Things happened. Ryuichi didn’t remember any of them. A medic had set his arm—that was what woke him up. The tension around the bones, the feel of the cast over his skin. An uncomfortable reminder that things had gone very, very wrong and people were dead. That the other Hunters hadn’t gotten home. It would hit him later. Now, it was just facts bouncing around his head.

The mission was over. He wasn’t dead.

The latter was far more surprising. He opened his eyes slowly, to confirm.

It would be really stupid to get the wrong idea and discover he was actually dead after all this.

White walls, a dirty window looking out onto Konoha, and a very sleepy, unhappy-looking Katsuko. Nope, he was still alive.

There was an IV in his good arm. Ryuichi wrenched it out, didn’t pause to watch the blood well up. He hated needles. “Damn,” he muttered. Then, louder, “how long’ve I been out?”

"Are you a masochist?" Katsuko asked incredulously, staring at the bleeding needle wound. It really hadn't been the first thing she wanted to ask when (if) her partner returned from the dead, but it'd been high up on the list. Ryuichi ripping the IV out of his arm with barely a flinch had made her get ahead of herself. "You've been out for three days, give or take. You snore, too," she added spitefully. "I couldn't sleep at all."

There was really nothing she could say that didn't sound hysterically female after that--You're alive thank the gods never do that to me again--so she just hmmphed and crossed her arms, leaning back in her chair and glaring. He looked like shit, really, but living shit. That was good, she guessed.

The door opened and a male nurse walked in. "Good to see you awake, Arai-san," he said amiably, as if Ryuichi hadn't been fighting for his life in the operating room just days before. "Your friend here was getting worried. She's been here for three days straight. We needed to force her to eat."

Katsuko looked pleadingly at the nurse--Tamaharu something or other. "Can you tell idiot-face here--" she was exhausted, she wasn't in the mood to be especially creative with her insults, "--how incredibly stupid it was for him to push himself during our mission? I was going to, but now I'm too tired."

“Agent Arai, you’re stupid,” the medic said cheerfully. “So nice to see you here again. What’s it been, a week?”

“Two,” Ryuichi grunted.

Three fucking days. That was…unexpected. If he said disconcerting, that implied things Ryuichi wasn’t willing to face just then, so it wasn’t said. It wasn’t even thought. Some ninja were good at denial. Others were just good at lying. Ryuichi sucked at both, yet somehow, it all evened out. He was still alive.

By the way Katsuko was staring at him, that hadn’t been a certain thing. Ryuichi stared back at her. The last thing he remembered was falling down from the high. Wondering if the mission was a failure.

“It’s debatable,” he said finally, in reference to the are you a masochist? question. It was a common one. “You didn’t need to stay.”

The fact that Ryuichi would have done the same thing was beyond the point.

What he really wanted to know was if Katsuko had told HQ exactly what he’d almost died of. ANBU was lenient when it came to drugs, just so long as you were discreet. This wasn’t even close to discreet.

Ryuichi couldn’t lose his mask now. ANBU was his life.

"Well!" Tamaharu the male nurse interjected cheerfully, "It's good to see you're back to your old self again, Agent Arai. Another day or so of rest and you'll be good to go!"

Katsuko sat back in her chair and glowered at Ryuichi as Tamaharu bustled around the bed, taking readings and marking down things on charts. She stayed silent until the nurse had wheeled the cart out and shut the door behind him.

"Ryuichi," she said at last, after Tamaharu's footsteps had faded into the distance, "What was in those pills?" Her voice was raspy; her body ached from the strain she'd put it through during the mission. The bruises that she'd been ignoring while waiting for Ryuichi to wake up flared to life, throbbing in an ugly rhythm.

Ryuichi didn’t say anything for a while. The question wasn’t unexpected. He supposed Katsuko had a right to know. It was likely she wouldn’t understand, but that was the problem with questions. Sometimes the truth didn’t make sense.

“Speed, mostly,” he said quietly. “And something else. I don’t know the name.”

He didn't need to know. It did what sensei promised it would. That was enough.

Amphetamines. Amphetamines and "something else."

Katsuko ground her teeth together. Drug use in ANBU wasn't uncommon--you could get away with it as long as it didn't interfere with your mission capabilities. She wasn't sure how overdosing on homemade drugs in order to complete the mission went in the scope of things.

"Where did you get--" she cut herself off abruptly, started again, "How long have you been using them? Those pills? Have you overdosed before?"

Frustration vaulted her out of her chair and sent her pacing around the room, running her hands through her tangled hair. "Gods, Ryuichi, you know what shit like that does to your system. I just--"

“Since I was thirteen,” he said bluntly. “I know the risk.”

Probably better than Katsuko did. Ryuichi had seen his sensei, had seen what alcohol and bad missions had done to her. The person it turned her into, who was very different from the woman who had taught him how to fight. It hurt, sometimes, but she always came back down. Of course drugs caused damage, but it faded. Kaede-sensei always came back.

Ise came back, too. No matter how much heroin she shot into her veins, Kurosuki Ise came back down from it. It helped that she never got as far away as sensei. The damage was always justified. The missions were completed. Team Twelve came back home. They survived.

Only one of them had stayed clean. Hoshi had played by the books, a straight-laced ninja. He’d been strong, but it hadn’t saved him from the enemy’s genjutsu or Ryuichi’s kunai.

And then she asked if he’d overdosed before. He looked at the wall instead of Katsuko. “Does it really matter?”

The answer was yes. Yes, he'd overdosed before. Yes, he'd come close to dying before.

Yes, it had turned out alright.

Every time, the action was justified by the ends. The mission was completed.

Thirteen. He'd been using Speed on missions since he was thirteen.

Katsuko couldn't understand anyone who voluntarily put drugs into their systems, not after what happened to her in the labs. To willingly put chemicals into your body, to alter your system and put yourself at the mercy of the high--

It was absolutely baffling. She'd led a team of chuunin on a heavy combat mission, once, in that short space of time between her jounin exam and her enlistment in ANBU. Two boys and a little Nara girl. Heavy users, all three of them, soldier pills and meth and...


She'd asked the Nara girl, once, during the long empty hours before the actual fighting began, why in the world someone would willingly do that to themselves. The Nara girl had laughed before she'd realized Katsuko had was serious.

"Well, I dunno, Captain", she'd drawled awkwardly, looking at Katsuko in puzzled condescenscion. "It's partly because the high gives us the extra edge, y'know, adrenaline n' all that. But...it takes away the fear, too. Suddenly, you're not scared of dying. Y'just need to move. Death isn't important."

An hour later the Nara girl was dead, her torso blown clean away when she threw herself in between her teammates and an explosion note.

Katsuko sighed and massaged her temples, throwing herself back into the chair. "Godsdamnit, Ryuichi. i was worried about you."

Things used to be simple. She glared at him. "I'm not your caretaker or the damned military police. The Speed will work for you until the day it doesn't, and you die of an overdose. Dammit, it's like watching a house on fire and not being able to do anything about it. I mean--Fuck."

Ranting about a morally ambiguous issue on less than five hours of sleep grated on her nerves. Her patience was literally wearing thin, a tight painful knot in her chest that made it hard to breathe.

She didn’t get it. Maybe it wasn’t so surprising. Katsuko had told him that her chakra was fucked up. That hadn’t happened naturally. Avoiding drugs would make sense from her point of view. She had monster chakra, after all. She didn’t need an edge for taking on missing-nin with Bloodline Limit.

The first time he’d used Speed was a blurry memory filled with adrenaline and fire. Hoshi’s genjutsu fizzing out as he ran out of chakra and Kaede-sensei’s howl as the katon found her hands, ruining her ninjutsu for a long time, nine months instead of five minutes because they had all survived long enough to find a medic. At the time it hadn’t been certain.

Her voice rough with pain and hatred for the enemy that made her feel it: “take these,” and she’d given him two clear pills and that order again when he didn’t move.

It wasn’t addiction if it worked, and it did work. Every damn time. This mission. The last mission. The one before that. All justified.

“It was justified,” Ryuichi snapped, when he could get a word in edgewise. Katsuko ranted when she was angry. He didn’t respect her perspective as much as he probably should have. “And it wouldn’t really matter if I died. We got the mission done, didn’t we?”

After all, only one agent needed to survive. In a pinch, ANBU could deal with no survivors at all, just so long as the mission was completed. Katsuko was the captain, and a good one besides. ANBU would miss her if she died.

ANBU wouldn’t miss him. Ryuichi knew he had no special talents, no jutsu, no Bloodline Limit. Nothing but his skill with weapons, and this mission had proven that that wasn’t enough. Not even close.

Speed gave him that missing edge. He needed it.

"And it wouldn't really matter if I died."

Something snapped, deep inside, and Katsuko made a low ugly sound. "Doesn't matter? You stupid fucker, it might not matter to you--"

Her chair crashed to the ground. One step towards Ryuichi, another step, raw fury threatening to overwhelm her.

She punched him in the face, putting all the force of her momentum and anger into it.

There was a warning. It the field, it would’ve been more than enough. Not here, though. Not right now. Katsuko lunged and her blow landed solidly—Ryuichi’s head snapped away from the pressure. It took a moment for pain to happen, but once it did, it informed him that it intended to stay for a while.

He worked his jaw around the pain once he could see straight. Touched it gingerly with his hand—Katsuko was seething, and Ryuichi looked at her for a moment, took in her wide eyes and the way her pulse was jumping against her skin.

Then he laughed, low and guttered at the back of his throat.

In the bunker, she’d asked if he was broken. If he was crazy. Ryuichi hadn’t bothered to answer then. There had been a mission to complete, missing-nin who needed to die. It was different now. They could talk and no one would die. The damage was the kind a ninja could recover from. Maybe not a civilian, but neither of them had been civilians for a very long time.

“That’s right,” Ryuichi said, leaning forward until their faces were almost touching, when he could see every detail of her brown eyes, the way they were lighter around the edges and very dark near the irises. “I don’t care.”

She could hit him until he stopped breathing, and it wouldn't make a goddamn difference.

"You stupid motherfucking son of a whore," Katsuko seethed, "I fucking care." She grabbed his shoulders and slammed him against the headboard. "I should have left you there with the Morishitas, if you're that eager to die."

Her heart was pounding in her ears. She bared her teeth. Useless. It was useless trying to talk to him about it. The pighead was set on needing the drugs, would use the drugs whenever necessary, would overdose again if that was what it took to complete the mission.

"I care," Katsuko snarled, "about whether you live or die, you selfish bastard, even if you won't."

Ryuichi stared at her stubbornly, blue eyes narrowed. They were at an impasse.

As abruptly as her anger had flared to life it guttered out, leaving her exhausted in its wake. Relinquishing her grip on his collar, Katsuko stepped back and looked at him helplessly.

"Fine." Her voice was flat. "I have no say in the matter. I'm sorry to bother you." She drew out the bottle of pills from her jacket pocket and set it down on the bedside table with a firm clack. Turning around sharply, she strode toward the door and didn't look back.

She paused with one hand on the doorknob. "I didn't mention about whether the drugs were legal or not in report," she said, grudgingly. "My room in HQ is three fifteen, if you ever need help."

The door shut on Ryuichi's response, if there was any.

“I don’t—” Ryuichi started, but the door slammed down hard on his response, and there wasn’t any use in finishing the statement. I don’t want to die. There was a difference between being suicidal and being apathetic. A very big difference. Arai Saiyuri had been suicidal. She was dead and buried a hero. Ryuichi was apathetic about the subject. He was still alive and labeled as crazy by just about everyone who knew him.

That said too many things about shinobi right there.

He leaned back, felt the ache of broken bones dulled by morphine and whatever else medics were using for painkillers these days. Not nearly as strong as what Kaede-sensei had given him. If he was better, he wouldn’t need them, but not every shinobi was a genius. ANBU was like slow suicide in a way, or at least it was for chuunin. The jounin survived. Chuunin? Not so much. Ryuichi supposed he’d reached the expected time, and no one in HQ would have been bothered to find Katsuko the only survivor of their last mission.

Chuunin were expendable. Jounin weren’t.

Katsuko didn’t get it. Ryuichi couldn’t fault her for it, not really. Nothing wrong with trying to stay sane. It wasn’t a losing battle for everyone.

When it all came down, they weren’t friends. If he had died, Katsuko would have gotten over it, just like Ise would have. That took strength, and dedication to a cause Ryuichi didn’t have. If Ise died, Ryuichi wouldn’t have recovered. A mission would have killed him. It wasn’t suicide if it happened like that.

Despite everything, he wasn’t like his sister.

If Katsuko had died, then the mission would have been a failure. Ryuichi would have followed her trying to complete it, trying to do something a chuunin couldn’t.

That was what shinobi did. They kept fighting until they broke. Sometimes death made them heroes. Sometimes it labeled them the enemy. Circumstances were hard to control when you were reduced to something so small as a name on a rock.

Ryuichi had always been a shinobi. Not a genius like his sister or a truly powerful one like Katsuko, but a shinobi nonetheless. He intended to die as one.

Continued two hours later.