. Iwa usually orders their entries by affilliation and threat level, but an exception appears to have been made for Suna's ruling family. A sketch of the Kazekage's bushy-haired daughter, with a focal point being the handle of a giant tessen on her back. As a wind-style user himself, Danzo holds some amount of respect for the tessen-wielding Shodai Kazekage, for all that he never faced the legend personally during the First War. He doesn’t expect this girl to measure up to her ancestor— shinobi like that only come once in a lifetime, and Danzo’s own is not quite over yet. 

The next page is a fierce-looking, half-veiled jounin noted to be Suna no Temari’s sensei, in the place of the Glass Hawk's entry that Danzo once came to expect. Dead, likely, for all that no one has stepped forth to claim the bounty. There will be two more entries to come in his place, soon enough. It’s common knowledge that the Kazekage has four children, and Wind and Earth remain antagonistic enough that Danzo knows he’ll see the other two sons in Iwa’s bingo book whenever they show their faces beyond Suna’s canyon walls. Only now, he has potentially five in addition to watch for, with black hair and red eyes. Sunagakure would not be so stupid as to leave those wells untapped, if they know. 

And Danzo will be waiting to reclaim what is rightfully Konoha’s when the time comes. 

::::::

“You’re sure that your primary is lightning?” 

There’s a distinctly irked tone to his little sister’s voice in the wake of his wind vortex. Tensei offers her a teasing grin. “Absolutely, positively, one-hundred percent—” he deflects a flurry of attacks before slipping behind Temari for a knockout blow to the temple, only to duck or risk being brained by the metal guard of her tessen. She lets the momentum of the missed attack carry her into a sweeping back-kick, but a side-step and yank by the ankle sends his sister flying across the clearing instead. 

Temari wastes no time in opening her tessen to the second moon and blasting a wave of chakra-infused wind at him. Tensei goes airborne to evade, a risky move if it weren’t for the sun at his back, and takes aim. Wind Release: Air Current Wild Dance shoots forth from his palms to meet Temari’s next attack, and they cancel each other out just as Tensei lands on the ground again.

Two clones appear from the resulting cloud of sand. He takes them out easily with a handful of glass senbon each and layers a genjutsu over the field. Only the very edges of the next gust of wind manage to catch his clothing when he relocates, and while Temari struggles to break the pitch-dark illusion, Tensei applies his coating of complete silence to sneak up beside her and put her in a chokehold. “Come on, Tem, how many times have you fallen for that?”

“Too many,” she snaps. Tensei catches the elbow aiming for his gut and carefully executes a weak Lightning Release: Crackling Circuit. “Ow! Fine, I yield!”

He lets her go, only for a foot to hook the back of his knee. Tensei curses and they grapples for a moment until he has Temari pinned. Neither of them are truly suited to close combat, but his little sister is smart enough to recognize that their skill in taijutsu has the smallest gap.

"How many times have you fallen for that?" she mocks him.

Tensei snorts. He doesn't begrudge her the trickery, obviously. There's nothing 'fair' about how shinobi fight. "Too many, and more to come, I'm sure. Yield for real now?"

"Fine."

With the genjutsu dispelled, both of them can see Baki’s stern gaze judging his student from the sidelines. Temari shakes out the spasms from her muscles with a huff. “Why can’t my wind-release overpower yours yet?”

It’s a valid question. As a ninja tool, the tessen boosts most wind techniques beyond what the average shinobi can manage unassisted, even if it’s a drawback in other ways. However, the owls know a couple tricks about giving direction to the wind with their wings, and Asuga has painstakingly taught him the art of mimicry. “It’s a contest of differing shape transformations, not strength," Tensei answers. If you strip his propensity for ninjutsu down to the bare bones, that’s where his real talent lies. Magnet release is just detailed shape transformation of massive proportions, after all. “But hey, that was really good. You’ve gotten better from last time.”

“He’s not using his Darting Owl attack against you, anymore,” Baki points out. “You’re pushing him beyond what the average jounin would use in a fight against a genin.”

While Tensei might be lightning-natured as his primary, it’s far from the best thing in his arsenal. That he invented an entirely new jutsu for the element was… not an accident, but not entirely intentional, either? He’d gotten frustrated while trying to learn the Great Fireball Jutsu from the old notes that he took before Fumiko-san and her peers passed. Frustration had turned to distraction, and, well. After a bit of refinement, Tensei can now spit a vaguely bird-shaped bolt of lightning out of his mouth. Lightning Release: Darting Owl is a decent mid-range technique that can function as either a distracting flashbang or a nasty paralyzing shock. Tensei is rather happy with it, for all that his father had pronounced it on the mediocre end of the spectrum when he demonstrated. Still no progress on the damned fireball, but he has some time to chip away at it before Shouta will have the proper chakra reserves to pull it off.

Temari kicks at a pile of sand at her feet. “Because wind beats lightning, obviously. Besides, Nii-san said he needed the practice.”

True. Aside from the rare spar that their father manages to make time for, Tensei hasn’t taken any field missions outside of the village for almost a year. The anbu refuse to spar him while they’re on guard duty for professionalisms' sake, and the members of his department are a little over-enthusiastic about making an event out of it anytime he asks one of them. An audience of one is quite enough for him. “Just making sure that I’m not useless without my magnet release or White Bear,” he chuckles, ruffling Temari’s bangs. “Sou, thanks for indulging me.”

Temari swats his hand away. “My secondary’s not nearly as strong,” she grumbles. “This is stupid. ”

“This is natural,” Baki corrects. “While every shinobi has a nature release that their chakra is more suited for, everyone has varying levels of affinity for said nature. Same goes for their secondary, if they even have one.”

“You’re no less for having a heavy leaning towards wind and not much towards lightning,” Tensei says gently. “Just as Kankuro is no less for having equal but weak affinities for lightning and earth.” Their little brother had come home from the Academy the other day with a scowl at the results of his aptitude test. Negligible, especially for a puppeteer, but predictably disappointing to any kid obsessed with flashy showings as they are at that age. “It’s all about how you use what you've got.”

Baki nods. “Well said. Although I'll add that you have great potential for improvement as long as you keep at it, Temari.”

His little sister perks up a little anyways. Tensei has to admit, the older jounin makes for a decent mentor. Temari is running C-ranks in the field regularly now, and they haven’t run into any complications that couldn’t be dealt or severe injuries so far.

And hopefully ever, but Tensei’s not that optimistic. He just hates the idea of his little sister swallowed up by the white of the hospital— or any of his friends and family. Rooster got his arm broken on his last mission, not for the first time, but it served as an unpleasant reminder how very human everyone around him is.

Not that Tensei isn’t. He thinks. Neither Enma-Dai’O nor the Scribe have contacted him since that fateful encounter with Itachi last year, if he doesn’t count the summoning, so he couldn’t ask even if he knew how to without it being taken as ‘insolence’. Which he doesn’t. Add that to the distant impression of dissatisfaction that rings a degree removed from his own emotions, on top of being unable to remember their last interaction? It’s not an exaggeration to say that Tensei dreads their next meeting. Whether or not the prayers, the incense, the blood actually helps anything, he doesn’t know. Tensei hadn’t exactly been given any directions on how to convert his Uchiha charges, and he’d been a non-practicing agnostic in his previous life, so there’s no experience to draw on there. For better or for worse, Tensei is winging it.

His father asked him about the shrine in their courtyard, just the once. A quiet morning; two people getting ready for the coming day. Neatly pressed clothing and a mental rehearsal, for one. Immaculate lines of paint and meditative blankness, for the other. 

“I didn’t expect our time in Kannan-shi to influence you so heavily,” Rasa said. 

There’s a variety of religions across even this world— Shintoism for Earth and Fire Country, some kind of monotheism in Lightning, nature worship for Water and the northern half of Wind. Buddhism makes an appearance in the southern half, River Country, and a smattering of islands. Most shinobi are only religious by exposure to their country’s culture at large, though. Tensei doesn’t think he knows anyone who seriously believes that certain winds bring forth spring or good luck, or that the sky is an entity that watches over them, or that the sands are forever hungry. Sayings are just that— platitudes and wordplay. 

“It did,” Tensei had replied, “but not in the way that you’re thinking.”

“No?”

“No.” Feather the two shades out, blend them together. A gradient of purple. “Their court of law. The free dissemination of information. The architecture. The technology.”

“And not the altar to the king of ten hells.”

“You know what our life expectancy looks like. If you had to pick a god to worship, wouldn’t it be the one who presides over the afterlife that shinobi are most likely to end up in?”

“Most wouldn’t pick a god at all.”

Tensei set his brush down, a clack amidst the quiet. He thinks of an honorific he’s carried since he was born. He thinks of being bowed deeply to by utter strangers. He thinks of the way that he can count the number of people who dare meet his eyes with any amount of consistency on two sets of hands. “You fail to recognize,” he’d told his father, “that to most of our people, the council is peripheral. The councilors are honoured for their advice, not for their rule. For all that opposing them would make things very hard for us, the Kazekage’s word is law.” And here, he had turned to face Rasa. “They look at you, haloed in gold. In their eyes, Otou-san, you might as well be god.”

Rasa stepped beside him, then, so that they were reflected side by side in the mirror. “And in yours?”

Tensei had shrugged. “I like to think I’m close enough to see a man.”

An exhale. A hand on his shoulder. “Ever the wordsmith.”

“I try.”

Some days, it feels like his father treats him as an equal. Other days, Tensei is a walking, talking liability; an extension to examine, note, and dismiss. Except Tensei has the leeway to poke and prod and argue, and he uses it as far as Rasa has the patience for, and sometimes a little further than that. His father has too much self-control to ever truly snap, of course, and Tensei can live with being considered a grating nuisance if it means his father joins them for dinner on Kankuro’s birthday. Tensei wants them all to have as many good memories of the entire family together, in case he can’t— in case something happens, in three years’ time. He hasn’t given up hope, he swears. He hasn’t.

But he takes in the view of everyone waiting at the table for a little longer than usual, anyways. Just in case.

Chapter Text

75年, June

Knock-knock. Knock.

Silence. Rasa sighs, testing the handle. Unlocked. "I'm coming in," he warns before opening the door.

The fuinjutsu department is one of many located beneath the main public operations building, on the top floor of which resides Rasa's own office. It had been converted into an extension of the intelligence department during the Second War, and only in recent years had it been reclaimed by its original cause. 

Rasa enters a seemingly empty room, but he knows his son's tricks by now. A tendril of gold creeps out from under his sleeves to settle over the space between the desk and chair, which is tellingly only partially pushed in. 

A tug. Rasa curls his control tight and tugs back, until his son lets go of the gold. A moment later, Tensei appears in the spot with a peeled-back privacy seal in his hand. There's a put-upon feeling about him. "I was wondering why you weren't answering me. Sorry about that."

Rasa looks to the angular marks of blood, now visible on the floor. It’s not the first time that Tensei has forgotten that he’s concealed under an active seal, and he’s sure it won’t be the last. “Hiding from Councilor Yuma’s neice again?”

“You would, too,” his son grumbles. “Mari-san is relentless.”

He can relate. The first few years after Sarou-sensei had named him his heir were remarkably unpleasant in this particular context, until his engagement had been officially announced. Tensei will have to find someone eventually, but for now, Rasa’s position is stable enough to spare his son a while longer. 

“Sou, did you need something?”

“The messenger couldn’t find you.” And here, he’d thought Peony a decent sensor. Apparently not. “There was a conflict of interest. The council has pushed back the progress update on the chakra storage seal by a week.”

“Every storage seal is a chakra storage seal.”

Of course. Rasa knows his way around the basics, having learned a little from his great-aunt back when she was younger and more inclined to teach. A fruitful endeavor, but only if one had the time to pursue it properly. Which he didn't have, then, much less now. “I'm only repeating the notice verbatim," Rasa says. "You know which one they mean.”

“Sure, but would it kill them to use the actual name?”

The Yin Mimicry. Chiyo-baasama more than over-indulges in ranting about the audacity of new innovations if only Rasa sits long enough to listen, but this one especially holds her fascination. The trademark diamond is already its own jutsu-shiki, used by his great-aunt’s rival during the Second War to power her Hundred Healings from an anchor on her forehead— aside from the Yin seal and a handful of ways to contain tailed beasts, the art of stabilizing fuinjutsu onto skin has been lost alongside Uzushio.

Occasions like these, Rasa finds both admiration for his son’s skill, and amusement in his nonchalance. That Tensei is attempting to reverse-engineer the Uzumaki’s infamous Yin seal onto ink and paper as a consequence-free alternative to soldier pills is one thing. That he appears to be succeeding is another. 

That his health is suffering for it is unacceptable.

“Still falling asleep at your desk,” Rasa raises a brow at the purple imprint atop a pile of open scrolls. “Don’t make me re-establish your curfew like some unruly child.”

Tensei looks over, sighs, and scribbles something in the already-full margins. “I wasn’t sleeping,” he grumbles. “You’ve never rested your head against your desk before?”

Not since his Academy days, no. His retinue of guards are ever watching, and there is no room for such a display of weakness as Sunagakure's leader.

“Sou, I’m pretty sure you’re not just here to deliver the council’s notice. Is something the matter?”

“That depends.”  Rasa turns, his robes dragging through the air on his skin. “My office. Walk with me.”

It might be faster to shunshin outside and walk the walls up rather than take seven floors’ worth of stairs, but the longer route gives Rasa the opportunity to observe. For all that Tensei hides it well, Rasa finds it strange that his son appears discomfited when everyone in their path bows. Unlike Rasa, Tensei has grown up with it all his life. 

Certainly, neither Temari nor Kankuro find the respect paid to their station unnatural. The thought of his daughter pulling rank on one of his best jounin is an amusing one to revisit, especially during meetings that dither on pointlessly for ages. Rasa is glad that Tensei had been the one to take their report that day, or else he never would have heard. The rambling that his son tends toward is not a concise way to impart information by any means, but he supposes it has its merits as a distraction tactic during their spars.

Hm. There’s a thought. He could have Tensei taken off of the missions desk roster. All village-bound shinobi are required to man a five-hour shift for every seventy-two hours that they remain off the field, barring medical exemptions and alternative assignments. In fact, being a department head does count as an alternative assignment, Rasa is pretty sure. He’ll make a note to have that checked. Suna is not a village that can afford to run on inefficient administration. 

“Minoru-san,” Tensei greets the old secretary. 

“Tensei-dono. Yondaime-sama.” Minoru eyes him shrewdly. “You had this time blocked off for a meeting with a consultant, not for liesure.”

How laughable. Rasa hasn't had any time to himself in longer than he cares to think about. “He is the consultant.”

Minoru huffs, a wheezy, brittle sound. “Give me my details when I ask for them, Yondaime-sama.”

It’s an old argument. “I give you all the details that pertain.” Rasa has been trying to get him to retire for nearly two decades now, but Minoru simply refuses to pass on his position until he finds someone he deems component enough. Many interns have come and gone, and still he remains, a relic of Sarou-sensei’s era. 

They slip into his office a moment later, and Rasa takes a privacy seal out of a drawer. His son tracks the motions of setting it up with a wary look— good. Caution keeps a man alive.

“The map changed,” Tensei says once the seal lights up. 

The last time they had to update the mural, Roran had been painted over, and the then-new Land of Waves added on top of the ruins of the Land of Whirlpools. Now, his son stares at a music note next to a circle of red. Shinobi settlements rise and fall frequently, but none have advanced quite as aggressively as this one. “Otogakure no Sato has overthrown their daimyo,” Rasa answers. He suspects that the country’s name will be changed as well, soon enough. “Rather ambitious, for a village barely a year old.”

“A year. Right. Skies." His son runs a hand through his bangs. "They haven’t… asked anything of us, have they?”

An odd question. It would be more of a geographical advantage for Oto to ally themselves with Lightning or Fire than Wind. “No. You can ask Rio for a better understanding of the situation later.”

“Then we— no, you’re right. I guess this kind of news doesn’t quite merit, ” Tensei gestures at the privacy seal. “Sou, what does?”

“Gaara.” Even the world’s best poker face doesn’t help if one cannot keep the emotion out of one’s eyes, and the familiar violet ones have always been prone to giving his son away, much like his mother before him. His eldest always becomes guarded whenever Rasa brings this topic up. “He listens to you.”

“No more so than you. The both of us have proven dangerous to him.”

Yes, and no. Whatever Yashamaru said on his deathbed has rendered Rasa's youngest lost to him. Rightfully so, perhaps, but this is not about what is right. “You and I both know that Macchia’s analysis is coloured by his past. I don’t believe that Gaara is trying for the kill.”

His son scoffs. “And your faith manifests as suffocating me in anbu?”

If Tensei thinks his guards are too much, Rasa would like to see what he thinks of the Kazekage’s retinue. The number of attempts on his life have just started tapering off from the usual spike that follows every containment breach. 

This time, the outrage comes from his absence rather than his actions. A novelty Rasa would be fine with— the agents he handpicked are more than satisfactory in their performance— if it weren’t for the fact that they’re targeting his son as well. “You know that’s not all they’re there for.”

“I do, and I’m thankful for their service, but come on. Otou-san, I can take on an assassin any day of the week.”

There’s no pride in his son’s words, only a statement of fact. Rasa narrows his eyes. “I’ve been told that your sensory abilities have been inconsistent as of late.” And that’s not all. He’s personally witnessed Tensei clipping his shoulder on doorways and when turning tight corners in their home, the one on his blind side. Rasa knows that Tensei has trained himself to consciously compensate, so the return to lesser coordination implies a significant mis-allotment of focus. 

“Clematis?” 

“Yes.”

Tensei sighs. “Snitch,” he mutters. “I’ve been wondering why he started flaring inane questions during his shifts. You were testing me?”

No, actually. Clematis had taken the initiative by himself, such as to not waste Rasa’s time on suspicion without evidence. “We’re not having this argument again.”

Tensei narrows his eyes. Rasa narrows his back. The day he's unable to stand his ground against one of his children when the situation calls for it is the day that he'll concede to retirement, himself. “Fine," Tensei scowls. "What’s this about Gaara?”

Another drawer, a storage scroll, and a wisp of smoke. Rasa takes the sash of the large gourd that appears and offers it to Tensei. His son hefts it up by one hand, testing its weight. “Skies, this thing is going to be heavy once it’s filled with sand.”

Hm. “You know what it’s for, then?”

“Aa. Gotta cart your own sand around outside of the desert. I assume you intend for the three of them to be the face of Suna for the next Chunin Exams in Konoha?”

Well, that saves him some time. Rasa has long stopped asking how his son deduces what he does, because Tensei has never offered a straightforward answer. “Gaara’s reliance on the sand has made him physically weak. He’ll need time to adjust within Suna’s walls.”

Notably, Rasa does not say, ‘in a safe environment’. Agent Primrose clears civilians and shinobi alike out of Gaara’s path before the boy can deem that someone is ‘looking at him wrong’ and paint the streets bloody, but that does not mean there have not been incidents. The reason behind suggesting that Tensei holds influence over him, aside from being the object of his shadowing, lies in the non-existent casualty rate when the two are in close proximity. Reports claim that Tensei is not actively doing or saying anything to prevent such violence, even when sudden appearances or flares that startle Gaara fail to incite the usual retaliation. 

Rasa, however, suspects otherwise.

“Convincing him to carry this on his back is going to be a pain,” his son groans. “You realize I can’t even get him to bring his own bento for lunch? I don’t think he’s ever held anything heavier than his bucket of sand on the playground, Otou-san. Actually—” Tensei cocks his head. “Yeah, he’s headed in our direction right now. Are you going to help, or am I doing this alone?” 

Rasa raises his brow. Sure enough, his guards alert them of an incoming a second later. Tensei shoots him a smug smile, as if to say, see? My sensing is fine.

An exception. Rasa sighs. “I have a meeting with the candidates for the next Head of Security in a moment. Take the gourd home with you later, if he doesn’t.”

“Right. Yep. Easy, no problem whatsoever—” he shuts up when Rasa turns a glare onto him. “Yes, Otou-san.”

Good. Rasa doesn’t need the sarcasm; competency can be rare this high up on the ladder amidst all the nepotism. His son, though, will find a way to meet his expectations. 

Rasa looks to the seal, still glowing as Tensei leaves to meet Gaara on the roof. It’s not even the earliest sample of ingenuity from his son, and far from the latest that has padded the bottom of Suna’s coffers. 

He’s no god. Rasa knows how the other shinobi villages consider Sunagakure to be a monarchy, though, and the past wars have proven that there is no longer any place for kings on the front lines of a battlefield. Too many Kage lost and too many villages left bereft of their leaders makes for a conflict that sputters and dies without any goals achieved. 

He doesn’t deny that scholars are valuable, but Tensei holds the key to more than that. If Rasa is to be Sunagakure’s king, then there’s all the more reason for its prince to be able to wield the army’s blade. 

::::::

75年, July

Shimo starts preparing an order she knows by heart when she sees the crowd parting. There’s only one regular that can do that, and he always gets the same thing, for some reason. Not that there's anything wrong with beef stew and miso, but every single time? 

Still, it's kind of cool that the Kazekage's son frequents her family's stall. The unsaid endorsement has attracted a lot of people over the years, enough that her aunt and uncle started struggling to manage the rush hours by themselves. Shimo is glad that she can help, especially since they're not getting any younger, nevermind Kaemon-oji having lost his sight and an arm during the Second War.

“Ema-obasan, Shimo-san,” the Kazekage’s son greets her and her aunt with a smile. “How’s business lately?”

“So-so.” Shimo ducks her head in as much of a bow as she can manage with a ladleful of soup in hand. Sometimes it makes him laugh. Today, though, he only looks tired, and his makeup is drawn extremely thick around the eyes. “The new look is interesting,” she hedges. 

“The what?”

Her aunt wipes her hands and bustles over. “It’s not kohl,” Shimo’s told. “Been a while since I last saw those rings, though. Is there a special occasion?”

Tensei-dono raises a hand to his eyes. Ah, shit, did she make him feel self-conscious? Now she feels bad. “They look fine,” Shimo backtracks. “Good-interesting, you know?”

“Just ‘interesting’ sums it up pretty well, I’d say. I forgot that you’ve never seen me with them, huh?” Shimo watches with wide eyes as the coverings on his arms come apart into black needles, which swirl through the air until they’re compressed into a tight bundle in his hand. Tensei-dono closes his fist over it, and then the not-eyeliner disappears. “I’m testing the capacity of something I’ve been working on,” he tells Ema-oba, showing her the now-revealed inside of his forearm. Shimo squints at the faintly glowing ink on a piece of paper, but she can’t make out any of the words before he lowers it again. “To borrow from your niece, it’s going ‘so-so’.”

It’s a reminder that they live in vastly different worlds. Shimo was born and raised in Suna, but sometimes, she wonders what people who don’t see blurs clearing several rooftops with a single jump on the regular think of ninja. 

“Is it supposed to make your hands shake, or are you just really hungry?” Ema-oba hums teasingly.

“Ah, Oba-san, do you really have room to talk?” Tensei-dono turns towards Shimo. This time, with his eyes how they normally are, his smile looks a little more genuine. “The first time Ema-obasan saw me with these, I was saving her foot from a cast-iron pan that she dropped.”

“Oiya, once! That only happened once, young man, and you didn’t save those sauteed mushrooms from hitting the floor!”

“They were already flying through the air, I can’t control mushrooms. ”

Her aunt turns around, tutting in mock disappointment, and that’s when Shimo nearly drops food on her foot. Because there, right next to Tensei-dono, is a little boy with the very same markings that have reappeared around his eyes.

“Gaara,” Tensei-dono sighs, “I asked you to wait for me at home.”

“You took too long. I was hungry.”

“Which is why I stopped to get food. Where's Primrose?” 

The foot traffic in the street slows as more and more people notice the additional presence at her aunt and uncle’s soup stall. It takes a moment to look past the giant gourd and see that it isn’t Temari-dono or Kankuro-dono or any one of the gaggle of orphans that shadow Tensei-dono’s feet. Shimo gets no such delay— she’s staring straight at a head of wild, blood-red hair.

Shimo is going to die. She is going to die a stupid, horrible death, and while she misses her parents, she doesn’t actually want to join them this soon. 

Ema-obasan tugs Shimo behind herself. She can feel her aunt’s hand on her wrist trembling before it lets her go. “Of course,” Ema-obasan says, taking over bagging the usual order of beef stew and miso broth. “It’s— it’s on the house today, Tensei-dono. Please. Have a nice day.”

There’s a wide berth of empty space around their stall, now, just like the blank in her head pushing back memories of that night.

“I thought we were past this song and dance, Oba-san.” Tensei-dono places the full amount and more on the counter, then glances down beside him. “No one is going to hurt anyone else here,” he adds quietly. “Right, Gaara?”

“Mm.”

The reassurance rings hollow. Skies above, all Shimo wants is for Tensei-dono to take the thing that killed her mother and go away.

Ema-obasan makes no move towards the money. “Have a nice day,” Ema-obasan echoes.

The Kazekage’s son takes the bags from her outstretched hands. “Thank you,” he murmurs, before bending down to— to pick the thing up, by an arm around its waist. “Gaara, what do we say?”

“I’m sorry for scaring you.”

Tensei-dono dips his head to them in turn. “I’ll see you around,” he says, and then disappears in a blur.

Somehow, Shimo doesn’t think they will.

Chapter Text

76年, August

Kankuro’s twelve when he graduates from the Academy, and he already knows who he wants as his mentor. 

Chiyo-baasama. Duh. 

Like, yeah, she's technically retired and he only ever really sees her and Ebizo-jiisama on Memorial Day, but once in a blue moon, Anigo will come back home with stains all over his clothes and grumbling about Chiyo-baasama being a slave driver. Clearly, she’s not retired- retired.

She says no, to which he asks again because the whole point of this song and dance that genin have to go through to get a secondary instructor is to prove they have tenacity, jan. But Kankuro gets the feeling that whoever started the tradition didn’t have to deal with Chiyo-baasama.

After a week of making arguments that he thinks are pretty good— and they are, he practiced them with Temari and she thinks so, too— Chiyo-baasama starts throwing senbon at him after her ‘no’. And Kankuro thinks he’s moved on to the second stage of this song and dance; that she’s testing him to see what he can bring to the table. Except even with Crow positioned in between them as a shield, his evasive skills only go so far, dammit. 

And the senbon are poisoned. “A fast acting one, plant-based, non-lethal,” the old hag tells him when he doesn’t get hit again but staggers a minute later. “Or was it a slow-acting fatal one, after all?”

“What." 

She scoffs. “I’m old enough to have trouble remembering things, you know. Go your brother. He’ll have the antidote, I’m sure.”

For the first time in a long time, Kankuro loses. Not that he ever expected to win against Chiyo-baasama— he’s never won against Rooster or Dragon or any other master yet, either— but it’s frustrating all the same. Kankuro takes pride in being able to defend himself against the onslaught of challenges from sons of bitches who think he doesn’t belong in the Playhouse. He’s pretty sure he’s challenged and been challenged and beaten every single apprentice there is under sixteen, because no adult wants to say they fought a kid and lost.

Well, Kankuro doesn’t like to say that he fought an old lady and lost, either, but here he is.

His older brother swears an unintelligible blue streak when Kankuro stumbles into his office calling for him in a blind panic, douses him with a general antivenom and three other things he can’t identify by taste alone, and sits him down with a trash bin between his legs. “No, yeah, this checks out with her sense of humor,” Tensei mutters to himself. Kankuro feels the need to remind his older brother of the feud between the Playhouse and the government, and that he’s one of the Kazekage’s kids. “She wouldn't— you know. She wouldn't. And screw the feud, she’s hardly the Troupe Master anymore. Dragon replaced her in all but name a couple years ago.” Hey, why are they feuding, anyways? Tensei’s a history nerd, he would know. “Because great great grandfather Reto and his iteration of the council were a bunch of bull-headed warhawks and our puppeteers suffered for it. Who do you think assassinated him? Now, shut the hell up, I’m trying to figure out if this is actually just a really dramatic paralytic or if I have to go grovel at her for a name.” Kankuro thought his brother said she wouldn’t kill him. “Yeah, doesn’t mean you’re gonna have a fun time if you annoyed her badly enough.” What? Why? Kankuro’s all about fun times, isn’t Tensei just having a blast right now— “Skies, Kankuro, please shut up.”

Fifteen minutes and a vomit-fest later sees Kankuro sweating and a little shaky but otherwise fine, according to his older brother’s diagnostic jutsu. “Don’t go anywhere,” Anigo says as he goes to swap the bin out with another.

Which leaves Kankuro alone, only he’s not. He leans his head back to take a breath and nearly jumps out of his skin to see Gaara, sitting on his heels while sticking to the upper corner of the wall. There’s a book in his hands— A Field Guide to Bird-watching in Southern Wind Country, the title reads.

Gaara doesn’t look at him. Kankuro huffs and turns away.

Kankuro can recognize a rejection when he gets poisoned by it. He made a good effort, no one can say he didn’t at least try.

Go ask your brother. Well, too bad. Anigo doesn’t have time for anything but his work and Gaara, these days. Kankuro isn’t stupid enough to fight the volatile youngest of the family for something as small as Tensei’s attention. 

Plan B is Dragon, obviously, except he up and vanished a few weeks ago. “Long-term research assignment in the capital, jan,” Rooster-senpai tells him. “Should take a year or two. He’s expected to know the roots behind Playhouse traditions if he ever wants to, you know. Take over. When Chiyo-baasama kicks it.”

Kankuro wants to laugh. She’s very much still kicking, just not the bucket.

So he turns to Rooster next, but Kankuro has already been badgering him for months now. The older puppeteer really, really doesn’t want to take on a student. Ever. Which is ass, because he’s basically training Kankuro once a week already. “All I’m asking is for you to make it official,” Kankuro says. “Maybe meet up a bit more often, or take me with you on missions.”

“You’re not going to hear something different this time just because you keep asking,” Rooster’s girlfriend informs him curtly. “This is not a test of perseverance. No means no.”

“I do have something different for him, actually,” Rooster grumbles. “A ‘fuck off’, perchance.”

“Why!? And don’t say it’s because you hate kids, jan! Look at this,” Kankuro grabs a fistful of the symbol on his own shirt. Only the best, only the favoured are allowed to wear the rising and setting suns of the Playhouse. Kankuro has earned the right to wear it through blood and sweat and copper and sawdust. “Even the Playhouse thinks I’m good enough, so what’s your problem?” 

Rooster flicks the Playhouse’s symbol with a sigh. “You think being a mentor is just training and missions? Crow, I don’t want to be responsible for your life.”

But— it’s not his lineage, otherwise Rooster never would have sponsored Anigo.

Except a sponsorship isn’t the same as a mentorship.

“So, what, you’re scared of my dad?” he scoffs. "People die in this line of work all the time." The puppeteers he stops seeing around the Playhouse. The drunkards in the street that he’s told to stay away from. The guilty survivors found with slit throats and a kunai in hand. Kids like Asa, even, not even close to fully trained and part of the collateral. Kankuro is not some dumb, naive child who thinks being a ninja is about protecting the village and beating up bad guys. He knows what might happen. But he’s not the golden, prodigal son to watch rise, and he’s not the red, monstrous son to watch fall— Kankuro is the inconsequential white that borders their sides. “I’m the spare, jan. Besides, Anigo wouldn't let Tou-sama do much more than slap you on the wrist if you get me killed. Which I’m pretty sure you’ll try not to,” he snarks.

Rooster looks at him with undisguised pity. Whatever. Good, even, because Kankuro can use that. “You’re not expendable, kiddo.”

“Then teach me, jan. Help me stick it to my dad.” He knows that Rooster doesn’t like the Kazekage, for whatever reason.

Except Rooster only shakes his head and tells him the same thing he always ends these arguments with: “You should talk to Bear.”

Kankuro is this close to blowing a gasket. “Anigo. Is. Busy.”

“He’ll make time if you ask,” Aya says. “Skies knows how, but he always manages.”

You know what? Fine. Fine. 

Kankuro spends the route home composing himself, sliding a genial mask atop his Face. He’ll offer to help with dinner, corner his brother in the kitchen early enough that the idea of ‘sleeping on it’ won’t ever come up. Then he’ll make his move, and he’ll keep pushing that front until something gives.

And he follows the plan to a T.

“You’re going to be my mentor, jan,” he says while putting a pot of water on to boil.

Tensei splutters, “What?” 

Joke’s on him, though. Kankuro might not be able to see which buttons he’s pushing with the old hag— he picked up Tensei's habit of looking at things with one eye closed as a kid, even, and it didn't help— but Kankuro knows his older brother.

It barely even takes an hour to wear him down. He's kind of weird about it— Somehow, Tensei got the impression that Tou-sama was planning to hand Kankuro off to an older jounin. Namely, Baki. But why would Tou-sama put Kankuro under Baki? Don't get him wrong, the guy's a decent sensei to Temari, but their skillets don't exactly match. And the hypothetical team won’t be for a while yet, unless Gaara miraculously gets a handle on himself tomorrow morning or something.

Anigo makes noises about being too young and not having enough to teach. Kankuro points out that Tensei is older than him by six years. His brother shoots back that he’s been an adult for only two— and a jounin and a master for longer, Kankuro adds. That’s more than him, so it’s enough, in Kankuro's eyes. 

Something he said must resonate more than everything else, because Tensei stares at him for a solid minute before agreeing when Kankuro prompts him again. And then he spends the rest of the dinner sulking about it with his good eye closed in favor of his blind eye, a habit Kankuro has never understood when closing both eyes is so much easier if you don't want to see anything. 

“Baki says it's probably just the first-student jitters that all new mentors get,” Temari tells him the next day. Which makes sense, but they're family, so he's not really sure what his brother is so nervous about. It’s not like Tou-sama is going to hold Kuroame no Tensei accountable if anything bad happens.

Anigo— who refuses to be called Tensei-sensei, which is just as well because there's no way Kankuro could say that with a straight face— starts off their first training session with a familiar Wind Country proverb: There are four things you can be, in a dessert.

"Temari is a survivor," Tensei tells him. "Gaara," he nods in the direction of two legs hanging off of a sandstone pillar a distance away, "will be great. Let's see if we can't make you deadly, ne?"

Kankuro appreciates that, he really does. He's going to enjoy introducing himself as Sabaku no Kankuro and leaving others in the know wondering which of the desert they have just encountered, but. “Leaving the last for yourself?” he scoffs.

Anigo ruffles his hair under the pointed tips of an apprentice hood. “Eh. Now, come on. I won’t use my magnet release, so if you can draw blood, how about I teach you our uncle’s Crackling Circuit technique?”

Kankuro eyes the training field his brother has chosen. There’s a scattering of sandstone structures and some shrubbery for cover, and a couple boulders that are just the right size to kawarimi with. On top of that, Tensei’s not wearing the pouch with his three scrolls of iron today. In their place is the storage scroll that he knows contains White Bear, although it's shrunk in size since he first saw it as a kid. Perks of being a fuinjutsu master, he supposes. “And what happens if I can’t?” he asks, just in case.

Anigo chuckles. “Then I’m going to drill you on reaction time until you can’t stand anymore, of course.”

Fair enough. Kankuro palms the smoke bombs in his pocket and grins, mean and wide and narrow like Genkuro the Fox. “Bring it, jan.” 

::::::

76年, September

“He’s like a plant.”

Tensei carefully does not look up from his scroll. Not because the observation report of Nidaime Tsuchikage Muu and Nidaime Mizukage Gengetsu is too fascinating to tear his eyes away from— the archives remain a treasure trove of materials he can use to prepare for the worst— but so as not startle his friend. “You’re talking about Kankuro?”

“Aa.” Rooster isn’t usually one for standing around in contemplative silence, but that’s what they’re doing today, it seems. They’re watching Kankuro weed Councilor Ken’s garden for a D-rank, and Rio-sensei is using the opportunity to lecture at him from the shade of her own home. A familiar lesson on Wind’s agriculture as a whole and the reflection of Suna’s chicken hatcheries, as far as Tensei can make out. Not a second wasted, with his old tutor. “He needs his feet on solid ground. Water. Attention. You know what I’m getting at?”

“I think so.” It was never Tensei’s intention to put work before family, but aside from Gaara, his younger siblings just don’t seem to need him much anymore. Temari has Baki, of course, and Tensei had assumed that either their father would talk to the older jounin about the plan properly or that Kankuro would drag a master puppeteer home to dinner one day. Not… whatever this is. “Would it really have been so bad to say yes?”

“I’m not going to risk fucking up with your little brother, Bear.”

Tensei inhales. Exhales. “Am I fucking this up, then?”

Three D-ranks. That’s all the missions he’s forced Kankuro to do: painting a new roof, guarding Councilor Hitoshi’s great-granddaughter’s rabbits on their outside-time, and now weeding Councilor Ken’s gardens. Kankuro had grumbled the entire time— a little bit of humbling for a cocksure crow.

They’re leaving the village for Kankuro’s first time tomorrow.

“I know that anything I say can and will be held against me, but hey. I’ve got faith in you, jan.”

It’s misplaced. 

Tensei picked the escort mission to Hari-mura because it's a familiar, reoccurring one, even if it does take them way far out to the southwest. At least four days away by himself, closer to six with Kankuro by his side, but two weeks with the civilians they’re guarding. It’s really too bad that the rest of his siblings will never get to meet anyone else from their mother’s side of the family. Tensei was told last visit that Genji-jiisan passed away in his sleep— old age is a pretty good way to go, all things considered.

He’d assumed that his little brother would be blooded on a faceworm or snapion or something, bring a tail and a tale back to Suna. Tensei didn't intend for Kankuro to get his first kill straight out of the Academy on a pair of pathetic bandits once they reached the village. 

Kankuro doesn't even flinch.

He doesn't get a single scratch on him, either. They take care of the bandit problem for only a bonus, less than a multiple-target C-Rank should cost. They're already here, after all, and Tensei has seen these people once a year, every year since just before he turned twelve. Customer loyalty goes both ways. 

Its residents carve their homes into the canyon walls and spin art out of glass, so there’s only the one little family-run inn that he always stays at. Tensei leads them to clean up at the river first, obviously, because there’s a chance that Akira-chan will be working the front desk and he really doesn’t want to traumatize the owner’s kid by traipsing in with blood splatters on their clothes. 

‘Kid’. Ha. Kankuro is barely a year older than her, if he remembers correctly. His little brother makes a face when he has to clean the carnage off of his Crow puppet, but there's no—

It's too—

"I'm going to make you deadly."

Tensei hands Kankuro a couple ryo and tells him to treat himself to midnight lunch, maybe buy a glass souvenir to bring back for the siblings' growing collection. He climbs up a cliff face on the outskirts of the village.

There’s a cavity half-way up that he found the first time he came here, with Niyu and Kota before they ran his first Chūnin Exams together. The crack is harder to slip into, now, and the inside is a snug fit even when he curls up and tucks his chin into his knees.

Tensei lets the sandstone hug him in lieu of tears that never come.

Chapter Text

76年, October

There’s a B-rank commission from Chori no Sato, and Tensei has dibs on it. 

“Gotta keep in shape, you know?” he offers as his justification. This will be his second out-of-village mission in nearly as many years. “Do some live-testing of the new techniques I’ve learned. And I’d hate to be accused of not contributing.”

Asahi-san raises his brows. “Not contributing,” he echoes. “I’m going to tell Ume you said that.”

“And she’ll agree with you. Skies know she could run the department without me.”

“Don’t think I won’t. She’ll laugh at you.”

Tensei lowers his voice, teasing but quiet. “The only thing you won’t do is propose already. You know she’s getting antsy, right?”

Nevermind the age gap, which in itself is nothing out of the norm in Suna— Asahi-san just turned thirty-seven, and Ume-senpai, twenty-nine. They keep their relationship on the low, but Tensei would be a terrible superior officer not to know about the going-ons of his own people. 

Asahi sighs. “We’ve talked. Started the paperwork.”

“The paperwor— Skies, you are the least romantic man I know,” Tensei chuckles. “I’ll be sure to have a congratulations at the ready for the official announcement.”

“Mm-hm. Don’t think you’ve distracted me,” Asahi-san opens the mission scroll and makes a note. “Standing orders are to not let you take B-rank and higher missions alone. If you still want this mission, I’m assigning you a partner.”

He would have picked Rooster, if the choice was up to him. It’s not, though. Instead, he meets a chunin named Jaku at the village gates the next morning, who claims to know him. An old classmate from back in the Academy’s first level— Tensei has a vague recollection of losing to him in a couple taijutsu matches, and it seems like Jaku took that skill and ran with it. A close-combat tracking specialist and mid-range support for a search and retrieval is fitting, if not what Tensei would prefer. 

Kankuro is not exactly happy to be left behind, but Tensei pushed him hard enough on the run back that the soreness is really making itself known. Rest and recovery is important for development, especially while a shinobi is still growing, and his little brother knows that.

"Chakra nature?" Tensei asks as they set out.

"Wind." Like most shinobi in this country, including Tensei himself. "I'm not one for ninjutsu, though."

Tensei rifles through his pouch to pick out two slips of Yin Mimicry seals marked with the corresponding kanji. "We use our chakra for more than ninjutsu. Stick these onto your skin if something goes wrong, they'll give you a small boost. No side-effects." Unless he's lying about his primary nature, of course. 

Jaku takes them with wide eyes. "Not that I'm complaining, but isn't it against your department's interests to hand these out for free?"

"I'm aware of the going rate," Tensei says wryly. While they've been incorporated into every field mission ranked A or higher as a complementary mission expense, most shinobi have to pay a considerable amount out of pocket to get one of these. "Still, I'd rather you have one just in case. Feel free to keep them if you don't use them on this mission." 

The Yin Mimicry is, essentially, a packaged chakra transfusion. The closer the match, the smoother the transfer— the first draft used neutral, filtered chakra that anyone could absorb, but Ume quickly pointed out that production wouldn't be able to meet demand like that. The seal doesn't produce chakra on its own— someone has to manually imbue it with their own, and the only people who can do so with neutralized chakra are those that have chakra control over the eighty-fifth percentile. 

To clarify: that means only about fifteen percent of their shinobi population can filter their own element out of their chakra, and of that fifteen percent, only medics practice the skill consistently. Hoki-sensei made it known that the hospital is overtaxed as it is— for all that she agrees that the innovation is a healthier alternative to the soldier pill, there's no way she can spare enough medics to produce them without compromising her own operation's efficiency. 

The other part of that fifteen percent are mostly master puppeteers who could learn, but the council shut down his suggestion to rope them in almost unanimously. Tensei supposes they're cautious of giving the Playhouse even more influence, and Dragon's absence hadn't helped. 

Thus, the Yin Mimicry seal is not filtered upon production and instead comes in five variants, one for each standard elemental nature. Wind is the priority, of course, since over two-thirds of Suna’s forces lean towards that as their primary. It’s followed by earth, lightning, fire, and water, according to the statistics of how common each is in Suna's shinobi. The jutsu-shiki keeps the energy from dissipating into the atmosphere, although no one has figured out a way to prevent the stored chakra from degrading over time. Every seal has an expiration date of about two months after its creation. 

In contrast, soldier pills provide a small burst of chakra alongside a boost to a person's natural chakra production, resulting in both a greater and longer-lasting amplification, but also flooding the chakra coils in an unnatural manner. The inflammation and crash that follows is somewhat comparable to a person eating twice as well as he usually does for several days before going back to eating normally— less than normal, even, because the source of food has been depleted and needs time to recuperate. In the meantime, lethargy, fever, and shivering come to take their dues, which Tensei can personally attest makes for a terrible time. It’s inadvisable to take a second until the after-effects of the first pill have worn off, but technically, doing so can stave off the chakra exhaustion for a little longer.

And like anything that stretches a person out, going 'back to normal' isn't something that all chakra coils manage to do.

The seal notably differs in that it can be applied and drained in quick succession with no lasting side-effects. As long as they’re not layered for a simultaneous surge that can shock the living daylights out of a person’s chakra system, the Yin Mimicry is both safer and arguably more versatile, even if soldier pills make for a bigger boost and are cheaper to produce. 

It works for his current purpose, too. There’s no way Tensei is going to get caught with withdrawal symptoms by a near-stranger, but the seals on his forearms are easily hidden by his vambraces, and he released the summoning on a handful of owls in the aviary to be safe. Precautions and planning are always preferable, if possible.

Ha. Try saying that five times fast.

This close to the border, the surrounding scenery looks more like Konoha with its forests than the desert that takes up the majority of Wind Country. Chori no Sato is a quaint little place uncreatively named after its thriving ceramics industry. Tensei has seen a couple Hanasaki-style display pieces in Chiyo-baasama and Ebizo-jiisama's house, been treated to more than one bemoaning tangent about the increasingly cluttered designs and obnoxious colors coming out of Chori lately when their merchants pass through Suna. Personally, Tensei is quite fond of the unnecessarily ornate pot that Yua bought him on impulse a few years ago. It holds one of the only two spots of greenery in his room, a hardy little marigold plant that somehow hasn't died yet next to Yashamaru's old iris flower. Probably because Gaara has assigned himself the job of watering them. Maybe he can get his baby brother something to put a small cactus in while he's here? A few ceramic plates for Kankuro to armour his puppets with, in the future. A leather necklace catches his eye for the centerpiece that reminds him of an upside-down fan, and he buys it with Temari in mind. 

Ceramics doesn't really have a place among Tensei's various noches of interest, but Chori no Sato provides an interesting contrast to Hari-mura’s delicate swinging bridges and homes carved into canyon faces. Ceramic tiling on the roof and comically tall chimneys on every other house— seems like almost everyone has a firing kiln of their own. 

Gousho, the village leader, finishes their tour at the large mansion in the center of the village, which serves as a cultural museum, a governmental office, and residential location for the village elders alike. 

Only, the security of the museum part must be lacking, because five displays are noticeably empty.

"You have to understand," a civilian pleads with him, "The Akaibara Vase was the greatest innovation of its kind. My great-grandfather inspired so many in his masterful use of slip-trailing the glaze— it's priceless."

"And you're all sure, beyond reasonable doubt, that this Yamada-san has stolen them and is currently hiding in Takumi no Sato." 

"He has family there," the man insists. Not the part of the question that needed an answer, but an answer all the same. That would explain why Chori commissioned Suna instead of Tanigakure, at least. Despite the Land of Rivers not being very insular, the latter hidden village probably wouldn't be down to invade a settlement in their own country on the behest of a village from the Land of Wind.

“Mission parameters state a clear-cut live retrieval procedure,” Jaku says in a bored tone, but Tensei hears the subtext— they’re not being paid to do investigative work. Correlation and causation are two different things, but the fact of the matter is, a known dissenter of the direction Chori no Sato has been taking its artform was noted to have gone missing shortly after the select Hanasaki pieces disappeared.

It just seems strange. All the other Hanasaki pieces on display look well-cared for, albeit to Tensei’s untrained eye. "Out of curiosity, what will be done with Yamada-san upon his return?"

"That depends on how many of the pieces you manage to retrieve undamaged," his guide says. "After we pull a confession out of him… well, we can discuss monetary compensation for his disposal later, shinobi-san."

How pleasant. 

At their unhurried pace, it only takes a day and a half to cross River Country. The north isn’t nearly as mountainous or water-logged as the southern half of the nation, but there is one incredibly wide river that Tensei has to coax Jaku to walk across instead of taking the long way via a bridge. Contrary to popular belief, most Suna-nin are able to swim if they need to— just not very well. It’s a necessary skill for any shinobi that takes missions outside of the Land of Wind, where there are no bodies of water to practice on.

And not just because of how rare they are— any settlement that relies on a spring, river, or any other ‘live’ water source are fiercely protective of the nature spirit that they believe resides there. To walk on such a blessed thing with chakra? Well, riots have been started for less than such blasphemy. It’s always annoying to see an incident report in the weekly meetings of some foreign idiot triggering civilians with their cultural insensitivity. Tensei would think the other nations know by now to warn their shinobi beforehand, but no, apparently not always.

Although perhaps he doesn’t have the room to talk right now. They’d decided that Tensei would stay in the inn while Jaku disguised himself as a civilian to scout out the situation, since Tensei is unfortunately well-known for being unable to pull off a henge. That doesn’t mean he’s willing to sit still and look pretty when he feels a spike of agitation from his mission partner only two blocks away.

At the market. 

“What’s going on?” he asks a woman at the edge of the crowd.

She tsks in disapproval. “Some ninja from Wind making trouble, I think. Why they insist on making a scene out of things, I’ll never know.”

Fantastic. Tensei flares a greeting, and he gets a distracted acknowledgement back as he shapes the air around his head to mimic a dish and funnel sound in his direction. It takes a moment to adjust Asuga’s technique to a manageable level, as it always does, but eventually he picks up Jaku’s voice over the din of the gathering.

Sounds like the other person knows the target personally, from the way that he’s yelling in Yamada’s defense. Damn. <Back-up needed?>

<Negative. Secondary target acquired, tail when I disengage.>

<Acknowledged.>

Yamada would have been wiser in hiring a guard detail, but the fact that he didn’t makes this easier. Living quarters? Located. Family? Corralled together on the lawn outside. Artifacts? Well.

It’s really rather crass of them to invade Yamada’s relatives’ home like this. Jaku holds them all gathered at knifepoint while Tensei searches the house again. Two pieces had been on blatant display, and two more had been in the back of a closet. He rifles through cabinets and drawers, looking for false bottoms, but nothing.

“I’m going to look around the grounds for signs of digging,” Jaku says, watching the civilians closely for their reactions. “Might be buried.”

Unlikely. The missing Akaibara vase is the biggest of the five, a decorative piece that stands at a meter tall. The way that the man looks at the others lined up on the ground makes Tensei think that he wouldn’t be so careless as to package or handle it improperly. “Four out of five recovered isn’t bad,” he muses, even if Tensei heavily suspects that Yamada is lying about the vase shattering on the journey here. “Accidents happen.”

“Permission to look anyways?”

Right. He keeps forgetting that anything he says can be taken as an order, since he’s the commanding officer on this mission. “Go ahead,” Tensei says, and they swap positions.

Jaku gives him a questioning glance when he doesn’t bother to take out a kunai. Tensei motions to get on with it. It’s not like he needs the thing, and he’d rather not use such a blatant threat of violence when there are two children present. 

Tensei sighs when the chunin is out of earshot. “Sorry about this,” he addresses who he thinks is the patriarch of the family. “I give you my word that I didn’t damage or take anything from your home.”

The elderly man glowers at him. “A ninja’s word is worth less than dirt. If you’re truly sorry, then leave.”

“When my partner is done.” He sits down on the ground, ignoring the family’s suspicious looks. “Hey, ojou-chan?” The young girl behind what must be her mother or aunt’s arms snaps to attention. “Do you think that stealing is wrong?”

She looks to the woman, who murmurs something in her ear. Hesitantly, she nods her head. Tensei offers the softest smile he can manage at the moment. “Very smart. You should listen to whoever taught you that.” He then looks to the patriarch again. “Yamada-san did steal several public works from his village. Your sheltering him technically makes you complicit, but we’re not here to enforce the law. Tell me where the last vase is, and then we’ll take the pottery and Yamada-san and be out of your hair.”

One of the younger men steps forward. He looks to be about Tensei’s age, at a guess. “There’s thirteen of us and only one of you,” he starts, but a middle-aged man puts a hand on his shoulder. “Tou-san?”

They're not wrong. The grounds are fairly large, indicating that this family holds a notable amount of wealth, so Jaku won’t be back for a while yet. Depending on how far away he’s gotten, he might not hear Tensei calling for him. Or pick up on his alarm flare, since he didn’t mention being a sensor when they were trading basic introductions. “Sou, want to see something cool?”

“No,” the father says. 

Tensei blurs through the hand signs faster than they can take a step back, and a bird-shaped mass of lightning jumps forth from his palms. It takes more concentration to keep it still than to let it zip forward. The way it pulses in place sort of makes it look like it’s flapping its wings. Tensei holds it out in front of himself, and a few members of the family flinch. Not the girl, though— she reaches out for it. Brave kid. "A kami no raichou?" she asks.

A 'lightning-bird spirit'. Not quite, but the description is apt. "Something like that," he agrees. "It will hurt your eyes if you keep looking at it, so could you please turn away, ojou-chan?"

"Can it fly?"

The lady carrying her hushes her sharply. Tensei chuckles. "Only if your Yamada-oji decides to run."

A threat for a threat. Their target stares at him with wide eyes, reflecting the bluish-white light of his technique. “Please,” he says. “I told you, I broke it, I don’t have it. ”

Tensei flicks the technique to the side, where it flies forward in a jagged line before disappearing mid-air. “Alright. But you understand that we’re still taking you back to be put on trial?”

"What are they paying you? I can offer more, if you give me time."

The words of a desperate man who doesn't even wait for an answer. "Sunagakure no Sato adheres to the contract concerning any commissions made."

“They’ll kill me. You know they’ll kill me.”

Tensei thins his lips. He does know, and if he was asked, Tensei would argue that death is too harsh of a punishment. But he wasn’t asked, so he says nothing. A job is a job, he supposes, and Suna’s vicious reputation is too well established to try and copy Konoha’s deceptive kindness. “You’ve made your own bed, Yamada-san. Don’t drag the rest of your kin into it, too.”

They never end up finding the Akaibara piece. Chori-mura grumbles about it a little, but Gousho does fork over the agreed upon amount for payment. “You’ll stay for the trial in a few days?” the village leader asks.

Tensei hums. “Time is money.”

“This afternoon, then.”

He looks to Jaku, subtly tapping a request for a second opinion on folded arms. Jaku shrugs. “Gives us time to crash for a few hours. I can do it, if you want to hash out the paperwork for the standard bonus.”

The standard bonus. Because this is a normal occurrence, and Tensei is by far not the only shinobi to have played the role of someone else’s executioner before.

He sighs. “Sure.”

Chapter Text

76年, October

It starts out as a relatively innocuous idea.

“With all due respect, Tensei-dono, the Great Dune of the East is a terrible pitstop.”

“I’ve heard of the legends.” The landmark is one that Suna-nin usually go out of their way to avoid, a supposedly giant sandstone formation where the mythical Prince Shigemura made his resting place from The Mountain Mover play. Rumor has it that any shinobi who tries to take shelter in its cave systems during a sandstorm are inevitably driven out by some kind of vengeful spirit.

Which, if that’s true, then Tensei might be able to do something. Improvise a last-rite ritual, or maybe just… kill a ghost. Hell if he knows. 

But that’s not his main concern with the Great Dune of the East. There were novels, he remembers, and a handful of filler scenes concerning the Sannin’s betrayal of the Akatsuki. Now that he knows Orochimaru is messing around with Otogakure, Tensei wants to see if there’s anything useful he can salvage from any potential labs.

The rock formation is clearly visible in the distance when Tensei slows to a halt. It’s just a brush against his senses, but there are two chakra signatures at the very edge of his range. “Hang on,” he tells his partner. “We’re not alone.”

“Hostiles?”

One of them is vaguely familiar, but they’re still too far away for him to tell. “Not sure yet. Let me check it out.” Snake-Monkey-Rat-Monkey-Bird-Monkey-Dragon-Monkey-Rat— the gold that he hasn’t had any cause to use lately comes winding out from his pouch to form an eyeball. Tensei sends it speeding off in the apt direction. It takes a few seconds, but...

Ah. Black cloaks, red clouds. There’s no way his luck is actually this bad, is it? "On your guard,” he says grimly. “Two nuke-nin. One from Iwa’s Explosion Corps and one master puppeteer.”

Jaku furrows his brow. “One of ours? We should silence him, then.” 

“We’re not going to— fuck. ” He’s kept the Third Eye as low to the ground as he could, how did—? No, of course, Tensei shouldn’t underestimate them. He just didn’t think Deidara would have his eye-scope this early on. “Nix that, they noticed my technique. Brace for incoming.”

“Prepare to engage?”

“No offense, but this fight is out of your league.” Jaku’s a taijutsu specialist, and a chunin-level one at that. This is a terrible match-up for him. “Both are mid- to long-range. Bombs and poisons. S-ranked,” Tensei says grimly. “Get those Yin Mimicries I gave you.”

Jaku stares in response. Tensei lets go of the gold rather than have it return and give away their exact location, and then drops to the sandy ground. “Know any tunneling jutsu?”

Jaku shakes his head. Tensei sighs, having suspected that already, and puts a scroll’s worth of iron to work in manually concealing a bunch of exploding tags and glass senbon beneath their feet. Times like this, Tensei really hates the desert. What he wouldn’t give for some tree cover to hide their retreat right now.

“I’m not making a run for it without you,” Jaku tells him. “Back-up would take too long to get, anyways.”

Stupid. Brave. And ultimately, correct. A round-trip from here will take a whole day on foot. “One of them can go aerial. Either you be the distraction and draw him away temporarily, or I distract both of them and you trust in my abilities to keep me whole.”

“Protocol states,” Jaku starts, but Tensei silences him with a glare. Yes, he’s aware that between the two of them, Tensei has the ‘higher’ survival priority. Ridiculous, but that’s what social constructs from military regimes result in. “And there’s no way you can, uh, outpace his aerial capabilities with both of us?”

Tensei knows what he’s capable of, and carrying two grown men on his iron platform for an extended length of time is pushing it. He suspects that he wouldn’t be able to outlast Deidara’s clay bird, and even if he could, leading them back to Suna— to Gaara— is not an option. “We wouldn’t make it very far. I suggest you start running now, Jaku-san.”

The chunin curses under his breath. “May the wind be with you, Tensei-dono.”

“And you.” For whatever that's worth.

Come on, think, what’s the game plan here? He doesn’t summon his owls; they’d simply be shot out of the sky. Tensei has the elemental advantage over Deidara, but he…

The quadrupedal puppet doesn’t look anything like the crimson-haired teen he once knew. The cousin that he should have known better than to look up to. The first person that he failed, maybe on the basis of never having really tried. Tensei doesn’t have the Mother and Father puppets on him to ply for sentimentality, and he’s not so naive as to think that the older puppeteer has spared a single thought for the remnants of a family left behind.

Oh, skies, he doesn’t want to do this. He’s not ready. But they’re close enough to hear him now, and Tensei has to buy time. 

“Sasori-nii,” he calls out. “I’ve missed you.”

Life-like eyes train themselves on him. Tensei meets them evenly, despite knowing there’s no way he can win a staring contest with glass. For someone who spent most of his tutelage as part of Chikamatsu’s school, Sasori has made his Hiruko puppet neither very humanoid, nor aesthetically pleasing to look at.

“You’ve grown up tall, I see,” Hiruko’s voice box sounds out. It’s a raspy, gravelly thing; nothing like Sasori’s lilting tenor from their last conversation so many years ago. 

So many that Tensei is three years older now than Sasori had been when the latter left the village. So many years, but all Tensei can manage is, “It’s been a while.”

“I was expecting Rasa. Interesting that gold listens to your beck and call, too.” 

“Things change.”

The puppet head turns, ever so slightly, for no discernable reason. There’s no tell-tale clicking that comes with the motion— truly, the mark of the ultimate craftsman. “You knew it was me. Suna figured it out, then?”

No, but Tensei’s not going to say that out loud. “Probably would have been less suspicious to disappear during a deployment than right after being released from the village hospital,” he offers instead, letting the false implication ring. “A ‘goodbye’ would have been nice, you know.”

“I didn’t owe you one. And I'm not going back, either, if that’s the next thing you’re about to say.”

Tensei dips his head. It’s an awkward reply for a terrible reconciliation. Tensei has neither been expecting Sasori to return, nor chasing after him with any sense of desperation to bring him back. It's not— ha. It's not a Naruto-Sasuke situation.

“Oi, oi!” Deidara cuts in. “You know this guy, Sasori-danna?”

Tensei holds back a snort. “-danna?” he echoes, because teenagers are easy to tease and the blonde is only fourteen. “No offense, but he’s a little old for you, kiddo.”

Deidara scowls at him. Fourteen and in the Akatsuki. Skies, that’s Temari’s age. “Fuck off. Who the hell are you to him, anyways?”

“The Kazekage’s brat,” his brother-cousin-once-friend says. 

“The kid you used to babysit,” Tensei feels the need to add. Maybe— well, he hasn’t exactly been living in the other’s shadow all these years, not really, and it’s not like Sasori would have any reason to think of him. “Sorry if I was boring, by the way. I have little siblings of my own now, and they weren’t much fun until they turned four or so.” 

Deidara looks between the two of them, can you believe this guy radiating from his disbelieving expression. Sasori continues to stare, despite Tensei having lost their contest twice already. He clears his throat. “Sou, were you guys here for Orochimaru? Hard to believe that he’d leave Otogakure to his minions for very long,” he hedges. 

Deidara jerks a thumb behind the duo. “Blew him to bits, hmm! You only missed the rapturous display of my art by an hour or so.”

Which confirms that they didn’t find a body amidst the collapsed rubble. “Are you sure about that? Because I sensed a really heavy chakra signature moving in our direction a while back,” Tensei tries, banking on Sasori’s assignment taking precedence over his feelings towards Suna and all that Tensei may or may not represent. “Gave him a wide berth, but in hindsight, that might have been your target.”

“Liar! My traps would have gone off if he ran!”  

“Shut up,” Sasori snaps. 

Tensei silently bemoans the loss of a very forthcoming source when the blond closes his mouth in realization. “Why now?” he presses, regardless. “I thought Orochimaru left your mercenary organization at least a year ago.” Closer to two, if he’s counting from Itachi’s defection, but Tensei is realizing that he can’t trust his sense of the timeline when it comes to filler.  

“You’re well informed.”

“Better to be, in our line of work.”

Deidara gives him a considering once over, probably wondering what the heck to do with him. “He’s mine,” Sasori says. “Go toy with the other one.”

Not on his watch. Tensei detonates one of the makeshift landmines, throwing up an iron wall to shield himself from the shrapnel. It doesn’t take long for the debris to clear, and like he predicted, Deidara has a grin on his slightly-scuffed face.

Tensei unseals a packet of his personal explosive tags and flips it face-up. “Don’t underestimate a bit of paper and ink,” he tells the teen. “Fuinjutsu’s an art, too.”

The grin grows wider. Artist to artist to artist— there’s a proper trifecta here. “Clay’s better, hmm.”

Sasori has his Hiruko puppet roll its glass eyes as it reaches into the folds of its cloak. Tensei tells himself he’s ready. Lie enough times and the brain will start believing it, so he mutters it once more under his breath as Sasori unseals his puppet. 

Tensei gives no other reaction than to summon forth a second act of iron, wrapped around his shoulders like a protective fur mantle. Tensei has known what happened to the man since the day he disappeared, after all, and the puppet doesn’t actually look that much like Suna’s late leader. Sandaime-sama might have had a preference for going bare-chested minus a black haori around the house, but he wouldn't be caught dead in those rags.

Or, uh. He is technically dead and dressed in said rags, isn't he.

Deidara takes to the skies on his giant bomb bird while Tensei keeps his eyes on the facsimile of his former leader. “Did Suna ever figure out where its beloved Sandaime went?” Sasori muses out loud. 

“My father didn't want— no one wanted to believe that he was dead for a long time.” The Sandaime was, arguably, the strongest shinobi that Sunagakure had produced in all its history. But that wasn’t why Rasa had held off donning the hat for weeks on end, not really. “Or you, either. You didn’t have to leave,” Tensei says. For his own sake of mind, he needs this out in the clear. “You were a war hero, Sasori-nii. Chiyo-baasama ran the Playhouse. Your lineage goes back to the Shodai. Whatever you did, no one could have done more than slapped you on the wrist.” 

The Hiruko puppet draws out its bladed tail. “And if I decided I would pursue my path further regardless?”

You didn’t have to, Tensei wants to say, but he doesn’t. That’s not the right answer. “That life is transient makes us human,” he tries. “You can’t cherish things the same way our hearts do if everything and everyone lasted forever.”

For the first time in his life, Tensei gets to experience the Scattered Showers technique from the other end. Even though the original requires a hand-sign to help it along, the Sandaime’s and his own are for all intents and purposes the same thing. Bullets speed towards him before being deflected by a wall of iron, and Tensei sharpens the projectiles into points before turning it all around. He notes the sheen on the puppet’s iron, a tell-tale sign of poison, and scrunches up his nose. Tensei’s going to have to wash his main supply before he gets home. Cross-contamination is no joke, and having any of that on his shoulders and neck where he usually perches his material? No, thank you. 

“You’re just blind to the beauty of eternity,” Sasori tells him. “Just like everyone else.”

“I see it in our weathered canyons and the constant stars,” Tensei refutes. “And even those don’t last forever. You think too much of yourself, Sasori-nii. Who gave you the right to play god with the remnants of the dead?” 

He has to divert his focus for a moment to bat a hail of clay spiders away. The puppet of the Sandaime takes advantage to launch itself at him with a spinning fuma-shuriken of a hand. Tensei tries jamming its joints with his iron while fending it off, but the blades retract, turning into a barrage of arms instead. That’s— wow. Law of Conservation, whomst? “How did you get that bit of fuinjutsu to work out?”

“A second opinion.”  

Was there a fuinjutsu master in the Akatsuki at one point? Tensei can’t See, and not just because he's busy with the more physical aspect of this back-and-forth. 

" Katsu! " Comes a gleeful shout from above before a hail of white sets the air ablaze. Tensei ignores the wave of heat, the source having landed much too far away to do any damage. Where the hell is Deidara aiming?  

A second wave, this time followed by a distinctly different explosion. Ah, shit, the kid is chain-detonating Tensei’s shrapnel landmines to prevent him from using them. 

The next wave is aimed straight for his head while Tensei is attempting to lasso the Sandaime puppet out of the air with his iron tendrils. Tensei bats them away again— outright shielding will only result in his iron melting into one big, unmaneuverable mess.

Either one of them alone, Tensei might be able to take, but the two together? They keep him on his toes with his attention split, constantly taking advantage of the openings that the other creates to try and land a hit on him. Tensei can keep up, but this isn’t sustainable. He doesn’t have to check the glowing meter of the Yin Mimicries underneath his vambraces to sense that they’re already running low, and it doesn’t look like he’ll get the chance to pop a soldier pill.

Time for something else, then. Tensei allows himself a bit of flair in unlatching White Bear’s scroll from his back, biting his thumb and opening it with a smear of blood in one, fluid movement. 

His creation appears in a calculated puff of smoke, jaw unhinged in a silent roar, and its flank block’s a brace of kunai from the Hiruko puppet’s mouth while Tensei attempts a return-to-sender with one of Deidara’s bigger spiders. “Took some inspiration from you after all, Sasori-nii!”

Sasori scoffs, a momentary lapse during which Tensei sends a couple blades of a wind release. Not that Tensei thinks the Hiruko shell would be so easy to cut open, but he’ll be damned if he doesn’t try— only the puppet is more maneuverable than he’d assumed. Well, quadrupedalism has its advantages. “Eight strings,” Sasori notes with scorn.

“Don’t knock it,” Tensei protests. “I beat another master using two puppets for my Trials with only White Bear!” It promptly spits a shower of poisoned senbon in the wake of a Darting Owl, which pulls up short to blind Deidara instead of the shock it looks like he was preparing to fend off— Tensei timed it perfectly with the blonde reaching into his pouches for more clay, so there would be no intercepting with a kunai. 

In the meantime, fighting Sasori’s Sandaime puppet feels a lot like fighting a cognizant Shukaku. Tensei breaks his Dune stance to manually evade the giant iron battering ram in the interest of conserving his chakra, hyper aware of potentially being corralled. 

“Rather pathetic, really. Look how it lumbers.”

Tensei scowls and slides White Bear’s shoulder panels back to launch a sheaf of explosive tags at the Sandaime. Sasori slams his bludgeon to meet them in mid-air, and Tensei steals as much as he can when the explosions scatter the black particles all around the air. There’s a quick game of tug-of-war with the deformed cloud before Tensei abruptly lets it go to lob the half-melted blobs of fallen metal at both opponents instead. 

White Bear closes its shoulders in a shudder and takes off running. Tensei maneuvers it around yet another series of spider grenades and also an earth pillar that he forgot Deidara could pull off. Gnashing steel teeth meet a bladed metal tail that seems not to be made of iron, by the way it fails to respond when Tensei yanks on it with his magnet release. It scores several deep lines into White Bear, and Tensei can physically feel the feedback of springs in White Bear’s neck being destroyed. 

Change of targets; cooling metal makes for great cannonballs. It’s just really fucking hard to aim and launch them, and keep up a steady defense against Deidara’s bombings, and wrestle with the Sandaime-puppet’s iron to keep all of that poison at bay. Residual chakra swirls around in a mess, and Tensei quite literally only has one eye to keep track of everything. Fuck, okay. Three, two, one…

The world plunges into darkness. Tensei takes advantage of the temporary confusion to pull the Sandaime-puppet out of the sky and slam it into White Bear’s hollow, jutsu-shiki lined insides. He winces at the audible snap of a piston breaking, but the ensuing crunch of the internal guillotine seems to do its job. A hasty pull sends White Bear flying back to be re-sealed into its scroll.

The sand beneath his feet shakes in time with another round of explosions, and Tensei hisses when his iron doesn’t return to him fast enough to shield against several glass shards tearing through his clothes. The vambraces and mesh under-amour stops the worst of it, but not the wide sweep of wind release that follows. “Oi, Sasori-danna! Formation C!”

What? Tensei gathers his iron up into a platform that he hops on as it passes by, bringing him high up into the air before he releases the genjutsu for another Darting Owl. The sudden return of Wind Country’s blazing sunlight should stun them for a moment—

“ Katsu! ”

Concentrated pockets of air begin combusting. Or rather, Tensei realizes, airborne particles of clay are combusting. Are there— did he breathe any in? But no, he’s not exploding— because he’s molding lightning chakra. Lightning, which trumps the earth-release based clay. Holy shit. 

Instead of sending the Darting Owl out, Tensei keeps the infused chakra within himself. He very well might be a ticking time bomb, at Deidara’s mercy as soon as he lets his guard down.

A whirring shuriken saw comes flying at him. Tensei diverts its path, only to feel something latch onto his right leg. Laced wire?

No. Chakra strings. 

Tensei scrambles to keep his footing when the strings go taunt, so thin that they’re invisible to the naked eye. They keep him in place well enough for the giant clay bird to bodily tackle him off the platform. 

He drives black filaments into Hiruko's joints before his iron catches him once more. The puppet grinds to a halt mid-jump, falling like a piece of deadweight— only its tail can fucking extend. The joints on it are too numerous for his iron to disable in any meaningful way, and Tensei knows that getting hit means a slow death by poison out here on the edges of the desert. 

So he nearly dodges right into a hail of spider-grenades.

They detonate much too close for comfort, making his ears ring despite the way he tries to envelop himself in black. Holy shit, Tensei wants to throw up. The iron wobbles. Tensei hisses as another onslaught of explosions heats the protective sphere and parts an opening to throw himself out of. Tuck and roll; the sand absorbs some of the impact of his rough landing, at least.

He knows there's an organ full of liquid in the ears that aids in mobile stability, and his probably just got fucked up because it’s harder than he’d like to admit to stand. A little easier to shape the unfused remnants of his shield into a net for Deidara to fly into, which Tensei closes by clasping his hands and then rips.

Skies, but the ringing doesn’t block out the cries of a hurting kid nearly as much as he’d like.

It’s more intuition than conscious thought that has him stumbling forwards to avoid another brace of senbon. Wood? No, that makes sense, wooden senbon are much cheaper than steel ones outside of Wind Country. 

And an ample diversion to buy the handful of seconds needed to shed the Hiruko puppet.

Tensei looks upon crimson strands and obvious ball-joints and a face that appears even younger than his own. "Sou,” Tensei sighs, “I really don't want to fight you, Sasori-nii."

A useless sentiment, too late by far. What, the red-head seethes, did you do to my ultimate creation?

At least, that’s what Tensei gets from reading his lips. The ringing has subsided into a din, and not one that he can hear the words of quiet rage through. “The Sandaime-puppet?” Tensei laughs, a hysterical note plainly present in the wavering vibrations of his throat. “I’m not giving it back.”

It only takes a few seconds to grab a soldier pill from the pack in his pouch, during which the chakra signature before him surges. One artificial hand latches onto the lid to a core, and one scarred hand reaches behind to better secure White Bear’s scroll. 

Tensei meets honey-brown eyes that he can’t tell the genuinity of, moving rubber lips still clear in his peripheral. 

I wasn’t asking.

::::::

Asuga kicks up a big, screeching fuss when he summons her to a mess of blood and a battlefield of melted-together iron and sand. At least, he thinks she does— it’s hard to tell. Most of the blood is Deidara's, though, and Tensei has Hiruko's whole entire tail as a souvenir, so who's the real winner here?

Ow. Maybe not him. He's going to need so much physical therapy for the veritable chunk carved out of his left thigh. Half-blind and half-deaf equals half-dead, he guesses.

And also, help. He needs help, and he’s not the gambling type to wholly depend on Jaku making it back. A pass of the diagnostic jutsu tells him that he's going to want an evac, even if he does manage to dredge up enough of his reserves for a healing green glow.

It was either two summons, one to run the message and one to stand guard, or just Asuga and patching himself up. Easy choice, since he’s fucking bleeding out. Tensei props himself up in a crevice of the sandstone rubble so that there's only one direction to defend from— cutting off his other avenues of escape doesn't matter if he can't take them. He only has one working eye and he needs his hearing back. The eardrums aren't ruptured, thank the skies, but that doesn’t make them any less useless at the moment.

His eye is no help in providing information on Orochimaru’s current whereabouts. For all Tensei knows, the nuke-nin is still in the area, or maybe tunneling out of the rubble. So he tamps down on his chakra signature and strips the tattered glove off his left hand for something to bite down on. No fucking wonder why a gag is such a common find in med-kits— Tensei has vastly overestimated his ability not to scream while applying pressure to the wound.

From then on, it's a fight to stay conscious. Six hours for Asuga to reach Suna, seventeen for backup to arrive if they don't pause for breaks. He's pulled all-nighters without sleep before, during a fender bender of a research binge, but that was within the safety of the village's canyon walls. 

Isn't this part of their standard anbu initiation, actually? Two days of sleep deprivation on top of a grueling interrogation session, in case they're ever found and captured by a foreign force. Maybe it’s Tensei’s turn to run the gauntlet once, too.

Fuck, it hurts. It really, really fucking hurts and there’s fucking sand messing everything the fuck up. His throat keep closing in hitching, aborted breaths half a step away from outright sobbing and keeping him from getting fucking air.

Count. Come on, you can do it. One, two, breathe. Four, five, breathe. Six, seven, you’ll be fine. He has  to be. His father is going to self-implode otherwise, and his siblings— skies, his siblings. Temari. Kankuro. Gaara. Tensei can’t afford to die here—

The List.

Oh. Oh, shit, that’s right. Enma-Dai’O literally won’t let him, right? He knows he failed, he gets it, but he can always try again. Please, please don’t let him die here.

Please.