| [Jul. 12th, 2016|10:25 pm] |
“And Tousaki, you should have seen him,” Genma continued. “He didn’t just step it up, he went for broke. Hatake worked with him on flash cards I don’t even know how many hours. And Hatake’s still recovering, so Tousaki must have put in at least as many more hours by himself. He came back ready to prove to Kuroda he could hack it as a medic, read off a bunch of complex medical terms — way more than I’d told him he needed to memorize to start. And that still wasn’t enough. Kuroda tosses him this identical pair of vials, says one’s a medicine, one’s a poison, pick one to give a teammate. The labels are illegible. I couldn’t have read them, either. Plus Tousaki hasn’t even started learning about pharmacology. I objected, Kuroda told me to shut up, and put Tousaki back on the spot, with Ueno as the patient.”
He stared past Raidou, remembering the moment. “So I did something that was probably dumb, definitely insubordinate, but I didn’t care. I told Kuroda to stuff it, I stood by my recommendation that Tousaki study field medicine, and I wasn’t going to sit there and let Kuroda bully him with impossible tasks.” He slugged back another cup of the sake without tasting it at all. “Weird thing is, Kuroda did back off then. He gave me a week’s worth of scut to do in a day, which wasn’t that bad. But he also assigned Ueno to work in T&I. I know her history’s classified, but I’ve seen those scars and read the report on how her chakra got scrambled. It was… I could have killed him right then. I really could.”
He fell quiet at last, spent but still ice cold with fury. “Considering all of that, it’s probably a good thing she got reassigned. Maybe that’s even part of it. Maybe Sagara-sama or even Yondaime-sama intervened before he pushed her so far she could detonate.”
Raidou didn’t say anything for a moment. Genma could hear his own breath in his ears, feel the heat in his cheeks. Maybe he’d gone too far, let the alcohol loosen him a little too much.
Then Raidou broke the silence and put Genma’s doubts to rest. “Sagara's the one who assigned him in the first place, though.” He rolled onto his side, propped up on one elbow in a perfect mirror of Genma. “You said Hatake and Tousaki studied together. What else has the team been doing since Kuroda took over?”
Genma let a relieved breath out through pursed lips. “Not much, actually. It hasn’t really been all that long. I gave Tousaki a bunch of medical charts. We’ve all done some training, very low key given everyone’s injuries. Except Ueno and Hatake; both of them ignored medical advice, as usual. Ueno started teaching Hatake her sword style, but I gather they only got a couple of lessons in. That morning when Kuroda really skewered us — shit, that was yesterday. How is that even possible? — Yesterday morning, Ueno and Hatake showed up for roll call with mud on their clothes and leaves in their hair, and swore up and down they hadn’t been sparring that hard. Ueno told us all about how Hatake had been fighting unfairly.”
Raidou barked a short laugh, startling the kitten. Handsome Bastard’s ears flicked, but he showed no inclination to move. “I'll bet he wasn't the only one,” Raidou said. He rolled onto his back, lifting Suki into the air and settling her on his chest. She immediately started biting at the strap of Raidou’s navy tank-top, while he rumpled her ears and raked his fingers through her white fur. “So here's what I'm hearing: since I've been out, our catastrophe of rookies have actually figured out their shit enough to train together, teach each other, and present a united front. And none of them have tried to stab Kuroda in the neck.”
“When you put it like that, it sounds a lot better than how I told it,” Genma admitted. “Although I don’t know how much longer Kuroda’s neck is going to be safe. I don’t think any of us are stupid enough to cross that line, but that man is probably a demon from one of the five-hundred hells just passing time here before he goes back to tormenting the damned.” He thought about it for a moment. “Unless this is one of the hells. But I’m pretty sure if it were there would be a lot more Kurodas around.” |
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