Mana simply could not sleep. One couldn’t have really blamed her “ she was quickly brought to her room while the ninja carrying her decided to explain the situation to her parents. The girl’s father used to be an average ranked ninja, despite his unimpressive rank and career cut short by an injury he was still very respected even among higher ranking ninja. He may not have been that powerful or amazing during his time but he worked with plenty impressive ninja like Tanshu and some jounin, he also displayed great potential to become a good leader in the future. It was sad that said future remained a speculation after his arms got burnt badly.
The little magician still shook in her bed. She couldn’t believe what had happened, such was usually the case when events simply broke out of one’s control. She genuinely intended to talk Sugemi down, then Shimo decided that beating him would’ve been much simpler… Everything that could have gone wrong did go wrong after that. Mana could still hear voices below, her parents kept asking questions and the ninja replied to the best of her abilities. A middle aged jounin woman carried Mana home, one she had never seen before that night. Judging from a rather tough tone of her fathers she and father shared no history also, but the respectful and soft tone of the woman revealed that she did indeed respect him enough to use such a manner of speaking.
The strange thing was that Mana didn’t even know what was going on, nor did she wish to. Honestly it’d have been much better if the jounin lady just explained everything and left, explained enough that the young girl didn’t have to explain the events to her parents. What was even worse was the possibility that Mana would have her status as a ninja stripped from her. Such events weren’t that common, that happened when a ninja committed treason or dishonored their Feudal Lord so badly that they requested the ninja’s status being stripped. Treason also had numerous degrees: one may have left the village and become a rogue, the status of a wandering samurai or a ronin was romanticized often in folk tales but wandering ninja were usually frowned upon and hunted down. A ninja with no village to swear allegiance to was basically open season to have things done to them according to the hunter’s sick desires. There was only one limit to what couldn’t have been done to such an individual and that limit was the imagination of their attacker.
Slowly Mana’s eyes became heavier, the pain in her thighs was easing up a bit, most likely the result of her sleepiness with the body doing what it could to neutralize all obstacles in the way of her rest. The girl found herself having snoozed off for entire half an hour at a time as she peeked at the alarm clock on her table every time she woke up from such an occasion. After one such event the ninja magician realized that there was no one below talking anymore. Slowly and carefully so that her aching thighs weren’t lit up with excruciating pain again the girl sat up and took her clothes off, trying to settle down for her rest. Only then did she remember that she had a mission tomorrow… Well, after this night that no longer mattered did it?
*****
Sugemi’s heavy head shot up as he found himself locked to a chair, the boy tried to build up his chakra trying to augment his strength and see if he could break out of the bindings. After all, if Mana could do it on the stage every other day it couldn’t have been too hard, right? After several unsuccessful attempts to channel his chakra Sugemi found multiple stickers with strange hieroglyphs symbolizing seals on his body. These were applied to unconscious or submissive prisoners to take away their ability to use chakra as long as the seals were intact. It would’ve been a very handy tool if anyone could just slap a sticker and take one’s chakra mastery away, however these seals started working when one’s chakra was dormant beneath a very hard line to sink to. Usually it took a lot of beating to reduce one’s chakra to that level, either that or conscious effort of the restrained person to not raise their chakra above it. For assassins like your average ninja either way worked…
A man entered the room, it was not the jounin with the overcoat and silly hat and the cigarette that Sugemi could vaguely remember from before. After Mana took both him and Shimo down the boy could remember his mind fading in and out, he saw plenty of people but trying to recall those events hurt his head. Just how on Earth could this have happened? Mana took both of them out as well as all the guards in a circle around her. The Nara had underestimated that girl, everyone seemingly did. They mistook her peaceful nature for weakness when, truth be told, it must’ve been one of her greatest strengths. She had absolutely no regard for her own life, no desire to be happy whatsoever, all that mattered to her was that everyone else was happy. Such a person either died very young or became a hero, then again, neither was a very attractive path. A hero was just one step away from being a martyr.
The man was really creeping Sugemi out, he was tall but incredibly slim, had wild black hair that flowed freely all over his face, he had those blank blue eyes with no actual visible pupils inside of them. Such a weird and scary guy… The creep just settled down on a chair in front of Sugemi and with tremendous effort raised his shoes on the edge of the chair wrapping his arms around his bent legs. Very creepily the man kept staring at Sugemi from above his bent knees. Almost as if he was peeking from a cover. The door then slammed open and a woman walked in “ the very same woman that the three saw in the Administration building earlier.
The lady now looked a bit different, she still had that wild flowing brown hair, she still kept her height and build but now she wore a white coat, similar to that a Hokage wore. The only accessory missing from where Sugemi would’ve started making suggestions was the big red and white hat. “It’s okay, M” the woman said looking at the creep sitting in front of Sugemi, “No need to do your thing, you’re gonna stare a hole in him if you keep going. I can tell when a person is lying to me without your Yamanaka clan techniques, thank you” the woman gently placed her hand on the creep’s shoulder making the man jump up in surprise.
The door opened again and another ninja peeked in, “Lady Hokage, could you please not touch M-san, he is very sensitive to social interaction and he once had a stroke when a girl touched him accidentally during an Academy student group tour in the interrogation facility. M-san, Lady Hokage does not require your expertise, please come with us… Ummm… Cookies and milk are in order, I believe.” It appeared that the prospect of cookies and milk greatly motivated the creep, at least if by greatly motivated one meant him moving like a sloth to the door and leaving so slowly that Sugemi would never rid the feeling that he was still watching the man leave. His long fingers wrapped around the door and didn’t disappear before it would’ve been dangerous for him to keep his hand on the closing door.
The woman sighed and slapped her forehead as she sat down. “First day as Hokage and I have to deal with this…” she moaned out in annoyance. It was clear that this was not a woman who concealed her emotions much.
Sugemi coughed out. “Wait… Hokage?” he asked to which the woman just nodded, stroking over her madly flowing long hair and pointed at herself using her thumb. “That’s right, my name is Hanasaku Senju though I don’t like using my clan name too much, people just call me…”
“Cut the crap! I know how they call you “ Chestnut Hanasaku, you’re a Sannin, everyone knows that even non-ninja.” Sugemi was yelling out quite rudely and even louder than he was rude. The weight of the person in the room sitting in front must’ve not sank into his brain just yet. The woman stared into his eyes and the Nara kept on staring back, usually the eyes of a ninja would’ve broken down and sunk to the floor when meeting the gaze of a Hokage. Sugemi was either one with tremendous willpower or just as stupid as the lady in front of him was known to be.
“So they didn’t even take an entire day to replace the Fourth, did they?” Sugemi grunted out angrily. He was still very much offended by everything that happened recently: death of the Hokage, death of his sensei, his own teammates trying to get in his way and him failing to take revenge on a man he pinned everything on without any reason to because a girl in his team kicked his butt with a simple genjutsu technique.
“Well they really would’ve let it sink in before appointing another Hokage, then there’d have been an inauguration ceremony, obviously enough, they wouldn’t even have appointed a woman known for her tendencies to strategize in a battle by charging at everyone and looking like a pin-cushion after the battle. Sadly, time for formalities is a luxury we do not have. I have to read books with fancy words to improve my vocabulary, I have to review candidacies for my pick at Konohagakure’s appointed representative in Kirigakure relationships since the Mizukage was removed and the Great Villages now own its autonomy. Up until today I didn’t even know what “autonomy” meant.”
The woman’s body stood up and moved to Sugemi’s in an instant, a gentle finger tap sent the boy’s body through the room painfully bumping into the stone wall, the chair slid all the way to the other end of the room and it didn’t appear that the woman even used that much effort to fling Sugemi around. She must’ve known that the boy couldn’t mold chakra, he couldn’t toughen his body up, he couldn’t survive being crashed through stone walls anymore so she restrained herself to an extent that would’ve been impossible to restrain one’s abilities to. It was not the amount of power the woman had that impressed the Nara clansman, it was the amount of restraint she could issue to that immeasurable strength. It didn’t even appear she used any chakra at all, it was just her finger that pushed Sugemi’s chair to the other end of the room.
“So you might see why I’d have no time to deal with little shits like you!” the woman roared out loud, this certainly was not the Fourth’s manner of speech. Usually the Fourth spoke politely and never lost balance even when talking to his opponent. It would’ve taken a mass murderer to annoy that man and send him to a frenzy as fierce as this woman’s, this lady just looked like she was ready to smash the restaurant that served her a soup with a hair in it.
“They don’t care… They don’t care about Fourth, they don’t care about Tanshu-sensei, they don’t care about you or me. They don’t even want revenge, they just want more ASSETS. Three most powerful ninja in our village die in one day and the council only cares to establish people who could leak resources and intelligence from another village. I heard Mana speak of how little life was worth in this world but… Only now do I understand what she knew all along, she wants to change this world, she puts the weight onto her shoulders to change all of THIS? She’s insane. Only now do I understand what Tanshu-sensei meant when he spoke to her. Only now do I understand how stupid she really was…”
“And yet…” Hanasaku rolled back her gigantic sleeves and wrapped her arms around her chest. “You talk of her when you’re being interrogated, she stopped you and your comrade from killing each other for no reason. Perhaps this girl you speak of is closer to realizing her goal than you imagine, perhaps she was not as stupid as you and Bro think her to be.”
Sugemi laughed out, “Only an idiot strives to change the world, only a sadomasochist wishes to understand, let alone start changing this piece of shit of a world we live in. I once wanted having my story serialized in a manga, I wanted that people appreciated my existence, I wanted to be known, I wanted to know that life mattered and that I was born for a reason. Maybe it was because in the end I knew just what kind of world I lived in, just like Mana, I wanted to prove it to be different. Unlike Mana however I seem to have grown out of such foolish dreams.”
Hanasaku slowly walked up to Sugemi, the boy uncomfortably shook in his chair as she leaned up to him. Her strange hazelnut perfume reached his nose, her long wild hair touched his thighs as she leaned down to his eye level.
“And what is your dream now? Letting a Kirigakure Demon out of Police Force custody? Getting imprisoned yourself? Sounds like a sadomasochistic goal to me” the woman almost whispered out. Just Sugemi and her knew what she said, no gear, no sound transferring seals placed in the room could’ve transmitted that.
Sugemi jumped up trying to free his wrists. “What are you talking about? I wanted to kill him! I wanted to kill that Kirigakure scum, we are allies, they are the enemy, it’s as easy as that. Fools like Mana keep wrapping everyone’s head around with stupid confusions, they keep shifting blame around until it becomes no one’s. I just have the guts to admit the truth. An enemy cannot stay silent until their enemy is destroyed, for that reason until the enemy disappears we will never know peace.”
Hanasaku walked back to the center of the room and sat on the table crossing her legs. “Well spoken, you speak the words of Namikaze Shirona “ the woman responsible for Howoku’s and Bro’s death as if you’ve heard them.” The woman’s retort utterly crushed Sugemi, his head weighed down and his eyes almost whited out like back then when he was knocked out. The utter shock that he may have been adopting the position of the person he wanted to kill the most of all was incinerating the boy’s sanity.
“Yours is a toxic way of life, sadly, toxic people seem to be the majority these days, to be smart is to be like you. For that reason people choose to remain stupid and be happy, or at least make someone else happy. This Mana girl you spoke of, she is a person I could hang around with, a fool who dismisses their own happiness to make others happy is my kind of fool. Can you not realize that if everyone was like her the world would be a perfect place to live: everyone caring about others solely but remaining happy because there is someone close to them who only tends to their happiness. I’d much rather stick to this ideal than kill all I deem my enemy, that being said I don’t possess the amount of patience for that belief.”
Hanasaku turned around and stepped to the door when she was stopped by Sugemi’s grunt. “Wait? You said “Let operative out”, didn’t you? We didn’t let him out, we knocked him out.” The boy spoke with a relative tone of surprise and sadness, the woman turned around with an expression of strictness and anger. “Well too bad, it seems you haven’t been smart enough to realize you two were being played “ the Demon slipped out during the ruckus, we don’t know where he is now, it is highly likely that he escaped the village as his chakra level was low enough to not trigger any seals and since he was already captured he wasn’t really wanted. By throwing it all away to kill him you set him free, well done “avenger”.”
Sugemi yelled out loud like a madman as the heavy steel door closed. He didn’t care if he was imprisoned or even executed. It usually took an extreme case of treason for a ninja to be executed so even his maddened mind didn’t think it possible, either way his life had little attraction at that moment. He had become his own worst enemy and secretly a part of Sugemi wished himself death. A bunch of jounin surrounded the Lady Hokage leaving the room, she shook her head angrily and stopped them from entering.
“His mind is in shatters. We can’t have that kind of madman running around on missions armed to the teeth, yet he’s still young, feels wrong to have him in the Correctional Facility at this age, he is weak and confused, if we expose him to criminals like that we’ll just doom his mind for good. Send him to one of the remote facilities and lock him up there in solitude, let him hang around alone and think about all of this for a couple of years, observe him and report on his condition yearly.” The men seemed to obey the Hokage’s orders without hesitation, they didn’t care of the woman’s reputation up to that moment. She took this responsibility seriously, her love and adoration to the men she had lost, her desire to continue and honor their legacy made her a serviceable leader at the very least.
A jounin appeared close by, the one who lead that charge previously, still smoking, even in a closed in place like the Police Force interrogation room. “I spoke to that Shimo guy, he seems a pretty decent lad, he just feels compelled to beat up any bad guy he sees and in his eye his friend looked pretty bad at that moment.” The jounin spat out his smoke to the side and quickly lit up another, an annoyed Police Force officer picked it up and tossed it to the bin. He was impressed by the speed at which cigarettes were swapped and lit up, however.
“Doesn’t matter, he cost us a valuable prisoner, he is temporarily relieved from duty. I’ll review his case yearly and see if he can have his ninja status back but for now I’m tempted to throw him into a remote correctional facility as well” the tired Hokage scratched her worn out eyes as she grunted the words out. After finishing she yawned, it was tough break “ she woke up that day somewhere in Fire Country with her students still a Sannin, now she was a full blown Hokage with so much to do on her hands, her life basically flipped over all on one day.
“You won’t have to, this Shimo boy said he’ll be leaving the village to think about what happened anyways, wander around until he’s got his status back, he already knew you’d strip him of it. And what of this “Mana” girl?” the jounin asked.
“Well I’ve heard some interesting things about her, initially I wanted to strip her of her ninja status too, after all with her career as a magician she doesn’t need it. Also magic is a poor tool for a ninja, ninja must use ninjutsu…”
“Lady Hokage, you do realize that’s not REAL magic she’s using, just stage tricks, right?” the jounin stressed out as he even took off his tight hat from the headache that the woman summoned in him.
“Well… I suppose in that case… I’d like to meet her, I’ll tell her my decision personally then. Let’s see that Shimo boy first though.” Hanasaku decided as she turned around and started walking towards the exit. The jounin with the nasty smoking habit followed her, obviously his Hokage did not know where the girl lived or where Shimo was placed in, the woman was infamous for often forgetting where she herself lived after all. Despite Chestnut Hanasaku, no, the Fifth, displaying extraordinary leadership and wisdom on rare occasions when it counted, she was a total twit most of the time who couldn’t have been trusted wandering around the village by herself.
*****
A rough hand shook Mana’s body from its sleep, it was father and while his manner of waking the little genin up was rude his face suggested that it wasn’t intentional. After the injury he oftentimes had trouble of properly restraining and controlling his muscles. “Honey, the Hokage wants to see you, please get up” he whispered making Mana jump up in shock, almost instantly snapping her out from her slumber. The Hokage? What did he mean? Swiftly the girl stumbled to her drawer and pulled out her night gown and slipped into it. She managed to do it just in time as the woman in the white Hokage coat entered her room and sat right by the girl’s bed.
Mana tried to kneel but the pain in her thigh made her drop on the ground like an idiot. The brown haired woman broke into uncontrollable laughter but then she restrained herself. “I’m sorry, I’ve heard a bit of your injury but I suppose slapstick appeals to the fools. I am Chestnut Hanasaku, the Fifth Hokage, pleased to meet you, Mana! Please don’t bother with the kneeling, just settle down into your bed and sleep that nasty injury off.” the woman looked really concerned for Mana’s well-being. The girl sat back onto her bed looking pretty confused.
“It took great courage to do what you did, initially reading the report I was pretty stumped as to why you did what you did so late and why you didn’t start fighting with your comrade from the get-go. All sorts of thoughts ran through my head, then I heard it from your father and Sugemi about what kind of girl you are and I understood. No. I perfectly understood your actions, it takes real heroism to oppose your friends like that, especially when the idea of your friends fighting each other crushes you completely inside, to move past that devastating inner defeat and settle it all saving both of your friends’ lives like that… I think you’ll want to know what my decision was…”
The woman didn’t give Mana any chance to respond or recover from her confusion, this was the first time that the magician even saw this Fifth Hokage person, except that time in the Administration. There was no official declaration, no inauguration ceremony or a celebration, she was just appointed out of the blue and took over like that. Then she spoke as if she knew Mana, talking about how she knew just how difficult it was to hurt one’s friends when one didn’t even hurt their enemies all that much… Even if the woman went out of her way to confirm her knowledge of Mana’s feelings somehow the girl wondered if the woman actually understood.
“I decided to imprison your friend Sugemi at a remote Fire Country facility, he’ll be locked up with only the lake island he’ll be in being accessible to think about what happened. I have little mercy for those who hurt their friends like he hurt you, both physically and internally. Your friend Shimo decided to leave the village on a journey of self-discovery himself, after talking to him and hearing about his dream of being the Hokage I sort of went back on my decision to strip his ninja status but he decided on it himself. I took his status away until he returns a new man from his wandering. As for you…” the woman stopped talking and sighed. Mana’s little heart was pounding inside, with a single word this woman could’ve ruined the young magician’s life beyond salvation.
*****
Sun finally rose in the horizon, the guards stood awaiting the arrival of the famous around the entire world Guru Ayushi. Instead of the figure of the monk arriving from outside the gate, a figure of the young girl arrived from inside of it. She wore a peculiar magician’s uniform with a fancy hat to top it off. It didn’t look like she was ready to leave as she carried no supplies with her, she did have a weapon pouch on her leg however. The guards knew this girl “ there was hardly a person in the village who hasn’t heard of Nakotsumi Mana, Konoha’s Sorceress, the little stage magician at least once.
The guards kept staring at the girl as she slowly stumbled to the gate, it was clear she had trouble walking straight as it appeared like each step made her bite her lip and breathe erratically but she didn’t use any aid walking. Perhaps her condition improved over the days she was seen using walking aid…
“Isn’t it a bit too early for your shows? Hanging posters for the new ones?” a guard asked politely. The girl turned at him and forced a genuine smile as her head was shaken playfully and as cute as a child breaking into teen years can.
“No. I’m waiting for my mission “ my team was assigned to protect Guru Ayushi, there’s no Team Oak anymore but the mission objective still stands.”
“Oh…” the guard uttered with a certain shade of admiration for the girl’s devotion to her job slightly. He had heard of the event last night, he wondered about the Guru’s protection squad. Apparently having hardly any sleep last night didn’t bother this girl too much, nor did her injured legs. “Well then, little lady, we won’t get in your way. Make us proud!” the guards smiled as they relaxed and kept staring at the forest clearing outside waiting for Guru Ayushi’s frame to finally appear.
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