Chapter 52

Unfortunately, I escaped one potentially awkward outsider moment and landed in another, running straight into Minato, who appeared to have been dragged in by Jiraiya, who stood against the wall with an uncharacteristic attentiveness and looked as if he had just returned from a mission.

"Um—" I began.

"You're in ANBU," Minato interrupted.

"No," I lied firmly.

Someone had intentionally made sure Ise had the information he needed to figure out my new post. I knew my post in ANBU wasn't a secret in the upper tiers of the village, but to preserve my safety and village security, protocol still had to be followed. Since Kushina was my immediate family and next-of-kin, she had a right to know why I would be disappearing, and in my absence, she took on most of my responsibilities. Fusō would know by extension, since Nagato was a part of ANBU as well, but to anyone else, I was just another Chuunin and Minato should know better than to try to poke his nose into my duties. Compartmentalization was extremely important during wartime, and he knew that.

I could tell that Minato was extremely angry and I had a good idea what he was angry about. Kushina's fists were clenched, but she was obviously upset as well.

"I shouldn't be a part of this—"

"In here, all three of you," Jiraiya ordered and jabbed his thumb at the door he was leaning beside.

I followed them in, tense. Jiraiya shut the door and activated the privacy seals.

"I don't know what got between the two of you, I was gone for less than a week, but this is going to be resolved here and now."

"She's a lying traitor!" Minato snarled, jabbing a finger at Kushina. Jiraiya flinched at that, though I couldn't be sure why. I flinched too, so I didn't say anything.

"I didn't betray anyone!" Kushina shouted back.

"What happened?" Jiraiya demanded.

When both of them started trying to talk over each other, Jiraiya held up a hand until they quieted.

"Kichiro, what started this?"

"I don't know the entire situation."

"What do you know?"

"That assumptions kill."

Jiraiya flinched again and my forehead crinkled as I tried to figure out why he was so easily affected by the conversation. I knew Jiraiya didn't have the most favorable opinion of me, but for him to show anything but perfect control was worrisome at the very least. I was certain that something had knocked Jiraiya off-kilter.

I could have paid more attention as Minato and Kushina explained the disagreement. Instead, I turned over Jiraiya's oddities and tried to make sense of them. I wasn't sure why I was interested, I just was.

My first thought was that he was an imposter, but a silent confirmation of identity and a quick confirmation of his chakra signature was enough to convince me.

My opinion and expectations of Jiraiya were odd, to say the least. From the original story, I remembered him to be an incorrigible pervert, but now, except on a handful of occasions, he kept his comments and actions appropriate for younger company.

I had met Jiraiya for the first time while working as a trainee in the hospital a few months after I arrived in Konoha. He had come back with Tsunade from a mission and had been tagging along after her for hours before I arrived on shift. It had been my fourth day to use actual medical techniques on patients, and due to my age and gender, Tsunade had taken special interest in my training, so she decided to accompany me. I walked in on some kind of argument that was quickly resolved with Jiraiya flying out the window.

Every other week or so, I would spend a day training with Tsunade and saw more of Jiraiya than I wanted to. If it wasn't for the fact that high-level ninja and village officials always found some sort of excuse to visit the hospital and somehow always seemed to run into me, I would have thought something was up.

Even so, I would have had to be an idiot to not notice the political piece I had become. I managed to distance myself from most of it, mainly by excusing myself from the encounters as quickly as possible and avoiding engagements with a handful of excuses, like picking up Kushina from the Academy, training, or studying. Most of them were childish and flimsy excuses but no one pushed the matter far enough for them to fall apart.

I noticed that when Tsunade or Jiraiya were in the hospital, the visits were fewer and further between. I wasn't entirely sure what the message they were trying to send entailed, but in hindsight, I was sure the Hokage was behind it, and it made me feel like claimed property.

Jiraiya played the idiot goofball incredibly well, and if it wasn't for his retorts, which were far quicker and more intelligent than any real idiot, I wouldn't have noticed. Eventually, about a month before the war started, I found myself too sick of the act to let it continue any longer and told him to cut it out. When I confronted him, Tsunade had been in the room, and from her reaction, I was shocked that she had never noticed Jiraiya's acting. Even so, Jiraiya quit the idiot routine when he had no one to act for. While I couldn't pretend to know his act inside and out, his reactions now weren't adding up.

He was showing far more of his true reactions than I had ever seen before, in fact, the amount of expression he was showing was at a dangerous level for a shinobi of his caliber. In ninja terms, that meant he was severely compromised.

As the three of them exploded into an argument, I interrupted firmly. "I hereby authorize protocol seven-seven-five-three-eight on the authority outlined in section seventy-three, subsection eight, of the Konoha ninja code."

The three of them stiffened and looked at me.

"Jiraiya-san, please report to the hospital."

"No!" He screamed, completely losing control.

I jerked backwards as he lunged forward and grabbed the front of my shirt and shoved me against the wall.

"I already lost one team, I refuse to lose the one as well!" He snarled in my face, too quiet for Minato and Kushina to hear. For a brief second, I thought he was going to kill me, but I tamped down that fear when I realized that I wasn't the slightest bit injured by the rough treatment.

Minato and Kushina tried to pull him off, but Jiraiya could probably hold his own against a Kage if pushed to it, even if he couldn't win. Two ten-year old children weren't going to budge him.

"Jiraiya-san, you are emotionally compromised."

"I can still do my job."

"If you were capable of performing your duties, we would not be in this situation right now. Please report to the hospital for an evaluation and treatment. Until then, you are not to take a mission."

I quickly signed for Minato and Kushina to wait outside and after a moment of hesitation, they obeyed, but I could feel them staying directly outside the door before I reactivated the privacy seals and locked the door.

"You have two minutes to tell me what the hell your problem is or I really will have you kicked off the force."

"You can't—"

"Try me. My name has a hell of a lot of weight in the hospital, no matter how long I've been gone."

"I'm not going to talk to a kid about my issues."

"Then report to the hospital, but you are not fit to command a squad."

"You're not any expert."

"Despite my age, I am fully qualified to make that decision. Talk to someone, but until then, you are in no position to try and lead. Talk to me, talk to Tsunade, talk to a stranger, I don't care, but get yourself under control. We are still at war and no one can afford to be emotionally compromised."

"That's rich, coming from you," Jiraiya growled.

"And look where it got me," I retorted seriously.

He couldn't refute that. An outburst of emotion ensured the Kyuubi was sealed inside of me, even though Kushina was an all-around better candidate. That sealed my path, and I only made everything worse every time I lost control of my emotions.

"I'm not going to warn you away, heaven knows you are fully aware of the consequences, but I will not allow you to bring harm to my family, no matter your intentions."

"You have no idea—" He broke off and sat down on the low table in the middle of the room. "You probably knew all along, didn't you?"

"Knew what?"

"About Orochimaru. You knew his experiments were unethical from the very beginning, didn't you?"

"What?"

"Sensei found a lab with a dozen children, eights adults, and four infants locked in cells, Orochimaru was attempting some kind of research in growing back limbs and body parts, Tsunade is still sifting through the material."

"So, this is about Orochimaru."

"You knew what kind of person he was from the beginning; you always seem to know that kind of thing."

"I just assume everyone is an unforgiveable ass until they prove me wrong. For the record, I didn't know what he was doing, I just believed him to be responsible for the Uzumaki child's kidnapping. I had no proof."

"You never told—"

"If I told anyone, I'd be denounced as a liar."

"You could have told me."

"At best, you would have severely injured me for bringing up an accusation of that nature against a teammate. At worst, I would have been court-martialed for slander."

"I wouldn't—"

"It doesn't matter now. Can I bring the kids back in here or are you going to lose you temper at them again because of Orochimaru?"

Jiraiya rubbed his temples. "You're right, I'm not ready to handle this. You know the brats better than I do anyways."

"Hold on—" I protested.

"I want whatever problem they have with each other resolved. They're scheduled to go back out in the field together for an A-rank tomorrow morning."

"They're ten, and Chuunin. They shouldn't be going on an A-rank without a Jōnin at the very least. In fact, Chuunin aren't supposed to be on anything above a B-rank period."

"The two of them could be Tokubetsu Jōnin if I let them take the test, albeit for Fūinjutsu, but the point still stands," he responded. "If they get over whatever has them pissed at each other, they'll be fine. With a bit of preparation, they can defeat any normal Jōnin."

For some reason, the Kyuubi started growling in the back of my mind at that statement. "They wouldn't be fighting a single Jōnin—"

"Konoha has lost over half their Jōnin. The other countries have lost the same, if not more. The chances of them running into an enemy Jōnin team anywhere but the front lines are worse than their chances of catching an enemy Jōnin infiltration team in the Hokage tower."

"There's a reason Konoha only allows Jōnin on solo or duo missions. They're not Jōnin."

"And if they were?"

"They're still ten!"

"You know that no one has a choice in this."

"It doesn't mean I approve. Konoha is supposed to be the place where children don't have to fight, where children can still be children. That's what the Shodai—"

"You speak as if you weren't one."

"No one would allow someone they considered a child to walk into enemy arms like an animal for slaughter. If the governing body of Konoha got its way, I would be dead several times over. Anyone who still considers me a child is an idealistic fool."

"Kichiro—" Jiraiya murmured.

"Look, if you're going to leave, leave, I don't care, but for the time being, you are in no condition to remain a commander. Either way, I'll do as you ask and take our troublesome duo into the backyard to beat some sense into them." I turned on my heel and marched out of the room. I didn't make any effort to avoid startling Minato as I slammed open the door. He immediately reacted with a punch that would have hit an adult in the solar plexus, but nearly caught me in the throat. I only held back my retaliation enough to avoid killing him. I bent to the side, and even as Minato recognized me, I grabbed his wrist and his upper arm, braced my feet and twisted, slamming Minato face-first into the frame of the door. Taken by surprise, Minato took the full force of the strike. I immediately felt guilty, but I still followed through before Minato could recover, jabbing my elbow into his back to give him a horrible cramp that reached from the middle of his back to his fingertips.

He gritted his teeth and tried to retaliate, but I had already twisted the unharmed arm behind his back and started to drag him towards the back of the house. Hearing the commotion, Nagato emerged from his room just as I grabbed the collar of Kushina's shirt and started dragging her along with me. I jerked my head for Nagato to follow.

The boy hurried ahead of us and stopped at a training post with a seal etched into it. When we were close enough, Nagato activated it and a solid blue barrier enveloped the four of us and coated the ground. There were at least five other barrier seals that most likely were to create different conditions, but I wasn't curious enough to see what they did. I stuffed my hand into my pocket and fished out the small roll of bandages I kept in my pocket, just in case I was without my medic pouch. I tore off a section about six inches long and loosely tied it to my belt.

"I could try and talk and reason with the both of you all day, hell, the Hokage could order the two of you to get along and nothing would come of it. I don't give a damn who was right and who was wrong, but this is going to be solved now. Whoever gets this from me gets to resolve this—disagreement, to put it mildly, on their terms."

Both of them gained rather bloodthirsty expressions at my terms.

"Since you obviously care about fairness, it will be Nagato and I against the both of you. We are unarmed you are not. Begin."

Minato and Kushina glanced at each other. I barely had a second to face palm before Kushina took advantage of the bruise forming over Minato's eyes, kicked his legs out from under him, and launched herself towards me. Nagato intercepted her, distracting her just long enough for me to shift positions. Minato lunged towards me, but as he tried to compensate for my change in position, he collided with Kushina, their heads knocking together. I barely managed to pull Nagato out from between them in time. Very quickly, I realized that both of them could beat me in straight Taijutsu. The only thing that kept me out of their grasp was the fact that they fought each other as much as they fought me, and Nagato was an extremely effective distraction and just enough of a threat to them both that their attention was split three ways and it was ridiculously easy to manipulate the attacks meant for me into hitting each other.

I wasn't exactly mad at them until Nagato accidentally trapped himself between the two of them. I barely managed to trade places with him with a desperate Kawarimi and knock the attacks apart and down so their kunai didn't stab me in the front and back, but instead caused a significant damage to each other. Minato's kunai cut deeply into Kushina's side, between her bottom two ribs. Kushina's kunai landed in Minato's ilium. They both released their weapons and stumbled backwards, holding their respective wounds. So far, the fight had only been weapons and Taijutsu. If they worked together, I knew they could beat Nagato and I without a problem. I was only holding back potentially lethal attacks and Nagato held nothing back.

I knew Jiraiya had given them the bell test after they graduated the Academy. "You're both pathetic, weak, and stupid," I snarled at them as Nagato took up his stance beside me. It was a bit harsh, but they should have seen through the objective I gave them within seconds, yet they still looked at me as if they expected me to heal their injuries. I did give them the chance to realize I wasn't planning on it before I turned the fight into a Ninjutsu battle. Nagato caught on faster than I expected and created an uncountable number of Bunshin while I sped through unnecessary hand seals, launching a horizontal blade of wind in their direction. The Bunshin raced after the blade to catch them when they dodged. They wouldn't cause any damage if they managed to lad a hit, but Nagato was in the horde somewhere and they couldn't just disregard the Bunshin when there was no way to tell them apart from the real Nagato in the chaos.

Minato and Kushina leapt over the blade of wind and threw several dozen kunai into the charging horde.

I noted the Genjutsu Nagato applied. A kunai appeared to pass through his real self even as he caught it and threw it back at Minato.

The Genjutsu and the horde vanished as Nagato growled out his next jutsu. "Shuriken Kage Bunshin no Jutsu!" He did not learn that one from me. I didn't want to know where he learned such a high-level jutsu.

Nagato stumbled back towards me, the jutsu taking more chakra than he intended. I didn't let him attack alone. I sped the flight of the kunai with a gust of wind. They managed to avoid anything worse than shallow scratches. They tried to counter as I followed up with a barrage of wind Ninjutsu, but there was no way they would be able to keep up, not when both of them were still constrained by hand seals.

"Nii-san, I need water!" Nagato insisted.

I paused in my barrage to direct a giant bullet of water into the ground beneath me. It wasn't pleasant for Nagato to somehow take control of the water before I completed the jutsu. I shook it off as Nagato shot a widespread spray of water. When I added my wind Ninjutsu to it, the ice froze and shot towards the two in a barrage of icy senbon. I pulled back the wind Ninjutsu a moment before Minato and Kushina found themselves riddled with holes. Instead they were pelted with the equivalent of giant raindrops, soaking them.

The four of us stood there in shock for a long moment. "Well, ice is supposed to be a bloodline, but that works just as well," I commented. "Let's save that for when we really need to kill someone," I suggested quietly to Nagato.

The boy nodded quickly. Minato and Kushina were stunned at how close they had come to getting killed in a simple spar.

While Nagato still needed hand seals to focus his chakra and control the general direction of his jutsu, he had already gained more control of the actual shape of the jutsu and it deviated from the wild rush of water it was several days before. Either it was because he was a genius, or the Rinnegan was indirectly helping him. I wasn't sure, but it worked, though I should probably make sure Nagato had a lot more practice applying it than a single spar.

I made note of a lot of things Nagato needed to work on.

Both Minato and Kushina were going to wake up sore in the morning. Kushina fell to her knees.

"I yield. I can't do this," Kushina choked, pressing her hand against her side.

I stared at Minato. He had done a good job deflecting my merciless barrage of Ninjutsu, but it took more chakra than he wanted to admit. He charged forward, brandishing two kunai. I signed for Nagato to stay out of the fight. I started out with a rush of senbon, which Minato deflected and kept charging. In straight Taijutsu, I couldn't win, but with close-range Ninjutsu on my side, he was the one struggling. I was ruthless once his initial attack failed and forced him onto the defensive. While Minato was able to overcome the problems of his size in Taijutsu, and he had passable skill in Genjutsu, but he couldn't overcome the fact that the chakra reserves of a non-Uzumaki child could only grow so much.

Minato had the reserves of a mid-level Chuunin, which was impressive, but it would be several years before his reserves would be anywhere near Jōnin level. Kushina had better genetics in that department, putting her on equal footing, nearly giving her the upper hand, even though she was a half-year younger than Minato and a girl. The way I repeatedly flooded my body with Kyuubi chakra stretched my Chakra coils to the point where they would nearly rupture and the Kyuubi would heal them, provided a massive boost to how much chakra my body could hold, which boosted how much chakra my body produced etcetera. My reserves and control were ridiculous even if my application was severely lacking in proportion.

Unlike the handful of times I sparred with him before, I didn't hold back my more brutal assaults, mostly because nothing connected. While Minato managed to deal out almost a dozen debilitating strikes, I recovered in seconds or shrugged it off as if it never happened. It only took one solid hit to his ribs to take him down. Minato sprawled out onto his back, struggling to draw in air. He tried to grab the kunai that had fallen beside him, but I kicked it away.

"You're done, Minato." I pulled the strip of bandage off my belt. "I know Jiraiya gave you the bell test when you graduated from the Academy. This is absolutely pathetic." I looked at Kushina. "An Uzumaki ought to be much better than that." My gaze shifted to Minato. "And you call yourself a Chuunin of Konoha," I scoffed, continuing to look between them. "Have you learned nothing in your three years of being shinobi? When both of you charged me, did you even have a plan or did you just want to beat the snot out of me and each other?"

Neither of them met my gaze.

"The two of you spent nearly five years practically inseparable, but now you're stabbing each other over a technicality. Kushina, you knew he didn't understand your situation or why you made the choices you did. Minato, you felt betrayed and never stopped to think there might be more going on behind the scenes."

Both of them burned with shame. Nagato slid into my shadow and I clenched my fists.

"You're disgusting. If that is how you're going to treat the people closest to you, I want nothing to do with either of you." I threw down the strip of bandage and marched away from them. I barely made it to the door and slam it shut before the tears started to fall. I clamped my hands over my mouth to hold back a sob.

Nagato hugged me around the middle. "I'm sorry, Nii-san."

"There's nothing you can do about it, Nagato," I murmured back and laid my head on his, hugging him back tightly. "They'll come around soon, right? They'll be friends again and things can go back to normal, right?"

"Are you tired, Nii-san?"

I nodded. I was utterly drained emotionally. It was completely unfair that I was clinging to Nagato for emotional support. He was six, and mentally, I was supposed to be over thirty. I knew it made him feel better to be doing something helpful, but a little voice in the back of my head kept nagging that he shouldn't have to. Konoha was supposed to be a place that protected children. Konoha wasn't supposed to be a place where children felt they had to be a part of the quid pro quo system.