Asuma made a face that implied he knew those words were accurate but didn’t like them anyway. “If I was a disciplinary problem I’d be a walking bruise.” No matter how much he enjoyed pranking and sassing, Hyuuga-taichou would have been putting him in his place far more often if he was crossing the invisible line of insubordination. Depressing, but true. He was losing his touch.

He sighed a cloud of smoke through his nose, and attempted to sneak a strawberry without Kayan noticing. She grabbed his hand by one finger and gave him a dirty side-eye. “I like ANBU,” he said to the loris, although his words were really aimed toward Genma. “Even the boring bits. Does that make me crazy?”

“Hell no,” Genma replied. “Well, no crazier than me, anyway, and they declared me fully sane at my last fitness eval.” He rolled a few wasabi peas out of their bowl and offered them to Kayan; after a moment of inspection she carefully selected a strawberry for him and accepted the trade. All without letting go of Asuma’s pinky. Traitor. “So it’s not like you’d be on an extended ANBU mission, then? Would you still report in to the Hokage at all?”

“Not a mission, no. Most likely I’d have my ANBU service temporarily suspended. It’d be like a reassignment with a new boss, mostly. Only super important stuff would need to be reported to the Hokage — everything else is managed in-house.” He managed to wiggle out of Kayan’s surprisingly strong grip, and attempted to offer some peas, too. The strawberry she gave him in response was significantly more squashed than the one she gave Genma. “Really, Kayan? Really?”

“Rude,” she scolded in response. He pouted; she ignored him and crunched on one of Genma’s peas. Ladies and gentleman, their relationship in a nutshell.

Genma just grinned and ate his strawberry, clearly pleased with his higher ranking in the loris’ mind. “Managed in-house by who? They’re all shinobi, right? So presumably they all came from Konoha.”

“So far as I know.” Asuma doubted the Daimyo would have ninja from another country - the Hokage would be up in arms over that. “From what I understand the Daimyo has his own police force on top of the Twelve on top of whatever security the capital has. Which makes sense. Even with the Hokage’s speed, it’d be hard for Konoha to react as quickly as anyone local.”

His teammate nodded thoughtfully and took a moment to finish his beer. Kayan attempted to close the strawberry container, gave up due to how mangled the packaging was, and began to groom herself. She’d eaten easily half. Asuma expected she’d be in a fructose coma for the rest of the night.

“Other than ‘Yondaime-sama asked me to’,” Genma finally said, leveling a long and steady look at him, “what are the reasons for accepting the post?”

Asuma took the time to eat his strawberry of reproach and give the question the thought it deserved. “Prestige,” he offered eventually. “Maybe broaden my skills, learn new jutsu. Travel without having to be incognito. Pay increase. Finally ending up in someone else’s bingo book.” He nodded to himself as he re-considered the last point. “That’s a good one.”

“As if you aren’t already,” Genma replied with a grin. “But yeah, that’d guarantee you a place on enemy bounty lists for sure. Wonder what the going rate is in Mist these days.”

“Not nearly high enough if no one’s come for my head yet.” Asuma finished his cigarette and smudged it out with a grand flourish, or at least as grand a flourish as one could get in that tiny apartment. “I’m worth at least a hundred thousand ryou. I mean, have you looked at this ass lately? This does not come cheap. And no way whatever get-up the Daimyo puts his Guardians in would flatter me as well as the ANBU gear. There’s a con: probable lack of fashion.”