| [Nov. 16th, 2016|09:23 pm] |
They joined him at the desk, standing shoulder to shoulder around the maps. Raidou picked up his pen again. Kakashi asked, "Revenge strike or hostage exchange?"
"Rescue mission," Raidou said, with quiet pleasure.
Genma glanced up from the map he'd been trying to read upside down. "That feels somehow karmic, given the conversation the rookies and I were having about Fukuda earlier. Are we taking a full medical team with us?"
"No, but we're working with another ANBU team that has a field medic, plus a pair of Intel agents." Raidou's mouth tilted. "And Kuroda, for mission commander."
Mission commander? Ryouma looked up to meet Kakashi's eye. Any trace of irritation had stripped away; Kakashi stood alert and focused, his grey gaze gleaming.
Two ANBU teams, two Intel agents, and ANBU's second-highest ranking officer. Something significant was happening in Kirigakure.
Raidou spun the map around and pointed to a blank spot circled in pen in the left center, where the mapmaker had sketched in only the roughest suggestion of islands in the Eastern Sea. "We're not rescuing Konoha-nin. Command brokered a deal with Fukuda. In exchange for information, including Kirigakure's location, we're breaking her sister and niece out of the village."
Ryouma stared. "So Fukuda did ask for asylum? And—Hokage-sama agreed?"
"Not exactly." Raidou's bare shoulder lifted in half a shrug. "She doesn't want to stay here any more than we want to keep her. If this succeeds, she'll get free passage to Waterfall with her family. I figure the Hokage has arranged some kind of permanent watch, but that'll be their problem."
Genma's eyes narrowed. "What's so special about her sister and niece that she's willing to turn traitor, and Konoha's willing to send this large of a force, to get them out?"
"You'd have to ask Fukuda why she values her family," Raidou said mildly. He stepped back from the table to pick up the forgotten packed lunches. "But I gather the niece is from an unapproved liaison, and she's showing early signs of a bloodline."
Bad news, in Kirigakure.
"Either way," Raidou continued, pushing a lunch tray into Kakashi's hands, "Kiri's not asking for Fukuda back, and they'll likely kill her if we return her. As for Konoha agreeing…" He handed Genma and Ryouma their bento and held up the map. "Kirigakure's location. Plus safe avenues to get in. What'll you bet Kuroda intends to pick up more than a few runaways?"
"Hell of a lot more, if we're escorting Intel agents too," Ryouma muttered. He hesitated, then peeled the plastic lid off his bento and cracked his chopsticks open. Mouth full of chicken katsu, he nudged a second map toward him. This one seemed to be a sea-chart; numbers and markings littered the wavy blue of the ocean, with reefs and rocks picked out in painstaking detail and coastlines fading into a blur of unimportant green. "Why assign Team Six to this one?"
"Fukuda requested us." |
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