| Bringing Back the Living [Genma] |
[Jan. 14th, 2010|03:23 am] |
Backdated. Takes place in early March, one year and five months after Kyuubi's attack. One and a half weeks before Got That Mountain to Climb
The orders were clear and unambiguous; it was a retrieval mission--three ANBU were missing on a mission in Earth Country: presumed captured, feared dead. Shiomori Hiroko, ANBU Hunter, volunteered for the retrieval squad because she'd known the the agents who were missing: Kamiyama Kobo, Hoashi Seijuro, and Shiranui Genma. She knew Kobo best, a quiet, competent leader with nearly three years' service in ANBU and uncanny skills with explosives. She and Kobo had entered ANBU in the same rookie group, and had trained together, sparred together, taken missions together. Slept together. He was her friend as well as her lover, and reason enough, all by himself, for Hiroko to have volunteered.
The other two she knew less well. Hoashi Seijuro was a rookie she'd barely interacted with. But Kobo had said good things about the kid--had hand-picked him for the mission. He was young and inexperienced, but the ANBU they served in was full of the young and inexperienced. Just sixteen months ago the Fox had claimed far too many of the few seasoned veterans that the Third War had spared. For ninja like Seijuro, the four months' experience he'd gained since joining ANBU was enough. It had to be.
( Then there was Shiranui Genma ) |
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| Find Me Faithless [Kakashi & Rina] |
[Jan. 5th, 2010|11:46 pm] |
Takes place five years previously, four days after the Kyuubi attack.
Kakashi was late for Minato's funeral.
It was a village-wide affair, held at the smoke-charred base of the Hokages' monument, attended by anyone with the strength to stand. Or lean on a friend's shoulder. Or maneuver one of the wheelchairs that was suddenly a precious commodity. Several hundred shionobi, ordered by clan and rank and allegiance, clad in sober black and hitai-ate steel. More civillians, clustered into tight-knit family groups and marked by tears they felt free to shed. Masked ANBU, fringed around the edges and stiff with battle-weariness that still lingered. Dignitaries paying their respects from other villages still under treaty. Fire Country Daimyos.
The Sandaime. Jiraiya.
And Kakashi, slipping through the massed ranks like a pale wraith to stand between them, ignoring the ripple of sound that followed him. Mid-sentence, the Sandaime paused and laid a hand on his shoulder. Jiraiya slanted him a sideways look.
"Obito sends his regards, I'm guessing," he said, voice scraped deep and flat.
Tight-jawed, Kakashi jerked his shoulder. The Sandaime's hand fell away. Calm and dignified and utterly weary, the newly reinstated Hogake returned to his eulogy speech, delivering it with the measured skill of a man who'd recently had cause to practice.
( One week after the Kyuubi attack, Kakashi had lost count of funerals. ) |
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| Chasing the Sun [Genma & Raidou] |
[Jan. 5th, 2010|02:31 pm] |
WARNING: NC-17 for graphic sexual content.
Takes place in the afternoon on April 8th, immediately following Warm in the Shadows
There were two clear signs someone had been in their apartments: their beds were made with fresh sheets, and their ANBU uniforms, gear, weaponry, and masks were folded and stacked neatly at the foot of each bed. Genma couldn't speak for Raidou, but he certainly hadn't put any time into making military corners on his quilts when they'd been summoned in the wee hours two and a half weeks ago for the mission to track Yukaho and her team.
A third, less obvious, but rather gratifying sign, was that the leftover takeout containers, softened carrots, dried up half onion, and half-empty carton of spoiled milk Genma had anticipated finding in his refrigerator were not there. In fact it appeared the little cold box had been cleaned, with the assorted jars and bottles of longer keeping items (pickled ginger, mustard, miso paste, beer) carefully packed back in.
Genma gave everything a careful inspection: the piles of magazines and a half-worked sudoku he'd left on his table were still there. His shrine was undisturbed; even its oranges were still there, starting to shrivel and harden. Spare weapons, sharpening kits, clothes, books--it was all exactly as he'd left it. But the kitchen had been cleaned, the bathroom tidied and scrubbed, and there was the bed...
He plugged in his electric water heater and went to find Raidou, who was giving his own already insanely clean apartment a thorough going over. "Gotta be a D-rank, cleaning two small apartments and making the beds. But they'd only let someone with ANBU-level clearance in here. What unlucky bastards you think got that detail?" He leaned against Raidou's door frame. It felt almost surreal to be looking at him, to be back here, home. Like those two and a half weeks hadn't happened at all.
If you overlooked the bandages.
"I didn't find any bugs or traps in mine. And I started the water for the ramen. Coming?" |
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| Warm in the Shadows [Genma & Raidou] |
[Jan. 3rd, 2010|07:45 pm] |
Takes place in the early afternoon on April 8th, three days after The Shadow Proves the Sunshine
The very last thing Genma and Raidou had to do, before they could go home, was sign out with security. They were dressed in real clothes, which someone from internal ops had helpfully retrieved for them from their apartments. Genma was in jeans and a t-shirt, with an olive green hoodie over it, the left sleeve sacrificially split to accommodate the splint still holding his hand together. His arm was in a sling, held carefully close to his chest by straps of canvas, and there were still fading bruises, scabbing over cuts on his neck, and a pallor to his skin, but he was up, on his own feet. Eager to run (well, limp) free at last.
Raidou was champing at the bit to go, too. Their handlers had managed to get him similar clothes to Genma's: soft, faded jeans, a dark red t-shirt, and a brown hoodie that didn't quite hide the bandages still encasing the left side of his face and neck. If you overlooked their injuries, they were dressed for an afternoon of hanging out on any off-duty day.
"You understand your aftercare instructions?" The woman at the desk asked.
"Yeah," Genma told her. "Follow up in the outpatient clinic at 1100 tomorrow for me and 1120 for Rai, take our meds, watch for any signs of fever or infection, no workouts until we're signed off on that, no sparring, no jutsu, don't leave the village, take it easy, eat properly, get enough sleep, and don't take candy from strangers." His deadpan delivery ended with a wink.
She blinked at him, then laughed. "I see. Well then, Shiranui-san, Namiashi-san..." She pushed the sign-out sheet towards them. "I hope I don't see you back here any time soon."
Genma grinned as he took the pen from her. Signing was harder, as the paper wanted to scoot away from him, but Raidou slapped a hand down to steady it, then took the pen from Genma and signed himself out as well. |
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| Let's Not Speak of It Again [Ryouma, Katsuko] |
[Dec. 26th, 2009|11:39 am] |
[[Takes place early in the morning of April 8, the day after Something That the Knife Took and two days after Lay Your Armor Down. Titles inspired by Dashboard Confessional's song Don't Wait.]]
By the fifth mile, the shallow cut on Ryouma's hip had clotted and he was beginning to find his stride. At the fifteenth, when they paused for a breather and for Ryouma to burn his reeking gloves and scrub his crusted hands, two of Katsuko's clones peeled off to backtrack. They caught up again half an hour later, running with easy satisfaction. One of the sharp-faced masks was sprinkled with blood. Ryouma thought about asking, and decided to focus on running instead.
At least they knew the territory. When Katsuko swung in a wide west-ward circle to avoid Ashirogi Swamp, Ryouma followed her without question. When her next clone peeled off, it returned quickly with a canteen refilled from a stream running cold with snow-melt. And when, near midnight, Ryouma veered south-east again into the low forested foothills near the border of Plains and Fire Country, he found the ancient ryokan still standing among its sheltering pine-trees.
The frail, white-haired old landlady was still there, too--a little deafer, and more than a little rumpled from the bed they'd rousted her out of, but still as bright-eyed and energetic as she'd been when Ryouma had first stayed here on his way to the border five years ago. She was also obviously dying of curiosity, but any innkeeper who made half her living from ninja clientele was a past master at the art of discretion. There were no other guests at the moment, she informed them as she entered a neat spiral-leaf sigil in the register. The baths were open-air, but heated by hot-springs; they would be quite safe, too, because years of ninja guests had left the perimeter so heavily trapped that not even squirrels could cross from the forest into the ryokan grounds. (The landlady's kitchen garden fared quite well in the absence of four-legged brigands.) She would stir up the maids and have supper waiting when they finished in the baths. "And a medical kit," she added, with an unsuccessful attempt not to stare at Ryouma's shoulder and Katsuko's broken armor. "Is there anything else you require, shinobi-san?"
( 'Privacy,' Ryouma said, slinging his good arm over Katsuko's shoulders. ) |
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| Something That The Knife Took [Ryouma, Katsuko] |
[Dec. 15th, 2009|09:59 pm] |
[[Takes place April 7, the day after Lay Your Armor Down.]]
Dawn came, bright and cold.
Katsuko rolled out of her blankets and looked at Ryouma's sleeping form for a moment, then slipped outside. She flinched at the sharp morning air, coughed as it raked a freezing trail down her sinuses. The sky was stained red and gold, the rising sun hidden by a veil of wispy clouds.
Last night's conversation--the soul-baring honesty of it--scared her more than even the nightmares that followed. At least the horror of her subconscious memories was familiar. It was an old terror that she'd grown used to, if not comfortable with. Ryouma's embrace, his openness in displaying his scars, her reaction--it was all new. It was all frightening. He hadn't flinched away, hadn't changed the subject as her family did. There'd just been the silent listening, understanding, sympathy.
Confusing, how a near-stranger could offer her the comfort that her own blood relations couldn't.
The sleepy curl of chakra and a slight rustle in the tent told her Ryouma was up. Katsuko stood by the dead campfire and didn't turn around as the tent flap unzipped a minute later. The weight of his dark-eyed gaze settled on her back.
"I'm going to wash up." Her tone was matter-of-fact, brusque. She refused to glance behind her. "I'll be ready to go in ten."
She strode off toward the stream. Behind her, Ryouma lifted a hand, then dropped it. He watched her for a moment more, but said nothing. At last, he turned and went to get changed.
A few hours later, Katsuko and Ryouma were well on their way to setting the record for "Most Voluntarily Silent Mission, Ever." Masahiko's fortress was easy enough to locate, garish perversion of military architecture on the landscape as it was, and the former cloud-nin had even been considerate enough to forbid any sort of town or civilization to spring up around his walls. The number of civilian casualties would be drastically reduced, a fact that cheered Katsuko to no end. She could kill and burn to her heart's content.
They stood amidst a grove of trees on a hill directly overlooking Masahiko's fortress. The faint sound of weapons drills drifted up to them from the compound's courtyards. Miniature black dots moved with mindless (mindless-looking, down there it probably made more sense what they were doing than it looked from up here) efficiency on the fort's walls and ramps.
Katsuko stirred restlessly, turning to Ryouma. "We got a plan? Or we just going to go in there and start killing? I'm good, either way." |
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| Lay Your Armor Down [Ryouma, Katsuko] |
[Nov. 21st, 2009|10:53 am] |
Takes place April 6, the morning after All My Regrets Are Nothing New, a week after Katsuko and Ryuichi's mission in Knife's Edge and No Rest for the Wicked.
Ryouma stopped by the mission office just before breakfast, right after his morning workout and the mission desk shift change. The gangly young chuunin who manned the desk for the morning shift was new--he'd just come in a few weeks ago, after an injured knee took him off active duty for the next month or two--and unlikely to ask questions. In fact he seemed much more interested in the sudoku puzzle in his newspaper than in the reasons Ryouma had spent a week on Personal Leave and now wanted the first mission that would take him out of Konoha. "Things're always slow at the beginning of the week," he said, poking through the open-assignment missions stacked on his desk. "There's a B-rank surveillance out in Mangrove Country, but--"
"I need somethin' with less time to think," Ryouma said. "Team'd be good." Dammit, where were Arata and Hiroyuki when he needed them? "There's not anything up by the Lightning Country border, is there? Near the post that replaced the Dainichi Nyorai Temple Base?"
"Operations there are extremely limited right now," the chuunin said firmly. "But... Hold on a sec." He swiveled his chair around to paw through another basket of sealed scrolls. "You said your name was Tousaki, right? Then you're just in time. Another two days and they'd probably have pulled you off Personal Leave for this one, or assigned someone else. Reiko-san must've been keeping this one back for you. You're good with straightforward assassinations, aren't you?"
( 'My specialty,' Ryouma said. 'Who's coming along for the ride?' ) |
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| The Devil's Got My Secret (Tsume/Ryouma) |
[Nov. 12th, 2009|11:22 am] |
Backdated. Takes place March 31, the day after All We Know Is Distance, the day before Tsume leaves on her mission with Asuma inFire and Water, and five days before Kakashi wakes up in Welcome to My Morning.
"Ryouma," Kuromaru said, pausing in the apartment doorway, "is still not in his room."
Tsume slid the whetstone along her kunai, glancing over at her familiar. He looked highly disapproving. Her lips twitched. "Well, Kuromaru, if you're going to let him be the alpha, he can go wherever he wants."
"I know." Kuromaru walked inside, stiff-legged and unhappy. "He's probably with Kakashi still."
Tsume felt that golden eye narrow at her, and tried not to react.
"You know they're mounting each other."
Tsume snorted a laugh. "Pup, Kakashi's in a coma." If Ryouma's clone hadn't found them the night before to let them know where Ryouma was and why -- with instructions that they could visit if they brought food -- rumor would have still told her about Kakashi. ANBU were almost as good at fighting as they were at gossip.
"Well." Kuromaru flopped down. "We should go check on him."
She almost said they didn't need to hover -- which was true -- but... it was nice to see a friendly face, even if you were just sitting with a hospitalized friend, rather than hospitalized yourself. It wasn't like Ryouma had other family to visit -- or Kakashi either, though she wasn't sure if Kakashi would even appreciate guests. And Ryouma probably was bored.
Tsume stood, opening the chest she'd planted at the foot of her bed. Her armor was still heaped in a corner, but now her clothes and various bits and pieces were at least dumped into the chest, instead of strewn across the floor. She dug around until she found a deck of cards, then slipped them into the pocket of her cargos. ( They could stop by and get okonomiyaki, too, which would probably make Ryouma happier than any friendly face. ) |
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| Feuds and Families [Asuma, Tsume, the Sandaime] |
[Nov. 3rd, 2009|05:21 pm] |
Set two days after Kunoichi and Bastards.
As he walked down one of the many twisting corridors of ANBU's hospital wards, Sarutobi Hizuren re-read the battered scroll in his hand and contemplated the new shape of the universe. As ANBU missives went, the scroll wasn't even slightly succinct. Or typical.
dear konoha, it read,
we've landed in inabe. (staying at the Salted Goose Hotel--and no, we didn't ask about the name) we need an extration team for two ninja, chakra depleted but only slightly injured, (SLIGHTLY?) and a lot of money. you wouldnt believe how much food asuma goes through, even though hes not eating meat. he says its okay because its on
(hey! she eats at LEAST as much as I do. More considering she's half a foot tall.)
we have your tickbit thing you wanted and i expect you to explain to hariuchi why i was on a mission before being released. hopefully before i get back.
tell kuromaru i'm fine.
(and tell that pretty desk chuunin I'm bringing her back something sparkly)
your faverite agents,
Inuzuka Tsume and
(P.S. Checked in under the names Yamaguchi Tsubame and Yamaguchi Arata. Staying in room 312. Bring lots of painkillers. GOOD painkillers.)
Lips twisting dryly, he read one of the scrawling additions again. It was strange how little the handwriting had changed, despite five years and a continent's worth of distance. He could remember reading identical scrawls on assignments carried home from the academy--and on walls, in lengthy, misspelled graffiti that gained height as the artist had grown.
He remembered several (dozen) shouting matches on the subject of defacing one's own village.
Of course, being the Hokage, he remembered many things. Including the last sight of a gawky, ill-tempered, impatient teenager storming out of the village to get some damn freedom, dad! And the man he'd become, strolling back.
And joining ANBU.
The Sandaime reached the right door, inclined his head to one of the nurses hurrying by, and let himself in. The scroll vanished into one of his wide robe-pockets, whisked neatly out of sight; he didn't need it anyway, it was already two days old. And the 'faverite agents' it concerned were neatly installed in clean, comfortable--
Completely abandoned hospital beds.
The Sandaime raised his eyebrows at the little party of humans--and one large, ragged Inuzuka familiar--splayed about on the floor, arguing over cards.
"Is this a bad moment?" he inquired. |
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| All My Regrets Are Nothing New. [Kakashi & Ryouma] |
[Oct. 30th, 2009|10:39 pm] |
Takes place seven hours after Welcome to My Morning, and begins two hours before The Little Things Give You Away
This time, when Kakashi woke up, it was with the little mental click of reality slotting back into place. He knew where he was, and why he was there. He knew that Ginta was across the hall, Tsuyako was in the ground, and Ryouma--
Was fast asleep in a chair.
Stiffly, Kakashi raised himself up on one elbow and glanced around the room. The clock said he'd been asleep for at least seven hours, but nothing much had changed. There were more food wrappers in a crumpled heap around the rubbish bin (Ryouma must have eaten), a stack of Intel forms on the rickety bedside table, and a pile of neatly folded black clothes at the foot of the bed: Kakashi's clothes, with a mask on top.
So Ryouma had paid attention to his free pass into Kakashi's room.
Kakashi raked a hand through oily grey hair, pulling it out of his eyes, and decided he was okay with that. Well, mostly okay with that. Ryouma wouldn't be curious enough to mess with his scrolls, at least; not if he couldn't read them.
Welded metal bed-struts creaked quietly as he shoved himself back against the pillows and looked at the man. Ryouma had curled himself up into the ugly vinyl chair, long legs folded beneath him, arms crossed loosely over his chest, head resting against a stolen hospital pillow. Definitely there, not easy to miss, but taking up as little space as possible. Which was not surprising, given that he'd probably had to negotiate for his right to be there all week.
The red Atomic Sunrise hoodie was draped across his stomach and wedged beneath one arm, a makeshift blanket. He breathed soft and slow, eyes not even flickering beneath their lids; too tired to dream, probably, if the fresh hollows in his face were any indicator.
( Good. That would make things easier. ) |
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| Reconaissance and Recovery [Haruichi, Katsuko] |
[Oct. 28th, 2009|06:03 pm] |
Takes place directly after Celestial Navigation.
With Haruichi tracking, it'd taken them a scant half-hour to locate the fortress. By that time the moon had come out, throwing their shadows into sharp relief on the blank white desert. Eerie quiet reigned as they closed in on their destination, with not even the soft whisper of booted feet upon the sand to give their presence away.
Katsuko kept her eyes trained on Haruichi’s back as she ran, trusting the Hyuuga to lead the way. The byakugan and his encyclopedic knowledge of the stars made him more of an expert on this bit than her; all she had to do was focus on providing backup. She skimmed her fingers over the hilt of her mother’s katana, double-wrapped and oiled with balm to protect against the harsh desert winds. The mission brief had said to expect heavy resistance. She’d be ready.
The Intel bastard had been half-right: the bunker was near a cliff, and a godsdamned mountain range. It’d be pushing it to call it the ‘Cliff of Sorrows’, though. Looked more like the ‘Sad Little Half Hill’. The bunker itself almost dwarfed the cliff, its builders having added onto the original design since Konoha had obtained the floor plan. It clung to the side of the mountain like a parasitic mass; obviously, the architects thought that normal geometric designs were for weaklings. The bunker itself was divided into round little ‘pods’, similar to the structure of Sunagakure. Bridges manned by hidden guardsmen connected each ‘pod’ to each other, leaving Katsuko with the impression of a giant insect nest glued to the side of the mountain. Mountain range and attached bunker were located in the deepest part of a desert valley, shielded by genjutsu that had taken all of Katsuko’s and Haruichi’s skill to see through.
Now both Konoha ANBU were crouched behind a stand of boulders on the lip of the valley mouth, looking down on the slumbering bunker below. Katsuko raised an eyebrow at the size of the thing. Rather more than two ANBU could handle.
Good thing she’d brought extra explosive tags. |
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| Celestial Navigation [Haruichi, Katsuko] |
[Oct. 25th, 2009|07:16 pm] |
[Backdated!! Set on March 3rd, not long after Can't Choose Your Family]
Huh.
Well as first days went, this one hadn't been so bad. Katsuko set up her things in her new apartment and laid traps around her soon-to-be permanently opened window. Then she wandered around HQ, learned nothing about its layout, and got hopelessly lost. Somehow, she made it back to her room for a quick catnap that ended up lasting several hours.
And then that message summoning her to a mission debriefing came.
Katsuko sighed and eyed the lone couch in the room. It didn't look nearly long enough to accommodate her lounging frame. Briefly, she considered sprawling out on the floor to continue her nap.
Then the door slammed open and her mission partner stalked in. |
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| The Little Things Give You Away [Ginta, Hiro] |
[Oct. 20th, 2009|10:05 am] |
[Takes place the evening of April 5, the same day as Welcome to My Morning, three days after Just Enough Rope]
By sundown Ginta was awake and really wished he wasn't. He'd woken in his own bed shortly after noon, gotten an update from the nurses -- Kakashi was fine, sleeping, but no longer in a coma -- and crashed back out again. Ryouma was still in there with Kakashi. Keeping an eye on him. Keeping the door closed. And as much as Ginta'd told himself a hundred times in the last few days alone, that he was letting it go...
He couldn't let it go.
Couldn't let go of the way Kakashi had clung to him that morning. Or the way he'd been caught painfully in the middle when Ryouma had returned to the room. Kakashi had wanted proof Ginta was alive--he'd gotten that. And then Kakashi'd wanted proof he himself was alive, and the only one he wanted that proof from was Ryouma.
Grandmother hadn't been by and wasn't expected until tomorrow. Ginta's mother was absent as well, busy with her own life. Now that Ginta was out of danger there was no further need to sit by his bedside. And he was, he told himself, just as glad she was staying away. It was harder to endure an hour of his mother's sighs and glances at her watch and weak attempts at conversation, than it was to sit in silence, reading the film magazine she'd left behind, and try not to notice the closed door across the hall.
( That's what he told himself. ) |
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| All You Can Take [Ryuichi, Katsuko] |
[Oct. 3rd, 2009|06:38 pm] |
Late at night on April 14th, after Knife's Edge and No Rest For the Wicked.
What it all came down to was that Headquarters wasn't stupid. They'd see something wrong with the report, or the hospital charts, and eventually they'd dig a little deeper into Arai Ryuichi's files. What they'd find there was anybody's guess, but Katsuko knew it would more than enough for them to put two and two together and come up with four.
They'd find out Ryuichi had taken illegal drugs, that he'd overdosed on those drugs to complete the mission.
And then they'd realize that Katsuko had deliberately left it out of her report.
Kami, what had she been thinking, enabling a chronic user? Some skewed notion of honor, protecting a teammate who didn't want her help? The most she'd managed to do was buy both of them some time, and it would only ensure that HQ would come down on their asses all the harder for it.
Ryuichi would be unrepentant.
Three agents dead, one partner looking for death, and her caught in the middle of it all.
It pissed her off.
Katsuko wouldn't have been so irritated about it--hell, she'd known what she'd been getting into when she'd given Ryuichi back his bottle of pills, but...she was due for her period in a week. Unlike some lucky bitches who just bled and went on with their lives, she'd inherited from her mother the cramps, headaches, and hair-trigger temper that came before the 'woman's gift'. It made her chafe inside her own skin, want to lash out at whoever and whatever crossed her path. It was a restless feeling burning underneath her breastbone, a sort of exhausted energy that wouldn't let her sleep until she'd worked the need to hurt and hit and fight out of her system.
So that was how she found herself slipping out of bed and down to one of the training grounds by the Forest of Death, where she could punch and kick at trees and unseen enemies to her heart's content. The training ground itself was rarely used by anyone except fellow jounin, and even they wouldn't be crazy enough to come around in the dead of night.
Katsuko shrugged out of her jacket and dropped it carelessly on the ground, heading over to one of the training dummies. She'd beat it until she worked up a sweat or it broke, whichever came first. Then she'd move on to practicing lightning jutsu on the trees. That was always a stress-relieving exercise in futility. |
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| Lost and Found [Genma & Haruichi] |
[Sep. 20th, 2009|09:16 am] |
[Backstory. Takes place the evening of March 14, immediately following Can't Stay Lost Forever and a few hours after Pay It Forward, half a week after Could You Bite The Hand?, and half a week before Walking In Your Footsteps]
It had been a relatively quiet week, which was just as well, Genma thought, seeing as he'd had to spend some portion of it explaining to Arakaki why he'd brawled with Raidou and broken a cop's collarbone. And worrying about Raidou. Healing his face. Listening for nightmares. There'd been that little talk with Tsume earlier in the day, too, and laundry and weapon sharpening and otherwise preparing for his upcoming mission with a rookie he didn't know.
He would have preferred to have Raidou on the mission, but Genma was very low on the list of people allowed to ask for favors from the mission office right now, what with his recent arrest. So he'd just have to go to the mission briefing tomorrow morning, and leave with this Gekkou Hayate kid in the afternoon, and Raidou would be fine. Was already fine. Had bounced back remarkably well, all things considered.
Now Genma just needed to get his gear in order for the mission. His med kit was running a little low on supplies--soldier pills, blood pills, poison antidotes, bandages. He decided to stop by the infirmary now, since late on a Friday afternoon was usually a good time to find them with nothing to do, while Saturday morning they'd be busy with whatever was left over from Friday night.
He made his way to the basement, paused to flirt with the mission desk staff, then turned the corner to find the medical bay empty as predicted. Empty except for one black-haired, hunched-backed figure in a white coat. His back was to the door, but that didn't mean anything to a Hyuuga.
"Yo, Haruichi. S'up? I came by to stock up and..." Genma broke off. Haruichi still hadn't turned around. Three-sixty vision not withstanding, there was something wrong about that.
"Haruichi?" |
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| The Ballad of Shiranui Genma [Yanagi, Genma] |
[Sep. 6th, 2009|07:15 pm] |
[Set mid-February, six weeks after Karma's Bitch, roughly four months after the Fox]
Yanagi had spent the last six weeks composing, re-composing, writing, scrapping, re-writing, and editing one single song. It had varied from punk to metal to a ballad to dirty limericks put to music, only to be tossed out so that he could try putting goth lyrics to a hip hop tune.
In the end, he had something he wasn't at all sure was any good, but it was certainly unexpected, and he'd had a fun six weeks playing with it.
He shifted the guitar on his back, retrieved from his father's house -- which was in one of the few quarters of Konoha that had been remarkably unscathed after the Fox had attacked -- and trotted across the snow that covered ANBU HQ grounds. They must have had a hot spell; it was only ankle-deep, with ice underneath. For mid-February, that wasn't bad.
Yanagi bent, hooking his guitar back before it slid over, and gathered up a handful of snow. He packed it, looking up at the building before him.
Shiranui Genma lived on the third floor, and if the information Yanagi had gotten was correct -- and it was, because Intel kept tabs like this, and he had access to Intel -- then Genma's window was--
There.
He popped chakra into the snow and tossed it upward. It arced against the night sky, brilliant white, skimming into blue, and spattered against the window. White electricity sizzled and crackled across the window. Yanagi ducked instinctively, muffling a snicker, ( and did it again. ) |
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| The Shadow Proves the Sunshine. [Genma and Raidou] |
[Sep. 2nd, 2009|10:13 pm] |
[Takes place in the morning of April 5th, the same day as Welcome to My Morning, three days following After the Rain and Just Enough Rope, and six days after Meet You on the Other Side.]
The day after Genma's second hand surgery and two days after Rina's visit (which he'd had heard about only in reluctant snatches from Genma), things had settled into something like a routine. 0600 brought a snap of florescent light as the first nurse of the day began the morning shift, followed almost immediately by the first cardiac clench of the day as Genma and Raidou twitched awake with their own personal curses.
(Holy Buddha's scrotum, was Genma's contribution today.
Son of a riddled whore, Raidou returned, with equal fervor.
Mornin', said the nurse.)
Then there was the ritual peeing in a cup (which Genma, as always, wanted to make a race), followed by the first blood samples of the day (there was no way to make that a race, but Raidou decided he won on account of not going corpse pale), and finally the systematic checking of IV lines, monitor screens, the black seals on Raidou's bandages, and the glowing blue ones on Genma's cast. Medications were adjusted and given, and Raidou almost missed it when Genma tucked his psych pill under his tongue and pretended to swallow it. He glowered; Genma gave him a narrow-eyed, slightly sulky look in return. The nurse stepped in before anyone decided to punctuate the lowering argument with a thrown bedpan, and made Genma swallow the pill.
( Then they had to rate their pain on a scale of one to ten. ) |
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| Just Enough Rope [Hiro] |
[Sep. 2nd, 2009|12:04 am] |
[Takes place in the early morning of April 2nd, several hours following After the Rain, three days after All We Know is Distance, four days after Meet You on the Other Side, and eight days after Dude, that was YOU?.]
Hiro slipped through the hospital like a wraith, trying not to observe his surroundings or have any impact upon them. He was a container tipped to the brim with precious information, and he couldn't be a person again until he had poured it all out in pages of notes spilling over Kotoe-san's desk.
Raidou had slept through the rest of the debriefing. Hiro wasn't sure Genma would be able to sleep for days.
It was still in the small hours of the morning -- it had only taken that long? -- and the usual ICU hush had escalated into a deathly absence of sound. At this hour the electrical chirping of monitors was muffled behind closed doors; the visitors were mostly slumped, asleep, over uncomfortable hospital armchairs; and the patients seemed to be taking a brief respite between emergencies.
Experimentally, Hiro scuffed a foot on his next step. It echoed.
The sound reverberated in the ache behind his eyes, creating ripples in his carefully-constructed equilibrium -- Genma's experience, painstakingly recreated image by image, moment by moment, carried whole and entire within the confines of his skull -- and he quickly withdrew back into himself.
( An image caught the corner of his eye and held it, jostling his mental load until he had to scramble for security. ) |
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| Almost Not Alone [Genma, Rina] |
[Aug. 29th, 2009|10:40 pm] |
[Takes place on the 3rd of April, one day after After the Rain, five days after Meet You on the Other Side, and about five years after Got That Mountain to Climb.]
It was almost a rule, that Genma always had to screw up all of her hard work whenever she wasn't there to fix it. Turning up the water from 'hot' to 'scorching,' Rina poured another handful of shampoo and tried desperately to scrub all the branches out of her hair.
One week. One week she'd been gone, and this was the kind of thing he got up to. How did he manage it? She'd been looking forward to a nice, relaxing shower ever since she'd crossed back over the border, and instead here she was, frantically scrubbing her skin off along with the grime.
Ducking her head under the spray for the fifth time, she forcefully widened her eyes, not letting them close. When she closed them, all she could see was--
Don't think about it. The note said it wasn't as bad this time.
No sense worrying until she got there, anyway--right, as if thinking that ever helps--and they wouldn't let her into the hospital until she was clean. Dragging her fingers roughly through her hair again, searching for dirt and debris, she ended up with just a handful of pale, gleaming strands.
Finally.
The water ran clear now, instead of red-black with ink and unidentified blood. Rinsing her hair one more time, she shut it off gingerly, using her fingertips so the layer of grime she'd left on the knobs wouldn't transfer back to her hands again.
( Housekeeping could deal with the dirt; she didn't have time. ) |
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| Welcome to My Morning [Ginta, Ryouma, Kakashi] |
[Aug. 29th, 2009|02:08 pm] |
[Takes place late morning on April 5th, almost a week after All We Know is Distance.]
A week in the hospital was enough to drive even the calmest man to extreme measures. Or at least that was Ginta's thinking. When they finally allowed him up from his bed, five days in, he immediately started making boredom contingency plans. Many of them, in fact most of them, involved finagling himself into a wheelchair and over to Kakashi's room with a deck of cards and a couple of cans of apple juice, to help Ryouma keep watch.
Shiratori had debriefed him and sworn that the docs said Kakashi was mending. The nurses and even his own doctor had said the same thing. Ryouma had gotten the same story, evidently. Chakra exhaustion and a soldier pill overdose were serious conditions, but they were known quantities. Kakashi would be in an uncomplicated coma for several days, and then he'd wake up. It had happened before, it would probably happen again. And it was happening now.
Patience, they said. Ironic that patient and patience were such similar words. Even his grandmother could get nothing more from the doctors. And, she'd told Ginta, she believed them. Of course Ginta believed them, too, at an intellectual level. Kakashi's vitals were stable, and his chakra readings were improving daily. Believing didn't make the wait any easier.
( On the seventh day home, the fifth of April, at a little after ten in the morning, Ginta talked his nurse into helping him get set up in the wheelchair again. ) |
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awake
sleepy
confused
angry